{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_46187/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_46187","id":"gutenberg_46187","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/46187","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Essays, Letters & Speeches","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Category: Travel Writing","Palestine -- Description and travel"],"text":"Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed\nProofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was\nproduced from images available at The Internet Archive)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n                      LETTERS FROM THE HOLY LAND\n\n                    AGENTS\n\n  AMERICA   THE MACMILLAN COMPANY\n            64 & 66 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK\n\n  CANADA    THE MACMILLAN COMPANY OF CANADA, LTD.\n            27 RICHMOND STREET WEST, TORONTO.\n\n  INDIA     MACMILLAN & COMPANY, LTD.\n            MACMILLAN BUILDING, BOMBAY\n            309 BOW BAZAAR STREET, CALCUTTA\n\n[Illustration]\n\n[Illustration: THE START\n\n(FRONTISPIECE)]\n\n\n\n\n                             LETTERS FROM\n\n                             THE HOLY LAND\n\n                                  BY\n\n                           ELIZABETH BUTLER\n\n          WITH SIXTEEN ILLUSTRATIONS IN COLOUR BY THE AUTHOR\n\n                       [Illustration: colophon]\n\n                                LONDON\n\n                        ADAM AND CHARLES BLACK\n\n                                 1906\n\n                         _Published March 1903\n                         Reprinted July 1906_\n\n\n                             TO MY MOTHER\n                          CHRISTIANA THOMPSON\n\n\n\n\nPREFACE\n\n\nThese letters, written to my mother, and published chiefly at her\nrequest, can lay no claim to literary worth; their only possible value\nlies in their being descriptive of impressions received on the spot of\nthat Land which stands alone in its character upon the map of the world.\nBut the reader will more easily excuse the shortcomings of my pen than,\nI hope, he will ever do those of my pencil!\n\nI will make no apologies for the sketches, save to remind the reader\nthat most of them had to be done in haste. They are necessarily\nconsiderably reduced in size in the reproduction, so as to suit them to\nthe book form.\n\nIt was a happy circumstance for me that my husband's appointment to the\nCommand at Alexandria should have enabled us to realize this journey. A\nfour-weeks' leave just allowed of our accomplishing the whole tour. The\nwider round that includes Damascus and Palmyra would, of course,\nnecessitate a much more extended holiday.\n\nThe time of year chosen by my husband for our visit was one in which no\nreligious festivals were being celebrated, so that we should be spared\nthe sight of that distressing warring of creeds that one regrets at\nJerusalem more than anywhere else. Also the spring season is the\nhealthiest and most agreeable, and we timed our journey so as to begin\nand end it with the moon which beautified all our nights.\n\nWe are chiefly indebted to Mr. Aquilina, the very capable and courteous\nagent for Messrs. Cook and Son at Alexandria, for the perfect way in\nwhich the machinery of the expedition was managed for us. Without such\ngood transport and camps one does not travel as smoothly as we did. To\nthe Archbishop of Alexandria we owe a debt of gratitude for his kind\noffices in helping to render our way so pleasant.\n\nELIZABETH BUTLER.\n\nGOVERNMENT HOUSE, DEVONPORT,\n_Christmas Day, 1902_.\n\n\n\n\nLIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS\n\n\n1. Frontispiece\n\n                                                             FACING PAGE\n\n2. Jaffa                                                               8\n\n3. The \"Cenaculum.\" Site of the House of the Last Supper              26\n\n4. In the Garden of Gethsemane. Noonday. Looking towards\n   Valley of Jehoshaphat                                              30\n\n5. Bethany                                                            32\n\n6. \"Ain Kareem,\" reputed birthplace of John the Baptist,\n   from roof of Convent of the Visitation                             36\n\n7. Solomon's Pools, near Jerusalem, looking towards Dead Sea          38\n\n8. Bethlehem from the Sheepfold, Field of Boaz                        42\n\n9. The Plain of the Jordan, looking from \"New Jericho\"\n   towards Mount Pisgah                                               48\n\n10. The Plain of Esdraelon, from foot of Tabor, with\n    the village of Naim in distance                                   60\n\n11. Our First Sight of Lake Galilee                                   62\n\n12. Galilee, looking towards Hermon                                   64\n\n13. Galilee, looking from near the mouth of the Jordan towards\n    the \"Mount of Beatitudes\" and Tabor                               66\n\n14. Nazareth at Sunrise                                               68\n\n15. St. Jean d'Acre                                                   72\n\n16. Ruins of the Crusaders' Banqueting Hall, Athleet                  78\n\n\n_The illustrations in this volume have been engraved and printed by the\n                  Carl Hentschel Colourtype Process_\n\n\n\n\nLETTERS FROM THE HOLY LAND\n\n\nIN THE ADRIATIC, _28th February 189-_.\n\n\nMy....--I am out on the dark waters of the Adriatic. It is late, and the\npeople on board are little by little subsiding into their cabins, and I\nshall write you my first letter _en route_ for the Holy Land.\n\nIf all is well I shall join W. at Alexandria, and we shall have our\nlong-looked-forward-to expedition from thence. Venice has given me a\nmemorable \"send-off,\" looking her loveliest this radiant day of spring,\nand were I not going where I am going my thoughts would linger\nregretfully amongst those lagoons already left so far behind. I watched\nto the very last the lovely city gradually fading from view in a faint\nrosy flush, backed by a blue-grey mist, and as we stood out to sea all\nland had sunk away and the sun set in a crimson cloud, sending a column\nof gold down to us on the perfectly unruffled waters. Later on the moon,\nhigh overhead, shining through the mist, made the sea look like blue\nair, and quite undistinguishable from the sky. The horizon being lost we\nseemed to be floating through space, and the only solid things to be\nseen were the moon and our fellow planets and the stars, so that I felt\nas though I had passed out of this world altogether. Indeed one does\nleave the ordinary world when shaping one's course for Palestine!\n\n\nPORT SAID, _Sunday, 5th April 189-_.\n\n\nMy....--We are moored at Port Said on board the large Messageries\nsteamer, having left Alexandria at 5.30 P.M. yesterday on our way to\nJaffa. What a hideous place is this! And this is the Venice that modern\ncommerce has conjured up out of the sea. Truly typical! As I look at the\ndeep ranks of steamers lining the Canal mouth, begrimed with coal-dust\nand besmirched with brown smoke, I might be at the Liverpool Docks, so\nmuch is the light of this Land of Light obscured by their fumes. On the\nbanks are dumped down quantities of tin houses with cast-iron supports\nto their verandahs. When my mind reverts to the merchant city of the\nAdriatic and compares it with this flower of modern commerce I don't\nfeel impressed with, or in the least thankful for, our modern\n\"Progress.\" Last night, when we arrived, a barge of Acheron came\nalongside full of negroes in sooty robes, one gnawing a raw beef bone by\nthe light of the torch in the bows. They were coming to coal us. And,\nbeing coaled, we shall draw light out of darkness, loveliness out of\nhideousness, and this evening we shall be taking our course to the\nLong-promised Land!\n\nWhere shall I finish this? Is it possible that my life-long wish is now\nso soon to be accomplished?\n\nNo two people, I suppose, receive the same impression of the Holy Land.\nNone of the books I have read tally as to the feelings it awakens in\ntravellers. How will it be with me?\n\n\nRAMLEH, ON THE PLAIN OF SHARON,\n_6th April_.\n\n\nAt sunrise this morning the throbbing of the screw suddenly ceased, and\nas I went to the port-hole of our cabin I beheld the lovely coast of the\nLand of Christ, about a mile distant, with the exquisite town of Jaffa,\ntypically Eastern, grouped on a rock by the sea, and appearing above\nhuge, heaving waves, whose grey-blue tones were mixed with rosy\nreflections from the clouds. Here was no modern harbour with piers and\njetties, no modern warehouses, none of the characteristics of a seaport\nof our time. Jaffa is much as it must have looked to the Crusaders; and\nwe approached it, after leaving the steamer, much as pilgrims must have\ndone in the Middle Ages. The Messageries ship could approach no nearer\non account of the rocks, and we had to be rowed ashore in open\nboats--very large, stout craft, fit to resist the tremendous waves that\nthunder against the rocky ramparts of Jaffa. How often I have imagined\nthis landing, and have gone through it in delicious anticipation!\n\nEverything was made as pleasant as possible to us, Mr. ---- coming on\nboard to direct the proceedings, and a Franciscan monk also boarding the\nsteamer with greetings from Jerusalem, at the request of the Archbishop\nof Alexandria.\n\nAs our boat was the last to leave the steamer I had time to watch the\ndisconcerting process of trans-shipping the other tourists who all went\noff in the first boats, and nothing I have ever seen of the sort could\ncompare with what I beheld during those breathless moments. The effect\nproduced by brawny Syrian boatmen tussling with elderly British and\nAmerican females in sun-helmets and blue spectacles, and at the right\nmoment, when the steamer heaved to starboard and met the boat rising on\nthe crest of a particular wave, pushing them by the shoulders from\nabove, and pulling them into the boat from below, was a thing to\nremember. (To go down the ladder was quite impossible, so violent was\nthe bumping of boat against ship.) To miss the right moment was to have\nto wait till the steamer which then rolled to port, and the boat which\nthen sank into the trough of the sea, met again with the next lurch. The\npoor tourists said nothing; they hadn't time given them for the feeblest\nprotest, but they looked quite dazed when stuck down in their seats.\nThanks to our kind friends we had a boat to ourselves and we were not\nworked off so expeditiously, being thus able to submit with something\nmore approaching grace. We had a large crew of rowers, and being only\nourselves, the monk, and Mr. ----, we went light. Three or four times the\nhelmsman had to be extra vigilant as a huge roller, which hid everything\nbehind it, came racing in our wake, and lifting us as though we were so\nmuch seaweed, carried us forward with dizzy swiftness. Woe betide that\nboat which such a wave should strike broadside on! At each crisis the\n\"stroke oar\" sang out a warning, and redoubled his work, the\nperspiration coursing down his face. The whole crew sang an answer to\nhis wild signal in a barbaric minor. Nothing could be more invigorating\nthan this experience; one moment when hoisted on the crest of a wave one\nsaw Jaffa, the Plain of Sharon, and the hills of Judea ahead, and astern\nthe Messageries steamer and small craft riding at anchor, and the next\nmoment nothing between one and the sky but jagged and curling crests of\nwild billows! On landing at the rocks we were hoisted up slippery steps\nin more iron grips. On such occasions it is useless to hesitate--indeed\nthey don't let you--and as you don't know what is best for you, you had\nmuch better at once surrender your individuality and become a passive\npiece of goods if you don't want a broken limb.\n\nWe immediately found ourselves in such a picturesque crowd as even my\nEgypt-saturated eyes took new delight in, and we passed through the\nCustom-house with the agent obligingly clearing all before us, and got\ninto a little carriage after climbing on foot the steep part of the\ntown. What a town! No description I have yet read does full justice to\nits tumble-down picturesqueness. Those black archways like caverns,\nthose crooked streets filled with people, camels, and donkeys--all this\nto me is fascinating. I am too hurried to pause here long enough to try\nand define the difference between life here and life in Egypt. There is\nnot here the barbarism of the latter's picturesqueness, and one feels\nhere more the beauty of the true East. I don't see the abject squalor of\nEgypt, and the people's dresses are more varied. All this stone masonry\nis very acceptable after the brick and mud of Egyptian hovels. Here is\nthe essence of Asia--there, of Africa. I am afraid these remarks are\ncrude, but I think the definition is a just one.