b'LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. \n\nChapHii-* Copyright No..---. \n\nUNITED STATES OF AMERICA. \n\n\n\nHome of the Bible \n\n\n\nWhat I Saw and Heard in Palestine \n\n\n\nAn account of the Sacred Places, Battle scenes, miracle-haunted hamlets and holy Homes of the \ncountry of David and the Christ, together with sketches of Historical events, \ntragedies and romances, marvelous legends, customs and char- \nacteristics, hopes and promise of the Race of Israel. \n\n" Put off thy shoes from off thy feet ; for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground." \n\nB y Marion Harland \n\n"*TWvi "VtVaW.ia. $W\xc2\xabs) \\e-rVmwe_ \n\n^ Author of \n\n" Common Sense in the Household,\'\' "The Royal Road," "A Gallant Fight," \n" His Great Self," etc. \n\nCoOlOlislv Illustrated With en 2 ravin 2 s from Photographic views taken in Palestine, \n\n^ y to which has been added \n\nThe Story of Martyred Armenia \n\nThe Christian People of Ancient Eden, and their Cruel Persecutions \n\nby the Moslems \n\nBy G. H. SANDISON \n\nAssociate Editor of " The Christian Herald " \n\n\n\nTHE CHRISTIAN HERALD \n\nLOUIS KLOPSCH, Proprietor \n\nBIBLE HOUSE, NEW YORK CITY \n1896 \n\n\n\nCOPYRIGHT, 1895, BY H. S. SMITH \nCOPYRIGHT, 1896, BY LOUIS KLOPSCH \n\n\n\n1 ^ \n\n\n\nTHE ILLUSTRATIONS in this work being \nfrom original drawings and photographs, \nand protected by Copyright, their repro- \nduction in any form is unlawful, and notice is \nhereby given that persons guilty of infringing \nthe Copyright thereof will be prosecuted. \n\n\n\nPHILADELPHIA \n\n\n\nTHE VESTIBULE \n\n\n\nHIS book is not a diary of travel, drawn out in detail to fill a given \nnumber of pages. Nor does it deal with statistical data and archaeo- \nlogical research. My object in going to Palestine was to see with \nfresh eyes, and judge with unprejudiced mind what this, the most \ninteresting of lands to the Christian, is like to-day; how the inhabitants look, and \nlive, and think, and what traces the traveler finds in the ruins of the Past of the \nnations who flourished, battled and were, in turn, swept from home and country \nby the march of GOD\'S providence. \n\nAs a pilgrim, an observer of the people, a student of the various scenes, and \na historian of the heart-stirring incidents which have immortalized for all the ages \nthe country divided between, and apportioned to, the sons of Jacob, I visited the \nHome of the Bible. In reverence of spirit I pursued the path of John the Baptist \nin the wilderness, stood upon the spot where he baptized the " Greater than he," \nand looked across the Dead Sea to the ruins of Machaerus where he was \nbeheaded. In more profound reverence I trod the route taken by the Master \nduring the three years of the ministry that began at 1 \' the place where John was \nbaptizing \' \' at the Jordan, and culminated upon Calvary. With a strange nearness \nof heart and thought to the people and times of patriarch, prophet and apostle, I \nhave looked upon the homes of Abraham, David, Isaiah, Samson \xe2\x80\x94 of the disciples \nof Christ and the Mother who bore Him. \n\nOf these places and so many more that the enumeration here would be \ntedious, I have written in familiar style, avoiding statistics and dry historical \ndetails \xe2\x80\x94 most of all, moralizing and preaching. In short, I have let place and \npeople speak for themselves. \n\nThe people of Palestine have changed less in their manner of living, customs, \nand their prejudices, than those of any other country; they are almost the same \nto-day that they were two thousand and more years ago. I therefore saw them \n\n(25) \n\n\n\n\n6 THE VESTIBULE. \n\nZl^ory of Palestine as much as I enjoyed the V****^ \xc2\xab"* 1 \n\nshall esteem my labors well rewarded and my purpose completely fulfilled . \nsnail esreen y feeen & mtQ whlch T \n\nThe iourney was a delight, ine tening ui \n\nwill come as good news from a far country. \n\n\n\nJ6 \n\n\n\n\n: 3W^ \n\nChapter. Page. \n\nI. From Port Said to Jaffa, 33 \n\nII. In Beirut and Paradise 40 \n\nIII. Martha oe Lebanon, 46 \n\nIV. An Afternoon Call, 58 \n\nV. A Syrian Baby, 65 \n\nVI. In David\'s Camp, 7 2 \n\nVII. The Native Girl, 80 \n\nVIII. Fudda\'s Betrothal, 87 \n\nIX. Fudda\'s Wedding, 94 \n\nX. Among the Lepers, 100 \n\nXI. The Pearl of the East, 107 \n\nXII. By the Sea of Galii.ee, ... 121 \n\nXIII. Where He Was Brought Up, 131 \n\nXIV. From Nain to Jezreel, . . . \xe2\x80\xa2 \xe2\x80\xa2 139 \n\n. XV. Gideon\'s Fountain and Doth an, 146 \n\nXVI. The Burden of Samaria, 152 \n\nXVII. Jacob\'s Well and Joseph\'s Tomb, . . 160 \n\nXVEII. The Sons of Ishmael, \xc2\xb0 170 \n\nXIX. The Sons of Ishmael (Concluded), 177 \n\nXX. The City of the Great King, 185 \n\nXXI. The Mount Called Olivet, \xe2\x80\xa2 196 \n\nXXII. Bethany, 206 \n\nXXIII. On the House-top, 214 \n\nXXIV. The Wailing-place, 222 \n\n(27) \n\n\n\nCONTENTS. \n\n28 \n\nPagk. \n\nChapter. 228 \n\nXXV. A Round of Visits, . . 240 \n\nXXVI. In a Palankeen to Jericho, * ^ \n\nXXVII. STILL ON THE JERICHO ROAD, \xc2\xb0 ^ \n\nXXVIII. The Dead Sea, . \xe2\x80\x94 \n\nXXIX. The Jordan, 27I \n\nXXX. Sunday in Camp, \' . . 281 \n\nXXXI. -Thine Ancient People the Jews," ^ \n\nXXXII. The Box-Colony, ^ \n\nXXXIII. The Church oe the Holy Sepulchre, 309 \n\nXXXIV. To Mar-Saba, 3l6 \n\nXXXV. AT Mar-Saba, ... 323 \n\nXXXVI. Hebron, ... 333 \n\nXXXVII. The Threshing Floor oe Ornan, .345 \n\nXXXVIII. The Green Hill Far Away, . . 353 \n\nXXXIX. On the Road to Bethlehem, . \xe2\x80\xa2 ... 362 \n\nXL, Christmas in Bethlehem, ^ \n\nXU Christmas in Bethlehem (Continued), . . . . . 378 \n\nXLII. STILL IN BETHLEHEM, ^ \n\nXLIII. JAEEA, .... 397 \n\nXUV. Dragomans and Hotels, ^ \n\nXLV. My Friends, the Missionaries, \n\n\n\nTHE STORY OF ARMENIA. \n\nPage. \n\n415 \n\nArmenia and its People, .... 420 \n\nThe Edict oe Extermination, - \n\nThe Massacre oe Sassoon, . . 425 \n\nThe Later Massacres, ^ \n\nThe Suffering and destitution \n\nThe Relief Movement, \n\nThe Armenian Revolutionists, ^ \n\nAttitude of the European Powers, ^ \n\nHope Dawns for Armenia, ^ \n\nAction of Our Government * * \n\n\n\n\nO O G Q Q Q~Q^~a O O O Q Q Q \n\n\n\nPage. \n\n\nPaobl \n\n\n\n\n34 \n\n\n\n\n90 \n\n\n\n\n35 \n\n\n" It Was Plain to be Seen That He Was \n\n\n\n\nPort Said Family Coming Home from \n\n\n\n\n\n\n96 \n\n\n\n\n33 \n\n\n\n\n99 \n\n\nView from My Window in Beirut, . . . \n\n\n41 \n\n\nHouse of Chief Leper in Naaman\'s House \n\n\n\n\nThe " Ecce Homo " Arch, Jerusalem, . . \n\n\n42 \n\n\n\n\nIOI \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n103 \n\n\n\n\n45 \n\n\n"They Obtrude Themselves Upon Our \n\n\n\n\n" She Looks Up from Her Washing, . . \n\n\n46 \n\n\n\n\n105 \n\n\nDruses of Mt Carmel at Meat, .... \n\n\n43 \n\n\nPostman Across the Desert from Bagdad \n\n\n\n\n\n\n49 \n\n\nto Damascus, \n\n\n108 \n\n\n\n\n5o \n\n\n" Paul\'s Window " in Damascus Wall, . \n\n\nno \n\n\n"Brought Upon Her Shoulder," .... \n\n\n53 \n\n\n" Another Bit of City Wall," \n\n\nIII \n\n\n\n\n54 \n\n\n" Of the Country and the Desert," . . . \n\n\n112 \n\n\nIt is Quiescent Under Treatment," . . \n\n\n55 \n\n\n" The Street That is Called Straight," . \n\n\n114 \n\n\n\n\n56 \n\n\n"It is Needless to Say by Whose Hands," \n\n\n117 \n\n\nPeasant Moslem Married Women of \n\n\n\n\n"They March More Soberly Now," . . \n\n\nIl8 \n\n\n\n\n59 \n\n\n\n\n119 \n\n\n\n\n60 \n\n\n4 4 The Entire Population of Capernaum," \n\n\n122 \n\n\nA Syrian Mother and Her Child, \n\n\n66 \n\n\n\n\n123 \n\n\n" The Girls Are Burden-bearers from the \n\n\n\n\n" It Was Certainly Here Last Year," . . \n\n\n124 \n\n\nFirst," . . . \n\n\n68 \n\n\n\n\n126 \n\n\nSheik and Muleteers at Evening, . . \xe2\x80\x9e . \n\n\n7i \n\n\n\n\n127 \n\n\n\n\n73 \n\n\n" Once Exalted Unto Heaven,\xe2\x80\x94 Now ! " . \n\n\n128 \n\n\n\n\n74 \n\n\nThe Town of Nazareth as it Appears \n\n\n\n\n\n\n75 \n\n\n\n\nI30 \n\n\n\n\n76 \n\n\n" He Laughs and His Hands Chafe One \n\n\n\n\n\n\n78 \n\n\n\n\n132 \n\n\nMrs. David Jamal\'s "Industrial Class" \n\n\n\n\n\n\n134 \n\n\n\n\n81 \n\n\n\n\n135 \n\n\nCoasts of Tyre and Sidon, Between Jaffa \n\n\n\n\n\n\n136 \n\n\n\n\n84 \n\n\n\n\n137 \n\n\n"Women Who Are Never Mature in \n\n\n\n\n\n\nI40 \n\n\nIntellect," \n\n\n85 \n\n\n\n\n142 \n\n\n44 A Child and Nothing More," \n\n\n88 \n\n\nSyrian Bread and Cake Venders, .... \n\n\n143 \n\n\n\n(29) \n\n\n\n3\xc2\xb0 \n\n\n\nLUSTRATIONS. \n\n\n\nPage. \n\n\n\n147 \n\n148 \n149 \n150 \n153 \n155 \n157 \n\n\n\n159 \n161 \n\n\n\n163 \n164 \n\n\n\nNear View of Mt. Tabor, \xe2\x80\xa2 \xe2\x80\xa2 *45 \n\n" Letting Dervish Stand up to His Fet- \nlocks in the Water," \n\n"The Spot Selected by Our Attendants, \n\nA Group Outside the Mill, \n\n"Study of Reuben." Gen. xxxvii, 29-30, \n" Carrying the Money With Them," \xe2\x80\xa2 \xe2\x80\xa2 \n" The Dreary Line of Nameless Columns, \' \' \n\n" They Fall Into Line," \n\nJacob\'s Well, Before the Recent Excava- \ntions, Ebal and Gerizim in the Back- \nground, \n\n" We Pass Two More," \xe2\x80\xa2 \xe2\x80\xa2 \n\nJohn and Imbarak, 162 \n\n"David Relates, Seated on the Upper \n\nStep," \xe2\x80\xa2 \xe2\x80\xa2 \n\nJoseph\'s Tomb, \n\n" The Girl We Met at Banias," l6 5 \n\n166 \n\n167 \n169 \n\n171 \n172 \n174 \n175 \n178 \n179 \n180 \n\n\n\nsemane, * \' * * \n\nGarden of Gethsemane, the Holy Land, \n\xc2\xab It Has Been Wa hed This Morning," \n\n\n\nGate of Banias, the Ancient Dan, .... \n\n"A Joseph of To-day," . \n\nFountain in Cana of Galilee, \n\n" Having Witnessed the Parting," . . . \nTea at Our Own Tent Door, . . \xe2\x80\xa2 \n"The Settlement is Sparce in the Suburbs, \' \n"Turns Her Toward the Kodak," . . . \n\n" Mother and Child," \n\n" The Son of the Sheik," \n\n"Handsome, Black-eyed and Merry," \n\n" Shows but Obscurely," I ^ 1 \n\n"The Tribal Poet," \xe2\x84\xa2 2 \n\nRailway Station at Jerusalem, \n\n\xc2\xab A City that is Compact Together," . . 186 \n\nThe Mount Called Olivet, J ?7 \n\n"The Prince of Hotel Managers," . \xe2\x80\xa2 \xe2\x80\xa2 \nMount Zion and the Mount of Olives, . . \n" Picturesqueness is a Part of Their Busi- \nness," \n\nTower of David, \xe2\x80\xa2 \n\n"The Driver of a Muddy Hack," . . . \n\nThe Jerusalem of To-day, \xe2\x80\xa2 \xe2\x80\xa2 \n\n(So-called) Tomb of the Kings, without \n\nthe Walls of Jerusalem, \n\n" We Gain an Open Space," \n\nPool of Siloam, * * * \' \n\n"They Slink Back Mute," . 201 \n\n" Over and Beyond the Rounded Crowns \nof the Olives," \n\n\n\n188 \n189 \n\n191 \n192 \n193 \n195 \n\n197 \n198 \n199 \n\n\n\n202 \n\n\n\nPagb. \n\nAeed Olive Tree in the Garden of Geth- \n\n203 \n204 \n206 \n\nModern Bethany, 207 \n\n"Young David," 209 \n\n"Listens with Downcast Eyes," . . ... 212 \n\n"In Bethany," 213 \n\n" An Odd, Charming Place," 2I 5 \n\n"The Host Meets Us," 216 \n\n" One Cannot Wish for a Nicer Place," . \n\xc2\xab The Little Wife Still Chats with the \n\nNeighbor," \n\nRobinson\'s Arch, Jerusalem, ...... \n\n"The Wailing-Place," \n\nWailing-Place and Upper Courses of \n\nStones in Wall, \xe2\x80\xa2 \xe2\x80\xa2 * \n\nIn the Jewish Quarter, \n\n" A Stirring and Noble Housewife," . . \nWoman Waiting with Bowl of Dough at \n\nCity Oven, \n\nCourtyard of a Home in Nazareth, . . . \n" She Ran Wild Upon the Street," . . . \nHoliday Street Scene in Jerusalem, . . . \nThe Damascus Gate, Jerusalem, .... \n\n" The Leper\'s Husky Cry," \n\n" Our Fresh Start," \n\nShepherd and Wife, \n\n"The Fountain of the Apostles," . . . . \nRuins of a Roman Watch Tower, . . . \n< \' The Sheik Mounts Guard Without, \' \' . \n"A Miniature Edition of a Convent," . \n\nThe Camp at Sunset, \n\nDead Sea Fruit, \n\nWomen Crossing the Plain on their Way \n\nto the Burial, \xe2\x80\xa2 \n\nThe Dead Sea, \n\nSand-dunes and Clumps of Scrub Growth, \nEncampment Upon the Jordan, . . .. . \xe2\x80\xa2 \nA Ferry Over the River Jordan, Showing \n\nthe Thither Bank of the Jordan, . . \nParty of Tourists on the Jordan, .... \n< < Unconscious David, Water-jug in Hand, \n\nOur Sheik at the Jordan, \xe2\x80\xa2 \n\n"Gathered by David from the Edge of \n\nthe Stream," \n\nHouse of Zaccheus, \n\n\n\n217 \n\n219 \n220 \n223 \n\n225 \n226 \n229 \n\n231 \n233 \n235 \n237 \n238 \n241 \n242 \n243 \n244 \n245 \n247 \n251 \n253 \n254 \n\n\n\n257 \n258 \n\n259 \n261 \n\n263 \n264 \n265 \n266 \n\n267 \n268 \n\n\n\nILLUSTRATIONS. \n\n\n\n3i \n\n\n\nPage. \n\nPlain of Jericho, 269 \n\n"In Lordly Forgetfulness," 272 \n\nModern Jericho, ... 273 \n\nIn the Tent-door, 274 \n\nElisha\'s Fountain, 275 \n\nFountain of Elisha, Seen from Mound \n\nCovering Ancient Jericho, 276 \n\nPreparations for Departure, 277 \n\nSerkeese and Luggage, 278 \n\nOur Head Muleteer, 279 \n\nIn the <( Box Colony," Jerusalem, ... 282 \n\n"A Maze of Filthy Streets," 283 \n\nJewish Immigrants in Jerusalem, .... 284 \n"His Inferior in Appearance and in Of- \nfice," 285 \n\n"Along Miry Alleys," 288 \n\n" Children, Children Everywhere," . . . 289 \n" Something Little Better Than Beggars," 290 \n" A Villainous-looking Tramp, " .... 292 \nRuins of the Hospital of St. John, Jeru- \nsalem, Crusaders\' Work, 295 \n\nChurch of Holy Sepulchre, Court-yard \nand Entrance, Showing Tomb of God- \nfrey of Bouillon, 297 \n\nInterior of Church of Holy Sepulchre, Je- \nrusalem, .... 298 \n\nThe (alleged) Tomb of Christ in Church \n\nof Holy Sepulchre, 300 \n\nA Meaner Figure, 3 0r \n\n" There Are a Great Many of Them, " . . 302 \n\nA Beggar\'s Noon Siesta, 303 \n\n"I Don\'t See Why Not," ....... 304 \n\nWayside Beggars, 3 o 5 \n\nThe Field of Blood, Jerusalem, 308 \n\n"Her People," 3 IO \n\n"The Ancient Edifice," 3I2 \n\nTower of Justinian at Mar-Saba, .... 313 \nThe Face of the Cliff at Mar-Saba, ... 315 \n\n" In Silence as Sullen, " 3I 6 \n\n"Held Tenderly Between His Strong \n\nHands," ^17 \n\nSome of Our Visitors at Mar-Saba, . . . 318 \nConvent Seen from the Table Rock, . . 319 \nGrackles Feeding in Court-yard of Con- \nvent, 320 \n\n" Arrested Upon the Half-step," .... 321 \n"Sealed Fountain," 324 \n\n\n\nPage. \n\nTree of Abraham, Hebron, Holy Land, . 325 \nWomen Carrying Water-skins at Solo- \nmon\'s Pools, 325 \n\nPigskin Water-bottle, 327 \n\nMan Ploughing with Camel, 328 \n\nThe City of Hebron as it now Appears, . 330 \n\nMosque of Omar, ........... 332 \n\nMohammed the Magnificent, 334 \n\nMosaics in Facade of Mosque of Omar, . 335 \n\nThe Rock, 335 \n\nMosque of Omar, 337 \n\nThe Tower of Antonia, Jerusalem, . . . 338 \n\nJudgment Seat of Solomon, 339 \n\nMosque of Aksa, in Grounds of Mosque \n\nof Omar, 340 \n\nBeautiful Gate of Temple, 34! \n\n(So-called) Stables of Solomon in Temple \n\nAna, 342 \n\nInterior of Beautiful Gate of the Temple, 344 \n\n"Golgotha," 345 \n\n"The Green Hill Far Away," 346 \n\n"A Great Hebrew Cemetery Lay About \n\nthe Base," \n\n"The Solitary Tomb," 348 \n\n" Oddly Riven from Top to Bottom," . . 350 \nGrotto of Jeremiah in the Side of Cal- \n\nvarv > 351 \n\nThe Stone of Elijah, 354 \n\nThe House of Benjamin, 355 \n\n"Well of the Three Kings," 356 \n\nTomb of Rachel, 357 \n\n" Heaps Pressing Down the Dead," . . . 358 \n\nIn the Field of Boaz, * 359 \n\nTomb of Rachel, 360 \n\nOn the Roof, 362 \n\nA Company of Gypsies, 363 \n\n"One End of the Market Place," ... 364 \n"Upon the Roof of a Low Wing of the \n\nBarracks," 365 \n\n"The Gorgeous Pageant," 366 \n\n"Every House-Top is Filled," 367 \n\nChurch of the Nativity, Seen from Below, 370 \n\nThe Church of the Nativity, 371 \n\nArea About the Gypsy Camp. 372 \n\nInterior of Church of the Nativity, . . . 373 \n\nGreat Square at Noon, 374 \n\nField of the Shepherds, 376 \n\n\n\n32 \n\n\n\nILLUSTRATIONS. \n\n\n\nPage. \n\nRussian Pilgrims, 379 \n\nGrotto of the Nativity, 3 8 \xc2\xb0 \n\nBack Street in Bethlehem 3 8x \n\nManger in Church of Nativity, 382 \n\nDaughter and Daughter-in-Law, . . . \xe2\x80\xa2 3 8 3 \nThe Sad -Eyed Bridegroom, ....... 384 \n\nVillage of Abou-Goch, on the Road from \n\nJerusalem to Jaffa, \n\nHouse of Simon the Tanner, in Jaffa, \nOlive Grove Near Jaffa, \n\n\n\n386 \n388 \n389 \n\n\n\nCamels Laden with Jaffa Oranges, . . \n\nFountain in Jaffa, \n\nStreet in Old Jaffa, \n\nJaffa ( Joppa) from the Harbor, .... \n\nMarket Place in Jaffa, \n\n" Our Incomparable Dragoman," . . . \nFront of the Holy Sepulchre, Jerusalem \nGate of St. Stephen, Jerusalem, . . . \xe2\x96\xa0 \n\nGolden Gate, Jerusalem, 4\xc2\xab9 \n\nGeneral View of the Vasques of Solomon, 411 \n\n\n\nPack. \n\n, 391 \n\n\xe2\x96\xa0 39* \n\n\xe2\x96\xa0 m \n\n. \xc2\xab \n\n. 407 \n\n\n\nPage. \n\nThe Dardanelles, 4j5 \n\nKurdish House and Inmates, 4 l6 \n\nArmenian Women Baking Cakes, ... 417 \n\nMt. Ararat and Little Ararat, 4* 8 \n\nKurdish Robbers, . . - 4 J 9 \n\nArmenian Girls Spinning, 421 \n\nRefugees from Sassoon, 422 \n\nKurdish Chief, 423 \n\nMassacre in the Streets, 4 2 4 \n\nTrebizond\xe2\x80\x94 General View, 427 \n\nArmenians in Prison, 4 2 8 \n\nMgr. Izmirlian, Patriarch of Constanti- \nnople, 429 \n\n\n\nPag s. \n\nChild Victims at Erzeroum, 43* \n\nArmenian Refugees on the Frontier, . . 43* \n\nHunger Bread, 43$ \n\nArmenian Bread Makers 434 \n\nA Relief Commissioner Passing Ararat, . 435, \n\nArmenian Beggar of Van, 43& \n\nPortrait of Dr. Grace N. Kimball, ... 431 \n\nGroup of Destitute Armenians, 43& \n\nPortrait of Clara Barton, 44S \n\nThe Fleets at Anchor, 441 \n\nKarpoot\xe2\x80\x94 View of the Burned Mission \nBuildings, . . 44S \n\n\n\nMarash\xe2\x80\x94 The American College, .... 44s \n\n\n\nThe Home of the Bible* \n\n\n\nCHAPTER I. \n\nFROM PORT SAID TO JAFFA. \n\nV/ T E had expected to rough it at some, and probably at several, periods \n# I I of our journeyings. We had not expected that the process would \n\\JJ[ be S in u P\xc2\xb0 n one of the far-famed steamers of the Peninsular and \nV* Oriental line, plying between England, Australia and India. Per- \nhaps we were unreasonable in comparing "The Coromandel , \' \' on which we took \npassage from Marseilles, with the floating palaces that make an Atlantic voyage \nendurable to the least sea-worthy tourist. Certain it is that the Peninsular and \nOriental craft suffered grievously by the contrast. The table was little better than \nthat of a second-class boarding-house; the appointments of the state-rooms\xe2\x80\x94 \n" cabins " as they are called by the English\xe2\x80\x94 were mean and uncomfortable, the \ndmmg-saloon so narrow and dark as to make meals a penitential process. \n\nAdded to these drawbacks to the comfort of the voyagers was the circum- \nstance that the Mediterranean was in a bad humor, and so maltreated us that \nthree-quarters of the land-farers on board were wretchedly ill, until we were flung \nas it were, into the Straits of Messina, and, under the lee of Sicily, glided into \nthe blue placidity of what, for the first time since our embarkation, deserved the \nname of a " summer sea. " It kept up this reputation to the end of our voyage\xe2\x80\x94 \nthe harbor of Port Said, at the mouth of the Suez Canal. There we discovered \nto our chagrin, that the steamer which was to have taken us on up to Beirut \nupon the day succeeding our arrival was detained\xe2\x80\x94 nobody knew where\xe2\x80\x94 in \nquarantine\xe2\x80\x94 nobody knew for what\xe2\x80\x94 and no other would sail within four days. \nThe town is drearily modern, cheaply built as an entry-port to the canal upon a \nlow-lying sand-bank. \n\nBefore we had been an hour in the " Hotel Continental," we made the dis- \ncovery that there was not a woman-employe" in the house. Our beds were made, \nour rooms swept and dusted, and all other functions of chambermaids performed \nby men, brown of face, black-eyed, and arrayed in a mongrel costume of jacket, \n\n? \' C33) ; \xe2\x80\xa2 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n34 \n\nThev moved quickly and quietly, they answered the \nblue blouse and trousers. They moved qu y m certain experiences \n\nbell promptly and were the very soul o cmhty Rec ^ ^ ^ \n\n\n\n\nTHE ROADSTEAD AT JAEFA. \n\nDuri ug our first stroll through the little town, \nWO men who must wive the men, and "f^^J\xe2\x84\xa2^ American, in \nthemselves. Except for an occasional French or E g ^ ^ \n\n\n\n36 THE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\nWomen were there, in number and variety sufficient to quiet our speculations. \nThey sat flat in the doors of the houses, or upon the ground against the outer \nwalls of the same, knitting, tending babies and gossiping; they stirred messes m \nbrass pots over braziers of charcoal, and made coffee for men who sat cross-legged \nupon the bare earth to drink it; they sold beads, sweetmeats, sausages, uninviting \nvegetables and less attractive fruit-apples, dates and lemons-at stalls set right \nin the street. However engaged, they were covered up to the eyes m a sort of \ncombination-suit of circular cloak, hood and veil, usually black, and of some \nopaque material. It is picturesque, and, after the manner of many other pictur- \nesque costumes, it must be inconvenient and unpleasant, especially m a country \nwhere the thermometer in December ranges at noon from seventy-three to ninety- \nsix in the shade. How a native woman, thus muffled up and swathed, can \ndischarge even the few domestic duties incumbent upon one who, as we have \nseen lives and keeps house mainly in the open air, is a hopeless puzzle to the \nforeign observer. That nothing may be lacking from the discomfort of mantle \nwimple and veil, our Arabian, or Egyptian, or Syrian matron wears, m token of \nher honorable estate of wedlock, a brass tube, nearly an inch in diameter, strapped \nperpendicularly upon her forehead directly between her eyebrows and m a line \nwith the bridge of her nose. Close scrutiny showed us the black string attached \nto one end and losing itself in the close black hood which forms the upper part \nof the mantle; how it was attached to the veil below is still to us an Oriental \neniema Through this pipe, Mohammed, or some other Moslem authority m \nspiritual matters, is supposed to breathe admonition, counsel and consolation as \nthe married devotee requires it. \n\nMaking our way slowly through the motley crowds of the native quarter, our \ncoachman and dragoman yelling incessantly to the pedestrians to clear the roads, \nand the whip of the driver doing sharp execution upon the bare legs of innumer- \nable boys and lads whose brown bodies were covered to the knee by a single \ngarment, half-frock, half-trousers-we at length escaped from dm and dmgmess \nand a nameless and altogether nauseous mixture of vile odors into an open road- \nway, laid along the water\'s edge to the cemetery, two miles from the town. To \nsecure this roadway, a curbing of solid stone was laid on both sides, the space \nbetween being filled with earth and sand. After leaving the outskirts , oi Port \nSaid, there were no signs of human habitation except a few scattered hovels \ndotting the waste on our left. About the doors small black pigs rooted and \nsquealed; a stray dog skulked in the forlorn hope of a supper, and toward ^the \ndesert three camels, with outstretched noses, followed their masters We watched \nthem kneel to be unloaded, and then remain quiet on the sand for theu nightly \nrest. The only symptom of vegetation, as far as eye could reach, was in clumps \nof something we mistook for beach-grass, until the dragoman plucked a branch for \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n37 \n\n\n\nour inspection, and we found it strangely succulent, with fleshy leaves and even \nsmall yellow berries, ovate and pulpy. \n\nRight in the middle of this desert arose the walls of the cemeteries \xe2\x80\x94 the \nChristian, devoted to the interment of French Roman Catholics and Egyptian \nCopts, and the Moslem, where lie \'\'the faithful" of whatever nationality. We \nlooked into the first, seeing nothing very different from the tall crosses and head- \nstones hung with tawdry immortelles and beads, such as we had beheld in dozens \nof other foreign burial-grounds. We alighted at the gate of the Moslem cemetery \nand entered the enclosure. Arid sand for many feet downward is the substance \nthrough which the graves are sunk. Within a few days after the mound is heaped \nabove the sleeper below, the meeting winds of sea and desert tear it down and \nwhirl the sand to the four quarters of the enclosure. Hence, as soon as may be, \na box, of the shape and size of the grave, is fitted over it. When the relatives \ncan afford it, a structure of similar form in cement takes the place of the wooden \ncase. Upon box and cement are written the names of the deceased and texts \nfrom the Koran. Above many of the rude tombs arise coop-like constructions, \nwith trellised sides and tops, within which stand pots of dwarf palms, of cacti, \ngeraniums, and, once in a great while, of sickly vines, pathetic to behold in a \nregion where rain does not fall for months together, and water is sold to the poor \nby the jar or skinful. \n\nThere are no regular walks or avenues, and wherever the graves were not \nprotected by boxes the sand bore the imprint of man}^ feet. Leading the way to \nthe outermost row of graves, the guide pointed to a line of freshly-heaped mounds, \nto the head-boards of which were tied shabby bunches of palm-leaves, palm- \nbranches and artificial flowers. \n\n"If you had been here this morning," he explained in execrable French \nenlivened by insupportable English, "you would have seen two thousand women \n\xe2\x80\x94 perhaps more, maybe less \xe2\x80\x94 here, crying, and crying, and crying, and telling \nhow good her husband was, or her child was so sweet, or how she mourned her \nfather, or her sister, or her brother, and did break her heart for her mother, died \nso long ago. They come so, every Friday, and cry just the same and ever so \nhard, and it is they who do this " \xe2\x80\x94 pointing to the newer mounds. " These are \nthey who were buried of late, you comprehend; and the ladies, they keep them \nhigh until the boards go about them \xe2\x80\x94 so they be not blown away by the sea-wind \n\xe2\x80\x94 you comprehend ?\' \' \n\nFriday is the Moslem Sabbath, and this pious pilgrimage is a duty to be per- \nformed uppn the holy day. Hearing the tale, we looked with different eyes upon \nthe sandy heaps raised by pitying hands; the already withering memorials lashed \nto the main head-boards had mining and poetry. The woman-heart is the same \nthe world around. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n39 \n\n\n\nAt the end of the row of new mounds was an open grave. \' \' When is this to \nbe filled ?\' \' I asked, knowing that burial in this tropical country follows with \nawful rapidity upon death, and supposing that the pit was dug purposely for \nsomebody. \n\nThe dragoman shrugged his shoulders. \n\n"Ah ! who can know? It may be to-morrow; it may be next week. But \nthere is always one ready. Somebody must come to fill it some day. You com- \nprehend ?" \n\nComprehend ! ah, but too well ! That, also, was an old, old story, known \nwherever men and women live and die. \n\nHeaven forbid that we, or any of our blood, should ever die at Port Said! \n\nI was awakened this morning, after a night\'s voyage upon the still pacific \nMediterranean, by a voice outside my cabin, vibrant with emotion, hardly \nrepressed : \n\n\' \' Have we reached Joppa ? \n\n" In an hour, madame !" \n\nPeeping beyond the edge of my door, I saw a woman gazing through an open \nport-hole with an expression that sent me to my own window. The east was \nflushed and golden in welcome to the coming sun; the sea dimpled with smiles; at \nthe meeting of sky and water lay a dark irregular line of hills. It was my first \nglimpse of the Holy Eand \xe2\x80\x94 and beautiful exceedingly ! Yet, presently, I went \nback for another glance at my neighbor\'s face. Unconscious of possible scrutiny, \nher eyes were still fixed upon the horizon-line, and soul and thought went with \nthem. She may have been fifty years of age, she was thin in face and figure, and \nplain- featured. She may have been a Yankee school-mistress or an English \nex-governess. Something in her air forbade the supposition that she was illiterate \nor underbred; under the rushing association of the scene, the commonplace visage \nwas glorified. In spirit she was on her knees before the altar of the hills, behind \nwhich gleamed the flame of a new day. I knew as surely as if she had broken \ninto a Magnificat, that, like myself, she had longed through years for this hour; \nthat nothing in human language could voice aright the emotions swelling her \nheart to actual pain. \n\nWhatever may be the degree of disillusionment which many well-meaning \npeople predict for us in our pilgrimage, I shall always be thankful that I met in \nthat still hour, in spirit, the simple devoutness I read in the face of a stranger \nwhose name I shall never know, and who will never suspect my reverent \nsympathy with her mood. \n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II. \n\nIN BEIRUT AND PARADISE. \n\nOU have made a paradise here !" said a visitor to the \n\nowner of a city garden. \n\n"Humph !" looking sourly at the dingy, ill-built \ncross streets by which his home and grounds were \nsurrounded. \' \' But you see I have to go through the \nother place to get to my Paradise !" \n\nThe growl recurred to me as we climbed the stone \nsteps leading from the boat that had brought us to the \nBeirut landing. The yellow walls, red roofs and, \nwhat were at that distance, hanging gardens, of the \ntown sloped upward to the brow of a hill that is not \nshamed by Mount Lebanon facing it across the nar- \nrowed sea. Tall palms showed above masses of olive, \nfig and mulberry trees and flowering vines. \nAt the head of the flight of stairs rocked and yelled a crowd in motley array \nHad time and quiet been vouchsafed, we could have identified Parthians, and \nMedes and Elamites, and the dwellers in Mesopotamia, Phrygia and Pamphyha and \nin Egypt- Strangers of Rome, Jews and proselytes assuredly had their represen- \ntative waves in the surf of humanity, and Cretes and Arabians were loudest of \nlung most violent of gesticulation. We were upon the topmost step when a big \nfellow in a black gown and a white cap reeled almost to the lower from a push \ndealt by a smaller man in custom-house livery. Before our turn came to stand m \nthe official presence, two others were thrust from a door leading to an inner room. \nIf there were one hundred men there, eighty-eight were vociferating m half-a-dozen \ndifferent dialects, with apparently eighty-eight separate and dire grievances. \n\nDavid Jamal\xe2\x80\x94 the impassively courteous dragoman-looked twice over nis \nShoulder to say, " Keep close to me !" and in the lee of his broad back we waited \nuntil he presented our passports, with a grave bow, to the aforesaid functionary. \nHe was not a large functionary, as I have said; he was young, and nature m \nbestowing upon him a round face and fresh-colored cheeks, had not intended him \nto look fierce. He achieved a tolerable imitation of ferocity, as, jerking open the \nfolds of the documents, and glaring from them to us, he demanded m English: \n" Why didn\'t they have them visid by the Turkish consul m America? \n\n(40) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n41 \n\n\n\nWe said nothing, but we were not abashed. David was running the affair; \nwe had a serene sense of being only passengers. Had we taken part in the con- \nversation, it would have been to ask why in the name of reason and the law of \nnations, we should have the papers visM by the Turkish, any more than by the \nEnglish, German, French, Egyptian, Austrian, Grecian and Italian consuls. As \nan illustration of the Turkish principles that might makes right and occupation \nsignifies despotic power, our officer sat down at a table, after three * minutes of \n\n\n\n\nVIEW FROM MY WINDOW IN BEIRUT. \n\n\n\nheathenish raging, and executed a half- score of scratches in the corner of each \npassport, for which we paid six dollars and a half. \n\n" Now, be off with you !" was the next mandate, and, still in David\'s wake, \nwe passed into an inner and \xe2\x80\x94 incredible as it would have seemed a moment ago \xe2\x80\x94 \na noisier court, where our luggage was examined. Men in braided jackets and \nred fezes, with swords at their sides, fell upon our respectable trunks, satchels and \nshawl-straps, as tigers upon sheep, tore out books, clothing and shoes, opened boxes \nand portfolios, ran rude hands into the depths and under the sides of the dis- \nordered mass. A wild exclamation burst from two who had in hand a shawl-strap \ncontaining a sea- rug and something hard and square. In a twinkling, buckles were \nloosened, the suspicious folds undone, and Alcides\'s kodak lay revealed to the \n\n\n\n42 THE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\nmajesty of the Ottoman government. The wolfish gleam in eyes that beheld the \nsmiles we did not try to repress would have meant bastinado and bow-string \na century-and-a-half ago. \n\nWhile the examination was going on, I had retired to a bench behind a \nsort of counter, and, always serene in the persuasion that ours was a second- \nary interest in the scene so long as our dragoman stood dignified and unbend- \n\ning, in the fore-front of the \nbattle, entertained myself \nwith watching our fellow- \nvictims. \n\nOne old Greek, with \ngrizzled beard and travel- \nstained robe, had no less than \nsix bags of divers materials, \nall sewed up with strong \ntwine. \n\nHe actually threw him- \nself upon them, as an officer \nwhipped out a knife and \nbegan cutting the stitches. \n\nA second official flew to \nhis comrade\'s aid and tore the \nlean arms from their hold. \n\nAfter that, they left not \none stitch upon another to \ntell the tale. \n\nOut tumbled upon the \nfloor what looked more like \nthe contents of a rag-bag than \nany possible valuables. \n\nThe officers kicked them \napart and over, and leaving \nthem where they lay, turned \nto the wretched owner, who was now blubbering like a seven-year-old baby, \nand dived into his pockets. From one they drew a filthy calico bag, containing \nwhat from the shape and size might have been marbles, and, after shaking it \nbefore his eyes, transferred it to the pocket of one of his tormentors. The old \nGreek sat like Marius in the middle of ruin, watering the dusty floor with his \ntears, when, our own belongings having been restored to the trunks and bags by \nDavid and his men, we left the screeching babel behind. \n\n\n\n\nTHE "ECCE HOMO" ARCH, JERUSALEM. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n43 \n\n\n\nNobody can form an approximate idea of the tumult accompanying what \nI have but faintly described, unless he has with his own ears taken in as \nmuch of it as the excruciated tympanum can bear. I had lain upon the \nlounge in my room in the Hotel d\' Orient\xe2\x80\x94 a chamber with a ceiling fully \ntwenty feet high, looking across the blue waters to the Lebanon range for \nan hour before the horrid din ceased to vibrate upon the nerves of hearing. \nThen \xe2\x80\x94 a card was brought to me, accompanied by a gift of fruit and flow- \ners, and the gates of Paradise began to swing ajar. \n\nThey were wide open as we drove, later in the day, to the higher part \nof the town where are situated the buildings of the Syrian Protestant Col- \nlege\xe2\x80\x94that splendid monument of Christian genius and faith in those who \nfounded and have conducted it, and of the Christian liberality of large- \nminded men at home. As we cleared the lower streets, vegetation became \nmore abundant and of tropical luxuriance. The yellow stone walls on each \nliand were overtopped by masses of verdure ; passion flowers showed darkly - \npurple among the five-fingered leaves of vines running over verandas and \n"house-fronts and along the rough walls. \n\nIntersecting lanes were lined with tall cacti, the fleshy leaves as large as a \nman\'s hand, the stalks near the ground larger than a man\'s arm. Oleanders, \npink and white, blossomed upon trees fifteen and twenty feet high ; the regal \n" poinsettia," cultivated in American conservatories, spread broad disks of \nscarlet upon shrubs six feet in height ; orange trees hung full of fruit, and \nunder those laden with the dwarf variety of the same\xe2\x80\x94 known in our country as \n" tangerines,"\xe2\x80\x94 here and in Southern Europe as "mandarins" \xe2\x80\x94 the sweet aro- \nmatic globes lay as plentifully as windfall apples in a New England orchard. But \nthe roses ! the roses ! growing rankly in every garden, and requiring little atten- \ntion except from the pruning-knife \xe2\x80\x94 Marechal Neils, La France, tea-roses, yellow, \nwhite, crimson and pink \xe2\x80\x94 of which one can buy a half- bushel of buds and blossoms \nfor fifteen cents\xe2\x80\x94 filling street and lanes with perfumes \xe2\x80\x94 how can white paper \nand black ink convey to my far-away audience an adequate idea of the wealth and \nbeauty and sweetness in a Syrian rose-garden ? Now and then, a whiff of subtler \nfragrance called our eyes to a mantle of jasmine draping a wall, and as our \ncarriage drew up in front of the house built by a wealthy American for the Presi- \ndent of the College, Dr. Bliss, whose name and fame are dear to all conversant \nwith the story of Syrian missions, our wheels brushed against a hedge of rose- \ngeranium. \n\nSuch were the external phases of our paradise on that late autumnal afternoon. \nLovelier and far dearer was that unexpected welcome that awaited us from those \nwho ceased to be strangers from the moment our hands met in greeting. This is \nnot the place, nor is mine the province, to give a statistical history of the glorious \n\n\n\n44 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\neducational institution\xe2\x80\x94 the light-house set on a hill\xe2\x80\x94 through which we were cour- \nteously conducted. We attended afternoon prayers in the fine chapel, the gift of \nanother of our Christian countrymen. The services were all in Arabic\xe2\x80\x94 the selec- \ntion of Scripture, the hymn, set to an Arabic air, and the prayer by Dr. Post\xe2\x80\x94 \nthe distinguished \nhead of the medical \ndepartment of what \nis, to all intents and \npurposes, a univer- \nsity. The students \nare chiefly Syrians, \nmany of them be- \nlonging to Moslem \nfamilies, but there \nare Egyptians among \nthem, and here and \nthere an uncovered \nhead bespoke Greek \nparentage or birth. \n\nThen we had \nwhat our English \ncousins know as "a \ncup of afternoon \ntea," in the cosy \nparlor of the Preci- \ndent\'s house. My \ncup was the more \ndelicious because \npassed to me by a \nbright -faced, sweet- \nvoiced girl \xe2\x80\x94 a mis- \nsionary in the third \ngeneration\xe2\x80\x94 to whom \n\nArabic is as familiar as English. The tea-drinking was a prelude to a Thanks- \ngiving gathering held two evenings later in the house of Professor Porter. Reck- \noning backward, as befitted our eastern pilgrimage, we computed that at the very \nhour in which we were thinking of and praying for "home and native land," \nhundreds of thousands of happy families were discussing Thanksgiving dinners. \nA sweet savor of turkey and pumpkin pies floated into the imagination, and as \nwe sang, with a will, "My Country, \'tis of Thee," we could almost catch the \n\n\n\n\nSCENE IN BEIRUT. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n45 \n\n\n\nechoes left in the welkin by the millions of voices that had shouted it that day. \nWe had much and delightful social communing when the more formal exercises of \nthe evening were over. To us, the newly arrived, the cordial hospitality then and \nthere received, the pleasant ring of American voices, the genial warmth of in- \nquiries as to our plans, and offers of co-operation in our work, are among the things \none dare not trust oneself to commit to paper. As I write, the sunset is bathing \nthe Lebanon Mountains with pink. The Lebanon, where Hiram\'s men relieved \nSolomon\'s in regular turn in lifting axes upon thick trees. The floats which were \nto convey the felled cedars to Joppa were moored over there in the bay. The wash \n\nof the waves mingles \nwith the tinkle of the \ndonkey-bells from the \nstreet below, that re- \nminds one oddly of \nsleighing season. \n\nCircumstances \nhave compelled us to \ntarry for a few days in \nthis land of Beulah. \nThe sea lies behind us, \nthe hills and desert are \nbefore us, the breath- \ning spell is welcome. \nSuch wealth of kind- \nness, such Christianly- \naffectionate treat- \nment as has been ours \nfrom the hour we \n"a breathing spei.Iv." cleared the purgatory \n\nof the lower town, add sensibly to one\'s wealth of heart and memory. The \nrecollection will sound through the years to come like the soothing murmur of \nthe Mediterranean upon the Beirut beach; lie upon "mountain-ranges over- \npast " of experience, as the sunset flush upon Lebanon. \n\n" Everything is ready for to-morrow, David?" as the majestic figure bows in \nthe doorway. \n\n"Everything, madame; my men, implements and animals." \n"To-morrow, then, begins our real work?" \nDavid bows again, his hand on his heart. \n\n"Not of myself, madame, but with God\'s help, I hope to see you safely tc \nyour journey\'s end !" \n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER HI. \n\n\n\nMARTHA OF LEBANON. \n\n/^>^f HE looks up from her washing as we near her home. Her laundry is \n\n1 roofed by a friendly fig-tree; one side is protected from the wind by \nY^^\\ a wall of loosely-laid stones, picked up in the adjacent fields. Her \n^^-^ house joins this at a right angle. Upon her right hand is a confused \nheap of baskets, water-pots, sticks and straw. A chicken roosts \nupon the topmost basket and will probably sleep in it to-night. A shapeless gar- \nment that may be Martha\'s own "izzar," or her husband\'s trousers, is spread \n\nupon the heap to dry. . \n\nThe entire furniture of the laundry is in full sight, when we have added to it \nher " set tub." I need not remind American housewives of the insistence of Irish \nhelp upon this 4 \' convaynience \' \' of every well- \nordered household. Martha\'s tub is a great \nmetal bowl, and it is set between her knees, her \nseat being the earth from which she\xe2\x80\x94 and we\xe2\x80\x94 \nsprang. One daughter sits with folded hands \nbeside her; another is lazily stirring lentil pot- \ntage in the pot used awhile ago for heating \nthe water required for her mother\'s morning \ntask. For Martha, be it understood, is as \nsensible of the desirableness of having both \n"hot and cold water " when she is about her \nwashing, as Bridget-of-the-bog. She makes \na little go very far, however, and the fire of \nsticks over which it was heated having burned \nitself out into a bed of clear coals, she utilizes it and the kettle in the preparation \nof the family supper. \n\nThe family wash is not large. When she has rubbed, rinsed, and wrung a \ncouple of white izzars for herself, a cotton tunic or shirt for her lord, and two or \nthree sheets for the baby, the bulk of the work is disposed of. Those who groan \nover the " heavy wash of a- Monday " in our more (or less) favored land, can form \nan idea of the diminution of toil that would be brought about by the absence \nfrom the weekly tale of articles, of towels, table-cloths, sheets, napkins, stockings, \n\n(46) \n\n\n\n\nSHE IvOOKS UP FROM HKR WASHING." \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n47 \n\n\n\nhandkerchiefs and underclothing of all kinds. Martha wears neither shoes nor \nstockings, nor does any member of her flock. Each is habited in at least one gar- \nment, for she is a decent body, and scorns the shiftless neighbors who suffer their \nboys to run abroad with no covering on their supple bodies. When the solitary \nfrock or tunic or \' \' combination suit \' \' of blouse and trousers drops quite to pieces, \na new one is substituted, and the remnants of the former are worked up in some \nmanner. By the time that the washing is spread upon the stones and underbrush \nto dry, it is time the bread, set to rise this morning in a red earthen pan, should \nbe kneaded. The kitchen is on the other side of the house. Martha has ideas of \nthe fitness of things, and does not \' \' clutter, \' \' as the manner of some is. She has \nall of out-of-doors to work in and uses what she needs. A cloth is laid under the \nlow table which is sprinkled thickly with flour before the risen dough is cast upon \nit. What falls from the board during the kneading will thus be saved. With \nrapid touches she brings the yielding lump into a ball, and tosses it from one hand \nto the other with incredible swiftness. It grows in size and lightness before your \neyes, and when she adjudges it to be light and large enough, is turned to the \nboard and patted into a sheet hardly thicker than stout writing-paper. A round, \nslightly convex piece of iron, not unlike a shield in form and size, has been heat- \ning over coals glowing within a sort of semi-circular fender of red clay. The \nbread-sheet is laid upon the shield and cooks quickly. As each relay is browned, \nit is transferred to a wicker tray to cool, and another takes its place. These cakes \nhave a top and bottom crust with a void space between them. They are usually \nsour. Indeed, most of the bread I have eaten, or tried to eat, in Syria, is sour, \nand my soul loathes it. Martha\'s cakes are likewise tough, shortening being an \nunknown quantity in the manufacture. \n\nThe family, as a rule, meet at but one meal in the day, and that is supper. \nUnless it rains, they will partake of this under the fig-tree, and chickens and dogs \nwill be in readiness to devour such scraps as may be flung to them. Less careful \nproviders do not get up a hot supper every day of the week, contenting themselves \nwith preparing a great pot of stew of some description on alternate days, and \neating what is left over on the morrow. Martha looks well to the ways of her \nhousehold. Her husband earns a matter of thirty- two cents a day \xe2\x80\x94 which goes as \nfar as a dollar- and- a-quarter would in the United States \xe2\x80\x94 and deserves a comfort- \nable, orderly meal when he comes home in the evening. To-night, it will be \n" that same red pottage" we have seen the daughter stirring in the pot. We \nwould call the lentils composing it brown; Martha knows them as red, and the \ndish she evolves from them is, we believe, identical with that bought by hungry \nKsau from his "smart" brother. The dried lentils are soaked, then boiled and \ndrained, and left to cool and stiffen for awhile. Half-an-hour or so before supper, \nthey will be thrown into boiling oil or fat of some kind, and heated thoroughly, \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBEE. 49 \n\nthen seasoned and poured into a large crockery or wooden bowl. If she would \nhave it especially savory, she fries an onion in the fat before putting in the lentils. \n\n" You will observe," says our interpreter, " that this is not porridge, nor yet \nwhat the French cooks set before us as \'potage,\' or a \'puree.\' It is a dish of \npottage." \n\nIt gives forth a goodly smell as it reeks in kettle and bowl. I have eaten it \nwith hearty relish more than once in hotel and private house, and never without \n\n\n\n\n\n"her fi,ock." \n\na sorrowful thought of the hungry hunter who made an unlucky meal of " bread \nand pottage of lentils." \n\nHe doubtless ate it as Martha\'s spouse will eat of this, from a bowl set flat \nupon the earth. The family gather about it, cross-legged, or, as one traveler puts \nit\xe2\x80\x94 "sitting upon nothing, as only Orientals can sit." Each tears off a bit of \nleathery crust from a round cake of bread, dips it deftly into the pottage, securing \nenough to envelope in the folded scrap of crust, which is thus conveyed to the \nmouth. As a fresh bit of bread is used each time the "sop" is dipped, the \n4 \n\n\n\n5\xc2\xb0 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nmethod is not unclean-provided always that the eater\'s fingers are clean. In \nview of the scarcity of water in the land, and the absenee of towels, not to mention \nthe various uses to which bowls are put, we do not inquire wisely when we give \nthis point too much consideration. m \n\nTo-morrow, Martha may serve a stew of potatoes, flavored with onions and \nunctuous with grease. After the custom of the peasantry of all countries, the \nlower classes of Northern and Southern Syria are inordinately fond of fat and \nsweets Potatoes, although introduced into Syria by missionaries, less than a \ncentury ago, have taken kindly to the soil and are a favorite dish. Or, she may \npull up a cabbage from the plot of garden behind her hut, or buy it from a neigh- \nbor Chopped cabbage, rice and onions, shining with fat, are not to be despised. \nThere is also what we classify as a species of vegetable marrow, but shaped more \n\nlike a cucumber, that, when shred into the \npot, reminds us of the great vessel Elisha \nordered his servant to \' \'set on and seethe \nthe pottage for the sons of the prophets." \n\n"And one went out into the field to \ngather herbs, and found a wild vine, and \ngathered thereof wild gourds his lapful and \nshred them into the pot of pottage; for they \nknew them not. \n\nRice is cooked far better by Martha than \nby a majority of professional cooks with us. \nEvery grain stands up for itself, and is fur- \nther encouraged to independence by a coat- \ning of olive oil or some kind of gravy. \nSeasoned with onion, and made more pleasing to the eye by bits of minced tomato, \nit is palatable and nourishing. \n\nThe hostess stands aside, and bows, raising her hand to her forehead, then \nlaying it npon her heart, inviting ns to pass into her dwelling before her. The \nJter walls of heavy stones are laid in snn-dried clay, with which the inner walls \nb olted. The flat roof is snpported by rongh boards laid from side to \nUpon these is a layer of sticks and straw, and over these earth is spread to the \nSh of eight or ten inches, and beaten or rolled flat. As the winter rains come \non, the covering of the honse mnst be freqnently-sometimes daily-inspected. A \ncrack soon widens into a fissure. \\, a \xe2\x80\x9eA a tliP \n\n\xe2\x80\xa2\xe2\x80\xa2By slothfulness the roof sinketh in, and through idleness of the hands, the \n\nh \xc2\xb0 U Tlf continual dropping in a rainy day is of muddy water, and I the house \nhold is fortunate if the whole superstructure of mud, twigs and boards does not \n\n\n\n\nBREAD-MAKING. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OE THE BIBLE. 51 \n\ngive way and overwhelm them, or drive them out into the windy storm and \ntempest. \n\nOui Martha is notable in her generation, and evidently expects us to admire \nthe proofs of the quality offered by the interior of her abode. To appreciate her \ningenuity, I must remark that the flooring of clay mixed with chopped straw or \nstubble is kneaded and spread by the women themselves, and that they keep the \ninner walls in repair by daubing them with the same mixture. When the floor is \nbadly broken, or very foul from use, the house-wife cleans house by kneading a \nfresh supply of this untempered mortar and besmearing it anew. Martha has \ninvented a process of combining her mortar with gum gathered laboriously from \nmountain-trees, which imparts a gloss to walls and floor. She has likewise \nsmoothed the cement with a board instead of contenting herself with patting it \nlevel with hands and feet. The only attempt at decoration we have seen in the \nhouses of the Eastern peasants is prominent in the ten-by-ten room in which we \nnow stand. It is Martha\'s masterpiece and must be duly admired if one desires \nto secure a reputation for taste in the fine aris. Right in the middle of the room \n(which is the house) is a rude pillar, about as thick and high as a five o\'clock tea- \ntable, constructed of red clay hardened by gum, and really resembling red stone. \n\nBesides the door there are two small windows upon opposite sides of the apart- \nment. The dead- wall facing us as we enter is the family store-room. The place \nof honor is given to the barrel of family flour (meal) . Upon the top is the knead- \ning-trough, or pan, in which the dough is mixed and set to rise. A hole near the \nbottom of the barrel lets out the meal when it is needed for use, and is then plugged \nup with a rag. The sight corrects our pre-conceived ideas of the widow of Sar- \nepta\'s mode of getting the day\'s supply from her exhaustless barrel. We who \nhave pictured her as leaning far over the edge, scraping up the flour from the \nechoing bottom, have lost the beauty and the significance of the miracle. The \ndaily dole came from above, as will be seen, and she had no means of estimating \nhow much or how little was left in the barrel, as she drove the plug back into \nplace. \n\nThe cruse of oil, by a pleasant coincidence, not of our contrivance, is near by \non the floor, full-bodied and narrow-necked. If faithless, the widow might peer, \nbut unsuccessfully, to guess how long she might depend upon the contents remain- \ning in the bottom. \n\nI cannot leave the widow of Sarepta without relating a little incident that \ncame to me the other day. A party of travelers and missionaries visiting Sarepta \nfrom Sidon on Thanksgiving day saw, just without what was once the gate of the \ncity, "a woman gathering of sticks " to make a fire. \n\nThe commonest event of the lowliest life in this country, so strange and yet \nso familiar to the Bible student, is an expressive commentary upon the Scriptures. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE- \n\nAs when before coming indoors, Martha, perceiving that the fire of coals under \n\nfhetndiitwas nearly ont, hastily rolled a bunch of dried grass into a w.sp, \n\ntnrust it under the kettle, and as it smoked, persuasively blew it into a flame, \ntnrnst it under^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ and to . morrow 1S \n\ncast into the oven." \n\n" ^mokino- flax shall he not quench.\' \n\nBut to our store-room ;-Strings of onions and peppers hang from the .ceiling; \n^ TTpr ronsin of Bethany would hasten to unroll a mat or rug tor us to stanu \n\nbtth, American \xe2\x80\x9ey *c,ri\xe2\x80\x9e n , p\xc2\xab= ^"l^S y ^ Z S\xc2\xab \n\n...ce-with the ease aeqni.ed by ye.ra of practice, I more <\xc2\xbb\xc2\xbb>\xc2\xb0"\xc2\xbb\xc2\xb0 \xc2\xbb \n\nf t\xc2\xab g \xe2\x80\x9e \xe2\x80\x9e,, rcW of visit, \xc2\xab.,. \xc2\xbb., =\xc2\xabgt.~l \xc2\xbb \xc2\xb0\' > J* , C "*\xe2\x84\xa2 he \n\nabiding-place for the rest of her natural life. On ^ >^ es \xc2\xa3 1 \xc2\xa3arth \nwide shelf of unplaned boards, elevated upon sticks about \n\n^ichisthefloor^ ^^^^^^^J^^ \ntwo breadths of cotton cloth run together at the edges \n\ncotton, or cloth, or rags, to the thickness of an inch or so. J 1 ^ \nthe would-be sleeper will lie to-night when it is unfokied ove ^ the ^floor, \nanother he or she will be covered, the nigh s being chilly at thi ^ ~ as \nmo ther and five children will rest "P*"**^ \n\nthey can be put, and having known no ^^Z ising from seven pairs \nof the unyielding floor, the low ceiling and the stumness aris g \nof togs a\'nd sevL unwashen bodies. Windows \n\nnight-air is believed to be unwholesome. Martha would al so ask m gr \nment when she hears of the daily baths of her pale-faced visitors, if they \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n53 \n\n\n\nafraid of making themselves ill by so much washing?" She is neat and notable \naccording to her lights, but illumination has never struck athwart the, to us, vital \nquestion of much soap and more water. \n\nBefore judging her, I recall the reply made to me once by a New York woman \nwho has thrown talents, energy \xe2\x80\x94 all that make up and abound in her grand per- \nsonality \xe2\x80\x94 into the work of elevating working- women to a higher plane of thought \nand living. \n\n"They might at least make themselves \'skin-clean,\' " I heard said, "even \nif they have not time for keeping their poor rooms tidy. Bathing costs little." \n\n"You might change your mind if you had to perform your ablutions in a \nquart of water, brought by hand \xe2\x80\x94 and a very \ntired hand ! \xe2\x80\x94 up four nights of rickety stairs, \' \' \nretorted the practical philanthropist. \n\nEvery drop of the water used in Mar- \ntha\'s household is brought from the foun- \ntain in the village at the foot of the hill, and \nbrought upon her shoulder in a huge jar of \nbaked clay. The recreation she derives from \ngossip, friendly or mischievous, with other \nburden- bearers who there do congregate, \nhardly offsets the bodily fatigue of trudging \nup the steep and stony path. Her husband \nstays his labor in the threshing-floor and, \nleaning upon the " fan " in his hand, throws \nher a kindly word as she passes, the drip \nfrom the water- pot mingling with the sweat \nof her face. He is a model spouse, as Mos- \nlem spouses go, but he would no sooner \nthink of offering to run up the hill with her \nload than Eleazar of Damascus thought of forestalling Rebekah in her hospitable \ntask of "watering all his camels," after she had letdown her pitcher from her \nshoulder and given him to drink. \n\nAs for her boys, she spoils them from the beginning, teaching them by \nobject-lessons, if not by precept, the inferiority of her sex to theirs. Sooner \nthan degrade them to the position of drawers of water, she would fetch and carry \nevery hour of every day of all the days of her life. In due course of time they \nwill marry and each bring his child-wife home for at least one year to be drilled \nin housework by her mother-in-law. Martha will get her "innings" then, and \nlives in hope of this consummation. \n\nTo-morrow morning, she will hustle the laggards out of bed and out-of-doors, \n\n\n\n\nBROUGHT UPON HER SHOUI/DER. \n\n\n\n54 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nthat she may roll up the beds and pack them upon the shelf. The cushions keep \nthem company except when a visitor drops in, and besides these, there is abso- \nlutely no furniture in the house \xe2\x80\x94 neither table nor chair, nor a stool, nor anything \nbearing the faintest resemblance to a chest of drawers. The family wardrobe is \nupon their backs. If there are extra garments they are in sundry uncouth bundles \nand a couple of rough boxes tucked under a broad shelf and among the bedding. \nHer pots and kettles, jars and bowls, compose the \' \' plenishing \' \' of the home. \n\n" But when it rains, \' \' I ask, \' \' where is the cooking done then ? \' \' \n\nMartha brings out a misshapen utensil of clay baked in the coals, which is \nenough like the braziers in use by tinkers and solderers to make it recognizable as \na receptacle for fire. She explains how this is set upon the pillar in the middle of \nthe floor, a fire built within it, and what could be more satisfactory ? \n\n\' \' Where does the smoke go ? " \n\nA gesture replies \xe2\x80\x94 " Anywhere !" \n\n" And the children, who cannot run out of doors in the rain ?" \nShe admits that they are troublesome in such circumstances, but it is the will \nof God that the rain falls, and she must make the best of it \n\nI think of the five restless little beings, wild as hawks and wayward as the \nwind, and the curling smoke under the low rafters, and the dampened roof making \ndark the interior, and find the only light in the picture in the \nreflection that real winter and Syrian rains \xe2\x80\x94 violent deluges as I \nknow them to be \xe2\x80\x94 last, as a rule, but two months a year. \n\nShe will have few of the morning tasks to perform that render \nthe day-dawning a bugbear to Occidental house-wives. \nWhen the mats are stowed away, a cup of coffee made \nfor her husband and the children served with a cake of \ntough bread apiece, to be devoured when and where they \nplease, the day may be said to be fairly upon its feet. Her \nhusband has carried his luncheon to the field with him ; \nthe children will be nibbling all day long, but there will \nbe no noon-day meal spread or cooked. It is surprising, \nby the way, what an amount of various trash those childish \nstomachs try to dispose of during the day. Besides the \nleathery cakes that are the chief of their diet, there are radishes in abundance \n\nbig, juicy roots \xe2\x80\x94 to be had for the pulling out of the ground, and raw turnips, \n\nand onions, and salads, and such homely sweets as the mother compounds. They \nrun about with slices of cold, boiled beets in grimy fingers, devouring them as \ngreedily as if they were candy, and chew and suck bits of purple sugar-cane, and there \nis a tall jar of \' \' dips, \' \' \xe2\x80\x94 i. e. , grape-juice, boiled down to the consistency of treacle- \nin the corner of the house, to which resort is made when the mother\'s back is turned. \n\n\n\n\nIN THE THRESHING- \nFLOOR. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n55 \n\n\n\nCandidly, we cannot see what Martha can find to keep her as busy all day \nlong as she assures us she is. That she believes herself overworked is evinced by \nthe worried plaits between her eyes, as deep as the furrows plowed by ceaseless \ntoil and care in the forehead of a New England farmeress. Yet this is the easy \nseason among the dwellers upon Lebanon slopes, for the silk-worm work is over \nfor the year, and the eggs that are to be hatched next spring are simply done up \nin bags and hung up in the church over yonder \xe2\x80\x94 less out of custom or superstition \nthan because the eggs must be kept at an even temperature, and out of the chil- \ndren\'s way. For these ends there is no safer place than the church. All the \nneighbors thus utilize the sacred place, and the priest raises no objection. Martha \ndoes not know how she could "\xe2\x96\xa0 > \n\npay the rent of her house and \nkeep the children clothed, but \nfor the blessed worms. From \nthe beginning of the season, \nwhen the eggs are disposed \nupon boards and hurdles in \nthe hut, to the day when the \nlast cocoon is completed, the \nfamily dwell in booths out- \nof-doors, leaving the quiet \ndwelling to the voracious \nfeeders upon the mulberry < \nleaves gathered fresh daily \nfor them. They eat the whole \nof the first crop; a second \nputs forth for the sheep. \n\nThis last word is in the \n\nsingular number in more " IT is quiescent under treatment." \n\nthan one sense of the adjec- \ntive, as our illustration will show. The oldest girl of the humble home has her \nhands full for some hours of each day in collecting food and literally stuffing it \ndown the throat of the animal. It is tied, and could not get away if it would. \nIt soon ceases to frisk and tug at the cord, and is as quiescent under treatment as \nthe Strasbourg goose whose feet are fast to a board, and whose liver distends abnor- \nmally in the attempt to digest the matter with which it is surfeited. The sheep \nbelongs to a breed that has very broad tails. As he becomes first plump, then fat, \nthen so unwieldy that he can hardly breathe, and does not offer to move, the tail \ngrows to an enormous size, often weighing from thirty to forty pounds. To the \nday of his death, which must be a relief to the ponderous body, the stuffing is kept \n\n\n\n\n5& \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE* \n\n\n\ntip, and he must have consumed many times his weight in mulberry leaves. The \nhorrified beholder marvels within his disgusted soul if the creature could not be spun \ninto silk as well as the worms, which are monsters of gluttonness and corpulency. \n\nOf the skin, with the fleece on, Martha has made, about every fifth year, a coat \nfor her husband,\' who sometimes has work further up the mountain in winter. If \n\nthis be not worn out, \nshe finds a ready mar- \nket for wool and hide. \nEvery morsel of the \nprecious fat is treas- \nured, \' \' tried out, \' \' and \nclarified, then poured \ninto jars to harden, \nand used during the \nwinter as butter. Few \ncows are kept by the \npeasants in the coun- \ntry, none in towns. \nWhen milk must be \ni had, they get it from \ngoats, or buy from bet- \nter-off neighbors. All \nclasses are fond of \nwhat is called " leb- \nben," which is noth- \ning more or less than \nloppered milk, \n\' \' turned \' \' into firm \nblanc-mange-like con- \nsistency by adding to \n" her turf-roofed hut." sour milk a \' \' lebben \n\nleft over from the previous day. This makes the delicacy more sharply acid than \nour loppered milk, or "bonny clabber," as the Southerners name it. I have seen \n\xc2\xab < lebben " passed with a dish of rice and meat at a hotel table, and eaten from the \nsame plate as we would a vegetable or sauce. \n\nThe bones and meat of the valuable sheep are boiled until the flesh slips \noff easily, when it is cut into small pieces, seasoned well and packed into jars. \nMelted suet is \'/flowed" over the surface, and the jars are set in a cool, dry \nplace. Except when a chicken is killed upon some great holiday, the family have \nno other meat than this as long as it lasts. \n\n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n57 \n\n\n\nMartha reckons fat of whatever kind as more valuable than lean meat, and, \nnext to olive oil, the stored suet from her fatted sheep as most desirable. It is, \nreally, sweeter and more delicate than could be imagined of " mutton- tallow," and \nshould not be confounded with it. \n\nI have rated the thirty-two cents a day which represent the earnings of the \nhead of this Syrian house as equal to a dollar-and-a-quarter or a dollar-and-a-half \nin United States currency. I am told by trustworthy authorities that this is a fair \nstatement in view of the wide disparity between the customs of the two countries, \nas well as between the needs of the poorer classes here and in America. Martha \ndoes not need to lay in coal or wood, or to keep up fires night and day. Charcoal \nis cheap; sticks may be had for the gathering, and in the lower countries dried \ncamels\' -manure is sold at a trifling cost in the markets for fuel. The boys need \nno flannels, the girls no shoes, no bonnets or caps, there are no Sunday clothes, \nno bedsteads, bureaux, washstands, chairs, or even tables. \n\nTea is an unknown luxury, and when she uses coffee, it is of the commonest \nsort. There is no striving to keep up appearances. So long as she lives as well \nas her fore-mothers and her acquaintances, and a little better than the majority of \nthe last-named, she is content. Her world, to our eyes, may be typified by the \ncompass of her turf-roofed hut, but it is all the world she knows, or is likely to \nknow. \n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV. \n\n\n\nAN AFTERNOON CALL. \n\n\n\n\xe2\x80\x94 9 AVING due regard to the proprieties it is, perhaps, well that I should \n\nnot state in which of the larger cities we have visited in Palestine and \nI \xe2\x80\xa2 northern Syria I availed myself of the invitation through a friend to \nJL_ C pay my respects to the wife of a wealthy citizen. In our wanderings \nwe have come upon Boston, New York and Chicago newspapers in such unlikely \nplaces that we have grown timid in the use of the names of persons and well- \nknown localities. Some people on this side of the Mediterranean (and on the \nthither side of the Atlantic) like to be written up. The sight of one\'s name m \nprint infuses a grateful glow through the moral and mental system and titil ates \nthe self-love which is the one mighty common attribute of humankind from pole to \npole Others shrink honestly from printed publicity, as from the touch of red-hot \niron, even if the notice be laudatory. Nobody-and this is a rule without excep- \ntion\xe2\x80\x94enjoys being made ridiculous in the sight of friends or strangers. \n\nIn view of these things, the sketch of this one of my visits, if I would report \neverything as it happened, must go forth undated as to time and place. \n\nWe were set down by our coachman at the mouth of a long, rather narrow \npassage or court, paved with rough stones, and neither light nor clean. In the \nUnited States, we should have considered it an unpromising entrance to a factory \nor warehouse. As the introduction to the abode of one who counts his wealth by \nmillions of dollars, it was simply inexplicable to the mind of the average traveler \nfrom the sunset land. As strange seemed the four flights of stone stairs we climbed \nto reach the drawing-rooms. They were not even marble steps up which we toiled \npantingly but of the yellowish freestone in general use here for the better class \nof buildings. Staircases borrow new horrors (to those who have left youth and \nlength of wind behind them) from the height of Oriental ceilings. It is not \nunusual to find these in private residences from twenty to twenty-five feet high, \nand each staircase conducting to the floor above is double and mercifully broken \nby a landing. Upon these landings we paused to gather breath and heart, until \nwe beheld at the head of the eighth half-flight a maid in jacket and short skirt, a \nveil pinned over her black hair, awaiting us. Taking the right hand of each of \nus in turn with both of hers, and courtesying so deeply that one knee must have \ntouched the floor, she raised the back of the hand, first to her lips, then to her \n\n(58) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n61 \n\n\n\nforehead, lastly to ner heart, and stepping back as she arose, motioned us to pre- \ncede her into an open door. A few steps within the threshold of a spacious draw* \ning-room we were met by the mistress of the house. She is a Circassian, married \nto a Turkish gentleman, and still bears traces of unusual beauty in her clearly- \nmolded features, dark eyes and sweet smile. Her attire was a disappointment. \nI had expected Oriental magnificence and found Parisian simplicity in a pale-pink \ngown, trimmed modestly with native lace. Except that her wrists were loaded \nwith bracelets and that the brooch at her throat was a superb emerald, the largest \nI ever saw, surrounded by diamonds, I should have sought vainly for tokens of \nher nationality and her husband\'s wealth. She greeted us cordially, shaking \nhands as an Englishwoman might, and led us through the outermost and largest \nroom of the suite to a smaller, where she waved us to arm-chairs. Two little girls, \neight and ten years of age, were their mother\'s aides in making us welcome. \nEach bent her pretty head to kiss our hands, and each, unbidden unless by the \nmother\'s eye, hastened to fetch stools for our feet before withdrawing into the \nbackground. \n\nI could speak no Arabic : our hostess neither English nor French. We carried \non a sort of three-cornered conversation that would have been droll enough to a \nlistener, the trite nothings of polite society losing what little flavor they might \nliave had at first hand (or mouth) in filtering from English into Arabic and back \nfrom Arabic to me in English. \n\nMy initial observation that the afternoon had become suddenly warm was \nmade in French under the impression that the handsome Circassian understood \nthat tongue, and at her inquiring look, had to be " done" into English that the \ninterpreter might get hold of it. It was irresistibty funny, but we three kept \nstraight faces and proceeded to pelt one another with cut-and-dried figures of \nspeech, the little daughters regarding us with wide, grave e3\'es, and a maid, a \nstraight, dark-eyed woman, a striking figure, standing in the arched doorway of \nthe third drawing-room, never removed her gaze from the hands of her mistress. \nShe had slipped off her sandals upon entering the parlor, and stood now in her \nwhite-stockinged feet upon the carpet. \n\nThis carpet was another and a sharp disappointment. It was costly in mate- \nrial, but for pattern might have been selected by a rich vulgarian in Cincinnati or \nDenver. With the vision before me of certain Persian and Turkish rugs I had \nseen that day in a city bazaar, the soft harmony of whose colors was a dream of \nartistic perfection, I resented the glaring flowers ramping over about four hundred \nyards of white ground. Chairs and sofas from a Parisian upholsterer were pushed \nstiffly against the walls; satin curtains from the same establishment hung at the \ndozen windows. The bare walls were the only evidence of Moslem occupation of \nthe vast rooms. \n\n\n\n62 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nI was beginning to weary of tasteless splendor that had in it hardly a touch \nof the Oriental element, when another maid, putting off her sandals at the entrance, \nushered in two more visitors. They were introduced to us in due form as the wife \nand mother of the highest Turkish official in the city, and were evidently person- \nages of importance. It presently transpired that they were to remain to dinner. \nThat meal would be served at six o\'clock, and it was now a little after four. \nThree maids removed the new visitors\' hoods and wraps, and the wife of the Pasha \naccepted an arm-chair. Not so with her mother-in-law. Parisian innovations \nmight catch the fancy of the younger generation, and turn aside the very elect \nfrom time-honored customs. She would none of them. A couple of maids has- \ntened under the mistress\'s direction to heap in one corner four red satin cushions, \nand, when the old woman had crossed her legs upon them, to place other cushions \nat her back. Thus established, she sighed satisfiedly and smiled around the room. \nShe supplied the \' \' Oriental element \' \' for which I had longed ! \n\nAnswering the smile and nod bestowed upon me when she learned that I had \nmade a three weeks\' journey to see her, I took a mental photograph of her as \nMoslem and as mother-in-law. The East is the paradise of mothers-in-law, as I \nshall further demonstrate some day, and this particular specimen of a well-abused \nclass magnified her office. It was plain that she considered herself the most impor- \ntant personage in the room. Her daughter-in-law was languid and looked sickly. \nHer sallow complexion showed to disadvantage against a Parisian gown of tan- \ncolored stuff, with a vest of creamy silk; her heavy bracelets hung upon her lean \nwrists like handcuffs; her head was bare, and her hair negligently arranged. \nAfter her mother-in-law had interrupted her several times in the middle of a \nremark indolently uttered in the Turkish dialect, she became silent, leaned back \nin her arm-chair and lighted a cigarette. A silver stand of cigarettes and matches \nwas brought in just before her arrival. \n\nThe " Oriental element" was clad in yellow silk trousers, white silk stock- \nings and yellow slippers, as her attitude allowed us ample opportunities for observ- \ning. Above these was a long shapeless sacque of fawn-colored silk, quilted in \nperpendicular rows. If she had selected color and pattern with an eye to heighten- \ning her native homeliness, her success was perfect. The sacque was large in the \nneck and revealed the dingy wrinkles of the throat. A big diamond on one hand \nand a ruby upon the other called attention to the thick, yellowish fingers, when \nshe clasped her hands below one knee and swayed gently back and forth. Her \nhead was bound about with a white turban, or loose cap, below which escaped \nstray gray locks; she had but three teeth, and her lower lip hung loosely. I could \ncompare her to nothing but the hag of childish nightmares and the wicked fairy \nof folk-lore. Yet she laughed benevolently when the pretty little girls approached \nher and bowed to kiss her veinous hand, and patted them on the head, muttering \nwhat sounded like an incantation, and was probably a blessing. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n63 \n\n\n\nSmall gilded tables were now brought in, and upon them were set in array a \nSevres tea-service, and silver baskets of biscuits and cakes. The hostess poured \nout the tea, through a silver tea-strainer \xe2\x80\x94 precisely as an American woman serves \nit on her \' \' At Home \' \' afternoon ; the maids passed the refreshments to the guests. \nThe \' \' Oriental element \' \' refused the foreign beverage with an imperious wave of \nthe hand, and looked on rebukingly. \n\nBut the oddest performance was still in store for my unaccustomed eyes. As \nthe bell in a neighboring tower struck five, the old lady scrambled to her feet like \na cat, and without uttering a word, waddled into the third room of the suite. \nThe black-eyed maid who stood, statue-like, in the doorway, followed her, and the \nhostess, with no sign of surprise, excused herself to us with a slight bend of the \nhead, and went, as we supposed, to see what it all meant. In my Western igno- \nrance, I supposed that the \' \' Oriental element \' \' meditated a nap upon the luxu- \nrious divan visible through the wide arch, and when the maid dragged out a rug \nfrom beneath the cushioned lounge, was puzzled by seeing her lay it in the exact \nmiddle of the apartment. The hostess now produced from the drawer of a cabinet \na long white scarf of some thin tissue, and offered it to the " Oriental element." \nStepping upon the oblong bit of carpeting which I now saw was what buyers of \neastern stuffs know as a " prayer- rug, \' \' the crone wrapped the scarf over her head \nand across her forehead and chin, after the manner of a veil, and folding her \nhands, first upon her chest, then upon her forehead, raised them and her eyes \ntoward the ceiling. \n\nThe maid resumed her station in the doorway, her dark face as immobile as \nthe Egyptian Sphinx, her eyes again directed to the hands of her mistress, who \ncame back to us, saying tranquilly in Arabic: \n\n" Madame wishes to pray !" \n\nI bent my head involuntarily, feeling and courtesy dictating some token of \nrespect to an act of devotion, but the daughter-in-law took a fresh cigarette and a \nhandful of sweets from a basket near by, and with the air of one temporarily \nrelieved from an irksome presence, began a lively chat with the lady of the house, \ninto which my friend and interpreter was speedily drawn. While the talk pro- \nceeded, I watched furtively, but closely, the proceedings in the adjoining room. \nIt was one of the five times a day in which the devout Moslem must pray with his \nface toward Mecca. I have been informed since that it is unusual to see a woman \nMoslem at her devotions, although in this part of Syria the faithful of the other \nsex drop spade, trowel, paint-brush, chisel, awl, plow, even knife and fork, at \nthe appointed season and prostrate themselves as commanded by the Koran. But \nthis particular specimen of the "Oriental element," obviously differing from St. \nPaul as to the profitableness of bodily exercise, went through the various stages \nof her orisons with a swing and energy worthy of the most stalwart follower of the \n\n\n\n6 4 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nProphet. She bowed seven times toward the holy city, at an angle her apparent \ninfirmity would seem to make impossible; she lifted eyes and clasped hands times \nwithout number, and finally went down upon her knees on the prayer-rug, and \nbumped her head hard upon the spot indicated by the pattern as the proper and \nedifying point where the faithful forehead should strike. She was still in this atti- \ntude, her covered head rising and falling with the regularity of an automatic toy, \nwhen we took our leave. The performance, so extraordinary to us, was of no \nmoment whatever to her fellow-religionists. Their gossip went on more smoothly \nfor her absence; their voices were not lowered by so much as a semi-tone. Unless \ndeafened by religious ecstasy, she must have heard every word. The hostess \noffered no excuse or explanation. Attending us to the outer door of the drawing- \nroom, she thanked us for the honor we had done her by calling, and hoped that we \nwould repeat our visit, then went back to the Pasha-ess, who was helping herself \nto a third cigarette. The little daughters kissed our hands, and raised them to \ntheir foreheads, the three maids courtesied low to us from their several stations; \nour last glimpse of the \' \' Oriental element \' \' showed her still prostrate, and still \nsmiting the prescribed spot of the prayer-rug with her forehead. \n\nThe fair Circassian is her husband\'s only wife, and they have, as we have \nseen, advanced ideas upon the subject of housekeeping and the entertainment of \nvisitors. Their daughters have a governess \xe2\x80\x94 a Parisian \xe2\x80\x94 and the sons a tutor. \nBut with the exception of her husband, not a man enters her presence. There \nwas a queer sensation in sitting in social converse with three women whose lives \nwere so rigorously divided from what, in our own land, brings variety and spirit \ninto homes and society \xe2\x80\x94 the frank and gracious association of the sexes. \n\nWoman may be said to supply the sugar- and- water at such entertainments, \nand some people, notably the French, enjoy \' \' eau sucre." The American palate \xe2\x80\x94 \nand constitution \xe2\x80\x94 give the preference to lemonade. \n\n\n\nCHAPTER V. \n\n\n\nA SYRIAN BABY. \n\nGHRKB months before our call the news that a birth was impending \ndrew about the one-roomed hut in which parents and three children \nalready lived, a crowd of friendly neighbors. Outside, the men \nsmoked and talked, with the father to while away the period of \nsuspense. Within, their wives thronged the chamber to suffocation, also smoking \nand talking, all at once. The mother lay upon a mat at the far side of the floor, \nwith just enough room between her and the wall to allow the passage of the \nloudly-officious matrons who hovered about her. \n\nDr. William Gray Schauffler, the beloved physician to many natives in Beirut, \nonce told me how he had charged into the midst of such a rabble, upon being \ncalled to take charge of " a dangerous case." \n\n" There were fifty women in a twelve-by-twelve room," he said. "The air \nwas stifling; the hubbub indescribable. I wasted no words. Two strong sentences \nin Arabic, with gestures to match, sent them scurrying to the door, and I could at \nleast see the patient. " \n\nWhen the sex of our particular baby was reluctantly announced, there was a \ngeneral falling away of solicitous friends. A dead silence followed the unwelcome \nphrase\xe2\x80\x94 accentuated, presently, by the groans of the nearest of feminine kindred \nand the sobs of the poor mother. The men emptied their pipes upon the ground \nand stalked off, mercifully forbearing to look at the father, disgraced by the \nappearance of still another daughter. \n\nThe women departed in like manner, without speaking to him, or to his \nwife. Often the husband approaches the mat upon which the unhappy woman is \nleft alone with her new-born child, and scolds her vehemently for the disappoint- \nment she has caused him. Sometimes he actually strikes her in his fury. My \nguide told me of one instance that had come under her personal observation in which \nthe mother had beaten her head and breast with her fists in a frenzied attempt to \ncommit suicide. Life under the shame that had come to her was insupportable. \n\nHad our baby been a boy, a turmoil of congratulations would have ensued \nupon the proclamation at the door of the hut. The happy father would have been \nembraced with tears of joy by his comrades, drums would have been beaten and \n5 (65) \n\n\n\n66 THE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\ntrumpets blown, and such humble gifts as the poor can make to one ^ \nS to the mother, already overwhelmed by the caresses and praises of her gossipy \n\xc2\xa3e\\truAer upon a domestic circle and community thus organized had \nhad few visitors and no presents when we made our call. \n\n\xe2\x96\xa0i \n\n\n\n\nA SYRIAN MOTHER AND HER CHII.D. \n\n\xc2\xab I wish," said an indignant woman-missionary, \' \' that not another girl would \nbe bom to you Syrians for half a century, that you might know the real value of \nwoman in the world !" \n\n\n\nthe: home of the bible. \n\n\n\n67 \n\n\n\nThe cradle of roughly-cut, unpainted wood stood in the middle of the floor. \nUpon slats nailed over the tall rockers was tacked a mattress stuffed with straw. \nDirectly upon this, the child, clad in a single calico garment, was strapped by \nmeans of strips of cotton cloth, six inches in width, attached to the framework of \nthe cradle. The only pillow was placed exactly beneath the shoulder-blades, the \nhead sagging forlornly upon the lower level of the mattress. The baby\'s arms \nwere laid close to its sides, its legs were stretched as straight as though the bed \nwere its coffin; a sort of " duvet " \xe2\x80\x94 or quilt \xe2\x80\x94 was spread above it, and over all the \nstraps were passed, smooth and level, under the slats and up again on the other \nside, to be tied with tape strings to a rude framework above the head of the tiny \nmummy. She could not stir finger or foot, or roll over by so much as a quarter- \ninch of space. When she cried, the mother knelt upon the floor and nursed her. \n\n\'\'She does not like it \xe2\x80\x94 no !" she answered, smiling at the query whether or \nnot the baby relished the strapping process. \n\nNevertheless, whenever the small prisoner cries, it is assumed that she is \nhungry and whatever the mother is doing, she leaves everything to feed her. The \ncustom of regular meal-time practiced by most intelligent mothers and nurses in \nAmerica and England is considered barbarous. \n\n\' \' But it may be that the mothers in those countries do not pity the poor little \nthings as we do?" said our hostess, tentative, but courteous, as she responded for \nthe third time within half- an -hour to her nurseling\'s fretful appeal. \n\nIt stopped whining when she lifted it to display the construction of the \ncradle and the mysteries of the long strips of cloth, depositing the late occu- \npant upon the mat beside her. The brown legs were kicked eagerly into \nthe air, the arms tossed wildly in true baby-style, and the gurgling coo which \nis the natural language of infantile humanity the world around testified to its \nrelief and pleasure. A four-year-old sister laughed gleefully in reply, and grab- \nbing the baby, hitched it up to her hip in Syrian fashion, the tiny head wobbling: \nfrightfully. \n\n"She will surely drop it !" gasped I, with a glance at the pitiless floor, a \nconcrete of clay and stones. \n\nThe mother smiled; the interpreter reassured me. \n\n\' \' Oh ! the older children carry the babies \xe2\x80\x94 when they are carried \xe2\x80\x94 from \ntheir birth, even when just able to toddle about themselves. She has probably \nhad that little one in her arms four or five times a day, ever since it was born. \nThe boys never touch them, of course. The girls are burden-bearers from the \nfirst." \n\nThe baby\'s head was already one-sided, the soft skull yielding readily to the \npressure of the straw mattress. For twenty hours out of twenty-four it is bound \ndown in the way I have described, and as the mother always kneels on the \n\n\n\n\n\n68 THE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\nright-hand side of the eradle to nurse it, the head is habitually turned in that \nThere is hardly one well-shaped skull among the hundreds of Syrian boys \n\n\n\nThey wear the fez \nindoors and out. \nWhen it is removed \nthe deformity is \nseen." \n\nIf the effect of \nthe much-dreaded \nevil eye be, as is sup- \nposed, a mysterious \nwasting away of flesh \nand loss of vigor, \nsome former visitor \nmay have exercised \n\n\': \' it upon another wee \n\ncreature in a swing- \ning cot. She was so \nfragile in frame, so \nethereal in her pale \nprettiness, that I \nasked out of the full- \nness of common- \nsensible experience \nand observation \nupon what diet she \nwas fed. \n\n" She is not yet \nweaned," was the \nunexpected answer, \n\n^hT^iri^s are burden-bearers erom the eirst. -but she eats any- \n\nlaid zzzsz "irr^r* se * u \xe2\x80\x94 - - \xe2\x80\x94 \n\n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n69 \n\n\n\nsmile. Her dress consisted of pink calico trousers, very wide and full, a short \njacket of the same material, of a deeper red, and a veil of coarse white cotton, \npinned tightly around her forehead and falling down her back. The sale of red \ncalico of every conceivable shade must be immense in this country, almost as \nlarge as that of the blue cloth of which the men\'s jackets and trousers are made. \nWhile we chatted of the baby, a third was brought upon the scene, of course in \nthe arms of an older sister. Few of the babies I have seen are plump, and fewer \nare robust with the rollicking elasticity of muscle and joints manifest in healthy \nAmerican babies. Yet the much-decried \' \' state of artificial civilization " is as far \nremoved from them as if they were creatures of a different genus from our rosy, \nwell-fed darlings. Those who advocate bringing up children in absolute obedience \nto natural laws and instincts would have few suggestions to offer to the Syrian \nmother, except in the matter of binding her baby in the cradle. As soon as he can \ncreep, he is tossed upon the bosom of Mother Earth, and left to "hustle" for \nhimself among his fellows. When drowsy, he crawls into a corner and goes to \nsleep like a little brown dog; if hungry, he eats whatever comes within reach of \nhis dirty hands that commends itself to his judgment as possibly eatable. At \nnight, he huddles down, in the one garment he has worn all day, close to brothers \nand sisters, to gain warmth through me sunless hours from their bodies. \n\nWhen his mother is in a good humor she strokes and pats him and flings a fig \nor morsel of sweet cake to him; when she is busy, she kicks him out of her path; \nwhen angry\xe2\x80\x94 and this is often with the ignorant, untrained woman who was \nmarried ai twelve years of age\xe2\x80\x94 she takes a stick to him and swears volubly, \ncursing the day in which he was born and invoking the vengeance of heaven upon \nhis undutiful soul. The immature soul that, in this state of nature and natural \ndevelopment, gets even less washing than his body ! \n\n"How clean your baby looks !" said my guide to the mother of still another \nbaby. \n\nIt was a boy, and almost the only infant w T e had seen whose skin was clear \nand whose hair had the appearance of growing upon a healthy scalp. The proud \nparent showed her white teeth in a gleam of childish gratification. \n\n"Yes! He should be clean. He had his first bath to-day. He is four \nmonths old, quite old enough to be taken to the baths." \n\nHome washing is an unknown luxury. Four times in a year, parents and \nchildren treat themselves to a plunge at the public baths, where a cleansing \ncan be had for an absurdly small sum. For three months thereafter, soap and \ntowels, comb and brush\xe2\x80\x94 belonging to the "state of artificial civilization "\xe2\x80\x94have \nno place in the unsophisticated household. While we still sat about the swinging \ncradle, the rush of naked feet was heard, and three little girls from five to ten \nyears of age halted upon the threshold at sight of the clean new matting the \n\n\n\n70 THE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\nmother had unrolled at our entrance, and, one after the other, stepped into an \nearthen bowl of dirty water, standing outside, dabbled their toes in it, rubbed one \nbare foot hastily over the other and entered. They left wet tracks upon the \nuncovered strip of concrete flooring, and muddy marks upon the " company " \nmatting but complacent in the conviction that they had done all which decency \nand etiquette demanded, they tucked their dripping feet under them, and composed \nthemselves to get their share of the enjoyment of our visit. Of the unmarried girl \n\xc2\xa9f Northern Syria and Palestine I will talk at some future day. \n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI. \n\n\n\nIN DAVID\'S CAMP. \n\n" As when the weary traveler gains \n\nThe height of some o\'erlooking hill, \nHis heart revives, if \'cross the plains, \n\nHe sees his home, though distant still." \n\nI REPEAT the lines, wistfully, from a "height " so lofty and crowning a \ndescent so steep that all have alighted from their horses to walk down. \nDavid Jamal has lifted his hand to point down the valley lying at the \nfoot of the range : \n\n" There is our camp !" \nAccording to custom, the mule-train was sent on early this morning to make \nall ready for our coming. The little encampment is always a goodly sight. It \nwas never more inviting than as we see it now, nestled among olive trees and \nbacked by a green plain. We give hardly a glance to the range beyond, which \nmust be passed to-morrow. Visions of precipitous denies and sudden " drops \' \' m \nthe road, and hills full of rolling stones, to me most formidable of all, where the \nformula, " I believe I will walk up this !" excites the good-humored smiles of the \nescort\xe2\x80\x94 none of these things mar the pleasure which warms our hearts at the first \nglimpse of the white tents that, by now, mean home to the wanderers. We walk \ncheerily down the rugged slope, and more cheerily traverse the stony level at the \nbottom, a river in the rainy season, and now filled with pebbles and boulders \nbrought down by the freshets; blithely we climb the knoll on which smiles our \nencampment. \n\nDavid and the Bedouin sheik, who is our safe conduct through the country, \nhave spurred forward, and the former stands ready to lift me down at the door of \n" the lady\'s tent." Within, water and towels await me, and a bed as comfortable \nas I have found in any hotel, should I care to rest until " afternoon tea \' \' is served. \nBy David\'s wise management, we are seldom, if ever, too late in arriving for this \nrefreshment. By the time I have washed face and hands, and brushed my hair \nand garments, Imbarak, tall and serene, has set the tray in order, our camp- \nchairs beside it, and awaits further orders. The tea is swallowed and our hearts \nare revived into actual joyousness. \n\n(72) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n72 \n\n\n\n" The j oiliest life in the world !" sighs Alcides, in blissful content. " Don\'t \nget out your note-book. It is enough to be alive on an evening like this \xe2\x80\x94 and \nhere!" \n\nWe never weary of the incidents and scenes of camp-life and continually discern \n\nnew and picturesque \nfeatures in it. Oppo- \nsite the door of my \ntent is the luncheon- \nbooth, different in \nshape from the rest, \nwith an awning above \nthe entrance, never \nlet down to close up \nthe interior, except \nwhen rain overtakes \nus on the road, for it \naccompanies us \neverywhere, and is \nthe only tent pitched \nat noon. Like the \nothers, it is lined with \na vari-colored fabric \nof Cairene needle- \nwork, the outside be- \ning waterproof and \n4 1 wind-tight." To \nthe right, as we sit, \nyawns the cooking- \ntent. In fine weather, \nthe construction \xe2\x80\x94 I \ncannot dignify it by \nthe name of \' \' range \' \' \n\xe2\x80\x94 stands outside. It \nis a series of holes \nwith a slight sheet of iron built about them, and each glows with a charcoal fire. At \nthis hour, the cook \xe2\x80\x94 Johannes, \xe2\x80\x94 Johanen (" Yohanen ") \xe2\x80\x94 or, as we prefer to know \nhim, plain John \xe2\x80\x94 presides over these craters, like a burly priest above sacrificial fires. \nBefore I had learned wisdom by experience, I used to watch doubtfully processes \nso unlike any other methods of cookery with which I was acquainted as to waken \napprehensions as to the outcome. That, without other utensils than two or three \n\n\n\n\nJOHN AND IMBARAK. \n\n\n\n74 THE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\npots, a couple of kettles, a frying-pan, a gridiron, a chopping-tray and knife, and \na few spoons, he could get up a decent meal, might well tax the credulity of a \nMiddle States housewife. That from the enchanted craters or retorts will be sent \nto our table, at six o\'clock, a six-course dinner, as well-cooked and as daintily gar- \nnished and served as if furnished by Delmonico\'s chef, is a fact stated upon the au- \nthority of all who have partaken of these magical repasts. Excellent soup is the first \ncourse; two dishes of meat, always - \nchickens or partridges, a "made \ndish" or entree, salad, pudding, \nor tart or custard or blanc mange, \nfruit, nuts and raisins and black \ncoffee\xe2\x80\x94 is a bill of fare that repre- \nsents our every-day family dinner. \nWhen a holiday intervenes, or dis- \ntinguished guests are expected \xe2\x80\x94 \nah, then, John of the many names \nbuckles on his armor of proof and \nspreads a table in the wilderness \nthat would have made David the \nRoyal open his eyes in amazed \ndelight. \n\nNext to the kitchen comes the \ndining- tent, furnished with table, \nand jointed or camp-chairs of \nJamal\'s own design, having each \nfour stout legs, perpendicular and \ntrustworthy, and a good back of its \nown. Besides these, are camp-stools \nthat may be used as foot-rests, \nand steamer-chairs or lounging- \n\xe2\x80\xa2chairs for lazy and weary hours. The table furniture is that of an elegantly ap- \npointed home; the invariable brightness of the silver is a despair to one house- \nwife who, after many years of patient effort, confesses herself unequal to the \ntask of training hirelings to keep urn and teapot and spoons up to looking-glass \nlustre. \n\nImbarak dwarfs the tent every time he enters by his slim altitude of six-feet- \nthree. He serves each course faithfully, omitting not one jot or tittle of the waiter\'s \nduty, and moves like a long-drawn-out shadow. \n\nThe number of sleeping-tents is regulated by the size and material of the party. \nThat allotted to the only lady of the present company is in nothing more luxurious \n\n\n\n\nX \n\n\n\nis \n\n\n\nTHERE IS OUR CAMP. