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Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..fadd9b1 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #55958 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/55958) diff --git a/old/55958-0.txt b/old/55958-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 90b0dbe..0000000 --- a/old/55958-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,7218 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Holy Land, by John Kelman - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with -almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or -re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included -with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org/license - - -Title: The Holy Land - -Author: John Kelman - -Illustrator: John Fulleylove - -Release Date: November 13, 2017 [EBook #55958] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE HOLY LAND *** - - - - -Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images available at The Internet Archive) - - - - - - - - [Illustration: JERUSALEM. - -From the traditional spot on the Mount of Olives where Christ wept over - the city.] - - - - - [Illustration: - - THE - HOLY LAND - - PAINTED BY - JOHN FULLEYLOVE, R.I. - - DESCRIBED BY - JOHN KELMAN, D.D. - - A&C BLACK L^{TD} - 4.5.6 SOHO SQUARE, LONDON, W.1.] - - - - - _Printed in Great Britain by_ R. & R. CLARK, LIMITED, _Edinburgh_. - - _First Edition, with 93 illustrations, published in October 1902 - Reprinted in 1904 and 1912 - Second Edition, revised, with 32 illustrations, published in 1923_ - - - AGENTS - - AMERICA THE MACMILLAN COMPANY - 64 & 66 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK - - AUSTRALASIA THE OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS - 205 FLINDERS LANE, MELBOURNE - - CANADA THE MACMILLAN COMPANY OF CANADA, LTD. - ST. MARTIN’S HOUSE, 70 BOND ST., TORONTO - - INDIA MACMILLAN & COMPANY, LTD. - MACMILLAN BUILDING, BOMBAY - 309 BOW BAZAAR STREET, CALCUTTA - INDIAN BANK BUILDINGS, MADRAS - - - - -Preface - - -The secrets of satisfactory travel are mainly two--to have certain -questions ready to ask; and to detach oneself from preconceptions, so as -to find not what one expects, or desires to find, but what is there. -These rules I endeavoured to follow while in the Holy Land. As to this -book, I have tried to write it “with my eye on the object”--to describe -things as they were seen, and to see them again while describing them. -The extent to which this ideal has been reached, or missed, will be the -measure of the book’s success or failure. - -No attempt has been made to add anything original to the scientific -knowledge of Palestine. For that task I am not qualified either by -sufficient travel or by expert study of the subject. On the other hand, -this is not merely an itinerary, or journal of experiences and -adventures of the road. I have freely introduced notes from my journal -in illustration of characteristics of the country and its life, and have -claimed the privilege of digressing in various directions. But the main -object has been to give a record of impressions rather than of -incidents. - -These impressions are arranged in three parts, as they bear upon the -geography, the history, and the spirit of Syria. They have been -corrected and amplified by as wide reading as the short time at my -disposal allowed. A few of the books read or consulted are referred to -in footnotes, but many others have helped me. To append a list of them -to so small a contribution to the subject as this, would be but to -remind the reader of the old fable, _Nascetur ridiculus mus_. I must, -however, acknowledge with much gratitude my obligation to two volumes -above all others--Major (now Colonel) Conder’s _Tent Work in Palestine_, -and Professor George Adam Smith’s _Historical Geography of the Holy -Land_. To these every chapter is indebted more or less, some chapters -very deeply. Among the pleasures which this task has brought with it, -none is greater than the intimate acquaintance with these two works -which it entailed. - -With Professor Smith I have a more personal bond of obligation than the -invaluable help I have had from his book. Last year we rode and camped -together from Hebron to Damascus, back over the eastern spurs of Hermon -to the coast, and north by Tyre and Sidon to Beyrout. All who were in -that party know, as no words can express, how much insight and -suggestion we owed to the leader who interpreted the land for us so -brilliantly and with such kindness. For my own part I feel that at times -it has been difficult to distinguish between impressions of my own and -those which have been unconsciously borrowed from him. If I have -borrowed freely, I am sure he will allow me to count that among the many -privileges of our long acquaintance, and as a token of my admiration for -his genius and gratitude for his friendship. - -JOHN KELMAN. - -EDINBURGH, 1902. - - - - -PUBLISHERS’ NOTE - -For the purposes of this reissue the author has revised the work and -slightly abridged it, but no attempt has been made to describe the -changed conditions consequent on the War. - -_September 1923._ - - - - -Contents - - -PART I.--THE LAND, pp. 1 to 84 - -CHAPTER PAGE - -1. THE COLOUR OF THE LAND 7 - -2. THE DESERT 20 - -3. THE LIFE OF THE LAND 37 - -4. THE WATERS OF ISRAEL 51 - -5. BROWN VILLAGES, WHITE TOWNS, AND A GREY CITY 65 - - -PART II.--THE INVADERS, pp. 85 to 172 - -1. ISRAELITE 88 - -2. GRÆCO-ROMAN 98 - -3. CHRISTIAN 115 - -4. MOSLEM 137 - -5. CRUSADER 157 - - -PART III.--THE SPIRIT OF SYRIA, pp. 173 to 245 - -1. THE LIGHTER SIDE OF THINGS 177 - -2. THE SHADOW OF DEATH 190 - -3. THE SPECTRAL 205 - -4. THE LAND OF THE CROSS 226 - -5. RESURRECTION 239 - - - - -List of Illustrations - - -1. Jerusalem, from the traditional spot on the Mount of -Olives where Christ wept over the City _Frontispiece_ - - FACING PAGE - -2. The Mount of Temptation, from Jericho 9 - -3. Cana of Galilee 16 - -4. On the Road from Jerusalem to Bethany 25 - -5. The Hills round Nazareth, from the Plain of Esdraelon 32 - -6. Mount Hermon, from the Slopes of Tabor 41 - -7. Jerusalem--The Pool of Hezekiah 48 - -8. The Golden Gate, from the Garden of Gethsemane 57 - -9. The Lake of Galilee, looking North from Tiberias 64 - -10. The Fountain of the Virgin at Nazareth 73 - -11. Joppa, from the Sea 80 - -12. The Lake of Galilee, looking South from Tiberias 89 - -13. Site of the ancient City of Samaria 96 - -14. The Forecourt of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre 105 - -15. The Rotunda and Chapel of the Holy Sepulchre 112 - -16. The Dome of the Rock (Mosque of Omar), as seen -from the Porch on the North Side of the Mosque -of El Aksa 121 - -17. The Dome of the Rock (Mosque of Omar), from the -Barracks near the Site of the Tower of Antonia 128 - -18. Interior of the Mosque of El Aksa, from the S.E. 137 - -19. The Temple Area and the Mount of Olives, from Mount -Zion 144 - -20. The West Side of the Temple Area, from the Barracks -near the Site of the Tower of Antonia 153 - -21. Entrance to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre 160 - -22. Interior of the Dome of the Chain, looking North 169 - -23. Interior of the Dome of the Rock (Mosque of Omar), -from the S.E. 176 - -24. The Mount of Olives, from a House-top on Mount Zion 185 - -25. The Church of the Nativity at Bethlehem, from a Garden -on the opposite Hill 192 - -26. Jerusalem--Exterior of the Golden, or Beautiful, Gate 201 - -27. The Tomb of Rachel, on the Road from Jerusalem to -Hebron 208 - -28. The Judean Desert and the Dead Sea, from the highest -point of the Mount of Olives 217 - -29. Valley of Hinnom, with Hill of Offence 224 - -30. The Rock-cut Tombs of the Valley of Jehoshaphat 233 - -31. The N.E. End of Jerusalem and Mizpah, from the -Mount of Olives 240 - -32. The Plain of Jericho, looking towards the Mountains of -Moab 244 - -_Sketch-map on page viii_ - -[Illustration: SKETCH-MAP OF PALESTINE.] - - - - -PART I - -THE LAND - - -A journey through the Holy Land may reasonably be expected to be in some -sort a sacramental event in a man’s life. Spiritual things are always -near us, and we feel that we have a heritage in them; yet they -constantly elude us, and need help from the senses to make them real and -commanding. Such sacramental help must surely be given by anything that -brings vividly to our realisation those scenes and that life in the -midst of which the Word was made flesh. The more clearly we can gain the -impression of places and events in Syria, the more reasonable and -convincing will Christian faith become. - -Everything which revives the long past has power to quicken the -imagination, and site-hunters and relic-hunters in any field have much -to say for themselves. Now, apart altogether from the Christian story, -Syria has the spell of a very ancient land. The mounds that break the -level on the plain of Esdraelon represent six hundred years of buried -history for every thirty feet of their height. Among the first objects -pointed out to us in Palestine was a perforated stone which serves now -as ventilator for a Christian meeting-house in Lebanon, but which was -formerly a section of Zenobia’s aqueduct. In Syria the realisation of -the past is continual, and the centuries mingle in a solemn confusion. -Its modern life seems of little account, and is in no way the rival of -the ancient. In London, or even in Rome, the new world jostles the old; -in Palestine the old is so supreme as to seem hardly conscious of the -new. - -All this reaches its keenest point in connection with men’s worship; and -what a long succession of worshippers have left their traces here! The -primitive rock-hewn altar, the Jewish synagogue, the Greek temple, the -Christian church, the Mohammedan mosque--all have stood in their turn on -the same site. His must be a dull soul surely who can feel no sympathy -with the Moslem, or even with the heathen worship. These religions too -had human hearts beating in them, and wistful souls trying by their help -to search eternity. To the wise these dead faiths are full of meaning. -Through all their clashing voices there sounds the cry of man to his -God--a cry more often heard and answered than we in our self-complacency -are sometimes apt to think. - -The sacramental quality of the Holy Land is of course felt most by those -who seek especially for memories and realisations of Jesus Christ. -Within the pale of Christianity there are several different ways of -regarding the land as holy, and most of them lead to disappointment. The -Greek and Roman Catholic Churches vie with one another in their passion -for sites and relics there, and seem to lose all sense of the -distinction between the sublime and the grotesque in their eagerness -for identifications. A Protestant counterpart to this mistaken zeal is -that of the huntsmen of the fields of prophecy, who cannot see a bat -fluttering about a ruin or a mole turning up the earth without turning -ecstatically to Hebrew prophetic books,--as if these were not the habits -of bats and moles all the world over. Apart from either of these, there -are others less orthodox but equally superstitious who have some vague -notion of occult and magic qualities which differentiate this from all -other regions of the earth. Benjamin Disraeli and Pierre Loti are -representatives of this point of view. The former is persuaded that the -land “must be endowed with marvellous and peculiar qualities”; and the -hero of his _Tancred_ seeks and finds there supernatural communications -from the unseen world. The latter tells in his _Jérusalem_ how he went -to Palestine with the hope that some experience might be given him which -would revive his lost faith in Christianity. He returned, a disappointed -sentimentalist. The saddening and yet fascinating narrative reaches its -climax in Gethsemane, where, beating his brow in the darkness against an -olive tree, he waited (as he himself confesses) for he knows not what. -His words are: “Non, rien: personne ne me voit, personne ne m’écoute, -personne ne me répond.” - -The belief in miracle is always difficult: nowhere is it so difficult as -on the traditional site. The earth is just earth there as elsewhere; and -the sky seems almost farther above it. The rock is solid rock; the -water, air, trees, hills are uncompromising terrestrial realities. It -is wiser to abandon the attempt at forcing the supernatural to reveal -itself, and to turn to the human side of things as the surest way of -ultimately arriving at the divine. When that has been deliberately done -the reward is indeed magnificent. An unexpected and overwhelming sense -of reality comes upon the sacred narrative. These places and the life -that inhabited them are actualities, and not merely items in an ancient -book or the poetic background of a religious experience. More -particularly when you look upward to the hills, you find that your help -still cometh from them. Their great sky-lines are unchanged, and the -long vistas and clear-cut edges which you see are the same which filled -the eyes of prophets and apostles, and of Jesus Christ Himself. - -It is this, especially as it regards the Saviour of mankind, that is the -most precious gain of Syrian travel. Now and again it comes on one with -overpowering force. Sailing up the coast, this impression haunted the -long hours. As we gazed on the mountains, and the image of them sank -deeper and deeper, the thought grew clear in all its wonder that -somewhere among these heights He had wandered with His disciples, and -sat down by the sides of wells to rest. In camp at Jericho we were -confronted by an uncouth, blunt-topped mountain mass, thrusting itself -aggressively up on the Judean side, in itself a very rugged and -memorable mountain-edge. Not till the light was fading, and the bold -outline struck blacker and blacker against the sky, did the fact -suddenly surprise us that this was Quarantana, the Mountain of -Temptation. Then we understood that wilderness story in all its -unprotected loneliness, and we almost saw the form of the Son of Man. - -Thus, as day after day he rides through the country, the traveller finds -new meaning in the words, “I have glorified Thee _on the earth_.” An -inexpressible sense possesses him of the reality of Jesus Christ. These -pathways were, indeed, once trodden by His feet; through these valleys -He carried the lamp of life; under these stars He prayed; through this -sunshine He lay in a rock-hewn grave. To a man’s dying day he will be -nearer Christ for this. The chief sorrow of the Christian life for most -of us is the difficulty of realisation. At times we have all had to flog -up our imagination to the “realising sense” of Christ. After this -journey that necessity is gone. It is almost as if in long past years we -had seen Him there, and heard Him speak. The divine mystery of Christ is -all the more commanding when the human fact of Jesus has become almost a -memory rather than a belief. - - - - -CHAPTER I - -THE COLOUR OF THE LAND - - -Every land has a scheme of colour of its own, and while form and outline -are the first, they are not the most permanent nor the deepest -impressions which a region makes upon its travellers. It is the colour -of the land which slowly and almost unconsciously sinks in upon the -beholder day by day. We observe the outlines of a scene; we remember its -colouring. - -This is especially true of Palestine. Nothing about it is more -distinctive than its colour-scheme; and nothing is perhaps less familiar -to those who have not actually seen it. Syria may be treated as if it -were Italy, or even Egypt--in hard intense colouring; or it may be -treated as if it were England, in strong tones but with a certain homely -softening of edge. Neither of these modes is true to Syria. Its -edge-lines are sharp, but they are traced in such faint shades as to -produce an effect very difficult either to reproduce or to describe, and -yet impossible to forget. - -The colours are manifold, and they vary considerably with the seasons of -the year. Yet the bare hill-sides (which form the greater masses of -colour in most landscapes), the desert, and the distant mountain ranges, -are ever the same. Most travellers make their first acquaintance with -Palestine in Judea, entering it from Jaffa. When the plains are behind -you, and you are in among the valleys up which the road climbs to -Jerusalem, you at once recognise the fact that a new and surprising -world of colour has been entered. In the valley-bottom there may be but -a dry watercourse, or perhaps a rusty strip of cultivated land; but -above you there is sure to be the outcrop of white and grey limestone. -In some places it appears in characterless and irregular blotches whose -grotesque intrusion seems to confuse and caricature the mountain side. -This is, however, only occasional, and the usual and characteristic -appearance is that of long and flowing lines of striation which -generally follow pretty closely the curve of the sky-line. The colours -of these strata are many. You have rich brown bands, dark red, purple, -yellow, and black ones; but these are toned down by the dominant grey of -the broader bands, and the general effect is an indistinct grey with a -bluish tinge, to which the coloured bands give a curiously artificial -and decorative appearance. As a work of Art Judea is most interesting; -as part of Nature it is almost incredible. - -In the northern district, near Bethel, everything yields to stone, and -the brighter colours disappear. The mountain slopes shew great naked -ribs and bars--the gigantic stairs of Jacob’s dream. On the heights your -horse slips and picks his way over long stretches of - -[Illustration: THE MOUNT OF TEMPTATION, FROM JERICHO. - -The Mount of Temptation is one of the spurs of the mountains which -overlook the deep valley of the Jordan on its western side. The central -peak is the traditional site of the Temptation of Christ.] - -smooth white rock; in the valleys the soil is buried under innumerable -boulders and fragments of broken rock. - -The whole land is stony, but Judea shews this at its worst. It is an -immense stone wedge thrust into Palestine from east to west. South of it -lie the fertile valleys of Hebron, with their wealth of orchard and -plantation. North of it open the “fat valleys” of Samaria, winding among -rounded hills planted to the top with olives, or terraced for vines. -Over these, here and there, a red cliff may hang, or the irrigation -ditches may furrow and interline a vale of dove-coloured clay. But while -the green of Judea is for the most part but the thinnest veil of sombre -olive-green, a mere setting for the rocks, Samaria is a really green -land, variegated by stone. - -In the north of Samaria the land sinks gradually upon the Plain of -Esdraelon. As we saw it first it was covered by a yellow mist through -which nothing could be seen distinctly. But afterwards, viewed in its -whole expanse from the top of Tabor in clear sunlight, the great -battlefield of the Eastern world appeared in characteristic garb--“red -in its apparel,” with the very colour of the blood which has so often -drenched it. - -Galilee repeats the limestone outcrop of Judea, but in far gentler -fashion, the undergrowth and trees softening almost every landscape, and -the mountains leading the eye along bold sky-lines to rest on that form -of beauty and of light which masters and watches over the whole -land--the white Hermon. Hermon is always white. But sometimes when -clouds are forming rapidly around its summit, it is a wonder of -brightness. On no other mountain, surely, was it that “a bright cloud -overshadowed” Jesus and his three friends. Even now, on many a summer -day, Hermon is lost in a changing glory of frosted silver, when the sun -strikes upon its cloudwork, and the long trails of snow in the corries -stream towards the plain below. - -The limestone runs on into Phœnicia, and seems to grow whiter there. -Nothing could be finer than the valleys east of Tyre at harvest time, -when the fields of ripe grain wave below cliffs white as marble, and the -whole scene, with its foreground of brilliantly robed reapers, is a -study in white and gold. But in the higher valleys of Phœnicia the rock -breaks through a rich red soil, which in parts is gemmed with the -curious and beautiful “Adonis stones”--little egg-shaped bits of -sandstone, dyed to the heart of them with deep crimson, as if they had -been steeped in newly shed blood. Little wonder if the women of old days -“wept for Tammuz” at the sight of them. - -The thing most characteristic of Syrian colour is its faintness and -delicacy. Pierre Loti, who in this matter is a witness worthy of all -regard, is constantly ending the colour adjectives in his Syrian books -with _-atre_--“yellowish,” “bluish,” “greenish,” etc. The general -impression is of dim and faded tints, put on, as it were, in thin -washes. In the stoniest regions there seems to be no colour at all, as -if the sun had bleached them. The curious colouring of the Judean -valleys, which has been described, is never aggressive, and it takes -some carefulness of observation to see anything in them more than a blue -green in the sparsely-planted olive-groves fading into faint greenish -grey above. The valleys of ripe sesame and vetch are washed into the -picture in pale yellow or yellow ochre. Where tilled earth appears it is -generally a variegated expanse of light brown, or pink, or terra-cotta. -The eastern slopes of Hermon, below the snow, shew vertical stripes like -those of the haircloth and jute garments of the peasants, washed out -with rain and sun; or they are spread upon the roots of the mountain -like some vast Indian shawl cunningly and minutely interwoven with red -and green threads, but worn almost threadbare. As you approach a village -in strong sunlight, you see it as a dark brown mass shaded angularly -with black; but it seems to float above a mist of the airiest purple -sheen, where the thinly-planted iris-flowers stand among the graves -before the walls. The Sea of Galilee, as we saw it, was light blue; the -Dead Sea was light green, with a haze of evaporation rendering it even -fainter in the distance. - -If this be true of the near, it is doubly so of the distant, landscape. -In a country so mountainous and so sheer-cleft as Palestine, distant -views are seen for the most part as vistas, the “land that is very far -off” revealing itself at the end of some =V=-shaped gorge or towering over -some intermediate mountain range. Of course distant views are faint in -all lands, but in Palestine the clear air keeps them distinct with -clean-cut edge, however faint they are. Thus there is perhaps nothing -more delicate and _spirituel_ in the world than those faint dreamlike -mountains in the extreme distance of Syrian vistas--the hills east of -Jordan grey, with a mere suspicion of blue in them, or the lilac and -heliotrope mountains of the desert which form the magic background of -Damascus looking eastward. - -Reference has been made to the irises (the “lilies of the field”) near -villages. These are but typical of the general sheen of that carpet of -wild flowers which every spring-time spreads over the land. They are of -every colour. There are scarlet poppies and crimson anemones, blue dwarf -cornflowers, yellow marigolds, white narcissus (said to be the Rose of -Sharon); but here they seldom grow in patches of strong hue. Each flower -blooms apart, and the sheen of them is delicate and suggestive rather -than gorgeous. They seem to share the reticence and shyness of the land, -and tinge rather than paint it. Even the animal life conforms to this -dainty rule; lizards are everywhere, but their colouring is that of -their environment, now stone-grey, now wine-red, now straw-coloured. -Chameleons are anything you please--green in growing corn, black among -basalt rocks. Tortoises are blue at the sulphur springs, brown or slate -in the muddy banks of streams. - -This faintness is, however, but half the truth of the colour of Syria. -Everywhere it is rendered emphatic by certain vivid splashes of the most -daring brilliance. Wherever springs are found you have instances of this -contrast, and Palestine is essentially the land of bright foregrounds -thrown up against dim backgrounds. - -The Jordan valley is the greatest example, running south along its whole -length, “a green serpent” between the pale mountains of the east and the -faint mosaic of the western land. Its jungle is uncompromisingly -distinct throughout the entire course, and its colour is living green, -with a white flash of broken water or a quiet flow of brown bursting -here and there through the verdure. Other streams are similarly marked, -with luxurious undergrowth of reeds, varied by clumps of hollyhock or -edged with winding ribbons of magenta oleander. But the most striking -oases of this kind are the valley of Shechem and the city of Damascus. -There is a hill seldom visited by tourists, but well worth climbing, set -in the broad vale of Makhna, right opposite Jacob’s Well. North and -south past the foot of this hill runs the broad valley. It is edged on -the western side by the continuous line of the central mountain range of -Samaria--continuous except for one great gash, where, as if a giant’s -sword had cleft the range, the valley of Shechem enters that of Makhna -at right angles. The whole landscape is in dim colour except for that -valley of Shechem. Ebal and Gerizim guard its eastern end, dull and -rocky both. But the valley which they guard is fed by countless springs -and intersected by rivulets, so that below the shingle of their slopes -there spreads a fan-shaped expanse of intensely vivid green, like a -carpet flung out from Nablus between the mountains. The lower edge of -the green is broken by the white wall of the enclosure of Jacob’s Well, -and the cupola of Joseph’s tomb. Damascus--surely the most bewitching -of cities--owes its witchery to the same cause. The river Abana spends -itself upon the city. As you approach it from the south it discloses -itself as a mass of bold outline and high colour in the midst of a great -field of verdure, flanked on the west by precipitous hills of sand and -rock--sheer tilted desert. When you climb those hills you see the white -city, jewelled with her minarets of many hues, resting on a cloth of -dark green velvet whose edge is sharply defined. Immediately beyond that -edge the sand begins, stretching into the farther desert through paler -and paler shades of rose and yellow to the lilac hills in the eastern -distance. - -It is not only the water-springs, however, that provide the land with -vivid foregrounds. Loti describes a little sand-hill in the desert “all -bespangled with mica,” which “sets itself out, shining like a silver -tumulus.” Such bold and detached features are by no means uncommon even -on the west of the Jordan. The name of the cliff “Bozez” in Michmash -means “shining,” and there are many shining rocks in these -valleys--either masses of smooth limestone, or dark basalt rocks, from -whose dripping surface the sun is reflected in blinding splendour after -rain. Even without such reflection the sudden intrusion of black rock -will often give character to an otherwise neutral landscape. - -But the sun is the magician of Syria, who bleaches her and then throws -up against his handiwork the boldest contrasts of strong light and -shade. No one who has seen the crimson flush of sunset on the olives, -or the sudden change of a grey Judean hill-side to rich orange, or the -whole eastern cliffs of the Sea of Galilee turned to the likeness of -flesh-coloured marble, will be likely to forget the picture. Loti’s -wonderful description of desert sunsets--“incandescent violet, and the -red of burning coals”--is not overdrawn. Shadows will transform the -poorest into the richest colouring. The tawny desert changes to the -luscious dark of lengthening indigo at the foot of a great rock; and the -shadows of clouds float across Esdraelon, changing the red plain to deep -wine-colour as they pass. Silhouettes are of daily occurrence in that -crisp air. One scene in particular made an indelible impression. It was -a village on terraced heights, thrown black against a gold and -heliotrope sunset. The figures of Arabs standing or sitting statuesque -upon the sky-line were magnified to the appearance of giant guardians of -the walls, and the miserable little hamlet might have been an -impregnable fortress. - -The inhabitants have entered with full sympathy into the spirit of this -play of foreground. They are spectacular if they are anything. Their -religion forbids them all practice of the graphic arts, and most of the -Western pictures which are to be seen in churches are execrable enough -to reconcile them to the restriction. But they obey the law in small -things only to break it by transforming themselves and their -surroundings into one great picture. Their clothing, their buildings, -and their handiwork are a brilliant foil to the dull background. From -them Venice learned her bright colouring, and there are few English -homes which have not borrowed something from them. - -In part, this is thrust upon them by the sun. The interiors of houses -are all Rembrandt work, as Conder has happily remarked. The rooms are -dark, and the windows very small. But when the sun shines through the -apertures, their rich brown rafters and red pottery gleam out of the -shadow. One such interior is especially memorable, where a bar of -intense sunlight lit up the skin and many-coloured garments of children -sitting in the window-sill, while through the open door the green grass -of the courtyard shone. Still more wonderful is the effect when one -opens the door of a silk-winding room in sunlight, and sees the colours -wound on the great spindles, or when one enters the dark archways of the -bazaars where long shafts of light striking down slantwise upon a -shining patch below turn the brown shadow of the arch to indigo. The -natives see this, and love the lusciousness of it. They build minarets -cased with emerald tiles, or domes of copper which will soon be coated -with verdigris. Of late years a further touch has been added in the -red-tiled roofs which are already so popular in the towns. - -In proof of the genius of the Easterns for colour, nothing need be -mentioned but their carpets and their glass. The glass of old windows in -mosques beggars all description. It is an experience rather than a -spectacle. The panes are so minute, and so destitute of picture or of -pattern, that they are unnoticed in - -[Illustration: CANA OF GALILEE. - -This is the village of Kafr Kenná, believed to be the Cana of the New -Testament, where our Lord performed His first miracle at the marriage -feast.] - -detail, and the general effect is that of a religious atmosphere in -which all one’s ordinary thoughts and feelings are lost in the -overpowering sense of “something rich and strange.” After the magic of -that light, with its blended purple and amber and ruby, the finest -Western work seems harsh. It is hardly light; it is illuminated shadow. -The rugs and carpets, with their intricate colouring, are more familiar -and need not be described. The finest of them are of silk, and their -delicacy of shade is marvellous. The patterns constantly elude the eye, -promising and just almost reaching some recognisable figure, only to -lose themselves in a bright maze. It is said that they were suggested by -the meadows of variegated flowers; but they are intenser and more -passionate--as if their designers had felt that their task was to supply -an even stronger counterpart to the faint landscape. - -The gay clothing of the East is proverbial. Even the poorest peasants -are resplendent. “Fine linen” is still the mark of the rich man, but -Lazarus can match him for “scarlet.” In certain parts the men are clad -in coats of sheepskin, the wool being inside, and protruding like a -heavy fringe along the edges. Almost everybody’s shoes are bright red. -In one place we saw a shepherd whose sheepskin coat had met with an -accident, and the patch which filled the vacant space in the raw brown -back of him was of an elaborate tartan cloth. In another village all the -men wore crimson aprons. When our camp-servants were on the march they -seemed to be in sackcloth, or in thick grey felt which suggested -fire-proof apparel; but when they reached a town they blossomed out into -a rainbow. Children playing in a village street, women at the wells, -statuesque shepherds standing solitary in the fields, all seemed -arranged as for a tableau. Everybody official--the railway guard, the -escort, even the mourner at a funeral--is immensely conscious of his -dignity; and on him descends the spirit of Solomon in all his glory. The -man you hire to guide you for a walk of half a dozen miles will -disappear into his house and emerge in gorgeous array. One of our guides -decked himself in flowing yellow robes and marched before us -ostentatiously carrying in front of him a weapon which appeared to be a -cross between a carving-knife and a reaping-hook, through a land -peaceful as an infant school. A procession marching to some sacred place -across a plain lights the whole scene as with a string of coloured -lanterns. Even where the natives have adopted European dress the fez is -retained, and a crowd of men, seen from above, is always ruddy. - -The delight in strong colour goes even one step farther. The rich hues -of the flesh in sunny lands seem to suit the landscape, and one soon -learns to sympathise with the native preference for dusky and brown -complexions. To them a fair skin appears leprous, though bright flaxen -or auburn hair are regarded with great admiration. Not satisfied, -however, with their natural beauty, the Syrians paint and tattoo their -flesh in the most appalling manner, and redden their finger-nails with -henna. Fashionable ladies, and in some places men also, paint their -eyebrows to meet, and touch in their eyelids with antimony, whose blue -shadow is supposed to convey the impression of irresistible eyelashes. -In towns where “the Paris modes” are the sign of smartness, some of the -girls paint their faces pink and white--faces painted with a vengeance, -with a thick and shining enamel which transforms the wearers into -animated wax dolls of the weirdest appearance. But that which shocks the -unsophisticated traveller most is the tattooing of many of the women. -Some of them are marked with small arrow-head blue patches on forehead, -cheeks, and chin; others are lined and scored like South Sea Islanders, -and their lower lips transformed entirely from red to blue. - -All this is savage enough, but it illustrates in its own crude way that -delight in strong colour which transforms the human life of the East -into such a vivid foreground to the faint landscape. In the dress there -is artistic instinct as well as barbaric splendour, and in the carpets, -the mosaics, and the glass there is brilliant and matchless artistry. As -to the general principle which has been stated in regard to natural -colouring, this is as it always must have been. These were the quiet -hues of the land, and these the brilliant points of strong light in it -which Christ’s eyes saw, and which gave their colour to the Gospels. - - - - -CHAPTER II - -THE DESERT - - -Environment counts for much in national life. A country knows itself, -and asserts itself, as in contrast with what is immediately over its -border; or it retains connection with the neighbouring life, and is what -it is partly because the region next it overflows into its life. At any -rate, to understand anything more than the colour of a land--indeed even -to understand that, as we shall see--it is necessary to begin outside it -and know something of its surroundings. For Palestine, environment means -sea and desert--sea along a straight line for the most part unbroken by -any crease or wrinkle of coast-edge which might serve for a harbour, and -desert thrown round all the rest, except the mountainous north. -Palestine is a great oasis--a fertile resting-place for travellers -making the grand journey from Egypt to Mesopotamia; between which -kingdoms she was ever also the buffer state in war and politics. These -nations were her visitors, her guests, her terrors, but they never were -her neighbours. Her neighbours are the sea and the desert. - -The sea she never took for a friend. With no harbour, nor any visible -island to tempt her to adventure, and no sailor blood in her veins, she -hated and feared the sea, and thought of it with ill-will. There is -little of the wistfulness of romance in her thought of the dwellers in -its uttermost parts; little of the sense of beauty in her poetry of the -breaking waves. She views the Phœnician trader who does business on the -ocean as a person to be astonished at rather than to be counted heroic. -She exults in the fact that God has his path on the great waters, but -has no wish to make any journey there herself. Her angels plant their -feet upon the sea, and she looks forward almost triumphantly to the time -when it will be dried up and disappear. Meanwhile its inaccessible huge -depth is for her poets a sort of Gehenna--a fit place for throwing off -evil things beyond the chance of their reappearing. Sins are to be cast -into it, and offenders, with millstones at their necks. - -The desert was Israel’s real neighbour. South-east from her it stretched -for a thousand miles. From N.N.E. round through E. and S. to W. it -hemmed her in. To a Briton, watching the departure of the Bagdad -dromedary post from Damascus, the desert seems infinitely more appalling -and unnatural than the sea. For ten days these uncanny beasts and men -will travel, marching (it is said) twenty hours out of every -twenty-four. The stretch of dreariness which opens to the Western -imagination, as you watch the lessening specks in the tawny distance, is -indescribable. To the Eastern it is not so, and it never was so. He -knows its horrors, and yet he loves it. The modern Arab calls it Nefud -(_i.e._ “exhausted,” “spent”), and, according to Palgrave, there are in -the Arabian desert sands no less than 600 feet in depth. Yet with all -its horrors it is after all his home. - -The desert is not all consecrated to death. Besides the occasional oases -which dot its barren expanse, there are many regions where grass and -herbage may be had continually so long as the flocks keep wandering. -Accordingly the long low black tent, with its obliquely pitched -tent-ropes and skilfully driven pegs, takes the place of such -substantial building as might create a city. It has been so for -countless generations, until now the desert Arab fears walls and will -not be persuaded to enter them. Kinglake gives a remarkable instance of -this, telling of a journey to Gaza on which his Arabs actually abandoned -their camels rather than accompany them within the gates.[1] - -Colonel Conder insists that the Arabs are entirely distinct from the -Fellahin of the Syrian villages; yet he and other writers call attention -to the borderland east of Jordan where the boundaries of the rival races -swing to and fro with the varying successes or failures of the years. In -places where the land lies open, as at the Plain of Esdraelon, the east -invades the west. No one who travels in Palestine can fail to be -impressed--most will probably be surprised--by the frequency with which -those black hair-cloth tents are seen, sprawling like the skin of some -wild-cat pegged out along the ground. If the question be asked what -becomes of them, the day’s journey will likely enough supply the answer. -In the market-place of a town you may see their inhabitants trading -their desert ware for city produce. But even such slight contact of city -with desert evidently has its temptations. In the valley below, the tent -is pitched on the edge of a field rudely cultivated. The nomad here has -already yielded to the agriculturist. Descend to the Jordan valley, and -you shall see the hair-cloth covering a hut whose sides are of woven -reeds from the river, and a little farther on the covering itself will -be exchanged for a roof of reeds. Finally, you may look from the road -that runs between the two main sources of the Jordan, and see in the -southern distance, shining out against the lush verdure of the Huleh -morass, the red-tiled roof of a two-storey villa--the house of the -Sheikh of the local tribe of Arabs![2] This immigration has gone on from -time immemorial, and it was some such process by which Palestine -received all her earlier inhabitants. Once fixed in cities and settled -down to the cultivation of the fields, their character and way of life -so changed that the desert and its folk became their enemies. Yet a -deeper loyalty remained through all such alienation; and, in spite of -dangers and even hostilities, the desert was still their former home. - -It is not only by its neighbourhood, however, that the desert has -influenced Palestine. Nature has done her best to shut it off from the -land, from the eastern side at least, by the tremendous barrier of the -Jordan valley. Not even the angel of the wilderness, one would think, -might cross that defence. Yet even that barrier has been crossed, and a -bird’s-eye view of Palestine shews a land bitten into by great tracts of -real desert west of Jordan. In a modified degree, the whole of -Judea--that great stone wedge to which reference was made in Chapter -I.--exemplifies this. Half the Judean territory is wilderness, and the -other half is only kept back from the desert by sheer force of industry. -Even on the western side this is strikingly seen. As viewed from the -ocean, the desolate sand and scrub of the coast seems to clutch at the -land, stretching here and there far inland from the shore. But the -desert of Judah, in the south-east of the country, is the great -intrusion of the desert upon Palestine. The sea-board of Palestine is -perhaps the smoothest and most unbroken of any country in the world. But -if a coast-line of the desert were sketched in the same way as a -sea-coast is shewn on maps, the edge would show an outline almost as -broken as that of the Greek coast, with many a bay and creek. The desert -is the sea of Syria, and its inthrust is like that of great fingers -feeling their way through the pastures to the very gates of her cities, -and at one place reaching a point within a mile or two of her capital. -Disraeli describes graphically the transition from Canaan to - -[Illustration: ON THE ROAD FROM JERUSALEM TO BETHANY.] - -stony Arabia--the first sandy patches; the herbage gradually -disappearing till all that is left of it is shrubs tufting the ridges of -low undulating sand-hills; then the sand becoming stony, with no -plant-life remaining but an occasional thorn, until plains of sand end -in dull ranges of mountains covered with loose flints. In the journey -from Bethlehem to the Dead Sea the transition is even more abrupt. -Hardly have you left the “fields of the shepherds” when you perceive -that the herbs, though still plentiful among the stones, are parched. In -a mile or two there is nothing round you but wild greyish-yellow sand -and rock. You thread your way precariously along the sides of gorges -till you reach that sheer yellow cleft down which Kidron is slicing its -way with the air of a suicide to the sea. Then you come up to a lofty -ridge from which are seen the dreary towers of Mar Saba, like the “blind -squat turret” of Childe Roland’s adventure, “with low grey rocks girt -round, chin upon hand, to see the game at bay.” So you journey on, -feeling at times that this is not scenery, it is being buried alive in -great stone chambers beneath the surface; at other times welcoming the -sight of a broom bush like that under which Elijah lay down and prayed -that he might die. The carcase of a horse or the skeleton of a camel are -almost welcome, breaking the monotonous emptiness of this land of death. - -The physical influence of the desert on the land is evident in many -ways. Greece and Britain are not more truly children of the sea than is -Syria the desert’s child. Even those who have had no experience of the -desert proper, but have only made the regulation tour in Palestine, will -have memories of what they saw recalled to them in every page of a book -descriptive of the desert. The land throughout has ominously much in -common with its desolate neighbour--so much so as to suggest a territory -rescued from the desert and kept from reverting only by strenuous -handling. - -Many things go to confirm this impression. The winds that blow from east -or south have crossed the sand before they reach the mountains. When -they are cool, they are pure and fresh, unbreathed before, “virgin air.” -The evening breeze of Syria is “the respiration of the desert” after its -breathless heat of day. When the wind is hot, it is terrible as only -wind can be that comes off burning sand. The _shirky_, or sirocco, -interprets the desert in a fashion which the traveller is not likely to -forget. We rode against it half the length of the Plain of Esdraelon, -when the thermometer registered 104° in the shade, until the steel of -our coloured eye-glasses became so hot that we were glad to remove them, -and endure the glare by preference. - -The plant-life of the desert has its counterpart in the land. Loti -describes it with his usual vividness. There is the furze dusted with -fine sand; there are the strange sand-flowers of yellow or violet -colours, the spikes shot out of the soil without leafage, the balls of -thorn which wound the feet, the occasional palm-tree, the white edible -manna plant. And there is the exquisite scent of these after rain, so -strong that one might think a jar of perfume had been broken at the tent -door--a perfume in which one distinguishes the scents of resin, lemon, -geranium, and myrrh. All this the Palestine traveller seems to -recognise; in that curious but familiar flora, and that pungent aromatic -smell, we have the intrusion of the desert again. - -The colour of the land has already been described, and here again we -have the touch of the wilderness. The colouring is no doubt partly due -to the quality of the air, dry and crisp as nothing but those miles of -sand could make it. Having absolutely no concerns of its own, as wooded -or grassy lands have, the desert abandons itself to the sun. It takes -and gives the sunlight wholly, making itself a mere reflector for the -light and heat. “Everything in this desert is of one colour--a tawny -yellow. The rocks, the partridges, the camels, the foxes, the ibex, are -all of this shade.”[3] Yet this absolutely neutral region, just because -of its neutrality, catches the sunrise and the sunset in a brilliance -that is all its own, and deepens its shadows to liquid depths of indigo -and violet. In this we see the extreme and untempered form of that -interplay of faint background with intense foreground which is the -characteristic feature of the colour-scheme of Syria. - -It is the same as regards form. The two towers of Mar Saba are among the -most impressive of all the Syrian spectacles. Pitilessly unsuggestive, -they are the most unhomely things one ever saw, like the mere skeletons -of habitations. But part of this impression comes from the shape of the -surrounding hills. Ranged in a wide semicircle, their fronts eaten out -with land-slips and torrents, they are polished and smooth like gigantic -sculptures. In some parts the regularity of their cones and tables -suggests the work of purposeless but mighty builders. In other parts the -rocks are twisted as if by tormentors, or tumbled in utter confusion. -This too, as we shall see, has its modified counterpart in the land. - -If the desert has thus produced a strong physical effect upon the land, -its moral effects are even more apparent. We have seen how to the -dwellers west of Jordan it was at once an abiding enemy and an ancient -home. Shut out from it by the huge trench of the Jordan valley and the -barricade of the eastern mountains, the Syrian still feels enough of the -desert’s fiery touch to fear it as an enemy. Its wind blasts his crops -and its heat drives him from his valleys to the hill country for the -breath of life. Every traveller speaks of the “positive weight” of heat -that makes men bend low in their saddles. Others besides the Persians -are constrained, as Kinglake puts it, to bow down before the sun, whose -“fierce will” is most terribly felt in those tracts of the land which -the desert has claimed for its own. In the desert there are the same -conditions which are to be found in the land, only in extreme forms and -without mitigation. It is the place of tempests, fires, and reptiles. -These visit the land at times, but they abide in that weird country into -whose distances the Syrian may peer from most of his mountain tops. -There, too, abide those dark and occult powers of evil in which every -Eastern man believes. The magic of the desert--its treacherous mirage, -its genii (by no means difficult to imagine in the forms of sandy -whirlwinds whose march is strewn with corpses), and its infinite -unexplored possibilities of terror--all this is very real to the native -imagination. Its inhabitants, too, are uncanny to think of. The true -Arabian, whom perhaps they may have met on a journey, with his -jade-handled jewelled sword and his shrunken skin; the lunatics who have -wandered to its congenial wildness; the anchorites and ascetics whom, -like the scapegoat of ancient times, sin has driven forth to its -unwalled prison-house,--all these fill in for Syrians the ghastly -picture, and its tales of wars and massacres add the last touch of -horror. - -Nothing proves and exemplifies all this more strikingly than the -apparently unreasonable view of the fertility, beauty, and general -perfection of Palestine which its inhabitants have always cherished. -Visitors from the West are often disappointed, and as they move from -place to place their wonder grows as they recall the Biblical -descriptions of the land flowing with milk and honey. Allowing for the -many centuries of misrule and deterioration, it still remains obvious -that Palestine never can have been that dreamland of natural delight -which piety has imagined. But the inhabitant views it, as Dr. Smith has -pointed out, not in contrast with the West, but in contrast with the -desert. We have to remember how “its eastern forests, its immense -wheat-fields, its streams, the oases round its perennial fountains, the -pride of Jordan, impress the immigrant nomad.” This contrast exaggerates -all his blessings in a heat of appreciation. Coming in from the desert, -a man sees trees and fountains not as they are in themselves, but as -they are in contrast with burning sand: he welcomes them as the gift of -God’s grace. The sound of wind among the leaves or of flowing water is -to him truly the speech of a god.[4] To many a wayfarer the poorest -outskirts of the Syrian land have meant salvation from imminent death, -and so appreciation enlarges to optimism, and the very barrenness of the -desert becomes a challenge to hope and faith. Streams will break forth -there, as in his happy experience they have already broken forth, until -the whole barren waste shall blossom as the rose. It is by such hope and -faith that the tribes of Palestine have lived. There is a magnificent -indomitableness in the spectacle of Jews after two thousand years of -exile still celebrating their vintage festival in the slums of great -cities, or in the “squalid quarter of some bleak northern town where -there is never a sun that can at any rate ripen grapes.” One seems to -find the key to this in that tradition of the Arabs that certain ruins -near the Dead Sea are the remains of ancient vineyards. The Syrian land -can never be seen but as a miracle of life and beauty rescued from the -desert, and that appreciation becomes the incentive for a larger hope. - -Yet it is not as an enemy, however wonderfully conquered or strenuously -held at bay, that the desert appeals most to the Syrian. As he looks -eastward to the hills of Moab and dreams of what lies beyond them, there -is perhaps more of wistfulness than of terror in his heart. The -melancholy note of his music, heard by every camp-fire in the long -evenings, is infinitely suggestive as well as pathetic. Where was that -note learned if not in black tents pitched in the boundless waste, where -man’s littleness, in contrast with the great powers of Nature, oppressed -him into prone fatalism, or revealed to him the infinite refuge and -comfort of the Everlasting Arms? He whose fathers have sung such songs -will not satisfy his soul with the bustle of towns. He will need the -desert for retreat, that his confused mind may calm itself down to order -and find new revelations of truth. And when the Syrian retreats to the -desert he seems rather to be going home than abroad. David and Elijah, -Paul and Mohammed, for various reasons, but with the same urgency, -betook themselves to the solitude. Jesus Christ himself was driven of -the Spirit into the wilderness. If temptation waited them there, and the -sense of exile and desertion, it was there also that angels ministered -to them; and ancient prophecies were fulfilled in those “streams of -spiritual originality which broke forth in the deserts of moral routine” -of their times. To their spirit, and to the spirit of all dwellers in -the land, the desert is not enemy only, it is home. - -This fact is abundantly borne out by many traits of character which are -the survivals of a desert ancestry. There is nothing in Syria which can -explain the fact that the most skilful dragoman cannot understand a map, -nor guide you to your destination by geographical directions. On unknown -ground a Syrian is of little use as guide. On one occasion some of us -set out on a journey of five or six miles in Hauran under the guidance -of an excellent lad who started with the air of a Napoleon Bonaparte. -His directions were to go straight from Muzerib to Sheikh Miskin--two -stations on the railway south of Damascus, between which the railway -line runs in a wide curve. Our route was the bow-string, while the line -was the bent bow. For a little way he boldly marched forward, but soon -began to edge towards the rails, and finally lost his head altogether, -crossed the line, and set out on a route whose only apparent destination -was Persia! This was too much for us, and we mutinied and reversed the -direction, arriving at Sheikh Miskin in less than an hour, with our -guide under a cloud. There could not have been a better illustration of -a Syrian’s helplessness on ground without familiar landmarks. He finds -his way partly by a nomad instinct, very difficult to account for; -partly by the habit of noticing minute features of the road which -entirely escape the ordinary observer. A story is told of a thief in a -certain town in Palestine who entered a house and stole nothing. He -simply went out and claimed the house before the judge. When the case -came to trial, the thief challenged the owner to tell how many steps -were in the stair, how many panes of glass in the windows and a long -catalogue of other such - -[Illustration: THE HILLS ROUND NAZARETH, FROM THE PLAIN OF ESDRAELON. - -The village of Nazareth shows out white in the dip between the hills.] - -details. This the owner could not do, and when the thief gave the -numbers correctly, the house was at once given to him as its obvious -possessor. The tale at once recalls the Arab of our childhood who -described the route of the strayed camel. - -The Syrian character is nothing if not complex, a mass of paradox whose -contradictory elements it seems hopeless to attempt to reconcile. The -politest and the most ruffianly of men, the most effusively frank and -the most impenetrably wary, the most silent and the most voluble, the -gayest in laughter and the most melancholy in song, is the Syrian. He -will bully you so long as he has the majority, and he will beg for the -privilege of tying your shoe’s latchet if the majority is with you. He -will row a boat or drive a donkey under a noonday sun with a violence -which threatens apoplexy; he will suddenly subside into a repose which -no surrounding bustle can disturb. The captain of the _Rob Roy_ tells -how in the Huleh region a native boy running alongside pointed his long -gun at him at least twenty times with the cry of _bakhshish_, so close -that he once knocked the barrel aside with his paddle; and yet in the -tent that evening this same youngster “was my greatest favourite from -his lively laugh and eyes like diamonds, and his quick perception of all -I explained.” In a note on page 39 an adventure of our own is told which -illustrates sufficiently the rapidity of change in the mood of the -native. He is a civilised barbarian, a scrupulous fraud, an aged little -child. No doubt so complex a character is traceable to many causes, but -in the main it is the work of the desert. There the extreme -conditions--the long hunger and the occasional surfeit, the great -silence and the shrill speech in which that silence unburdens itself, -the demand for desperate exertion and the long deep rest--these call -forth the most opposite qualities, each in exaggerated degree. - -Perhaps the most important contributions of the desert to the Syrian -character have been two. There is a certain hardiness and strenuous -carelessness of comfort, which produces a rather bleak impression on -European travellers, but which nevertheless has counted for a great deal -in national life. It has told in opposite ways. Judea’s success has been -undoubtedly due to the fact that it had to be fought for against such -bitter odds. On the other hand, this same independence of fate has led -the nation to settle down in a too easy contentment. Defeat, and even -oppression, sit more lightly on people who are indifferent to -circumstances; and if the artificial demands for luxury have been the -ruin of some nations, they have been the saving of others, keeping alive -in them their vigour and whetting their ambition. The other contribution -is the instinctive kindliness and hospitality which are well known as -characteristic of the desert tribes. Where life is so precarious, it -inevitably comes to be regarded as an inviolable trust by the man on -whose mercy it is cast. Accordingly the wandering Arab has but to draw -in the sand a circle round his laden camel in order to secure every -scrap of his possessions from robbery; and the bitterest enemies are -sure of safety so long as they abide in each other’s tents. A little -incident which occurred to ourselves brought home to us vividly the real -kindliness of the Eastern sense of guest-right. It was in Damascus, and -after nightfall. Some of us, wishing to see how the city amused itself, -set out for a ramble through the streets. It was only nine o’clock, yet -everything was shut up and the bazaars and thoroughfares silent and -deserted. At last we found a little café still doing business at the end -of the high black vault of a bazaar. Seats were placed in the open air -in front of it, while from within came the rattle of dice and the voices -of one or two gamblers. Sitting down on the outside bench, we asked for -coffee, which was immediately brought. A stylishly dressed Moslem, in an -indescribable flow of robes, took his seat silently opposite us and sat -smoking his nargileh. When we rose to go we found that he had paid for -us all, and when we would have thanked him he would have none of it, -satisfied with the consciousness of having shewn hospitality to -strangers sojourning in his land. We could not help wondering how long -our friend might have continued making the circuit of London restaurants -before a similar experience would have fallen his way! There is a tale -of a scoundrel who acts as guide to English travellers, and presents to -each of them a certificate from a former victim, which invariably makes -them laugh. The writing is, “I was a stranger and ye took me in.” It was -pleasing to find that this testimony need not always be ironical. - - -EXTRACT FROM JOURNAL - - One of the horses had been stolen in the night. It was the last on - the line, and beyond it Harun was sleeping on the ground. At 11.30 - all was right, but by 12.30 it had disappeared. By 1 A.M. the - village had been roused, and the head men were coming in to the - camp offering us one of their mares in compensation. The mares, - which were wretched skeletons of beasts, were refused, and the - horse demanded. Nothing could persuade them to bring him back, or - to acknowledge any cognisance of him whatever. They said that - passing robbers had taken him, and begged us not to report the - affair. Our dragoman, however, took another view. He wrote a - letter, long and circumstantial, describing us as “Hawajas” - (merchants, gentlemen), travelling for information under tescera - from the Sultan. The touch of genius in the letter was its - insistence upon the seriousness of this affair on the ground that - we were travelling under three flags, the Union Jack, the Turkish - flag, and the Stars and Stripes. This letter was sent, by one of - our men on horseback, to the Kaimakham, governor of the district, - at a place some distance from where we were. The Kaimakham passed - him on to the Mudir at another village, a person of terrible - reputation, of whom everybody in the neighbourhood was afraid. The - upshot of it all was that Mohammed, the messenger, returned to camp - accompanied by two soldiers, powerful and intelligent young - fellows, but savage-looking and rather ragged. The taller of the - two, named Nimr (the leopard), was armed with bayonet, rifle, and - revolver, while a double belt of cartridges added to the effect. - His orders were to take the thirteen leading men of Banias in - irons, and march them off “shoulder-tight” to prison at Mejdel. - During the day a great meeting was held in the dragoman’s tent, the - soldiers on one side, the “leading men” on the other. One of the - latter protested that this was unfair--they had expected the - dragoman to grow cooler, but although he had been hot at first, he - was getting hotter instead of cooler. The reply was--(may it be - forgiven!)--that he had meant to get cooler, but the Hawajas were - getting hotter steadily, owing to the three flags aforesaid. After - a long parley it was arranged that they should send to another - village for a horse worth £20, the value of the stolen one. They - stoutly maintained that a stranger, and none of themselves, had - committed the robbery, and that it was a bitter day when the - Hawajas had pitched their tents among them. Nimr the soldier sat - frowning and beating the ground savagely with a stick between his - wide open legs. He repeated several times, with gusto, the - aphorism, “Better to touch fire and scorpions than the property of - Hawajas,” to which the rueful answer of the Sheikh was that it - _would_ be better! All was gloom, and when at last a messenger was - sent off to procure a horse worth £20, the grandees went to their - houses with the air of men doomed. Next morning the horse was - brought, and was to be seen at the end of the line kicking and - biting viciously. Its worth was only £15, but the balance was - condoned. We expected that this would draw forth gratitude and even - some gladness; but instead it brought them all to tears, and drew - from them many assurances of the miserable poverty of their - condition, and the inevitable ruin that awaited them if we actually - accepted this horse which they had brought. To these pleadings the - dragoman was deaf, insisting that we must now at least let things - take their course. When they saw that this was the final position - of affairs, they ceased from wailing. Within five minutes our own - original horse was led into the camp, and their new one removed! - Their game had been played to its very last turn, and having failed - was laid aside. During the rest of our sojourn there these same men - lingered in the camp, manifesting neither regret nor shame, but - smoking, chatting, and laughing with our company in the highest - possible good-humour. - - - - -CHAPTER III - -THE LIE OF THE LAND - - -Every writer about Palestine speaks of the smallness and concentration -of the land, yet these take the best informed by surprise. It is “the -least of all lands” indeed, when one thinks how much has happened in it. -Leaving Jaffa at 10 A.M., the steamer reaches Beyrout at 6 P.M. The -passengers in that short sail have seen the whole of Palestine. National -life there is a miniature rather than a picture. In a stretch of country -equal to that between Aberdeen and Dundee you cover the whole central -ground of the Bible, from the Sea of Galilee to Jerusalem. In a ride -equal to the distance from London to Windsor there may be seen enough to -interpret many centuries of the world’s supreme history. The Dead Sea is -but 50 miles from the Mediterranean, the Sea of Galilee about 25 miles; -while the distance in miles between the two seas is only 55. Yet in that -little land there is every kind of soil, from mere sand and broken -limestone to rich red and chocolate loam. It is a mountainous country -throughout, and its inhabitants are a race of Highlanders. So numerous -are its mountain spurs that you may pass up and down the centre of the -country for scores of miles, and yet never catch sight of the sea, -though you constantly feel it in the breeze. Everything is there--the -gorge, the wide sweeping valley, the great plain, the rolling tableland. -It is, indeed, a land in miniature, the _multum in parvo_ of lands. Its -history and religion, like its natural features, are crushed together -and compact. The epigram is the only form of speech that can express it. - -This idea of smallness and compression, however, is by no means the only -possible view which may be taken. All depends on what it is with which -one compares Palestine. Thinking of it as a field of history, one -inevitably has other fields in mind. If we think of Britain, Palestine -is but the size of Wales; if of France and Germany, it is the equivalent -of Alsace. But a more primitive point of view is gained when you regard -it as a reclaimed tract of the desert. Just as Egypt is a huge -river-meadow, and Venice a glorified harbour in the sea, so Syria is the -largest oasis in the world. Its whole geographical character is that of -desert, more or less modified by water. The sculptured hills are here, -the rock and the shingle and the sand. Dry up its rivers and arrest its -rainfall, and you will have a continuation of the peninsula of Sinai, -except that instead of granite it will be of limestone. It is this, as -we have seen, that has led its inhabitants to regard it with a rare -appreciation, an extraordinary sense of its preciousness, and a -tendency to exaggerate both its beauty and its fertility. - -Nothing illustrates this loving appreciation of their land better than -the play of imagination which has created the place-names of Palestine. -Hebrews, Arabs, and Crusaders vie with each other in the poetic beauty -of their nomenclature. It is a little land, but there is much witchery -in it. For its inhabitants it _lives_ personified, and its masses of -mountain scenery are often named from parts of the human body. There are -“the shoulder,” “the side,” “the thigh,” “the rib,” “the back.” The -“head” of Pisgah looks down upon the “face” of the wilderness.[5] There -is a “hollow hearth”--homeliest of names to a Semite. In other names -poetry has reached its utmost of epigrammatic beauty--“the dance of the -whirls,” “the star of the wind,” “the diamond of the desert.” Yet sacred -and beautiful as its scenery was to Israel, she had a dearer bond with -her land than that. She was kept from nature-worship by a spiritual -faith which created such names as “Bethel” (the house of God), and many -others of similar significance. These claim the land in all its length -and breadth for the God of Israel. Every green spot was for the Semites -the dwelling-place of some divinity; this whole oasis of hers was for -Israel the house of her God of peace and blessing. To the ancient Greek -“God was the view”; to the Hebrew, God was the inhabitant of the -view--He Himself was Righteousness. And because the land was -His--rescued by Him from the desert with His waters, and given to the -people in His love--it was tenfold more dear to them. Down every vista -which shewed them a land that was very far off, their eyes caught sight -also of some vision of the King in His beauty; every high hill was a -veritable mountain of the Lord’s house. - -Let us try to get, as it were, a bird’s-eye view of this fascinating -country, noticing in their right perspective and significance its -outstanding natural features. Dr. Smith’s _Historical Geography_ has -perhaps rendered no service higher than the aid towards this which is -afforded by its epitome and map (pp. 49, 50, 51). These divide Palestine -into five parallel strips running north and south. Cutting across these -strips in a straight line westwards from the desert to the sea, we first -traverse the range of the eastern mountains; then dip to the immense -gulf of the Jordan valley, far below the Mediterranean level; then climb -by precipitous ascents to the summit of the central range; then descend -through the foot-hills; and finally land on the maritime plain. To grasp -thoroughly the lie of these five longitudinal regions is the first -necessity for understanding the geography of Palestine. Its general -impression is one of extraordinary brokenness of contour, and Zangwill -points out the important fact that a land with so much hill surface has -in reality a very much larger superficial area than that estimated by -multiplying its length by its breadth. - -By far the most remarkable feature in the whole - -[Illustration: JERUSALEM--THE POOL OF HEZEKIAH.] - -territory is the Jordan valley. Rising from springs at the western roots -of Hermon, high above sea level, it sinks by rapid stages till at the -Dead Sea it reaches bottom nearly 1300 feet below the Mediterranean. -Down its extraordinary gully flows the one great river of Palestine. -There are other perennial streams, but none to compare with Jordan -either for volume or for associations. It is this mass of flowing water -which stands as the heart and soul of the Syrian oasis. Its mighty -stream has overcome the desert, and claimed the western land for -greenness and for life. It is this huge cleft that has isolated the Holy -Land for the purposes of its God. - -The only clear opening from the Jordan to the Mediterranean is the Plain -of Esdraelon. Standing on Jordan’s bank below Bethshan and looking -westward, you see before you a valley whose farther end shows nothing -but sky. Many streams cut their way down its slopes beside a green -morass, and hold in their embrace the ruins of a strong city. You must -follow them up westwards for some ten miles before you reach sea level, -and soon after that you cross the watershed in a wide valley with -mountains rising to north and south. Jezreel stands above you on a -protruding tongue of high cultivated land to the south. At a level of -about 200 feet above the sea, you suddenly emerge upon a great -triangular plain, with Carmel at its apex, 15 miles to the west. This is -the Plain of Esdraelon. The one really large level space in Syria, its -rich soil, even surface, and plentiful water-supply make it a famous -piece of cultivated ground. But it is also the natural battlefield of -the East, and its chief associations are not with agriculture but with -war. - -Esdraelon, however, is but an incident in the geographical fact of -Syria, though an important and large incident. It is but the largest of -those open spaces into which Syrian valleys swell out. There are three -or four of them in the Jordan valley, and several of smaller size are -scattered here and there throughout the country. The really essential -feature of the land--that, indeed, which historically _is_ the land--is -the mountain range that sweeps from Lebanon to Hebron and beyond. It was -on the mountains that Israel lived. The Plain of Esdraelon, being the -ganglion of the natural main routes of traffic and of war, was but a -doubtful possession, precariously held at best, and often changing -owners. The strong city of Bethshan at the eastern mouth of its main -valley was held by Israel’s enemies during almost the whole of her -history; and, until a year or two ago, the Arabs made yearly raids upon -the Plain. Again, the sea-coast was largely in the hands of enemies; -while the Jordan valley, with its insupportable heat and malaria, was -thinly peopled, and its population swiftly degenerated from national as -well as from moral loyalties. Thus he who would know the Holy Land must, -in every sense of the words, “lift up his eyes unto the hills.” - -It was our good fortune to have this view at its very best for our first -sight of Palestine. We should have landed at Jaffa, but a rather -doubtful case of plague at Alexandria inflicted a two days’ quarantine -on all ships coming out of Egypt. So we looked at Jaffa from under the -yellow flag, and sailed off in the morning sunlight northward to -Beyrout. All day long we lay on deck, with maps spread out before us. -The quarantine had cost us the sight of the Greek Easter ceremony at -Jerusalem, but it gave us in exchange the rare experience of a daylight -sail along the Syrian coast. The day was marvellously clear, and every -object on the shore was seen in photographic outline, while the various -distances were preserved in fading colours, back to the thin -transparency against the sky which stood for the furthest mountain -ranges. The shore was barren: a low belt of tawny sand, broken by dark -olive-green scrub, and very desolate. One solitary house was all we saw -for the first two hours, and in another place a column of smoke, -apparently rising from some invisible camp. Beyond this the foot-hills -east of the plain were seen, lifting towards the great central ridge of -the mountain range. Though broken here and there by an occasional point, -or overlooked by a peak that rose very high beyond, the crest of the -range was remarkably level, with wavy outline. Until we passed Carmel it -shewed as a unity--“the _mountain_” of Ephraim and Judah. North from -that there was a bolder sky-line, much nearer to the sea, which led on -eventually to the magnificent heights of Lebanon, beautiful as they are -mighty. - -Let us suppose ourselves to land at Beyrout and journey from north to -south well inland. At first we climb eastwards among bold bare hills, in -whose recesses mulberry gardens nestle and on whose heights innumerable -villages perch. Cedars are conspicuous by their absence, but there are -plenty of humbler trees. Soon we come to realise the large-scale meaning -and contour of the district. We have been crossing Lebanon, whose -highest peaks have revealed themselves now and then far to the north. -Some twenty miles from the coast we find ourselves in the valley of the -Litany (Leontes). This whole region is easily understood. It consists of -the magnificent ranges of Lebanon and Antilebanon and the spacious -valley between them, running in ample curves parallel with the shore. - -Mighty though these are, however, it is neither of them that has -received the name of Jebel-es-Sheikh--“the patriarch of mountains.” That -honour is reserved for Hermon, the range and summit which Antilebanon -thrusts south from it into Galilee, just opposite Damascus. It is -happily named “the sheikh.” Go where you will in Palestine, Hermon seems -to lie at the end of some vista or other. For many miles around it, -Hermon commands everything. Its mass tilts the plain and sends out -innumerable spurs of rich and fertile land; its snow shines far and -gives character to the view; its eastern waters redeem the wilderness -through many a mile of Hauran; and from its western roots spring all the -fountains of the Jordan. This is the king of Syria, by whose beneficent -might the desert has become oasis. - -While the southern continuation of Hermon holds up the high tableland of -Bashan and runs it on into the mountains of Gilead and Moab east of -Jordan, the thrust of Lebanon into Western Galilee ends curiously in a -succession of hills divided by valleys running east and west, like great -waves of mountain rolling south to break along the northern edge of the -Plain of Esdraelon. There is a quiet regularity about these Galilean -Highlands, which gives the impression of a region made to plan. The -eastern end of Esdraelon is blocked by the group of Tabor and “Little -Hermon,” while the feature of the western end is the long lonely ridge -of Carmel. - -Crossing the plain we enter Samaria, whose deep rounded valleys, rich in -corn, send their sweeping curves in all directions. Here there is -neither the dominant north-and-south trend of Lebanon, nor the -horizontal ripple of Galilee, but an intricate network of curving -valleys, which leave the mountains everywhere more individual and -distinct, and which frequently expand into wide meadows or fields. Yet -the general rise of the region is from west, sloping up to east. The -watershed is perhaps 10 to 15 miles from Jordan, while it is more than -30 miles from the sea. But Jordan here is well-nigh 1000 feet below -sea-level, so that the eastern slope is immensely steeper than the -western. - -As we enter Judea, we find the land, as it were, gathering itself up on -almost continuous heights. The lesser valleys are shallow, and the -hilltops swell from the lofty plateau in colossal domes or cupolas. So -high is the general level that when we come to Jerusalem we look in vain -for the mountains we had understood to be round about her. No peaks -cleave the sky--only smooth and gentle hills, which have never been in -any way her defence, but have made excellent platforms for the -siege-engines of her enemies, and have grown wood for the crosses of her -inhabitants. The lateral gorges of Judea, both east and west, cut into -her high tableland in angular zigzags, and as you descend these in -either direction you realise what is really meant by “the mountains -round about Jerusalem.” She does not see them, lying secure upon the -height to which they have exalted her. But he who approaches her must -come by their gorges, where for many miles his sky will be but a strip -seen between sheer heights of cliff and scaur.