\n\nAs we drove to the little German inn in the outskirts of the town, we\nnoticed the air getting richer with the scent of orange-flowers, and\nsoon we passed into the region of the orange-orchards. The trees were\ncreamy white with dense blossom, and the ripe fruit was dotted about in\nthe masses of white. The honey they gave us at breakfast was from these\norange-flowers. Here our dragoman, Isaac, met us. I made my first\nsketch--the first, I trust, of a series I marked down before leaving\nAlexandria. It was of Jaffa, seen over the orange-trees from the inn\ngarden, and charming it was to sit there in the cool shade, with birds\nsinging overhead as never one hears them in Egypt. Fragments of\nclassical pillars stood about and served as seats under the chequered\nshade of flowering fruit-trees along the garden paths. The Mediterranean\nappeared to my right, and overhead sailed great pearly clouds in the\nvibrating blue of the fresh spring sky. I must say I felt very happy at\nthe reality of my presence on the soil of Palestine!\n\n[Illustration: JAFFA\n\nTHE upper part of the town is seen over the tops of orange orchards.\nTime, morning.]\n\nAt 2 P.M. we started in a carriage like our dear old friend, the\n\"Vetturino,\" for Ramleh, our halting-place for the night. How can I put\nbefore you the scenes of loveliness we passed through? The country was a\nvast plain of rolling wheat, bordered in the blue distance with the\ntender hills of Judea. This land of the Philistines far surpassed my\nexpectations in its extent, its grand sweep of line, its breadth of\ncolour and light and shade. It was some time before we came out on the\nPlain of Sharon, and we drove first a long way between orange-orchards\nbordered along the road by gigantic hedges of prickly pear. Our\nVetturino was drawn by three horses abreast, all with bells, and it was\nexhilarating to set out at a fast trot along the easy road in company\nwith other jingling and whip-cracking vehicles, and escorted by horsemen\nin brilliant Syrian costumes dashing along on their little Arabs, and\ncarrying their long ornamental guns slung across their backs. I had just\none horrible glimpse (of which I said nothing, as of some guilty thing),\njust as we started, of a railway engine under some palm-trees. It is\nwaiting there the completion of the line to Jerusalem to puff and\nwhistle its beauty-marring career to the Holy City. I am thankful my\ngood luck has brought me here just in time to escape the sight of a\nrailway and its attendant eyesores in this sacred land. Why rush through\nthis little country, every yard of which is precious? An express train\ncould run in two hours \"from Dan to Beersheba\"--and what then?\n\nBefore emerging on the Plain we passed a white mosque-like building\nplaced between two cypresses by the roadside, which is supposed to stand\non the site of the place where Peter raised Dorcas to life. Be that as\nit may, the white dome and the black-green cypresses are charming. The\nsoil of the country, now being ploughed in all directions between the\ngreen wheat-fields, is of a rich golden colour, like that I noticed with\nsuch pleasure around Sienna, and makes a pleasing harmony with the vivid\ngreen. The dear olive-tree, beloved of my childhood, is here in its very\nhome. I hailed its pinky-grey foliage and its hoary old gnarled trunk.\nAnd now for those wildflowers that all travellers who are so well\nadvised as to come here in spring have told us of. Well may they speak\nof them with rapture! As we proceeded they increased in variety, and so\nabundant were they that they made tracts and wide regions of colour over\nthe land. Come here in spring, O traveller! and not in the arid, dusty,\nburnt-up autumn. On entering the Plain of Sharon we saw to our left the\ntown of Lydda, with St. George's Church gleaming in the sunshine. Never\nhave I seen, even in Ireland, fresher effects of cloud shadow and\nsunlight over rolling spaces of waving green corn, and even the sky was\ntypically West of Ireland. Yet lo! in the foreground strings of camels,\nmules, and wild Bedouins and caracoling Bashi-Bazouks! The ploughing was\ndone by tiny oxen, two abreast, and sometimes a tall camel stalked as\nleader. On arriving at Ramleh we walked to the great tower, some\ndistance out of the town, from the top of which I had my long-looked-for\nview of the whole of Philistia--northward to Carmel, westward to the\nsea, eastward to the mountains of Judah. As the sun sank the tints\ndeepened on that lovely plain, and nothing on earth could be more\nbeautiful than that immense view. I made a hasty water-colour sketch up\nthere, but what can one do in a few minutes with such a scene? A sad\nspectacle awaited us as we reached the German inn. As we walked I had\nbecome absorbed in the contemplation of the limpid sky, where the last\nlark was carolling to the sinking sun, and of the mountains whose rosy\nflush was fading into the cool greys that already veiled the plain, when\nmy eyes sinking lower, I beheld in the cold grey of the narrow street,\nranged along a stone wall, a row of lepers waiting for alms. Life has no\nsadder detail than the leper. As I approached them with a coin the\nnearest of these poor creatures put out a fingerless palm on which I\nplaced the money, and having only hollow sockets in the place of eyes it\nhanded it to its neighbour, who, being also eyeless, passed it on to one\nin whose fleshless face there lingered the remnant of an eye. This one's\nhand lifted the coin to its fragment of eye to see its value, and\ndeposited it in the recesses of its fluttering rags that only half\nveiled the decaying body. A low wail passed along the line, and bony\narms were stretched out in gratitude. And then we go to our _table\nd'h\u00f4te_ and comfortable beds, and they--where do they sleep? Do they lie\ndown on those bare bones?\n\n\nJerusalem, _7th April 189-_.\n\n\nMy....--We left Ramleh early this brisk, fresh morning, the air full of\nscent from the wildflowers. Fr\u00e8re Beno\u00eet, the Flemish Franciscan who met\nus on board the steamer, came with us, and an English lady who had all\nbut broken down the day before through the jolting of a shandrydan that\nhad been palmed off on her and her husband at Jaffa. So with the friar\nand Mrs. G---- inside, W. on the box, and Mr. G---- following in the\naforesaid shandrydan with Isaac, we set off in the usual whip-cracking,\nshouting, and prancing manner for\n\n                              JERUSALEM!\n\nThe first point of interest I was looking for was Ajalon. As we dipped\ndown from one of the hills traversed by the road in steep zigzags it\nunfolded its fresh loveliness on our left, but we could not see the\nactual site of Joshua's battle, as it was too deep in the folds of the\nhills. This view was, perhaps, the loveliest of all, and nothing could\nbe fresher than those cornfields and rich spaces of ploughed earth in\nthe light that streamed down from so pure a sky. Now and then a single\nhorseman with the well-known long gun inlaid with mother-of-pearl, and\nwith his Arab all over tassels, dashed past us, doing \"fantasia\" to\nimpress us strangers. The proceeding was never without success as far as\nI was concerned.\n\nAt 9.30 we left the plain and at once entered the hills of Judea, which\nare much more uniformly stony than one would suppose them to be from a\ndistance. We soon stopped at a wayside khan, about half-a-dozen\nVetturinos being assembled in the yard, and all the horses were rested.\nWe then began the ascent of the dear Hill Country, fragrant with\nmemories of Mary on her journey made in haste from Nazareth. I did not\nexpect such a long and high ascent, having failed to realise from\ndescription the immense altitude of the height of land that holds\nJerusalem. \"Things seen are mightier than things heard.\" The wildflowers\nincreased in beauty and variety, chief, I think, amongst them being the\ncrimson anemones with black centre which tossed their gay heads\neverywhere in the mountain breeze. Olives and stones, stones and olives\non all sides. Here and there a carob tree or a clump of tamarisk at a\ntomb. As we crested the first pass and looked back we saw the plains of\nPhilistia, with Ramleh white in the sunshine and the sea beyond shining\nin a long flash of silver. Before us to the right soon loomed against\nthe clouds the great tombs of the Maccabees, and away to our left on a\nhigh cone appeared, remote and awful, the \"Tomb of Samuel,\" a dominating\nfeature over all the land.\n\nAs we descended on the other side of the pass we came in sight of Ain\nKareem, the reputed birthplace of John the Baptist, on the side of a\nhigh hill. The words of the Magnificat sounded in one's mind's ear. It\nis a grand situation and most striking as seen from the road. At the\nbottom of the valley formed by the hill we were descending and the hill\nof Ain Kareem runs the dry bed of the brook from which David chose his\nsmooth stone for Goliath. W. went down and selected just such a smooth\nwhite stone as a memento. At the bottom of the valley we halted at a\nRussian khan and I took a little sketch of a bit of hillside and a\npear-tree in blossom. You must have seen this land with \"second sight,\"\nfor you have always seen a flowering fruit-tree in your mental pictures\nof it at Eastertide and Lady Day. Palestine is essentially the land of\nlittle fruit-trees.\n\nOn leaving the Russian khan, where we beheld chromo-lithographs of the\nlate and the present Czars on the walls, and were interested in the high\nMuscovite boots of our host, we had another great ascent, and soon after\nreaching the top my feelings became more and more focussed on the\nlook-out ahead. I saw signs that we were approaching Jerusalem. There\nwere more people on the road, and a detachment of the Salvation Army was\nmarching along with a strangely incongruous appearance. Yet only\nincongruous on account of the dress, for, morally, those earnest souls\nare amongst the fittest to be here. I stood up in the carriage, but W.\nfrom the box saw first. He raised his hat, and a second after I had the\nindescribable sensation of seeing the top of the Mount of Olives, and\nthen the Walls of Zion! It was about three o'clock.\n\nWe left the carriage outside the Jaffa Gate, for no wheeled vehicle can\ntraverse the streets of Jerusalem, and we passed in on foot.\n\nWe had first to go to the hotel, of course, a very clean little place\nfacing the Tower of David. Thence we soon set out to begin our wonderful\nexperiences.\n\nI had what I can only describe as a qualm when we reached, in but a few\nhundred steps, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. It was all too easy and\ntoo quick. You can imagine the sense of reluctance to enter there\nwithout more recollection. I had a feeling of regret that we had not\nwaited till the morrow, and I would warn others not to go on the day of\narrival. We reached the Church through stone lanes of indescribable\npicturesqueness, teeming with the life of the East, and there I saw the\nJerusalem Jews I had so often read of--extraordinary figures in long\ncoats and round hats, a ringlet falling in front of each ear, while the\nrest of the head is shaved. They looked white and unhealthy, many of\nthem red-eyed and all more or less bent, even the youths. No greater\ncontrast could be seen than between those poor creatures and the Arabs\nwho jostle them in these crowded alleys, and who are such upstanding\nathletic men, with clear brown skins, clean-cut features, and heads\nturbaned majestically. They stride along with a spring in every step.\nThere are Greeks here, and Russians in crowds, and Kurds, Armenians,\nand Kopts--in fact samples of all the dwellers of the Near East, wearing\ntheir national dresses; and through this fascinating assemblage of types\nand costumes, most distracting to my thoughts, we threaded our way\nto-day, ascending and descending the lanes and bazaars, up and down wide\nshallow steps, till we came in front of the rich portal of the Church of\nchurches. With our eyes dazzled with all that colour, and with the\nsudden brilliance of the sunshine which flooded the open space in front\nof the fa\u00e7ade, we passed in! Do not imagine that the church stands\nimposingly on an eminence, and that its proportions can strike the\nbeholder. You go downhill to it from the street, and it is crowded on\nall sides but the front by other buildings. But its gloomy antiquity and\nformlessness are the very things that strike one with convincing force,\nfor one sees at once that the church is there for the sake of the sites\nit encloses, and that, therefore, it cannot have any architectural\nsymmetry or plan whatever, and its enormous extent is necessitated by\nits enclosing the chapels over Calvary and the Holy Sepulchre and many\nothers besides, which the Empress Helena erected over each sacred spot\nwhose identity she ascertained with so much diligence. It is very\nnatural to wish that Calvary was in the open air,--lonely, under the sky\nthat saw Christ suffer on the Cross. But already, in the year 326, St.