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n75 \n\n\n\nthan that occupied by Alcides. It is spacious, and I can stand upright in any \npart of it. On one side is a dressing-table and behind it hangs a mirror. The \ncot-bed is most comfortable, supplied with feather pillows, clean linen, white \ncounterpane and warm blankets. The floor, of earth beaten hard and smooth, has \ntwo coverings of carpet, the uppermost being Oriental rugs, soft and pretty. The \npolished pole in the centre is set about with hooks and rings on which wraps and \n<extra clothing are hung. \n\nI am the more explicit as to the details of our present abode because of letters \n\n\n\n\nAFTERNOON TEA. \n\n\n\nlately received from friends over the sea, sympathizing with me in the hardships \nof camp-life, and fearing that I may be permanently injured by the experience. \nOne dear friend writes: \n\n\' 1 1 cannot express my admiration of your courage in undertaking to dwell in tents for \nwhole nights together. It is well enough for men, especially the young and healthy. For \nwomen, and those who are \xe2\x80\x94 well ! to say the least, not as young as they once were \xe2\x80\x94 it is, to my \nway of thinking, imprudent and hazardous." \n\n\n\n76 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nThere are hundreds in America who would echo her sentiments, who, but for \ndread of the difficulty and discomfort attending Palestine camp-life, would gladly \nextend their journey ings to the oldest and most interesting of lands. For the \nbenefit of such, I am describing our encampment just as I see it, this hour. In \nrainy weather, if we are caught abroad, we find our quarters snug and dry, if \nsomewhat confined as to sitting room space. If the torrents are heavy, trenches \nare dug about the tent to lead the water off. The floors never become wet. \n\nDinner over\xe2\x80\x94 and we discuss it as leisurely as we like, time being no object \nin the evening\xe2\x80\x94 our lounging chairs are set\xe2\x80\x94 if the night be dry\xe2\x80\x94 without my tent \ndoor. To our left, the mules, eight or ten \n\nin number, and the horses, are pitched on (I; M \n\nthe extreme verge of the encampment. \nNearer to us, the muleteers, "the boy," \n{of thirty or thereabouts, whose name ought \nto be spelled as it is pronounced \xe2\x80\x94 but prob- \nably is not\xe2\x80\x94 "Serkeese,") and the grave- \neyed, gentle- voiced sheik (pronounced \n"Shake/\') sit upon the earth about the \ncamp-fire, where they will sleep to-night. \nWe wish vainly for an artist, or for a \ncamera warranted to report by firelight, \nthat might preserve for us the picture made s \nby the unconscious group. The red light \xe2\x80\xa2 \nflames fitfully upon the bearded faces \nframed by the silken handkerchiefs (kafee- \nyahs) wound over their caps and under \ntheir chins, touching the gilt embroidery \nof the sheik\'s vest and the butt of his 1 \nsword, bringing out the red scarf of one \nman, the yellow "kafeeyah" of another, \nand showing the intent eyes fastened upon \nthe narrator. \n\nWe call up David to translate a few sentences of the story. He laughs in \nindulgent amusement at seeing that Serkeese is the speaker, and bends an atten- \ntive ear to the tale. It is, we learn presently, a story of a Sultan\'s son and a fairy \nwho is enraged because he has broken her water-jar. "I cannot punish you \nbecause you are the son of my Sultan," she says, " but you shall fall in love with \na beautiful woman who lives seven mountains away." \n\n"It is a scene right out of the Arabian Nights !" cries Alcides, delightedly, \nand we fall anew to watching the countenances of the auditors. \n\n\n\n\nSERKEESE. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n77 \n\n\n\nSerkeese uses his hands freely as he goes on; sometimes he is very animated; \nthe attention of the listeners never wanders from him; now and then a low \nexclamation evinces the feeling aroused by the simple \xe2\x80\x94 to us childish \xe2\x80\x94 recital of \nlove and adventures, of dangers many and miraculous deliverances. Men fifty \nyears old will hang upon the utterance of such until midnight; occasionally they \nhearken immovable all night long. \n\nWe have our own talk in the dimly-lighted background, while the bands of \nOrion glitter in the zenith and the nebulous glow of the Pleiades brightens in the \ndarkening night, and the sacred mountains keep watch and ward upon the hori- \nzon. Often we ask David to join us and tell us stories of real life; of Bedouin \nprowess and Bedouin thievery; of Arab love and Arab murders; of Moslem \nmanners and customs and superstitions. He has them all at his tongue\'s end, \nand if urged will give us, less freely, incidents of his own early adventures, when \ntravel in the Holy Land was another name for peril, It was not possible, then, \nfor foreigners \xe2\x80\x94 or natives, for that matter \xe2\x80\x94 to go from Dan to Beersheba with no \nother protection than a mounted sheik as a pledge of nomadic tribes that all is \nright, and, according to their tribal code, lawful. Armed men by the score \nattended the travelers, and attack, in certain regions, might be expected at any \ninstant. \n\n\' \' What has made the change ?" we ask him. \nThe loyal Syrian draws himself up proudly, \n\' \' The present Government, madame !\' \' \nWe laugh, having anticipated the reply. \n\n" Why, David, you will convince us, by and by, that your Sultan is a pretty \ngood sort of a fellow." \n\n" We never had a better ruler, madame. L,ook at the improvement in our \nroads, and how it is so much safer to go from place to place, and what he is doing \nfor the poor. He is most merciful and tender-hearted, moreover. He has given \nfrom his- own purse twenty thousand pounds toward rebuilding the mosque that \nwas burned at Damascus. \n\n"Then, too, there is Abraham Hakee Pasha, Governor of Jerusalem, who \ngives much attention to the condition of the city and the poor and needy. A very \njust and upright man in all his dealings. And El-Haj Saleem-Effendi-el-Husane, \nhead of the municipality of Jerusalem, gives all facilities for the welfare and \ncomfort of the inhabitants. A noble gentleman is he. His parents are of the \noldest house in Jerusalem. I cannot but speak well of our rulers and governors, \nmadame. They are doing their best for us. And madame must see that there is \nmuch to be done. \' \' \n\nHe is so much in earnest that we refrain from expressing our gratification that \nthe sheik of the neighboring village has sent a guard to patrol our camp to-night. \n\n\n\n7 8 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nWhenever it can be done, the encampment is within a few minutes\' walk of a ham- \nlet or town whence a guard of two men is drawn to be guarantee to the govern- \nment for the safety of the travelers. So secure does this precaution make us that \nwe lay us down to sleep as tranquilly as if we were behind walls and bolts at \nhome If additional surety were required, we have the knowledge that David \nJamal makes the rounds in person twice during the dark hours to assure his faith- \nful soul that all is well with his charges: I have never slept more soundly and \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nREADY EOR THE MARCH. \n\nhealthfully than in his tents. If we awake once in a while to hear the queer cry \nof jackals over their prey, or are startled by the weird laugh of a hyena and the \nbark of a wolf, we smile at the oddity of the situation and turn us again to our \npillows with renewed consciousness of safety in our guarded nest. \n\nMorning comes all too soon. Usually, the first knowledge we have of the \nreturn of the light is brought through the scratch that serves as a knock at the \ndoor of the tent, and the civil sentence in Arabic that signifies " hot water \' m \nEnglish The smoking can for our toilet stands at the entrance. \n\nNo refinement of civilization that thought and pains can secure is lacking \nOurs is the universal continental breakfast, also in vogue at the East\xe2\x80\x94 coffee and \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n79 \n\n\n\ntea, bread and butter, eggs in some form, and marmalade, honey or jam. While \nwe eat it, all the tents except that in which we sit are quietly " struck" and \npacked. When we come out, horses and men are ready, and the gravely-courte- \nous morning salutation of our dragoman is coupled with the reverent, \xe2\x80\x94 "By \nGod\'s will we will see " such-and-such a place " before the sun sets again." \n\nThe sheik swings into his saddle, and leads the way in the direction taken by \nthe mule-train; Massoud, the wiry gray ridden by Alcides, curvets and kicks like \na merry colt in falling into line; Serkeese rides briskly by, a grotesque figure upon \nhis perch atop of the roll of luncheon booth and hampers; before we have gone a \nhundred yards, David, who has tarried to issue a parting order to the three men \nengaged in clearing up the debris of the camp, gallops to my side, his mettled \ncharger, Dervish, brave with embroidered saddle-cloth and fringed housings, and \nwe are fairly started on the march. \n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII. \n\n\n\n\nTHE NATIVE GIRL. \n\n\\ my first interview with her, I, for awhile, mistook her for a boy. \nShe sat flat upon the floor, her legs crossed under her, and her head \nuncovered. Her body was clothed in a pair of cotton trousers, and \na blouse of the same, belted at the waist. Besides these, she had on \nnot another garment. Her eyes were black, her face expressive; her gestures \nwere animated, and she talked a great deal. She was, apparently, about ten \nyears old, and well-grown for her age. \n\n" A lively little fellow !" said I to my interpreter, after watching her for some \namused minutes. \n\n4 \'She is a girl, and the terror of the neighborhood," was the rejoinder. \n" One who in your country would be a brilliant woman in time, maybe, with \nprogressive ideas. Here \xe2\x80\x94 poor child !" \n\nIt was needless to finish the sentence. I knew enough already of the life of \na girl in the Bast to be able to lay in the shadows of the scene. \n\n<l Can she read?" I asked. \n\n" Not a word \xe2\x80\x94 and never will know her letters." \n" What training has she in housework ?" \n\n" None. Her mother will tell you that she is lazy. She carried the baby- \nthere is usually one every year\xe2\x80\x94 until a younger sister was big enough to shoulder \nthe load. Then our little friend here \' struck \' playing nursery-maid. She cannot \nsew a stitch, or knit, or cook, or wash, or iron. She runs wild all day long; she \ncan out-swear her brothers\xe2\x80\x94 and there is nothing that should be hidden from a \nyoung girl that she has not known since she was four years old." \n\nThe speaker was gentle of speech and of judgment, but I was inclined to \nhope that she was severe upon the subject of the unflattering sketch. Subse- \nquently I learned to know Lala well, and recognized the fidelity of the por- \ntraiture. \n\nI have told how unwelcome our baby girl was when she first made nersell \nheard in the one-roomed abode of her wedded parents. It is doubtful if Lala\'s \nfather has ever given her an affectionate word. If not actively unkind to her, he \nsubmits to her presence in his household as an inevitable disgrace. It matters \nless than nothing to him that she grows up like a weed, or like a "tramp " dog \nor cat. If passably good-looking, she will be married soon and out of his way. \n\n,80) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n81 \n\n\n\nShe stands within sight of me as I pen these lines. To be fleshy is considered \nan attraction in a woman by her countrymen, but Eala (Lai-la) is as yet slim. \nShe is also straight and well- formed, in spite of the circumstance that the eight- \nmonths-old brother she carries upon her hip, encircled by her arm, is her charge \nwhen out of the cradle. Upon the back of her head is pinned a white veil- \ncotton and coarse. This she has been compelled to wear in the street from her \neighth year. Seeing mere babies with veils on, which they coquettishly pulled \n\n\n\n\nMRS. DAVID JAMAl/S "INDUSTRIAL CLASS " OF SYRIAN GIRLS. \n\n\n\nover their faces at meeting men or strange boys, I for some time supposed that \nthey were worn of choice, as little girls with us masquerade in grown people\'s \nclothes. I discovered later that every prudent Moslem mother insists upon thus \nearly investing her daughter with the badge of womanhood. When we come to \ncomprehend what womanhood is in this land, we feel that the badge should be \ncrape or sackcloth. \n\n\' \' Do you love your little brother, Eala ?\' \' is the beginning of my dialogue \nwith her. \n\nShe laughs \xe2\x80\x94 the childish, half-bashful, half-pleased laugh one often hears here \n\nfrom the mother of several children \xe2\x80\x94 women who never mature in intellect \n6 \n\n\n\ng2 THE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\nand whose physical maturity is that of summer fruit that has a worm at the \ncore. \n\n" I don\'t know." \n* 4 Is he heavy?" \n\n" Oh, a little\xe2\x80\x94 sometimes, " indifferently. \n" How old is he?" \n\nShe looks at him, as if the thought were new, and laughs again. \n"I don\'t know." \n\n\' \' What do you do with yourself when he is in the cradle?" \nShe nods backward at the door. \' \' Go out into the street. \n" To school?" \n\nThis is the funniest idea of all, and makes her shake her head many times. \n"No! no I" \n"Can you sew?" \n\nShe lifts one brown hand, shapely and slender, we observe, and seems to \nexamine it with infantile curiosity. \n\n" No !" is the result uttered slowly. \n\n\xc2\xab How should she?" says the interpreter aside\xe2\x80\x94 that is, in English. " Her \nmother does not know how to use a needle. Poor as she is, she hires a sewing- \nwoman even to do what family-mending is absolutely needed." \n\nAs I jot down the reply, Lala, having given the baby to his mother to be \nnursed, sinks upon the matting beside me, and fingers lightly, first my sleeve \nthen the skirt of my dress, which has a band of fur on the bottom. I cannot but \nsmile into the child-face. I now perceive that it is comely, and would be intelli- \ngent had the brain back of it ever been awakened. I lay my hand upon the \ninquisitive, yet respectful fingers, as they pass to my stockings. \n" Would you like to wear shoes and stockings, Lala?" \n\nShe laughs three or four times, and nods twice as often, then explains com- \nplacently that when she is a bride she will have a pair of stockings-perhaps \nseveral pairs-and sandals, besides other fine things-new gowns and bracelets- \nholding out slender wrists encircled by strings of beads, blue and white. \n\nThe word "bride" is talismanic. When a baby-girl falls down, or hurts \nherself in any way, the mother or neighbor checks her lamentations by calling her \n-little bride," as nurses in America "fie-fie" their charges with "Little ladies \nought not to cry !" If the mother would cajole the unruly daughter she has \nnever controlled by reasoning, she wheedles her with, "Come now, little bride, \ndo so and so." Her narrow, pitifully starved life has but one ambition-to be \nmarried. She knows no other game than playing "bride," when her hair is \ndressed with flowers, herself covered with a veil, and a play-fellow takes the part \nof bridegroom. For this end she was created and has breath and being. I put \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n*3 \n\n\n\nup notebook and pencil and look at her, as she is \xe2\x80\x94 a type of tens of thousands in \nthis so-called Holy Land \xe2\x80\x94 in the sight of women who have, all their lives (as have \ntheir mothers and great-great-grandmothers before them), enjoyed the gifts of \nChristianity to our sex without appreciating the depth and height, the length and \nbreadth, the unspeakable value of what we owe to it \xe2\x80\x94 with pity for the ignorance \nI cannot enlighten, the degradation which nothing but the religion of the Christ \nwho humbled himself to be born of a woman among the Bethlehem hills over \nyonder can relieve. \n\nHampered as I am by the absolute impossibility of putting into print that \nwhich might make the very paper on which I write blush for shame, I writhe, as \nin bondage, because our wisest and best American Christians are not familiar with \nso much as the general features of a woman\'s life here and elsewhere in Eastern \ncountries. What I cannot write, and what you, my sisters, would not let your \ndaughters read, is a part \xe2\x80\x94 and a large part \xe2\x80\x94 of the everyday life going on under \nmy eyes. Our home-missionaries see much of what is popularly termed \' \' the \nseamy side \' \' of human living. The missionary in the foreign field might cry out \nin bitter disgust of spirit that he sees nothing but seams, and darns, and patches \nin garments stiff with filth. \n\nMrs. David Jamal, the sensible Christian wife of our dragoman and guide, \nwas educated in a Beirut school for girls, and went to Jerusalem as a native helper \nin a school there. Since her marriage, as before, the condition of her fellow- \ncountrywomen has been a sore weight upon her mind, and, although the mother \nof a large family, and a diligent housewife, she, some years ago, collected in her \nown home a class of native girls and began to give them instruction in plain \nsewing, knitting, crocheting, embroidery, and in all departments of housework. \nTwice a week she has presided over what, in her humility, she never thought of \ncalling " an industrial school," the attendance varying from thirteen to eighteen. \nShe can accommodate no more than eighteen, and has always applications on hand \nfrom ten or twelve who wish to join the class, and cannot for want of room. \n\nMrs. Jamal gives her time and house, and, up to this time, the expenses of \nmaterials for the work and the luncheon cooked twice a week by the girls under \nher supervision have been met by the sale of articles manufactured by the class, \nand an allowance of twenty dollars a month made by a benevolent man, a\' \nsojourner for some years in Jerusalem. He has now left Syria, and other circum- \nstances make it impracticable for him to continue the appropriation to this branch \nof mission work. Unless help comes from other sources, this most sensible and \npractical enterprise of a Syrian woman for the benefit of her sex will have to be \nabandoned. \n\nI wish it were possible for some of the societies represented by my readers to \ntake up the cause of this industrial class. Twelve \' \' circles \' \' contributing each \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. 85 \n\ntwenty dollars a year would enable Mrs. Jamal to carry it on and to receive a \nlarge number of pupils. I may add that, steadily and tactfully, she infuses \nreligious teaching with instruction in handiwork and housewifery. \n\nUpon a grander scale, and aiming steadily to accomplish the same end \xe2\x80\x94 the \nelevation of Syrian women from fellowship with the beasts that perish to the plane \nof rational, immortal beings \xe2\x80\x94 are such schools as Miss Everett\'s in Beirut; that \nat Sidon, in which Mrs. Dale, the daughter of Dr. Bliss, of the Syrian Protestant \n\n\n\n\n"WOMEN WHO ARE NEVER MANURE IN INTEW/ECT. " \n\n\n\nCollege, is an efficient laborer; and others at Nazareth, Haifa and Bethlehem \nunder the care of English societies. \n\nOne and all find a serious impediment to\' their work in the infamous system \nthat gives children of ten, eleven and twelve years of age to men whose concep- \ntions of the nuptial relation are of the lowest order. Still, there are parents who, \nthrough ambition or natural affection, desire that their girls should be educated like \nEuropean and American women, and allow them to remain under the care of Chris- \ntian instructors up to sixteen or seventeen before transferring them to their father\'s \nor husband\'s houses. For every such exception, we thank God and take courage, \n\n\n\n86 THE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\nMy pen was in place to affix the signature to the above when the sound of \nchanting in the street drew me to the balcony. Down the middle of the muddy \nthoroughfare walked a short procession of men in striped " abiehs " (native \ncloaks made of coarse camel\'s hair), chanting intermittently and listlessly, fol- \nlowed by a troop of ragged boys. The foremost man bore in his arms the \ntmcoffined body of a baby. It was wrapped in a white cotton shroud; the waxen \nface and closed eyes were pretty and peaceful. The sight of a dead infant always \nwrings my heart to breaking, and the old, sadly -familiar ache forced from me an \nejaculation of pain. "01, the dear little baby ! and the poor, poor mother !" \n\n"It is a girl!" said a voice in my ear. "Thank God it is dead!" An \nAmerican woman, whose nature is all sweetness, and her guest, an English \nteacher in the Bethlehem school, were in the adjoining balcony. \n\n" It is taken from the evil to come," pursued the speaker, answering my look \nof inquiry. " If you knew, as we do, the almost certain doom from which that \nlittle creature has been saved by death, you would say, \' Amen !\' " \n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII. \n\n\n\nFUDDA\'S BETROTHAL. \n\nIT is something to get fast hold of a woman in this country who does not \ntake fright at the sight of note-book and fountain-pen. It is something \nmore to secure one who knows of herself just what I wish to find out \nand to report. Best of all it is to discover that my brave woman, my \nwell-informed woman and the woman who can speak Arabic fluently and English \ngraphically, are one and the same, and cheerfully at my service. \n\nI have seated her in my room and given her due notice that I mean to make \nuse of her to the utmost. Circumstances \xe2\x80\x94 not the least formidable of which is the \naccident of my foreign birth and breeding \xe2\x80\x94 have kept me, to some extent, in the \nouter court when certain ceremonials are performed in the innermost of the home. \nI may see marriage processions, but as a visitor, not a participant in the festivities \nand solemnities of the occasion, and when I have sought to "interview" prospec- \ntive brides and brides\' parents, I have been conscious that a meagre outline of \nhistory is all that I can obtain. \n\nBut here is one who was born and brought up in Syria, who has used her \neyes, ears, tongue and brain, who has a fine sense of humor and the reportorial \nfaculty of seeing everything, and telling what she has seen. By virtue of some \nor all of these advantages, she has assisted at a dozen or more Moslem weddings, \nand has one fresh in her mind. I shall let her tell the story as nearly as possible \nin her own way. The occasional lapse into native idioms adds flavor to the narra- \ntive. I only regret my inability to enliven it for my readers as she brightens it for me \noy gesture and facial play. The nervous action of her strong, supple hands, the \nflash of eyes and teeth, as she touches the comic features of the story, would make \ntame language piquante. \n\nShe begins apologetically: \n\n"You will not mind that I say how strange " (rolling the r\'s richly) " some \nof the European customs of young men and young women appear to us. I \nhave seen young people who are betrothed walk in the streets, arm-in-arm, and \nwhen they do separate, say, for the gentleman to go into camping in the interior, \nand the lady to remain here with her mother or friends, he will take her in his \narms and keess her in sight of others ! And these are not common or vulgar or \nnot-educated people. Oh, no ! but ladies and gentlemen of the best order in their \nown land \xe2\x80\x94 genteel and religious. The ways of these strangers are wonderful, \n\n(87) \n\n\n\n88 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBEE. \n\n\n\nand may belong to the customs and climate of their countries, but they would not \nbe suffered here\xe2\x80\x94 not for one hour. With us, if a girl smile so much as once at \nthe man she is to marry, he will not have her\xe2\x80\x94 he will cast her off. He will say \n\xe2\x80\x94and he is wise\xe2\x80\x94\' If she be light in her behavior to me, she will be light to any \nother man. She is not to be trusted.\' " \n\nYet they must become acquainted with one another, before they are married, \nand it is natural for a light-hearted girl to smile while talking to a lover." \n\n"She never talks to him !" hands and eyes combining to enforce the declara- \ntion. " Usually, she has never seen him unless she catch a glimpse of him \n\nthrough the window, when \nthere is not danger that he \nwill see her peep at him, \nand despise her for being \nbold and curious. \n\n\' \' You see it is this \nway: A man who has \nwork, or money from his \nfather or in some way, \nsays to an old woman \xe2\x80\x94 \nperhaps it is his aunt, per- \nhaps it is his cousin, or \nperhaps it is an acquaint- \ntance, \xe2\x80\x94 \'It is time I get \nmarried. Do you know \nany girl that would suit \nme?\' \n\n\' \' She is always on \nthe outlook, you see, for \nit is many presents some \nget in this way, and she \nhas ready an answer: \n\n" \' Oh, yes ! there is \n(we will say) \' Fudda, \nwhose father lives near \nand healthy, and of a good family.\' \n\' \' Then she tell him who is her father and her mother, and how respectable \nthey are, and how young and good-looking is the girl. Perhaps she is but ten \nyears old, or she may be fourteen." \n\n\' 1 1 know, \' \' I interrupt, \' \' your girls mature much earlier than ours. A girl of \ntwelve with us is a child, and as for one of ten, she is hardly more than a baby." \n\n\n\n\n"A CHIIyD, AND NOTHING MORE. \n\nby me. She is a pretty girl, and young \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n89 \n\n\n\nMy companion is grave enough now; her eyes are dark and moist; she sinks \nher voice almost to a whisper. \n\n" A girl of ten is a child with us. A child and nothing more. \n\n4 \' Yet I know one who is married to a man seventy years old ! Her father \ncould not give her bread, he was so poor, and this old man gave a good price for \nher \xe2\x80\x94 fifty napoleons, for she is a pretty child." \n\n\' \' A good price ! Do fathers sell their children ?\' \' \n\n4 4 You shall hear. We do not call it that, but when you have listened, you \nmay say it is what you please. Well ! the young man is willing, after what he is \ntold, to marry the girl, and the old woman goes off to see Fudda\'s mother, just as \nif she had nothing of importance to say, but was passing by and thought she \nwould make a visit, and presently, when the} 7 have had coffee together and smoked \na few cigarettes, she says, if Fudda is in the room, 4 Will you send jour daughter \nout ? I wish to speak with you.\' Then she will bring forward the name of the \nyoung man, and make many praises of him, and tell how he would wish to marry \nher daughter. The mother knows, and the old woman who goes between knows, \nthat all depends upon what the father shall say, but they like to talk it over for a \nlong time, maybe two hours, and back the old woman returns to the young man, \nand says, 4 I have made straight the path for you so far as I can. Now it is for \nyou to act. \' \' \' \n\n" I see !" (and I think that I do.) 44 He must speak to the father and ask \npermission to address the daughter. That is the custom in some European \ncountries, as well. \' \' \n\nIt is plain that I am not upon the right line. Her gesture is deprecatory. \n\n44 That would not be correct. It would be too much haste \xe2\x80\x94 and not at all \nrespectful. The young man goes to his uncle or his brother \xe2\x80\x94 if he be an older \nbrother and very sober and \xe2\x80\x94 and \xe2\x80\x94 deegnified, and says \xe2\x80\x94 4 1 want that girl. Will \nyou talk to her father and see what arrangements you can make ?\' So the friends \n\xe2\x80\x94 for it is quite usual that he sends two \xe2\x80\x94 go to the father and tell what a respect- \nable young man this is, and how respectable and of good family are his parents, \nand that he weesh to marry his daughter. Perhaps, it may be, that the father is \nnot willing, for some reason, to let the marriage take place. Then he laughs and \nputs to scorn all that has been done. He say \xe2\x80\x94 4 This is some silly gossip of the \nwomen. I will give my wife a sound scold for her foolishness. You may go tell \nyour nephew \xe2\x80\x94 or your brother, as it may be \xe2\x80\x94 that I have no daughter to be mar- \nried.\' And there is the end of it all." \n\n44 But if the father has no objection ?" \n\n44 Ah ! then it goes on. The father says, * How much will your friend give \nfor this, my daughter ?\' Then they bargain and bargain. If she be pretty \xe2\x80\x94 very \npretty \xe2\x80\x94 the father may ask as much as a hundred and fifty napoleons. But it is \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nQl \n\n\n\nlikely that he will not get more than eighty, or maybe seventy -five. If she be \nnot handsome, maybe he will get but forty. This, when the father is not rich, or \nWhen he is greedy and wants the money for himself. You see it is this way: He \nsay, \' I have brought up my girl and had the expense and trouble of her all these \nyears, and she has not earned for me one piastre. Her husband must pay me \nsomething for all that.\' But the better class of Moslems, and especially of our \nown people \xe2\x80\x94 the Christians "\xe2\x80\x94(this includes Roman Catholics, Greeks, and \nProtestants), " will prefer to have the price paid in jewelry and clothes that will \nbelong to the bride. Then her father will have to give her nothing from his own \nhouse. So \xe2\x80\x94 the bargain is made, and the bridegroom and his friends, and the \nuncle or brother of the bride \xe2\x80\x94 and if she have no uncle or brother, perhaps her \nfather, will go to a judge \xe2\x80\x94 an advocate \xe2\x80\x94 do you call him ?" \n" A lawyer \xe2\x80\x94 do you mean?" \n\n"That is what I would say. They go to a lawyer, and he writes down on a \npaper how that this man \xe2\x80\x94 mentioning his name \xe2\x80\x94 desires to have in marriage \nFudda, the daughter of such and such a man, and promises to give on such a day, \nfirst a ring (the first present must always be a ring) , and on another day a silk \ndress, and again a gold chain, maybe, or a bracelet, and next another dress, \nand to this he signs his name, and the witnesses write theirs, and the lawyer \nsigns with the seal, and the paper goes to Fudda\' s father. This is the * cere- \nmo-nee.\' " \n\n" I beg your pardon ! What did you say ?" \n\n" The \' cere-mo-nee.\' This is what makes her betrothed to this man. There \nis no other. No church service. No questions, no answers. No promises. No \nvows. As soon as what the bridegroom has promised is paid, he can claim his \nwife. He can go to her father and say, 1 1 have here your receipts for so muck \nmone}^ \xe2\x80\x94 or so many dresses and jewelry. Now I will have my wife.\' She is \nhis by the law, and if her father did not give her up, the law would take her \naway from him. \n\n" Once in a great, great while, it happens that the man has promised what he \ncannot pay, or he is careless, or he is not honest, or he does not care so much for \nthe girl as he did at first. Something like this makes him slow in keeping his \nengagement. One, two, three, maybe four years are gone, and he has not paid \nall, and Fudda is living in her father\'s house, his wife and yet not his wife. \nBy-and-by, the father loses his patience, and he sends word to the man \xe2\x80\x94 \' This \nmust come to an end. My daughter cannot be married to any other man while \nshe is betrothed to you, and you cannot have her until you have filled your part \nof the contract. If you can pay what you have promised, do it at once. If you \ncannot, or do not mean to do it \xe2\x80\x94 if you are so disho-no-ra-ble as to wish to put \nthis deesgrace upon me and my daughter \xe2\x80\x94 then divorce her, so that I can give \n\n\n\n9 2 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nher to some better man.\' If he cannot or will not keep his engagement, he must \ndivorce her, just as if she were his wife." \n\n"Suppose the poor girl has become attached to him in this time?\'* \n\n" She could not !" This is said so positively that I am somewhat abashed at \nhaving offered the suggestion. " She has never seen him, unless she may have \nmet him, by chance, in the street. Then it is her duty as a modest woman to \nturn her head aside" \xe2\x80\x94 suiting the action to the sentence; \xe2\x80\x94 " and hurry by. Of \ncourse, he has not once seen her face, for she never stirs out of doors without her \nveil, and should he come to her father\'s door on an errand, she must hide in a \ncupboard, or run behind a curtain, or con-ceal herself. \n\n" Suppose, though, the young man has kept his word, and all the price is \npaid, and the lawyer writes his receipt that so many jewelry and dresses and so \nmuch money has passed through his hands to Fudda\'s father. Sometimes this is \ndone in a few weeks, sometimes in a few days. If the time is short, the girl does \nnot know that she is to be married, or that any man has asked for her, until, \nmaybe, two or three days before the wedding. Then, her father will say to her\xe2\x80\x94 \n\'On such a day \xe2\x80\x94 maybe next Wednesday or Monday \xe2\x80\x94 you are to be given in \nmarriage to such a man.\' " \n\n" Whom she has never seen !" I shudder forth. \n\n" It may be that she has never heard his name until that minute." \n\n"What if she refuses to marry him ?" \n\n" Ah, then, would not her father give her a good slapping? He would ask \nher, 1 Who knows best what is good for you \xe2\x80\x94 you, a silly, ignorant child, or your \nfather and your mother ? You disobedient, ungrateful girl ! And if you would \nnot have your father\'s curse, and be turned in deesgrace from your father\'s house, \ndo as you are bid. \' \n\n\' \'And, indeed, madame," interjects my informant, judicially, 4 \' he is in the right \nof it. What can a girl who has been kept close in-doors when there is any danger \nof meeting a man, and seen nothing of the world, understand of such things ? \n\n" Are such marriages generally happy?" \n\nIt is not a query to be dismissed lightly, and she ponders a minute. \n\n" Say there are one hundred marriages made in this way. I should say that \nten out of the hundred are not happy. And "\xe2\x80\x94slowly, and again dropping her \nvoice \xe2\x80\x94 " I have, myself, known of two girls who threw themselves into a well to \nescape marrying men chosen by their parents." \n\nDavid Jamal has allowed me to read an interesting paper prepared by \nhimself, upon " Marriage Customs in Jerusalem and the adjacent villages." It \ncontains, among other valuable and curious things, a literal translation of an \nArabic song sung by the "future bridegroom and his friends and relations" at \nthe betrothal-feast in the house of the bride\'s father. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n93 \n\n\n\nAt my request, Alcides has written a metrical version, that yet faithfully \nrenders the spirit and almost the language of the original: \n\nO father of the bride ! throw wide each door \n\nTo welcome us, the long-robed bridal train. \nMay Allah, in his mercy, evermore \n\nProtect thy home from every grief and pain. \nThy daughter\'s fame has spread to distant lands, \n\nMen call her gracious, fair and swift of thought, \nHer father, prince of gallant desert-bands, \n\nWhose wealth Aleppo\'s castle might have bought. \n\nO father of the bride ! be generous, \n\nAsk not a heavy dowry for the bride ; \nThy gold will perish if \'tis gathered thus \n\nBut we, thy friends, remain forever tried. \nThen welcome us, thy friends, the wedding guests, \n\nPrepare a feast for us beneath thy dome ; \nAnd then, when thou hast granted our behests, \n\nMount thy swift steed \xe2\x80\x94 escort us from thy home. \n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX. \n\n\n\nFUDDA\'S WEDDING. \n\n\n\n\nND I must tell you, at the first, madame, that her father is \na rich man and much respected, and the man she was to \nmarry is also rich. You must know that the better the \nclass of people, the more strictly they follow all the rules \nI have spoken of, regarding betrothing and marrying. \nSo I was very anxious to go to Fudda\'s wedding, for I \nhad heard much of the beautiful presents she had received \nfrom her bridegroom, and the great company that was to \nbe, and the feasting, and all that. \n\n\' \' When the mother of the bridegroom heard what I \nwished, she was very kind. She said to me, * You shall \ncome with me, and see all at my side.\' \n\n" She was as good as her word. When the night of the wedding came I was \nbeside her in the procession that left the house of the bridegroom\'s father. Such \n\n\n\na procession ! The women in white \n\n\n\nand veiled, some with crowns of \n\n\n\nflowers on their heads, and the men in their best clothes; the friends of the bride- \ngroom and the near relations of the bride in wedding-garments that were presents \nfrom him. But oh ! it is an expensive matter to be married here ! \n\n" I have heard sometimes, when the uncles and cousins or brothers of the \nbride are not well-satisfied with such gifts as he has sent to them, they will stop his \nway to the bride\' s house, and cry, \' You shall not have her until you give me a \ncoat, \' or maybe trousers, or something else. \n\n4 \' No such thing happened the night I am telling you of. We marched \xe2\x80\x94 the \nwomen all together, and the men together, and many carrying torches, and a band \nof music playing merry tunes at the head of the procession, until we came to the \nhouse of the bride\'s father. There the men stopped, at the gate and in the court- \nyard, and we women went on up to the chambers. One of them was locked, and \ninside of it was the bride, and no one had a right to open that door until such \ntime as the bridegroom\'s mother should come. Everybody made way for her, and \nyou may be sure that I kept close beside her. She unlocked the door and threw \nit open, and oh, dear ! what a rush there w T as ! \n\n"The first thing I saw was Fudda, seated up high in a chair, and the chair \nset upon a sofa at the back of the room. She was covered all over with a white \n\n(94) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBEE. \n\n\n\n95 \n\n\n\nizzar, like mine," \xe2\x80\x94 pointing to the sheet-like drapery she had laid aside at my \ninvitation \xe2\x80\x94 " and a mendeel like this, over her face," \xe2\x80\x94 holding up the square of \nflowered tissue edged with hand-made silk lace, always worn by Syrian women in \nthe street \xe2\x80\x94 \' \' and over all was a long veil of pink muslin, reaching down to her \nfeet. There she sat, straight and never moving, her hands in her lap, and her \neyes closed under the two veils. You know that the bride must go to her husband \nin pink ?\' \' \n\n\' \' I thought white the bridal garment all over the world." \n\n\' \' Not with us. Pink she must wear, or the marriage will not be fortunate. \nOn the floor, directly in front of Fudda, was a stand, and upon the stand a great \nbrass tray, as big as this," \xe2\x80\x94 extending her arms to indicate a wide circle\xe2\x80\x94 " with \never and ever so many candles lighted upon it. I thought there must be one \nhundred. All the married women rushed for a candle, and there was screaming \nand laughing and scrambling such as I had never heard before. I was afraid I \nshould be knocked down and trampled upon. \n\n\' \' And what do you think it was for ? Every married woman who got a \ncandle would see her own children married in her lifetime and in her husband\'s \nlifetime as well. Of course, that is all superstition, but the Mohammedans are \nvery, very superstitious. \' \' \n\n" What was the bride doing all this time ?" \n\nTeeth and eyes make arch play over the comely face. \' \' Sitting still and her \neyes shut ! It is not good fortune to open them. Presently, when the candles \nwere all taken, in came her father and her brother, and helped her down, and put on \nher two swords, one belt crossing her breast \xe2\x80\x94 over the veil so, the other so !" \ndesignating the right and left sides. " Next, they led her down stairs and out of \ndoors, she sobbing behind her veils. You could see her tremble and shake all over \nwith grief at leaving her home forever. At the door, up stepped four men carrying. \n\xe2\x80\x94 what do you name a cover fastened up high on four sticks ?\' \' \n\n" A canopy." \n\n\' \' That is it ! And under this canopy she walked in the procession to the \nhouse of the bridegroom\'s father. She walked, oh, so slow, about one inch to each \nstep \xe2\x80\x94 so !" \n\nShe rises and folding her hands and closing her eyes, marches, stiffly and \nlaboriously, deliberately across the floor. We both laugh heartily, as she resumes \nher natural gait and manner. \n\n" She must have looked like a jointed doll," I say. \n\n"That was what she did look like- and the joints were not easy. I thought \nwe would never, never get to the end oi our walk, and the band played all the \ntime. At last, we were there, and agaii. the men were to wait outside, while the \nwomen went in. The bride was taken with us. She did not seem to go in \n\n\n\n9 6 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nof herself. They sat her down flat upon a rug on the floor, and took off the \nswords, and the pink veil, and the short veil, and the white \' izzar, \' and we could \nsee that she had on only her little girl\'s dress of clean print, made like a child\'s. She \ndid not look to be more than eleven at most, and like a baby that is scared, her \neyes shut, and her face wet with tears, and biting her lips to keep from crying \nout aloud. She kept very still, however, while they stripped off her print gown \nand stockings (her sandals were left \nat the door with all the rest) , and \nput on her finery. Silk stockings \nand silk trousers and a fine \xe2\x80\x94 very \nfine \xe2\x80\x94 pink silk frock. And the \nwomen crowded and talked, and \nwere busy all around her. One \nwould put on her stockings, and \none braid her hair into two long \nbraids that hung down behind, \nand were tied with pink ribbons. \nAnother put her dress over her \nhead, and one fastened it, and one \nstuck flowers in her hair, and this \none pulled a pair of long gloves on \nher hands. All would take a share \nin decking her out in her jewelry. \nI never saw so many bracelets and \nchains and brooches upon one per- \nson before \xe2\x80\x94 diamonds and rubies \nand emeralds and turquoises. When \nher gloves were on, the rings were \nslipped upon her fingers over them. \nI could not help laughing to myself \nto see her \xe2\x80\x94 always keeping her eyes \nshut \xe2\x80\x94 stick out her fingers, so, to \nhave the rings put on, just like \nyour doll with joints. When she \nwas all dressed, the women pulled \nher upon her feet, and a pink veil \nwas fastened to her head and came to the floor in front. Then they brought again \nthe two swords. Now they were crossed \xe2\x80\x94 in this way " \xe2\x80\x94 making a St. Andrew\'s \ncross with her forefinger \xe2\x80\x94 "and tied with ribbons. Two women held them over \nher head, an old woman who is a sort of doctor and wise woman, you know, and \n\n\n\n\nIT WAS PLAIN TO BE SEEN \nPLEASED." \n\n\n\nTHAT HE WAS \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n97 \n\n\n\nanother as old and much looked up to. These swords signified her father and her \nbrother. You see, should her husband not be kind to her, he must recollect that \nshe had somebodies to protect her. \n\n" Now the door was opened and the bridegroom was waiting on the outside, \nand he came up to her where she stood between the two women, with the swords \ncrossed over her head, and the pink veil down to her feet, and the jewelry shining \nthrough it, and on her arms and hands. Then he lifted the veil and saw her face- \nto-face for the first time in all their lives. It was plain to be seen that he was \npleased, and he took her by the hand and led her to his own room. \n\n\' \' It is not what you call the etiquette for him to stay there more than a few \nminutes. He came out soon and took his part in the feasting and dancing and \nmaking merry that lasted all night long. The next da}\' there was more feasting \nin the house of the bridegroom\'s father, and the third day yet more, all at the \nexpense of the bridegroom. I have known weddings that cost so dear that the \nbridegroom had to sell some of the jewelry that he had given his wife to pay his \ndebts. The bride is not seen at any of the feasts. From the minute she is a wife, \nshe must not speak to another man except her father and brothers. Not so much \nas her husband\'s brother, unless he permits it. And he does not often allow his \nbrother to see her, for fear she should like him better than she likes her husband. \nHe would divorce her in one minute if he found her talking to any man, even \nthrough a window very high from the ground. \' \' \n\n\' 1 Could he divorce her legally upon such a pretext ! \' \' \n\n" He can divorce her for anything he likes. If she has not his supper ready \nin time; if she is not respectful to him; if she does not come quick, on the minute, \nwhen he calls her; if he would like to marry a younger woman, he can say the \nthree sentences that mean, \' Go ! I am divorced from you !\' and she is no more \nhis wife. \n\n" When he speaks these three sentences, she will drop whatever she is doing \xe2\x80\x94 \nsewing, washing, cooking, nursing her baby \xe2\x80\x94 and draw her \' izzar \' over her face, \nand go straight out of his house. She must not look at or speak to him any more \nthan to a strange man. Perhaps he has been angry and saidjnore than he meant, \nand is sorry in a minute, and tries to speak to her, or would follow her. 1 No ! \nshe says, keeping her face hidden and putting out her hand to warn him back \xe2\x80\x94 \nIn this way:" \xe2\x80\x94 a dramatic gesture \xe2\x80\x94 "\'You are not my husband. I do not \nknow you ! \' " \n\n\' 1 Where can the poor creature go ?\' \' \n\n"To her father, if she has one. If he is dead, to her brother, or if she has \nno brother, to her uncle. He says to the man who was her husband: 1 Give my \ndaughter, or my sister, or my niece, the clothes and the jewelry that belong to \nher. My house is her home until she can get another husband.\' " \n7 \n\n\n\n9 8 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n" And her children ? What becomes of them ?\' \' \n\n"If she has a nursing-baby it goes with her, and the father must support it \nuntil it can do without her. Then it belongs to him, like the other children." \n" Cannot the mother visit them, or have them with her at times ?" \n< \xc2\xab No. They are not hers any longer. They must go with the father. \n" Does he often marry again ?" \n\n" Always ! always ! A man must marry, you know. \n\n" I hope the new wife is kind to the children," I say, sighingly. \n\nThen the narrator smiles roguishly, the look that makes her face attractive. \nSuch a look, I may remark, as I have never yet seen upon the visage of a Moslem \nwoman. These carry in every lineament the stamp of inferiority to the other sex: \nare mere mindless machines to minister to the pleasure and comfort of their \nmasters. \n\n"It happens, once in a while, that she is so cross to them, and keeps her \nhusband\'s house so badly, that he sees plainly what a great mistake he made m \ndivorcing their mother. Ah ! but what would he not give if he had never said \nthose three sentences ? So he says to himself, \' I have made a poor bargain this \ntime I will have my first wife back again.\' Now, what does he do but send \nword that she must be married to another man, and then be divorced, and marry \nher first husband again ! , \n\n" Yes, it is true that I tell you. He cannot take back the woman he divorced, \nyou see but he can marry the woman another man has put away. Of course, it \nwould not be a sensible man who would marry somebody he knew would be taken \nfrom him next day. So the woman\'s friends look about for a man who was born \nsilly\xe2\x80\x94 what do you name him?" \n\n\' \' You cannot mean an idiot ! \' \' \n\n" Yes ! yes ! that is it\xe2\x80\x94 or a crazy man. They pay him to take this woman \nas his wife, and to-morrow to divorce her, that her first husband may have his \nwish It seems horrible to you, and we native Christians cry out upon it as a sin \nand a shame, but is thought nothing of by Mohammedans. It is quite usual for \na man to marry one, two, three, four wives, and divorce them all. I know a man \nwho had six, one after the other. He divorced four, one died, and the last one is \n\nnow his widow." . \n\n\' \' And the divorced wives were not disgraced in the eyes of acquaintances ? \n\n" But, surely not ! If they are young and pretty, or very good housekeepers, \n\xc2\xa9r if they have some money, it is as easy for them as for girls to marry." \n\n\n\nBETHLEHEM BRIDE. \n\n\n\nCHAPTER X. \n\n\n\n\nA LEPER IN THE SUN. \n\n\n\nAMONG THE LEPERS. \n\nT is, I think, incorrigible Mark Twain, who says that the name \nof the \' \' street that is called Straight \' \' is the only bit of \nirony in the Scriptures. The flippant fling comes into the \nmind of many pilgrims to the " Eye of the East." It arises \nto our lips as we follow it to the Eastern gate of the \ncity, and see it merged into a wider and less devious \nroad. \n\nThis is bounded on one side by the dry moat of the \nwall. We ought, after two months\' seasoning in regions \nassociated in the western imaginations with attar of rose \nand spicy breezes, and Araby the blest \xe2\x80\x94 to be coolly indif- \nferent to the effluvia arising from the wasting carcasses \nof two camels which have been thrown out of the highway into the ditch. A \npack of lean scavenger-curs, yellow and black, are snarling over the unsavory \nspoils. Skeletons, denuded and dessicated, lie further on, and small bones make \nan unattractive miscellany between the larger and more pronounced. \n\n"It is an Eastern poet, I believe, who says that Damascus is as fragrant \nas Paradise?" observes Alcides, with his nose well in the air. t \n\nThere is no reply to the gibe, for our guide, Abraham Ayoub, a Damascene, \nselected by David Jamal, " halts" us at a miserable gateway in a more miserable \nmud wall on the left of the road. If there were ever gates, they have fallen from \nthe hinges long ago. This is the entrance to a filthy court-yard where the sun \nfalls with kindly warmth. Four human figures are huddled in the sunniest cor- \nner, mere bundles of rags to the casual glance. Two look up as we pass, and our \nshadows fall upon them. With our minds full of Bible stories of "lepers white \nas snow," we should not recognize these caricatures of humanity as victims of the \nawful plague, had not David\'s graphic descriptions prepared us for the revelation. \n\nAlcides has recorded in his note-book as our dragoman\'s diagnosis of the \nloathsome thing\xe2\x80\x94 " a combination of itch, chilblains and gangrene." No more \napt language comes to my pen, after having seen scores of the wretched objects. \nBeyond the outer court, we pass between two huts into a second enclosure, about \nthirty feet square, surrounded by squalid hovels, all facing upon the open area. \n\n(100) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME \n\nM \n\n\n\nOF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nIOI \n\n\n\nThey are of mud, they are without windows; they have one door apiece, and they \nare unfurnished, save for the ragged mats which serve as beds. Scraps of moldy \nbread, bits of bone and rotten vegetables strew the floor \xe2\x80\x94 the remnants of meals \ndevoured here as the dogs without the walls are gnawing theirs. Of the odors \nflowing through the doors into the sun-filled outer world, I cannot speak. On \nthis fine day everybody is outside except a few women dimly visible in the \nobscure interiors, and at these we abstain from looking as we pass. \n\nA strange voice, both hoarse and shrill, hails us while we stand in the middle \nof the courtyard. It proceeds from the porch of a small frame house directly \nopposite the opening \nby which we had en- \ntered. The house is, \nwe note, larger than \nthe mud huts, and has \ntwo windows besides \nthe door. A woman, \nor girl, for she must \nbe under twenty, and \nmight be good-looking \nbut for her viragoish \nexpression and a cer- \ntain hardness, \xe2\x80\x94 I \nmight term it a callos- \nity of skin and features \nthat betrays the blight \nwhich has fallen upon \nher \xe2\x80\x94 stands upon the \nupper step wringing \nout a cloth she has \ntaken from a great \nmetal pan. We have house of chief leper in naaman\'s house of lepers. \ninterrupted her day \'s washing, and for other reasons she is ill-pleased. Her husky \nscream is a question, for our guide answers apologetically what he translates to us \nin a hasty undertone: \n\n"This gentleman" \xe2\x80\x94 designating Alcides \xe2\x80\x94 "is a great \'hakim\' (physi- \ncian) from over the sea, who seeks to help you if he can. We intend no \nharm." \n\nShe has thrown the cloth back into the tub with a despairing gesture, and \nrushed into the house while he is still speaking, appearing a minute later at the \nwindow: \n\n\n\n\n102 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBEE. \n\n\n\n" Go away ! " she cries, her voice breaking oddly upon the high notes as a \nconsumptive\'s fails when he is about to cough. " Go away ! Allah only can help \nus, and he will not ! \' \' \n\n\' \' Her father is the chief man of the lepers, " says the guide to us. " He was \nonce a rich \xe2\x80\x94 one very rich \xe2\x80\x94 man. Now he is here \xe2\x80\x94 and old\xe2\x80\x94 and cannot leave \nhis bed. His housekeeper, also old, and this, his only child, live here with him \nin the Naaman House. \' \' \n\nFor this loathly place (to borrow a word from a former generation), is nigh \nunto the grounds where are shown a few columns surrounded by a mud-and-stone \nwall, said to be the ruins of the house of the famous Syrian captain. The asylum \nis maintained by Moslem charity. Wealthy Mohammedans die and leave legacies \nfor the support of the colony, in the hope that the act may bring repose to their \nown disembodied souls. Kind-hearted people in the neighborhood give them \nprovisions, leaving them inside the outer gate and hastening away to avoid con- \ntamination. In spring-time a few of the stronger men are hired to do light work \nin the fields, and in harvest to glean after the reapers, gather beans, etc. A less \nhumane measure is the permission granted to the least afflicted of the colony to \nbake in the public ovens dough kneaded by their diseased hands. \n\nWe had been led to believe the Naaman House a hospital for what are \nsurely the most grievously-smitten of all God\'s human creatures, and are surprised \nto learn that this retreat is merely a hole in which they can burrow and hide and \nbe fed apart from the rest of the world. Last year there were forty-two lepers \nhere; now, we are told, they number but twenty-eight. \n\n" What has become of the rest ?" \n\nThe guide lifts his shoulders to his ears. \' \' What must come to all of them \n\xe2\x80\x94 death. Each is a dying man even now. See!" \n\nPity unutterable gets the better of disgust, as we survey the scene. The \nlepers lie grouped and sit singly in the sunshine, most of them against the wall, \nseemingly regardless of our presence. Curiosity is dead within them. They do not \neven beg for \' \' bakshish, \' \' as is the habit of their kind in the streets of the city and \non the wayside. Some crouch in corners, their poor, marred faces supported by hands \nfrom which the fingers are literally dropping; others lie flat upon their backs, soak- \ning in the warmth, eyes closed and jaws falling as if dead. Every few minutes one \nbegins to cough spasmodically, and the example proving infectious, another and \nanother will join in, until a horrid chorus that threatens to shake the loose frames \napart fills the place. Two near us crawl away, still coughing in a weak, wheezy way, \nclots of blood dripping from their lips as they go. None of them walk, but all \nshuffle along on their haunches like beasts who have been hamstrung, or creep upon \nhands and knees. In some cases, the hands and feet are muffled in dirty rags. \nTurks are here in garments that bear tokens of old-time finery in shreds of \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\ntarnished gold lace and frayed embroidery, and Bedouins that are ghastly travesties \nof the tall, bronzed horsemen we see in the desert and among the mountains. \nThey still wear the costume of their race, the suggestion thus conveyed of the \nfree, active life forever left behind them accentuating their present misery. \n\nOne of these loiters nearer to us than the rest, his eyes and manner expres- \nsive of some degree of interest in us and our movements. The girl at the window \nswears furiously at him, as he obeys the beckon of our guide\'s hand and approaches. \n\n\n\n\nRUINS OF NAAMAN\'S HOUSE. \n\n"Dare not to go near them !" she vociferates. " They are dogs and the off- \nspring of dogs, as their fathers were before them. They come, not to give alms, \nbut to make a mock of us and to take pictures of us !" \n\nThe last half-sentence is drawn forth by the sight of the kodak swung from \nAlcides\' shoulder. \n\nA magic word of two syllables \xe2\x80\x94 the first I verily believe that Arab and \nSyrian babies learn to lisp\xe2\x80\x94 has quickened the Bedouin\'s step, and he stands \nbefore us, well-made and heavily bearded, with comparatively few traces in face \nand figure of the fatal malady. He is about forty years old, and when he \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nhis voice is faint and dissonant. His lungs must be well-nigh gone. He is quite \nwilling to converse \xe2\x80\x94 thanks to the prospective \' \' bakshish. \' \' \n\n\' \' How long have you been ill ?" we asked by the mouth of the interpreter. \n\n\' \' Since I was fourteen years old. \' \' \n\n\' \' At what age do the symptoms first show themselves ?\' \' \n" In men, about fifteen; in women, twelve to thirteen." \n\n"Are you contented \xe2\x80\x94 and \xe2\x80\x94 " bringing out the last word with an effort \xe2\x80\x94 \n" comfortable here ?\' \' \n\n\' \' I am not unhappy. I have .no work to do. I have my lodgings. I have \nmy food. What more do I want?" \n\n" But if you have no work to do, how do you pass the day ?" \n\n" I sit in the sun. I do nothing. Why should I work? Man works to get \nclothes; I have clothes. And for bread and bed, and a cover by night when it \nrains. These are mine." \n\n\' \' Have you amusements here ?" trying not to glance around the mean enclosure \nand at the repulsive occupants. \n\nHe stares vacantly. The idea is too new and strange to work itself into his \nbrain. From the groups distributed about the court odd murmurs are arising; \nmutterings in weak, raucous tones, like the growling and whining of beasts dis- \nturbed in their slumbers in the sunshine. The woman leans over the window-sill \nand devotes us to the vengeance of heaven and the abode of the fiend. The \nwhole affair is an abhorrent nightmare, from which we are thankful to escape. Our \nBedouin casts furtive looks over his shoulder at the malcontents, and will answer \nno more questions, however mildly put. The liberal bakshish dropped from a \nprudent height into his maimed hand does not pacify the daughter of the bed- \nridden chief of the queer colony. As long as we can hear her, she is reckoning \nup the misdeeds of our ancestry and imprecating curses upon our heads. \n\nDante never pictured a fouler deep than this so-called House of Mercy, where \nbeings of like form and nature with ourselves are decaying piecemeal, while the \nbreath of life still animates their dismembered bodies. As I have intimated, this \nform of leprosy must not be confounded with that which overtook Moses as a \nproof of God\'s ability to work whatever wonder He wills; or Miriam and Gehazi \nandUzziah, as punishment for sin, or that which drove haughty Naaman to bathe \nin little Jordan, at the behest of a prophet who would not even grant him a per- \nsonal interview. This is hereditary in forty-nine cases out of fifty, and the recog- \nnized result of the sins of the forefathers. David Jamal and his Damascus friend \nagree that the malady is unknown at this day among the Jews, testimony which \nis corroborated by other authorities to which I have referred the question. \n\n"It is clearly, then, not caused by want of neatness in this generation," is \nthe grave conclusion of our dragoman. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nIntermarriage among lepers are constantly occurring, and sometimes, \nalthough, David says, not frequently, children are born to the horrible heritage of \ndisease and disgrace. \n\nInstances are on record of attempts to avert the certain doom by removing the \nchild in early infancy to the judicious guardianship of others than the parents. \n\n\n\n\n\' \' THEY OBTRUDE THEMSELVES UPON OUR NOTICE." \n\n\n\nIn spite of sanitary and medical precautions, the unmistakable signs make their \nappearance between the ages of thirteen and fifteen. The incipient stages are \nintense itching of the hands, extending gradually to other parts until the whole \nframe is a body of living death, a mass of putrefying sores and decomposing bones. \n\nThe Jerusalem lepers who are at large are, if possible, in a sadder case than \nthose sheltered in the Naaman House at Damascus. They have, it is true, a \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nvillage of their own below Siloam (whose \' \' shady rill \' \' and growing lily are \nsadly dismissed to the realm of hymnal romance), a wretched cluster of huts \nto which they resort at nightfall, but the streets are their home, and begging is \nthe only means by which they earn a livelihood. They haunt places frequented \nby tourists and pilgrims, following Russian and Greek devotees in their periodical \nvisits to the Virgin\'s Tomb, Gethsemane and the Mount of Olives. There may \nbe in the Holy City about sixty of this class of professional mendicants. \n\nSingularly enough, lepers are found in but four towns in Syria: Damascus, \nNablous, Ramleh and Jerusalem. These are to them as cities of refuge when \nattacked in the neighboring villages. No longer with the warning cry of \n"unclean! unclean!" they obtrude themselves upon our notice whenever we \nwalk or drive through the thoroughfares in Damascus and Jerusalem; stumps \nof hands or fingers, from which one or several joints are missing, are thrust into \nour faces, the horrid voice, unhuman in quality and inflection, calls for "bak- \nshish," and the disfigured faces grin or weep, as suits the owner\'s mood and taste. \n\nThe lights in this dark picture are found in the Leper Home at Jerusalem, \nfounded in 1867 by the Baroness Keffenbrinck-Ascheradin, and by her trans- \nferred in 1880 to the Moravians. The building stands upon a hill pleasantly \nvisible from the Bethany road. The management is excellent, and all the \nappointments are those of a well-kept hospital. Divine service is held twice a \nweek, and those who are too ill to attend it are visited separately in their rooms. \nThe \' \' house father \' \' and his wife and the chaplain address themselves to their \nterrible task in the spirit expressed by the last-named in a recent report: \n\n\' \' Remembering always that the loathsome and terrible disease of the patient \nis one which seems ever to have thrilled our Saviour\'s breast with a keen and \ninstantaneous compassion. \n\n\' \' Gospel addresses, prayers offered at the bedside of many a stricken sufferer \nand private intercourse with Moslem and Christian patients have led many to \nacknowledge the benefits of Christianity and to endeavor to live according to the \nhigh principles of the Gospel." \n\nPhysicians and nurses acknowledge that the malady is absolutely incurable. \nThey are likewise unanimous in the opinion that, however long the seeds may lie \nlatent in the individual or family, leprosy is not to be eliminated from the blood. All \nthat they can do \xe2\x80\x94 and this is much \xe2\x80\x94 is, by cleanliness, alleviative medicines and ex- \nternal applications, to lessen present suffering, and smooth the pathway to the grave. \n\nWild rumors of extraordinary cures effected by a German physician who was \nhere for a while, and whose work included some skilful operations, and of the mirac- \nulous properties of a certain oil, have excited false hopes in many who eagerly \napply for admission. Those in charge of the Home are firmly candid in dissipating \nthese fancies, declaring that no mortal skill can do anything more than to alleviate \nsuffering and to delay the horrible end. \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI. \n\n\n\n"THE PEARL OF THE EAST.\'* \n\nOUTSIDE the walls of Damascus\xe2\x80\x94 which, if you like, you may consider \nthe setting of the " Pearl " \xe2\x80\x94 we first encounter a couple whom we are \nto know so much better by-and-by that I may be excused for intro- \nducing them somewhat at length. \nLuther Zwinglius Sharpe, D. D., is the ex-pastor of an Eastern church in \nAmerica, and ex-president of a Western college, and these are but a few of his \ntitles to the respectful notice of the world in general and his country people in par- \nticular. A Congregationalist by birth, education and choice, he yet committed \nthe ecclesiastical solecism, five years ago, of marrying a High Church Episcopalian \nof the most advanced type. She was rich then, and has lately become much \nricher. Shortly after the later accession to her fortune, the Rev. Zwinglius \nSharpe (thus he registers his name at hotels), resigned all his offices in his native \nland and came abroad to rally from a combination of bronchitis and nervous pros- \ntration, which, various doctois say, might have been expected in the (altered) \ncircumstances. With this aspersion we have nothing to do. Still, as one who \nhas spent more than thirty years in church-and-charity work, I may express the \ndoubt whether the friction of pastorate or professorship could have worn more \nseriously upon the nervous system of the average man than the continual conflict \nof opinion and belief which goes on between his spouse and himself. But Dr. \nSharpe is many removes from the average man. \n\nThey have left their carriage and stand below the projecting raiment of a \nround tower upon the outer wall. Close to the ground are sections of ancient \nRoman masonry; the tower is topped by a modern shed. The outlines of a win- \ndow, almost wholly blocked up with rubbish, appear below the rude building on \nthe summit. \n\n\' \' That, \' \' says our guide, \' \' tradition points out as the window from which \nPaul was let down in a basket, as recorded in Acts, the ninth chapter and twenty- \nfifth verse." \n\nI cannot record that Dr. Sharpe pricks up his ears as the innocent remark \nenters them, for they are already red and bristling with the heat of argument. He \nturns energetically upon us. \n\n" I do hope," he says, " that as intelligent Christians of the nineteenth cen- \ntury, you will not credit this worthless \xe2\x80\x94 utterly worthless \xe2\x80\x94 tale concocted by \nmonkish charlatans. Setting aside the extreme improbability that the dwellers \n\n(107) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nin the Damascus of that day would have regarded the spot as noteworthy, the \nmasonry of the wall belongs so evidently to a later period that one is lost in sur- \nprise at the impudence of the attempt to identify the locality with the manner of \nthe apostle\'s escape from his persecutors. And cannot you see, my good \nfriends "\xe2\x80\x94haranguing the guides of his party and of ours\xe2\x80\x94" that you are guilty \nof folly, if not of mischief, in perpetuating the legend ? Not that I blame you as \nmuch as I blame the superstitious ignorance of the travelers who encourage you to \nrepeat such stuff. \' \' \n\nDr. Sharpe is tall and meagre, with a long face running down into a pointed \nred beard. He waves his arms like a windmill as he declaims. His wife is much \nbelow medium height and plump as a quail, with bright, beady eyes not unlike \nthose of the same bird; her voice is a mild twitter, but we feel at once that for \n"staying power " she can be counted upon as no mean antagonist for her irascible \nhusband. It may be the staying quality of the feather-bed that yields only to \nrebound, but it is " all there." \n\n" My love !" is the preface to h^r remonstrance \xe2\x80\x94 " where would the Church \nbe now, but for these traditions ? When I see the unhappy effect produced upon \nyour mind and spirits by incredulity, I am disposed to cling more closely to what \nholy men have transmitted to the generations following. For instance, you took \nno comfort whatever in our visit to the scene of St. Paul\'s conversion \xe2\x80\x94 and I had \nsuch a precious time !" \n\n" No comfort ! Where should I find satisfaction in a baseless legend, fabri- \ncated originally, I doubt not, on purpose to induce travelers to stop and buy \nrefreshments at what, it is pretended, was an ancient resting-place of caravans \nfrom Jerusalem to Damascus. My good wife \xe2\x80\x94 " turning to us, as he says this, \nan audience being a vital necessit}\' with men of his calibre\' and class \xe2\x80\x94 " my goo\'d \nwife formed her belief upon this, as upon other subjects of sacred history, by the \nhelp of pictures and goody-goody story-books. She has in her mind every detail \nof the scene as depicted by these; Saul \xe2\x80\x94 he wasn\'t even Paul then, my dear, much \nless a saint \xe2\x80\x94 tumbling from his horse upon a macadamized road, and his compan- \nions in various attitudes of a like plight, when it is not certain, or even probable, \nthat he was ever upon a horse in his life. It is more likely that he made the \njourney on foot, or upon a camel, or an ass. As to the location of the event, I \ndare say that each of you guides " \xe2\x80\x94 in sudden appea \xe2\x80\x94 " has heard one or more \nplaces named besides Katana, as the scene of Paul\'s conversion?" \n\nThe men look at one another, and even grave David Jamal smiles as he \nanswers that " Katana, on the ancient route to Jerusalem, has been for centuries \npointed out as the place where the Apostle Paul was struck to the earth and had \na direct revelation from Christ, our Lord. Other places have been suggested, but \nthe best authorities agree upon Katana." \n\n\n\nno \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nI think there is something in the Christian dragoman\'s way of pronouncing the \nwords, "Christ, our Lord," that tends to silence the disputants. At any rate, \nthey do not resume the discussion until we are out of hearing. \n\n" I have heard of that gentleman before," observes David, as we drive away. \n4 \'He is, I believe, very learned, and is collecting materials for a book upon the \nHoly Land. Up to this time, it is said, he has found nothing anywhere that he \ncan believe in. His book will not be large." \n\n\n\n\n"PAUL\'S WINDOW" IN DAMASCUS WAI,!,. \n\n\n\nEncouraged by our laugh, he adds: " I recollect his wife as one of a party of \nthirteen ladies I took through Palestine over twelve years ago. Miss De Credo \nwas her name. I should have said, then, that she would have been a Roman \nCatholic by now. She set great store by relics and the like." \n\nWe halt to examine another bit of city -wall, almost ruinous above, but rest- \ning upon a sure foundation of Roman architecture. In spring-time, when the \nencompassing orchards are in bloom, Damascus may deserve, in the mind of the \napproaching traveler, some of the encomiums lavished upon it by poets and histo- \nrians of a former age. At this season, the "pearl" is undeniably dingy. No \nmodern Mohammed will pause without any one of the four gates to compare the \nattractions of this, as an earthly Paradise, with those of the heavenly, much less \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBEE. \n\n\n\nin \n\n\n\nturn away with a sigh of renunciation, saying: " Man can have but one Paradise \nand mine must not be here !\' \' \n\n" Certainly not, if Damascus odors were the same then as now !" remarks \nmy traveling companion. \n\nDiverging from the road skirting the city-wall are others leading between \nwalled orchards into the outlying country, some stretching far away to cities \nwhose names kindle wistful gleams in our eyes. Upon that leading to Bagdad\xe2\x80\x94 \n\n\n\n\n"another bit of city waix \n\n\n\ndistant, from thirty-five to forty days\' journey, as a caravan travels, ten by the \n" swift\' dromedaries " that carry the mails\xe2\x80\x94 has halted a long string of camels. \nWe check the driver to have a better look at the ugly and at present patient \nbeasts, laden with who can say what wonders of that far and fabled mart ? The \ncamel is notoriously uncertain of temper, captious, irritable, and sometimes so \nsullen as to refuse food for a fortnight at a time, during which period he must be \nmuzzled to prevent him from biting his fellows and drivers. We hear of another \npeculiarity while we survey this group. \n\n"They are of the country and the desert," we are told, "and must be \n\n\n\n112 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nunloaded here, without the gates. Not being used to city streets and sights, they \nwould be unmanageable if taken into the town." \n\nThere they stand, with the outstretching necks that look at once supple and \nStiff, meek and stubborn, awaiting the command to let themselves down groan- \ningly upon their much-doubled-up knees that their burdens may be unstrapped\xe2\x80\x94 \nfascinating studies, if only because of their irredeemable hideousness and the \n\n\n\n\nc OF THE COUNTRY AND THE DESERT." \n\n\n\nphysical idiosyncracies that set them apart from other quadrupedal domesticated \ncreatures. I always stop to look at a camel in passing, and never without a \nshudder of wonder that is not admiration, and loathing which is antipathy. \n\nPassing through the city-gate into the street which is called Straight and, \nwith the memory of the Rev. Zwinglius fresh in our thoughts, negativing the \njesting proposition to visit, first the house of Ananias, and then the grave of \nCain\xe2\x80\x94 this latter being a shapeless pile of stones cast together by the passers-by \nin execration of the first murderer\xe2\x80\x94 we alight presently at the entrance of the \nworld-famous bazaars of Damascus. Hard-by yawns a mighty, blackened shell; \nthe walls still standing and the roof arched above them, but through gaps in the \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nrude boarding filling up the doors, and through the empty window- frames, on\xc2\xab \nsees what devastation has been wrought, and recently, by fire. The bazaars \nnearest to the ruin have not escaped the licking flames that burst from the win- \ndows. A stately minaret towers heavenward near to what was the great mosque \nof Damascus. \n\n\' \' There was nothing in Syria like it," relates our guide. \' \' Men came many \nmiles\xe2\x80\x94 oh, very many \xe2\x80\x94 to pray here. They believed one prayer in this mosque \nto be worth thousands and tens of thousands said in another. And that God \nwould leave this holy place standing for forty years after the world should be \nburned up, in order, that those who had not yet found the Gate of Paradise might \nhave a place for prayer. \' \' \n\n\' \' How did it take fire ?" \xe2\x80\xa2 \n\nThe two dragomen exchange looks. One steps near and lowers his voice: \n\' \' From the melting solder with which workmen were repairing the roof, say \nthe Christians. Others " \xe2\x80\x94 avoiding in the crowd the mention of Mohammedans \nor Moslems \xe2\x80\x94 "will have it that the fire fell from heaven upon the Mosque because \nChristians were employed in building it after it was burned in part many years \nago." \n\nWe have just fairly entered one of the principal streets of the bazaars \xe2\x80\x94 a con- \ntinuation of that "which is called Straight" \xe2\x80\x94 when a roar as the sound of \nmany \xe2\x80\x94 and musical \xe2\x80\x94 waters, draws our eyes to the tossing crowd filling the lower \nend. The guides have barely time to draw us within the shelter of a doorway \nwhen the human tide rolls up to our feet, choking the narrow thoroughfare \xe2\x80\x94 a \nhustling, struggling mass. Foremost are perhaps a hundred boys, clapping \ntheir hands high above their heads and screeching, rather than yelling, what \nDavid translates in our ears as \' \' Praise to the Prophet ! " A herd of twice as many \nmen is upon their heels, vociferating the same words, shaking tambourines high in \nthe air and beating small drums while whirling them aloft. \n\n" What is it? A popular revolution?" we gasp, as the billows roll away in \nthe distance, and the air settles about us in comparative quiet. \n\nBoth guides smile, evidently in no wise excited by the demonstration that \ntook our breath and well-nigh our senses away. \n\n"They are men and boys who have offered their sacrifices, without pay, to \nthe government to build again the Great Mosque," replies a guide. " They go \nthus about the streets crying, \' Praise to the Prophet !\' that others maybe moved \nto do likewise. We hear, to-day, that the Sultan will give generously, some say, \nmore than one hundred thousand mejidie" \xe2\x80\x94 the Turkish dollar \xe2\x80\x94 " from his own \npurse toward the great work." \n\nA pursy Englishman, who fairly exhales his nationality, so obtrusive are his \n\nround-crowned hat, mutton-chop whiskers, red face and tweed suit, is crowded \n\nagainst us, and has the benefit of our explanation. \n8 \n\n\n\nii 4 THE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n" Rayly !" he utters, coolly. " Now, do you know, I took it to be a sort of \nEastern Salvation Army, don\'t you know? The tambourines, drums, and all, \nlook like it. \' \' \n\nThe roar is not even a whisper by this time. Besides ourselves, and our \nBriton, nobody seems at all interested in the doings of the clamorous crowd. The \nfine-looking Turk, sitting cross-legged upon the counter of his stall over the way, \n\n\n\n\n"THE STREET THAT IS CAUSED STRAIGHT." \n\n\n\nlias dropped the lids upon his dark eyes with as fine an expression of boredom as \ncould be achieved by an English exquisite at the height, or depth, of a London \nseason. At the stall to his right, a customer is beating down the price of a \nnarghileh (or water-pipe) , with an amber mouthpiece, with no more apparent \nconsciousness of the passage of the mob than of our observation of himself and \nhis actions. \n\n"This is the Oriental calmness of which we have heard, all our lives," we \nsoliloquize, " and these narrow, dirty lanes are the great bazaars ! \n\n"The poorer bazaars, of course?" we pronounce, in cheerful certainty of the \nreply. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OK THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nThe Damascus guide does not catch our meaning. The question is put in a \ndifferent form: \n\n\' \' There are broader streets and finer shops in Damascus than these ?\' \' \n\nTo prepare ourselves for this expedition, we have been reading a chapter in \n" Mirage," a strangely sad story published perhaps a score of years ago, and a \nsentence is freshly distinct in our minds: \n\n"They were deep in the bazaars of Damascus \xe2\x80\x94 deep in those cool, dim, \nvaulted spaces, with the lustre of silks, the gleam of metal and porcelain about \nthem, and the odor of gums and curious spices filling the dusty air." \n\nCertainly the air is dusty, after the rush of the not-clean mob described in a \nformer paper, and there is an odor \xe2\x80\x94 there are more than a score of odors \xe2\x80\x94 that fill \nthe vaulted space. If there be one sense which the traveler in the East comes to \nregard as superfluous and inconvenient, it is that of smell. If I refer repeatedly \nto this fact, it is because the pressure of the truth is never absent from us. Being \ntold that the scene before us is a favorable specimen of what we are here to see, \nwe resign ourselves to the Oriental odor, \' \' curious \' \' to the uninitiated, but \nfreighted with no spice or gum with which our olfactories are acquainted, and set \nour eyes to work instead. \n\nWe are in a network of narrow streets, none of which are twenty-five feet in \nwidth. Low, arched roofs cover them; the light breaking, here and there, \nthrough slits in the arch, in a deliberate, dreamy fashion essentially Oriental. \nAs the sight becomes accustomed to it, we see that the glints brought out b}^ the \nintermittent rays come from stalls piled and hung with silverware of every \ndescription. \n\n" The street of the silversmiths," Abraham observes. " The trade is in the \nhands of the Christians. The man over there has the same shop which his \ngrandfather kept. The Christians, in former times, could not hold such property \nas cattle, houses and orchards, for it was often taken from them or destroyed by \xe2\x80\x94 \nthose who were of a different race." \n\n(Again we notice the scrupulous avoidance of the word " Mohammedan," or \n"Moslem," in a public place, and speculate as to whether prudence or courtesy \ndictates the custom.) \n\n" Therefore, Christians usually are in trade \xe2\x80\x94 manufacturers, and like that." \n\nWhat are dignified by the name of shops are really stalls, such as line our \nmarkets at home, but enclosed on three sides. A movable door, a sort of wooden \nshutter \xe2\x80\x94 sometimes in one piece, sometimes in several \xe2\x80\x94 closes the front at night. \nWhen this is taken down, the shop is opened without other ceremony. A big \nwindow of one of our great dry goods stores would hold the entire stock-in-trade \nof any of these recesses, and leave room to spare. Upon the counter, or upon a \ndivan behind it, the proprietor has tucked his slippered feet away in the folds of \n\n\n\nii6 THE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\nthe baggy cloth trousers which, I insist, are the reverse of graceful aud pulls \nslowlv at the yards of flexible tube couuecting the amber mouthpiece between his \nlips with a vessel exactly like the carafe, or water-bottle, used upon our dinner- \ntables with the exception of the tobacco-pipe attachment. \n\nWe are collecting-with the rest of the traveling " foreigners "-souvenir \nspoons, and mean to procure some in Damascus. The expression of the intention \nis all we have to do for the present. David steps to the front as the coveted \narticles are produced. The prospective vender is an acquaintance nay more, a \nfriend for they kissed one another just now, and the Damascan au.