[6] The rugged sharpness -of outline reaches its climax on the eastern side, where the range, -split in the wildest gorges, falls in fragmentary masses between their -mouths down to the Jordan valley. Nothing in the land has a more bare -and savage grandeur than the square-chiselled mountain blocks of -Quarantana, seen from below at Jericho in black angular silhouette -against the sunset. South of Jerusalem the Kidron gorge, cleaving the -intruding desert, exaggerates the wildness of the north, but as you -climb past Bethlehem to Hebron you are in a region liker to Samaria, -with its deeper and more rounded valleys and its richer pasture and -cultivation. South of Hebron the range spreads fanwise and gradually -sinks to the desert. - -The most impressive memories of the land, so far as its form and -contour go, are two--the gorges cleft through the Judean mountain, and -certain isolated conical hills thrown up from the Samaritan valleys. -Judea is mountain, emphasised by gorge; Samaria is valley, diversified -by hill. The gorges are uncompromising. When we read, for instance, the -third verse of the seventh chapter of Joshua, we think of an ordinary -march--“The men went up and viewed Ai. And they returned to Joshua, and -said unto him, Let not all the people go up; but let about two or three -thousand men go up and smite Ai; and make not all the people to labour -thither.” But he who has himself “gone up” from Jericho to Ai puts -feeling into his reading of the words “to labour thither.” That is the -only way of going up. The recollection is of several hours of -precipitous riding, with beasts stumbling and riders pitched ahead. When -the climb is over you turn aside to the south, and view the gully of -Michmash along whose northern edge you have scrambled inland. It looks -not like a valley, but a crack in rocks, hundreds of feet deep. The -valley of Achor, next to the south of Michmash, presents an almost more -dramatic appearance as you view its entrance from the Jordan foot-hills. -It gapes on the plain, like the open mouth of some petrified monster. - -The isolated hills of the northern territory are in their way as -memorable as the gorges of the south. In Judea you cannot see the -mountains for “the mountain.” The whole land is one great elevated -range, and the noticeable features of the district are the gorges that -cut across it. Samaria, on the other hand, is a place of valleys and of -plains, and its mountains are seen as mountains. This fact finds its -most striking instance in certain “Gilgals,” or isolated cones standing -free in the midst of plain, or cut off by circular valleys round their -bases. The most perfect of these is that which bears the name of Gilgal, -rising detached in the wide valley to the south-east of Jacob’s Well.[7] -It is in shape an almost perfect cone, whose gradual curve renders it -very easy of ascent. The Hill of Samaria itself is another such -“Gilgal,” the centre of a splendid circular panorama of hills. Sanur, in -the country of Judith and Holophernes, is a third, on a smaller scale, -but with even wider panorama. North of Esdraelon, again a long ripple of -mountains sweeps round at least one such Gilgal, leaving Sepphoris -isolated on the peak of it. And Tabor itself might plausibly be counted -in this class--Tabor the irrelevant, whose cone seems always to be -peeping over the shoulder of some lower ridge, unlike any other -landmark, commanding all the views eastward from the heights of -Nazareth. These curious cones are in Palestine to some extent what the -Righi is in Switzerland. With the exception of Tabor, they are but -lesser heights; yet they give the widest mountain views, and seem to -shape the land into a succession of circles, of which their summits are -the centre-points. - -The mountains of Israel are the characteristic features of her history -as of her geography. In every part of Syria they are the companions of -the journey. Great - -[Illustration: MOUNT HERMON, FROM THE SLOPES OF TABOR. - -The lofty mountain in the extreme distance is Mount Hermon.] - -distant masses, or near crests of them, seem to accompany you as you -move. And as you travel through the history of the land it is in the -same companionship. The Jordan valley lies along the western side of the -mountain range, a place of luxury and temptation. But Israel abides on -the hills, sending down to it only the most degenerate of her children. -It is a very striking fact that Jesus was tempted to sin for bread on -the mountain almost within sight of Jericho, where the Herodians were -sinning with surfeits of wine and rich meats. All that is truest to -Israel and most characteristic of her at her best is on the hills. They -are the places of her war and of her worship. The Gilgals have almost -all stood siege. All, or at least the most of them, have been fortified. -On some of them the rude remains of ancient sacred circles, or the -decayed steps of altars cut in the rock, may still be traced. Her -enemies found by bitter experience that “her gods are gods of the -hills.” Her ark had its abode on the tableland at Shiloh or on the hill -of Zion. Its history on the low ground was but a story of calamity; it -had to be sent up again to Kirjath-Jearim among the hills. Yet the -heights of Israel stand for more than this blend of war and worship; -they were her home. All her greater towns nestle among them somewhere; -most of them stand on the summits, or just below them. It was a race of -Highlanders that gave us our Bible--men whose home was on the heights. - -Her wars, indeed, were everywhere, for it is a blood-drenched land. -Many of her battles were fought at the edge of the mountain-land, on the -kopjes that run along the southern border of Esdraelon, or among the -foot-hills near the mouth of the western gorges. There, or on the great -plain, she met her invaders. But the heights were the scenes of battles -in the last resort, and the gorges are associated with the advance and -retreat of armed hosts, the rush of the invader and the headlong retreat -of armies that had been surprised and routed from above. - -Meanwhile, in the middle spaces, she fought her continuous battle with -the desert and the sun for her daily bread. It is said that in Malta, -where every possible spot is cultivated, the earth has been all -imported, and that the Knights of Malta allowed no vessel to enter the -harbour without paying dues in soil. The denuded hill-sides of -Palestine, with their ruined heaps of stones that once built up terraces -for cultivation, tell a similar story. On some hillsides the remains of -sixty or even eighty such terraces may still be traced. In many places -the valleys are rich in an altogether superfluous depth of fertile soil. -But this did not suffice the inhabitants, and they built up the terraces -along the southward slopes, in many places quite to the walls of their -mountain villages. On not a few of these slopes labour must have -actually created land, and men’s hearts grown strong within them as they -changed the rocks into gardens and the slopes of shingle into harvest -fields. - - - - -CHAPTER IV - -THE WATERS OF ISRAEL - - -Keeping in mind our view of Palestine as an oasis, we naturally turn at -once to the thought of the waters that have retrieved it from the -desert. By far the most conspicuous of these is the Jordan, flowing down -a long course to its deep-dug grave in the Dead Sea. At whatever point -we approach that great valley the eye is inevitably led along it -northward to the white Hermon, whose great “breastplate” shines over all -the land. That mountain, and the Lebanons of which it is the southern -outpost, are the real makers of Palestine. - -There was a beautiful poetry of Hermon which from earliest times made it -a sacrament of sweet thoughts to Israel. Perhaps the sweetest thought it -gave her was that of dew. In every part of that land of clear skies, a -heavy dew lies upon the ground at sunrise. Poetic feeling, undertaking -the work of science, interpreted this dew as Hermon’s gift, so that “the -dew that descended on the mountains of Zion” was “the dew of Hermon” -(Psalm cxxxiii. 3). The meteorology is faulty, but the larger idea is -true. The cool and glistening snow-field, more than a hundred miles -away from Zion, does indeed send out and receive again the waters that -refresh the land in an endless round. “The Abana dies in the marsh of -Ateibeh, yielding its spirit to the sun, as Jordan dies in the Dead Sea, -and, rising into clouds again, both of them wafted to the snow-peaks -where they were born, they pour down their old waters in a current ever -new, in that circuit of life and death which God has ordained for -all.”[8] - -So conspicuous are these two rivers that we almost need to remind -ourselves that they are not the only waters of Israel. There are several -perennial streams in Syria, of which something will be said presently; -but the list of these by no means exhausts the stores of water in the -land. Great stretches of the country are apparently waterless, -especially in the south, and yet water is almost everywhere, -underground. In many parts the soil and surface-rock are soft, lying on -a hard bed-rock at various depths below. Accordingly we find that one of -the most mysterious and characteristic features of the south country is -its underground waters.[9] Springs and streamlets find their way through -fissures or filter through porous stone to the harder rock below, and -flow along subterranean channels there. Zangwill quotes an older -authority for the somewhat startling statement that “the entire plain of -Sharon seems to cover a vast subterranean river, and this inexhaustible -source of wealth underlies the whole territory of the Philistines.” -Putting the ear to any crack in the sunburnt clay of the surface, in -certain parts, one may hear the subdued growl and murmur of the waters -underneath. Trees flourish in places where there is no water apparent, -their roots bathing in unseen streams, and drawing life and freshness -from them. One can well understand the feelings of awe with which -primitive people regarded these mysterious nether springs. They did not -connect them with the idea of rain from above, as modern science does, -but believed that they had forced their way up from “the Great Deep,” -which was supposed to underlie the earth, and into which the roots of -the mountains were thrust far down like gigantic anchors of the world. -Some of the rivers of Damascus are also underground, “and may often be -seen and heard through holes in the surface.”[10] Jerusalem is a -waterless city, whose famous pools are tanks for rain-water. Its one -spring is that strange intermittent one which overflows from the Well of -the Virgin through Hezekiah’s aqueduct to the Pool of Siloam. Yet there -are legends that beneath the sacred rock which the mosque of Omar covers -there is a subterranean torrent; and that the rushing of hidden waters -has been heard at times below the massive stones of the Damascus Gate of -the city. - -These underground waters have given to Palestine a still more -interesting feature at the points where her greatest rivers rise. This -is the sudden emergence of full-bodied streams from the ground. These -rivers have, so to speak, no infancy. Their springs are not little toy -fountains with trickling rivulets. They bound into the world full-grown, -with a rush and fury which is perhaps unparalleled in any other land. -This inspiring and suggestive phenomenon has not been without its effect -on the national thought and imagination. In the midst of one of the most -gloriously forceful passages of Isaiah (chap. xxxv.) the vigour and -impetuousness of the prophecy finds its climax in the sudden leap of -waters which “break out” in the wilderness, and which are described in -the same breath as the first glad leap of the restored lame man, leaping -“as an hart.” When Moses in his blessing of the tribes speaks of Dan -“leaping from Bashan,” he refers to that wonderful spot where Jordan, in -the tribe of Dan, leaps up from below Hermon. Matthew Arnold, had he -chanced to think of it, might have seen in his delight in full and -rushing streams another link connecting him with the Hebrew race with -which he so quaintly claims affinity. - -The south country keeps its rivers for the most part below ground, -though even there considerable streams suddenly break out. Conder -describes deep blue pools of fresh water near Antipatris which “well up -close beneath the hillock surrounded by tall canes and willows, rushes -and grass.”[11] Yet the greatest outbursts are in the north. One -traveller describes a river-source in Lebanon as an abyss of seething -black waters, into which he rolled large stones, only to see them -presently reappear, flung up like corks from the depths. At one of its -sources the Abana bursts from the masonry of some ancient temples “a -pure and copious river, rushing into light at once as if free.” - -It is at Hermon that we find the true centre of the water supply of -Palestine. Parts of it are under snow all the year round, and it gives -off some thirty streams flowing in every direction. Not one of these -streams reaches the Mediterranean. They flow forth only to evaporate -sooner or later in some inland morass or sea, and to return in vapour -that will be condensed again by the snows of Hermon. Conder describes -one of these in the north, whose water “rushes out suddenly with a -roaring noise from a cavern” in winter, and transforms the plain below -into a lake. But the great work of Hermon is the Jordan, two of whose -three sources leap up from its roots. The most striking of these is that -of Banias, which Jewish tradition names as one of the three springs of -Palestine which “remained not closed up after the Flood.” On the crest -of a spur of Hermon stands the ruined castle of Subeibeh, one of the -noblest ruins in the world. From the castle you descend 1400 feet to the -village of Banias, the ancient Caesarea Philippi. The descent, over -basalt boulders whose interstices are filled for the most part with -thorn-bushes, is said in the guide-books to be practicable for horses. -One wonders how long the horses are supposed to survive the journey! The -view across and down the Jordan valley is indescribably grand. Near the -foot the path curves round the top of a precipice and doubles back on a -lower level to a white-washed Mohammedan weli, or praying-house. Just -below, as you look down from the weli, a large cavern is seen, with -niches beautifully carved in the rocks beside it. On one of these niches -is the inscription “To Pan and the Nymphs,” and on another the names -“Augustus and Augustina.” Here, most likely on the site of a prehistoric -holy place of the Semites, stood the Roman temple which Herod built in -honour of Augustus. Nor is it wonderful that these and so many other -faiths have counted this a sacred place; for Jordan used to pour forth -from that cavern, clear and full-bodied. Now the old cave-channel is -choked up with debris, and Jordan forces its way to light in many -smaller fountains among the stones and earth of the open space below, -which is coloured by long trails of slime. Within a few yards the -streams unite in a rich green pool, with reeds and luxuriant -water-growth. The second source of Jordan is even more impressive. It is -at Tell-el-Kadi, some two miles west from Banias. On the western side of -this Tell, on which there are traces and ruins of an ancient city, there -is a thicket of rank undergrowth, from beneath whose lowest branches and -creepers the river suddenly appears, spreads immediately into a wide -pool, and within a hundred yards is racing violently south in foaming -rapids. The pool was reported to be bottomless, but the irrepressible -little canoe _Rob Roy_ was launched upon its boiling waters, and the -depth proved to be but five feet! - -Jordan is a river worth much study, interesting from - -[Illustration: THE GOLDEN, OR BEAUTIFUL, GATE, FROM THE GARDEN OF -GETHSEMANE. - -The well is in the upper part of the Garden of Gethsemane.] - -every point of view--geographical, historical, religious.[12] Changing -in colour, as the floods wash down their various soils to it, it tumbles -and rushes south through a stretch of some 137 miles without a single -cascade till it sweeps, with strong and level current, into the Dead -Sea. At Banias its height above the Mediterranean is about 1000 feet, -but the extraordinary valley is chiselled on a running slope down to the -depths of the earth. Clouds have been seen sweeping above its bed 500 -feet below the level of the ocean. The Dead Sea level is 1290 feet below -the Mediterranean; its bottom, at the deepest part, is as deep again. -Spanned by a few bridges, of which only one or two are now entire, the -river’s course is for the most part through solitudes without -inhabitants, or tenanted but by a few half-savage people. The valley is -alternately wide and narrow, swelling out in five broad expanses, of -which the two northern are lakes, and the other three are plains. From -Banias to the last confluence of the different head-streams is a -distance of some seven miles through green land. Soon after that point -the river loses itself in a vast forest of impenetrable papyrus canes -growing in shallow water, from which it emerges in a little lake or -clear space half a mile lower. Then it flows, a solemn and glassy -stream, for some three miles and a half down a sharp-edged lane whose -perpendicular banks are tall papyrus canes, till it glides silently out, -a hundred feet in breadth, into Lake Huleh. From Huleh to the Sea of -Galilee is ten miles, along the greater part of which the river tears -through a narrow gorge. Emerging clear and broad from the Sea of Galilee -it soon begins its innumerable windings. A few streams flow into it -perennially from east and west, and countless torrents after rain. In -the north it quickens a poisonous soil into rank vegetation, and spreads -its superfluous waters on steaming swamps, full of malaria. Opposite -Shechem its clay is good for moulding, and the mounds which break the -level are for the most part apparently the remains of old brickfields or -brass foundries. As it descends to the broadest of its plains at Jericho -the valley falls into three distinct levels. From the hills a flat -expanse of desolation spreads towards the river, till it falls in steep -banks of 150 to 200 feet to the lower level of the “trench” down which -the river flows in flood. Finally, in the centre of this lies the -ordinary channel, at whose banks the trees and undergrowth seem to -crouch and kneel over the sullen brown stream. - -There are other perennial rivers in Syria, but their courses are short. -The Litany (Leontes) rises between the Lebanons a short distance north -of the highest springs of Jordan. For many miles the two flow in -parallel courses, divided only by the little ridge of Jebel-es-Zoar. But -before Jordan has passed its new springs at Banias, the Litany has swept -to the west in a sharp right angle, to pour itself into the ocean north -of Tyre. It is a fine stream, yellow with rich loam, but its bed is in -the sharp angle of valleys whose sides remind one of the Screes of -Wastwater. Its descent is so rapid that even if there were meadows in -the bottoms of its gorges, it would hurry past them to pour its treasure -of water and of soil alike into the thankless sea. The Abana, rising in -the same region as the springs of the other two, has a course of only -some fifty miles. Kishon, which waters the Plain of Esdraelon, is -certainly the most generous in the matter of cultivated fields, but it -is also the most treacherous. Its fords are never certain, for great -masses of sand and mud are shifted to and fro in the most unaccountable -manner. The rest of the perennial rivers are either tributaries of the -Jordan, companions of the Abana in its eastern course, or streams from -Carmel or the central mountain range, whose short course to the -Mediterranean is of little account. - -As we think of these rivers flowing through a land which so sorely needs -their help, we cannot but feel oppressed by a sense of waste that is -almost tragic. There is no boat plying on any of them. Most are, indeed, -far too rapid for that, but not everywhere. The guide-book speaks of a -steamer plying on the lower reaches of Jordan; and the local story of -oppression there--every district has its particular grievance--is of two -boats that had been brought for the service of the monastery, and then -confiscated by Government. The only boats of any kind we saw on fresh -water between Hebron and Damascus were two on the Sea of Galilee, manned -by Syrians in red jerseys, on which the magic letters were inscribed, -“COOK.” In the old days it must have been very different. There is -mention of a ferry-boat on the Jordan in 2 Sam. xix. 18, and in Christ’s -time there must have been a considerable fishing fleet on the lake. The -trireme on the coins of Gadara reminds us of Roman vessels which sailed -there for warlike purposes, and here and there you find a valley dammed -across its breadth for the construction of an artificial lake, on which -a _naumachia_ or naval fight might add piquancy to the games. There is -an island in the Dead Sea itself on which what are supposed to be ruins -of a landing-stage are still visible, showing that long ago even these -uncanny waters were not without their sailors. There used to be a -wrecked boat in the Ateibeh marsh from which three men had been drowned. -The wreck of another boat was still visible some years ago under the -surface of Lake Huleh. These wrecks are but too truthfully symbolic of -the fate of men’s attempts to utilise the waters of Israel. The Abana, -indeed, is utilised. Never was river so wholly taken possession of by a -city as Abana by Damascus. She flows into it--right into the heart of -it--and disappears underground; she is led captive into a thousand -fountains in public streets and the courts of private houses; she is -sent in a thousand little channels to irrigate the gardens which -surround it. All the more pitiful is her ending in that wild and haunted -morass of Ateibeh, where she yields up her waters to the desert and the -sun. - -The fate of Jordan seems still more tragic. In the far north his waters -are indeed utilised to some small extent for irrigation, but for the -vastly longer part of his course he does nothing but flee through the -wilderness to the bitter sea in the south. Dr. Ross has strikingly -summed up Jordan’s career in the words: “So, in a valley which is -thirsting for water, the Jordan rushes along to an inglorious end.” Yet -that is only one aspect of the matter. Jordan gave Israel her last story -of Elijah and her first of Christ’s ministry. Neither association is of -the kindly sort which a nation’s sentiment usually gathers round its -rivers. There is, as it were, the glitter of fire from the prophet’s -departure for ever lending to these brown waters a sort of unearthly -grandeur. Those fiery horses which bathed their feet here take the place -of the gentle memories of generations of lovers or little children. Yet -that is true to the spirit of the river. To Israel it stood for a very -forceful and practical fact. Their first crossing of Jordan began their -national life in Palestine and cut them off from the desert. So, to the -end, the Jordan stood for this to them, and that was much. Jordan -created no great city as Abana created Damascus; but it streamed down -the side of the east, flinging, as it were, a great arm round the land, -claiming it from the desert, and proclaiming this to be oasis and the -home of men. Disraeli characteristically writes: “All the great things -have been done by the little nations. It is the Jordan and the Ilyssus -that have civilised the modern races.” And truly it is the Jordan that -is in great part responsible for the Hebrew share in that -civilisation--not by his material gifts, indeed, which were ever -ungenerously given and carelessly gathered, but by his sentiment of -isolation and aloofness from the rest of the Eastern world, to which we -owe much that is best in our inheritance from Israel. - -For the homelier uses and gentler thoughts of Israel’s waters we must -turn to the lesser fountains and streams. There is, it is true, much -disillusionment for the sentimentalist even here. Remembering the sweet -music in which they have been sung--the “Song of the Well” (“Spring up, -O Well, sing ye unto it!”) or the “gently flowing waters” of the 23rd -Psalm--one expects the perfection of purity and freshness. Early -tradition has pictured the angel Gabriel meeting with Mary at the -village spring of Nazareth; nor is that the only Syrian fountain by -which the footsteps of angels have been traced. All the more trying is -the reality. Hideously tattooed women squat by the sweetest springs, -fling filthy garments into them, and beat them with stones till the -stream flows brown below them; or they toil wearily a mile or two away -from their villages to fill the heavy water-pots, beasts of burden -rather than mothers in Israel. Of cleanliness the natives have not the -remotest idea. We used to see them filling their vessels from a stream -where our horses were being washed down after their day’s ride, and they -seemed on principle to choose a spot just below that where the horse was -standing. Often the water seemed calculated to assuage hunger rather -than thirst. The natives drank it freely when it was mere mud in -solution; and even when it was clear, the glass bottles on the table -sometimes presented the appearance of lively and well-stocked aquariums. -Our squeamishness was unintelligible even to our camp-servants, who -drank in defiance large draughts of the water we refused. The landmarks -of the hot journey are the pools where one may bathe, and the first -sight of Elisha’s Fountain and the Well of Harod is refreshing to -remember still. But one touch of the bottom mud sufficed to bring to the -surface a gas which sent us posthaste to our stores of quinine--and yet -the deliciousness of the plunge was worth the risk! - -The spell of the fountains remains in spite of all, and no traveller -wonders that the ancient men revered them as sacred places. Israel -exulted in the forcefulness of her larger rivers, but hardly knew their -kindlier resources. Her affection was kept for those wells and -streamlets which flowed past her doors and made glad her cities. It is a -land of dried-up torrent-beds, and no river made glad any City of God -except at the seasons when God had filled it with His rain. In such a -land a wayside well like Jacob’s counts for more than our Western -imagination can realise. Property in water was an older institution than -property in land. These wayside wells and “sealed fountains” refreshed -men from time immemorial in the very presence of their enemies. They -were the choicest riches of their owners. The journey from south to -north leads one ever more frequently in among such springs, but many -towns of the south are built at places where there is abundance of -them. Hebron has twelve little fountains; Gaza fifteen. In Samaria they -burst forth in every valley, and the vale of Nablus is a net-work of -rivulets, springing, it is said, from no fewer than eighty sources. In -Galilee they are still more abundant. At Khan Minyeh, supposed by many -to be the site of the ancient Capernaum, the ruins are mostly those of -aqueducts, and springs break forth and stream in little rivers -everywhere. - -The beauty and refreshing coolness of such fountains is very great. The -dripping walls of the Khan Minyeh aqueducts are covered with magnificent -bunches of maidenhair, whose fronds were the broadest we had ever seen. -The Well of Harod, close by the stream where Gideon tested his soldiers, -is one of the loveliest spots imaginable. There is a little cave, where -the pebbles shine up blue through the shallow water; ferns grow in its -crannies, and at the side a clear spring, two feet broad and five inches -deep, splashes into the pool from a recess entirely hidden by hanging -maidenhair. Nor is the natural beauty of these springs their only charm. -When one remembers the days of old through which they flowed, and the -men who stooped to drink of them so along ago, all that was most sacred -and most heroic to one’s childhood lives again, and speaks to the heart. -Ay! and to the conscience too; for these were the springs that gave to -Bible men their metaphors of a fountain opened for sin and for -uncleanness; this is the land in which it sprang up and from which it -has flowed forth with cleansing and refreshment for the whole earth. - -[Illustration: THE LAKE OF GALILEE, LOOKING NORTH FROM TIBERIAS. - -The road at the left of the picture is the main road to the north from -Tiberias.] - - - - -CHAPTER V - -BROWN VILLAGES, WHITE TOWNS, AND A GREY CITY - - -Nothing could better illustrate the completeness of the change through -which Israel passed when she exchanged a nomadic for a settled life than -the great importance which the idea of _the city_ has in the Bible. -Kinglake describes the Jordan as “a boundary between the people living -under roofs and the tented tribes that wander on the farther side.” The -very name of “city,” applied to these grotesque little hamlets, shews -how seriously they took themselves, and compels an amused respect for so -mighty a little self-importance, for a “King” of that time might be -compared with a chairman of parish council to-day. The idea of the city -became more and more part of the religion of Israel as Jerusalem rose to -religious as well as civil importance. To them God was a city-dweller, -and there is an eastern saying about lonely wanderers journeying -homeless towards the sunset, that they are “going to God’s gate.” - -The changing history of the land has passed it through many phases, and -no doubt there are far wider differences between the centuries in -respect of men’s dwellings than in respect of those natural features of -the land which we have been studying in the preceding pages. This -chapter will describe present conditions. And yet in spite of changes -the aspect of things must be pretty much what it always was. Men -gathered into cities on some strongly fortified hill for purposes of -war, or around some holy place for worship, or in some fertile valley -for safe agriculture; and the sites thus chosen are retained for the -most part. With the exception of the wandering tents, which are -occasionally seen throughout the land, there is hardly a solitary -dwelling in Palestine which is not a ruin. And the want of good roads, -together with the uncertain government, seems still to keep the village -communities more apart than they are in most countries. Each village has -a character and a reputation of its own, and cherishes views regarding -its neighbours which it is not slow to impart either to them or to -foreigners. The colour of these townships divides them into the three -classes of our title. Damascus and Beyrout are beyond the scope of the -present description--Damascus, the greyest city in the world so far as -age is concerned; and Beyrout, the over-grown white town upon which the -ends of the world are come, leaving it little individual character of -its own. Keeping to the south of these, we have the clearly marked -division, with little overlapping. A brown village may indeed have a -white church or mosque gleaming from its bosom, and the walls of some -towns besides Jerusalem are grey; yet in the main it is a land of brown -villages, white towns, and one grey city. - - * * * * * - -The villages are very brown--“dust-coloured,” as they have been happily -called. Seen from a distance they generally look inviting, but it takes -the traveller no long time to believe that a near approach will -certainly disillusionise him. They have many sorts of charm in the -distance. Some of them are set up on the edge of a hill, and these seen -from below present all the appearance of fortification, their flat roofs -and perpendicular sides giving them an angular and military aspect. -Others are surrounded by neatly walled and cultivated olive-yards which -give the promise of a well-conditioned village. In the rare instances -where trees are planted among the dwellings, the flat brown roofs seem -to nestle among the branches in delightful contentment and restfulness. -Where trees are absent there is generally a high cactus hedge, serving -as an enclosing wall, which sets the village in a pleasant green. Even -those hamlets which have about them no green of any kind are not -uninviting, especially if they are built on a hill-slope. There is a -peculiar formality and neatness given by irregular piles of flat-roofed -buildings overlapping each other at different levels. But as you -approach, all is disillusionment. The trees seem to detach themselves -and stand apart in the untidy paths. The cactus hedge is repulsive, with -its spiked pulpy masses and its bare and straggling roots. The brown -walls seem to decay before your eyes, and the village seen from within -its own street changes to a succession of ruinous heaps of débris, with -excavations into the mud of the hillside. If, as at Nain, there be a -white-walled church or mosque in the place, it seems to stand alone in a -long moraine of ruins. An acrid smell hangs upon the air, for the fuel -is dried cakes of dung. These are plastered over the walls of low ovens -into which the mud seems to swell in great blisters by the street-side. -In some of these ovens crowds of filthy children and tattooed women are -sitting, while the men loiter in idle rows along the house walls. When -suddenly you say to yourself that this is Shunem, or this Nain, or -Magdala, the disappointment is complete. - -In some places the houses are built of stones gathered from the ancient -ruins of the neighbourhood (Colonel Conder believes that in hardly any -instance are the stones fresh quarried). Other houses consist simply of -four walls of mud, with a roof of the same material laid upon branches -set across. A small stone roller may be seen lying somewhere on the -roof, for in heat the mud cracks and needs to be rolled now and then to -keep the rain from leaking through. The sheikh, or headman of the -village, has a better house--often the one respectable habitation in the -place, but suggestive of a ruined tower at that. It is a two-storeyed -building, whose great feature is the public hall, or reception-room, -where local matters are discussed and strangers interviewed. There is no -glass in the windows, and the strong sunlight deepens the gloom of the -interiors to a rich brown darkness with points of high light and -colour. The shade is precious in these sun-smitten places, and Conder -narrates an incident which often recurs to mind in them. It was in the -cave of the Holy House at Nazareth, the reputed home of Jesus in His -boyhood. The visitor “observed to the monk that it was dark for a -dwelling-house, but he answered very simply, ‘The Lord had no need of -much light.’” The rooms are almost bare of furniture, a bed and a few -water-jars in a corner being sometimes the only objects visible. In some -of them the floor space is divided into two levels, half the room being -a platform two or three feet higher than the other half. On this -platform the family lives, while the cattle occupy the lower part; and -along the edge of the platform there are hollows in its floor, which -serve as mangers for the beasts. No doubt it was in such a manger that -Jesus was laid in Bethlehem. - -The inhabitants of these villages are the Fellahin, of whom Conder has -given so interesting a description.[13] He recognises in them a people -of almost unmixed ancient stock. Distinct from Bedawin and from Turks, -they are the “modern Canaanites,” probably descendants of the original -inhabitants whom Israel displaced. These were never quite exterminated; -and although there have no doubt been many minor instances of the -absorption of other breeds, yet in the main they remain very much as -they were when they talked with Jesus in Aramaic, or even as they were -in days much earlier than His. A slight enrichment to their lives has -been made by each of the invaders, and reminiscences of Israel, Rome, -the early Christians, the Crusaders, may be found blended with their -Mohammedanism. But they are conservative to the last degree, and any -radical change seems an impossibility among them. Many things contribute -to this conservatism, among which perhaps the chief is the tradition of -intermarriage between the inhabitants of the same village. Another -factor is their extraordinary ignorance, combined with a pride no less -remarkable. It would be difficult to find anywhere men so self-satisfied -on such small capital of merit. A third cause of their immovableness is -to be found in the usury and oppression by which they are held down; and -even their local self-government--that _imperium in imperio_ which -prevails under the larger oppression of the Turk--keeps up, so far as it -is allowed, the ancestral ways and thoughts. In one respect this -conservatism of theirs is a gain to the world: it has preserved among -them those habits of speech and manner with which the Bible has made us -all so familiar; and it is to them, with all their faults, that we owe -much of the “sacramental value” of Palestine travel. - -As for their faults, no doubt they are many, but it is not for the -passing stranger to attempt an estimate of their character. The most -obvious lapses are sins of speech, and one always has the impression -that the interpreter is toning down as he translates. One can see that -property is insecure, and life by no means so sacred as in the West. One -incident brought this home to us vividly. Some of our party had been -detained on an exploring excursion till after dark. When we asked a -group of natives what could have become of them, the answer was more -significant than reassuring, for they pointed with their fingers -vertically downwards! It was not so bad as that, however, for we soon -heard revolver shots, and answered them. We fired into a field, aiming -at a large stack of corn to prevent accidents. Conceive our horror when -a silent figure in flowing robes rose from the centre of the stack! He -was spending the night there to keep his property from thieves. For the -rest, it is their laziness that strikes one most forcibly. Their -agriculture is as leisurely as it is primitive. They sit while reaping, -and thresh by standing upon boards studded with flints, which oxen draw -over the threshing-floors. Their ploughs are but iron-shod sticks which -scratch the surface of the field. In outlandish districts they are -described as mere savages, but we saw little to justify such a -criticism. They are uncompromisingly dirty everywhere, yet their food is -simple, and they appear in the main to be healthy enough. At first one’s -impression of them is of universal gloom, sulky and contemptuous; but -the mood soon changes if you stay among them for a little time, and the -knit brows relax to a smiling childishness. - - * * * * * - -Of white towns, with a population between 3000 and 3500, there are about -a dozen in Palestine, of which, excluding Damascus and Beyrout, the best -known are Haifa and Acre, Tyre and Sidon, Tiberias, Jenin, Nablus, -Bethlehem, Hebron, Gaza, Jaffa. They shine from far as you approach -them. Some, like Jenin, gleam most picturesquely from among palm trees; -others, like Nazareth seen from Jezreel, shew like stars of white in -high mountain valleys; and yet others, like Bethshan, appear “like white -islands in the mouth of an estuary.” The nearer view of Nazareth, when -the hill has been climbed and the town suddenly reveals itself, is one -of rare beauty. You are looking down into an oval hollow full of clean -and bright houses. Many cypress trees and spreading figs enrich the -prospect, and the whole picture is most pleasing. Bethlehem, again, has -a picturesqueness that is all its own. Approaching it from the south, -the track turns sharply into a valley whose end is entirely blocked by a -lofty hill, covered along its whole length with shining white masonry -set far up against the sky. It looks trim and newly finished; and one -hardly knows whether to be delighted or vexed that Bethlehem should be -so workmanlike a place. - -But it is the sea-coast towns which are the most characteristic of their -class. Tyre is a surprisingly living and wide-awake place still, and the -name recalls ever some vista of blue sea with ships seen through the -white arches or rich foliage that decorate the town’s western front. -Jaffa is still more surprising. It is usual to embark at Port Said late -in the evening, and when you wake in the morning and find the steamer at -anchor, the first sight of Palestine that greets you is Jaffa, framed in -the brass circle of the port-hole--a very perfect and brilliant little -picture. The town is set well up, a conical - -[Illustration: THE FOUNTAIN OF THE VIRGIN AT NAZARETH.] - -hill of sparkling colour, backed, as we first saw it, by cloudless -Syrian sky, into which it ran its two minarets. It was larger than we -had imagined, and much loftier, with a very bold and gaily tilted -edge-line--a city set on its hill, and with a mighty consciousness of -being so set, like Coventry Patmore’s old English cottage. Dark-leaved -trees, red roofs, and occasional jewel-like points of green, where -copper cupolas have been weathered, light up the picture into one of the -most ideal of its kind. - -Within, the white towns shew a strange mixture of splendour and of -sordidness. The streets are aggressively irregular, and the whole -impresses one as at once ancient and unfinished. The wider spaces are -full of colour and of noise, and the houses which surround them are a -patchwork of all manner of buildings, with smaller structures leaning -against their sides, and gaudy awnings of ragged edge protecting -doorways from the sun. Where the street narrows, it is filled with -crowds of men, women, and children, and laden donkeys pushing them aside -as they pass along. There are lanes, also, in deep shadow, with -buttresses and long archways converting them into high and narrow -tunnels. The shopkeepers in these lanes sit behind their piles of -merchandise and converse in shrill voices with neighbours on the other -side, not six feet away. The whole appearance of the town is that of -close-huddled dwellings, which have squeezed themselves into as little -space as possible, and have been forced to expand upwards for want of -lateral room. - -These towns are the mingling-places of Syria--crucibles of its national -life, in which new and composite races are being molten. One or two of -them, like Nablus and Hebron, are inhabited chiefly by a fanatical -Moslem population, and in these life stagnates. But the others are open -to the world. In the past, long before the modern stream of travellers -came, this process was going on. In very early times the towns were -recruited by the neighbouring Canaanites and Arabs. They were, as they -still are, so insanitary that if it were not for such additions their -population would soon die out. In Christ’s time the Greek and Roman -world poured itself into them; then came the long train of Christian -pilgrims; after that the Crusader hosts. Each of these, and many other -incursions, have helped to mix the race of townsfolk. In Bethlehem and -elsewhere there are many descendants of the Crusaders, whose fair hair -and complexion tells its own tale. But the mingling of races has gone on -with quite a new rapidity during the last few decades. Trade and travel -have combined to force the West upon the East. Circassians, Kurds, -Turks, Jews, Africans, Cypriotes have settled there. Travellers who have -twice visited the land, with an interval of some years between their -visits, are struck by the sudden and sweeping change. Even the passing -visitor cannot fail to perceive it. The villagers remain apart, -intermarrying within the village or with neighbouring Fellahin. The -townspeople bring their brides from other towns, and sometimes from -other nations. Many kinds of imported goods are exposed for sale in the -bazaars. There are parts of Damascus where nothing is sold that was not -made in Europe. The habits of the West are also invading towns. -Intoxicating liquors are freely sold, and in Nazareth there are now no -fewer than seventeen public-houses. “Paris fashions”--probably -belated--are ousting the ancient customs. Tattooing is quite out of -fashion among the women of the towns, and knives and forks have -penetrated native houses even in Hebron. The traveller comes into -contact with the townspeople far less fully than with the villagers. In -the towns everybody is minding some business or other of his own, and -the stranger meets with the residenter merely as buyer with seller. Once -only did we see the interior of a town house, and that visit confirmed -the impression of a new and composite life very remarkably. It was in -Tyre. An agreeable native, who had brought some curiosities for sale, -invited us to go home with him and inspect his stock. The house was in a -narrow street, but the rooms were large. His wife sat near the window -smoking a nargileh, her eyebrows painted black, and her face heavily -powdered and rouged. The room was crowded with furniture. There were a -sofa and two European beds with mosquito curtains; a new English -wardrobe of carved walnut, with a large mirror; a kitchen dresser -covered with dinner dishes of the customary European kind. Dry-goods -boxes were drawn forth from under the beds and the sofa, and pasteboard -boxes from drawers and shelves, all filled with the most indescribable -medley of curiosities from rifled tombs. Bracelets, tear-bottles, -ear-rings came to light in rapid succession. Finally, a square foot of -lead-work appeared--part of a leaden winding-sheet which had recently -been torn off an ancient corpse in a sarcophagus--a heavy shroud, finely -ornamented with deep-moulded garlands and figures. Our hosts were -good-humoured and pleasant people, who conducted the conversation in -some five different languages, and appeared to combine in themselves and -their properties several centuries of human life. - - * * * * * - -The grey city of Jerusalem stands unique among the towns of Palestine. -With the brown villages it has nothing in common. The immense variety of -its buildings, with their domes, flat terraces, minarets, and sloping -roofs, distinguishes it at once from the rectangular masses of the -villages. As if on purpose to emphasise the contrast, one of these -villages has set itself right opposite the city across a narrow valley. -Looking from the southern wall of the Haram enclosure, this village of -Siloam is seen sprawling along the opposite hillside, a mere drift of -square hovels seen across some fields of artichokes. Nothing could -appear more miserable; inferiority is confessed in every line of it. - -More might be said for the description of Jerusalem as the largest of -the white towns. It is, like them, a centre where races mingle; indeed -it is _the_ centre of such mingling. All roads lead to it from north, -south, east, and west; and when one suddenly comes upon one of those old -Roman roads which make for Jerusalem with such purposeful and grim -directness over the Judean mountains, one realises that this has been -the centre and mingling-place of nationalities for many centuries. Yet -on the spot an obvious distinction is felt at once. There are two -Jerusalems: the old one within the walls, and a new one spreading on the -open ground to the west and north. This “new Levantine city side by side -with the old Oriental city” is quite a modern place. When Stanley wrote -his _Sinai and Palestine_ it was unsafe to inhabit houses outside the -walls. Now such houses are clustered together to the west in a city -which is actually larger than the enclosed one, and whose rows of shops -are hardly distinguishable from those of Western Europe. A strange -medley its buildings are! The best sites are occupied by the great -Russian Cathedral and Hospice, white-walled and leaden-roofed. Beyond -these, embedded in Jewish “colonies,” are the European consulates, with -a Syrian Orphanage and an English Agricultural Settlement farther up the -slope. The Tombs of the Kings lie to the north, in all their desolation, -and the still more desolate Mound of Ashes which is supposed by some to -be a relic of Temple sacrifices; but these are next neighbours to the -Dominican monastery, the Bishop’s house, and the house of that curious -body of Americans known as the “Overcomers”; while on the hill, not a -mile above them, is an English villa. All this and much else pours -itself into the city and mingles in the streets with the very composite -life already dwelling there. Just at the foot of the hill which Gordon -identified as Calvary, while Turkish bugles were blowing from the fort, -we saw two Syrians engaged in rough horseplay, a party of Americans and -English riding, some tonsured and cowled monks on foot, and a travelling -showman with an ape clinging to him in terror of a tormenting crowd of -Jews and Mohammedans; while poor women, unconscious of any part in so -strange a tableau, were returning to the city with full waterpots on -their heads. - -Yet in Jerusalem all this makes a different impression from that of -other towns. The mingling of races here is but, as it were, the surface -appearance of a far more wonderful fact. From the days of Solomon, -Israel centralised her life in Jerusalem. On that hill the mountainland -seems to gather itself as in a natural centre, typical and -representative of the whole. There the nation centred its life also, in -“the mountain throne, and the mountain sanctuary of God.” Jeroboam’s -attempt to decentralise cost the nation dear; but in spite of that -attempt the centralisation took effect, and made her the most composite -of cities from the first. All ends of the earth meet here as in a focus. -Laden camels of the Arameans from the far East are making for the city, -and ships flying like a cloud of homing doves to their windows are -bearing precious freights to her port. History and religion are -compressed within the walls. On the spot no one can forget the ancient -geography which regarded Jerusalem as the centre of the earth, with Hell -vertically below, and the island of Purgatory its antipodes, and -Heaven’s centre overhead. In the Church of the Holy Sepulchre they shew -a flattened ball in a little hollow place as the centre of the world. As -in some other cases of faulty science, an imaginative mind may discover -here a happy truth beneath the error. The composite life of Jerusalem -without the walls is but of yesterday, that within the walls is hoary -with age. - -We have called it “a grey city,” and even in respect of colour this is a -true name. Not that there is any one colour of Jerusalem. In the varying -lights of sunrise, noon, afternoon, and evening, its colour changes. At -one time it hangs, airy and dreamlike, over the steep bank of the Valley -of Jehoshaphat; at another time it seems to sit solid on its rock, every -roof and battlement picked out in photographic clearness; again, in the -twilight of evening, all is sombre with rich purple shadows. There are -spots of colour, too, which break its monotonous dull hue. The Mosque of -Omar, with its faint metallic greenish colour, stands in contrast to -everything, and makes a background of the city for its isolated beauty. -There is another dome, that of the Synagogue of the Ashkenazim, whose -colour is a lustrous blue-green, shining over the city almost -luminously. White minarets and spires are seen here and there, and a few -red-tiled roofs have found place within the walls. Several spots are -softened by the foliage of trees, and the pools, whose edges are formed -of picturesque and irregular house-sides, catch and intensify the -colours in their rich reflections. Yet, in spite of all that, Jerusalem -is grey. The walls are grey with a touch of orange in it. The houses, -massed and huddled close within, are grey with a touch of blue. They are -built roughly, the stones divided by broad seams of mortar, and most of -them in their humble way conform to the fashion set by the Mosque of -Omar and the Holy Sepulchre, and are domed. But the domes of ordinary -houses are far from shapely, and suggest the fancy that the scorching -sun has blistered the flat roofs. - -By far the best view of Jerusalem is that which is seen from the Mount -of Olives, as one approaches the city by the hill-road from Bethany. Her -environs are of interest from many associations--there, on the Mount of -Offence, Solomon offered sacrifices to idols; yonder, on the hill of -Scopus, the main body of Titus’ troops was posted; here, near where we -stand, is the place of the agony in Gethsemane. For many days one might -go round about the city, every day gaining new knowledge of its story. -But what the first eye-shot gives is this: a sharp angle formed by the -two valleys of Jehoshaphat and Hinnom; steep banks rising from their -bottoms to the walls, which they overlap in an irregular and wavy line; -within the walls, glancing back from the angle which they form above the -junction of the valleys, the eye runs up a gradually rising expanse of -close-packed building, which is continued more sparsely in the long -rolling slope beyond, to the ridge of Scopus in the north, and to the -distant sweep of long level mountain-line in the west. It is as if the -whole city had slidden down and - -[Illustration: JOPPA FROM THE SEA.] - -been caught by that great angle of wall just before it precipitated -itself into the gorges. - -To see the grey city rightly, and feel how grey it is, you must view it -across these gorges. The more distant environs are detached from the -city. They are cultivated in patches, and dotted with modern buildings -of various degrees of irrelevance. But these are mere accidents, which -the place seems to ignore. The gorges themselves are part and parcel of -the city, and they stand for the overflow of her sad and desolate -spirit. Their sides are banks of rubbish--the wreckage and débris of a -score of sieges, the accumulation of three thousand years. You look from -the lower pool of Siloam in the valley of Hinnom, up a long dreary slope -of dark grey rubbish, down which a horrible black stream of liquid filth -trickles, tainting the air with its stench. Far off above you stands the -wall, which in old days enclosed the pool. Here the city seems to have -shrunk northwards, as if in some horror of conscience. The Field of -Blood and the Hill of Evil Counsel are just across the gorge to the -south. The valleys are full of tombs, those on the city side for the -most part Mohammedan, while the lower slopes of Olivet are paved with -the flat tombstones of Jews. - -What a stretch of history unrolls itself to the imagination of him who -lingers on the sight of Jerusalem! The boundaries seem to dwindle, till -that which stands there is the old grey battle-beaten fortress of the -Jebusites, the last post held by her enemies against Israel. David -conquers it, and the procession of priests and people bring up to its -gate the ark, for the celebration of whose entrance tradition has -claimed the 24th Psalm. A new city rises, and falls, and rises again, -through more than twenty sieges and rebuildings. Assyrians, Babylonians, -Romans, Moslems, Crusaders batter at its gates. The level of the streets -rises through the centuries, till now the traveller walks on a pavement -thirty or forty feet above the floor of the ancient city. To discover -the old foundations, the explorers of our time have sunk shafts which at -some parts of the wall touch bottom 120 feet below the present surface. -Far below the slighter masonry of the present wall, with its -battlemented Turkish work, lie the huge stones of early days, some of -which bear still the marks of Phœnician masons.[14] - -The gates, of course, are modern, though in some of them there are -immense stones of very ancient date, whose rustic work the Turkish -builders have cut away, and scored the flat surface with imitation seams -to make them match the small square stones of the building above. Yet -the positions of the ancient gates are not difficult to fix, and modern -ones do duty for some of them. Others are built up with solid masonry, -notably the double-arched “Gate Beautiful,” which was thus closed -because of a tradition that Messiah would return and enter the city by -it. It was from this gate that in olden times the man went forth with -the scapegoat that was to bear the sins of the people to the wilderness. -The interior (which, however, dates from the seventh century) is a rich -and beautiful piece of architecture, with massive monolithic pillars -supporting heavy arches, and an elaborately decorative entablature -cornicing the walls. It is a dreary little place, with its litter of -débris and its flights of bats; and its dead wall, pierced only with -loophole windows, now affords neither entrance for Christ nor exit for -sin. What memories crowd the mind of the beholder as he looks upon these -gates! Here, seven centuries ago, went out the weeping company of the -inhabitants, when Saladin took the city. There, eleven centuries -earlier, the Jews set fire to the Roman siege-engine, the flames were -blown back upon the fortifications, and the wall fell and made an -entrance for the legions. That was near the Jaffa Gate. Here again, by -the Damascus Gate, if Gordon’s theory be the correct one, the Saviour -passed to Calvary; and there may be stones there on which the cross -struck, as Simon the Cyrenian staggered out under its weight. - -It is indeed a strange city, a city of grey religion, in which three -faiths cherish their most hallowed memories of days far past. But “far -past” is written on every memory. That Beautiful Gate has indeed shut -out Christ, and shut in all manner of sin unforgiven. The land, as has -been already said, seems still inhabited by Christ, but He has forsaken -Jerusalem; it is almost impossible to feel any sense of His presence -there. This is a city of grey history, whose age and decrepitude force -themselves upon every visitor. It has been well described as having -still “the appearance of a gigantic fortress.” But it is a weird -fortress, with an air of petrified gallantry about it, and an infinite -loneliness and desolation. No river flows near to soften the landscape. -A fierce sun beats down in summer there upon “a city of stone in a land -of iron with a sky of brass.” But for the sound of bugles, whose calls -seem always to shock one with their savage liveliness, it might be a -fossil city. Built for eternity, setting the pattern for that “New -Jerusalem” which has been the Utopia of so many devout souls, it seems a -sarcasm on the great promise, a city “with a great future behind it.” -What has this relic to do with a blessed future for mankind--this rugged -bareness of stone, this contempt for beauty, this pitiful sordidness of -detail? History and religion seem to mourn together here, and one sees -in every remembrance of it those two weeping figures, the most -significant of all, for its secular and religious life--Titus, who -“gazed upon Jerusalem from Scopus the day before its destruction, and -wept for the sake of the beautiful city”; and Jesus Christ who, when -things were ripening for Titus, foresaw the coming of the legions as He -looked upon Jerusalem from Olivet, “and when He was come near He beheld -the city and wept over it.” - - - - -PART II - -THE INVADERS - - -Since the days of the ancient Canaanites Palestine has been often -invaded. The composite life of the towns we have already noted. The -history of Palestine shows how composite the life of the whole land has -become. Its central position among the nations is known to every one. To -the south, shut off by but a strip of desert, are Egypt and Africa; to -the east lie Arabia, Persia, and the farther Asiatic continent; easily -accessible on the north are Asia Minor, Turkey, and Russia; while ships -almost daily arrive which unite it on the west with Europe and America. -Yet one day’s ride along any of its chief highways will do more to show -the traveller what that central position practically means, than all his -study of it in books and on maps. For in one day’s ride he may meet -Kurds, Circassians, Arabs, Syrians, Turks, Cypriotes, Greeks, Russians, -Egyptians, Nubians, Austrians, French, Germans, English, and Americans. -In a mission school in Damascus were found some little dark-eyed Syrian -children speaking English with an unmistakable Australian accent. They -had been born and brought up in Queensland. - -It is in Hauran that this mixture of races is most forcibly thrust upon -one’s notice. In the villages south of Damascus, the crowd which gathers -round the tents is sure to contain several smiling negroes, some of -them branded on the cheeks; Circassians, with sickle-shaped nose and -thin lips, sharp-featured and small-limbed men with an untamable -expression on their bitter faces; Arabs, darker of complexion, and more -languid of eye; and Turkish soldiers, thin and smallpox bitten. There -are to be found the Jew, sneering complacently at the inferior world; -the fanatical Moslem, who will break the water-bottle your lips have -touched; the Druse, who objects to coffee and tobacco, and to whom you -hesitate to say “Good morning,” lest he may have conscientious scruples -about that; and the cross-bred ruffian, who has no scruples about -anything. Everything helps to strengthen the impression. In Damascus it -seems always to be Sunday with one or other portion of the population, -and a different set of shutters are up each day for nearly half the -week. The railway, it might be supposed, must have blended the life of -the composite East, but it only serves to emphasise the compositeness. -In one of the Hauran stations we had some hours to wait. We spread our -rugs in the shadow of the station-house, with a Turkish officer, an Arab -soldier, and a long line of camels to watch till lunch was ready. When -the time came, the hall of the booking-office was cleared of passengers -of a dozen different nationalities, and our lunch was spread on the -floor, just in front of the ticket-window! The train came at last, an -hour late, drawn by a rather blasé-looking engine. Then began that babel -of tongues which shows how nations meet in the East. All the world -seemed to have sent its representatives to that train--its wealth to -the white-cushioned first-class; its middle-class to the bare boards of -the second; its poverty to the cattle-trucks dignified by the name of -third,--while behind the carriages came two waggons loaded with grain, -their owner perched high on one, and a baby’s cradle on the other. - -All this phantasmagoria of the present helps one to realise better the -extraordinary history of the past. For thousands of years the flow of -manifold human life through Syria has been continuous. At the mouth of -the Dog River, whose valley has from time immemorial served as a main -passage from the sea to the East for armies, there is, cut in smoothed -faces of the solid rock, the most remarkable collection of inscriptions -in the world. The Assyrian slab shows still the familiar bearded figure -of the monarch with his air of strength untempered by compassion. The -Egyptian slab records its invasion in hieroglyphics. The Greek, Roman, -and French stones tell their similar tale. Throughout the land the same -thing repeats itself. In Hauran we found a fine Egyptian hieroglyphic -embedded in the mud-and-rubble interior wall of a private courtyard, an -altar of the time of Titus lying exposed on a hillside, and many -Graeco-Roman inscriptions built into the walls of houses.[15] The five -names which we have selected from so great a number of invaders are -those whose mark upon the land has been deepest and most permanent. - - - - -CHAPTER I - -ISRAELITE - - -Every traveller is impressed by the very meagre remains of a material -kind which Israel has left for curious eyes. In a museum at Jerusalem -many of these have been gathered--fragments of pottery and glass, coins, -and other relics,--but the total number of them is surprisingly small. -There are, of course, those huge stones to which reference has been -already made, cut in a style which experts used to regard as distinctive -enough to enable them to identify it as Jewish work.[16] But -inscriptions are extremely rare. Phœnicia and Israel seem to have -purposely avoided the habit of Assyrian and Egyptian kings, who wrote -upon everything they built. There is, of course, the Moabite stone, -whose characters are closely allied to Hebrew writing. But with that -exception there is hardly any certain Hebrew inscription extant except -one. That is indeed a writing of romantic fame. There is a tunnel known -as Hezekiah’s Aqueduct, connecting the Fountain of the Virgin with the -Pool of Siloam at Jerusalem. Its length is rather more than the third of -a mile; its - -[Illustration: THE LAKE OF GALILEE, LOOKING SOUTH FROM TIBERIAS. - -Two of the circular towers and wall which defended the ancient Tiberias -are seen in the foreground.] - -height varies from five or six feet to one foot four inches. Its course -bends in a wide sweep which adds greatly to the distance, and is said to -have been taken in order to avoid tombs. There are a number of _culs de -sac_, where the workmen had evidently lost their way. The flow of water -is intermittent, so that Sir Charles Warren and his friends took their -lives in their hands when they first explored it. Their mouths were -often under water, “and a breath of air could only be obtained by -twisting their faces up. To keep a light burning, to take measurements, -and make observations under these circumstances was a work of no little -difficulty; and yet, after crawling through mud and water for four -hours, the honour of finding the inscription was reserved for a naked -urchin of the town, who, some years after, announced that he had seen -writing on the wall, whereupon Professor Sayce, and Herr Schick, and Dr. -Guthe plunge naked into the muddy tunnel with acid solutions, and -blotting-paper, and everything necessary to make squeezes, and emerge -shivering and triumphant with the most interesting Hebrew inscription -that has ever been found in Palestine.”