South America - A General History And Collection Of Voyages And Travels - Volume 7 - By Robert Kerr
 -  They use
no pumps, being so well daubed with pitch as effectually to exclude the
water. This pitch they have - Page 241
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They Use No Pumps, Being So Well Daubed With Pitch As Effectually To Exclude The Water.

This pitch they have from a great plain near the city of _Heit_ on the Euphrates, two days journey from Babylon.

This plain full of pitch is marvellous to behold, and a thing almost incredible, as from a hole in the earth the pitch is continually thrown into the air with a constant great smoke; and being hot it falls as it were sprinkled all over the plain, in such abundance that the plain is always full of pitch[123]. The Moors and Arabs of the neighbourhood allege that this hole is the mouth of Hell; and in truth it is a very memorable object From this native pitch or bitumen the whole people of that country derive great benefit, as with it they pay or serve their barks, which they call _Daneck_ and _Saffin_.

[Footnote 122: In imitation of the original translator Hickocke and Hakluyt, this word must be left untranslated and unexplained. - E.]

[Footnote 123: This account of the hole which discharges pitch or native bitumen mixed with water is most true; the water and pitch running into the valley _or island_, where the pitch remains, and the water runs into the Euphrates, when it occasions the water for a long way to have a brackish taste with the smell of pitch and brimstone. - Hakl.]

When the river Tigris is well replenished with water, the passage from Babylon or Bagdat to Basora may be made in eight or nine days, less or more according to circumstances; we were fourteen or fifteen days, because the water was low, and when the waters are at the lowest it requires eighteen days.

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