\'resses h.m as \n"Abou-Nassar," the "Father of Nassar." When a man become, the proud \nowner of a son, he is thenceforth known among his intimates as that toy s lather. \nTen daughters may have preceded the youngster, and six brothers may lollow \nhim, but the parent continues to rejoice in the title of father of the firstborn son. \n\nThese are two friends, as I have said, but as the buyer\'s representative the \ndragoman is transformed forthwith, until the sale is concluded, into the bitter \nenemy of his countryman. . \n\n"Never give the first price named !" is the first lesson taught the foreign \nvisitor The sum may sound reasonable to us, but a cardinal principle of Eastern \nshopping is to believe and hold for certain that it is iniquitous, and the universal \npractice is to beat it down to at least one-third less. It matters nothing to cur \nhonest representative, who would not cheat his worst enemy ot a penny, that the \namount involved is only a franc, or, at the most, two. Figuratively, he girds up \nhis loins, and rolls up his sleeves, and " pitches in" for a wordy duel. Thevoi.es \nof both combatants rise, their gestures threaten each other\'s lives; one-tenth of the \nnoise in an American shop would call in the police m force. \n\nQuite aware that it is all sound, and no fury, we lean back in the rush- \nbottomed chairs set outside for us in the open street-for sidewalks there are \nnone-and give ourselves up to contemplation of the vistas stretching away from \n\nus on four sides. . , , \n\nAfter the shadeless glare of the Damascus sunshine, we recognize the cool \nhalf-lights as grateful, and the occasional streams of radiance through the aper- \ntures fn the roof bring out picturesque features in merchandise and costumes \nAt the far end of the street are shops wherein are manufactured the various stuffs \n\nhere offered for sale. \xe2\x80\x9e A . . \n\nOne street is given up wholly to the display of rugs; another to a bewildering \nsuccession of rings, curios, brass trays, cups, bowls and the like; another to \nmother-of-pearl tables of divers sizes, patterns and heights. A principal avenue \nexhibits on both sides "Franji" articles. The manufactured term, m universal \nuse in this country, and referable, I think, to no known language covers w ha\xc2\xa3 \never smacks of European or other Occidental usage, and is freely applied to all \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n"liiili"\' \n\n\n\nsorts of innovations. It signifies, in the present instance, French, English \nGerman, Italian, and even American goods \xe2\x80\x94 calicoes from Manchester, tinware \nand cutlery (cheap) from the United States, colored glass from Baden-Baden \nand every variety of knick-knacks from Paris. Several streets away from \nwhere we are awaiting the result of the pitched battle of Arabic tongues are \nthe meaner quarters devoted to the sale of second-hand clothing \xe2\x80\x94 it is needless \n\nto say by whose hands. \n\nIt may gratify their \nAmerican sisters to \nknow that those whose \nlot seems to us hard \nenough without such \na barbarous restriction \nare not debarred from \ndoing their own shop- \nping in Damascus. \n\nOld as is the be- \nclouded \' \' Pearl of the \nEast," the "inferior \nsex \' \' has the advan- \ntage in this particular \nover Nazareth, Nab- \nlous, Gaza, Jenen and \nJaffa, where native \nwomen, veiled or un- \nveiled, are never al- \nlowed to visit shop or \nmarket-place. Even \nthe Christian matrons \nmm> must apply to this oc- \n\ncupation, so dear to the \n"it is needless to say by whose hands." feminine heart the in- \n\njunction of the Great Bachelor (or widower?) of Tarsus, and ask their husbands \nat home concerning the latest sweet thing in jewelry, and the " Franji" gown- \npatterns put up in decorated boxes in Paris, and sent eastward at the end of the \nseason for the delectation of hareems and Greek, or Roman Catholic, or Protestant \nhouseholds. \n\nHow do they support existence in such circumstances ? \n\nFathers, brothers and husbands, in unconscious prevision of Mr. Edward \nBellamy\'s "Looking Backward," select and bring home samples of cloth, silk, \n\n\n\n\nnS THE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\netc., and the secluded wife, daughter or sister chooses from among these such \nstuffs as she imagines, from the bits laid before her, would be handsome and \nbecoming. Those who know how unlike the sample is to the effect of the fabric \nwhen seen "in the piece," especially as displayed by the cunning hands of a \ntrained salesman, can guess how frequent and sore are the disappointments when \nthe purchases are unfolded in the women\'s apartments. \n\nThat tall woman, whose mumings cannot conceal the outlines of a figure \nuncommonly good for a land where corsets are unknown, and a "neat fit" is \n\n\n\n\n"THEY MARCH MORE SOBERLY NOW." \n\n\n\nalmost as rare, makes as serious a business of her bargaining as if she had the \ninterests of a brace of defenceless "foreigners " upon her conscience. She stands \nall the while, we note. The uncompromising rush-bottomed chair would seem to \nbe reserved for foreigners. She haggles over a pair of silver filagree bracelets, \nfitting them upon a round, brown wrist, and slipping them excitedly up and \ndown, chattering volubly in Arabic in a voice so dissonant that her " mended" \nshivers, rather than wavers, before the torrent. It is dark blue, with red poppies, \nlarger than life, \' \' powdered \' \' over it. All that we see of her face is the indication \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n119 \n\n\n\n(to use a technical phrase) of two big, black eyes in the upper part. She can \ndiscern clearly not only the countenance of her natural enemy, the tradesman, \nbut defects in the workmanship of the trinkets she is trying on, for she calls his \nattention sharply to a misshapen link, tears them from her wrists, tosses them \ndisdainfully upon the counter, gathers the voluminous "izzar" about her and \nturns away with the air of one resolved to endure no more imposition. She has \ntaken two or three steps when the merchant, picking up the discarded ornament, \nsays something quietly and indifferently. As indifferently she pauses and answers \nhim over her shoulder. \n\nA minute later she is again at the counter; the salesman is folding the \nbracelets in tissue-paper, and she-still as if she would rather leave than take \nthem\xe2\x80\x94 is extracting from her purse the sum finally agreed upon between them. \n\n\n\nr V 1 \n\n\n\nSHEARING A CAMEL. \n\n\n\nThe affair is a farce throughout, and is repeated often enougn to lose all \nnovelty, not to say eharm, were the disposition to make a bargain less oostmate \nin the human breast. The buyer knows perfectly well that the \' asking-price - \na term with which one speedily becomes familiar over here-is as much above the \nreal value of the article offered as what he, on his part, proposes to give for it is \nbelow it; he is also certain that somewhere between the two will be the final point \n\nof settlement. , . \n\nThe responsive yawn is arrested midway by David\'s abrupt termination of \nhostilities. He has pushed aside the spoons, and, generous indjgnanon m every \nline of his visage, motions us to follow him. \n\n\n\n120 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n\xc2\xab But ^\xe2\x80\x94expostulates one of the unsophisticated\xe2\x80\x94 \' \' since they are what we \nwant, and not really dear, would it not be better to pay his price ?" \n\n\'\'Like the rest of them "\xe2\x80\x94enunciates the dragoman, judicially, without \nspecifying who are included in the pronoun\xe2\x80\x94 " he thinks travelers are made of \nmoney. You will get the spoons. He will call us back." \n\nThe spoons are in my trunk, and are probably worth a half-franc apiece less \nthan was paid for them after the profuse expenditure of breath, nervous force and \nminutes. Shopping, always wearisome work to busy people, gathers new horrors \nfrom such accessories. By the time we have halted here fifteen minutes, and there \ntwenty, and somewhere else ten, we are thankful to be out of the covered arcades, \nand to see the unobstructed blue overhead in a street where we meet one wing of \nthe boyish troop who passed us an hour ago. They march more soberly now, but \nstill chant the sing-song, "Praise the Prophet !" \n\nThe sun is low and red upon the horizon as we, for the second time, drive m \nat the eastern gate of the aged city. A single camel is left in the open space \nwithout, where we saw the caravan at noon. He lies so prone and abject upon \nthe earth, his neck stretched out to a length so incredible, that we are divided \nbetween the desire to pity and to deride him. His acknowledged master stands \nabove him brandishing a pair of shears; one side of the forlorn beast is already so \nnaked as to put Sterne\'s shorn lamb to the blush, and as the crimson sunlight \nstrikes athwart him, the "stranded ship of the desert" looks abnormally and \ninconceivably hideous \xe2\x80\x94 even for a country camel. \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XII. \n\n\n\nBY THE SEA OF GALILEE. \n\n\n\n\n\'her fat puppy. \n\n\n\nWAY from Bethsaida, the city of Andrew, James, John, Peter \nand Philip, we took a handful of curious shells, as black as \ncoal. The beach is strewed with them, and they are so unlike \nthe gray and brown we find at other points of the sea of Galilee \nthat we cherish fanciful associations connecting them with the \nsilent desolation pervading this coast. "City," there is none. \nA few half-buried stones mark the site of the town built by the \nPhilip who married Salome a little while after she danced off the \nhead of John the Baptist. He was the most respectable member \nof the Herod tribe, we recall in picking up our shells, but we \nlook in vain for the handsome tomb built here for him, about the \ntime that the Cross which was to draw all nations unto it was lifted up on Calvary. \n\nCapernaum lies a short hour\'s ride from Bethsaida. The horses pick their \nway over the pebbly beds of what will be torrents in a couple of months, and eye \nlongingly patches of coarse grass, greening where the stones are not so thick; we \npass a ruined Roman aqueduct used in the days of the Herods for conveying \nwater to the fine cities they built upon the sea called by their Emperor\'s name. \nIn the immediate vicinity of Capernaum, reeds and flags must have hidden the \nfallen stones last spring and summer, for they rustle drearily in the wind moaning \nup from the sea, and tufts of dried herbage define the outline of such fragments of \nlimestone as have not been utilized in building the Roman Catholic convent we \nsee rising up in the background. It is unfinished, but there are no workmen to \nbe seen to-day. By the time we have alighted, the entire population of Caper- \nnaum is drawn up in hospitable order to welcome us. Pitched where, for aught \nwe can say to disprove it, Matthew\'s custom-house may have stood, is a small \nblack tent, and from the smoky recesses emerge a Bedouin, as venerable and \nbenign as Abraham; his wife, throwing a fold of her dark blue nondescript \ngarment modestly over her chin as she comes; a daughter of fifteen, or there- \nabouts, bashful where her mother is modest, and the prettiest native child we have \nseen, a girl of four, whose conviction that we will covet and probably steal her fat \npuppy, overcomes curiosity during our stay. \n\n(121) \n\n\n\n122 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE \n\n\n\nThe patriarch is the care-taker of the sacred precincts. The smile with which \nwe hear his office named is exchanged for disappointed looks upon discovering \nthat what we especially desired to see is nowhere to be found. \n\n\xc2\xab Yet it was certainly here last year," David says, his soul divided between \nsurprise, sorrow and wrath. " If I am not mistaken, Dr. Geikie speaks of it in \nhis book and Dr. Talmage will have told you how impressed he was by it when \nhe was in Capernaum, three years ago. It is more than pity that some of those \nthieves who are all the while hanging about such places have stolen it. I say it I \n\n\n\n\n"THE ENTIRE POPULATION OE CAPERNAUM." \n\n\xc2\xabven if it has been built into those walls over there "\xe2\x80\x94nodding ominously in the \ndirection of the unfinished convent. \n\nAfter a moment of painful silence, he resumes: "You see, it helped to make \nit all so plain ! I have stood here, many times, and imagined just how He looked \nwhen He said it. It was very interesting to think that His eyes must have rested \nupon it often, and that He may have pointed to it when He said, \' Our fathers did \neat manna in the desert \'\xe2\x80\x94as you will read in John, sixth chapter, thirty-first verse, \nand again in the verse forty-ninth, \' Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness, \nand are dead. This is the bread which came down from heaven \'\xe2\x80\x94meaning \n\n\n\n(123) \n\n\n\n124 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nHimself. It is all about the manna and the living bread, you see. Who can \ndoubt what put it into the mind of Christ, our Lord, to preach upon that subject \nin or before the synagogue that used to stand hereabouts !" \n\nWe stroll up and down wistfully, musing, while the population of Our Lord\'s \n\n[ \' own city\' \' watch \nus, mystified, but \nsilent. Nobody \nexplains to them \nwhy we have come \nor why we are dis- \nsatisfied. A query \nin Arabic has \nproved that they \nknow nothing of \nthe disappearance \nof the massive \nblock of lime- \nstone, probably \npart of the facade \nof the noble syna- \ngogue now leveled \nto the earth. \nUpon it was a bas- \nrelief of the pot of \nmanna kept with- \nin the Ark, and \nafterward in the \nFirst Temple. It \nwould have been \neasy, in looking \nupon it, to repro- \nduce in fancy the \nscene referred to \nby our guide. \n\n\' \'The Bible is the best Baedeker for Palestine," says Alcides, for the hun- \ndredth time, and we seek for ourselves seats upon the fallen stones to read up in \nour invaluable " International Teachers\' Edition," the passage indicated under the \nhead \' \' Capernaum. \' \' \n\nOne cries out presently, " Why may not this synagogue have been that built \nby the centurion who loved the Jewish nation ?" \n\n\n\n\nIT WAS CERTAINLY HERE EAST YEAR. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n125 \n\n\n\nIt is not unlikely, since the bits of carving from which we proceed to clear the \ndead grass show skill and taste. The curling acanthus leaf of a Corinthian \ncapital is embedded in a tough tussock, and there is a richly sculptured corner \nthat may have belonged to a frieze. \n\n" And this is the Capernaum, once exalted unto heaven by these and many \nother wonderful works \xe2\x80\x94 now ! \' \' \n\nWe gaze with new comprehension of the story and the prophecy, upon the \ngrass-grown stones, the black tent that makes the picture more, not less, desolate, \nand in the background, the useless convent, where able-bodied men will patter \nprayers in an unknown tongue, and exalt above the Divine Son, the very human \nmother who broke in upon the most solemn sermon that has come down to us from \nHis lips, by the request that He would shake off the crowd hanging upon the \ninspired words, and come out to speak to her. " His own city," with none to \ntake pleasure in her stones, or to favor the dust thereof ! \n\nThe folded tents, the camp-equipage and mules have gone forward toward \nTiberias when we return to Bethsaida, but David and Alcides alight to survey the \nground and make sure that nothing has been overlooked, consigning Dervish and \nMassoud to the care of Serkeese. In consequence of which misplaced confidence we \nhave a diversion from the sober reverie that has held us since we left Capernaum. \n\nMassoud is not a colt in years. He will never be otherwise than coltish in \nheart. There is a clatter of hoofs among the irregular boulders and pebbles, a \njocund neigh, and Serkeese stares open-mouthed after the fleeting steed, letting \nfall Dervish\'s bridle in the excess of his astonishment. No fences obstruct the \ngambols of the merry beast, who would have a companion in his scamper were \nDervish as light of heart and heels as himself. Eor one mortal hour he leads \nthree bipeds a dance up and down the beach which none of them can forget. At \nevery hundred yards or so, he stops to laugh in the perspiring faces of the pursuers, \nwaiting until a hand is almost upon his bridle before he throws up head and hoofs \ntogether and trots gently out of reach. Yiciousness is as far removed from the \nheart of the little horse as the intention to surrender himself voluntarily to any of \nthe trio. Each mentally recalls the story of a similar escapade upon the plain of \nEsdradon when the tricky creature eluded capture for twelve hours, keeping the \nwhole party waiting upon his pleasure. \n\nHe blunders at length, when even the solitary looker-on appreciates that there \nis a time to laugh, and a time to refrain from laughing; takes a wrong turn and \nis followed by David into a little pass forming what is, in sporting phrase, "a \npocket." \n\n" He cannot do justice to the subject !" quotes Alcides, aside, as, having seen \nhis passenger again in the saddle, the dragoman receives Dervish from the hand \nof the abashed cause of the misadventure, with never a syllable of comment. \n\n\n\n126 THE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\nV A fool uttereth all his mind; but a wise man keepeth it in until afterward.\' \' \nThis particular wise man has something to say by and by, and, as usual, \n\nsomething pertinent. \n\n\' \' We have lost time, and shall be caught in the rain before we can get into \n\ncamp. \' \' \n\nBy the time we draw rein upon the slope \xe2\x80\x94 green even in winter \xe2\x80\x94 where \ntradition says our Lord commanded the five thousand men, women and children to \n\n\n\n\n"MISPLACED CONFIDENCE." \n\n\n\nsit down upon the grass, and fed them by the hands of His disciples with the \nmiraculously-multiplied loaves and fishes, the sky is one cloud, dark-gray and \nsullen, the lake upon our left a gloomier reflection of the pall above it, and stirring \nuneasily in an occasional flaw of wind. \n\nThe use of the word "sea" misleads many as to the size of this, the most \ncelebrated sheet of water upon the globe. I is, in fact, but fifteen miles in length \nand half as wide, and, apart from storied interest, as unremarkable as scores of \nmountain lakes in America whose names are not known beyond the special town- \nships that border them. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n127 \n\n\n\nIt is here, as the surface begins to be pitted with large, slow drops of rain, \nthat we listen \'to a true tale confirmatory of the Scriptural account of the storms \nwhich overtook the "little ship " in which our Lord slept, his head upon a pillow \nin the boat which the toilsome rowing of the disciples could not bring to land, \nuntil, in the fourth watch of the night, the pressure of His feet stilled the billows, \nand His voice rebuked the \' \' contrary \' \' wind. \n\nBut a year ago a tempest rushed down Lake Gennesaret so fierce and sudden \nas to tear from their foundations and wash into the sea thirty houses from the \ntown of Tiberias. Now, as of old, the rage of wind and wave is intense and \nshort-lived. \n\nTiberias can never be comely. Seen under a dripping sky, it is repulsive. \nThe alleys that do duty as streets are lined, in some quarters, with booths or \n\n\n\n\xe2\x80\x94] \n\n\n\n\nTHE CAMP. \n\nstalls, in others with mean dwellings, ail dirty- white in the sunshine, dirtier gray- \nwhen wet. The inhabitants have retreated to the rear of the shops, even where \nthe streets are covered with matting or with leaky wooden roofs, and eye us \nlistlessly as we pass, the horses plash through filth made liquid by the rain, and \ncoursing in vile smelling rivulets down the middle of the street. The situation of \nthe town, and the general noisomeness remind one of Jaffa, although Tiberias is \nmuch the smaller of the two. \n\nPleasant exceedingly is it to arrive at the camp pitched beyond the out- \nskirting houses and so near the edge of the lake that the wash of the water \nupon the banks promises a lullaby throughout the dark hours. By the time \nluncheon is disposed of, the rain abates, and we sally forth for a walk upon the \nwet stones. \n\n\n\n128 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nThe custom of washing the bodies of the dead in the Sea of Tiberias is of \nimmemorial antiquity, and was, until recently, almost a daily occurrence. Corpses \nwere brought from the surrounding country and across the lake, and committed to \na sect whose profession it is to prepare them for burial by these ablutions. The \ndetails of the operation are too disgusting for publication, the process of evisceration \nbeing at once ingenious and revolting. Not until the water pumped into the body \nkaves it as clear as when it entered, is the work considered complete. As described \n\n\n\n\n"once exacted unto heaven\xe2\x80\x94 now !" \n\n\n\nto us, the business is unpleasantly like that of preparing a fowl for cooking, even to \nbreaking certain small bones of the limbs. Our informant, a resident of the town, \nalthough a foreigner and a Christian, adds the gratifying intelligence that a strenu- \nous movement is on foot to break up the practice altogether, and that such success \nhas followed it as to intimidate those who have made it a means of livelihood. \nThe world moves \xe2\x80\x94 even in Syria. \n\nThe sun sets gloriously over the lake, some peculiar effect of refraction bringing \nthe opposite shore nearer and nearer as the amber glow deepens. We look out \nupon a sea of glass mingled with fire; the white tents are washed with yellow \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n129 \n\n\n\nlight; there is not breeze enough to lift the American flag floating from the peak \nof the largest of the group, and we see in tremulous yet distinct outline, to our \nright across the water, the roof-shaped \' \' steep place \' \' down which the herd rushed \nviolently into now placid waves. \n\nFish, fresh from the lake, follow the soup at dinner. The water teems with \nthem, as when the weight of an hundred-fifty-and- three strained, without breaking, \na mesh of the net cast at the Lord\'s command upon the right side of the ship. \nWe talk, over the savory mess, of the story that the hook sometimes brings up one \noddly marked with a black spot upon the head and under the throat in com- \nmemoration of the grasp of Peter\'s thumb and finger upon the prize that yielded \nup the piece of money. \n\n"A \'stater,\' \xe2\x80\x94 in value two shillings and a sixpence," we gather from our \n" Palestine guide book," and consult dragoman and John-of-the-many-names, as \n*o the authenticity of the tale. \n\nNeither of them has ever seen such a fish. David, however, has heard of it \nbefore from Mrs. Sharpe. \n\n" When she was Miss De Credo, of course," he subjoins, with no intention of \nbeing satirical. " She quite believed in it." \n\nAfter dinner we again seek the beach. The new moon sinks below the low \nhills of the horizon ; the swish of the wavelets blends musically with the low hum \nof talk from the camp behind us. \n\nAnd the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea, \nWhen the blue waves roll nightly on dark Galilee, \n\nrepeats a dreamy voice. " Byron never saw Galilee. But the stars and the sheen \nare here." \n\n\n\n9 \n\n\n\n\n\n(130) \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIII. \n\n\n\nWHERE HE WAS BROUGHT UP. \n\nE have never been so nearly in sympathy with Dr. Sharpe, or so intol- \nerant with his wife\'s devout credulity, as after visiting the Latin \nand Greek churches built above the spots where the Virgin Mary re- \nceived the visit of Gabriel and the announcement of the great glory \nto be bestowed upon her. \n\nEach is in a crypt, and going first to that of the Greek church, we look \nrespectfully, if not reverently, at the dark, damp chamber, supplied with altar and \nthe usual paraphernalia of the underground or the upper-world shrine\xe2\x80\x94 candles, \nartificial flowers and other tawdry ornaments. We are in a sort of cellar, the \nstone walls of which are grim with time. A well yawns in the floor; beyond it is \na locked gate. The sacristan thrusts his arm between the bars, and throws the \nlight of a torch upon a flight of steps leading up into the darkness. \n\nOur guide mechanically translates the Arabic that gurgles from his tongue: \n" This church stands upon the site of the house of the Blessed Virgin. This \nwas her kitchen. Here she was busy at work when the angel appeared to her and \nsaid, \' Hail, Mary ! thou that art highly favored, for thou hast found favor with \nGod.\' The fountain burst forth from the rock in celebration of the event." \n\nA cup is lowered into the well; we drink thereof, cross the palm of the sac \nristan with a piece of Turkish silver, and mount to the surface of the earth, obedi- \nently following our leader to another church, where the same story is told, almost: \nword for word, of a second subterranean chamber and spring. \n\nA little heart-sick and a good deal disgusted, we thread the public ways of \nthe " white city," discouragingly new in appearance, and long, as we have oftem \nand elsewhere longed, for something that will restore the lost sympathy with what \nthe place should recall. \n\n\' \' Mary and Joseph lived here," we say to ourselves and one another. \' \' Here \nwas the scene of the Annunciation ; hence Mary went into the hill country in haste \n\xe2\x80\x94perhaps up that slope over there\xe2\x80\x94 to visit Elizabeth. Here, her Son grew in \nfavor with God and man. Here, cut to the quick by the home truths spoken to \nthem by Him in later years, the townspeople with whom He had been so popular \nas a youth hurried Him to the brow of the hill on which the city is built, and \nwould have ended His ministry then and there but for a miracle." \n\n(131) \n\n\n\n\n132 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nAll this we know and believe, but cannot feel. \n\nAt a turn of the street we are confronted with something that alters the cur- \nrent of discontented meditation. A lad stands just without the threshold of a car- \npenter\'s shop. His tunic of blue serge is girt at the waist with a red sash; red \nslippers are upon the unstockinged feet; the red tarboosh, or fez, worn by all \nTurkish subjects, sits jauntily upon short, faircurls. At sight of the leveled kodak, \nhe laughs, and his hands chafe one another nervously. From the recesses of the \nshop, black as midnight when \none looks in from the outer light \nmade more glaring by reflection \nfrom the white houses, a voice \ncalls in not unkindly admonition ; \nthe boy laughs again, brightly \nand fearlessly, in moving away \nto his work. A bench extends \nfrom the door to the rear of the \nwindowless shop, and two men, \none turbaned, the other wearing \nthe tarboosh, are busy about it. \nOur lad drops flat upon the \nground, crosses his legs under \nhim to gouge a square hole in a \nblock into which a beam is to be \nmortised. He handles the chisel \ndeftly, and, now that he is at it, \nso diligently that he does not \ngive us another look. But for \nthe modern bench, the picture \nmust be very like that which has \nbeen a theme beloved of such \nartists as Holman Hunt and the \nearlier masters. Presently, the elder of the men, who stands near the door, glances \naround, his notice attracted by our shadows upon the floor, and touches, first his \nforehead, then his heart, bowing profoundly: \n\n" Naharak said!" (Peace be unto you) he says gravely. \n-And unto you !" we instruct our interpreter to reply. The carpenter is \nan old man, but hale, with clear eyes and a full white beard. \n\nNot a bad model for a Joseph in a " Holy Family," we agree, after watching \nhim for a minute longer, taking in all the accessories of the tableau, even to the play \nof a stray sunbeam upon the yellow shavings curling from the bench to the floor. \n\n\n\n\nHE LAUGHS AND HIS HANDS CHAFE ONE ANOTHER." \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n133 \n\n\n\nThere is fascination in the scene, and soothing. We are brought again into \ntouch with a past that filled our minds at the first sight of the hillside town. Thus \nmight the supposed father and docile Son, "subject" to all the conditions of a \nGalilean artisan\'s life, have toiled together for many a day and week during the \nthirty years of preparation for His ministry and His death. \n\n"Mar salaami!" (Good-bye) \xe2\x80\x94 we call out at length, moving on, and be- \ntween the deeper tones of the two men rises the silvery treble of the apprentice: \n\n" Mar salaami /\' \' \n\n4 4 In what language did our Saviour speak? " questions Alcides, suddenly. \n\nThe query is apparently new to David Jamal and our other escort, a Nazarene \nChristian and a graduate of Beirut College, a fine, intelligent young fellow, by the \nway, and an honor to his Alma Mater. It seems quite certain, after some minutes\' \ntalk, that in a country where customs have changed so little in nineteen cen- \nturies that one can hardly take a dozen steps without seeing or hearing something \nillustrative of Biblical history \xe2\x80\x94 the peasantry at least may use the dialect familiar \nto the household of Joseph, the carpenter. Did the musical phrase of farewell \nthat lingers in our ear often pass His tongue ? \n\nWe are still talking of it when another turn brings us into an open square \nthat must be the rallying-point for both sexes of all classes, so alive is it with \nmovement and murmur. Right before us is a group of children, chiefly boys, of \nvarying ages, arrested in some game by the abrupt appearance of strangers. The \nforemost and tallest boy lays a reassuring hand about the neck of a mere baby \nwho is his charge, and blinks inquisitively at us in the broad sunshine; in the \nbackground on his right hand stands a much smaller child with a face of singular \nbeauty. It is not possible to regard the children, especially the boys of Nazareth, \nwith indifference, and there is something in this encounter that dizzies one by the \nswift rush of association. \n\n" What do they know of the child Jesus ?\' \' we interrogate the young Nazarene \nstudent. \n\n\' \' Those who have Christian parents think and speak of Him as do the chil- \ndren in your land and other Christian countries. The rest know little of Him \nand care nothing for Him. We have here Sunday and day schools in which the \nBible is taught, and the story of our Lord\'s life and death is well known to the \nmembers of the Latin and Greek churches." \n\nMore children ! The soft thud of their bare feet upon the pavement is hushed \nas they halt and huddle together in the exact focus of the insatiable kodak \xe2\x80\x94 \nneither timid nor bold, but moved by a common desire to inspect and make ac- \nquaintance with us. They are healthy, well-formed and evidently well cared for. \nIn all Nazareth, as we note with gratification, we see not one deformed child, or \none professional beggar of tender years. All this may signify less than we fancy, \n\n\n\n134 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\nthe sentiment to ourselves, we are glad that these \n\n\n\nbut, without quite definin \nthings are so. \n\n" The fountain of the Virgin," says our guide, and it is not in tourist-nature \nto withhold the exclamation\xe2\x80\x94 " How many more ?" We change our tone at a \nsecond glance. No monkish fable of kitchen and miraculous gush of living streams \nclings about the one perennial well in a district mainly dependent upon rain- \ncisterns for a supply of water. For hundreds and hundreds of years this fountain \n\n\n\n\nA GROUP OF CHILDREN. \n\n\n\nhas borne the name by which the world knows it, and even Dr. Sharpe cannot \ndeny the probability that it was here when Mary kept her husband\'s house in \nNazareth, and her Boy ran by her side in street and market-place, or clung shyly \nto her skirts, as that pretty toddler across the square steadies his trial steps by \nholding with both hands to his mother\'s izzar. The water leaps from a spout in \nthe face of the wall into a stone trough, escaping thence into a tank. An arch is \nbuilt above it, and steps lead down to tank and trough. These steps are crowded \nwith women, some rubbing out, and some rinsing clothes as composedly as if the \nopen archway were a back laundry at home; others bearing down empty jars \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\ni35 \n\n\n\nfa their hands to be filled at the spout, or trudging up the wet stairs with foil \nvessels upon their heads. They chatter cheerily among themselves, and the most \nnotable are in no hurry to hie them back to home and indoor labor. Of all mar- \nketable possessions, time is least considered in the East. \n\nSometimes, as we are not surprised to hear, there are wrangles over the com- \nmon wash-tub, and quarrels as to precedence in the matter of filling the great \n\n\n\n\n"THE FOUNTAIN OF THE VIRGIN." \n\nearthen jars. In the sunny noon of to-day good humor prevails, and sociability \n\n" ^ Satywa" a peasant and working-woman like these. We cheek ours^ves aj \nif guilty of irreverence, in wondering if she bore the narrow-necked pitcher \nupon her head with the audacious grace of that laughing girl who does not touch \nit with her hand, and if she adjusted it, before mounting the steps, upon a ^any- \nfolded cloth such as the handsome woman down there has interposed betjen he, \nveiled head and the dripping vessel. Yet-and agam-the highly-favored among \nTomen was a daughter of the people, and her Son, at thirty-three years of age. \nhad not where to lay his head. \n\n\n\n1 3 6 \n\n\n\nTHK HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nA rhythmic murmur hums up the street leading to the open space about the \nVirgin\'s Fountain; the women cease their gossip; the children run off in the direction \nof the sound, and we follow more leisurely. All recognize the tuneless chant with \nwhich the mourners go about the streets. It is a Latin funeral, and the proces- \nsion is led by a fat priest in full canonicals. An acolyte, clad in what looks like a \nwhite dressing-sacque, swings a censer at his side. The coffin, borne upon the \nshoulders of friends or neighbors, is of a vivid scarlet with white bars crossing it. \nBehind a little company of what we take to be relatives and acquaintances, six \n\n\n\n\nMODERN - NAZARETH. \n\n\n\ncowled friars walk two-and-two. They are stalwart of frame and bearded up to \nthe eyes; upon their large feet are strapped leathern sandals. Not a woman is \nseen in the band of mourners or among the lookers-on that straggle after the bier \ninto the church. \n\nWe remain without the burial-ground until the short service is over. Church \nand cemetery are on the slope of the hill which rises far behind them. The whole \ntown has the air of holding on for its life to the declivity. Every house is literally \nfounded upon a rock, and the circumstance is but one of the numberless proofs \n\n\n\n\n(137) \n\n\n\n!f3 8 THE HOME OE THE BIBLE. \n\ndaily laid before our eyes of the care with which the Nazarene Teacher studied \nthe world in which He was brought up, and His tact in presenting to the "com- \nmon people " analogies and types drawn from the life He shared with them. \n\nThe grave is partly dug, partly hewn in the stony ground, and the bright red \ncoffin containing, we are told, the body of a young man, is set down upon the \npile thrown up beside the mouth of the pit. The throng, augmented by many \nwho have gathered from all quarters, closes about it, and the prayer committing \ndust to dust is droned above it. Until now, all has been conducted as quietly as \nin an English churchyard, but at the conclusion of the service, the father, who \nhas stood at the head of the grave, motionless, with folded arms and averted face, \ncasts himself with an "exceeding loud and bitter cry," upon the coffin, and \nclutches it frantically. His friends close in about him, and with the feeling that \nwe have no right to gaze upon a scene that has become exquisitely painful, we \n\nhurry down the hill. \n\nSomewhere, on these steep slopes, the mortal remains of our Lord s ancestors \nmoldered back to clay ages ago, and His pious foster-father was laid to rest, \nperhaps by the loving hands of Him who wept at the grave of Eazarus, and m \nthe death-agony committed His widowed mother to the care of His best-beloved \ndisciple. \n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIV. \n\nFROM NAIN TO JEZREEL. \n\nk HE leaves of our Bible turn heavily, being damp with \ncoming rain, as, guided by the "Biblical Gazetteer " at the \nback, we look up Luke vii. 11-15, and read that on the day \nsucceeding the healing of the centurion\'s servant, Our Lord \n"went into a city called Nain, and many of his disciples \nwent with. him and much people." \nWS^" \' \' Now when he came nigh unto the gate of the city, \n\nbehold there was a dead man carried out, the only son of his mother and she was \na widow, and much people of the city was with her." \n\n"Where is the city?" we interrupt the reading to inquire. David points to \na cluster of wretched huts, walled with clay and roofed with straw plastered over \nwith mud. \n\n" A Moslem village !" we pronounce decidedly, as the scent of low-hanging \nsmoke from hovel-fires is brought down by the moist wind. \n\nTwo kinds of fuel are in general use in such hamlets, chaff, and cakes of \ndried camel\'s manure, the latter predominating in regions where the ungainly \n" ship of the desert " is brought into the service of man. One of the most impor- \ntant branches of woman\'s labor in these circumstances is collecting the manure, \nmolding it into flat cakes, and spreading it to dry upon stones, walls, and house- \ntops. I have seen roofs literally tiled with the malodorous combustible, and whole \nrods of stone-wall caked with it. \n\nWe smell chaff now, and prefer it. \n\n"Did I tell you," remarks Alcides, reining back Massoud into a conversa- \ntional walk, \' \' what Rev. Mr. Jamal, the Nazareth pastor, said of chaff fires ? In \nthe village ovens they never go out, day or night, but smolder and smoke con- \ntinually. He says that is the meaning of the \' unquenchable fire,\' into which the \nchaff is to be cast \xe2\x80\x94 the fire that is not allowed to go out." \n\n1 \' Quite so, sir ! " This from David, who is within ear-shot. \' \' Matthew, third \nchapter and twelfth verse. Likewise Luke, the third chapter and seventeenth \nverse. They are the words of John the Baptist. The end of chaff in this country \nis to be burned. I do not know what the poorer people would do without it. " \n\nWe are gazing at the knot of poor cabins that look as if a sweeping rain \nmight wash them down into the plain some winter night, and marveling that no \nsign of a walled town remains, by the gate of which the funeral train may have \n\n(139) \n\n\n\n14\xc2\xb0 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nemerged on the way to the rocky tombs we are told lie further down, and not so- \nremote from the old Nazareth road as the ruins of the city \xe2\x80\x94 when something \nmoves quickly across the lower plain directly within our field of vision. Four \nmen hold aloft a misshapen burden, and half a dozen others keep pace with \nthem in the long lope, swifter than a slow run would be. Serkeese grunts and \n\nsays something we \njudge to be con- \ntemptuous. \n\nDavid trans- \nlates: \n\n\' \' He says \' they \nhave done up the \ndead man to look \nlike our luncheon \ntent\' \xe2\x80\x94 and the boy \nis right. \' \' \n\nThe luncheon- \ntent being swung \nacross the very \nmule the \' \' boy \' \' be- \nstrides at this mo- \nment, we can testify \nto the truth of the \ncriticism. It is, \nnevertheless, a \nhuman body which \nthe "fellaheen " \n(Syrian peasants) \nare carrying to the \n\nmost desolate tract of a territory unrelieved by tree or shrub for many acres. \nTurning our horses in the direction they have taken, we come up with them as \nthey deposit the figure, swathed in coarse matting, upon the naked earth, and \nbegin with rude mattocks to make a hole among the stones \xe2\x80\x94 I cannot call the \nbusiness "grave-digging." There are no mounds in what we now perceive is a \ncemetery, but ovals of round stones are set thickly all over the place, each desig- \nnating a grave, and at long intervals we descry a low, upright block of granite, \nunlettered. The man who directs the gruesome task answers readily and civilly \nthe few questions put through the interpreter. \n\n" It is a child who has died. A boy of eight. He has escaped much trouble, \nHe is better off here than living. Allah is good !" \n\n\n\n\nALLAH IS GOOD \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. W \n\nOther figures appear from behind the shoulders of the bleak hills, women, \nbare-legged, but shrouded as to heads and faces in the dark-blue cotton mantles \nthat uniform matrons and girls of the lower classes. They walk well and fleetly, \nand approaching the grave-makers, without evincing the slightest curiosity at sight \nof us, seat themselves upon the ground about the motionless bundle and begin to \nsob in a subdued kev, breaking finally into a chant, without beginning, middle, \nend or the remotest suggestion of musical idea. The men pay no attention what- \never to the performance. We characterize it silently as "the people making a \nnoise," very much the same, doubtless, as was kept up by the "much people of \nthe city," winding down from the Nain which is no more, when the Master\'s \nhand fell upon the bier and those that bare it stood still. One woman, as \nwe note neither sobs nor chants, but, her muffled face bowed upon her knees, \nsits at the head of the dead boy, motionless, as if as deaf as himself to all that \n\npasses. _ \nDavid explains aside that the women of the neighborhood take advantage ol \neach funeral to visit the graves of their own relatives, and shows us other and \nsmaller groups, now arriving and scattered over the face of the hill. All crouch \nupon the earth soaked by yesterday\'s rain, and the humid air makes the dissonant \ncroon of each family, "mourning by itself apart," audible to all the rest. Almost \nunder Massoud\'s forefeet, one woman has thrown herself face downward beside a \nlong egg-shaped round of stones, and cries out, over and over, the same form of \nwords to the newly-turned earth. David hearkens attentively, and interprets, line \nby line in his grave undertone. Over against this translation, Alcides\xe2\x80\x94 having \nwhat he chooses to call, " a fatal facility for rhyme "-pencils a metrical version \nalmost as literal: \n\nI arose and came to the grave, at the breaking of day. \n\nTo the grave on the barren hillside where Abou, my husband, lay; \n\nI called on him by his name, but no answer came again; \n\nOnce more I repeated the cry, but repeated it in vain. \n\nNo dear voice answered my cry, from the rough, forbidding stones. \n\nHe sleeps too deep beneath the earth to hark the widow\'s moans. \n\nWho will help his children now, since my calls are all unheard ? \n\nO, form in the grave there, among the rocks ! answer a single word ! \n\nThe workmen step out of the shallow hole they have scooped, and lay the \nmattocks aside. Another relay covers the bottom of the pit with stones, and lays \nthe uncoffined body upon them. Earth is thrown in until it is nearly level with \nthe surface, and a second layer of larger stones to hinder the depredations of \njackals and hyenas; more earth, which is beaten hard, and the ring of great \npebbles defines the last home of the little fellow who "has escaped much \ntrouble." \n\n\n\n142 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nWe were surprised, but not shocked, to learn that our informant-the dignified \nman in a brown-and-white " abieh " and gray beard-is the father of the dead \nboy While the grave is filling, an aged man, whom we take to be a priest, sits \nnear by upon a gravestone and mutters fast some form of prayer, his palms \noutward. Four old men respond, when he pauses for breath, their hands outspread \nin like manner. \n\nNow that all is over, the priest rises, and approaching the father, kisses him \nsolemnly upon both cheeks, an example imitated by all the men present. The \nmother has not stirred, nor has any one spoken to her that we have been able to \nsee, when we ride away and resume our journey. \n\nThe funeral must have drawn to a centre all the population \nof the surrounding country, for during the next two hours we pass \nno human being except a swarthy well-built "fellaheen " who is \nsowing grain in a field lately scratched over by the wooden \nplough used by the so-named husbandmen of Palestine. \nHe has made a " lap " of his outer garment, and it is full of \ngrain. There is promise of an abundance of rain to settle \nthe furrows, and he may be that phenomenon in this old \nland\xe2\x80\x94 a "forehanded" man. \n\nTabor lifts a gently rounded crest upon our left, and \nthe wide plain passed an hour ago was the field in which \nBarak and Deborah overcame Sisera. Whenever we rise \nout of the occasional " dips " in the road, which is nothing \nbut a bridle-path\xe2\x80\x94 we look for and find the snowy brow of \nMount Hermon upon the horizon. \n\n"Which Hermon the Sidonians call Sir ion, and the \nAmorites call it Shener," writes the author of Deuteronomy, \nparenthetically. - \n\n~ - \xe2\x96\xa0 \xe2\x80\x94 At Shunem we pause to get a picture that we do not, \n\na iraiAAHEEN sower. for a momen t, attempt to believe is the house of Elisha, and \nto arrange to our satisfaction in which of the no longer fertile fields the boy, now \ngrown to be a lad, was \' \' making believe \' \' help the reapers when the fierce sun \nstruck the young head. \n\n" Did you ever think"\xe2\x80\x94 one muses aloud\xe2\x80\x94 " what a risk the poor mother ran \nin venturing out in the terrible midday heat that had killed her child? And in \nexcitement and haste that were in themselves dangerous ?" \n\nThere is no immediate response, but we know that the thoughts of all \nare with the solitary figure crouched together at the head of the flat, name- \nless grave in sight of the hill on which once stood Nain, and that each ponders \nupon the mother-love which is one and the same to-day with that which \n\n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nH3 \n\n\n\ncast the Shunammite woman, bitter of soul and speechless, at the prophet\'s feet. \nOur luncheon-tent is pitched within the ancient bounds of Naboth\'s vineyard. \nThe threatening rain-clouds, after a spiteful shower, have rolled by to mass them- \nselves beyond Hermon and the hill Mizar. The sun shines kindly upon a spot \nwhich no man in his senses would covet at this day. Earlier comers have pre- \nempted the ground about the well that may have been here and used to irrigate \nthe vines when Ahab went down to survey the blood-bought plot, and met Elijah \n\n\n\n\nSYRIAN BREAD AND CAKE VENDERS. \n\nface to face. One of my pet abominations, a camel, an uncommonly ugly specimen \nat that, erects his head against the pale sky. His master, his master\'s wife and \nhis master\'s child, and the family donkey are enjoying their "nooning." The \nhuman creatures stare stupidly at us; the donkey is stolidly indifferent to our \nvicinity; the camel is supercilious. Hardy grasses push their way between the \nstones of every form and size that cumber the soil, and rank weeds fringe a lazy \npool where a woman sits upon her heels, alternately beating wet clothes against \nthe rocks, and going through the form of rubbing them between her fists while she \ngazes over her shoulder at the "foreign animals " feeding in their tent. \n\n\n\n144 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nThe Plain of Esdraelon stretches beyond to the foot of the mountains; the \ngleam of standing water gives back the sunlight at a dozen different points; copses \nof scrub trees diversify the level growth. It is not a barren outlook; neither is it \nattractive. \n\n" A garden of herbs !" reads Alcides from "the best Baedeker for Palestine." \n"That didn\'t mean parsley, summer-savory, thyme, sweet marjoram, or even \nrosemary- and-rue, I take it \xe2\x80\x94 hey, David ? \n\n"I have often reflected upon that, sir, and in my humble judgment, King \nAhab had a fancy for ornamental flower-gardens \xe2\x80\x94 terraces and the like\xe2\x80\x94 that could \nhave been well contrived here. He was a spoiled child \xe2\x80\x94 was King Ahab \xe2\x80\x94 and \nhis wife kept him spoiled \xe2\x80\x94 and a child \xe2\x80\x94 for reasons of her own. What are we to \nthink of a man of years, and the king of a great nation, who takes to his bed and \nwill not eat his dinner because he cannot get a bit of land he has set his heart \nupon ? There was something evil at work besides his own folly. And when the \nevil outside of a man is a woman !" \n\nHe shakes the crumbs vigorously from the tablecloth at the tent door with \nthe gesture of one aware of the impotency of speech. \n\nThe vineyard was close under the walls of Ahab\'s palace or "house," as he \ncalled it in bargaining with Naboth. There is as little vestige of one as the other \nnow. From out of the shelter of the tent, as we lie luxuriously upon our rugs, we \ngaze up at all that is left of Jezreel\xe2\x80\x94 a ruined watch-tower. From that height the \nwatchman spied the armed company approaching and recognized the foremost as \nJehu, the son of Nimshi, " for he driveth furiously." \n\n\' \' The marginal reading has it \' in madness, \' \' \' interpolates Alcides. \' \' Hark !" \n\nThe thunder of racing hoofs is in the air; across the base of the hill rushes a \ndrove of half-wild horses, bred upon the Plain of Esdraelon; leaping tall boulders \nand broad pools; tearing up the slope within pistol range of us, wheeling, as at a \nspoken order, and dashing off, until lost in the scrub. \n\nWe laugh, consciously, before confessing that for an instant we had seen, as \nby a flash, the mad driving of the rude usurper, the intrepid old queen, her eyes \ndefiant between the painted lids, the tiara upon her wrinkled forehead, looking \nfrom her high window to fling her last taunt, barbed with a threat, at the soldier \nof fortune in her court-yard. \n\nAlcides kicks at a cur who is nosing about in the grass for scraps, and shudders. \n\' \' I don\'t fancy the breed \xe2\x80\x94 here /\' \' \n\nThe text he has in his mind is upon the open page before our eyes: \n"In the portion of Jezreel, shall dogs eat the flesh of Jezebel." \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XV. \n\n\n\nGIDEON\'S FOUNTAIN AND DOTHAN. \n\n* * / W B diverge from the regular route connecting Jezreel with Nablous, \n/ / T because Alcides has a strong desire, dating from his childish liking \nI I I for " Gideon\'s band," to visit Gideon\'s Fountain. It is but a mile \n^/^A. or so from our road. The rocks bound it on one side; on the other \nmarsh lands stretch away into arid slopes which lose themselves in the barren \nbleakness of the mountains of Gilboa. Had David lived in this century, he would \nnot have troubled himself to call down the curse of dewless and rainless seasons \nupon the naked sides and bald brows. \n\nThe " Fountain " is a shallow pool, perhaps sixty feet square, having its \nsource in the rocks and finding an outlet in the sluggish brook. Of course, every- \nbody alights for a drink at the spot where we imagine Gideon may have tested the \nqualifications of his host for the expedition of the morrow, and equally of course, \nnobody gets down upon his knees upon the brink to put his lips to the water \nThen the horses are ridden slowly across the fountain and back again to wash and \ncool their hoofs. \n\n" Dr Sharpe does not believe that this is the pool of Gideon, remarks our \nguide letting Dervish stand for a grateful minute up to the fetlocks in the gliding \nstream " And Dr. Sharpe is a very learned man. However, we have always \nbeen told that it was here that the three hundred were chosen to march against \nthe enemy encamped upon the Plain of Esdraelon. If the Captain "-a title \nnewly bestowed by him upon Alcides-" will turn to Judges vi. 5, he will there \nread how they \' came up with their cattle and their tents, and they came as grass- \nhoppers for multitude; for both they and their camels were without number; and \nthey entered the land to destroy it.\' No wonder Gideon was afraid to undertake \nthe business of dispersing them. See verse fifteenth, if you please, sir-where he \nasks the Lord\xe2\x80\x94 < Wherewith shall I save Israel? Behold my family is poor m \nManasseh, and I am the least in my father\'s house.\' At that very time he was \nthreshing his wheat when it was hardly ripe, to keep it out of the hands of the \nMidianites." \n\nThe clouds return after the rain, this time in a steady downpour, before we \ngain the shelter of the camp. It is pitched without the precinct of Jenin, a \nmarket-town for the surrounding country, situated near the southern point of the \n\n(146) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nH7 \n\n\n\nmighty oasis we have been traversing, and which, I may say here, becomes \nimpassable during the January rains, to blossom with lily and rose and a riotous \nhost of other wild flowers in March and April. Through the descending floods \nwe made out the outlines of what looked like a barrack as we hurried into the \ntents. Before we have had time or means for drawing a dry breath we are advised \nthat we are uncomfortably near an arm of law, if not of order, by the apparition \nof a couple of uniformed representatives. It is not easy to lay hand immediately \nupon the passports for which we have had no use since leaving Damascus, but it \nis presently apparent that they must be exhibited to the doughty officer who does \n\n\n\n\n"letting dervish stand up to his fetlocks in the water." \n\n\n\nthe talking. He may be the embodiment of an armed constabularj^ of his city, \nor responsible to his government for all suspicious strangers found loitering under \nthe walls of Jenin. He is peremptory enough to be a triune mayor, high sheriff \nand pasha, as he drips over John\'s cook stove, and rains Arabic gutturals upon the \nconductor of the obnoxious foreigners. \n\nIt is the first moment of actual discomfort we have had in camp, for every- \nthing is wet that the rain could reach, and Syrian rain is a force to be remembered \nwhen once encountered. But a damp portmanteau is hastily overhauled, and \n\n\n\n148 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF ?HE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nfrom the very bottom is dragged a long envelope, marked "Passports," armed \nwith which Alcides dashes across the rainy area to present it, defiantly, to his \nHighmightiness. David intercepts it, unfolds it in the kitchen-tent and extends it \nin dumb dignity. The official motions to Imbarak to hold a candle at his shoulder, \nand proceeds to peruse the document from top to bottom. Seen from the tent- \ndoor opposite, the scene has striking features, and Rembrandtish effects of light \nand gloom. We have time to study them all before the official snatches the candle \nand throws the gleam full upon the face of Alcides, standing unguardedly near. \n( \' He has a beard ! \' \' dramatically. \n\nIf he does not add, " It is not so nominated iv die bond," it is because \nShakespeare is an unknown quantity in the list of his learning and accomplish- \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n"THE SPOT SELECTED BY OUR ATTENDANTS. \n\n\n\nments He insists upon what amounts to the same thing, and so doggedly that, \nfor the only time upon record, our worthy dragoman for a season bids farewell to \nhis temper, and absolutely talks his countryman into shamed silence. \n\nThis is the first insult offered his travelers, and he means that it shall be the \nlast if he has to complain to the government in person of the stupidity of a man \nwho pretends to serve it, and does not know that a gentleman has a right to shave \nhis chin or to let his beard grow, as pleases him, without asking permission of \nthe Jenin police. No ! the gentleman will not go up to the town, or one step out \nof this tent, to have his passport "vised." The official knows, as well as the \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n149 \n\n\n\nspeaker, that the office where this should tie done is locked up for the night. If \nhe\xe2\x80\x94 the official\xe2\x80\x94 wants to pocket the contemptible \' \' beschlik \' \' (sixpence) it would \ncost to \' \' vise " the " tezkere \' \' (passport) , the speaker will pay it to him out of \nhand, and here, to end a matter that disgraces the honorable government under \nwhich both parties live. \n\nThe conclusion of the whole matter is the ignominious retreat of the intruder, \nfollowed by his subordinate, who has not uttered a sound throughout the affair, \nand the business of camp-life can go on in the customary manner. David\'s spirit is \ntoo deeply ruffled to subside at once and as we sink to slumber three hours there- \nafter, we catch, between the dashes of rain upon the canvas roof, the murmur, not \nloud, but deep, of his rehearsal of the grievance to his lieutenants, as they smoke \ntogether in the kitchen -tent. \n\nCamp is broken next morning, and the cavalcade sets forward under a sky as \nsoftly blue as ever bowed over Italy. Our first halt is at " Joseph\'s Well." \n\n\' \' What we believe is the \n\n\n\npit into which his brethren put \nhim," is our introduction to \nthe walled quadrangle and old \nstone building toward which \nthe horses turn of their own \naccord. \n\n\' \' But we surely passed such \na pit four days ago ?" \n\n\' \' The Mohammedans are* \nresponsible for that blunder, sir. \nThey claim that Joseph was let. \ndown into that well. Whereas, \nas every reader of the Old Testa- \nment knows, we learn in the- \nthirty-seventh chapter of Gene- \na group outside the milt,. s j Sj the seventeenth verse, that: \n\nJoseph\'s brethren were in Dothan. This is Dothan." \n\nAs to the last statement, there is no question. We exchange incredulous; \nglances as, after having left the horses with Serkeese, severely enjoining him to \nkeep his wits and all the bridles well in hand, we enter a gap in the low stone wall \nand perceive that the building it surrounds is a mill, erected above a square well. \nA water-wheel turns creakingly within this, constructed after a primitive pattern, \njars being bound to the broad rim, going down empty and coming up full. The \nplace is very dark until our eyes become accustomed to the change from the outer \nday; we walk up to the "pit," and look down into it. \n\n\n\n\n150 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n" \' And the pit was empty; there was no water in it !\' Is it ever dry now ?" \n\nThe miller holds up his hand in deprecation. What would then become of \nhis business? And the visitors can see for themselves how many bring hither \ncorn to be ground. \n\nThey are sitting about on stones outside, genuine children of Ishmael, albeit \nlounging against \nthe wall precisely \nas Yankee and \nWestern loungers \nhaunt grist-mill or \n\'\'store." \n\n"The sight \nmakes one quite \nhomesick!" de- \nclares Alcides, pen- \nsively. "All they \nlack to complete the \npicture is the na- \ntional jack-knife \nand shingle." \n\nThe one excep- \ntion to what passes \nwith the saturnine \nrace for sociabil- \nity is a solitary \n\nwrapped in his \nabieh and with- \ndrawn to a corner of \nthe mill-yard. Be- \nside him on the wall \n\nare the trappings of \n\nahorseormule. He \n\nregards us gloomily \n\nfrom the shadows \n\nof his kafeyeh. In .. \n\nthe kodak-book he is registered as a "Study of Reuben." -Gen. xxxvn. 29-30. \nTry as we will, we cannot take Joseph\'s Pit seriously. There are too many \n\nof them. There is one in Egypt, the peculiar property of the Copts. \n\nThe place has other associations of which we speak softly to one another, after \n\nwe have lunched, and David and Serkeese are breaking their fast in the shadow \n\n\n\n\n" STUDY OF REUBEN."\xe2\x80\x94 GEN. XXXVII. 29-30. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. I 5 I \n\nof the old walls. The country is fertile and beautiful with olive orchards. The \nwet trees glisten in the morning light, as from a bath of silver, and now, as far as \nthe eye can reach, clothe the plain, and round off the heights. Hermon shows \nfaint but fair, in the remote distance, already a beloved landmark for which we \nlook upon rising each hill. Peasants are plowing the brown fields with patient \nflocks of crows\xe2\x80\x94 gray instead of black\xe2\x80\x94 hopping and foraging in the shallow \n\n\n\noxen \n\n\n\nfurrows. \n\nIn these meadows the sons of Jacob fed their flock, and compared notes con- \ncerning the little brother who was taking unwarrantable airs upon himself. We \npicture them herding morosely together at sight of the slender figure crossing the \nplain appearing and reappearing under the low olive boughs. They would know \nhim, when yet a long way off, by the many-colored coat. Did he fling it back as \nhe ran, as the fellaheen whose salute we return as he goes by to the mill-yard, lets \nhis brown-and- white abieh slip from one shoulder ? \n\nThe boy had told tales out of school to their old father of the misdoings of \nhis half-brothers, but his dreams were a more grievous offence in their sight. If\xe2\x80\x94 \nour mood more confiding with our talk-they did, indeed, cast him into the (then \ndry) pit behind us, they must have awaited his approach about where we were \nsitting upon the sun-warmed rocks, and in sight of the old caravan road from \nGilead to Egypt. They were eating their luncheon (maybe nigh unto the spot \nselected by our attendants to-day\xe2\x80\x94 who knows?) when they espied the dark line \nof Ishmaelites with their camels, bearing spicery and balm and myrrh, going to \ncarry it to the richest land in the known world. \n\nThe Dothan\xe2\x80\x94 compassed at night by a host, both with horses and chariots, \nsent to take the prophet who told the King of Israel the words spoken by the \nKing of Syria in his bed-chamber-has disappeared from the face of the earth \nwith lesser and greater cities of the Holy Land. We do not know which of the \npicturesque hills bounding our view was the " mountain full of horses and chariots \nof fire round about Elisha," made visible to the eyes of the terrified servant m \nanswer to his master\'s prayer. But the way by which the blinded Syrian troops \nwere led by Elisha to Samaria must be nearly, if not quite, the route we are to \ntake this afternoon. \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVI. \n\n\n\n"THE BURDEN OF SAMARIA." \n\n\xe2\x80\x94 B^ND, I will make Samaria as an heap of the field, and as plantings of \nA I a vineyard; and I will pour down the stones thereof into the valley, \nM 1 and I will discover the foundations thereof." \n\nJ. L* We are climbing the hill that has stood from age to age, in ghastly \n\nfulfilment of a prophecy pronounced against the haughty rival of Jerusalem, two \nthousand six hundred years ago. The turns of the road are made by buried \nruins ; here and there a carved fragment has been washed bare, the corner of a \nstone sarcophagus projects. The thoroughfare is ancient, and probably the same \nby which the four leprous men stole down in the twilight from the gate of the \nbesieged city into the camp of the Syrians, in the desperation of famine : \n\n" If they save us alive, we shall live ; and if they kill us, we shall but die." \n\nThe route is as solitary and silent now as when the night hid from the tremb- \nling outcasts the deserted tents and ways of what they had expected to find teem- \ning with life. Of the old Samaria, nothing is left but heaps upon heaps, and, \nbordering the neglected road upon a plateau more than half-way up the mountain, \na line of truncated granite columns, the remains, say some, of the market-place, \nor forum, of Omri\'s city. \n\n"If you please, Captain, you will find that in First Kings, the sixteenth \nchapter, twenty- fourth verse," interjects a respectful voice from the head of the \nlittle cavalcade. The Bible cushion in these wayside lectures is the pommel of \nthe saddle generously pressed upon Alcides by the beloved physician in Beirut as \ninfinitely more comfortable than the ordinary Arabian. From the peripatetic desk \nwe hear the first record made of the celebrated town. \n\n"And he bought the hill Samaria of Shemer for two talents of silver, and \nbuilt on the hill, and called the name of the city, which he built, after the name of \nShemer, owner of the hill, \'Samaria,\' " or, as the margin has it, " Shomoron,\' \' or, \n" Watchfort." \n\nAn orchard of olive-trees backs the ruined pillars, and a little further on the \nroad ends in the modern village of Samaria. \n\nWe have only time to see that it like a majority of other Syrian hamlets \xe2\x80\x94 \nless thrifty than Nazareth, and not so large and cleaner than Jenin, when our \nguide rides back from the front to the spot where we have paused for a view of \n\n(152) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n1 53 \n\n\n\nthe landscape, and the shining ribbon of the Mediterranean bounding it upon our \nright. \n\n\' \' If you please, here is something you will like to see,\xe2\x80\x94 the boys of Samaria \nat the very games, I doubt not, which the holy men of old, when children, played \nin Israel and Samaria, and in like manner." \n\nWe hasten into an open space,\xe2\x80\x94 the village common, it may be called\xe2\x80\x94 peopled, \nat this instant, with a wild rabble of youngsters, scratching, biting, kicking and \n\nr\xe2\x80\x94 " " \xe2\x80\x94 " \' : \' -\xe2\x80\x94\xe2\x80\x94 \n\n\xe2\x96\xa0 \xe2\x96\xa0 \xe2\x96\xa0 \n\n\n\n\n"CARRYING THE MONEY WITH THEM." \n\n\n\nswearing (there is no mistaking the tone of profanity, however strange the tongue), \nlike a pack of quarrelsome hounds. \n\nJeremiah would have laughed with us, at the unexpected climax and the \nadded stimulus of the grieved chagrin eloquent in the honest bronzed visage of \nthe showman at our shout of \' \' Holy men of old ! Oh, David ! \' \' \n\n\' \' And they were so peaceful and friendly not three minutes ago, I do assure \nyou!" \n\nThey are neither friendly nor reasonable now, for when they can be persuaded \nto stop fighting one another, they despise the admonition to "go on playing," and \nafter basely accepting a bribe, get into position by driving a stick into the ground, \n\n\n\n, 54 THE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\nthen, catching sight of the kodak, raise a shriek of " sorcerer ! \xc2\xbb and pelt up the \nhill carrying the money with them. \n\n\' Our respect for the Crusaders deepens with each visit to such memorials of their \noccupancy of the Sacred Soil as the ruins of magnificent bridges, strong fortresses \nand noble churches which the wanton Saracen and pitiless Time have not succeeded \nin effacing utterly. The impression is too general, even among educated Christ- \nians that the impetuous zeal to rescue the Holy Sepulchre from the hands of the \ninfidel expended itself in a great measure in spasmodic fury such as was displayed \nby the bereaved bridegroom who \xe2\x80\x94 \n\nThrew his life away, fighting with the Turk. \nTreasure and taste were lavished, no less than the best blood of Christendom \nin the effort to establish the true faith in the land that had given the Founder of \nFaith to the whole world, and it is not in human nature not to grow bitter, some- \ntimes, at thought and sight of the desecration that has succeeded a sublime, if ill- \n\niudged, enterprise. c \nA fondly-cherished family tradition has to do with a renowned champion of \nthe Cross who fought every inch of his way from Jaffa to Jerusalem, and left his \nbones in the dust of Mount Zion. We have never acknowledged the kinship more \nfully than in the indignant leap of our pulses at an incident of our visit to the \nChurch of St. John the Baptist, the one object of interest m modern Samara. \nThe walls have withstood the action of almost nine centuries, "Crusader s work \nbeing the synonym for stability from comer to cap-stone. Hammer and trowel \nare busy upon the interior as we cross the marble threshold. The whole church \nis gutted, and is undergoing alteration into a Mohammedan mosque. Portions of \nit have been thus used for a hundred years. Under the hands now engaged here, \nthe last vestige of Christian architecture will, in a few years, be obliterated. \nHolding, as we do, as a rule of good breeding, the obligation to bear ourselves \ndecorously in whatever place of worship we may visit, we have made the round \nof the place quietly, and are on our way to the entrance, when a man who seems \nto be the superintendent of the workmen steps up in front of us and addresses us \nin Arabic, to which David replies. , . , \n\nWe are evidently the objects of remark in the ensuing dialogue m which the \nstranger presses some point, and Jamal as resolutely, although more temperately, \n\nrefuses \\_ \xe2\x80\xa2 \n\n"What does he wish to have you tell us ? " we demand, having made out this \n\nmuch of the tenor of the altercation. \n\n\' \' Nothing worth my telling\xe2\x80\x94 or you knowing, \' \' is the answer. It is better \nI should not say it. He has no right to speak it to me, much less to ask me to \nsay it in your ears." \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n155 \n\n\n\nThe excitement of the Moslem rises dangerously fast, and we, too, make a \n\nStand. " What have we done ? " _ \n\n" Nothing whatever," the interpreter hastens to convince us. if you wdl \npardon me for carrying such words to your ears, he will have it that I tell you \nthat the faithful (as he will call them) have, at last, broken down and cast down \nS sTgns of idolatrous religion that were once in this church, and that the hke \nhould be done everywhere, as he hopes and he believes it will be before long. \n\n\n\n\n"THE DREARY LINE OF NAMELESS COLUMNS. \n\n\n\nThat is all ; and now, if you please, we will thank the gentleman for his hospitality \nand leave him." \n\nWe take this advice, without trespassing further upon Moslem courtesy by \nasking to see the reputed tomb of John the Baptist in the crypt. \n\n\' \' It is by no means probable that he was buried here, \' \' we are informed. \' \' It \nis believed that John was beheaded at Herod\'s castle at Machias beyond the Jordan, \nand as the Captain will see in St. Matthew xiv. 12, and likewise in St. Mark \nvi. 29, his disciples got possession of his body and buried it. St. Mark says, \' laid \n\n\n\nI5 6 THE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\xe2\x80\xa2 it in the tomb. 5 Then \' they went and told Jesus.\' They would hardly bring \nhim to Samaria. There was a splendid temple here then, built by Herod, I have \nheard, and dedicated to the Emperor Augustus Caesar." \n\nHe pauses to speak to a woman sitting upon the ground, an earthenware bowl \nof dough between her knees, in the door of a stone building plastered with mud. \nShe replies to his kind tone, testily, without looking at him, and draws her veil \nover the lower part of her face. We know the place for a public oven, having seen \nsuch elsewhere, and having, also, witnessed the friendly favor gained by our drag- \noman with all sorts and conditions of people, are amazed that this acquaintance \nshould snub him decidedly. He shakes his head sorrowfully in walking away. \n\n" That woman\'s husband was sick last year, and I was kind to him, and to- \nday it is she who has told the boys that we are sorcerers, on account of the kodak, \nand she says she is herself afraid of it. Sorcery ! and in the nineteenth century." \n\nApparently, it is the Christians with whom the Samaritans, now-a-days, will \nhave no dealings. \n\nBeyond the dreary line of nameless columns lining the ancient market-place \nand the olive orchard, amid a thicket of low trees\xe2\x80\x94 known by Christian peas- \nants as the " Christ- thorn," because of the legend that from a branch of this the \nthorny crown was plaited\xe2\x80\x94 and a tangle of furzy growth, gathered when dry for \nfuel by the poorest women\xe2\x80\x94 is the alleged site of the " ivory palace of Ahab\'s \nqueen. \' \' \n\nAlmost a century after the memory of the wicked sovereign and his wickeder \nconsort had rotted from the mind of the nation they had misruled, the herdsman \n3 f Tekoa saw in a vision the fairy-like structure that was the coronet of mighty \nSamaria, and prophesied concerning it : \n\n\' \' And I will smite the winter house ^ \' h the summer house ; and the houses \nof ivory shall perish, and the great houses > \'all have an end, saith the Lord." \n\nLizards, green and black, slip in and ou of the jungle, scampering faster as \nthe branches are stirred by a lean, starved-looking donkey, who pokes his head \nbetween two thorn-bushes to look at us. We have seen no drearier spot, unless it \nwere the heap of stones passed soon after leaving Damascus, a cairn covering the \nreputed grave of Nimrod. \n\nNo one who has read the weird lines could refrain from reciting aloud here : \n\nThey say the Lion and Lizard keep \nThe courts where Jamshyd gloried and drank deep ; \nAnd Bahram, that great Hunter, the wild Ass, \nStamps o\'er his head, but cannot break his sleep. \n\nThe prickly furze \xe2\x80\x94 for which we know no other name \xe2\x80\x94 is at the driest now , \nand Bedouin women, from the encampment of booths we see in a hollow of the \ngreat hill down there, are cutting it with bill-hooks, binding it into immense \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nI 57 \n\n\n\nbundles and bearing it home upon their heads. It is light, although so bulky ; yet \nwe watch them with wonder, stepping fleetly over stones and stubble, straight and \nstrong, apparently careless of the loads. \n\nIn the direction toward which our faces are turned a panorama of fertile loveli- \nness unfolds itself to the delight of eyes wearied by sterile terraces and jutting \n\n\n\n\n"THEY FAIX INTO LINE." \n\n\n\n-crags. Slopes are greening under a day of blandest sunshine ; in sheltered \ncrevices, flowers\xe2\x80\x94 pink, white and yellow\xe2\x80\x94 are beginning to bloom, and in the \ngentle descent into the Valley of Shechem, the silver-green groves are vocal with \nthe laughter and prattle of children who are gathering purple olives from laden \nboughs. They fall into line and return cur salute as we pass. \n" The labor of the olive has not ceased," says one. \n\n\n\n158 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE \n\n\n\nYet, in the mournful recollection of the matted jungle overgrowing the fallen, \nstones of the royal palace, another wondrous prophecy is read aloud before the \n" guide-book \' \' is returned to the saddle-pocket : \n\n"And it shall come to pass in that day that every place shall be, where there \nwere a thousand vines and a thousand silverlings, it shall be even for briars and \nthorns ; \n\n\' \' With arrows and with bows shall men come hither ; because all the land \nshall become briars and thorns." \n\nThis is Isaiah\'s cry against "the head of Ephraim, which is Samaria." \n\nAnd " For all this, His anger is not turned away, but His hand is stretched \nout still." \n\n\n\n(159) \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVII. \n\n\n\nJACOB\'S WELL AND JOSEPH\'S TOMB. \n\nURSUING our way from Nablous (the ancient Shechem) in the cold \nwinter morning, we are spared the sight of the lepers who sit daily \nat the wayside, begging, when the weather is moderate. Cold is \npeculiarly painful to these unfortunates, and until it abates, they lie \nas nearly torpid as their condition will allow, in whatever shelter they can find. \nWe see but four to-day. In the immediate outskirts of the town, one, better \ndressed than a majority of his class, his face muffled from the sharp air so that but \n\xc2\xa9ne eye is visible, and with his maimed hands behind him, shivers against a sunny \nwall, and another is huddled in a neighboring doorway. When we leave the \nstreets behind us we pass two more; one squatted on the stones, his companion \nlying upon his stomach, supported by his elbows. \n\nAll stare vacantly at us, too demoralized by the fall of temperature to unclose \ntheir lips, even to utter "bakshish." If any men and women upon this beautiful \nearth have a valid excuse for beggary, it is the lepers of the country towns. Cut \noff from such branches of industry as require people to labor in companies, \ndebarred by mutilated members and stiffened joints from tilling the fields, their \nonly resort from starvation is to cry aloud and spare not to entreat the charity of \nall who pass by. If the day were mild, both sides of the road would be lined \nwith them, and the strange, husky call we learned, long ago, to recognize above \nthe clamor of crowded thoroughfares\xe2\x80\x94 " Bakshish ! howadji ! A bras ! A bras ! \nbakshish!" (Give money, gentlemen! we are lepers! lepers! Oh! give \nmoney !")_ W ould deafen the ear and sicken the heart. Whatever may be our \nviews on the subject of mendicancy and the evils of indiscriminate alms-giving, \nwe cannot refrain from throwing some coins to them in hurrying by, and looking \nback, see them stoop slowly and painfully to pick them up. \n\nThis is the sharpest morning we have felt. John, of the numerous appella- \ntions, and Imbarak, the tall, following the mules laden with tents and camp- \nfurniture, are bundled up in all manner of extemporized shawls and scarfs; the \njaunty waiter, erect as a ramrod in the discharge of official duties, is bowed and \nshrunken as a gladiolus- stalk under a nipping frost, and glances piteously at us in \nresponse to our cheery " good-bye." \n\n(i6oj \n\n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n161 \n\n\n\n\nThe weather that shrivels up these children of the sun has cleared the atmos- \nphere from horizon to horizon. The valley of Shechem is wondrously beautiful \nin the pure light. But we miss Hermon, gleaming as with newly-fallen snows, \nand the purple peak of Safed, the highest point of Galilee, so often visible to us \nfor the past two days. \n\n" To which, it is said, Christ our Lord pointed when he said, \' A city set on a \nhill cannot be hid !\' " is our guide\'s comment upon the storied height. \n\nEvery foot of ground \nis connected with the \nsacred Classics. For \nwhile Nablous means \nnothing to us, our eyes, \nears and hearts are opened \nwhen we recollect that \nthe modern town is the \nancient Shechem. Mount \nEbal, on our left, and \nGerizim, on the right, are \nthe Mounts of Cursing \nand of Blessing. \n\n"If the Captain will \nkindly turn to Joshua, \nthe eighth chapter, thirty- \nthird and thirty-fourth \nverses, \' \' suggests our ani- \nmate Concordance. In \nthe still, dry air, the \nwords have a peculiar \nring that helps us to be- \nlieve what learned com- \nmentators upon the re- \nmarkable narrative aver, namely, that the responses chanted by that half of the \nIsraelites stationed upon Mount Ebal could be heard across the narrow valley \nupon the summit of Mount Gerizim: \n\nAnd all Israel and their elders, and officers, and their judges, stood on this side the ark and \non that side before the priests the Levites, which bare the ark of the covenant of the Lord, as \nwell the stranger as he that was born among them: half of them over against Mount Gerizim, \nand half of them over against Mount Ebal, as Moses the servant of the Lord had commanded \nbefore, that they should bless the people of Israel. \n\nAnd afterward he read all the words of the law, the blessings and cursings according to all \nthat is written in the book of the law. \n\n\n\n\n\xe2\x96\xa0\xe2\x96\xa0EH \n\n\n\n\nWE PASS TWO MORE." \n\n\n\n162 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n" What a magnificent responsive service !" observes one, as the "best Baede- \nker for Palestine;" is closed. \n\nNot put away, for Shechem of old figures often and prominently upon the \ninspired pages; the mention of the name draws about it a host of striking pictures. \nIn Mrs. Whitney\'s one book of foreign travels, "Sights and Insights," she puts \ninto the mouth of Emory Ann, a shrewd New England spinster, a saying we bor- \nrow often, and at last appropriate unscrupulously. She describes herself as \n" realizing her geography." We are "realizing our Bible." \n\n\n\n\n"JOHN AND IMBARAK." \n\n\n\nThe little village whitening in the sunshine and nestling at the base of Geri- \nzim marks the place where the Father of the Faithful built the first altar raised \nto the One True and Only God in the land then held by the Canaanites. They \ncall it now, " The Holy Oak," in memory of the tree under which Jacob buried \nthe " strange gods that were in their hands, and all their earrings that were in \ntheir ears," and where Joshua set up the great memorial stone of the "statute \nand ordinance " made in Shechem. \n\nNearer to us, and toward this holy site, we turn our steps in mute reverence. \nFor this is " the parcel of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph, the parcel of \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n163 \n\n\n\na field where he had spread his tent, which he bought of the children of Hamor, \nShechem\'s father, for an hundred pieces of money.\' \' We turn from Genesis to \nJohn\'s Gospel. \n\nNow Jacob\'s well was there. Jesus, therefore, being wearied with His journey, sat thus on \nthe well ; and it was about the sixth hour. \n\nThe \' \' sixth hour \' \' would be high noon, and there had been a fatiguing walk \nover the hills. As He "sat thus" (wearily), upon the curb of the well, He \n\n\n\n\n* \' DAVID RELATES, SEATED ON THE UPPER STEP." \n\n\n\nneeded the meat which his disciples had gone into the city to buy, no less tnaii \nwater and rest. \n\nA rough, broken stone wall surrounds the well. The archway is closed half \nthe way up by a door. This is locked, and there is no care-taker near to admit us. \nSelecting the lowest breach in the wall, we clamber over fallen masonry to the \ntop and over it to the inside. A church stood here once, probably erected by those \nvaliant and indefatigable church-builders, the Crusaders; but altar, columns and \narchitrave were swept away centuries ago, and the mosaic pavement buried many \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nfeet deep under the rubbish we see. A feeble effort at exploration for what we \nknow must underlie the ruins was made recently, and laid bare the steps. A short \nflight leads down to the landing; beyond the landing is another locked door. We \nshake it energetically and uselessly. The priest who acts as custodian is absent, \nand the key is with him. On the other side of the door is the mouth of the well, \nmore than seventy feet deep. \n\n" It was, we are told, over an hundred feet in depth in former times," David \nrelates, seated on the upper step. " The custom of visitors of throwing stones to \n\n\n\nJOSEPH\'S TOMB. \n\nthe bottom to hear them fall into the water has helped fill it up. There used \nto be a flat stone on top, with a round hole in the middle, through which pig-skm \nbuckets were let down by long ropes. I\'m thinking that a few thousand dollars \nwould be well spent in clearing away all this rubbish, and show what the well was \n\non that day." . \' . , - . \n\nThe sigh is continually in the mouth of the visitor who bears m memory that \nthe deposit of ages has arisen many feet above the surface upon which our Master \nwalked We make our way up to the present level; lay our Guide-book upon \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n165 \n\n\n\nthe wall, and re-read the beautiful story of the interview with the woman of \nSamaria. \n\n"It is called Askar, now," we learn, "and lies just there" \xe2\x80\x94 a finger is \npointed toward Mount Kbal \xe2\x80\x94 " a little distance away." \n\nIt was an insignificant town then, and she who came carelessly along the \npath winding around the hill was not a good woman, an onrament to the place. \nSo loose had been her life, and so bold \nmust have been the glance she dropped \nupon the Galilean peasant, sitting with lax \nlimbs and drooping head \xe2\x80\x94 maybe upon the \nmassive steps we have just left \xe2\x80\x94 that the \nimpulse of a man who consulted self-respect \nrather than the opportunity to lift the fallen, \nwould have been to feign ignorance of her \npresence. \n\nWe have never appreciated until at this \nreading the effrontery of her rejoinder to the \nrequest common to the lips of every way- \nworn man, halting at a well, from the days of \nEleazar of Damascus down to this, our day \xe2\x80\x94 \n;< Give me to drink." She might be noto- \nriously profligate, getting rid of, or being \ncast off, by one after another of five hus- \nbands, and at length braving public opinion \nand risking a shameful death by living with \none who was not her husband; but she had \nnot sunk so low as to give a draught of cold \nwater to a Jew. She was a Samaritan, \nthrough and through. Even when her in- \nsolence was quelled by the majesty of the Stranger\'s presence and speech, she \nvaunted herself upon her great ancestor, Jacob, and the patriarch fathers who \nworshiped in \'\'this mountain." \n\n"That would be Gerizim," we check the narrative to say, looking up with \nawe to the summit on which may be traced the ruins of an ancient synagogue. \nHowever changed other features of the scene may be, the hills are the same, and \nit is certain upon what His eyes rested as He spoke of " this mountain." \n\nWe have sent the horses on to wait for us at the Tomb of Joseph, and \nwalk the quarter-mile separating us from Jacob\'s Well. The low-domed mosque \nbeside the last resting-place of the patriarch glares whitely against the back \nground of mountains. The tomb itself is in the enclosure without the mosque, \n\n\n\n\nTHK GIRI< WE MKT AT BANIAS. \n\n\n\n\n(i66) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nand olive trees grow so near as to shade it when the snnbeams slant from \n\n^ W \xc2\xab?