[17] The inscription describes -the meeting of the two parties of miners, who, like the engineers of -modern tunnels, began to bore simultaneously at opposite ends. - -Failing any wealth of such material remains, we must seek for Israel in -the human life of the land. Jews are there in abundance, gathered, for -the most part, within their four holy cities of Jerusalem, Tiberias, -Hebron, and Safed. In Hebron they are a persecuted minority; in Safed -they form about half the population; in Jerusalem, where there are more -than seventy synagogues, it was estimated in 1898 that out of the 60,000 -inhabitants 41,000 were Jews, nearly six times the number of the -Mohammedans; while in Tiberias also they form about two-thirds of the -population. Besides the Jews resident in these cities there are others -both in the older colonies and in the new settlements of the Zionist -movement, which have been created by the generosity of Jewish -millionaires. Reports differ as to the success of these interesting -experiments, and the knowledge of them which can be obtained from a -passing visit is a quite inadequate ground for forming any judgment. Mr. -Zangwill eloquently pleads for the restoration of the land to its -ancient people; Colonel Conder assures us that the Jew is incapable of -becoming a thoroughly successful agriculturist, though as a shopkeeper, -a money-changer, or, in some cases, as a craftsman, he prospers in his -native land. Certain it is that Jews are gathering to it from Russia, -Poland, Germany, Spain, Arabia, and many other countries, with what -ultimate result the future alone can shew. - -It would be unfair and misleading to take the present Jewish population -of Syria as the representative of ancient Israel. It still perpetuates, -indeed, the sects of Pharisees and Sadducees, and it still holds aloof -from the surrounding population with that independence and tenacity -which has marked Israel from of old. Crucified by Romans, butchered and -tortured by Crusaders, oppressed and driven forth by Moslems, this -marvellous people lives yet and will live on. In Europe the lot of the -Jew has been and still is a bitter one. In Syria to-day the lowest and -most insulting term of abuse among the Fellahin is to call each other -Jews. Yet the spirit of the people is not broken by oppression, as is -the spirit of the Fellahin. The Jew takes what comes and says little; -but he believes in himself, his past and his future, with a faith -indomitable as it is daring. Still it must be confessed that the Jew of -Palestine is generally repulsive. Mark Twain’s description of them as he -saw them at Tiberias is hardly overdrawn--“long-nosed, lanky, -dyspeptic-looking ghouls with the indescribable hats on, and a long curl -dangling down in front of each ear.” The hats are circular black felt -plates, giving to their wearers a peculiar air of conscious rectitude -and semi-clerical superiority; the curls are grown for the convenience -of the archangel in the resurrection! The younger men and lads of -Tiberias impress one as the most unpleasant-looking of all the -inhabitants of the land. They are so neurotic and effeminate, and at the -same time so monstrously supercilious. The Jewish quarters are famous -for their excessive dirt. In the visitors’ book of the hotel at -Tiberias, Captain MacGregor wrote “that the _Rob Roy_ and myself had -stopped there two nights, and that the canoe was not devoured.” This is -not encouraging, and in part it is the result of mistaken methods. Many -of these Jews are subsidised, and a subsidised religion is inevitably -degrading. A man who receives an income for no other service to his kind -than that he is a Jew is not likely to do credit to his ancestors. - -In the Samaritans we have better representatives of the ancient days. No -people in the land have a more pathetic quaintness about them than these -few survivors of antiquity who are still met with in the streets of -Nablus. They preserve the old type of features, for their blood has been -unmixed for more than 2000 years. But they are fast dying out, and only -a remnant of less than 200 individuals is now alive. Difficult of -access, reserved, mysterious, they are the ghosts of ancient Israel, who -seem to haunt rather than to enjoy their former heritage. - -In the manners and customs of Syria a still more interesting memorial of -Israel is found. Many of these were not peculiar to Israel, nor was she -the first to cherish them. They are the forms of the general Semitic -stock, of which she was but one people. But the words and ways of Israel -are the only form of Semitic life with which the world is familiar, and -every student of the Bible finds in these the greatest source both of -devout and of scientific interest. In the towns and in Jerusalem there -is still much to remind one of the life so matchlessly delineated in -Scripture. Lean and mangy dogs still sniff around Lazarus at the very -door of Dives. The windows of houses generally face the interior courts, -and the outer walls are blank, so that every door opened after nightfall -contrasts the vivid light of the interior with the “outer darkness” of -the street. Still more in the country, among the Fellahin and the -wandering Arabs, does one seem to live in Bible times. The gipsy-like -Bedawin west of Jordan are certainly degraded by change of nomadic -habits and by contact with the villagers; yet there is enough of their -desert heredity in them to interpret many of the patriarchal stories. -The Arab sitting at noon-day in the shaded edge of his tent, or walking -at eventide in the fields where it is pitched, is the true son of -Abraham and Isaac. When you know him better you will not improbably -recognise Jacob also. Except for tobacco, gunpowder, and coffee, he -lives much as Israel lived in those days of wandering to which her -writings love to trace back her origin. Even these modern innovations -hardly break the continuity. The Arab smokes with such enthusiasm that -it is difficult to imagine his fathers without their chibouk; and his -brass-bound gun might be the heirloom of countless generations. Of the -Fellah and his descent, and his conservatism of the past, we have -already written. - -So it comes to pass that he who journeys intelligently through Palestine -reads the history of Israel ever afterwards with a quite new interest. -The Bible is incomparably the best guide-book to Syria; and you seem to -journey through its chapters as you move from place to place. Here is -the fig tree planted in the vineyard; there, the tower guarding the -wine-press. Unmuzzled oxen are trampling the corn on the -threshing-floor, from whence the wind drives the chaff in a glistening -cloud. Women are still coming from the city to draw water, and grinding -in couples at the mill. We saw the prodigal son, drinking and singing at -Beyrout; and the owner of the waggonloads of corn we noted in Hauran had -kept them from the last year on the chance of a drought, which would -raise their prices in the market--he was the rich man of the prophets -who was grinding the faces of the poor. Under the walls of Jezreel a -curious coincidence brought back vividly to mind the tragic fate of -Jezebel. It was there that we first saw people with painted eyes and -faces; and there a horse lay dead with a pack of dogs at work upon the -body. Next morning, as we parted, nothing was left but the skeleton and -the hoofs. The people whom you meet are talking in Bible language. When -they repeat the familiar words of Scripture they are not quoting texts, -but transacting business in their ordinary way. We were told of a -shepherd near Hebron who, when asked why the sheepfolds there had no -doors, answered quite simply, “I am the door.” He meant that at night, -when the sheep were gathered within the circular stone wall of the -enclosure, he lay down in its open entrance to sleep, so that no sheep -might stray from its shelter without wakening him, and no ravenous beast -might enter but across his body. In the north, an American was -endeavouring to persuade a stalwart Syrian lad to try his fortunes in -Chicago. The boy evidently felt the temptation, but he turned smilingly -towards the middle-aged man at his side, and, pointing to him, answered, -“Suffer me first to bury my father.” - -But of all our experiences there was one which recalled the ancient life -most vividly, and on that account it may be related here. We had camped -over night near the village of Tell-es-Shihab in Hauran. In the morning -we mounted our horses amid a crowd of villagers, and started for the -village. The men protested loudly, and when we told them we were going -only to search for inscriptions, they assured us that there were none. -In spite of their opposition we rode on, followed by a tumultuous -chorus. A chance remark led finally to an invitation from the headman of -the village to his _menzil_, or reception hall. It was the mention of -the name of Dr. Torrance, of the Tiberias Medical Mission, who, on one -of his journeys, had cured this sheikh of an illness. At the door our -host met us, and most courteously invited us to enter, bowing and -touching our palms with his. The hall was dark, with the great stone -arch characteristic of Hauran architecture spanning its centre. Smoke -had coloured the arch and the rafters a rich dark brown, from whose -shadow swallows flitted continually out into the sunshine and back -again. We were seated on mats, spread with little squares of rich carpet -round three sides of a hollow place in the floor, where a fire of -charcoal burned, surrounded by parrot-beaked coffeepots. This was the -hearth of hospitality, whose fire is never suffered to go out; near it -stood the great stone mortar, in which a black slave was crushing -coffeebeans. The coffee, deliciously flavoured with some cunning herb or -other, was passed round. But the conversation which followed was the -memorable part of that entertainment. In the shadow at the back the -young men who had been admitted sat in silence. The old men, elders of -the village community, sat in a row on stone benches right and left of -the door. The sheikh made many apologies for not having called upon us -at the tents--he had thought we were merchantmen going to buy silk at -Damascus. Then followed endless over-valuation of each other, and -flattery concerning our respective parents and relations. “How long -would we stay under his roof? surely at least till to-morrow or next -day? No, one of us had to catch a steamer at Beyrout? But any steamer -would wait for so great a general,” etc. Until finally our leader came -to the delicate subject of inscriptions, and was made free of the town, -and immediately guided to the Egyptian slab mentioned on p. 87. It was a -perfect specimen of intercourse with Arabs, and it dazed us with its -ancient spell. There is no possibility of hurry. You must despatch your -business by way of a discussion of things in general. Compliments were -as rife and as conventional as those of Abraham and the children of Heth -at Kirjath-Arba, and they were received and given without any pretence -of taking them seriously. The elders sat silently leaning upon their -staves, except now and then, when one of them would slowly rise and -expatiate upon something the sheikh had said--perhaps about camels or -the grain crop--beginning his interruption almost literally in the words -of Job’s friends:--“Hearken to me, I also will shew mine opinion. I will -answer also on my part, I also will shew mine opinion. - -[Illustration: SITE OF THE ANCIENT CITY OF SAMARIA. - -The remains of the ancient city are on the olive-clad hill to the -left.] - -For I am full of matter, the spirit within me constraineth me.” -Altogether it was a scene of the unadulterated East--just such a scene -as might have been witnessed any time these three thousand years. - - * * * * * - -The great memorial of Israel is her religion. To her it was given to -know the Eternal God and to pass on that knowledge to all the nations of -the world. Among the many impressions given by a journey through -Palestine, none is so important and none so strong as this, that the -land was eminently suited for that one purpose and for that alone. She -tried many similar experiments, but they all failed utterly. The -luxurious orientalism of Solomon, the democratic revolt of Jeroboam, the -military ambitions of Baasha, and the attempt at commercial supremacy -which Omri made--each of these was an imitation of one or other of the -contemporary nations. For Israel they were alike impossible. Their -successive failures proclaim her a peculiar people, set in a peculiar -place for a peculiar purpose. For them, as Renan says, “to act like -men”--_i.e._ like all the rest of the world--was a sort of degradation. -All other experiments in greatness failed; their greatness lay solely in -the knowledge of the Lord. - - - - -CHAPTER II - -GRÆCO-ROMAN - - -Nothing strikes one more than the contrast in Palestine between the -vanishing of Hebrew buildings and the permanence of Roman ones. You have -come here to a land which you know to have been for many years under -Roman government, but which still to your imagination is Oriental, with -here and there a Roman touch. You find, among the very ancient -buildings, hardly a remaining trace of anything that is not Roman; and -of Roman work you find an amount which probably astonishes you. Before -you have long left Jaffa, some part or other of one of the old Roman -roads making for Jerusalem will be seen. Not long afterwards Bether -comes in sight--that terrible little valley where the blood ran so deep -when the siege ended and the Jews’ last hope was broken. So you move on -from point to point of Roman story until, as you climb the steep ascent -from the Jordan valley to Gadara, you realise that it was when encamped -just here that Vespasian heard the news of Nero’s death and was -proclaimed emperor by his legion. - -The Roman work in Palestine seems to exaggerate its peculiar -characteristics, so that here one notices these more distinctly than in -any other land. A Roman tower in Switzerland, a Roman road in -Scotland--certainly they are Roman, but they are not removed from all -things Swiss or Scotch by so vast an interval as that which divides -Roman from native work in Palestine. It is indeed an invasion of arms, -this Roman life--an intrusion of what is, first and last, alien to the -spirit of the place. The traveller to-day, to whom the very dust of this -land is dear, inevitably feels about the Roman relics an air of -obtrusive and uncomprehending indifference. They “cared for none of -these things,” or, if they did care a little now and then and try to -understand, they did it clumsily and unnaturally. Rome’s policy was that -of wide toleration, but her spirit was absolutely unaccommodating. She -might allow her provinces to govern themselves and to worship pretty -much as they chose, but she herself, in her officials and their works, -stood aloof from them and was Rome still. This is to be seen in -Palestine in all its good and in all its bad aspects. In those -solidly-constructed bridges and mighty aqueducts and imperishable -causeways there is the very embodiment of the Roman _virtus_ and -_gravitas_, that output of manhood which never trifled nor spared -itself, that solemn, business-like reality which is so full of purpose. -In this hard _reality_ of Rome there is not only purpose but -pitilessness of force to accomplish what is planned. Every Roman road -you chance upon seems to be feeling its way with an unerring instinct -towards Jerusalem or some other goal, and you know that it will arrive. -Just as impressive, on the other hand, is the sense of Rome’s -limitations. Her works disclose her seeing a certain length, and you -know beyond all doubt that she will get there. But there are very -obvious and very clearly defined limits to the length she ever sees or -will go. The work of Greece is far beyond the furthest reach of Roman -work--the glad spring, the grace of conscious strength that is beautiful -as well as strong, the restfulness withal of perfect harmony that is -thinking of more than merely utilitarian values; of these Rome knows not -the secret. Beside the flight of Greek art she is pedestrian; to the -Greek artist she plays at best but the part of Roman artisan. Forceful, -massive, successful up to its highest desire, the Roman work is finished -and perfect. And it has attained finish and perfection on a lower level -than that of any nation that ever yet dreamed dreams or “looked beyond -the world for truth and beauty.” - -Not that there are no other traces of Rome in Syria beyond the stones of -Roman ruins. In many place-names Latin is discernible, and the country -is full of inscriptions of all sorts. A still more permanent mark was -left by that invasion of Roman spirit which, for a time, claimed Israel -for Rome. Rome came to Syria next in succession to the invasion of -Alexander the Great. After his death the Macedonian power remained in -the East, and the seductive spirit of Greek humanism became the rival of -the old Puritan Hebraism of the nation. It was this that led to the Wars -of the Maccabees, who fought for the sterner against the more genial -spirit. As in the days of English Cromwell, the Puritan was invincible -while he remained true to his faith--that singularly effective blend of -patriotism with religious belief which has made itself felt in so many -national histories. The triumph of Hebraism lasted for about a century, -and then came Pompey in 63 B.C. to Jerusalem. Hellenism regained its -ascendency and the Greek cities of Palestine their freedom. About a -quarter of a century later the figure of Herod the Great appears as a -critical factor in the history of Palestine. An Idumean and a Sadducee, -he had neither patriotism nor religion to check his ambition. The path -of glory and of easy advancement, then, was by way of Rome, and there -was much in Herod that found Rome congenial. As a young man he had made -his name by clearing out a notorious band of robbers from the valley -which led down the great road from the Mediterranean to the Sea of -Galilee at Capernaum. This “Vale of Doves” is flanked by precipices -pierced with many caves, in which the robbers lived. Josephus tells us -how Herod fell upon the device of letting down cages with the bravest -of his soldiers. These men, lowered by ropes from the edge of the cliff, -sprang upon the robbers in their cave’s mouth, and when they retreated -within, smoked them out with fires like vermin. The man who contrived -and carried out that design was not unworthy of the title “Great” from -the Roman point of view. He became the centre and the champion of the -new Hellenism, which was really the worship of Rome, touched as Rome was -with the Greek culture she had conquered and envied and sought in vain -to acquire. Rome was clumsily Greek at this time, and Herod was clumsily -Roman. Certainly he would have been a Roman if he could. He was prepared -to go any length to serve his end. At the Banias springs of Jordan he -built a temple to Augustus. Samaria and Cæsarea, his Roman cities, must -have cost him a fabulous sum to build. - -Of the actual architectural remains of Rome in Palestine, the smallest -are perhaps the most impressive. Here and there, from south to north, -you come upon tesseræ, the remains of inlaid mosaic floors of the -ancient houses. Sometimes it is single little cubes that turn up among -the gravel of the sea-shore or shine from the newly-ploughed furrow. At -other times broken fragments of a hand-breadth’s size may be found, with -enough variety of colour to suggest the beginning of a pattern. But here -and there you may find whole floors of elaborately designed mosaic, with -concentric circles of various colour and size, with large-scale -pictures, or, as in one case at least, with an ancient map--one of the -most ancient in the world. On many a spot of Palestine you ride over -ground whose stones are capitals of carved pillars, and whose layers of -caked earth disclose fragments of ancient mosaic floors. - -The Roman roads are still frequently met with in Palestine, and these, -perhaps more than any other of their works, help the imagination to -realise the old life in its magnificence of power. Whether the causeway -lies bare to the weather across a mountain, or whether it cuts its track -along the sheer cliff of a gorge, there is the same uncompromising -purpose and capacity in it--the stride of the road, that seems to be -aware of whither it is going and the reason for its going there. In the -cities of the Decapolis and others there is generally one straight line -of Roman causeway--the “Street called Straight,” which is by no means -peculiar to Damascus. It was a Roman hobby, this of straightness, and -one of the most characteristic of Roman hobbies. The roads went, so far -as that was possible, up hill and down dale in a direct line from place -to place; and in the cities at least one columned street did the same. -The milestones which may still be found occasionally seem to heighten -the human interest, though that is considerably damped when we realise -that none of these roads date from the early Roman days in Syria. The -paths our Saviour walked on were but tracks, not unlike those which -modern travellers follow. - -But the bridges are older, and in some places they are used for traffic -to-day, spanning Jordan and Leontes. There is little causeway at the -ends of them--their one business in these old days was to do the -difficult and needful task of crossing water. Once across, the traveller -might find his path or make it for himself. Parapets are not provided on -the old bridges, and the surface is a flight of broad and shallow steps. -If you walk unwarily and are drowned in the torrent below, that is no -concern of these resolute but unluxurious bridge-builders. Their -business is simply to span the stream. So effectively and -conscientiously have they done this, that even when time and floods have -broken the bridge, you may see the half of it still standing: the huge -pier of stone and of mortar almost harder than stone stands at the side, -and the actual arch is still flung across the water, wedged into an -almost unbreakable strength by its keystone, while all the surface -building above the arch has long been washed away. Such a ruin may be -seen to-day on the coast some miles to the north of Tyre. It was in her -fight with water, either for it in aqueducts or against it in quays and -bridges, that Rome seems to have put out her utmost strength of masonry. -Along the coasts both of the Mediterranean and of the Sea of Galilee, -submerged stones and fragments of building may be seen, which bear -testimony to this; and at Taricheæ, where a large fish-curing trade had -to be provided for, there are remains of a dam and quay where Jordan -swept round in a circle, affording a great length of water-frontage. But -perhaps the most noticeable monuments of Rome in this dry and thirsty -land are the - -[Illustration: THE FORECOURT OF THE CHURCH OF THE HOLY SEPULCHRE.] - -aqueducts, sections of which still stand in many parts. In the -neighbourhood of Jericho, Laurence Oliphant counted nine different -aqueducts. At Khan Minyeh, believed by some to be the site of Capernaum, -there is a bewildering mass of water-building of many sorts. A -Wasserthurm still stands, whose walls are 12 feet in thickness, and in -all directions water is carried at various levels in channels which run -along the top of mighty banks of masonry. Great stone water-pipes, with -rim and hollow for fitting to the next pipes tightly, lie scattered in -all directions, peeping up through the long grass and ferns, or hiding -among the roots of the thorn trees. Elsewhere are to be seen longer -stretches of aqueduct, whose architects have been able to turn strength -into beauty in a very wonderful fashion. Roman building at its best -relies on the one principle of constructive truth. It never aims at -being pretty; it never fails in being _right_ for the purpose it is -meant to serve. From the point of view of beauty this may often have -produced harsh, material, and heavy work--and indeed that is part of -what we have already referred to as the limitation of Roman achievement. -But the highest beauty is, after all, a matter far more of truth than of -ornament, and there are many remains of Roman work in which such high -beauty has been unconsciously attained. They built to accomplish some -definite practical purpose, and for that end they built thoroughly and -well. The result is the beauty which comes like a crown upon honest work -beyond the design of the workers--a beauty of wholeness, adequacy, -truth, which is perhaps not so far removed from the Hebrew idea of the -“beauty of holiness” as careless observers might be disposed to think. -This is seen in many a fragment of the Roman aqueducts. These irregular, -three-tiered clusters of variously sized and shaped arches, carrying the -stone or concrete channel across a gorge, have a real beauty of their -own; and the long stretches of single or double tiers that take up the -channel where it emerges from a mountain-tunnel, lead it high and secure -across the treacherous ooze of a marsh, throw their level line on high -bridges over ravines, and at last end in the tumbled ruins of a city -whose pools and fountains they filled long ago--these have an -indisputable beauty of workmanship and design, as well as an infinite -pathos of sentiment. - -Next in impressiveness to these monuments are the remains of the Greek -amphitheatres of the Roman period. Whether it be that the massiveness of -the stones has been too much for the lazy builders who have constructed -their modern dwellings out of stolen fragments of ruins; or whether, in -its irony, history has attached to these monuments of Rome’s attempt to -amuse the world some special sacredness, it would be difficult to say. -Certain it is that these in many places remain, sunk in the natural -hollow of a hill as in a socket, while all traces of the city which once -surrounded them have disappeared. They have been often described, both -as they are found in Syria and elsewhere; and the stage arrangements, -the underground passages, and the whole design of them does not -materially differ from those of other countries. One feature in the -Syrian theatres appears with special distinctness. When the play was -going on, an awning may be supposed to have been spread horizontally -over the roof, to shade spectators and actors from the sun. Between the -edge of this awning and the flat top rim of the stage buildings, there -would be a blank space left, as it were, like a framed and draped -picture. The sites were so chosen that this space was filled up with -some commandingly beautiful vista--in the north generally a view of -Hermon. Hauran boasts many such theatres in the cities of the Decapolis. -In cities which were first Greek and then Roman, such as these, it may -be difficult to determine the exact date of a particular building. If -the Romans built these theatres, they closely imitated the older Grecian -work. They certainly built the theatre and hippodrome of Cæsarea, in -which latter the goal-post is still to be seen, an immense granite -stone, which has seen life in its day. - -The theatres have, as a rule, survived the fortresses and the temples. -Rome undertook many things. She would worship, govern, educate, amuse. -Is it not significant that her wreck looks so like a gigantic -playground, as if in those degenerate days of her conquest the Empire -was already finding in the motto “il faut s’amuser” her rule of life? -After all, it is his chief interest that is the immortal thing about any -man or nation. Yet this may be an unjust and fanciful estimate. Relics -of Roman temples and fortresses also remain. A statue of Jupiter has had -its resurrection from the sands of Gaza, and a monument in honour of -Jupiter Serapis now bears a Roman inscription near the Zion Gate of -Jerusalem. Near springs and the fountain-heads of rivers especially, the -ruins of Roman shrines to the Genius of the fountain are found, as at -Banias. Fortresses too, where Roman garrisons used to be located, can -still be traced, in a ring or an oblong trail of loose stones. Such -ruins crown the height of Tabor, the summit of Gerizim, and many another -hill. But these shew little trace of their former meaning. Here and -there the acropolis of a Greek or Roman town may retain its ancient -embankment, built on the steep slope of the hill, as if shoring up the -plateau above where the temple once stood. Elsewhere, some parts of the -curtain wall of a crusader castle may be blocks of Roman fortification -left _in situ_. But the greater part of the Roman building must be -looked for in the walls of village houses, where the contrast between -such fragments and their surroundings is as grotesque as it is pitiful. -The Gadarenes have built into their walls whatever lay nearest them. -Coffins and tombstones, capitals and columns, even altars themselves, -are there, “stopping holes to keep the wind away”; it is exactly what -“imperial Cæsar” has come to in Gadara. - -When Roman power decayed, the signs of its decadence were manifest in -the departure from old severity into an efflorescence of ornament and a -magnificence of mere size out of all proportion to the constructive -meaning of the work. In Baalbek, Rome has left us a monument of such -decadence. The elaborated detail is foreign to the grand simplicity of -the old Roman style, and the exaggerated size is but boastfulness. “The -Romans had seen the huge Jewish stones at Jerusalem” (as Dr. Merrill -explained the matter to us) “and began at Baalbek to work on a bigger -scale, the Barnums of the ancient world, whose ambition was to run the -biggest show on earth. By and by they got tired of that, and left it -off; it was not their line, after all.” “The line” of Rome was a very -straight and simple one. With immense power and a great and single -purpose, she went straight forward, and did what she meant to do. Hers -was a rough simplicity which never failed. Strange that, with so mighty -a resource, she should have ever gone out of her line to attempt any -other work than her own! When men or nations discover their limitations, -and rashly make up their mind no longer to stay within them, their -ambition has already begun to foreshadow their downfall. - -The pathos of seeing anything which evidently was once so competent and -so strong, now so absolutely dead as Rome is, is heightened almost to -weeping, in those places where the little and everyday memorials of her -former life are commonest. It is not the gigantic monoliths, but the -little tesseræ, not the fallen columns, but the broken jar-handles, that -touch the heart most. Between Tyre and Sidon the rider passes over -fields every stone of which is a fragment of some marble slab or -curiously-carved piece of masonry. His horse is overturning the remains -of Ornithopolis, “the city of the bird,” in these ploughed fields. But -it is at Samaria that the emotion is most irresistible. Where the “fat -valley” opens to the westward, a conical hill, slightly oval and with -flattened top now clad with an orchard, nestles in and yet lies apart -from the bend of the mountains of Ephraim. It was this hill that Omri -bought from Shomer for the heavy price of two talents of silver. It was -here that the city rose--the inferior houses (if we may reconstruct the -probable past) of white brick, with rafters of sycamore; the grander -ones of hewn stone and cedar--while the royal palace overtopped them -all. A broad wall with terraced top encircled it, and the city lay -there, “a vast luxurious couch, in which its nobles rested securely, -‘propped and cushioned up on both sides as in the cherished corner of a -rich divan.’” It was Ahab’s capital too, and after the varying fortunes -of centuries it was granted to Herod the Great by Augustus, who -immediately called it by the Greek name of the emperor, Sebaste, and -proceeded to rebuild it in a style of unheard-of magnificence. A -hippodrome appeared in the hollow, a temple on the hill. Round the -summit he ran a flat terrace with double colonnade of monolithic pillars -about 16 feet in height, with palaces and massive gateways. From our -camp on the threshing-floor, quite near the circuit of pillars--for many -of them are still standing, and the bases of almost all may be seen in -the ground--we crossed to within the ring of the colonnade. The ground -was ploughed here even along the faces of the artificial terrace-banks, -which still preserve their sheer angle, clean and steep as of old. The -furrows were literally sown with fragments of broken pottery and -tesseræ. We crossed to a squared and heavy mass of fallen stones and -carved pillars lying slantwise against walls still strong in ruin, which -bears the name of Herod’s daughter’s palace; and then along the -colonnade to the great piles of masonry which guard the gate that looks -toward Cæsarea. Two massive towers are there, partly in ruins and soon -to be wholly so, for the cactus hedge is busy with its roots among the -stones, and is making its way through cracks to the very heart of the -towers. We sat there watching the sun sink into the sea, and thought of -all those faded splendours and crimes that make this spot so famous -among the tragic places of the world. It was the home of Jezebel, it was -the slaughter-house of Mariamne, both of whom must often have watched -the sunset from that gate. The ambitions of the ancient kings, the pride -and wealth and cruelty of Herod, the beauty and the misery of passionate -women, dead these many centuries--all seemed to people the place with -ghosts, as the twilight deepened. We turned to go back, and found -ourselves accompanied by the man who farms the hill--a tall, friendly, -and gracious man in long flowing robes. He held the hand of his little -five-year-old girl, a dark-eyed, sweet-faced child, dressed in a red -cloak crossed with blue and yellow stripes. Her hair was short, in -clustering curls of glossy black, with a blue bead cunningly inwoven -among them to keep off the evil eye. She had her free hand entwined by -all its fingers in the wool of a pet lamb, which she steered along -sideways vigorously. How dead the mighty Herod and all the Roman glory -seemed in contrast with this simple picture of the eternal life of home! - - Where a multitude of men breathed joy and woe - Long ago; - Lust of glory pricked their hearts up, dread of shame - Struck them tame; - And that glory and that shame alike, the gold - Bought and sold. - Now,--the single little turret that remains - On the plains, - By the caper over-rooted, by the gourd - Overscored, - While the patching houseleek’s head of blossom winks - Through the chinks-- - Marks the basement whence a tower in ancient time - Sprang sublime, - And a burning ring all round, the chariots traced - As they raced, - And the monarch and his minions and his dames - Viewed the games. - - * * * * * - - Oh heart! oh blood that freezes, blood that burns! - Earth’s returns - For whole centuries of folly, noise and sin! - Shut them in, - With their triumphs and their glories and the rest! - Love is best.[18] - -It is not, however, merely with the chill of that which has been long -dead that Rome affects us in Syria; - -[Illustration: THE ROTUNDA AND CHAPEL OF THE HOLY SEPULCHRE.] - -it is with the living interest which attaches to all that touched -Christ, and entered in any way into Christianity. It is a far-reaching -generalisation which reminds us that “the great civilisations have -always risen in the meeting-places of ideas.”[19] Historically it is -true that the times of greatest international struggle have been times -of heightened vitality, when the mingling nations were ready to receive -and to impart much, and to send forth a new spirit upon the world. -Nothing could be more providentially apposite, from this point of view, -than that Jesus should have been born “amid the fever of the -establishment of the Roman power in Judea.” He kept aloof, indeed, from -the Herodian people who lived delicately in kings’ houses, and from all -the Greek and Græco-Roman life of his day. Yet, as Dr. Smith has shown -us memorably, Jesus was no quiet rustic dreaming dreams and seeing -visions far from the life of men. He lived and died in close touch with -all that Rome, Greece, Egypt, Mesopotamia, Arabia had to show. Not for -the first time, nor for the last, did He see, in His temptation, “the -kingdoms of the world and the glory of them.” As this realisation -becomes more and more distinct, a new force is added to the contention -that His Gospel is the Gospel for the world. It was thought out and -first preached amid the throng of commerce, and while the din of battle -was as yet hardly silent. - -This contact of Jesus Christ with Rome, which under Paul’s hand was to -become the messenger and instrument of His kingdom, is vividly -associated with two hill-tops in Palestine. One of them is that height -near Nazareth, some ten minutes distant from the village well, the -description of whose outlook closes the chapter on Galilee in the -_Historical Geography_ with the well-known passage about the boyhood of -Jesus. There, while He faced seawards, lay on the left hand below Him -the wine-coloured, battle-soaked plain of Jezreel, with squadrons of the -Roman army marching east and west along it; while on the right hand the -Sepphoris Road ran ribbon-like along the ranges, with its constant -stream of merchandise. The other hill-top is that known as “Gordon’s -Calvary” at Jerusalem--a low and rounded hillock just outside the -Damascus Gate. If this be indeed the site of Calvary, Christ was -crucified on a wedge of ground between a military and a commercial road; -and “they that passed by wagging their heads” may have been soldiers -from the Tower as well as merchants from the Northern Gate. - -Certain it is, at least, that Rome was about His cradle and His grave. -The earliest narratives of His earthly career bring Him to Bethlehem to -a Roman taxation; the latest story delivers Him to a Roman judge, to -Roman soldiers, and to a Roman cross. - - - - -CHAPTER III - -CHRISTIAN - - -From the invasion of warlike Rome we turn to that “Peace and her huge -invasion” which came to the Holy Land during the later days of the Roman -Empire. Before the time of Constantine the Church in Syria had grown and -spread with such startling vitality and promise of even more abundant -life as to bring down upon her the cruelty of persecutions. In the north -the Christian communities were mainly Gentile, in the south Jewish -Christians. They must have been intellectually as well as spiritually -vigorous, for the curious speculations and mystic dreams of the Gnostics -had already, in the second century, gained footing in Syrian -Christianity. - -With Constantine (324-337) Roman persecution ceased for ever. The Jews -were permitted to return to Jerusalem, and the construction of the -written Talmud began its career of three centuries. Julian, the last -emperor on the throne before the Empire divided into east and west, had -apostatised from the Christian faith before his ascension, and in 361 -he attempted the restoration of the temple in Jerusalem as a strength to -Judaism against Christianity. But the Galilean had conquered, and it was -the day of Christ. The recognition of Christianity as the religion of -the State began a new era, which ran on for a thousand years in the -Eastern Empire, until the siege of Constantinople changed the face of -Europe in 1453. The words of Dante will often recur to the student of -early Christian days in Palestine:-- - - Ah! Constantine, what evil came as child - Not of thy change of creed, but of the dower - Of which the first rich father thee beguiled. - -The reference is to the legend of “The Donation of Constantine,” by -which he transferred Rome and the states of the Church to the Papal See. -Christianity in Syria has run a strange career. - -Up to the time of Constantine the Church was at bay, fighting a -desperate battle against the Pagan world. At Cæsarea especially, but in -many another Roman town besides, native Syrians were forced underground -into caves and catacombs, or brought to the death in the public games. -Many records of this period survive. At Sidon, searching about among the -tombs which Renan has recently explored, we came upon a broken marble -slab--evidently the lintel of a church raised in memory of a local -massacre of Christians--with the word MARTURION inscribed on it. The -martyr monuments of Syria are wonderfully full of peace, hope, and -assurance. Like Marius the Epicurean you feel, when first you come upon -them, that for the first time you are seeing the wonderful spectacle of -_those who believe_. You understand his impression of every form of -human sorrow assuaged--desire, and the fulfilment of desire working on -the very faces of the aged, and the young men obviously persons who had -faced life and were glad. And the same wistful sense of a sure word of -revelation comes upon the beholder as that which appealed to him. Surely -here the earth was for once not forsaken of the higher powers, but -visited and spoken to and loved! - -After Constantine the pilgrim takes the place of foremost interest, -which the martyr previously held. From 451, when an independent -patriarchate was established at Jerusalem, pilgrimages became very -frequent; and a century later there were hospices with 3000 beds in them -within Jerusalem, while trade of many sorts flourished by their aid. In -the oldest itineraries there are very curious accounts of these -pilgrimages; but two, which Colonel Conder gives, are especially quaint -and interesting. They refer to later pilgrimages, but are appropriate -enough to earlier ones. The first one is from Saewulf, giving an account -of his landing at Jaffa: “From his sins, or from the badness of the -ship,” he was almost wrecked, and his companions were drowned before his -eyes. The other is Sir John Maundeville’s--most fascinating, if most -unscrupulous, of travellers: “Two miles from Jerusalem is Mount Joy, a -very fair and delicious place. There Samuel the prophet lies in a fair -tomb; and it is called Mount Joy because it gives joy to pilgrims’ -hearts, for from that place men first see Jerusalem.” - -From the first, pilgrimage seems to have had its moral disadvantages and -special temptations. The Turkish proverb runs, “If your friend has made -the pilgrimage once, distrust him--if he has made the pilgrimage twice, -cut him dead.” And it would seem that the Christian pilgrim is not -altogether in a position to throw stones at his Moslem brother. Apart -from any sins to which the freedom of travel in a far land may be -supposed to tempt poor human nature, there are some which are _par -excellence_ pilgrim sins. Thus we find in the seventeenth century the -Armenian patriarch complaining that the seat in the Chapel of St. Helena -in which he used to sit had been so hacked to pieces by relic-hunting -pilgrims that he was “frequently obliged to renew it.” The case was all -the harder because it was not from its association with the patriarch, -but because St. Helena had sat in it, that it was so much in request! If -Mark Twain be a true reporter, there are pilgrims who have inherited -that particular kind of moral frailty with remarkable fidelity to the -manners of their predecessors. Then again, the pilgrimages, which -everywhere stimulated trade, created an amazing amount of fraud in the -sale of false relics and other such traffic. Dr. Conan Doyle’s picture -of the pilgrim in France, who takes a nail from the box of a blacksmith -and sells it to unsuspecting soldiers as one of those which were driven -into the wood of the true Cross, is drawn from the life. Even on the -sacred spots themselves the simplicity of pilgrims has always been a -temptation to custodians. A tale is told of some one who, only a year or -two ago, dropped by accident a Bible down the dry shaft of Jacob’s Well. -The Bible was reclaimed within a few days, but when brought up it was a -mere mass of pulp. A large party of pilgrims had visited the place in -the interval, and had professed a strong desire to drink water from the -famous well. A small stream, conveniently diverted to the well mouth, -had enabled the priest in charge to gratify their desire by draughts of -water drawn from the depths before their eyes. - -The pilgrim is still extant. For well-nigh two thousand years he has -come and gone, a tourist who has always had an immense commercial value -for the Holy Land. The levy made on pilgrims at the gate of Jerusalem -was one of the principal causes of the Crusades, and it is hardly more -than a hundred years since a heavy tax was imposed upon every pilgrim -when he reached the gate of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. The -greater part of those who come now are Russians. Jaffa is full of them, -but they are to be seen in long caravans of pedestrians, with a donkey -or two bearing all their scanty luggage, as far north as Samaria and -Galilee. The men are typical Russian peasants, in the blouses and caps -that are so familiar. Their long hair may be fair or dark, but it is -always matted and coarse. The women, with their good, weather-beaten -faces, are uncommonly like old-fashioned peasant women from the northern -Scottish countrysides. Their head-dress is a simple kerchief, and their -hands grasp a rude pilgrim staff polished with much wear. The privations -of such pilgrimages must be very great. They involve the expenditure of -a lifetime’s savings, and a journey in many cases of at least six -months. Most of this is done on foot, and largely by people who are -growing old. There is no nation that could send forth such multitudes -except “rough but believing Russia.” The belief is everything. They are -very poor people, and very ignorant and simple. Yet many whose minds’ -conflict seems only to grow sterner in this land of contradictions, may -own without shame to a touch of something like envy as they see the -exaltation of their childish faith. They encompass the walls of -Jerusalem to the strains of Psalms, and march triumphantly to the sand -south of Jaffa for shells to authenticate their travels, such as those -which appear on the coats-of-arms of some European families, telling of -former pilgrimages. Mere children in intellect, the gleam in their eyes -tells that in their own pathetic way they have entered here into a -veritable kingdom of heaven. - -The objects of pilgrimage are somewhat gruesome in - -[Illustration: THE DOME OF THE ROCK (MOSQUE OF OMAR), AS SEEN FROM THE -PORCH ON THE NORTH SIDE OF THE MOSQUE EL AKSA.] - -their way. A favourite ambition used to be that of measuring the “stone -of anointing” in the Holy Sepulchre, in order to have the pilgrim’s own -winding-sheet made the same length. The great goal, however, is the -Jordan, whose banks at the period after Constantine used to be paved -with marble. In the old time a wooden cross was erected in mid-stream, -and the waters were blessed by a priest, after which the pilgrims -tumbled in with such haste that numbers of them were drowned. Here, too, -the winding-sheet is in evidence. Besides the flask of Jordan water -which they fill, they dip their own winding-sheets and those of friends -at home who have been unable to come in person, but have sent these pale -substitutes. It was not our good fortune to see the merry band of -pilgrims at the Jordan, though we met scattered groups of Russians in -many places. One other pilgrim we saw, and he accompanied us through -several days’ march northward. He was a jet-black Abyssinian--a lonely -and silent figure clad from head to foot in a loose robe of pure white -sackcloth. He went with us to Nazareth, the destination of his -pilgrimage. His only word in common with us was “Christianus,” and he -always bowed and crossed himself when he said it. All day long he walked -in silence in our company. He asked for nothing, but ate the meat he -received in singleness of heart, and sat apart watching the loading and -unloading of the baggage with the eyes of a great child. - -While so many Christians paid a passing visit to Palestine in the early -days, there were some who came to stay. It was the time of the rise of -monastic institutions, which first appear in the beginning of the fourth -century. Their history from the first is peculiarly associated with -Syria, into which they spread almost immediately after their start in -Egypt. Some of the most famous of the early recluses, including even St. -Symeon Stylites himself, were of Syrian origin.[20] These ascetics were -the natural successors of the martyrs. The first hints of them are given -during the time of earlier martyrdoms, for it is recorded that -Christians as early as the Decian persecutions fled to the wilderness -and led a life there which was soon to become popular beyond all -possibility of forecast. - -It was not, however, until Constantine’s favour had secularised the -Church, or at least had made easy that life which hitherto had been so -dangerous, that the reaction set in which gave monasticism its great -hold on the world. This is generally explained as a matter solely of -protest against growing worldliness, or a development of that curious -kind of “other-worldliness” which finds in asceticism the surest means -of attaining earthly fame and heavenly reward. No doubt both these -elements are true. In the early ascetics there was a self-denial -prompted by the purest desire for escape from the defiling society of -their time into the spiritual cleanness of the faith, and from its hard -and coarse materialism into the delicate ideality and refinement of -Christian thought and feeling. It was also, on the other hand, a refuge -and an outlet for much of the inefficiency and moral worthlessness of -the time, which found in its freedom from social restraint and its wide -leisure things exactly to their own taste. But behind all this there is -another fact which is really the most significant of all. Monasticism -was “the compensation for martyrdom.” Readers of the letters of Ignatius -are familiar with that mania for martyrdom which during persecuting -times took possession of so many in the Church. In abnormal and extreme -conditions such as these, certain minds grow hysterical and lose their -perspective and sense of proportion altogether. In such minds a morbid -and passionate delight in pain develops into a sort of lust--a -_religiosa cupiditas_--for suffering torture, just as in the persecutors -cruelty becomes a lust for inflicting it. So asceticism offered itself -when martyrdom could no longer be had--“a voluntary martyrdom, a gradual -self-destruction, a sort of religious suicide.”[21] - -The new ideal passed through several successive phases. From an -unorganised and individual way of life within the Church, it developed -first into anchoretism about the beginning of the fourth century. In -barren and solitary places, where life at best was precarious and -physical enjoyment impossible, every cave and den had its tenant. On -Mount Sinai one hermit is said to have lived for fifty years in absolute -solitude, silence, and nakedness. As you ride down the terrific gorges -from Mar Saba to the Dead Sea, you pass along precipitous hillsides and -rock-faces which appear literally riddled with small caves and holes in -the rock and sand. These, which now serve for a covert from the heat for -passing shepherds, or for the lairs of jackals, were once populated by -hermits. Saint Saba is said to have collected the bones of no fewer than -10,000 solitary dwellers in this district, who had fallen victims to the -Carismians. And in many parts of Syria even now, a hillside which during -the day has seemed barren of all human habitation, is unexpectedly -illuminated with hermits’ lights--those “hands praying to God”--in the -dark. The enthusiasm with which this dreary life has filled some of its -devotees may be realised in the following lines from an epistle of St. -Jerome:--“O desert, where the flowers of Christ are blooming! O -solitude, where the stones for the new Jerusalem are prepared! O -retreat, which rejoices in the friendship of God! What doest thou in the -world, my brother, with thy soul greater than the world? How long wilt -thou remain in the shadow of roofs, and in the smoky dungeon of cities? -Believe me, I see here more of the light.”[22] - -It was in cloister life, however--at first in smaller communities and -then on the large scale of many cloisters gathered under a common -rule--that early Christianity reached its full development. Besides the -native establishments, there was, in the first centuries after -Constantine, a cloud of religieux, flying like homing doves across the -sea to alight and quietly settle down on holy soil. These -establishments had many faults. They perpetuated little sectarian -differences and exaggerated them into quite ridiculous importance. The -very lamps that hang in the oldest churches are denominational, and are -divided with a childish arithmetic among rival sects. The insistence of -these on their respective rights is such that a guard of armed Moslem -soldiers has to be kept perpetually on the spot to keep the peace. Yet -there is a splendid dash of courage in this part of Church History, -which cannot possibly have been all in vain. It must have been an -exciting life in some of the outpost stations in these old days. “It is -true,” says Warburton of one monastery, “the monks were occasionally -massacred by the Saracens, Turks, and Carismians, but their martyrdom -only gave fresh interest to the spot in the eyes of their successors.” -No doubt these establishments drained the world of some of its best -manhood, and diverted much greatly needed energy from family life and -state loyalties; yet, on the other hand, these were the soldiers of the -Cross who then fought the paganism of the world and conquered it. - -Monastic establishments still remain, and supply much-needed inns to -many thousands of poor travellers in Syria. They vary by very wide -degrees of difference from one another. By far the worst place we saw in -Palestine--one of the worst perhaps that could be seen anywhere--is the -convent of Mar Saba near the Dead Sea. Coming out on the high ridge of -the Judean mountain country, we caught a glimpse of two towers, which -we have already described,[23] square and blind, and so pitilessly -unsuggestive that they seemed, as it were, built into the desert, or -part of its fantastic offspring. They were the most unhomely buildings -we had ever seen, and they are the nearest point to which women are -allowed to approach the monastery, lady travellers being accommodated -with cells there if they have not tents. By and by we passed between -them, down a road so steep as to be practically a stairway, on every -step of which loathsomely dirty beggars sat plying their trade. In the -courtyard to which this entrance led were two monks, fat and -stupid-looking, who brought out strings of beads, rosaries, and crosses -of their own manufacture for sale. Having, apparently, absolutely -nothing to do, the making of these things may be taken for sign of -enterprise and commercial genius, but as time is evidently valueless, -they sell their work very cheap. To the right is a rock, hollowed out -into a chamber or broad gallery, which is sacred as having been the -shrine of Saint Saba’s devotions. The entrance is violently coloured in -washes of blue and white paint, so crude and aggressive that it quite -robs the pictures in the interior of their horror, and prepares you to -look with unclouded eye upon the skulls which fill the grilled recesses. -One of these skulls is set in front, to receive the kisses of devout -pilgrims. It is deeply worn and polished. When it has actually been worn -through to a hole it will be replaced, as others have been before it. -Across the courtyard you follow narrow stairs and galleries that run -irregularly along the edge of a precipice; for the monastery has affixed -itself to the face of a cliff four hundred feet high. It clings there, -supported by huge flying buttresses that spring from the depths below in -a fashion which, as one writer says, remind you of pictures of -Belshazzar’s feast. The cells of the monks, little disconnected -“lean-to” sheds or caves, have the Greek cross upon their doors, and the -often-repeated inscription, “O Christ, abide with us!” Here and there -are a few plants in pots, or a feeble attempt at rearing vegetables in -little garden patches which fill in any foot of level among the -many-cornered buildings; while in one cranny grows the solitary -date-palm which Saint Saba planted more than 1300 years ago. At every -few yards you pause to look over a low balustrade into the gorge, which -here is a sort of yellow-ochre gulf, with all the horror but none of the -rich depth of colouring that belongs to frightful abysses. Over these -walls the monks throw meat to the jackals which come and fight for it -below. Occasionally, as we passed, a face was visible at a window, -generally either wizened and dried up, or with a white, neurotic -appearance that was almost more repulsive. Everywhere dirt reigned -supreme--unspeakable filth in open drains and putrid litter. In one -place, where the smell was sickening, a monk was lying asleep by the -side of a broken drain, covered with flies in great black masses on his -face and arms. In another place an abominable-looking dish of food, -fly-blown and disgusting, was pushed with a spoon in it half through a -hole broken in the bottom of a cell door. And everywhere throughout this -palace of disgust was to be read the prayer, “O Christ, abide with us!” - -That was the worst. Mar Saba is a sort of combination of prison and -asylum, where lunatics are kept under the charge of monks condemned to -this place for heresy or immorality. Other monasteries we saw, of a very -different kind. Our tents precluded the necessity for our making any of -these our home for the night, but in many cases it would have been very -pleasant to do so. On the top of Tabor, at Tell Hum on the Sea of -Galilee, and in other places, we were received and entertained with the -most cordial and generous hospitality. The clean and spacious -guest-chambers are open to all comers. They are adorned with photographs -of various sorts, and often contain a cabinet of rare local curiosities. -The brothers in charge of these establishments were fine genial men, -courageously facing the risks of fever in deadly spots, or varying their -hospitable labours on the heights by long seasons of study (for some of -them are distinguished scholars); but always ready to meet a stranger as -a friend, and to chat with him in French or German, over a pipe of -Western tobacco, about the great world from which they had gone so far. - -In all these ways the many-sided life of the old Christian days lingers -and may still be seen. But it - -[Illustration: THE DOME OF THE ROCK (MOSQUE OF OMAR). - - From the barracks near the site of the Tower of Antonia. The north - porch of the Dome of the Rock is towards the spectator; to the left - is the Dome of the Chain; to the right, in the middle distance, is - the Mosque of El Aksa. -] - -lingers more impressively in the most ancient of the churches which date -from this period. There is in Palestine an astonishing number of ruins -of old Christian churches, many of them dating back, at least so far as -their foundations go, to the Byzantine period. There are many modern -churches, but they are not as a rule impressive. Even when, as in the -Russian church at Gethsemane, the building is in itself rich and costly, -it is so irrelevant as to rouse a feeling of rebellion. - -Most of the ancient churches have utterly vanished, like that roofless -basilica which Constantine built on the supposed scene of the Ascension -on the Mount of Olives. In other cases they are mere heaps of ruin, like -the remaining fragments of the Church of Jacob’s Well, which was built -about the middle of the fourth century, and has been several times -rebuilt since then. This church takes most travellers by surprise. They -go expecting an out-door scene, with all the harvest breeze of the -Scripture story on it. They find a newly built white wall, glaring in -the sunshine. Through a gate in this wall they are admitted by certain -broken-down-looking persons in the greenish-black garments of the Greek -clergy. Within the gate, a few steps bring them to the edge of a sort of -oblong pit full of masonry. It is the nave of the old church, and the -splendidly carved pillars of its white stone show how beautiful it must -have been. A door in the sunk side-wall opens upon a groined vault newly -rebuilt. In the dim light you can discern in the centre a rough stone -altar, with candles and lamps and a couple of execrable pictures of -Christ and the woman of Sychar. On the ground before the altar is a flat -stone perforated with a hole two feet in diameter. This is the cover of -the well, and a second clerical person, badly marked with smallpox, lets -down a twist of lighted candles by a long rope, while a little green -lamp of silver hangs above, dripping oil steadily down the well. Surely -this is the infatuation of reverence! If there is any memory of Jesus -which is essentially of the open air, it is this incident of the Well of -Samaria. Yet reverence must build its dark chamber, and proceed to -illuminate with candles the spot where Jesus sat and saw the miles and -miles of waving fields, white already to harvest. No doubt the church -dates from the fourth century; but what right had even the ancients to -build a church here, to keep men busy with their sectarianism on the -very spot where they and all the world were told that the hour was come -when neither in this mountain nor yet at Jerusalem would the Father be -worshipped, but in spirit and in truth? - -There are, however, two great churches of this ancient time which waken -feelings very different from these; they have been for centuries the -centres of Christian interest and devotion in the land, covering, as -they are supposed to do, the sites of the birth and death of Jesus -Christ. In some respects they are alike. The outsides of them are -huddled and packed together, a heterogeneous mass of apparently -unrelated buildings. The insides are not, like the houses, Rembrandt -studies in intense light and shadow. By some skilful arrangement, the -sunlight seems to be caught and diffused in a pale luminous twilight -that sinks gradually to darkness in chapels and recesses, and blends -with the light of many lamps and candles not unpleasingly. The Church of -the Holy Sepulchre is the gift of St. Helena, mother of Constantine, and -was consecrated by her in A.D. 336. Tradition relates how, at the age of -seventy-nine, she made her pilgrimage to Jerusalem, was baptized in -Jordan, discovered the true Cross, and built the church upon the spot of -its discovery. Our guide-book tells us of an ante-chamber “where -Oriental Christians are in the habit of removing their shoes, though we -need not follow their example.” Yet the Crusaders entered it barefooted, -though with songs of praise, a thousand years ago; and the impulse of -most Christians, however little they may be disposed to believe in the -identity of the sacred sites within, will be to share the veneration of -the Easterns. Not that what we see now is the original building. That -was a rotunda and a basilica, the former quite other than the present -rotunda, as we know from the fact that it formed the model for the -Mosque of Omar. It has suffered many things from assault, from decay, -from fire, and from rebuilding. In the twelfth century the whole group -of detached shrines and monuments was included for the first time in one -huge and complicated building. Probably no such patchwork in stone is to -be seen elsewhere in the world. Yet each rebuilding found many of the -older materials ready for its use, and incorporated them in the newer -work. Thus the columns at the eastern door are supposed to have come -from some ancient pagan temple, and the present foundations of the -pillars belong to the old rotunda. The capitals of many pillars are -Byzantine, while the pink limestone column which is embedded in the wall -to the right of the eastern entrance is also very ancient. - -It is a strange conglomeration of imaginary associations and real value -of material. The atmosphere is at times dreadful enough within to -justify that daring little touch of realism in the French bas-relief -over the door, where some of the spectators at the raising of Lazarus -are holding their noses with their hands! The chapel of the Empress -adjoins the altar of the Penitent Thief; Adam and Abraham jostle each -other for standing ground under the sacred roof; the stone of anointing -has been “often changed” according to the guide-book, and the column of -scourging “judging from the narratives of different pilgrims, must -frequently have changed its colour and its size”--yet pilgrims poke a -stick at it and kiss the part that has touched the stone to-day. Every -incident of the world’s great tragedy is commemorated there, from the -footprint of Jesus to the silver socket in the rock where His Cross was -erected. Futile enough all this, and even wearisome. But the worship of -fifteen hundred years is neither futile nor wearisome. And that worship -seems to detach itself from the legends and find its embodiment in the -marvels of precious stone that are gathered there. As one sees the slabs -of costly stone with which the rock is overlaid--the ruddy yellow slab -of the “anointing,” the red and white polished limestone of the central -shrine, the green serpentine and the black basalt--one remembers the -tomb which the Roman bishop ordered in St. Praxed’s, with its -“peach-blossom marble,” its lump of _lapis lazuli_, “blue as a vein o’er -the Madonna’s breast,” and its block of jasper, “pure green as a -pistachio-nut.” But there is a difference. The stones of the Holy -Sepulchre were given in love: they are the tribute of many souls whose -adoration was the noblest feature of their times. - -The Church of the Holy Nativity at Bethlehem is a simpler and, to many -minds, a more impressive structure. It consists of a broad nave, -entirely screened off from what lies beyond, with two rounded transepts -and a rounded apse behind the screen--this trefoil-shaped inner building -being the church proper. One of the transepts is the property of the -Armenians; the other, together with the great altar in the apse, belongs -to the Greeks. Below the great altar-rail (“in the breast of God,” in -Dante’s language) is the cave of the Nativity, with steps leading down -to it from either transept. A Mohammedan soldier stands at the bottom to -keep the peace between Christians. The transepts and apse are ablaze -with lamps and hangings. Below, the “manger” is overlaid with coloured -marble, and the rock is entirely covered with yellow silk cloth, on -which are stamped the insignia of the Franciscans--an arm of Christ -crossed with an arm of St. Francis, both shewing the print of nails in -the palms of their hands. All this, and the air of raree-show that -exhibits so many spots where somebody or other stood, destroy any -lingering credulity of which a man may still find himself capable; they -make one rather ashamed, and glad to escape. But the nave is mighty in -its simplicity, and no less mighty in its wealth of historical -association. It is a great severe oblong basilica, with four rows of -massive pillars giving double aisles. Old glass and old mosaics add -their appropriate wealth of sombre beauty. The rafters, replacing -Constantine’s beams of cedar from Lebanon, are the gift of Philip of -Burgundy. Lead for the roof was sent by Edward IV. of England. Most -impressive of all is the old plain font of polished stone, with its -Greek inscription--not, like so many such inscriptions, a record of the -donor’s name, but a prayer for God’s blessing upon those who gave -it--“whose names are known to Thee only.” Opinions differ as to the -plausibility of the claim to the site of our Lord’s nativity; but this -church was built by Constantine, and the Vulgate was written in it by -Jerome. And since that time the feet of countless millions of -worshippers have trodden its stone pavement--a consecration in itself -worth many traditional sanctities. - -In this chapter we have sought to gather the most obvious survivals of -that old Christian invasion of Palestine which followed next after the -Roman. Almost inevitably we find ourselves quarrelling with the -legendary lore that has stultified so many venerable buildings and -associations. Yet in its legends too the early Church survives, and some -of them embody eternal truths in forms of rare beauty. Take three of the -legends of the Holy Sepulchre by way of example. They show the spot -where the one-eyed soldier Longinus, who pierced the side of Christ, -received back the lost eyesight at the touch of a drop of the blood. -There, too, is the cleft in the rock through which blood flowed from the -Cross down into the tomb of Adam, whose corpse came to life at once. And -there, on Easter Eve, the sham miracle of the “Holy Fire” has been -enacted annually for at least a thousand years. Who can miss the -underlying truth beneath these legends? They are, for all but the -ignorant and the gross, symbols of the eternal healing and quickening -power that the love and sacrifice of Christ exert on humanity and even -on His enemies. The torch-bearers, who kindle their fires at the blaze -on Easter Eve, and speed thence to Bethlehem and other towns to light -from it the candles waiting on many altars, tell their own exhilarating -lesson. Two other legends may be mentioned, which the Western world owes -to the Syrian Church--those of St. George and St. Christopher. St. -George, who was a Roman soldier under Diocletian, was martyred in A.D. -303. His memory, mixed up with the Greek myth of Perseus and Andromeda, -and with Crusader stories of Richard Cœur de Lion, stands for the -victory of faith over paganism. St. Christopher would only follow the -strongest, and finding that his master the devil was afraid of Christ, -renounced his service and set out to seek Him who was strongest of all. -The point of the story is that, after seeking Christ far and wide, he -found Him while he was performing the humble task of carrying passengers -across a river. It is characteristic of the pilgrim point of view that -legend has fixed this scene not by some homely German stream but at the -fords of Jordan, where he is said to have carried the infant Christ -across upon his shoulder. Even of such legends no wise man will speak -with scorn. They, too, are monuments of that conquest of Christ which -gives its meaning and its glory to the Christian invasion. - -[Illustration: INTERIOR OF THE MOSQUE OF EL AKSA, FROM THE SOUTH-EAST.] - - - - -CHAPTER IV - -MOSLEM - - -Mohammedanism is the religion which is everywhere in evidence in the -East to-day. From the smart Turkish officer who drops in to smoke a -cigarette with you in the tent after dinner, and discusses European -politics in excellent French, down to the beggar who beseeches you in -the name of Allah for a pipeful of tobacco or the end of your cigar, -your acquaintance in Syria is Moslem. From the consecration of the -Church of the Holy Sepulchre to the Moslem capture of Jerusalem was -exactly three hundred years. When, in 637, Jerusalem fell, Damascus had -already fallen, and Antioch was to follow next year--all within sixteen -years of the beginning of the Mohammedan era. The conquest was -inevitable. First Persia and then the scattered tribes of pagan Arabs -had proved too much for the Byzantine empire in Syria. Then the man -appeared who understood his opportunity. The Eastern world was in -confusion. Heathens constituted the ruling race, the Jews were scattered -in their dispersion, and the Christians torn into many fragmentary -heretical sects. It was the moment for a great union of scattered -forces. The Arabs were united by the new faith in God, for which they -abandoned their paganism with a marvellous willingness. The bond of -union with Christians and Jews was the common ancestry in Abraham by -which Mohammed hoped to rally and unite the Syrian world. One sharp -battle at the Yarmuk threw Syria open to his advance, and the crisis of -the faith was past. - -Mohammed has been declared an impostor, who from first to last won his -way by cleverness without faith; he has been idealised as a hero and -prince of heroes in the religious world. Dean Milman, perhaps, is wisest -when he says, “To the question whether Mohammed was hero, sage, -impostor, or fanatic ... the best reply is the reverential phrase of -Islam: ‘God knows.’” One thing is certain, viz., that he founded a -religion which proved itself capable of wakening response from the -Semitic East with a swiftness and a completeness never elsewhere known. -It would be a matter of rather serious consequences to affirm that such -sweeping success is possible without any vestige of honest faith on the -part of its own prophet. - -Arabia found Islam a religion after her own heart. The conquest of the -Arabian mind, and that sudden transference of religious and political -loyalties which changed it from chaos into cosmos, is little short of -miraculous. In the words of one of the severest critics of Islam: “In -A.D. 570, Abdullah, the son of Abd el Muttalib, a Mecca merchant, went -on a trading trip from Mecca to Medina and died there; the same year his -wife, Amina, gave birth to a boy, named Mohammed, at Mecca. One hundred -years later the name of this Arab lad, joined to that of the Almighty, -was called out from ten thousand mosques five times daily, from Muscat -to Morocco, and his new religion was sweeping everything before it in -three continents.”[24] In many ways the new religion was congenial to -Arabia. “Although it made a most vigorous effort to conquer the world, -it is, after all, a religion of the desert, of the tent, and the -caravan, and is confined to nomad and savage or half-civilised nations, -chiefly Arabs, Persians, and Turks. It never made an impression on -Europe except by brute force; it is only encamped, not really -domesticated, in Constantinople, and when it must withdraw from Europe -it will leave no trace behind.”