\nHelena found the place of execution buried under mounds of rubbish\npurposely thrown upon it; and where would any trace of it be to-day had\nshe not enclosed it--what with man's destroying acts and the violence of\nthe storms that have beaten against this rock for nineteen centuries and\nmore? It was, to begin with, but a small eminence close outside the\nwalls. On entering the church you discern in the depths of the gloom of\nthe tortuous interior the rough steep steps cut in the rock that lead to\nCalvary, on your right hand. On climbing to the top, groping in the\ntwilight, you find yourself in a chapel lined with plates of gold and\nhung with votive lamps. The sacred floor, which is the very top of\nCalvary, is entirely cased in gold, and under the Greek altar is shown\nthe socket of the Cross, a hole in the rock. Our altar stands to the\nproper left of the Greek, which has the post of honour. Descending from\nCalvary there is a long stretch of twilight church to traverse before we\ncome to the sepulchre. Again I had not realised, from the books I have\nread, the great distance that separates the two, and, indeed, many\nwriters in their scepticism have done their best to belittle the whole\nthing. I confess that before to-day I was much under the influence of\nthese writers, but I have now seen for myself, a privilege I am deeply\nthankful for. It was an overwhelming sensation to find the spaces that\nseparate the sites so much vaster than I had expected, and to have, at\nevery step, the conviction driven home that after all the modern\nwrangling and disputing the old tradition stands immovable. It certainly\nwould be hard to believe that when St. Helena came here the dwellers of\nJerusalem should have lost all knowledge of where their \"Tower-hill\"\nstood in the course of three centuries. She was commissioned, as you\nknow, by her son the Emperor Constantine, that ardent convert to\nChristianity, to seek and secure with the utmost perseverance and care\nall the holy sites, and to her untiring labours we owe their\nidentification to this day. The great central dome of the church rises\nabove the chapel of the Holy Sepulchre, which chapel stands in the vast\ncentral space, a casket enclosing the rock hollowed out into Our Lord's\nTomb and its ante-chamber. You enter this ante-chamber and, stooping\ndown, you pass on your hands and knees into the sepulchre itself. On\nyour right is the little low, rough-hewn tomb, covered with a slab of\nstone worn into hollows by the lips of countless pilgrims throughout the\nlong ages of our era. A monk keeps watch there, and beside him there is\nonly space enough for one person at a time. I have made many attempts to\ntell you my thoughts and feelings during those bewildering moments of my\nfirst visit, but I find it is impossible, and you can understand why.\n\n\nJERUSALEM, _8th April 189-_.\n\n\nMy....--To-day was exquisitely bright and full of heart-stirring sights\nto us. Those who have not been here can scarcely, I think, realise the\nsensation of living in daily intimacy with the scenes of Our Lord's\nPassion. Think of lying down at night under the shadow of the Cross.\nTo-day we first visited the Wailing Place of the Jews. Strange and\npathetic sight, these weird men and women and children weeping and\nmoaning, with their faces against the gigantic stones of the wall that\nforms the only remaining portion of the foundation of their vanished\nTemple, praying Jehovah for its restoration to Israel; and over their\nheads rises in its strong beauty the Moslem Mosque of Omar, standing in\nthe place of the \"Holy of Holies,\" the varnished tiles of its dome\nablaze with green and blue in the resplendent sun! Jews below, Moslems\nabove, yet to the Christian, Christ everywhere!\n\nThen we followed the \"Via Dolorosa,\" which winds through the dense town,\nstarting from the Turkish barracks on the site of Pilate's house. Of\ncourse, I need not say that the surface of Jerusalem being sixty to\neighty feet higher than it was in Our Lord's time, the real Via Dolorosa\nis buried far below, but the general direction may be the true one.\nStrange to see the Stations of the Cross appearing at intervals on the\nwalls of alleys crowded with Jews and Mahometans. There are no evidences\nof Turkish intolerance in Palestine that I can see! The last stations\nare, of course, in the great Church. We followed the walls from Mount\nMoriah to Zion and round by Accra to the Damascus Gate, outside which\nstands General Gordon's \"Skull Hill,\" which he so tenaciously clung to\nas the real Calvary (on account of its resemblance to a gigantic skull),\ntogether with the sepulchre in a garden at the foot of the mound, which\nhe held was that of Joseph of Arimathea. As far as my eye can tell, the\ndistance between \"Skull Hill\" and this sepulchre is much the same as\nbetween Calvary and the sepulchre that tradition hallows. I send you a\nsketch that I made on the spot of Gordon's \"sepulchre,\" to show you the\nuniversal plan of these burial-places. You will see three tombs (their\nlids are gone) in the inner chamber. At the Holy Sepulchre only Our\nLord's is preserved, tallying with the one I have marked with a cross;\nthe other two have been cut away.\n\n[Illustration]\n\nI made a very hurried sketch of Jerusalem, with the Mount of Olives and\na glimpse of the mountains of Moab, from the hotel roof. Had I been\nperched a little higher I could have shown the head of the Dead Sea. We\nvisited the Mosque of Omar, one of the great sights of the world. The\nimmense plateau on which the Temple stood is partly occupied by this,\nthe second oldest of mosques, and by great open spaces planted with\ngigantic and ancient cypresses and by a smaller mosque. The whole group\nis surpassingly beautiful, but what thoughts rush into one's mind in\nthis place! A vision of Herod's Temple fills the whole space for a few\nmoments with its white and golden splendour, its forest of shining\npinnacles flashing in the sun, and its tiers of pillared courts\nculminating in the Holy of Holies. And then the reality lies before us\nagain--great empty spaces and two pagan mosques. From thence we went out\nby St. Stephen's Gate, and looked down on Gethsemane on the opposite\nside of the Valley of Jehoshaphat. Very dusty and stony looked that part\nof the Mount of Olives, and the excavations for the building of numerous\nchurches by various sects have greatly spoilt its repose and beauty and\ndisturbed its seclusion. But one must not complain. All Christians\nnaturally long to have a place of worship there.\n\nI cannot describe to you the charm of life here. All one's time is\nfilled to overflowing with what I may call the \"holy fascination\" of the\nplace, and though all this continual walking and standing about may be\nsomewhat fatiguing in a physical sense, the mind never is weary and the\nfatigue is pleasant. At night, sound sleep, born of profound contentment\nat the day's doings, so full of keen interest without excitement, renews\none's vitality for the succeeding day's enjoyment.\n\n\n_9th April 189-._\n\n\nThis has been a day of clear loveliness, much hotter and altogether\nexquisite. In the morning we first went to the \"Cenaculum,\" the rambling\nbuilding erected over the site of the house of the Last Supper, which\nSt. Helena found and enclosed in a chapel, and also including the\nundoubted Tomb of David, jealously guarded from us by the Mahometans.\nThe Cenaculum stands out lonely and impressive, looking towards the\nmountains of Moab and the dim regions to the south of the Dead Sea. I\nwill show you a sunset sketch of this.\n\nI was not pleased to feel hurried through those rooms and narrow\npassages and stairs by the guide in a rather nervous manner, when I\nperceived that the reason was the unfriendly looks of the Mahometans who\nmoved about us, and who evidently resent the presence of Christians so\nnear the royal tomb. I was too much distracted to realise where I was,\nand indeed, not till we get away from the noise and bustle of town life\ninto the solitudes shall we be able to fix our thoughts as we would\nwish.\n\nFrom the Cenaculum we walked half-way down to the valley through which\nthe brook Cedron flows, and by very much the same path that Our Lord\nmust have followed to go to Gethsemane after the Last Supper. Down to\nour right was the desolate Gehenna--the Pit of Tophet--now only\ninhabited by lepers, and a ghastly hollow it looked. Beyond rose that\nhill where once sat Moloch of the red-hot hands, and deep down on the\ndeclivity between us and these landmarks of terror lay the Potter's\nField. When looking from some commanding height\n\n[Illustration: \"THE CENACULUM.\" SITE OF THE HOUSE OF THE LAST SUPPER\n\nTHE mass of buildings shown includes, in the centre of the block, the\nremains of the Chapel built by the Empress Helena over the site of the\nhouse of the Last Supper. The Tomb of David at the left-hand extremity\nis surmounted by a dome. Time, sunset.]\n\nover the city and its surroundings the mind staggers at the thought of\nthe appalling catastrophes that have burst upon this narrow area--the\nhuman agony that has been concentrated here through so many ages, of\nwhich we read in the Old Testament and in the writings of the early\nhistorians of our era. Twenty-five fierce sieges has this mountain\nfastness endured. No other city ever went through such sufferings. If we\ncould really concentrate our thoughts upon the events that have passed\nupon this ground which, from such a standpoint as ours of this morning,\nthe sight can compass in one sweep of vision, it would be too painful to\nbe endured. Perhaps if I could see the place on some bleak twilight or\nin a sounding thunderstorm I might dimly appreciate the long agony of\nJerusalem, but to-day the April air was full of scents of flowers and\naromatic shrubs, and the bees were humming; there were little\nbutterflies amongst the anemones, and the lark was in full song. The\nvery spirit of the Gospel peace seemed to float in the gentle air of\nspring. I was glad I could not concentrate my thoughts on the gloomy\nside of that wondrous prospect.\n\nFrom the cave whither St. Peter crept away to weep after the denial of\nOur Lord is certainly the finest view of the site of the Temple to be\nobtained anywhere. This cave is some distance down the path from the\nCenaculum and the house of Caiaphas, which latter we had also visited,\nnow a beautiful chapel.\n\nIn the afternoon we had our first ride, and went by the old stony track\nso often trodden by the Saviour to Bethany. Never shall I forget the\nview of the Dead Sea, Jordan, and mountains of Moab which burst upon us\nas we crested the summit of the Mount of Olives and passed by the\ntraditional site of the Ascension. The ride down to Bethany, on the\nreverse slope of the Mount, was enchanting, and how solemn all was to\nus--the deep black \"tomb of Lazarus,\" the site of the house (now a\nruined chapel) where Jesus so often stayed. We returned by the lower, or\nnew, road from Jericho, and had at sunset that grand view of Jerusalem\nfrom the lower slopes of Olivet which has so often been painted. We\nreserved Gethsemane for another time, but visited the ancient Church of\nthe Assumption on our way home.\n\n\nJERUSALEM, _10th April_.\n\n\nMy....--We spent the whole morning in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre,\nI remaining alone for an hour after W. left to write letters at the\nhotel. There was hardly another soul in that vast building, except a few\npriests and the monk who keeps watch over the Tomb. I find I can write\nleast about this, the climax of what makes Palestine the Holy Land.\n\nAt two o'clock I went to Gethsemane, escorted by Isaac, where I sketched\ntill six. I would have preferred a moonlight sketch of that garden, but\nI had to be content with a very hot daylight one. It was blissful\nsitting there undisturbed under the old olives whose trunks are as hard\nas stone, and I pleased myself with the idea that they might be\noffshoots of offshoots of the trees that shaded Our Lord. When Titus had\nall the trees around Jerusalem cut down, some saplings may have been\noverlooked! My protecting dragoman was somewhere out of sight, and the\nFranciscan monks who own this most sacred \"God's Acre\" were\nunobtrusively tending the flowers somewhere about. Insects hummed amid\nthe flowers, all the little _burrings_ of a hot day were in the air, it\nwas a place of profound peace. As I returned, towards sunset, and\nclimbed the steep sides of the Valley of Jehoshaphat up to St. Stephen's\nGate--the shortest way to the City--I looked back towards the scene of\nmy happy labours, and a sight lay there below me which impressed me, I\nam sure, for life. The western sides of the abyss which I was climbing\nwere already in the shades of night, for twilight hardly exists here,\nbut the opposite slopes received the red sunset light in its fullest\nforce, and in that scarlet gleam shone out in intense relief thousands\nupon thousands of flat tombstones that cover the bones of countless Jews\nwho have, at their devout request, been buried there to await, on the\nspot, the Last Judgment which they and we and the Mahometans all believe\nwill take place in that valley. Had I more time I would much like to\nmake a study of this truly awful place in that last ray of the vanishing\nsun, for nothing could be more impressive and more touching, but\nhigher-standing subjects claim all the time I can spare. My intention is\nto use all my sketching moments for scenes connected with Our Lord's\nrevealed life. I resolutely deny\n\n[Illustration: IN THE GARDEN OF GETHSEMANE. NOONDAY. LOOKING TOWARDS\nVALLEY OF JEHOSHAPHAT\n\nPART of the Garden in foreground under old olive-trees and cypresses.