\' ov over sixty years his mummy must have traveled with the tribes;" \nAlcides has been making a rough computation upon the fly-leaf of his note- \nbook based upon the chronological headings of certain pages m the Palestine \n\nBaedeker." \' \'And he \nhad lain in a coffin \nin Egypt four hundred \nyears. Not such a long \ntime compared with \nthe two or three-thou- \nsand-year-old mum- \nmies one makes free \nwith in museums ; yet \none cannot but feel \nthat it must have been \na comfort when Joshua \nat last buried his \nbones quietly (and for \nall time, let us hope) \nin this parcel of \nground." \n\nIt is a goodly \nresting-place, guarded \nby the everlasting \nhills, upon one of \nwhich Eleazar and \nPhineas, the son and \ngrandson of Aaron, \nwere interred. \n\nThe defile be- \ntween the Mounts of \nBlessing and of Curs- \nine scarcely more than half a mile wide in the narrowest part, widens into what \nis styled the "Wandering Field of Joseph." Again-(and I am ashamed to con- \nfess for what number of times we might set it down) -we discover that our pre- \nconceived idea of time and distance in a familiar Bible story is utterly at fault. \nIf catechised we should have said that Joseph\'s search lasted throughout, per- \nhaps one day, and that the ground covered by the " wandering m the field was \nmeasured by acres, not miles. It absolutely startles us to discover that the \n\n\n\n\nA JOSKPH OF TO-DAY, \n\n\n\n168 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nseventeen-year-old lad had traveled over forty miles\xe2\x80\x94 measured by an air-line\xe2\x80\x94 \nafter leaving his father at Hebron, before he met " a certain man " at Shechem, \nwho had heard Jacob\'s elder sons say, " Let us go to Dothan." Dothan, itself, \nis fifty miles from Jacob\'s home in Hebron. \n\nOne is moved to compassion and admiration at the thought of the anxious \nhours and tedious days consumed in the errand, and the steadfastness that held \nthe messenger to it. \n\n\' \' Yet, \' \' we remind one another, \' \' the boy was used to such expeditions. \nDo you recollect the Bedouin girl we met at Banias, who had been looking for her \nfather\'s camels for two days, and had not found them when we saw her ? She had \nslept at night in the tents of her people, as she chanced to come up with them. \nJoseph no doubt did the same, or laid him down to rest, as darkness fell upon \nthe grass. That his brethren were in the fields with their flocks shows that the \nseason was not winter." \n\nA shepherd-boy appears in the defile terminating in the "Wandering Field," \nswinging himself along with the springing tread of the mountain-bred native. His \ntunic is dark blue cloth, the upper garment of sheep-skin made up with the wool \ninside; a scarf of many colors is twisted about his waist, and a gay " kaeyeh " is \nbound over his head with a black "ikal," or cord of camel\'s hair. In the \nmomentary pause caused by the sudden sight of the approaching cavalcade, the \nkodak has caught him as a " Joseph of to-day." \n\n\n\n(i6 9 ) \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVIII. \n\n\n\nTHE SONS OF ISHMAEL. \n\nOHK black tents clustered, in winter, in sheltered hollows of the hills \nhave been, from ^: e date of our entrance into the Holy Land, objects \nof peculiar interest to us. Like those of Kedar, they are comely in \nour observant eyes. Once and again, we have alighted at a small \n-encampment, and sat for an hour in the tent of the sheikh, accepted coffee, and \ndeclined pipes and cigarettes upon one or another civil pretext, and talked (at \nsecond-hand) with the inmates of the temporary home. More frequently we have \nridden near enough to witness the hospitable stir created by our approach, \nexchanged friendly salutations and passed on, for a twenty-minute or half-hour \ncall is an impossibility without giving deep offence to the astonished host. \n\nWe are now to pay our first regular visit to a Bedouin sheikh, whose village \nlies within three miles of the table-land where we pitched our camp last night, and \ndirectly in line with our projected route for to-day. \n\nThe potentate, in passing our door at sunset, had alighted to proffer in person \na courteous request that we would honor his poor abode by a call at whatever \nhour it might please us to do so. All that he has, and whatever he can do, is, \naccording to his showing, at our service, now and forever. His grave dignity and \ngraceful deference of tone precluded ungrateful doubts of his sincerity. \n\nWithout emulating his deportment, we accepted the invitation, leaving our \nmajor-domo, as master of ceremonies, to clothe the acquiescence in terms suffi- \nciently high-flown to satisfy himself and our would-be entertainer. Jamal came \nto the dining-tent when dinner was over, to post us up as to the sheikh\'s rank and \nimportance. He is one of the richest and most powerful Bedouins on this side \nof the Jordan, with a following of over five hundred families. His flocks of \nsheep, his herds of goats and larger cattle are immense, and his horses are the \nfinest for many miles around. \n\n" He has but two wives," is a part of the story, "He is only forty years \nof age, and may, of course, add to the number. Yet that is not likely. He is a \nsensible man." \n\nHaving witnessed the parting between the proprietor of our camp and the \nmighty sheikh, we quite comprehended the compliment of the call, and the \nfriendliness of the pair. \n\n(170) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n171 \n\n\n\nWe talk Bedouin until our early bed-time, comparing impressions and infor- \nmation with regard to the strange nomads. The two hours\' discussion is thus \nboiled down in Alcides\' note-book: \n\n\' \' Their object in living seems to be to rob other tribes, and to fight the injured \nparties afterward; to hunt, to ride, marry, and to wander from one chosen place to \nanother. Their ostensible business is agriculture and stock-raising. \n\n"Leading characteristics: Politeness and hospitality to guests; revenge and \nill-doing to enemies, and a large and level eye to the main chance, especially in \nthe matter of robbery and horse-trades. \n\n\n\n\' HAVING WITNESSED THE PARTING." \n\n" In morals of other kinds, their methods are summary. If a man suspects \nhis wife of undue liking for another man, he invites her to accompany him upon a \nhunting expedition, or a pleasure ride, and comes back without her. She is never \nseen or named again, and the murderer is honored for the deed. If a girl gets \n< talked about,\' there is no investigation of proofs. Her father or brother takes \nher off out of sight of the camp, and shoots her as he would a dog suspected of \nhydrophobia. Half-way measures are unpopular among this simple-minded \npeople." \n\n\n\n172 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nAt breakfast, the theme is still the sons of Ishmael and the visit we are to \nmake. Imbarak, dwarfing the tent, as usual, waits without, tea-pot in hand, five \nminutes before his presence is perceived. He is too decorous to "hem," or \nshuffle, to call attention to the unimportant circumstance of his existence. And \nthis morning, alas! he casts no shadow. He never casts much, as to width, but \nthe sun which arose red and sullen has, as the old saying is, " gone to bed again," \nunder an uncompromising gray curtain. \n\nThe curtain lets down more closely, on our side of the nearer hills, by the \ntime we are on the march, as we reach the one irregular street defined by the \n\n\n\n\nTEA AT OUR OWN TENT DOOR. \n\n\n\nlow, black tents, preliminary drops have lengthened into business-like streams. \nIt rains, and rains straight. \n\n\' \' They were meaning to remove the encampment to-morrow, up to the hills, " \nDavid says. "As you will see, the rains have made this flat, low situation quite \nmuddy." \n\nThere are perhaps one hundred tents, all low, and some long, covered with a \ncoarse fabric, woven of mingled goat\'s and camel\'s hair. Oddly enough, \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. l \xe2\x84\xa2 \n\nalthough smoke is rising everywhere through this stuff as through mosquito-net- \nting it is practically water-proof. On the rainward side curtains are fastened to \nthe ground. As the day is not cold, only wet, the other sides and ends of the \ntents are open. The settlement is sparse in the suburbs, and diversified by trees \nand bushes. As we go on, the tents are nearer together, almost touching; one \nanother. They vary from ten to forty feet in length, and from ten to fifteen in \ndepth- the sides are five feet high at the lowest, and about eight from the earth to \nthe ridge-pole running from end to end. The largest is, as a matter of course, \nthe sheikh\'s, and is further designated by a spear stuck in the ground. \n\nBefore we halt, half-a-dozen men rush out, ready to seize the bridles of the \nhorses and assist us in alighting. As each takes a visitor\'s hand to help him \ndown, he tries to kiss it, with a gesture of profound humility. Alcides, whom \nDavid coaches upon nice points of Syrian etiquette, dexterously evades this cere- \nmony by withdrawing his hand and touching the back of it to his own lips. A \nwoman and a foreigner permits the salute, bowing and smiling appreciation of the \ncompliment paid to her. We are escorted into the largest compartment of the \ntent, the reception, or guest-room. There are three divisions, that in which we \nare received, and one apiece for each wife and her children. In the middle of the \nearthen floor smoulders a fire of coals, and in the hot ashes are set three brass \ncoffee-pots, the tops attached to them by slender chains. \n\nThe sheikh rises from a low stool at the left of the fire, and advances to wel- \ncome us, raising his hand first to his forehead, then to his heart. Behind him is \na row of men, cross-legged upon rush matting unrolled from one end of the tent \nto another. All bow and touch their foreheads without rising. At the right of \nthe fire, servants spread a crimson rug, thick and soft, then place in the centre \nof it a \'camel\'s saddle and housings, richly embroidered. Upon this, as the seat \nof honor, we are invited to place ourselves. Little is said while all this goes \non gestures, much salaaming and a few sedate Arabic gutturals doing the work \nof making us at home and comfortable. When we are seated, the attendants \nback to the rear wall of the tent, and stand, alert, but motionless, behind the \nline of sitting figures. These, we are now aware, are fellow-guests with our- \nselves, invited to do us honor. Almost simultaneously, we find out that we have \nbeen invited to breakfast. There are as many breakfasts per day in a Bedouin\'s \nlodge as there are relays of guests in the forenoon. If these arrive hourly, each \nhour a fresh breakfast is cooked and served. One of the true tales to which we \nhearkened overnight was of a Bedouin, who, pursued by those who sought his \nlife, fled to the chief of the hostile tribe for refuge. The sheikh received and \nsheltered him, and asked what the fugitive would like to have for dinner. \n" That," said the other, "lam content to leave to your generosity." \nThe sheikh left the tent for a few minutes, returning presently, and resuming \n\n\n\n174 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nhis seat in tranquil gravity. After a while, the guest, growing uneasy at the \nbleating and bellowing going on without, sallied forth to see eighteen sheep and \nhalf-a-dozen calves lying bleeding on the grass, and the work of slaughter still \ngoing on. But for his interposition and vehement protests, all the live stock in \nthe encampment would have been sacrificed upon the altar of hospitality. \n\nThe bill-of-fare on the present occasion was settled before our arrival. The \ntable is set by depositing upon the floor a huge bowl of stout earthenware, filled \nwith a smoking mess of broth, thickened with lentils until it would almost stand \nalone. About the basin is arranged upon the matting a circle of round, flat cakes \nof unleavened bread, hot from the oven or griddle on which they were baked. \nThe central dish is flanked by a smaller of honey and one of loppered goat\'s \nmilk, or lebben, the same delicacy offered by Jael to Sisera in a "lordly dish," \n\n\n\n\n"THE SETTLEMENT IS SPARSE IN THE SUBURBS." \n\nprobably no better as to quality than the brown ware in which the national article \nof diet is placed before us. As many guests as can conveniently gather about the \n" dishes \' \' are collected by the host. They double their legs under them with the \nease acquired by long practice, and each tearing off a fragment of the tough, warm \ncake, folds it with thumb and forefinger, plunges it into the reeking mess, and \ncarries his spoil to his mouth. Portions of lebben and honey are partaken of \nbetween times. \n\nOur guide, always considerate of our well-being, assures us, in a guarded \nundertone, that we need not eat unless we desire it. He will represent the late \nand hearty breakfast we have had, and make all right. Alcides politely waives the \napology, takes a distinguished place in the ring and tears off one \' \' spoon " after \nanother from his round of bread, as to the manor born. It is excruciatingly \nfunny to behold when one\'s stomach has nothing at stake in the exhibition, and \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n175 \n\n\n\nthe trifling accident of a brown thumb withdrawn, dripping, from the trencher, \nand carried with the bread-ladle to bearded lips, signifies less than if the next dip \nand sop were to feed the beholder\'s inner man \xe2\x80\x94 or woman. \n\nCoffee-making goes on all the time. The raw berries are roasted upon an \niron plate shaken by a long handle over the enlivened coals; then they are turned \ninto a mortar made of oak from Bashan and of a rich brown with age and use, \nand pounded with a pestle by a servant. As he pounds and grinds, he beats a \nsort of tune upon the resonant sides of the mortar, monotonous and not unmusi- \ncal. Lastly, the coffee powder is put into one of the brass kettles, simmering or* \n\n\n\n\n"TURNS HER TOWARD THE KODAK." \n\n\n\nthe fire, and boiled up three times, before it is poured into small cups, without \nhandles, and passed to the guests. I taste it, and even drink half of the contents \nof the cup although it is thick, unsweetened, and made absolutely odious to the \nuninitiated by a liberal pinch of allspice. The exhilarating draught is dispensed \nfive times during the two hours of our stay within the hospitable precincts. \nCooking is carried on as industriously in the adjoining compartment, to a subdued \naccompaniment of women\'s and children\'s voices. In the presence of so many \n\n\n\n176 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nmen, the wives and women-servants are not allowed to show themselves. In view \nof the prejudice \xe2\x80\x94 or principle \xe2\x80\x94 enjoining the\' seclusion, we cannot admire too \nheartily the perfection of breeding that extends to the pale-faced stranger of the \ninferior sex attention as marked as that received by her escorts. Not a glance, \nmuch less a word, testifies to surprise at her uncovered face and assumption of \nequality with the men surrounding her. Furthermore, not a question is asked as \nto the antecedents or intentions or destination of the foreigners. The talk runs \n(or walks) on the weather, the crops and horses, and is led by the sheikh, who \neats apart from the rest, as a token of humility. He is not worthy, he intimates by \nthe separation, to dip his fingers in the dish prepared for those he delights to honor. \n\nWhen the first guests have satisfied their hunger, another set takes their \nplace; the central bowl is carried away to be refilled, more bread is brought in, \nand the bowls of honey and lebben, if emptied, are replenished. Napkins, finger- \nbowls, spoons, knives, and forks are unheard of accessories of civilization. All \nthe furniture in the "drawing-room" has been mentioned, and there is little \nmore in the " hareem," or women\'s tent, except rugs and quilts used for bedding, \nand the few brass and earthenware vessels needed for primitive cookery. \n\n"The Bedouin\'s life is not a happy one (in winter)," is scribbled upon a \npage of "Notes by the Wayside." The valleys and low-lying plains, selected \nbecause the winds there are less violent than upon higher ground, are at this \nseason sodden with rain, and when the storm is violent, fowls and cattle rush \npell-mell to the one available shelter, and will not be excluded. The floor is \ndrenched by dripping fleeces and hides, and trodden into a quagmire by many \nhoofs, and it is not a rare circumstance for the human family to be driven to take \nrefuge in one compartment, leaving the others for the dumb creatures. However \ncrowded the premises, the guest, be he friend, stranger, or even foe, has the best \nplace in the tent and the choicest portion of food, and the host would protect him \nat the risk of his life against insult or attack, were the assailant of his own tribe \nand kindred. \n\nThe parting token of hospitality that effaces self in the desire to gratify the \nvisitor is given by our host, when, the sun breaking forth for a brief half-hour, \nwe are in the act of leaving the encampment, and Alcides quietly tries to get a \npicture of a woman crossing the open space about the principal tent. The intention \nis perceived by the sheikh, who overtakes her with a few strides, lays a hand \nupon her shoulder and turns her toward the kodak. He probably has no \nsuspicion that he also appears upon the plate; the attitude is one which his \ncompeers would consider derogatory to the dignity of his sex and office. Never- \ntheless, we believe that his action would have been the same had he had time \nto weigh the consequences of the attempt to meet the wishes of the parting guest. \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIX. \n\n\n\nTHE SONS OF ISHMAEL. \xe2\x80\x94 (CONCLUDED.) \n\nH LESS formal call than that reported in the last chapter is paid to a \nBedouin camp of humbler pretensions and many miles distant from \nthe powerful sheik whose portrait accompanied that chapter. \nA woman came to our tents this morning before breakfast with \nexactly two fresh eggs to sell. She belonged to the poorer class of Bedouins, \nemigrants from the wealthier tribes across the Jordan. A thin, miserable-looking \nbaby was upon her shoulder, and scratched its head while the kodak, hidden \nby a curtain of the tent door, took a picture of mother and child. She had come \nfrom an encampment four hills away, she said, and was on her way to Jericho \nto spend the money she would get for her fresh eggs. They were laid yesterday. \nJohn had his orders to pay her three times what they were worth, and to give \nsomething to the baby. With all my love for the young of the human species, I \ndid not care to go nearer this specimen. \n\nIt is after our lunch and siesta, that our journeying brings us in sight of \nthe village the woman must have quitted at dawn for the walk over the hills. The \nturn that reveals it, burrowing, as it were, between two sand-mountains, is so \nabrupt that the community is spellbound for an instant. Children playing upon \nthe waste lands about the black booths, gape at the approaching party, and the \none man visible out-of-doors is the only person who has the self-possession to call \nback the pack of yelping, baying curs rushing about the feet of the horses. To \nthe momentary consternation succeeds a hurry-skurry on the part of the women, \nled on by a tall figure who is named to us\' as the principal wife of the sheik. From \ntwo compartments of the three-roomed tent they issue in frantic haste, laden with \nquilts and rugs, and bearing them into the guest-room. By the time we enter \nthis, a sort Of bed or divan is laid around two sides of the compartment, and \ncushions are piled at irregular intervals upon it. The wife-in-chief meets me, \nstoops to kiss my hand, carries it to her forehead and her heart, and indicates \nwhere she would have me sit. When I comply, but do not recline, another older \nwoman pats the nearest heap of cushions, and smiles persuasively. A compromise \nis effected by resting an elbow upon this " arm " of the divan. \n\nThe sheik\'s favorite, registered in our note-book, at one time, as "Zenobia," \nat another, " Boadicea," must have been as nearly handsome in youth as a dusky \nmaiden can be, whose forehead, cheeks and chin are tattoed with polka-dots, rings, \n\n12 (i 77 ) \n\n\n\nl 7 8 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\ncrescents, stars and other designs, and whose upper and lower eyelids are painted, \nShe is stately in shape and carriage, and wears her dark-blue gown and veil, upon \nwhich are some tatters and embroidery, as an empress her ermine. Taking a \nhandful of dried thorns and twigs from a maid, she kneels over the hillock of \nwhite ashes in the middle of the floor, and herself kindles the fire, pushing up her \n\nloose sleeves to the elbow, and \nholding back her veil that she \nmay blow the embers to a \nblaze. Her slender wrists are \nloaded with silver bracelets, \nand her arms are tattoed as far \nas we can see them. As she \nsits on her heels, watching the \nresult of her labor upon the \ncreeping flame, we open the \nconversation by thanking her \nfor taking so much trouble to \nmake us comfortable, and pro- \ntesting against further exertion \non her part. She answers with- \nout withdrawing her eyes from \nthe fire or turning her head. \n\n"She says that she is \nonly performing her duty in \nher husband\'s absence," says \nDavid from the other side of \nthe apartment. \' \' That, should \nhe be told, when he returns, \nthat she had done less, he \nwould be displeased with her. \nAlso, that he would have a \nright to be. " \n\nUneasy at the silence that \nprevails, we give the ball of \ntalk another shove. \n\n4 \'Tell her how much we admire those bracelets, and that we have seen no \nothers of that pattern. And if it is quite the thing, ask where we can find some \nlike them." \n\n1 \'In Jerusalem !" returns the sheik-ess, laconically, still staring the fire out \nof countenance. \n\n\n\n\n\'mother and chiud. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBEE. \n\n\n\n179 \n\n\n\nSeeing it, at length, burn brightly, she rises like a queen, for all her tattooing \nand tatters, and sweeps her long robes out of sight. Her mother, very like her \nin face, but gentler of mien, takes her place, producing two brass coffee-pots, with \ntops, one of which she sets in the ashes, the other upon the ground. To a man, \nwho is our fellow- guest, \nand who at our entrance, \nlay asleep upon a mat at \nthe back of the tent, is \nassigned the duty of \nroasting the coffee. \n\n\' \' He is a near rela- \ntive of the family," says \nthe interpreter, \' \' and \nmay therefore be hon- \nored by helping prepare \nfor entertaining the visi- \ntors." \n\nThe son of the sheik, \nwell-knit in figure and of \ngood stature, but whose \notherwise fine face is dis- \nfigured by weak eyes, \nnow makes his appear- \nance from another part of \nthe village. His black- \nand-white abieh parts \nover an embroidered vest; \nhis ample kafeyeh is \nalso wrought in various \ncolors, and one end is \nflung picturesquely \nacross his breast. When \nthe coffee is ready, he \npresents a cup to me upon \none knee, and hopes I \nwill honor him by tasting it. So princely is his deportment, so thoroughbred the \ngrave courtesy of his behavior to the intruders upon his home, that I entreat \nDavid to convey him in his very best manner our appreciation of his kindness \nand our sense of our ill-deserts. \n\n\n\n\n"THE SON OF THE SHEIK.\' \n\n\n\nl8o \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OE THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nThe acting host listens respectfully, his head slightly bent and not a muscle \nof his visage relaxing from the pensiveness which seems habitual. Then he turns \nto me and makes a speech of several sentences. \n\n"He says that in his father\'s absence, he hopes you will look upon him as the \nhead of the household, and your host. That he is proud and h\xc2\xb0 nOTed ^y your \nvisit to his poor hut. That ne trusts you will reman long, and consider all that \nhe has as vours," repeats David, conscientiously. \n\nIn response to our queries, the young man informs us that his father is sheik \nover about one hundred and twenty families, scattered over an area of five ots\xc2\xab \n\nand herds we have \npassed on the road \nsince luncheon be- \nlong to the tribe. \n\nThe, until \nnow, unsmiling \ncountenance lights \nup as a little tod- \ndler of two and a \nhalf years runs \ninto the tent and \nclasps him about \nthe knees. \n\n"My son!" \nhe says pridefully, \nraising him in his \narms. The old \nwoman who made \nthe coffee laughs \nsympathetically, \n\n_ \xe2\x80\x94 \xe2\x80\x94 \xe2\x80\x94 \xe2\x80\x94 \xe2\x80\x94 \xe2\x80\x94 \xe2\x80\x94 and glances at me \n\n" HANDSOME, BLACK-EYED AND MERRY." ^ q U i C k \n\nfree-masonry of motherhood which is comprehended the whole world round. \n" How many children have you ?\' \' I have David Jamal ask her. \n\n\'\'Sh are married, I suppose?" recollecting that she is mother-in-law to the \n\nsheik. \n\n" Neither is married. " \n\nThis "poser" is solved subsequently by the intelligence that her two \nbachelor sons are much younger than the favorite of the hareem (who is not the \n\n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE \n\n\n\n181 \n\n\n\nyoung host\'s mother, by the way) and that her three daughters do not count in the \ncomputation of her "jewels." \n\nThere are twelve children, belonging to somebody\xe2\x80\x94 or somebodies\xe2\x80\x94 in the \nsheik\'s abode. Handsome, black-eyed and merry younglings, all of them, and as \nragged and unkempt for the most part as they are jolly. We beg to be allowed to \nphotograph a group drawn up in unconscious effectiveness across the open front of \nthe " reception room," and it is pleasant to see the sheik\'s son persuading them to \nstand still, and holding his shy half-sister, the beauty of the band, by the hand to \nreassure her that we intend no harm. A second trial brings in more subjects, and \nin the foreground \nthe baby boy, the \napple of his father\'s \neye. \n\nThey are a gen- \ntle, peaceable tribe, \nif we may trust the \nevidence of our ob- \nservation among \nthem this afternoon. \nNot a question is \nput to us, and there \nis not a symptom of \nsurprise at our de- \nscent, horse and \nfoot, upon the en- \ncampment. When \nwe make a motion \nto go, we are urged \nto remain to dinner, \nand assured that we \ncould be made com- . \nfortable for the night. Our diffident petition to be allowed to carry off pictures ot \nthe village and inhabitants meets with ready assent, the women (unaided by the; \nmen, we notice), eagerlv looping back the western curtain to let in a stream of \nlight upon an interior that, even thus, shows but obscurely upon the developed, \n"film." \n\nGood-byes have been exchanged, and our small party is m motion, when the \nsheik\'s son brings forward his boy\xe2\x80\x94 the fond smile which the baby alone has \ncalled to the serious face, irradiating it\xe2\x80\x94 and holds him up to kiss my hand. The \nlittle fellow, tutored by his parent, goes prettily through the form; I detach a \n\n\n\n\n1 SHOWS BUT OBSCURELY. \n\n\n\n182 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nbright flower I am wearing, from my dress, and drop it into the child\'s hand, and \nwe carry away the image of the two in the foreground of our memory of the visit. \n\nA mile further \nupon our road we \nmeet the tribal poet, \nand he is duly pre- \nsented to our notice. \n\n\' \' Herein is nov- \nelty !" we can hardly \nawait our parting to \nejaculate. "A Bedouin \nbard ! What does he \ndo? and when? and \nhow ? and where ?\' \' \n\nAs a sequence, we \nenjoy at our tent door \nin the moonlight and \nsucceeding the even- \ning meal an intelligent \nand entertaining lec- \nture upon Bedouin \nwar-songs, love-songs, \nand horse-songs. To \nthe latter, the Ishmael- \nitish muse most seri- \nously and frequently \ninclines. A metrical \n\n"THE TRIBAL POET." . ... _ \n\ntranslation of one \ncopied from Alcides\' note-book will give a fair idea of their scope and spirit: \n\nI covet not the hoarded wealth the rich Damascene boasts; \nI covet not the merchant\'s ships that trade with distant coasts; \nBut the man who owns the swiftest steed that sweeps the desert sands, \nHis wealth I covet more than all throughout the Prophet\'s lands. \nI covet him, although he bears no saddle and no rein; \nThat horse I\'ll buy if he should cost all I e\'er hope to gain. \nAlthough my tribesmen call me mad \xe2\x80\x94 although they speak me ill, \nI wish not more; my horse shall be my greatest treasure still. \n\nThe Bedouin war-lyrics are in the same key with the old border-ballads. \nWhile they may not rank in poetic merit with " Chevy Chase " and " Edom \n\xc2\xa9\'Gordon," we make notes of some which show fire of imagination, as well as of \n\n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. l8 3 \n\nspirit. One, founded upon an actual occurrence, is worth relating here. The \nmeagre outline can not impress the reader as the hearing moves us in the profound \nstillness of an evening as mild as May-time. The interpreter sits a few feet away, \nthe moon full upon the dark, strong features, reciting one line at a time in the \nnative Arabic, as in soliloquy, then rendering it into English for our enlightenment. \n\nA young man\'s sweetheart was captured by a marauding band with whom her \npeople were at war. All through the country-side went the call to arms against \nthe robbers who had stolen the fairest treasure of the tribe. When all the men-of- \nWL r mustered before the tent of the sheik, he said there were too many. There \nwould be no honor in attacking the enemy with an overwhelming force. He would \ntake with him no boys, only warriors used to carry arms, and as a test, he decreed \nthat none should follow him whose beards were not thick enough to hold the \n" beard comb " when stuck into them. \n\nNow, the youth whose promised bride had been carried off was but twenty \nyears of age and had no beard. Should he endure the disgrace of seeing the fight- \ning men of the tribe depart to recover his betrothed, and revenge him upon her \ncaptors, and he be left behind with the women and children in the tents ? So, he \ndrove the beard-comb into his chin, and leaving it sticking in the flesh, presented \nhimself thus to the sheik. The chieftain was so delighted with his daring that he \nallowed him to ride forth at his side. The lover recovered his bride, and bore the \nhonorable scar to his dying day. \n\nAnother song has to do with the adventures of Ali Diab, a sheik in the land \nof Moab, renowned for bravery. He was proscribed by the Government for daring \nviolations of the law, and, while an outlaw, married one of the most beautiful women \nin Syria. Shortly after the wedding, he, his wife and a few horsemen were crossing \nthe country when news was brought that a body of the pasha\'s soldiers were in close \npursuit of them. The sheik ordered his wife to mount before him on his horse, that \nthey might make a desperate flight while the way was yet open. She spat in his \nface and broke into biting reproaches. " I married you not for your beauty but \nyour courage," she said. " I see you are a coward and no better than a woman." \n\nThe husband hastily detailed a handful of his men to remain with his wife;: \ntook the rest along "to guard his back," charged upon the soldiers, killed thirty \nof them, captured their horses; rode back to his bride and they escaped to the \nmountains together. This woman was so fair that a song was sung in her honor \nin Ali Diab\'s tribe, the refrain of which runs something like this: "We will beat \nthe soldiers of the pasha, for the sake of the eyes of Ali Diab\'s wife." \n\nThe hero of this tale is still living in a hale old age, and is reputed to be the \nmightiest and wealthiest Bedouin in Syria. \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XX. \n\n\n\n"THE CITY OF THE GREAT KING." \n\nOR a close, comprehensive view of the present city of Jeru- \nsalem and the encompassing hills, there is no better \nstanding-point than that to which we have ascended \nwithin fifteen minutes after our arrival. The hour is \nclose upon sunset, and this " loggia" upon the roof of \nthe Grand New Hotel is an incomparable observatory \nfrom which to enjoy the rising and going down of the sun. \nM. Antoine Gel at, the prince of hotel managers in \nkindly regard for the comfort of his guests, and a sort of intuition that anticipates \ndesires and suits circumstances to their tastes, is our conductor. He says just \nenough to accustom us to our environment, then stands aside, ready to answer \nfurther questions, but volunteering no comment. \n\nWe lean upon the railing, our souls in our eyes, and gaze toward the Mount \nof Olives. What pilgrim does not first turn in that direction ? The west is crim- \nson behind it; the white road leading around it to Bethany is partly in the shadow \ncreeping up the city-ward slope to the tall tower upon the top, said to mark the \nspot of the Ascension. \n\n"Which cannot be," \xe2\x80\x94 our host suggests, " since we read that 1 He led them, \nout as far as Bethany.\' " \n\nThe intervening roofs and the outer wall of the city conceal Gethsemane from \nus. The evening light folds warmly about the dome of the Mosque of Omar, \nstanding all these centuries as a type of the abomination of desolation, above the \nmost Holy Place. \n\n\' \' Mount Moriah ! \' \' has been said in our ears \xe2\x80\x94 \' \' and over there, Calvary, \nand where we stand, Mount Zion. Across the street is what is known as David\'s \nTower. The foundation stones belong to the original structure. You :an see \nwhere the more modern masonry begins. \' \' \n\nCreeping plants grow rankly in the crevices between the massive stones; upon \nthe flag-pole on the top, the crescent- and-star flap feebly in the sunset breeze; the \nshrill sweetness of bugle notes winds upwards above the noises of the street. A \nTurkish garrison occupies the ancient fortress, for long the citadel of the "city \nwhich David built. \' \' \n\n(185) \n\n\n\n\ni86 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE \n\n\n\n" It is a little city now, \' \' we murmur, voicing the disappointment inevitable \nto those whose imaginations have drunk in since infancy, stories of Jerusalem the \nGolden. \n\n" Beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth, is Mount Zion on the \nsides of the north, the city of the Great King." \n\nThe words roll like a majestic chant through the memory. The mountains \nare around about her still, but where are the towers we are bidden to count ? Are \nher bulwarks worth marking ? and her palaces\xe2\x80\x94 where are they ? \n\n"It was smaller still when David had reigned here thirty years," says one, \n" for Moriah was the Jebusite\'s threshing-floor." \n\nReluctant to admit what is making our hearts sink, we ask for the site of the \n\n\n\n\n"a city that is compact together." \n\n\n\nChurch of the Holy Sepulchre, and it is shown to us, almost beneath our feet. \nThe Jaffa gate is close to the hotel; the street conducting from it is the narrow \nartery of city -life. Against a wall where passers-by must stumble over their feet, \nsit three men in attitudes of intense fatigue, or dejection. \n\n" Professional beggars !" Mr. Gelat remarks. " Picturesque? Yes ! pictur- \nesqueness is a branch of their business. \' \' \n\nNobody notices them, while we are looking on. This is the busiest thorough- \nfare in Jerusalem. We had not known that there were so many donkeys in the \nworld as we see driven or ridden by here in one hour of the day. (In some parts \nof Europe, the ass is known as the "Jerusalem pony.") Some carry burdens \n\n\n\n(i87) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBEE. \n\n\n\nbigger than themselves of faggots, bales of merchandise, crockery green veg t - \ntabfes-whatever snpplies shops and private houses. Some are bestndden by \nturbaned eonntrymen, sitting so far baek upon the hind quarters hat the bulging \nabiehs conceal the animals\' tails; upon others are women muffled up to the fore- \nhead with children upon their laps, and panniers dependent from both sides. \nRed tarbooshes make spots of color everywhere; some of the wearers are m native \n\ncostume, many m Euro- \npean; peasants are here \nin every variety of shab- \nbiness possible to the \nstriped robe of cheap \ncamel\'s hair, t h a t i s \ngraceful or ungainly ac- \ncording to the wearer\'s \nstation and bearing; \nSyrian women in white \nizzars and colored men- \ndeels jostle Jewish \nwomen with shawls over \ntheir heads, and uncov- \nered faces; donkey-boys, \nfruit-selling boys, camel- \nboys trudging beside the \nugly beasts lunging right \nthrough the heart of the \ncrowd, their great spongy \nhoofs spattering the mud \nright and left from the \nsunken middle of the \npaved way; beggar-boys \n\xe2\x96\xa0 \xe2\x80\x94 even \xe2\x80\x94 and here we \n"the prince of* Horn managers." laugh, \xe2\x80\x94 newsboys, cry- \n\ning what look like evening papers \xe2\x80\x94are everywhere conspicuous. Some of the \nurchins sport the loyal tarboosh, most of them are bareheaded, and so far as we \ncan judge at this height, not one has a personal acquaintance with a comb, or ever \nheard of a brush. It rained this morning, and from the mire and dirt the many \nfeet stir up evil odors. \n\n" The joy of the whole earth !" Ah ! \n\nThe lower rim of the sun kisses the hilly horizon, and through the ming- \nling and nameless clamor of the lower world, a wild alien cry reaches our \n\n\n\n\nigo \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\noutlook, and turns us toward a square minaret, nigh unto the Church of the \nHoly Sepulchre. \n\nOnce heard, it is forever recognizable \xe2\x80\x94 that tremulous wail of the Muezzin, \nsent out five times daily to the faithful, whether they will hear, or whether they \nwill forbear. \n\nAllah, hu akbar ! \n\nLa illahillah Allah ; \n\nSiadnah Mohammed Rasoul Allah \n\nHayah Allah II Salah ! \n\nHayah Allah II Fallah ! \n\n(God is great ! \n\nThere is but one God ; \n\nOur Lord Mohammed is his apostle (or prophet). \nCome to prayers ! \nCome to worship !) \n\nEach phrase is said twice before passing to the next; at the conclusion of the \ncall, the whole formula is repeated from first to last, faster than before, and to a \ndifferent tune, if tune there be. \n\nThis is the famous call to pra}^er of which such capital is made by writers of \ntravels and Oriental tales. It is, as I have said, peculiar. To be frank, it is not \nmusical, and except when heard from a distance on a still evening not even pleas- \nant. As to the devoutness with which it is enunciated and heard, candor com- \npels the admission that the whole performance is perfunctory to the last degree, \nand that the effect upon the listener is very unlike what we have been led to \nexpect from the use made of the \' \' much speaking \' \' of Moslems by Sunday- \nschool orators and returned missionaries. As the many a\'s (as broad as cir- \ncumflex accents can make them) are shaken and quavered and trilled over the \nred tarbooshed heads of the faithful, we seek in vain for tokens of the profound \nimpression we have been told is invariably produced by the solemn summons. \n\nBetween the machicolations of the venerable tower opposite, are visible sol- \ndi erly figures, lounging and smoking and evidently off-guard. So far from kneel- \ning with their faces toward Mecca and going through the form of prayer, \nthey continue to saunter, to chat and idly survey the street passengers, who \nfor their part, are as deaf to the worse than vain repetitions agitating the air \nabout them as if there were not a minaret within ten miles of Jerusalem. \n\nThe beggars pull themselves up and shuffle out of sight, the sunshine having \nleft them in chill shadow; camel-drivers hold on their heedless way in the middle \nof the street; the driver of a muddy hack drawn up in a corner near the Jaffa gate, \neyes with more sense of humor than one usually detects among the saturnine peo- \nple, a lively tussle between two donkey-boys in front of a huckster\'s booth; the \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n191 \n\n\n\nlordly " kervasse " (orderly) of a foreign consul \xe2\x80\x94 gorgeous in gold lace, portent- \nous as to sword, official baton and ultra-official frown \xe2\x80\x94 awaits his chief\'s return \nfrom the photograph and olive wood bazaar across the street. Nobody prays that \nwe can discover, unless it be a white-bearded man upon a neighboring house-top, \nsitting motionless with his back toward us \xe2\x80\x94 but, as we now perceive, with his face \nturned away from Mecca. \n\nWe are unaffectedly sorry to take the pith out of an illustration so potent in \nstirring up Christian listeners to emulate the devotion prevalent in "lands be- \n\n\n\n\n" PICTURESOUENESS IS A PART OF THEIR BUSINESS." \n\n\n\nnighted " \xe2\x80\x94 but the facts are precisely as I state them. Four minarets rear bal- \nconied heads heavenwards within range of attentive ears, and a good glass shows \nus as many muezzins popping out of inner chambers, like cuckoos when the clocks \nStrike the hour, and uttering, still cuckoo-like, their "wobbling " cry. \n\n\xe2\x96\xa0 \'We expected to see every man fall upon his face and go through his \nprayers," we complain. " It must cost a great deal to build up these minarets \xe2\x80\x94 \n(there must be at least a dozen in this little city) \xe2\x80\x94 and to employ the muezzins, \nyet nobody pays any attention to them. Is it so everywhere !" \n\n\n\n\n(1 9 2) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\ni93 \n\n\n\nA Jerusalem Roman Catholic comes forward to reply: \n\n"Even in the East, people are too busy in towns to pray so many times a \nday, unless they are very religious. Most Moslems here content themselves with \nmorning and evening exercises. In the country it is different." \n\nWe face the ruddy glory of the west, and without the exchange of a word or \nglance, each knows that the other recalls "The Angelus," and the bowed peasants \n\nin the foreground, \n\nF~ ^ " I the prayerful stillness \n\nthat may be felt of \nthe fields at eventide. \n\nDrawn darkly \nagainst the sky that \npalpitates with fervid \ncolor, is a windmill \nsolitary upon a dis- \ntant hill; pale stone \nbuildings, some large \nand all new, start \ninto prominence in \nmiddle distance and \nforeground. The city \nwithout the gates is \ngrowing fast, and \nwill soon exceed in \ndimensions, as in \nneatness and stabil- \nity, the old town with \nits strait, steep alleys \nand irregular lines \nof houses. \n\nThere are no \ngas-works and no \nwater-works. After \nnightfall, if one would \n"the driver oe a muddy hack." venture abroad, he \n\nmust have an attendant with a lantern. The water supply is drawn from cisterns \nof vast depth, some of which never go dry. In a drizzling rain the streets are foul \nwith semi-liquid filth; when the showers fall heavily, much of this is swept down to \nlower levels. One does not care to calculate what proportion of noxious matter \npercolates through the soil to the mighty honeycomb of cisterns underlying the town. \n13 \n\n\n\n\n, 94 THE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\nOld Jerusalem is buried many feet below the surface of modern by the rub- \nbish of seventeen overthrows of the City of the Great King. All her pleasant \np aces often restored, were laid waste beyond the hope of rehabilitation when the \nPlowshare of Titus furrowed the hill of Moriah before the generation had passed \naway that heard the Galilean Teacher\'s lament over the Jerusalem that killed \nthe Prophets " The Jerusalem who in three days\' time would hound to a male- \nfactor s dSh the Greatest of them all. To our left, between us and the long, \n\xc2\xa3aSht trow of Scopus and rising above the city wall, low tombstones crown \nano her hill. Our eyes never leave it fox long, however they may stray as con- \nvent hospice, asylum and church are named to us The horizontal sun-rays \nItrik. and linger upon it, while we take one final look before going below, and \nthe light brings out the tender hues of verdure that always clothe it, even m \nwinter. \n\nThe green hill far away, \nWithout a city wall\xe2\x80\x94 \n\nis what, after all, we have come out to see in this far land-a veritable wilderness \nto Mm whose happiness depends upon the luxuries of nineteenth century eivih- \n\nZati \xc2\xb0V oices _a heavy bass and a light treble-clash together between the walls \nshutting in the stairway by which we have climbed to the roof. A dumpy woman \npants to the upper floor, followed by a thin man. We know the smooth, round \nfece of one and^the sharpened red beard of the other. They are not staying m the \nGrand and have only come to get the view. Mr. Gelat advances urbanely; Dr. \nJharpe introduces, first himself, and then his wife, and "hopes there is no intru- \n\n\n\nsion \n\n\n\nThe hospitable manager sets his mind at rest in some fitly chosen words \n"You are well known to me by reputation, Dr. Sharpe, and I shall be hon \nored by any use you can make of my house or my poor services. The view is, a, \nyon see, extensive. You are, I presume, familiar with the several points of \ninterest visible from here?" \n\nMrs Sharpe utters a little cry. She has walked to the farthest end of the \n\n\'^^TS^^rT^ dear, * Church of the Holy \n\n^%*Z^ Perpetuates the wildest fable of the hundreds the Mid- \ndle Ages have bequeathed to us !" we hear her husband begm-and hasten down \nthe steps. \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXI. \n\n\n\n"THE MOUNT CALLED OLIVET." \n\nIT is still made conspicuous among the mountains round about Jerusalem \nby the olive groves clothing the sides and summit. In spring-time, the \napparently barren reaches which are unshaded by trees will be mantled \nwith verdure and flowers. In late autumn, and in the winter, the \nmighty slopes are a study in neutral tints, the silvery gray of the olives \ncontrasting but faintly with the darker uniformity of color in soil and stones. \n\nIf we would ascend to the church and convent built upon the crown of the \nlong hill, we must walk or ride. Driving in any kind of vehicle is out of the \nquestion This has been set fairly before us, but we sally forth from the Jaffa \ngate with an inadequate conception of what lies before us on this bland December \nafternoon. Massoud, refreshed by a couple of days in the stable, curvets and \nprances ahead of the two donkeys ridden by David and his charge. Jamal\'s is a \nbrisk brown beast, with an amiable, conscientious amble, a pigmy beside the \ndignified creature, white as wool, allotted to me. \n\n"Tradition tells us that the Queen of Sheba rode a white ass when she came \nto visit Solomon, madame,\' \' I hear, as we skirt the city wall and see upon our left \nthe heights where Titus massed the Roman legions for the terrible siege begun at \nthe Feast of the Passover, A. D. 70, to end five months later in the destruction \nof temple and citadel. "And kings\' sons rode upon such. It is therefore \ncounted a royal animal." \n\nThe royal animal beneath me is broad and stalwart and comely\xe2\x80\x94 of his kind. \nHe is also so lazy as to require the jerk of Serkeese at his head, and the goad of a \nsecond boy upon his flanks when we begin to climb. The flesh may be strong, \nbut the spirit it encases is at once unstable and rebellious. \n\nI have not found this out when we pace down the long declivity, passing on \none hand the -green hill," on the other the Damascus gate. The road is wide \nand smooth, and near the bottom bears away from the city wall to cross a bridge. \n" The Brook Kidron !\' \' says the guide. \n\nWe draw up to the side of the bridge and look down into the dry valley. It \nis not even a ravine now, which spring floods might fill. Olive trees grow upon \nthe accumulated debris of eighteen centuries. If there be water in the ancient \nchannel, it never makes its way to the surface. The so-called Tomb of the Virgin \n\n(196) \n\n\n\nI9 8 THE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\nis on our left hand. In a few months, upon the day fixed by ecclesiastical dogma \nas the birthday of our Lord\'s mother, thousands of pilgrims will pitch tents and \nbooths about tomb and chapel; brass bands will be in full blast all day and all \nnight long; all manner of merchandise will be peddled along the road. \n\n\' \' Just\'like a picnic, \' \' says a Greek Christian whom we encounter on the bridge. \n\nThe monument with a square base and peaked tower in the deeper part of the \nvalley upon our right, is known as the Tomb of Absalom. \n\n\n\n\n\'WE GAIN AN OPEN SPACE. \n\n\n\n-Where he was never buried," comes from the back of the brisk brown \ndonkey "If the Captain will look at second Samuel, eighteenth chapter and \nseventeenth verse, he will read that the young man Absalom was cast into a pit m \nthe wood of Ephraim. Learned men think that this may be the pillar alluded to \nin the eighteenth verse (if you please, sir!) which \'Absalom in his life-time \nreared up for himself in the king\'s dale.\' \' \' \n\nAt the name of the undutiful son a pathetic scene rises before us. We turn \nSilently to another part of the sacred record and read how " all the country wept \n\n\n\n200 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nwith a loud voice" as the deposed king and his followers passed over Kidron; \nthen, \xe2\x80\x94 that: \n\n" David went up by the ascent of Mount Olivet, and wept as he went up and \nhad his head covered, and he went barefoot; and all the people that was with him \ncovered every man his head and they went up, weeping as they went up." \n\nWe are still reading when rasping voices smite our ears. Close to our stirrups \nis the vanguard of the forces drawn up on the sunny side of the walled way by \nwhich we are to make the ascent. The village of Siloam, the houses of which \nare scarcely distinguishable from the gray rocks to which they cling, lies a short \nhalf mile away. Above and beyond it, is the group of wretched huts tenanted by \nJerusalem lepers, and this thoroughfare along the Kidron, and so on into the open \ncountry, is the pariah\'s stamping-ground. Old and young of both sexes haunt \nthe spot on every moderatery fine day. Some carry pails and baskets into which \npassing market-gardeners drop vegetables and fruit. One and all beg, and that \ncontinually, shamelessly making capital of mutilation and other disfigurement that \nsicken our souls and senses. David charges into the line closing across our way: \n\n"We went this way this morning, and gave you backshish \xe2\x80\x94 and you know \nit !" he vociferates in stinging Arabic. " I am ashamed of you !" \n\nAt the admonition they slink back mute, if not abashed. That a party must \nnot be bled twice in one day is a tenet in their unwritten code of honor and business. \n\nThe narrow roadway soon twists and contracts into a bridle-path. A path by \ncourtesy only, for the rolling stones of all shapes and sizes are as plentiful under \nour feet as on both sides of the route. Serkeese tugs hard at my royal beast\'s \nhalter, the other boy applies a vigorous shoulder to the creature\'s haunches as we \ngo up and up, tacking across the steep breast of the hill. Now and then, the \nefforts of both drivers are ineffectual to prevent the donkey from stopping short in \nan especially precipitous place, and, drawing a long breath that heaves one high \nin the saddle, venting his emotion in what is surely the most ear-splitting and \nincredibly protracted bray that ever expanded asinine ribs. The experience is \nexasperating \xe2\x80\x94 but funny \xe2\x80\x94 up to the seventh repetition. \n\nStill tacking, we gain an open space, \xe2\x80\x94 a waste of loose stones \xe2\x80\x94 not far from \nthe Church of the Ascension, and turn for a long look at the view. The day is \nvery still; the sunlight is colorless; beyond gray hillside and melancholy olive- \ntrees, and across the valley where the Kidron flows no longer, and cool Siloam is \nchoked by the heaps upon heaps of pleasant places laid waste \xe2\x80\x94 rise the hoary \nwalls of Jerusalem. \n\nHere Hushai overtook David, and was sent back into Jerusalem by his master \nto defeat the counsels of Ahithophel. For aught that we, or any one now alive \ncan know, it might have been upon this very spot that our Lord sat down to rest, \nafter departing from the temple, and staying in the outer vestibule at His disciples* \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n2or \n\n\n\nappeal to look upon the great stones to be thrown down before the passing of the \nfaithless generation. The leaves of our "guide-book" do not flutter in the \nwaveless air as we look for the story: \n\n\' \' And as He sat upon the Mount of Olives, the disciples came unto Him \nprivately, saying: \'Tell us, when shall these things be? And what shall be the \nsign of the coming?\' " \n\nIf this be true, here, or near where we read these words, were given the \n\n\n\n\n"THEY SUNK BACK MUTE." \n\nparables of the Ten Virgins and the Ten Talents, and the awful picture was \ndrawn of the division of the righteous from the wicked. \n\nWe visit Gethsemane on the way down. The inclosed "Garden," never \nlarge, has been subdivided into what may be called flower-plots, that Greek and \nRoman Catholic may no longer disgrace the name and memory of a common \nMaster by hideous wranglings. Each sect has its own paled-in territory. Having \nleft our beasts of burden and our attendants at the end of the short lane leading \nto the main road, we have the place to ourselves, but for a lay-brother m a wide \n\n\n\n202 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nfelt hat who is " pottering " with a hoe among the borders of old-fashioned cottage- \nflowers, under the most aged of the olive trees. Without so much as visiting the \nGrotto of the Agony, or the connecting subterranean chapel where are shown the \ntomb of St. Anna, the mother of the Virgin Mary and that of Mary\'s husband, \nJoseph, or caring to measure the distance \xe2\x80\x94 " as it were a stone\'s cast " \xe2\x80\x94 dividing \nthe Grotto of the Agony from the place without the garden\xe2\x80\x94 designated as that \nwhere Peter, James and John slept while their Lord wept and prayed\xe2\x80\x94 we bow to \n\n\n\n"7^ \n\n\n\n\n\n"OVER AND BEYOND THE ROUNDED CROWNS OF THE OUVES. " \n\nthe solemn influences of the hallowed precincts. Somewhere on this sunny \ndeclivity was the retreat to which the Man of Sorrows so often resorted with His \ndisciples, that the arch-traitor knew only too well where He was to be found after \nthe Passover feast. The olives, gaunt and gnarled with years, that gleam in the \nafternoon light, have sprung from the soil that gave foothold to the trees of the \nGethsemane He loved. He must have crossed the brook by some such route as \nwe have taken, and the tinkle of the running water may have joined with the sigh \nof the night-wind in the olive-boughs to lull the overwrought disciples to slumber. \nWe forget traditions and monkish superstition in pondering these things, our faces \n\n\n\nAGED OLIVE-TREE IN GARDEN OF GETHSEMANE. \n\n\n\n(203 ) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n205 \n\n\n\nturned toward Jerusalem that, held not back, after slaying the prophets, from \ndenying the Holy One and Just, and killing the Prince of Life. \n\nThe muezzins are answering one another from minaret to minaret, the harsh \ncry mellowed in the passage across the valley, when we withdraw our eyes from \nwhat our hearts and memories must ever hold. David stands without the gate, \nand the lay -brother comes up with a sprig of rosemary. \n\nSeeing me examine the gift in the hope of finding a woody stem, he goes back \ninto the garden for a stouter spray, and breaks off a piece of lavender as well. \n\n"Both will grow, if planted," the interpreter says for him to me. \n\n" Would he give me earth in which to plant them?" \n\nHe not only will, but hastens to transfer a generous double-handful to a stout \nenvelope David produces from his inexhaustible pockets, and furthermore insists \nupon my acceptance of marigold and princess-feather seeds, pulled from dry stalks \nbeside him. \n\nDavid smiles, gravely indulgent to the simply uttered admonition accompany- \ning the humble marigold. \n\n" He warns you, madame, that the flower requires sun and a warm soil. He \nthinks you are from a far-off and a cold country, like Russia, from which hundreds \nof pilgrims come yearly to Gethsemane." \n\nIt falls upon our exalted mood like the touch of a warning hand that we will \nnever return from our \' \' far-off\' \' home upon a second pilgrimage to the Garden of the \nAgony and Bloody Sweat. We have repeatedly remarked to one another that full \nappreciation and right feeling do not come to us until we review the moment or \nhour in thought\xe2\x80\x94 that warmth and thrill then are like the afterglow of the \ndeparted sun. We shall always be glad that the Figure, never distant from our \nspiritual apprehension in our daily walks and rides about Jerusalem, has never \nbeen nearer than in the solemn shadows now gathering under the trees of the \ngarden into which He entered that night with His disciples, "As He was wont." \nThe breath of His presence, the calm, and the blessing of it may well abide \nhere now and forevermore. \n\nWe ride a little way back up the Mount called Olivet, to possess ourselves of \na glimpse we had awhile ago, over and between the rounded crowns of the olives, \nof a hill- top rising dimly through the gauzy haze, " beyond the city wall." \n\n" By thine Agony and Bloody Sweat, by thy Cross and Passion, good Lord, \ndeliver us ! " \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXII. \n\nBETHANY. \n\nH N excellent road connects Jerusalem with Bethany. The city boasts \nof but one handsome carriage ("the Landau," belonging to the \nGrand Hotel) , yet comfortable conveyances may be hired without the \nJaffa Gate. That into which David packs our rugs, the camera, and \nlastly the women of the little party, is commodious, if shabby. \n"As you will observe, madam, it has been washed this morning," says the \nhonest dragoman, withdrawing a space to contemplate complacently the effect of \n\n\n\n\n" If HAS BEEN WASHED THIS MORNING." \n\nthe unwonted process. " As I have said to the driver, a muddy carriage does not \ngo well with a day like this. \' \' \n\nWe have alighted to look back at the city, and to remark again upon the \n\n(206) \n\n\n\n208 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\ngrowth of the settlement without the walls, for the most part hospitals, convents \nand the private residences of consuls and well-to-do citizens. The day is glorious ; \nrespiration is a luxury. The stony hill-sides can never look cheerful except in \nthe brief blossom season ; but under the cloudless blue arch of this sky, they are \nresigned in expression and almost benignant. \n\nMy companions within the lately-washen vehicle are a newly arrived fellow- \ncountry -woman, bright of face and of nature, and the native Syrian matron who \nacts as my intelligent interpreter in the jealously- guarded homes where the foot \nof a strange man may not tread. We have crossed the waterless bed of Kidron ; \nrun the gauntlet of the leprous beggars, mustering in force on the south side of \nthe wall of Gethsemane, holding our breaths in passing, the odor of the collective \nbodies being overpowering when so large a delegation is abroad ; have traced with \nserious eyes the "Path of the Captivity \' \' winding around the shoulder of the \nlieight upon which the city is built, said by tradition to be the way along which \nOur Lord was led after his betrayal. \n\nWe have flanked Olivet and come into sight of the open country. The road \nis lively with foot-passengers, generally market-women with great baskets or bun- \ndles of green stuff upon their heads\xe2\x80\x94 oftener bundles than baskets. It is surpris- \ning what variety of commodities can be contained in a fold of the Syrian woman\'s \nblue cotton robe, or be enveloped in the dingy cloth knotted about her cargo. \nBeets, turnips, cauliflower, carrots, eggs, oranges, potatoes, cheeses\xe2\x80\x94 chiefest of \nall, cabbages\xe2\x80\x94 are thus carried with ease and in safety. Donkeys pace by, under \nloads of faggots and greens, and dark-visaged men seated stolidly upon the beasts\' \nrumps, and we meet a string of camels, coming up from Jericho, loaded with \noranges and citrons, and hugging one side of the white road. Upon the hill-top \nto the right we see a building which we are told is the reputed house of Simon the \nLeper. \n\n* 1 Then we must be nearing Bethany ? \' \' \n"We are in Bethany ! " \n\nThe carriage has come to a full stop again, and we get out in blank bewilder- \nment. Upon one hand the ground slopes away into stony fields ; upon the other, \nhalf ruined huts of stone, perhaps twenty in number, straggle up a rudely-ter- \nraced hill. The invariable group of children, a couple of beggars, and divers \nwomen, appear in doors and from behind walls to stare at us. The terraces and \nhouses have an intermittent backing of the saddest-looking olives we have yet be- \nheld in this saddened land. \n\n" Bethany ! " w T e reiterate in wonder and disbelief " Where is the town ? " \n\nThis is all of it, and the two women who are bribed with a few " metalliks" \n(pennies) to stand out upon the platform of their house to be photographed are \nrepresentative matrons. They have no scruples about letting us see their faces, \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n209 \n\n\n\netiquette in this respect being less stringent among the peasants thar m the town \nand with the higher classes of society. Whatever other objects and occasions of \ncarefulness and trouble these housewives may have, the business of keeping \nthemselves and their children clean is not ranked as an essential to peace of mind \nor comfort. Their own gowns \nare ragged and dirty ; their hands \nhorny and filthy, albeit the nails, \nlike those of the little girl who \nlugs an inconceivably dirty baby \nupon her hip, are dyed with \nhenna. The children are, as the \nuninitiated new arrival at my \nelbow shudderingly whispers, \n" horrors ! " sore-eyed, barefoot- \ned and unclean. One, sour of \nvisage, a kafeyeh, stiff with \ndirt, bound above matted locks, \nhugs a mangy dog, whose eyes \nare as sore as his master\'s. \n\nWe are on our way up a \nnarrow, steep alley, abominable \nfor pollutions, but the only means \nof approach to \' \' the best house \nin Bethany, \' \' when a boy bounds \ninto the track, and stops to in- \nspect us. By some accident, his \nface is clean, and the soiled \nsheepskin jacket beneath his \nabieh does not disguise a certain \ncareless grace of bearing. His \neyes are bright and healthy, his \ncheeks glow rosily. \n\n" \' Ruddy, and withal of a \nbeautiful countenance, and goodly to look at ! \nDavid ! and let me have your picture. \' \' \n\nThe model frowns slightly, the sun striking full in his eyes, but the erect \ncarriage of figure and head that gives something kingly to the boyish figure is \npreserved. \n\n\' 1 Such a fellow must be regarded as a freak in Bethany, \' \' comments his ad- \nmirer, clicking the film into position. \n\nT4 \n\n\n\n\nYOUNG DAVID. : \n\n\n\nquotes Alcides 1 \' Stand, young \n\n\n\n2IO \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nThe best house in Bethany is at hand. The stone platform, or terrace, on \nwhich it perches sets the front and only door ten feet above the level of the near- \nest neighbor\'s. A ladder, fitted with rungs, not steps, must be mounted if we \nwould accept the invitation extended in smile and beck by the mistress of the \neyrie One by one, we three women adventure the climb, and stand beside our \nhostess on a ledge, maybe fifteen feet in width. It looks down into the court of \nthe - House of Lazarus," a blackened building that must now be used as a mill \nor granary, for through sashless windows protrude sheaves of grain and bundles \n\n^ St In W the reeking court-yard where the sun seldom falls, two sparrows twitter \nhappily over some kernels that have dropped from above. Another pair, as busy \nand cheery, sport upon the broken stones of the time-stained wall, pecking their \nnoon meal out of the chinks and crannies. r i u \' \n\n\xc2\xbb \'Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing,\' " one of us breathes softly before \nleaving the little preachers and the cheerful light of day behind. \n\nThe door opens into a vaulted chamber that cannot be over twelve feet square. \nThere is no window, but six queer niches in the sides of the room are utilized as \ncupboards The walls are whitewashed, and above the niches are gaudily-colored \ndesigns of palms, flowers, fruits, and odd green hands, with outspread fingers \npointing upward. \n\n* \' To keep off the Evil Eye, \' \' explains my interpreter, avoiding looking at the \nmystic signs while she speaks. . . \n\nTo direct attention to them by any manifestation of curiosity on our part \n\nwould excite suspicious alarm. \n\nQuilts and matting are dragged from a pile at the back of the room to supply \nus with seats. A man, his wife, and five daughters of assorted ages, have their \nonly home here, sleeping, eating, sitting and living here the year around. Cook- \ning is done over an earthenware brazier, exhibited to us pridefully by the house- \nwife The bread, she tells us, is kneaded into flat rounds which are laid upon hot \npebbles in the brazier, patted down, and covered with a fire of dried camel\'s ma- \nnure A heap of this fuel fills one cupboard ! Flour for each day\'s provision is \nground in the morning. A laughing-eyed girl of thirteen, persuaded by the gra- \ncious arts of our interpreter, sits down upon the floor, takes the mill-a stone, laid \nin a socket and worked back and forth by an upright pin, or handle of wood\xe2\x80\x94 be- \ntween her feet, pours in grain and begins the work. \n\n-But it is nothing without the song," interrupts the interpreter. Sing, \nwill you not ? These ladies have never heard the Syrian grinding-song. \n\nThe fair performer requires as much coaxing as the musical prodigy of an \nAmerican provincial circle, but demur and diffidence finally overcome by the win- \nsome interpreter, she chants in a fresh, tuneful voice, to the accompaniment of \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. 211 \n\nthe mill. The effect is marvelously melodious, the hum of the stone in its groove \nkeeping perfect time with the song. Our Syrian matron translates what I seize a \nmoment to jot down in my note-book, and subsequently pass over to Alcides the \nRhymer. I wish it were possible to give with it the beat and whirr that, as I \nread the faithful translation which retains the very measure of the rude ballad, \nseems to underrun the voice in my ears : \n\nSoldiers ! soldiers ! far over the sea ! \nAs we grind the yellow grain, may the Prophet hear our plea ! \nMay he spread his mighty arms in protection round your host, \nAnd hide you in their shelter safe when perils threaten most. \nMay he guard his faithful followers wherever they may be ! \n\nSoldiers ! soldiers ! far over the sea ! \n\nThe cupboards, unscreened by curtain or door, hold, besides the cakes of fuel, \nearthenware jars and bowls, the inevitable apparatus for coffee-making, and a big \nmetal pan covered with a mat of plaited straw. The day\'s baking is in this basin, \nand since we cannot wait for coffee, we must eat, each of us, a morsel of the \ntough, warm cake. It is curiously stamped by the hot pebbles, and dark-gray in \ncolor. \' Yet we accept it with smiling gratitude, and feign to swallow it, retiring \nin fair order toward the door, while our interpreter voices our thanks for hospi- \ntality received. \n\nJamal and Alcides in the lower court are the cynosure of an admiring group. \nThe Bethany women are notable of their kind, carrying on (for Palestine) a \nthriving trade with Jerusalem in butter milk, eggs, cheese and butter. One of \nthe most prosperous listens with downcast eyes to David\'s talk of crops and \nweather, cunningly drawn out while Alcides retires to a ledge far enough away to \nfocus the modern Martha of Bethany. Every line of her coarse features ex- \npresses the cumbering cares of much serving in home and market. Her baby \nsleeps in a stout bag suspended between her shoulders by a cord passed across her \nforehead ; on her head is the flat basket that went with her and the baby to town \n(a Sabbath day\'s journey), filled with butter, cheese and eggs, and holds now \nsundry parcels of groceries and other household necessaries. The baby-bag is a \ncurious thing, made of dyed goat\'s hair cords, ingeniously netted and trimmed \nwith long fringes. \n\n1 \'Will she sell it?" I ask. \n\n" She will sell anything ! \' \' tersely, and the bargain begins. \n\nOther and shrewder lines cross Martha\'s visage. She is in her element. \n\nWithdrawn a few paces from the battlefield, we are kept by the laughing in- \nterpreter in touch with the principal actors. Martha draws the first blood by a \nfirm demand for sixteen shillings, English money (four dollars) . \n\n"Is the woman mad!" David raises appealing eyes and hands to the \n\n\n\n212 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\npresumably sane spectators. "We don\'t want to buy the baby, too! Only \nthe bag ! \' \' \n\nMartha does not join in the merriment excited by the wilful misinterpreta- \ntion Buying and selling are not matters for jest. She chaffers valiantly, but \nthe end of the ten-minute duel is the purchase of the gayly-colored netting at \nhalf the sum she asked at first. My Syrian \nfriend interferes when I order the coachman to \nput the bag with other belongings of ours in \nfront of the carriage. \n\n\' \' It will go first to my house, if you \nplease," she says, significantly. "I have a \ngarden where it can be sunned, and fumigated \nwith burning sulphur, and so be made quite \nsafe to be packed with clean things. You \nshall have it in a few days. \' \' \n\nA warm discussion arises on the way \nhome. Alcides has been thinking. \n\n"We see how little social and domestic \ncustoms have changed in this part of the \nworld since Bible times "\xe2\x80\x94is the summing up \nof these meditations. \n\n" The Bedouin of 1894 A. D. is the Bed- \nouin of 1894 B. C. That was in Abraham\'s \nday \xe2\x80\x94 wasn\'t it, David?" \n\n\' \' Between the eighteenth and twenty-sec- \nond chapters of Genesis, Captain." \n\n" Dress, modes of speech, tricks of trade, \nmarrying and giving in marriage \xe2\x80\x94 all these \nthings are so much the same now as then, \nthat I believe the original Martha of Bethany \nlived and looked very much as her sister of the \nnineteenth century lives and acts and looks \nnow. The whole family probably lived in one \nten-by-ten room, and sat on the floor to eat \nand talk, and lay upon dirty mats to sleep, and crouched, on rainy days, over a \nbrazier in a windowless chamber, and were upon as bad terms with soap, water \nand towels, and combs, as at present." \n\nIt is a bomb that bursts disastrously. The sketch is repulsive, unnatural\xe2\x80\x94 \nwe declaim\xe2\x80\x94 if not actually blasphemous. We remind the transgressor that the \nbleak hills about us blossomed as the rose in the days of Israel\'s glory ; that \n\n\n\n\nLISTENS WITH DOWNCAST EYES." \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nHerod the Magnificent was on the throne and abundant in public works when the \nNazarene Teacher withdrew to Bethany at eventide after the day\'s disputation in \nthe Temple, or many hours of healing and talking in market-place and by the \nwaysides. At last the gentle voice of the sweet-faced American traveler is heard. \nShe speaks modestly \xe2\x80\x94 but confidently. \n\n\' \' I cannot think that our Martha was like that ! Or that her house and \n\n\n\n\nclothes\xe2\x80\x94 and children, if she had any\xe2\x80\x94 were dirty. For you know\xe2\x80\x94\' Jesus loved \nMartha, and her sister, and Lazarus ! \' And Bethany was His chosen resting- \nplace. Martha\'s home may have been humble. It must have been neat and \npeaceful." \n\nA sudden and a lasting calm ensues that has not been broken when we quit \nthe carriage to walk a little way up the side of Olivet to the old Bethany road, \nand gaze down upon Jerusalem as our Lord beheld it four days before the shout \nof " Hosanna " was exchanged for the howl of " Crucify Him ! " \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIII. \n\n\n\nON THE HOUSE-TOP. \n\nOHB roof is gained by means of a succession of narrow stone stairways \nbuilt upon the outside of the house. At the head of the last flight the \nhost meets us, having heard our voices. \nA handsome, well-made man, in European costume except for the \nred tarboosh that proclaims him a Turkish subject, he smiles genially at our \napproach. \n\n" You are welcome," he assures us in excellent English. "Iam sorry my \nwife is not at home, but she will return soon. Will you walk in ?\' \' \n\' \' Presently, \' \' we reply. \n\nFor a moment we must get our breath and look about us at the odd, charming \nplace to which we have climbed, and fill our lungs with the delicious air, the \nsweetest we have tasted in Jerusalem. It pours in upon the enclosed house-top \nthrough geometrical patterns of short tiles set horizontally in mortar upon a stone \nwall six feet high. In the middle of the area, blocks of stone are built into a \nsquare platform with sloping sides, and this is surmounted by a box filled with \nearth Flowers grow luxuriantly on all sides; pots of flowering plants and vines \nstand against the sunniest side of the little courtyard and crowd a graded wooden \nframe up to the top of the wall. It is the bonniest nook our eyes have lighted \nupon since we left Beirut gardens, and we say it in frank admiration. Gratified by \nour appreciation of the advantages of his dwelling-place, the host enlarges further \n\nupon these. ^ . \n\n<< We are raised so high above the level of the city that we get no dust, no \nfog no bad smells, no noise. And the view-ah ! that you shall see when \nwe go into the room. Here it is only to be had in bits, by peeping through these \nholes You see this is one of the oldest houses in Jerusalem-very old and solid. \nThe walls are thick, as you have noticed. It must be hundreds-yes, hundreds \nof years old. At that time the Moslems had entire possession of the city, and built \ntheir houses to please themselves. Their wives must have air and sunshine, and \nheing women-and human beings "-smilingly- " they would not be contented \nwithout seeing something of the world. So they made these walls high that \nthey could not look over, and that nobody could look in at them, and exchange \nsignals, you know, but with peep-holes out of which the women could see what \nwas going on outside. \n\n(214) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n215 \n\n\n\n\' \' What does your wife say to this sort of prison ?" \n\n" She does not mind. It makes the place more private; in fact gives us a \npleasant sitting-room when the sun is not too hot. And on moonhgh t _ evemngs \nwhen the weather is mild and the flowers in bloom, a man cannot wish for a mcer \nplace for smoking his cigarette with his wife by his side and maybe, fnends \n\ndropping in to help us enjoy it." , v , fw\xc2\xab \n\n< \' You do not hide your wife away then behind curtains and lattices after the \n\nfashion of some of your countrymen ?" _ \n\n"I trust my wife!" drawing himself up unconsciously, yet with a good- \n\n\n\n\n\n"an odd, charming place." \n\nhumored laugh. " We of the Greek Church have generally more liberal views on \nsome subjects than Moslems. Ah?" ^ \n\nWe have heard nothing except the soft rush of the breeze through the peep- \nholes " and the light rustle of the vine-leaves against the wall, but he turns \nexpectantly toward the staircase. \n\nSomething white rises into sight in the doorway giving upon the flight, and \na little woman enveloped from head to foot in an izzar, trips forward upon the \n\n\n\n2l6 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nstone floor, pauses abruptly at perceiving us, and raising the blue mendeel from \nher face, stands hesitatingly, holding nervously to the edges of the white mantle \nwhich is usually cast off the instant the wearer finds herself within doors. \n\n"My wife, madame ! my wife, sir !" utters the proud husband. She kisses \nmy hand, lays hers timidly into that extended by the masculine visitor, and looks \n\nin mute appeal to her mentor. \n\n\' \' She understands English when it \nis spoken to her, but she will not try to \nspeak it herself," he says, indulgently. \n"She would say that she does not \ncomprehend it, but I know better, and \nI am sure, too, that she could speak \nit if she were not afraid to attempt it. \nShe is what you call diffident." \n\nAt a word in Arabic, the little \nwoman motions us to enter her dwell- \ning, stands aside until her husband \nhas passed in after us, slips off a pair \nof low shoes, with coquettish rosettes \nupon the instep, at the threshold, and \nfollows us in her stocking-feet. They \nare pretty feet, we notice, and clad in \nscarlet stockings, and she looks very \nsmall for the loss of her slipper-heels. \n\n" Let us make a little chamber, I \npray thee, on the wall, and let us set \nfor him there a bed, and a table, and a \nstool and a candlestick; and it shall \nbe, when he cometh to us, that he \nshall turn in thither. \' \' \n\nWe comprehend it all with one \nglance around the "little chamber.\' \' \nHow the prophet might gain the retreat thus prepared for him without entering \nany other part of the house, and without speaking to any of the family. How \nwelcome, too, was the absolute quiet of the seclusion thus offered the foot-weary, \nnerve-tired man of God. \n\nThe room is of fair dimensions and massive in construction, with a groined \nroof. The windows are deeply embrasured, and from one end projects an alcoved \ncasement, raised two feet or more from the floor, and cushioned with red chintz, \nas is the conventional divan running around two sides of the apartment. Before \n\n\n\n\nTHE HOST MEETS US. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n217 \n\n\n\nwe sit down we are invited to look at the view, and for this purpose we are told to \nstep, although we protest, into the cushioned alcove. It hangs upon the outer \nwall, as we now perceive, and overlooks, beyond the nearer jumble of tiled roofs \nand chimneys, the Mosque of Omar, about which we can trace from this altitude \nthe boundaries of the Temple Area. A sudden dip outside the city walls means \nthe Valley of Jehosha- \nphat, and then arises the \nMount that is called \nOlivet, with the church \nand campanile upon its \nlevel brow. Scopus joins \nit on our left. If the \nJew householder of A. D. \n70 built as high as his \nMoslem successor, what \nan observatory would this \nhave been from which to \nmark the manoeuvres of \nthe investing Romans ! \nThe free air sweeps \ngladly by us, the tran- \nquil blue of the Syrian \nsky, falls, an unruffled \ncanopy, behind farther \nand bare hills. Titus \nleveled all the trees \nabout the city, and Pales- \ntine has never stood \nfirmly enough and long \nenough upon her feet \nsince to clothe her deso- \nlate places with forests. \n\nThe floor of the house-top chamber is covered with Damascus rugs, and \nbesides the divan, there are several light chairs; cupboards are numerous, and \nhidden by curtains. One is exposed because it is filled with books. There are \nlittle stands here and there, and bits of bric-a-brac, for the master of the quaint \nabode is a popular dragoman and has traveled much. The wife, black-eyed and \n"sonsie," wears a blue cloth bodice and skirt, a gold chain and an embroidered \nmendeel, and a bouquet of living flowers is pinned to the bodice. She is as \nneat and bright as her home, and steps noiselessly about making ready for our \n\n\n\n\nONE CANNOT WISH FOR A NICER PEACE. \n\n\n\n2l8 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nentertainment. A stand, bearing small glass dishes of quince conserves and a \nbasket filled with candies and nuts, is set before us, and upon another * \narranged a tea-equipage. We have been given the choice between tea and coffee, \nand have gratefully chosen the former. The little matron opens a bhnd door m \nthe wall, disclosing spirit-lamp and kettle, and falls to work to make the beverage \nmy soul loveth, deftly and swiftly. \n\nWe have sipped it satisfiedly and tasted the conserves, and munched a \nbon-bon, and the hostess is outside in the elevated courtyard, talking with a \nneighbor who has called on a matter of housewifely business, when we draw from \nher husband the idyl of the house-top. It comes about through our comment \nupon the circumstances that the izzar -a cumbrous and not becoming garment \nbeing as I think I have already said, merely a square sheet draped and tucked and \nbanded about the figure-is worn by women of all nationalities and religions m \nmost cities of Northern and Southern Syria. It is a Moslem custom, we opme, and \nmarvel at the adoption of it by Christians. \n\n" It happened in this way, you see," is the next step to the story we have set \nour hearts upon getting. \' \' Many, many years ago, as I told you, the Christians \n-Greeks and Roman Catholics alike\xe2\x80\x94 were accounted as nothing by their masters. \nI have heard my father say that in his boyhood it was not uncommon for a \nTurkish soldier, in passing a native Christian, to kick off his own slipper into the \nmiddle of the street, and say, \'You infidel dog ! go get my slipper and put it on \nmy foot The Christians did not care to muffle up their women and hide their \nfaces but they were forced to do as the Moslem women did, to save their wives and \ndaughters from insult when they went into the streets. So they fell into Moslem \nfashions in this and other things, and even now must wear the izzar and the \n\nmendeel in public." ..... . \n\nThe little wife still chats with the neighbor, the Syrian sunshine bringing out \nthe gleam of every link of the gold chain, and blazing back from the broad golden \nbands upon her wrists. She looks so prosperous and happy that the question \nfollows naturally upon our glance at the fair picture: \n\n" How long have you been married ?\' \' \n\n" Nine years." \n\n" Is it possible !" for the wife does not look to be twenty. She must have \nbeen a mere child at the time ?\' \' \n\n"She was sixteen. But "\xe2\x80\x94a half-embarrassed laugh " I made up my \nmind that she should be my wife the first moment I set eyes on her-a girl of \nthirteen, and just home from school." \n\nThis is promising\xe2\x80\x94 and refreshing in a country where marriage is a synonym \n\nfor barter and sale. \n\n" Ah ! love at first sight ?" \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n219 \n\n\n\nHe looks doubtful. \n\n" As to that, madame, we do not think so much of love here as you do m \nyour country. It is more a matter of business." \n\nTo prove the assertion he narrates how, having arrived late at night at his \nsister\'s house after a protracted tour with a party of English people, he had slept late, \nand awaking at noon, \nespied through the \nwindow a young girl \npassing back and forth \nto a well in the court- \nyard. How, after \nwatching her for an \nhour or so, he had \narisen, and breakfast- \ned, and while at break- \nfast, asked his sister the \nname of the stranger. \n\n1 \' This was one \no\' clock in the day . By \nsix that evening my \nsister had made appli- \ncation to the girl\'s par- \nents for their daughter \nin my name." \n\nThe father insis- \nted upon a truce of \nthree months, and the \nlover waited, volun- \ntarily, six, before re- \nnewing his suit. \n\n\' \' I told him that \nmy mind had not \nchanged; that it \nwould never change, \nbut that if he said \'Wait six years,\' instead of six months, six years it should \nbe. I was given leave to visit at the house twice a week, and talk with her father \nand mother. \' \' \n\n"Not with her?" \n\n" Oh, for that matter, customs have altered with us since the times when a \nwoman was not allowed to look at her betrothed until she was his wife. When I \n\n\n\n\n"THE WTTXE WIFE STIEE CHATS WITH THE NEIGHBOR. : \n\n\n\n(220) ROBINSON\'S ARCH, JERUSALEM. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n221 \n\n\n\nwent in she did not run out of the room, as was the rule in her mother\'s young \ndays. I would say < Good evening,\' and she answered < Good evening,\' when I \nwent in and \' Good night \' when I went away. And now and then I pretended to \nbe thirsty that I might ask her to get me a glass of water,"\xe2\x80\x94 a little shame-faced \nat the confession. " Further than this we never spoke together. It was three \nyears after I first saw her before we were married. No ! I had never seen her \nalone for one minute. I respected her too much to get her talked about. As it \nwas many thought our behavior very strange\xe2\x80\x94 quite a new fashion. They said it \nhappened through my knowing so many Europeans. The wedding, too, caused \ngreat talk. Up to that time everybody was married at night, and it was the \ncustom with us Greeks for the bride to stand just inside the door to receive the \n.guests and to hold out her hand for whatever money, or other present had been \nbrought to her. I said: \n\n-My wife shall not play the beggar, and we will be married at noon and \ninvite whoever will to come in the afternoon and wish us well, and have some \nrefreshment, and then go quietly away. There will be no drinking and feasting \nand singing and dancing all night and all day, such as is the custom with others, \nfor maybe two or three days together. And so it was. And many have followed \nour example. The Patriarch of Jerusalem has expressed himself as greatly in \nfavor of the new order of things. " \n\n" You served for her three years and six months,\xe2\x80\x94 half as long as Jacob for \nRachel/\' I remark, a little mischievously, as the wife, again leaving her sandals at \nthe door, comes in to stand behind her husband\'s chair, laying her hand upon his \n-shoulder. \n\n" Yet you do not think so much of her as we do, you would have us believe ! \nAnd you told us just now, that it would be accounted shameful for a woman to \nallow herself to love a man before she is married. I call yours a love match out- \n.and-out, on your part, and, I more than half suspect, on your wife\'s also. Don\'tyou \nbelieve she had learned to love you a little in all those years of patient waiting?" \n\nHis hand steals up to that resting on his shoulder; leaning back to look in her \nface, he repeats the query in English\xe2\x80\x94 not Arabic\xe2\x80\x94 adding, merrily\xe2\x80\x94" I believe \nit myself !" \n\nThe dark, piquant face glows red as a Georgian peach; the plump hand falls \nsmartly upon his cheek; the black eyes are full of confusion and laughter: \n" No ! no !" she cries, unguardedly. " Never ! never ! not one bit !" \nThe hero of the idyl of the house-top flashes a triumphant glance at us: \n" Didn\'t I tell you she understands English, and could speak it if she would ?" \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIV. \n\n\n\n" THE WAILING PLACE." \n\nHK deep descent down which we pick our way to the section \nof the ancient wall of the Temple known the world over \nas "The Wailing Place," is nothing more or less than an \naccumulation of rubbish hundreds of years old. Ancient \nJerusalem lies from fifty to seventy feet below the modern \ntown. \n\nWe turn aside from the more direct route to the sacred \nspot for a look at " Robinson\'s Arch." The celebrated \nfragment springs boldly from the wall which enclosed the area of the Temple. \nThe bridge of which it was an abutment once spanned the valley between the \nHouse of God and Mount Zion. The polished stone pavement below is over- \nwhelmed by nearly fifty feet of earth and stones. This bridge, in the opinion of \nable commentators, was but one of several arches connecting the two hills, proba- \nbly the " ascent by which Solomon went up into the house of the Lord." \n\nWhen the eager spirits that direct and execute the work of the Palestine \nExploration Society so far prevail with the jealous Government now in despotic \npossession of the storied precincts as to be allowed to lay bare the bosom of the \nCity of the Great King, what marvels will be brought to light ! \n\nIn discussing the subject for the twentieth time in three days, we almost \nfancy that the conscious superincumbent soil thrills and heaves beneath us with a \nsense of the importance of buried secrets. We recount wistfully the timbers and \nboards of cedar of a day when silver was in Jerusalem as stones, and cedars as \nsycamore trees for abundance; the cherubim carved out of olive wood and overlaid \nwith gold: the wrought cornices and wainscoats of cherubim and palm-trees and \nopen flowers; the doors decorated in like manner and overlaid with fine gold beaten \ninto the underlying tracery; the three rows of hewed stone; the brass work of \nflowers, of lilies, lions, oxen, cherubim and palm-trees, knops and pomegranates, \nthe marble and ivory, the ceilings of cedar, and walls of vermilion. Nebuchad- \nnezzar and his imitators in unholy demolition and robbery must have overlooked \nmuch in sacking Temple and palaces; the flames and Roman conquerors spared, \nbecause they could not destroy the wonderful stones of Herod\'s building. \n\nDay and scene are in unison with this train of thought. The alleys we have \ntraversed since leaving David Street, twist in and about the Jewish quarter. The \nlast twist brings the Wailing Place into view. \n\n(222) \n\n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. 225 \n\nA blind wall lifts high above our heads the great stones we have learned to \n/ecognize as belonging to Phoenician an d Jewish architecture-some twenty, some \n\n\n\n\n"THE WAITING PLACH." \n\nthirty feet long. They were built so " compact together " that but a few crevices \ngive foothold to hyssop and other clinging plants; they are darkened by rain and \n\n\n\n224 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\ndrip with moisture which we fancy is unclean. Close against the base of the wall \nis ranged a row of figures \xe2\x80\x94 men, women and even children. Women, for the most \npart past middle age, wear bedrabbled skirts, and faded shawls drawn cowl-like \nover their heads. Nearly all hold tattered copies of the Hebrew Psalms and the \nbabble of intoned reading is broken to the attentive ear by sobs. \n\nWe know what they are saying, and, withdrawn a decent space from the \nthrong, open the " International Teachers\' Edition" of our " Palestine Baedeker/\' \nand follow the service silently. \n\nO God ! the heathen hath come into Thine inheritance : \nThy holy Temple have they defiled : \nThey have laid Jerusalem on heaps. \n\n* * * # * * \n\nWe are become a scorn to our neighbors ; \nA scorn and derision to them that are around about us. \n\nHow long, Lord, wilt Thou be angry forever ? \n\nShall Thy jealousy burn like fire? \nPour out Thy wrath upon the heathen that have not known Thee, \nAnd upon the kingdoms that have not called upon Thy name : \n\nFor they have devoured Jacob, \n\nAnd laid waste his dwelling-place. \nOh, remember not against us former iniquities ; \n\nLet Thy tender mercies speedily prevent us ; \n\nFor we are brought very low ! \n\n" Very low !" we interrupt ourselves to comment. \n\nAmong the dwellers in fallen Jerusalem, they are the most degraded, and to \nhuman eye, the most hopeless. The Psalm they chant might have been penned \nyesterday, so graphic is the portrayal of their present estate. For eighteen centu- \nries the cry now upon their lips has been sobbed to heaven. Well may they \niterate: \n\nWilt Thou be angry forever ? \n\nAs our ears accustom themselves to the intoned clamor, we discover that three \nor four men stationed beyond one whose long robe and furred cap proclaim his \npriestly office, are conducting with him a responsive service quite irrespective of \nthe readings going on about them. A learned friend in our little party translates \nthe litany made familiar to him by many hearings: \n\nFor our temple that is destroyed, \xe2\x80\x94 \n\nchants the leader. The response follows: - \n\n\n\nHere sit we down lonely and weep. \n\n\n\n226 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nThen, \n\nFor our walls which are torn down, \n(Here sit we down lonely and weep !) \nFor the glory that has vanished, \n(Here sit we down lonely and weep !) \nFor the goodly stones that are dust, \n(Here sit we down lonely and weep !) \n\nA roughly laid stone wall closes the area at one end; a door set in it is \nslightly ajar, and withdrawing still further from the mourning crowd, we push it \nback and step into a sort of courtyard where are several trees. Beneath a branchy \nolive a woman sits flat upon the damp earth, her forehead laid against the trunk \n\nof the tree. A soiled and ragged book is \nupon her knees; her hands are clasped \nbelow her chin, and tears roll slowly down \nher withered cheeks upon the worn pages. \nHer lips move soundlessly in prayer, or peni- \ntential Psalm. She does not notice our \nintrusion, but a young girl standing behind \nher and looking up through tears at the wall, \nstarts nervously aside, turning her face away \nin timidity or distress. A baby is in her \narms; both are wretchedly clad and look \nhalf-starved. The guide knows her by sight. \n\n\' \' She is but thirteen years old," he tells \nus, as aware that we are trespassers, we with- \ndraw, pulling the gate shut after us. \' \' That \nis her grandmother, and, young as she is, \nthe child is hers. Her husband left her be- \nfore the baby was born. They are very \npoor and almost friendless." \n"Are they Jews?" \n\n" Of course; but not natives of Jerusalem. Erom Poland, I think." \n\nNothing in the strange scenes of the hour will linger more distinctly in our \nminds than^this little episode. Compared with the unfeigned grief of the aged \nexile bemoaning her nation\'s fate in the one retired spot from which she could \ngaze upon the sacred stones, the loud lamentings of the line ranged against the \nwall, seem artificial and ostentatious. \n\n"A periodical parade of mawkish sentimentality !" say strident accents at our \nelbow. " At the best, the whole business is the outcome of custom and supersti- \ntion and unworthy of respect. Is it reasonable?\xe2\x80\x94! go further\xe2\x80\x94 is it possible ?\xe2\x80\x94 \n\n\n\n\nIN THK JEWISH QUART KR. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n227 \n\n\n\nto believe that these people come here every Friday ready to shed tears of genuine \ndistress over a story almost two thousand years old ? It is all done for effect- \npumped up to order. If nobody ever came to look at the show, and travelers \nnever wrote up \' The Wailing Place,\' the exhibition would go out of fashion inside \nof five years." \n\nDr. L. Zwinglius Sharpe is, of course, the speaker. He is robed in a mackin- \ntosh which owes something of its exceeding glossiness to the Scotch mist thicken- \ning in the valley. His wife\'s gray cloak and hat have a conventual touch; her \nplacid face might be that of a Dutch Madonna. \n\n\' \' We have seen nothing finer, more elevating than this, my love, \' \' she sighs \nblissfully. " Everything harmonizes so consistently! The hoary old walls, the \nbright colors of the women\'s shawls toned down by the wet \xe2\x80\x94 the solemn sound of \nthe chanting \xe2\x80\x94 and oh, Doctor dear ! will you look at the delicious dull olive of \nthose old velveteen coats ? And that woman, over there sitting on the stones \xe2\x80\x94 \nthe one in white, who is looking this way \xe2\x80\x94 doesn\'t she remind you of \' By the \nrivers of Babylon we sat down ?