[25] It gave the heathen Arabs, in -exchange for their precarious dependence on incalculable and wayward -gods, the sublime conception of “Islam,” the absolute surrender to the -One God, whom it declared to be Almighty, All-Wise, and All-Merciful. -For the rest, its secret was simplicity. It drove straight for its -object, sacrificing art, appetite, the purity of home life, the -spirituality of religious imagination, and some of the accepted -moralities of conscience. What was left was a creed and standard, -somewhat impoverished truly, but workable and uncompromising. A thousand -difficult questions were avoided, and one of those forces set in play -before whose rough simplicity finer and more delicate things are swept -away. - -Mohammedanism meets the traveller at every turn in Syria. Now and then a -dervish is encountered--the extremest sort of Moslem. It would seem -difficult to develop a mystic school within the pale of so clear-cut a -faith as Mohammedanism; yet it has been done. But the Mohammedan -dervishes escape from this despised material world by the vulgar process -of hypnotising themselves by the repetition of the word “Allah” or “Hu,” -or by whirling in circles until they are stupefied. This they call the -ecstatic state, and when they have reached it they are said to perform -many violent tricks, stabbing their flesh or eating broken glass, -without appearing to feel pain. In Syria they are by no means impressive -in appearance. Here and there you meet one, with hair crimped in long -thin pointed wisps, and sticking out in a wiry fashion from his head in -all directions. The dazed and rather weak look in the eyes is suggestive -of a strayed reveller rather than a holy man, but the people hold them -in great reverence. - -Another occasional freak of Mohammedanism is the religious procession, -which is conducted on the principle of a rival show to the Christian -fêtes. It starts on Good Friday from Jerusalem to visit the tomb of -Moses--a late fiction, somewhat daring in its contradiction to the old -belief that the tomb of Moses was known to no man. It is amusingly -described by witnesses, but appears to be rather a poor affair on the -whole. - -These extravagances apart, one is never out of sight of Mohammedan -religion for an hour of travel in Syria. The worship, like old idolatry, -seems to have claimed every high hill and every green tree for its own. -It has settled itself, in the very seat of old Judaism, on the sacred -area of the temple. Almost every one of the prominent hills of Palestine -is crowned with a little building, domed and whitewashed, opening in a -porch in front, and containing a single empty chamber. This is the weli -(_i.e._ monument, not necessarily tomb) of a Mohammedan saint. What the -terms of canonisation may be, it is perhaps best not to inquire too -minutely. Many of these departed saints are said to have been prophets, -but the discoverer of coffee has his monument in Mocha, to which great -processions come, and there is more than one weli in Palestine -commemorative of a dead robber chief. Not the less sacred are they to -the Mohammedans. In various parts of the country we were puzzled by -little piles of stones, gathered and arranged in considerable numbers on -the tops of long ascents or passes, and bearing a curious resemblance to -the cairns which in certain districts of the west of Scotland mark the -spots at which funeral processions have halted to change the -coffin-bearers. The explanation of these little piles is very simple. -When a Mohammedan comes to the hill-top, and looking around him sees a -weli shining in the distance, he offers up a prayer, and drops a stone -there, to call the attention of the next comer, that he also may look -and pray. Very picturesque and quaint these little holy houses are; -serving, like the hermit’s tower of old in Western lands, for landmarks -as well as for shrines--the white light-houses of the inland. - -It is not at the white tombs only that the Moslem prays. Five times a -day, at the call from the mosque, he is summoned to his devotions. -Often, indeed, it is inconvenient to worship at some of these hours, and -it is permissible to say the prayer five times in succession in the -evening, when there is most leisure. Sometimes he carries with him his -rosary, to help his memory with the ninety-nine beautiful names of -Allah, and in railway trains or steamers wealthy gentlemen are to be -seen cherishing a string of amber beads which appear more like the -property of young girls than of grown men. To perform his devotions the -Syrian goes to a fountain, when that is possible, as it is part of the -ritual to wash the hands before praying; but the Arab, spreading his -carpet in the shade of his camel, far away upon the desert, where no -water is to be had but the precious drops in his leathern bottle, is -permitted to wash his hands and lips with sand instead. That which -impresses every spectator is the extraordinary faculty for abstraction -which is manifested. The Moslem seems to have at command the power of -annihilating the world around him, and entering the unseen. His eyes are -open, but you may pass within a yard of them and they will not seem to -see you. They are fixed on the far distance, as if, over the Southern -edge of the world, the man saw the Holy City towards which he bows, with -its Kaaba and its black stone. He might be crystal-gazing, or watching -the horizon for a sail at sea. People may be dancing and singing by his -side, but he does not see them nor hear. Bathing once in the waters of -Elisha’s fountain at Jericho we had a memorable instance of this. We -found the pool empty and the walls undergoing repair. A lad who had -charge of the place was persuaded in the usual fashion to let down the -door of a sluice and so allow the pool to fill, greatly to the detriment -of the newly mortared wall. When we had stripped, the owner of the place -appeared, and we rose to the surface from a dive to hear a controversy -going on, with violent gesture and apoplectic fury, which marks a high -point in our register of vituperation. The water seemed on the whole to -be the safest place, and we kept to it until suddenly we perceived that -a great silence had fallen on the landscape. Looking anxiously to see -what had happened, we found the owner on his knees, praying by his own -spring. We dressed without delay, and had to pass in front of him to -reach the tents, but he never seemed to know that we had passed. - -The muezzin, or call to prayer from the minaret, is one of the most -affecting of all Eastern sounds. Men are chosen for this office with -singularly mellow and rich voices; they intone, with a very musical -little cadence in a minor key, the first chapter of the Koran, and -sometimes other prayers. At the great Mosque of Damascus, a solitary -reciter calls from the slender minaret, and is answered from the balcony -of the broader one across the court by twenty voices in unison. While -the waves of rich sound float out over the city, and are caught and -faintly echoed from scores of other minarets, one remembers how that -voice has rolled forth already over innumerable villages from Bengal -westwards, and men have paused from their labour to pray according to -their lights. - -Islam is usually supposed to have been the “Ishmaelite in church -history,” with hand against every man from the first. Really, when it -was Arabian, as it remained for four centuries, it was very tolerant, -and the Christian pilgrims, priests, and monks were little disturbed. -But in 1086 the Seljuk chiefs of wandering Turkish tribes came into -possession, and the days of suspicion and that heavy cruelty which is -characteristic of the stupid began. There were massacres of monks on -Carmel and elsewhere then, and such a state of general tyranny and -oppression that the cry reached the West, and the Crusades began. The -Crusades, as they dragged their slow length along, did not tend to -better understandings; and after Saladin’s conquest of Jerusalem, we -read that the walls and pavement of the Mosque of Omar had to be -purified with copious showers of water distilled from the fragrant roses -of Damascus. The relations between Moslem and Christian in the land -to-day are happier, and the intercourse of increasing trade and travel -is breaking down old partitions here as elsewhere. Yet little love is -lost between the professors of the rival faiths even now. Dr. Andrew -Thomson relates how, in recent years, “it had been observed that at a -particular period of the day the shadow of the great Mosque of Omar fell -upon a certain Christian burying-ground. Even the honour of - -[Illustration: THE TEMPLE AREA AND THE MOUNT OF OLIVES, FROM MOUNT ZION. - - The dome on the right is that of the Mosque of El Aksa, and that on - the left is the Mosque of Omar. Between these domes, and just below - the principal group of cypresses, is the “Wailing Place.” The hills - in the background are the Mount of Olives. -] - -blessing conveyed by so sacred a shadow was grudged. The public -authorities in Jerusalem were strongly urged to have the Christian -cemetery removed to some more distant place, and it required all the -combined influence of the European consulates to prevent a scandalous -order to this effect from being issued.” The Ordnance Survey party was -on several occasions attacked, and even fired upon. In fanatical Moslem -cities like Hebron and Nablus, travellers have to conduct themselves -with the utmost discretion, and even then will probably be stoned with -more or less effect according to the courage and the marksmanship of the -thrower. The Christians return the animosity with a kind of impatient -ridicule, which seems to indicate a lack of refined piety on their part. -Our camp-waiters were Christians, and they used to give us very freely -their opinions on the theological differences between them and the -Mohammedans. There would be a reverent if somewhat startling account of -the Holy Trinity, and then, in scornful contrast: “Mohammedans only -One,--and Mohammed all the rest!” The scorn is hardly to be wondered at -when one remembers the intellectual level of the powers that be. This is -forced upon one’s notice by countless tales of the custom-house and -censorship officials. A map of ancient Palestine was objected to because -“there were no maps in those days!” An engineer, telegraphing about a -pump, was arrested because the message read: “One hundred revolutions!” -In certain Bibles the text was erased, “Jesus Christ came into the world -to save sinners”; and it was directed that the word “Christians” should -be substituted, as there were no sinners in the Turkish empire! After a -certain amount of that regime, one would no doubt put new meaning into -the prayer which invokes God’s mercy “upon all Turks,” as well as on -infidels and heretics! - -In spite of all this there is a good deal of interchange between the two -faiths, or at least of borrowing on the part of Islam from Christian -tradition. So many points have the two in common, that a theory has been -broached on which Mohammed appears only as the Judaiser (as it were) of -later days, who saw the difficulty that Christians had in working with -general principles, and set himself to simplify the situation by -reducing Christianity to a stereotyped system. Carlyle distinctly calls -Islam “a kind of Christianity.” However this may be, there is no -question as to the immense amount which Syrian Mohammedanism borrows -from the Jewish and Christian Scriptures. Countless tombs and other -monuments are dedicated to Joshua and other Old Testament worthies. -This, of course, may be due to the fact that many Moslem saints have -borne the old names, and as time went on their memories came to be -confused with those of their more famous namesakes. Samson’s exploits -especially have appealed to the Mohammedan imagination, and he appears -under the _incognito_ of “Ismân Aly,” among many other names. St. George -is a very popular saint for Moslem worship. It startles us still more to -find that in the great fire at Damascus numbers of Moslems threw -themselves into the flames in the attempt to rescue the head of John -the Baptist; while a copy of the Koran--one of the original four -copies--which lay below the relic, was forgotten and destroyed. - -The most extensive and curious point of contact between the two -religions is found in those mosques which were formerly built as -Christian churches, and then appropriated by the conquerors. The Grand -Mosque of Damascus is a conspicuous case in point. It is built on the -site of a pagan temple, part of whose hoary front still stands, a -magnificent fragment of ancient heavy masonry and carving now brown and -grey with age. On the ruins of the temple rose the Christian church of -St. John the Baptist, whose date is about the beginning of the fifth -century. After the Mohammedan conquest the church became a mosque, and -fabulous sums were spent on its decoration. It has twice been destroyed -by fire, and is now being restored after the last of these -destructions.[26] The restoration has a very brand-new appearance, yet -it is magnificent with its wealth of marble and of other costly stone. -The Mosque of Samaria, conspicuous from a distance by its minaret is -another Christian church reconstructed for Mohammedan worship. There was -a sixth-century basilica here, but the present mosque is built out of -the material of the Crusader church which replaced that. The severity -and bareness of its stone walls and pillars are relieved only by one -touch of colour--the flags and the lovely green pillars of the pulpit. -The wall at the pulpit’s side has been recessed into a mihrab or niche, -which points towards Mecca and so gives the worshipper his bearings. In -the crypt, where the Crusaders believed they had the tomb of John the -Baptist, large slabs of polished marble attest the former wealth of -decoration, and these slabs are of peculiar interest because of one -curious little fact. It was customary to carve on Christian buildings -the sign of the Cross--a Maltese cross, set within a circle. Such a -cross may be distinctly seen on one of the stones close to the embedded -pillar at the south door of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. On the -marble slabs of the crypt in Samaria these encircled crosses are to be -seen; but the Mohammedans have chipped away the uprights of them, -leaving only the meaningless horizontal bar bisecting the circle, and -the obvious mark of the chisel in their rough workmanship leaves the -uprights also faintly visible. Perhaps the most interesting case of all -is the Mosque el Aksa, close to the Mosque of Omar, within the temple -area. This is that “far-off place of prayer” which Mohammed counted -among the most holy shrines in the world. Founded by Justinian as a -Christian basilica, it was converted into a mosque by Omar, and adorned -with unheard-of lavishness by Abd el Melik, who overlaid its doors with -gold and silver plates. Since then it has passed through many -adventures. Widened to efface some suggestion of cruciform shape, its -breadth became unmanageable, and six rows of pillars support the roof. -The roof has fallen in, and earthquakes have broken the building more -than once, so that most of the masonry is comparatively modern, the -great arches of the structure which supports the dome being “anchored” -by wooden beams which throw horizontal bridges from capital to capital -in Arab fashion. The green-and-gold mosaic with which the interior of -the dome and the upper portion of the adjacent masonry is covered, -cannot be very old, though their dim and antique beauty is worthy of the -older art. The pulpit, richly inlaid with Aleppo work of ivory and -mother-of-pearl, was Saladin’s gift seven hundred years ago. But that -which most of all attracts the eye and fascinates the imagination is the -aspect of the pillars, whose variegated colours are peculiarly rich and -harmonious. Up to a certain height they are polished to the shining -point by the garments of worshippers rubbing against them as they pass; -above that they are smooth, unpolished stone. The capitals, and some at -least of the columns, are very ancient, and may have stood in the -original basilica. - -The Mosque of Omar is not, strictly speaking, a mosque at all. The -mosque is El Aksa, and the more famous building is but a glorified -praying-station of the nature of a weli in its court. It stands near the -centre of a wide open space, practically the only such space in -Jerusalem, which occupies one-sixth part of the whole area of the city -within the walls. The enclosure is partly artificial, supported on vast -substructures of vaulted building which raise the enclosed ground to a -general level. The mosque is set up on a platform ten feet higher than -this level. - -Its history has been a strange one. Behind the time of its erection lies -all the story of the Temple, whose sacred ark Jewish tradition affirms -to have been concealed here by Jeremiah. But that rock, whose red -outcrop breaks through the floor of the mosque, leads us back to a -dimmer past, and to the story of Abraham’s sacrifice upon Moriah, whose -site this is said to be. Various theories have been advocated as to the -place which the rock held in the arrangements of the Jewish temple. The -Jews of to-day have a legend that on it somewhere the Unspeakable Name -is written, and they explain the miracles of Jesus by the supposition -that He had succeeded in deciphering it. We, too, for whom its chief -interest and pathos lie in the fact that Christ came hither to worship, -and in the things that befell Him here, may accept the meaning at least -of that curious legend. For His own words were that He had declared to -men the name of His Father, and that declaration has truly revealed to -mankind the hidden meaning of their holiest things. - -It was in 680 A.D. that the first Mohammedan sanctuary was erected on -the temple area, but the date of the present building is two hundred -years later. It struck us as a curious fact a year ago in Damascus that -the burnt mosque was being rebuilt almost entirely by Christian masons. -Still more surprising is it to learn that the Mosque of Omar was built -by Byzantine architects and modelled on the Rotunda of the Holy -Sepulchre. Two hundred years later the Crusaders entered Jerusalem, and, -according to the dreadful story, “the carnage in the Mosque of Omar -swept away the bodies of thousands in a deluge of human blood.”[27] -Mistaking the Mosque for the veritable Temple of Solomon, they founded -there the Society of the Knights Templars, on whose armorial bearings -the dome appears. They converted the building into “Templum Domini,” and -planted a large gilded cross upon the summit of it. Traces of their -invasion still remain in the cutting of the rock to suit their altar, -and in the great wrought-iron enclosing screen. For almost a century the -Templum Domini remained in Christian hands, until 1187, when Saladin -conquered Jerusalem. His generosity and gentleness contrasted strangely -with the “loathsome triumph” of the Crusaders; but the first destination -of the triumphal march was the mosque, from whose dome the Cross was -hurled to the ground, and for two days dragged about the streets. From -that time the mosque has been one of the most exclusive places in the -world. Till recent years no Christian was permitted to enter it, and -Jews avoid it, lest they should unwittingly tread upon the ground of the -ancient Holy of Holies. - -The first impressions of the Mosque of Omar are very pleasing. There is -a barbaric splendour in its rich colouring and metallic glitter when -seen from a short distance, while the more distant view of it is one of -rare soft beauty. Its wide courts, too, give it a fresh and open-air -character which is very refreshing after the stifling dark heat and -closeness of the Holy Sepulchre. Above all it impresses one with its -grand simplicity. The sharp-edge angles of the octagon are taken in at -a glance; the rock within is bare rock, and infinitely more impressive -than the silk and marble in which rock masquerades at Bethlehem. The -great number of its pillars, screens, reading-stands, and other -furniture, leaves little open room, and it feels rather a crowded than a -spacious place for worship. Yet, on the other hand, you are not wearied -with the complex symbolism of many of the ancient churches. The meaning -of this may be poorer, but at least it is plain. This means just a -perfectly shapely and highly coloured octagon, where men have worshipped -God for a thousand years in the least complicated way in which worship -has been done. Thus the mosque is typical of the faith and the policy -that created it. “I do not believe,” says Disraeli’s _Tancred_, “that -anything great is ever effected by management.... You require something -more vigorous and more simple.... You must act like Moses and Mohammed.” - -On the other hand, the enthusiasm for Mohammedan simplicity is sorely -tried when the first moment of almost awestruck feeling ends with the -advance of the guide. He is to shew you the wonders of the mosque, and -the torrent of mingled absurdity and superstition by which you find -yourself swept on is very trying to the would-be admirer of the faith -and its monument. First of all, there are the relics--the footprint of -Mohammed, and the hairs of his beard; the praying-places of Abraham and -Elijah and other “very fine, high-class people,” as our dragoman -described - -[Illustration: THE WEST SIDE OF THE TEMPLE AREA. - - From the barracks near the site of the Tower of Antonia. Above the - domed building in the right foreground rises Mount Zion. The rosy - hills to the left are the mountains of Judea. -] - -them to us; the round hole where the rock let Mohammed through when he -ascended to heaven, the hollow place in the roof of the cavern where it -rose to let him stand erect to pray, the tongue with which it spoke, and -the mark of the angel Gabriel’s finger when it had to be held down from -following him in his ascension. Still more disenchanting is the knot of -underground superstitions that desecrate the holy place, and rob it of -its freshness and healthy simplicity, like snakes in the garden. The -wild imagination of the East has pictured to itself the regions which -lie underneath this sanctuary in its own grim way. In spite of a very -obvious pillar, and a bit of white-washed wall to be seen in the cavern, -the rock is supposed to hover unsupported over the abyss. Beneath is -“the well of souls,” where the dead assemble twice weekly to pray. Some -think of these departed ones as those who wait for the Resurrection, but -a darker fancy holds that the gates of hell are here. The worshipper -feels the souls of the dead flitting about him, and prays with the cries -of the lost in his ears. Even the open spaces of the court are haunted -by unclean legends, and seem to be heavy with the odour of graveyard -mould. Here, at St. George’s dome, with the two red granite pillars in -front of it, is the place where Solomon tormented the demons; there, by -the eastern wall, is the throne whereon he sat when dead, the corpse -leaning on his staff to cheat them, until worms gnawed the staff -through, the body fell forward, and the demons found out the trick. - -In common decency, any place that lays claim to sacredness must have -something to say to worshippers regarding conduct; but the ethics of the -Mosque of Omar are a match for its impostures, alike in gruesomeness and -in impudence. They are all of the nature of magic tests, by which souls -are to be tried for their eternal fate. The little arcades at the top of -the steps of the platform are called “Balances” because the scales of -judgment are to be suspended there on the Great Day. The Dome of the -Chain owes its name to the circumstance that there a golden chain hung -at David’s place of judgment, which had to be grasped by witnesses and -dropped a link when a lie was told. A place in the outer wall is shown -from which a wire will be suspended on the Day of Judgment, whose other -end will be made fast on the Mount of Olives. Christ will sit on the -wall and Mohammed on the mount. Over this wire must all men find their -way, but only the good will cross, the wicked falling into the valley -beneath. In the El Aksa Mosque a couple of pillars stand very near each -other, so worn that they are perceptibly thinned. The space between them -bulges, in which a piece of spiked iron-work is now inserted. These were -another test for the final award--he who could squeeze himself through -the aperture, and he alone, had found the true “narrow way” to heaven. - -Frauds such as these force upon every visitor the question how far the -Mohammedans themselves believe them. The utter want of earnestness, or -anything that to a Western mind bears the resemblance of reality, is -painfully evident in the attendants who guide you through the mosque. -You are forced to respect its sacredness by purchasing the loan of -slippers to cover your boots, and you feel rather like one entering a -circus than a place of worship, when you have been transformed into an -illuminated caricature by means of one yellow and another red slipper. -Your guide, who wears the appearance of a convict in clericals, greatly -enjoys your picturesqueness, and makes haste to conduct you to a certain -jasper slab into which Mohammed drove nineteen nails of gold (which -look, however, indistinguishable from iron). A nail comes out at the end -of every epoch, and when all are gone the end of the world will come. -One day the devil destroyed all but three and a half of them, when the -Angel Gabriel, caught napping for once, stopped the mischief just in -time. Here you are invited to lay any coins you may chance to have about -you, and assured that if the coin be silver you will save your soul by -giving it. As the coins are tabled, the whole body of assistant clergy -assembles to count the collection. - -All this, and much else, is but the inevitable outcome of a worship that -gathers round a stone. It is a petrified worship, hard and dead as its -sacred rock. Nothing could be more pathetic than a window in El Aksa -almost darkened with little rags of clothing hung there by poor folk who -come to pray for their sick friends. If Syrian Christianity is corrupt, -it is at least not so pitiless as Syrian Mohammedanism. The very aspect -and situation of the rival shrines is symbolic. The mosque does not -really love men, whether it really believes in God or not. It sits apart -in its wide enclosure, while the Church of the Sepulchre is huddled -indistinguishably into the thickest pressure of the life of men and -women in the city. The church seems, by its rugged and broken outline, -to sympathise with the shattered fortunes of the life around it; it is -grey and ruinous-looking, as if it had borne man’s sorrows and carried -them. The mosque, with all its beauty, seems to sit there like some -great sleek sphinx, watching everything, but sharing little and loving -none of the misery around it. In this city of ruins there is something -repellent about its smooth and self-complacent finish. No, the mosque -does not really love men; whether it really believes in itself and its -miracles or not is another of the many Mohammedan things which God only -knows. - - - - -CHAPTER V - -CRUSADER - - -To tell even in barest outline the long story of the Crusades would be a -task as impossible as it would be thankless. The magic of Sir Walter -Scott’s _Talisman_ is happily not yet dead, and in some degree the -Crusader still lives as an actual and human figure in our imagination. -Many Christians who had come as pilgrims had settled in the land as its -inhabitants, and for four centuries after the Arabian conquest these -continued both their trade and their worship under the tolerably mild -Mohammedan rule. In the eleventh century all was changed by the Saracen -invasion. Pilgrims were extortionately taxed at the gates of Jerusalem; -their lives were imperilled, their persons and their devotions insulted. -The old commerce, which had grown to considerable proportions, was -ruined, and pilgrimage, from being a lucrative and pleasant service, -became an almost certain martyrdom. - -It was this state of affairs which sent Peter the Hermit through Europe -on his great campaign in 1093, and those extraordinary wars that raged -in Syria through two centuries bore the complex character of the -motives which had prompted them. From the departure of that motley -rabble which followed the Hermit to the East in the first Crusade, down -to the pitiful expedition of French children who started 30,000 strong -from Vendôme in 1212, there stretches perhaps the most picturesque -period in all history.[28] - -The mass of paradox and contradiction which that period presents is no -less striking. It was an invasion by the West, whose purpose was to -rehabilitate an Eastern faith. It was a religious war carried on by the -jealousies and ambitions of rival nations. It was the occasion of some -of the most statesmanlike government that the world has seen, and it was -accompanied from first to last by frequent outbursts of treachery, -massacre, and lust. It was the most airy dream and at the same time the -most effective practical force of its time. It was the expression of the -most ascetic severity and the most reckless luxury. Utterly futile, -commercially and socially disastrous, often wholly irreligious, it was -yet everywhere a massive and purposeful conception, in which the -determination and forcefulness of the West thrust their iron wedge clean -to the centre of this sleepy land. Its high idealism, curiously alloyed -with grosser elements both sensual and brutal, was yet able to preserve -through all the genuine spiritual fire of chivalry and of faith. - -Our task is simply to ascertain what all this stands for in the history -of Palestine, and what it has left behind it there as its memorial. In -two words, it stands for the contact of the East and West, and for their -separateness. Into Europe the Crusades brought much from the East. It -was due to them more than to all other causes that there was so immense -an increase of Eastern merchandise in Western markets--not of Jerusalem -relics only, but of Damascus ware and of Persian and even Indian produce -from beyond the great rivers. Their influence on architecture, too, is a -well-known fact of Western history. The Mosque of Omar rose on at least -three European sites, and the plan of many another piece of Byzantine -building and Arabesque decoration was brought home by the Crusaders from -the wars. Into the East, again, the Crusades brought much from the West. -From north to south of Palestine one meets with the remains and -memorials of that invasion. Theirs are the footprints most visible -throughout the land. Everything in Syria has felt the touch of them and -retained its mark. At every turn one finds something recognisable and -homely to Western ears and eyes--the name of a castle, the chiselling of -a stone, the moulding of metal--they are strangely familiar as they are -met so far away from home. Yet they survive as wreckage, and as wreckage -only. He who hopes to westernise the East is attempting a task in which -all must fail, whether they be soldiers or priests, missionaries or -statesmen. The ancient Eastern life has long ago flowed back over the -relics of the Western occupation of Syria. - -The surviving traces are of many kinds. There are the descendants of -Crusaders, sprung of intermarriages with Eastern women, and still -preserving a distinctively European type in little suggestive details of -feature or of hair. Names such as Belfort, Belvoir, Mirabel, -Blanchegarde, or Sinjil (St. Giles), coming without apology next to the -Hebrew and Arabic names of villages in Palestine, strike one with very -much the same shock as old Scottish place-names do, alternating with -incorporated aboriginal ones, on the railway stations of the Australian -bush. Relics like the sword and spurs of Godfrey de Bouillon may, like -most other relics, be discounted, but not so the wonderful masonry of -castles and of churches which everywhere overawes the man accustomed to -modern walls. Winding our way with tight rein along the narrow and -crooked streets of Tyre, we suddenly plunged into the darkness and foul -air of the Bazaar. At the other end of it, emerging under a Gothic -archway, we found ourselves in the courtyard of a khan, a very dirty and -unpleasant place. Seeing nothing but unclean stables, we imagined that -our horses were to be put up here and perhaps fed, and we pitied them. -Then, to our astonishment, we discovered that this was the old Crusader -Church, where these broken and discoloured arches had once echoed the -hymns and prayers of European chivalry; and that somewhere among them -lay the bones of the great emperor so famous in - -[Illustration: ENTRANCE TO THE CHURCH OF THE HOLY SEPULCHRE.] - -history and legend--“Der alte Barbarossa, der Kaiser Friederich.” Not -less affecting in its way was the discovery of a little patch of -snapdragon flowers on the ruined walls of Belfort Castle. We were -informed that the plant is not elsewhere found in Syria, and the -likelihood is that some Crusader’s lady brought it from the garden of a -far-off French or English home. - -The Crusader was at once the dreamer, the worshipper, and the fighter of -the Middle Age. The knight was not indeed the sort of man whom at first -sight we would suspect of dreaming. Could we see him riding down the -street to-day, we should probably be reminded of some village blacksmith -on a Clydesdale horse. Yet he had been dreaming dreams and seeing -visions. He was a gentleman and a man of feeling, though he had his own -rough ways of shewing it. Part of what had set him dreaming was the -instinct of travel and the literature of travel which in those days was -so quaint and picturesque. No doubt this travel literature was largely -due to pilgrims, but there were others then who could play no tune but -“Over the hills and far away.” Travellers’ half-remembered and -exaggerated adventures conspired with the fantastic imaginings of the -untravelled rustic to create that magic land beyond the horizon where -giants, monsters, and devils had their home. All the wistfulness, the -dream, and the desire of the ancient days are there. The chroniclers of -the time before the Norman Conquest are the most fascinating of -geographers, and the singers of Arthurian romance in the later days of -the Crusades arrived at a geography which was an utter bewilderment, -the result of ages of vague travel and rumours from the Syrian seat of -war. Babylon and Wales and places with names wholly unpronounceable are -in sublime confusion, and the geography in general is that of -Thackeray’s Little Billee, who saw from his mast-head “Jerusalem and -Madagascar and South Amerikee.” - -Jerusalem always came first. “The Crusades,” as Sidonia says in -_Tancred_, “renovated the spiritual hold which Asia has always had upon -the North.” The spell of the East had come upon the West, and in that -there lay a reason for the Crusades deeper than any commercial or even -military attraction. The West was waiting for it. Behind the British men -of the twelfth century lay a heredity of patriotic legend connected -largely with the battle of Christianity against Paganism under Arthur. -There lay the foundation of much that was best in the crusading -enthusiasm. On their own soil they had followed the King and fought -under him for Christ. But to satisfy the hearts of these rough men it -needed more than all such practical life could yield them, even when -that life was so exciting as it was then. There is an infinite pathos in -the dream that was coming to clearness through those years. Discontented -with the glories even of Arthur’s court, longing for a spiritual -something which might give to chivalry its finest meaning, they sought -the Holy Grail. Until, well on in the twelfth century, the shadowy -figures of Walter Map and Robert de Borron formulate the romance,[29] -we see it growing out of old pagan legends baptized by Christian -missionaries and blended with Bible stories. It emerges at last in the -romances of the French Trouvères, the summit and flower of all past -idealisms, the spiritual secret and gist of life, and the chief end of -noble men. This is all well known to those who interest themselves in -that spiritual search which is the main business of choice souls in all -ages, and which in that age took literary form in the Grail Quest. But -to us it is specially interesting to note that the century whose later -years received the Trouvère legend from Chrétien de Troyes began with an -event but for which that legend would never have assumed the form in -which it appeared. In 1101 Cæssarea was besieged and taken by Baldwin I. -“It yielded a rich booty. Among other prizes was found a hexagonal vase -of green crystal, supposed to have been used at the administration of -the sacrament, and now preserved in Paris. This vase plays an important -part in mediæval poetry as the Holy Grail.” The visionary aspect of the -Crusades is that which continually obtrudes itself as one reads their -history. Tasso’s _Gerusalemme Liberata_ is full of it. Even so rough and -boisterous a hero as Richard is obviously a dreamer also. Nothing in all -this history is more striking than that fateful day when, after marching -to within seven leagues of Jerusalem, Richard commanded his army to -halt, and courted their murmurs during a month’s unaccountable -inaction. Performing unheard-of feats of valour in minor sallies, he -could only weep when he beheld the towers of the Holy City, and after -routing Saladin’s army in a great battle at Joppa, negotiated a truce -and wandered off to shipwreck and imprisonment, commending the Holy Land -to God, and praying that it might be granted him to return again and -recover it.[30] - -As worshippers, the Crusaders are famous figures in the Holy Land. It is -hard to reconcile the tales of wild debauchery which followed almost all -their victories, with the obviously genuine religious enthusiasm that -swept the hosts down weeping on their knees when they caught first sight -of Jerusalem. Yet the worship was sincere, and there were pure and -gentle spirits among them whom victory did not demoralise. They are -always, indeed, armed worshippers--at first a religious soldiery, -afterwards a military priesthood, as Stebbing puts it. This composite -character is well brought out in the two orders of knights, the -Hospitallers and the Templars. The former, working for the sick in the -Holy City, wore a black robe with a white cross upon the breast of it, -but when there was fighting to be done they covered this with a surcoat -of scarlet on which a silver cross was embroidered. They lived simply, -contenting themselves with such lodging and fare as were offered them, -and they were bound to keep themselves provided with a light which must -always be kept burning while they slept. The Templars pledged -themselves in even stricter vows, and were warrior-priests in the most -literal sense of the term. On the summit of Mount Tabor there is the -ruin of a Crusader church, whose broken walls still enclose the sacred -space where once men worshipped. Spacious and strongly built, the ruin -has a severe grandeur of its own. In the chancel an altar has been -rebuilt, and an upturned Corinthian capital set upon it, in the centre -of which is fixed a heavy iron cross. That iron cross seems to sum up in -its grave symbolism the very spirit of the Crusades. Many of their -churches were reconstructions of older Christian edifices, and most of -them have been transmuted into mosques, so that their ecclesiastical -architecture still remaining is as composite as their character and -their enterprise. Yet enough remains of what is distinctively their own -to show at once the massive strength and the decorative beauty of their -buildings. Its strength is that of men who were accustomed to build -fortresses; the buttressed walls are of immense thickness, and the -mortar is sometimes harder than the stone. Its beauty has been defaced -by the mutilation of much fine work, but from what is left we know how -well they carved; and there is a certain high solemnity about their -arches and columns which tells of men whose minds were large, strong, -and real. - -One curious fact, to which Conder often directs attention, is constantly -perplexing the traveller. Their identifications of sacred sites are -those of men whose enthusiasm far exceeded their knowledge. Had they -taken time to consult the Scriptures, or to read them with any -thoughtfulness, countless errors would have been avoided. But the -soldier instinct is very far from the critical, and they were impatient -to find the sites they wished to see. Anything was sufficient for a -clue. The name Jibrin suggested “Gabriel,” and a great church arose in -honour of the Archangel. Athlit was near the sea-shore, and the -Crusaders who lived there found Tyre and Capernaum in its immediate -neighbourhood. For reasons equally cogent, Shiloh was brought within a -mile or two of Jerusalem, Shechem became Sychar, and the heights of Ebal -and Gerizim were recognised as the Dan and Bethel of Jeroboam’s calves. -Most curious of all, the little hill of Jebel Duhy, on whose summit you -look down across the valley from the top of Tabor, was named Hermon, for -no other reason than that a psalm places the two together in its promise -that “Tabor and Hermon shall rejoice in Thy name.” Altogether, these -worshippers were in too great haste. “Crusading topography is more -remarkable than reliable.” - -Great as the Crusaders were in dream and in worship, it is their -fighting that remains for ever most impressive and most characteristic. -Of no men in history is the verse truer, in spite of all their -extravagances-- - - Know that the men of great renown - Were men of simple needs: - Bare to the Lord they laid them down - And slept on mighty deeds. - -Looked at from a distance, the Crusades very generally wear the aspect -of a stream of vivid colour--a spectacular progress of Europe through a -corner of Asia, whose main feature is its brilliant picturesqueness. On -the spot the quality in them which is by far the most impressive is -their stern reality and fighting weight. The Crusader was doubtless one -who in his time played many parts, but whatever else he was, no one who -has seen the remains of his work will question that he was at least “a -first-class fighting man.” The figure of Richard, as it is preserved for -us in the records of the older historians, may be more or less -apocryphal, but it is at least true enough to crusading ideals, which -must have found many an actual realisation in these strong and fearless -soldiers of the Cross. We read of amazing captures of booty; of single -combats in which “the King at one blow severs the head, right shoulder -and arm of his opponent from the rest of his body”; of a conflict in -which only one Christian perished, while “the Turks lost seven hundred -men and above fifteen hundred horses.” At Joppa the king leaps out of -his ship before it can reach land, and rushes on the enemy. Three days -later he and his knights are surprised and have to fight half-naked, -some in their shirts and some even barefoot; yet they win. At another -time we see Richard plunging alone into the midst of the hostile army, -and fighting until Saladin’s brother sends him a gift of two Arab -war-horses to enable him to fight it out. Altogether such a hero was he, -that the Moslems asserted “that even the horses bristled their manes at -the name of Richard.” No wonder if in the popular imagination he became -for England hardly distinguishable from that St. George who had already -been identified with Perseus, who on these same sands had fought the -dragon for Andromeda. - -The grandeur of crusading warfare lingers in the mighty ruins of their -castles. Nothing could surpass the impressiveness of these castles, seen -on hill-tops from below, combing the sky with the sharp broken teeth of -their ruined towers, or rearing a black “mailed head of menace” against -the stars. Many of them are on the sites of older fortresses, and -actually stand on Jewish or Roman foundations. By far the most imposing -of such castles is that of Banias, which crowns that spur of Hermon at -which “Dan leaped from Bashan” long ago. It must have been capable of -quartering a small army, and the quantity of broken vessels confirms the -impression. Cisterns, vaulted and groined archways, mosaic floors, -dungeons, and every other luxury of their European homes had been -imported hither. - -The Crusaders ran a line of fortresses along that western edge of the -Jordan valley where Israel, as we saw, failed to protect the mouths of -her gorges. Belvoir, “the Star of the Wind,” guards from its lofty -promontory the passes immediately south of the Sea of Galilee. Bethshan -itself, where the Canaanites lingered to the standing shame of Israel, -shows the well-preserved remains of a crusader bridge and fortress. Not -less striking is the sea-board line of castles. Not only in such old -localities as Tyre and Sidon, Cæsarea and Joppa, did fortresses arise, -but on at least two quite new sites--those of Athlit and Acre. - -[Illustration: INTERIOR OF THE DOME OF THE CHAIN, LOOKING NORTH.] - -Athlit is unmentioned in Scripture, and only the eye of seafaring -soldiers could have discovered how its little crease in the long -straight line of coast might be utilised for defence. Acre is “the Key -to Syria”; but it was left for the Crusaders to discover that fact. - -Yet with all this might and purpose and strategic instinct manifest in -every mile of Syria, failure is written broad across the land in these -ruins. At two points the sense of it becomes especially acute. One is -the battlefield below the very mountain which tradition has assigned to -the preaching of the Sermon on the Mount. The horrors of that field were -such that even yet it is impossible to look without shuddering upon the -flattened top of Hattin, where the black basalt stands out from the -green slopes below. The Crusaders were rushed into the open plain, near -which Saladin’s cavalry were waiting for them, and they met his assault -unfed, unrested, and without even water to quench their thirst. -Throughout a long hot day they perished round the banner of the Cross, a -final element of horror being added when the Saracens set fire to the -scrub, and unhorsed knights were roasted alive in their armour. That was -the decisive battle of the Crusades, and Saladin marched after it -straight upon Jerusalem. - -The other point at which the failure of the Crusades has set up its -monument is at their own Athlit. The creation of their genius, and for -solidity and massive strength perhaps the most characteristic ruin in -Syria, it is also the saddest thing of all they have left for a -memorial. Near its rocks King Louis IX. of France--most unfortunate and -yet most saintly of all crusading kings--was shipwrecked. Here, too, at -the end of the thirteenth century, the Knights Templars made their last -retreat after the fall of Acre, and it was from its castle that they -departed--the last to abandon the last Crusade. Seen from the sea, the -compact and rounded promontory of Athlit presents the appearance of a -clenched fist menacing and defiant. Its history grimly corroborates the -imagination that here through centuries of decay the land as it were -gathers itself together, and thrusts out this grim headland in perpetual -defiance of the Western world. - -The Crusades stand for more in Palestine than it is easy to realise. The -comprehensiveness of their historical significance is by no means -exhausted when we have stated it in such paradoxes as those with which -our chapter began. They were indeed the greatest sham and at the same -time the greatest reality of Syrian history, but they were far more than -that. They were heirs to all the past of the country, and they did much -to perpetuate that past and to carry it on into the time to come. Even -from the Moslem life they wrestled with, they borrowed something. They, -and the chivalry which they fostered, are the most spectacular part of -Western history, and give a dash of brilliant colour to the grey life of -the Middle Ages. That brilliance is in part the splendour of the East. -The Crusader has borrowed from the Saracen at least a scarf for his -sword. - -It is chiefly as builders that the Crusaders remain in Syria exposed to -modern eyes, and in their building they have perpetuated and utilised -the other three invasions. From the first Christians they took over -their churches and rebuilt them, retaining something and adding more. -From the older Jewish architects they had almost as great an -inheritance. There seems no incongruity in the heavy stone mangers and -far-driven iron rings which they fixed in the walls of those tremendous -vaults on which the Temple area rests; and it is by a not unnatural -transference that tradition has given to these the name of Solomon’s -Stables. Solomon’s vaults they may have been, but as stables they were -of crusading origin. Their own building is a rough imitation of the -drafted stones of the Jews. The rustic work is much the same, only -rougher, but the plain chiselling is very far from the minute fineness -of the older workmanship. Altogether, they were fighters first and -builders second. Like the men of Nehemiah’s time, “every one with one of -his hands wrought in the work, and with the other hand held a weapon.... -Every one had his sword girded by his side, and so builded.” Nor did -they fail to utilise the work of Roman builders. At Cæsarea there is the -most striking instance of this, and one of the most suggestive facts in -the whole story of the Crusaders. Cæsarea was the most Roman of all -Syrian towns. Built as the seaport for Sebaste by Herod, it was the part -of Syria which travellers and governors sailing from Italy first -sighted, and it was designed to give them the impression of a land -Romanised. Herod’s delight in pillars is attested by the colonnades of -Sebaste, and the wealth of shaft and capital which marks the ruins of -all his cities. But in Cæsarea he seems to have excelled himself. The -Roman mole which forms the northern side of the harbour “is composed of -some sixty or seventy prostrate columns lying side by side in the water -like rows of stranded logs.”[31] On the long promontory south of the -mole stands the Crusader Castle, notable for the circumstance that the -Crusaders built hundreds of lighter and shorter columns into their walls -to thorough-bind them, so that, in Oliphant’s exact and graphic words, -“the butts project like rows of cannon from the side of a man-of-war.” -Which thing is for an allegory; and one of the most eloquent of all -sermons in stone it is. Rome did more for Christianity than all its -friends, while she was as yet its enemy. Without her courts of justice -Paul would have had short shrift from his countrymen. Her roads and her -citizenship gave to the first missionaries of the Cross their exit upon -the world and their opportunity. Her laws gave them not protection only, -but a groundwork for much that entered into that theology which -conquered the thought of the world. Paul appealed unto Cæsar, and he -wrote to the Romans his gospel expressed in the forms with which they -were most familiar. And it was at Cæsarea that he made his appeal, doing -in flesh and blood what his disciples a thousand years later did in -stone--thorough-binding the walls of the building of Christian faith -with Roman columns. - - - - -PART III - -THE SPIRIT OF SYRIA - - -In the first and second parts of this book we have been collecting -impressions of the Land and its Invaders. It remains for us in the third -part to gather these together into something which may enable us to -realise more clearly the general meaning and quality of the spirit of -Syria. In the main two things must be noted, and the first of them is -religious. Whatever else Palestine may be, she is certainly a land with -a God. The meaning of Syria is disclosed in her Israelite and Christian -periods, whose great fact and characteristic process is the revelation -of God to men on earth. All her other invasions have to reckon with that -fact. Some of them were bitterly hostile to it, but they were powerless -to efface it. Others were indifferent, entering Syria for ends of their -own; but history shews them bent over to God’s purposes and -unconsciously made the instruments of working out His will. That will -brought Israel to her land, isolated her there, hemmed her in, bore her -and carried her in everlasting arms on through her centuries, finally -was incarnate in her life. For Jesus Christ was a Syrian, and we must -orientalise our thoughts of Him before we can rightly understand the -Christian revelation. - -Not less clear is the second impression, which is that of the -unfinishedness and imperfection of all things Syrian. It is a place of -wreckage, new and old. But the peculiarity of that wreckage is that it -was always there, more or less. None of the ideals of the land were ever -quite realised. It was never completely conquered by the Israelites, -their ambition stopping short and their energy flagging before their -task was done. It was never completely cultivated, or made to yield its -full harvest of natural wealth. In countless small things this -incompleteness is evident. The contrast between the beauty of the -distant view and the disorder and slovenliness of the near has been -already noted. The post-office in Damascus is a quite good post-office, -so far as letters and telegrams go. But you inquire for these in a hall -which looks like a very dirty stable-yard with a very dirty fountain in -the middle of it, furnished with little rough-sawn wooden boxes for -private letters, such as no self-respecting grocer would pack with -oranges. Even the tombs, about which so much sacredness is supposed to -gather, are the untidiest of sepulchres. You may see a large and -expensive tombstone, shining white in the distance, with all the air of -aristocratic self-importance which man’s pride can lend to death; but -when you approach, it is railed off with bamboo and barbed wire which -might have been picked off a rubbish-heap. There are good roads in -places, but they lead to nowhere. Generally they collapse into mere -watercourses after a few miles, or they run on in a squared and measured -lane of sharp boulders down which no horse can walk. Nor is this -incompleteness a peculiarity of Turkish administration. Probably nothing -in Palestine is older than the landmarks which divide the fields. From -generation to generation these have been held sacred, laws against their -removal having been in force among the ancient Canaanites before the -conquest by Israel. So sacred are they that even murderers and thieves -will seldom dare to tamper with them. Yet through all the long past the -landmarks are said to have remained as the first men laid them -down--mere inconspicuous heaps of little stones, the easiest things in -the world to remove. - -When we take the unfinishedness of the land along with the revelation -and consider them together, we can hardly fail to gain a lesson of -far-reaching meaning. The great incompleteness of Syria--the thing in -which her life has been most lamentably unfinished--was her response to -the revelation of her God. She never was at pains to understand it; she -never fully opened her heart to its new progress, nor felt her high -destiny as the bearer of good tidings to the world. She never seriously -set herself to obey its plainest ethical demands. The wreckage is her -price paid for the neglect. No man nor nation can finish any task to -perfection, who has not done justice to such revelation of God as his -heart and conscience have received. It is truth to the inward light that -keeps us from losing heart and enables us to feel that energy and -patience to the end are worth our while. Right dealing with revelation -is the secret of all efficient performance. The combination in -Palestine of such revelation and such defect in strenuous action shows -us a land that has just missed the most amazing destiny on earth. - -It is in the remembrance of these thoughts that the chapters of this -part should be read. The Shadow of Death has fallen because these men -could not escape their knowledge of some greatness in death, more moving -than anything life had to show. The spectral is but a degenerate and -perverse form of their sense of God. The Cross gives its ethical -significance to the burden and sorrow of the land. Resurrection shows -signs even now that God has not yet done with Syria. But first, before -we treat these aspects of her spirit, let us look at it on its brighter -side--the smile and song of the land. - -[Illustration: INTERIOR OF THE DOME OF THE ROCK (MOSQUE OF OMAR), FROM -THE SOUTH-EAST.] - - - - -CHAPTER I - -THE LIGHTER SIDE OF THINGS - - -One easily forgets, among the many sorrows of the Holy Land, that there -is any lighter side to the picture there. Yet such a side there is, and -always has been. Nature is not always severe, nor the spirit of man -melancholy, in the East. Both nature and man are sometimes found in -lighter vein here as elsewhere. Stevenson’s most charming good word for -the world he always defended so gallantly, is specially applicable to -the Syrian part of it.--“It is a shaggy world, and yet studded with -gardens; where the salt and tumbling sea receives rivers running from -among reeds and lilies.” Syria has always known the value of her -gardens, and felt the sweet enchantment of her reeds and lilies. Was not -her first story told of a garden where four such rivers flowed, and her -noblest sermon that whose text was “the lilies of the field” and “the -birds of the air”? What pleasantness of open nature there is in these -two latter expressions! What sense of field-breadth and sky-space, in -which the Preacher had room for breathing and for delight! Every -Israelite, sitting under his vine and fig tree, or going forth to -meditate in the fields at evening, knew this charm. From of old the -inhabitants have taken delight in exchanging roofs for bowers in their -fields and gardens, or for booths, built with green branches on their -house-roofs. Many a sweet vista is seen in Palestine framed in trellised -vines or in passion-flower swinging over a roofed fountain or a garden -house. The mountains were often bare and unhomely, for at no time can -any but a minor part of them have been cultivated; yet even the -wind-swept heights were inhabited by health and hope and gladness, and -when a shepherd passed by, or the reapers shouted in the harvest-fields, -the heart of the men of Israel sang aloud. In the words of the 65th -Psalm this exhilaration and childlike glee finds its most perfect -expression; we quote them in that old Scottish rhymed version which has -so singularly caught their spirit:-- - - They drop upon the pastures wide, - That do in deserts lie; - The little hills on ev’ry side - Rejoice right pleasantly. - - With flocks the pastures clothed be, - The vales with corn are clad; - And now they shout and sing to thee, - For thou hast made them glad. - -Similarly the Jordan, usually thought of with a certain gloom, and -rendered still more dismal by its persistent allegorical association -with death, is by no means so melancholy as it is supposed to be. Its -rise, indeed, was from a black cave, where ancient pagan worship erected -its shrines, seeing life issue there from the abyss of death. Its course -leads it far down, like the dark stream of classic fable, below the -surface of the earth and ocean. Yet there is no sense of all that as -one looks at it from any point in its course. The trees of Syria are -generally disappointing. For the most part solitary, or undersized where -there is a wood, many of them are decaying, and most of them are dull in -colour. But the vegetation of the Jordan is a bright exception. Even at -its lowest point, when it is hurrying over the last miles to the Dead -Sea, it flows through that rich boscage known as the “Swellings” or the -“Pride” of Jordan, where pilgrims cut their staves. It is to this part -of its course that the words in _Tancred_ apply most exactly, “The -beauty and abundance of the Promised Land may still be found ... ever by -the rushing waters of the bowery Jordan.” Warburton, describing the same -scene in early morning, speaks of the awakening of birds and beasts -there, and then the sunrise, adding, “I lingered long upon that -mountain’s brow, and thought that, so far from deserving all the dismal -epithets that had been bestowed upon it, I had not seen so cheerful or -attractive a scene in Palestine.” - -The scents of the East add to the delightfulness of Nature on her -pleasant side. There are plenty of abominable smells there, but these -are in the towns and villages. The open country is continually -surprising and refreshing its travellers with new perfume. That this is -fully appreciated by the natives, no reader of the Bible can forget. -There we have the scent of spices and of wine; of the field, of water, -and of Lebanon; of budding vines, mandrakes, apples; of ointment, of -incense, and of raiment. In such references we see the East inhaling the -fragrance of the land with an almost passionate delight. It is all -there still. The scent of the desert after rain has been already -referred to, but the same aromatic perfume may be enjoyed by climbing -the hills above Beyrout, where every ground-plant seems to breathe forth -spices. Again, there are the blossoming trees, the heavy perfume of -orange-flower, and the simple fragrance of roses. Best of all, there is -the clean smell of ripe grain in the cornfields, and the fresh, briny -exhilaration of breezes from the sea. - -Such is the lighter side of Nature; and man is not by any means so far -out of touch with it as is often supposed. The severity of material -conditions and of historical experience has not been able quite to -suppress man’s gaiety. It is well that this has been so, for here -certainly the words of the Scots song are true enough: “Werena my heart -licht, I wad dee.” With so much of the darker powers of the universe -pressing hard upon them, one trembles to imagine what the spirit of -Syria would have been without those inexhaustible stores of gaiety that -break forth sometimes like her great river from the very darkness of the -abyss. Her laughter is not that of progressive lands looking to the -future in the great joy of an intelligent hope. It is rather a part of -her inalienable childhood, whose fresh sweetness and virginity have -somehow been permitted to remain through all her sorrows. Renan -describes the heroes of the Bible as “always young, healthy, and strong, -scarcely at all superstitious, passionate, simple, and grand.” There is -still some inheritance of such life, perpetually young and even -childish, in the Holy Land. - -The first appearance of an Eastern is grave and solemn, with an element -of contempt in it rather trying to the would-be jester or too familiar -stranger. But this is not wholly due to any weight of gloom pressing on -his heart. It has, with singular ingenuity, been traced to quite minor -and apparently insignificant causes, such as the wearing of flowing -robes by the men and the burden-bearing of the women. There can be no -doubt that both clothes and burdens exercise a powerful influence on -character; and it may well be the case that the management of their -garment has taught dignity to the men, while the carrying of heavy -waterpots has helped to make the women graceful and erect. There is also -the instinct of self-defence, and the constant remembrance of danger. -Every Eastern, however prosperous, impresses one with the idea that his -table is spread for him in the presence of his enemies. This leads -him--especially if he be an Arab--to assume a show of superiority and a -bullying swagger, which seem to the uninitiated quite impervious to any -thought of fun. But the mask is easily laid aside, and the gravest and -most contemptuous Syrian will suddenly collapse into harsh laughter or -forget himself in childish interest. - -It would be wonderful if it were otherwise. The East is full of -provocatives to mirth--not merely such as seem ridiculous to a stranger -because they are foreign, but things grotesque in themselves. Take the -one instance of the camel. Much has been written about him from many -points of view, but justice has never yet been done to the camel as a -humorous person. Yet he is the most humorous of all the inhabitants of -the East. Beside him, with his sardonic pleasantry, the monkey is a -mountebank and the donkey but a solemn little ass. He has been described -as “the tall, simple, smiling camel”; but on closer acquaintance he -turns out to be hardly so simple as he might be taken for, and if he -smiles, he is generally smiling at you. The camels you meet in Syria are -carrying barley with the air of kings, and regarding their human -companions with, at best, a sentiment of contemptuous tolerance. The -lower lip of a camel is one of the most expressive features in the whole -repertoire of natural history. The humours of this animal reached for us -their climax at Sheikh Miskin, while we were waiting for the Damascus -train. A camel had been persuaded to kneel in order to receive its load -of long poles brought by the railway. It was roaring steadily, in a -fiendish and yet conscientious manner. Ten men were loading it, of whom -one stood upon its near fore-leg, two fastened the poles upon its back, -and the remaining seven looked on and made remarks. The beast waited -until the poles were all but fixed--ten of them or so. Then it indulged -in a shake, which sent them rolling in all directions. Finally it was -loaded, with two of the sticks on one side and one on the other, their -ends projecting far out behind and in front. It rose, nearly ruining a -well-dressed Arab who had somehow got in among it. Just then the train -arrived and the camel fled incontinently, sidewise like a crab, -spreading the fear of death in man and beast for many yards around, and -dragging a terrified driver, who hung on to its head-rope, across -towards the distant east. A loaded camel behaving in this fashion is a -deadlier weapon than a loaded gun. - -Now the native wit always appeared to us to have modelled itself on -camel drollery of this sort. It is generally personal, and its essential -function is to hit somebody. It lacks freshness, and has a certain -suggestion of a clown with “crow’s feet” under his eyes. Sometimes -indeed a Syrian indulges in jokes at his own expense, but more -frequently his facetiousness is at the expense of others, and it is -tolerably direct. The habit of nicknames lends itself to Oriental wit, -the lean man being described familiarly as “Father of Bones,” and the -stout man as “Full Moon of Religion.” Passing through a village some -distance off the usual route of travellers, we were surrounded with -villagers who asked the dragoman why we had come. “To take away your -country!” was the answer, and it was met with peals of laughter. Another -witticism which was immensely appreciated was the remark to some farmers -who were suffering from drought that we in England had stolen their rain -and it had made many people sick there. A boatman on the Sea of Galilee -was being chaffed unmercifully upon the fact that he had once tried to -commit suicide. He appealed, smiling, to one of the passengers as “My -Father,” and pled that he had been mad when he did that. A -fellow-boatman rebuked him for calling the gentleman “father of a -lunatic,” and the whole crew was dissolved in laughter, the victim -himself heartily joining in the chorus. In Damascus we found a time-worn -Joe Miller in the shout of the nosegay-seller--a very musical cry, which -the guide-book translates “Appease your mother-in-law,” _i.e._ by -presenting her with a bouquet. - -From of old pleasure has been apt to degenerate in the luxurious East, -and the fun of Syrians shows abundant traces of such degeneration. Many -unpleasant elements mingle with it. One of the recognised forces in -Eastern life is _humbug_--barefaced bluff and transparent pretence, -which is apparently seen through and yet retains its potency. The -lengths to which this method may go are almost incredible, and cases are -on record of interpreters who have volubly translated a long English -address and afterwards confessed that they did not know a word of the -English language. At times, also, high spirits leads to savagery. The -men who were in charge of our animals were kind and even affectionate to -them, but their moods changed unaccountably. Your donkey-driver, -trotting behind his donkey, will sometimes encourage it with yelling -which would fill any animal less philosophical with the fear of instant -extermination, and he jocularly throws rocks at it until you stop him. -Worst of all, the Syrian humour constantly tends towards indecency of -the most bestial type. The song with which a musical donkey-boy relieves -the monotony of the journey is sometimes quite untranslatable. The -“body-dances,” which form the staple - -[Illustration: THE MOUNT OF OLIVES, FROM A HOUSE-TOP ON MOUNT ZION.] - -entertainment provided by wandering Arabs, are often pantomimic, and -their crude realism is unspeakably disgusting. - -Yet there is a very innocent and cheerful vein in the human nature of -Syria. At times it is irrelevant and trying. The camp guards, _e.g._ who -are hired from the nearest village to watch the sleeping tents, are apt -to beguile the hours of darkness in a manner hardly conducive to repose. -In most of our camps they were silent figures, flitting about in an -almost ghostly fashion, with perfectly noiseless footsteps. But -MacGregor complains of having had to pay his Egyptian guards “for -sleeping very loud to keep away the robbers.” Our difficulties were not -exactly the same as his, but in some places the guards kept singing as -they paced to and fro, and shouted cheerily to one another along the -whole length of the encampment, or whistled incessantly, and -occasionally fired guns to prove their vigilance. There is a sense of -spontaneity and heartiness about the mirth of the East which throws into -strong contrast its subtler and more gloomy characteristics. -Irresponsible and gay, Syrians seem to be grown-up children, and they -retain the ways of childhood. We rarely saw children playing games, but -bands of full-grown men were seen at times playing schoolboys’ field -games with much shouting. Everybody in the cities appears to be either -selling or eating sweetmeats. Sport is rare, but men go forth with guns -to shoot little birds like sparrows. One of the most curious sights of -Damascus is that of shopkeepers and artisans who go about the streets -followed by pet lambs instead of dogs, the wool of these strange little -creatures being dyed in brilliant spots of blue or pink. - -The kindliness of the East is as genuine and as pleasing as that of any -land in the West. It is not in evidence indeed when there is nothing to -call it forth. As you pass through the country, the villagers and -townsfolk regard you with indifference if not with scorn. But one must -remember the universal _acting_ of the East--its devotion to -appearances, and its very curious ideas as to which appearances are most -becoming. With that in mind, the indifference and the scorn become less -alarming. You may find the whole spirit of the situation suddenly change -to one of the kindliest. A traveller who has fallen victim to one of the -malarial fevers which are so common in Syria at certain periods, will -never forget the tenderness with which his camp-servants come about his -tent inquiring, “Ente mabsut?” (Are you happy, or well?). When he -returns the inquiry the answer is, “Ente mabsut, ana mabsut” (If you are -happy, I am happy). At Sidon we had just arrived and had the tents -pitched in the open space next the burying-ground. It was Thursday, and -the graves were crowded with visitors--Mohammedan women in black, white, -or light-coloured robes. They did not seem very sad, even beside the -most recent graves, but gossiped and enjoyed their half-holiday, -disappearing before sunset silently, like a flock of pigeons to their -dovecots. The spectacle was theatrical and almost unearthly. It was -difficult to persuade oneself that these flitting figures were really -women at all; they seemed rather to be animated bits of landscape. Just -while we were watching this, and feeling all its dreamy remoteness from -human life as we had ever known it, two new figures appeared. They were -the gardener of a neighbouring garden and his young daughter Wurda -(Rhoda, Rose). She was five years of age, a tiny vision of black eyes -and hair, the hair being arranged in two pigtails down her back. She -brought a little bunch of roses for each of us, and as she gave them -kissed our hands with as sweet a shyness as any child anywhere could -have done. The incident, like that on the hill of Samaria, lingers on -the memory, and bears witness to a world of gentleness and kindliness -such as we had little dreamed of. Altogether there are abundant signs -that in ancient days there must have been much of that Syrian life -described by one scholar as “gay and bright, festive and musical--the -very home of songs and dances.” It is pleasant to know that although the -fortunes of the land have saddened her so terribly, there still remains -something at least of her former gaiety. - -Even the religion of Syria has its lighter side. Every student of the -Bible knows how much there was of rejoicing and fresh childlike -revelling in the situation, in the worship of ancient Israel. It is -peculiarly interesting to find that in the Semitic worship before and -apart from the invasion of Israel, so kindly and friendly a relation -subsisted between man and his gods. “The circle into which a man was -born was not simply a group of kinsfolk and fellow-citizens, but -embraced also certain divine beings, the gods of the family and of the -state, which to the ancient mind were as much a part of the particular -community with which they stood connected as the human members of the -social circle.”[32] Accordingly it would appear that among these ancient -Semites the conception of sacrifice was by no means so gloomy as it came -to be later, when the moral tragedy of life was more clearly realised. -The idea was that of “communion with the deity in a sacrificial meal of -holy food.” They “go on eating and drinking and rejoicing before their -god with the assurance that he and they are on the best of jovial good -terms.... Ancient religion assumes that through the help of the gods -life is so happy and satisfactory that ordinary acts of worship are all -brightness and hilarity, expressing no other idea than that the -worshippers are well content with themselves and with their divine -sovereign.”[33] - -Of course the severer truth and cleaner conscience which Israel’s -revelation brought her gradually deepened the shadows on her religious -life. She substituted duty for happiness, the beauty of holiness for the -mere _joie de vivre_, and the tragic blessedness of forgiveness for the -careless pleasures of life. Yet to the end she retained and insisted on -the gladness of religion. The duty of joy was a command and not merely -an epigram for Israel. Dante himself was not more explicit in his -condemnation of perverse sullenness than was he who wrote, “Because -thou servedst not the Lord thy God with joyfulness, and with gladness of -heart, for the abundance of all things: therefore shalt thou serve thine -enemies.”[34] - -It is surely a very striking fact that the spots which all travellers -select as those in which the gladness of the land dwells most freely -still are Nazareth and Bethlehem. For beauty of feature and of dress, -and for their general air of pleasant and light-hearted gaiety, these -are the acknowledged centres. It was of Bethlehem that we felt this most -true. Its name, signifying “House of Bread,” is significant of plenty -and of comfort. Its associations, even apart from the song of angels -there, are sweet and gracious. While approaching it, you look across a -pleasant and lightsome landscape to the dim blue mountains of Moab, and -remember how Ruth looked across these very fields, when the reapers of -Boaz were working in them, to her distant home in those mountains. Here -it was that King David in his boyhood played and tended the flocks of -his father, and it was the water of that sweet well for which he longed -in the days of his adversity. These and a hundred other memories prepare -the traveller for a place of gracious and kindly sweetness. - - - - -CHAPTER II - -THE SHADOW OF DEATH - - -We now turn sharply to the other side of things, and it must be apparent -to every one that we are passing from the smaller to the vastly greater -element in the spirit of Syria. The text in Deuteronomy which we -quoted[35] shows us joy commanded at the sword’s point, as if the nation -were unwilling and unlikely to obey easily the happy command. Even when -Jesus Christ repeats the injunction in His great words, “Rejoice and be -exceeding glad,” it is a defiant gladness He enjoins. The context shows -that the rejoicing is that of persecuted and slandered men. A recent -writer has bitterly described our march through life in the words: “We -uphold our wayward steps with the promises and the commandments for -crutches, but on either side of us trudge the shadow Death and the -bacchanal Sex.”