A spring of water is in itself so important to a primitive people that it is not to be wondered at that water is called the Gift of God, and that a living spring is looked at as in a sense divine, and that it has even been worshiped as a god among primitive peoples.[82] When, therefore, salt, as the synonym of life or of blood, is found in a spring of living water, it is natural to recognize the spot as peculiarly favored of God, or of the gods. Thus "among inland peoples a salt spring was regarded as a special gift of the gods. The Chaonians in Epirus had one which flowed into a stream where there were [as in the Dead Sea] no fish; and the legend was that Heracles had allowed their forefathers to have salt instead of fish (_Aristotle_). The Germans waged war for saline streams, and believed that the presence of salt invested a district with peculiar sanctity, and made it a place where prayers were most readily heard (Tacitus, _Ann._, XIII., 57)."[83] [82] See _Kadesh-barnea_, p. 36, and note, 298 f.; and _Studies in Oriental Social Life_, pp. 213, 404 f. [83] W. Robertson Smith in art. "Salt" in _Encyc. Brit._, 9th ed. There is said to be a salt lake in the mountain region of Koordistan, which was changed from fresh water to salt, by St. Peter, when he first came thither preaching Christianity. He wrought this change so that he could influence the people to accept his teaching through sharing his life by partaking of the salt. To this day the tradition remains, that, if the natives will bathe in that lake, they will renew their faith. Aside from the question of any basis of truth in the legend, it remains as a survival of the primitive idea of a real connection of shared salt with shared life. It is customary among some primitive peoples to anoint or smear a new-born babe with blood, as a means of giving him more and fuller life.[84] Thus among the ancient Caribs, of South America, "as soon as a male child was brought into the world, he was sprinkled with some drops of his father's blood;" the father "fondly believing that the same degree of courage which he had himself displayed, was by these means transmitted to his son."[85] In one of the Kaffir tribes of South Africa, when a new chief assumes authority, it was customary to wash him in the blood of a near relative, generally a brother, who was put to death on the occasion. In order to give more life and character to the freshly elevated representative of the ruling family, the family life was drawn from the veins of one near him, in order that it might be absorbed by him who could use it more imposingly.[86] [84] _Blood Covenant_, p. 137 f. [85] Edwards's _Hist. of Brit. West Ind._, I. 47, referred to in _Blood Covenant_, p. 137 f. [86] Shooter's _Kafirs of Natal_, p. 216, _ibid._