\' " \n\nFrom the rising ground about a stone\'* cast from the " Wailing Place," we \nglance back. The crowd is thinning, and we cannot avoid seeing that some of \nthose who mourned most volubly are most brisk or indifferent by the time they \nreach us. There is no difference in the aspect of those who were but now appar- \nently plunged into the depths of hopeless sorrow and others of the race who are \nbuying and selling at the stalls in the Jewish quarter. \n\n"Is Dr. Sharpe right for once ?" \n\nWhile we say it, the grandmother and the child- wife we surprised at their \ndevotions, come slowly up the narrow way. The baby has fallen asleep upon the \nmother\'s shoulder. The load is heavy for the little creature, and stopping to get \nher breath half way up the hill, she turns for a last look at the grim wall below. \nTears well afresh into her eyes, and again she averts her face, as if ashamed of" \nthe weakness. The old woman has drawn her dingy shawl over her book; trudging \nweakly onward, she keeps her regards fixed upon the ground; the sadness of a. \nlong-frustrated desire is in the drooping lines of the wrinkled face. She is not \nartistically \' \' harmonious, \' \' but we believe her to be the type of a class. Her \nfigure and visage come between us and the page upon which we read, when we \nshed our damp wraps and sit down before a glowing fire in our hotel quarters: \n\nThe Lord was as our enemy : \n\nHe hath swallowed up Israel : \n\nHe hath swallowed up all her palaces : \n\nHe hath destroyed his stronghold. \n\nAnd hath increased in the daughter of Judah mourning and lamentation. \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXV. \n\n\n\nA ROUND OF VISITS. \n\nAVING stipulated that our visits on this afternoon shall be confined to \nrespectable people whose worldly circumstances are moderately good, \nI demur when Mrs. Jamal, holding up the hem of her clean white \nizzar, leaves a narrow dirty street for a cross-alley, narrower and \ndirtier yet. \n\nWhen I say that a Syrian street is dirty, I seek to convey a depth of meaning \nhard to be received into the imagination of the dweller in Western cities. This \nparticular alley is positively noisome. Refuse of the most objectionable descrip- \ntion rots and reeks in corners and close to the walls. The least unsafe footing is \nin the middle of the street. The houses stand close together, are from two to \nthree stories high, of stone, and badly lighted. Most of them have but a single \nwindow in each room; some have none, the door admitting all the light and air \nthat find their way to the murky interior. \n\nAll the children who can walk alone are in the street. In commenting upon \nthe circumstance, I check the censure upon my lips. Ailie Dinmont retorted, \n-when her husband complained to a visitor that she " would aye give the bairmes \ntheir ain way," "It\'s little else I have to give them\xe2\x80\x94 puir things !" And the \nuncombed, unwashed, black-eyed elves, strolling and scampering in what is no \nbetter than a filthy gutter, would seem to have preciously little except their own \n-wild will to make life endurable. \n\nSix or eight troop at our heels as we mount to the third story of a building \nno better and no worse than its neighbors. \n\n" I will take you first to see the people who own the house\xe2\x80\x94 people who are \nwell-off, almost rich, for this part of the world," my conductress flings back to \nme over her shoulder, her pleasant eyes sparkling with fun. \n\nI see the meaning of her arch look the next minute. We have climbed the \nstairway, built, as are all in the neighborhood, upon the outside of the house, and \nslippery with mud, and pause at an open door while my guide asks leave to enter. \nTwo-thirds of the one-room constituting the " home " is raised by two steps from \nthe rest the door opening at the side of the lower portion. Near the edge of the \nupper step a woman is slicing carrots into a big metal bowl-copper or brass but \nblack as iron Her legs are doubled under her; the floor is covered with dirty \nmatting, and she sits flat upon it. She wears a dingy cotton skirt and a wadded \n\n(228) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n229 \n\n\n\njacket; upon her head is an equally dingy mendeel. A brazier of charcoal is not \nfar off, over which the meal she is preparing will presently be cooked; a divan, \ncushioned with Turkey red cotton, runs around two sides of the apartment; in a \nrecess is a pile of quilts and rugs for bedding. Under the divan are a water jar \nand an oil-jug, with three earthenware bowls of various sizes, also a coffee-pot and \nhalf-a-dozen cups. There is \nnot another stick of furniture; \nnot another utensil is to be \nseen. \n\nWithout rising, the host- \ness says in Arabic that we are \nwelcome, and motions us to \nseat ourselves upon the divan, \ngoing on with her work, plac- \nidly ignorant of any deficiencies \nin her garb or surroundings. \nThe children crowd together \nat the bottom of the room, \nstaring stolidly at us; an older \nwoman than the mistress of \nthe establishment seats herself \nupon the matting, reaches out \nan arm to grab the solitary \ngarment of an eighteen-month- \nold creeping dangerously near \nthe steps, and when he screams \nand slaps her, smiles listlessly. \nFrom her appearance I should \ntake her to be sixty years of \nage, and am amazed at discov- \nering that the baby-boy is hers \nand not yet weaned. She was \nthe sixth wife\xe2\x80\x94 and is now the widow \xe2\x80\x94 of a Moslem who could afford to please \nhimself in the matter of a plurality of partners. Three were divorced, and \ntwo died while he was alive. Three of the children we now see belong to the \nwidow by right of birth; her step-sons and daughters are married. Her jointure \nas her lord\'s only legal relict enables her to live independently of them, I am \ninformed. The deceased was in easy circumstances. \n\nThe widow\'s idea of independent ease is to dwell as a boarder with the gain- \nloving proprietors of the three-story tenement. She and her children, the man \n\n\n\n\n:< A STIRRING AND NOTABLE HOUSEWIFE. \n\n\n\n23\xc2\xb0 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nof the house, his wife and two children, eat and sleep in this room. Upon hearing \nit I gasped. The place may be fifteen feet square. It is certainly not larger than \nthis computation would make it. There is but one window, and that is set high \nup in the thick stone walls. A pair of pet pigeons are tip-toeing about the door, \npecking at crumbs; there is even a dog upon the threshold, albeit he is an \naccursed animal among the Moslems. At night-fall the door will close all these \ncreatures in, and the window remain shut for fear of the damp draughts. The \nfloor will be covered with quilts, and eight human beings lie down to sleep in the \nclothes they have worn by day. \n\n4 \' Yet you tell me these are not of the poorest class ? that hundreds of others \nlive in the same way without losing respectability ?" I inquire. \n\nMy interpreter raises her eye-brows, and makes a gesture that would be \nimpatient were it not courteous. \n\n" I do tell you that they consider themselves comfortable. They have houses \nand money. They want nothing. And are proud \xe2\x80\x94 so very proud that did they \nknow that we are here to see how they live, we would not be let inside of that \ndoor. I have told them that you are my English teacher \xe2\x80\x94 \' \' and at my look of \nsurprise, she adds, gracefully, " Indeed, madam ! it is I who have learned much \n\xe2\x80\x94 ah, so much from you ! I know these people. They have good characters and \nkind hearts. They are not of my religion, but I respect them. You wished to \nsee the ways of the country, and you are seeing them." \n\nThis is uttered low and rapidly, with the impassive countenance we train \nourselves to assume when upon such errands. But for the speaker\'s womanly wit \nand tact, I could not gain access to what I especially wished to inspect, the homes \nof the great middle-class of Syrians. I bow to the unintentional rebuke conveyed \nin her protest. If " these people" choose to sit cross-legged and eat and sleep \nupon the floor, it is surely their affair and not mine. My prejudices in favor of \ncarpets, mattresses, tables and table-cloths, knives, forks and bath-tubs, would \nseem as outlandish to them as their peculiarities appear to me, while as to their \n" pride " \xe2\x80\x94 the wife of an American freeholder would resent yet more indignantly \nthe intrusion upon her domestic life of a Jerusalem reporter \xe2\x80\x94 if there be such a \nthing. \n\nI copy carefully Mrs. Jamal\'s deportment, as she takes leave of our enter- \ntainers, after ten minutes\' chat in Arabic. I even utter after her the one Arabic \nphrase I have learned, " Mar Salaami /" in withdrawing our feet from the door. \n\nVisit No. 2 has livelier elements in it. In point of worldly circumstance the \nfamilies represented in the group to which I am introduced are apparently superior \nto the people I set down as "No. i." The room, approached, as before, by an \nouter stone stairway, is larger than that we have just left, but looks smaller for \nhaving an iron bedstead, draped with mosquito netting, and a veritable bureau, in \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OE THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n231 \n\n\n\nit A plump cushion, covered with Turkey-red, is laid upou the floor across two \nsides of the room, close to the wall. Upon it sit, cross-legged, the grandmother \nof the household, sewing upon a man\'s shirt, and a Nubian woman, as black as \ncharcoal. A deep brand upon the left cheek shows that she was once a slave \nAlthough manumitted by law some years ago, many African slaves have elected \nto remain with their former owners. This is evidently one of the family. While \nher mistress plies the needle, the negress folds her arms upon her stomach and leans \nlazily against the wall, a *rin upon her face, and more curiosity m her rolling \neye-balls than I have ever \nseen evinced by a native \nSyrian of either sex. Chairs \nare set for us by a young \nwoman who enters hastily \nbehind us. She is intro- \nduced as a married daugh- \nter of the old woman. Her \nroom is upon another floor \nof the house, and this is \nvirtually but one family. \n\nThe invariable brazier \nis in the middle of the mat- \nted floor, and the unavoid- \nable coffee steams upon it. \nWe have talked of the \nweather and the chances \nof more rain for five min- \nutes before the coffee is \npoured into tiny, handleless \ncups by a representative of \nthe third generation, a girl \nof fourteen who is to be \nmarried in a couple of weeks. She trips around the circe m stockinged feet, \nhaving left her sandals at the door; her calico gown, belted about a full waist s \ncleanandverymuchM^ \n\ndoing- the morning\'s housework. Her brown wrists are banded with gold and \nsilver bangles, eight or ten upon each arm; she looks really animated as, m taking \nthe cup from her hand, I wish for her, through our interpreter many > ears of \nhappiness in her new life. The spirit of enterprise exemplified m bureau and \nchairs, gives tone to the household. A breeze from the world outside of harem \nwindows has stolen in here through some unguarded crevice. The talk has \n\n\n\n\nWOMAN WAITING WITH BOWI, OF DOUGH AT A \nCITY OVEN. \n\n\n\n232 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nbriskness and almost sprightliness in it. The coffee is thick after the manner \nof all Turkish coffee; it is, moreover, made excessively sweet out of compliment \nto the foreign guest, and a liberal pinch of allspice is added to it. A decoction \nof wormwood would be more palatable to one of the victims, but the alternative \nbeing to take one of the cigarettes assuming form in the supple fingers of the \ndaughter, the draught is committed to an amiable, and just now oft-abused, \nstomach. \n\nThe cigarette-maker has deposited her yearling baby upon the floor, and, \nwith a bowl of tobacco upon her lap and a pile of papers upon one knee, wets \nforefinger and thumb in her mouth before beginning each fresh roll. Her mother \nlays by her sewing; the Nubian loosens her lazy bones to accept a cigarette; the \nbride-expectant puffs as fast as the rest, and the baby does not cough when the \nroom is soon blue with smoke. The top of the bureau is ornamented with three \ntripods of black w T ood inlaid with mother-of-pearl, all standing upside down. One \nis placed in front of me, and several cigarettes and a box of matches are laid in \nseductive array upon it. Should I change my mind, overcome by the temptation, \nI need not be mortified by the necessity of asking for the luxury. \n\nThe cigarette is always offered to me, and, I need not say, never accepted. \nMy reputation for taste and good manners must suffer in the minds of the specta- \ntors, but they refrain from criticism, spoken or looked. \n\nCoffee is made every Lour in this room, and cigarettes are rolled by one or \nother of the women all day long. They do literally nothing between meals, but \nsip and smoke and \xe2\x80\x94 as a pasha\'s wife told a visitor of her own method of passing \nthe time \xe2\x80\x94 "just sit." The grandmother is a notable and stirring house-wife in \nthat she knows how to sew, and occasionally makes a garment for her soldier-son. \nShe is further distinguished among her neighbors by preferring to sleep in a bed \nrather than on a quilt upon the floor. \n\nThe greeting bestowed upon Mrs. Jama! is cordial to affectionateness. She \nexplains it aside, presently, the baby\'s screaming demand to be taken up and fed \nabsorbing the attention of the others. \n\n\' \' You see I run in once in a while, and tell them stories. They are only \nchildren \xe2\x80\x94 nothing more \xe2\x80\x94 and will listen for hours to tales of Abraham, Isaac, \nJacob, Joseph, Samuel, and all that, you know. I give them only Bible stories, \nbut that they never suspect. Not that they would care, but the men object to \nhaving their wives and daughters taught the Christian religion. They say it \nmakes them too independent. So, I must slip in the good I would do them \xe2\x80\x94 \npoor souls ! \' \' \n\nA quick footstep sounds upon the stone stair. The women of three genera- \ntions arise to greet the stalwart young fellow in uniform who appears in the door- \nway. One after another, they kiss his hands; his aged mother hastens to set the \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n233 \n\n\n\none unoccupied chair for him; the young niece serves him with coffee, his sister \nsupplies him with a cigarette and lights it for him. He is not ill-looking, and his \nbehavior is " quite the thing," according to his lights and those of his kinspeople. \nHe has nodded to us, receiving without a word the attentions paid to him by his \nassiduous servitors, and when we exchange \' \' Mar Salaamis \' \' with the rest of the \nparty and are urged to repeat the call, we leave him seated, his long legs stretched^ \n\n\n\n\nCOURTYARD OF A HOME IN NAZARETH. \n\n\n\nhalf-way across the room, the cigarette between his lips, his handsome eyes fixed \nupon the ceiling. \n\nNo. 3 of this one of our \' \' afternoons out \' \' is paid to a young matron who \nwould be comely were she less slatternly and plumper. Her room is without a \nwindow, and if the sun did not shine out brightly for the quarter-hour of our \nstay, we should not be able to see from one wall to another of the gloomy \nconfines. \n\nMy guide knits her brows disapprovingly and sighs in entering. Her second \nremark to the hostess is a protest. A cradle is drawn near the door that the light \nmay fall upon a weazen-faced baby, sitting upright in it. His eyes are startftngly \n\n\n\n234 THE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\nlaree and dark in the small visage ; the fingers eagerly outstretched to the bowl \nin the mother\'s hand, are like the claws of a bird. He is too hungry to notice \nthe strangers, yet Mrs. Jamal intercepts the vessel. \n\n\' \' You are not going to give him this ! \' \' \n\nShe shows it to me. \n\n\' \' Curdled ! " I say. 1 \' We call it \' loppered milk ! \' \' \' \n\n" It is lebben and old lebben at that, sour like vinegar and mouldy, and not \ntoo clean Child ! child ! \' \' turning to the mother, \' \' don\'t you know that babies \nshould have sweet milk? the freshest you can get? Goat\'s milk, if you cannot \nget cow\'s ? \' \' And again to me and despairingly-\' \' What can be expected of a \nmother who is hardly more than a baby herself? She is but fourteen now." \n\nThe girl- wife laughs childishly and good-humoredly, and proceeds to hold \nthe nauseous-looking mess to the greedy lips. \n\n\' \' He eats it every day. He eats nothing else, \' \' she says carelessly. \n<< He looks like it ! " retorts the visitor. "Ah, madame, it is cases such as \nthis that make the heart ache. I have known this girl since she was six years \nold She was married at twelve. She cannot cook, she cannot sew ; her baby\'s \nolothes must be made by somebody else, and you see what a place this is for a \nhusband to come to at night. I would teach her if I could, but they never learn \nanything after they are married." \n\nThe mother looks around at the earnest tone, and laughs again, comprehend- \ning nothing except that her friend is troubled, and about her, and profoundly in- \ndifferent to censure as to praise. The chamber is as ill-furnished as her mind. \nNo " Franji " innovations, in the shape of beds with legs to support them, seats \nto match and chests of drawers, have perverted Syrian simplicity here. A roll \nof dirty bedding in one corner, a brazier of hot ashes, the coffee-pot simmering \nupon it, a big bowl, the cushioned bench against the wall, and the cradle, make \nup the \'list of household goods and chattels. The odor of unwashen humanity ; \nof past cookery, in which onions took an active part, and of stale tobacco-smoke, \nblend queerly and powerfully with the pungent fumes of the boiling coffee. \n\xe2\x80\xa2Seasoned as I have thought myself to be by now to assaults upon the olfactory \norgans, I am thankful to be allowed to retreat to the outer air. My companion \nlinkers\' a moment longer to explain that we have not time to accept the coffee the \ngood-natured hostess would press upon us, and to offer a few more words of neigh- \nborly counsel. . . . \n\n-Not that it will do any good," continues the mentor in rejoining me. \n- But I cannot help liking the poor child. She is of -such a good disposition and \nloves her baby. Her husband is much older than she and has steady work, and \nwould be kind to a woman who made his home comfortable. I try to make her \nunderstand this, and to encourage her to keep things clean and learn to sew and \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n235 \n\n\n\ncook his food well. As you have seen, she but laughs. She ran wild upon the \nstreet until she was married, just as those girls are doing now "\xe2\x80\x94directing my \nnotice to a knot of children scrambling over a broken wall at the bottom of the \nstreet, chattering and shrieking like so many parrots. 1 \' What can mothers ex- \npect who let their daughters grow up so, but that they will have homes and babies \nlike those you saw just now ? \' \' \n\nShe is so much absorbed in the subject, and so intent upon shielding her \n\nwhite izzar from the \npollution of pavement \nand wall, that she \n\xe2\x80\xa2does not at once hear \na soft call from the \nlanding of a flight of \nsteps bulging over the \nstreet. \n\nThe summons is \nrepeated, and we look \nup to see a woman \nbeckoning importu- \nnately. She pulls her \nmendeel forward over \nher face and runs down \nto meet us, when we \nbegin the ascent of the \nstairway. \n\n\' \' She will have it \nthat we must come to \nsee her," smiles the \ninterpreter, introdu- \ncing me in dumb \nshow. \n\nMy new acquaint- \nance unveils her face \n\n"SHE RAN WIU5 UPON THE STREET. \n\nwhen we are within \n\nher door, kisses my hand and Mrs. Jamal\'s cheeks, and begs us to be seated \nupon the divan. It is covered, I note immediately, first with the conventional \nTurkey-red, and over this with clean, white muslin, a sort of " scrim," such as \nis used for window-curtains. An iron bedstead fills up one corner of the room, \ncurtained with the same material as the divan-cover ; a neat chest of drawers is \nin the opposite corner, and a tray set upon this holds cups, saucers, tumblers \n\n\n\n\n23<S \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBEE. \n\n\n\nand plates. A cupboard is let into the wall ; a baby is creeping over the floor, \nMrs. Jamal picks it up and kisses a face that is positively clean and almost \nchubby. \n\n"The youngest of four!" she interjects, between caresses and pet-names. \n" The mother was married at ten. Her first was born at fourteen. She is nearly \ntwenty now. From eight until ten, she was in my school. She reads and is \nhandy with the needle. And we have always been dear friends. Ah ! " nodding \nand smiling to the pleased mother \xe2\x80\x94 " I am very proud of my scholar ! " \n\nWe have been seen from other doorways. Mrs. Jamal still cuddles the baby \nwhen two more women enter ; one leads a child ; her companion carries another \nin her arms. Salutations and introductions over, the mother of the toddler pre- \nfers a request. A piece of dark blue cloth is thrown over her shoulder, just pur- \nchased for her by her husband, and she would like to make a jacket out of it for \nherself. With frank disregard of conventionality, or what we account conven- \ntional usages, Mrs. Jamal lays by her izzar, spreads the cloth upon the matted \nfloor, kneels down beside it, measures and chalks a pattern upon it with work- \nmanlike skill, and cuts out the garment as swiftly and well as if she were a \ntrained tailoress. The women follow every movement with keen interest, and I \nam almost as much engrossed. \n\nIt is doubtful if my conductress has ever heard of "zenana missions," \nunder that name. She would be surprised were I to dub her "a home-and- \nforeign-missionary. " She is merely a Christian woman, dwelling among her own \npeople ; a housekeeper, wife and mother, happy in her home, and longing to \nmake other homes as happy as hers. \n\nI have already learned to distinguish Christian women from Moslem wherever \nI see them, and silently conclude (correctly, as I learn presently) that the bearer \nof the baby belongs to the Greek Church. It is not an expression of superior \nintelligence alone that characterizes the Christians, but a general alertness of \nbearing and play of countenance, a sort of self-respectfulness, if I may thus \nphrase it. " This woman has a soul of her very own," it seems to say. "She \nthinks, feels, hopes and lives her own life to some extent. Knowing herself to \nbe immortal and more accountable to God than to her husband for word and \naction, she is lifted above the beasts that perish." \n\nIt is rare to find a Moslem woman of twenty who can read or write. It is \nrarer to meet with a Christian woman of any age among the respectable middle \nclasses who cannot. A teacher in a mission school told me yesterday that a \nwealthy Moslem, yielding to his daughters\' importunities to be sent to school \xe2\x80\x94 \neducation of some kind being just now a "fashionable fad" in their circle \xe2\x80\x94 \nbrought them to the English lady in person, and asked that they might be in- \nstructed in needlework and music and even taught to read. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n237 \n\n\n\n" But not to write ! " he stipulated. " Women who can write will bring dis- \ngrace upon their families by sending love-letters to men who are not chosen by \ntheir parents to be their husbands. It is never safe. \n\nLet me remark, furthermore, while my guide kneels on the floor, the shining \nshears moving as briskly as her kindly tongue\xe2\x80\x94 that jealous dread of the en- \ncroachments of the Christian religion is on the increase, not decline, among \nMohammedan men. Mrs. Jamal conveyed the secret of this distrust in saying \n\nthat they fear religion will j : \n\nmake wives and daughters \nindependent. Dr. Sand- \nreczky, whose Children\'s \nHospital is one of the no- \nblest monuments to Chris- \ntian enterprise in Jerusa- \nlem, and to whose courtesy \nand professional skill for- \neign residents and visitors \nalike bear grateful testi- \nmony, once said the same \nthing in effect to me : \n\n\' \' In the Moslem\'s opin- \nion, the most mischievous \nidea that could get pos- \nsession of the mind of his \nwife or daughter, would be \nbelief in the equality of \nsexes. Whatever tends to \noverthrow the tenet of mas- \nculine \xe2\x80\x94 that is, patriarchal \n\xe2\x80\x94 sovereignty, is a direct \n\n\xc2\xab 1 1 HOLIDAY STREET SCENE IN JERUSALEM. \n\nblow at the Mohammedan \n\nreligion. The woman who suspects her own individuality is dangerous." \n\nHere is the key-note to what makes mission work among the followers of the \nProphet especially difficult and discouraging. It is not uncommon for an \nEnglish or American visitor to a harem, small or large, to be warned not to \nspeak of Christ or his religion to the women, and frequent calls from the pale- \nfaces would excite a degree of suspicion which would lead to exclusion. It \nfollows, as a necessity, that the good done to the creatures who minister to \nthe needs and pleasures of the superior sex, must be wrought tactfully and \ngradually. \n\n\n\n\nTHE HOME OE THE BIBLE. 2 39 \n\nI am no more in my husband\'s sight than his donkey ! " said a sad-eyed \nwoman to an American woman who had been an angel of mercy to the miserable \nhousehold. "Not so much, for he beats the donkey less." _ \n\nIn our homeward walk, I say something of this to my companion. She \n\nshakes her head mournfully : \n\n\xe2\x96\xa0 \' You see but a little. If you were to live among them year after year, you \nwould be very sad. I do what I can to lighten the load of my small world. But \nwhat is that among so many ? " ^ \n\nThree times a week she collects in her neat sitting-room from fourteen to \neighteen native girls, and teaches them to do plain sewing, embroidery, knitting \n2d mending, giving her house and her time without charge. The girls take \nLrns fn cootifg a\'luncheon served at noon, washing up the dishes and setting \nthings in order when the meal is over. In the spring, she leads them into the \ncountry to gather the wild flowers that glorify the hills and fields for a few weeks. \nThese are carefully pressed, and, under her eye, arranged upon cards inscribed, \n" Flowers from the Holy Land," and sold during the tourists\' season as souvenirs \nof the visit. The sales of these and other articles do not meet the expenses of \nmaterials and food, unless the number of visitors be unusually large. In an ordi- \nnary season, the class is kept up at a loss. What afflicts the instructress most a \nthat she must refuse many applications from girls who wish to become pupils, \nwould-be recruits from the ranks of the empty-handed and empty-minded, whom \nthe busy philanthropist pities from the depths of her generous heart. _ \n\nMrs Tamal\'s modesty would shrink from the title of philanthropist. She is \nsimply living her life conscientiously, in the fear of God, and in love for her \nneighbor in the sphere to which she has been called. Yet I can answer for her \ngratitude should the proposition made by me in a former << Talk \' \'-that some of \nthe " Circles " in the far land in which women are surely more highly favored by \nHeaven than in any other, would send monthly a few dollars for this quiet, prac- \ntical work-be taken up in active earnest. Twenty-five dollars per month would \nenable the teacher to enlarge her class and increase the usefulness of what she has \n\nundertaken. , - . ^ r \n\nShe can labor successfully where foreigners may not enter, and, being one ot \nthemselves, can brighten and better her country-women\'s lot as it now is, while \ngradually raising ttem to desire and appreciate higher things. \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVI. \n\n\n\nIN A PALANKEEN TO JERICHO. \n\n\xe2\x80\xa2^^^^^HE romantic reader of Oriental fable and travel conjures up at the word \nm *\\ \' \' Palankeen, \' \' a vision of luxury which will be dashed by a description \nJ of the conveyance as it is brought up to the hotel door on this fine frosty \n^^ m0 ^ December morning. It is not a curtained litter, piled with silken \ncushions, borne upon men\'s shoulders; neither is it a sedan chair swung between \ngilded poles. A stout wooden box, open in front, and half-way to the back on the \nsides, is fitted upon two pairs of shafts, one behind, one in front. A glass window, \nworking upon hinges, is let into each side, and over these hang red curtains. A \nbench fastened into the rear end of the interior is cushioned with red stuff; a mat \nlies on the foot. \n\nAt first sight the vehicle strikes one as clumsy, un wieldly and grotesquely \nugly. A mule is harnessed within each pair of shafts; rugs, a railway pillow and \nmy satchel are bestowed within, and I mount to my carriage by means of a step- \nladder, held firm by David himself. I was inclined to laugh when this feature of \nOriental magnificence was first submitted for my approval, but in previous journeys \nto that upon which we are now bound, I have learned to appreciate the shelter and \ncomfort it affords, and respite from the saddle when one is weary, or not well, is \ngrateful in the extreme. Packed in among downy cushions, swathed in furs and \nsoft woolens, with abundance of room for limbs that tire of one position in the \nlong marches, I do not begrudge Mrs. Lofty her carriage and high prancing pair, \nas the muleteer gives the word and the little caravan sets forward through the \nJaffa gate. Some women have complained to me that the swing of a palankeen \nmade them slightly sea-sick for a few hours. Although a wretched sailor upon the \nwater, I have never known the slightest nausea in this ungainly equipage. The \nmotion is precisely what one feels in the saddle on the back of a fairly well-gaited \nhorse. It is not as smooth as that of a carriage built over elastic springs, but the \ncomparative roughness has ample compensation in the roominess of the interior \nand opportunity for change of position when one is cramped by sitting. \n\nWe were once jocosely critical over the quantity of timber in the body and \nshafts of my "coach." Experience has proved the need of stanchness and \nsolidity; nevertheless, as we jog along the first familiar stages of our route, I fall \nto musing upon what manner of conveyance I would have constructed in America, \nand presented to my faithful dragoman, had I the means to compass this end. It \n\n(2 4 G) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n241 \n\n\n\nshould be light and strong, weather-tight, and upheld by such springs as only \nAmerican carriage builders know how to make, and be gratefully dedicated to the \nuse of American women tourists. \n\nA halt is called, and I arouse myself to inquire why. David, gorgeous in \nprofessional gear, rides to my side to prefer the petition of a native photographer \n\nto "take" the palan- \nkeen and the escort. \nThe picture herewith \npresented gives so \ncorrect an impression \nof the procession and \nthe place \xe2\x80\x94 a stone- \nstrewn olive-orchard \non the lowest slope \nof Olivet\xe2\x80\x94 that I com- \nmend a study of the \nnovel scene to the cu- \nrious and interested. \nThe camp and camp \nappointments have \ngone forward, leaving \nto me as attendants, \nSerkeese, grinning \nfrom the top of the \nswathed luncheon- \ntent and hampers; the \ntwo muleteers; Al- \ncides, upon Massoud, \nand disguised in \nhunting shirt, fez \nand kafeyah, and \nDavid Jamal upon \n\nthk lepkrs\' husky cry. Dervish. The fore- \n\nmost posts of the palankeen are wreathed with leaves and flowers in honor of \nour " fresh start." \n\n" Now," calls out Alcides from the van, as we are released from the glaring \neye of the camera, " We can all go to\xe2\x80\x94 Jericho I" \n\n" Quite so, sir !" replies the only hearer besides myself who comprehends an \nEnglish sentence, a grave response that may or may not signify familiarity with \n\nAmerican slang. \n\n16 \n\n\n\n\n\n(242) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n243 \n\n\n\nFor our destination is Jericho, and we are to be absent from our headquarters \nin Jerusalem for some days. We pass Gethsemane, dispensing a few coins to still \nthe husky shrillness of the lepers\' cry; skirt the Mount of Olives, and, diverging \nto the right, fall into line upon the Bethany road, an excellent thoroughfare for \nseveral miles\xe2\x80\x94 almost half-way to Jericho. After we have left the mean hamlet \n\nof Bethany behind \nus, we begin the de- \nscent between hills \nthat grew more and \nmore barren, as we \ngo on. The olive \nis the only tree to \nbe seen, and the \ngroves of this be- \ncome rarer and \nsmaller. At the \nj u n cture of the \nBethany highway \nwith a compara- \ntively disused track \nleading to Beth- \nphage, waits a \nmounted and digni- \nfied figure \xe2\x80\x94 the \nsheik who is to be \nour safe conduct as \nwe go " down from \nJerusalem to Jeri- \ncho.\'\' He and \nDavid ride together; \nAlci.ies falls back \nto the side of my \npalankeen; Ser- \na taciturn company \n\n\n\n\nSHEPHERD AND VTFE \n\n\n\nIt is \n\n\n\nkeese trots on ahead with his queer looking load, \nwhen we are bound upon an all-day expedition. The road winds down into \na tortuous valley, at the head of which David reins up his horse and waits \nour approach. A small, half-ruined khan planted upon the edge of the way has \na reason for being in a well opposite to it, and lower by twenty feet or thereabouts. \nBoth are very old, the situation of a khan usually remaining the same for count- \nless generations, particularly when it is in the vicinity of a spring of living water. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n245 \n\n\n\nSome one at the hotel spoke of this well last night as probably En-shemesh, one \nof the division lines between Judah and Benjamin. \n\n" The waters of En-shemesh, and the goings ont thereof, were as Enrogel." \n("The Fuller\'s Fountain, " reads the margin.) "And the border went up by \nthe valley of the son of Hinnom unto the south side of the Jebusite; the same is \nJerusalem." \n\nOur guide has a more interesting story of the waters: \n\n" Called \' The Apostles\' Fountain,\' because of the tradition that Christ our \nLord, on His last journey to Jerusalem, rested here while telling His disciples that \n\n\n\n\nRUINS OF ROMAN WATCH-TOWER. \n\nHe was going up to be betrayed and crucified. He was on His way from Jericho^, \nyou see, and not yet come to Bethphage, near the Mount of Olives. It is only a. \ntradition \xe2\x80\x94 but it might have been." \n\n" It might have been," for the ruined wall and part of a roof of the ancient \ncaravanserai are distinctly Roman, and the spring is perennial. What more \nnatural than that the \' \' taking of the twelve disciples apart in the wa} T \' \' may have \nbeen at the foot of the ascent upon the summit of which He was to meet the \' \' great \nmultitudes \' \' and their shouts of \' 1 Hosanna to the Son of David ! Blessed is He \nthat cometh in the name of the Lord ! " \n\nBe this as it may, this was the route by which He came up from Jericho \n\n\n\n246 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBEE. \n\n\n\nwhere He had dined with Zaccheus, and in departing from which He had made the \nblind Bartimeus to see. \n\nAll signs of human habitation fail us as we proceed. High hills line the \nhighway, ridged by natural terraces, treeless, and at this time of the year, sere to \nthe summits. The heights, with their naked ledges, remind us of nothing more \nforcibly than of gigantic skeletons from which the flesh has wasted and dropped \naway. The silence is profound and awful. The clink of the horses\' iron hoofs \nupon the rock-bedded road and the harsh call of the muleteers to the patient beasts \nare all that we hear for miles together. Another\xe2\x80\x94 and a credible \xe2\x80\x94 tradition is \ncommitted to us in a defile, an hour\'s journey beyond the Apostles\' Fountain. \nHereabouts, it is believed, Shimei came out from Bahurim, \'\'and as David and \nhis men went by the way, Shimei went along on the hill\'s side over against him, \nand cursed as he went, and threw stones at him and cast dust." \n\nAs we read the tale, imagination is quick with the picture of the royal father\'s \nflight between the hills, and there is cordial, although may be, unholy sympathy \nexpressed with rude Abishai\'s outbreak: " Why should this dead dog curse my \nlord the king? Let me go over, I pray thee, and take off his head !" We can \nalmost see the foul-tongued son of Gera\xe2\x80\x94 whose behavior, after the king\'s restora- \ntion was a convincing proof that the bully is always the coward, \xe2\x80\x94leaping from \none to another projection of the hillside, to hurl down missiles upon the fugitives \nwho "came weary and refreshed themselves there." \n\nOn, on we ride, between sad and silent heights, over waterless ravines, whose \npebbly beds will be washed and tossed by turbulent floods after the spring rains. \nThe glare of the white rocks is now and then relieved by curious pink strata, \nsometimes deepening into rose-color. At long intervals, we see high up on the \nbreast of the mountain mingled flocks of sheep and goats, feeding together, while \nthe shepherd, wrapped in his brown-and- white mantle, stands or sits near. Here, \nwe observe for the first time, an illustration of the division of the mixed herd prophe- \n^sied by our Lord, and to which our attention was once called by Dr. Webster, the \n-devoted missionary of Haifa. A shepherd, walking before the flocks, a sickly \nlamb tucked away close to his warm body inside of his thick garment, called them, \nas he went, in a peculiar note, plaintive, yet penetrating, which we could hear \nplainly half a mile away. The sheep followed him in a long steady line,\xe2\x80\x94 the \nblack goats straggled hither and yon, cropping the herbage, running races, \nscampering up rocks at the left and right, until we wonder how he could ever \ncollect and finally get them safely to the fold. \n\n" And when he putteth forth his own sheep, he goeth before them, and the \nsheep follow him; for they know his voice." \n\nAlcides spurs up a hillside to have audience with a shepherd, whose garment \nof goat\'s hair is wrapped about him as gracefully as ever Roman senator wore \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n247 \n\n\n\ntoga, and gallops back in proud possession of a veritable pastoral pipe. The \nsounds evoked from it by the new owner are weak and shrill, yet \' \' carry \' \' well in \nthe still air. \n\n"Do you suppose that the boy-shepherd of Bethlehem played psalm- tunes \nupon a machine like this?" winds up the performance. " One could get better \nmusic out of a penny whistle. \n\nThe classic instrument is about eight inches in length and consists of two \n\nreeds, each pierced on \none side with six \nbreathing holes. They \nare fastened longitu- \ndinally together with \nresin, and into the up- \nper end are fitted two \nmovable mouth- \npieces, attached to the \npipe by a twine string. \nIt is a primitive affair, \nbut looks as if it might \nhave capabilities \xe2\x80\x94 in \nthe right hands. \n\nNoon is near when \nwe espy the Hathrur \nKhan, or the Khan of \nthe Good Samaritan. \nHaving always sup- \nposed the story of the \nman who fell among \nthieves upon this road \nto be merely a parable \nrelated with a specific \npurpose, we are sur- \nprised to learn that it \nis here considered that \nour Lord made use of a real incident, as historic as the fall of the Tower of Siloam, \nin answering the lawyer\'s question\xe2\x80\x94 " Who is my neighbor?" The Jericho \nroad has been for twenty centuries the haunt of banditti. Even yet, peaceable \nhusbandmen conveying crops to the Jerusalem market, or returning with the \nproceeds of their merchandise, are often set upon by watchful predatory tribes, \nand robbed. It is certain that the site of this wayside khan is very old, and that \n\n\n\n\nTHE SHEIK MOUNTS GUARD WITHOUT. \' \n\n\n\n248 \n\n\n\nTHK HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nit has borne for hundreds of years the name of " him who showed mercy " to \na feudal foe. It is almost certain that our Lord, journeying, as usual on foot with \nHis disciples, stayed His progress to the city, where He was to offer the last and \nGreatest Sacrifice for sinning humanity, and rested here, perhaps for the mid-day \nmeal, as we are now doing. \n\nThe khan is a big shed, with a courtyard at the back, as new as it is uncomely, \nbut the foundations are ancient. Upon an overlooking hill are the ruins of a \nRoman watch-tower from which is an extensive view of the defiles of approach in \nall directions. \n\nPalankeen and mules are left without; human beings lunch in the vast, bare \nchamber, open at the back toward the courtyard in which the horses are tethered. \nDavid hovers about us to be sure that we are comfortable; the sheik mounts guard \nwithout, perched in a niche of the archway, cigarette between his fingers, his eyes \nclosed in meditation or slumber. The hum of conversation from another party of \ntourists and the chatter of the muleteers in the road, disperse thinly into the vast \nsilences that encompass us in what is, for all we can see or hear, desolation withouJ \nan inhabitant. \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVII. \n\n\n\nSTILL ON THE JERICHO ROAD. \n\nSEVCND the Khan Hathrur, the road from Jerusalem to Jericho grows \nmore difficult until narrowing, almost without warning, into a bridle- \npath, it ends the speculations in which we have indulged as to the \npossibility of going by carriage all the way to the Jordan. So rough \nand straight is it that more than once I insist upon alighting and walking \naround a sharp spur where the track is a narrow ledge overhanging a precipice, \nor the hill we are to descend seems, to my apprehension, to have more incline than \n\nthe side of a house. \n\nThe brooding silence is oppressive to ear and spirit. Alcides avers gloomily \nthat the - best Baedeker for Palestine " opens of itself at Jeremiah whenever we \nwould consult it. Even a cluster of black tents would be "comely" to eyes \nwearied by the illimitable stretch of treeless mountains, but we see none. Follow- \ning the example of their robber ancestry, the Bedouins burrow in ravine and \n"wady " and natural dens and caves of the earth. The shepherds far up the \nheights\' a few men on foot and still fewer upon donkeys are all the fellow-creatures \nwe see until, in the dreariest part of the route, a defile so deep that the sun never \nvisits it in winter except at noon, a woman rides briskly past. Being portly of \nfigure she is no inconsiderable load for her donkey, and parcels of divers patterns \nand weights are strapped to her saddle, but she goes by our party at a smart amble \nand is soon lost behind the bulging shoulder of a hill. Two men, similarly \nmounted, and a pack-donkey hardly visible under his load of baskets and sacks, \n\nfollow her. , , \n\n< \' An enterprising lady,\' \' the guide says, admiringly. < \' She and her brother \nkeet> the hotel at Jericho. And keep it well. She has been to Jerusalem for \nsupplies." \n\nThe incident is incongruous with the stern desolation of the scene, but we are \nglad of the relief of a laugh. A modern hotel, household supplies of sugar, eggs, \nflour, and coffee, not to dwell upon the brisk donkey and his plump rider\xe2\x80\x94 bring \nus down\xe2\x80\x94 (or up) from meditations among the -tombs of a mighty Past. The \ncheerful ring of our voices comes back in a shocked echo from the furrowed walls \nclosing us in on either hand. The upper heights are honeycombed with caves, \nwinding paths, slight threads at a distance, leading to black mouths of some \nThese were, ages ago, die cells of hermits, emulous of austere Elijah\'s fame, and \n\n(249) \n\n\n\n2 5 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nlittle dreaming, amid fastings and prayers and temptations, of the far different \nwarfare to be waged against flesh and blood by their successors in the tenantry of \nthe high places of the rocks. \n\nDown the Wady Kelt which, by and by, runs parallel with our road, wears a \nfierce little brook, brawling so noisily that we can hear it before we can see it. \n\n"The Brook Cherith," David names it, and we have enough to think and talk \nof for the next mile. We alight then, and quitting the track, clamber over inter- \nvening hills and gulle}^s to reach the cliff at whose base foams the fussy torrent. \nIt will shrink to a tiny rivulet in summer, and is making the most of its day of \npower. Right over against us, scarcely distinguishable in the shadow of the per- \npendicular wall opposite from the rock to which it clings, is a miniature edition of \na Greek convent. Those who founded it believed, or said that they believed, the \nsite to be near Elijah\'s hiding-place during the miraculous drouth that plagued the \nland in Ahab\'s reign. They named it, however, the Monastery of St. John, the \nElijah of the New Testament. It is marvelous how the materials for building \neven so tiny an edifice were transported to the chosen spot, although we trace \nagain upon the face of the precipice thread-like paths along which wild goats \nmight fear to tread. The monastery seems actually to "back up" against the \ngrim wall as if afraid of falling. \n\nPink and rose-color have given place to chalky whiteness in the towering sides \nand heads of the mountains hemming us in. We are going down all the while, \nfollowing generally the capricious turns of the brook, and never out of sight of \nthe gorge it has worn in the everlasting hills. I have alighted to walk down a \nrocky fall \xe2\x80\x94 I cannot call it a descent \xe2\x80\x94 the abruptness of which makes me dizzy \nwhen I behold it from the palankeen; David Jamal and the sheik have gone on \ndown, their horses treading warily upon the rolling stones, when half-way to the \nbottom we take a sharp turn and another world opens upon us. It is as if the \ntwo peaked promontories in which the sides of the pass terminate were rolled \nback like gates, and the landscape unfolded panorama-wise before our eyes. \nThe plain of the Jordan loses itself behind sand-hills on our left, and farther \naway on the right is the Dead Sea, blue and serene as the Mediterranean on this \nafternoon. \n\nGlimpses of the sacred river sparkle between clumps of green. The oasis, \nluxuriant upon the banks, disperses in sparser verdure and coppices of thorn trees \nreceding from the water. The white tents of our camp gleam near one of these \ngroves, and to reach it we must cross a plain overgrown with bushes, nearly a mile \nin width. The track is sandy; the mules with the best intentions with regard to \ntheir waiting supper, cannot make much speed. I am ashamed of the folly, but I \nhave not been so undeniably terrified since first setting foot upon Syrian soil, as in \ndiscovering that the moving brown objects partially concealed by the low growth \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OE THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n251 \n\n\n\nare camels\xe2\x80\x94 a herd of them\xe2\x80\x94 pasturing with nobody near to hinder any demon- \nstration they may take it into their hideous heads to make toward the equipage \nwhich excites their curiosity. Utterly ignorant as to the stampeding proclivities \nof my favorite abominations, I do not know whether to expect a charge in force, \nor a challenge to single combat. There are, I judge, at least one hundred of the \nhulking creatures munching the coarse grass, stripping leaves from the bushes \nand principally\xe2\x80\x94 or so it appears to me\xe2\x80\x94 wandering aimlessly over the meadow m \nquest of some stray bit of mischief peculiarly suited to the camel-me nature. \n\n\n\n\n\'A MINIATURE EDITION OF A CONVENT \n\n\n\nAll three of my mounted escorts have ridden on, Jamal, doubtless to make all \nready for our reception in camp, and the sheik for Jamal\'s good company. With \ndifficulty I restrain the wild impulse to scream to Alcides\' disappearing figure as \nMassoud gallops after the pair now lost to sight in the coppice. Glancing through \nthe window on my right hand, I see a particularly malevolent camel, a big blackish \nbrute, "point" me fifty feet off, and come straight toward the palankeen, nose \noutstretched and shoulders hunched up after the manner of that most idiotic of \nfeathered bipeds\xe2\x80\x94 a turkey-hen. In a truce a dozen other noses take the same \nline, and a row of the horrors is coming directly for us. The muleteers pay no \n\n\n\n252 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nattention to them, until my energetic gesticulation directs their eyes to the peril. \nThen both laugh a little, and one shouts carelessly at the foremost camel, whc* \nhalts to stare at us \xe2\x80\x94 and with joy unspeakable, yet which I dare not confess, I \nbehold the top of Alcides\' kafeyah above the bushes that swallowed him up, \njust now, and he canters back to see what has become of me. With all the con- \nsideration for my welfare that never sleeps or wavers, he has not bethought him- \nself of my antipathy for the desert craft. \n\n\' \' What harm could they do to you ? They are the most peaceable of animals, \' * \nhe chides, laughingly. \n\nI offer no excuse for the silly terrors, from the effects of which I do not fully \nrecover until the cup of four-o clock tea Imbarak has ready when we dismount at \nthe tent-door, has been swallowed and the exceeding beauty of the view begins to- \nact soothingly upon jarred nerves. The absurd incident has peaceable fruits of \nrighteousness in one particular, at least\xe2\x80\x94 I shall never again sneer at a woman who \njumps upon a chair at sight of a mouse, or screams when a spider runs over her \nneck or cheek. \n\nThe situation of the camp is, as usual, well chosen. We are, as I have indi- \ncated, upon the outskirts of the oasis. Beyond the band of verdure, apparently sa \n\xe2\x80\xa2 near that we are incredulous as to the miles that separate us from them, rise the \nmountains of Moab, purpled by the sunset, solemn with the glooms of falling \nevening. A double peak is pointed out as Mount Nebo. \n\nThere is light enough for us to read in the clear type of the 4 \' International \nTeachers\' Edition," how " Moses went up from the plains of Moab unto the moun- \ntain of Nebo, to the top of Pisgah " \xe2\x80\x94 (or the hill) , " that is over against Jericho. \n\\nd the Eord showed him all the land of Gilead, unto Dan, and all Naphtali, \nand the land of Ephraim, and Manasseh, and all the land of Judah, unto the \nutmost sea. \' \' \n\n(\'\'That is the Mediterranean," is interjected here.) \n\n4 \'And the south, and the plain of the valley of Jericho, the city of palm- \ntrees, unto Zoar." \n\nJericho was worth having in that age, and fourteen hundred years thereafter, \nwhen enamored Antony deeded it to Cleopatra, from whom Herod rented it The \nflow of milk and honey was scarcely a figure of speech. The fertile plains, irri- \ngated from the Jordan, were grazed by flocks and herds, and bee-culture was one \nof the chief industries of the population. "A divine region," says Josephus, \n44 covered with beautiful gardens and groves of palms of different kinds." \n\nThere are not a dozen palms in sight, when we stroll to the top of the bank \nbeyond the camping-ground, for an unobstructed view, but the Jericho oranges \nhave a reputation of their own. A man sent into the town on an errand brings \nback immense citrons, six inches in length and ten in circumference, sweet \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n253 \n\n\n\noranges, and, rather as a curiosity than to please the palate, sweet lemons, which \nwe find insipid. It is David\'s will that the dining- tent be decorated this evening, \nand the messenger is laden with fruit-bearing branches of citron and lemon-trees, \nlong sprays of acacia, studded with fluffy golden balls, deliciously fragrant; an \nunknown white flower, and, because I have expressed a desire to see them, bunches \nof the famous " Dead Sea apples." Several clusters are hung against the palan- \nkeen curtain, and Alcides transfers the group to a "film," while I cut open some \nof the nondescript vegetables for the purpose of classification. The writer who \ncalled them " a sort of potato," looked no further than leaves and flower, which \nstrongly resemble those of the potato. But they grow upon a bush from two to \n\n\n\n\nTHE CAMP AT SUNSET. \n\n\n\nsix feet high, and in color and shape are identical with our yellow egg tomato. \nThe seed, also, are those of the tomato, but dark-brown, as is the soft pulp sur- \nrounding them. Jamal says that they give forth a goodly smell at a certain stage \nof ripeness. Now, we find in them no particular odor of any kind beyond a \ncertain rank weediness shared by them with scores of other plants. They are not \nedible, nor yet poisonous, and assuredly are never filled with ashes. \n\n" What sort of growth do you suppose the poet had in mind when he wrote \xe2\x80\x94 \n\nAnd Dead Sea fruit shall quench the thirst \nOf those who long for wine ?" \n\n-queries Alcides, returning the kodak to its case. \' 4 And no tourist in modern \nEgypt can find the genuine lotus. There is a sign in New York City: \' Destroyer \n\n\n\n254 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nof Moths. \' Foreign travel might be advertised as a 4 Universal Myth De- \nstroyer.\' " \n\n" We are to have visitors !" David comes up to say. \n\nA long man and a short woman are alighting from their horses. It does not \nsurprise, however it may annoy us, to recognize the Inevitables. It is in accord- \nance with the law of the general fitness of things \xe2\x80\x94 especially of human things \xe2\x80\x94 \nthat Dr. and Mrs. \nSharp e should have \n" dropped in" upon \nour sunset rest on their \nway to the Jordan Ho- \ntel in the lower valley. \n\nWith hospitable \ntact, the head of our \ncommissary department \nhas fresh tea made, and \nour easiest chairs are \nparaded for the visitors. \nIt chimes in with our \npresent opinion of the \nex-college -president \nthat he rejects sugar \nand cream, and gulps \nthe boiling-hot liquid \nwithout winking. Set- \nting the cup down with \nunnecessary stress, he \nsummons David. \n\n" Now, I dare say \nyou have been telling \nthese * In nocen ts \nAbroad \' " \xe2\x80\x94 in grim- \nmest pleasantry \xe2\x80\x94 \' \' that \nthe contemptible \' run \' \nof rain-water up there is the Brook Cherith, where Elijah was fed twice a day by \nthe ravens?" \n\nDavid\'s inclination of the head and slight smile are the soul of the Oriental\'s \nrespectful forbearance. \n\n"And being a latter-day dragoman, you have thought it incumbent upon \nyou to hint at doubts of the ravens themselves ? Some traveled fool \xe2\x80\x94 the most \n\n\n\n\nDEAD SEA ERUTT. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n255 \n\n\n\nobnoxious species ot iool extant \xe2\x80\x94 probably a professor of theology\xe2\x80\x94 has rattled off \na lot of stuff about the same word meaning \' ravens \' and \'Arabians \' or, as others \nhave it \xe2\x80\x94 \' merchants, \' or still others \xe2\x80\x94 \'Orbites \' \xe2\x80\x94 the inhabitants of the neighboring \ncity of Orb. Each and all of these efforts to explain away the miracle plainly \nrecorded in the inspired Word is an insult to the Book and to the learning of those \nwho translated it into the vulgar tongue. \' \' \nAlcides has got hold of an idea. \n\n\' \' If the word translated \' ravens \' can be made to mean any one of the three \nother things you have mentioned, why not give Elijah the benefit of the doubt, \nand relieve his memory from the obloquy of eating tainted flesh ? Anybody who \nknows the raven\'s habits and tastes must prefer this reading. What more likely \nthan that the Bedouins would have protected and fed the fugitive who threw him- \nself upon their hospitality ? They would do it to-day, wouldn\'t they, David ?" \n\n" Without a doubt, Captain." \n\n"The question, young gentleman, is not what you, or I, or anybody else \nwould p -refer \xe2\x80\x94 \' \' \n\n"Now, doctor, dear, why will you dispute with everybody?" Mrs. Sharpe \nslips in, plaintively. " It is so much sweeter and more Christian to believe what \nthe Church and the dragomans, who were born here and have lived here all their \nlives, tell us, than to be forever in the seat of the scornful, as one might say. \nAs for Cherith \xe2\x80\x94 doesn\'t the Bible say expressly that it dried up, after a while, \nand what more likely than when the summer weather came on \xe2\x80\x94 and, as you have \nremarked," turning to Alcides \xe2\x80\x94 " the idea of tainted meat isn\'t pleasant to are- \nfined person. " \n\nHer spouse jumps up and strides away to his horse, calling harshly to the \ndragoman that the sun is down and they ought to be off. Mrs. Sharpe finishes \nthe tea she has had qualified with \' \' two lumps, a good deal of cream, and a dash \nof hot water \xe2\x80\x94 if you please !" before rising to follow. \n\n"The blessed man is a saint at heart, but a little impatient of contradiction," \nshe murmurs oilily with her " good night." \n\nWe renew our laugh over the interview after dinner, when a company of \nfriends from the hotel below walk over the intervening half-mile to pass the even- \ning with us. There are two clergymen among the guests and both have fled for \ntheir lives, having dared to lean toward what we call " the Bedouin theory." \n\nWe are thankful nothing was said to the critic of Nebo or Pisgah, in looking \nby the light of a late moon toward the solemn height across the river. Already \nwe have learned to seek out that point of the landscape, and dream, in gazing upon \nit, of the solitary man who climbed it to see \' \' sweet fields beyond the swelling flood, \' \' \nbefore dying there alone. \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVIII. \n\n\n\nTHE DEAD SEA. \n\n&^^\xc2\xbbHK march over the plains is begun betimes on the morrow It leads, \n\xc2\xa3 \xc2\xab\\ shortly after quitting the camp, right through a Moslem burial- \n% J ground. Six men are hollowing a shallow grave in the sand; about \na stone\'s cast away, the corpse that is to fill it, wrapped in coarse \n\nmatting, is laid in the shadow of a thorn- tree; a group of women wail and sob \n\nintermittently about it; the intermission is devoted to cheerful chat, probably to \n\ngossip. \n\n" It was an old man, or they would not be laughing and talking between their \ncrying-fits," says David, in riding by. "If he were young, they would mourn \nloud and long. \' \' \n\nChalk hills bound the tedious level in the direction from which we have come; \nthe purple mountains of Moab are upon the left; all about us are spread sand- \ndunes and clumps of scrub-growth; thorn bushes \xe2\x80\x94 the "Spina Christi " \xe2\x80\x94 or \n" Christ-thorn," with wild willows, and now and then a bunch of pinkish flowers \ngrowing upon a tall succulent stem, with fleshy leaves, and a shrub resembling the \nlarch, but with more feathery foliage, that bears brownish-red berries. In an hour \nthe land dips to a lower plain where the recent rains have settled in bluish mud. \nThe horses keep upon drier ground, David and the sheik dashing away for horse- \nback practice upon a stretch of short, scant grass. Both are well mounted, and \nthe racing, the sudden turnings and wheelings, the bounds and curvetings of the \nblooded animals are interesting to watch. My muleteers are ankle-deep in the \nsticky mire, drawing their feet out with a sucking sound. The subaltern has \ntaken off his red slippers (it is always a puzzle to me how he ever keeps them on, \nfor they are turned in under the heel and held in place by the toes only) and \ncarries them in his hand till I suggest that he put them into the boot of the palan- \nkeen. \n\nThe sun shines hotly overhead by the time we get an unobstructed view of the \nDead Sea. A blue haze hangs above it and veils the encompassing range of \nmountains; ineffable lights play over hills and sea; the water gives back the sun- \nshine from dimpling waves. All the storied desolateness of the scene is to be \nfound upon the land. The horses kick up salt as they walk, and about the hoof- \nprints in the sands are borders like hoar-frost \xe2\x80\x94 salt and so acrid to the tongue, \nthat I marvel at the mules\' disposition to snatch mouthfuls of it. \n\n(256) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n257 \n\n\n\nHereabouts, archaeologists incline to locate Sodom and Gomorrah, and not in \nthe bed of the salt sea. \n\nAnother shock to early belief and dreams ! Never more can I repeat the \nweird lines conned with delightful shivers in my girlhood: \n\nThe wind blows chill across the gloomy waves \n\nHow unlike the green and dancing main ! \nThe surge is foul as if it rolled o\'er graves ; \xe2\x80\x94 \n\nStranger ! here lie the cities of the plain. \n\nAnother myth goes down before scientific investigation. The waves are not \ngloomy, much less foul, and the tradition that the cities of the plain lie under- \n\n\n\n\nWOMEN CROSSING PLAIN ON THEIR WAY TO THE BURIAE. \n\n\n\nneath is \xe2\x80\x94 traditional ! Loath to admit all this, we have fled to the history and \nthe testimony concerning the destruction of the guilty towns, and are confounded \nthat the main narrative and confirmative passages to which the margin refers us, \ndo not so much as intimate the engulfment by the Dead Sea of Sodom, Gomorrah, \nAdmah and Zeboim. Again and again, we read, that they were " overthrown by \nthe Lord in His wrath," but the incoming of the bitter waters has no part in the \ntragedy. Furthermore \xe2\x80\x94 the " cities of the plain " would show that they were at \n17 \n\n\n\n\n(258) \n\n\n\n\\ \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n259 \n\n\n\nthe basin of the Jordan lying at the upper, or northern end of the sea. The \nsouthern border is sharply precipitous, and a line of mountains would have hidden \nfrom Abraham in Hebron, \' \' the smoke of the country that went up like the smoke \nof a furnace," had this "country" occupied the present bed of the Dead Sea. \nExcavations in the mounds near the Jordan are constantly unearthing the rubbish \nof buried towns, and the subsoil of the waste lands over which we are riding is \nsaturated with bituminous ooze. "The vale of vSiddim was full of slime-pits " \xe2\x80\x94 \ni. e. t say erudite authorities, liquid bitumen, such as was used for mortar in the \n\n\n\n\nSAND-DUNES AND CLUMPS OF SCRUB GROWTH. \n\n\n\ntower of Babel, and by Semiramis in building Babylon. The doomed cities came \nto their ruin by brimstone and fire from the Eord. The whole region would burn \nlike tinder if once ignited. The agency of water in the terrible work does not \nappear in the sacred record. \n\n\xe2\x96\xa0"Tarn afraid we must give it up," concludes my fellow-student, ruefully. \n"But should we encounter Dr. Sharpe here\xe2\x80\x94 (which may the fates forfend !) we \nwill not admit our discomforture to him. He is quite capable of discounting the \nwhole story, Bible or no Bible." \n\nTwo large boats are beached upon the shelving shingle, lapped by the spark- \nling waves. The government has a monopoly of the bitumen that floats upon the \n\n\n\n26o \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nsurface of the Dead Sea, and the boats are here to collect it. A piece weighing \nfourteen tons arose to the top of the water last week, and smaller fragments are \nfound in abundance, especially after a storm of wind. To the government alone \nbelongs all the salt brought into and sold in Syria. The drift-wood along the \nshore of this sea is thickly encrusted with it, and the peasants of the region \ncome by stealth to scrape it off for family use. When detected in the act, they \nare arrested and punished as thieves. \n\nOf course, Alcides must take the regulation bath in the saline waves, so \nbuoyant that, as he reports afterward, it is impossible to sink oneself without \ngreat effort, and then the body bounds back to the surface like a rubber balk \nWhile he is absent with an attendant, I pace the wet shingle, as hard as a floor, \nand find mood and scene wondrously tranquil \xe2\x80\x94 not at all what might be expected \nwith the Dead Sea washing the tips of my boots, and the overthrow of Sodom \nand Gomorrah vivid in my mind. Far away toward the southern extremity of \nIhe shining sheet, which is likewise known as * \' Lake Asphaltum," once stood \nMachias, in whose dungeons John the Baptist was murdered, and nearer to us \n* \' little Zoar, \' \' spared that Lot might take refuge there. The latter place is yet \nmore to me because it was the boundary of the sweep of the undimmed eye of the \nprophet, nigh unto death, and yet in the full vigor of manly perfection. \n\nMy eyes return, and lingeringly, to " Nebo\'s lonely mountain," sublime in \nnoon-tide serenity, still the warder of the plain and sea. All the beauty of the \n" city of palm-trees " and the "glory" (not the "swellings") of Jordan, could \nnot have hindered a compassionate thought from crossing the seer\'s mind as he \nbeheld from afar the region he had so lately described as " the land of brimstone, \nand salt, and burning, that is not sown, nor beareth, nor any grass groweth \ntherein \xe2\x80\x94 Sodom and Gomorrah and Admah and Zeboim, which the Lord over- \nthrew in His anger, and His wrath." \n\n\n\n\n(261) \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIX. \n\n\n\nTHE JORDAN. \n\n\n\n\nHE luncheon-tent is pitched upon the very spot from which, says \ntradition, Elijah ascended to heaven. \n\nStretched luxuriously upon the rugs with which David has car- \npeted the turf, we, as is our custom, read the story of the event from \n\n\n\nthe original record, and draw conclusions unbiased by popular tales and erudite \ncommentators. \n\nThe two prophets passed over Jordan between the waters divided hither \nand thither by the stroke of Elijah\'s mantle ; \xe2\x80\x94 "And it came to pass as they still \nwent on and talked, that, behold, there appeared a chariot of fire and horses of \nfire, and parted them both asunder ; and Elijah went up by a whirlwind into \nheaven." \n\n" Elisha took up also the mantle of Elijah that fell from him, and went back \nand stood by the bank (or \'lip,\' says the margin) of Jordan." \n\nWe are within fifty yards of the shelving brink, a distance scarcely worth the \nmention of a return to the river. It is more likely to our imaginations that \nthe stupendou miracle \xe2\x80\x94 second only to the Ascension of the King of Glory and \nthe lifting of the celestial gates to let Him in \xe2\x80\x94 took place much further away \ntoward the interior, perhaps upon the bushy plain back there, over which horses \nand mules have forced a way through thicket and briery tangle to reach the sacred \nstream. \n\nAll visitors agree in pronouncing the Jordan a disappointment at first sight. \nIt is, to put it plainly, a mere creek \xe2\x80\x94 by actual measurement, one hundred and \nten feet wide, and seemingly not more than fifty. So delusive is the apparent \nwidth that we cannot credit the dragoman\'s respectful insistence upon his figures \nuntil the picture taken by the kodak of the thither bank shows, by the blurred \nlines, that the jungle of bulrushes and willows lining the water\'s edge is almost \nbeyond range. Nor is there anything dignified in the environing scene. A \nfringe of ragged trees, tall flags and flowering reeds is broken in front of our noon \nencampment by an open space through which we view the Moabitish shore. On \nthat side the ground rises somewhat abruptly and is more heavily wooded. Back \nof it are the mountains of Moab \xe2\x80\x94 mysterious barriers which we long hourly the \n\n(262) \n\n\n\n264 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nmore intensely to visit. In our immediate foreground, unconscious David, water- \njug in hand, has stopped to offer friendly admonition to the younger dragoman \nof a party of tourists who occupy a conspicuous position in the field of the camera, \nand are lunching among the willows. In common with many of his guild, the \nyoung fellow is exalted above measure by the circumstance that he can speak \n\nboth English and Ara- \nbic, and that the for- \neigners he has in \ncharge are at his mercy \nin the matter of topog- \nraphy and bargains. \nHe is sharply authori- \ntative in forbidding a \ngirl of fourteen and a \nboy of twelve not to \ncut canes in the bushes \nup the stream. \n\n"Don\'t go ten \nsteps away unless I \ngive you permission !" \nis the order that catches \nJamal\'s ear. \n\n4 \' I have told him \nthat he had no right to \nuse that tone in speak- \ning to any of his trav- \nelers," David answers \nour interrogations as to \nthe meaning of the \nscene. \' 1 He is young \nand \'fresh.\' In time \nhe will learn better. \nNo ! there is no real \ndanger in wandering off a little way from a party. That is, not now. In the old \ntime, robbers were hidden in the brushwood and canes." \n\nAlcides, accompanied by Serkeese, disappears among the undergrowth lower \ndown the bank, intent upon a literal seven dips in the Jordan. A lesser number \nwould not rid skin and hair from the smart and stickiness left by the Dead Sea \nbath. The men of the party under the broken willow tree, taking the children \nalong, stray off to cut walking-sticks as souvenirs of day and spot. I send one of \n\n\n\n\nPARTY OF TOURISTS ON THE JORDAN. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n265 \n\n\n\nthe rugs furnished by the more experienced dragoman to the one lady of the com- \npany under the escort of the " fresh " young Syrian, when I see her lie down \nupon the sloping turf, and double her arms under her head for a pillow. Then, \namong my cushions, I look up "Jordan " in the " Biblical Gazeteer " at the back \nof " the best Baedeker for Palestine." \n\nWhile reading of the passage of the twelve tribal representatives through the \n" dry ground" of the river-bed, each with a stone upon his shoulder, "which \nthey took out of Jor- \ndan and carried them \nover with them unto \nthe place where they \nlodged, and laid them \ndown there," finally \nat Joshua\'s command, \nM pitching them in \nGilgal," \xe2\x80\x94 the rush of \nthe muddy, crooked \nstream in the stillness \nof high noon takes on \nsolemnity to the ear \nof my spirit. I close \nthe book upon my fin- \nger and look from the \nshadow of the tent- \nhood upon the historic \ncurrent as one awak- \nened out of sleep. \nHereabouts, beyond \nthe shadow of doubt, \nthe host of Israel \ncrossed into the Prom- \nised Land. Midway \nin the stream \xe2\x80\x94 per- \nhaps upon the very \nspot on which I am \ngazing \xe2\x80\x94 the ark, up- \nborne by the white-robed priests, held back the flow from the far-off source at \nthe foot of Hermon " until all the people were passed clean over Jordan." \n\nSlowly, and as if I had never heard or seen it before \xe2\x80\x94 I reread the wonderful \n\ntale: \n\n\n\n\nUNCONSCIOUS DAVID, WATER-JUG \n\n\n\n266 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n"And as they that bear the ark were come unto Jordan, and the feet of the \n^priests that bear the ark were dipped in the brim of the water (for Jordan over- \nflowed all his banks all the time of harvest), the waters which came down from \nabove stood and rose up upon an heap very far from the city Adam, that is beside \nZaretan ; and those that came down toward the sea of the plain, even the salt sea, \nfailed and were cut off ; and the people passed over right against Jericho. \n\nMuddy, tortuous, and neither broad nor long, the Jordan has yet a certain \ndignity of its own, or so it seems to me, as I watch the swift, steady flow toward \nthe salt sea that is to swallow it up and render no account of the flood poured \n\ninto it. At this point \nit is nine or ten feet \ndeep, and, as Alcides \nreports upon his re- \nturn, icy cold. He \nhad meant to land \nupon the Moab side \nafter swimming \nacross, but hastened \nback, fearing cramp \nshould he remain too \nlong in the water. We \nare thankful for the \nchange of purpose \nupon hearing that the \nrushes of the opposite \nI border mask a most \ndeceitful and danger- \nous quagmire. The \nriver must have under- \ngone many and \nmighty changes since \nthe "this day" (B. \nC. 1427) in the which, \nwe are told, other twelve stones, \' \' set up by Joshua in the place where the \nfeet of the priests which bare the ark of the covenant stood, \' \' were known to \nbe there. They are probably there now, buried deep beneath the alluvial deposit \nof centuries. \n\nThe longer we look at the river and talk of the \' \' wonders \' \' done in and \nabout it, the more majestic it grows. There is silent eloquence in its swift prog- \ncess to the sea of death, grave, self-contained consciousness of the part it has \n\n\n\n\nOUR SHIRK \n\n\n\n"HE J( \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n267 \n\n\n\nplayed in the world\'s history, and of its importance as a type of the Dark Stream \neach must ford for himself when the word is given to " pass over Jordan." \n\nOver yonder were pitched the tattered tents of the great host, tremblingly \nexpectant of the entrance denied to their sinning fathers into the Canaan of \nprophecy and prayer. We may have in sight the place from which Joshua issued \n\n\n\n\n2 \n\n"GATHERED BY DAVID FROM THE EDGE OE THE STREAM." \n\nthe command;\xe2\x80\x94" Sanctify yourselves; for to-morrow the Lord will do wonders \namong you. \' \' \n\nThe morrow that was never to dawn for the sleeper,\xe2\x80\x94 \n\n" On Nebo\'s lonely mountain, \nOn gray Beth-poor\'s height." \n\nAgain, and from the deeps of our hearts\xe2\x80\x94" Poor Moses ! " \n\nNot far from where we are sitting, John the Baptist preached, and "there \nwent out to him Jerusalem, and all Judea, and all the region round about Jordan \nand were baptized of him in Jordan, confessing their sins." \n\nAbove our very heads the "heavens were opened, and" the Divine Man \n4t saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon Him." The \n\n\n\n268 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nexact spot cannot be designated with any degree of certainty, although since the \nfifth century after Christ, and we know not how much earlier, crowds of pilgrims \nresort yearly to the region round about Jordan to be baptized and to bathe in. \nwaters they esteem as holy. \n\nWe have left no other place \nacknowledge as, having seen our \n\n\n\nin Palestine with \nbottles of Jordan \n\n\n\nmore reluctance than we \nand of Dead Sea water \nbestowed in the bottom \nof the palankeen, and a \nbundle of walking-sticks \nand feathery grasses \ngathered by David from \nthe edge of the stream, \nstrapped upon Serkeese\'s \nluggage, we turn our \nbacks \xe2\x80\x94 probably forever \n\xe2\x80\x94 upon the scene that \nlooks so tame and is \nfraught with so much of \nsupreme and tender in- \nterest. Our little caravan \nis headed straight for a \nclump of trees marking \nthe sight of Gil gal \xe2\x80\x94 \xe2\x80\xa2 \nJoshua\'s Gilgal. The \noasis of the Jordan \ndwindles into briers and \nthorns and such coarse \nherbage as can thrive in \nthe salty soil, before we \nreach the few mounds\xe2\x80\x94 \nor rather hillocks \xe2\x80\x94 sup- \nposed to mark the site \nhouse of zaccheus. of the place where the \n\nrite of circumcision was renewed in the temporary lull of hostilities caused by the \nawe cast upon the people of the land by the news of the miraculous crossing of the \nJordan. Where, too, the children of Israel were encamped when they kept the \npassover on the fourteenth day of the month at even in the plains of Jericho. \n\n\' \' And the manna ceased on the morrow after they had eaten of the old corn of \nthe land; neither had the children of Israel manna any more, but they did eat of \nthe fruit of the land of Canaan that year." \n\n\n\n\n270 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nThere were two millions of the chosen people by now. The land to which \nthey had emigrated had need to be all aflow with milk and honey, and stored \nbeyond our power of conception as we traverse the waste places, with 4 1 butter \nof kine, and milk of sheep, with fat of lambs, and rams of the breed of Bashan, \nand goats, with the fat of kidneys of wheat, and the pure blood of the grape." \n\nWe skirt modern Jericho upon our campward way. It is a dismal collection \nof mud-huts, covered with turf and with reeds packed over with earth. A ruin \nof brick walls, unroofed and crumbling away, is pointed out as the house of \nZaccheus. Beyond is a modern hotel, insignificant in size, and mean in architec- \nture. In following the winding, muddy lanes, we have glimpses over a wall of \na garden belonging to a monastic order, wherein grow lemon, orange and citron \ntrees; the feathery foliage of the acacia-tree brushes our cheeks in the narrowest \nturnings, and we secure handfuls of the little golden tufts to be used as perfume \nin handkerchiefs and glove-cases. \n\nIt has been a long and an eventful day, and like the flash of lights from the \nwindows of home, falls upon our vision the gleam of color from the peak of white \ntents, when the muddy maze has been threaded. A breeze from the hills leading \nup to Jerusalem almost four thousand feet higher than the plain of the salt sea \nand the plain of Jericho, lifts into distinctness the crescent-and-star of the Turkish \nflag over the dining- tent, and the stars and stripes under whose dear folds we are \nto sleep to-night. \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXX. \n\n\n\nSUNDAY IN CAMP. \n\n\n\nGHE phrase "Sabbath stillness \'* borrows new meaning from the expe- \nrience of a Lord\'s day passed in a wilderness camp. The very mules \ncomprehend that nothing is expected of them, and do not offer to rise \nfrom breakfast until luncheon-time. The big leader of the palankeen \nteam lies in the shadow of the burden he is accustomed to bear six days m the \nweek in lordly forgetfulness of yesterday and carelessness of to-morrow-a sedate \npreacher to the care-taking bipeds who watch him from the tent-door. \n\nOur morning-reading has to do with Joshua and with Jericho. The city of \npalm-trees, and of roses rivaling those of Damascus in prodigality of bloom was \nstill a place of note in our Lord\'s day, and the great mound to the left of our \ncamp probably hides the ruins of one of the fortified towers from which perhaps \nas we like to think, the inhabitants, " straitly shut up because of the children of \nIsrael \xc2\xbb watched during six suspenseful days the daily circuit made by priests m \nsacerdotal robes, bearing the ark, and followed by " all the men of war." Fancy \ndwells in the perusal, upon the awful silence that prevailed among a host so vast \nthat it must have girdled the place, unless measurements made m modern times \nerr as to the extent of ancient Jericho. _ \n\n"Ye shall not shout, not make any noise with your voice, thus ran the \nleader\'s order\xe2\x80\x94 " neither shall any word proceed out of your mouth, until the day \nI bid you shout. Then, shall ye shout." . \n\n" And it came to pass on the seventh day that they arose about the dawning \nof the dav," I read aloud. \n\nThere was need of an early start and brisk work, for between that gray day- \nbreak and the going down of the sun behind the hills lifting their bald heads \nagainst the cloudless heavens to-day, the town was compassed seven times it \nwould be well on towards evening when "it came to pass when the people heard \nthe sound of the trumpet and shouted with a great shout that the wall fell down \nflat "-or, as the margin has it, "under it." That is, at the mighty roar which \nmust have reverberated from distant Nebo and shaken the waters of the salt sea. \n\nIn the sanguinary history of conquest which succeeds the tale of this mar- \nvelous siege, we come once and again upon the war-cry-" As Joshua had done \nto Jericho and her king." \n\n(271) \n\n\n\n272 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE \n\n\n\nAlcides calls a halt, by-and-by. In his opinion the Jews were never a war- \nlike people unless urged to the front, and then required divine interposition in \nevery exigency. \n\n\' \' Who of us does not ? " I interpolate here. \n\n\' \' True \xe2\x80\x94 but listen ! The surprise of Ai was planned by the Lord. When \nJoshua made a forced night-march from Gilgal, we are expressly told that " the \nLord discomfited " the five kings from Jerusalem, Hebron, Jarmuth, Lachish and \nEglon, so that they fled before Israel, and " He cast down great hailstones from \n\n\n\nthe heaven" upon them in the retreat, so that \' \' they were more that died with \nhailstones than they whom the children of Israel slew with the sword." \n\nThe young critic breaks off to observe, \xe2\x80\x94 " It makes one dizzy to think of it \nAnd how kings quarreled for the possession of this miserable stretch of waste \nland. Eglon of Moab \'possessed the city of palm-trees,\' and David\'s shorn \nambassadors took refuge here until their beards were grown, and three hundred \nand forty-five former inhabitants of Jericho were returned to the beloved oasis \nafter the captivity ; Antony thought it good enough to give to Cleopatra ; Herod \nthe Great coveted and bought it from her, fortified and built in it his favorite \n\n\n\n\n" IN LORDLY FORGFTFULNESS. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBEE- \n\n\n\n273 \n\n\n\npalace \xe2\x80\x94 where he died by the way. There was a big hippodrome here, in which \nhe ordered all the leading citizens of Jerusalem and the vicinity to be imprisoned \nwhen he knew his end was near, and left a dying injunction that the}^ should be \nmassacred as soon as the breath was out of his body \xe2\x80\x94 a Shylockian device to pro- \ncure a general mourning for the dead king. And look at Jericho now ! " \n\nThe forenoon wears on peacefully. The writing-table is brought out to the \ntent-door and \xe2\x80\x94 always in sight of Nebo \xe2\x80\x94 letters are written to the dear ones in \nthe distant home \xe2\x80\x94 all done as in a dream-world, so steeped are thought and fancy \nwith the tragic story of that dead past. \n\nWe are still dreaming as we visit what modern travelers and natives know as \nthe Sultan\'s Spring; a living fountain bubbling from the side of the mound of \n\n\n\n\nMODERN JERICHO. \n\n\n\nwhich I have spoken as covering a fortification of the Jericho destrc^ed by Joshua. \nExcavations have brought to view broken marbles and pottety, the remains of \ntemples and dwellings belonging to a long-buried era. The whole hill is a con- \nglomerate of dumping grounds of different ages, kings and conquerors having \nacted as scavengers. A bit of reddish stone picked up at random on the hillside \nproves upon inspection to be a fragment of rosso antico marble, susceptible of \nexquisite polish, and is laid away to do duty as a paper-weight, when Jericho and \nthe unreal outlying lands shall have taken their place among the other by-gones \nof this witching winter. \n\nThe Sultan\'s Spring has another name in David\'s mouth. \n18 \n\n\n\n274 THE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n" If the Captain will look at Second Kings, second chapter, from the nine- \nteenth to the twenty-second verses," he intimates as we stand above the shallow \npool, and remark upon the solidity of the masonry securing and bounding it. \n\nIt is the well-known incident of the appeal of the men of Jericho to the \nprophet tarrying in their midst, after the translation of Elijah while the sons of \nthe prophets sought vainly for his vanished friend. For, " Peradventure the \nSpirit of the Lord \nhath taken him \nup, and cast him \nupon some moun- \ntain, or into some \nvalley." \n\n"The situa- \ntion of the city is \npleasant," the Jer- \nicho people repre- \nsented, "but the \nwater is naught and \nthe ground bar- \nren." * * * "And \nhe went forth unto \nthe spring of wa- \nters, and cast the \nsalt in there and \nsaid, Thus saith \nthe Lord, I have \nhealed these wa- \nters. There shall \nnot be from thence \nanymore dearth or \nbarren land. So \nthe waters were \nhealed unto this \n\ny " This is Elisha\'s Fountain, if wise men are to be believed, \n\n^The healed waters are crystal- clear, and, led off in various directions from \nthe outlet, make green and nourishing the small gardens of herbs in the neigh- \nborhood. The sides are covered with succulent plants. All growing things \nwithin reach of it press eagerly toward the life-giving stream. \n\n\n\n\nIN THE TENT DOOR. \n\n\n\ncomments the \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OE THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n275 \n\n\n\n" It is a pity that Elisha set the she-bears upon the children so soon after a \ndeed the good of which has come down to us," regrets the reader, and I cannot \ngainsay the stricture. \n\nIn flat contradiction of a serene sunsetting, the eastern sky is a passion of \nflame-color as I draw aside the flap of my tent-door on Monday morning. \nAgainst it lie the mountains of Moab, misty purple as an August plum; waves \n\nof softest pink quiver \nup to the zenith; the \nyellow sand-hills \ncatch the reflection \nand deepen into \norange-red. In all \nthe camp no one is \nastir except John \nand the head-mule- \nteer; horses and \nm ul e s have not \naroused themselves \nfrom their Sabbath \nrest. The world en- \nclosed by the eastern \nand western ranges \nof hills is still and \ncool, and transfig- \nured by the magic \nbath of glorious \ncolor. Hastily \nthrowing on a dress- \ning-gown, I steal to \nAlcides\' door and \nsummon him to en- \njoy the sight with \nme. \n\n* It will be foul weather to-day, for the sky is \n\n\n\n\nEIJSHA\'S FOUNTAIN. \n\n\n\nPresently we repeat in unison, \nred and lowering. \' \' \n\nDavid is of like opinion for once with Pharisee and Sadducee, for he hastens \nthe preparations for departure. The cords and stakes of the dining- tent are \nloosened while we are at breakfast. When we issue from the shaking tenement, \npalankeen and horses are ready. The sunlight has not touched the lower valleys \nwhen we take the road to Jerusalem. The defiles gloom blackly between the bleak \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n277 \n\n\n\nheights; the profound stillness is even more oppressive than when we traversed \nthe same road last week. Above the sullen mists that hide the depths play broken \nrainbows; the bold brows of the distant hills are wreathed with fogs, turbans of \nwhite and gray, changing to the prismatic colors as the sun darts through a rift in \nthe gathering clouds. The mules pick their way among rolling stones, and along \nshelving paths, where the palankeen tilts crazily; David and the sheik ride mutely \nahead, heads lifted often toward the darkened sky. \n\nAlcides alights to unstrap a roll from Serkeese\'s luggage. It contains mack- \nintosh, rubber boots and helmet, and is swung now from Massoud\'s saddle. At \n\n\n\n\nPREPARATIONS FOR DEPARTURE. \n\nthe dragoman\'s suggestion, I get out m}^ own waterproof, and fasten the palankeen \nwindows. Our preparations are made none too soon. As we turn the pass \nbeyond the Khan of the Good Samaritan, the storm strikes us, sharp and sudden. \nWe have hardly time to see it rushing toward us in slant, white sheets, from a \ndozen different directions, when the road is filled with a falling volume of water, \nlike a cloud- cataract, under which the horses stagger and the mules stop for a \nblind moment. There is a steady, bitter rain in our faces all the rest of the way. \nEnveloped in waterproof, furs and rugs, I sit well back in my corner, and, but for \n\n\n\n278 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nthe spray drenching cap and veil, am unharmed. Serkeese pulls his abieh over \nhis head, and bends almost double; Alcides and David ride erect, the rain pouring \nin sheets from their glistening mackintoshes, the eyes all that is visible of their \nfaces under the visored helmets; the sheik is as impassive as a mummy. The \nforemost muleteer, at the first dash of the flood, has snatched off his heelless red \nslippers, and tucked them into the foot of the palankeen. In three minutes there \nis not a dry thread on him; in five, every wet thread is a tiny aqueduct, every \nfold of his garments a pool. The rain is at its bitterest worst when he breaks into \n\n\n\nthe earthen floor. Six or eight men huddle about a fire of thorns built in the \nmiddle of the room. They fall back at our approach, and after David has laid \nour luncheon upon a rude table at the back of the room, nobody glances in our \ndirection. It is a taciturn group. The cold and wet have taken all the spirit out \nof them, and there was never much. They part their ranks again to let a black \nwoman pass to the fire, with a baby in her arms. The blackest, forlornest baby \nI have ever beheld, the creature sits upon a stool drawn up into the very area \nof flame and smoke, and shivers piteously in a violent ague, never uttering a \nwhimper, but staring solemnly at the fire. \n\n"It will die, I think," says the mother, stolidly, to David, who replies, \n-< Indeed, I think so," with more show of concern than is manifested by her. \n\n\n\n\nsong \xe2\x80\x94 the nasal drone \nthat passes with the \nSyrian peasant for mu- \nsic \xe2\x80\x94 and keeps it up at \nscant intervals for at \nleast five miles. \n\n\n\nSERKEESE AND LUGGAGE. \n\n\n\nI seem to have lis- \ntened forever to the \ndissonant chant by the \ntime we halt for lunch- \neon at the ruined khan \nopposite the Apostle\'s \nFountain. At one end \nan arch of Roman ma- \nsonry protects the pal- \nlet and rugs laid upon \na ledge on which the \nproprietor sleeps at \nnight. The roof is of \nreeds overlaid with \nturf, and the rain drips \nthrough crevices upon \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n279 \n\n\n\nAt the parting of the ways between Bethphage and Bethany, the sheik rides \nclose to my palankeen, thrusts in a brown hand, and utters the only English word \nI am to hear from his lips: \n\n"Good-bye!" \n\n" His village is near," explains David. \n\nI have been in a deep reverie for a long hour. Thoughts of the Homeless \nMan who walked this weary road, foot-sore and heart-sore, have well-nigh supplied \n\n\n\n\nOUR HEAD MULETEER. \n\nthe place of sight. As we pass Bethany, dimly visible through the curtain of rata, \nthe solitary Figure is yet more vividly present to my imagination. \n\nIn the exaltation of spirit begotten by these musings, it is a shock when the \npalankeen swerves abruptly to the side of the road to get out of the way of a \n.carriage and three horses driven abreast, in Syrian fashion, and coming down the \n\n\n\n28o \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nhill at full speed. Before I can ask a question, the vehicle stops in mid-career, the \nhorses falling back upon their haunches, and out springs Domian, the ex-partner \nof David Jamal, his dark, handsome face full of kindly solicitude, an umbrella in \none hand, a bottle of brandy, already uncorked, in the other. In a trice we are \nbestowed among dry rugs in the interior of the coach, hot- water bottles at our feet, \nand the three horses are galloping back to town. \n\n" Mr. Gelat and I thought you should be met, madame," says the dragoman, \nand we discover, all at once, that we are drenched and chilled to the bone, and \nmust have been utterly wretched in another half-hour. \n\n" I shall have a fire kindled in my room !" I articulate between chattering \nteeth in alighting at the door of the Grand Hotel. \n\nDomian says nothing, but hurries me along corridors and across a great hall \nto my familiar quarters, throws the door open, and with the current of genial \nwarmth there streams out upon us the red glow of firelight and the fragrance of \ntired woman\'s sweet restorer, \xe2\x80\x94 a cup of hot tea. \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXI. \n\n\n\n"THINE ANCIENT PEOPLE THE JEWS." \n\n\n\n\nNDER this name I heard them prayed for every day throughout my \ninfancy and girlhood. The phraseology in which the patriarch of \nthe household remembered them at the family altar varied little in \nall those years: \n\n\n\n"We pray Thee to have mercy upon Thine ancient people the Jews, and \nbring them into Thine Everlasting Kingdom, together with the fullness of the \nGentiles. May they look upon Him whom they have pierced, and acknowledge \nHim as King of kings and Eord of lords." \n\nI am saying it over to myself on this murky afternoon, as, despite the corru- \ngated soles of my overshoes, I slip and slide upon the greasy mud of the Jewish \nquarter in the City of David. The smells are the foulest I have encount- \nered, and we stir them into aggressiveness in our passage through the damp, \nbreezeless air. It is Friday, and marketing is lively, in preparation for the \nnational Sabbath. Every huckster has put forward his choicest wares ; women , con- \nspicuous by their uncovered faces, have baskets on their arms, and haggle shrewdly \nover " green stuff," groceries and meat. Once we are shoved against a wall by a \ncrowd of both sexes gathered about an auctioneer who is selling tainted fish at a \npiastre (eight cents) a pound. The ground is wet and steep; the stones are \ntreacherous, the throng motley and unsavory, with an indescribable air of sordid- \nness evident through the squalor of the region. \n\nMy companion is Rev. Joseph Jamal, a cousin of our educated dragoman, and \nassistant rector of the English Church in Jerusalem. Under his guidance I have \nseen the various benevolent institutions established in Jerusalem by the Church \nMissionary Society which is an honor to English Christians and philanthropists. \nThe Ophthalmic Infirmary, where tens of thousands of sufferers from the fearfully \nprevalent diseases of the eye are treated annually; the Dispensary, well stocked \nand admirably managed; the Industrial School, where carpentry, printing, book- \nbinding, etc., are taught; the Hospital, fifty-five years old, which will be, erelong, \ntransferred to the fine new building now in construction outside of the walls \xe2\x80\x94 one \nand all are fraught with deep interest to her who has seen enough of the Jewish \npopulation of Palestine to appreciate the needs and the discouragements of the work \nundertaken by the splendid organization named above. Mr. Jamal\'s twenty years \nof labor in the service in the Church Missionary Society have fully qualified him \n\n(281) \n\n\n\n282 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nas an intelligent and trustworthy authority upon the subject which, during the \npast few days, has especially engrossed my time and thoughts. \n\nThreading the maze of filthy streets, we arrive presently at an archway so low \nthat my tall guide stoops low, and I have to bow my head in passing it and enter- \ning a sort of tunnel, wetter and fouler than the open street we have left, and \n\nsloping down- \nward. Another \nturn, and a \nplunge of sev- \neral steps, and \nMr. J a m a 1 \nknocks at a low, \ndingy door in a \nblank wall. It \nis opened by \nmeans of a cord \nrunning along \nthe dark pas- \nsage, and we see \nnobody until we \nare met at the \nhead of a flight \nof unclean stone \nsteps by a ker- \nvasse in dirty \nuniform, with a \nred fez upon his \nhead. He takes \nus into an apart- \nment of fair size, \nthe upper half \nraised by two \nsteps above the \nlower, and lined \non three sides \nThis is the drawing-room of the \nChief Rabbi of Jerusalem. The floor is covered with matting; a few rugs are \nscattered here and there, and two small stands are set back against the wall. \nBesides these there is no furniture. The kervasse, having taken our cards to his \nmaster, returns in four or five minutes, ushering in two old men. One, tall and \n\n\n\n\nIN THE "BOX COLONY," JERUSALEM \n\nby a cushioned divan, on which we are seated. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n283 \n\n\n\nwith traces of former dignity and comeliness, walks in advance of his companion, \nwho is his inferior in appearance and in office. Both wear dark-blue cloth gowns, \nlined and edged with coarse fur, and bands of like material trim the caps, which \nare round and flat on top. A moment later, a third man, similarly attired, enters, \nunannounced, and sits down upon the divan with the others, we facing them from \nthe other side of the room. \n\nAfter a few and ceremonious preliminary remarks, we come to the chief object \nof my call. I ask the master of the house through my interpreter if he attaches \n\n\n\n\n"A MAZE OF FII/THY STREETS." \n\n\n\nany significance to the influx in late years of the Jews from other lands into \nPalestine. Also, if he can give me an approximate idea of the number who have \nthus immigrated within ten 3^ears. \n\n" If you would know how many have come in the past sixty years, I should \nanswer that there were but one thousand Jews in Jerusalem and the vicinity in \n1833. There are thirty thousand now." \n\n1 \' How do you account for the steady increase of immigration ? Are all drawn \nby the same motive ?\' \n\n\n\n28 4 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n" The Jews come to Palestine because they love it as the land of their fathers \nand their own country. Some have come expecting the Messiah. They are \nfoolish. When He comes, He will rule the whole earth, not merely this little \ncorner of the globe." \n\n"You expect, then, His personal advent? What will preface it?" \n\n"The Great \nFight of Armaged- \ndon must come first. \nGog and Magog \nwill appear and be \no ver t hr o w n . There \nwill be a terrible \nbloody conflict of \nall nations in the \nValle}^ of Decision. \' * \n"Where there \nis not room to de- \nploy four regi- \nments !" I heard \nDr. Merrill say in- \ndignantly, last \nnight, but I forbear \nto quote the sensible \nobj ection to the \nchosen battlefield. \nI ask, instead: \n\n"Where is the \npromise of His com- \n\n\n\n\ning \n\n\n\nDo \n\n\n\nyou see \nsigns of the ap- \nproaching gathering \nof nations ?\' \' \n\n\' \' Who can say ? \n\nJewish immigrants in jerusaxem. The political horizon \n\nis dark, and may mean much. Since the prophets passed away there is no man \nwho can read the signs of the times. \' \' \n\n" Where will the Messiah first appear?" \n\n" He will descend from heaven upon Mount Safed, the highest point of Gal- \nilee. So say the holy writings." \n\n(I recall that Safed is pointed out as the "city set upon a hill " to which our \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBEE. \n\n\n\n285 \n\n\n\nXord, ever ready to illustrate His teachings by natural and present objects, may \nhave pointed in the Sermon on the Mount.) \n\n" But," I say aloud, " we are told by Zechariah that when \' the Eord shall \ngo forth and fight against those nations as when he fought in the day of battle, \nHis feet shall stand \nupon the Mount \nof Olives which is \nb e f o r e Jerusalem \non the east.\' " \n\n\' \' True. The \nMessiah will pro- \nceed from Safed to \n\xe2\x80\xa2Olivet." \n\n"I read fur- \nther that the Mount \nof Olives shall \n\' cleave in the midst \nthereof toward the \n-east and toward the \nwest, and there \nshall be a very \n.great valley, and \nhalf of the moun- \ntain shall remove \ntoward the north, \nand half of it toward \nthe south.\' Will \nthis prophecy, in \nyour opinion and \nin the opinion of \nother learned men, \nbe literally ful- \nfilled >" \n\nMy host inclines his head in grave assent. The colleague who sits next to \nhim says decidedly, "Certainly, no one has ever questioned it." \n\n\xc2\xab Where\xe2\x80\x94 may I ask\xe2\x80\x94 do you read the prophecy concerning Safed?" \n\n" In the Talmud," with the air of a disputant ending a controversy. \n\nBut I am intensely interested, and my interpreter being altogether in touch \nwith my mood and desire, conveys my meaning so faithfully that I cannot refrain \nfrom further researches. \n\n\n\n\nHIS INFERIOR IN APPEARANCE AND IN OFFICE.\' \n\n\n\n286 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n"Tell him," I say to Mr. Jamal, "that some of the most learned Rabbis in \nAmerica no longer expect a personal Messiah. They believe that the prophecies \nrelative to His coming point to the perfectibility of human nature; to an advanced \nstate of morality and subjugation of whatever is base and vicious in man\'s nature \nand conduct; to the cessation of war and crime, the elimination from body and \nmind of all that engenders sorrow, pain and death itself. \' \' \n\nFor the first time, the old man gives signs of excitement as this speech is \ntranslated to him. He crosses one leg over the other nervously; his black eyes \ngleam under the white brows; his raised hand and voice shake with agitation. \n\n\' \' No devout Jew believes such a monstrous thing ! The men who assert it \nare infidels \xe2\x80\x94 materialists. The Messiah will be a real personage, great, holy, \npowerful, perfect, and He shall reign in the Mount Zion, forever and ever." \n\nI return to a former question: \n\n4 \' When will he come ? Are there indications that the time may be near V * \n\nMy venerable interlocutor retires unequivocally into his shell of dignified and \nofficial reserve. \n\n" Who can say ? That is in GOD\'S hands \xe2\x80\x94 not in mine." \n\nIt is obvious that further catechizing would be unwelcome, and having par- \ntaken of the usual refection of sweetmeats and coffee, we exchange a few conven- \ntional compliments and part amicably. \n\nOur next visit is to a poorer Rabbi, living in a more lowly abode, but as genial \nas the former was politely-frosty. He belongs to a sect whose business is the study \nof the law, and the shabby room is surrounded with bookshelves. So far from \neluding such queries as I have put to his superior in office and worldly gear, he \ntalks enthusiastically of his belief that the Kingdom of the Messiah is near at \nhand. He holds the same view with the Chief Rabbi as to the Great Battle of \nArmageddon. \n\n\' 1 Gog and Magog are, I am inclined to think, Russia. All nations will be \nengaged in the Valley of Jehoshaphat. The right will conquer, the God of Israel \nfighting for it. A congress of nations will be held and decide to restore Palestine \nto the Jews, who will thenceforward possess it and cause the waste places to break \nforth into singing, the desert to bloom as the rose. \' \' \n\n"But there is not room in Palestine \xe2\x80\x94 or in all Syria, for that matter \xe2\x80\x94 for one- \nhalf of the Jews now alive upon the earth." \n\nHe smiles benignantly and with the calmness of his convictions: \n\n"You forget that they have never yet had all the Promised Land\xe2\x80\x94\' from the \nriver of Egypt\' \xe2\x80\x94 the Nile \xe2\x80\x94 \'unto the great river, the river Euphrates.\' The \npromise is \' ordered in all things and sure. \' The whole world will then be at \npeace; nations shall learn war no more. All will worship one only and true GOD, \nthe GOD of Israel." \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n287 \n\n\n\nI put out my hand impulsively and we shake hands cordially upon this. \n"You are a Protestant !" I declare. \n"We serve the same Lord," he answers. \n\nAfter more sweets and more coffee, served by the Rabbi\'s wife\xe2\x80\x94 a motherly \nbody\xe2\x80\x94 we are conducted by him into an amazingly small synagogue, one thousand \nyears old, entirely underground, having been built when Jews were forced to \nworship in secret. It is lighted from above by means of two grated windows, like \n\xc2\xab \' man-holes, \' \' let into the pavement. There is light enough to enable us to examine \na curious old manuscript copy of the law, over six hundred years old, brought from \nBagdad and, at my request, the Rabbi reads the lesson of the day from it, a quav- \nering intone, such as we have heard at the Wailing-place. \n\n" It is a poor place," he says, running his eye around the dank den, " and \nmust always have been very dark. \n\n" Daniel prayed in a darker," I remind him. \n\nHis eyes twinkle, good-humoredly. \n\n"And Jonah in still less desirable quarters !" is the unexpected rejoinder. \n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXII. \n\n\n\n"THE BOX COLONY." \n\nOUR excursion to-day has brought us to a muddy common outside the \nwalls of Jerusalem. Right in the centre of it sprawls the most miser- \nable village that can be imagined. Houses of unbaked clay and \nstubble, of cobble-stones held unsteadily in place by dried mud; \nboard shanties roofed and sheathed with tin cans beaten out flat and nailed on, all \none-roomed huts, built along miry alleys, hardly six feet wide\xe2\x80\x94 make up the \n\n"Box Colony" \ntenanted by immi- \ngrant Jews from all \nquarters of the \nglobe. The ground \nis loaned to them \nrent free by a \nwealthy Hebrew \nresident of Jerusa- \nlem. Most of the \nrooms are window- \nless, and every door \nstands wide open \nto admit the light \nof a short winter \nafternoon. A bun- \ndle of rags, or a \nheap of straw, does \nduty in each as a \nfamily bed; bra- \nziers of charcoal are \nkindled with thorn- \nbushes, a heap of \nwhich lies in a \n\ncentral shed. There are children ! children ! everywhere. Four of us women \nhave driven out from town as close to the settlement as a carriage can approach, \nthen walk down the clayey slope. Not far from Dr. Sandrecsky\'s hospital is a \nmeat dwelling inhabited by two American missionaries \xe2\x80\x94 ladies, by birth and \n\n(288) \n\n\n\n\n\'AI.ONG MIRY AI^I^EYS. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n289 \n\n\n\nbreeding, who, at their own charges, have devoted time and labor and life to the \nwork of ameliorating the physical ills and enlightening the souls of this Jewish \nsettlement. I have begged the favor of their escort, assured that the sight of \nthese ministers of mercy will admit and recommend me everywhere. Mrs. Jamal \naccompanies me as interpreter. \n\nOur first call in the forbidding circuit is upon a family of Aymonites, or \nArabian Jews, usually esteemed as the most devout of all the sects. Our mission- \nary friends have \nspoken warmly of \ntheir faith in God \nand the revelation \nmade in their Scrip- \ntures of Him and \nHis purposes \ntoward their race. \nAn elderly woman \nsits flat upon the \nmud floor, stitching \nat a nondescript \ngarment of many- \ncolored rags. Near \nher stands a strik- \ning figure \xe2\x80\x94 a man \nwith an Arab face \nand head-gear. His \neyes glow like live \ncoals, his manner \nof greeting us has \na gentle courtesy \n-out of keeping with \nhis patched abieh \nand bare feet. He \nholds a baby in his \narms, who clutches \nhis beard for pro- "ghhotbn.! children! everywhere." \n\ntection while staring at us. We have not talked a minute before the room \nbegins to fill with interested auditors. Every woman has a child in arms, and \npresses to the front; the few men skulk in the rear of the crowd, and peer in \n.at the door; the children fill up the chinks in the living wall. \n\nThe picture is peculiar and impressive. Near the door, Miss Dunn, of New \n19 \n\n\n\n\n2 go \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nYork, small in stature, with delicate features, dressed simply hi black, takes hi \nevery feature of the scene through grave, pitying eyes; at my side Miss Robertson, \na native Kentuckian, whose Southern intonations sound strangely and sweetly \nfamiliar to me in this far-distant land, salutes each new-comer with a smile or \nword, and when the conversation opens, hearkens with eye as with ear. Mrs. \n\nJamal, handsome \nand vivacious, ready \nwith both the lan- \nguages in which the \ncolloquy must be \ncarried on, her izzar \nfallen back from her \nhead, and the blue- \nflowered m e n d e e 1 \nlifted from her face, \nis at my other hand. \nTo the man, as a \nleader and a teacher \namong his people, \nmy queries are ad- \ndressed: \n\n" Where was \nyour home before \nyou came to Jeru- \nsalem ?" \n\n" In Arabia." \n\' \' What brought \nyou so far from it ?\' \' \n\' \' We came as \npilgrims, as Abra- \nham of old, to the \nLand of Promise. \n"something eitti<e better than beggars." Jerusalem is the \n\nCity of the Great King. Our fathers builded it. It is our city." \n\' \' How have you fared here ? \' \' \n\n"Badly enough, as you see. We left a land where we were comfortable, and \nhad enough to eat and to wear, to become something little better than beggars." \n1 \' Was that wise ? Do you not regret it ?" \n\n" Not for a moment. We bear all hardships patiently, expecting a release \nfrom captivity. Weeping may endure for a night. Joy cometh in the morning." \n\n\n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n291 \n\n\n\n" You expect the Messiah to come before long \xe2\x80\x94 perhaps?" \nA gesture of amazement. \n\n\' \' Who does not ? The Deliverer will come to Zion. We are here to wait for \nHim." \n\n\' \' When will He come ?\' \' \n\nHe spreads out his hands in Oriental (and Hebraistic) fashion. \n\n1 \' Ah ! who can tell ? We Arabians have three proverbs \xe2\x80\x94 * \' Who can tell \nwhen the rain will fall ? Who can foretell when a child will be born ? Who \nknoweth when Messiah will appear?" \n\nMrs. Jamal\'s face lights up archly; she takes a step forward and answers \nquickly: \n\n" But there are, in two of these cases, signs which we may read aright. \nWhen clouds gather, we say, The rain is at hand. When pain takes hold of a \nwoman, she knows that her hour is at hand. Do 3-011, who watch and expect, see \nno signs that the day of the Lord is at hand?" \n\n" We believe that we do. I name but one. Houses are rising within and \nupon Jeremiah\'s measuring-line \xe2\x80\x94 \'from the tower of Hananeel unto the gate of \nthe corner, and upon the Hill Gareb and compassing about to Goath.\' Have \nyou not read that \' the whole valley of the dead bodies, and of the ashes and all \nthe fields unto the brook of Kidron unto the corner of the horse-gate toward the \nEast shall be holy unto the Lord \' \xe2\x80\x94 that is, a part of the holy city ? And beyond \nthe Jaffa gate, behold houses upon houses, building, building continually. It is \nwritten that there shall be one great beautiful city stretching from Jerusalem even, \nunto Jaffa." \n\nHis air is that of an inspired seer, and he piles word upon word breathlessly. \nA low chorus of what sounds like "Amen !" arises from the listening women. \nOne kisses her baby convulsively and begins to sob. Tears are on other \ncheeks. \n\n"Ask him" \xe2\x80\x94 I request of Mrs. Jamal \xe2\x80\x94 "where he has read the prophecy \nabout the line of houses from Jerusalem to Jaffa ?\' \' \n\n\' \' In our sacred books, \' \' is the reply. 1 \' Not in the Scriptures that the lady \nknows. \' \' \n\n" Will Messiah be born as child, or as a man ?" \n\n" He will come as a King, descending from heaven, and clothed with majesty \nand, as we believe, very soon." \n\n"Will your children probably see Him?" \n\nA sudden look at the unconscious infant, who still plays with the father\'s \nmatted beard, a closer clasping of the little form, and he shows us a face from \nwhich the light of holy exaltation has faded into quiet resignation. \n\n" Who can know that ? God\'s wa}^s and God\'s times are past finding out. y> \n\n\n\n2Q2 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n\nds her wo \n\nm \n\n\n\nA woman breaks in excitedly here. Mrs. Jamal turns to listen kindly and \nanswers gently: \n\n44 She says that it must be that God will not let them cry \' How long? how \nlong ?\' forever. And that they are weary, weary, weary with waiting ! " \n\n" Will the Temple be restored in all its beauty and given to the Jews ?" is my \n\nlast question. . \n\n" Surely yes\xe2\x80\x94 for thus it is written, and God keeps His word. \nIn one of the huts a woman is dying of consumption, a huddle of rags all \nthat shields her worn body from the damp earth. The missionaries have brought \n\nher clean clothing and nourishing broth. In another is \na baby but three days old, for whom they have flannels \nand slips and petticoats. With them they leave a \nleaflet containing a hymn translated into Hebrew. \n\nA man, with long curls, and a beard cut in accord- \nance with the prohibition\xe2\x80\x94 "Ye shall not round the \ncorners of your heads, neither shalt thou mar the cor- \noners of thy beard," clothed in a rusty velveteen gab- \nardine, a tall cap, edged with a strip of mangy fur upon \nhis head, and a most disreputable bundle in his hand, \nstops to stare at us as we quit the wretched home of \nmother and child. He is to American eyes a villainous \nlooking tramp, but Miss Robertson touches me appre- \nhensively: \n\n\' \' He is one of their priests ! and will, I am sure, \nquestion the poor woman sharply as to what I said to \nher. He will certainly take the leaflet away from her, \nshould he see it." \n\nGlancing over our shoulders we see him enter the \nhovel, no doubt with the intention she has indicated. \nThe good done in this unpromising field by these devoted women is incalculable \nby any system of human statistics. Walking meekly and unobtrusively in the \nfootsteps of the Master, in sight of the hill upon which He died, they have but one \nrule of action. " Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might \nwhen the doing is to succor the oppressed, feed the hungry and minister to the \nsick. Their parish, their vineyard, their world is the scene before us; their \nrecompense will be given in the day when the Lord of those servants shall come \n\nand reckon with them. . _ \n\nThere lies open before me, as I write, a printed official report signed by Dr. \nSelah Merrill, then consul at Jerusalem, of the present condition of the Jews m \nPalestine, from which I am permitted to glean certain fact-, regretting, in con- \ndensing the story, that I have not room to copy it in full. \n\n\n\n\n"A VILLAINOUS-LOOKING \nTRAMP." \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n293 \n\n\n\nAccording to this able archaeologist and historian, in 1882-83 there was a \nsudden influx of foreign Jews into this country, so large that, as many readers \nmay recollect, the attention of the Christian world was attracted to what might be \nthe fulfilment of prophecies pointing to the literal return of the scattered tribes to \nthe former home of the race. Dr. Merrill accounts for the movement by the rail- \nroad "boom " resulting in the construction of the line from Jaffa to Jerusalem. \nMany came to look over the ground and to confirm or dissipate the belief that \nmoney could be made by the purchase and sale of real estate. Much land- \nexchanged hands during this period of excitement. Of the multitude of Israelites \nwho then visited the Holy Land, a fair proportion remained. Dr. Merrill estimates \nthe number here now at from forty-two to forty-three thousand. \n\nIn July, 1 891, the Turkish Government forbade the immigration of Russian \nJews into Palestine, and land went down one-third in price. The late consul adds \nthat the immigrants are almost entirely of the lower and poorer classes. Well-to-do \nJews prefer to live in rich towns, seeking centres of trade. As a race, they are \nnotoriously non- agricultural. Of four hundred and thirty-nine families belonging \nto the thirteen colonies of Jews established at a comparatively recent date in the \nHoly Land, two hundred and fifty-five are beneficiaries of the Rothschilds, and, \npractically, semi-paupers. Rothschild has built model lodging-houses overlooking \nthe Valley of Jehoshaphat and the Pool and Village of Siloam, and besides giving \nthem house-rent and paying water-rates and synagogue-tithes, allows each person \na fixed sum per month for maintenance. The like provisions are made with regard \nto the farm-houses erected upon tracts of arable land in various parts of Palestine, \nwhere it is alleged (although on this head I have no data from Dr. Merrill to work: \nupon) that the colonists hire the neighboring fellaheen to do the work at extremely \nlow prices, and do not themselves put the hand io the plough. \n\n" In a word "\xe2\x80\x94thus the ex-consul sums up the case\xe2\x80\x94 4 \' Palestine is not ready \nfor the Jews, and the Jews are not ready for Palestine." \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXIII. \n\n\n\nTHE CHURCH OF THE HOLY SEPULCHRE. \n\nOHB De Credo blood is in fullest flow in the veins of the woman we \nknow as Mrs. Sharpe when the Church of the Holy Sepulchre is \nspoken of. She actually wept yesterday in confiding to me the pain \nshe feels at hearing so many wise and good people express doubts as \nto the authenticity of the Church\'s traditions with regard to it. \n\n"As I said to-day to my doctor, some regard should be paid to what the \nchurch has held for all these centuries. It is bewildering to listen to his talk of \nthe improbability of this and the impossibility of that having happened there. \nWhat do / care about the discovery of a new old wall of the city, which proves \nthat the crucifixion could not have taken place where the saints of all ages have \nbelieved that it did ? And think what a crash to the faith of Catholic and Greek \nChristians if the public should come to doubt all the lovely things we are told \nwhile in the darling old Church ! The free-thinking of this so-called Christian \nage is enough to curdle the blood in a pious heart. For my part, I agree with dear \nold Bishop Cheeseman, who urges how much better it is to cling to what is sanc- \ntioned by the belief of centuries than to lend ear to a theory not yet fifty years old. \nAs to archaeology and explorations and excavations and such modern innovations, \nI have no patience with them. They are so many forms of unbelief \xe2\x80\x94 downright \nSadduceeism, I call them." \n\nThe ill-matched pair, have by now, ceased to amuse us, and with inward \ngroanings of spirit we see the approach of the husband while we are standing over \nthe flat stone let into the quadrangle just without the entrance of the church. \nThe symbol known as " the Jerusalem Cross," said to have been used as the badge \nof the Crusaders by the order of Godfrey of Bouillon, is cut deep into the gray \nslab; all that was mortal of the gallant warrior, made by the decree of his peers, \nKing of Jerusalem, lies under it. We have our own and especial reasons for \nreverencing the memory of the Christian hero, reasons that have drawn us to the \nplace more strongly than churchly legends, and we are disposed to stiffen up at \nthe prospective intrusion upon our musings. \n\nTo our surprise, the usually rampant doubter touches his clerical broad brim \nin respectful silence, and stands beside us, looking down upon stone and sunken \ncross, until I am moved to address him: \n\n" I hope that Mrs. Sharpe is well to-day?" \n\n(294) \n\n\n\n(295) \n\n\n\n296 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n" Quite well, thank you," still with the gentle gravity that is to us uncharac- \nteristic. ( \' She is in there " \xe2\x80\x94 ducking his red head sideways at the church \xe2\x80\x94 and, \nafter a pause \xe2\x80\x94 " Praying in the \' Chapel of the Finding of the Cross.\' " \n\nIt is an awkward moment, no suitable comment occurring to either of the \nauditors. He resumes, presently, as gently as before: \n\n\' \' I need not say that all the monkish superstitions that bring large revenues \nto this church are indescribably abhorrent to me. But having expressed this, and \nmore than once, to my excellent wife, and failing to bring her to my way of \nthinking, I cannot pursue the subject. I can ridicule old wives\' fables touching \nAbraham, Isaac and Jacob, Peter, James and John. Perhaps I lose my temper \nwhen the fable is too grotesque. When the subject thus touched has to do with \nthe death and burial of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ" \xe2\x80\x94 uncovering his \nhead in pronouncing the words \xe2\x80\x94 " I am dumb. Either the imposture is too \nblasphemous to be dealt with by human speech, or the faith of those who believe \nthis to be the scene of the events I have referred to is too holy to be spoken of \nlightly. When Mrs. Sharpe told me of her desire to spend an hour in devotion \nin the chapel below, I raised no objection. I simply answered, \' Very well, my \ndear. You will find me outside when you are ready.\' I more than suspect " \xe2\x80\x94 a \nqueer carroty flush mantling the Scotch cheek-bones \xe2\x80\x94 " that the sweet soul is \nnow engaged in prayer that my eyes may be opened to see the truth, as it is \napparent to her. \' \' \n\nWith a deepening of respect for a good, if testy, man, and more real liking \nthan we had imagined we could ever feel for him in any circumstances, we enter \nthe ancient edifice. \n\nThose indefatigable church-builders, the Crusaders, remodeled it in the \ntwelfth century, but there was a sanctuary of some kind here in the fourth, a \nchurch raised by Constantine in commemoration of the discovery of his mother \nHelena of what she assumed was the True Cross. As the house in which believers \nhave worshiped for almost fifteen hundred years, it merits reverential mention. \nWe try to keep this in mind and the lesson learned from the usually hypercritical \ndivine just now, as we are arrested every few paces to note this or that holy \nplace. \n\nThe stone upon which the Saviour\'s body lay when anointed for the tomb is \nnear the spot where the Maries stood while men performed the last, sad office, and \nfurther away, right under the immense dome of the church, is the so-called Holy \nSepulchre. The chapel covering it is tawdry with red marble, gilding and poor \npaintings. Ever-burning lamps swing from cornice and pillar. We slip off our \nrubber shoes before we are permitted to enter, lest common soil be carried into the \nsacred place. In the ante-room to the sepulchre we are shown a rough stone, \nsaid to be a piece of that rolled from the door of the tomb by the angels; the place \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE EIBLK. \n\n\n\n297 \n\n\n\nwhere they stood at the disciples\' visit is also pointed out. Stooping low, we pass \ninto a small recess \xe2\x80\x94 it cannot be called a room \xe2\x80\x94 all ablaze with red, yellow and \ngreen lights. There must be between forty and fifty of these lamps, with shades \n\n\xe2\x96\xa0 \n\n\n\n\nCHURCH OF HOI/ \n\n\n\nIE, COURT-YARD AND ENTRANCE, SHOWING TOMB OF \nGODFREY OF BOUIEEON. \n\n\n\nof different colors, illumining a marble altar, six feet long, three wide, and two \nhigh, set out with the customary altar- furniture, gold vessels, artificial flowers and \nlace- trimmed altar-cloths. \n\n\n\n\' ; . . - " ^ \' . ,,,, i|Pj \n\ni - \xe2\x80\x94 \n\n(298) INTERIOR OF CHURCH OF HOLY SEPULCHRE, JERUSALEM. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n299 \n\n\n\n"This," pronounces David in subdued accents, "is said by tradition to be \nthe tomb of Christ, our Lord." \n\nWe linger before it for a respectful minute, and at our movement to retire he \n\xe2\x80\xa2continues in the same key, " You will please back out !" \n\nHis innocent employment of the undignified phrase does not provoke a smile \nbut it heightens the incongruity of which we have been disagreeably conscious \nfrom the instant of our entrance into the chapel. The necessity of stooping \nas we retreat backwards, and the dragoman\'s care of my head lest I should \nstrike it against the top of the low doorway, are a further strain upon the grave \ndecorum we would maintain out of respect to the name, if not the fact of the \nholy spot. \n\nOutside the Chapel of the Angels we are stopped to look at the " Fire-hole." \nPerhaps we have heard of it before, but as we listen now the singular tale seems \nnew and incredible on the verge of the twentieth century. A part of the Easter \nceremonies of the Greek Church, four hundred years ago \xe2\x80\x94 how much earlier we \ndo not know \xe2\x80\x94 was the descent of a dove upon the Chapel of the Holy Sepulchre, \n.after which the patriarch, waiting in the chamber of the tomb and invisible to the \ncrowd without, passed a lighted torch through the fire-hole to a priest on the \nother side. His first care was to light a candle to be sent by a swift horseman to the \nChurch in Bethlehem, and then the multitude pressed upon him, every one with a \ntaper to be ignited at the sacred torch. \n\n"And this is really done still !" we ejaculate. \n\n\' \' The dove does not appear, but the holy fire descends at the Greek Easter, \nevery year." \n\n"And people still believe that the fire comes down from heaven ?" \n\nAn English-speaking monk, in passing, catches the words. \n\n"And why not ?\' \' he interrogates drily, rather than fiercely. "All things are \npossible with God." \n\nDiscussion in the circumstances would be the height of indiscretion. Again \ntaking a hint from Dr. Sharpe\'s latest lesson, we pass on toward the stairs con- \nducting to the subterranean Chapel of St. Helena. On the way, our notice is \ncalled to a dumpy column rising from the marble pavement. I say " column " \nfor want of a fitter word, but it looks more like a raised register or radiator than \na monument, and is said to cover the exact centre of the earth. \n\n" Reference is made by those who believe this to Ezekiel, fifth chapter and \nfifth verse" (David is conscientiously prudent here). "\'This is Jerusalem; I \nhave set it in the midst of the nations and the countries that are round about \nher.\' " \n\n" That says nothing of this particular spot. There was nothing here then, \nto designate it, that we have ever heard of." \n\n\n\n\nTHE (ALLEGED) TOMB OF CHRIST IN CHURCH OF HOLY SEPULCHRE. \n\n(300) \n\n\n\n1 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. 3\xc2\xa9i \n\n"Quite so, sir. This is also believed to mark the hole out of which the \nAlmighty took the earth for making Adam." \n\n\' \' What do you think of that story ? " \nIn my opinion, Adam was never here, sir; but I am not a scholar." \n\nAlcides, bold in the spirit of advanced Young America, does "not take much \nStock in Constantine. He was probably a charlatan in religion, as in statecraft. \nIf he ever had the vision of the Cross in the sky and the motto, l In hoc vinces,\' \nhe turned it cleverly to his own account,\' \' etc. \n\nI hearken to the fulmination, seated upon a narrow marble bench let into the \nwall near the top of the steps leading to the Chapel of the Findings of the Cross.. \nBy leaning upon the sill of a small square window at a con- \nvenient distance above the bench I can look down into a dim \ncellar, like a tank, badly lighted by two candles set upon what \nI presently make out to be an altar. Somewhere down there \nMrs. Sharpe is kneeling and wrestling in prayer for her hus- \nband\'s soul. Here, if we heed tradition, sat the aged Empress \nHelena in the year 326 A. D., and watched the excavations \ngoing on at her order, in quest of the True Cross. She had \ndreamed before setting out upon her pilgrimage to Jerusalem, \nwhere this precious relic would be found. \n\nI interrupt the recital here : \n\n" She could hardly have sat upon this bench and looked \nthrough this window, for they are a part of the church which \nwas built to commemorate \' the Invention \'\xe2\x80\x94in ecclesiastical \nphraseology\xe2\x80\x94\' of this very Cross.\' " \n\n\xe2\x96\xa0 1 Invention isn\'t bad in the connection ! \' \' Alcides slips \nin an " aside." \n\nThe narration proceeds. Three crosses were dug out of \nthe hole down into which I am gazing, and the Empress, the A MEANBR FIGURE> \nshrewd mother of a shrewder son, bethought herself of a test * . \nthat should reveal the right relic. A Christian woman of rank lay on her death- \nbed in Jerusalem. The three exhumed crosses were borne into her room, and \nby touching one of them she was healed. This is the one and only ground, so \nfar as we have been able to discover, for the belief that the Church of the Holy \nSepulchre rises above the place of crucifixion, burial and ascension of our Lord, \nunless we are to admit the evidence of a church historian of that day who ascribes \nthe building of the church to Constantine, who had of himself discovered the site \n\nof the Sepulchre. . . \n\nWhen we consider the improbability that the crosses upon which three Jew- \nish peasants, criminals in the eye of the Roman authorities, would be preserved \n\n\n\n\n302 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nin any way after they had served their ignominious end ; the greater improba- \nbility that they were buried near the sepulchre of the Nazarene ; when we take \ninto account the three centuries during which they thus lay concealed from the \nknowledge of mankind, and then, the manner of the disinterment, one grows \nthoughtful and distrustful. The students of God\'s Word, who in trying to identify \nany locality in or near Jerusalem with the scene of our Lord\'s crucifixion " without \n\nthe gate," have \nmore than one dis- \ncrepancy to confirm \nthem in the belief \nthat this venerable \nchurch does not \ncover the spot. \n\nVespers are \nsinging or intoning \nin the Chapel of St. \nHelena while we \nloiter in this corner. \nMuch visiting of \nchurches has ac- \ncustomed our \nsenses, and not un- \npleasantly, to the \nthrobbing echoes \nawakened in aisle \nand dome by re- \nsponsive chanting \nand the organ ac- \ncompaniment. We \nrather like the \n\nsmell of good incense, and the aesthetic sense is gratified by the " dim religious \nlight \' \' produced by the blending of lamp-rays and the faint daylight that finds \nits way through the stained glass windows. \n\nJust at present we are in no mood for enjoying aesthetic effects. Even Mrs. \nSharpe, as Miss De Credo, must have supped her fill of superstition and churchly \ntradition in her frequent visits to the sanctuary reared by the Crusaders. They \nbelieved, to the bloody death, in the authenticity of the story that makes the \ngorgeous altar in the low-ceiled chamber over yonder the tomb from which our \nLord arose upon that first Easter morning. From the depths of aching hearts we \nwish that we could credit it, and \xe2\x80\x94 say one-tenth of \xe2\x80\x94 the other tales poured into \n\n\n\n\nTHERE ARE A GREAT MANY OF THEM. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nour ears with volubility acquired by continual practice. We look the sacristan \nwho has us in tow steadfastly in the eyes for sign of faltering or embarrassment, \nas he runs off legend after legend as an auctioneer extols his wares. \n\nGolgotha has three chapels attached to it, each erected by a different sect of \nChristians. It is even harder to believe in than in the sepulchre, and is yet more \neffectually disguised by precious metals and marbles. The square opening above \nthe socket in the rock in which the foot of the Cross is reputed to have been sunk, \nis lined and bound with silver. Scarcely six feet away, is what looks like a ven- \ntilator of open brass-work that\xe2\x80\x94 upon payment of a fee\xe2\x80\x94 is slid aside to show a \n\n\n\n\n- - -- - - * Vft \n\nA beggar\'s noon siesta. \n\nfissure in a rock, said to have been made by the earthquake that rent the veil of \nthe temple during the crucifixion. In close succession are exhibited with busi- \nness-like promptness the spot where Mary Magdalene fell upon her knees, ex- \nclaiming " Rabboni ! " the grave of Joseph of Arimathea ; the prison in which \nour Lord was detained until the Sanhedrim could be collected ; the tomb of Nico- \ndemus, and of James the brother of John and son of Zebedee, who was killed by \nthe sword in Herod\'s persecution of the early church ; the Pillar of Scourging; \nthe place where the Roman soldiery parted the raiment among them, casting lots \nfor the vesture ; the boughs in which the ram was entangled as a substitute for \n\n\n\n304 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nIsaac, and the altar on which Abraham would have sacrificed his son ; the tomb \n-of Adam in whose dust we are told the Cross was set up \xe2\x80\x94 and so many other \nnotable places that I have not the heart to transcribe a list which could not but \ndisgust the sensible reader, and pain the devout. \n\nWe are driven, whether we will or not, to recollect at every new exhibition, \nDr. Sharpe\'s allusion to the revenue drawn from this marvelous \xe2\x80\x94 I had almost \nwritten monstrous \xe2\x80\x94 collection of sacred curios, and to wonder, only, at the \n\neconomic instinct \nthat has gathered \nso many under the \none domed roof of \nthe Holy Sepulchre. \nNor is it possible, \nbeing human, and \nreaders of the Bible, \nthat we should fail \nto remind ourselves \nand one another, in \nconnection with the \nvenders of rosaries, \ncharms and photo- \ngraphs without the \nchurch, and of paint- \ned candles within ; \nof the riot raised by \nthe craftsmen of \nEphesus when the \ntrade in silver \nshrines for Diana \nwas threatened by \n" 1 DON \' T SEK WHY NOT -" Paul\'s preaching. \n\nThe ablest scholars who have studied and written upon sacred history, agree \nin declaring that this cannot be the true Calvary ; that the site of the Church of \nthe Holy Sepulchre never was within the city walls, and corresponds in no par- \nticular with the description of the holy spot given by the Evangelists. The fact \nwill never be admitted by those whose interest it is to encourage pilgrimages to \nthe Mecca of Christendom. \n\nIt is like a breath of purer, honester air when David again takes us in hand \nand conducts us into a side- room to see the sword and Jerusalem cross-badge worn \nby Godfrey of Bouillon. They are kept in a locked coffer and shown, upon the \n\n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n305 \n\n\n\npayment of a trifling sum, to the sacristan. The Syrian dragoman lifts the great \nweapon carefully, and lays it in Alcides\'s hand with : \n\n\' \' There, sir, is the sword of your favorite hero. He must have been a great \nman in more ways than one, if he used that in battle." \n\nThe badge is several inches long, and both it and the sword are evidently ex- \ntremely old. Our interest in them being merely a matter of hero-worship, we \ndo not tread upon, to \nus, debatable ground \nin choosing to be- \nlieve them genuine \nrelics of the stout- \nhearted, stainless \nknight of St. John. \n\nAt the head of \nthe steps leading into \nthe dismal Chapel of \nthe Invention of the \nCross, sits an old \nman with a noble \nhead and a white \nbeard, such as we \nsee in pictures of \nAbraham. He is \nturbaned, and wears \nthe brown-and-white \nabieh of the fella- \nheen. He raises his \nface at sound of our \nfootsteps, and we see \nthat he is blind. \n\n\' 1 For the love of God and for holy charity ! : \ntin cup. \n\n\' \' A professional beggar, \' \' I remark. \' \' He might be King Lear, or Belisarius, \nor Homer. Get his story, if you can, \xe2\x80\x94 please?" \n\nHe tells it readily, but not officiously. According to it he is a farmer from \nOphrah. \n\n"If the Captain will look up 1 Samuel, xiii. 17, when he gets back to the \nhotel," murmurs David aside and parenthetically. \n\nWhile on a visit to Jerusalem twelve years ago, he went to sleep one night, \nwell, and, awakening next morning could not open his eyes, " for a great swelling \n\n\n\n\nWAYSIDE BEGGARS. \n\n\n\nhe quavers, holding out a \n\n\n\n3 o6 THE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\nwhich made his head so large "\xe2\x80\x94describing an area about it with his hand. He \nwent to a physician who put something into his eyes that burned like fire, or boil- \ning water, and from that time he has been totally blind, unable to tell day from \nnight. A blind man cannot work in the fields or tend cattle, or thresh grain, so \nhe came to this city and makes a living by begging. He has children who give \nhim a home where he may sleep at night\xe2\x80\x94 but they are poor\xe2\x80\x94 very poor\xe2\x80\x94 and he \nwill not be a burden to them. Being a Christian, he is allowed to sit here and ask \nalms of those who come to pray, or to see the church. Sometimes, in the season \nof visitors or at Christmas and Easter, he makes as much as four piastres a day \n(fifteen cents of our money), sometimes he makes but two piastres, sometimes but \nhalf a piastre,\xe2\x80\x94 sometimes but eight paras\xe2\x80\x94 (the lowest in value of Syrian coins, \nbeing many times less than a cent). \n\nDavid is still translating when Mrs. Sharpe comes up the steps, rising oddly \nout of the darkness, first, her white face, then her hands, becoming visible against \nthe black background and her black dress. She stops to listen, and we see that \nher eyes are large with tears, her face pure and solemn, for all the babyish round- \nness and softness it will never outgrow. \n\n"And what do you think, then, of a heavenly Father who lets you go to bed \nhungry ?" she interpolates as the last pitiful sum is named. \n\n"I go to sleep and trust Him for to-morrow," the man makes answer in \nsimplicity that sounds sincere. \n\n"Tell him that is right," Mrs. Sharpe instructed David\xe2\x80\x94" and never, never \nto doubt Him. Tell him too ; how sorry / am that he must sit here all day long in \nthe darkness and where it.is so damp, and ask him to pray for me to-night." \n\nShe has dropped two francs into the tin cup, and hurries away to avoid his \nthanks. \n\n"I believe that is a good woman," utters David, peering into the cup where \nthe silver shines bright upon a layer of copper coins. Then, to the beggar \xe2\x80\x94 \n" You have there two francs. When you buy your supper, see that you do not \npass them off for pennies. And don\'t forget to pray for the lady." \n\nA second beggar sits at the head of still another staircase, and here, too, the \nsunshine never falls. He is a meaner figure than that we have just left, but is made \npicturesque by a pretty little girl, not more than eight years of age, who leans \nagainst his knee and regards us with big, solemnly pathetic eyes. They have been \nhere all day and come every day in the week, the child leading him from his home \noutside of the city walls to his place upon the steps about eleven o\'clock in the \nday, few tourists visiting the church before that hour. The child looks like a \nplant that has grown in a cellar, pale and slight to fragility, so poor of blood that \nshe shivers all over now and then, under her thin cotton gown. Her brown feet \nare bare, and her paleness is made more striking by a black shawl worn over her \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. 307 \n\nhead. Her father was blinded by a sunstroke while working in the fields before \nshe was born, and has no business but beggary. \n\n" I have been told that every professional beggar in Jerusalem would be cared \nfor by the convents and other religious organizations if he would let them \nhelp him," I say to David when we are out of the church and climbing Chris- \ntian Street. \n\n"There are a great many of them, madam, and as they must be supported by \ncharity, having no work to do, and knowing no trade of any sort, they are freer \nto come and go when they beg for themselves from anybody who happens along, \nthan if they had to obey rules and accommodate themselves to certain hours, and \nall that. To them, their way of living is as respectable as to ask alms of a \nreligious society. They may be wrong, but that is the way they feel about it." \n\nThe idea is novel\xe2\x80\x94 and there may be something in it\xe2\x80\x94 in Jerusalem. The \npoverty of means and of resources prevailing among the lower classes here is patent \nand pitiable. The afternoon is fine and cold, and we walk from one side of the \ncity to the other before returning to the hotel\xe2\x80\x94 not an arduous undertaking, \nthe entire circumference of the walls being less than three miles. We are hurry- \ning somewhat, in order to get back in season for dinner when, for the second \ntime to-day, we encounter Dr. and Mrs. Sharpe. Whereas we were glad of the \nopportunity afforded by a former meeting to modify a harsh judgment, we wish \nnow that we had taken another turning of the narrow thoroughfare in which \nwe find them. For the husband\'s hair bristles pugnaciously, and the wife has \non her most amiably -obstinate expression. \n\n" I don\'t see why not, doctor dear," we hear in nearing them, "What more \nnatural than that He might have pointed to that very stone in speaking the words, \nand devout men would be sure to treasure it piously afterward." \n\n\' \' Of all the sacrilegious enormities,\xe2\x80\x94\' \' splutters her spouse, and we quicken our \nspeed to get out of hearing. \n\nThe cause of dispute is known to us, having been designated by Dr. Merrill in \none of our earlier walks about Jerusalem. It is a time-stained stone built into the \nwall of a filthy cross-street, a round, common-looking fragment, with a hole in it, \nan aperture enlarged and discolored by the kisses of devotees. The relic is \nbelieved by others besides Mrs. Sharpe to be " the stone that would have cried \nout," had "the whole multitude of the disciples rejoicing and praising God with a \nloud voice," have held their peace in the Master\'s triumphal progress into the City. \n\nThat the appeal of the Pharisees to Him to silence the acclamations, and the \nLord\'s reply are plainly said to have been spoken at the descent of the Mount of \nOlives, avails nothing with those who make the word of God of none effect \nthrough their traditions. \n\nCan human effrontery and the credulity of superstition go further than this? \n\n\n\n\n(3o8) \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXIV. \n\n\n\nTO MAR SABA. \n\nOHE palankeen has been made ready instead of a horse, for my use in \nthe journey from Jerusalem to Mar Saba, said to be the oldest convent \nin the world. I acquiesce the more willingly in the arrangement that \nthe memory of a succession of \' \' Jerusalem ponies \' \' does not incline \nme toward the experiment of undertaking a long ride upon what I heard an Eng- \nlishman describe in a Christmas talk in Bishop Gobat\'s school on Mount Zion, as \n"that most unhasty beast, the ass." I do not take kindly to the donke3 T nor, to \njudge from his behavior when honored by bearing my weight, does he to me. \n\nWise David demurs when a horse, a slow and amiable creature and gentle of \nmotion, is proposed. The way is steep and rough, he represents, and much time \nwould be lost by a certain traveler\'s habit of alighting to walk up or down par- \nticularly dizzy heights. The mules and donkeys are as sure-footed as cats from \nlong training, and madame has faith in her muleteers. Madame, growing indo- \nlent, and maybe a trifle weary in nearing the end of her many and varied journey- \nings, seconds the motion. \n\nWe leave the Jaffa gate at noon of a lovely day that has in it a promise \nof spring to the bare earth. Already pale purple and bright yellow blossoms \nshow bare heads above the withered turf on sunny terraces, and in sheltered nooks \nlooking southward. As we wind below the bluffs beyond Siloam, built up with, \nthe mean huts of the leper settlement, we see upon the right, the Potter\'s Field, \nor Aceldama, in which, it is said, Judas hanged himself. A tree that must be \nnearly, if not quite, fifty years of age, is pointed out as that which refused to bear \nthe traitor\'s weight. By now, we have learned to laugh at such solemn absurdi- \nties, and, a more difficult undertaking, not to let a manifest impossibility blind us \nto what may be true and what is altogether reasonable. \n\nA little further on we meet a party of a dozen women laden with enormous \nbundles of the dried furze or low thorny growth which serves them for kindling \nwood, and is, in mild weather, the only fuel used by many of the poorer peasantry. \nThey resemble nothing else so much as ants plodding along under burdens many \ntimes larger than their own bodies, but this company is unusually merry, talking, \nlaughing and shouting gayly to each other as they take the side of the road to \ngive us the middle. One is really very pretty, bright-eyed, plump and light of \nfoot, although she carries, besides her great bunch of prickly stuff, a baby slung" \n\n(309) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OE THE BIBEE. \n\n\n\nbetween her shoulders in such a bag as we bought from " Martha of Bethany." \nShe does not stoop under the load, and glances laughingly in at the window of the \npalankeen from the stony bank that brings her face on a level with mine, calling \nout something, to which David replies good-humoredly. \n\n"What did she say to me? " I inquire in natural curiosity. \n"That you are blessed among women," is the translation given to me, but \npresently Massoud appears at my side, and Alcides supplies the rest of the young \nmother\'s salutation. \n\n" She asked if you wouldn\'t get down and give her a ride. Human nature \n\non one side of the world \ndoesn\'t differ much \nfrom human nature on \nthe other/ \' \n\nI comfort myself \nby the belief that the \nbrown beauty\'s chal- \nlenge was mere banter. \nThe tone was too \ncheery, and her smile \ntoo free for envy. \n\nThe route is all \nnew to us, and after \npassing the fields out- \nlying the city of Jeru- \nsalem, we decide that \nwe have seen no more \ndesolate and forbid- \nding country. Except \nfor a few scattered \npatches of vegetables \ncultivated in the close \nneighborhood of what \nare water- courses for a few months of the year, and an occasional olive-grove, \nalso in the low grounds, not a glimpse of green blesses eyes pained by dwelling \nupon gray rocks and livid hillsides. Eor a while, our course lies in the pebbly \nbed of the Brook Kidron, now as dry as dust, and glaringly white. Then \nwe begin to climb by a narrow, twisting path, where the horses walk in single file \nand the palankeen, scraping naked rocks upon one side, overlooks, upon the other, \nsheer precipices from fifty to two hundred feet deep. Eooking forward, I am \noften bewildered to guess where, amid the heaps of stones and the criss-crossing \n\n\n\n\nHER PEOPLE. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OE THE BIBLE. 3" \n\nof projections that seem to close up the route, my faithful mules can make their \nway, but they do not slip once, even when their small, nimble hoofs displace \nloose pebbles and larger stones, and send them clattering into lower ravines. \n\nThere is so little to amuse me and we pass so few notable points, (" places" \nthere are none) that I fall to watching a woman with a mass of something green \nupon her head, walking on the hillside in a straight line in the same direction \nwith ourselves. As the route she holds with something of the crow\'s instinct in \ndetermining the shortest distance between two given places, brings her near \nenough for me to see her more plainly, I perceive that she wears a dark blue cot- \nton tunic, reaching to her ankles, which, like Maud Muller\'s, are " bare and \nbrown " as well as her feet. The tunic, or underdress, has wide flowing sleeves; \nover it is a long sleeveless jacket of red woolen stuff; an embroidered and fringed \nveil, once white, now dirty, drapes her head, and one end is bound about her \nburden which is composed of the refuse leaves of cabbage and cauliflower. With- \nout casting a look at our party, she holds on her way, never quickening or slack- \nening her fleet walk, down hills and across torrent beds, springing from crag to \ncrag like a chamois, until I see her near a gap in a ledge hardly wide enough, \napparently, to afford a foothold to a mountain-goat. The shelf of rock follows the \nface of a bare granite shoulder of the mountain towering above us until the whole \nvalley is darkened by the shadow. The gap has been made by a rush of winter \nrain, or by a landslide, and looks to be about four feet wide. As the girl ap- \nproaches it, she puts up one hand to steady the load upon her head, and, without \nstay or falter, leaps across, landing erect upon the farther side, then passes on as \nfleetly as before. We have never seen another woman walk so gracefully and \nfast, and call upon David to find out who she is and upon what errand she is \n\nbound. . . \n\nThe dragoman gallops forward and intercepts her where his practised eye has \nseen that she must keep our path for a while, and we see them talking together for \na hundred yards or so, the girl actually lessening her speed to keep back with Der- \nvish\'s walk. Next, both have stopped to wait for Serkeese who is trotting along \nin the gravelly " bottom," atop of hampers and luncheon-tent. When palankeen \nand Massoud come up with them, the woman is still walking beside the mounted \ndragoman, devouring a loaf of bread drawn from Serkeese\'s stores, as incurious \nand impassive as ever. David falls back to my side and narrates: \n\nThe young woman went to Jerusalem this morning to buy some cloth m the \nname of her tribe, only to be refused credit by the merchant to whom she was sent. \nShe had no money to buy food, and picked up the refuse greens m the market- \nplace. Breakfastless and luncheonless, she set her face homeward and has now \nwalked more than fifteen miles since daybreak. While he speaks, she looks back \nto wave her hand, and disappears around a hill. From the parting of our ways, \n\n\n\n312 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nwe, by-and-by, see her swiftly climbing the long breast of the hill, near the sum- \nmit of which is a cluster of black tents, with moving figures before them. \n\n" I hope she will not get a beating from her people for her bad luck in not \nbuying the cloth," says David, solicitously\xe2\x80\x94 and when we admire her strength \nand staying power \xe2\x80\x94 " oh, she is used to walking all day, and to fasting." \n\nWilder and gloomier grows the way, but now we are in a veritable road, \nwinding up and along the heights, a low parapet of loosely-laid stones guarding \n\n\n\n\n"THE ANCIENT EDIFICE." \n\nit upon the outer edge. The sun still sleeps upon the heads of the gray and red- \ndish mountains, but in the depths of the defiles night is settling. This is the \nwilderness in which John the Baptist spent his novitiate, these are the deserts in \nwhich he "grew and waxed strong in spirit, till the day of his showing unto \nIsrael. \' \' \n\n" And the same John had his raiment of camel\'s hair, and a leathern girdle \nabout his loins, and his meat was locusts and wild honey." \n\nThe rude figure thus portrayed harmonizes perfectly with the naked gorges \nwhere not a leaf of herbage or blade of grass clings to sides honey-combed with \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\ncaves. These natural dens and grottos were, before the forerunner of our Lord \nsought their awful solitudes, the resort of fanatics and world-weary hermits. In \nthe early ages of the Christian church, literally thousands of refugees from perse- \ncution, and men sickened out by the corruptions of society, fled to the \' \' Wilderness \nof Judea," and dug cells in the cliffs in which to hide themselves for prayer and \nsacred meditations and fastings innumerable. About 460 A. D., the leading \nspirit of the strange colony, a Greek hermit by the name of Sabas, established at \nthe head of the gorge the monastery that bears his name. In time, repeated \n\n\n\n\nTOWER OF JUSTINIAN AT MAR SABA. \n\n\n\nattacks from predatory bands, and, early in the seventh century, a terrible invasion \nof the Persians in which 3000 monks and anchorites are said to have been massa- \ncred\xe2\x80\x94made it necessary to fortify the retreat, and it became almost impregnable. \n\nThe sun is near the horizon as we gain a plateau behind the ancient edifice \nwhich hangs dizzily over the "Valley of Fire," four hundred feet below the \nfoundations laid in the solid rock. We do not ask for admittance. By an inviol- \nable law of the establishment, no woman can pass the outermost gate, and, while, \n\n\n\n3H \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nin a detached tower, removed by some fifty feet from the forbidden precincts, \nshelter and food would be given me upon application, I prefer the luxurious inde \npendence of our camp. The evening is cloudless and bland, and the moon in her \nsecond quarter lights up the tall tower erected by Justinian, the grim walls and the \nbelfry, from which the hours chime out sweet and startlingly clear in the rarefied \nair. Seated, as usual, in the tent-door, we hearken to stories of the stringent \nausterities practiced by the holy brotherhood. They eat no meat, and are allowed \none egg apiece on Sunday, black bread, vegetables, a scanty allowance of fruit \nand sour wine forming their diet the year around. There are seven services in \nthe twenty-four hours, the first long before daylight, and, the vows once taken, \nthe monks seldom quit the convent upon any errand. \n\nYet the loftiest mountain of the range separating them from the world of \nactive labor is believed to be the Hill of the Scapegoat, down which the hapless \nanimal, bearing upon his head the iniquities of the people, was thrown yearly by \nthe hand of the " fit man " who had led him into the wilderness. \n\nI think of the ceremony and its significance as, awakened in the dense dark- \nness of a winter morning at four o\'clock by the vibrant call of the bells to prayer, \nI put out my hand for the extra blanket laid across the foot of my bed, and, nest- \nling down in the warm comfortableness of my nest, picture the shivering monks \nkneeling for two long hours upon the stone floor intoning prayers to Him who, \nlike as a Father pitieth His children, and has given them all things richly to \nenjoy. \n\n\n\n\n(315) \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXV. \n\n\n\nAT MAR SABA. \n\nGHKRE is a profundity of silence that hinders sleep. I have never appre- \nciated the fact more sensibly than in the early hours of the new day \nwe greet from the bald mountain-top on which our camp is pitched \nat Mar Saba. The world is in a dead swoon. From the time the \nbells chime out for the first service, until I hear the shuffle of the muleteers\' bare \nfeet upon the rock as they feed their animals, and the subdued clatter of pan and \n\n\n\n\n"in silenck as suixbn." \n\n\n\ndish in the kitchen-tent testify that John is getting ready to feed us, the beating \nof my own heart is absolutely the only sound I hear. \n\nWe have finished breakfast before we have any tokens that there are other \nliving things besides ourselves in the vast solitude. Then the interruption is \n\n(3i6) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n3i7 \n\n\n\nsudden and peculiar. Alcides is filling his fountain-pen, and I am unscrewing \nmine to see if it also needs attention, when right between us fly two birds, tied \ntogether by a leash that, getting entangled about Alcides\'s legs, checks their flight. \nAround the corner of the nearest tent conies David in pursuit, and at his heels \nthe more deliberate figure of a Bedouin, who looks on in apparent unconcern \nwhile the pretty \ncreatures \xe2\x80\x94 a spe- \ncies of orange- \nand-black grackle \nunfamiliar to us \n\xe2\x80\x94 are captured. \n\nDavid has had \n-an order from \nLord Somebody, \nan English or \nScotch nobleman, \nwho is a zealous \nornithologist, for \nfive hundred of \nthese birds. As \nthey are to be \nf o u n d nowhere \nexcept in this \nneighborhood, \nand about the \nsouthern shores \nof the Dead Sea, \nit is necessary to \ndepute a native \nof the region to \nprocure them, and \nour Bedouin \nfriend has the \ncommission. \n\n\' \' He is a great \n\ncheat," subjoins the dragoman. "He wants me to pay him four shillings the \npair, when he has snared them without difficulty in the valley down there at the \nbottom of the pass ! They are very tame, for the monks feed them there three \ntimes a day. He is a rascal who has no conscience whatever." \n\nWhile he grumbles, the birds, held tenderly between his stout hands, have \n\n\n\n\nHEW) TENDERI/Y BETWEEN HIS STRONG HANDS.\' \n\n\n\n3i8 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nfastened upon his thumbs with all the strength of their little beaks. The feeding; \nof them within the convent walls is one of the few human enjoyments vouchsafed \nto the brothers of Mar Saba. Other wild things \xe2\x80\x94 jackals, foxes and wolves \xe2\x80\x94 \nmake friends with the recluses and have their stated times of feeding, regulated \xe2\x80\x94 \nas we are told, and it is possible with truth \xe2\x80\x94 by the chiming of the bells as they \nmark the hours of service. One\'s heart contracts with an odd physical pain in \n\nhearing of this \nphase of the \nstarved, narrowed, \nbelittling round of \nexistence decreed by \nthe leaders of these \nmen\'s souls. \n\nThe current of \ncompassion is some- \nwhat changed by \nthe appearance of \na holy brother in \nthe costume of the \norder who leaves \nthe pale of sanctity, \nbearing to the pale- \nfaced strangers, not \nthe blessing and \ngo o d-w ill of the \ncommunity, but ro- \nsaries, wooden forks \nand spoons, charms, \nwalking-sticks and \nother traps for the \ncoin of unwary \nthe rock, and in silence \ncheat \' \' has drawn forth \n\n\n\n\n\nSOME OF OUR VISITORS AT MAR SABA. \n\n\n\nheretics. He spreads his wares in sullen silence upon \nas sullen, stands looking down at them. The Bedouin \' \na long pipe from the folds of his abieh and smokes in tranquil contentment, \nsure of getting at least one-third of what he has asked for the half-domesticated \ngrackles; his bare-legged son gapes at the display of " curios " I am turning over \nwith uncovetous fingers, while the kodak gets the picture of a dark-visaged, bad- \neyed fellow whom one would not choose to meet in one of the lonely ravines \nintersecting the Valley of Fire. In fact, as the dragoman informs us, this famous- \nmonastery is in our degenerate day a sort of penal settlement for monastic \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. 3*9 \n\nculprits. A member of the present fraternity is a notorious murderer from Port \nSaid, his residence here being equivalent to imprisonment for life. Our merchant \nmakes no more effort to sell his wares than if he were a young saleslady, brave m \nfrizzettes and rhinestoues, behind the counter of a New York emporium. If \nwe want anything, we can take it; if not, leave it. His sulkmess increases \nrather than diminishes at David\'s courteous petition to be allowed, upon payment \nof a gratuity, to conduct Alcides into the convent. Gathering up his wares, the \n\n\n\n\nconvent seen from the table rock. \nbrother restores them to his basket and stalks on ahead of ns to the little table- \nland under the walls of the detached tower where I am to be left. \n\n" If he is a specimen article, I do not envy you your visit," I say philosophy \ncally to the favored pair, and settle myself for half an hour with my note-book \n\nA folded rug makes the rock passably comfortable as a seat; the air is still \nand bracing, the sunshine delightful. I have written fast and satisfactorily for \nperhaps twenty minutes when a shadow strikes the page, and I raise my eyes. \nTwo women, one middle-aged, one young, both clad in the dark blue gowns and \nveils of the Bedouins, have arisen as out of the rock, and are staring placidly at \nBehind the older woman a boy of five, or thereabouts, is peeping around her \n\n\n\nme. \n\n\n\n320 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nskirts. To test their mood and manners, I write on in serious disregard of their \npresence. The mother sinks to the ground and watches my fingers and pen, \nintent and mute. The girl lifts my glove and veil from the rock where I have \nlaid them and examines them closely, and as I give no sign of noticing her occu- \npation, goes on to finger the trimming upon my skirt, calling her mother\'s atten- \ntion to it in childish glee, then passing her fingers lightly up the cloth of the \ngarment until she reaches my sleeves, picks at the braiding to see if it will come \noff. The whole proceeding is as inoffensive as if she were a baby, but I do object \nwhen she lays the tip of her finger upon my pen. At my gesture of disapproval \nthe mother chides the meddler sharply, and pointing to the convent, evidently \n\n\n\n\nGRACKI/ES FEEDING IN COURT-YARD OF CONVENT. \n\ntells her that I am writing of, or drawing it. Thenceforward, two pairs of won- \ndering eyes follow the flowing ink, looking from the page to the building and back \nagain until the exhibition is too much for my gravity. I sheathe the pen, close \nthe book and laugh outright in their faces. After a slight start of surprise, they \njoin in the merriment and fall to asking questions, not one of which I comprehend. \n\nI wear upon the front of my corsage a brilliant carnation, brought from Jeru- \nsalem, and presently drop it into the girl\'s hand. She exclaims with delight, \nsmells it, shows it proudly to her mother and finally hides it carefully in the \nbosom of her gown. Whatever glory of blossoming spring may bring to these \nsad-colored wilds, it is plain that a flower in winter is a phenomenon to the untutored \ndaughter of the desert. She would be pretty but for the blue tattooing disfiguring \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nher face. A line of polka spots runs clear across her forehead; another row defines \nthe lower lip and three are "powdered " irregularly upon one cheek; a tattooed \nbracelet of Grecian pattern encircles each wrist and a square of the same design \nis upon the back of her right hand. Seeing me look at them, she laughs, pulls a \nlong, cruel-looking needle from the front of her mother\'s gown, and goes on to \nshow me how the \nmarks have been \nmade, and that her \nmother is the artist. \nWhen I shrink and \nsignify that the op- \nera t i o n must be \npainful and disa- \ngreeable, she laughs \nagain \xe2\x80\x94 the infant- \nine gurgle one \nnever hears in our \ncountry from a child \nover ten years old \n\xe2\x80\x94 and pulls up her \nloose sleeve to dis- \nplay a more elabor- \nate pattern sprawl- \ning all the way to \nher elbow, the up- \nper part still raw \nfrom the needle. \n\nTwo ragged \n\xe2\x80\xa2children have joined \nthe group, and their \ninquisitive forefin- \ngers are unpleas- \nantly familiar with \n\nmy dress and portfolio. Twice the mother, at my appeal, boxes their ears, but \nwithout outcry or any sign that the blow is unwelcome, they return to the charge \nuntil I get up, collect my belongings and walk to the edge of the table-rock almost \noverhanging the courtyard of the monastery. Two black-robed friars are pacing \na short balcony in the sunshine like bears in a cage; in the stillness I can hear \nthe whirr and whiz of a hundred pairs of wings. The grackles are feeding upon \nthe crumbs and grains flung from the front of the convent into the defile, and \nstrewed upon the pavement of the inner courts. \n\n\n\n\n\'arrested upon the haef-step. \n\n\n\n322 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nI have not shaken off my juvenile tormentors. One tugs at my skirt, another \nlifts the flap of the writing-case in my hand, a third, the biggest and dirtiest of \nthe trio, and who rejoices in the only pair of shoes in the party (which, by the \nway, remind us of the Gibeonites\' stratagem of "old shoes, and clouted, upon \ntheir feet ") pushes impudently to the front and demands " baksheesh." At this \nopportune moment I espy David and Alcides in the convoy of a lay brother > \ndescending an outer flight of stairs in going from one wing of the building to \nanother, and call cheerily to them. The dragoman takes in the situation at a glance \nand shouts out something to my besetting neighbors that frees me from annoyance. \nThey fall into the background and remain there until the return of my escort. \n\nThe girl, who must be about sixteen, withdraws modestly, putting a corner \nof her coarse linen veil over her mouth at sight of two men, one young and pale- \nskinned. As I am determined to get a picture of her, all David\'s tact is brought \ninto play to distract her attention and her mother\'s suspicion from the tell-tale \nkodak while this end is secured. She is actually in flight, arrested upon the half- \nstep by the dragoman\'s call \xe2\x80\x94 an untamed creature as timid and wild as one of the \nhares we frightened out of a hollow yesterday. Her brothers and father are easily \npersuaded to stand for their portraits, but we see her no more, until we drop \ndown, as it were, upon a group of black tents from a steep ridge two hours later, \nand recognize her as the centre of a knot of attentive listeners, enchained by the \nnarrative of her morning \' \' outing. \' \' \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXVI. \n\n\n\nHEBRON. \n\nI MADE me great works; I builded me houses; I planted me vineyards; I \nmade me gardens and parks, and I planted trees in them of all kinds of \nfruits; I made me pools of water to water therewith the wood that \nbringeth forth trees. \' \' \nSo writes the Royal Preacher in the preface to the cry of \' \' Vanity of vanities ! \nall is vanity !" \n\n\' \' So I was great, and increased more than all that were before me in Jerusa- \nlem,\' \' was no unfounded boast. \n\nThe king who projected Solomon\'s Pools on the road to Hebron was so many \ngenerations in advance of his predecessors that, reasoning after the manner of \nmen, we think that he might have excepted this gigantic enterprise from the sweep- \ning condemnation passed upon the rest of his \' \' great works. " The three immense \ntanks, to visit which we have left the direct road to Hebron, are lined with hewn \nstone, and in the opinion of wiser critics than my unlearned self, were constructed \nby Solomon\'s workmen to lead the living waters of adjacent springs to his pleasure- \ngardens, the " orchards of pomegranates, with pleasant fruits, cypress with spike- \nnard and saffron, calamus and cinnamon with all trees of frankincense, myrrh and \naloes, with all the chief spices." \n\nThe enumeration is plainly incongruous with the ruined reservoirs and the \nsereness of the surrounding fields at this season. The air "nips shrewdly," \ndespite our heavy furs and the clear shining of the sun. Midway between the- \nhighway \xe2\x80\x94 the finest in the length and breadth of Palestine \xe2\x80\x94 and the Pools, is the \n" sealed fountain " of Canticles, a square building covering the source of the \nwaters led by an underground aqueduct to the lower reservoir. Close to the walls \nenclosing the great cisterns is another small building, with a domed roof, erected \nabove a second well, reached b}^ six or eight steps. The water is very cold, the \nsteps are wet; it makes one shiver to look down into the dark cavity; but half a \ndozen women are passing down to fill water-skins, and then lugging them up. A \nwater-skin or bottle is the whole hide of a goat tanned inside and out, sewed up \nlengthwise, and filled through the throat at the well. It is carried by means of \ntwo cords tied about the front and back feet, then passed across the forehead of the \nbearer, a fold of her veil keeping the rope from cutting into the skin. As the skin \nis always of a goat three-quarters or full-grown, some idea may be formed of the \n\n(323) \n\n\n\n324 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OE THE BIBEE. \n\n\n\nweight of the burden. Two of the women with whom we speak at this well live \na mile away, a third at Bethlehem, more than twice as far. \n\nWe have regained the road when we catch sight of a man ploughing with a \ncamel, the first instance of the kind that has come within our observation. The \nslight wooden plough and the undersized man contrast grotesquely with the un- \nwieldy brute, but the incident leads us to note the increasing fertility of the \ncountry. The grapes of Hebron are noted for size and flavor and clothe the \nupper terraces of the hillsides. Eower terraces are clothed with fruit trees, the \n\n\n\n\n"sealed fountain. " \n\n\n\nfig and mulberry being the most abundant. There is a proportionate improve- \nment in the looks of the husbandman. They are better clad, more alert in move- \nment and really work as if a motive lay back of action. Women are busy in the \nfields, pulling up dried furze by the roots ; donkeys, laden out of sight except for \ntheir ambling legs and the tips of their noses, are met in droves ; camels, hitch- \ning their clumsy bulk along under moving groves of a stouter shrub that perfume \nthe air as they brush us in passing ; bearded Moslems with white turbans coiled \nabout shaven heads, and (as we never fail to think, in contemplating the close fit \nof the head-gear) the few valuable papers they possess in the world snugly stowed \naway between the inner and outer linings of the turban, \xe2\x80\x94 are indices of thrift and \na fair degree of prosperity. \n\n\n\n326 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nOur guide points to a level stretch a mile away from the road, and we cease \nto note or consider anything modern. \n\n" Mamre ! " he utters, "and with this glass you can make out the old oak, \nthe only tree of the kind in many miles. " \n\nNot the oak, of course, although we talked last week in Jerusalem with a \nman who argued earnestly for the possibility of the existence, through thousands \n\n| \xe2\x80\x94 \xe2\x80\x94 \xe2\x80\x94 \xe2\x80\x94 rrm of years, of the tree \n\nunder which Abra- \nham \' \' dwelt in the \nplain of Mamre and \nbuilt there an altar \nunto the Lord." \nBut we gaze in the \ndirection indicated \nwith intense and de- \nvout interest. From \nthat plain or plateau \nAbram sallied forth, \nat the head of three \nhundred and eight- \neen servants born in \nhis house, to over- \ntake and defeat the \nkings who had taken \ncaptive his brother\'s \nson ; there he had \nthe vision of the \nsmoking furnace and \nburning lamp pass- \ning between the \n\' \' pieces \' \' laid in or- \nder for the sacrifice, \nand received the ex- \nwomen carrying water-skins at Solomon\'s poors. ceeding great and \n\nprecious promise of the son to be born of his old age ; there, from the home \nwhere life had grown intolerable, Hagar fled into the wilderness to be sent back \nby the Divine command; there, \'\'the Lord appeared unto Abraham in the \nplains of Mamre, as he sat in the tent-door in the heat of the day," and upon the \nnext day from the elevated table-land, the anxious patriarch looked toward \nSodom and Gomorrah to see \' \' that the smoke of the country went up as the \n\n\n\n\n328 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBI.E. \n\n\n\nsmoke of a furnace." The cave purchased from the children of Heth as a bury, \ning-place where the dead wife could be buried out of the husband\'s sight, was in \n"the field of Machpelah before Mamre. The same is Hebron in the \'land of \nCanaan." \n\nBesides the Prince of Wales, his sons, and their attendants, including Dean \nStanley, but five or six people, not Moslems, have ever been admitted to the in- \nterior of the Mosque of Abraham. Gen. Eew Wallace, by special permit from \nthe Sultan, obtained this privilege, and took with him several particular friends \n\n\n\n\nMAN PLOUGHING WITH CAMEI,. \n\nof his own, among them Dr. Selah Merrill, then resident in Jerusalem. Their \nreport was of six mock tombs of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, Sarah, Rebekah and \nLeah, each wife lying opposite her husband in the sealed crypt below. Beyond \nthese, the mosque contains little to interest Jew or Christian. \' \' Father Abraham\' \' \noccupies an exalted place among saints revered by the Moslems, and the jealous \nhatred of the Jews, never absent from the creed and feelings of the worshiper of \nMohammed, is at fever-heat in Hebron. Nowhere else in the Holy Eand, or out \nof it, are they regarded with such intolerant suspicion as in the ancient city in \nwhich David reigned over Judah seven years and six months. Hence, the \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n329 \n\n\n\napproach of an Israelite to the tomb of the patriarchs is even more abhorrent to \n"believers " than that of the " Christian dog." On our way to the Mosque we \nsee certain money-changers of the despised race, sitting in the bazar, and learn \nhow cunning is their revenge upon the masters who would drive them clean out \nof the land if it were possible. Traders and usurers everywhere, they grow rich \nin the neighborhood of Abraham\'s tomb by becoming money-lenders and pawn- \nbrokers to the poorer citizens, and especially to the farming peasantry. One, in \nwhose physiognomy the characteristic facial features are conspicuous, is examining \na set of silver ornaments belonging to a farmer\'s wife, her husband standing \nanxious by her side. \n\n"He will lend her one-tenth of what they are worth," says David, "with \nthe certainty that she can never redeem them. Or, he will buy them, out and \nout, at one-fifth of their value. I know his reputation. He has no mercy, and \nindeed it is not strange that he should be hard with these people who despise and \ninsult him. \' \' \n\nA flight of broad, low steps conducts the faithful from the street to the main \nentrance of the mosque. Beyond the fifth step none but a Moslem may go upon \npenalty of death. We ascend to the forbidden line and look defiantly up, then \naver that there is nothing within the walls worth our seeing, and enact the King \nof France\'s celebrated retrograde movement, stopping on the way "down again \nto peer into a deep crevice between two of the old stones of the wall, into which, \nunder the easy tolerance of the present government, the descendants of Abraham \nmay, when they like, thrust their arms at full length to drop written petitions to \ntheir great ancestor. This is the Hebron Wailing Place and their nearest ap- \nproach to the tomb. The ceremony must be some sort of sad satisfaction to \nthem in their disreputable homelessness in a land once deeded to them by the \nJudge of the whole earth, for we are told that many avail themselves of the poor \nright. \n\nA wall of comparatively modern masonry shuts in the mosque from profane \neyes. By mounting a heap of rubbish across the street we can see the quadran- \ngular building reared above the cave of Machpelah. The gray walls are of the \ngreat stones we have learned to recognize as belonging to the Phoenician period, \nand identical in finish with those in the base of David\'s Tower in Jerusalem. \nThe Crusaders consecrated and used the mosque as a church. A writer of the \nperiod during which it was occupied by the Christian invaders describes the cave \nas divided into three chambers, the last containing the six tombs of which I have \nspoken. He relates, also, that it was the habit of Jews to bring thither in tubs or \nboxes the bones of their dead to be laid near the sepulchres of the patriarchs. \nThe desire to sleep with one\'s fathers and the custom of the survivors of carrying \nout the wish were even then extremely ancient. Witness the oath exacted by \n\n\n\n33o \n\n\n\nthe; home of the bible. \n\n\n\nJoseph from the children of Israel that they would carry his bones out of Egypt \nwith them, a promise kept two hundred years afterward. \n\nA narrow alley leading to the mosque is alleged by tradition to be the scene \nof the murder of Abner by Joab, when " he took him aside in the gate to speak \nwith him quietly and smote him there under the fifth rib that he died. \' \' Assassina- \ntion so dastardly that every reader sympathizes in the bitter outbreak of the nomi- \ninal king then reigning in Hebron; "These men, the sons of Zeruiah, be too \nhard for me!" \n\nOur next halt is at the "pool of Hebron." It is a large shallow tank, occu- \npying about half as much space as a modern city block of average size, and sur- \n\n\n\n\nrounded by a wall of solid masonry. The water is stagnant, and coated with \ngreen scum, but women are coming down the steps at one corner with skins to be \nfilled. The water, such at is, is shallow, leaving exposed above it, some twenty \nfeet of wall. We try to guess whereabouts were nailed the feet and hands of \nRechab and Baanah his brother, the sons of Rimmon the Beerothite, who, after \nkilling the sleeping Ishbosheth, " took his head and gat them away through the \nplain all night and brought the head of Ishbosheth unto David to Hebron." \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n331 \n\n\n\nInstead of the expected reward, they were put to death and their hands and feet \nhung over this pool as a terror to other evil-doers. \n\nOur luncheon is spread in the house of the only missionaries in Hebron, Mr. \nand Mrs. Murray. They are, moreover, the cnly Christians in the home of \nAbraham and David, with the exception of an English family resident in the \nhospital lately erected here by the Church - Missionary Society. Mr. and Mrs. \nMurray are under the care of no one denomination or society, and lead the \nsimplest, happiest "life of faith" it has ever been my privilege to behold. In \n\xe2\x80\xa2one room is collected a class of twenty -two little Moslem girls, who are instructed \nin knitting, sewing and reading by Mrs. Murray and her Bible-reader. I sit down \n\xe2\x80\xa2among them and make friends with the well-behaved pretty little creatures, by \n" turning off " a garter, and hemming a few inches of a ruffle. The school began \n-with two children and not one dollar. More than twenty are now in regular \nattendance, and daily means have come with daily strength for daily needs. And \n-even in bigoted Hebron the Master has given this pair of trusting laborers great \nfavor in the eyes of the people. \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXVII. \n\n\n\n\nTHE THRESHING FLOOR OF ORNAN. \n\nE are so fortunate as to have in our first visit to Mount \nMoriah the guidance of Rev. Selah Merrill, D. D., LL. D., \nwhose long consulate in Jerusalem and ability as archaeolo- \ngist and historian have qualified him beyond any other living \nman for the office of cicerone to the Holy City and the \nenvirons thereof. Our little party is preceded by Mohammed, \nthe "kervasse" of the American consul, a personage so \nmuch more magnificent than his nominal master as to deserve, or demand, espe- \ncial mention. From top to toe he is official. The embroidered vest; the loose \nsleeves stiff with gold lace; the jauntily-ferocious tilt of the red fez capping his \nsix feet of altitude, the wand of office in his right hand (something that suggests \nin equal measure the < \' hunting-crop \' \' of an English squire and the \' \' caduceus \nof Mercury), go to make up the imposing presence stalking down David Street, \nthen turning into side- ways lined with stuffy bazaars. \n\nHe takes and keeps, the middle of the narrow thoroughfare leading into the \nheart of the city from the open space before the Grand Hotel. At ten o\'clock on \nthis fine winter morning all the world is abroad. The heavy rains have washed \nthe steep street almost clean. We see more distinctly than during previous walks \nthat it is paved with square stones, and, instead of being graded m the ordinary \nway drops to the lower level every ten feet or so, in a marble step six inches deep. \nOf course no wheeled vehicle can be used upon it, but donkeys, laden with human \nand inanimate freight, amble up and down the miniature precipices; camels lower \ntheir clumsy hulks, one foot at a time, and climb as if each step were an outrage \nto the inner brute. Barefoot boys belabor the donkeys\' unyielding flanks; tur- \nbaned men tug and drive the larger craft of the desert. \n\nMohammed, the Magnificent, goes neither around nor over anything. Lome \nwhat may, and go what can, he holds the right of way in the centre of the street. \nUnder the temperate rule of the representative of a Republic, he forbears to strike \nman or beast. Everything makes way for the party of pale-faces, and nobody \neyes us curiously or stops to stare at us. \n\nWithout the enclosure of what were of old the Temple grounds, and which is \nnow the wall defending the precincts of the Mosque of Omar, we pause while \nMohammed, running briskly forward, disappears into the barracks and presently \nemerges with two uniformed soldiers. Prior to the visit of the Prince of Wales \n\n(333) \n\n\n\n334 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nand his tutor-guardian, Dean Stanley, to the Holy Land, no Christian was suffered \nto pass the limits of the Temple area. To-day, Jew and Gentile may visit even \nthe interior of the Mosque, but under the surveillance of a Turkish soldier. The \nbrace of warriors detailed to attend us clank close at our heels throughout the \nthree hours we spend upon holy ground, and we are cautioned not to speak of \n\nTurkey by name, or \nto comment even in \nEnglish upon the \npeculiar stringency \nof existing govern- \nmental laws and or- \nders. \n\nAll this matters- \nlittle to visitors whose \nthoughts are sur- \ncharged with the as- \nsociations aroused by \nthe fact that our feet \nactually stand within \nthe gates of the Sa- \ncred Place. The space \nenclosed by the walls \nof the Mosque is \nnearly identical with \nthat occupied by the \nancient Temple \ngrounds. It is, for \nthe most part, paved \nwith slabs of white \nstone. \n\n\' \' This was the \nCourt of the Gen- \ntiles, \' \' says our guide \nmohammed thk magnieiceni\xc2\xbb. and instructor, and \n\nwhen we have crossed it and gone up a step or two \xe2\x80\x94 "And this the Court of the \nWomen." \n\nOlive and acacia and karob trees grow luxuriantly in patches of unpaved soil. \nMohammed breaks off and offers us green sprays to take away as souvenirs of \nplace and hour. \n\nSuch goodly trees may have been in David\'s mind when he cried out in pro- \nphetic transport: "lam like a green olive-tree in the House of God !" \n\n\n\n\n\nif \n\n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBEE. \n\n\n\n337 \n\n\n\nWe loiter a little in the rear of the small company of Gentile strangers, to \nreproduce in imagination the throngs that filled the area while the Royal Preacher \nbowed himself in prayer with hands spread forth to heaven upon the brazen \nscaffold he had reared in the sight of all the congregation of Israel. \nO Eord God of Israel ! \nthere is no God like \nThee in the heaven, \nnor in the earth !" \n\nThe mighty plateau, \nbuilt up, filled in and \nleveled by the Wise \nKing, overlooks val- \nleys and hills in all \ndirections. Solomon\'s \nPorch, glorious in \nwhite- and-gold, f o r - \nmerly crowned the hill \non the eastern side. \n\n"And Jesus walked \nin the Temple, in Solo- \nmon\'s Porch." \n\nHere the lame man \nclung in a rapture of \njoy and gratitude to \nPeter and John until a \ncrowd collected about \nthe three, "greatly \nwondering." \n\nThe tower on the \nnorthwest corner of \n\n. MOSQUK OF OMAR. \n\nthe enclosed area occu- \npies the site of the tower of Antonia, from which the Roman chief captain ran down \nwith centurions and soldiers to rescue Paul from the infuriated Jews. This, as the \nreaders of Josephus will recall, was the last citadel held by the Jews m the final \nsiege of Jerusalem. The Mosque of Omar, although inferior in dimensions to the \nTemple, is exceedingly beautiful without and within. I well recollect with what \navidity I used to read travelers\' stories of the mysterious interior to which none but \nthe Moslem faith could penetrate, and how more than one curious pilgrim lost his \nlife in the attempt to explore it in disguise. The gorgeous environment of tiles, \nmosaics, wrought marbles and stained glass detains us but a few minutes m our \n\n22 \n\n\n\n\n\n0^8) THE TOWER OF ANTONIA, JERUSALEM. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n339 \n\n\n\nhurried passage to what would be called in music and poetry the "motif" of the \nsuperb structure. The hoary brow of Mount Moriah breaks through the tessel- \nlated pavement directly under the noble dome. A richly- wrought railing sur- \nrounds it. I thrust a reverent hand through an interstice and let it lie upon the \nrough surface, deaf to the voluble prattle of the trio of sacristans who insist upon \npointing out the clumsy imitation of the imprint of a man\'s hand graven in the \ngranite. It is a big, ungainly hand-print, and, according to Moslem tradition, \n\n\n\n\nJUDGMENT-SEAT OF SOLOMON. \n\n\n\nwas left there by the angel Gabriel. To clear this story out of the way, let me \nsay that Mohammed is fabled to have ascended to heaven from this rock, which \nstarted with him, and was held back by the angel. \n\n" Eet the fellows tell it to you," advises Dr. Merrill. " I always do this. It \nis the best way of ridding oneself of them. They cannot go on telling the same \nstory for all time, even in the hope of 1 baksheesh.