\nStations of the Cross along path inside boundary wall. Walls of\nJerusalem and top of Mosque of Omar in background. Time, early\nafternoon.]\n\nmyself the indulgence of elaborately sketching the people and animals\nthat seem to call out to the artist at every turn, though I have\noutlined some in my note-book. Anywhere else our fellow-travellers at\nthe hotel would be too tempting in my lighter moments, so comical they\nlook in their sun-proof costumes. Why such preparations against the\nApril sun? But one is too \"detached\" here to be much distracted by their\nunspeakable outlines. And, talking of distractions, I really do not find\nthe drawbacks of Jerusalem, which so many travellers give prominence to\nin accounts of their experiences, so very bad. Indeed our life here is\nwithout a single drawback, to my thinking.\n\n\n_Saturday, 11th April 189-._\n\n\nThe heat is greatly increasing. At 1.30 we drove to Bethlehem with our\nfriend, Fr\u00e8re Beno\u00eet. The hill country we passed through was very stony\nand rocky, and only cultivated here and there. Again olives and stones,\nstones and olives everywhere. The inhabitants are a splendid race, the\nmen athletic, the women graceful, though their faces are sadly\ndisfigured by tattooing. We were on the look-out for the little city of\nDavid long before it appeared, and very beautiful it looked as we beheld\nit from a high hill, crowning a slightly lower one amid a billowing sea\nof other hill-tops. It has a majestic appearance on its rocky throne,\nand its large, massive conventual buildings add greatly to its\nstateliness. We passed that pathetic monument, Rachel's Tomb, at the\ncross roads, our road leading to the left, and the other diving down to\nthe right towards Hebron. We ascended Bethlehem's hill and were soon in\nits steep, narrow, slippery stone lanes, utterly unfitted for a\ncarriage. We drove at once to the Franciscan Convent and then to the\nChurch built over the site of the Nativity, and had the happiness of\nkneeling at the sacred spot where the manger stood, which is shown in\nthe rocky vaults below, and marked with a white star inlaid in the\nfloor. The cave was rich and lovely with votive lamps and gold and\nsilver gifts. Little by little the dislike I had to the too precise\nlocalisation of the events we love most in the Bible is disappearing.\nSpeaking for myself, I find that, on the spot, the mind demands it. But\nI know that many people regret it. I only wish that, in their separate\nand individual ways, all\n\n[Illustration: BETHANY\n\nThe locality of the Tomb of Lazarus is marked by a little domed tower to\nthe extreme right of the town. Ruins of chapel built over site of house\nof Lazarus, Martha, and Mary are in centre of village. The road to\nJerusalem of Our Lord's time passes over the brow of the hill to the\nright. Mid-day.]\n\nwho come here may feel the happiness that I do.\n\nIn a very dark niche in the rocks close to where the white star shone\nout in the floor I perceived the figure of a Turkish sentry,\nbreech-loading rifle and all, standing on his little wooden stool,\nmotionless. Well, do you know, though my eyes saw him my mind was not\nthereby disturbed any more than it was by the Turkish guard at the door\nof the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. I could not bring my thoughts down\nto that figure and the reason of its being there.\n\nWe visited St. Jerome's Cave, close by, where he worked, near the scene\nof his Redeemer's birth, giving to the world the translation into the\nVulgate of the Holy Scriptures. Then we walked down to the field of\nBoaz, full of waving green wheat, in the midst of which stands the\nsheepfold surrounded by a stone wall. You must imagine the shepherds\nlooking _up_ to Bethlehem from there on that Christmas eve. The little\ncity is seen from the sheepfold high up against the sky to the west\nabout two miles off. I had only time for a pencil outline of this view,\nhoping to colour it on a future occasion. All the country round was\nvery pastoral, and just such a one as one would expect. Wildflowers in\ngreat quantities, and larks--little tame things with crests on their\nheads--enjoying the sun and the breeze, quite unmolested; lovely sweeps\nof corn in the valleys, olive-clad or quite grassless hills bounding the\nhorizon all round--can you see it? How many figures of Our Lady we saw\nabout the fields and lanes with babes in their arms! Surely the old\nmasters got their facts about the drapery of their Madonnas from here,\nwhere all the women wear blue and red robes, exactly as the Italian\npainters have them.\n\n\n_Sunday, 12th April._\n\n\nWe went to seven o'clock mass at the Latin Altar on Calvary. We were in\na dense knot of people, who were kneeling on the floor in that dark,\nlow-roofed chapel, lit by the soft light of lamps hanging before each\nshrine. How often we say in our prayers, \"Here, at the foot of Thy\nCross.\" We were literally there. After breakfast with the prior at the\nCasa Nova Monastery, which used to be the hostelry for travellers before\nthe hotel was in existence, we drove with Fr\u00e8re Beno\u00eet to the reputed\nbirthplace of John the Baptist, Ain Kareem in the Judean Hills. I\nbelieve there is considerable doubt as to this site, but there is the\npossibility. It was a very poetical landscape that we passed through,\nand there were many flowering apricot, pear, and almond trees as we\nneared St. Elizabeth's mountain home. We first visited the site of the\nBaptist's birth high up in the north end of the village, now covered by\na church, and then we crossed over to the south side of the valley to\nSt. Elizabeth's country house, also now a chapel, where her cousin\nvisited her. There is a deep well of most cool crystal water at the side\nof the altar in this \"Chapel of the Visitation,\" which belongs to the\nSpanish monks. From the roof of the convent over this chapel I made a\nsketch of the little town on its hillside planted with cypress trees.\nThe heat here in this enclosed valley was very great.\n\n\n_Monday, 13th April._\n\n\nWe were up at five for our drive to Hebron. I longed to see this most\nancient city and that mosque which, without any doubt whatever, covers\nthe \"double Cave of Machpelah\" which Abraham bought for his own and his\ndescendants' burying-place. \"There,\" said Jacob when dying, \"they\nburied Abraham and Sarah his wife; there they buried Isaac and Rebekah\nhis wife; and there I buried Leah,\" and there also they buried Jacob.\nThink of it! If we could look into those tombs and see the very bones of\nAbraham and Isaac and the mummy of Jacob, for the Bible tells us he was\nembalmed according to the manner of the Egyptians. Altogether, though,\nour visit to Hebron has rather given me the horrors. Near Rachel's tomb\nwe left the Bethlehem road and dived down to the \"Vale of Hebron,\" the\nheat increasing greatly as we descended. We halted for the mid-day\nrefection (how more than usually horrid the word \"lunch\" sounds here!)\nand rested in the \"shadow of a rock in a thirsty land,\" where tradition\nsays Philip met the Eunuch journeying from far-off Meroe on the Upper\nNile. It was a wilderness of stones, where the big lizards of Palestine\nwere in strong force, panting over the top of every rock, their black\nheads and goggle eyes upturned to the burning sky in a very comical way.\nClose to Hebron is a nice cool German hostelry, where we rested before\ndescending to the gloomiest town I have ever seen in the East, with\n\n[Illustration: \"AIN KAREEM,\" REPUTED BIRTHPLACE OF JOHN THE BAPTIST,\nFROM ROOF OF CONVENT OF THE VISITATION\n\nChurch built over supposed site of Zacharias' and Elizabeth's house to\nright of town, high up, where St. John was born. Roof of chapel built\nover site of their country house, where Mary visited her cousin, in\nforeground.]\n\nsome of its bazaars like tunnels, into which scarcely any light could\nenter. Here in the gloom we met insolent-looking Moslems and spectral\nJews, their strongly-contrasted figures and faces appearing for a moment\nin the twilight as they passed us. And outside it was blinding noontide\nsunlight. We went all round the huge mosque that guards the precious\ntombs of the patriarchs, but had we attempted to enter we should have\nhad a bad quarter of an hour from the Mahometans. These sons of the\nBondwoman would stone any son of the Free who would attempt an entry.\nThere is a little black hole in the wall, which I am sure does not\npierce it through, which we are told we can look through and see the\ntombs from outside, but I saw nothing in the hole but the beady eye of a\nlizard. We do not feel as though we would care to revisit Hebron.\n\nWe drove back to the German khan which was full of exhausted Americans\nwho had also returned from the oven of Hebron. Most of them had been\ntrying to combine botany with Biblical research, and near many of the\nfigures that lay prone on the divans I saw Bibles and limp flora on the\nfloor.\n\nTowards evening we drove from this place of rest a long way back on the\nroad to Jerusalem, but not far short of Bethlehem we came in sight of\nour camp! How charming and inspiriting that sight was--three snowy tents\npitched by the Pools of Solomon under the walls of a Crusader Castle,\nwith some fifteen saddle and baggage animals picketed close by, and the\ndear old Union Jack flying from the central tent! I was delighted at the\nfact that our camp life was to begin that night. Everything struck us as\nin excellent order, our horses, saddles and bridles, the tents, the\nservants and all. Those Pools of Solomon are three immense reservoirs of\nwater which the Wise King made to supply the Temple at Jerusalem.\nMyriads of frogs were enlivening the evening air with their\nmultitudinous croakings which increased to deafening proportions as\nnight closed in. I took a hasty sketch. Much hyssop grows here,\n\"Asperges me, Domine, hyssopo et mundabor.\"\n\n\n_14th April._\n\n\nI was greatly pleased with my first night under canvas. To have grass\nand stones and little aromatic herbs for a bedroom carpet was a\n\n[Illustration: SOLOMON'S POOLS, NEAR JERUSALEM, LOOKING TOWARDS DEAD SEA\n\nShows the central one of three reservoirs which are built one below the\nother on a slope inclining towards valley of the Dead Sea.\n\nMeasurements of Solomon's Pools:--Upper one, 380 ft. by 236 ft., 25 ft.\ndeep; middle one, 423 ft. by 250 ft., 39 ft. deep; lower one, 582 ft. by\n207 ft., 50 ft. deep.]\n\nnew and delightful sensation to me. We started this morning at sunrise,\nmy sketching things handily strapped to my saddle by W.'s directions, in\na flat straw _aumoni\u00e8re_. Isaac had swathed his tarboush in a\nmagnificent \"cufia,\" and our retinue wore the baggy garb of Syria. W.\nrode a steel-grey Arab, I a silver-grey, Isaac a roan-grey, and the man,\nwhom we call the \"flying column,\" because he is to accompany us with the\nlunch bags, while the heavy column with baggage, tents, etc., goes on\nahead by short-cuts, rode a chestnut. We passed through Bethlehem and\ndown to the Field of the Shepherds, where I completed, as well as I\ncould in the heat and glare, my sketch begun the other day. A group of\nsome twenty Russian pilgrims arrived as we did, and we saw them in the\ngrotto of the sheepfold, each holding a lighted taper and responding to\nthe chant of their old priest, who had a head which would do admirably\nfor a picture of Abraham. These poor men were in fur coats and high\nclumsy boots, and one told us he had come from Tobolsk, and had been two\nyears on that tramp. He assured us he could manage his return journey in\nno time, only ten months or so. Their devotion was profound, as it\nalways is, and was utterly un-self-conscious. I think we English are too\napt to suppose that because devotion is demonstrative it is not deep.\nGreat pedestrians as we are, how many Englishmen would walk for two\nyears to visit this sheepfold? That two years' test borne by the Russian\npeasant must have gone very deep.\n\nI remember reading with much approval, when a child, with a child's\nnarrow-mindedness, Miss Martineau's shocked description of the\ndemonstrative piety of a noble Russian lady on Calvary, who repeatedly\nlaid her head in the hole where the Cross had been, weeping and praying\nand behaving altogether in a most un-English manner. The memory of that\npassage came back to me to-day as I saw these rough peasants, so\nsupremely unconscious of our presence, throwing themselves heart and\nsoul into their adoration of God, and I thought of Mary Magdalene and\n_her_ prostrations and tears.