[36] The words sound profane to Western ears, but they -are not untrue of the spirit of Syria. It is of “the shadow Death” that -the present chapter treats. - -As primitive religion decayed and men lost their sense of kinship and -their easy and friendly relations with the old gods, they were left -alone with death, which everywhere stared them in the face and claimed -them for its own. Next to God, death is the most impressive fact in -human experience, with sin for its sting. When old and defective views -of God are passing away, two courses are open to men. As death closes in -upon them, and they feel its grasp upon their unprotected souls, they -may appeal from it to God, and find Him revealing Himself, with eternal -life for them in the knowledge of Him. This was what the noblest of -Israel’s thinkers did, and the growing revelation of the Bible was their -reward. God showed Himself to them in ever-increasing clearness, until -one and another and another of them found that the hand that grasped -them was “not Death but Love.” But another course is open. They may -enthrone death in place of the broken gods--“Death is king, and vivat -rex!” They may “say to corruption, Thou art my father; to the worm, Thou -art my mother, and my sister.” Then the emphasis of thought will fall on -the grave, and all men’s imaginations will grow morbid. - -The tombs of the Holy Land are of many patterns. In his _Haifa_, -Laurence Oliphant describes several different kinds of them, from the -cave-sepulchres, or the underground galleries, to the little wayside -graves or narrow holes driven into rock which seem such tightly-fitting -homes for the dead. There are, of course, the modern graves sacred to -the wives and children of missionaries who have laid down their lives -in the loving service of Christ and man. Buckle the historian sleeps in -the Christian burying-ground at Damascus, and Henriette Renan was laid -to rest in Byblus. These graves and others dear to the Western world -are, as graves have been since Abraham’s day, symbols of the strangers’ -inheritance and lot in the Holy Land. From these, back to the tombs of -hoariest antiquity, the country is bound by an unbroken chain of death. -Through all the centuries the dead have been thrust upon the notice of -the living in a fashion so obtrusive as to make this the most obvious -impression of the land. Most of the graves are those of persons now -unknown and quite forgotten. Small and great, common men and heroes, are -alike conspicuous in death. Each of the invaders has left his memorial, -and the sites of ancient cities are traced by help of their -burying-grounds. - -Moslem tombs are everywhere. Most of them are oblong structures of rude -but solid masonry erected over shallow graves. In some cases a painted -tarbush (fez-cap) marks the head and a little upright stone the feet. A -slight hollow is often cut in the flat top for birds to drink from. -Tombs are clustered among their iris-flowers beside the walls of -villages. They have crept up to the very summit of the hill which Gordon -identifies as Calvary. They have encroached on the palace of Herod’s -daughter at Samaria. They crowd the ground outside the built-up “Gate -Beautiful” at Jerusalem. There is, to our feelings, a certain indecency -in this promiscuous invasion of the grave: Mohammedans seem - -[Illustration: THE CHURCH OF THE NATIVITY AT BETHLEHEM. - - From a garden on the opposite hill. -] - -to bury their dead anywhere. The Crusaders have left fewer memorials of -themselves in the shape of tombs than one might have expected. -Barbarossa’s tomb we have already visited. For the rest, their memorials -are mostly those great buildings whose ruins stand to this day. Early -Christianity, too, has left its tombs--catacombs and single graves, -especially in the southern part of the coast, and eastwards in Hauran. -People of importance have sometimes more than one tomb, like St. George, -who is buried both in Lydda and Damascus. But the graves of humbler -Christians are more precious than these, for their inscriptions remain, -breathing forth the faith and peace with which Christ had blessed the -world. Such memorials of victory over death are inextinguishable lamps -hung in the sepulchres of Syria. And these lamps are kindled at the -Great Light. Never was symbolism more appropriate than that of the Holy -Fire in the Church of the Sepulchre. The very heart and soul of Syria is -a tomb--the reputed grave of Jesus Christ. To this day the chief pilgrim -song repeats with exultant reiteration the words, “This is the tomb of -Christ.” It is a song which has never been silent in the land. In the -Crusader camps a herald closed the day with the loud cry, “Lord, succour -the Holy Sepulchre”; and the sentinels passed the word from post to -post, “Remember the Holy Sepulchre.” - -It is not, however, the victory over death that impresses one as the -spirit of Syria. It is death itself, unconquered, mysterious, and dark. -Its Christian tombs are few and far between compared with the countless -multitude of sepulchres where there is no lamp alight. Most common and -most impressive of these are the Roman and Greek graves. The sands of -Tyre and Sidon are strewn with sarcophagi. Here a man’s magnificently -carved stone coffin serves for a drinking-trough, there a little child’s -stands alone and desolate near a river mouth. In Sidon the ancient -cemetery is on a scale whose rifled grandeur speaks volumes concerning -the vanity of earthly greatness. At Gadara, the eastward road is a -miniature Appian Way: hollow to the tread of horses as they cross the -excavated rock, and adorned with sarcophagi carved with crowns and -garlands, but bearing inscriptions without hope in them. Farther north, -on the eastern slopes of Hermon, we found a far older monument near one -of the Druse villages. We were crossing a little brook, when we noticed -that the bridge consisted of two huge monolithic slabs of limestone, -which, on examination, appeared to be the lids of ancient sarcophagi. -The carving on the ends was obviously intended to represent figures of -cherubim or some such winged creatures. The heads were gone, but the -plumage of the wings was very perfectly preserved. No one in the -locality knew anything about their origin. Their general appearance -seemed to connect them with the far East. - -The Jewish tombs are those which impress the imagination most with the -bitterness of death in Syria. They are so sad, with their antique -solemnity--so severely simple and unadorned. Where there is carving it -is almost always of Roman or Christian workmanship. A few stones with -such symbols as the seven-branched candlestick engraved on them are the -only unquestionable remains of ornamental Jewish work. Few of the Jewish -sepulchres have escaped appropriation by Gentiles. The more famous of -them have been appropriated by the Mohammedans, and early Christian -tradition is responsible for many other indentifications. The saints and -heroes of Israel, claimed also by Mohammedans and Christians, have -achieved a kind of funereal immortality which makes the whole land seem -one vast graveyard. Every prospect is dotted with tombs. The tomb of -Jonas shines white from its hill-top north of Hebron, that of Samuel -north of Jerusalem, while Joseph’s tomb commands the view where the Vale -of Shechem opens on the wider valley of Makhnah. None of them, however, -is at all so impressive as the tomb of Rachel, where a modern house and -dome cover a rough block of stone worn smooth with the kisses of -centuries of Jewish women. The wailing, as we saw it there, is a -memorable custom. The women were mostly elderly or aged, but they were -weeping real tears and wailing bitterly as they kissed the stone. It is -an old story that consecrates that rough stone, but how eternal is its -human pathos: “And they journeyed from Bethel; and there was but a -little way to come to Ephrath: and Rachel travailed, and she had hard -labour.... And Rachel died, and was buried in the way to Ephrath, which -is Bethlehem.”[37] - -The earlier fashion of Jewish work seems to have been the “pigeon-hole,” -in which the corpse was thrust into a little tunnel six feet long driven -at right angles to the rock face. Later, troughs were excavated to fit -the body along the line of the rock. In some instances these graves, -especially the former kind, are found in detached groups in wayside -rocks, whose perpendicular faces front the open air. For the most part -they are grouped in larger numbers within natural caves or subterranean -excavations, whose low doorway is blocked by a large circular stone -running in a groove. A later example of such a cave is that which is -shewn as the “new tomb” of Joseph of Arimathea, close to Gordon’s -Calvary. A few specimens of another sort, built of masonry without -cement, are to be found in Galilee.[38] Nothing could be gloomier than -the constantly repeated ruins of ancient Jewish graves in Syria. No -day’s journey is without them. They meet you casually, as it were, at -every turning. They are not, indeed, quite dark like the pagan tombs; -but the twilight, in which the hope of immortality just broke the -darkness for ancient Israel, is grey and cheerless, and the contribution -of Jewish graves to the spirit of Syria is a very sombre one. - -The typical spot for this side of the spirit of Syria is the town of -Hebron. - -The lanes and the dark bazaar are filthy and foul-smelling. The mosque -is an impressive building, suggestive of military rather than devotional -ideas. The Tomb of Abraham, which it covers, is one of the sights which -only a very few Christian eyes have seen. It is permitted to none but -Mohammedans to approach nearer the entrance to it than the seventh step -of the lane, or staircase, alongside its eastern wall. There is a hole -in that wall which is supposed to communicate with the cave below. Jews -write letters to Abraham, and place them in this hole, to tell him how -badly they are being treated by the Moslems. But the Moslem boys are -said to know that the hole has no great depth, and to collect these -letters and burn them before Abraham has seen them. The tomb is the very -heart and black centre of the Shadow of Death in Palestine. - -There is no part of man’s faith in which it is more necessary to be -thoroughgoing than in his thoughts about immortality. Egypt and Greece -furnish examples of great significance here. Egypt held an elaborate -doctrine of the future life, and it dominated all her thought concerning -this life. Men built their tombs and kings their pyramids as the most -important of their life’s achievements. The earthly house of the -Egyptian was but an inn where he spent a little time in passing; his -tomb was his eternal house and real home. Thus the tombs were glorified -copies of the dwelling-houses, either of the present, or more often of a -former generation.[39] Greece, on the other hand, did not believe in a -life beyond the grave. Her funeral celebrations were full of -lamentation, and her inscriptions sound sad enough to us. But it was a -principle with Greece and Rome to decorate tombs exclusively with glad -symbols such as sculptured flowers and even dances.[40] The point to be -observed about these is that neither of them was morbid. Morbidness -appears to avoid a robust faith or a frank scepticism,[41] and to cling -about the thought which is neither sure of one thing nor another. - -Israel’s position in regard to the belief in immortality is extremely -difficult to define. It was obviously with her a thing of gradual -development, as her revelation opened its broadening light upon life’s -problems. He would be a bold critic who would sum up the situation of -Isaiah’s time as Renan does in the statement, “not looking beyond the -world for reward and punishment,” the Hebrew life “has a heroic tension, -a sustained cry, an unceasing attention to the events of the world.” -Everything goes to shew that long before the faith in immortality had -grasped the imagination and the belief of the people in general it had -been revealed to chosen spirits. As for the others, it had been working -its way among them, occupying their minds in speculation, and leading -them, as it were, among the shades of the nether world. There was -something in the genius of the nation which rendered this interest in -death quite inevitable. The natural bearing of the people has a strange -solemnity about it, which finds constant expression in pose and -gesture, and often strikes the stranger with sudden vividness. Women may -be often seen, especially when clad in thin white garments on holidays, -who might stand just as you see them as models for monumental sculpture. -Along with all its activities, there is a distinct sympathy with death -in the genius of Israel. - -This phenomenon is, of course, due to very complex causes. It is a -deep-rooted Semitic instinct, which seems to be not altogether unlike -that of the Egyptian feeling to the tomb as the real home. Some parts of -Arabia are very rich in sacred tombs and spots of holy ground, and -pilgrimages are made to these both by Moslems and by Jews. Long strings -of mules, laden with coffins, wend their way to such sacred places as -Nejf, and thousands of corpses are sent thither even from India.[42] Old -tombstones are held in peculiar veneration by the more devout Arabs. The -well-known reverence with which the Syrian Jews regard the tombs of -their ancestors may be in part explained on the ground of patriotic -loyalty. Such scenes as those which may be witnessed at the tomb of -Rachel, remind us that a sense of the pathos of human life and its -mortality is also developed strongly and enters as a very real factor -into the spirit of Syria.[43] Nor can there be any doubt that a certain -moral or didactic use of death is also characteristic of the East, such -as is expressed in the sententious rhymes of old graveyards in this -country. The reader will recall the famous instance of this, which Sir -Walter Scott has made familiar--the shroud which served for the banner -of Saladin, with its inscription, “Saladin must die.”[44] - -If, however, such elements have entered into earlier thoughts of death, -it is to be feared that Palestine of the present day has little of them -left. The great light of Christ illuminated the sepulchres of Christian -Syria; but with the Mohammedan conquest darkness fell again, and all the -morbid fascination of the grave reasserted itself. There is little -reverence for the ordinary man’s place of burial now, whether it be of -ancient or of recent date. Dr. Merrill tells how he has found Arabs -actually stealing graves, i.e. clearing out old ones to make room for a -newly-deceased body, on the plea that “the dead man who was buried there -could not possibly want his grave any longer.”[45] On many a hillside -the rock tombs are rent and split, like pictures from Dante’s _Inferno_, -where they have been blasted open with gunpowder in the search for -treasure; and sometimes parties of natives may be seen prowling about a -hillside on that business. The find may consist of glass bracelets, -which have to be taken from the bone of a baby’s arm, or gold earrings -beside the skull whose face was once fair; but they excite no emotion -except that of money values. Laurence Oliphant had difficulty in -restraining the natives who searched with him from smashing the cinerary -urns they found, on - -[Illustration: JERUSALEM--EXTERIOR OF THE GOLDEN, OR BEAUTIFUL, GATE. - -This gate, which was walled up by the Arabs after the conquest of -Jerusalem, forms a tower projecting from the Eastern Wall of the Temple -Area. The tombs in the foreground are part of the great Mohammedan -Cemetery extending along the Eastern Wall of Jerusalem.] - -the plea that “they are so very old that they are not worth anything.” - -With the decay of reverence for the dead, however, there seems to have -been a recrudescence of that morbid and charnel-house interest in death -which marks the spirit of the land. At times one is shocked by the -apparently total indifference displayed--houses being built close to the -mouths of graves or even, it is said, upon the roofs of them. Yet any -one who has seen a festival at a holy tomb, whether Jewish or -Mohammedan, must have realised the strong attraction by which death and -the grave draw men. A curious instance of this is that of the “Jews’ -Burning” at Tiberias. - -Tiberias has been a Jewish centre since the time of Vespasian. Before -that time, Jews avoided the city, because in building it Herod had -disturbed a burial-place. To-day, by a strange coincidence, it is a tomb -that gives it its special popularity for the Jews--the grave of the -famous Rabbi Meir. Conveniently near the tomb there are large baths, -whose warm and sulphurous water is considered highly medicinal. At this -tomb a curious spectacle may be seen on the second day of May each year. -Jewish pilgrims from near and far assemble, bringing with them their -oldest garments, which are immersed in a great cauldron of oil, and then -piled up and burned. The honour of setting fire to the pile is sold to -the highest bidder, and the sum paid reaches £15 or more. - -The same fascination of death, seen as it were past a byplay of -irreverence and grotesqueness, is felt in the burial customs as they are -seen to-day. At the Moslem funerals we saw there was no appearance of -mourning. The men were dressed in gay colours, and they trotted along -behind the corpse talking and gesticulating with an apparent gusto. It -may have been the unusual appearance of the thing which impressed -strangers more powerfully than natives; but to us it seemed that the -realism of death was here in more crude and aggressive consciousness -than in Western funerals. The corpse lay on a board, shoulder-high, with -a gorgeous crimson and purple pall covering his body and limbs instead -of a coffin. The head, wrapped tight in a napkin, rested on a pillow, -and the features of the face stood prominently out against the sky. The -man seemed, in an altogether gruesome way, to be _attending_ his own -funeral, and to be thrusting the fact of his presence on the spectators. - -This may be subjective criticism, and it is always unfair to judge the -burial-customs of other peoples without intimate knowledge of their -origin and inner meaning. In one respect, however, it is certain enough -that the Shadow of Death rests upon the land of Syria. That is Fatalism. -We have all heard of the fatalism of the East; and strange stones have -become familiar, of soldiers selling cartridges to their enemies, of -villagers refusing to drain the swamp that was decimating them by its -malaria, or even to desist from poisoning their own springs with foul -water. “It is Allah!” ends all questioning and checks all energy. Yet -the constant recurrence of living instances of fatalism shocks the -traveller, however well he was prepared for them. A traveller asked a -Mohammedan in Damascus what they had done to the workman who upset his -brazier and burned the great mosque. “Oh nothing,” said he, “what should -we do?” “I should have thought you might have killed him.” “No,” he -replied; “in the West you say when such things happen, ‘It is the -devil’; in the East we say, ‘It is God!’” Still more impressive was a -conversation with one of the camp-servants during a long ride near -Jezreel. He had told the pathetic story of his life--how they had lived -comfortably till the father died, leaving no money; then came work, -begun too early and with no providence and little hope of success, until -it had come to be “eat, drink, sleep, then again, eat, drink, -sleep--then die and sleep, no more eat nor drink.” The Syrian character -of the present day has been well expressed on its negative side in three -traits. These are, want of concentration, want of will-power, and an -absolute want of the sense of sin. Of sin they literally do not -understand the meaning, the substitute for conscience being a dread of -the opinion of friends and of the public. They do not think about the -problem of evil as in any sense a practical problem. “The Lord said unto -Ahriman, I know why I have made thee, but thou knowest not”--that is -their philosophy of the moral mystery of things. Conder sums up the -situation in striking words: “Christian villages thrive and grow, while -the Moslem ones fall into decay; and this difference, though due perhaps -in part to the foreign protection which the native Christians enjoy, is -yet unmistakably connected with the listlessness of those who believe -that no exertions of their own can make them richer or better, that an -iron destiny decides all things, without reference to any personal -quality higher than that of submission to fate, and that God will help -those who have lost the will to help themselves.”[46] - -The spirit of Syria is darkened by a shadow of death that has grown not -only familiar but congenial, as darkness does to all who choose it -rather than the light. Strange that Syria should thus have “made a -covenant with death,” she from whom shone forth once the Light of the -World. But that was long ago. These many centuries this has been one of -that sad multitude of nations and of individuals who have sent forth a -spirit that has inspired and moved the world, and who yet themselves sit -desolate and listless. - - - - -CHAPTER III - -THE SPECTRAL - - -THE shadow of death is always haunted. A strong and pure faith peoples -it with angels, and is accompanied through its darkness by that Good -Shepherd whose rod and staff comfort the soul. When the faith is neither -strong nor pure, and when those who sit in darkness have been disloyal -to their faith, it is haunted by spectres, and its darkness becomes -poisonous. The fascination of the marvellous passes into “what French -writers call the _macabre_--that species of almost insane preoccupation -with our mouldering flesh, that luxury of disgust in gazing on -corruption.”[47] This unclean spectral element is a very real part of -the spirit of Syria. - -The spell of the East is proverbial, and it is a more literal fact than -is sometimes realised. Even such a commonsense Englishman as the captain -of the _Rob Roy_ confesses to a nameless fear that came upon him in the -solitudes of the upper Jordan.[48] There is a well-known passage in -Eothen, where Kinglake describes the calculating merchant, the -inquisitive traveller, the wakeful post-captain all coming under the -spell of Asia.[49] The warmth and strangeness of the land may have -something to do with it; but the associations and the prevalent tone of -thought have more. Every one feels it whose imagination and heart are in -the least measure open to spiritual impressions. - -To analyse it or to specify the causes which have produced it were an -impossible task. Three things have to do with it very specially. There -is the habit of the Eastern mind in dealing with matters of fact. Truth -is not to the Oriental the primary moral necessity which it is to the -West. Vividness and forcefulness of presentation count for at least as -much. The Arab story-teller is said to close his enumeration of various -legends with the sacramental formula, “God knows best where the truth -lies,”--the truth being a matter of God’s responsibility, while to man -is committed only responsibility for being interesting. Again, in the -East, terror is a recognised force between man and man; and the great -forces of nature and the more occult forces of magic are recognised and -taken as part of the natural order. Religion also has had her share in -the “Great Asian Mystery.” This land is, to most devout persons, -altogether isolated and apart, as the place of a divine revelation such -as no other part of earth has known. There is a passage in -_Pseudo-Aristeas_ where, describing his supposed embassy to Jerusalem, -he gazes at the constant waving of the veil in the Temple, which -screened from his view the holiest things of Israel. As it rippled and -swung in the wind it seemed to tantalise the gazer with the -never-fulfilled promise of a glimpse into the secret place.[50] The -wistful sense of mystery in that letter gives a hint which is of -extraordinary significance on this subject. - -The geographical formation of the land and its strange colouring lend -themselves to the spectral and the uncanny. The Dead Sea presents the -most sinister landscape in the world. The opening paragraphs of Scott’s -_Talisman_, founded upon the description of Josephus, are certainly -overdrawn, yet in truth everything conspires to produce a sense of -ghostliness by these unearthly shores. A ring of “scalded hills” -encircles them, and a perpetual haze lies upon their waters. Their soil -is nitrous and their springs sulphurous. Blocks of asphalt lie among -their shingle; and fish, dead and salted, are cast up by the waves. -There is little life visible about them, whether of man or beast or -bird. Here and there the tempting Apple of Sodom grows, to appearance -the most luscious of fruits, but so dry that its core is combustible and -is used as tinder by the Arabs. A few feet above the summer level of the -sea runs an unbroken line of drift-wood washed down by winter floods and -left white and sparkling with crusted salt. - -Yet it was not the Dead Sea that seemed to us most unearthly, but that -more famous lake of which one thinks so differently. It would be a -curious and instructive task to collect the various impressions which -the Sea of Galilee has made upon travellers. Romance and piety conspire -to furnish many of its visitors with a predisposition to find it -surpassingly beautiful; and not a little could be quoted which owes most -of its touches to the imagination of the writer. A natural rebellion -against this has led to no less exaggerated expressions of -disappointment, and to accusations of ugliness which are simply untrue. -The fact is that ordinary canons of description are of no avail here. -The Sea of Galilee, even so far as natural appearance goes, must be -judged by itself. - -Journeying to it from Tabor, you ride across a rather characterless -tract of country. A jackal, a stray Circassian horseman, a low black -tent of the Bedawin, are the only signs of life. Suddenly the track, -sweeping up over the farther side of a shallow and rudely cultivated -valley, lands you on an unexpected edge, from which the ground falls -sheer away before you into the basin of the lake. This is not scenery; -it is tinted sculpture, it is jewel-work on a gigantic scale. The rosy -flush of sunset was on it when we caught the first glimpse. At our feet -lay a great flesh-coloured cup full of blue liquor; or rather the whole -seemed some lapidary’s quaint fancy in pink marble and blue-stone. There -was no translucency, but an aggressive opaqueness, in sea and shore -alike. The dry atmosphere showed everything in sharpest outline, -clear-cut and broken-edged. There was no shading or variety of colour, -but a strong and unsoftened contrast. To be - -[Illustration: THE TOMB OF RACHEL. - -On the road from Jerusalem to Hebron. It is stated in the 35th chapter -of Genesis that Rachel died and was buried in the way to Hebron -(Ephrath).] - -quite accurate, there was one break--a splash of white, with the green -suggestion of trees and grass, lying on the water’s edge directly -beneath us--Tiberias. - -When, next day, we sailed upon the lake, coasting along the western -shore from north to south, we found ourselves again as far removed from -anything we had seen or experienced before. A casual glance showed utter -and abject desolation, and a silence that might be heard oppressed the -spirit. As the eye grew more accustomed, villages were discerned. But -what villages! With the same exception of Tiberias, they were brown -slabs of flat-roofed cubical hovels--let into the slope of the shore or -the foot-hills. And as we skirted closer along the beach, we descried -everywhere traces of ruined architecture. It appeared to form a -continuous ring of towers; columns broken and tumbled, but showing -elaborately carved capitals; aqueducts and retaining walls; fragments of -all sorts, and apparently of widely different styles of architecture. -Foliage is scanty, save for the thorn-trees and bamboo canes in which -the carved stones are often half buried. Here and there a plantation of -orchard trees hides a trim little German garden. At Tiberias a few palm -trees lend their graceful suggestion of the Far East. - -All this impresses one in a quite unique way. You try to reconstruct the -past--rebuild the castles and synagogues and palaces, and imagine the -life that sent forth its fleets upon the lake in the days of Jesus. Or -you more daringly attempt the future landscape, and imagine these -hillsides as scientific cultivation and the withdrawal of oppressive -government may yet make them. But from it all you are driven back upon -the extraordinary present--petrified, uncanny, spectral--a part of the -earth on which some spell has fallen, and over which some ghostly -influence broods, silencing the daylight, and whispering in the -darkness. If, however, this sense of the ghostly be intenser here than -elsewhere, it is but an exaggeration of the spirit of the whole land. - -Nature in Syria seems always to have something of the supernatural about -her. Not only in the petrifactions of the Lejja and the silent stone -cities east of Jordan is this the case. The whole country offers you -stones when you ask for trees, and that mere fact of its stoniness is -enough to lend it the air of another world. As an indirect consequence -trees, when they are found, assume a factitious importance, and a -supernatural significance either for good or evil. Some of the fairest -plants of Syria are treacherous as they are fair. One of our company, in -gathering sprays of a peculiarly lovely creeper, somewhat resembling a -white passion-flower, had his hand wounded with invisible but virulent -needles which caused it to swell and gave great pain. The green spots, -where grass and trees abound, tempt the unwary to drink and rest in -them. But they are the most dangerous places in the land, and some of -them are deadly from malaria. On the other hand, a tree in a treeless -country is an object of preciousness inconceivable by any who have not -come upon it from the wilderness. In the distance it beckons the -traveller with the promise of shade and water. Arrived beneath its -branches, life takes on a new aspect; kindly voices are heard in the -rustle of its leaves, and gracious gifts seen in its shadow and its -fruit. It is said that our fleur-de-lis pattern, often supposed to -represent the flower of the lily or the iris, is really an Eastern -symbol. The central stem is the sacred date-palm, while the side-lines -and the horizontal band stand for ox-horns tied to the stem to avert the -evil eye. It is no wonder if by the ancient Semites trees were regarded -as demoniac beings, or as growing from the body of a buried god.[51] -Such traditions are no longer to be found in their ancient forms, but -they linger in a vague sense of the holiness of conspicuous trees, which -may be seen covered with rags of clothing hung on them by natives. A -like play of imagination has from time immemorial haunted the -pools--especially those whose dark waters made them seem -bottomless--with holy or unholy mystery. Still more terrible is the -superstitious dread with which the natives regard undrained morasses. -The Serbonian Bog on the south coast has from of old been regarded with -special fear, owing to its treacherous appearance of sound earth. The -marsh in which the Abana loses itself shares with the Serbonian Bog its -grim distinction, chiefly on account of its deep black wells, which the -natives take to be man-devouring whirlpools. - -In her grander and more impressive features, Nature is in Syria -constantly suggestive of the play of occult powers. Earthquake has left -its mark in many a split rampart and broken tower, and that of itself -is enough to give a peculiarly ghostly tinge to the spirit of any land. -The unspeakable loneliness of the desert has its own magic--a melancholy -spell which has no parallel in other lands. In the desert, too, the sky -conspires with the earth in its bewitchment. The mirage has power to -arrest and overawe the spirit with something of the same sense of -helplessness as that felt in earthquake. In the one case earth, in the -other heaven, are turning ordinary procedure upside down, and the -bewildered mortal knows not what is to come next upon him. The writer -has had experience of both, though with an interval of several years -between them. The mirage he saw to the east of the Great Haj Road in -Hauran. For some time the rocky hills of the Lejja had been the horizon, -shimmering dimly through the heat-haze. Suddenly, on looking up, he was -amazed to find that the hills had disappeared, and in their place had -come a long string of camels on the sky-line, with an island, a lake, -and a grove of palm-trees floating in the air above them. The sudden -apparition recalled on the instant a day in the Antipodes when he felt, -though at a great distance, the tremble of the New Zealand earthquakes. -Either experience is unearthly enough to explain many superstitions. - -In most lands the sea would have yielded a larger crop of unearthly -imaginations than has been the case in Palestine. For reasons which have -been already stated, Israel kept out of touch with the ocean. Yet, all -the more on that account, it is the case that almost every thought she -has of the sea is fearsome. Its immensity bewilders her with the -unhomely distances of the world, and the four winds strive savagely upon -it. The roar and surge of the shore are all she needs to remember in -order to impress herself with its terror. Now and then she thinks of the -Great Deep, and of its horrible inhabitants--leviathan unwieldily -sporting there, and other nameless monsters bred of the slime and ooze, -and the dead men who are waiting to float up from their places to the -Great Judgment, when their time shall come. - -Mention of the Great Deep reminds us of yet another prolific source of -the spectral element in Syrian thought. It was but natural that the -sound of underground rivers and their explanation by the theory of a -world founded on bottomless floods (the “waters underneath the earth”), -should have given to the whole land an air of possession by ghostly -powers. It may have been that same phenomenon which drew down the -imagination of Syria to the subterranean regions, or it may also have -been to some extent the hereditary greed of buried treasure, which every -nation whose buildings have been often overturned is likely to acquire. -Whatever be its explanation, the fact is certain that the underground -element is one which counts for much in the spirit of Syria. Alike in -Christian and in pre-Christian times there seems to have been a most -unwholesome dread of fresh air blowing about holy things. Sacred caves -and pits were among the most characteristic properties of ancient -Semitic religion.[52] As for Christian tradition, it seems positively to -dread the open air. The Nativity in Bethlehem and the Agony in -Gethsemane have each their cave assigned to them, and many another site -has a cave either discovered or actually constructed for its -commemoration. Nature and history have combined to encourage the -underground tendency. Palestine is remarkable for the number and size of -its natural caverns, and it is not slow to add its imaginative touch to -the length of them, connecting distant towns with supposed subterranean -passages. These caves have been used as dwelling-places from very -ancient times. The strange cities of Edom and of Bashan are well known -to all as wonders. And not in these places only, but in many other parts -of the land, men have dwelt beneath the ground. In times of invasion, -for the solitude of hermit life, and in the terrors of persecution, -caves have offered natural places of refuge and of hiding, which have in -many cases been greatly enlarged by excavation. Besides those caverns -whose interest lies in the memory of ancient inhabitants, there are some -of an interest whose terror is not yet departed. These are the -cave-dwellings of lunatics, who in former times often chose the dead for -company and inhabited tombs. Now, in some places they are chained in -black recesses of mountain caverns, where their life must be horrible -indeed. There are also one or two caves in Syria which end in sudden -perpendicular shafts of great depth, where adulteresses are said to meet -their fate. Such modern instances may have reinforced the natural -fascination of the occult which subterranean places offer. But there is -something congenial to it in the spirit of Syria quite apart from these. - -If the natural features of Syria thus tempt men towards the ghastly side -of things, her history suggests plenty of material for superstition to -work upon. If the legend were true that no dew nor rain would moisten -the spot where a man had been murdered, Syria would be no longer an -oasis, but the driest of deserts. In a spiritual sense the legend is -truer than it seems. When, in his _Laughing Mill_, Julian Hawthorne -works out the idea of a mystic sympathy in Nature with crimes that have -been done by man, he is reminding us of something which every one of -sensitive spirit has more or less clearly felt. In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s -subtler tales the same idea is worked out in a fashion still more -convincing. There are times and places when it is difficult to resist -the conviction that the material world, in its dumb, unconscious way, is -yet burdened with the weight of man’s evil deeds. In Syria one can -almost hear “the groaning and travailing of the whole creation.” It -seems to be a land waiting the hour of its release, and meanwhile -shrouded in deeper mystery than any other land. Something has happened -here, you feel, which never happened elsewhere; something is going to -happen here again, when the time shall come. - -Nothing could better attest this fact than the extraordinary wealth of -legend in Syria. Fragments of Bible story, changed and often distorted -by those who have retold them, are met with every day. Sometimes a story -has passed from Jews to Christians and from Christians to Mohammedans, -increasing steadily in marvellousness and decreasing in verisimilitude -as it passed. Samson, Goliath, and the prophet Jonah are notable cases -in point. A Mohammedan weli marks the spot where the latter was thrown -ashore; but the inventors of this legend have been inconsiderate. The -weli stands at the bend of a shallow sandy beach, where the whale must -either have itself come ashore to deposit the prophet, or have projected -him a distance of at least a hundred yards. A very curious instance of a -similar kind is that of the fall of Jericho as narrated in Joshua vi. -Conder gives two legends, both of which are obviously elaborated forms -of that account. One of these is a Samaritan story of iron walls, and -the other a Mohammedan one of a city of brass whose walls fell after -Aly, the son-in-law of Mohammed, had ridden seven times round them.[53] -Still more curious is a legend related by the same author, which looks -like a Mohammedan version of the Wandering Jew. It tells how, at Abila, -Cain was allowed to lay down the corpse of his brother Abel after -carrying it for a hundred years. The whole story of the Herods has -infested the region of their crimes with the ghosts of their victims. In -Samaria the murdered Mariamne still seems to dwell in her honey, and -Herod and his servants to call her by name and force the pretence that - -[Illustration: THE VALLEY OF HINNOM WITH THE HILL OF OFFENCE - -The upper portion of the picture to the left is the Hill of Offence, -with the village of Siloam on its lower slopes.] - -she is yet alive. The land is sick with ancient crimes whose blood -“crieth from the ground.” - -The religions of the land seem to be in league with the powers of -darkness for the propagation of magic lore. It is an extraordinary fact -that Syria has sent forth to the ends of the earth a religion that is -the Eternal Word of God to mankind, and yet herself has reverted to the -religious conceptions of ancient Semitic paganism. One of the most -fundamental of these conceptions was that of a religion whose essential -element is not belief but ritual.[54] While in the West the free play of -reason has tested and interpreted Israel’s faith, and discovered in it -the unique revelation of the living God to man, the worshippers in the -Holy Land itself seem to treat that same faith wholly as a department of -magic lore. Certain rites have to be performed, no matter how -unintelligently, and that is all. All creeds alike share the blame of -this. Druse and Samaritan, Jew, Christian, and Mohammedan vie with one -another to-day in the poor ambition of making the religion of Jehovah -contemptible in the eyes of thinking men who investigate it as it is -practised on its native soil. - -Much of the magic of the East is decadent or decayed religion. On rare -occasions a marriage superstition may be met with, such as the -foretelling of marriage destinies by tying green twigs with one -hand,[55] which appears to be the creation of pure romance. But the -great majority of those superstitions which hold the Eastern mind in -bondage are evidently relics of pagan thought incorporated now in -Jewish, Christian, or Moslem creeds, and absorbing all the interest of -those who believe in them. If a Mohammedan saint’s bones flew through -the air from Damascus to Mount Ebal, the Christians can match the -miracle and more, for was not the very house of the Virgin carried off -by angels from Nazareth to Loreto lest the Moslems should desecrate it? -Magic dominates the mind of the East and explains everything there to -this day. Every inscribed stone runs the chance either of being honoured -by a place in the wall of a dwelling or of being heated with fire and -split with water, according to the sort of magic it is supposed to -represent. It is difficult to realise that the men you converse with are -actually living in the world of Tasso’s _Gerusalemme Liberata_, where a -dealer in black art, by his incantation, - - unbinds the demons of the deep to do - Deeds without name, or chains them in his cell, - And makes e’en Pluto pale upon the throne of hell. - -Yet such is undoubtedly the case. Even the saddle-bags you buy at -Jerusalem--those gorgeous labyrinths of shells and tassels--have a blue -bead concealed somewhere in them to return the stare of any evil eye -that may look upon your horse. To avert the same danger you will see -little boys dressed in girls’ clothes, and specially pretty children -kept dirty and untidy. Lest the dreaded eye should blight the fortunes -of a newborn babe the Jewish Rabbis sometimes hang up the 121st Psalm -on the wall over mother and child. Magic is as useful a substitute for -science as it is for religion. It explains any phenomenon and clears up -any mystery without the trouble of investigation. All great buildings -must have been built by enchantment, so what is the use of speculating -as to their architecture? Western civilisation is, no doubt, a -remarkable affair, but it never occurs to an unsophisticated Syrian that -it is a matter for energetic emulation. The Frank has only been lucky -enough to learn the proper spell. It is easy to see how Syria, with such -views as these, is doomed at once to moral and intellectual stagnation. - -The vivid mind of the East is fertile in poetic imagination. Restless -and quick itself, it cannot conceive the Universe otherwise than as -living around it. Everything is alive and aware. All inanimate things -are personified; or, to speak more accurately, they are inhabited by -spiritual beings. Natural phenomena express the purposes of minds hidden -behind them. Every dangerous or adverse experience is regarded as the -work of malice. Human life is beset with ambushed spiritual enemies. The -advantage which their invisibility gives to these over the human -combatants would be enough to put fighting out of the question, were it -not that so many of the spirits are of feeble intelligence and may be -hoodwinked; while all of them have other spirits for their enemies who -may be enlisted on man’s side against them. These spirits are of many -kinds, but they may be classed in two groups, according to their -connection with natural phenomena or with death. - -Chief of the former group are the angels, good and bad; and the jinn, or -genii, whom Islam took over from the ancient paganism of Arabia. The -angels are God’s attendants, and have some functions entirely -independent of natural phenomena. Thus the two stones which mark a -Moslem’s grave show the stations of the angels who are to examine him; -and the tuft of hair on his shaven head is (like the Jewish sidelocks) -to enable the Angel Gabriel to bear the man to heaven. Yet the angels -are in many instances personified parts of nature, guardians of the -land, spirits of wind or fire or water, who are obviously the -descendants and the heirs of the ancient local gods.[56] Thus the wicked -angels are supposed to have descended on Mount Hermon, and to have sworn -their oaths there--a belief which adds considerably to the importance of -the great mountain in Syrian estimation. The jinn are the demons of the -desert, lordly and terrible to all who have not the charm which masters -them, obedient as little children to those who have it. They are the -inhabitants of those whirling sandstorms which sweep across the waste. -Some superstitions of this kind may be connected with the former dangers -from wild beasts, which used to haunt the jungles of lower Jordan and -swarm up to the inland territories after an invasion had depopulated -them. Even now there may be seen in Palestine an occasional wolf or -leopard, to say nothing of the jackals which every traveller is sure to -see. Some of the fauna of Palestine are in themselves so strange as to -suggest unearthly affinities. The jerboa, for instance, the jumping -mouse of the desert, merits Browning’s description of him, when in -_Saul_ he says, “there are none such as he for a wonder, half bird and -half mouse.” The lizards, too, seem anything but ordinary respectable -law-abiding animals as they twinkle to and fro among the ruins of old -buildings. It is said that Mohammed refused to eat lizards, considering -that they were the metamorphosed spirits of Israelites. - -The spirits that haunt sepulchres are either ghosts of the dead or -ghouls that prey upon their flesh. It is this class of apparition which -appears to have the strongest fascination for the Syrian mind; and its -graveyard lore is the natural sequel to the morbid interest in death -which formed the subject of our preceding chapter. Conder, whose book -gives much interesting information on this whole subject, found it -difficult to keep any Arabs about him at Fusâil, a few miles north of -Jericho, because of their fear of a ghoul in the ruins, who might chance -to desire a change of food were he to see them there. The dead appear to -have undergone a change for the worse in dying. The utmost caution and -politeness are required to prevent their ghosts from doing harm to the -visitors at their tombs, even in the case of men who, while in the body, -were hospitable and friendly persons. Some localities are regarded as -peculiarly dangerous, among which is the reputed site of the stoning of -Stephen and (according to Gordon) of Calvary, near Jerusalem. An Arab -writer of the Middle Ages advises the traveller not to pass that haunted -spot at night.[57] - -If, under ordinary conditions, life in Syria is overshadowed and -haunted, the dread becomes far greater when disease has come. The -explanation of disease is the same easy one as that which has deadened -science and distorted religion--magic again. Even when the true cause of -illness has been guessed, it has to be explained in ghostly language. -When plague has broken out in a locality the Jewish Rabbis make the -neighbours of the stricken house empty all jars and vessels, saying that -“the angel of death wipes his sword in liquids.” The malaria of swamps -is set down to the same cause, and it is probable that many of that -mixed multitude who are to be seen sitting chin deep in the hot -sulphur-springs of Gadara or Tiberias regard their cure as due to some -local spirit who happens to be benevolently inclined. In the -neighbourhood of the tomb of a Mohammedan saint, every accident or -ailment is regarded as the work of the dead man. Indeed the main idea of -Syrian medical science is that all or most sickness is possession by -demons, and a common cure is to bore or burn holes in the patient’s -flesh, by which the evil spirit may escape. The treatment of lunacy is -perhaps the saddest case in point. Until Mr. Waldmeyer built his asylum -at Beyrout, there was but one mode of treatment. At certain monasteries -there are caves in which the insane are chained below huge stones, with -hardly space for movement, and are kept there for days in hunger and -filth, in order to drive out the devil. The test for devil-possession is -somewhat crude. The patient is shewn a cross. If he turns from it and -refuses to look he is possessed; if he shews no aversion to it he is -only unwell and is allowed to go. In the Beyrout asylum we were told -that no case of lunacy had been discovered which in any way differed -from the European types of the same disease. The record of cures there, -under the same treatment as that which is practised in the West, is a -most encouraging and hopeful one. - -It is true that the bright spirit of the East with its rapid changes and -its unquenchable sparkle of gaiety, has mitigated the horror and -oppressiveness of the spectral there. There are times when one would -almost fancy that the whole of their superstition was a pretence which -was never meant to be taken seriously. In Damascus, and probably -elsewhere, you may buy little rag-dolls supposed to resemble camels. -They are made of bones, covered with patches of many-coloured cloth, and -tricked out with tinsel and strings of beads. We bought two of these -from a young girl in “the street called Straight” for half a franc, and -bore them through the city with a crowd of idlers following us. We -learned afterwards that these were cunning devices to cheat the ghosts. -When you are very sick or in danger you vow a camel to your saint or -friendly spirit--this is how you pay your vow. Poking fun at Hades in -this fashion might seem a dangerous game, and one hardly to be -recommended while any lingering belief in the reality of ghosts -remained. Yet such is Syrian character. This sort of thing persists -along with a deep horror of the other world. The words of Job are not in -the least out of date in Palestine to-day: “Fear came upon me, and -trembling, which made all my bones to shake. Then a spirit passed before -my face; the hair of my flesh stood up. It stood still, but I could not -discern the form thereof; an image was before mine eyes: there was -silence, and I heard a voice.”[58] The horror is all the deeper because -it appears to be seldom brought to clear statement. The spectral world -is undefined, and it has, therefore, all the added power of the unknown, -whose play upon the imagination is so much more strong and subtle than -that of any clear conception, however ghastly. - -In this chapter no attempt has been made to distinguish between the -superstitions of Jews, Christians, and Mohammedans in Palestine. As a -matter of fact, there is little to choose between them, and they have -much in common. It is true that every nation has some outlook or other -upon the world of spirits. But each has its own way of regarding the -apparitions; and the kind of spectre which a land believes in is no bad -indication of the tone of the land’s thought and character. About the -fairy-lore of Teutonic nations there is a child-like simplicity and -purity which make - -[Illustration: THE VALLEY OF HINNOM, WITH THE HILL OF OFFENCE. - -The upper portion of the picture to the left is the Hill of Offence, -with the village of Siloam on its lower slopes.] - -that lore wholly refreshing and precious. The nymphs and Pan, whose -ancient monuments we have seen in ancient Palestine, were graceful. But -the spectral element in modern Palestine appears to be almost wholly -morbid and unclean,--the further decadence of a land that has made its -covenant with death. The life a Syrian peasant leads to-day is haunted -by ghostly terrors; it is a life led by leave of the dead, or by a -systematic cunning which plays off one malign spirit against another, or -succeeds in winning a point or two against the grave for the player. It -is a view of life than which surely none can be at once more impudent -and more melancholy. - - - - -CHAPTER IV - -THE LAND OF THE CROSS - - -It is a sad view of the spirit of Syria which the last chapters have -offered, yet it is but too true. We must linger yet a little longer -listening to “the sob of the land” before we turn to that which is at -once the explanation and the hope of relief for its long sorrow. Apart -altogether from the ghostly elements in this land of ruins, the mere -melancholy is persistent and depressing as one moves from place to -place. The gloom is so ominous, as to be at times suggestive of a -supernatural curse that broods upon everything with its depressing -weight. The khans outside of villages are in ruins; so are the bridges -over streams, and the castles on the hills. Amid such scenery it is -natural to remember the defeats rather than the glories of the past, and -the national history seems to be one long record of misfortune. In the -modern conditions of life in Palestine the long story of tears and blood -seems to be continued in the haggard desolation of its present. - -Two things especially must send this impression home even to the most -casual observer, viz. the heartlessness of toil and the prevalence of -disease. In every country much must always depend on the spirit in which -men labour. Where the walls of its cities rise to music, as the old glad -legends told of Troy and Thebes, there is hope and promise; but here -there is no song to help men’s toil. It is hard and joyless, with little -promise and less hope. With the death of these self-respect also dies; -and work, without incentives to anything which might tempt ambition, -remains merely as a hard necessity and a curse. - -Next to its heartless toil the uncured sickness of the land contributes -to the deep sadness of its spirit. Disease seems to stare you everywhere -in the face. Superstition and fatalism combined have blocked all -progress in medical science. The people are naturally healthy; and their -strong constitutions, kept firm by plain living, yield to medical -treatment in a marvellous way. But when any serious accident has -happened, or any dangerous disease infected them, they are utterly -helpless, and things take their course. The medicinal springs form an -exception to this rule, and seem to be the one real healing agency in -the country. Their bluish waters bubble with sulphuretted hydrogen, and -smell abominably, but they cure sicknesses of some kinds. For other -diseases there is no native cure. Those which are most in evidence are -ulcers and inflammatory diseases of the eyes. The natives appear to be -immune so far as malaria is concerned; but a peculiar kind of decline is -not uncommon, in which the emaciation is so great as to reduce the -patient to the appearance of a skeleton, with great lustrous eyes. It -need hardly be said that the characteristic disease of Syria is leprosy. -The first object which attracts the eye after you arrive at the railway -station of Jerusalem is an immense leper hospital. In a case which -created some sensation lately in the south of England, it turned out -that a fraudulent Syrian had been raising money for a non-existent -hospital at Tirzah, which was to accommodate eleven thousand lepers. Of -course the figure was a monstrous one, but the fact that it was invented -shews how terrible a scourge this is. It is a curious circumstance that -the inhabitants of towns do not contract leprosy. It appears in -villages, and the sufferers are at once driven out, to wander to the -larger towns, outside of which they settle in communities or beg by the -wayside. The view of the north-east end of Jerusalem from the Mount of -Olives shews a roadside which is always dotted with these pitiable folk. -For many travellers this is the road of their first journey from the -city, leading over Olivet to Bethany, and they are not likely to forget -that ride. Lepers, in all stages of hideous decay, line the roadside; -real or sham paralytics sprawl and shake in the middle of the path, so -that the horses have actually to pick their way among the bodies of -them. The epileptics appear to be frauds. Their faces are covered, but -they see what is going on well enough to stop shaking when the horses -have passed. The leprosy is all too real. Arms covered with putrid -sores, hands from which the fingers have one after another fallen off, -and husky voices begging from throats already half eaten out--these -cannot be imitated. - -As to the causes of Syrian disease, and leprosy in particular, there -seems to be much obscurity. Perhaps the word that comes nearest to an -explanation is uncleanness, and the promise of “a fountain opened for -sin and for uncleanness” may have a physical as well as a spiritual -significance. The land is incredibly contaminated with filth, as the -following quotation shews: “Sir Charles Warren tells us that the soil in -which he made some of his excavations was so saturated with disease -germs that his workmen were often attacked with fever, especially if -they had any sore or scratch on their hands.”[59] It would be hard to -find words more significant than these. - -For this state of matters, and for its continuance from generation to -generation, many reasons may be given. The usual explanation of the -whole is the government, with its soldiers and its taxation. The wild -notes of Turkish bugle-calls answering each other across Jerusalem sound -harsh, and as it were blasphemous, and further travel deepens the -resentment rather than removes it. When, behind all the present evils, -one remembers the past, with its massacres and all its other iniquities, -one’s heart grows hot. One Syrian, after narrating a specially -aggravated case of oppression, asked us if we knew “the story of the -prophets Ananias and Sapphira.” We said we had heard it; and he added, -“Ah, in _those_ days God punished at once; now, _God waits_!” Dr. -Thomson somewhere quotes a proverb to the effect that, “Wherever the -hoof of a Turkish horse rests it leaves barrenness behind it”; and all -that is seen in Syria tends to prove that saying but too true. Every -possible experiment in misgovernment seems to have been made here. -Frequent change of governors, underpayment of officials, conscription of -the most ruinous sort, bribery, cruelty, fanaticism, laziness, -sensuality, and stupidity--all are to be seen open and without pretence -at concealment. - -Yet in the interest of truth it ought to be remembered that there is -another side to the story. The incident of the horse at Banias[60] made -one understand how a Turk might answer his critics, with some show of -reason, that this was the only sort of government these people could -understand. Of course it might be again replied that it was oppression -that had brought this about. Yet it is perfectly clear that Syrian -character is very far from that of martyred innocence. From whatever -causes it has come about, the fact is certain that in many respects the -moral sense of Palestine is as depraved as that of her oppressors. Her -worst enemy is her own wickedness. - -Thus many elements enter into the desolation of the Holy Land, and make -it a place of decaying body and of shiftless spirit, but of all these -elements the ethical is supreme. The very look of the country suggests -this. It is not merely stony; as has been cleverly said, it seems to -have been _stoned_--stoned to death for its sins. The loose boulders of -Judea, and the scattered ruins of old vineyard terraces and village -walls, present all the appearance of flung missiles. This view of the -case is acknowledged freely by the inhabitants themselves, in whose -thoughts judgment has a prominent place. The buried cities of Sodom and -Gomorrah are favourite subjects of reflection with disciples of all the -creeds. A somewhat similar story is told of the Lake of Phiala, a -volcanic mountain lake south of Hermon. Tradition tells of a village -submerged below its waters “to punish the inhabitants for their -inhospitable treatment of travellers,” and there are many other stories -of judgment in the country. Yet the judgment always falls upon some one -else than the narrator of the story, who would not insult your -intelligence by supposing that you thought _him_ in need of judgment. -Even in the familiar quotations from the litany chanted by the Jews at -their Wailing-Place, the confession of sin is conspicuous by its -absence. There is sore mourning over the departed glories of the land, -but the only sins confessed are those of priests and kings long dead. To -all creeds alike the essential element in religion seems to be ritual -performance, and the ideal life is accordingly not one of ethical -character but of formal correctness. And yet in the midst of all this -self-righteous complacency, any one can see that every part of the land -is being judged and is bearing the punishment of sin. Jericho, squatting -sordidly amid the ruins of its ancient Hellenism, looked down upon by -the severe and barren mountain where Jesus hungered, is a monument of -the reality of ethical distinctions as hard and practical facts. They -may be ignored, but they must be reckoned with in the end. - -Of the ethical significance of the fate of Palestine there cannot be a -moment’s doubt. It is here that the love and care of God have been met -and foiled by the sin and carelessness of man. In regard to its whole -moral and social life, there is one overmastering conviction which grows -upon the traveller from day to day. That conviction is, that it is a -land which requires and demands righteousness. Nature and man are in -close touch, and each depends upon the other. It is not a desert, where -no amount of labour can produce result; nor is it a luxuriant tropical -country whose fruits fall ripe and untoiled for into man’s hand. It -demands labour, but it answers to it. The least effort of man to be a -man and do his human work meets with immediate and generous response. -Neglected plains and valleys, once rich, are now a wilderness; the most -unpromising hillsides, where terracing and irrigation - -[Illustration: THE ROCK-CUT TOMBS OF THE VALLEY OF JEHOSHAPHAT. - -These tombs are opn the eastern side of the alley facing the East Wall -of the Temple Area.] - -have kept the human side of the compact, are fertile. The labour would -indeed require to be hard and unremitting. Many of the streams are so -deep sunk in their channels that extraordinary enterprise would be -needed to raise their waters for irrigation or to conduct them from -higher levels in long conduits. Yet every remaining arch of an old -aqueduct, and every watermill whose wheel thuds round in its heavy way, -shew that such enterprise is possible. Each of those grooved and -checkered valleys where men with their naked feet open and close the -little gates of clay, and water the fat crops of onion and tomato, shews -how sure is the reward of enterprise. Similarly the terracing reminds us -that soil is as precious as water. Both must be laboured for and fought -for. It is the desert that naturally claims the land and sets the normal -point of view for its inhabitants. Syria is an oasis by the grace of God -and the toil of man. - -This alone would suffice to make Palestine an ideal training-ground for -a nation to learn righteousness. The whole theory of Providence which -dominates the earlier Old Testament, and lingers on in popular belief -through the New, is apparent on every mile of these valleys. That theory -was that even in the present life the sin of man will be immediately -punished by adversity, and his righteousness rewarded by prosperity. It -was a theory which had to be abandoned, and the whole marvellous story -of Job shews us the process of the nation’s discarding it. To us it -seems wonderful that it should have been able to survive at all in face -of the inexplicable and at times apparently irrational facts of all -human experience. But the fact that in Syria nature’s rewards and -punishments are so certain and so immediate goes far to explain both its -origin and its persistence. - -Such thoughts as these regarding Syria inevitably lead towards one goal. -There is but one symbol in the world which expresses all that depth of -pain which we have found in the history of this sorely-tried land, and -at the same time forces on even the most thoughtless its moral -significance. That symbol is the Cross of Christ. It is still to be seen -very frequently in Syria, generally in its Greek form ([Illustration: -cross]). In this form it is more impressive than in the other. The -oblique lower bar represents a board nailed across the shaft for the -feet of the sufferer to rest on. The realistic effect of this is -surprising, for it brings home to one’s imagination in a quite new way -the terrible fact that men have actually been crucified. - -The later history and legend of the cross in Palestine is one of -singular and tragic interest. First of all there is the preposterous -story of St. Helena’s dream--the miraculous discovery of the three -crosses, and the miracle of healing which enabled her to distinguish the -cross of Christ from those of the robbers. Since then the sacred wood -has been tossed about from hand to hand, hunted for, bargained for -sinned for, died for. Its presence in their army comforted the Crusaders -in their misery; the sight of it in the hands of the Saracens filled -them with despair. The restoration of it was among the chief demands -conceded by Saladin when he surrendered Acre to Richard; and when he -failed to deliver it, hostages to the number of 2700 were slaughtered in -sight of the Saracen camp. All through the Crusades it was the badge of -self-devotion to the holy wars, and a strange tale is told of an -occasion on which Louis IX., presenting robes to his courtiers according -to an ancient custom, had crosses secretly embroidered on them, so that -the wearers found themselves committed unawares to the Crusade. - -For 1500 years that symbol pointed to the site which the buildings of -the Church of the Holy Sepulchre cover. Godfrey was buried there, and -many a devout soul regarded it as the holiest of holy places. In the -middle of the nineteenth century the question of its authenticity was -raised; and General Gordon, who spent part of the last year before he -went to Khartoum, in Jerusalem, championed the identification of the -hill of Jeremiah’s Grotto, just outside the Damascus Gate, with Calvary. -His point of view was a strange one. It was suggested by the words -“place of a skull,” from which he developed the idea of the Holy City as -the body of the bride of Christ, this hill being the head, Zion the -pleura, and so on. The theory, so far as it regards Calvary, has -appealed to many competent judges who were very far from adopting the -mystical and emblematic views of Gordon. The hill is an old quarry, -within which Jeremiah is supposed by tradition to have written his -Lamentations. It is quite a little hill, whose short and scanty grass -was burnt up with drought when we saw it, leaving a surface of loose -sandy soil. A man crucified here would have the Mount of Olives in his -eyes behind some roof-lines of the city. By a curious coincidence a -rock-hewn tomb, with a groove running in front of the face of it for a -great stone which would close its entrance, has been discovered close -by. It is a grave with only one loculus in it, and it is temptingly like -one’s idea of the Garden Tomb of Joseph; but it is said to be -undoubtedly of later date than the death of Jesus. From one point in the -road, somewhat nearer the Valley of Jehoshaphat, the hollows and caves -of the hill, which here breaks along its length into a small precipice, -bear a striking resemblance to a chapfallen skull. Not that the features -can be examined in anything like accurate detail. But in the evening, -while the sun sets over Jerusalem and the shadows slowly deepen, the -resemblance is sufficient to strike one who had not heard that this was -the place so named. Many arguments have been urged for this new site. -Its proximity to an ancient Jewish cemetery is in favour of the -probability that Joseph’s tomb was there. It was close to the public -highway, as Calvary undoubtedly was. It is also significant that the -gate now known as the Damascus Gate was formerly called St. Stephen’s -Gate; and tradition affirmed that through it St. Stephen was led forth -to his martyrdom. It is probable that the martyrdom took place on the -public execution-ground, where, in the natural course of events, Jesus -and the robbers would also have been crucified. Finally, and most -important, recent explorations have discovered, in various parts of the -city, huge Jewish stones which are believed by advocates of this theory -to be those of the wall which stood there in the time of Christ. By -completing the line of these stones a wall is reconstructed which -encloses the traditional Church of the Holy Sepulchre, while it leaves -Gordon’s site still outside. To get the Holy Sepulchre outside this -wall, as we know the place of the crucifixion was, it would be necessary -to imagine a sharp angular recess in the wall pointing inwards, with -Calvary filling the space within the arms of the angle. It matters -little where the spot was. Yet it would be interesting if the north side -of the city should ultimately claim Him from the west--Nazareth, as it -were, from Rome. The garden and the new grave belong to an English -committee of trustees endowed in 1901. It would indeed be a striking -thing if, after all the idolatry of sites which the vision of St. Helena -started, the real hill and garden where the world’s great tragedy was -enacted should prove to have gone past Roman and Greek worshippers both, -and to have been committed to the hands of Protestants.