ble. The reasons are given in detail bj- Celsius (Ifie- robot. i, 393). (1.) The name is supposed to be derived from "pS,/)aZ;a', "to sjMt," or "to burst,'" from the exploding of the fruit, and scattering the seeds on be- ing touched ; and this is tlie characteristic of the spe- cies called the wild cucumber by the ancients. (2.) The form of the fruit appears to have been ovoid, as the name is essentially the same with that of the "knops," or W^Vp^, pekain/ , of 1 Kings vi, 18; vii, 24, rendered "eggs" in the Chaldaic version of Jona- than, to whom tlie form of tlie fruit could not have been unknown. (3.) The seeds of iha pukkuoth, more- over, yielded oil, as appears from the tract Shubbath (ii, § 2). The seeds of the different gourd and cucum- ber-like plants are w ell known to yield oil, which was employed by the ancients, and still is in the East, both as medicine and in the arts. (4.) The bitterness which was probabh' perceived on eating of the pot- tage, and which disappeared on the addition of meal, is found in man}- of the cucumber tribe, and conspic- uously in the species which have usually been select- ed as the pakkuoth, that is, the Coloeynth (Cucumis Co- locgnthii), the Squirting Cucumber {Afomordica elate- 7'ium'), and Cucumis projjkctarian ; all of whicii are found in Syria, as related by various travellers. The first, or Coloquintida, is essentially a desert j.lant. Kitto says : " In tlie desert parts of Syria, Egypt, and Arabia, and on tiie banks of the rivers Tigris and Eu- phrates, its tendrils run over vast tracts of ground, offering a prodigJous number of gourds, which are crushed under foot by camels, horses, and men. In winter we have seen the extent of many miles covered with the connecting tendrils and dry gourds of the preceding season, the latter exhibiting precisely the same appearance as in our shops, and when cruslicd, with a crackling noise, beneatli the feet, discharging, in the form of a light powder, the valuable drug which it contains"' (^Plct. Bible, note ad loc). In the Arabic version, hunzal (which is the Coloeynth) is used as the synonyme iox ixikkuoth in 2 Kings iv, 39. The third, or Globe Cucumber, "derives its specific name (Cucumis pro- pkefarum) from the notion that it aft'orded the gourd which 'the sons of the prophets' shred b}' mistake into their pottage, and which made them declare, when they came to taste it, that there was ' death in the pot.' This pbint is smaller in every part than the common melon, and has a nauseous odor, while its fruit is to the full as bitter as the Coloquintida. The fruit has a ratlier singular appearance, from the manner in which its surface is armed with prickles, which are, however, soft and harmless" (Kit- to, Pict. Palestine ; Physical Geog. p. cclxxxix). But this plant, the fruit not being bigger than a cherry, docs not appear likely to have been that which was shred into the pot. Celsius, however, is of opinion tliat the second of the above-named species, the Cucumis agrestis of the ancients, and which was found by Belon in descending from Mount Sinai, was the plant, being the Cucumis asininus of the druggists. Tliis plant is a well-known drastic purgative, violent enough in its action to be con- sidered even a poison. Its fruit is ovate, obtuse, and scabrous, and likely to have been the plant mistaken for oroth, as it might certainly be mistaken for young gherkins. — Kitto, s. v. The wild cucumber bursts at the touch of the finger, and scatters its seeds, which the coloeynth does not (Rosenmiiller, Alterihumsk. iv, pt. i, etc.). The etymology of the word from "|^3 has been thought to favor the identification cf the
GOUSSET
954
GOVERNMENT
ColocyntU (CitinVMs Co!ocynthns\ with Fruit and Section of the latter.
plant with the EchaUiun elaterium, or "squirting cu- cumber,"' so called from the elasticity with which the fruit, when ripe, opens and scatters tiie seeds when touched. This is the (iyniog eriKvoQ of Dioscorides (iv, 152) and Theophrastus (vii, G, § 4, etc.), and the Cucu- mis sylvestris of Plinj' {Hist. Nat. xx, 2). Celsius (//t- erob. i, 393), KosenmuUer (Bib. Bot. p. 128), and Gc- senius (Thes. p. 1122) are in favor of this exjilanation, and, it must be confessed, not without some reason. The old versions, however, understand the culocynth, the fruit of which is about the size of an orange. The drastic medicine in such general use is a preparation from this plant. Michaelis {Suppl. Lex. Ueb. p. 344) and Oedmann {\'erni. Samml. iv, 88) adopt this expla- nation.— Smith, s. v.
Gousset, Jacques (Lat. Gusscthis), a French Prot- estant theologian, and distinguished Hebrew scholar, was born at Blois Oct. 7, 1635. He studied thcologj' at Saumur, and acquired Greek under Lefevre, and Hebrew under Louis Cappel. Having become pastor of the church at Poitiers in 1002, he remained in that ofHce until the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, re- fusing on three several occasions the professorship of thoolog}'^ at Saumur. In 1G85 he went to England, and soon after to Holland, where he became pastor of the Walloon church of Dort in 1087. In 1092 he went to the University of Groningen as professor of (hx'ck and of theology, and remained there until his death, Nov. 4, 1704. Gousset advocated a very different sys- tem of Hebrew grammar from the one generally fol- lowed in Holland. AVhile the Dutch scholars consid- ered, like Erpenius, a knowledge of Arab and Syriac as of the utmost importance for the correct under- standing of Hebrew, Gousset held that error mast in- evitalily result from attempts to find out tlie meaning of words and tlio grammatical construction of sen- tences in Hebrew 1>y comparing it with the other Sbemitic dialects which arc but derivatives from it, and have often undergone changes to which the orig- inal language remains a stranger. He considered the old versions and the writings of the Rabbins as of lit- tle use in the interj)retation of the O. T. Schultens, who, at the age of eighteen, had a public discussion witli Gousset on that subject, refutes his views in his Origines Ihbnccc and Vctus ct rcgia via hchraizandi. Gousset wrote largely. We name, out of liis numerous works, the following : Examen des endroilx de I'accom- plissement des prophelies de Jf. Jurieu qui concernent la svppntiition des temps (Anon. 1087, 12mo) : — Jcsu Christi Eranr/e/iique Veritns salutifefii dcmonstiatri in conf'iilii- tione lihri Chizzuk Emonna (Amst. 1712, 4to) : — Consi-