\n\nAfter the service for the Russian pilgrims \"father Abraham\" fell asleep\nunder an olive-tree, with his hoary head on a stone which he had\ncushioned with dock leaves, and the younger priest who had taken part in\nthe service went back to his ploughing, which he had left on the\napproach of the pilgrims. They both had their Fellaheen clothes under\ntheir cassocks, and they wore the tall Greek sacerdotal cap. They were\nnatives of Bethlehem. \"Abraham\" blessed our meal, but refused to partake\nof it, except the fruit, as this is the Greek Lent. We had a long talk\nwith him through Isaac, and a lively theological argument, which had the\nusual success of such undertakings, enhanced by its filtration through a\nMahometan interpreter converted to Protestantism by the American Baptist\nMission at Jaffa. That old patriarch was a magnificent study as he sat,\npointing heavenwards under the olive-trees and discoursing of his Faith,\nwith Bethlehem rising in the distance behind his most venerable head. He\nmade some coffee for us, a return civility for the fruit, and as we rode\noff many were the parting salutations between us and the group of people\nwho had been the audience of our theological arguments, made\nunintelligible by Isaac. Among the crowd was an ex-Papal Zouave who\nturned out to have been orderly to a friend of ours in the old days at\nRome.\n\nWe rode along a track in the field of Boaz, now knee-deep in corn, a\ncavalry soldier, who had been sent to escort us through the \"dangerous\"\nregion, leading the way. His escorting seems to consist of periodical\n\"fantasia\" manoeuvres, when he shakes his horse out at full gallop,\npicking a flower in mid-career and circling back to present it to me,--a\npicturesque proceeding in that floating caftan and white and brown\nstriped burnous. I am pleased to see this figure in our foreground\ncaracoling, curveting, and careering. He is in such pleasing harmony\nwith his native landscape. He and Isaac are all over pistols and weapons\nof various sorts, but W. says that the necessity for arms in Palestine\nis now a thing of the past, and only a bogey.\n\nOur course lay south-east, as we wished to visit the far-famed Greek\nmonastery of Mar Saba on our way to our camp. Formerly there was great\ndanger and difficulty in going to this extraordinary place, owing to the\nfierce robber Bedouins that haunted these regions, and in many accounts\nof Palestine travel I have read of the disappointment of the writers at\nthe impossibility of making this visit. It is an awe-inspiring place.\nThe\n\n[Illustration: BETHLEHEM FROM THE SHEEPFOLD, FIELD OF BOAZ\n\nThe town is shown on a hill. The Convent of the Nativity stands to the\nextreme left. Field of Boaz with green wheat in middle distance,\nenclosure of sheepfold in foreground.]\n\nmonks have even denied themselves that great earthly consolation of\nnatural beauty which our monasteries, as a rule, are so well situated to\nenjoy. On the edge of an abyss of rock, through which the now dry Cedron\nonce rushed to the Dead Sea, and facing the opposite rock pierced with\nthe caves of former hermits, it is so placed as to have not one\nbeautiful thing within sight, and as little of even the light of the sky\nabove to give a ray of cheerfulness. We saw pigeons and paddy birds\narriving in flocks to the rock ledges, and had glimpses of furtive furry\nthings coming round corners. We marvelled at the presence of the paddy\nbirds so far from water till we were told the pleasing fact that all\nthese wild things since time immemorial have been in the habit of\ncongregating here to the sound of the bugle, to be fed by those Greek\nmonks. They were waiting for their dinner-bell!\n\nI soon had enough of Mar Saba, but W. thought a month there with two\ncamel-loads of books would be very pleasant. We espied our camp after\nleaving this dread place a long way below us in a hot hole, amongst most\ndesolate mountains, whose cinder-coloured sides neither distance nor\natmosphere could turn purple, and some of these were pale yellow,\nspotted at the top and half-way down with black shrubs, conveying an\nirresistible impression of mountains covered with titanic leopard-skins.\nThe deadness of the Dead Sea was beginning to be felt.\n\nA great wind arose in the night, and had not W. seen himself to the tent\nropes and pegs our tent would certainly have been blown down, and we\nshould have been smothered in a mass of flapping canvas. As it was, the\ntent shook and heaved at its moorings and cracked like pistol-shots,\nsome of the furniture coming down with a crash. All night the\npistol-shots, the flappings, and the creakings went on, so that I was\nrather disconcerted at losing my night's rest, for the morrow was, as W.\nsaid, to be my \"test day.\" If I stood it well--it being the hardest we\nshould have--I would do the journey.\n\n\n_Wednesday, 15th April 189-._\n\n\nWe were off at sunrise on a tremendous ride, down to the Dead Sea, up\nthe Jordan and round to Jericho--about eight hours in the saddle,\nexclusive of dismounted halts. We were very fortunate, for the wind\nwhich had so troubled our slumbers kept away the heat, which in these\nregions is most trying. We descended to 1300 feet below the level of the\nMediterranean, and not a tree was to be seen till we gained the green\nbanks of Jordan, where we made our halt after half an hour's rest on the\nbeach of the Dead Sea. All my expectations of the desolation of \"Lake\nAsphaltites\" were fulfilled, but the bitter burning of its salt far\nsurpassed what I expected. I could realise how Lot's wife, lingering in\nher flight from the doomed Sodom to look back till the fringe of the\ndestruction that engulfed the Cities of the Plain covered her, remained\nstiffened into the semblance of a pillar of salt (\"statue\" of salt in\nour version) when my hand in drying, after I had but dipped it into the\ncrystal-clear water that now fills the hollow delved by the swirl of the\ngreat cataclysm, was stiff and white with the plaster-like brine. The\nwan look of the blue shrubs that grow here was like something in a\ndream, and the air was full of huge locusts, brilliant yellow, tossed by\na high hot wind. The earth was cracked by the heat into deep chasms, and\nthe treeless mountains round the sea were lost at its farther end in a\nmist of hot air. There was great beauty with this desolation, but the\nmind felt oppressed as well as the body. The blue of the sea was\nexquisitely delicate, and gave no idea in its soft beauty of the fierce\nbitterness of its waters. I felt deep emotion on sighting Jordan's\nswift-rolling stream--a touching and unspeakably dear river--but\nbeautiful only for its holiness, for the water is thick with grey mud,\nand the banks are tangled with the shaggy _d\u00e9bris_ that the over-hanging\ntrees have caught as the winter flood brought them swirling down. The\nheat there was great, and the flies made it absolutely impossible to\ntake a sketch of the place tradition says saw the baptism of Our Lord. I\nwas much disappointed, for the flies fairly drove us away, and in the\nburning heat we turned our horses' heads towards Jericho, unable to bear\nthese tormentors any longer. We were to camp at \"new Jericho\"--a huddled\ngroup of mud-pie houses situated in a garden of lovely trees and shrubs\nand flowers, which, owing to the abundance of water flowing through this\nregion, grow in tropical luxuriance. In the far western distance, above\nall the mountain-tops intervening, we kept the Mount of Olives in view,\nwith that tall landmark on the top, the tower of the Russian \"Church of\nthe Ascension,\" and only lost it as we neared our camping-place. Before\nus, to our right, a beautiful mountain of more stately lines than those\nof the weird crags around it rose solemnly against the west--it was the\nMountain of Temptation, where Our Lord was tempted after His forty days'\nfast. Immediately on reaching our camp I made a sketch of the plain,\nlooking towards Mount Pisgah in the land of Moab to the east. I was just\nin time to save the sunset. Would that we could include Pisgah in our\npilgrimage, and receive on our retin\u00e6 the same image of the Promised\nLand that Moses received on his!\n\nIn spite of the baying of dogs, the braying of donkeys, and other camp\nnoises sleep came swiftly and soundly that night.\n\n\n_Thursday, 16th April._\n\n\nWe set out at six for Jerusalem, the sun rising over the mountains of\nMoab. We passed over the site of \"old Jericho,\" and saw what a\nmagnificent site they chose for it, backed by mountains in a majestic\nsemicircle, and looking on the Plain of the Jordan.\n\nThe Bible speaks of a \"rose plant in Jericho\" as of something\nsuperlatively lovely amongst roses, and one may ask why particularly in\nJericho? Here one can answer the question, for one sees how richly the\nflowers grow in this land of many streams, which is all the more\nconspicuous for its exuberance as contrasted with the aridity of the\nsurrounding regions. I can best describe the fascinating quality of our\njourney by saying that it is like riding through the Bible. At every\nturn some text in the Old or New Testament which alludes to the natural\nfeatures of the land, springs before one's mind illumined with a light\nit could not have before. I know many devout Christians shrink from a\nvisit to the Holy Places for fear of--what? Do not fear! The reality\nsimply intensifies, gives substance and colour to, the ineffable poetry\nof the Bible. It is simply rapture to see at last the originals of our\nchildhood's imaginings, and, believe me, the reality becomes more\nprecious in one's memory even than the cherished illusion. Our ride\nthrough this land of little brooks, running clear over pebbly beds under\ncool foliage, was\n\n[Illustration: THE PLAIN OF THE JORDAN, LOOKING FROM \"NEW JERICHO\"\nTOWARDS MOUNT PISGAH\n\nWild vegetation in the plain. Mountains of Moab in distance. The slight\neminence in their straight sky-line to extreme left is Mount Pisgah.\nSunset.]\n\nrefreshing after my \"test ride\" of yesterday in the dry glare. We soon\nleft this zone of verdure, however, and began the ascent to Jerusalem\nthrough that gloomy pass which Our Lord chose for the parable of the\nGood Samaritan. They are making a road here, but, being as yet\nbridgeless at the ravines, it is not open to carriages. Our\nhalting-place was Bethany,--most lowly hamlet--and I made a sketch of it\nat our mid-day halt. We then proceeded to our camping-ground, which W.\nhad selected outside the north wall of Jerusalem, and in skirting the\nbase of Olivet we had again that great view of the city that artists\nlove (and I must say have often exaggerated as regards the height of its\nrocky pedestal). For the first time there was a \"hitch\" in the\narrangements for the camp. On reaching the north wall no camp was there,\nand we rode in and out of olive-woods and ugly new roads and dusty\nbuilding _d\u00e9bris_ in search of it, Isaac _appearing_, at least, to be\nquite at sea. At last, after sending him _ventre-\u00e0-terre_ successively\nin several directions, we saw him returning and calling out that he had\nfound it. To our horror we found the people in charge of the baggage had\nselected the only really hideous and repulsive spot in all Jerusalem,\nof all places, the Jewish extra-mural colony! There were our white tents\npitched down in a hollow full of the back-door refuse from the houses of\nthis unsavoury population, surrounded by youths and bedraggled women who\nmight have just come out of Houndsditch to look on at the preparations\nof the camp. The idea of a night on this ground was impossible. On\ncatching sight of this state of things W. pushed forward at a gallop at\nthe whole assemblage of servants, muleteers and cook, and the whole\namalgamated crowd, and with an unmistakable twirl of his stick told them\nto \"be out of that\"; and the muleteers, servants, and cook fell on their\nknees and with joined hands called out \"Pardon! pardon!\" In the\ntwinkling of an eye tents were struck and reloaded, dinner preparations\nbundled away and an instant movement made to the place behind the north\nwall on Mount Moriah, which W. had fixed upon in the morning. He\nsuspects that he was disobeyed on account of the ease with which the\nservants knew they would obtain drink from the Jews.\n\nCertainly our final encampment was enchanting, overlooking Gethsemane\ndeep down to the east, with the battlemented walls of Jerusalem before\nus to the south, and tall pines waving above our tents. The moon was now\nwaxing bright, and never can I forget that evening, as by its light I\nlooked upon these things.\n\nWhat a change in the temperature here! It is quite cold. My kit is\nproving well devised for this country. You must be prepared for these\nvery marked changes of temperature in a land which rises so high and\nsinks to such abnormal depths below the level of the sea in such a small\nspace.\n\nI shall post this in Jerusalem, for to-morrow we set out on a journey\nduring which no post-offices will be found for many days.\n\n\n_Friday, 17th April._\n\n\nMy....--I continue my letter in diary form from notes taken on the march.\nThis morning we left rather late, as the weather was so cool, and after\nmaking some purchases in Jerusalem we set out with our faces due north\non our long ride into Galilee. It was again an eight-hours-in-the-saddle\nday, but over such rolling stones that our horses seemed to me to be\ngoing at about three miles an hour. It was a relief at the almost\nimpassable places to dismount and lead one's horse. As W. said, these\npaths of Palestine seem to have been rather worn by the people's feet\nthan made by their hands. These bare hills of Benjamin were weary and\nsad, but what a thrilling view was our last one of Jerusalem from a high\npoint overlooking the ocean of mountains that bore afar off the island\nof the Holy City and its domes. Good-bye, Jerusalem! good-bye, Olivet!