[61] - -No one who has stood upon that hill of Golgotha and thought of the -wondrous past can have failed to perceive a mystical and dark connection -between the crime which has rendered Jerusalem so famous, and all that -deathly and spectral fate which has befallen the spirit of Syria. As we -stand amid the deepening shadows of sunset on the spot where Christ was -crucified, a change seems to come, as the blood-red sky crimsons the -minarets and domes. It is no longer Christ that hangs upon the Cross, -but Palestine. No other land would have crucified Him. Had He come to -Greece He might have been neglected or ridiculed, but certainly not -crucified. For that it needed a religion as bitterly earnest, and at the -same time as morally decayed, as Judaism was then. And that same moral -and spiritual condition which set up the Cross for Jesus, has finished -its course by crucifying the nation that murdered Him. Most literally -this happened in the days when Titus used up all the trees near -Jerusalem to make crosses for Jews. But in Sir John Mandeville’s time -the legend had expanded to this, that at the Crucifixion all the trees -in the world withered and died. Certainly a blight came upon the land of -Palestine. It has sometimes been asserted that the nation which -crucified Jesus Christ can never again rise to national prosperity or -greatness. The forces at work in history are far too subtle and complex -to allow any one to say with assurance what the future may or may not -have in store for a race. But this at least is evident, that meanwhile -the Cross has marked this region for its own; the land is everywhere on -its Cross, and the obvious cause of this is the want of righteousness, -both in oppressors and oppressed. It is a land that cries aloud for -righteousness in its agony. - - - - -CHAPTER V - -RESURRECTION - - -In regard to the future of Palestine the outlook of different writers -varies perhaps as much as upon any similar question that could be named. -Every one is familiar with the Utopian dreams which optimistic -constructors of programmes cherish regarding it. On the other hand, -grave and thoughtful writers have sometimes felt the misery of its -present state so heavily as to abandon all hope for the future, and to -acknowledge the most discouraging views as to the possibilities before -the land. Apart from sentiment, or from some favourite method of -interpreting prophecy, the reasons for such pessimism are mainly two. -One is the change of climate, which appears from many indications to be -an unquestionable fact. The other is the destruction of terraces, and -the consequent washing away of soil from the higher regions of the -country. These are serious considerations, which cannot be ignored. If -this view be the correct one, the only permanent continuance of Syria -will be as a symbol of judgment, a kind of Lot’s-wife pillar among the -peoples, a sermon in stone upon the ethical principles which govern the -fortunes of nations. The land will remain as a proverb, but will never -again be a home. - -Yet neither these nor any other such forebodings seem to the ordinary -observer quite to be justified. If the climate has changed, may not that -be due to causes that can be remedied? By proper drainage of swamps and -planting of trees, it would seem perfectly possible to modify climatic -conditions to an extent at least sufficient to allow the hope of -prosperous agriculture and pleasant habitation. As to the terraces, if -they have been constructed once they may be reconstructed with hope of -result. There are tracts even in the desert itself where traces of -former cultivation may still be seen. If the uncivilised or -semi-barbarous tribes of the ancient time built up the land until -handfuls of corn waved on the tops of mountains, surely it is not too -much to expect that men armed with all the skill and appliance of modern -engineering may yet repeat the process. The instance of Malta has been -already cited; and, apart from that it is a very dusty world, and soil -accumulates as if by magic where man provides for it a place to rest on. - -It seems rash in one little qualified for the task to pronounce judgment -of any sort on the future of Palestine, yet the conviction that all is -not over with the land grows stronger, rather than weaker, with -reflection. Renan speaks of “the little kingdom of Israel, which was in -the highest degree creative, but did not know how to crown its edifice.” -Put in another - -[Illustration: THE NORTH-EAST END OF JERUSALEM AND MIZPAH, FROM THE -MOUNT OF OLIVES. - -The mountain above the city to the north, with mosque and minaret on its -summit, is the point from which the Crusaders had their first view of -Jerusalem.] - -form, this means that the Holy Land is a land of prophecies unfulfilled -or half-fulfilled. But each such prophecy was an inspiration, by which -the highest men saw possibilities for the nation, whose conditions the -lower men failed to realise or to fulfil. Yet the possibilities were -there, as to a great extent they still are there, and, as Coningsby puts -it, “the East is a career.” As to what those possibilities and that -career may actually be, the past history of the land may guide our -speculation. Here, as elsewhere, the lines of hope for the future are -pointed out by the failures of the past. The failure has been due to bad -morality and disloyalty to religious faith; the hope of success lies in -ethical and religious regeneration. - -When we sought for an explanation of the misery of Palestine we were -thrown back on the ethical aspect of the case. Had the land been -faithful to her high calling her story would have been very different. -Never was a country honoured with so lofty a trust as hers; never did a -country so often betray her trust. This was the despair of her ancient -lawgiver, and the burden of her later prophets. When Christ came to her, -she knew no better thing to do with Him than to break His heart and to -crucify Him on Calvary. Within the century Jerusalem was crucified in -turn; and soon a Christian Syria took the place of the perished Judaism. -That in its turn decayed. Its creed became artificial, its spirit -effeminate, and its morality corrupt. The spirit of Christianity had -sunk so low in Palestine before the Mussulman occupation as to manifest -its zeal by using every effort to defile that part of the Temple area -which they regarded as the Jewish Holy of Holies. The young faith of -Islam, fresh and vigorous, and not as yet embittered, made an easy -conquest of the effete religion, which has lived since then on -sufferance, lamenting its sufferings, but never realising its desert of -them. To this day the Christian travelling in Syria is oppressed by the -sense of its desertion. Christ has forsaken the desolate shores of the -Sea of Galilee. He walks no more in the streets of Jerusalem. It is the -old story--“They besought Him that He would depart out of their coasts, -and He entered into a ship, and passed over and came unto His own city.” - -Yet somehow it is impossible to believe that He has gone from the land -of His earthly home for ever. An incident which occurred to us in -Damascus dwells in our memory with prophetic significance. We had -visited the Great Mosque, which rose upon the ruins of an ancient -Christian church. The original walls were not entirely demolished, and -among the parts built into the new structure was a beautiful gate on -whose lintel may still be deciphered the Greek inscription, “Thy -kingdom, O Christ, is an everlasting kingdom, and Thy dominion endureth -throughout all generations.” To see this inscription we climbed a ladder -in the Jewellers’ Bazaar. At the height of some fifteen feet we stepped -upon a ledge of rather precarious masonry, and after a short scramble -along this came to the lintel, half concealed by a rubble wall running -diagonally across it. A stranger was with us, a devout Christian from a -town far south of Damascus. In the whole city nothing moved him so -deeply as this stone, and he exclaimed, “It was the Christians’ -fault--they were so rough, so rude, so ignorant--it was done by the wish -of God--_but He will have it again_.” And He _will_ have it again, -sooner or later! When Omar heard that Mohammed was dead he would not -believe it, but proclaimed in the Mosque of Medina, “The Prophet has -only swooned away!” But Mohammed had died, and it is his dead hand that -has held the land these thirteen centuries. Christ, being raised from -the dead, dieth no more; and the future of the land lies with Christ. To -the Western world He has fulfilled His tremendous claim, “I am the -resurrection and the life,” not only in the hope of immortality, but in -the spring and impulse which His faith has given to national ideals. It -is impossible not to hope for a fulfilment of the promise to the land -where it was first spoken. Looking down from Tabor upon the hill of -Dûhy, one has sight of Endor to the east, while Shunem lies just round -the western slope, and between them is the village of Nain. It is as if -that hill were a sanctuary from Death, where the grave could not hold -its own. Palestine holds in trust for the world those empty graves, and -one grave above all others from which He Himself came forth. Surely she, -too, will rise, by His grace, in a faith and character purer than those -which she has lost. - -It would be impossible, within our present limits, to say anything of -the political or national outlook of Syria, or of the many schemes and -agencies which are dealing with such problems. The impression made by -Christian missions, however, must have a word of record before we close -these notes of travel. We have already described at considerable length -the sadness of Palestine. As you journey from place to place the -impression deepens. Sores, exposed and fly-blown, intrude themselves -into the memory of many a wayside and city street. The dirt and stench -of the houses make the sunshine terrible. After weeks of travel the -feeling of a sick land has deepened upon you until it has become an -oppression weighing daily upon your heart. Suddenly you emerge in a -mission-station, and an indescribable feeling of relief possesses you. -There is at last a sound of joy and health. These are the spots of -brightness in a very grey landscape, little centres of life in a land -where so much is morbid. The visiting of sacred places would be the most -selfish of religious sentimentalities if it were done without a painful -sense of helplessness against the misery that surrounds them. The only -thing that turns pity into hope in Palestine is the mission-work that is -being done there. No one can see that work without being filled with an -altogether new enthusiasm for missions. Across the sea, one believes in -them as a part of Christian duty and custom. On the spot, one thanks God -for them as almost unearthly revelations of “sweetness and cleanness, -abundance, power to bless, and Christian love in that loveless land.” - -The names of Christian missionaries are imperial names in Syria. It is, -indeed, an empire of hearts, and - -[Illustration: THE PLAIN OF JERICHO, LOOKING TOWARDS THE MOUNTAINS OF -MOAB. - -The road in the foreground, stretching across the plain, is that from -Jerusalem to Jericho.] - -its coming is not with observation. But of its reality and power there -can be no question even now, and its sway is extending year by year. To -those whose Syrian travels have given them the vivid imagination, vivid -almost as memory, of the real fact of Christ in the past, this fact of -Christ in the present is as welcome as it is evident. They feel, and the -East too is feeling, that the Great Healer still goes about the land -doing good. The future, whatever its political course may be, is -religiously full of hope. It may take time--God only knows how long it -will take. The ancient miracles of Christ did not reveal the Healer to -the world in a day. Yet quietly and out of sight, the East is learning -that Christ is indeed the Healer of mankind. It does not as yet confess -this, even to itself. But the hearts of many sufferers know it, and -every Christian knows that certainly “He will have it again.” - - - - -Index - - -Abana, 52, 59, 60 - -Achor, 47 - -Acre, 169 - -Agriculture, 71 - -Amphitheatres, 107 - -Angels, 220 - -Antipatris, 54 - -Aqueducts, 104 - -Arabia, Arab, 22, 29, 93 f., 149, 181, 198, 199 - -Aramaic, 69 - -Asceticism, 122 - -Athlit, 169 - - -Baalbek, 108 - -Banias, 55, 168 - -Barbarossa, 161 - -Bashan, 44 - -Beautiful Gate, 83, 192 - -Bethel, 8, 102 - -Bether, 98 - -Bethlehem, 25, 46, 72, 74, 189, 214, 253 - -Bethshan, 41, 42, 72, 169 - -Beyrout, 66 - -Bible illustrations, 92, 93, 94 - -Booths, 178 - -Bridges, 57, 104 - -Burdens, 181 - - -Cæsarea, 102, 163, 172 - -Calvary, site of, 78, 83, 114, 196, 222, 235, 236, 276 - -Capernaum, 64, 101, 105 - -Carpets, 16 - -Castles, 168 - -Caves, 214 - -Character, Syrian, 15, 33, 62, 232 f. - -Children, 111, 187, 218, 231 - -Christianity, early, 115 f. - -Church of the Holy Sepulchre, 79, 131, 150, 151, 156, 193, 235 - -Church of the Nativity, 133 f. - -Churches, 129, 146, 160, 165, 171 - -Cities, 22, 65 f. - -Clothes, 17, 181 - -Coast, 43 - -Colour, 7 f. - -Commerce, 75, 78, 157, 159 - -Constantine, 115, 116 - -Cross, the, 147, 234 f. - -Crusaders, 74, 157 f., 192 - - -Damascus, 12, 13, 21, 35, 53, 60, 66, 75, - 85, 137, 143, 146, 174, 185, 191, 193, 223, 241 - -Damascus Gate, Jerusalem, 53, 83 - -Dan, 54 - -Dead Sea, 11, 25, 37, 41, 51, 57, 60, 207 - -Death, 76, 190 f. - -Dervishes, 140 - -Desert, 12, 14, 15, 20 f. - -Detail, observation of, 32 - -Dew, 51 - -Disease, 222, 223, 227 f., 244 f. - -Dog River, 54, 86 - - -Earthquake, 212 - -East of Jordan, 22 - -El Aksa, 147 f. - -Elijah, 61 - -Elisha’s Fountain, 143 - -Esdraelon, 9, 22, 26, 41, 42, 49, 59 - -Evil eye, 218 - - -Fanaticism, 188 - -Fatalism, 201, 202 - -Fauna, 12, 220, 221 - -Feasts, 188, 201 - -Fellahin, 22, 69 - -Flora, 12, 67, 161, 207, 209, 210, 211 - -Future, 239 f. - - -Gadara, 60, 98, 108, 194 - -Galilee, 9, 45 - -Games, 185 - -Gardens, 177 - -Gaza, 64 - -Genii, 220 - -Geography, 32, 161 - -Gethsemane, 214 - -Ghosts, 190 - -Gideon, 64 - -Gilgals, 47 f. - -Glass, 16 - -Gorges, 47 - -Great Deep, 53, 213 - -Greece, 100, 113, 197 - - -Harod, Well of, 64 - -Hattin, 169 - -Hauran, 85 - -Hebron, 9, 46, 64, 74, 75, 90, 196 - -Hermits, 123 - -Hermon, 9, 11, 41, 44, 51, 54, 55, 220 - -Herods, 56, 101, 110, 171 - -Hezekiah’s aqueduct, 53, 88 - -Holy Fire, 133, 193 - -Holy Grail, 162 - -Hospitality, 35 - -Houses, 16, 67, 75 - -Huleh, Lake, 58, 60 - -Humour, 183 - - -Immortality, 197, 198 - -Inscriptions, 87 - -Irrigation, 9, 233 - -Israelites, 88 f. - - -Jacob’s dream, 5 - -Jacob’s Well, 13, 48, 63, 119, 129 - -Jaffa, 72 - -Jehoshaphat, Valley of, 79 - -Jericho, 26, 49, 105, 227, 232 - -Jeroboam, 78 - -Jerusalem, 45 f., 53, 65 f., 76 f., 149, 228 - -Jesus Christ, 4, 5, 10, 31, 46, 49, 69, 84, 113, 114, - 150, 173, 177, 204, 242, 243, 245 - -Jews, 30, 88 f., 195, 201 - -Jezreel, 41 - -Job, 96, 224, 233 - -John the Baptist, 146, 147 - -Jordan, 13, 23, 28, 40, 41, 42, 44, 49, 51, 55 f., 65, 121, 178 - -Joy, 188 - -Judea, 8, 9, 24, 34, 45 f., 47 - - -Khan Minyeh, 64, 105 - -Kidron, 25, 46, 63 - -Knights, 151, 164, 170 - - -Landmarks, 175 - -Lebanon, 44 f., 51 - -Legends, 62, 69, 103, 134 f., 150, 153 - -Leontes, 44, 58 - -Leprosy, 228 - -Lunacy, 222 - - -Maccabees, 100 - -Magic, 3, 29, 154, 205, 217 f. - -Mar Saba, 25, 27, 123, 125 f. - -Martyrs, 116, 123 - -Medicinal springs, 201, 222, 227 - -Melancholy, 31 - -Michmash, 47 - -Miracle, 3, 4 - -Mirage, 212 - -Missions, 95 - -Mohammedanism, 2, 74, 137 f., 142, 242 - -Monastic establishments, 122 - -Morasses, 211 - -Mosaics, 102, 168 - -Mosques, 146 - -Mosque of Omar, 53, 79, 80, 131, 144, 149 f., 159 - -Mount of Olives, 154 - -Mountains, 40 f., 49 - -Muezzin, 143 - -Music, 31 f. - -Mystery, 206 - - -Nablus, 64, 74, 92 - -Nain, 68 - -Names of places, 39, 160 - -Nazareth, 48, 62, 69, 72, 114, 189, 218 - - -Oppression, 229 - - -Past, the, 2 - -Paul, St., 172 - -Persecutions, 116 - -Phœnicia, 10 - -Pilgrimages, 117 f. - -Pools, 211 - -Prayer, 142 - -Providence, 233 - - -Quarantana, 5, 46, 49 - - -Rachel, 195 - -Railway, 86, 182 - -Relics, 2, 119, 152, 160 - -Religion of Israel, 39, 65, 97 f., 173 f., 187 - -Revelation, 97 f. - -Richard Cœur de Lion, 163, 167 - -Rivers, 51 f. - -Roads, 77, 99 f., 174 - -Rib Roy canoe, 57, 91 - -Romans, 56, 77, 83, 98 f., 107, 108, 113 - -Russians, 119 f. - - -Safed, 90 - -St. Christopher, 135 - -St. George, 134, 168, 193 - -Samaria, 9, 45, 47, 48, 102, 110, 146 - -Samaritans, 92 - -Sanur, 48 - -Scents, 179 - -Sea, 21, 24, 78, 212, 213 - -Sea of Galilee, 11, 15, 37, 58, 59, 208, 209, 210 - -Shirky, 26 - -Siloam, 53, 76, 81, 88 - -Sites, identification of, 165 - -Smallness of the land, 37 - -Solomon, 78, 153 - -Spectral, the, 205 f. - -Springs, 54 - -Stones, Jewish, 82 - -Straight Street, 103 - -Sun, 14, 16, 28 - -Synagogues, 79 - - -Tabor, 45, 48, 128, 165 - -Tattoo, 18, 75 - -Tell Hum, 128 - -Tents, 22 f. - -Terraces, 50, 240 - -Terror, 206 - -Tiberias, 90, 91, 201, 209 - -Titus, 84 - -Tobacco, 93 - -Toil, 227 - -Tombs, 81, 140, 174, 186, 191 - -Towns, 65 f., 71 - -Travel, 2, 161 - -Trees, 67, 210, 211 - -Truth, 206 - -Tyre, 10, 72, 75, 160 - - -Underground waters, 52, 213 - -Unfinishedness, 174 - - -Villages, 11, 15, 65 f. - - -War, 49, 50 - -Welis, 141 - -Wells, 62 - - -Zionists, 90 - - - -THE END - - -FOOTNOTES: - - [1] _Eothen_, ch. xxiii. - - [2] The natives have at last borrowed the sloping red-tiled roofs from - the Franks who introduced them. Cf. a letter written by Professor G. - A. Smith to the _Spectator_, October 1891. - - [3] _Tent Work_, p. 54. - - [4] Cf. _The Semites_, Robertson Smith, chaps. iii. and v. - - [5] For these and other instances cf. _Historical Geography_, p. 52, - and Appendix I. - - [6] Cf. _The Least of all Lands_, Principal Miller, ch. 1. - - [7] Cf. p. 15. - - [8] _The Rob Roy on the Jordan_, p. 129. - - [9] Cf. _The Semites_, Robertson Smith, p. 97. - - [10] _Rob Roy_, p. 102. - - [11] _Tent Work_, p. 120. - - [12] The _Rob Roy_ has contributed gallantly to its exploration. To - her captain’s book this chapter is under many obligations. - - [13] _Tent Work_, chaps. xx., xxi. - - [14] They are cut with a cross-chiselled margin, and rough outstanding - rustic work in the centre. Their size and weight are enormous. One - writer, whose sense of humour is hardly equal to his knowledge of - Scripture, in describing them is carried away into the statement that - “the Jewish architects, taught by their Phœnician neighbours, bestowed - special care upon the corners of their great buildings. They show a - finish, a solidity, and choice of material superior to other parts.... - And how beautifully expressive is the language of the Psalmist, ‘our - daughters are corner-stones, polished after the similitude of a - palace’--one of the corner-stones of this angle weighs over a hundred - tons”! - - [15] For an account of these and others cf. Palestine Exploration - Fund, Quarterly Statement, October 1901. - - [16] See, however, Professor G. A. Smith’s _Jerusalem_, vol. i. pp. - 189, 190. - - [17] _Haifa_, Laurence Oliphant, pp. 317, 318. - - [18] “Love among the Ruins,” Robert Browning. - - [19] _The Dawn of Art_, Martin Conway, pp. 58-76. - - [20] St. Symeon was a shepherd from the borderland between Cilicia and - Syria. - - [21] Cf. Schaff’s _Church History, Nicene and Post-Nicene Period_, - chap. iv. - - [22] St. Jerome, Ep. xiv. - - [23] Cf. pp. 27, 30. - - [24] _Arabia, the Cradle of Islam_, Zwemer, p. 179. - - [25] _Mediæval Christianity_, Schaff, p. 150. - - [26] Written in 1904. - - [27] _The Crusades_, Cox, p. 72. - - [28] _The Crusades_, Cox, p. 215. Of these children only 5000 - crossed the Mediterranean. They were sold, when they landed, in the - slave-markets of Alexandria and Algiers. - - [29] Map has the credit of introducing the Grail story into Arthurian - romance; Borron of adding the early part which traced it to Joseph of - Arimathea. - - [30] Cf. _Chivalry and Crusades_, Stebbing, vol. ii. chaps. iv. and v. - - [31] _Haifa_, Laurence Oliphant, p. 189. - - [32] _The Semites_, Robertson Smith, p. 29. - - [33] _Ibid._ pp. 244, 257. - - [34] Deut. xxviii. 47, 48. - - [35] Deut. xxviii. 47, 48. - - [36] _Robert Browning_, William Sharp, p. 203. - - [37] Gen. xxxv. 16, 19. - - [38] _Haifa_, pp. 270-272; _Tent Work_, p. 85. - - [39] Cf. _The Dawn of Art_, Martin Conway, p. 95, etc.; _Some Aspects - of the Greek Genius_, Professor Butcher, p. 30. - - [40] Cf. _Rationalism in Europe_, Leckie, ii. 197. - - [41] Cf. the sprightly figure of Glaucon in Plato’s _Republic_, B, - x, § 9: “Do you know,” says Socrates, “that our soul is immortal and - never dies?” “By Jove, I do not,” replies Glaucon. “Are you prepared - to prove that it is?” - - [42] _Arabia, the Cradle of Islam_, Zwemer, xiii. - - [43] The rags which are hung on trees or fences near certain tombs - suggest the medicinal value of holy places, which attracts men to them - from selfish interests. - - [44] _Talisman_, xxviii. - - [45] _East of the Jordan_, Dr. Merrill, p. 496. - - [46] _Tent Work_, p. 314. - - [47] _Marius the Epicurean_, Walter Pater, i. 44. - - [48] _Rob Roy on the Jordan_, p. 260. - - [49] _Eothen_, ch. viii. - - [50] Cf. _Geschichte des Jüdischen Volkes_, Schürer, ii. 819, 820. - - [51] Cf. _The Semites_, W. Robertson Smith, iii. v. - - [52] Cf. _The Semites_, W. Robertson Smith, pp. 197, etc. - - [53] _Tent Work_, pp. 68, 204. - - [54] Cf. _The Semites_, Robertson Smith, pp. 16, 17. - - [55] _East of the Jordan_, Merrill, p. 193. - - [56] The early Christian belief that the gods of paganism were demons - has died hard, if indeed it be quite dead. The “weird horsemen” who - in windy nights are to be heard galloping down lonely valleys lead us - back to that interesting custom by which a horse was actually provided - in some of the temples of the Syrian Herakles, to that the god might - ride forth at night. - - [57] _Haifa_, Laurence Oliphant, p. 300. - - [58] Job iv. 14-16. - - [59] _The Cradle of Christianity_, D. M. Ross, p. 60. - - [60] See p. 36. - - [61] Professor G. A. Smith, in his chapter on “The Walls of - Jerusalem,” has given the results of an exhaustive study of the - most recent research on this subject, and his conclusion is that - “on our present data it is hopeless to decide between the rival and - contradictory arguments.”--_Jerusalem_, vol. i. p. 249. - - - - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Holy Land, by John Kelman - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE HOLY LAND *** - -***** This file should be named 55958-0.txt or 55958-0.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/5/9/5/55958/ - -Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images available at The Internet Archive) - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions -will be renamed. - -Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no -one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation -(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without -permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or -re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included -with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org/license - - -Title: The Holy Land - -Author: John Kelman - -Illustrator: John Fulleylove - -Release Date: November 13, 2017 [EBook #55958] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE HOLY LAND *** - - - - -Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images available at The Internet Archive) - - - - - - -</pre> - -<hr class="full" /> - -<p class="figcenter"> -<img src="images/cover.jpg" alt="cover" /> -</p> - -<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="" -style="border: 2px black solid;margin:auto auto;max-width:50%; -padding:1%;"> -<tr><td> - -<p class="c"><a href="#Contents">Contents.</a><br /> -<a href="#Index">Index</a>: -<a href="#A">A</a>, -<a href="#B">B</a>, -<a href="#C">C</a>, -<a href="#D">D</a>, -<a href="#E">E</a>, -<a href="#F">F</a>, -<a href="#G">G</a>, -<a href="#H">H</a>, -<a href="#I-ind">I</a>, -<a href="#J">J</a>, -<a href="#K">K</a>, -<a href="#L">L</a>, -<a href="#M">M</a>, -<a href="#N">N</a>, -<a href="#O">O</a>, -<a href="#P">P</a>, -<a href="#Q">Q</a>, -<a href="#R">R</a>, -<a href="#S">S</a>, -<a href="#T">T</a>, -<a href="#U">U</a>, -<a href="#V-ind">V</a>, -<a href="#W">W</a>, -<a href="#Z">Z</a></p> -<p class="c"><a href="#List_of_Illustrations">List of Illustrations</a><br /> <span class="nonvis">(In certain versions of this etext [in certain browsers] -clicking on the image will bring up a larger version.)</span></p> -<p class="c">(etext transcriber's note)</p></td></tr> -</table> - -<p><a name="ill_001" id="ill_001"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<a href="images/ill_001_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_001_sml.jpg" width="500" height="346" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">JERUSALEM.</p> - -<p>From the traditional spot on the Mount of Olives where Christ wept over -the city.</p></div> -</div> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<img src="images/title.jpg" height="500" alt="THE -HOLY LAND - -PAINTED BY -JOHN FULLEYLOVE, R.I. - -DESCRIBED BY -JOHN KELMAN, D.D. - -A&C BLACK LTD -4.5.6 SOHO SQUARE, LONDON, W.1." /> -</div> - -<h1> -<big>THE<br /> -HOLY LAND</big><br /> - -<small>PAINTED BY</small><br /> -JOHN FULLEYLOVE, R.I.<br /> - -<small>DESCRIBED BY</small><br /> -JOHN KELMAN, D.D.<br /> -<br /> -A&C BLACK L<sup>TD</sup><br /> -<small>4.5.6 SOHO SQUARE, LONDON, W.1.</small> -</h1> - -<p class="c"> -<small><i>Printed in Great Britain by</i> <span class="smcap">R. & R. Clark, Limited</span>, <i>Edinburgh</i>.<br /> -<br /> -<i>First Edition, with 93 illustrations, published in October 1902<br /> -Reprinted in 1904 and 1912<br /> -Second Edition, revised, with 32 illustrations, published in 1923</i></small> -</p> - -<table border="0" cellpadding="1" cellspacing="0" summary="" -style="font-size:85%;"> -<tr><td align="left"> </td><td class="c">AGENTS</td></tr> -<tr class="smcap"><td align="left">America</td><td align="left">The Macmillan Company</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"> </td><td align="left"> 64 & 66 Fifth Avenue, New York</td></tr> -<tr class="smcap"><td align="left">Australasia </td><td align="left">The Oxford University Press</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"> </td><td align="left"> 205 Flinders Lane, Melbourne</td></tr> -<tr class="smcap"><td align="left">Canada</td><td align="left">The Macmillan Company of Canada, Ltd.</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"> </td><td align="left"> St. Martin’s House, 70 Bond St., Toronto</td></tr> -<tr class="smcap"><td align="left">India</td><td align="left">Macmillan & Company, Ltd.</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"> </td><td align="left"> Macmillan Building, Bombay</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"> </td><td align="left"> 309 Bow Bazaar Street, Calcutta</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"> </td><td align="left"> Indian Bank Buildings, Madras</td></tr> -</table> - -<h2><a name="Preface" id="Preface"></a>Preface</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">The</span> secrets of satisfactory travel are mainly two—to have certain -questions ready to ask; and to detach oneself from preconceptions, so as -to find not what one expects, or desires to find, but what is there. -These rules I endeavoured to follow while in the Holy Land. As to this -book, I have tried to write it “with my eye on the object”—to describe -things as they were seen, and to see them again while describing them. -The extent to which this ideal has been reached, or missed, will be the -measure of the book’s success or failure.</p> - -<p>No attempt has been made to add anything original to the scientific -knowledge of Palestine. For that task I am not qualified either by -sufficient travel or by expert study of the subject. On the other hand, -this is not merely an itinerary, or journal of experiences and -adventures of the road. I have freely introduced notes from my journal -in illustration of characteristics of the country and its life, and have -claimed the privilege of digressing in various directions. But the main -object has been to give a record of impressions rather than of -incidents.</p> - -<p>These impressions are arranged in three parts, as they bear upon the -geography, the history, and the spirit of Syria. They have been -corrected and amplified by as wide reading as the short time at my -disposal allowed. A few of the books read or consulted are referred to -in footnotes, but many others have helped me. To append a list of them -to so small a contribution to the subject as this, would be but to -remind the reader of the old fable, <i>Nascetur ridiculus mus</i>. I must, -however, acknowledge with much gratitude my obligation to two volumes -above all others—Major (now Colonel) Conder’s <i>Tent Work in Palestine</i>, -and Professor George Adam Smith’s <i>Historical Geography of the Holy -Land</i>. To these every chapter is indebted more or less, some chapters -very deeply. Among the pleasures which this task has brought with it, -none is greater than the intimate acquaintance with these two works -which it entailed.</p> - -<p>With Professor Smith I have a more personal bond of obligation than the -invaluable help I have had from his book. Last year we rode and camped -together from Hebron to Damascus, back over the eastern spurs of Hermon -to the coast, and north by Tyre and Sidon to Beyrout. All who were in -that party know, as no words can express, how much insight and -suggestion we owed to the leader who interpreted the land for us so -brilliantly and with such kindness. For my own part I feel that at times -it has been difficult to distinguish between impressions of my own and -those which have been unconsciously borrowed from him. If I have -borrowed freely, I am sure he will allow me to count that among the many -privileges of our long acquaintance, and as a token of my admiration for -his genius and gratitude for his friendship.</p> - -<p class="r"> -JOHN KELMAN.<br /> -</p> - -<p><span class="smcap">Edinburgh, 1902.</span></p> - -<h2><a name="PUBLISHERS_NOTE" id="PUBLISHERS_NOTE"></a>PUBLISHERS’ NOTE</h2> - -<p>For the purposes of this reissue the author has revised the work and -slightly abridged it, but no attempt has been made to describe the -changed conditions consequent on the War.</p> - -<p><i>September 1923.</i></p> - -<h2><a name="Contents" id="Contents"></a>Contents</h2> - -<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" summary=""> - -<tr><th colspan="3" class="c"><a href="#PART_I">PART I.—THE LAND,</a> pp. <a href="#page_001">1 to 84</a></th></tr> - -<tr><td><small>CHAPTER </small></td><td> </td> -<td><small>PAGE</small></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_I-i">1.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_I-i"><span class="smcap">The Colour of the Land</span></a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_007">7</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_II-i">2.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_II-i"><span class="smcap">The Desert</span></a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_020">20</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_III-i">3.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_III-i"><span class="smcap">The Life of the Land</span></a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_037">37</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV-i">4.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV-i"><span class="smcap">The Waters of Israel</span></a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_051">51</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_V-i">5.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_V-i"><span class="smcap">Brown Villages, White Towns, and a Grey City</span></a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_065">65</a></td></tr> - -<tr><th colspan="3" class="c"><a href="#PART_II">PART II.—THE INVADERS,</a> pp. <a href="#page_085">85 to 172</a></th></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_I-ii">1.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_I-ii"><span class="smcap">Israelite</span></a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_088">88</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_II-ii">2.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_II-ii"><span class="smcap">Græco-Roman</span></a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_098">98</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_III-ii">3.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_III-ii"><span class="smcap">Christian</span></a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_115">115</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV-ii">4.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV-ii"><span class="smcap">Moslem</span></a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_137">137</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_V-ii">5.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_V-ii"><span class="smcap">Crusader</span></a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_157">157</a></td></tr> - -<tr><th colspan="3" class="c"><a href="#PART_III">PART III.—THE SPIRIT OF SYRIA,</a> pp. <a href="#page_173">173 to 245</a></th></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_I-iii">1.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_I-ii"><span class="smcap">The Lighter Side of Things</span></a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_177">177</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_II-iii">2.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_II-iii"><span class="smcap">The Shadow of Death</span></a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_190">190</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_III-iii">3.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_III-iii"><span class="smcap">The Spectral</span></a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_205">205</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV-iii">4.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV-iii"><span class="smcap">The Land of the Cross</span></a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_226">226</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_V-iii">5.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_V-iii"><span class="smcap">Resurrection</span></a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_239">239</a></td></tr> - -</table> - -<h2><a name="List_of_Illustrations" id="List_of_Illustrations"></a>List of Illustrations</h2> - -<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" summary=""> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_001">1.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_001">Jerusalem, from the traditional spot on the Mount of Olives where Christ wept over the City</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#ill_001"><i>Frontispiece</i></a></td></tr> - -<tr><td colspan="2"> </td><td class="rt"><small>FACING PAGE</small></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_002">2.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_002">The Mount of Temptation, from Jericho</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_009">9</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_003">3.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_003">Cana of Galilee</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_016">16</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_004">4.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_004">On the Road from Jerusalem to Bethany</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_025">25</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_005">5.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_005">The Hills round Nazareth, from the Plain of Esdraelon</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_032">32</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_006">6.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_006">Mount Hermon, from the Slopes of Tabor</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_041">41</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_007">7.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_007">Jerusalem—The Pool of Hezekiah</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_048">48</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_008">8.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_008">The Golden Gate, from the Garden of Gethsemane</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_057">57</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_009">9.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_009">The Lake of Galilee, looking North from Tiberias</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_064">64</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_010">10.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_010">The Fountain of the Virgin at Nazareth</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_073">73</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_011">11.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_011">Joppa, from the Sea</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_080">80</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_012">12.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_012">The Lake of Galilee, looking South from Tiberias</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_089">89</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_013">13.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_013">Site of the ancient City of Samaria</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_096">96</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_014">14.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_014">The Forecourt of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_105">105</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_015">15.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_015">The Rotunda and Chapel of the Holy Sepulchre</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_112">112</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_016">16.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_016">The Dome of the Rock (Mosque of Omar), as seen from the Porch on the North Side of the Mosque of El Aksa</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_121">121</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_017">17.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_017">The Dome of the Rock (Mosque of Omar), from the Barracks near the Site of the Tower of Antonia</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_128">128</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_018">18.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_018">Interior of the Mosque of El Aksa, from the S.E.</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_137">137</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_019">19.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_019">The Temple Area and the Mount of Olives, from Mount Zion</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_144">144</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_020">20.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_020">The West Side of the Temple Area, from the Barracks near the Site of the Tower of Antonia</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_153">153</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_021">21.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_021">Entrance to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_160">160</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_022">22.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_022">Interior of the Dome of the Chain, looking North</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_169">169</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_023">23.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_023">Interior of the Dome of the Rock (Mosque of Omar), from the S.E.</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_176">176</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_024">24.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_024">The Mount of Olives, from a House-top on Mount Zion</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_185">185</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_025">25.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_025">The Church of the Nativity at Bethlehem, from a Garden on the opposite Hill</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_192">192</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_026">26.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_026">Jerusalem—Exterior of the Golden, or Beautiful, Gate</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_201">201</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_027">27.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_027">The Tomb of Rachel, on the Road from Jerusalem to Hebron</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_208">208</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_028">28.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_028">The Judean Desert and the Dead Sea, from the highest point of the Mount of Olives</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_217">217</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_029">29.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_029">Valley of Hinnom, with Hill of Offence</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_224">224</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_030">30.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_030">The Rock-cut Tombs of the Valley of Jehoshaphat</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_233">233</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_031">31.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_031">The N.E. End of Jerusalem and Mizpah, from the Mount of Olives</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_240">240</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="rt" valign="top"><a href="#ill_032">32.</a></td><td valign="top"><a href="#ill_032">The Plain of Jericho, looking towards the Mountains of Moab</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_244">244</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="c" colspan="3"><a href="#sketch"><i>Sketch-map on page viii</i></a></td></tr> </table> - -<p><a name="sketch" id="sketch"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<a href="images/ill_003_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_003_sml.jpg" alt="SKETCH-MAP OF PALESTINE." /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">SKETCH-MAP OF PALESTINE.</p> -</div></div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_001" id="page_001"></a>{1}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="PART_I" id="PART_I"></a>PART I<br /><br /> -THE LAND</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">A journey</span> through the Holy Land may reasonably be expected to be in some -sort a sacramental event in a man’s life. Spiritual things are always -near us, and we feel that we have a heritage in them; yet they -constantly elude us, and need help from the senses to make them real and -commanding. Such sacramental help must surely be given by anything that -brings vividly to our realisation those scenes and that life in the -midst of which the Word was made flesh. The more clearly we can gain the -impression of places and events in Syria, the more reasonable and -convincing will Christian faith become.</p> - -<p>Everything which revives the long past has power to quicken the -imagination, and site-hunters and relic-hunters in any field have much -to say for themselves. Now, apart altogether from the Christian story, -Syria has the spell of a very ancient land. The mounds that break the -level on the plain of Esdraelon represent six hundred years of buried -history for every thirty feet of their height. Among the first objects -pointed out to us in Palestine was a perforated stone which serves now -as ventilator for a Christian meeting-house in Lebanon, but which was -formerly a section of Zenobia’s<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_002" id="page_002"></a>{2}</span> aqueduct. In Syria the realisation of -the past is continual, and the centuries mingle in a solemn confusion. -Its modern life seems of little account, and is in no way the rival of -the ancient. In London, or even in Rome, the new world jostles the old; -in Palestine the old is so supreme as to seem hardly conscious of the -new.</p> - -<p>All this reaches its keenest point in connection with men’s worship; and -what a long succession of worshippers have left their traces here! The -primitive rock-hewn altar, the Jewish synagogue, the Greek temple, the -Christian church, the Mohammedan mosque—all have stood in their turn on -the same site. His must be a dull soul surely who can feel no sympathy -with the Moslem, or even with the heathen worship. These religions too -had human hearts beating in them, and wistful souls trying by their help -to search eternity. To the wise these dead faiths are full of meaning. -Through all their clashing voices there sounds the cry of man to his -God—a cry more often heard and answered than we in our self-complacency -are sometimes apt to think.</p> - -<p>The sacramental quality of the Holy Land is of course felt most by those -who seek especially for memories and realisations of Jesus Christ. -Within the pale of Christianity there are several different ways of -regarding the land as holy, and most of them lead to disappointment. The -Greek and Roman Catholic Churches vie with one another in their passion -for sites and relics there, and seem to lose all sense of the -distinction<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_003" id="page_003"></a>{3}</span> between the sublime and the grotesque in their eagerness -for identifications. A Protestant counterpart to this mistaken zeal is -that of the huntsmen of the fields of prophecy, who cannot see a bat -fluttering about a ruin or a mole turning up the earth without turning -ecstatically to Hebrew prophetic books,—as if these were not the habits -of bats and moles all the world over. Apart from either of these, there -are others less orthodox but equally superstitious who have some vague -notion of occult and magic qualities which differentiate this from all -other regions of the earth. Benjamin Disraeli and Pierre Loti are -representatives of this point of view. The former is persuaded that the -land “must be endowed with marvellous and peculiar qualities”; and the -hero of his <i>Tancred</i> seeks and finds there supernatural communications -from the unseen world. The latter tells in his <i>Jérusalem</i> how he went -to Palestine with the hope that some experience might be given him which -would revive his lost faith in Christianity. He returned, a disappointed -sentimentalist. The saddening and yet fascinating narrative reaches its -climax in Gethsemane, where, beating his brow in the darkness against an -olive tree, he waited (as he himself confesses) for he knows not what. -His words are: “Non, rien: personne ne me voit, personne ne m’écoute, -personne ne me répond.”</p> - -<p>The belief in miracle is always difficult: nowhere is it so difficult as -on the traditional site. The earth is just earth there as elsewhere; and -the sky seems almost farther above it. The rock is solid rock; the -water,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_004" id="page_004"></a>{4}</span> air, trees, hills are uncompromising terrestrial realities. It -is wiser to abandon the attempt at forcing the supernatural to reveal -itself, and to turn to the human side of things as the surest way of -ultimately arriving at the divine. When that has been deliberately done -the reward is indeed magnificent. An unexpected and overwhelming sense -of reality comes upon the sacred narrative. These places and the life -that inhabited them are actualities, and not merely items in an ancient -book or the poetic background of a religious experience. More -particularly when you look upward to the hills, you find that your help -still cometh from them. Their great sky-lines are unchanged, and the -long vistas and clear-cut edges which you see are the same which filled -the eyes of prophets and apostles, and of Jesus Christ Himself.</p> - -<p>It is this, especially as it regards the Saviour of mankind, that is the -most precious gain of Syrian travel. Now and again it comes on one with -overpowering force. Sailing up the coast, this impression haunted the -long hours. As we gazed on the mountains, and the image of them sank -deeper and deeper, the thought grew clear in all its wonder that -somewhere among these heights He had wandered with His disciples, and -sat down by the sides of wells to rest. In camp at Jericho we were -confronted by an uncouth, blunt-topped mountain mass, thrusting itself -aggressively up on the Judean side, in itself a very rugged and -memorable mountain-edge. Not till the light was fading, and the bold -outline struck blacker and blacker<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_005" id="page_005"></a>{5}</span> against the sky, did the fact -suddenly surprise us that this was Quarantana, the Mountain of -Temptation. Then we understood that wilderness story in all its -unprotected loneliness, and we almost saw the form of the Son of Man.</p> - -<p>Thus, as day after day he rides through the country, the traveller finds -new meaning in the words, “I have glorified Thee <i>on the earth</i>.” An -inexpressible sense possesses him of the reality of Jesus Christ. These -pathways were, indeed, once trodden by His feet; through these valleys -He carried the lamp of life; under these stars He prayed; through this -sunshine He lay in a rock-hewn grave. To a man’s dying day he will be -nearer Christ for this. The chief sorrow of the Christian life for most -of us is the difficulty of realisation. At times we have all had to flog -up our imagination to the “realising sense” of Christ. After this -journey that necessity is gone. It is almost as if in long past years we -had seen Him there, and heard Him speak. The divine mystery of Christ is -all the more commanding when the human fact of Jesus has become almost a -memory rather than a belief.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_006" id="page_006"></a>{6}</span> </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_007" id="page_007"></a>{7}</span> </p> - -<h3><a name="CHAPTER_I-i" id="CHAPTER_I-i"></a>CHAPTER I<br /><br /> -THE COLOUR OF THE LAND</h3> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">Every</span> land has a scheme of colour of its own, and while form and outline -are the first, they are not the most permanent nor the deepest -impressions which a region makes upon its travellers. It is the colour -of the land which slowly and almost unconsciously sinks in upon the -beholder day by day. We observe the outlines of a scene; we remember its -colouring.</p> - -<p>This is especially true of Palestine. Nothing about it is more -distinctive than its colour-scheme; and nothing is perhaps less familiar -to those who have not actually seen it. Syria may be treated as if it -were Italy, or even Egypt—in hard intense colouring; or it may be -treated as if it were England, in strong tones but with a certain homely -softening of edge. Neither of these modes is true to Syria. Its -edge-lines are sharp, but they are traced in such faint shades as to -produce an effect very difficult either to reproduce or to describe, and -yet impossible to forget.</p> - -<p>The colours are manifold, and they vary considerably with the seasons of -the year. Yet the bare hill-sides<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_008" id="page_008"></a>{8}</span> (which form the greater masses of -colour in most landscapes), the desert, and the distant mountain ranges, -are ever the same. Most travellers make their first acquaintance with -Palestine in Judea, entering it from Jaffa. When the plains are behind -you, and you are in among the valleys up which the road climbs to -Jerusalem, you at once recognise the fact that a new and surprising -world of colour has been entered. In the valley-bottom there may be but -a dry watercourse, or perhaps a rusty strip of cultivated land; but -above you there is sure to be the outcrop of white and grey limestone. -In some places it appears in characterless and irregular blotches whose -grotesque intrusion seems to confuse and caricature the mountain side. -This is, however, only occasional, and the usual and characteristic -appearance is that of long and flowing lines of striation which -generally follow pretty closely the curve of the sky-line. The colours -of these strata are many. You have rich brown bands, dark red, purple, -yellow, and black ones; but these are toned down by the dominant grey of -the broader bands, and the general effect is an indistinct grey with a -bluish tinge, to which the coloured bands give a curiously artificial -and decorative appearance. As a work of Art Judea is most interesting; -as part of Nature it is almost incredible.</p> - -<p>In the northern district, near Bethel, everything yields to stone, and -the brighter colours disappear. The mountain slopes shew great naked -ribs and bars—the gigantic stairs of Jacob’s dream. On the heights your -horse slips and picks his way over long stretches of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_009" id="page_009"></a>{9}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_002" id="ill_002"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<a href="images/ill_004_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_004_sml.jpg" width="500" height="291" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">THE MOUNT OF TEMPTATION, FROM JERICHO.</p> - -<p>The Mount of Temptation is one of the spurs of the mountains which -overlook the deep valley of the Jordan on its western side. The central -peak is the traditional site of the Temptation of Christ.</p></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">smooth white rock; in the valleys the soil is buried under innumerable -boulders and fragments of broken rock.</p> - -<p>The whole land is stony, but Judea shews this at its worst. It is an -immense stone wedge thrust into Palestine from east to west. South of it -lie the fertile valleys of Hebron, with their wealth of orchard and -plantation. North of it open the “fat valleys” of Samaria, winding among -rounded hills planted to the top with olives, or terraced for vines. -Over these, here and there, a red cliff may hang, or the irrigation -ditches may furrow and interline a vale of dove-coloured clay. But while -the green of Judea is for the most part but the thinnest veil of sombre -olive-green, a mere setting for the rocks, Samaria is a really green -land, variegated by stone.</p> - -<p>In the north of Samaria the land sinks gradually upon the Plain of -Esdraelon. As we saw it first it was covered by a yellow mist through -which nothing could be seen distinctly. But afterwards, viewed in its -whole expanse from the top of Tabor in clear sunlight, the great -battlefield of the Eastern world appeared in characteristic garb—“red -in its apparel,” with the very colour of the blood which has so often -drenched it.</p> - -<p>Galilee repeats the limestone outcrop of Judea, but in far gentler -fashion, the undergrowth and trees softening almost every landscape, and -the mountains leading the eye along bold sky-lines to rest on that form -of beauty and of light which masters and watches over the whole -land—the white Hermon. Hermon is always<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_010" id="page_010"></a>{10}</span> white. But sometimes when -clouds are forming rapidly around its summit, it is a wonder of -brightness. On no other mountain, surely, was it that “a bright cloud -overshadowed” Jesus and his three friends. Even now, on many a summer -day, Hermon is lost in a changing glory of frosted silver, when the sun -strikes upon its cloudwork, and the long trails of snow in the corries -stream towards the plain below.</p> - -<p>The limestone runs on into Phœnicia, and seems to grow whiter there. -Nothing could be finer than the valleys east of Tyre at harvest time, -when the fields of ripe grain wave below cliffs white as marble, and the -whole scene, with its foreground of brilliantly robed reapers, is a -study in white and gold. But in the higher valleys of Phœnicia the rock -breaks through a rich red soil, which in parts is gemmed with the -curious and beautiful “Adonis stones”—little egg-shaped bits of -sandstone, dyed to the heart of them with deep crimson, as if they had -been steeped in newly shed blood. Little wonder if the women of old days -“wept for Tammuz” at the sight of them.</p> - -<p>The thing most characteristic of Syrian colour is its faintness and -delicacy. Pierre Loti, who in this matter is a witness worthy of all -regard, is constantly ending the colour adjectives in his Syrian books -with <i>-atre</i>—“yellowish,” “bluish,” “greenish,” etc. The general -impression is of dim and faded tints, put on, as it were, in thin -washes. In the stoniest regions there seems to be no colour at all, as -if the sun had bleached them. The curious colouring of the Judean -valleys, which has<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_011" id="page_011"></a>{11}</span> been described, is never aggressive, and it takes -some carefulness of observation to see anything in them more than a blue -green in the sparsely-planted olive-groves fading into faint greenish -grey above. The valleys of ripe sesame and vetch are washed into the -picture in pale yellow or yellow ochre. Where tilled earth appears it is -generally a variegated expanse of light brown, or pink, or terra-cotta. -The eastern slopes of Hermon, below the snow, shew vertical stripes like -those of the haircloth and jute garments of the peasants, washed out -with rain and sun; or they are spread upon the roots of the mountain -like some vast Indian shawl cunningly and minutely interwoven with red -and green threads, but worn almost threadbare. As you approach a village -in strong sunlight, you see it as a dark brown mass shaded angularly -with black; but it seems to float above a mist of the airiest purple -sheen, where the thinly-planted iris-flowers stand among the graves -before the walls. The Sea of Galilee, as we saw it, was light blue; the -Dead Sea was light green, with a haze of evaporation rendering it even -fainter in the distance.</p> - -<p>If this be true of the near, it is doubly so of the distant, landscape. -In a country so mountainous and so sheer-cleft as Palestine, distant -views are seen for the most part as vistas, the “land that is very far -off” revealing itself at the end of some <span class="sans">V</span>-shaped gorge or towering over -some intermediate mountain range. Of course distant views are faint in -all lands, but in Palestine the clear air keeps them distinct with -clean-cut edge, however faint they are. Thus there is perhaps<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_012" id="page_012"></a>{12}</span> nothing -more delicate and <i>spirituel</i> in the world than those faint dreamlike -mountains in the extreme distance of Syrian vistas—the hills east of -Jordan grey, with a mere suspicion of blue in them, or the lilac and -heliotrope mountains of the desert which form the magic background of -Damascus looking eastward.</p> - -<p>Reference has been made to the irises (the “lilies of the field”) near -villages. These are but typical of the general sheen of that carpet of -wild flowers which every spring-time spreads over the land. They are of -every colour. There are scarlet poppies and crimson anemones, blue dwarf -cornflowers, yellow marigolds, white narcissus (said to be the Rose of -Sharon); but here they seldom grow in patches of strong hue. Each flower -blooms apart, and the sheen of them is delicate and suggestive rather -than gorgeous. They seem to share the reticence and shyness of the land, -and tinge rather than paint it. Even the animal life conforms to this -dainty rule; lizards are everywhere, but their colouring is that of -their environment, now stone-grey, now wine-red, now straw-coloured. -Chameleons are anything you please—green in growing corn, black among -basalt rocks. Tortoises are blue at the sulphur springs, brown or slate -in the muddy banks of streams.</p> - -<p>This faintness is, however, but half the truth of the colour of Syria. -Everywhere it is rendered emphatic by certain vivid splashes of the most -daring brilliance. Wherever springs are found you have instances of this -contrast, and Palestine is essentially the land of bright foregrounds -thrown up against dim backgrounds.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_013" id="page_013"></a>{13}</span></p> - -<p>The Jordan valley is the greatest example, running south along its whole -length, “a green serpent” between the pale mountains of the east and the -faint mosaic of the western land. Its jungle is uncompromisingly -distinct throughout the entire course, and its colour is living green, -with a white flash of broken water or a quiet flow of brown bursting -here and there through the verdure. Other streams are similarly marked, -with luxurious undergrowth of reeds, varied by clumps of hollyhock or -edged with winding ribbons of magenta oleander. But the most striking -oases of this kind are the valley of Shechem and the city of Damascus. -There is a hill seldom visited by tourists, but well worth climbing, set -in the broad vale of Makhna, right opposite Jacob’s Well. North and -south past the foot of this hill runs the broad valley. It is edged on -the western side by the continuous line of the central mountain range of -Samaria—continuous except for one great gash, where, as if a giant’s -sword had cleft the range, the valley of Shechem enters that of Makhna -at right angles. The whole landscape is in dim colour except for that -valley of Shechem. Ebal and Gerizim guard its eastern end, dull and -rocky both. But the valley which they guard is fed by countless springs -and intersected by rivulets, so that below the shingle of their slopes -there spreads a fan-shaped expanse of intensely vivid green, like a -carpet flung out from Nablus between the mountains. The lower edge of -the green is broken by the white wall of the enclosure of Jacob’s Well, -and the cupola of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_014" id="page_014"></a>{14}</span> Joseph’s tomb. Damascus—surely the most bewitching -of cities—owes its witchery to the same cause. The river Abana spends -itself upon the city. As you approach it from the south it discloses -itself as a mass of bold outline and high colour in the midst of a great -field of verdure, flanked on the west by precipitous hills of sand and -rock—sheer tilted desert. When you climb those hills you see the white -city, jewelled with her minarets of many hues, resting on a cloth of -dark green velvet whose edge is sharply defined. Immediately beyond that -edge the sand begins, stretching into the farther desert through paler -and paler shades of rose and yellow to the lilac hills in the eastern -distance.</p> - -<p>It is not only the water-springs, however, that provide the land with -vivid foregrounds. Loti describes a little sand-hill in the desert “all -bespangled with mica,” which “sets itself out, shining like a silver -tumulus.” Such bold and detached features are by no means uncommon even -on the west of the Jordan. The name of the cliff “Bozez” in Michmash -means “shining,” and there are many shining rocks in these -valleys—either masses of smooth limestone, or dark basalt rocks, from -whose dripping surface the sun is reflected in blinding splendour after -rain. Even without such reflection the sudden intrusion of black rock -will often give character to an otherwise neutral landscape.</p> - -<p>But the sun is the magician of Syria, who bleaches her and then throws -up against his handiwork the boldest contrasts of strong light and -shade. No one<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_015" id="page_015"></a>{15}</span> who has seen the crimson flush of sunset on the olives, -or the sudden change of a grey Judean hill-side to rich orange, or the -whole eastern cliffs of the Sea of Galilee turned to the likeness of -flesh-coloured marble, will be likely to forget the picture. Loti’s -wonderful description of desert sunsets—“incandescent violet, and the -red of burning coals”—is not overdrawn. Shadows will transform the -poorest into the richest colouring. The tawny desert changes to the -luscious dark of lengthening indigo at the foot of a great rock; and the -shadows of clouds float across Esdraelon, changing the red plain to deep -wine-colour as they pass. Silhouettes are of daily occurrence in that -crisp air. One scene in particular made an indelible impression. It was -a village on terraced heights, thrown black against a gold and -heliotrope sunset. The figures of Arabs standing or sitting statuesque -upon the sky-line were magnified to the appearance of giant guardians of -the walls, and the miserable little hamlet might have been an -impregnable fortress.</p> - -<p>The inhabitants have entered with full sympathy into the spirit of this -play of foreground. They are spectacular if they are anything. Their -religion forbids them all practice of the graphic arts, and most of the -Western pictures which are to be seen in churches are execrable enough -to reconcile them to the restriction. But they obey the law in small -things only to break it by transforming themselves and their -surroundings into one great picture. Their clothing, their buildings, -and their handiwork are a brilliant foil to the dull background.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_016" id="page_016"></a>{16}</span> From -them Venice learned her bright colouring, and there are few English -homes which have not borrowed something from them.</p> - -<p>In part, this is thrust upon them by the sun. The interiors of houses -are all Rembrandt work, as Conder has happily remarked. The rooms are -dark, and the windows very small. But when the sun shines through the -apertures, their rich brown rafters and red pottery gleam out of the -shadow. One such interior is especially memorable, where a bar of -intense sunlight lit up the skin and many-coloured garments of children -sitting in the window-sill, while through the open door the green grass -of the courtyard shone. Still more wonderful is the effect when one -opens the door of a silk-winding room in sunlight, and sees the colours -wound on the great spindles, or when one enters the dark archways of the -bazaars where long shafts of light striking down slantwise upon a -shining patch below turn the brown shadow of the arch to indigo. The -natives see this, and love the lusciousness of it. They build minarets -cased with emerald tiles, or domes of copper which will soon be coated -with verdigris. Of late years a further touch has been added in the -red-tiled roofs which are already so popular in the towns.</p> - -<p>In proof of the genius of the Easterns for colour, nothing need be -mentioned but their carpets and their glass. The glass of old windows in -mosques beggars all description. It is an experience rather than a -spectacle. The panes are so minute, and so destitute of picture or of -pattern, that they are unnoticed in<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_017" id="page_017"></a>{17}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_003" id="ill_003"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<a href="images/ill_005_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_005_sml.jpg" width="500" height="294" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">CANA OF GALILEE.</p> - -<p>This is the village of Kafr Kenná, believed to be the Cana of the New -Testament, where our Lord performed His first miracle at the marriage -feast.</p></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">detail, and the general effect is that of a religious atmosphere in -which all one’s ordinary thoughts and feelings are lost in the -overpowering sense of “something rich and strange.” After the magic of -that light, with its blended purple and amber and ruby, the finest -Western work seems harsh. It is hardly light; it is illuminated shadow. -The rugs and carpets, with their intricate colouring, are more familiar -and need not be described. The finest of them are of silk, and their -delicacy of shade is marvellous. The patterns constantly elude the eye, -promising and just almost reaching some recognisable figure, only to -lose themselves in a bright maze. It is said that they were suggested by -the meadows of variegated flowers; but they are intenser and more -passionate—as if their designers had felt that their task was to supply -an even stronger counterpart to the faint landscape.</p> - -<p>The gay clothing of the East is proverbial. Even the poorest peasants -are resplendent. “Fine linen” is still the mark of the rich man, but -Lazarus can match him for “scarlet.” In certain parts the men are clad -in coats of sheepskin, the wool being inside, and protruding like a -heavy fringe along the edges. Almost everybody’s shoes are bright red. -In one place we saw a shepherd whose sheepskin coat had met with an -accident, and the patch which filled the vacant space in the raw brown -back of him was of an elaborate tartan cloth. In another village all the -men wore crimson aprons. When our camp-servants were on the march they -seemed to be in sackcloth, or in thick grey felt which<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_018" id="page_018"></a>{18}</span> suggested -fire-proof apparel; but when they reached a town they blossomed out into -a rainbow. Children playing in a village street, women at the wells, -statuesque shepherds standing solitary in the fields, all seemed -arranged as for a tableau. Everybody official—the railway guard, the -escort, even the mourner at a funeral—is immensely conscious of his -dignity; and on him descends the spirit of Solomon in all his glory. The -man you hire to guide you for a walk of half a dozen miles will -disappear into his house and emerge in gorgeous array. One of our guides -decked himself in flowing yellow robes and marched before us -ostentatiously carrying in front of him a weapon which appeared to be a -cross between a carving-knife and a reaping-hook, through a land -peaceful as an infant school. A procession marching to some sacred place -across a plain lights the whole scene as with a string of coloured -lanterns. Even where the natives have adopted European dress the fez is -retained, and a crowd of men, seen from above, is always ruddy.</p> - -<p>The delight in strong colour goes even one step farther. The rich hues -of the flesh in sunny lands seem to suit the landscape, and one soon -learns to sympathise with the native preference for dusky and brown -complexions. To them a fair skin appears leprous, though bright flaxen -or auburn hair are regarded with great admiration. Not satisfied, -however, with their natural beauty, the Syrians paint and tattoo their -flesh in the most appalling manner, and redden their finger-nails with -henna. Fashionable ladies, and in some places<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_019" id="page_019"></a>{19}</span> men also, paint their -eyebrows to meet, and touch in their eyelids with antimony, whose blue -shadow is supposed to convey the impression of irresistible eyelashes. -In towns where “the Paris modes” are the sign of smartness, some of the -girls paint their faces pink and white—faces painted with a vengeance, -with a thick and shining enamel which transforms the wearers into -animated wax dolls of the weirdest appearance. But that which shocks the -unsophisticated traveller most is the tattooing of many of the women. -Some of them are marked with small arrow-head blue patches on forehead, -cheeks, and chin; others are lined and scored like South Sea Islanders, -and their lower lips transformed entirely from red to blue.</p> - -<p>All this is savage enough, but it illustrates in its own crude way that -delight in strong colour which transforms the human life of the East -into such a vivid foreground to the faint landscape. In the dress there -is artistic instinct as well as barbaric splendour, and in the carpets, -the mosaics, and the glass there is brilliant and matchless artistry. As -to the general principle which has been stated in regard to natural -colouring, this is as it always must have been. These were the quiet -hues of the land, and these the brilliant points of strong light in it -which Christ’s eyes saw, and which gave their colour to the Gospels.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_020" id="page_020"></a>{20}</span></p> - -<h3><a name="CHAPTER_II-i" id="CHAPTER_II-i"></a>CHAPTER II<br /><br /> -THE DESERT</h3> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">Environment</span> counts for much in national life. A country knows itself, -and asserts itself, as in contrast with what is immediately over its -border; or it retains connection with the neighbouring life, and is what -it is partly because the region next it overflows into its life. At any -rate, to understand anything more than the colour of a land—indeed even -to understand that, as we shall see—it is necessary to begin outside it -and know something of its surroundings. For Palestine, environment means -sea and desert—sea along a straight line for the most part unbroken by -any crease or wrinkle of coast-edge which might serve for a harbour, and -desert thrown round all the rest, except the mountainous north. -Palestine is a great oasis—a fertile resting-place for travellers -making the grand journey from Egypt to Mesopotamia; between which -kingdoms she was ever also the buffer state in war and politics. These -nations were her visitors, her guests, her terrors, but they never were -her neighbours. Her neighbours are the sea and the desert.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_021" id="page_021"></a>{21}</span></p> - -<p>The sea she never took for a friend. With no harbour, nor any visible -island to tempt her to adventure, and no sailor blood in her veins, she -hated and feared the sea, and thought of it with ill-will. There is -little of the wistfulness of romance in her thought of the dwellers in -its uttermost parts; little of the sense of beauty in her poetry of the -breaking waves. She views the Phœnician trader who does business on the -ocean as a person to be astonished at rather than to be counted heroic. -She exults in the fact that God has his path on the great waters, but -has no wish to make any journey there herself. Her angels plant their -feet upon the sea, and she looks forward almost triumphantly to the time -when it will be dried up and disappear. Meanwhile its inaccessible huge -depth is for her poets a sort of Gehenna—a fit place for throwing off -evil things beyond the chance of their reappearing. Sins are to be cast -into it, and offenders, with millstones at their necks.</p> - -<p>The desert was Israel’s real neighbour. South-east from her it stretched -for a thousand miles. From N.N.E. round through E. and S. to W. it -hemmed her in. To a Briton, watching the departure of the Bagdad -dromedary post from Damascus, the desert seems infinitely more appalling -and unnatural than the sea. For ten days these uncanny beasts and men -will travel, marching (it is said) twenty hours out of every -twenty-four. The stretch of dreariness which opens to the Western -imagination, as you watch the lessening specks in the tawny distance, is -indescribable. To the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_022" id="page_022"></a>{22}</span> Eastern it is not so, and it never was so. He -knows its horrors, and yet he loves it. The modern Arab calls it Nefud -(<i>i.e.</i> “exhausted,” “spent”), and, according to Palgrave, there are in -the Arabian desert sands no less than 600 feet in depth. Yet with all -its horrors it is after all his home.</p> - -<p>The desert is not all consecrated to death. Besides the occasional oases -which dot its barren expanse, there are many regions where grass and -herbage may be had continually so long as the flocks keep wandering. -Accordingly the long low black tent, with its obliquely pitched -tent-ropes and skilfully driven pegs, takes the place of such -substantial building as might create a city. It has been so for -countless generations, until now the desert Arab fears walls and will -not be persuaded to enter them. Kinglake gives a remarkable instance of -this, telling of a journey to Gaza on which his Arabs actually abandoned -their camels rather than accompany them within the gates.<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a></p> - -<p>Colonel Conder insists that the Arabs are entirely distinct from the -Fellahin of the Syrian villages; yet he and other writers call attention -to the borderland east of Jordan where the boundaries of the rival races -swing to and fro with the varying successes or failures of the years. In -places where the land lies open, as at the Plain of Esdraelon, the east -invades the west. No one who travels in Palestine can fail to be -impressed—most will probably be surprised—by the frequency with which -those black hair-cloth tents are<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_023" id="page_023"></a>{23}</span> seen, sprawling like the skin of some -wild-cat pegged out along the ground. If the question be asked what -becomes of them, the day’s journey will likely enough supply the answer. -In the market-place of a town you may see their inhabitants trading -their desert ware for city produce. But even such slight contact of city -with desert evidently has its temptations. In the valley below, the tent -is pitched on the edge of a field rudely cultivated. The nomad here has -already yielded to the agriculturist. Descend to the Jordan valley, and -you shall see the hair-cloth covering a hut whose sides are of woven -reeds from the river, and a little farther on the covering itself will -be exchanged for a roof of reeds. Finally, you may look from the road -that runs between the two main sources of the Jordan, and see in the -southern distance, shining out against the lush verdure of the Huleh -morass, the red-tiled roof of a two-storey villa—the house of the -Sheikh of the local tribe of Arabs!<a name="FNanchor_2_2" id="FNanchor_2_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_2_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a> This immigration has gone on from -time immemorial, and it was some such process by which Palestine -received all her earlier inhabitants. Once fixed in cities and settled -down to the cultivation of the fields, their character and way of life -so changed that the desert and its folk became their enemies. Yet a -deeper loyalty remained through all such alienation; and, in spite of -dangers and even hostilities, the desert was still their former home.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_024" id="page_024"></a>{24}</span></p> - -<p>It is not only by its neighbourhood, however, that the desert has -influenced Palestine. Nature has done her best to shut it off from the -land, from the eastern side at least, by the tremendous barrier of the -Jordan valley. Not even the angel of the wilderness, one would think, -might cross that defence. Yet even that barrier has been crossed, and a -bird’s-eye view of Palestine shews a land bitten into by great tracts of -real desert west of Jordan. In a modified degree, the whole of -Judea—that great stone wedge to which reference was made in Chapter -I.