\' " \n\nThe tale repeated with an infinity of gesticulation and gibberish, the doctor \nkindly engages the chatterers in conversation in their own tongue, and we come \nback to the bare rock over which twelve hundred years agone, Caliph-Ab-el-Melek \n\n\n\n________ \n\n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n341 \n\n\n\nbuilt a Mosque. Inwardly we are grateful for the legend that has led to the jealous \npreservation, without coating of marble or inlaying of fine gold, of the naked top \nof the hallowed mountain. Beyond reasonable doubt, it was upon this rock that \nAbraham \' \' built an altar, and laid the wood in order, and bound Isaac, his son, \nand laid him upon the altar upon the wood." \n\nNo student of sacred history and archaeology disputes the assertion that the \nawful apparition of \' \' the angel of the Lord standing between the earth and heaven, \n\n\n\n\nOF THE TEMPLE. \n\n\n\nhaving a drawn sword in his hand stretched out over Jerusalem, \' \' seemed to David\'s \nlifted eyes to hover above this, the threshing-floor of Oman, the Jebusite. \n\n\' \' So David bought the threshing-floor and the oxen for fifty shekels of silver. \nAnd David built there an altar unto the Lord and offered burnt-offerings and peace- \nofferings." \n\nThe great altar of Solomon\'s Temple succeeded that erected by his father. A \nChristian church was reared here by the Crusaders, and for nearly two hundred \nyears, European kings, before assuming their crowns, laid them, in solemn dedi- \ncation, upon this rock. It is fifty-six feet long by forty-two wide. Dr. Merrill \nshows us a round hole about the size of a man\'s body in the heart of the huge \n\n\n\n\n(SO-CAIXFD) STABILES OF SOLOMON IN TEMPLE ANA. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n343 \n\n\n\nstone, believed by competent judges to be the aperture by which the blood of \nvictims slain in sacrifice flowed into escape pipes. A cave or crypt beneath the \ntipper stone is floored with marble, and a circular space, corresponding with the \nupper opening, gives back a hollow reverberation when struck. Could this be \nlifted, the vast " leader " flooded daily with the typical purple tide\xe2\x80\x94 \n\nThe blood of beasts \nOn Jewish altars slain, \n\ncould, probably, be followed to the valley a hundred feet below. One intrepid \nexplorer, many years ago, by the help of huge bribes, obtained permission from the \nguardians of the place to lift the marble cover and lower himself by ropes into the \nvery bowels of the mountain. At the last moment, superstitious fears overcame \navarice, and the permission was revoked. The Mohammedans say that the hole \nis the mouth of hell and that evil spirits would arise in a great cloud should the \nsealing marble be removed. \n\nDirected by Dr. Merrill, we make out the location, beyond the central rock \nand railing, of the Holy of Holies. The space once filled by ark and cherubim is \nsmall. No devout Jew will enter the mosque, lest he should inadvertently tread \nupon the hallowed spot which it was not lawful for any man to visit save the high \npriest, and he but once a year. \n\nIn leaving the grounds, one of the party leaps up lightly to snatch for me a \nbit of hyssop growing in a cleft of the stones, quoting of the King-philosopher: \n\n\' \' And he spake of trees, from the cedar-tree that is in Lebanon even unto the \nhyssop that springeth out of the wall." \n\nThe traditional site of Pilate\'s Judgment-Hall is hard by the Temple enclosure. \nThe howls of our Lord\'s enemies must have echoed through the midnight silence \nof the courts to which the tribes had that day repaired with "joys unknown " to \ncelebrate the Passover-feast. \n\n\n\n\n(344) \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXVIII. \n\n\n\n"THE GREEN HILL FAR AWAY." \n\nIT is Sunday morning and without communicating our intention to anyone \nexcept our dragoman we have left the hotel directly after breakfast, ac- \ncompanied by him have passed out of the city through the Jaffa gate and, \nskirting the walls as far as the Damascus Gate, diverged there from the \nhighway to climb this gentle eminence. The top and one side are studded with \nmany flat and a few upright tomb-stones. For uncounted generations the Mos- \nlems have buried their dead here, and thus protected it from the encroachment o\xc2\xa3 \n\n\n\n\n" GOLGOTHA." \n\n\n\nbuildings for the use of the living. Across the road rises the north wall of Jeru- \nsalem, founded upon and built into the solid rock. The ancient capital of Israel \nwas "\'a city that had foundations." In the native granite upbearing the massive \nmasonry is a rude door, closed to-day and locked, leading into Solomon\'s Quarries> \n\n(345) \n\n\n\n346 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nWe explored them, yesterday, marveling to see "what manner of stones" were \nleft there by workmen who hewed out and squared the material for the temple \n\' \' so that there was neither hammer nor axe, nor any tool of iron heard in the \nhouse while it was in building. \' \' Big blocks, still as white as chalk, because never \nexposed to air and light, bear the mark of chisel and wedge. When the quarry \nwas first opened many years ago, bones of men and also of animals, and frag- \nments of pottery were found in out-of-the-way corners. These last were probably \n\n\n\n\n"THE GREEN HILE FAR AWAY." \n\n\n\nleft there by workmen, while the human remains may have been those of fugitives \nfrom the law or from persecution forced to hide in forgotten dens. \n\nDiagonally opposite the quarry yawns a natural cave, known familiarly as the \nu Grotto of Jeremiah," from a tradition that the prophet lived here while writing \nhis Lamentations. I name it now because it, and another wide mouth in the \nupright rock, form the eyes in the " skull," which is considered by some to assist \nin the identification of this hill with Golgotha. By the help of imagination any- \nbody can make out the eyes, the line of the nose, and the mouth. Some think it \nmarvelous and attach great importance to the fantastic likeness. Others find in \nthe round top of the hill warrant for calling it " the place of a skull. \' \' Thoughtful \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE, \n\n\n\n347 \n\n\n\narchaeologists set aside these features of the spot, whether natural or artificial, as \nunnecessary in proving that here was enacted the most momentous scene in the \nhistory of the world and of the universe. Since our arrival in Jerusalem we have \nstudied carefully the evidence of what is now the received hypothesis of the most \nlearned and devout Bible scholars of the age, with regard to the place of the \nCrucifixion. As briefly as is consistent with comprehensiveness, I will rehearse \nsome of the reasons we have for believing this \' \' green hill " to be the true Calvary. \n\nI have already cited several arguments against the once popular belief that \nthe Church of the Holy Sepulchre covers the place where the Cross was set up, \n\n_ \xe2\x80\x94 . \xe2\x80\x94 __ \xe2\x80\x94 . - \xe2\x80\x94 \xe2\x80\x94 \xe2\x80\x94 \n\n\n\n\n<C A GREAT HEBREW CEMETERY UY ABOUT THE BASE." \n\n\n\nas well as \'\'that where the Lord lay " during the three days separating His Death \nfrom His Resurrection. It is needless to repeat them here further than to say \nthat the Church of the Holy Sepulchre is not, and has never been, outside of the \ngate of Jerusalem, and, that Our Lord was led forth to the "place of a skull " and \n4 \'suffered without the gate" is directly affirmed by the writers of the Bible. \nScripture students will not require to be reminded of the important significance of \nthis circumstance in connection with Christ our Sacrifice. \n\nIn looking, then, for a hill resembling a skull in shape, without the gate, in \na public place where many passing by would witness the Crucifixion, bearing in \nmind also that the place of public execution among the Romans remained the \n\n\n\n348 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n\nsame from one age to another (as witness the scene of Panl\'s death at Tre? \nFontane, near Rome, well-known as the ancient Tyburn of that city), and seeking \nto find records of other executions as having occurred in the same vicinity; reading \nthat the new sepulchre of Joseph of Arimathea was near the place where He was- \ncrucified, hence, in consecrated ground already used as a Jewish burying ground \n\xe2\x80\x94 it would be strange, indeed, had intelligent explorers failed to see how faithfully \n\nall these requisites \n\n\n\nare met by the hill \non which we now \nsit. \n\nBehind us, as we \nface the city and \nlook directly into \nthe Temple enclo- \nsure, lies what was \nknown four hun- \ndred years after \nChrist as the \n"Place of Stoning\' * \nand as the scene of \nStephen\'s death. \nIt bears the name \nstill in Jewish tra- \nditions, and there, \naccording to Jewish \nchroniclers, crimi- \nnals were hung up\' \nby the hands after \ndeath until the sun \nwent down. A \nchurch in memory \nof St. Stephen was \nraised upon the \n\ns^_-_^.. \xe2\x80\x94 \xe2\x80\x94 - \'\'Place of Ston- \n\n" THE SOLITARY TOME. 55 ing > > by \xc2\xa3 t _ \xc2\xa3 u dotia \n\nin the fifth century, the ruins of which have lately been excavated down to the \nexquisite mosaic pavement. In turning to the account given of the death of \nStephen, we note that the marginal reference against the words, " they cast him \nout of the city, \' \' is Hebrew xiii. 1 2 : \n\n\' \' Wherefore, Jesus, also, that He might sanctify the people with His own \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n349 \n\n\n\nblood, suffered without the gate." The proximity of the two places is, to say the \nleast, a singular coincidence. \n\nA great Hebrew cemetery lay all about the base and upon the slope of the line \nof hills of which Calvary is one, for centuries before Our Lord\'s birth. Of this \nI shall speak more at length by and by. If Joseph of Armithea had wished to \nbe gathered to his fathers at his death, he would naturally have made hereabouts \nhis new tomb. \n\nAt " Herod\'s Gate " began, in the time of Our Lord, the great military road \nleading from Jerusalem to Caesarea Philippi, along which Paul was hurried at \nnight by his escort of four hundred and seventy Roman soldiers, he riding in \ntheir midst upon the beast provided for him to bring him safe to Felix, the Gov- \nernor. This road, recently uncovered, winds directly about the foot of this hill, \nand forks of the great highway lead off to Damascus and other large towns. At \nthe Great Feast of the Passover it would have been thronged with passers-by, and \nlent itself fully to the custom of the Romans of making their places of execution \n.as public as possible by establishing them near the busiest thoroughfares. \n\nI cannot resist the temptation to quote at this point from the eloquent com- \nment of Dr. Cunningham Geikie upon his able summing up of proofs as to the \nidentity of the \' \' New Calvary \' \' with the old. \n\n"Here, then, on this bare, rounded knoll ... the Saviour of the world \nappears to have passed away with that great cry which has been held to betoken \n\xe2\x80\xa2cardiac rupture\xe2\x80\x94 for it would seem that He literally died of a broken heart. \nBefore Him lay outspread the guilty city which had clamored for His blood; \nbeyond it, the pale slope of Olivet from which He was shortly to ascend in \ntriumph to the right hand of the Majesty on High; and in the distance, but clear \n\xe2\x80\xa2and seemingly near, the pinkish-yellow mountains of Moab, lighting up, it may \nbe, the fading eyes of the Innocent One with the remembrance that His death \n-would one day bring back lost manhood to the Kingdom of God." \n\nI read it aloud, and then, more slowly and tenderly, the story of the Cruci- \nfixion given by each of the four Evangelists. \n\nThe day is very still; the place is deserted but for ourselves, seated upon a \nflat tomb-stone, and David, who stands within hearing of the familiar, always \nthrilling words. About our feet fragile crocuses pierce the earth, clustering closely \nupon the southern side of the grave-stones. Hyssop grows freely in the pale- \n:green turf, and wild lilies shoot rank leaves above the lower herbage. Masses of \nclouds, white and gray, roll slowly apart, glints of sunshine stream fitfully upon \nthe low cliffs at our right, where is another and much smaller cave than the \nGrotto of Jeremiah\xe2\x80\x94 a sepulchre hewn in the rock, and overlooking a garden. A \nvery ancient well attests the age of the enclosed space, and olive and fig trees \ngrow in the garden. \n\n\n\n35o \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nWe let ourselves down to the lower level, and are in front of what Gordon \nCummings, Selah Merrill, Lew Wallace and many other godly and learned men \nbelieve to be the long-hidden Tomb of Christ. \n\nWe have visited the vaults excavated, with the ruined church built by the \npious Eudocia, and seen with strange emotion the grooves in which moved the \nrolling stones used in Our Lord\'s time for closing the mouth of the principal tomb \ncontaining several sarcophagi or niches in which bodies were laid. When uncov- \n\n\n\n\n\n"oddity riven from top to bottom." \n\nered, these were full of bones, great heaps of which are still to be seen in holes \nbeneath the niches. A road divides this cemetery from Calvary, and the explorers \nhave not been allowed to dig beneath the highway for other graves that, no doubt, \nreach all the way to the solitary tomb in the side of Calvary. A board door has \nbeen fitted into the opening once filled by the rolling stone, and a square window \ncut out in the same side of the rock allows anyone to look in. The door is kept \nlocked, and the key, during Dr. Merrill\'s time of office, was kept at the American \nConsulate. A single empty sarcophagus fills the far end of the small chamber. \nThere is w inscription, and, as I gratefully record, no frippery of altar, candles,, \n\n\n\n352 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nlace and artificial flowers detracts from the solemn simplicity of the shrine. Upon \nthe brink of the natural cliff is a great rock, oddly riven from top to bottom by \nthe shock of an earthquake, each severed projection corresponding with a depres- \nsion or gap upon the other side of the fissure. David points out these peculiarities \ndiffidently : \n\n1 * Of course nobody can say positively that it is so, and we Protestants are, \nmaybe, over careful in such matters, but I can\'t help thinking whenever I look at \nthat, of what St. Matthew tells us \xe2\x80\x94 that "the earth did quake, and the rocks \nrent." \n\nI find the place and read on: \n\n"And the graves were opened, and many bodies of the saints which slept \n\xe2\x80\xa2arose, and came out of the graves after His resurrection, and went into the Holy \nCity and appeared unto many." \n\nThe saints that slept in the mighty cemetery lying along these hills from \nOlivet to Golgotha \xe2\x80\x94 the vanguard of the multitude which no man can number \nwho shall stand beside their victorious Lord at the last day upon the earth. \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXIX. \n\n\n\nON THE ROAD TO BETHLEHEM. \n\n\n\n\nO other stage of our eventful journey ings has seemed so like a beauti- \nful dream, from which we keep thinking that we must presently \nawake to disappointment, than this glorious December morning on \nwhich we find ourselves actually setting out for Bethlehem. \n\n\n\nTen months ago, when the plans for this tour were first discussed by us, \nwe had but one definite idea as to the dates and methods of our travels: \n\n" If we go," we said, resolutely, " we will spend Christmas in Bethlehem." \n\nOur itinerary, as then sketched, has undergone many changes, some deliber- \nate, others forced upon us by unforeseen exigencies. This one design has stood \nby us, a fixed pivot, upon which all modifications have revolved. \n\nIt is the twenty-fourth of December, and a cloudless day. Going, as is my \ncustom, every clear morning, to the loggia on the roof of the Grand Hotel, for a \nview of the city and encompassing hills, I see the sky of a clear amber behind the \nfar-off mountains of Moab; the silver- gray olives on the descent of the Mount of \nOlives shining softly in the rising sun, and upon the western horizon the round \ncrown of the hill where Rizpah the daughter of Aiah watched the bodies of her \ndead sons " from the beginning of harvest until water dropped upon them out of \nheaven, and suffered not the birds of the air to rest on them by day, nor the beasts \nof the field by night." \n\n"And it was told David" (here, in his royal capital of Jerusalem) , "what \nRizpah had done." \n\nIt is not perhaps unnatural that the vision suggested by the sight of the lonely \nhill- top should be joined in my mind with that of another mother, David\'s de- \nscendant, Mary of Bethlehem, who was to watch upon the brow of another Mount \nof Expiation, her soul pierced through by as sharp a sword as that which rankled \nall those anguished days and nights in the fierce heart of her who had borne unto \nher kingly lover Armoni and Mephibosheth. The joys, the pains, the sorrows \nand the compensations of motherhood have been the same from Eve\'s day until \nnow. \n\nThere is no question as to the safety of the carriage-road to Bethlehem. A \nmacadamized causeway runs all the way from Jerusalem to Hebron, past the \nbirthplace of David and " David\'s Greater Son," Our carriage is one of many \nthat take it to-day. The blue of the sky is like that of Switzerland; there are no \n\n23 \xe2\x80\xa2 (353) \n\n\n\n354 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nmists in the valleys between the russet-red and gray-green hills. Our horses are \ngood, and the rush of the air in our faces and lungs is an ecstasy. At every hun- \ndred yards we are thrilled by the mention of names as well known and as dear as \nthose of our own kindred and the places trodden by our childish feet. \n\n" The Valley of Rephaim !" says our guide, indicating fertile fields bounding \nthe track and stretching out far to right and left. We stop the carriage to " look \nit up." \n\nThe border-line between Judah and Benjamin was drawn hereabouts. It \n" went up by the Valley of the Son of Hinnom " \xe2\x80\x94 ("There is the valley of Hin- \n\n\n\n\nTHE STONE OF ELIJAH. \n\nnom !" interposes the dragoman) \xe2\x80\x94 "Unto the south side of the Jebusite; the \nsame is Jerusalem. And the border went up to the top of the mountain that lieth \nbefore the valley of Hinnom westward, which is at the end of the valley " for \nRephaim) \' \' northward. \' \' \n\nWe turn back to Genesis: \n\n"And in the fourteenth year came Chedorlaomer and the kings that were \nwith him and smote the Rephaim," giants and powerful, 1921 years before the \nbirth of Christ. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n355 \n\n\n\n"If the Captain will look at Second Samuel, fifth chapter and eighteenth \nverse," says David, modestly. \n\n" The Philistines also came and spread themselves in the valley of Rephaim." \n\nRepulsed by David, leaving their idols behind in the retreat to be destroyed \nby David and his men, they "came up again, and spread themselves in the \nValley of Rephaim . \' \' \n\nThe figure of the rolling hosts, like spreading waters over the fertile reaches, \nis apt as we survey the twice-chosen battle-ground. \n\nThe exquisite episode of the \' \' sound of a going in the tops of the nralberry- \n\n\n\n\nTHE HOUSE OF BENJAMIN. \n\ntrees" follows, after which David "smote the Philistines from Geba until thou \ncome to Gazer." \n\nIn turning the next leaf of what we note down as " a peripatetic Bible lesson, \nwith illustrations from actual scenes," \xe2\x80\x94 we alight and mount a stone at the road- \nside for an unobstructed view of the landscape we have overpast. Just here Abra- \nham must have caught sight of Mount Moriah on the third day of his journey \nfrom his quiet home in the shadow of the grove (or tree) he had planted in \n\n\n\n356 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nBeer-Sheba and where he had sojourned for many days before receiving the awful \ncommand to sacrifice his son \xe2\x80\x94 "this one only son, Isaac, whom thou West, \nupon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of. \' \' \n\n" Then, on the third day Abraham lifted up his eyes, and saw the place afar \noff. And Abraham said unto his young men \xe2\x80\x94 "Abide ye here with the ass; and \nI and the lad will go yonder and worship, and come again to you." \n\n\'\'Here" \xe2\x80\x94 where we read the story, our backs turned upon the Mount of \nPromise, on our way to worship upon the Mount of Fulfillment, on the birthplace \n\n\n\n\n"WElvL OF THE THREE KINGS." \n\n\n\nof the Divine and only Son whose day Abraham saw in the long, long vista of the \nages and was glad ! \n\nOur guide has a tradition \xe2\x80\x94 frankly admitted to be only a tradition \xe2\x80\x94 to relate \nof another, and a flat stone on the other side of the road. Elijah, also coming \nfrom Beersheba, where he had left his servant, "went a day\'s journey into the \nwilderness and sat down under a juniper tree; and he requested for himself that \nhe might die; and said, \' It is enough ! now, O Lord, take away my life; for I am \nmot better than my fathers.\' " \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n357 \n\n\n\nAfter the miraculous refreshment of " a cake baken on the coals," and water, \nhe "laid him down again," and slept so long and hard that he left a shallow \nimpress of his body in the rock, says the legend. The face of the flat stone is \nslightly indented, but with the utmost aid of willing imaginations we cannot \ntrace the outline of a human form. A thrifty olive-tree shades the prophet\'s \nhard bed, and near by is a large substantial building-the monastery of St Ehas. \n\nAnother monastery is pointed out on our right when we have bowled along \nthe smooth road for ten or fifteen minutes longer. " The house of Benjamin \n\n\n\n\n\n\nTOMB OF RACHEL/. \n\nmeans little until the information is added that here it is said Benjamin was bom \non the way from Bethel, when " there was but a little way to come to Ephrath." \n\nWe are out of the carriage again, open Bible in hand, and walk up the \nshaded alley leading from the gate to the convent. A thrifty olive orchard hides \nthe house from the highway, and we do not care to go up to the door of what we \ncan see is a modern building. The sunlight flickers between the leaves over the \npage upon which we read how " it came to pass, as her soul was in departing \n(for shedied) that she called his name \'Ben-oni,\' but his father called him \n\n\n\n358 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n* Benj amin.\' " The grove is sweet and peaceful; budding lilies are springing" \nluxuriantly in the walks. We find ourselves wondering at what season the poor \nmother laid her down, unexpectedly, upon her bed of pain and death, and if olives \nand lilies grew here then. \n\nOn the other side of the way is another traditional landmark, the Well of the \nThree Kings, where, as the story runs, the three wise men from the East stopped \nto water their horses when Herod had sent them to Bethlehem to search diligently \nfor the young child, and again beheld the star which they had seen in the East \n\n\n\n\n"heaps pressing down the dead." \n\n\n\ngoing before them, " till it came and stood over where the young child was. \nWhen they saw the star they rejoiced with exceeding great joy." \n\nThe legend may be, like a thousand others, the work of monkish fancy, but \nheard here, with the white roofs of Bethlehem in sight, it is exceedingly beautiful \nand impressive. The well, or spring, is surrounded by stonework said to belong \nto the Roman period. \n\nOur next, and longest, pause in the wonderful series of object-lessons is at \nthe Tomb of Rachel, one of the best authenticated localities in Palestine. \n\n\' \'And Rachel died, and was buried in the way to Ephrath, which is Bethlehem. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBEE. \n\n\n\n359 \n\n\n\nAnd Jacob set up a pillar upon her grave; that is the pillar of Rachel\'s grave unto \nthis day." \n\n" When thou art departed from me to-day, then shalt thou find two men by \nRachel\'s sepulchre in the border of Benjamin at Zelzah," Samuel told Saul \nbetween six and seven hundred years after Rachel\'s burial. The inimitably \npathetic prophecy of Rachel weeping for her children, quoted by Matthew as ful- \nfilled in the massacre of the children in Bethlehem and the coast thereof, refers to \nthe tomb of Benjamin\'s mother within sight of Bethlehem-Ephratah. \n\n\n\n\nIN THE FIELD OF BOAZ. \n\n\n\nA chamber about twenty feet square and as many high is surmounted by a \nlow dome. Behind this is a sort of quadrangular courtyard with a flat roof. The \nentire building is of stone, put roughly together with cement. There is no \nattempt at decoration without, nor, as we are assured, within. This we take \nupon hearsay, as visitors are not allowed to enter the inner chamber. To-day, \nthe building is closed in every part. We stroll quite around it, finding it blank, \nmean and desolate. The Jews are the custodians of the tomb, but the grave* \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n361 \n\n\n\nscattered all around it are of Bedouins. A few are enclosed by rude masonry, but \nthe great majority are irregular heaps of stones, collected at random, and piled \nwith no attempt at order. An oblong ring of the large stones marks the confines \nof each grave; the rest are huddled within this, making a sort of cairn. \n\nThe sight is forbidding enough before we learn that the heaps pressing down \nthe dead are needed to protect the bodies from hyenas. Recollecting how often \nwe have heard the horrid laughter of the unclean beasts through our tent-walls, \nwe shudder at the weird scene conjured up by fancy by this new scrap of knowl- \nedge. Of the bare and lonely sepulchre, dim under the stars, or defined by the \nmoonlight, the midnight silence broken by the growls of the baffled brutes as they \ntear at the heavy stones, or shriek with delight over the rifling of a shallow grave \ninto which the tenant was thrust with careless hands, and left unguarded -xcept \nby the gravelly sand we crunch under our feet. It is a dreary resting-place for \nthe patriarch\'s petted wife. The only vegetation near it is a woolly -leaved plant \ngrowing under the wall. I pluck a spray and press it in my note-book. Beneath \nI pencil the touching digression from the main line of Jacob\'s narrative to Rachel\'s \nelder son, forty years after he had laid his darling down for the long sleep on the \nroadside. After speaking of Joseph\'s sons, Ephraim and Manasseh, as entitled to \na place among their father\'s brethren, rather than among his issue, the old man \nbegins to wander backward in his talk, and never completes what he had begun \nto say at the first: \n\n"And, as for me, when I came from Padan, Rachel died by me in the land \nof Canaan in the way, when yet there was but a little way to come unto Ephrath; \nand I buried her there in the way of Ephrath; the same is Bethlehem." \n\nDid something in Joseph\'s eyes bring up the face of his beautiful mother to \nthe dying husband who had never ceased to be her lover ? Or had the father a \nvague intention of commending to the son the charge of her grave, and the pillar \nJacob had set upon it ? \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI,. \n\n\n\nCHRISTMAS IN BETHLEHEM. \n\nBETHLEHEM is approached by a succession of hills, terraced to afford \nfoothold. for olive, fig and mulberry -trees and vineyards. In David\'s \nyouth it was a prosperous region, and the successors of Boaz and \nJesse maintain a tolerable reputation as good farmers. By contrast \nwith the shiftless husbandry between Jerusalem and Jericho it is like a garden in \norder and fertility. \n\nThe appearance of the town is imposing when we behold it from the plains \nbelow. The group of churches, about which the white stone houses are clustered, \n\n\n\n\nON THE ROOF. \n\nhave some architectural pretensions, and rise finely from the summit of the ridge \nsloping away from them on two sides. When surrounded by walls the site must \nhave been picturesque, and as a fortification, strong. At a distance the houses \nlook higher than they really are, being built upon the sides of the ridge. After \n\n(362) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n363 \n\n\n\nreaching the town we perceive that it is not an exception to other Syrian \' \' settle- \nments, " 01 whatever size, in point of commodiousness and cleanliness. The \nsteep streets are the only sewers, and are so narrow that two carriages cannot pass \nin many ot them. They are also so crooked that, as our vehicle rattles around a \ncorner, the driver gives a warning yell to pedestrians lest they should be surprised \nand hurt. He dashes through one and whirls into another in great style, cracking \nhis whip and shrieking out his cautions to the occupants of doorways and the \nmiddle ot the thoroughfare, while the foul mud flies in every direction. The peo- \n\n\n\n\nA COMPANY OF GYPSIES. \n\npie take him quietly, with true Oriental indifference, flattening themselves against \nthe walls and retiring into open doors and arches until the danger is over. In one \nvery strait passage we meet two camels, the nose of the second tied by a rope to \nthe saddle of the first. We graze the mire-encrusted side of one and nearty upset \nthe other, without lessening our speed, until we draw up with a mighty clatter \nand jerk at the door of the " Hotel Bethleem." \n\nThe great square between the hotel and the Church of the Nativity is filled \nwith people, most of them in holiday attire, and after a hasty luncheon brought \nwith us, but eaten in a big, bare room of the caravanserai, we go up to the roof for \n\n\n\n364 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\na better view of the striking scene. A parapet, three feet high, runs all around \nour look-out. There are a few chairs for infirm or distinguished guests, and \nplenty of standing-room for a party little less varied in character than the greater \nassembly below. Five nationalities are represented among the spectators upon \nour house-top, the hotel being beneath us. As far as we can see them, every roof \nis filled with people, the white veils and gay jackets of the women giving a festive \nair to the multitude. The aspect of the open square \xe2\x80\x94 as I reflect with a thrill of \nemotion \xe2\x80\x94 probably does not differ materially from what might have been seen \n\n\n\n\n4 ONE END OE THE MARKET-PI.ACE. " \n\nthere almost nineteen hundred years ago on Christmas- Eve. "All the world "\' \nwas to be taxed, and Bethlehem Ephrata was little among the thousands of Judah; \ntoo strait to accommodate the return of those of the house and lineage of natives \nof the town, who must be enrolled there. \n\nThere will be no room in this, or any other inn of Bethlehem to-night for one- \nfourth of the visitors drawn hither by the prospective celebration out-of-doors and \nin the church. In the shadow of the barracks opposite a company of gypsies \nhave pitched their tents and are cooking their dinner in the open street, an opera- \ntion gravely superintended by an ass in harness. A bearded shepherd and his. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE, \n\n\n\n365 \n\n\n\nwife have lambs in their arms for sale. A string of kneeling camels ocenpies one \nend of the market-place, their gowned and tnrbaned owners chatting, or, more \nlikely, chaffering near by. An old man and a girl who pulls one end of her izzar \nover her mouth, as a man in European cut-away coat and Derby hat turns to look \nat her in passing, sit upon the ground with half a dozen hoppled hens at their feet, \nawaiting purchasers. While the clamor and bustling activity of an American \ngala-day are absent, the subdued hum of many voices arises to our ears like the \nswarming of a thousand bees. \n\nMary had come up from Nazareth with her husband and would be weary of \nnerve and limb, diffident in the presence of the motley crowd, anxious to get into \nshelter, and disappointed, \nwith the heart-sickening \nchagrin of a modest peasant \ngirl, when she found that \nthere was not a vacant nook \nin the khan where she could \nlie down and rest. We \nmake it all so real to our- \nselves that we resent the \ncomplacent well-being of \nthe loungers below, the \ngreater comfort of the \nwatchers upon the secluded \nhouse-top. We visited the \noldest khan in Jerusalem \nlast week, and it helped us \nto understand into what sort \nof quarters she was com- \npelled to retire at last. \nThe little light came \nthrough openings in the \ngroined roof; the stone \nfloor was littered with bun- \ndles of straw and hay along the four walls, which had fastened to them raised \nmangers but a foot above the ground. We have likewise seen several stables in \ncaves, and learned that these natural grottoes are, in some parts of Syria, pre- \nferred to buildings above ground. \n\nOur minds are preoccupied with the Jewish maiden while the panorama of \nshifting figures and colors passes before the field of vision The crowd grows more \ndense; from the barracks issues a company of Turkish soldiery in brilliant uniform \n\n\n\n\n3 66 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nand marches down the middle of the square, throwing the masses of people \nright and left until a broad track is left clear from the end of the street to the \nentrance of the church. Upon the roof of a low wing of the barracks is collected \na knot of men sumptuously appareled, to whom an officer evidently reports now \nand then. \n\n" The Patriarch of Syria and Palestine is too infirm to come in person, and he \nhas sent a Bishop who will be here presently. All these people are waiting to see \nhis arrival. The Pacha could not come, and has sent his dragoman. It is a case \n\n\n\n\n"THE GORGEOUS PAGEANT." \n\n\n\nof substitution, all the way through," somebody says in English, and sneeringly. \n\nThe Bishop is lunching somewhere, we are told vaguely, and, apparently, is in \nno hurry to quit the table. Until he comes, we may not enter the church of the \ngrotto of the Nativity. But for the novelty of the scene and the liberty to sit \nsilent if we choose, and think out our own thoughts, we should be intensely weary \nbefore a blare of trumpets sounds down the steep street and is answered by the \nbugler in front of the barracks. A mounted officer gallops into the square, strik- \ning with the flat of his sword at trespassing groups. Two foot-soldiers, armed \nwith whips of hippopotamus-hide take, each, one side of the way, and literally \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n367 \n\n\n\nlash the crowd back into place, respecting neither sex nor age. We can hear the \nhiss and thud of the heavy whip, and are amazed that no outcry, much less resist- \nance, follows the blows. The populace are used to the summary methods of their \nmasters, and take it all as a matter of course. Into the area thus rid of the lower \norders of humanity, rides a small body of horsemen; several carriages come next; \nthe military band bursts into triumphal music; the distinguished party leaves the \nroof and a majestic figure descends from a coach upon a carpet spread for his feet. \nAt the sound of the trumpet, a procession of priests and choir-boys emerge from \n\n\n\n\n"EVERY HOUSE-TOP IS FII.EED." \n\n\n\nthe church and, advancing slowly, singing as they go, have reached the carpeted \nspace as the bishop steps from the carriage. \n\nNow ensues a ceremony inexplicable to us, and, perhaps on that account, fan- \ntastic to ludicrousness. The black robe with scarlet hood worn by the prelate is \ndexterously whisked off, and a purple robe with a train several yards in length \nsubstituted. Gloves of the same color are drawn upon his hands, which are then \nfolded upon his breast and kept there, fingers extended stiffly like those of an \nautomaton. Thus dressed, the bishop moves toward the church, attended by \nscores of ecclesiastics and acolytes, all wearing black gowns, and above these the \ngarments we style, for the lack of the technical term, white dressing-sacks trimmed \n\n\n\n368 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nwith lace that looks cheap, and is dear. Censers swing clouds of perfume into the \nair, the sustained chant of men\'s voices mingles with the chimes from the belfry; \nwomen drop upon their knees as the gorgeous pageant passes them. The bishop\'s \npace is inconceivably deliberate; his steps must not be over an inch long. \n\n* \' Like our little bride ! \' \' says a laughing voice in my ear. \n\nMy Syrian interpreter, to whom I am indebted for the story of 1 \' Fudda\'s \nWedding, \' \' stands close behind me, her black eyes full of enjoyment of my sur- \nprised interest in the performance. Four choir-boys bear the purple train; the \nwhite-robed attendants sway in the slow march like banks of lilies in a gentle \nbreeze; the air is vibrant with bells and voices. It is all imposing and beautiful, \nand the pulses keep time to the throbbing of chant and chime. \n\nMy interpreter leans near. \n\n" I wonder" \xe2\x80\x94 the careful articulation of a foreign phrase making the sen- \ntence more significant \xe2\x80\x94 \' \' / wonder what Jesus thinks of all this /" \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XU. \n\n\n\nCHRISTMAS IN BETHLEHEM (CONTINUED). \n\nGHE Church of the Nativity was built by Constantine (305-337 A. D.) \nand restored in the eleventh century by the Crusaders. The pillars \nupholding the roof are of reddish stone, and scratched all over with \nthe names and crests of these valiant knights: \n\n" Their swords are rust, \nTheir bones are dust, \nTheir souls are with the saints, we trust." \n\nEight centuries have, in passing, rubbed into illegibility what each man wrote \nof himself and his deeds in this high and holy place. More distinct, and easy to \nbe read by a Greek scholar, is the inscription upon the octagonal baptismal font: \n\n" A memorial before God and for the peace and forgive?iess of sinners {whose \nnames the Lord knows)." \n\nOne wall bears in (now) shattered mosaics rude pictures of the churches of \nSardis and of Antioch. There were man}\' other churches represented here and \nsome mosaics date back to the twelfth century. Beyond the immense columns of \ndusky-red, the shell of the church with huge rafters richly embrowned by time, \nand the mutilated mosaics, little remains of the temple reared by Constantine and \npiously remodeled by the Crusaders. Modern ecclesiastical art has crowded the \ninterior with costly decorations, most of which are in good taste, although some \nare tawdry. \n\nThe service of Christmas Eve begins at half past ten at night. \n\nAfter a very poor dinner served in the Hotel Bethleem, and eaten in the good \ncompany of half-a-dozen Americans, an Englishwoman, a German officer and an \nItalian gentleman, we disperse to our several bedrooms and try to sleep until the \nhour of service. With mysek the attempt is utterly vain. It is not only that the \nstone floors and walls of the small chamber create a chill that pierces to bone and \nmarrow, and that an unclosable window opens upon the staircase, down which boots \nare clattering incessantly. My head is hot and my brain awhirl. In all the day I \nhave had but one still hour in which to pull myself together and appreciate in \nheart and soul where I really am, and why I have come. At sunset I got away \nfrom the crowd of people and press of distractions, and found my way to the roof \nalone. \n\n3d (369) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n371 \n\n\n\nThe great square was no longer a restless mass of human life, but was dotted \nwith groups of quiet figures; the area about the gypsy camp was faintly illumined \nby the wavering flame of thorns crackling under the supper-pot; here and there a \nduller glow revealed a brazier over which the owner warmed his hands or boiled \nhis coffee. Beyond the massed houses with their twinkling windows, the outer \ndarkness was rolling up from the valleys. The hills lay hushed and low against \nthe cold yellow of the horizon, and the stars were kindling in the zenith. The air \nwas breezeless, but frosty, and I paced the wide area until the sky was full of stars, \n\n\n\n1 \n\n\n\n\nTHE CHURCH OF THE NATIVITY. \n\nkeeping watch over Bethlehem and the surrounding land, as \' \' shepherds watched \ntheir flocks by night, \n\nAll seated on the ground," \n\nupon the gentle slope over there, still bearing the name of the Field of the Shep- \nherds. \n\nIt is of that lonely rapt hour, never-to-be-forgotten, and not to be described by \npen, that my mind is full to the exclusion of thoughts of slumber. In all the medi- \ntations of the day, the Galilean peasant-girl has moved, a presence that may be \nfelt, almost seen. Her Magnificat is read again, and for the third time to-day t \nbefore we set out for the church. \n\n\n\n372 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nIt is thronged to suffocation. David has had a man on the spot, holding chairs \nfor us ever since sunset. He lies, half- asleep, across them when we appear to claim \nthem. The aisle upon our right is filled with kneeling women; the long white \nlinen veils worn alike by by maid and wife, give a wondrously picturesque appear- \nance to the throng. Men stand, shoulder to shoulder, in the aisle upon our left; \nthe Europeans bare-headed, Turkish residents of towns wearing the red tarboosh, \nthe shaven skulls of fellaheen bound with turbans, generally white. A liberal \nsprinkling of soldiers, on police duty, enlivens the more sober garments. The \nmusic is fine from choir and organ; at least forty gorgeous ecclesiastics, in gowns \nStiff and glittering with gold embroidery, are within the chancel-pale. The bishop \n\n\n\n\nAREA ABOUT THE GYPSY CAMP. \n\nsits in the tall patriarchal chair at the extreme left of the high altar, as we face it, \nthe brilliant array of churchly millinery and altar- furniture is seen mistily through \nclouds of incense. \n\nIt is half-past eleven o\'clock, and the organ still rolls; priest has relieved priest \nin the nasal sing-song reading of the " First and Second Gospels \' \' in Latin, anthem \nhas succeeded chant, the bishop has been undressed and re-dressed twice, as to \nslippers, robe and headgear. The lofty, steepled hat, gleaming with gold and \nprecious stones, has been placed over his white hairs and taken off again so many \ntimes that we have stopped counting. The chairs are hard; the air is stifling; \nexcept for two student-like men near me, who speak English and are probably per- \nverts to the Roman Catholic Church, nobody in the audience, that I can see, makes \nany pretence of following the service. These men read silently all the while from \n\n\n\n374 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nLatin Testaments, and when I ask Mrs. Jamal in an undertone the meaning of \nsome manoeuvre of the ecclesiastical forces, one turns to offer me a book taken \nfrom his pocket. \n\n" Perhaps you would like to read the Gospels as they go on?" \n\nDeclining with thanks, I note that his accent is American, that he wears a \nstrait-breasted, long-skirted coat and a plain, high collar fastened at the back of \nhis neck. His companion is as evident^ English. \n\nTen minutes of twelve ! Many men have sat down upon the marble floor, \ncrossing their legs under them and gone to sleep; among the white- veiled ranks \n\n\n\n\nGREAT SOU ARK AT NOON. \n\n\n\nof kneeling women I see some who have had the wisdom, or good luck, to get \nclose to the great pillars and now rest tired heads against the cool stone, eyes fast \nshut \xe2\x80\x94 perhaps in devotion. A significant pause in the peal of the organ and \nresponses from the two lines of choir-boys causes a stir in the crowd. Indiffer- \nence and drowsiness are exchanged for alert interest. Raised heads are turned \ntoward the high altar, above which I observe for the first time a curtain hung \nbefore what may be a niche or a painting, perhaps two feet long, and half as \nhigh. After a low prelude, the organ glides into a lullaby, sweet and tender and \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n375 \n\n\n\ntuneful, that has in it the very swing of the cradle, and the brooding love in \nmother-heart and the mother\' s voice. It is still sighing through the now strangely- \nquiet church when the curtain hiding the niche above the altar is drawn back by \nan unseen cord or hand, and we see\xe2\x80\x94 a cradle, with a doll lying in it ! \n\nTo those about me what is to me an anti-climax, belittling the august pre- \nliminaries, and inconceivably unworthy of the occasion that has collected the vast \naudience\xe2\x80\x94 is apparently impressive and affecting. Men stand on tiptoe to gaze; \nmany bow their heads, and some kneel as if overcome by emotion; women are \nconvulsed by sobs, or smile lovingly through tears. Not even the glorious Gloria \nin Excelsis that rolls a triumphant volume of sound up to the embrowned rafters \nthat have been jarred by the Angels\' Song for over a thousand years, brings back \nto me one symptom of the feeling I have striven all day long to encourage, in \nspite of Bishop\'s toilettes and a host of other (to me) senseless mummeries. In \nthe abrupt revulsion from thoughts of Mary the handmaid of the Lord, and of the \nBirth, which was a world\'s redemption, I find myself sick in body as in heart, and \nwere I not wedged in the crowd to an extent that would make extrication a work \nof time and disturbance, I should beg to be allowed to leave the church. \n\nAs the drawn curtain and the pealing Gloria proclaim the Event of the \nevening, the packed aisles are agitated by an arrival. Two amazingly- appareled \nkervasses bearing long, gilded staves, force a passage for a trim, natty little gentle- \nman, military in bearing and in the white " imperial " tuft upon his chm. Keen- \neyed and suave, he is conducted to a chair immediately in front of us. \n\n4 \'The French Consul !" whispers Mrs. Jamal. \n\nThe Roman Catholic Church in Palestine is under the immediate protection \nof France, and the homage paid to the handsome little man may savor of gratitude. \nSitting erect and portentously attentive, a gorgeous kervasse upon each side, he is \nthe most distinguished personage present, even before two priests part themselves \nfrom the crowd of ecclesiastics and approach him while the choir-boys chant \nmelodiously. One of the priests bears what looks like a gold plate about six \ninches in diameter, and bending respectfully offers it to the lips of the consul, who \narises at his approach and kisses the gold disk, whatever it may be. Somebody \nexplains that it is \' \' the Seal," but what Seal or why thus presented and saluted \nI am unable to learn. In equal ignorance as to the meaning of the marching and \ncountermarching; the kneelings and uprisings, and especially the robings and the \nunrobings of the majestic Chief of the hour, I sit for two-and-a-half mortal hours \nlonger, a miserable fixture in my uncomfortable chair. The Third and Fourtn \nGospels are intoned in Latin by a third and a fourth glittering priest; all read and \nchant through their noses, and it is within bounds to assert that not fifty out of \nthe hundreds assembled in this, the oldest church in the Holy Land, comprehend \none syllable of what is uttered. \n\n\n\n376 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBEE. \n\n\n\nAnd still the white- veiled women continue to kneel in the aisle, their faces \nturned altarward, and the motley-hued garments of the men are pressed close \ntogether in the body of the church. \n\n" They will not stir until the Baby is carried around," says my interpreter, \nwhen I wonder that the crowd does not thin. \n\nAt half-past two, " the Baby " is borne in solemn procession of all the priests, \namid chanting and organ thunder, and the adoration of the now wide-awake and \nexcited people, down one aisle and across the end of the church, then up another \n\n\n\n\nFIEU) OF THE SHEPHERDS. \n\n\n\naisle and back to its resting-place near the high-altar. It is a large wax doll, \ngowned in lawn and lace, not a particularly pretty, but a very artificial baby. It \ngoes without saying that we do not prostrate ourselves as it passes, but there are \nnot many other exceptions to the rule of what may not be worship in very deed, \nbut is so much like it that the uninitiated are excusable for drawing no distinction \nbetween the two. \n\nIn the crush of the retiring spectators at the door, I am hustled against Mrs. \nSharpe, and she seizes my hand in both of hers, speechless with emotion. \n\nI remark in a voice that must sound jaded, that I had seen Dr. Sharpe across \nthe church, but without her, and supposed her absent. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE, \n\n\n\n377 \n\n\n\n" I have passed the whole evening upon my knees in the Grotto !" she sighs, \nhysterically . " I was never so blissfully happy before in my life." \n\nArrived at the hotel, which is full to overflowing, I go at once to my room, \nand to bed, cold, disgusted, disappointed, and, I doubt not, disagreeable to my \npatient attendant who does her best to mitigate physical malaise by a cup of hot \ntea, and by a hot-water bag tucked between the chilly sheets. \n\nAt intervals during the hour that elapses between bidding her \' \' Good-night \' \' \nand falling asleep, I hear the measured fall of footsteps upon the roof overhead, \nsounds that recall, with soothing efficacy, my twilight promenade and reverie. \n\nIn the morning I learn that Alcides has walked there, and alone, under the \nsilent stars until half-past-three. \n\n"To restore the balance you know," he remarks, concisely. \n\nI do know ! \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XUI. \n\nSTILL IN BETHLEHEM. \n\nHE Grotto of the Nativity is reached by a stone staircase of thirteen \nf *v steps leading down irom the church. It is a natural cave, and the \nW J church, having been built directly over it, shuts out the light of day. \n\n* Before visiting Bethlehem, we have carefully looked into the \n\nevidence tending to substantiate the genuineness of the claims of the grotto to the \nhigh honor bestowed upon it by the Christian world. A few sentences on this \nhead may not be amiss here. \n\nOne of the earliest authorities who has left on record any information as to \nthe birthplace of Our Lord was Justin Martyr, whose generation overlapped that \nof the Apostle John. St. John lived to be nearly one hundred years old, and Jus- \ntin Martyr, less than one hundred and fifty years after the birth of Christ, says \nexplicitly that his Lord was born in a cave very near to the village of Bethlehem. \nThis Christian Father of the early Church was a native of the ancient Shechem \n(now Nablous), and very possibly may have himself talked with John. It is \nnearly certain that he must have known people who recollected hearing in child- \nhood the wonderful story of the Messiah\'s miracles, death and resurrection from \n\'their parents who had been eye-witnesses of these things. Every student of \nRoman history as associated with the early life of the Church is familiar with \nHadrian\'s daring impiety in planting a grove and building an altar to Adonis over \nthe grotto in which the Jewish peasant, whose followers were turning the world \nupside down, was said to have been born of a virgin. This was done between \n1 17-138 A. D. Fifty or sixty years after Hadrian\'s death, Origen, another of the \nearly fathers, writes that even the pagans acknowledged the cave to be the place \nwhere Christ was born. In the fourth century, the saintly Jerome took up his \nabode in a neighboring cave that he might study and write, live and die, as near \nas might be to the spot of his Lord\'s Incarnation. A church had already been \nbuilt upon the exact site once desecrated by the idolatrous rites commanded by \nthe Roman Hadrian. \n\nWhen the Crusaders occupied Bethlehem, they found Christians there treas- \nuring with pious zeal the tales handed down to them of the honors lavished upon \ntheir town, the city of David, and the birthplace of David\'s lineal descendant. \nThere are still families in Bethlehem who pride themselves upon the intermar- \nriages of ancestresses with the Crusaders, and upon the superior physical and \nmental strain that survives to this day in the offspring of these unions. \n\n(378) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n379 \n\n\n\nIn all ages, and among all sects of Christians, there has no been doubt as to \nthe truth of the statement that Our Lord was born in the place where we now \nstand. The exact spot is said to be the arched recess directly before us. The \nfirst thought with the devout visitor is invariably a regret that the natural walls of \nrough rock appear only in two or three parts of the cave, and, especially, that the \nshrine of shrines is overlaid with colored marbles and further adorned with gold \nand silver \xe2\x80\x94 a display \nthat absolutely vul- \ngarizes it. A silver \nstar let into the mar- \nble floor of the semi- \ncircular niche is \nkept bright by the \ntears and kisses of \npilgrims. We do not \nkiss it, but we kneel \nto lay a reverent \nhand upon the sym- \nbol of the Light of \nthe World, the Star \nof Bethlehem. \n\n"Here Jesus \nChrist was born of \nthe Virgin Mary," \nis the translation of \nthe Latin inscription. \n\nWe are sorry, \non some accounts, to \nhave visited it for \nthe first time at a \nseason when throngs \nof devotees make \nquiet meditation im- \npracticable. We Russian pilgrims. \n\nhave to move aside almost immediately to make way for those who are waiting \nfor their turn to prostrate themselves and press their lips to the star. A crowd of \nRussian pilgrims have walked up from Jerusalem this morning. Most of them are \npeasant women, past middle age, and it goes to my heart to see them kneel, mutely, \none after another, here and touch the holy spot with forehead and mouth, kissing it \npassionately, over and over, sometimes sobbing quietly, yet never uttering a word. \n\n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE, \n\n\n\n38i \n\n\n\nLight from a semi-circle of silver lamps suspended by silver chains shows the \nStar, the vari-colored marbles, and above, the embroidered lambrequin hung from \na marble shelf furnished with its usual appurtenances of a Roman Catholic altar. \nThis is guarded by a gilded grating from careless or sacrilegious touch. We are \n-thankful that the space beneath has no such defence. \n\nWe bestow but a glance upon the so-called Manger, disfigured by ecclesiastical \n\n\n\nmillinery, and fenced about with gilded wires \n\n\n\nbehind which \n\n\n\nmore silver \n\n\n\n\nlamps. Overhead, an- \ngels hold a scroll in- \nscribed in Latin with \nthe angel\'s song: \n"Peace on Earth, \n\xe2\x96\xa0Good-will to Men:\' \nWe care even less to \nlinger at the altar \nerected where, as the \nChurch has it, the \nThree Wise Men \nadored the Holy \nChild. The sacristan \nshows us, also, the \nplace of Joseph\' s warn- \ning dream and the \ncrypt in which the \nslaughtered Bethlehem \nbabies were buried. \n\nWe do not pretend \nto believe in the \nauthenticity of any, or \nall of these legendary \nlocalities, but we listen \ninterestedly to some- \nthing Mrs. Jamal has \nto say apropos to this \ncrypt. It is said that there are always more boys than girls born in Bethlehem, \nand that they are stronger and handsomer than the boys of other Palestine \ntowns. \n\n-Because the dear Lord will make up to Bethlehem women through all the \nages for what they suffered and lost when the Innocents were killed." \n\nIt is a beautiful thought, and we cannot deny that we have, before hearing the \n\n\n\nBACK-STREET IN BETHLEHEM. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n383 \n\n\n\n1 \n\n\n\n\n\ntradition, remarked upon the number of fine-looking urchins playing in the streets \nand attending the services of the church with their mothers. \n\nThe cave tenanted by St. Jerome is close at hand and in it his tomb is shown \nwith that of Paula, the disciple to whom he refers in his works. \n\nAs we come thoughtfully out of the upper churc h, David directs our attention \nto the venders of \ncrosses, beads, paint- \ned candles and other \nmementoes of Beth- \nlehem, who have \nstalls or tables in the \nvestibule, and even \nhawk their wares \njust inside of the \ndoors. There are act- \nually money changers \njust outside, ready \nto take up and ex- \nchange foreign coins \nfor Turkish money. \n\n\' \' It was such as \nthese that Christ our \nLord drove out of the \nTemple, declaring \nthat they had made it \na den of thieves," he \nutters in grave disap- \nprobation. \n\nWe go in quest IBHHBf \nT :vk \xe2\x96\xa0 . \nder the conduct of j \nour worthy drago- - - - \n\n, \' 1 , DAUGHTER AND DAUGHTER-IN-DAW. \n\nman, who takes us to \n\nthree, all having equal claims upon our credulity. We refrain from mentioning \nthe unsatisfactory search during a visit we pay to an old inhabitant of Bethlehem \nand a chief among his people, who will have us drink a tumbler of water " from \nthe well of Bethlehem which is by the gate." There are several mouths to the \none spring of living water upon the ridge on which the city is built, and there are \nno signs of a gate there now, but the old inhabitant may be in the right. He is \nan imperious, yet jolly and kindly patriarch, and has a history. In earlier and \n\n\n\n3^4 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBI,E. \n\n\n\ntroublous times he exercised a sort of sheikship in the territory around Bethle- \nhem, having such influence with his lawless neighbors that he was frequently \nchosen to escort travelers through doubtful passes and over hills that had more \nthan doubtful reputation. As David tells me this in English, the host catches his \nmeaning and points proudly to his gun, sword and spear hung against the wall. \n\nChristmas is a uni- \nversal holiday, and \nthe retired potentate \nis in high feather, re- \nceiving our party and \nother visitors. He \nsits cross-legged in a \ncorner, a snowy tur- \nban setting off his \nswarthy face, which \nis strong and intelli- \ngent, and issues or- \nders to each member \nof the household staff. \nHis wife, his married \ndaughter and a daugh- \nter-in-law are at his \nbeck and call, and a \nrelative who chances \nto drop in, is bidden \nto pound the coffee \nroasted by the ex- \nsheik himself, after \none woman has \nbrought it, another \nthe shovel in which it \nis to be browned, and \na third has blown up \nthe fire in the char- \n\n\n\n\nTHE SAD-EYED BRIDEGROOM. \n\n\n\ncoal brazier before him. With palpable enjoyment of the little bustle of prepara- \ntion, he turns the hot grains into an olive-wood mortar which is, he tells us, an \nheir-loom in his family, and scolds the guest good-naturedly, but dictatorially, \nfor not beating the \' \' grinding-tune \' \' in proper time against the seasoned sides of \nthe vessel. His daughter has a Madonna-face; the daughter-in-law a beautiful. \nYet, as Mrs. Jamal tells me aside, the handsome son had set his fancy upon \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n385 \n\n\n\nanother woman, and even dared to reason with the parent who ordered him to \nespouse the village beauty. \n\n" Marry her, or leave my house !" rejoined the father. "You will obey me, \nor be no longer my son. \' \' \n\nWe agree privately that the family despot is not a bad type of Jesse in dignity \nand authority, and the impression deepens with each minute of our stay in this \nbetter-class household. The son is now very happy in his father\'s choice, we are \ntold, and that his sad eyes are the expression of bodily illness, \xe2\x80\x94 a sort of low fever \nhe cannot shake off. He smiles pleasantly, and even proudly, as the bride of three \nmonths\' standing, to please us, retires to her room and puts on her wedding-dress, \nreturning blushingly for our inspection. The gown is of red and green silk, in \nalternate " gores " of each color, put together with a sort of herring-bone pattern \ndone in red and green. Over this is worn an embroidered jacket, parting over a \nvest wrought in many stitches and colors. Upon her head is a stiff, helmet-like \ncap of green-and-red woolen stuff, made upon a pasteboard frame, and bordered \nabove the forehead with overlapping rows of gold coins. Strings of silver \n" pieces" depend from the sides and join below her chin in one large gold coin. \nThese are an important part of her dowry, and after marriage she seldom lays oflf \nthe heavy head-dress, even sleeping in it. \n\nI exclaim at this : \n\n" I should think it would make your head ache !\' \' \n\n"It did, at first. Now, my head aches if I do not wear it." \n\nThe weight of the cumbrous thing is materially increased by a linen veil, richly \nwrought at the ends with silk thread in an intricate pattern. It is three yards long \nand a yard wide. The texture and needle-work of these veils vary with the means \nand station of the wearer. Girls wear veils of linen or cotton, but not the stiff \nconstruction beneath it. \n\nThe host got a good price in exchange for his Madonna- faced daughter when \nhe bestowed her in marriage, but had to pay a larger for his son\'s wife, who is \nreckoned as yet comelier by kindred and neighbors. \n\n\n\n25 \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XLIII \n\n\n\nJAFFA. \n\nSOTH the carriage-road and railway from Jerusalem to Jaffa run through \nSamson\'s country, the stamping-ground of the long-man ed, strong- \nbacked, soft-hearted Nazarite. A village of new, neat farm-houses, \none of Rothschild\'s colonies, is in the immediate vicinity of Zorah, the \nhome of " a certain man of the family of the Danites whose name was Manoah," \nand the birthplace of his son. A large rock, lately uncovered, is supposed, from \nindications that it was used as an altar, to be that upon which the Danite offered \nthe kid unto the Lord: \n\n\' \'And it came to pass when the flame went up toward heaven from off the \naltar, that the angel of the Lord ascended in the flame of the altar, and Manoah \nand his wife looked on." \n\nSamson\'s range in his fightings with the Philistines, and his courtings of \ndivers women, lay between the hills on either side of the road. Zorah, Kkron, \nGath, Kirjathjearim, Gaza, the rock Etam, Lehi \xe2\x80\x94 are names that suggest the \n3\'ears upon years of warring with the original lords of the land who were a chronic \npest to the conquerors. The House of Dagon at Ashdod has left no trace upon \nthe landscape of to-day; Ashdod itself is represented by a few poor mud huts \nroofed with straw and turf. \n\nGezer, made a City of Refuge by Joshua, and afterward taken by Pharaoh of \nEgypt, rebuilt and given by him to his daughter, one of Solomon\'s wives, crowns \na hill on the right of the road. Far up the heights on the left is the cave of \nMakkedah (also lately discovered), in which Joshua cooped the five kings until \nthe battle was won, when " he smote them, and slew them, and hanged them on \nfive trees, \' \' afterwards casting their bodies into the cave and laying great stones \nupon the cave\'s mouth, " which remain until this very day." \n\nFrom the brook (marginal reading "valley," now a wide, dry water-bed, \npaved with loose white pebbles) , crossed more than once by our track, David took \nthe five smooth stones for his sling, and somewhere in this same valley was the \ngreat fight between Saul and the Philistines who \' \' stood on a mountain on the \none side, while Israel stood on a mountain on the other side, and there was a \nvalley between them." It is impossible to designate the exact spot where the \nstripling confronted Goliath of Gath, but we select a locality to please ourselves \nand fight the battle over to our satisfaction. \n\n(387; \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBEE. \n\n\n\n389 \n\n\n\n" Eydda was nigh unto Joppa," when Peter, tarrying in the smaller town \nwith resident saints, healed Eneas who had been bed-ridden for eight years, \xe2\x80\x94 in \nthe sublimely simple formula \xe2\x80\x94 " Eneas ! Jesus Christ maketh thee whole. Arise, \nand make thy bed !" \n\nHe was still a sojourner in Lydda when summoned to Joppa by the news of \nDorcas\'s death. The village is brought so near to the seaport by rail that a touch of \nNew World enterprise would make it a suburb easily accessible for .merchants who \ncare for purer air than is to be had in the narrow streets of modern Jaffa. The \nCrusaders set their stamp upon Lydda in the form of a noble church built above \n\n^Kff \xe2\x80\x94 " ~~ \' \n\n\n\n\nOUVE GROVE NEAR JAFFA \n\n\n\nthe alleged burial-place of St. George, the patron saint of England, and coupled \nin everybody\'s mind with the dragon. The remains of this structure, dating from \nthe twelfth century, are amiably shared by the Greek Church and the Moslems, \npart of them being used as a mosque. Besides this building there is nothing of \ninterest in the squalid village. \n\nThe approach to Jaffa is heralded by groves of orange and olive trees. Bleak \nhills, where the only signs of human habitation are villages of low stone houses, \nthe materials being taken in many cases from the ruins of citadels and walled \ntowns, make way for sand-dunes drifted from the seashore by winds that make the \nharbor of Jaffa a word of terror all over the world. Fertile patches fight with \nthese \xe2\x80\x94 sometimes victoriously, sometimes with such indifferent success that the \n\n\n\n39\xc2\xb0 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nfringes of grass and starved-looking grain edge oases of vines and fig-lands, and \nend abruptly in yellow sand. Then, the orange groves thicken into orchards, \nencircled by hedges of prickly-pear with big, fleshy leaves and ugly stalks as \ncrooked as snakes and as large as a man\'s arm, and we plunge suddenly into a laby- \nrinth of alleys, lined with dirty stone houses, standing flush with the pavement \xe2\x80\x94 \nthe usual, and now the old story in Syrian towns. One of these conducts us to \nthe Jerusalem Hotel, a rambling building of various ages, over the modest door- \nway which we read, " Go through, go through the gates ! " Gardens lie behind \n\n\n\n\nCAMFXS WITH JAFFA ORANGES. \n\nit, and by the way of these we go to see the house of Simon the Tanner, where \nPeter lodged. While neither of us believes that the unpretending building, evi- \ndently not more than five hundred years old, and which may be less, is that once \noccupied by the apostle\'s landlord, it is quite possible that the site may be the \nsame. Tanning has been the business of the locality for perhaps twenty centuries, \nI and the always restless surf of Jaffa booms against the sea-wall bounding the court- \nyard. We pay to enter this, the fee being taken by a man in the garb of a Mos- \nlem priest, the care-taker of the shabby mosque of which Simon\'s house is an \nappanage. Another man, similarly attired, lowers a skin bucket into the old well \nin the yard and gives us to drink of the water. It is exceedingly brackish and \n\n\n\n392 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBEE. \n\n\n\nsalt as might be expected. We pluck a few leaves from the fig-tree overhanging \nit and ascend the short staircase built upon the side of the house, to the flat roof. \nIt is surrounded, like the pretty nest on the house-top we visited in Jerusalem, \nwith hollow tiles, arranged horizontally in geometrical designs and set in cement, \nfor the convenience of Moslem women who would peep at the world. A parapet \nof some sort was about the house-top chosen by Peter as an oratory, "a battlement \nfor thy roof" being one of the laws of Moses. The fisherman-disciple certainly \nnever fell into a trance upon these cemented stones, yet the scene spread out for him \n\n\n\n\nSTREET IN OI,D JAEFA. \n\nthat noon-tide, before the miraculous vision locked his senses against external ob- \njects, was like in general features that upon which our eyes now fasten eagerly. \nThe great and wide sea \xe2\x80\x94 the \' \' utmost sea \' \' seen by Moses\' dying eyes \xe2\x80\x94 the Medi- \nterranean, blue, seductive and treacherous of mood and meaning, rolled and thun- \ndered then against a jetty built by a Roman Emperor. The ruins of this now \nmake dangerous the always difficult business of landing and embarkation. The \nhills, the distant line of mountains, the ineffable blue of the smiling heavens, were \nbeautiful then as they are now. But the town had in Peter\'s time a wall and \n\n\n\n394 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\na Roman garrison, and commodious inlets where had been moored Hiram\'s floats \nladen with Lebanon cedar for the Temple in building at Jerusalem. \n\n4 \' And Majarkon and Rakkon with the border before (over against) Japho," \n( Joppa) were deeded to the Danites in Joshua\'s grants of Palestine lands. From \nJoppa, Jonah sailed for Tarshish (probably in Spain) instead of to Nineveh. The \nterritory and town still belonged at that date to the Phoenicians, from whom the \nHebrews had never been able to take them. Joppa has been a bone of contention \namong Turks, infidels and Jews," and enough blood has been shed in defence \nand conquest of this rough key to the Mediterranean to dye the blue waters \ncrimson. In using the figure we look toward the east at a group of sand-dunes \npale-yellow in the sunlight, that should be forever red. There Napoleon \xe2\x80\x94 the \ngreat Napoleon \xe2\x80\x94 had three thousand prisoners shot in platoons, to avoid the \ntrouble and expense of transportation to Egypt. \n\nOn our way to the hotel we meet a funeral procession; turn aside to let it pass \nand then follow the line of march through the very muddiest streets we have ever \nseen, even in Palestine. Not one person in the company of mourners has shoes, \nor even sandals on his feet; the men wear abiehs and turbans, the women gowns \nof dark-blue cotton, and white (by courtesy) izzars. They are not too much \nafflicted to hold these up, we perceive, when the puddles reaching clear across the \nstreet are unusually deep. The bier is borne upon the shoulders of four men. \nOur guide makes us notice that it is an unpainted open box, so shallow that the \nbreast, shoulders and profile of the corpse are visible from the ground. \n\n"He was poor, and the friends cannot afford a new coffin. This has been \nused many times already. Rich people have new and handsome coffins, which are \nsometimes buried with them. You hear that they sing happy songs," continues \nthe speaker, a Jaffa man, and an acquaintance of David. \' \' That means that he \nwas a good man. He made a pilgrimage to Mecca but lately, so short a time ago \nthat he has, the Moslems think, surely gone to the bosom of the Prophet. He has \nnot had time for much sin since. So nobody cries, and the hymns are glad." \n\nMaybe so, to an ear cultivated into an appreciation of Syrian melody. To us, \nthe happy hymns are as dolorous as dirges, and like all other Moslem music, tune- \nless, but for a rhythmic beat of time such as a drum-stick brings from a drum in \nthe intervals of march or quick-step. The chanting of Southern negroes in ante- \nbellum days, of long sentences all upon one or, at best, two notes, was something \nakin to the nasal sing-song to which the motley crew splash through pools in the \nlanes and the stiffer mire of the market-place, where not a man or woman turns out \nof his way to make room for them \xe2\x80\x94 up to the door of the mosque, where we leave \nthem. \n\nOur solitary call in Jaffa is upon Miss Arnott, the principal of one of the best \nschools in the Holy Land, now over thirty years in successful operation. Since \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n395 \n\n\n\nleaving Beir u ., we have not sat in a room that reminded us of home so forcibly as \nthe pleasant parlor where we are entertained by the true gentlewoman and philan- \nthropist to whom is due the good accomplished by this great light in a dark place. \nDavid Jamal has two daughters here, one engaged in teaching where she was her- \nself taught, the other as a pupil. All the native assistants are graduates of the \nschool, and the gentle dignity of the principal is reflected in the deportment of \nher subordinates. Dismissing David, and sending Alcides with him, I have a \nlong and, to me, deeply interesting talk with Miss Arnott. She left home and \ncountry in her youth to devote her whole life to the task of lifting her fellow- \nwomen out of the depths wherein they have lain for ages of despotic rule and \nunspeakable degradation. She has laid hold of the onry hope for her sex in Syria, \nand toiled hopefully for the girls who are to be the wives and mothers of the next \ngeneration. After all these decades of patient labor and manifold discourage- \nments, she sees her school a recognized power in the land and sits, a queen-mother, \namong her grateful children-in-heart. \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XLIV. \n\n\n\nDRAGOMANS AND HOTELS. \n\nEXT to health and the resolution to make the best of everything, a \ngood dragoman is the most important factor in the sum of Palestine \ntravel. As the country becomes more accessible to the visitor from \nforeign lands, the supply of guides and interpreters increases. I \nshould like to add that preparation for the profession is more thorough than when \nthere was not one-tenth as many who followed it. \n\nThe first and indispensable qualification for the position of dragoman to \nAmerican tourists is, of course, a knowledge of the English language. The \nnumber of schools established throughout Syria has greatly facilitated this object, \nand made it an easy matter, moreover, to get a smattering of history and archae- \nology that impresses the superficial observer with the apparent intelligence of the \nnative displaying it. The respectful attention with which he is heard raises his \nopinion of himself, already inflated by the consciousness of superiority to his \nuneducated fellow country-people. He can speak English, and usually French, as \nwell, and they only Arabic; he wears better clothes than they and knows some- \nthing of European ways of living and behaving. In his capacity of guide and \ninterpreter, he is continually consulted by his party, and a tolerable degree of \nfamiliarity with routes and the history of the places visited exalts him into a per- \nsonage of importance. But for him the tourist could not make a purchase, or \nexchange his gold for Turkish coins, or so much as ask for a drink of water. \nBeing, as a rule, a man of less than ordinary breeding to begin with, a son of the \npeople, his head is turned by his new position, and he assumes \xe2\x80\x94 not unreason- \nably \xe2\x80\x94 that, like the storied "little ostrich," he "knows it all." \n\nSuch specimens of the genus dragoman, flashily -dressed in the uniform of \nthe guild, swagger in the corridors and ante-rooms of hotels, and exchange loud \ngreetings in the market-place, and haunt places of interest on, or off escort duty, \nrattling off statistic and tradition, and directing the movements of "parties " with \nassurance becoming appreciation of the little brief authority inseparable from \nthe office. The duties of a dragoman, as the better -behaved and better-informed \nof the class comprehend, are to conduct the tourist in safety and comfort over the \nproposed line of travel; to guard him from imposition; to cater to his tastes, not \nonly as to food, but in the style of entertainment offered him, and to give him full \nand trustworthy abstracts of the history and legends associated with each place \n\n(397) \n\n\n\n\n398 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nvisited. In all this, lie is, nevertheless, to hold himself subject to the wishes- and \nfancies of those he has in charge. However important in his estimation it may be \nthat the party shall visit this ruin, or see that form of amusement peculiar to the \ncountry, it is his part, having once laid the case before them, to abide cheerfully \nby their decision, whether to follow his respectful advice or their own caprice. \nHe is paid to wait upon their pleasure, not to play the dictator or master. \n\nOur own experience with our incomparable dragoman prepared us to criticise \nwith surprise and indignation what we characterized as the \' \' freshness \' \' of others \n\n\n\n\n"our incomparable dragoman. \n\n\n\nwe chanced to meet. I well remember the glow of resentment with which I turned \nupon a young fellow to whom, while David was busy elsewhere with my son, was \ndeputed the duty of showing me the way back to the hotel. \n\n" Have you other sons ?\' \' he amazed me by inquiring presently. \n\n"No," I answered, stiffly. \n\n" Won\'t you take me to America with you ? I would be another son to you." \n"You will please call one of those donkey-boys over there," was my only \nreply, " 1 will ride the rest of the way." \n\nIn narrating the incident afterward to a resident of Jerusalem, he explained \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n399 \n\n\n\nwhat I took for insolence by telling of several instances of formal adoption of \ngood-looking young dragomans by wealthy Americans, subjoining incidents that- \ntransferred my displeasure from the vain, but ignorant, native to the traveling: \nAmerican. It is not unusual, according to this informant, and others who have \nhad equal opportunities of observation of the relations of tourist and guide, for \ntravelers from our free and independent country, to insist that the dragomans should \nsit at the table with them while in camp, and to treat them in all other respects \nas equals, and even as honored guests. American girls will walk arm-in-arm with \nfavorite dragomans in the streets of Damascus, Beirut and Jerusalem; run races \nwith them on the plains and down the hills, divide an orange or apple with a nice- \nlooking Syrian guide, eating half and giving him the other; eat bonbons from the \nsame box, and \xe2\x80\x94 I blush to say \xe2\x80\x94 smoke cigarettes with them. Sometimes, when \nthe guide is especially prepossessing and entertaining, the Daisy Miller of oriental \njourneyings goes so far as to carry on a lively flirtation that amuses her and utterly \nspoils the native of a country where the frank, innocent association of the sexes is \nabsolutely unknown. \n\nBefore visiting the Holy Eand, the traveler should obtain through trustworthy \nsources the address of a really competent dragoman \xe2\x80\x94 one conversant with every \nstep of the proposed tour, honest and intelligent, and who will make the cause of \nhis charge his own from the moment he enters upon his duties. It is the habit of \nmany \xe2\x80\x94 as we found to our cost in Cairo and Alexandria \xe2\x80\x94 to make common cause \nwith merchants who pay them commissions upon every sale arranged by the drago- \nman. After two months of David Jamal\'s jealous watchfulness over our interests, \nit was a shock when our guide to the Pyramids and the Sphinx protested almost \nangrily against our call at a shop near both, where we wished to buy souvenir \nspoons. \n\n\' \' My travelers are never allowed to do their own buying, \' \' he asserted. \n\n\' \' There was Mr. , from Buffalo, New York, who bought five hundred pounds\' \n\nworth of things in Cairo, and left the whole business to me. I choose them, I \nsettle on the price, I pay the money, and he ask not one question." \n\nUpon learning that the money spent by us in Cairo would probably not exceed \nfive pounds, he became sulky and washed his hands of the whole transaction. The \ntraveler is a veritable victim in the hands of such a man, powerless to protect his \npocket and hardly able to defend himself against insult. He is wise who, at the \nfirst sign of arbitrariness, declares his rights and his intention to maintain them. \n\n"How do you like your dragoman?" I inquired of a Prussian officer whom \nwe met in Bethlehem. \n\nI had noticed the fellow in Jerusalem and been disagreeably impressed by his \nsmirking effrontery and the bullying tone used to a party of unsophisticated . \nAmerican women and children. \n\n\n\n400 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n\' 1 Oh, he is quite tolerable if I kick him (figuratively) three times a day. \nUnless I do he is simply unbearable." \n\nBefore positively engaging a dragoman, one should, by letter, arrange every \nparticular of the journey, settle everything relative to a time, expenses, etc., and \nhave a written contract drafted, to be signed by both parties. The arrangements for \nthe tour which we have just happily completed were made six months prior to our \narrival in Syria, and I record with satisfaction that every provision of the contract \nwas fulfilled to the letter and in spirit. Not one unpleasant word was ever spoken \nby one of the parties concerned in the expedition; we never saw a sullen look upon \nthe face of an attendant, or failed to get a ready and courteous response to any \nrequest. \n\nAfter the frequent tributes paid in these chapters to the worth and services of \nour dragoman, it would seem superfluous to recommend him in terms of unquali- \nfied approbation to any who may have in view a visit to the Holy Eand. Mrs. \nOliphant, the English authoress, in the preface to her book of Syrian travel, \nalludes to David Jamal as "the Providence of our little party." He also con- \nducted Canon Tristram, the Prince of Wales, Dean Stanley, and other eminent \npersonages through Palestine, and always with the same result of perfect satis- \nfaction to the traveler. Of our obligations to him personally I have not room to \nspeak, but I must cite him as an acknowledged authority, even among scholars, in \nall pertaining to the history, the ruins and antiquities of his native and beloved \nland. His Biblical knowledge is wonderful; his reverence for holy things modest \nand unaffected; his character for integrity and honor unimpeachable. His address \nis simply, " David Jamal, Jerusalem, Syria." \n\nIt gives me pleasure to speak here of his friend and late partner, Demetrius \nDomian, as an excellent guide and intelligent dragoman. Were I to revisit Syria \nand could not get David Jamal, I should undoubtedly endeavor to secure Domian \'s \nservices. His home upon the house-top, overlooking the Valley of Jehoshaphat \nand Mount of Olives, is the prettiest nook we found in Jerusalem. \n\nHe who expects to see in any Syrian caravanserai the elegant \' \' conveni- \nences \' \' of Parisian and American hotels, is doomed to sore and certain disappoint- \nment. The nearest approach to these was found in the Grand New Hotel in \nJerusalem, where the ingenious thoughtfulness of Mr. Gelat, the manager, goes \nfar toward compensating for the lack of appliances for properly heating in cold \nweather a house built with express reference to long, intense summers, and for the \nimpossibility of procuring fresh milk, butter and fruits. It is within bounds to \nsay that no one can suffer other than minor inconveniences under his care. \n\nThe Hotel d\' Orient in Beirut, while inferior to the Grand New of Jerusalem \nin furniture, fare and general comfort, is considered the best in that city. \n\nThe Hotel Dimitri in Damascus outranks the d\' Orient of Beirut in sanitary \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n401 \n\n\n\nprovisions, in the variety and preparation of food, and in the appointments of \ntable and chambers. \n\nEverywhere men are employed as chambermaids, an awkward circumstance \nin sickness, and indeed at all times when the travelers are women, and unaccom- \npanied by their own maids. After a while one gets used (comparatively) to the \nqueer order of service, as likewise to the deprivation of many refinements she \nonce esteemed essential to a moderate degree of bodily well-being. \n\nIn bidding farewell to the patient reader who has kept pace with me to this \nfinal "Talk," I must blend with thanks for his courtesy and forbearance, grateful \nacknowledgments to a few of the many whose counsels and timely assistance in \nthe hour of need have filled up deep places, leveled hills, and led us by ways of \npleasantness and paths of peace, back to home and friends. \n\nTo Mr. Iyouis Klopsch, of New York, whose was the inception of the project \nof our Oriental tour, we owe more than to any other man who forwarded the long- \ncoveted end. His wise foresight provided for our convenience and pleasure at \nevery stage of the journey, and each arrangement was made upon a scale of \nkindly generosity which is beyond praise. \n\nTo the Faculty of the Protestant College at Beirut and their families for \nloving hospitality to the weary stranger within their gates; to Rev. Joseph Jamal, \nof Jerusalem; to Dr. Sandrecsky, of the same place, and, in an especial degree, to \nRev. Selah Merrill, D. D., LE. D., late U. S. Consul at Jerusalem, our thanks are \ndue now and always, for a wealth of kindness and friendly aid that leaves us for \never and hopelessly in their debt. \n\nWith us the pleasure and interest of our eventful jauntings " up and down in \nPalestine" so far outweighed the mishaps, that the latter are reduced in the \nretrospect to a minimum, \xe2\x80\x94 delicate shading thrown in here and there, to make \nbrighter the lights that will never go out until Eternal Day breaks for us upon the \nshore beyond the river, and we know for ourselves the fadeless glories of the New \nJerusalem that to mortals have never been told. \n\n\n\n\n26 \n\n\n\nCHAPTER XLV. \n\n\n\nMY FRIENDS, THE MISSIONARIES. \n\nopposite neighbor at table upon the voyage from New York to South- \nampton in the autumn of 1893 was a }^oung woman about twenty- \nfive 3 T ears of age, whom I silently decided by the closing of the \n* second day out, to be among the most interesting of my fellow-pas- \nsengers. In feature she was pleasing \xe2\x80\x94 even pretty \xe2\x80\x94 but her charm lay in a certain \nrefinement of speech and manner, combined with quick intelligence and sensibility \nof expression. She was a lady in grain, and in education and conversation so far \nabove the average of her age and sex, that when the crucial twenty-four hours of \n\' \' slight unpleasantness \' \' to both of us were happily over, I made opportunity to \ncultivate our acquaintanceship. \n\nWe were already good friends when, on the fourth night of our voyage \xe2\x80\x94 \nwhich chanced to be Sunday night \xe2\x80\x94 we were pacing the moonlighted deck \ntogether, and the talk took a personal, semi-confidential turn. The initiative step \nwas my statement that I was bound for Palestine, the Promised I^and of my life- \nlong dreams, never before visited by me in body and in truth. My companion \nlistened with flattering interest, and when I proposed jestingly that she should \njoin me in Jerusalem, smiled brightly. \n\n" In other circumstances, nothing would give me more pleasure, but I, too, \nam going to a Promised Land. My destination is Rangoon." \n\n\' \' Are you going alone ? \' \' \n\n"Alone \xe2\x80\x94 so far as human companionship is concerned. The friends with \nwhom I was to have sailed left America a week ago. I was detained by a short, \nbut severe illness." \n\nThis was the preface to the story I drew from her in the intercourse that \nripened fast into intimacy on ship-board. \n\nFrom childhood, she had known that she was " appointed," as she phrased \nit, to the Master\'s service in foreign lands. With the natural shrinking of youth \nfrom privation and toil, she had tried to get away from the conviction in various \nways, entering, at twenty, upon the study of art as an experimental lesson in the \nexpulsive power of a new affection. At twenty-three, she was impelled to reveal \nto her mother the struggle going on between conscience and expediency, and how \n\n(402) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. 