\nWe sat many minutes on our horses looking back at that centre of the\nworld, and then resuming our way a turn in the rocky track shut out the\nHoly City from thenceforth. We overtook a large wedding party, the men\narmed with long flintlocks, and the women wearing brilliant dresses. We\nall moved forward together as far as Bethel. How powerfully this\nassemblage of men and women and children journeying northward from\nJerusalem represented that large company in which were Mary and Joseph,\nwho came along this way, a day's journey, to the evening halting-place\nat Beeroth, and found there that the little Jesus was missing. As I was\nthinking over this and watching the people, we passed a little goatherd\nwho had evidently been out on the hills many days \"on duty.\" His mother,\nwho was amongst the wedding party, catching sight of her son--about\ntwelve years old--snatched a moment to leave the line of march and ran\nup to him and kissed him and wept over him, then returning hurried\nforward to rejoin her companions. That meeting of mother and son, the\nbending form of the woman in her red and blue drapery, which concealed\nat that moment the rich dress worn underneath, the little goatherd held\nclose in her arms, formed a group that startled me, with my mind engaged\nas it was. On reaching the village the men all let off their guns and\nwere met by the people who had remained at home. We made our halt at\nBethel. What a place of hard, gritty, arid desolation! Beth-el, \"the\nHouse of God.\" From this great height Lot looked down on the plain of\nSodom, then the acme of fertile beauty, where now lowers the Dead Sea!\nThere are now only the dry bones of Bethel left. The goats eat up every\ngreen sprout that appears above ground. I could not sketch such blinding\nnothingness at our halt there. Towards evening the land grew more\nbeautiful as we journeyed on, but so much struggling over boulders and\njagged rock ledges made me very glad indeed to perceive the daily signal\nthat we were nearing our camp. That signal is the dashing forward of\nIsaac at full gallop and the pushing forward of the \"flying column\" (the\nman on the chestnut horse with the bags), whose place is at other times\nin the rear. The staff in camp being warned by these cavaliers of our\napproach tea is got ready, and very welcome it is on our arrival. W. was\non ahead as we scrambled up a higher hill than ever, and when I saw him\nwave his helmet to cheer me on for a final spurt I knew rest was close\nat hand. Our camp looked very lovely just at sunset on a plateau\noverlooking the hills and valleys of green Samaria and the far-off\nmountain-tops of Galilee! The moon shone brightly and the air felt quite\nfrosty as we went to rest. I always take a little meditative walk before\ngoing to bed, a sweet ten minutes each evening. The hurried start in the\nmorning and the rough riding all day leave one little time for quiet\nthought, and at our mid-day halts, when circumstances permit, I sketch\nwith concentrated intensity against time.\n\n\n_Saturday, 18th April._\n\n\nTo-day was breezy and the country less stony. Waving corn as in\nPhilistia refreshes the eye. We are now in the goodly land of Ephraim,\nwhich deepens in richness as we advance. We passed through Shiloh, where\nthe Ark of the Covenant rested so long, and the little Samuel heard the\ncall of God. The place is marked by some old ruins--Roman or Crusader?\nand a forlorn dead tree lies athwart them. A glorious cultivated plain\nopened out before we reached our halting-place, Jacob's Well. How I had\nlonged to see this well, where Our Lord conversed with the Samaritan\nwoman. But I was disappointed at being unable to make the sketch of it I\nhoped for so much. The well is about five feet below the surface of a\nmass of ruins. An early Christian chapel once enclosed it, but this has\nfallen in and all but buried the well. But you can imagine one's\nfeelings as one rests one's hand on its edge and realises that Our\nSaviour sat there as He spoke to the woman who had come to draw water.\nYou remember that it was at this well that He told His disciples to look\nup at the fields \"already white unto harvest.\" There they are, those\nfields, filling the valley of Sychar. But you cannot see them from the\nwell now, in the pit enclosed by ruins, nor the town to which the\ndisciples went \"to buy meats,\" nor even the two great mountains of Ebal\nand Gerizim that rise so high quite close by.\n\nThis well is like the Cave of Machpelah,--accepted by all as authentic\nbeyond question.\n\nI cantered my horse all the way up to our camp, high up in an olive-wood\non the other side of the town, for I must say I was longing to get the\nride over and have a good rest. But Society duties awaited me! The\nministers of various denominations came to call on us, and when later on\nthe Catholic priest (an Italian) honoured us with a visit I was called\nupon to take over Isaac's duties as interpreter.\n\nWe went, W. and I, for a pleasant stroll towards sundown, and had a\nperfectly exquisite view of Nablous, the ancient Shechem, lying between\nthose two mountains whose names rang so sonorously to us all in\nchildhood--the terrible Ebal and the smiling Gerizim. A most perfect,\ntypical Eastern town, this, embowered in orange and pomegranate\ntrees--the home of the nightingale, whose music blends with that of the\nmultitudinous cascades echoing from the over-hanging cliffs. A Turkish\nsentry came and lit his fire close to our tents, and was suffered to\nmount his quite unnecessary guard over us all night, with an eye to\nbacksheesh at sunrise.\n\n\n_Sunday, 19th April._\n\n\nThe Day of Rest. No travel to-day. Exquisite Nablous, what a Paradise to\nrest in! But all was not perfection. We went to Church too early, by\nmistake, and had to wait an hour before Mass began, passing the time in\nFrench small-talk (indeed reduced to a minimum of smallness on my part,\nfor it dwindled away almost to nothing) with the courteous ecclesiastics\nand the nuns in the garden of the little presbytery. As I was fasting I\nwas not fortified against the subsequent performance on the harmonium\nduring Mass, by a Syrian. On nearing our tent, cheered by the prospect\nof breakfast, I had another set-back by Isaac's announcing the imminent\narrival of what sounded like \"the Rev. Vulture,\" the Lutheran minister.\nHad that individual really been on the swoop I must have fled, but\nhappily that morning call never took place. It is all very well to\nlaugh, but I felt \"in the Pit of Tophet.\" I have spent the rest of the\nday in sleep, and in writing to you, and in fascinating strolls through\nthe town with W., and in returning calls. I am nicely burnt by the sun\nand wind, for nothing could induce me to let a veil blur or dim one\nsingle glimpse of the Holy Land.\n\n\n_Monday, 20th April._\n\n\nGlorious breezy weather with flying cloud shadows. Again eight hours in\nthe saddle, but the Sunday rest has made me quite fresh again. We passed\nto-day through the hill country of Manasseh. After riding a mile or two\nout of Nablous our \"flying column\" came running up on foot to the\ndragoman in front to ask what was to be done with a poor little stowaway\nwho had begged him to let him ride the baggage horse to escape from his\nunhappy home. \"His mother was dead and his stepmother beat him.\" He\nlooked so piteous perched up on the bags, but, of course, we could not\nkidnap him, and after receiving some money he was put gently down on the\nroadside. As we rode on we got a last sight of him on the green bank\nswaying to and fro in his desolate grief, his gown making a little pink\ndot in the vast landscape. Our mid-day halt was at a fountain in a fig\ncountry, and there we talked to the women and girls who were filling\ntheir pitchers. One showed me by signs how the figs were a failure this\nyear, the young figs all falling off their stalks before ripening. Her\npatient acceptance of the inevitable reminded me of the Italian peasants\nand their \"_Pazienza, \u00e8 la volont\u00e0 di Dio!_\"\n\nThen we deflected to the left on our journey to visit Sebaste, where St.\nJohn is supposed to have been beheaded, and with great probability. The\nCrusaders built a magnificent Church to his memory there, the ruins of\nwhich are very grand. We rode to the site of the gates of the city,\nalong a path lined with classic pillars, and at the end of this avenue\nwe saw the sea, and where C\u00e6sarea, the harbour of Sebaste, once stood.\nOur camp that evening was at Ain Jenin, an ideal Eastern town. I was not\nprepared for anything so beautiful as it looked in the evening light,\nwhen we emerged in sight of it from a defile between hills. We were well\nin the Plain of Jezreel, and lo! Hermon at last! In the light of the\nafter-glow we beheld his hoary head from our tents, to the north. Tender\nmoonlight succeeded the after-glow. All the mosques and minarets were\nlighted up with delicate golden lamps at sunset (for it is Ramadan), as\nat Jerusalem and Nablous. This place is full of pomegranate trees, with\ntheir scarlet blossoms, and of flowering tamarisk.\n\n\n_Tuesday, 21st April._\n\n\nOff at sunrise, the larks singing over the face of the land. We had a\nglorious ride through the Plain of Jezreel or Esdraelon, often coming\nupon the brook Kishon and its little trickling tributaries in their\nmultitudinous windings, and fording the same. What a vast space is here,\nhow Biblical in its majesty, and how troubled too with recollections of\nbattle from remotest ages of Israelitish history down to Napoleon's\ntime. Deflecting to the right we climbed up to Naim for our halt,\nmemorable for the raising of the widow's son. There was an immense view\nfrom this little bunch of mud houses towards Tabor and Galilee, with a\nforeground of purple iris. Then descending again into the plain we rode\nto the foot of Mount Tabor, where, in an olive-wood, and on ploughed\nland, our camp was pitched. How refreshing it is never to be told we are\ntrespassing in this country.\n\n[Illustration: THE PLAIN OF ESDRAELON, FROM FOOT OF TABOR, WITH THE\nVILLAGE OF NAIM IN DISTANCE\n\nPlain full of green wheat. Mountain to left is \"Little Hermon,\" on which\nthe village of Naim stands. Towards sunset.]\n\nOn arriving I chose to remain and make a sunset sketch of distant Naim\non its hill, whilst W. rode up to the top of Tabor.\n\n\n_Wednesday, 22nd April._\n\n\nOff again at sunrise over the saddle of Mount Tabor. Very rough riding\nthrough dells of oak, where the honeysuckle hung in masses and scented\nthe air. Tabor itself is scarcely beautiful in outline, and like the\nmagnified mounds that the old masters intended for mountains. In their\npictures of the Transfiguration their Tabors are very like the original.\nThis was our most glorious day's journey, for it took us to the shores\nof the Lake of Galilee. Hermon in distant Lebanon was visible ahead of\nus throughout. We rode up to near the top of the \"Mount of Beatitudes,\"\nand then on foot reached the very top, and had our first view of the\nSacred Sea from that immense height. Here Christ preached the Sermon on\nthe Mount, and down there, intensely blue, lay that dear lake whose\nshores were so often trodden by His feet. Hermon rose above the majestic\nlandscape, and a warm, palpitating light vibrated over all. In a scrap\nof shade from a rock we made our halt, and I had an hour and a half for\na sketch. Then we rode down to Tiberias, descending into a furnace,\nthough when once on the shore the breeze was sweet off the water.\nTiberias is a dreadful little town, and we were glad to thread its\nalleys as quickly as possible. Our camp was on a pebbly strand about\nhalf a mile south of this, the only, town on these shores that once held\nsuch brilliant cities. I made an evening sketch, and before retiring for\nthe night we strolled a long time by those sacred waters in the light of\nthe full moon. The waves were strong, and sounded loud in that great\nstillness. At such times as this the sense of Our Lord's Presence is\nalmost more than one's mortal heart can hold.\n\nWe picked up hundreds of shells, which will make appropriate rosaries,\nmounted in silver, the cross made out of olive wood which I have brought\nfrom Gethsemane. I will send you one.\n\n\n_Thursday, 23rd April._\n\n\nWe went by boat three hours' row to near the mouth of the Jordan, at the\nnorth end of the lake, where the grassy slopes are supposed to\n\n[Illustration: OUR FIRST SIGHT OF LAKE GALILEE\n\nThe snowy mountain is Mount Hermon. Northern edge of the lake shown.\nTall fennel plants amongst rocks in foreground. Early afternoon.]