—exemplifies this. Half the Judean territory is wilderness, and the -other half is only kept back from the desert by sheer force of industry. -Even on the western side this is strikingly seen. As viewed from the -ocean, the desolate sand and scrub of the coast seems to clutch at the -land, stretching here and there far inland from the shore. But the -desert of Judah, in the south-east of the country, is the great -intrusion of the desert upon Palestine. The sea-board of Palestine is -perhaps the smoothest and most unbroken of any country in the world. But -if a coast-line of the desert were sketched in the same way as a -sea-coast is shewn on maps, the edge would show an outline almost as -broken as that of the Greek coast, with many a bay and creek. The desert -is the sea of Syria, and its inthrust is like that of great fingers -feeling their way through the pastures to the very gates of her cities, -and at one place reaching a point within a mile or two of her capital. -Disraeli describes graphically the transition from Canaan to<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_025" id="page_025"></a>{25}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_004" id="ill_004"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<a href="images/ill_006_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_006_sml.jpg" width="500" height="384" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">ON THE ROAD FROM JERUSALEM TO BETHANY.</p></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">stony Arabia—the first sandy patches; the herbage gradually -disappearing till all that is left of it is shrubs tufting the ridges of -low undulating sand-hills; then the sand becoming stony, with no -plant-life remaining but an occasional thorn, until plains of sand end -in dull ranges of mountains covered with loose flints. In the journey -from Bethlehem to the Dead Sea the transition is even more abrupt. -Hardly have you left the “fields of the shepherds” when you perceive -that the herbs, though still plentiful among the stones, are parched. In -a mile or two there is nothing round you but wild greyish-yellow sand -and rock. You thread your way precariously along the sides of gorges -till you reach that sheer yellow cleft down which Kidron is slicing its -way with the air of a suicide to the sea. Then you come up to a lofty -ridge from which are seen the dreary towers of Mar Saba, like the “blind -squat turret” of Childe Roland’s adventure, “with low grey rocks girt -round, chin upon hand, to see the game at bay.” So you journey on, -feeling at times that this is not scenery, it is being buried alive in -great stone chambers beneath the surface; at other times welcoming the -sight of a broom bush like that under which Elijah lay down and prayed -that he might die. The carcase of a horse or the skeleton of a camel are -almost welcome, breaking the monotonous emptiness of this land of death.</p> - -<p>The physical influence of the desert on the land is evident in many -ways. Greece and Britain are not more truly children of the sea than is -Syria the desert’s<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_026" id="page_026"></a>{26}</span> child. Even those who have had no experience of the -desert proper, but have only made the regulation tour in Palestine, will -have memories of what they saw recalled to them in every page of a book -descriptive of the desert. The land throughout has ominously much in -common with its desolate neighbour—so much so as to suggest a territory -rescued from the desert and kept from reverting only by strenuous -handling.</p> - -<p>Many things go to confirm this impression. The winds that blow from east -or south have crossed the sand before they reach the mountains. When -they are cool, they are pure and fresh, unbreathed before, “virgin air.” -The evening breeze of Syria is “the respiration of the desert” after its -breathless heat of day. When the wind is hot, it is terrible as only -wind can be that comes off burning sand. The <i>shirky</i>, or sirocco, -interprets the desert in a fashion which the traveller is not likely to -forget. We rode against it half the length of the Plain of Esdraelon, -when the thermometer registered 104° in the shade, until the steel of -our coloured eye-glasses became so hot that we were glad to remove them, -and endure the glare by preference.</p> - -<p>The plant-life of the desert has its counterpart in the land. Loti -describes it with his usual vividness. There is the furze dusted with -fine sand; there are the strange sand-flowers of yellow or violet -colours, the spikes shot out of the soil without leafage, the balls of -thorn which wound the feet, the occasional palm-tree, the white edible -manna plant. And there is the exquisite scent of these after rain, so -strong that one might think a jar of perfume had been broken at the tent -door—a<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_027" id="page_027"></a>{27}</span> perfume in which one distinguishes the scents of resin, lemon, -geranium, and myrrh. All this the Palestine traveller seems to -recognise; in that curious but familiar flora, and that pungent aromatic -smell, we have the intrusion of the desert again.</p> - -<p>The colour of the land has already been described, and here again we -have the touch of the wilderness. The colouring is no doubt partly due -to the quality of the air, dry and crisp as nothing but those miles of -sand could make it. Having absolutely no concerns of its own, as wooded -or grassy lands have, the desert abandons itself to the sun. It takes -and gives the sunlight wholly, making itself a mere reflector for the -light and heat. “Everything in this desert is of one colour—a tawny -yellow. The rocks, the partridges, the camels, the foxes, the ibex, are -all of this shade.”<a name="FNanchor_3_3" id="FNanchor_3_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_3_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a> Yet this absolutely neutral region, just because -of its neutrality, catches the sunrise and the sunset in a brilliance -that is all its own, and deepens its shadows to liquid depths of indigo -and violet. In this we see the extreme and untempered form of that -interplay of faint background with intense foreground which is the -characteristic feature of the colour-scheme of Syria.</p> - -<p>It is the same as regards form. The two towers of Mar Saba are among the -most impressive of all the Syrian spectacles. Pitilessly unsuggestive, -they are the most unhomely things one ever saw, like the mere skeletons -of habitations. But part of this impression comes from the shape of the -surrounding hills. Ranged<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_028" id="page_028"></a>{28}</span> in a wide semicircle, their fronts eaten out -with land-slips and torrents, they are polished and smooth like gigantic -sculptures. In some parts the regularity of their cones and tables -suggests the work of purposeless but mighty builders. In other parts the -rocks are twisted as if by tormentors, or tumbled in utter confusion. -This too, as we shall see, has its modified counterpart in the land.</p> - -<p>If the desert has thus produced a strong physical effect upon the land, -its moral effects are even more apparent. We have seen how to the -dwellers west of Jordan it was at once an abiding enemy and an ancient -home. Shut out from it by the huge trench of the Jordan valley and the -barricade of the eastern mountains, the Syrian still feels enough of the -desert’s fiery touch to fear it as an enemy. Its wind blasts his crops -and its heat drives him from his valleys to the hill country for the -breath of life. Every traveller speaks of the “positive weight” of heat -that makes men bend low in their saddles. Others besides the Persians -are constrained, as Kinglake puts it, to bow down before the sun, whose -“fierce will” is most terribly felt in those tracts of the land which -the desert has claimed for its own. In the desert there are the same -conditions which are to be found in the land, only in extreme forms and -without mitigation. It is the place of tempests, fires, and reptiles. -These visit the land at times, but they abide in that weird country into -whose distances the Syrian may peer from most of his mountain tops. -There, too, abide those dark and occult powers of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_029" id="page_029"></a>{29}</span> evil in which every -Eastern man believes. The magic of the desert—its treacherous mirage, -its genii (by no means difficult to imagine in the forms of sandy -whirlwinds whose march is strewn with corpses), and its infinite -unexplored possibilities of terror—all this is very real to the native -imagination. Its inhabitants, too, are uncanny to think of. The true -Arabian, whom perhaps they may have met on a journey, with his -jade-handled jewelled sword and his shrunken skin; the lunatics who have -wandered to its congenial wildness; the anchorites and ascetics whom, -like the scapegoat of ancient times, sin has driven forth to its -unwalled prison-house,—all these fill in for Syrians the ghastly -picture, and its tales of wars and massacres add the last touch of -horror.</p> - -<p>Nothing proves and exemplifies all this more strikingly than the -apparently unreasonable view of the fertility, beauty, and general -perfection of Palestine which its inhabitants have always cherished. -Visitors from the West are often disappointed, and as they move from -place to place their wonder grows as they recall the Biblical -descriptions of the land flowing with milk and honey. Allowing for the -many centuries of misrule and deterioration, it still remains obvious -that Palestine never can have been that dreamland of natural delight -which piety has imagined. But the inhabitant views it, as Dr. Smith has -pointed out, not in contrast with the West, but in contrast with the -desert. We have to remember how “its eastern forests, its immense -wheat-fields, its streams, the oases round its perennial<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_030" id="page_030"></a>{30}</span> fountains, the -pride of Jordan, impress the immigrant nomad.” This contrast exaggerates -all his blessings in a heat of appreciation. Coming in from the desert, -a man sees trees and fountains not as they are in themselves, but as -they are in contrast with burning sand: he welcomes them as the gift of -God’s grace. The sound of wind among the leaves or of flowing water is -to him truly the speech of a god.<a name="FNanchor_4_4" id="FNanchor_4_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_4_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a> To many a wayfarer the poorest -outskirts of the Syrian land have meant salvation from imminent death, -and so appreciation enlarges to optimism, and the very barrenness of the -desert becomes a challenge to hope and faith. Streams will break forth -there, as in his happy experience they have already broken forth, until -the whole barren waste shall blossom as the rose. It is by such hope and -faith that the tribes of Palestine have lived. There is a magnificent -indomitableness in the spectacle of Jews after two thousand years of -exile still celebrating their vintage festival in the slums of great -cities, or in the “squalid quarter of some bleak northern town where -there is never a sun that can at any rate ripen grapes.” One seems to -find the key to this in that tradition of the Arabs that certain ruins -near the Dead Sea are the remains of ancient vineyards. The Syrian land -can never be seen but as a miracle of life and beauty rescued from the -desert, and that appreciation becomes the incentive for a larger hope.</p> - -<p>Yet it is not as an enemy, however wonderfully conquered or strenuously -held at bay, that the desert<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_031" id="page_031"></a>{31}</span> appeals most to the Syrian. As he looks -eastward to the hills of Moab and dreams of what lies beyond them, there -is perhaps more of wistfulness than of terror in his heart. The -melancholy note of his music, heard by every camp-fire in the long -evenings, is infinitely suggestive as well as pathetic. Where was that -note learned if not in black tents pitched in the boundless waste, where -man’s littleness, in contrast with the great powers of Nature, oppressed -him into prone fatalism, or revealed to him the infinite refuge and -comfort of the Everlasting Arms? He whose fathers have sung such songs -will not satisfy his soul with the bustle of towns. He will need the -desert for retreat, that his confused mind may calm itself down to order -and find new revelations of truth. And when the Syrian retreats to the -desert he seems rather to be going home than abroad. David and Elijah, -Paul and Mohammed, for various reasons, but with the same urgency, -betook themselves to the solitude. Jesus Christ himself was driven of -the Spirit into the wilderness. If temptation waited them there, and the -sense of exile and desertion, it was there also that angels ministered -to them; and ancient prophecies were fulfilled in those “streams of -spiritual originality which broke forth in the deserts of moral routine” -of their times. To their spirit, and to the spirit of all dwellers in -the land, the desert is not enemy only, it is home.</p> - -<p>This fact is abundantly borne out by many traits of character which are -the survivals of a desert ancestry.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_032" id="page_032"></a>{32}</span> There is nothing in Syria which can -explain the fact that the most skilful dragoman cannot understand a map, -nor guide you to your destination by geographical directions. On unknown -ground a Syrian is of little use as guide. On one occasion some of us -set out on a journey of five or six miles in Hauran under the guidance -of an excellent lad who started with the air of a Napoleon Bonaparte. -His directions were to go straight from Muzerib to Sheikh Miskin—two -stations on the railway south of Damascus, between which the railway -line runs in a wide curve. Our route was the bow-string, while the line -was the bent bow. For a little way he boldly marched forward, but soon -began to edge towards the rails, and finally lost his head altogether, -crossed the line, and set out on a route whose only apparent destination -was Persia! This was too much for us, and we mutinied and reversed the -direction, arriving at Sheikh Miskin in less than an hour, with our -guide under a cloud. There could not have been a better illustration of -a Syrian’s helplessness on ground without familiar landmarks. He finds -his way partly by a nomad instinct, very difficult to account for; -partly by the habit of noticing minute features of the road which -entirely escape the ordinary observer. A story is told of a thief in a -certain town in Palestine who entered a house and stole nothing. He -simply went out and claimed the house before the judge. When the case -came to trial, the thief challenged the owner to tell how many steps -were in the stair, how many panes of glass in the windows and a long -catalogue of other such<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_033" id="page_033"></a>{33}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_005" id="ill_005"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<a href="images/ill_007_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_007_sml.jpg" width="500" height="301" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">THE HILLS ROUND NAZARETH, FROM THE PLAIN OF ESDRAELON.</p> - -<p>The village of Nazareth shows out white in the dip between the hills.</p></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">details. This the owner could not do, and when the thief gave the -numbers correctly, the house was at once given to him as its obvious -possessor. The tale at once recalls the Arab of our childhood who -described the route of the strayed camel.</p> - -<p>The Syrian character is nothing if not complex, a mass of paradox whose -contradictory elements it seems hopeless to attempt to reconcile. The -politest and the most ruffianly of men, the most effusively frank and -the most impenetrably wary, the most silent and the most voluble, the -gayest in laughter and the most melancholy in song, is the Syrian. He -will bully you so long as he has the majority, and he will beg for the -privilege of tying your shoe’s latchet if the majority is with you. He -will row a boat or drive a donkey under a noonday sun with a violence -which threatens apoplexy; he will suddenly subside into a repose which -no surrounding bustle can disturb. The captain of the <i>Rob Roy</i> tells -how in the Huleh region a native boy running alongside pointed his long -gun at him at least twenty times with the cry of <i>bakhshish</i>, so close -that he once knocked the barrel aside with his paddle; and yet in the -tent that evening this same youngster “was my greatest favourite from -his lively laugh and eyes like diamonds, and his quick perception of all -I explained.” In a note on page 39 an adventure of our own is told which -illustrates sufficiently the rapidity of change in the mood of the -native. He is a civilised barbarian, a scrupulous fraud, an aged little -child. No doubt so complex a character is traceable to many causes, but<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_034" id="page_034"></a>{34}</span> -in the main it is the work of the desert. There the extreme -conditions—the long hunger and the occasional surfeit, the great -silence and the shrill speech in which that silence unburdens itself, -the demand for desperate exertion and the long deep rest—these call -forth the most opposite qualities, each in exaggerated degree.</p> - -<p>Perhaps the most important contributions of the desert to the Syrian -character have been two. There is a certain hardiness and strenuous -carelessness of comfort, which produces a rather bleak impression on -European travellers, but which nevertheless has counted for a great deal -in national life. It has told in opposite ways. Judea’s success has been -undoubtedly due to the fact that it had to be fought for against such -bitter odds. On the other hand, this same independence of fate has led -the nation to settle down in a too easy contentment. Defeat, and even -oppression, sit more lightly on people who are indifferent to -circumstances; and if the artificial demands for luxury have been the -ruin of some nations, they have been the saving of others, keeping alive -in them their vigour and whetting their ambition. The other contribution -is the instinctive kindliness and hospitality which are well known as -characteristic of the desert tribes. Where life is so precarious, it -inevitably comes to be regarded as an inviolable trust by the man on -whose mercy it is cast. Accordingly the wandering Arab has but to draw -in the sand a circle round his laden camel in order to secure every -scrap of his possessions from robbery; and the bitterest enemies are -sure of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_035" id="page_035"></a>{35}</span> safety so long as they abide in each other’s tents. A little -incident which occurred to ourselves brought home to us vividly the real -kindliness of the Eastern sense of guest-right. It was in Damascus, and -after nightfall. Some of us, wishing to see how the city amused itself, -set out for a ramble through the streets. It was only nine o’clock, yet -everything was shut up and the bazaars and thoroughfares silent and -deserted. At last we found a little café still doing business at the end -of the high black vault of a bazaar. Seats were placed in the open air -in front of it, while from within came the rattle of dice and the voices -of one or two gamblers. Sitting down on the outside bench, we asked for -coffee, which was immediately brought. A stylishly dressed Moslem, in an -indescribable flow of robes, took his seat silently opposite us and sat -smoking his nargileh. When we rose to go we found that he had paid for -us all, and when we would have thanked him he would have none of it, -satisfied with the consciousness of having shewn hospitality to -strangers sojourning in his land. We could not help wondering how long -our friend might have continued making the circuit of London restaurants -before a similar experience would have fallen his way! There is a tale -of a scoundrel who acts as guide to English travellers, and presents to -each of them a certificate from a former victim, which invariably makes -them laugh. The writing is, “I was a stranger and ye took me in.” It was -pleasing to find that this testimony need not always be ironical.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_036" id="page_036"></a>{36}</span></p> - -<h4>EXTRACT FROM JOURNAL</h4> - -<div class="blockquott"><p>One of the horses had been stolen in the night. It was the last on -the line, and beyond it Harun was sleeping on the ground. At 11.30 -all was right, but by 12.30 it had disappeared. By 1 <small>A.M.</small> the -village had been roused, and the head men were coming in to the -camp offering us one of their mares in compensation. The mares, -which were wretched skeletons of beasts, were refused, and the -horse demanded. Nothing could persuade them to bring him back, or -to acknowledge any cognisance of him whatever. They said that -passing robbers had taken him, and begged us not to report the -affair. Our dragoman, however, took another view. He wrote a -letter, long and circumstantial, describing us as “Hawajas” -(merchants, gentlemen), travelling for information under tescera -from the Sultan. The touch of genius in the letter was its -insistence upon the seriousness of this affair on the ground that -we were travelling under three flags, the Union Jack, the Turkish -flag, and the Stars and Stripes. This letter was sent, by one of -our men on horseback, to the Kaimakham, governor of the district, -at a place some distance from where we were. The Kaimakham passed -him on to the Mudir at another village, a person of terrible -reputation, of whom everybody in the neighbourhood was afraid. The -upshot of it all was that Mohammed, the messenger, returned to camp -accompanied by two soldiers, powerful and intelligent young -fellows, but savage-looking and rather ragged. The taller of the -two, named Nimr (the leopard), was armed with bayonet, rifle, and -revolver, while a double belt of cartridges added to the effect. -His orders were to take the thirteen leading men of Banias in -irons, and march them off “shoulder-tight” to prison at Mejdel. -During the day a great meeting was held in the dragoman’s tent, the -soldiers on one side, the “leading men” on the other. One of the -latter protested that this was unfair—they had expected the -dragoman to grow cooler, but although he had been hot at first, he -was getting hotter instead of cooler. The reply was—(may it be -forgiven!)—that he had meant to get cooler, but the Hawajas were -getting hotter steadily, owing to the three flags aforesaid. After -a long parley it was arranged that they should send to another -village for a horse worth £20, the value of the stolen one. They -stoutly maintained that a stranger, and none of themselves, had -committed the robbery, and that it was a bitter day when the -Hawajas had pitched their tents among them. Nimr the soldier sat -frowning and beating the ground savagely with a stick between his -wide open legs. He repeated several times, with gusto, the -aphorism, “Better to touch fire and scorpions than the property of -Hawajas,” to which the rueful answer of the Sheikh was that it -<i>would</i> be better! All was gloom, and when at last a messenger was -sent off to procure a horse worth £20, the grandees went to their -houses with the air of men doomed. Next morning the horse was -brought, and was to be seen at the end of the line kicking and -biting viciously. Its worth was only £15, but the balance was -condoned. We expected that this would draw forth gratitude and even -some gladness; but instead it brought them all to tears, and drew -from them many assurances of the miserable poverty of their -condition, and the inevitable ruin that awaited them if we actually -accepted this horse which they had brought. To these pleadings the -dragoman was deaf, insisting that we must now at least let things -take their course. When they saw that this was the final position -of affairs, they ceased from wailing. Within five minutes our own -original horse was led into the camp, and their new one removed! -Their game had been played to its very last turn, and having failed -was laid aside. During the rest of our sojourn there these same men -lingered in the camp, manifesting neither regret nor shame, but -smoking, chatting, and laughing with our company in the highest -possible good-humour.</p></div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_037" id="page_037"></a>{37}</span></p> - -<h3><a name="CHAPTER_III-i" id="CHAPTER_III-i"></a>CHAPTER III<br /><br /> -THE LIE OF THE LAND</h3> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">Every</span> writer about Palestine speaks of the smallness and concentration -of the land, yet these take the best informed by surprise. It is “the -least of all lands” indeed, when one thinks how much has happened in it. -Leaving Jaffa at 10 <small>A.M.</small>, the steamer reaches Beyrout at 6 <small>P.M.</small> The -passengers in that short sail have seen the whole of Palestine. National -life there is a miniature rather than a picture. In a stretch of country -equal to that between Aberdeen and Dundee you cover the whole central -ground of the Bible, from the Sea of Galilee to Jerusalem. In a ride -equal to the distance from London to Windsor there may be seen enough to -interpret many centuries of the world’s supreme history. The Dead Sea is -but 50 miles from the Mediterranean, the Sea of Galilee about 25 miles; -while the distance in miles between the two seas is only 55. Yet in that -little land there is every kind of soil, from mere sand and broken -limestone to rich red and chocolate loam. It is a mountainous country -throughout, and its inhabitants<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_038" id="page_038"></a>{38}</span> are a race of Highlanders. So numerous -are its mountain spurs that you may pass up and down the centre of the -country for scores of miles, and yet never catch sight of the sea, -though you constantly feel it in the breeze. Everything is there—the -gorge, the wide sweeping valley, the great plain, the rolling tableland. -It is, indeed, a land in miniature, the <i>multum in parvo</i> of lands. Its -history and religion, like its natural features, are crushed together -and compact. The epigram is the only form of speech that can express it.</p> - -<p>This idea of smallness and compression, however, is by no means the only -possible view which may be taken. All depends on what it is with which -one compares Palestine. Thinking of it as a field of history, one -inevitably has other fields in mind. If we think of Britain, Palestine -is but the size of Wales; if of France and Germany, it is the equivalent -of Alsace. But a more primitive point of view is gained when you regard -it as a reclaimed tract of the desert. Just as Egypt is a huge -river-meadow, and Venice a glorified harbour in the sea, so Syria is the -largest oasis in the world. Its whole geographical character is that of -desert, more or less modified by water. The sculptured hills are here, -the rock and the shingle and the sand. Dry up its rivers and arrest its -rainfall, and you will have a continuation of the peninsula of Sinai, -except that instead of granite it will be of limestone. It is this, as -we have seen, that has led its inhabitants to regard it with a rare -appreciation, an extraordinary sense of its<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_039" id="page_039"></a>{39}</span> preciousness, and a -tendency to exaggerate both its beauty and its fertility.</p> - -<p>Nothing illustrates this loving appreciation of their land better than -the play of imagination which has created the place-names of Palestine. -Hebrews, Arabs, and Crusaders vie with each other in the poetic beauty -of their nomenclature. It is a little land, but there is much witchery -in it. For its inhabitants it <i>lives</i> personified, and its masses of -mountain scenery are often named from parts of the human body. There are -“the shoulder,” “the side,” “the thigh,” “the rib,” “the back.” The -“head” of Pisgah looks down upon the “face” of the wilderness.<a name="FNanchor_5_5" id="FNanchor_5_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_5_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a> There -is a “hollow hearth”—homeliest of names to a Semite. In other names -poetry has reached its utmost of epigrammatic beauty—“the dance of the -whirls,” “the star of the wind,” “the diamond of the desert.” Yet sacred -and beautiful as its scenery was to Israel, she had a dearer bond with -her land than that. She was kept from nature-worship by a spiritual -faith which created such names as “Bethel” (the house of God), and many -others of similar significance. These claim the land in all its length -and breadth for the God of Israel. Every green spot was for the Semites -the dwelling-place of some divinity; this whole oasis of hers was for -Israel the house of her God of peace and blessing. To the ancient Greek -“God was the view”; to the Hebrew, God was the inhabitant of the -view—He Himself was Righteousness. And because the land<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_040" id="page_040"></a>{40}</span> was -His—rescued by Him from the desert with His waters, and given to the -people in His love—it was tenfold more dear to them. Down every vista -which shewed them a land that was very far off, their eyes caught sight -also of some vision of the King in His beauty; every high hill was a -veritable mountain of the Lord’s house.</p> - -<p>Let us try to get, as it were, a bird’s-eye view of this fascinating -country, noticing in their right perspective and significance its -outstanding natural features. Dr. Smith’s <i>Historical Geography</i> has -perhaps rendered no service higher than the aid towards this which is -afforded by its epitome and map (pp. 49, 50, 51). These divide Palestine -into five parallel strips running north and south. Cutting across these -strips in a straight line westwards from the desert to the sea, we first -traverse the range of the eastern mountains; then dip to the immense -gulf of the Jordan valley, far below the Mediterranean level; then climb -by precipitous ascents to the summit of the central range; then descend -through the foot-hills; and finally land on the maritime plain. To grasp -thoroughly the lie of these five longitudinal regions is the first -necessity for understanding the geography of Palestine. Its general -impression is one of extraordinary brokenness of contour, and Zangwill -points out the important fact that a land with so much hill surface has -in reality a very much larger superficial area than that estimated by -multiplying its length by its breadth.</p> - -<p>By far the most remarkable feature in the whole<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_041" id="page_041"></a>{41}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_006" id="ill_006"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<a href="images/ill_008_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_008_sml.jpg" width="500" height="331" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">JERUSALEM—THE POOL OF HEZEKIAH.</p></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">territory is the Jordan valley. Rising from springs at the western roots -of Hermon, high above sea level, it sinks by rapid stages till at the -Dead Sea it reaches bottom nearly 1300 feet below the Mediterranean. -Down its extraordinary gully flows the one great river of Palestine. -There are other perennial streams, but none to compare with Jordan -either for volume or for associations. It is this mass of flowing water -which stands as the heart and soul of the Syrian oasis. Its mighty -stream has overcome the desert, and claimed the western land for -greenness and for life. It is this huge cleft that has isolated the Holy -Land for the purposes of its God.</p> - -<p>The only clear opening from the Jordan to the Mediterranean is the Plain -of Esdraelon. Standing on Jordan’s bank below Bethshan and looking -westward, you see before you a valley whose farther end shows nothing -but sky. Many streams cut their way down its slopes beside a green -morass, and hold in their embrace the ruins of a strong city. You must -follow them up westwards for some ten miles before you reach sea level, -and soon after that you cross the watershed in a wide valley with -mountains rising to north and south. Jezreel stands above you on a -protruding tongue of high cultivated land to the south. At a level of -about 200 feet above the sea, you suddenly emerge upon a great -triangular plain, with Carmel at its apex, 15 miles to the west. This is -the Plain of Esdraelon. The one really large level space in Syria, its -rich soil, even surface, and plentiful water-supply make it a famous -piece of cultivated ground. But it is also the natural battlefield<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_042" id="page_042"></a>{42}</span> of -the East, and its chief associations are not with agriculture but with -war.</p> - -<p>Esdraelon, however, is but an incident in the geographical fact of -Syria, though an important and large incident. It is but the largest of -those open spaces into which Syrian valleys swell out. There are three -or four of them in the Jordan valley, and several of smaller size are -scattered here and there throughout the country. The really essential -feature of the land—that, indeed, which historically <i>is</i> the land—is -the mountain range that sweeps from Lebanon to Hebron and beyond. It was -on the mountains that Israel lived. The Plain of Esdraelon, being the -ganglion of the natural main routes of traffic and of war, was but a -doubtful possession, precariously held at best, and often changing -owners. The strong city of Bethshan at the eastern mouth of its main -valley was held by Israel’s enemies during almost the whole of her -history; and, until a year or two ago, the Arabs made yearly raids upon -the Plain. Again, the sea-coast was largely in the hands of enemies; -while the Jordan valley, with its insupportable heat and malaria, was -thinly peopled, and its population swiftly degenerated from national as -well as from moral loyalties. Thus he who would know the Holy Land must, -in every sense of the words, “lift up his eyes unto the hills.”</p> - -<p>It was our good fortune to have this view at its very best for our first -sight of Palestine. We should have landed at Jaffa, but a rather -doubtful case of plague at Alexandria inflicted a two days’ quarantine -on all ships<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_043" id="page_043"></a>{43}</span> coming out of Egypt. So we looked at Jaffa from under the -yellow flag, and sailed off in the morning sunlight northward to -Beyrout. All day long we lay on deck, with maps spread out before us. -The quarantine had cost us the sight of the Greek Easter ceremony at -Jerusalem, but it gave us in exchange the rare experience of a daylight -sail along the Syrian coast. The day was marvellously clear, and every -object on the shore was seen in photographic outline, while the various -distances were preserved in fading colours, back to the thin -transparency against the sky which stood for the furthest mountain -ranges. The shore was barren: a low belt of tawny sand, broken by dark -olive-green scrub, and very desolate. One solitary house was all we saw -for the first two hours, and in another place a column of smoke, -apparently rising from some invisible camp. Beyond this the foot-hills -east of the plain were seen, lifting towards the great central ridge of -the mountain range. Though broken here and there by an occasional point, -or overlooked by a peak that rose very high beyond, the crest of the -range was remarkably level, with wavy outline. Until we passed Carmel it -shewed as a unity—“the <i>mountain</i>” of Ephraim and Judah. North from -that there was a bolder sky-line, much nearer to the sea, which led on -eventually to the magnificent heights of Lebanon, beautiful as they are -mighty.</p> - -<p>Let us suppose ourselves to land at Beyrout and journey from north to -south well inland. At first we climb eastwards among bold bare hills, in -whose recesses<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_044" id="page_044"></a>{44}</span> mulberry gardens nestle and on whose heights innumerable -villages perch. Cedars are conspicuous by their absence, but there are -plenty of humbler trees. Soon we come to realise the large-scale meaning -and contour of the district. We have been crossing Lebanon, whose -highest peaks have revealed themselves now and then far to the north. -Some twenty miles from the coast we find ourselves in the valley of the -Litany (Leontes). This whole region is easily understood. It consists of -the magnificent ranges of Lebanon and Antilebanon and the spacious -valley between them, running in ample curves parallel with the shore.</p> - -<p>Mighty though these are, however, it is neither of them that has -received the name of Jebel-es-Sheikh—“the patriarch of mountains.” That -honour is reserved for Hermon, the range and summit which Antilebanon -thrusts south from it into Galilee, just opposite Damascus. It is -happily named “the sheikh.” Go where you will in Palestine, Hermon seems -to lie at the end of some vista or other. For many miles around it, -Hermon commands everything. Its mass tilts the plain and sends out -innumerable spurs of rich and fertile land; its snow shines far and -gives character to the view; its eastern waters redeem the wilderness -through many a mile of Hauran; and from its western roots spring all the -fountains of the Jordan. This is the king of Syria, by whose beneficent -might the desert has become oasis.</p> - -<p>While the southern continuation of Hermon holds up the high tableland of -Bashan and runs it on into the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_045" id="page_045"></a>{45}</span> mountains of Gilead and Moab east of -Jordan, the thrust of Lebanon into Western Galilee ends curiously in a -succession of hills divided by valleys running east and west, like great -waves of mountain rolling south to break along the northern edge of the -Plain of Esdraelon. There is a quiet regularity about these Galilean -Highlands, which gives the impression of a region made to plan. The -eastern end of Esdraelon is blocked by the group of Tabor and “Little -Hermon,” while the feature of the western end is the long lonely ridge -of Carmel.</p> - -<p>Crossing the plain we enter Samaria, whose deep rounded valleys, rich in -corn, send their sweeping curves in all directions. Here there is -neither the dominant north-and-south trend of Lebanon, nor the -horizontal ripple of Galilee, but an intricate network of curving -valleys, which leave the mountains everywhere more individual and -distinct, and which frequently expand into wide meadows or fields. Yet -the general rise of the region is from west, sloping up to east. The -watershed is perhaps 10 to 15 miles from Jordan, while it is more than -30 miles from the sea. But Jordan here is well-nigh 1000 feet below -sea-level, so that the eastern slope is immensely steeper than the -western.</p> - -<p>As we enter Judea, we find the land, as it were, gathering itself up on -almost continuous heights. The lesser valleys are shallow, and the -hilltops swell from the lofty plateau in colossal domes or cupolas. So -high is the general level that when we come to Jerusalem we look in vain -for the mountains we had understood to be<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_046" id="page_046"></a>{46}</span> round about her. No peaks -cleave the sky—only smooth and gentle hills, which have never been in -any way her defence, but have made excellent platforms for the -siege-engines of her enemies, and have grown wood for the crosses of her -inhabitants. The lateral gorges of Judea, both east and west, cut into -her high tableland in angular zigzags, and as you descend these in -either direction you realise what is really meant by “the mountains -round about Jerusalem.” She does not see them, lying secure upon the -height to which they have exalted her. But he who approaches her must -come by their gorges, where for many miles his sky will be but a strip -seen between sheer heights of cliff and scaur.<a name="FNanchor_6_6" id="FNanchor_6_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_6_6" class="fnanchor">[6]</a> The rugged sharpness -of outline reaches its climax on the eastern side, where the range, -split in the wildest gorges, falls in fragmentary masses between their -mouths down to the Jordan valley. Nothing in the land has a more bare -and savage grandeur than the square-chiselled mountain blocks of -Quarantana, seen from below at Jericho in black angular silhouette -against the sunset. South of Jerusalem the Kidron gorge, cleaving the -intruding desert, exaggerates the wildness of the north, but as you -climb past Bethlehem to Hebron you are in a region liker to Samaria, -with its deeper and more rounded valleys and its richer pasture and -cultivation. South of Hebron the range spreads fanwise and gradually -sinks to the desert.</p> - -<p>The most impressive memories of the land, so far as <span class="pagenum"><a name="page_047" id="page_047"></a>{47}</span>its form and -contour go, are two—the gorges cleft through the Judean mountain, and -certain isolated conical hills thrown up from the Samaritan valleys. -Judea is mountain, emphasised by gorge; Samaria is valley, diversified -by hill. The gorges are uncompromising. When we read, for instance, the -third verse of the seventh chapter of Joshua, we think of an ordinary -march—“The men went up and viewed Ai. And they returned to Joshua, and -said unto him, Let not all the people go up; but let about two or three -thousand men go up and smite Ai; and make not all the people to labour -thither.” But he who has himself “gone up” from Jericho to Ai puts -feeling into his reading of the words “to labour thither.” That is the -only way of going up. The recollection is of several hours of -precipitous riding, with beasts stumbling and riders pitched ahead. When -the climb is over you turn aside to the south, and view the gully of -Michmash along whose northern edge you have scrambled inland. It looks -not like a valley, but a crack in rocks, hundreds of feet deep. The -valley of Achor, next to the south of Michmash, presents an almost more -dramatic appearance as you view its entrance from the Jordan foot-hills. -It gapes on the plain, like the open mouth of some petrified monster.</p> - -<p>The isolated hills of the northern territory are in their way as -memorable as the gorges of the south. In Judea you cannot see the -mountains for “the mountain.” The whole land is one great elevated -range, and the noticeable features of the district are the gorges that -cut across it. Samaria, on the other hand, is a place of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_048" id="page_048"></a>{48}</span> valleys and of -plains, and its mountains are seen as mountains. This fact finds its -most striking instance in certain “Gilgals,” or isolated cones standing -free in the midst of plain, or cut off by circular valleys round their -bases. The most perfect of these is that which bears the name of Gilgal, -rising detached in the wide valley to the south-east of Jacob’s Well.<a name="FNanchor_7_7" id="FNanchor_7_7"></a><a href="#Footnote_7_7" class="fnanchor">[7]</a> -It is in shape an almost perfect cone, whose gradual curve renders it -very easy of ascent. The Hill of Samaria itself is another such -“Gilgal,” the centre of a splendid circular panorama of hills. Sanur, in -the country of Judith and Holophernes, is a third, on a smaller scale, -but with even wider panorama. North of Esdraelon, again a long ripple of -mountains sweeps round at least one such Gilgal, leaving Sepphoris -isolated on the peak of it. And Tabor itself might plausibly be counted -in this class—Tabor the irrelevant, whose cone seems always to be -peeping over the shoulder of some lower ridge, unlike any other -landmark, commanding all the views eastward from the heights of -Nazareth. These curious cones are in Palestine to some extent what the -Righi is in Switzerland. With the exception of Tabor, they are but -lesser heights; yet they give the widest mountain views, and seem to -shape the land into a succession of circles, of which their summits are -the centre-points.</p> - -<p>The mountains of Israel are the characteristic features of her history -as of her geography. In every part of Syria they are the companions of -the journey. Great<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_049" id="page_049"></a>{49}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_007" id="ill_007"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<a href="images/ill_009_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_009_sml.jpg" width="500" height="360" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">MOUNT HERMON, FROM THE SLOPES OF TABOR.</p> - -<p>The lofty mountain in the extreme distance is Mount Hermon.</p></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">distant masses, or near crests of them, seem to accompany you as you -move. And as you travel through the history of the land it is in the -same companionship. The Jordan valley lies along the western side of the -mountain range, a place of luxury and temptation. But Israel abides on -the hills, sending down to it only the most degenerate of her children. -It is a very striking fact that Jesus was tempted to sin for bread on -the mountain almost within sight of Jericho, where the Herodians were -sinning with surfeits of wine and rich meats. All that is truest to -Israel and most characteristic of her at her best is on the hills. They -are the places of her war and of her worship. The Gilgals have almost -all stood siege. All, or at least the most of them, have been fortified. -On some of them the rude remains of ancient sacred circles, or the -decayed steps of altars cut in the rock, may still be traced. Her -enemies found by bitter experience that “her gods are gods of the -hills.” Her ark had its abode on the tableland at Shiloh or on the hill -of Zion. Its history on the low ground was but a story of calamity; it -had to be sent up again to Kirjath-Jearim among the hills. Yet the -heights of Israel stand for more than this blend of war and worship; -they were her home. All her greater towns nestle among them somewhere; -most of them stand on the summits, or just below them. It was a race of -Highlanders that gave us our Bible—men whose home was on the heights.</p> - -<p>Her wars, indeed, were everywhere, for it is a blood-drenched<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_050" id="page_050"></a>{50}</span> land. -Many of her battles were fought at the edge of the mountain-land, on the -kopjes that run along the southern border of Esdraelon, or among the -foot-hills near the mouth of the western gorges. There, or on the great -plain, she met her invaders. But the heights were the scenes of battles -in the last resort, and the gorges are associated with the advance and -retreat of armed hosts, the rush of the invader and the headlong retreat -of armies that had been surprised and routed from above.</p> - -<p>Meanwhile, in the middle spaces, she fought her continuous battle with -the desert and the sun for her daily bread. It is said that in Malta, -where every possible spot is cultivated, the earth has been all -imported, and that the Knights of Malta allowed no vessel to enter the -harbour without paying dues in soil. The denuded hill-sides of -Palestine, with their ruined heaps of stones that once built up terraces -for cultivation, tell a similar story. On some hillsides the remains of -sixty or even eighty such terraces may still be traced. In many places -the valleys are rich in an altogether superfluous depth of fertile soil. -But this did not suffice the inhabitants, and they built up the terraces -along the southward slopes, in many places quite to the walls of their -mountain villages. On not a few of these slopes labour must have -actually created land, and men’s hearts grown strong within them as they -changed the rocks into gardens and the slopes of shingle into harvest -fields.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_051" id="page_051"></a>{51}</span></p> - -<h3><a name="CHAPTER_IV-i" id="CHAPTER_IV-i"></a>CHAPTER IV<br /><br /> -THE WATERS OF ISRAEL</h3> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">Keeping</span> in mind our view of Palestine as an oasis, we naturally turn at -once to the thought of the waters that have retrieved it from the -desert. By far the most conspicuous of these is the Jordan, flowing down -a long course to its deep-dug grave in the Dead Sea. At whatever point -we approach that great valley the eye is inevitably led along it -northward to the white Hermon, whose great “breastplate” shines over all -the land. That mountain, and the Lebanons of which it is the southern -outpost, are the real makers of Palestine.</p> - -<p>There was a beautiful poetry of Hermon which from earliest times made it -a sacrament of sweet thoughts to Israel. Perhaps the sweetest thought it -gave her was that of dew. In every part of that land of clear skies, a -heavy dew lies upon the ground at sunrise. Poetic feeling, undertaking -the work of science, interpreted this dew as Hermon’s gift, so that “the -dew that descended on the mountains of Zion” was “the dew of Hermon” -(Psalm cxxxiii. 3). The meteorology is faulty, but the larger idea is -true. The cool and glistening<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_052" id="page_052"></a>{52}</span> snow-field, more than a hundred miles -away from Zion, does indeed send out and receive again the waters that -refresh the land in an endless round. “The Abana dies in the marsh of -Ateibeh, yielding its spirit to the sun, as Jordan dies in the Dead Sea, -and, rising into clouds again, both of them wafted to the snow-peaks -where they were born, they pour down their old waters in a current ever -new, in that circuit of life and death which God has ordained for -all.”<a name="FNanchor_8_8" id="FNanchor_8_8"></a><a href="#Footnote_8_8" class="fnanchor">[8]</a></p> - -<p>So conspicuous are these two rivers that we almost need to remind -ourselves that they are not the only waters of Israel. There are several -perennial streams in Syria, of which something will be said presently; -but the list of these by no means exhausts the stores of water in the -land. Great stretches of the country are apparently waterless, -especially in the south, and yet water is almost everywhere, -underground. In many parts the soil and surface-rock are soft, lying on -a hard bed-rock at various depths below. Accordingly we find that one of -the most mysterious and characteristic features of the south country is -its underground waters.<a name="FNanchor_9_9" id="FNanchor_9_9"></a><a href="#Footnote_9_9" class="fnanchor">[9]</a> Springs and streamlets find their way through -fissures or filter through porous stone to the harder rock below, and -flow along subterranean channels there. Zangwill quotes an older -authority for the somewhat startling statement that “the entire plain of -Sharon seems to cover a vast subterranean river, and this inexhaustible -source of wealth underlies the whole territory of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_053" id="page_053"></a>{53}</span> Philistines.” -Putting the ear to any crack in the sunburnt clay of the surface, in -certain parts, one may hear the subdued growl and murmur of the waters -underneath. Trees flourish in places where there is no water apparent, -their roots bathing in unseen streams, and drawing life and freshness -from them. One can well understand the feelings of awe with which -primitive people regarded these mysterious nether springs. They did not -connect them with the idea of rain from above, as modern science does, -but believed that they had forced their way up from “the Great Deep,” -which was supposed to underlie the earth, and into which the roots of -the mountains were thrust far down like gigantic anchors of the world. -Some of the rivers of Damascus are also underground, “and may often be -seen and heard through holes in the surface.”<a name="FNanchor_10_10" id="FNanchor_10_10"></a><a href="#Footnote_10_10" class="fnanchor">[10]</a> Jerusalem is a -waterless city, whose famous pools are tanks for rain-water. Its one -spring is that strange intermittent one which overflows from the Well of -the Virgin through Hezekiah’s aqueduct to the Pool of Siloam. Yet there -are legends that beneath the sacred rock which the mosque of Omar covers -there is a subterranean torrent; and that the rushing of hidden waters -has been heard at times below the massive stones of the Damascus Gate of -the city.</p> - -<p>These underground waters have given to Palestine a still more -interesting feature at the points where her greatest rivers rise. This -is the sudden emergence of full-bodied streams from the ground. These -rivers<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_054" id="page_054"></a>{54}</span> have, so to speak, no infancy. Their springs are not little toy -fountains with trickling rivulets. They bound into the world full-grown, -with a rush and fury which is perhaps unparalleled in any other land. -This inspiring and suggestive phenomenon has not been without its effect -on the national thought and imagination. In the midst of one of the most -gloriously forceful passages of Isaiah (chap. xxxv.) the vigour and -impetuousness of the prophecy finds its climax in the sudden leap of -waters which “break out” in the wilderness, and which are described in -the same breath as the first glad leap of the restored lame man, leaping -“as an hart.” When Moses in his blessing of the tribes speaks of Dan -“leaping from Bashan,” he refers to that wonderful spot where Jordan, in -the tribe of Dan, leaps up from below Hermon. Matthew Arnold, had he -chanced to think of it, might have seen in his delight in full and -rushing streams another link connecting him with the Hebrew race with -which he so quaintly claims affinity.</p> - -<p>The south country keeps its rivers for the most part below ground, -though even there considerable streams suddenly break out. Conder -describes deep blue pools of fresh water near Antipatris which “well up -close beneath the hillock surrounded by tall canes and willows, rushes -and grass.”<a name="FNanchor_11_11" id="FNanchor_11_11"></a><a href="#Footnote_11_11" class="fnanchor">[11]</a> Yet the greatest outbursts are in the north. One -traveller describes a river-source in Lebanon as an abyss of seething -black waters, into which he rolled large stones, only to see them -presently<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_055" id="page_055"></a>{55}</span> reappear, flung up like corks from the depths. At one of its -sources the Abana bursts from the masonry of some ancient temples “a -pure and copious river, rushing into light at once as if free.”</p> - -<p>It is at Hermon that we find the true centre of the water supply of -Palestine. Parts of it are under snow all the year round, and it gives -off some thirty streams flowing in every direction. Not one of these -streams reaches the Mediterranean. They flow forth only to evaporate -sooner or later in some inland morass or sea, and to return in vapour -that will be condensed again by the snows of Hermon. Conder describes -one of these in the north, whose water “rushes out suddenly with a -roaring noise from a cavern” in winter, and transforms the plain below -into a lake. But the great work of Hermon is the Jordan, two of whose -three sources leap up from its roots. The most striking of these is that -of Banias, which Jewish tradition names as one of the three springs of -Palestine which “remained not closed up after the Flood.” On the crest -of a spur of Hermon stands the ruined castle of Subeibeh, one of the -noblest ruins in the world. From the castle you descend 1400 feet to the -village of Banias, the ancient Caesarea Philippi. The descent, over -basalt boulders whose interstices are filled for the most part with -thorn-bushes, is said in the guide-books to be practicable for horses. -One wonders how long the horses are supposed to survive the journey! The -view across and down the Jordan valley is indescribably grand. Near the -foot the path curves round the top of a precipice and doubles back on a<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_056" id="page_056"></a>{56}</span> -lower level to a white-washed Mohammedan weli, or praying-house. Just -below, as you look down from the weli, a large cavern is seen, with -niches beautifully carved in the rocks beside it. On one of these niches -is the inscription “To Pan and the Nymphs,” and on another the names -“Augustus and Augustina.” Here, most likely on the site of a prehistoric -holy place of the Semites, stood the Roman temple which Herod built in -honour of Augustus. Nor is it wonderful that these and so many other -faiths have counted this a sacred place; for Jordan used to pour forth -from that cavern, clear and full-bodied. Now the old cave-channel is -choked up with debris, and Jordan forces its way to light in many -smaller fountains among the stones and earth of the open space below, -which is coloured by long trails of slime. Within a few yards the -streams unite in a rich green pool, with reeds and luxuriant -water-growth. The second source of Jordan is even more impressive. It is -at Tell-el-Kadi, some two miles west from Banias. On the western side of -this Tell, on which there are traces and ruins of an ancient city, there -is a thicket of rank undergrowth, from beneath whose lowest branches and -creepers the river suddenly appears, spreads immediately into a wide -pool, and within a hundred yards is racing violently south in foaming -rapids. The pool was reported to be bottomless, but the irrepressible -little canoe <i>Rob Roy</i> was launched upon its boiling waters, and the -depth proved to be but five feet!</p> - -<p>Jordan is a river worth much study, interesting from<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_057" id="page_057"></a>{57}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_008" id="ill_008"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 337px;"> -<a href="images/ill_010_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_010_sml.jpg" width="337" height="500" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">THE GOLDEN, OR BEAUTIFUL, GATE, FROM THE GARDEN OF -GETHSEMANE.</p> - -<p>The well is in the upper part of the Garden of Gethsemane.</p></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">every point of view—geographical, historical, religious.<a name="FNanchor_12_12" id="FNanchor_12_12"></a><a href="#Footnote_12_12" class="fnanchor">[12]</a> Changing -in colour, as the floods wash down their various soils to it, it tumbles -and rushes south through a stretch of some 137 miles without a single -cascade till it sweeps, with strong and level current, into the Dead -Sea. At Banias its height above the Mediterranean is about 1000 feet, -but the extraordinary valley is chiselled on a running slope down to the -depths of the earth. Clouds have been seen sweeping above its bed 500 -feet below the level of the ocean. The Dead Sea level is 1290 feet below -the Mediterranean; its bottom, at the deepest part, is as deep again. -Spanned by a few bridges, of which only one or two are now entire, the -river’s course is for the most part through solitudes without -inhabitants, or tenanted but by a few half-savage people. The valley is -alternately wide and narrow, swelling out in five broad expanses, of -which the two northern are lakes, and the other three are plains. From -Banias to the last confluence of the different head-streams is a -distance of some seven miles through green land. Soon after that point -the river loses itself in a vast forest of impenetrable papyrus canes -growing in shallow water, from which it emerges in a little lake or -clear space half a mile lower. Then it flows, a solemn and glassy -stream, for some three miles and a half down a sharp-edged lane whose -perpendicular banks are tall papyrus canes, till it glides silently out, -a hundred feet in breadth, into Lake<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_058" id="page_058"></a>{58}</span> Huleh. From Huleh to the Sea of -Galilee is ten miles, along the greater part of which the river tears -through a narrow gorge. Emerging clear and broad from the Sea of Galilee -it soon begins its innumerable windings. A few streams flow into it -perennially from east and west, and countless torrents after rain. In -the north it quickens a poisonous soil into rank vegetation, and spreads -its superfluous waters on steaming swamps, full of malaria. Opposite -Shechem its clay is good for moulding, and the mounds which break the -level are for the most part apparently the remains of old brickfields or -brass foundries. As it descends to the broadest of its plains at Jericho -the valley falls into three distinct levels. From the hills a flat -expanse of desolation spreads towards the river, till it falls in steep -banks of 150 to 200 feet to the lower level of the “trench” down which -the river flows in flood. Finally, in the centre of this lies the -ordinary channel, at whose banks the trees and undergrowth seem to -crouch and kneel over the sullen brown stream.</p> - -<p>There are other perennial rivers in Syria, but their courses are short. -The Litany (Leontes) rises between the Lebanons a short distance north -of the highest springs of Jordan. For many miles the two flow in -parallel courses, divided only by the little ridge of Jebel-es-Zoar. But -before Jordan has passed its new springs at Banias, the Litany has swept -to the west in a sharp right angle, to pour itself into the ocean north -of Tyre. It is a fine stream, yellow with rich loam, but its bed is in -the sharp angle of valleys whose<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_059" id="page_059"></a>{59}</span> sides remind one of the Screes of -Wastwater. Its descent is so rapid that even if there were meadows in -the bottoms of its gorges, it would hurry past them to pour its treasure -of water and of soil alike into the thankless sea. The Abana, rising in -the same region as the springs of the other two, has a course of only -some fifty miles. Kishon, which waters the Plain of Esdraelon, is -certainly the most generous in the matter of cultivated fields, but it -is also the most treacherous. Its fords are never certain, for great -masses of sand and mud are shifted to and fro in the most unaccountable -manner. The rest of the perennial rivers are either tributaries of the -Jordan, companions of the Abana in its eastern course, or streams from -Carmel or the central mountain range, whose short course to the -Mediterranean is of little account.</p> - -<p>As we think of these rivers flowing through a land which so sorely needs -their help, we cannot but feel oppressed by a sense of waste that is -almost tragic. There is no boat plying on any of them. Most are, indeed, -far too rapid for that, but not everywhere. The guide-book speaks of a -steamer plying on the lower reaches of Jordan; and the local story of -oppression there—every district has its particular grievance—is of two -boats that had been brought for the service of the monastery, and then -confiscated by Government. The only boats of any kind we saw on fresh -water between Hebron and Damascus were two on the Sea of Galilee, manned -by Syrians in red jerseys,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_060" id="page_060"></a>{60}</span> on which the magic letters were inscribed, -“COOK.” In the old days it must have been very different. There is -mention of a ferry-boat on the Jordan in 2 Sam. xix. 18, and in Christ’s -time there must have been a considerable fishing fleet on the lake. The -trireme on the coins of Gadara reminds us of Roman vessels which sailed -there for warlike purposes, and here and there you find a valley dammed -across its breadth for the construction of an artificial lake, on which -a <i>naumachia</i> or naval fight might add piquancy to the games. There is -an island in the Dead Sea itself on which what are supposed to be ruins -of a landing-stage are still visible, showing that long ago even these -uncanny waters were not without their sailors. There used to be a -wrecked boat in the Ateibeh marsh from which three men had been drowned. -The wreck of another boat was still visible some years ago under the -surface of Lake Huleh. These wrecks are but too truthfully symbolic of -the fate of men’s attempts to utilise the waters of Israel. The Abana, -indeed, is utilised. Never was river so wholly taken possession of by a -city as Abana by Damascus. She flows into it—right into the heart of -it—and disappears underground; she is led captive into a thousand -fountains in public streets and the courts of private houses; she is -sent in a thousand little channels to irrigate the gardens which -surround it. All the more pitiful is her ending in that wild and haunted -morass of Ateibeh, where she yields up her waters to the desert and the -sun.</p> - -<p>The fate of Jordan seems still more tragic. In the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_061" id="page_061"></a>{61}</span> far north his waters -are indeed utilised to some small extent for irrigation, but for the -vastly longer part of his course he does nothing but flee through the -wilderness to the bitter sea in the south. Dr. Ross has strikingly -summed up Jordan’s career in the words: “So, in a valley which is -thirsting for water, the Jordan rushes along to an inglorious end.” Yet -that is only one aspect of the matter. Jordan gave Israel her last story -of Elijah and her first of Christ’s ministry. Neither association is of -the kindly sort which a nation’s sentiment usually gathers round its -rivers. There is, as it were, the glitter of fire from the prophet’s -departure for ever lending to these brown waters a sort of unearthly -grandeur. Those fiery horses which bathed their feet here take the place -of the gentle memories of generations of lovers or little children. Yet -that is true to the spirit of the river. To Israel it stood for a very -forceful and practical fact. Their first crossing of Jordan began their -national life in Palestine and cut them off from the desert. So, to the -end, the Jordan stood for this to them, and that was much. Jordan -created no great city as Abana created Damascus; but it streamed down -the side of the east, flinging, as it were, a great arm round the land, -claiming it from the desert, and proclaiming this to be oasis and the -home of men. Disraeli characteristically writes: “All the great things -have been done by the little nations. It is the Jordan and the Ilyssus -that have civilised the modern races.” And truly it is the Jordan that -is in great part responsible for the Hebrew<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_062" id="page_062"></a>{62}</span> share in that -civilisation—not by his material gifts, indeed, which were ever -ungenerously given and carelessly gathered, but by his sentiment of -isolation and aloofness from the rest of the Eastern world, to which we -owe much that is best in our inheritance from Israel.</p> - -<p>For the homelier uses and gentler thoughts of Israel’s waters we must -turn to the lesser fountains and streams. There is, it is true, much -disillusionment for the sentimentalist even here. Remembering the sweet -music in which they have been sung—the “Song of the Well” (“Spring up, -O Well, sing ye unto it!”) or the “gently flowing waters” of the 23rd -Psalm—one expects the perfection of purity and freshness. Early -tradition has pictured the angel Gabriel meeting with Mary at the -village spring of Nazareth; nor is that the only Syrian fountain by -which the footsteps of angels have been traced. All the more trying is -the reality. Hideously tattooed women squat by the sweetest springs, -fling filthy garments into them, and beat them with stones till the -stream flows brown below them; or they toil wearily a mile or two away -from their villages to fill the heavy water-pots, beasts of burden -rather than mothers in Israel. Of cleanliness the natives have not the -remotest idea. We used to see them filling their vessels from a stream -where our horses were being washed down after their day’s ride, and they -seemed on principle to choose a spot just below that where the horse was -standing. Often the water seemed calculated to assuage hunger rather -than thirst. The natives drank it freely when it was mere<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_063" id="page_063"></a>{63}</span> mud in -solution; and even when it was clear, the glass bottles on the table -sometimes presented the appearance of lively and well-stocked aquariums. -Our squeamishness was unintelligible even to our camp-servants, who -drank in defiance large draughts of the water we refused. The landmarks -of the hot journey are the pools where one may bathe, and the first -sight of Elisha’s Fountain and the Well of Harod is refreshing to -remember still. But one touch of the bottom mud sufficed to bring to the -surface a gas which sent us posthaste to our stores of quinine—and yet -the deliciousness of the plunge was worth the risk!</p> - -<p>The spell of the fountains remains in spite of all, and no traveller -wonders that the ancient men revered them as sacred places. Israel -exulted in the forcefulness of her larger rivers, but hardly knew their -kindlier resources. Her affection was kept for those wells and -streamlets which flowed past her doors and made glad her cities. It is a -land of dried-up torrent-beds, and no river made glad any City of God -except at the seasons when God had filled it with His rain. In such a -land a wayside well like Jacob’s counts for more than our Western -imagination can realise. Property in water was an older institution than -property in land. These wayside wells and “sealed fountains” refreshed -men from time immemorial in the very presence of their enemies. They -were the choicest riches of their owners. The journey from south to -north leads one ever more frequently in among such springs, but many -towns of the south are built at places where there is abundance<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_064" id="page_064"></a>{64}</span> of -them. Hebron has twelve little fountains; Gaza fifteen. In Samaria they -burst forth in every valley, and the vale of Nablus is a net-work of -rivulets, springing, it is said, from no fewer than eighty sources. In -Galilee they are still more abundant. At Khan Minyeh, supposed by many -to be the site of the ancient Capernaum, the ruins are mostly those of -aqueducts, and springs break forth and stream in little rivers -everywhere.</p> - -<p>The beauty and refreshing coolness of such fountains is very great. The -dripping walls of the Khan Minyeh aqueducts are covered with magnificent -bunches of maidenhair, whose fronds were the broadest we had ever seen. -The Well of Harod, close by the stream where Gideon tested his soldiers, -is one of the loveliest spots imaginable. There is a little cave, where -the pebbles shine up blue through the shallow water; ferns grow in its -crannies, and at the side a clear spring, two feet broad and five inches -deep, splashes into the pool from a recess entirely hidden by hanging -maidenhair. Nor is the natural beauty of these springs their only charm. -When one remembers the days of old through which they flowed, and the -men who stooped to drink of them so along ago, all that was most sacred -and most heroic to one’s childhood lives again, and speaks to the heart. -Ay! and to the conscience too; for these were the springs that gave to -Bible men their metaphors of a fountain opened for sin and for -uncleanness; this is the land in which it sprang up and from which it -has flowed forth with cleansing and refreshment for the whole earth.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_065" id="page_065"></a>{65}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_009" id="ill_009"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<a href="images/ill_011_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_011_sml.jpg" width="500" height="326" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">THE LAKE OF GALILEE, LOOKING NORTH FROM TIBERIAS.</p> - -<p>The road at the left of the picture is the main road to the north from -Tiberias.</p></div> -</div> - -<h3><a name="CHAPTER_V-i" id="CHAPTER_V-i"></a>CHAPTER V<br /><br /> -BROWN VILLAGES, WHITE TOWNS, AND A GREY CITY</h3> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">Nothing</span> could better illustrate the completeness of the change through -which Israel passed when she exchanged a nomadic for a settled life than -the great importance which the idea of <i>the city</i> has in the Bible. -Kinglake describes the Jordan as “a boundary between the people living -under roofs and the tented tribes that wander on the farther side.” The -very name of “city,” applied to these grotesque little hamlets, shews -how seriously they took themselves, and compels an amused respect for so -mighty a little self-importance, for a “King” of that time might be -compared with a chairman of parish council to-day. The idea of the city -became more and more part of the religion of Israel as Jerusalem rose to -religious as well as civil importance. To them God was a city-dweller, -and there is an eastern saying about lonely wanderers journeying -homeless towards the sunset, that they are “going to God’s gate.”</p> - -<p>The changing history of the land has passed it through many phases, and -no doubt there are far wider<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_066" id="page_066"></a>{66}</span> differences between the centuries in -respect of men’s dwellings than in respect of those natural features of -the land which we have been studying in the preceding pages. This -chapter will describe present conditions. And yet in spite of changes -the aspect of things must be pretty much what it always was. Men -gathered into cities on some strongly fortified hill for purposes of -war, or around some holy place for worship, or in some fertile valley -for safe agriculture; and the sites thus chosen are retained for the -most part. With the exception of the wandering tents, which are -occasionally seen throughout the land, there is hardly a solitary -dwelling in Palestine which is not a ruin. And the want of good roads, -together with the uncertain government, seems still to keep the village -communities more apart than they are in most countries. Each village has -a character and a reputation of its own, and cherishes views regarding -its neighbours which it is not slow to impart either to them or to -foreigners. The colour of these townships divides them into the three -classes of our title. Damascus and Beyrout are beyond the scope of the -present description—Damascus, the greyest city in the world so far as -age is concerned; and Beyrout, the over-grown white town upon which the -ends of the world are come, leaving it little individual character of -its own. Keeping to the south of these, we have the clearly marked -division, with little overlapping. A brown village may indeed have a -white church or mosque gleaming from its bosom, and the walls of some -towns besides Jerusalem are grey;<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_067" id="page_067"></a>{67}</span> yet in the main it is a land of brown -villages, white towns, and one grey city.