4\xc2\xb03 \n\nshe could not escape from the persuasion that the Divine will urged her to conse- \ncrate herself to the life of a foreign missionary. The mother\'s reply set the seal \nupon her purpose : \n\n\' \' Were I fifteen years younger I would go with you. As it is, let me fulfill \nmy part of the mission by giving you up cheerfully. \' \' \n\nFrom that moment, the deep peace that entered the daughter\'s soul had never \nknown a cloud. There was no sentimentality in language or ambition. She was \nnot a dreamer, much less a fanatic. A clear-headed, resolute woman, she knew \nwhat she had undertaken, and counted the cost to the minutest detail. In putting \nher hand to the plough, she had grasped it, not hastily, but with staying power \nin the hold. In our long and earnest talks upon the subject, I appreciated for the \nfirst time, what constitutes "a call to the Mission Field." Since then I have \nthought and spoken of it with reverence, as something with which a stranger to \nsuch depths of spiritual conflict and such heights of spiritual enlightenment as \nhers, may not intermeddle. \n\nMy last glimpse of her was in the Waterloo Station, London. We had said \n" Good-bye " upon the train and I was seated in a carriage awaiting the disposi- \ntion of our luggage, when she passed, under the escort of a clergyman who had \nmet her upon our arrival. She caught sight of me, stepped hastily to the open \ndoor of my carriage, and the electric light showed the ineffable white peace of the \nsmile with which she kissed her hand to me silently and made a slight, but elo- \nquent, upward motion. Then, the crowd and the London night swallowed her \nup, and I saw her face no more. \n\nThe recollection of her had much to do with the resolution that moved me, a \nmonth later, to seek an interview with a party of missionaries who, I heard \naccidentally, were voyaging with me upon a P. & O. steamship bound to India, \nvia Port Said. The information came to me through the lips of one of the ship\'s \nofficers who was my vis-a-vis at table. \' 1 A jolly game of cards had been disturbed \nthe night before by the psalm-singing of a pack of missionaries in the second \ncabin " he growled, " If they had sung something jolly, don\'t you know, the card \nparty would not have minded it so much, although there was such a lot of them \nthat they make a beastly racket \xe2\x80\x94 but hymn tunes have a way of making a fellow \nlow in his mind \xe2\x80\x94 don\'t you know ? \' \' \n\nI had never heard until then of missionaries as second cabin voyagers, and the \nimpression was unequivocally disagreeable. It is not agreeable down to the present \nhour, although I have learned how common it is for the Board at home (moved, \npresumably, by the churches at home) to economize in this way, especially when \nthe voyage is long. My readers may not sympathize with the indignation that \nflushed up to my forehead at the coupling of the words \' \' missionaries \' \' and \n" second cabin." It may be that the failure to fall in with my temper arises from \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OE THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nignorance of the conditions of a six weeks voyage, second class, in a P. & O. \nsteamship. The first cabin passage was inconvenient to discomfort to one used to \nAtlantic floating palaces. The linen was dingy and musty ; the food badly cooked \nand carelessly served ; the general debility of the milk and the sustained strength \nof the butter were matters of popular complaint. Nothing was up to the Ameri- \ncan standard of prime quality, except prices. \n\nI had looked over the rail separating the first from the second cabin, and mar- \nveled at the brave cheer of the less fortunate in their cramped quarters. Tell-tale \nodors from the kitchen and over-crowded sleeping cabin reached our olfactories ; \nchildren played and wrangled and romped, like beasts in a circus wagon, all day long. \n\nIt was easy to account for the preference of men and women in all weathers \nfor the strait bounds of deck-space allotted to them above remaining in doors. \n\nSo, the flush still burned my forehead when, as soon as breakfast was over, I \nbetook myself to the end of the ship where was located the second cabin, and, \npassing through the gate, asked a ruddy young Englishman if I might have speech \nwith my friends, the missionaries. He was one of them, he said, pleasantly, and \nhe had the whole band about me in a few minutes. Sixteen of them \xe2\x80\x94 all from \nGreat Britain. Four Wesley ans, four Baptist, four from the Church of England, \nand four Congregationalists. My exclamation at the equal allotment to each \ndenomination raised a laugh, and we were no longer strangers. In breeding and \neducation the women were the superiors of those who lounged in sea-chairs under \nthe double awning amidships, and murmured languidly at the heat and length of \nthe voyage. Not a man of them was as scantily equipped with brains and \nbehavior as the officer whose game their sacred music had disturbed. Eancy-work \nand plain sewing went on while the men took turns in reading aloud ; family \nprayers and bible readings were held in the cabin at stated hours, three violins \nand a flute made a tolerable orchestral accompaniment to the vocal music of the \nevening ; ship\'s coil and shuffle-board in a measure compensated for the lack of \nthe long promenade of the first cabin. \n\nThe cheerful contentment of the party was to me, astonishing. With one \naccord, they overlooked discomforts until they became glaringly obtrusive, then \nlaughed at them. In American phrase, they were " in for a good time," and they \nhad it. When questioned, all pitched the stories of personal experience in one \nand the same key. Of their own free will, and, after mature deliberation, they \nhad entered upon a course they hoped to continue while life should last, and they \nrejoiced and were glad in it. Six of the sixteen were veterans in the foreign \nfield ; five were the children of missionaries, who had been educated in England, \nand were going out to carry on the work begun by their parents. The peace \nthat passed worldly understanding was not the serenity of ignorance. They knew \nwhat they were undertaking. \n\n\n\nj \n\ni\' \n\nS \n\nr! \n\n\n\ngolden gate;, Jerusalem. (405) \n\n\n\n406 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nA young man \xe2\x80\x94 a first-cabin passenger \xe2\x80\x94 who had heard with mingled wonder \nand cynicism the report of my visits to the \' \' psalm-singers, \' \' one day asked per- \nmission to accompany me. Being a gentleman, he quickly affiliated with the \nmissionaries, and made the most of our call. It was evening, and, after bidding \nthem " Good night \' \' we walked the deck for awhile, he glancing, at each turn, at \nthe group seated in the moonlight within the cabin doors. By-and-by, he gave, \nwithout prelude, his solution of the mystery of the happiness of such people in \nsuch circumstances. \n\n" They must love Him " \xe2\x80\x94 reverently raising his cap \xe2\x80\x94 " very much." \n\nIn six words he had furnished the key to conduct that baffles the adepts in \nsecular policy. It is a key that adjusts itself to every combination. \n\nThrough the silence succeeding the unexpected remark, I seemed to hear, in \nthe rush of the south wind that blew softly and the wash of the Mediterranean \nwaves, \xe2\x80\x94 like the rhythm of a Gregorian chant : \xe2\x80\x94 \n\n" For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, ?ior principal- \nities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come. \n\nNor height, nor depth, nor any other creature shall be able to separate us from \nthe love of God, which is in Christ fesus our Lord." \n\nIn Beirut, Syria, I counted my friends, the missionaries, by the score. Dr. \nPost, the head of the Medical Department of the Protestant College in that place \n\xe2\x80\x94 which is, to all intents and purposes, a university \xe2\x80\x94 was our fellow passenger \nfrom Port Said, via Jaffa, and the first hand-clasp I had after we anchored in the \nBeirut offing, was from Dr. Bliss, the president. For ten days and more I was in \nhourly association with the noble body of professors and tutors, who, with their \nfamilies, make up one of the most charming social circles it was ever my privilege \nto enter. \n\nDuring one of the calls with which Dr. Bliss honored me, he said with the air \nof a man who celebrates a happy anniversary : \n\n\' \' Thirty-seven years ago to-day I left my native land for this place and work. \' \' \n\' \' Have you never regretted it ? " \n\n\' \' Regretted it ! In looking back to-da}^, my regret is that I have not, in the \ncourse of nature, thirty-seven years more to devote to the same cause." \n\n"We are sometimes spoken of as the gilt-edged mission," he continued. \n" But there are black edges to certain leaves of our history." \n\nThis introduced a deeply interesting abstract of the early struggles of the \nmission band \xe2\x80\x94 then a feeble folk, \xe2\x80\x94 against half-hearted backers at home, Moslem \ndistrust and jealousy, the apathy of the native population for whose sake personal \nease and selfish ambition were killed all the day long. I had from an eye witness \nthe particulars of the massacre of Christians by the Druses in 1862, and of the \nimminent danger of the American Mission. Of Dr. Bliss\'s ineffectual petition to \n\n\n\n.1* \n\n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBEE. \n\n\n\nthe English Consul for one man and an English flag, that the missionary might \nplead in person with the murderers. How every native Christian man and boy \nin the settlements near Beirut was killed, and the women and girls were brought \ndown from the ruins of their homes to fill to overflowing the Mission House, and \nbe fed, nursed and clothed by the missionaries and their wives. Of an alarm of \napproaching peril that led to the flight by night under cover of the cactus hedges \nlining a lane running down to the pier, where lay a boat ready to convey the \nhunted American Christians to an English man-of-war. Babies were snatched from \ntheir beds and borne off by their parents, everything else of value being left for \nthe pillagers. Of Mrs. Bliss\'s sigh, as she sped along in the midnight at her \nhusband\'s side, \xe2\x80\x94 "If we could only escape to the mountains !" and his reply, \n" God is our only refuge and strength, my dear. Eook at the mountains ! " \n\nThe Eebanon range, that at sunset had been as the Garden of the Eord in \nterraced luxuriance of vine and olive and fig tree,\xe2\x80\x94 was lurid with the glare of \nburning villages. \n\n" Now we have no hardships ! " was said to me so often that I inferred the \ncompleteness of the missionaries\' expatriation. Time and custom had, I supposed, \nreconciled them to the role of men without a country. The ties of land and home \nand kindred were weakened by the protracted tension upon patriotism and natural \naffection of absence and other interests. \n\nWhile confessing with shame the folly and injustice of the conclusion, I \nbelieve that the comparatively small number of American Christians who have \never given this side of the mission question a thought, have fallen or slidden into \nthe same misapprehension. My opinion was reversed by the events of the \nThanksgiving Day I passed in Beirut. At eight o\'clock in the evening\xe2\x80\x94 an hour \ncorresponding as nearly as could be computed with the one o\'clock dinner time at \nhome \xe2\x80\x94 there was a social gathering of the garrison at the house of Professor Porter. \nI shall never participate in such another celebration of our national festival. Ad- \ndresses were made, prayer was offered for the far away native land, and we all \nsang as clearly as swelling hearts and aching throats would allow, \' \' My Country, \n\'tis of Thee ! " \n\nI comprehended that night what patriotism, pure, simple and utterly disinter- \nested, is like ; a fire of devotion that had stood the chill of years, the creeping \ndamps of foreign life and of interests utterly dissociated from American institu- \ntions. A patriotism absolutely divorced from politics is a phenomenon worth \ngoing half-way around the world to see. \n\nI diverge from the main line of my theme to relate in this connection an inci- \ndent of Dr. Bliss\'s visit to England in 1864, when the financial condition of the \nBeirut Mission and the distress of the parent land made an appeal to British Chris- \ntians imperatively necessary : \n\n\n\nFRONT OF THE HOLY SEPULCHRE. JERUSALEM. (409) \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OE THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nAt a meeting of the friends of the mission, held in a London drawing-room, \nDr. Bliss announced that he had raised $10,000 toward the sum needed to put the \ncollege upon a stable foundation. \n\nA jeering voice called out, \xe2\x80\x94 " In money 1 or in Yankee greenbacks? " \n\nWithout the pause of a second, the reply rang back \xe2\x80\x94 \n\n\' \' I shall not use one cent of this amount until every dollar of the ten thous- \nand is worth a dollar in gold ! Nor shall I have long to wait ?" \n\nHe kept his word to the letter, and, as he had predicted, he had not long to wait. \n\nThis is the stuff of which the men are made who have set the Beirut College \nand Mission upon the hill commanding the harbor, the stretch of the blue Mediter- \nranean on the left, and, across an arm of the sea, the glory of Lebanon. I can \ncompare this station to nothing more aptly than to the colossal figure whose uplifted \ntorch gleams nightly over New York Bay. Like her, it proclaims liberty to the \ncaptives and the opening of the prison to them that are bound by the trammels of \na false faith, and the tyranny of a besotted government. \n\n1 \' You wonder at our contentment ? \' \' said one of the women missionaries to \nme. " I will show you a stranger thing if you will go with me a day\'s journey \nup the country." \n\nLet me take you, who now read, with us. \n\nRight in the heart of the hills upon the outskirts of the miserable Syrian \nvillage, is a house built of rough stones laid up in mud, and with a thatched roof. \nIt differs from its neighbors mainly in having three rooms, where the others have \nbut one. In it live an educated man and woman with two little children. In this \nmountain-parish, the American missionaries are school teachers, hospital nurses, \npreachers and physicians, laboring with hand and head from year to year, some- \ntimes seeing no white visitor for months together ; straitened for means to provide \nfor the needs of the primitive household, \xe2\x80\x94 yet never so much as cast down, much \nless in despair. It is in a home like this that one enters into the fullness of the \npledge \xe2\x80\x94 \xc2\xab < My peace I leave with you ; my peace I give unto you. Not as the world \ngiveth, give I unto you\' \' \n\n" Not as the world giveth ! " Else they had long ago been left comfortless\xe2\x80\x94 \nin exile, poor, toiling and destitute of all solace of friendship, social intercourse \nand intellectual stimulus. \n\nThey were very cheerful, and very busy \xe2\x80\x94 this devoted pair, and inexpressibly \nthankful that the native women began to keep their homes cleaner, to be willing to \nhave their girls taught to sew, and cook and read, and that a few men listened \nrespectfully to such simple Bible stories as every child brought up in a Christian \nhome knows by the time he is five years old. \n\nNot long ago I met an American Congregationalist, one of whose friends had, \nin a Syrian tour, spent a night in this hospitable hovel. \n\n\n\n412 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n"She thought them very good people," said the traveler\'s friend patroniz- \ningly, 4 \' and they seemed to have their work at heart. But she was disappointed \nto find them Using really lovely china and solid silver forks. All wedding-presents, \nshe said, or sent by her mother since, but such show of luxuries hurts the cause \nof Christ. It isn\'t like giving up all for Him, you know. And this is what the \nforeign missionary must do." \n\nOf this style of renunciation of other people\'s goods for Christ\'s sake and the \nGospel\'s, on the part of well-to-do church members, dwelling at ease in American \nZions, I shall have something more to say in considering the life of the home \nmissionary. \n\nI pass on, now, to the last glimpse of my friends, the Syrian missionaries. \n\nIn ancient Hebron, within a quarter-mile of the Cave of Machpelah where \nlie buried Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, Sarah, Rebekah and Eeah\xe2\x80\x94 we visited Mr. \nand Mrs. Murray, English people, and, with the exception of one other family, \nthe only English-speaking household in the town. Mrs. Murray is blind, her \nhusband is lame, and, when divinely directed, as they firmly believed, to this \nspiritual desert, the very stronghold of Moslem bigotry, they knew not one relig- \nious organization to which they could look for the means of carrying on their \nproposed mission. They have lived by the day a life of trust that casts into the \nshade any other I have ever heard of. Mrs. Murray and a Bible reader have \ncollected a school of twenty-five or thirty little girls, whom they instruct in all \nsorts of handiwork, in the rudiments of letters, and in knowledge of the Bible. \nAt the vintage season, almost the entire population of Hebron live for two months \nin booths in the vineyards, and the English missionaries go with them, helping \nthe mothers to look after the babies, nursing the sick, and, altogether, making \nthemselves one with the working people. \n\nMrs. Murray spoke with devout gratitude of the favor they have found in the \nsight of the Moslems of both sexes, although the inhabitants of the region are \nnotoriously the fiercest in their bigotry and fanatical jealousy of any other faith \nto be found in Palestine. \n\n" We have never been allowed to want for any good thing," said the blind \nwoman, the light of a great peace upon her face \' \' God has mercifully never let \nus doubt that this is our place in His great and wide vineyard. With this per- \nsuasion, labor in the foreign field is a blessed cross-bearing, for the Master carries \nthe heavier end." \n\nAt the American Mission in Cairo, I had the privilege of knowing, somewhat \nintimately, the laborers who have made strong the foundations of a worthy enter- \nprise. In the Bible-class of young men taught by Miss Harvey (now Mrs. \nRobertson) , I met, besides native converts, a dozen or more young fellows in the \nscarlet uniform of the British soldiery, most of them Scotchmen, to whom the \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n4i3 \n\n\n\nchurch service and Bible-class are like home voices, powerful in restraint and \nin consolation. The English occupation of Northern Egypt has made the care \nof this element of the motley population an important branch of evangelistic \nwork. \n\nHere again, was the same, and by now, the old, old story of peace that flowed \nlike a river, and happiness in a life which, to the unlearned in such matters, \nappears harsh and painful, and oftimes barren of desirable results in man\'s impa- \ntient calculation of profit and loss. \n\nIn this cursory retrospect, I have, with intentional catholicity, dealt with \nvarious denominations of those who love our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ, in \nsincerity and in truth. Of my friends the missionaries in Jerusalem, those con- \nnected with the Church Missionary Society of London and the two gentlewomen \nfrom our own country, who at their own charges, are doing such work among the \nlowest class of Jews as the Murrays are carrying on among the Moslems in \nHebron, I cannot even begin to speak. What I know of them personally\xe2\x80\x94 their \ntoils, their faith and patience, their sublime confidence in the promises to him that \novercometh\xe2\x80\x94 would consume, in the telling, more time than my readers have to \ngive, or I the strength to take. \n\nIn our age, as in that in which our Lord lived and taught, the children of this \nworld are more cunning than the children of light, but the wisest children of light \nare the ardent spirits that turn their backs upon the homes they love, the refine- \nments that have become as necessary to comfort as the breath they draw, and, deaf \nto lures of earthly gain and honor, devote life and talent to the service of Him \nwho established both Home and Foreign Missions in the general order that has \nnever been repealed, and will never be outlawed, until time shall be no more. \n\n" Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature\xe2\x80\x94 beginning \nat Jerusalem." \n\n^ If this be not disinterestedness of the highest order, then I do not know what \ndisinterestedness means. If this be not altruism of the stamp that came into \nbeing on the first Christmas day, then heroism, and self-sacrifice and the love that \nvaunteth not itself, doth not behave itself unseemly and never faileth, are but \nempty names. \n\n\n\nP. S. Since this book was written news has come to me over two seas of the \ndeath of one of these devoted women, Miss Robertson, of whom I have spoken in \nthe chapter entitled, "The Box Colony." To the first impulse to regret the loss \nto those to whom she ministered, and to the friends who loved her, succeeds our \nsolemn thankfulness that her unsealed eyes have looked upon Him for whose \ncoming she watched as those who wait for their Lord. \n\n\n\n4H \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\n" Does not your heart fail you, sometimes, in this daily round of duty to the \nmiserable and unbelieving?" I asked at our last interview. " Are you never \nhomesick for the \' Old Kentucky Home far away ? \' " \n\n"Sometimes \xe2\x80\x94 when I am very tired, I am homesick, but not for Kentucky, \nor for America," with the sweet smile that transformed a worn face. " Then, I \npra3^ \xe2\x80\x94 maybe impatient^ \xe2\x80\x94 \' Lord ! how long ? \' and \' Come quickly, Lord Jesus ! \' \nUsually, I am willing to abide His own good time." \n\nShe knows now, having entered into the joy of her Lord, why she \xe2\x80\x94 and the \nworld \xe2\x80\x94 have been kept waiting. \n\n\n\n\nThe Story of Rrrqenia \n\n\n\nThe Christian People of Ancient Eden and \nTheir Persecution by the Moslems, \n\n\n\nARMENIA AND ITS PEOPLE. \n\nINCB the foregoing pages were written, and after Marion Harland\'s \nreturn from Bible lands, Asia Minor, Syria and Turkish territory in \nboth Europe and Asia generally have been the scenes of events of a \nmost startling character. Above all others, Armenia, the ancient \nEden, and the seat of what is probably the oldest known form of \nChristian belief, has been visited by persecution and massacres of such appalling \nproportions and frightful inhumanity as to recall the early Christian sufferings \nunder the Roman rule, when multitudes perished in a single day. Rome\'s \nenormities, however, have been rivaled if not eclipsed by the horrible outrages \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n: _^ _ \n\n\n\nTHE; DARDANELLES \n\n\n\nrecently perpetrated by the Ottoman power in the plains, and on the valleys and \nhillsides of Armenia, where nearly one hundred thousand men, women and children \nof the Christian faith have been slain in cold blood \xe2\x80\x94 many with the most dreadful \ntortures, and from three to four hundred thousand others rendered destitute and \nutterly helpless. Furthermore, this gigantic holocaust, with all its attendant \nhorrors of name, rapine and violation, has continued unchecked, under the very \n\n(4i5) \n\n\n\n\n416 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nIt \n\n\n\n\neyes of the so-called civilized powers of Christian Europe. Whatever pangs of \nconscience may have assailed individuals or communities after each successive \noutrage, it stands as a record of shame that, in an enlightened age, no step was \ntaken by a single government to arrest the slaughter of the helpless Christians of \nArmenia, or to stay the hand of that nineteenth century Nero, Sultan Abdul \nHamid, from his sworn purpose of exterminating the Armenian people and \n-thereby ending forever the much- vexed Armenian Question. \n\nTurkish Armenia, the northwest division of Kurdistan, is a great plateau of \nnearly sixty thousand square miles, bounded on the north by the Russian frontier, \nby Persia on the east, the plains of Mesopotamia on the west, and Asia Minor on \nthe south. There are in all, at the present time, about four million Armenians on \nthe globe, of whom little more than half are in Turkey, and the rest in Russia, \n\nPersia, other Asiatic \ncountries, Europe and \nAmerica. In Armenia \n\xe2\x80\x94 the name and geo- \ngraphical existence of \nwhich are not recog- \nnized in T u r k e y \xe2\x80\x94 \nthere are probably six \nhundred and fifty \nthousand native Ar- \nmenians, or one-fourth \nof the whole number \nthat are scattered \nthroughout the Porte\'s \ndominions. The cli- \nmate is temperate and \nbracing. Facilities for travel and transportation are exceedingly meagre, and \nall the methods employed by the natives are unusually primitive. "Valis," \nor municipal governors, are appointed by the government at Constantinople to \n.administer the laws, and none but Moslems hold official positions. Among the \npopulation are found many races, including Turks, Kurds, Russians, Circassians, \nand Jews, besides native Armenians. Fully one-half the people are Moham- \nmedan. \n\nThe Kurds are tribal and lead a predatory life, dwelling in mountain \nvillages over the entire region. Their number is uncertain, but it is esti- \nmated that in the districts of Erzeroom, Van and Bitlis, there are not less \nthan six hundred thousand. Some of these tribes are migratory, like \nthe Bedouins of Syria. Almost all are warlike, and many have degenerated \n\n\n\n\nA KURDISH HOUSE AND ITS INMATES. \n\n\n\nTHE STORY OF ARMENIA. \n\n\n\n4i7 \n\n\n\ninto lawless brigandage. For centuries they have made serfs of the \nChristians, trampling them under foot at every opportunity, and extending \nto them no toleration whatsoever. These rude mountain Ishmaelites delight \nin bloodshed and pillage. A few years ago the Sultan, the better to con- \ntrol them, and with a view to securing for his army an element equal in ferocity \nand courage to the Russian Cossacks, organized the Kurds into a regular military \nbody with the title of Hamidieh, thus honoring these rough-riding, robber war- \nriors with his own royal name. Their spirit, like that of the wild Arab, the \nCossack, or the North American Indian, is one that scarcely brooks the restraints \nof military discipline. \n\n\n\n\ni \n\n\n\n1; \n\n\n\nThey are always for- \nmidably armed, and \nweapons in the hands \nof such war- loving \nraces are an incentive \nto disturbance and out- \nrage. They have long \nspread universal terror \namong the Armenians \nby their cruelty and \nfrightful excesses, but \nit has been reserved \nfor our own time to \nwitness such an exhibi- \ntion of barbarism on \ntheir part as has filled \nEurope and America \nwith horror. The \nTurks, although more \ncivilized, are only one \ndegree less cruel and \ninhuman than the Kurds. In marked contrast to Kurds and Turks alike, the \nArmenians are peace-loving, industrious, frugal and kindly. Their nation was \nconverted to the Christian faith in the fourth century, and has remained true to \nthat faith ever since. Their creed and forms of worship are those of the Orthodox \nEastern Church ; they believe in the Trinity, and although they cling to many \nof the ancient forms and symbols, they render no allegiance to Rome. Their \nnative priests or clergy are an earnest, faithful class, and the people themselves \nhold to their simple faith with an intensity that equals the zeal of the Moslem in \nsupporting Islam. This tenacity of creed, together with the fact that the \n27 \n\n\n\n\nBAKING CAKES IN ARMENIA. \n\n\n\n418 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nArmenians usually prosper everywhere, has been the means of stirring up bitter \nenvy and religious hatred against this peaceable people. \n\nArmenia is a lovely country. It was the first part of the globe to be settled \nby the human race after the flood, and Mount Ararat, where the ark rested, still \nrears its lofty crest, seventeen thousand feet in height, and overlooks the same \nlandscape of valley, plain and mountain that greeted the eyes of Noah and his \ncompanions when they gazed upon the new-risen earth after the subsidence of \nthe Deluge. In a thousand ways, it has a peculiar claim upon the interest \nand sympathy of the civil- 1 HHHHT \xe2\x80\x94 ~ " ~~ ~ " \nized world. Contemporary \nwith the mighty empires \nof Assyria, Babylon and \n\nI \\ \n\n\n\n\nMOUNT ARARAT AND " I^TTLE ARARAT." \n\n\n\nPersia, and still later with Rome, it was the birthplace of some of the grandest \ncharacters of ancient times. From the earliest days, the nation has wor- \nshiped the true God, even though surrounded by idolaters, and its men were \nfamed for bravery and its women for beauty and chastity. Of Prince Ara, one of \nits rulers, it is related that when urged by the beautiful but licentious Queen \nSemiramis, of Babylon, to become her husband, he preferred to go to war and lose \nhis life and kingdom, rather than desecrate the sanctity of the Armenian family by \nsuch an ungodly union with an idolatrous queen. \n\n\n\nTHE STORY OF ARMENIA. \n\n\n\n419 \n\n\n\nWhen Christianity dawned upon the earth, its teachers in the first century \nA. D. found a ready welcome in Armenia, where the Apostles Thaddeus and \nBartholomew are said to have preached. Under King Durtad, in the year 302, \nthe Armenians were the first people in the world to accept Christianity as a \nnation, and the Armenian Church, founded by Gregory, " The Illuminator," has \nheld all the great cardinal truths of the Christian religion throughout the last \nsixteen centuries, and without a single schism or heresy, or any disrupting theo- \nlogical controversy. Its liturgy was taken from that of St. James of the Church \nof Jerusalem, and its form of government has been one steady, unchanging line \nof the Episcopacy, yet without ecclesiastical tyranny. Upon the same patriarchal \nthrone at Etchmiadzin, near Erivan, in Russian Armenia, where once sat Gregory \nin 302 A. D., now sits the venerable Catholicos Mugurditch Khrimian, the \nspiritual father of the Armenian people, \nand well-beloved of all. \n\nMohammedan domination in Ar- \nmenia dates from the Crusades. Hav- \ning aided the warriors of the Cross on \ntheir outward progress, when the latter \nwere rolled back, discomfited, by the \nMoslem power, the Armenians were \nmade to feel the bitterness of a revenge \nsuch as only a Mohammedan horde \ncould inflict. Their country was over- \nrun and conquered, their property con- \nfiscated, even their beloved religion all \nbut suppressed, and their people en- \nslaved. Five centuries relaxed but \n\n, 1 . - \xe2\x80\x9e, - , , KURDISH ROBBERS DISGUISED AS SHEPHERDS. \n\ndid not unbind the Moslem bonds. \n\nThrough many generations these Armenian people have suffered oppression and: \noutrage at Turkey\'s hands in unresisting silence. Extortions under the name of \ntaxation, gross dishonesty by unpaid officials, and wholesale robbery by the \nKurdish chiefs or Agas, together with restricted freedom of worship, and! \ngeneral persecution, made their position almost unbearable. \n\nIn 1878, the Berlin Treaty was concluded by the European powers, under \nwhich reforms were guaranteed by the Porte in Armenia, whose people were \npromised security against Kurdish extortions and attacks, and also the fullest \nreligious liberty. Immediately after the Berlin Congress, a treaty of defence was \nentered into between Turkey and England, and the result has been that the \npromises made by the Porte to the Berlin Congress, like all others made by the \nsame power, were ignored and broken at every opportunity. From that date, the \n\n\n\n\n420 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nperiod of Armenia\'s worst sufferings was begun. The abuses to which it had \nbefore been subjected were now intensified tenfold. Armenians were robbed and \nbeaten, and their stores and houses pillaged at will, their wives and daughters \noutraged, their cattle and crops carried off, and murder became the common pas- \ntime of the Christian-hating Turk. Mohammedan officials ruled in all places of \nauthority, and the word of an Armenian was worthless in a court of justice when \nopposed to a Moslem. All the laws were distorted for the oppression and degrada- \ntion of this wretched subject people. At last so loud did the cry of the oppressed \nbecome that it again reached the ears of Europe, and the Sultan, being warned, \nonce more, promised to institute reforms in Armenia. He simultaneously registered \na vow to exterminate the Armenian people, as subsequent events have shown. \n\nAbdul Hamid\'s promised reform was inaugurated in September, 1894, by a \ngigantic and indescribably horrible massacre that has hardly a parallel in history. \nThat it was perpetrated by the Hamidieh\xe2\x80\x94 the Sultan\'s own specially-named \ntroops\xe2\x80\x94 is significant of the purpose for which they were organized. The mas- \nsacre of Sassoon is believed, like all the other great massacres that followed, to have \nbeen inspired from the palace at Constantinople, and Zekki Pasha, who com- \nmanded on that infamous occasion, was afterward decorated by the Sultan, as \nwere four Kurdish chiefs who had been specially savage and merciless while the \ncarnage was in progress. \n\nTHE EDICT OF EXTERMINATION. \n\nFrom time immemorial, the Armenians have been a rich source of revenue to \ntheir Moslem oppressors, who were free to rob, to torture and even to slay them \nat will. This was the inalienable privilege of the followers of Mohammed in \ndealing with the " infidel ghiaour." When Europe interfered, and especially \nwhen it became evident that such interference, if unchecked, might ultimately \nlead to the relaxation of Armenia\'s bonds and possibly even to absolute freedom, \nthe Sublime Porte secretly promulgated a policy as bold and startling as it was \ninhuman. That policy, which is believed to be the outcome of Abdul Hamid\'s own \nbrain, is one that stamps that monarch as the supreme savage of the century, and \nthe whole Moslem power as a "barbarian camp," unfit to be tolerated amid civil- \nized nations. Like all Mohammedans, Abdul Hamid\'s religion is his politics. \nHe regards the life and property of his Christian subjects as his legitimate prey. \nThey are so many dogs, to be whipped or even killed, as the emergency \ndemands; and in the present instance, the Armenians were clearly liable to become \na burdensome obstruction to Ottoman Government, and to the peace and serenity \nof the Sublime Porte. Their tax-paying and tribute-yielding capacity was \ndiminishing, as their numbers and the sympathy of Europe increased. To a true \nMussulman, the path of duty was clear. That their importance as a factor in \n\n\n\nTHE STORY OF ARMENIA \n\n\n\n421 \n\n\n\nTurkish affairs might be minimized, they were to be led forth to the slaughter, as \nother peoples had been in other years, by faithful Sultans. And so the edict of \nextermination went out from Constantinople, an edict which sealed the fate not \nonly of the people of Sassoon, but of the surplus Christian population of Armenia \nas a whole. Valis, military commanders and even subordinate officers, in all the \nprincipal events that followed, acted under orders from Constantinople. It was a \nprogram which, carried out to its fullest extent, contemplated the extinction \nof the Armenian race within Turkish territory, by the sword, by fire and by \nStarvation. To the Moslem mind, trained to abhorrence of all other religions and \nmrged even by the Koran itself to their subjugation, there was nothing repulsive \n\n\n\n\nARMENIAN GIRI\xc2\xa3 SPINNING. \n\n\n\nin this, but rather the contrary. How this sanguinary policy was to be put into \npractice was soon after disclosed. \n\nTHE MASSACRE OF SASSOON. \n\nSassoon is a mountainous province in the southern part of the Armenian \nplateau, east of Lake Van. Inhabited by Armenians and Kurds, the former are \ngreatly in the majority. There is, however, no intermingling of races. The \nKurdish villages are scattered around, being chiefly on the edges of the plateau, \nwhile the Armenians dwell in the centre of the province. Industrious and frugal, \nthe Armenians literally supported themselves and the Kurds, and besides paid \ntaxes to the Turkish Government. Of all goods manufactured by the Armenians, \nthe Kurds received their share, or desk, as they call it. Every spring, the chiefs \nor Aghas of the Kurdish tribes, came at the head of their men *o collect the \n\n\n\n422 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\ntribute from the Armenian villages in sheep, mules, carpets, stockings and \nimplements. The principal taxes which the Armenians pay to the government, are \n(i) the poll-tax, $2.00 per head, including the new-born male baby; (2) tax on \nreal estate; (3) Khamtchoori, namely, five piasters per head of sheep \xe2\x80\x94 one-eighth \nof the value of the sheep; (4) tithe of agricultural products. All these they had \nhonestly paid, but the legitimate taxes had been multiplied tenfold by Kurdish \nexaction and by the extortions of the valis and minor Turkish officials, each of \nwhom robbed the Armenians at every opportunity. In the Sassoon district, there \n\n\n\n\nA REFUGEE FAMILY FROM SASSOON. \n\n\n\nare three Kurdish tribes \xe2\x80\x94 the Khanuvdulik, the Busuktzik and the Ousvi \xe2\x80\x94 each \nclaiming its own tribute. There are other tribes on the borders of Sassoon \xe2\x80\x94 the \nPakrantzik, the Baduktzik, the Khiyantzik and the Belektzik, besides many other \nsmaller " ashirets " and all demanded their share. The villages of the Talvoreeg \ndistrict, richer than most others, paid tribute to seven tribes. Some of the other \nvillages were visited by as many as ten. The wretched Armenians were stripped \nabsolutely bare of everything worth possessing. In 1893, the impoverished Arme- \nnians decided to resist further robberies. Early in the spring of that year, the \n\n\n\nTHE STORY OF ARMEMIA. \n\n\n\n423 \n\n\n\nKurds came with demands more exorbitant than ever, the chiefs being escorted \nby a great number of armed men, but they were driven back by the brave vil- \nlagers. This unsuccessful attack was a new revelation to the Porte. The cry \nof rebellion was raised and Sassoon was marked for the first act in the drama of \nArmenian extermination. \n\nIn August, 1894, Kurdish and Turkish troops came to Sassoon. The Kurds \nhad been newly armed with Martini rifles. Zekki Pasha, who had come from \nErzingan, read the Sultan\'s order for the attack, and then urged the soldiers to \nloyal obedience to their Imperial master. It is said that on the last day of August, \nthe anniversary of Abdul Hamid\'s accession to the throne, the soldiers were spe- \ncially urged to distinguish themselves in making it the \nday of greatest slaughter. On that day the commander \nwore the edict of the Sultan on his breast. Kurds \nbegan the butchery by attacking the sleeping villagers \nat night and slaying men, women and children. For \ntwenty-three days this horrible work of slaughter lasted. \nNo pen can adequately describe the diabolical ferocity \nof the prolonged massacre. Some of the Kurds after- \nward boasted of killing a hundred Christians apiece. \nAt one village, Galogozan, many young men were tied \nhand and foot, laid in a row, covered with brushwood \nand burned alive. Others were seized and hacked to \ndeath piecemeal. At another village, a priest and \nseveral leading men were captured and promised release \nif they would tell where others had fled; and, after \ntelling, all but the priest were killed. A chain was put \naround his neck and pulled from opposite sides until he \nwas several times choked and revived, after which bay- \nonets were planted upright and he was raised in the air \nand dropped upon them. The men of one village, when fleeing, took the women and \nchildren, some five hundred in number, and placed them in a ravine where soldiers \nfound them and butchered them. Little children were cut in two and mutilated. \nWomen were subjected to fearful agonies, ending in death. A newly wedded couple \nfled to a hilltop; soldiers followed and offered them their lives if they would accept \nIslam, but they preferred to die bravely professing Christ. On Mount Andoke, south \nof Moosh, about a thousand persons sought refuge. The Kurds attacked them, \nbut for days were repulsed. Then Turkish soldiers directed the fire of their cannon \non them. Finally the ammunition of the fugitives was exhausted, and the troops \nsucceeded in reaching the summit unopposed and butchered them to a man. \nIo the Talvoreeg district, several thousand Armenians were left in a small \n\n\n\n\nA. KURDISH CHIEF. \n\n\n\n424 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nplain. When surrounded by Turks and Kurds they appealed to heaven for deliv- \nerance, but were quickly dispatched with rifles, bayonets and swords. The plain \nwas a veritable shambles. \n\nNo accurate estimate of the number slain in the first massacre has been made. \nForty villages were totally destroyed and the loss of life is believed to have been \nfrom ten to fifteen thousand. Efforts were made to conceal the real extent of the \n\ncarnage, but the \n\' \' blood-bath of Sas- \nsoon \' \' has now passed \ninto history and cannot \nbe forgotten. \n\nSome of the in- \ncidents connected \nwith this widespread \n\n\n\n\n|3B\xe2\x84\xa2iM M \xc2\xab with tins widespread \n\ni^MSlRS \xe2\x80\xa2SjP^IKj reeg district, between \n\n\n\nreeg \n\nMoosh and Diarbekr, \nwere of a nature to \nstrike the civilized \nworld with horror. It \nis said that no respect \nwas shown to age or \nsex; men, women and \ninfants were treated \nalike; the women being \nsubjected to greater \noutrage before being \nslain. In one place, \nabout two hundred \nweeping women knelt before the Turkish com- \nmander, pleading for life, but the brutal officer \nordered them to be served like the others. One \nletter describing the massacre said: " Some sixty \nyoung brides and other attractive girls were crowded into a little church where, after \nbeing assaulted, they were slaughtered and a stream of human blood flowed from \nthe church door. \' \' To some women in one village the proposition was made that \nthey might be spared, if they denied their faith. \' \' Why should we deny Christ ?" \nthey said, and pointing to the dead bodies of their husbands and brothers before \nthem, they nobly answered, " We are no better than they; kill us too "\xe2\x80\x94and so they \ndied. A priest was taken to the roof of his church and hacked to pieces; young \n\n\n\nARMENIANS KIEtED IN THE \nSTREETS. \n\n\n\nTHE STORY OF ARMENIA. \n\n\n\n425 \n\n\n\nmen were placed among wood saturated with kerosene and set on fire. After the \nmassacre, and when the terrified survivors had fled, there was general looting by \nthe Hamidieh Kurds. They stripped the houses bare, then piled the dead into \nthem and fired the whole, intending, as far as possible, to cover up the evidences \nof their dreadful crime. \n\nSo great was the indignation in Europe over the Sassoon slaughter, that a \nConsular Commission of Inquiry was demanded for the purpose of investigation. \nAfter a long investigation, a report was made which was only a partial confirma- \ntion of the truth. From the outset everything was against the Commission, and \nespecially against the efforts of the European delegates. In Van, Bitlis and else- \nwhere, witnesses were arrested and intimidated by the government. \n\nComparative order prevailed for a time during the period of the Commission\'s \nsitting, but it was a delusive calm. Its work completed (early in 1895), promises \nof new administrative reforms were made by the Porte, but almost as soon as the \nfield was again clear, the massacres recommenced with redoubled vigor. The \nKurdish Hamidieh were again brought into requisition, and the Mohammedan \npopulace in all the large cities of Asia Minor were deliberately inflamed against \nthe Armenians by circulating lying rumors of intended attacks on the mosques. \nSoon there was an outbreak at Constantinople in which nearly two hundred \nArmenians were killed by the "Softas," or Mohammedan students, and the \npolice. This was followed by a terrific outburst of fanaticism all over the Sultan\'s \nempire, and by such scenes of massacre as have not been paralleled since mediaeval \ntimes. Throughout all the vilayets of Armenia ran the red tide of murder. \nHundreds of villages were swept away, and their inhabitants either slain or \nexiled. In this work of destruction the Kurds played the most prominent part, \nbut soldiers and Turkish civilians did their full share. The object was to destroy \neverything so effectually that the Armenians would have no means of living, and \nwould have to choose between death and Islam. Their cattle and all movable \ngoods were carried off, and everything else destroyed. In some villages even the \nclothing was taken from the backs of the wearers, and they were left literally \nnaked. Abdul Hamid\'s government was completing its diabolical work by reduc- \ning the population and then confiscating property under the pretended forms of \nmartial law, and by forcing the starving Armenians to apostatize to save their \nlives. In some places the poor wretches yielded to the pressure, but the greater \nnumber held out staunchly for their faith, many dying rather than surrender their \nChristianity. \n\nTHE LATER MASSACRES. \n\nIn the absence of accurate data it is, of course, impossible to give a reliable \nestimate of the multitudes of Christian Armenians who perished in the great \n\n\n\n426 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBX.K. \n\n\n\nslaughter that followed Sassoon. The figures given below are approximate, and \nas they are compiled from Turkish sources, may be regarded as rather under than \nabove the mark. According to Turkish calculations, the number of those who \nwere in a condition of starvation in February, 1896, was one-half the agricultural \npopulation of the vilayets (or districts governed by a Vali or Pasha) of Anatolia, \n(the Turkish name for Armenia) being about 275,000 souls, of whom two- \nthirds were women and children. The figures below present a conservative \nview of the results of the Sultan\'s policy of extermination during the first \nsixteen months: \n\n\n\nName of Town. \n\n\nDate of Massacre. \n\n\n\n\n\n\nConstantinople, . \n\n\n. . September 30, \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n, . October 8, \n\n\n\n\nOctober 13, \n\n\nGumushane, . . \n\n\n. . October II, \n\n\n\n\nOctober 21, \n\n\n\n\nOctober 25, \n\n\n\n\n, November 11, \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n. . October 25, \n\n\n\n\nOctober 25, \n\n\n\n\n, . October \n\n\n\n\n. . October 30, \n\n\n\n\n\n\nKara-Hissar, . . \n\n\n. . October 25, \n\n\nMalatia, . . . * \n\n\n. . November 6, \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nNovember 10, \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nMarsovan, ..... November 15, \n\nKaesarea, November 30, \n\nGemerek, ... \n\n\n\n" Bgin, \n\nZileh, \n\nSefert, \n\nKhnous, \n\nBoulinek, \n\n\n\n0. Killed. \n\n\nBy Whom Done. \n\n\nIO,O0O \n\n\nKurds and Turks. \n\n\n172 \n\n\nPolice and Softas. \n\n\n45 \n\n\nMoslem villagers. \n\n\n1,100 \n\n\nSoldiers, Lazes, Turks. \n\n\n1,000 \n\n\nLazes and Turks. \n\n\n550 \n\n\n\n\n1,900 \n\n\nSoldiers and Turks. \n\n\n1,200 \n\n\nSoldiers, Kurds and Turks. \n\n\n1,000 \n\n\nSoldiers, Kurds and Turks. \n\n\n1,200 \n\n\nSoldiers and Turks. \n\n\n1,200 \n\n\nSoldiers, Kurds and Turks. \n\n\n2,500 \n\n\nSoldiers, Kurds and Turks. \n\n\n300 \n\n\n\n\n1,200 \n\n\nSoldiers and Turks. \n\n\n400 \n\n\n\n\n500 \n\n\nCircassians and Turks . \n\n\n250 \n\n\n\n\n1,000 \n\n\nSoldiers and Turks. \n\n\n\n\nNo details. \n\n\n3,000 \n\n\nKurds and Turks. \n\n\n2,000 \n\n\nKurds and Turks. \n\n\nNo details. \n\n\n\n\nNo details. \n\n\n\n\nNo details. \n\n\n\n\nNo details. \n\n\n125 \n\n\nTurks. \n\n\n1,000 \n\n\nCircassians and Turks \n\n\n500 \n\n\n\n\n\n\nNo details. \n\n\n\n\nNo details. \n\n\n\n\nNo details. \n\n\n\n300 \n400 \n\n\n\nTHE STORY OF ARMENIA. \n\n\n\n427 \n\n\n\nThe Turks estimated the "reductions" made by Abdul Hamid\'s slaughter \npolicy as follows: \n\nArmenian population in larger towns, 177,700 \n\nArmenian population in villages, 538,500 \n\nNumber killed in towns (estimated), ......... i 20,000 \n\nNumber of Armenian villages (about), 0,300 \n\nNumber of villages destroyed (estimated), 2,500 \n\nNumber killed in villages, . . No accurate data. \n\nNumber reduced to starvation in towns (estimated), 75,000 \n\nNumber reduced to starvation in villages (estimated), 360,000 \n\nThat these figures fall far short of the actual result of this series of wholesale \nassassinations is not disputed. Consular officials, missionaries and the few cor- \nrespondents unite in declaring that the total 1 \' reduction \' \' of population by this \nsanguinary method has in every \ninstance been underestimated. \nBut cold figures and dry sta- \ntistics can tell nothing of the \nunspeakable horror of those \n-days of blood, and of the tor- \ntures suffered by the Christian \npopulation of the cities of Ar- \nmenia at the hands of their \nmurderers. It is mainly from \nletters received by Armenians \nin the United States from sur- \nviving relatives at home, that \nthe true story of those dreadful \nwhere eleven hundred perished, \' 1 only a few Turks were killed, \' \' says a \nletter from a fugitive. 1 \' Like a clap of thunder in a clear sky, the thing began \nabout 11 a. m., October 8. Unsuspecting people walking along the streets \nwere shot ruthlessly down. Men standing or sitting quietly at their shop \ndoors were instantly dropped with a bullet through their heads or hearts. The \naim was deadly, and I have heard of no wounded men. Some were slashed with \nswords until life was extinct. They passed through the quarters where only old \nmen, women and younger children remained, killing the men and large boys, \n.generally permitting the women and younger children to live. For five hours this \nhorrid work of inhuman butchery went on, the cracking of musketry, sometimes \nlike a volley from a platoon of soldiers, but more often single shots from near and \ndistant points, the crashing in of doors, and the thud, thud of sword blows sounding \non the ears. Then the sound of musketry died away and the work of looting \n\n\n\n\nTREBIZOND, WHERE A MASSACRE TOOK PEACE. \n\nmonths has been gleaned. At Trebizond, \n\n\n\n428 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nbegan. Every shop of an Armenian in the market was gutted, and the victors in \nthis cowardly and brutal war glutted themselves with the spoils. For hours, bales \nof broadcloth, cotton goods and every conceivable kind of merchandise passed \nalong without molestation to the houses of the spoilers. The intention evidently \nwas to impoverish and as near as possible to blot out the Armenians of the town. \nTo any found with arms, no quarter was given. Some were offered life, if they \n\n\n\n\n\nARMENIANS HEED PRISONERS AFTER THE TREBIZOND MASSACRE. \n\nrenounced Christ and accepted Islam ; but large numbers were shot down \nwithout any proffer of this kind. One poor fellow when called on to surrender, \nthought he was called on to give up his religion, and when he refused, he was \nhacked to pieces in the presence of his wife and children. \n\n" Over five hundred Christian Armenians were slaughtered in the neighboring \nvillages. Untold horrors are implied in this brief statement. Many Armenian \nwomen vanished, having been either murdered or kidnapped; most of the \n\n\n\nTHE STORY OF ARMENIA. \n\n\n\n429 \n\n\n\nArmenian houses were burned to the ground, the survivors being driven like wild \nbeasts to the hills and woods. \n\n" Equally sad was the fate of the Christians of Baiburt, whose tragic taking off \nis related in a letter addressed by the survivors to the Armenian Patriarch at Con- \nstantinople. After giving a partial list of the slain, the writers state : \'\'.When the \nmassacres and plundering began, on account of the prevailing terror and insecu- \nrity, the people were compelled to close ail the churches, shops, and schools from \nOctober 13 to 26, and take refuge in the houses, fetters were sent from our pre- \nlate to the commandant of the Fourth Army Corps, at Erzeroum, and to the \nArmenian prelate at Erzeroum asking assistance, but all our prayers remained \nunanswered. After the massacres the Turks advised us indirectly that the order \nwas secretly given from the Imperial Palace and was irrevocable ! It was on \nSaturday, October 22, that the fatal hour struck. \nThe frantic Turkish mob, assisted by regular \ntroops, suddenly fell upon the innocent and un- \narmed Armenians. The bloody work began at \n4 o\'clock a. m., and lasted until 12 o\'clock in the \nevening (Turkish time). Besides murdering our \npeople, the mob plundered and fired the Arme- \nnian dwellings and stores, taking care that the \nGreeks should not be molested. On that fright- \nful day the Armenian community of Baiburt was \nalmost annihilated. Strong men, youths and \nwomen and even babies in their cradles, and \nunborn children in the wombs of their mothers, \nwere butchered. Infants were stuck on bayonets \nand exposed to the view of their helpless and \nfrantic mothers. Young brides and girls were \nsubjected to a fate that need not be described, \nthe part of the Armenians. All the native teachers, with a single exception, \nwere murdered with most cruel tortures. Baiburt became a slaughter-house. \nTorrents of blood began to flow. The streets and the bazars were filled with dead \nbodies. On the following day the Turks did all in their power to conceal the \nbodies of those who had been pierced by bayonets. Similar scenes were enacted \nin the surrounding villages. \' \' \n\nThe Harpoot massacre was another butchery carried out under orders. This \nwas one of the leading stations of the American Mission. Sixty Christians fled to a \nchurch in the vain hope that its walls would furnish them a shelter against those \nwho were crying for the blood of the Armenians. They were permitted for a time \nto believe themselves secure, but suddenly the church was surrounded by a great \n\n\n\n\nMGR. IZMIRUAN. \nArmenian Patriarch at Constantinople. \n\nNo resistance was possible on \n\n\n\n43\xc2\xb0 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nnumber of Kurds. The doors were then blown in, and the Christians thought \nthat they would be massacred within the sacred structure. They were not. Their \ncaptors took them one at a time outside the church, and there, heedless of the \ncries for mercy from women and children, killed them, either by shooting or \nstabbing them. The first victim was the Protestant pastor of the church, who, as \nhe was dragged out, bade the others, if they had to die, to die as Christians. He \nmet his death like a martyr. Some of the refugees, in a very agony of terror,, \noffered to abjure their faith and accept Islamism, thinking thus to save their lives. \nThe offers availed them nothing, for their insatiable enemies, after accepting them, \ndragged the converts out and killed them one by one. The Armenian Church has \nbeen turned into a mosque, and the Protestant Church into a stable. \n\nA missionary tells the story of the desolation of Harpoot as it was related to- \nhim by an eye-witness who saw the Christian quarter in flames and the houses of \nthe American Mission burning. He came on to Malatia (the ancient Melitene), \nand found not a house in the Christian quarter standing. In a khan there were \nabout twenty wounded men, the sole survivors of a caravan of 200 who had been \ntraveling to Harpoot from Northern Syria and whose members had nearly all been \nslain by the Kurdish bands. There were 150 dead bodies lying in the road. At \nMarash (another mission station of the American Board), the same witness, days \nafter the massacre, counted eighty-seven dead Armenians in one spot, and there \nwere hundreds of bodies strewn around in the near neighborhood. In the villages \non the plains near Harpoot, each containing from fifty to 1000 houses, the \nevidences of slaughter were sickeningly abundant. The Kurdish butchers had \nslain fully half the population. The door of a house would be burst open, a \nvolley fired upon the shuddering inmates, while those who rushed out were caught \nand killed in the fields. Then the houses were plundered, fired and left blazing. \nThis was the fate of thousands of Christian homes. \n\nIt is proved beyond doubt that the massacre at Erzingjan started in the office \nof the Vali or local governor, where an Armenian priest of Tevnik was shot down \nby Turkish assassins. Then followed a horrible carnage, during which over one \nthousand Christians were slaughtered. After the butchery, the dead victims \nwere dragged by neck and heels into the cemetery and cast into a long, deep \ntrench, not unlike the death pit of Galogozan \xe2\x80\x94 the murdered fathers, mothers and \nsweet, innocent babes, all calm and peaceful in the sleep of death, flung down \nlike carrion. Nothing more horrible or pathetic could be imagined than that \nscene at the cemetery two days after the massacre. The survivors dared not even \nexpress their grief. \n\nBut the climax had not yet been reached; the appetite of the Moslems for \nChristian blood had merely been whetted, not satiated. Other and equally ter- \nrible butcheries followed at Karahissar, Arabkir, Ouloupinar, Palu, Mardin, Sivas,, \n\n\n\nTHE STORY OF ARMENIA. \n\n\n\nand Tchoukmerzen, where Kurds and Turks perpetrated wholesale murders and \nswept large districts desolate. The villages round about Erzeroum were almost \ndepopulated, the orders for the slaughter of the Christians, as the Moslem troops \nadmit, having come from Constantinople. At Sivas the massacre was terrible, \nand a like horror occurred at Marash. The ungovernable fury of the Turks spared \nneither age nor sex, and the brutalities practiced upon women and children may \nnot be described. In the Erzeroum massacre fully twelve hundred perished, includ- \ning women, many victims being mutilated. Bodies of little children, dead and \nmutilated, were found in the fields after the slaughter had ended. Large numbers \nof the victims of these atrocities died the death of martyrs. They fell in the \nMoslem war for the extermination of the religion of Jesus in Asia Minor. \n\nAt Diarbekr, where the victims were numbered by thousands, there was \nabundant evidence that the massacre was premeditated. It was claimed that the \nArmenians had attacked a Moslem mosque, whereas the facts, as afterward dis- \nclosed, showed the Kurds and \nTurks to have been the sole \nand intentional aggressors. The \nmassacre began on Friday, and \ncontinued on Saturday and \nSunday with insatiable ferocity. \n\nMeanwhile, the story of \nwhat was taking place in the \nvillages and hamlets of the \ndifferent districts had not \nreached the public ear. When \nit came, it disclosed a tale of \nsuffering and savagism that has scarcely a parallel. Many hundreds of vil- \nlages were literally swept out of existence. The story of one is the story of \nall: the Kurds, directed from higher sources, swooping down, rounding up the \ncattle, slaying the strong men, outraging and abducting the women, and killing \neven the children, concluding the satanic work by burning everything that would \nconsume. In many places the Kurdish troops came equipped with empty sacks \nstrapped to their saddles for the purpose of carrying off the plunder. The \nKurdish chiefs openly declared that they were ordered to slay the Christians and \ntake the plunder for their pay. \n\nAn illustration of the Turkish method of extermination is found in the case \nof the village of Hoh, in the Sandjak district. At first the "aghas" (or local \nmagistrates) promised to protect the Christians, but when they saw villages \nburning in every direction, they refused to keep their word. All the Christians \n\xe2\x80\xa2were told that, under the pain of death, they must accept Islam. They were \n\n\n\n\nCHILD-VICTIMS OF THE ERZEROUM SLAUGHTER. \n\n\n\n432 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nassembled at the mosque, and there eighty young men were picked out and led \noutside the village\xe2\x80\x94 for slaughter. Eight escaped, sixty-two were killed, and ten \nwounded. The young women of the village were taken to Turkish harems. In \nand around the villages of Kenerik, Moorenek and Rusenik, and the town of \nMardin, fourteen native preachers were killed, several being hideously tortured \nbefore they were dispatched. During one of the days of massacre at Ksesarea, \nan attack was made on the public baths. Six naked Armenian women were \ndragged forth and bayoneted. Young girls were drawn through the streets by the \nhair and the feet. Eight of the villages near Van are totally depopulated, all \ntheir people slain or fled, except the young women who have been seized and \n\ntaken to Kurdish \nharems. In Van prov- \nince nearly 200 villages \nhave been partially de- \nstroyed. Eleven vil- \nlages around Harpoot \nwere forced to accept \nIslam unconditionally \nor die. The wretched \npeople were then set \nto killing their fellow \nArmenians, to prove \nthe genuineness of \ntheir conversion. Such \nhorrible tortures as \nflaying alive, cutting \nto pieces by swords, \ntearing out the eyes, \nbranding on the body \nwith red-hot irons, and even tearing out the entrails, filling up the cavity with \ngunpowder and exploding it \xe2\x80\x94 these were among the simplest of the diabolical \nmeasures adopted by the Sultan\'s officials and his soldiery in dealing with his \nChristian Armenian subjects. Women torn from their homes and outraged, and \nhundreds of young girls forcibly carried off, fiendishly used and wantonly slain, \nand other horrors unnamable, were some of the methods employed in upholding \nthe glory of Islam. \n\nTHE SUFFERING AND DESTITUTION. \n\nThese persecutions and wholesale massacres, together with the general \ndestruction of property, reduced the Armenian survivors to a condition of utter \ndestitution. From the ruined villages, the now homeless women and children \n\n\n\n\nREFUGEES ON THE TURKO-PERSIAN FRONTIER. \n\n\n\nTHE STORY OF ARMENIA. \n\n\n\n433 \n\n\n\nflocked to tiie cities and towns, while the remnant of the male Armenians were \nfain to hide in the mountains. There was a condition of universal suffering \nwhich the Turkish Government seemed resolved should have the effect of finishing \nthe work of extermination so well begun \xe2\x80\x94 death from starvation and exposure \nwould soon claim the survivors. Thousands had fled to the forests and the \nmountains; the survivors of Sassoon were living in caves, and subsisting upon \nberries and roots until they became livid like corpses. " Hunger- bread, " a \nhorrible compost of chopped straw and roots, pounded together and baked, helped \nto keep the life in their emaciated bodies. The babes and the weak women could \nnot survive such a diet, and they were quickly perishing when the Christian \nmissionaries came, like angels of blessing, with help, in the shape of food and \nclothing. Many had already died of hunger and cold, and all were more \nor less naked. Meanwhile Van was inundated by refugees, and also the \ncities along the Persian border ; \nwhile the interior cities were all \nfilled with crowds of destitute who \nhad flocked thither from the ruined \nvillages. All Armenia was reduced \nto a race of naked beggars. Thou- \nsands of families, lately prosperous, \nwere now destitute, their bread- \nwinners slain, their homes in ashes, \nand even their little stores of food \ndestroyed, so that they might starve \nthe quicker ! Yet had they, even at \nthis juncture, been disposed to yield, \nas some did, to the Turkish offer to \nabjure Christ and turn Mohammedan, persecution would have ceased and they \nmight again have been prosperous, with their property restored. But the \nArmenians, although a simple people, have the strong, sturdy character of which \nmartyrs are made, and to their honor be it recorded that in a majority of instances \nthe offer was spurned. They would rather die than become apostates to the faith \nof their fathers ! \n\nVery striking is the testimony of some of our most esteemed missionaries to \nthe Christian fidelity of the Armenian people. Probabty the best known and most \nexperienced of all the Americans who have served in the missionary field in Asia \nMinor is Rev. Cyrus Hamlin, D. D., the venerable founder of Roberts College, \nConstantinople. Dr. Hamlin, who is now in the United States, has a life-long \nacquaintance with the Armenian question in its various phases and is a strong \nchampion of the right of this oldest Christian nation on earth to be permitted to \n28 \n\n\n\n\nHUNGER BREAD FROM BlTLIS. \n\n\n\n434 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nlive and worship in the faith of their fathers. Conversing recently on the subject \nof Armenia\'s sufferings Dr. Hamlin said to the writer: " The condition of affairs \nin that country has not been exaggerated in the printed reports. I have lately \nfinished reading some two hundred letters from missionaries, a very large part of \nthem dealing with the oppressions and sufferings of the Armenians, which were \nof a most frightful character. The whole civilized Christian world should help \nthese people\xe2\x80\x94 they should be saved from death. They can look in no other direc- \ntion for help, for there is no sympathy and assistance to be had from Turkey. \nIndeed, the policy of the Sultan\'s government is apparently dictated by a desire to \nefface the Armenian people altogether\xe2\x80\x94 at least those of them who will not accept \n\n\n\n\nARMENIAN WOMEN MAKING BREAD. \n\n\n\nMohammed. When you talk sympathizingly about these people, a Turk will say \nin surprise: \' Why do you speak in behalf of such worthless trash and try to \nsave them ? They can save themselves\xe2\x80\x94 all they need to do is to accept Islam and \nthen they are safe and out of trouble.\' A Turk regards it as strange that an \nArmenian should refuse to purchase his life at the cost of his faith; but there are \nsome among them who take a different view. Some of the Turkish soldiers, who \nshared in the terrible atrocities lately perpetrated on the Armenian Christians, \nhave been stricken by remorse afterward. One soldier, who had borne his part in \nseveral horrible butcheries of women and children, was so troubled that he could \nnot sleep. He had visions of his victims that ultimately drove him insane. \n\n\n\nTHE STORY OF ARMENIA. \n\n\n\n435 \n\n\n\n" Mrs. Knapp, a missionary at -Bitlis, related a remarkable incident. A sol- \ndier, who had aided in the ruthless massacres of the helpless ones, was terribly \ntormented by conscience. To his wife he said: \' There was one thing about \nthose women and their children that I do not understand and I want you to ask \nthe wives of the \'\'ghiaour" (Christians) about it. It was very strange. The \nwomen were offered their lives if they would only say: " There is but one God \nand Mohammed is His prophet," but they would not. They all died in terrible \ntortures, calling on " Hissos Nazareetsees. " That is what I do not understand. \nNow, I wonder who this Hissos Nazareetsees is, whose very name made these \n\n\n\n\nA RELIEF COMMISSIONER PASSING MOUNT ARARAT. \n\nwomen so brave that, with their little children, they could die. That is what \ntroubles me greatly. \' \n\n"The good missionary explained to the Moslem wife, who, in turn, told her \nhusband, that the name was that of the worshipful Jesus of Nazareth, Saviour of the \nworld, whom the Christians serve. \' \' \n\nTHE RELIEF MOVEMENT. \n\nAppeals representing the condition of the Armenian people as deplorable \nbeyond description, touched sympathetic hearts in Europe and America and a gen- \neral movement for their relief was begun. This, however, did not suit the \n\n\n\n436 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\npurposes of the Turkish Government, which declared its entire ability to take care \nof its own, and even denied the palpable fact of universal Armenian 4estitution, as \nit had previously denied the perpetration of the massacres. In England a fund \nwas raised, under the auspices of the Duke of Westminster, and distributed \nthrough Consular officials and American missionaries, the Armenians resident \nin Europe and America contributing toward it. Dr. Louis Klopsch, of New \nYork, dispatched a commissioner to Van to ascertain the exact facts con- \ncerning the need of the people and to organize a Relief Committee of American \nmissionaries. Its Commissioner, William Willard Howard, was not permitted to \ncross the Turko-Persian frontier, being excluded by Turkey. He made a number \nof attempts, at the risk of his life, to push his way through. Passing near Ararat, \nin a lumbering stage, he was attacked by Kurds. Again, on a second attempt, the \nhorse he rode was shot and he himself narrowly escaped. In still another effort to \n\ncross the frontier he had a regular pitched \nbattle with Kurds, a number of whom, dis- \nguised as shepherds, were lying in wait for \ntravelers whom they might rob and slay un- \nhindered, the whole country being at war. \nMany, besides Armenians, have met their \nfate at the hands of those Kurdish murderers. \nMr. Howard took the caravan route through \nRussia and Persia, via Batoum, Tiflis, Erivan \nand Khoi, and so across to Van, keeping close \nto the Turko-Persian border for a considera- \nble part of the journey. At the frontier he \nwas driven back by the Turkish officials and, \nmenaced by their Kurdish allies, he re- \nluctantly gave up the effort to enter Van. \nMr. Howard\'s failure, however, did not deter \nthe Christian Herald from carrying out its humane project, for, with the co- \noperation of the missionaries of the American Board in Van, it organized a \nmost successful relief work, partly industrial and partly charitable, under the \nactive personal supervision of Dr. Grace N. Kimball, a medical missionary. \nThrough these means several thousands of the needy were fed and supported m \nVan daily. Other relief stations were opened by the same journal at Erzeroum, \nErzingjan, Harpoot, Diarbekr, Mardin, Gemarek, Aintab, Sivas, Arabkir and \nseveral other points which had been the scenes of massacre and where the \nsuffering was most acute. On these relief stations a fund of nearly $30,000 \nwas expended. An effort was made by the American Red Cross to obtain \npermission to visit Armenia and distribute relief, but its application met a decided \n\n\n\n\nAN ARMENIAN BEGGAR IN VAN. \n\n\n\nTHE STORY OF ARMENIA. \n\n\n\n437 \n\n\n\nrefusal from the Sultan\'s government, although, at the time, the necessities of \nthe Armenian people were greater than ever and hundreds were perishing of cold \nand starvation. \n\nIn the noble relief work that was being conducted amid so many perils, one \nfigure stands out boldly, that of a woman, delicately reared and highly cultured, \nyet brave to face even death in the Lord\'s work, to which she had dedicated herself. \nDr. Grace N. Kimball will long be remembered as the heroine of Van, whose \ncourage and nobility of soul were the means of saving probably thousands of \nprecious lives. As the first wave of persecution and slaughter receded, and the \nfugitives were flocking to Van, sick, indigent and nearly naked, Miss Kimball \ngathered what funds she could and quietly \nand without any preliminary flare of trumpets, \nbegan a systematic work of relief, which had \nalready achieved excellent results before the \nstartling series of massacres began in the fall \nof 1895. There were many times when Dr. \nKimball and her associates were imperiled in \nconsequence of their relief work, as the Turks \nresented all sympathy with the Armenians or \nthe extension of any aid that would prolong \ntheir lives. But all stood bravely at their posts. \nSo with the American missionaries at Harpoot \nand Marash (where the mission buildings were \nburned down after being looted) and at every \nother point throughout Armenia. Although \nwarned by United States Minister Terrell at \nConstantinople to leave and, with their wives \nand children, go to the coast for safety, the brave \nmissionaries clung to their posts, preferring to \nstay by and help the victims of persecution and if need be even to die with them, \nrather than leave them to the cruel mercies of the Turks. And they were sorely \nneeded, for every day increased the suffering. Before October, 1895, a large \nnumber of Armenians had actually died of hunger. Those who saved themselves \nby flight reached safety in rags, many with only a single garment to protect them \nagainst inclement weather. United States Consul Graves, writing from Talvoreeg, \nthus described the condition of these people: \' \'Bread they have not tasted for \nmonths, and curdled milk they only dream of, living, as they do, upon greens and \nthe leaves of trees. There are two varieties of greens which are preferred, but \nthese are disappearing, as they wither at this season. Living on such food, they \nbecome sickly; their skin has turned yellow, their strength is gone, their bodies \n\n\n\n\nDR. GRACE N. KIMBA1X, \n" The Heroine of Van." \n\n\n\n438 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nare swollen, and fever is rife among them." A touching picture of the gratitude \nof the sufferers on receiving relief from the missionaries, is contained in a recent \nletter from Van: " Men and women," the writer says, "come to us, their eyes \nstreaming with tears of gratitude, and clasp the missionaries\' knees, and even \nprostrate themselves, kissing the hands and feet in their gratitude. Many mis- \nsionaries even have no shelter and are compelled to sleep on the naked earth, while \nattending to the relief work." In all the larger cities of Armenia \xe2\x80\x94 Van, Aintab, \n\n\n\n\nDESTITUTE ARMENIANS BEFORE MISS KIMBAU/S REUEE STATION AT VAN. \n\n\n\nBitlis, Erzeroum and Trebizonid, the streets are filled with pitiful-looking crowds \nof fugitives, haggard and emaciated. They come from the country districts, which \nthe massacres have, in many places, swept as bare as a desert. In a few of the cities, \nlittle bands of American missionaries, aided by the Consular officials, stand \nbetween thousands and death. Hundreds of Christian churches have been \ndesecrated by Kurds and Turks, their fonts and altars befouled with offal, their \nsacred vessels stolen and the buildings either burned or transformed into stables \n\n\n\nTHE STORY OF ARMENIA. \n\n\n\n439 \n\n\n\nor mosques. The Turkish jails are full of prisoners, all Armenians, arrested on \nthe most frivolous pretexts, or on none at all, the general charge being rebellion. \nSuch is the horribly unsanitary condition of those jails (as at Trebizond and \nKrzeroum), that few will come out alive. Many have already died from the \neffects of their imprisonment. \n\nTHE ARMENIAN REVOLUTIONISTS. \n\nIt has been invariably asserted by the Sultan\'s Government that the Armenian \ntroubles were the outcome of a deep and widespread revolutionary movement, \n.and that the Turks themselves, rather than the Armenians, were entitled to com- \nmiseration. These revolutionists, who were controlled by a patriotic Armenian \nsociety known as the Huntchaugists, were directed by a governing power outside \nof Turkey. Their emissaries were everywhere, and they were constantly foment- \ning disturbance between Turk and Armenian. They had imported arms and \nmoney into Turkey and it was at their instigation that the rebellion broke out in \nsuch formidable force at Sassoon, which the Turkish army found much difficulty \nin quelling. It was due to the influence of the Huntchaugists too, and under the \ninspiration of their example that the Armenians in other places had arisen against \nthe kind and beneficent government of Abdul Hamid. Indeed, so formidable \nwas this insurrectionary movement that the Porte had been compelled to \nuse force in disarming the rebellious populace of the large cities, and the latter \nin several instances had so stubbornly resisted that blood had flowed, and \nmany innocent and inoffensive Moslems had perished at the hands of the desperate \nArmenian rebels. Incidentally, some of the latter were doubtless also slain; but \nthis fate only happened to them when in open rebellion. When the good- \nhearted Queen Victoria wrote a letter to the Sultan expressing regret over the \ndisorders in Asia Minor, Abdul Hamid explained that the troubles in Anatolia \n(the name Armenia having no geographical existence in Turkey), had been pre- \ncipitated by the Armenians themselves, that the printed reports in the British \npress were wilful exaggerations and that far from the Armenians being the greatest \nsufferers, a majority of the victims were Turks ! He professed regret that Her \nMajesty should believe any further disorders possible, m view of the reforms he \nhad decided to inaugurate in the disturbed districts. \n\nThis "ostrich" policy of denying what is obvious to the whole world, is \ncharacteristic of the Sublime Porte. With the facility for intrigue, distortion and \nfalsification, which peculiarly belongs to the Oriental, Abdul Hamid and his \nministers, have endeavored by constant prevarication, to hoodwink Europe as to \nthe real status of the Armenian case. But the Turk\'s pose as a martyr and a \nsaint is an ineffective one, and the mask is easily penetrated. \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nOne of the most mendacious statements circulated by the Ottoman Govern- \nment was the charge that the massacres were deliberately invited and provoked by \nthe Huntchaugists, that they planned the disturbances, knowing that the result \nwould be death to thousands of their fellow-countrymen and women, yet satisfied \neven at such a fearful cost to excite the sympathy and provoke the interference \nof Russia or some other great power. This charge has been emphatically denied, \nand is so wholly brutal and out of harmony with the Armenian character, as to \nbe utterly unworthy of belief. \n\nIt is undoubtedly true that, when pressed to the last ditch, the Armenians \nat different places made a desperate stand for their lives. These were gleams of \nheroism amid the massacres that lighted up the darkness as the sunshine glints \nthrough the storm-clouds. At Zeitoun, a fortified town of Armenia, the Christian \ntownspeople took arms and made a brave resistance. They mustered in force, \ncaptured the citadel and turned its guns on the dismayed Turks, having first pro- \nvided for the safety of their wives and children. Bravely they held out for weeks, \nand a strong force under Mustafa Pasha failed to dislodge them or recapture the \ntown. Resistance was also encountered by the Turks and Kurds at the hands of \nthe Christians of Diarbekr, and many fell under the Armenian attacks, although \nthe latter were finally overpowered and massacred. Some of the villages too \nopposed a brave resistance. But in the end, the story was the old familiar one \nof overwhelming forces and cruel butchery. \n\nATTITUDE OF THE EUROPEAN POWERS. \n\nWhile the great crime against the Armenian people was being enacted, and \neven while the red tide of massacre was at the flood, Europe looked on with \napparent indifference. The leading powers of Christian Europe \xe2\x80\x94 Germany, \nRussia, England, France and Italy \xe2\x80\x94 had their magnificent fleets riding at anchor \nwithin reach of Constantinople, and a single resolute remonstrance would have been \nheeded by the Turks, and might have saved many lives. But the word remained \nunspoken, the cannon lay silent, while a Christian nation was being exterminated. \nThe six great powers were dead- locked in hopeless impotence. Russia, it was \nbelieved, would have consented to occupy Armenia and to compel a cessation of \nthe massacres, but England would not yield assent. Germany, too, had its \njealousies, and Italy, France and Austria were each so intent on watching the \nmovement of the other powers that none of the three cared to bestir themselves. \nThe United States was represented in the Levant by several war vessels, for the \npurpose of affording a certain assurance of protection to American interests and \nthe American missionaries; but our naval demonstration was insufficient to save \nfrom destruction the American Board Mission buildings at Harpoot and Marash, \nwhich were burned by Turkish mobs during the riots and massacres in those cities. \n\n\n\nTHE STORY OF ARMENIA. \n\n\n\n441 \n\n\n\nBut if governments were inactive, Christendom was active, and leading men, \nin both Europe and America, were loud in their denunciation of the Sultan and his \nbloodthirsty policy. Lord Salisbury, the English Premier, speaking on a public \noccasion, at a time when the patience of Europe had apparently been well-nigh \nexhausted, said: "Above all treaties, all combinations of the powers, in the nature \nof things, is Providence. God, if you please to put it so, has determined that \npersistent and constant misgovernment jnust lead the government which follows it \nto its doom. The Sultan is not exempt any more than any other potentate from \nthe law that injustice will bring the highest one on earth to ruin." According to \nlatest advices, the English Government was still depending on Providence to save \nthe Armenians. It had seemingly forgotten its own sacred pledge to secure to \nthat afflicted people the right to free worship and the several reforms conceded \nunder the Berlin Treaty. Tenfold stronger was the emphasis employed by Mr. \nGladstone in a public utterance on the massacres. That eminent statesman, \nreplying to a delegate of Armenians, said: \n\n"We may ransack the annals of the world; but I know not what research \ncan furnish us with so portentous an example of the fiendish misuse of the powers \nestablished by God for the punishment of evil-doers, and for the encouragement \nof them that do well. No government ever has so sinned; none has so proved \nitself incorrigible in sin, or, which is the same, so impotent for reformation. I \nhave lived to see the empire of Turkey in Europe reduced to less than one-half of \nwhat it was when I was born, and why ? Simply because of its misdeeds \xe2\x80\x94 a great \nrecord written by the hand of Almighty God, in whom the Turk, as a Moham- \nmedan, believes, and believes firmly \xe2\x80\x94 written by the hand of Almighty God \nagainst injustice, against lust, against the most abominable cruelty. Such a \ngovernment as that which can countenance and cover the perpetration of such \noutrages is a disgrace to Mahomet, the Prophet whom it professes to follow, it is a \ndisgrace to civilization at large, and it is a curse to mankind." \n\nHOPE DAWNS FOR ARMENIA. \n\nOn January 23, 1896, a new and totally unexpected development of the \nArmenian question occurred, which took Europe by surprise. Throughout the \nArmenian troubles, and especially when the censure of Europe was strongest \nagainst the Porte, Russia maintained an attitude of friendly tolerance toward \nthe government of Abdul Hamid. When the other powers proposed that their \nrespective governments should have the privilege of an extra guardship in the \nDardanelles, Russia, through its ambassador at Constantinople, waived any claim \nto such concession by the Sultan. It was due to the influence of Russia also that \nan attempt by England to make a naval demonstration before Constantinople \nwas abandoned. Germany and France, while ostensibly on friendly terms with \n\n\n\n442 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nthe Czar\'s government, really stood in constant apprehension of some bold, \ndefiant stroke by Russia, that might incidentally either strengthen or shatter \ntheir friendly relations, while adjusting matters with Turkey to its own satis- \nfaction. England, suspiciously standing aloof from all alliances, yet pretending \nin turn to friendship for Russia, France, Italy and Germany, occupied a unique \nposition. As the special patron of Turkey, she was to a large extent responsible \nfor the series of frightful massacres which had disgraced Europe, and made of \nAsia Minor a region of death and desolation. Yet England, up to the very last, \ntook no step to stop the butchery, but satisfied her conscience with mild official \nand unofficial remonstrances, and ineffective political manoeuvring. At the \nheight of the troubles, it was intimated to England that Russia stood ready to \noccupy Armenia with an armed force, and to undertake the pacification of that \ncountry, but would do so only with the consent of all the powers. To this pro- \nposition England turned a deaf ear. Never would she consent to such a scheme; \nher jealousy of Russia\'s growing influence in the East forbade it altogether. \nThe Armenians, if saved at all, must be saved by some other power. Rather \nthan see their country come under Muscovite domination, even temporarily, Lord \nSalisbury\'s humane policy would prefer the continuance of the massacres as \nthe lesser evil. \n\nSuddenly came the news\xe2\x80\x94 late in January, as already stated \xe2\x80\x94 that a treaty \nor compact had been concluded between Russia and Turkey, for offensive and \ndefensive purposes, under which Russia agreed to defend the Dardanelles, in the \nevent of war against either country, and also to restore order in Armenia. The \ntreaty, while it guaranteed the integrity of the Ottoman Empire, also made the \nCzar the master of the Dardanelles. France, by a secret understanding with \nRussia, consented to the treaty and agreed to support the Czar\'s government \nthroughout. Germany and Austria were also supposed to be consenting and \ninterested powers, Italy and England being ignored. Thus, by a single coup,. \nM. Nelidoff, the Russian ambassador to Constantinople, won for his royal master \na double diplomatic triumph: securing the pacification of Armenia and the \ncessation of the massacres without involving Europe in a general war over the \ndismemberment of Turkey, and grasping for the Czar the splendid prize for \nwhich Russia has long hungered: the sovereignty of the Dardanelles. \n\nWith the new order of things, and with Sultan Abdul Hamid as a treaty \nvassal of the Czar, there comes a gleam of hope to Armenia, the hope of peace \nand brighter days to come. Many years must elapse, however, ere the " blood- \nbath of Sassoon," the death-pit of Galogozan and the other dark memories of \nthe terrible period of 1894-96 be forgotten, even by those who were children \nwhen these events occurred. But the fathers and mothers of Armenia, who have \nshared in those sufferings, will carry the recollection with them to the grave. \n\n\n\nTHE STORY OF ARMENIA. \n\n\n\n443 \n\n\n\nACTION OF OUR GOVERNMENT. \n\nAmerican sympathy for Armenia\'s sufferings took a more direct and practical \nform than that of any of the European countries. Clara Barton courageously \nproceeded to Constantinople, confident that the Sultan could be persuaded to relax \nhis opposition to the Red Cross entering Armenia on its work of relief. Not only \ndid the American people send generous contributions of money to feed the starving \nrefugees, but the press of the \n\n\n\nnation, not standing in awe \nof any alliances, was unani- \nmously outspoken in its strong \n-condemnation of the barbarous \npolicy of the Porte. A con- \ncurrent resolution was intro- \nduced in Congress, looking \nto the amplest protection for \nAmerican citizens in Turkey, \nand directing that our govern- \nment ask the European powers \nto act promptly for the pre- \nvention of further bloodshed, \nand a repetition of the mas- \nsacres. From all parts of the \nUnion, the President and Con- \ngress received, almost daily, a \nmultitude of letters, petitions \nand memorials, urging that the \ntime had arrived when the \nUnited States, as a Christian \nnation, should place on record \nits abhorrence and condemna- \ntion of the bloodthirsty and \nfanatical Ottoman policy in \nAsia Minor. Returning mis- \nsionaries, many of them \ncoming from places that had been the scenes of massacre, confirmed the stories \nof outrage and slaughter and deepened the impression already made by the \nrecital of Armenia\'s woes. From the pulpits of all Christian denominations came \nthunders of eloquent denunciation against the Turks. England, whose fleet had \nbeen stationed off Constantinople during the atrocities, received her share of cen- \nsure. One of the most striking of these clerical fulminations was a namerously \n\n\n\n\nCI<ARA BARTON, PRESIDENT, AMERICAN RED CROSS, \nWho is risking her life to relieve destitute Armenia. \n\n\n\n444 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nsigned and earnestly worded memorial by the Bishops of the Protestant Epis- \ncopal Church of the United States, which was presented to President Cleveland. \nIn this document \xe2\x80\x94 doubtless one of the most remarkable in the history of the \nChristian Church in America \xe2\x80\x94 the reverend memorialists declare that the situ- \nation in Armenia calls for " the indignant protest of all civilized and Christian \npeople." It then proceeds: \n\nThe entire severance of Church and State in our country should not be allowed to stifle \nour sympathies or hamper our action in a case like this. It should rather stimulate them. It \nis a case which especially appeals to us as men and Americans. As citizens of this Republic, \nwe have learned to know and dared to maintain that no form of religious belief should expose \nits adherents to persecution. \n\nIt is as representatives and maintain ers of this essential American principle that we appeal \n\n\n\n\nfor national action in this matter of a foreign persecution whose details are too horrible to depict \nor enumerate. \n\nWe sincerely trust that some measure or measures consistent with the national traditions \nand the national dignity may be devised, and that speedily, which shall bring the whole force \nof the national sentiment to bear upon the solution of this subject ; to cause the instant sup- \npression of the massacres, to succor the unhappy and impoverished survivors of them, and to \nsecure for the future ample guarantee for the safety of a Christian people in the exercise and \nmaintenance of their faith. \n\nWe feel profoundly that our nation should cease to recognize the Turkish Government as a \ncivilized power so long as its barbarous treatment of the Armenians continues, and that it should \nbring every influence to bear upon the civilized nations of Europe which may cause thern to \npresent a united front in demanding that such atrocities cease at once and forever. \n\n\n\nTHE STORY OF ARMENIA. 445 \n\nTurkey having sown the wind, must reap the whirlwind, and the aftermath \nin the shape of claims for heavy damages that will pour in upon the Sultan\'s Gov- \n\n\n\n\nAMERICAN MISSION AT HARPOOT, PARTIALLY DESTROYED. \n\nernment from many quarters, may give Abdul Hamid cause to repent some of the \nacts of his favorite Hamidieh troopers. Prominent among the claims to be made \n\n\n\n\nTHE AMERICAN COLLEGE AT MA RASH, WRECKED BY KURDS AND TURKS. \n\nin American interests are those of the American Board of Commissioners for \nForeign Missions for the partial destruction of the eight buildings of the mission \n\n\n\n446 \n\n\n\nTHE HOME OF THE BIBLE. \n\n\n\nat Harpoot and the wrecking and looting of the handsome college at Maraslu \nThese, with similar claims for damages to the property of our citizens at many \nother places in Asia Minor, will be vigorously pressed. But they are probably- \nsmall compared with the aggregated claims of other governments, whose citizens \nhave suffered in person or property. \n\n* * * \n\nSuch is the story of Eden \xe2\x80\x94 of that once beautiful land where, in the mornings \nof the world, "God planted a garden," and "walked in the cool of the day," \nbut which man\'s wickedness has transformed into a scene of slaughter and deso- \nlation. It may well be asked whether the Almighty has not forgotten Eden. \nTravelers who have passed through it recently, declare that, judging solely from \nits physical aspect, it would be regarded as the very last place on earth to be so- \nfavored. Treeless and barren, sterile and rocky, mountain and plain are alike \nuninviting; yet those bleak hills and the bare, dry valleys may have been rich in \nfoliage and juicy grasses, while every description of flower, and shrub, and tree, \nluxuriant with color and laden with fragrance, may have clothed the scene with a \nbeauty unequaled. For many centuries the human race has sought to rediscover \nthe site of the Garden of Happiness. Scientists, explorers, historians, antiquarians \nand students of the ancient legend, which appears in many tongues and belongs \nto many lands, have searched the wide world for it. And to this high Armenian \ntable-land the investigations of almost all have brought them at last. It meets all \nthe requirements of Scripture and tradition. Here flowed the four rivers \xe2\x80\x94 the \nPison, the Phrath, the Hiddekel and the Gihon, some of the ablest scholars now \nidentifying them with the Tigris, the Euphrates, the Arras and the Djorokh rivers \nof to-day. " Reduced to a matter of modern geography," writes William Willard \nHoward, who has traveled over the entire region, " it may be said in a general \nway that the site of Eden is now covered by the Turkish provinces of Van, Bitlis \nand Erzeroum, and that the centre of the Garden would be midway between the \ncities of Van and Erzeroum. Included in this district are the cities of Van, Bitlis, \nMoush, Erzinghian and Erzeroum, The scene of the Sassoon massacre is also \nwithin the limits of the district. The caravan route from Persia to the Black Sea \npasses through the Garden of Eden from end to end, entering it at Baiazid and \nleaving it at Baiburt on the road to Trebizond." Kurds, Turks, Lazes, Circassians \nand Armenians dwell there, the Armenians alone being Christians, the rest their \nenemies and persecutors. In agriculture the land has stood still for 4000 years ; \nin civilization it has retrograded from the patriarchal standard of early Bible times \ninto a condition of barbarism such as no other part of the world can equal. \n\n\n\n'