\n\nbe the scene of the miracle of the Loaves and Fishes. It is very\ndifficult to describe to you my enchantment at seeing one after another\nthese places I have longed to see from early childhood, when our beloved\nfather used to read us the Bible every Sunday. The lake was pale and\ncalm, delicately tinted, and there was a heat-haze over everything in\nthe early part of the day. We disembarked under some thorny acacias\nwhich gave a deep shade, and I had the delight of making a sketch there\nof the coast, looking westward, whilst W. went on by boat to the Jordan.\nRosy oleanders fringe the water as far as the eye can reach; the \"Mount\nof Beatitudes\" and top of Tabor are in the distance, and the site of\nCapernaum in the middle distance. God has trodden these scenes with\nhuman feet; the feeling of sketching them is scarcely to be put before\nyou in words.\n\nThe boatmen were very angry at being kept, whilst I finished the sketch,\nfrom returning at the right time, for they told us that if the west wind\nsprang up we should never be able to get home that night. Surely enough\nwe were only able to get as far as Capernaum with hard pulling against\na strong west wind, which suddenly changed the whole face of the lake.\n\nIts pale blue was now dirty green and the choppy waves lashed with foam,\nand so wild did the waves become that the progress of the boat was\nalmost impossible. These sudden and violent gusts that come through the\ngullies between the mountains are dreaded by the fishermen of to-day as\nthey were in Peter's time. Fortunately W. had in the morning ordered\nthat our horses should be sent round to meet us here in case the wind\narose, and we gladly got on them at this point, having an enchanting\nride back and being able at many places to canter our horses. We heard\nafterwards that the boatmen did not get in till one in the morning. At\nCapernaum are seen some rich Roman ruins lying tumbled about as though\nby an earthquake. We rode through the supposed site of Bethsaida, and\npassed through a portion of the old Roman roadway for chariots, cut\nthrough the rock. No accumulation of earth has buried the original\nsurface as elsewhere, so that this lane, with its polished floor of\nrock, must have undoubtedly been trodden by Our Lord as He passed from\ncity to city. Here are the remains\n\n[Illustration: GALILEE, LOOKING TOWARDS HERMON\n\nMount Hermon snow-capped in distance. Town of Tiberias on shore in\nmiddle distance to left.]\n\nof a Roman aqueduct, in one place pouring a huge volume of clearest\nwater over a ledge where, no doubt, in the city's time, a fountain\nstood. Now the flood from the northern hills disperses itself in\nabundant streams that rush through dense herbage to the lake. We counted\nsix of these little rivers on our way to Magdala, the birthplace of the\nMagdalen. We looked down from our mountain lanes to the milk-white\nstrands of the little inlets that border the northern end of Gennesaret,\nand I wondered at which of them the various episodes of the Gospel took\nplace--Our Lord preaching from the ship pushed out a little way to be\nfree from the jostling crowd on shore--the embarkation for the\nmiraculous draught of fishes----. Besides oleanders the pomegranates\ngrow all along this shore in dense masses half embedded in teeming\nvegetation.\n\nMagdala is a tiny mud hamlet with a single palm. There are splendid\nfig-trees here. Herds of oxen and goats and flocks of sheep browse\nknee-deep in the rich grass.\n\nOur dragoman took us this time through the whole length of the town of\nTiberias. It happened to be a great Jewish festival, and the men had\nall freshly oiled and curled their side locks, which dangled from under\nimmense round fur caps, and the women wore artificial flowers in their\nhair and were clothed in velvets of splendid hue. It was strange to see\nthem thus attired, coming upon them so suddenly when entering the town\nfrom the wilderness. The lanes were stifling and unwholesome, the\nchildren pale and sickly, and all had that same blighted look I noticed\nat Jerusalem. None of them were tanned, but remained white under such a\nsun! It was a relief to come out at the other end and canter back along\nthe margin of the \"Sea\" to our camp, for that ride through Tiberias had\noppressed and saddened me.\n\n\n_Friday, 24th April._\n\n\nAn early start as the sun rose over those dark cliffs of the country of\nthe Gadarenes down which the possessed swine careered to the abyss.\nGood-bye, blessed Sea of Galilee! We had our last look from the immense\nheight near the \"Mount of Beatitudes,\" and thence we turned south-west\non our way to Nazareth over the hills of Zebulon.\n\nYoung shepherds were piping on little fifes on the hills. The country\nbecame uninteresting\n\n[Illustration: GALILEE, LOOKING FROM NEAR THE MOUTH OF THE JORDAN\nTOWARDS THE \"MOUNT OF BEATITUDES\" AND TABOR\n\nOLEANDERS in flower skirting shore in foreground. Top of Mount Tabor\nshowing over nearer mountains in distance.]\n\n(comparatively!) after we left the immediate surroundings of the lake\ntill we came to Cana of Galilee, where we halted, and where I made my\nonly \"failure\" sketch.\n\nIt was a dear, holy, lovable landscape, but hillocky and green and\nimpossible in that flat noontide light. At Cana is the fountain from\nwhich undoubtedly was drawn the water for the marriage feast, since\nthere is absolutely no other spring in the place. It was a long journey\nto Nazareth. That holy town is very lovely, and so much superior in its\nbuildings to the others--quite well-to-do and exquisitely situated on\nthe slope of a cypress-topped hill, in terraces, like a tiny Genoa. Here\nculminated my disappointment in the faces of the women of Palestine, for\nthe tattooing is simply outrageous, worse than anywhere else in the\nEast. How can they be beautiful with blue lips and the mouth surrounded\nwith blue trees, animals and birds? This spoilt my pleasure in coming\nupon the \"Fountain of the Virgin,\" where these maids and matrons were\nfilling their pitchers amid a great chattering, at the entrance to the\ntown. We walked, after arriving, to the Church of the Annunciation.\nThere, in the \"Holy House\" (the front of which is at Loretto), far\nbelow the present surface of the earth, on the very spot where the angel\nsaluted Mary, one can say the Angelus. This is the portion of the house\nwhich (as is the custom here) is excavated out of the rock; the fronts\nonly are of masonry. We visited the \"Mensa Christi,\" which interested us\nbut little, as it savours too much of the \"pious fraud,\" and then the\nsite of Joseph's workshop.\n\nWe were disappointed in the position of our camp, as other travellers\nhad forestalled us in getting better places, and the best of all was\nbespoken for the great French pilgrimage expected on the morrow.\n\nOn this account we settled not to tarry at Nazareth and to send the\nheavy column back to Jerusalem in the morning. We are only one day's\njourney from Ca\u00effa, our place of embarkation. As I was looking at the\ntown from our tent door at the time of the Angelus, the bells of the\nChurch over Mary's house suddenly rang out a carillon, and the tune was\nthat very one we used to hear when A. and I were five and six years old\non our dear Genoese Riviera! I had not heard that tune since those days.\nLater on I watched the full\n\n[Illustration: NAZARETH AT SUNRISE\n\nTHE church with spire to the left stands over the site of Joseph's\nworkshop, and near Mary's house.]\n\nmoon rising over those mountain outlines which Our Lord looked on every\nday of His hidden life at Nazareth, and then turned and saw the town\nwhite in the moonbeams on its dark hillside.\n\n\n_Saturday, 25th April._\n\n\nWe started later than usual, as W. had to close accounts with the \"heavy\ncolumn\" and send a telegram to Alexandria to warn them of our impending\nreturn. There was a heavy dew. I made a sunrise sketch of the town. A\nglorious ride we had to Carmel, steeped in the poetry of the Old\nTestament. Carmel is one mass of oak-trees. There we met the vast host\nof the French pilgrims coming from Ca\u00effa and beginning their experiences\nof Palestine. We met amicably at the shady halting-place and exchanged a\nfew words of _camaraderie_, and we watched them depart towards Nazareth,\neach company headed by a banner. On our way to Ca\u00effa we crossed the\nKishon again, now near its mouth, flowing through a lovely plain,\nbordered, near the sandhills that skirt the sea, with date-palms. Over\nthe hills to our right towered Lebanon against the blue. As we came in\nsight of the bay the town of St. Jean d'Acre looked beautiful on the\nopposite side, and Ca\u00effa appeared a bright little town at the foot of\nCarmel. There we put up at the German inn, and I parted with my dear\nlittle horse \"Shiloh,\" and W. with his nimble \"Kishon,\" our good little\nsteeds that brought us so well through the Holy Land.\n\n\n_Sunday, 26th April._\n\n\nA great rest and much letter-writing. The congregation at Mass was\nlarge, for there is a considerable Christian colony here. We shall make\nthis our headquarters till Friday, when we must leave for Egypt.\n\n\nCA\u00cfFA, _Monday, 27th April 189-_.\n\n\nMy....--We had a very enjoyable expedition to Acre, driving the whole\nway there and back _in the sea_. Where the waves break the sand is hard,\nwhereas higher up the beach no wheeled vehicle could get through in the\nsoft sand. We were often covered with spray, and the lean horses\nsplashed along knee-deep in the surf. At the ferry across the Kishon,\nwhere it flows into the sea, our horses were unharnessed and swam\nalongside our punt, together with a string of camels that looked very\ncomical swimming. The shivering horses were reharnessed on the farther\nshore, and away we went tearing through the waves. The poor beasts\nseemed to enjoy their oats at the end, if enjoyment is possible to such\nwretched, ill-treated creatures. I made a sketch as well as I could with\nthe sun in my eyes from our shandrydan, about a quarter of a mile\noutside the one gate of Acre, on the white sandy strand, whilst W. went\nexploring all over the town. The military authorities molested us not at\nall, and the commandant only asked W. for backsheesh, although I was\nconspicuously sketching the fortifications and W. was scanning\neverything in a place so saturated with Napoleonic reminiscences. The\nsame amphibious drive in the gloaming back to Ca\u00effa.\n\n\n_Tuesday, 28th April 189-._\n\n\nTo-day we drove to remote Athlit, a long way down the coast to the\nsouth, and spent quiet hours amid the Gothic Crusader ruins on the\nwave-lashed rocks beyond Carmel. Acre and Athlit steep one's mind in\nCrusader sentiment, which feels almost modern after so long a sojourn in\nthe regions of the Bible. The majestic fragments of Northern Gothic we\nsaw to-day seem strange to the eye in this Oriental land, but to the\nintellect they are full of touching meaning, for this was the point of\ndeparture for most of the Crusaders. Baffled, haggard, heart-broken,\nthey took ship again from here.\n\nWednesday we spent in visiting the Carmelite Monastery, a perfect place\nto stay at instead of the rather dubious German inn. It is a\nfortress-like building commanding a sweeping view of the sea, south and\nwest and north, and of the grand landscape eastward and south again. The\nwhitewashed rooms are filled with the reflection from the light off the\nwater and the land. The Abbot and monks, in the well-known white cloak\nand brown habit, are, as everywhere, kindly and hospitable, and glad to\nsee you. What a place for study and for painting; what a place for a\nRetreat, where everything reminds you of Religion and not one single\nmundane, worrying, or ugly object comes within your ken! By \"ugly\" I\nalways mean some modern eyesore; it is not a word applicable to the poor\nand the diseased who humbly mount the steep path for the daily alms and\nfood the monastery has ready for them.\n\n[Illustration: ST. JEAN D'ACRE\n\nTHE roadstead is seen to the left. A sandy shore. City surrounded by\nwalls and fortifications.]\n\nSomewhere amongst this series of oak-clad hills that forms Mount\nCarmel, Elijah built his altar to the True God, whereon the\nburnt-offering was consumed by fire from heaven in sight of the prophets\nof Baal. \"Then the fire of the Lord fell, and consumed the holocaust,\nand the wood, and the stones, and the dust, and licked up the water that\nwas in the trench,\" III Kings xviii. 38. This was the scene of that\nmighty episode which is one of the most salient and impressive in one's\nmemory of the Old Testament, and look! down below rushes that same\nKishon on whose banks Elijah, after the great drama on the mountain,\nslew the prophets of Baal in sight of all the children of Israel. A\nthrill runs through one when recalling such scenes as one stands on the\nvery spot where they took place.\n\nAfter seeing specimens of the ancient tombs in this country one can\nfully understand the words of St. Luke and St. John alluding to the new\nsepulchre of Joseph of Arimathea \"wherein no man had yet been laid.\"\nThese tombs contain triple receptacles for the dead, as I showed you in\nthe sketch plan at Jerusalem, and some I believe have more than three.\nHad the sepulchre at the foot of Calvary contained but one, the words of\nthe Evangelists would be puzzling. This is an instance of the\nillumination that dispels certain obscurities in one's mind as one\njourneys across the theatre of Bible history.\n\nIt seems a strange paradox, but it is a very weighty fact, that the\npossession of the Holy Land by the conservative Turk preserves all such\ntokens of the past for the elucidation of the Christian's Bible. Were\nthis land in possession of a \"Christian\" Power, I fear that the service\nof Mammon would soon necessitate the obliteration of these tokens so\nprecious to our Faith. Railways, factories, mines and new towns \"run\" by\ngreedy syndicates, would very soon make an end of them all. There was a\nChristian proposal a little while ago, I believe, to flood the whole of\nPalestine for commercial purposes. My ideal would be (oh, vain dream!)\nthat some great confederation of earnest people whose God is not the\nDollar, belonging to the various European Powers and America, should\npurchase the little Holy Land as a possession \"for ever\" for\nChristendom--_real_ Christendom.\n\nTo-day, Thursday, we saw the \"School of the Prophets,\" a curious and\nawesome cavern in the side of the mountain. These have been quiet days,\nwherein I have been able to write much and assimilate the events of our\nglorious journey.\n\nLooking back along these days of travel, many flitting thoughts that\ncame and went as we journeyed on, return to one's mind in the stillness\nof repose. One of the facts that have struck us most in this ancient\nland which is yet so fresh--so fresh in its surprises and in its\nstirrings of the heart--is the fact that no book of human authorship\ndealing with the subject is readable on the spot. You may take with you\nDean Stanley, Dr. Thomson (_The Land and the Book_), Miss Martineau, or\nany of the delightful works on Palestine that have fascinated you in\ntimes gone by: you will open them once but not again. _The Bible is the\nonly book you can read here!_ All the others are inadequate: no man can\nmeasure himself with the Infinite. (Such books as P\u00e8re Didon's sublime\n_J\u00e9sus Christ_ or Father Gallwey's _Watches of the Passion_ I do not\nconsider as being of human authorship, because they are illustrative\naccompaniments of the Scriptures.)\n\nThe feeling I have when on the point of leaving the Holy Land is one\ndifficult to describe worthily. We seem to have been allowed a glimpse\ninto the other world through this sacred portal. To have stood on the\nsummit of Olivet whence Our Redeemer ascended into heaven in the form He\nreigns in now at the right hand of the Father, is as though one had\ntouched heaven itself. And then the force with which one realises\ncertain episodes of His revealed life on earth makes one see the\nIncarnation so vividly that the human mind bends beneath the might of\nthe revelation.\n\nWhen I saw our boatmen the other day on Galilee pulling with all their\nmight, but in vain, against the sudden west wind, so peculiar to that\nparticular lake, I saw before me the fishermen of Peter's type, dressed\nin the same loose garments, going through the same dangerous work that\nhe and his fellows had to face habitually. How easy it was, with that\nliving illustration before me, to see the struggling boat's crew on the\nnight that Jesus, remaining to pray alone on the mountain on the eastern\nshore, sent them forward to Capernaum without Him, and how easy to see\nthem trying to make their way as described in Matthew xiv. 24. \"But the\nboat in the midst of the sea was tossed with the waves: for the wind was\ncontrary.\" And then the divine Figure following them, moving over those\ntossing waves, can be imagined, approaching, full of calm reassurance,\nto still their fears at His apparition--\"It is I, be not afraid.\" The\ndirection in which the boat was steered, the mountain whence the divine\nFigure came forward and overtook the boat--all now appears to the mind's\neye in powerful vividness, in the setting of land and water that one has\nseen.\n\nAgain, the poor demoniacs that lived in the tombs that are cut out of\nthe sides of those same mountains \"over against Galilee\" (there are\noutcast maniacs like them to-day in the deserts, if not \"possessed\" as\nthese men were),--I fancy I can see the look of the wild animal in their\nfaces as they met our Lord, and hear the quick, wild cry of one of them:\n\"What have I to do with thee, Jesus, Son of the most high God?\"--and the\nhoarse answer to Christ's question, \"My name is Legion!\" I have before\nme the recollection of a strange creature I saw running out of a\nsepulchral chamber in a ruined temple on the Upper Nile, like the\nincarnation of Satan in some of the Old Masters' pictures: the head\nbald, and of the same cinder-coloured hue as the evil face, with its\nlarge pointed ears, and the muscular body. I do not mean that the\npossessed man of the Gospel might have been like this dweller in tombs,\nbut one sees strange beings in the deserts whose shelters are the\nresting-places of the dead.\n\nI continue to be haunted by the feeling that the sight of the Holy\nPlaces is too easily and too unceremoniously obtained nowadays. I hope\nwe do not feel less devoutly with regard to them than in the \"Ages of\nFaith,\" and that it is only our modern way to take these things as we\ndo. Do you remember how history tells us that Richard Coeur de Lion,\nafter his defeat by the Saracens some distance short of Jerusalem,\nfalling back towards the coast, baffled in his heroic efforts to redeem\nthe Holy Sepulchre from the Infidel, refused to look on the city which\ncame in sight in the rear of his line of march as he and his knights\ncrested a high hill near Emmaus? He would not look; he had failed; his\neyes were too unworthy to rest upon the City of the Lord. And to-day,\nwith the Infidel still in possession, the Christian tourist, nothing\ndoubting, takes a good look through his binocular on sighting the same\nJerusalem. I remember hearing that as some friends of ours, forming part\nof a mixed company,\n\n[Illustration: RUINS OF THE CRUSADERS' BANQUETING HALL, ATHLEET\n\nThe springs of the Gothic arches can be traced on the high brick wall.\nThe hills to the right form the lower western slopes of Mount Carmel,\ncovered with oak woods.]\n\ncame in sight of the city, one of their number dropped on his knees in\nas unobtrusive a manner as was possible under the circumstances. \"I did\nnot know your brother was a _fanatic_,\" whispered an American to his\nsister.\n\nAs regards certain details of life in this country that so much\nembarrass and disappoint some travellers, do not imagine that I\naffectedly ignore their existence; but I do feel grateful that in my\nview of the whole scene they have everywhere kept their proper place. I\nknow how disappointed some people are on their account, and I should be\nsorry if I was thought intolerant in my self-satisfaction at being so\nfortunate.\n\nOne lady, in a little book I once read, describing her journey, takes\nfor her text: \"He is not here, but is risen.\" In bitter chagrin she\nacknowledges the fact that nowhere in Jerusalem could she see Our Lord\nthrough her surroundings. I asked a friend once if she would like to see\nthe Holy Land: \"Certainly not!\" she exclaimed; \"I have read Mark Twain's\nbook.\" I inquired of an English traveller at Jaffa the other day, who\nwas on his way home, how the Holy Places had impressed him. His answers\nwere dispirited: the dirt, the flies, etc., etc., had annoyed him. His\nears were still ringing with the ubiquitous \"Baksheesh!\"; the lepers had\nspoilt some of the best views--and so on. How much better it would have\nbeen for him not to come here, like the Mark Twain lady, and to have\npreserved his Oxford impressions of the Bible uncontaminated!\n\nIn Our Lord's time, although the cities were splendid, the poor and the\ndiseased were just as much _en \u00e9vidence_ as now, and where He was His\npoor clustered thickest. Yet who thinks of the merely squalid details of\nthose crowds when reading the Gospel narrative? Why, then, dwell on them\nso much here to-day as we follow His footsteps on the very soil He trod?\nI must say any danger of distractions I may have felt has not come from\nwhat I have seen of the _native_ element here. Not long ago a party of\nChristian (?) European trippers (I will not define their nationality)\nreaching the Jews' Wailing Place at Jerusalem, charged with their\ndonkeys all along the line of those preoccupied figures standing praying\nwith their faces buried in their Testaments or pressed against the\nstones of the great wall, and knocked them over.\n\nBut \"Many men many minds,\" and as no country stirs the sincere heart as\nthis one does, one must accept each thoughtful traveller's account of\nhis experiences as being genuinely felt.\n\nI would warn intending tourists who are earnest and sensitive about this\nsacred land against forming large parties for the journey. Amongst the\ngroup of fellow-travellers there is sure to be at least one discordant\nunit. Facetious remarks, ignorant questions, thoughtless exclamations,\nare harder to bear here than elsewhere. Of course, if the party forms a\nreligious pilgrimage these warnings do not apply; but even a pilgrimage\nin company has drawbacks, if the time is limited, and many inevitable\ndistractions. Select as few companions as is practicable--one only, if\npossible, entirely one with you in faith and feeling. Also, any one in\ndelicate health should not attempt the entire journey. I have seen more\nthan one sad procession of returning tourists escorting a litter\ncontaining some poor collapsed lady, depending on the fore-and-aft mules\nthat carried her for a smooth transit back to Jerusalem and the carriage\nroad. Woe betide her if either of the beasts came down or even\nstumbled!\n\nWhen I wrote to you from Jerusalem I told you how convincing one feels\nthe traditional sites of Calvary and the Holy Sepulchre to be in spite\nof modern scepticism. But more modern still is the verification of their\nauthenticity. It has lately been proved, by that \"research\" which we\nseem to require nowadays, that they stand _outside_ the line of the city\nwalls of our Lord's time. The great stumbling-block to those who could\nnot accept the word of Tradition consisted in the idea that those sites\nhad always been within the city as now, for it is known that the Jewish\nlaw forbade places of execution and of burial within the walls. To show\nyou how the shape of Jerusalem, marked out by its fortifications, has\nchanged during its long history, I may mention that, whereas the house\nof the Last Supper stood within the lines in Our Lord's time, it stands\nfar outside the walls of to-day.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nAnd now the last sunset we shall see from the Land of Promise is\nsteeping Lebanon in rose and violet, and the slender shadows of the\npalms are lengthening across the sandy spaces of the plain. The sea has\nnot a sail upon it, and the sky not even a cloud \"the size of a man's\nhand,\" such as Elijah's servant saw from the top of this Carmel which\novershadows us.\n\nUndisturbed by wind or cloud, the mind can dwell upon thoughts which the\napproaching hour of leave-taking renders more poignant.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe afterglow is now kindling its fires, and transfiguring a scene one\nhad thought could not be rendered more beautiful. Of all the splendours\nof Nature the afterglow is the most surprising. I think in the East it\ncomes more swiftly after sunset than in Italy, and it is more\nastonishing in its display of light. I have often, in Egypt, tried to\npaint it, but it is no easy matter, for, although the light seems so\npowerful it is really too low to allow one to see one's work. The sky\nbecomes a low-toned grey-green-blue ... what shall I call it?--a tone of\nthe greatest subtlety, against which the illuminated objects on the\nearth shine with the colours of flame rather than of the sun. There\nfollows this last effort of the dying day what I may call the last\nsigh,--a few moments of delicate greys of infinite tenderness, and then\nnight,--absolute night. They are ringing the Angelus up at the\nCarmelite Monastery on the wooded heights. Those monks live a lonely\nlife on the mountain whence their Order takes its name. The author of\n_The Land and the Book_ speaks of this lonely monastery with its monks\n\"chanting Latin to nobody.\" Only to the great God Who chose this little\ncountry wherein to testify His love for man; Who has trodden with weary\nfeet those hills we have traversed in the journey that ends to-day!\n\n\n_Friday, 1st May._\n\nAt 1.30 this morning we left these blessed shores, deeply grateful for\nthe privilege of treading the soil of Palestine which had been accorded\nus. We put off in boats for the Austrian Lloyd steamer lying in the\noffing by the light of a waning moon. By 8 A.M. we anchored off Jaffa,\nwhere we lay all day, and at sunset stood out to sea, soon losing sight\nof the Holy Land in the shades of night.\n\n _The letterpress has been printed by Messrs. R. & R. Clark,\n                    Limited, Edinburgh._","title":"Letters from the Holy Land","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":18271}