</p> - -<p> </p> - -<p>The villages are very brown—“dust-coloured,” as they have been happily -called. Seen from a distance they generally look inviting, but it takes -the traveller no long time to believe that a near approach will -certainly disillusionise him. They have many sorts of charm in the -distance. Some of them are set up on the edge of a hill, and these seen -from below present all the appearance of fortification, their flat roofs -and perpendicular sides giving them an angular and military aspect. -Others are surrounded by neatly walled and cultivated olive-yards which -give the promise of a well-conditioned village. In the rare instances -where trees are planted among the dwellings, the flat brown roofs seem -to nestle among the branches in delightful contentment and restfulness. -Where trees are absent there is generally a high cactus hedge, serving -as an enclosing wall, which sets the village in a pleasant green. Even -those hamlets which have about them no green of any kind are not -uninviting, especially if they are built on a hill-slope. There is a -peculiar formality and neatness given by irregular piles of flat-roofed -buildings overlapping each other at different levels. But as you -approach, all is disillusionment. The trees seem to detach themselves -and stand apart in the untidy paths. The cactus hedge is repulsive, with -its spiked pulpy masses and its bare and straggling roots. The brown -walls seem to decay before your eyes, and the village<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_068" id="page_068"></a>{68}</span> seen from within -its own street changes to a succession of ruinous heaps of débris, with -excavations into the mud of the hillside. If, as at Nain, there be a -white-walled church or mosque in the place, it seems to stand alone in a -long moraine of ruins. An acrid smell hangs upon the air, for the fuel -is dried cakes of dung. These are plastered over the walls of low ovens -into which the mud seems to swell in great blisters by the street-side. -In some of these ovens crowds of filthy children and tattooed women are -sitting, while the men loiter in idle rows along the house walls. When -suddenly you say to yourself that this is Shunem, or this Nain, or -Magdala, the disappointment is complete.</p> - -<p>In some places the houses are built of stones gathered from the ancient -ruins of the neighbourhood (Colonel Conder believes that in hardly any -instance are the stones fresh quarried). Other houses consist simply of -four walls of mud, with a roof of the same material laid upon branches -set across. A small stone roller may be seen lying somewhere on the -roof, for in heat the mud cracks and needs to be rolled now and then to -keep the rain from leaking through. The sheikh, or headman of the -village, has a better house—often the one respectable habitation in the -place, but suggestive of a ruined tower at that. It is a two-storeyed -building, whose great feature is the public hall, or reception-room, -where local matters are discussed and strangers interviewed. There is no -glass in the windows, and the strong sunlight deepens the gloom of the -interiors to a rich brown darkness with points of high<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_069" id="page_069"></a>{69}</span> light and -colour. The shade is precious in these sun-smitten places, and Conder -narrates an incident which often recurs to mind in them. It was in the -cave of the Holy House at Nazareth, the reputed home of Jesus in His -boyhood. The visitor “observed to the monk that it was dark for a -dwelling-house, but he answered very simply, ‘The Lord had no need of -much light.’<span class="lftspc">”</span> The rooms are almost bare of furniture, a bed and a few -water-jars in a corner being sometimes the only objects visible. In some -of them the floor space is divided into two levels, half the room being -a platform two or three feet higher than the other half. On this -platform the family lives, while the cattle occupy the lower part; and -along the edge of the platform there are hollows in its floor, which -serve as mangers for the beasts. No doubt it was in such a manger that -Jesus was laid in Bethlehem.</p> - -<p>The inhabitants of these villages are the Fellahin, of whom Conder has -given so interesting a description.<a name="FNanchor_13_13" id="FNanchor_13_13"></a><a href="#Footnote_13_13" class="fnanchor">[13]</a> He recognises in them a people -of almost unmixed ancient stock. Distinct from Bedawin and from Turks, -they are the “modern Canaanites,” probably descendants of the original -inhabitants whom Israel displaced. These were never quite exterminated; -and although there have no doubt been many minor instances of the -absorption of other breeds, yet in the main they remain very much as -they were when they talked with Jesus in Aramaic, or even as they were -in days much earlier than His. A slight enrichment<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_070" id="page_070"></a>{70}</span> to their lives has -been made by each of the invaders, and reminiscences of Israel, Rome, -the early Christians, the Crusaders, may be found blended with their -Mohammedanism. But they are conservative to the last degree, and any -radical change seems an impossibility among them. Many things contribute -to this conservatism, among which perhaps the chief is the tradition of -intermarriage between the inhabitants of the same village. Another -factor is their extraordinary ignorance, combined with a pride no less -remarkable. It would be difficult to find anywhere men so self-satisfied -on such small capital of merit. A third cause of their immovableness is -to be found in the usury and oppression by which they are held down; and -even their local self-government—that <i>imperium in imperio</i> which -prevails under the larger oppression of the Turk—keeps up, so far as it -is allowed, the ancestral ways and thoughts. In one respect this -conservatism of theirs is a gain to the world: it has preserved among -them those habits of speech and manner with which the Bible has made us -all so familiar; and it is to them, with all their faults, that we owe -much of the “sacramental value” of Palestine travel.</p> - -<p>As for their faults, no doubt they are many, but it is not for the -passing stranger to attempt an estimate of their character. The most -obvious lapses are sins of speech, and one always has the impression -that the interpreter is toning down as he translates. One can see that -property is insecure, and life by no means so sacred as in the West. One -incident brought this home to<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_071" id="page_071"></a>{71}</span> us vividly. Some of our party had been -detained on an exploring excursion till after dark. When we asked a -group of natives what could have become of them, the answer was more -significant than reassuring, for they pointed with their fingers -vertically downwards! It was not so bad as that, however, for we soon -heard revolver shots, and answered them. We fired into a field, aiming -at a large stack of corn to prevent accidents. Conceive our horror when -a silent figure in flowing robes rose from the centre of the stack! He -was spending the night there to keep his property from thieves. For the -rest, it is their laziness that strikes one most forcibly. Their -agriculture is as leisurely as it is primitive. They sit while reaping, -and thresh by standing upon boards studded with flints, which oxen draw -over the threshing-floors. Their ploughs are but iron-shod sticks which -scratch the surface of the field. In outlandish districts they are -described as mere savages, but we saw little to justify such a -criticism. They are uncompromisingly dirty everywhere, yet their food is -simple, and they appear in the main to be healthy enough. At first one’s -impression of them is of universal gloom, sulky and contemptuous; but -the mood soon changes if you stay among them for a little time, and the -knit brows relax to a smiling childishness.</p> - -<p> </p> - -<p>Of white towns, with a population between 3000 and 3500, there are about -a dozen in Palestine, of which, excluding Damascus and Beyrout, the best -known are Haifa and Acre, Tyre and Sidon, Tiberias, Jenin,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_072" id="page_072"></a>{72}</span> Nablus, -Bethlehem, Hebron, Gaza, Jaffa. They shine from far as you approach -them. Some, like Jenin, gleam most picturesquely from among palm trees; -others, like Nazareth seen from Jezreel, shew like stars of white in -high mountain valleys; and yet others, like Bethshan, appear “like white -islands in the mouth of an estuary.” The nearer view of Nazareth, when -the hill has been climbed and the town suddenly reveals itself, is one -of rare beauty. You are looking down into an oval hollow full of clean -and bright houses. Many cypress trees and spreading figs enrich the -prospect, and the whole picture is most pleasing. Bethlehem, again, has -a picturesqueness that is all its own. Approaching it from the south, -the track turns sharply into a valley whose end is entirely blocked by a -lofty hill, covered along its whole length with shining white masonry -set far up against the sky. It looks trim and newly finished; and one -hardly knows whether to be delighted or vexed that Bethlehem should be -so workmanlike a place.</p> - -<p>But it is the sea-coast towns which are the most characteristic of their -class. Tyre is a surprisingly living and wide-awake place still, and the -name recalls ever some vista of blue sea with ships seen through the -white arches or rich foliage that decorate the town’s western front. -Jaffa is still more surprising. It is usual to embark at Port Said late -in the evening, and when you wake in the morning and find the steamer at -anchor, the first sight of Palestine that greets you is Jaffa, framed in -the brass circle of the port-hole—a very perfect and brilliant little -picture. The town is set well up, a conical<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_073" id="page_073"></a>{73}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_010" id="ill_010"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<a href="images/ill_012_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_012_sml.jpg" width="500" height="366" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">THE FOUNTAIN OF THE VIRGIN AT NAZARETH.</p></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">hill of sparkling colour, backed, as we first saw it, by cloudless -Syrian sky, into which it ran its two minarets. It was larger than we -had imagined, and much loftier, with a very bold and gaily tilted -edge-line—a city set on its hill, and with a mighty consciousness of -being so set, like Coventry Patmore’s old English cottage. Dark-leaved -trees, red roofs, and occasional jewel-like points of green, where -copper cupolas have been weathered, light up the picture into one of the -most ideal of its kind.</p> - -<p>Within, the white towns shew a strange mixture of splendour and of -sordidness. The streets are aggressively irregular, and the whole -impresses one as at once ancient and unfinished. The wider spaces are -full of colour and of noise, and the houses which surround them are a -patchwork of all manner of buildings, with smaller structures leaning -against their sides, and gaudy awnings of ragged edge protecting -doorways from the sun. Where the street narrows, it is filled with -crowds of men, women, and children, and laden donkeys pushing them aside -as they pass along. There are lanes, also, in deep shadow, with -buttresses and long archways converting them into high and narrow -tunnels. The shopkeepers in these lanes sit behind their piles of -merchandise and converse in shrill voices with neighbours on the other -side, not six feet away. The whole appearance of the town is that of -close-huddled dwellings, which have squeezed themselves into as little -space as possible, and have been forced to expand upwards for want of -lateral room.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_074" id="page_074"></a>{74}</span></p> - -<p>These towns are the mingling-places of Syria—crucibles of its national -life, in which new and composite races are being molten. One or two of -them, like Nablus and Hebron, are inhabited chiefly by a fanatical -Moslem population, and in these life stagnates. But the others are open -to the world. In the past, long before the modern stream of travellers -came, this process was going on. In very early times the towns were -recruited by the neighbouring Canaanites and Arabs. They were, as they -still are, so insanitary that if it were not for such additions their -population would soon die out. In Christ’s time the Greek and Roman -world poured itself into them; then came the long train of Christian -pilgrims; after that the Crusader hosts. Each of these, and many other -incursions, have helped to mix the race of townsfolk. In Bethlehem and -elsewhere there are many descendants of the Crusaders, whose fair hair -and complexion tells its own tale. But the mingling of races has gone on -with quite a new rapidity during the last few decades. Trade and travel -have combined to force the West upon the East. Circassians, Kurds, -Turks, Jews, Africans, Cypriotes have settled there. Travellers who have -twice visited the land, with an interval of some years between their -visits, are struck by the sudden and sweeping change. Even the passing -visitor cannot fail to perceive it. The villagers remain apart, -intermarrying within the village or with neighbouring Fellahin. The -townspeople bring their brides from other towns, and sometimes from -other nations. Many kinds of imported goods are exposed for sale in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_075" id="page_075"></a>{75}</span> -bazaars. There are parts of Damascus where nothing is sold that was not -made in Europe. The habits of the West are also invading towns. -Intoxicating liquors are freely sold, and in Nazareth there are now no -fewer than seventeen public-houses. “Paris fashions”—probably -belated—are ousting the ancient customs. Tattooing is quite out of -fashion among the women of the towns, and knives and forks have -penetrated native houses even in Hebron. The traveller comes into -contact with the townspeople far less fully than with the villagers. In -the towns everybody is minding some business or other of his own, and -the stranger meets with the residenter merely as buyer with seller. Once -only did we see the interior of a town house, and that visit confirmed -the impression of a new and composite life very remarkably. It was in -Tyre. An agreeable native, who had brought some curiosities for sale, -invited us to go home with him and inspect his stock. The house was in a -narrow street, but the rooms were large. His wife sat near the window -smoking a nargileh, her eyebrows painted black, and her face heavily -powdered and rouged. The room was crowded with furniture. There were a -sofa and two European beds with mosquito curtains; a new English -wardrobe of carved walnut, with a large mirror; a kitchen dresser -covered with dinner dishes of the customary European kind. Dry-goods -boxes were drawn forth from under the beds and the sofa, and pasteboard -boxes from drawers and shelves, all filled with the most indescribable -medley of curiosities from rifled tombs. Bracelets, tear-bottles,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_076" id="page_076"></a>{76}</span> -ear-rings came to light in rapid succession. Finally, a square foot of -lead-work appeared—part of a leaden winding-sheet which had recently -been torn off an ancient corpse in a sarcophagus—a heavy shroud, finely -ornamented with deep-moulded garlands and figures. Our hosts were -good-humoured and pleasant people, who conducted the conversation in -some five different languages, and appeared to combine in themselves and -their properties several centuries of human life.</p> - -<p> </p> - -<p>The grey city of Jerusalem stands unique among the towns of Palestine. -With the brown villages it has nothing in common. The immense variety of -its buildings, with their domes, flat terraces, minarets, and sloping -roofs, distinguishes it at once from the rectangular masses of the -villages. As if on purpose to emphasise the contrast, one of these -villages has set itself right opposite the city across a narrow valley. -Looking from the southern wall of the Haram enclosure, this village of -Siloam is seen sprawling along the opposite hillside, a mere drift of -square hovels seen across some fields of artichokes. Nothing could -appear more miserable; inferiority is confessed in every line of it.</p> - -<p>More might be said for the description of Jerusalem as the largest of -the white towns. It is, like them, a centre where races mingle; indeed -it is <i>the</i> centre of such mingling. All roads lead to it from north, -south, east, and west; and when one suddenly comes upon one of those old -Roman roads which<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_077" id="page_077"></a>{77}</span> make for Jerusalem with such purposeful and grim -directness over the Judean mountains, one realises that this has been -the centre and mingling-place of nationalities for many centuries. Yet -on the spot an obvious distinction is felt at once. There are two -Jerusalems: the old one within the walls, and a new one spreading on the -open ground to the west and north. This “new Levantine city side by side -with the old Oriental city” is quite a modern place. When Stanley wrote -his <i>Sinai and Palestine</i> it was unsafe to inhabit houses outside the -walls. Now such houses are clustered together to the west in a city -which is actually larger than the enclosed one, and whose rows of shops -are hardly distinguishable from those of Western Europe. A strange -medley its buildings are! The best sites are occupied by the great -Russian Cathedral and Hospice, white-walled and leaden-roofed. Beyond -these, embedded in Jewish “colonies,” are the European consulates, with -a Syrian Orphanage and an English Agricultural Settlement farther up the -slope. The Tombs of the Kings lie to the north, in all their desolation, -and the still more desolate Mound of Ashes which is supposed by some to -be a relic of Temple sacrifices; but these are next neighbours to the -Dominican monastery, the Bishop’s house, and the house of that curious -body of Americans known as the “Overcomers”; while on the hill, not a -mile above them, is an English villa. All this and much else pours -itself into the city and mingles in the streets with the very composite -life already dwelling there.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_078" id="page_078"></a>{78}</span> Just at the foot of the hill which Gordon -identified as Calvary, while Turkish bugles were blowing from the fort, -we saw two Syrians engaged in rough horseplay, a party of Americans and -English riding, some tonsured and cowled monks on foot, and a travelling -showman with an ape clinging to him in terror of a tormenting crowd of -Jews and Mohammedans; while poor women, unconscious of any part in so -strange a tableau, were returning to the city with full waterpots on -their heads.</p> - -<p>Yet in Jerusalem all this makes a different impression from that of -other towns. The mingling of races here is but, as it were, the surface -appearance of a far more wonderful fact. From the days of Solomon, -Israel centralised her life in Jerusalem. On that hill the mountainland -seems to gather itself as in a natural centre, typical and -representative of the whole. There the nation centred its life also, in -“the mountain throne, and the mountain sanctuary of God.” Jeroboam’s -attempt to decentralise cost the nation dear; but in spite of that -attempt the centralisation took effect, and made her the most composite -of cities from the first. All ends of the earth meet here as in a focus. -Laden camels of the Arameans from the far East are making for the city, -and ships flying like a cloud of homing doves to their windows are -bearing precious freights to her port. History and religion are -compressed within the walls. On the spot no one can forget the ancient -geography which regarded Jerusalem as the centre of the earth, with Hell -vertically below, and the island of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_079" id="page_079"></a>{79}</span> Purgatory its antipodes, and -Heaven’s centre overhead. In the Church of the Holy Sepulchre they shew -a flattened ball in a little hollow place as the centre of the world. As -in some other cases of faulty science, an imaginative mind may discover -here a happy truth beneath the error. The composite life of Jerusalem -without the walls is but of yesterday, that within the walls is hoary -with age.</p> - -<p>We have called it “a grey city,” and even in respect of colour this is a -true name. Not that there is any one colour of Jerusalem. In the varying -lights of sunrise, noon, afternoon, and evening, its colour changes. At -one time it hangs, airy and dreamlike, over the steep bank of the Valley -of Jehoshaphat; at another time it seems to sit solid on its rock, every -roof and battlement picked out in photographic clearness; again, in the -twilight of evening, all is sombre with rich purple shadows. There are -spots of colour, too, which break its monotonous dull hue. The Mosque of -Omar, with its faint metallic greenish colour, stands in contrast to -everything, and makes a background of the city for its isolated beauty. -There is another dome, that of the Synagogue of the Ashkenazim, whose -colour is a lustrous blue-green, shining over the city almost -luminously. White minarets and spires are seen here and there, and a few -red-tiled roofs have found place within the walls. Several spots are -softened by the foliage of trees, and the pools, whose edges are formed -of picturesque and irregular house-sides, catch and intensify the -colours in their rich reflections. Yet, in spite of all that, Jerusalem -is grey.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_080" id="page_080"></a>{80}</span> The walls are grey with a touch of orange in it. The houses, -massed and huddled close within, are grey with a touch of blue. They are -built roughly, the stones divided by broad seams of mortar, and most of -them in their humble way conform to the fashion set by the Mosque of -Omar and the Holy Sepulchre, and are domed. But the domes of ordinary -houses are far from shapely, and suggest the fancy that the scorching -sun has blistered the flat roofs.</p> - -<p>By far the best view of Jerusalem is that which is seen from the Mount -of Olives, as one approaches the city by the hill-road from Bethany. Her -environs are of interest from many associations—there, on the Mount of -Offence, Solomon offered sacrifices to idols; yonder, on the hill of -Scopus, the main body of Titus’ troops was posted; here, near where we -stand, is the place of the agony in Gethsemane. For many days one might -go round about the city, every day gaining new knowledge of its story. -But what the first eye-shot gives is this: a sharp angle formed by the -two valleys of Jehoshaphat and Hinnom; steep banks rising from their -bottoms to the walls, which they overlap in an irregular and wavy line; -within the walls, glancing back from the angle which they form above the -junction of the valleys, the eye runs up a gradually rising expanse of -close-packed building, which is continued more sparsely in the long -rolling slope beyond, to the ridge of Scopus in the north, and to the -distant sweep of long level mountain-line in the west. It is as if the -whole city had slidden down and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_081" id="page_081"></a>{81}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_011" id="ill_011"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<a href="images/ill_013_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_013_sml.jpg" width="500" height="298" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">JOPPA FROM THE SEA.</p></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">been caught by that great angle of wall just before it precipitated -itself into the gorges.</p> - -<p>To see the grey city rightly, and feel how grey it is, you must view it -across these gorges. The more distant environs are detached from the -city. They are cultivated in patches, and dotted with modern buildings -of various degrees of irrelevance. But these are mere accidents, which -the place seems to ignore. The gorges themselves are part and parcel of -the city, and they stand for the overflow of her sad and desolate -spirit. Their sides are banks of rubbish—the wreckage and débris of a -score of sieges, the accumulation of three thousand years. You look from -the lower pool of Siloam in the valley of Hinnom, up a long dreary slope -of dark grey rubbish, down which a horrible black stream of liquid filth -trickles, tainting the air with its stench. Far off above you stands the -wall, which in old days enclosed the pool. Here the city seems to have -shrunk northwards, as if in some horror of conscience. The Field of -Blood and the Hill of Evil Counsel are just across the gorge to the -south. The valleys are full of tombs, those on the city side for the -most part Mohammedan, while the lower slopes of Olivet are paved with -the flat tombstones of Jews.</p> - -<p>What a stretch of history unrolls itself to the imagination of him who -lingers on the sight of Jerusalem! The boundaries seem to dwindle, till -that which stands there is the old grey battle-beaten fortress of the -Jebusites, the last post held by her enemies against Israel. David -conquers it, and the procession<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_082" id="page_082"></a>{82}</span> of priests and people bring up to its -gate the ark, for the celebration of whose entrance tradition has -claimed the 24th Psalm. A new city rises, and falls, and rises again, -through more than twenty sieges and rebuildings. Assyrians, Babylonians, -Romans, Moslems, Crusaders batter at its gates. The level of the streets -rises through the centuries, till now the traveller walks on a pavement -thirty or forty feet above the floor of the ancient city. To discover -the old foundations, the explorers of our time have sunk shafts which at -some parts of the wall touch bottom 120 feet below the present surface. -Far below the slighter masonry of the present wall, with its -battlemented Turkish work, lie the huge stones of early days, some of -which bear still the marks of Phœnician masons.<a name="FNanchor_14_14" id="FNanchor_14_14"></a><a href="#Footnote_14_14" class="fnanchor">[14]</a></p> - -<p>The gates, of course, are modern, though in some of them there are -immense stones of very ancient date, whose rustic work the Turkish -builders have cut away, and scored the flat surface with imitation seams -to make them match the small square stones of the building above. Yet -the positions of the ancient gates are not difficult to fix, and modern -ones do duty for some of them. Others are built up with solid masonry,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_083" id="page_083"></a>{83}</span> -notably the double-arched “Gate Beautiful,” which was thus closed -because of a tradition that Messiah would return and enter the city by -it. It was from this gate that in olden times the man went forth with -the scapegoat that was to bear the sins of the people to the wilderness. -The interior (which, however, dates from the seventh century) is a rich -and beautiful piece of architecture, with massive monolithic pillars -supporting heavy arches, and an elaborately decorative entablature -cornicing the walls. It is a dreary little place, with its litter of -débris and its flights of bats; and its dead wall, pierced only with -loophole windows, now affords neither entrance for Christ nor exit for -sin. What memories crowd the mind of the beholder as he looks upon these -gates! Here, seven centuries ago, went out the weeping company of the -inhabitants, when Saladin took the city. There, eleven centuries -earlier, the Jews set fire to the Roman siege-engine, the flames were -blown back upon the fortifications, and the wall fell and made an -entrance for the legions. That was near the Jaffa Gate. Here again, by -the Damascus Gate, if Gordon’s theory be the correct one, the Saviour -passed to Calvary; and there may be stones there on which the cross -struck, as Simon the Cyrenian staggered out under its weight.</p> - -<p>It is indeed a strange city, a city of grey religion, in which three -faiths cherish their most hallowed memories of days far past. But “far -past” is written on every memory. That Beautiful Gate has indeed shut -out Christ, and shut in all manner of sin unforgiven. The land, as has -been already said, seems still inhabited<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_084" id="page_084"></a>{84}</span> by Christ, but He has forsaken -Jerusalem; it is almost impossible to feel any sense of His presence -there. This is a city of grey history, whose age and decrepitude force -themselves upon every visitor. It has been well described as having -still “the appearance of a gigantic fortress.” But it is a weird -fortress, with an air of petrified gallantry about it, and an infinite -loneliness and desolation. No river flows near to soften the landscape. -A fierce sun beats down in summer there upon “a city of stone in a land -of iron with a sky of brass.” But for the sound of bugles, whose calls -seem always to shock one with their savage liveliness, it might be a -fossil city. Built for eternity, setting the pattern for that “New -Jerusalem” which has been the Utopia of so many devout souls, it seems a -sarcasm on the great promise, a city “with a great future behind it.” -What has this relic to do with a blessed future for mankind—this rugged -bareness of stone, this contempt for beauty, this pitiful sordidness of -detail? History and religion seem to mourn together here, and one sees -in every remembrance of it those two weeping figures, the most -significant of all, for its secular and religious life—Titus, who -“gazed upon Jerusalem from Scopus the day before its destruction, and -wept for the sake of the beautiful city”; and Jesus Christ who, when -things were ripening for Titus, foresaw the coming of the legions as He -looked upon Jerusalem from Olivet, “and when He was come near He beheld -the city and wept over it.”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_085" id="page_085"></a>{85}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="PART_II" id="PART_II"></a>PART II<br /><br /> -THE INVADERS</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">Since</span> the days of the ancient Canaanites Palestine has been often -invaded. The composite life of the towns we have already noted. The -history of Palestine shows how composite the life of the whole land has -become. Its central position among the nations is known to every one. To -the south, shut off by but a strip of desert, are Egypt and Africa; to -the east lie Arabia, Persia, and the farther Asiatic continent; easily -accessible on the north are Asia Minor, Turkey, and Russia; while ships -almost daily arrive which unite it on the west with Europe and America. -Yet one day’s ride along any of its chief highways will do more to show -the traveller what that central position practically means, than all his -study of it in books and on maps. For in one day’s ride he may meet -Kurds, Circassians, Arabs, Syrians, Turks, Cypriotes, Greeks, Russians, -Egyptians, Nubians, Austrians, French, Germans, English, and Americans. -In a mission school in Damascus were found some little dark-eyed Syrian -children speaking English with an unmistakable Australian accent. They -had been born and brought up in Queensland.</p> - -<p>It is in Hauran that this mixture of races is most forcibly thrust upon -one’s notice. In the villages south of Damascus, the crowd which gathers -round the tents is sure to contain several smiling negroes, some of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_086" id="page_086"></a>{86}</span> -them branded on the cheeks; Circassians, with sickle-shaped nose and -thin lips, sharp-featured and small-limbed men with an untamable -expression on their bitter faces; Arabs, darker of complexion, and more -languid of eye; and Turkish soldiers, thin and smallpox bitten. There -are to be found the Jew, sneering complacently at the inferior world; -the fanatical Moslem, who will break the water-bottle your lips have -touched; the Druse, who objects to coffee and tobacco, and to whom you -hesitate to say “Good morning,” lest he may have conscientious scruples -about that; and the cross-bred ruffian, who has no scruples about -anything. Everything helps to strengthen the impression. In Damascus it -seems always to be Sunday with one or other portion of the population, -and a different set of shutters are up each day for nearly half the -week. The railway, it might be supposed, must have blended the life of -the composite East, but it only serves to emphasise the compositeness. -In one of the Hauran stations we had some hours to wait. We spread our -rugs in the shadow of the station-house, with a Turkish officer, an Arab -soldier, and a long line of camels to watch till lunch was ready. When -the time came, the hall of the booking-office was cleared of passengers -of a dozen different nationalities, and our lunch was spread on the -floor, just in front of the ticket-window! The train came at last, an -hour late, drawn by a rather blasé-looking engine. Then began that babel -of tongues which shows how nations meet in the East. All the world -seemed to have sent its representatives to that<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_087" id="page_087"></a>{87}</span> train—its wealth to -the white-cushioned first-class; its middle-class to the bare boards of -the second; its poverty to the cattle-trucks dignified by the name of -third,—while behind the carriages came two waggons loaded with grain, -their owner perched high on one, and a baby’s cradle on the other.</p> - -<p>All this phantasmagoria of the present helps one to realise better the -extraordinary history of the past. For thousands of years the flow of -manifold human life through Syria has been continuous. At the mouth of -the Dog River, whose valley has from time immemorial served as a main -passage from the sea to the East for armies, there is, cut in smoothed -faces of the solid rock, the most remarkable collection of inscriptions -in the world. The Assyrian slab shows still the familiar bearded figure -of the monarch with his air of strength untempered by compassion. The -Egyptian slab records its invasion in hieroglyphics. The Greek, Roman, -and French stones tell their similar tale. Throughout the land the same -thing repeats itself. In Hauran we found a fine Egyptian hieroglyphic -embedded in the mud-and-rubble interior wall of a private courtyard, an -altar of the time of Titus lying exposed on a hillside, and many -Graeco-Roman inscriptions built into the walls of houses.<a name="FNanchor_15_15" id="FNanchor_15_15"></a><a href="#Footnote_15_15" class="fnanchor">[15]</a> The five -names which we have selected from so great a number of invaders are -those whose mark upon the land has been deepest and most permanent.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_088" id="page_088"></a>{88}</span></p> - -<h3><a name="CHAPTER_I-ii" id="CHAPTER_I-ii"></a>CHAPTER I<br /><br /> -ISRAELITE</h3> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">Every</span> traveller is impressed by the very meagre remains of a material -kind which Israel has left for curious eyes. In a museum at Jerusalem -many of these have been gathered—fragments of pottery and glass, coins, -and other relics,—but the total number of them is surprisingly small. -There are, of course, those huge stones to which reference has been -already made, cut in a style which experts used to regard as distinctive -enough to enable them to identify it as Jewish work.<a name="FNanchor_16_16" id="FNanchor_16_16"></a><a href="#Footnote_16_16" class="fnanchor">[16]</a> But -inscriptions are extremely rare. Phœnicia and Israel seem to have -purposely avoided the habit of Assyrian and Egyptian kings, who wrote -upon everything they built. There is, of course, the Moabite stone, -whose characters are closely allied to Hebrew writing. But with that -exception there is hardly any certain Hebrew inscription extant except -one. That is indeed a writing of romantic fame. There is a tunnel known -as Hezekiah’s Aqueduct, connecting the Fountain of the Virgin with the -Pool of Siloam at Jerusalem. Its length is rather more than the third of -a mile; its<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_089" id="page_089"></a>{89}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_012" id="ill_012"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<a href="images/ill_014_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_014_sml.jpg" width="500" height="295" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">THE LAKE OF GALILEE, LOOKING SOUTH FROM TIBERIAS.</p> - -<p>Two of the circular towers and wall which defended the ancient Tiberias -are seen in the foreground.</p></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">height varies from five or six feet to one foot four inches. Its course -bends in a wide sweep which adds greatly to the distance, and is said to -have been taken in order to avoid tombs. There are a number of <i>culs de -sac</i>, where the workmen had evidently lost their way. The flow of water -is intermittent, so that Sir Charles Warren and his friends took their -lives in their hands when they first explored it. Their mouths were -often under water, “and a breath of air could only be obtained by -twisting their faces up. To keep a light burning, to take measurements, -and make observations under these circumstances was a work of no little -difficulty; and yet, after crawling through mud and water for four -hours, the honour of finding the inscription was reserved for a naked -urchin of the town, who, some years after, announced that he had seen -writing on the wall, whereupon Professor Sayce, and Herr Schick, and Dr. -Guthe plunge naked into the muddy tunnel with acid solutions, and -blotting-paper, and everything necessary to make squeezes, and emerge -shivering and triumphant with the most interesting Hebrew inscription -that has ever been found in Palestine.”<a name="FNanchor_17_17" id="FNanchor_17_17"></a><a href="#Footnote_17_17" class="fnanchor">[17]</a> The inscription describes -the meeting of the two parties of miners, who, like the engineers of -modern tunnels, began to bore simultaneously at opposite ends.</p> - -<p>Failing any wealth of such material remains, we must seek for Israel in -the human life of the land. Jews are there in abundance, gathered, for -the most part, within their four holy cities of Jerusalem, Tiberias,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_090" id="page_090"></a>{90}</span> -Hebron, and Safed. In Hebron they are a persecuted minority; in Safed -they form about half the population; in Jerusalem, where there are more -than seventy synagogues, it was estimated in 1898 that out of the 60,000 -inhabitants 41,000 were Jews, nearly six times the number of the -Mohammedans; while in Tiberias also they form about two-thirds of the -population. Besides the Jews resident in these cities there are others -both in the older colonies and in the new settlements of the Zionist -movement, which have been created by the generosity of Jewish -millionaires. Reports differ as to the success of these interesting -experiments, and the knowledge of them which can be obtained from a -passing visit is a quite inadequate ground for forming any judgment. Mr. -Zangwill eloquently pleads for the restoration of the land to its -ancient people; Colonel Conder assures us that the Jew is incapable of -becoming a thoroughly successful agriculturist, though as a shopkeeper, -a money-changer, or, in some cases, as a craftsman, he prospers in his -native land. Certain it is that Jews are gathering to it from Russia, -Poland, Germany, Spain, Arabia, and many other countries, with what -ultimate result the future alone can shew.</p> - -<p>It would be unfair and misleading to take the present Jewish population -of Syria as the representative of ancient Israel. It still perpetuates, -indeed, the sects of Pharisees and Sadducees, and it still holds aloof -from the surrounding population with that independence and tenacity -which has marked Israel from of old. Crucified<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_091" id="page_091"></a>{91}</span> by Romans, butchered and -tortured by Crusaders, oppressed and driven forth by Moslems, this -marvellous people lives yet and will live on. In Europe the lot of the -Jew has been and still is a bitter one. In Syria to-day the lowest and -most insulting term of abuse among the Fellahin is to call each other -Jews. Yet the spirit of the people is not broken by oppression, as is -the spirit of the Fellahin. The Jew takes what comes and says little; -but he believes in himself, his past and his future, with a faith -indomitable as it is daring. Still it must be confessed that the Jew of -Palestine is generally repulsive. Mark Twain’s description of them as he -saw them at Tiberias is hardly overdrawn—“long-nosed, lanky, -dyspeptic-looking ghouls with the indescribable hats on, and a long curl -dangling down in front of each ear.” The hats are circular black felt -plates, giving to their wearers a peculiar air of conscious rectitude -and semi-clerical superiority; the curls are grown for the convenience -of the archangel in the resurrection! The younger men and lads of -Tiberias impress one as the most unpleasant-looking of all the -inhabitants of the land. They are so neurotic and effeminate, and at the -same time so monstrously supercilious. The Jewish quarters are famous -for their excessive dirt. In the visitors’ book of the hotel at -Tiberias, Captain MacGregor wrote “that the <i>Rob Roy</i> and myself had -stopped there two nights, and that the canoe was not devoured.” This is -not encouraging, and in part it is the result of mistaken methods. Many -of these Jews are subsidised, and a<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_092" id="page_092"></a>{92}</span> subsidised religion is inevitably -degrading. A man who receives an income for no other service to his kind -than that he is a Jew is not likely to do credit to his ancestors.</p> - -<p>In the Samaritans we have better representatives of the ancient days. No -people in the land have a more pathetic quaintness about them than these -few survivors of antiquity who are still met with in the streets of -Nablus. They preserve the old type of features, for their blood has been -unmixed for more than 2000 years. But they are fast dying out, and only -a remnant of less than 200 individuals is now alive. Difficult of -access, reserved, mysterious, they are the ghosts of ancient Israel, who -seem to haunt rather than to enjoy their former heritage.</p> - -<p>In the manners and customs of Syria a still more interesting memorial of -Israel is found. Many of these were not peculiar to Israel, nor was she -the first to cherish them. They are the forms of the general Semitic -stock, of which she was but one people. But the words and ways of Israel -are the only form of Semitic life with which the world is familiar, and -every student of the Bible finds in these the greatest source both of -devout and of scientific interest. In the towns and in Jerusalem there -is still much to remind one of the life so matchlessly delineated in -Scripture. Lean and mangy dogs still sniff around Lazarus at the very -door of Dives. The windows of houses generally face the interior courts, -and the outer walls are blank, so that every door opened after nightfall -contrasts the vivid light of the interior with the “outer darkness”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_093" id="page_093"></a>{93}</span> of -the street. Still more in the country, among the Fellahin and the -wandering Arabs, does one seem to live in Bible times. The gipsy-like -Bedawin west of Jordan are certainly degraded by change of nomadic -habits and by contact with the villagers; yet there is enough of their -desert heredity in them to interpret many of the patriarchal stories. -The Arab sitting at noon-day in the shaded edge of his tent, or walking -at eventide in the fields where it is pitched, is the true son of -Abraham and Isaac. When you know him better you will not improbably -recognise Jacob also. Except for tobacco, gunpowder, and coffee, he -lives much as Israel lived in those days of wandering to which her -writings love to trace back her origin. Even these modern innovations -hardly break the continuity. The Arab smokes with such enthusiasm that -it is difficult to imagine his fathers without their chibouk; and his -brass-bound gun might be the heirloom of countless generations. Of the -Fellah and his descent, and his conservatism of the past, we have -already written.</p> - -<p>So it comes to pass that he who journeys intelligently through Palestine -reads the history of Israel ever afterwards with a quite new interest. -The Bible is incomparably the best guide-book to Syria; and you seem to -journey through its chapters as you move from place to place. Here is -the fig tree planted in the vineyard; there, the tower guarding the -wine-press. Unmuzzled oxen are trampling the corn on the -threshing-floor, from whence the wind drives the chaff in a glistening -cloud. Women are still coming<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_094" id="page_094"></a>{94}</span> from the city to draw water, and grinding -in couples at the mill. We saw the prodigal son, drinking and singing at -Beyrout; and the owner of the waggonloads of corn we noted in Hauran had -kept them from the last year on the chance of a drought, which would -raise their prices in the market—he was the rich man of the prophets -who was grinding the faces of the poor. Under the walls of Jezreel a -curious coincidence brought back vividly to mind the tragic fate of -Jezebel. It was there that we first saw people with painted eyes and -faces; and there a horse lay dead with a pack of dogs at work upon the -body. Next morning, as we parted, nothing was left but the skeleton and -the hoofs. The people whom you meet are talking in Bible language. When -they repeat the familiar words of Scripture they are not quoting texts, -but transacting business in their ordinary way. We were told of a -shepherd near Hebron who, when asked why the sheepfolds there had no -doors, answered quite simply, “I am the door.” He meant that at night, -when the sheep were gathered within the circular stone wall of the -enclosure, he lay down in its open entrance to sleep, so that no sheep -might stray from its shelter without wakening him, and no ravenous beast -might enter but across his body. In the north, an American was -endeavouring to persuade a stalwart Syrian lad to try his fortunes in -Chicago. The boy evidently felt the temptation, but he turned smilingly -towards the middle-aged man at his side, and, pointing to him, answered, -“Suffer me first to bury my father.”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_095" id="page_095"></a>{95}</span></p> - -<p>But of all our experiences there was one which recalled the ancient life -most vividly, and on that account it may be related here. We had camped -over night near the village of Tell-es-Shihab in Hauran. In the morning -we mounted our horses amid a crowd of villagers, and started for the -village. The men protested loudly, and when we told them we were going -only to search for inscriptions, they assured us that there were none. -In spite of their opposition we rode on, followed by a tumultuous -chorus. A chance remark led finally to an invitation from the headman of -the village to his <i>menzil</i>, or reception hall. It was the mention of -the name of Dr. Torrance, of the Tiberias Medical Mission, who, on one -of his journeys, had cured this sheikh of an illness. At the door our -host met us, and most courteously invited us to enter, bowing and -touching our palms with his. The hall was dark, with the great stone -arch characteristic of Hauran architecture spanning its centre. Smoke -had coloured the arch and the rafters a rich dark brown, from whose -shadow swallows flitted continually out into the sunshine and back -again. We were seated on mats, spread with little squares of rich carpet -round three sides of a hollow place in the floor, where a fire of -charcoal burned, surrounded by parrot-beaked coffeepots. This was the -hearth of hospitality, whose fire is never suffered to go out; near it -stood the great stone mortar, in which a black slave was crushing -coffeebeans. The coffee, deliciously flavoured with some cunning herb or -other, was passed round. But the conversation which followed was the -memorable part of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_096" id="page_096"></a>{96}</span> that entertainment. In the shadow at the back the -young men who had been admitted sat in silence. The old men, elders of -the village community, sat in a row on stone benches right and left of -the door. The sheikh made many apologies for not having called upon us -at the tents—he had thought we were merchantmen going to buy silk at -Damascus. Then followed endless over-valuation of each other, and -flattery concerning our respective parents and relations. “How long -would we stay under his roof? surely at least till to-morrow or next -day? No, one of us had to catch a steamer at Beyrout? But any steamer -would wait for so great a general,” etc. Until finally our leader came -to the delicate subject of inscriptions, and was made free of the town, -and immediately guided to the Egyptian slab mentioned on p. 87. It was a -perfect specimen of intercourse with Arabs, and it dazed us with its -ancient spell. There is no possibility of hurry. You must despatch your -business by way of a discussion of things in general. Compliments were -as rife and as conventional as those of Abraham and the children of Heth -at Kirjath-Arba, and they were received and given without any pretence -of taking them seriously. The elders sat silently leaning upon their -staves, except now and then, when one of them would slowly rise and -expatiate upon something the sheikh had said—perhaps about camels or -the grain crop—beginning his interruption almost literally in the words -of Job’s friends:—“Hearken to me, I also will shew mine opinion. I will -answer also on my part, I also will shew mine opinion.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_097" id="page_097"></a>{97}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_013" id="ill_013"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<a href="images/ill_015_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_015_sml.jpg" width="500" height="378" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">SITE OF THE ANCIENT CITY OF SAMARIA.</p> - -<p>The remains of the ancient city are on the olive-clad hill to the -left.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>For I am full of matter, the spirit within me constraineth me.” -Altogether it was a scene of the unadulterated East—just such a scene -as might have been witnessed any time these three thousand years.</p> - -<p> </p> - -<p>The great memorial of Israel is her religion. To her it was given to -know the Eternal God and to pass on that knowledge to all the nations of -the world. Among the many impressions given by a journey through -Palestine, none is so important and none so strong as this, that the -land was eminently suited for that one purpose and for that alone. She -tried many similar experiments, but they all failed utterly. The -luxurious orientalism of Solomon, the democratic revolt of Jeroboam, the -military ambitions of Baasha, and the attempt at commercial supremacy -which Omri made—each of these was an imitation of one or other of the -contemporary nations. For Israel they were alike impossible. Their -successive failures proclaim her a peculiar people, set in a peculiar -place for a peculiar purpose. For them, as Renan says, “to act like -men”—<i>i.e.</i> like all the rest of the world—was a sort of degradation. -All other experiments in greatness failed; their greatness lay solely in -the knowledge of the Lord.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_098" id="page_098"></a>{98}</span></p> - -<h3><a name="CHAPTER_II-ii" id="CHAPTER_II-ii"></a>CHAPTER II<br /><br /> -GRÆCO-ROMAN</h3> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">Nothing</span> strikes one more than the contrast in Palestine between the -vanishing of Hebrew buildings and the permanence of Roman ones. You have -come here to a land which you know to have been for many years under -Roman government, but which still to your imagination is Oriental, with -here and there a Roman touch. You find, among the very ancient -buildings, hardly a remaining trace of anything that is not Roman; and -of Roman work you find an amount which probably astonishes you. Before -you have long left Jaffa, some part or other of one of the old Roman -roads making for Jerusalem will be seen. Not long afterwards Bether -comes in sight—that terrible little valley where the blood ran so deep -when the siege ended and the Jews’ last hope was broken. So you move on -from point to point of Roman story until, as you climb the steep ascent -from the Jordan valley to Gadara, you realise that it was when encamped -just here that Vespasian heard the news<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_099" id="page_099"></a>{99}</span> of Nero’s death and was -proclaimed emperor by his legion.</p> - -<p>The Roman work in Palestine seems to exaggerate its peculiar -characteristics, so that here one notices these more distinctly than in -any other land. A Roman tower in Switzerland, a Roman road in -Scotland—certainly they are Roman, but they are not removed from all -things Swiss or Scotch by so vast an interval as that which divides -Roman from native work in Palestine. It is indeed an invasion of arms, -this Roman life—an intrusion of what is, first and last, alien to the -spirit of the place. The traveller to-day, to whom the very dust of this -land is dear, inevitably feels about the Roman relics an air of -obtrusive and uncomprehending indifference. They “cared for none of -these things,” or, if they did care a little now and then and try to -understand, they did it clumsily and unnaturally. Rome’s policy was that -of wide toleration, but her spirit was absolutely unaccommodating. She -might allow her provinces to govern themselves and to worship pretty -much as they chose, but she herself, in her officials and their works, -stood aloof from them and was Rome still. This is to be seen in -Palestine in all its good and in all its bad aspects. In those -solidly-constructed bridges and mighty aqueducts and imperishable -causeways there is the very embodiment of the Roman <i>virtus</i> and -<i>gravitas</i>, that output of manhood which never trifled nor<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_100" id="page_100"></a>{100}</span> spared -itself, that solemn, business-like reality which is so full of purpose. -In this hard <i>reality</i> of Rome there is not only purpose but -pitilessness of force to accomplish what is planned. Every Roman road -you chance upon seems to be feeling its way with an unerring instinct -towards Jerusalem or some other goal, and you know that it will arrive. -Just as impressive, on the other hand, is the sense of Rome’s -limitations. Her works disclose her seeing a certain length, and you -know beyond all doubt that she will get there. But there are very -obvious and very clearly defined limits to the length she ever sees or -will go. The work of Greece is far beyond the furthest reach of Roman -work—the glad spring, the grace of conscious strength that is beautiful -as well as strong, the restfulness withal of perfect harmony that is -thinking of more than merely utilitarian values; of these Rome knows not -the secret. Beside the flight of Greek art she is pedestrian; to the -Greek artist she plays at best but the part of Roman artisan. Forceful, -massive, successful up to its highest desire, the Roman work is finished -and perfect. And it has attained finish and perfection on a lower level -than that of any nation that ever yet dreamed dreams or “looked beyond -the world for truth and beauty.”</p> - -<p>Not that there are no other traces of Rome in Syria beyond the stones of -Roman ruins. In many place-names Latin is discernible, and the country -is full of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_101" id="page_101"></a>{101}</span> inscriptions of all sorts. A still more permanent mark was -left by that invasion of Roman spirit which, for a time, claimed Israel -for Rome. Rome came to Syria next in succession to the invasion of -Alexander the Great. After his death the Macedonian power remained in -the East, and the seductive spirit of Greek humanism became the rival of -the old Puritan Hebraism of the nation. It was this that led to the Wars -of the Maccabees, who fought for the sterner against the more genial -spirit. As in the days of English Cromwell, the Puritan was invincible -while he remained true to his faith—that singularly effective blend of -patriotism with religious belief which has made itself felt in so many -national histories. The triumph of Hebraism lasted for about a century, -and then came Pompey in 63 <small>B.C.</small> to Jerusalem. Hellenism regained its -ascendency and the Greek cities of Palestine their freedom. About a -quarter of a century later the figure of Herod the Great appears as a -critical factor in the history of Palestine. An Idumean and a Sadducee, -he had neither patriotism nor religion to check his ambition. The path -of glory and of easy advancement, then, was by way of Rome, and there -was much in Herod that found Rome congenial. As a young man he had made -his name by clearing out a notorious band of robbers from the valley -which led down the great road from the Mediterranean to the Sea of -Galilee at Capernaum. This “Vale of Doves” is flanked by precipices -pierced with many caves, in which the robbers lived. Josephus tells us -how Herod fell upon the device of letting down cages<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_102" id="page_102"></a>{102}</span> with the bravest -of his soldiers. These men, lowered by ropes from the edge of the cliff, -sprang upon the robbers in their cave’s mouth, and when they retreated -within, smoked them out with fires like vermin. The man who contrived -and carried out that design was not unworthy of the title “Great” from -the Roman point of view. He became the centre and the champion of the -new Hellenism, which was really the worship of Rome, touched as Rome was -with the Greek culture she had conquered and envied and sought in vain -to acquire. Rome was clumsily Greek at this time, and Herod was clumsily -Roman. Certainly he would have been a Roman if he could. He was prepared -to go any length to serve his end. At the Banias springs of Jordan he -built a temple to Augustus. Samaria and Cæsarea, his Roman cities, must -have cost him a fabulous sum to build.</p> - -<p>Of the actual architectural remains of Rome in Palestine, the smallest -are perhaps the most impressive. Here and there, from south to north, -you come upon tesseræ, the remains of inlaid mosaic floors of the -ancient houses. Sometimes it is single little cubes that turn up among -the gravel of the sea-shore or shine from the newly-ploughed furrow. At -other times broken fragments of a hand-breadth’s size may be found, with -enough variety of colour to suggest the beginning of a pattern. But here -and there you may find whole floors of elaborately designed mosaic, with -concentric circles of various colour and size, with large-scale -pictures, or, as in one case at least, with an ancient map—one of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_103" id="page_103"></a>{103}</span> -most ancient in the world. On many a spot of Palestine you ride over -ground whose stones are capitals of carved pillars, and whose layers of -caked earth disclose fragments of ancient mosaic floors.</p> - -<p>The Roman roads are still frequently met with in Palestine, and these, -perhaps more than any other of their works, help the imagination to -realise the old life in its magnificence of power. Whether the causeway -lies bare to the weather across a mountain, or whether it cuts its track -along the sheer cliff of a gorge, there is the same uncompromising -purpose and capacity in it—the stride of the road, that seems to be -aware of whither it is going and the reason for its going there. In the -cities of the Decapolis and others there is generally one straight line -of Roman causeway—the “Street called Straight,” which is by no means -peculiar to Damascus. It was a Roman hobby, this of straightness, and -one of the most characteristic of Roman hobbies. The roads went, so far -as that was possible, up hill and down dale in a direct line from place -to place; and in the cities at least one columned street did the same. -The milestones which may still be found occasionally seem to heighten -the human interest, though that is considerably damped when we realise -that none of these roads date from the early Roman days in Syria. The -paths our Saviour walked on were but tracks, not unlike those which -modern travellers follow.</p> - -<p>But the bridges are older, and in some places they are used for traffic -to-day, spanning Jordan and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_104" id="page_104"></a>{104}</span> Leontes. There is little causeway at the -ends of them—their one business in these old days was to do the -difficult and needful task of crossing water. Once across, the traveller -might find his path or make it for himself. Parapets are not provided on -the old bridges, and the surface is a flight of broad and shallow steps. -If you walk unwarily and are drowned in the torrent below, that is no -concern of these resolute but unluxurious bridge-builders. Their -business is simply to span the stream. So effectively and -conscientiously have they done this, that even when time and floods have -broken the bridge, you may see the half of it still standing: the huge -pier of stone and of mortar almost harder than stone stands at the side, -and the actual arch is still flung across the water, wedged into an -almost unbreakable strength by its keystone, while all the surface -building above the arch has long been washed away. Such a ruin may be -seen to-day on the coast some miles to the north of Tyre. It was in her -fight with water, either for it in aqueducts or against it in quays and -bridges, that Rome seems to have put out her utmost strength of masonry. -Along the coasts both of the Mediterranean and of the Sea of Galilee, -submerged stones and fragments of building may be seen, which bear -testimony to this; and at Taricheæ, where a large fish-curing trade had -to be provided for, there are remains of a dam and quay where Jordan -swept round in a circle, affording a great length of water-frontage. But -perhaps the most noticeable monuments of Rome in this dry and thirsty -land are the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_105" id="page_105"></a>{105}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_014" id="ill_014"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 350px;"> -<a href="images/ill_016_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_016_sml.jpg" width="350" height="500" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">THE FORECOURT OF THE CHURCH OF THE HOLY SEPULCHRE.</p></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">aqueducts, sections of which still stand in many parts. In the -neighbourhood of Jericho, Laurence Oliphant counted nine different -aqueducts. At Khan Minyeh, believed by some to be the site of Capernaum, -there is a bewildering mass of water-building of many sorts. A -Wasserthurm still stands, whose walls are 12 feet in thickness, and in -all directions water is carried at various levels in channels which run -along the top of mighty banks of masonry. Great stone water-pipes, with -rim and hollow for fitting to the next pipes tightly, lie scattered in -all directions, peeping up through the long grass and ferns, or hiding -among the roots of the thorn trees. Elsewhere are to be seen longer -stretches of aqueduct, whose architects have been able to turn strength -into beauty in a very wonderful fashion. Roman building at its best -relies on the one principle of constructive truth. It never aims at -being pretty; it never fails in being <i>right</i> for the purpose it is -meant to serve. From the point of view of beauty this may often have -produced harsh, material, and heavy work—and indeed that is part of -what we have already referred to as the limitation of Roman achievement. -But the highest beauty is, after all, a matter far more of truth than of -ornament, and there are many remains of Roman work in which such high -beauty has been unconsciously attained. They built to accomplish some -definite practical purpose, and for that end they built thoroughly and -well. The result is the beauty which comes like a crown upon honest work -beyond the design of the workers—a beauty of wholeness,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_106" id="page_106"></a>{106}</span> adequacy, -truth, which is perhaps not so far removed from the Hebrew idea of the -“beauty of holiness” as careless observers might be disposed to think. -This is seen in many a fragment of the Roman aqueducts. These irregular, -three-tiered clusters of variously sized and shaped arches, carrying the -stone or concrete channel across a gorge, have a real beauty of their -own; and the long stretches of single or double tiers that take up the -channel where it emerges from a mountain-tunnel, lead it high and secure -across the treacherous ooze of a marsh, throw their level line on high -bridges over ravines, and at last end in the tumbled ruins of a city -whose pools and fountains they filled long ago—these have an -indisputable beauty of workmanship and design, as well as an infinite -pathos of sentiment.</p> - -<p>Next in impressiveness to these monuments are the remains of the Greek -amphitheatres of the Roman period. Whether it be that the massiveness of -the stones has been too much for the lazy builders who have constructed -their modern dwellings out of stolen fragments of ruins; or whether, in -its irony, history has attached to these monuments of Rome’s attempt to -amuse the world some special sacredness, it would be difficult to say. -Certain it is that these in many places remain, sunk in the natural -hollow of a hill as in a socket, while all traces of the city which once -surrounded them have disappeared. They have been often described, both -as they are found in Syria and elsewhere; and the stage arrangements, -the underground passages, and the whole design of them does not<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_107" id="page_107"></a>{107}</span> -materially differ from those of other countries. One feature in the -Syrian theatres appears with special distinctness. When the play was -going on, an awning may be supposed to have been spread horizontally -over the roof, to shade spectators and actors from the sun. Between the -edge of this awning and the flat top rim of the stage buildings, there -would be a blank space left, as it were, like a framed and draped -picture. The sites were so chosen that this space was filled up with -some commandingly beautiful vista—in the north generally a view of -Hermon. Hauran boasts many such theatres in the cities of the Decapolis. -In cities which were first Greek and then Roman, such as these, it may -be difficult to determine the exact date of a particular building. If -the Romans built these theatres, they closely imitated the older Grecian -work. They certainly built the theatre and hippodrome of Cæsarea, in -which latter the goal-post is still to be seen, an immense granite -stone, which has seen life in its day.</p> - -<p>The theatres have, as a rule, survived the fortresses and the temples. -Rome undertook many things. She would worship, govern, educate, amuse. -Is it not significant that her wreck looks so like a gigantic -playground, as if in those degenerate days of her conquest the Empire -was already finding in the motto “il faut s’amuser” her rule of life? -After all, it is his chief interest that is the immortal thing about any -man or nation. Yet this may be an unjust and fanciful estimate. Relics -of Roman temples and fortresses also remain. A statue of Jupiter has had -its resurrection<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_108" id="page_108"></a>{108}</span> from the sands of Gaza, and a monument in honour of -Jupiter Serapis now bears a Roman inscription near the Zion Gate of -Jerusalem. Near springs and the fountain-heads of rivers especially, the -ruins of Roman shrines to the Genius of the fountain are found, as at -Banias. Fortresses too, where Roman garrisons used to be located, can -still be traced, in a ring or an oblong trail of loose stones. Such -ruins crown the height of Tabor, the summit of Gerizim, and many another -hill. But these shew little trace of their former meaning. Here and -there the acropolis of a Greek or Roman town may retain its ancient -embankment, built on the steep slope of the hill, as if shoring up the -plateau above where the temple once stood. Elsewhere, some parts of the -curtain wall of a crusader castle may be blocks of Roman fortification -left <i>in situ</i>. But the greater part of the Roman building must be -looked for in the walls of village houses, where the contrast between -such fragments and their surroundings is as grotesque as it is pitiful. -The Gadarenes have built into their walls whatever lay nearest them. -Coffins and tombstones, capitals and columns, even altars themselves, -are there, “stopping holes to keep the wind away”; it is exactly what -“imperial Cæsar” has come to in Gadara.</p> - -<p>When Roman power decayed, the signs of its decadence were manifest in -the departure from old severity into an efflorescence of ornament and a -magnificence of mere size out of all proportion to the constructive -meaning of the work. In Baalbek, Rome has left us a monument of such -decadence. The<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_109" id="page_109"></a>{109}</span> elaborated detail is foreign to the grand simplicity of -the old Roman style, and the exaggerated size is but boastfulness. “The -Romans had seen the huge Jewish stones at Jerusalem” (as Dr. Merrill -explained the matter to us) “and began at Baalbek to work on a bigger -scale, the Barnums of the ancient world, whose ambition was to run the -biggest show on earth. By and by they got tired of that, and left it -off; it was not their line, after all.” “The line” of Rome was a very -straight and simple one. With immense power and a great and single -purpose, she went straight forward, and did what she meant to do. Hers -was a rough simplicity which never failed. Strange that, with so mighty -a resource, she should have ever gone out of her line to attempt any -other work than her own! When men or nations discover their limitations, -and rashly make up their mind no longer to stay within them, their -ambition has already begun to foreshadow their downfall.</p> - -<p>The pathos of seeing anything which evidently was once so competent and -so strong, now so absolutely dead as Rome is, is heightened almost to -weeping, in those places where the little and everyday memorials of her -former life are commonest. It is not the gigantic monoliths, but the -little tesseræ, not the fallen columns, but the broken jar-handles, that -touch the heart most. Between Tyre and Sidon the rider passes over -fields every stone of which is a fragment of some marble slab or -curiously-carved piece of masonry. His horse is overturning the remains -of Ornithopolis, “the city<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_110" id="page_110"></a>{110}</span> of the bird,” in these ploughed fields. But -it is at Samaria that the emotion is most irresistible. Where the “fat -valley” opens to the westward, a conical hill, slightly oval and with -flattened top now clad with an orchard, nestles in and yet lies apart -from the bend of the mountains of Ephraim. It was this hill that Omri -bought from Shomer for the heavy price of two talents of silver. It was -here that the city rose—the inferior houses (if we may reconstruct the -probable past) of white brick, with rafters of sycamore; the grander -ones of hewn stone and cedar—while the royal palace overtopped them -all. A broad wall with terraced top encircled it, and the city lay -there, “a vast luxurious couch, in which its nobles rested securely, -‘propped and cushioned up on both sides as in the cherished corner of a -rich divan.’<span class="lftspc">”</span> It was Ahab’s capital too, and after the varying fortunes -of centuries it was granted to Herod the Great by Augustus, who -immediately called it by the Greek name of the emperor, Sebaste, and -proceeded to rebuild it in a style of unheard-of magnificence. A -hippodrome appeared in the hollow, a temple on the hill. Round the -summit he ran a flat terrace with double colonnade of monolithic pillars -about 16 feet in height, with palaces and massive gateways. From our -camp on the threshing-floor, quite near the circuit of pillars—for many -of them are still standing, and the bases of almost all may be seen in -the ground—we crossed to within the ring of the colonnade. The ground -was ploughed here even along the faces of the artificial terrace-banks,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_111" id="page_111"></a>{111}</span> -which still preserve their sheer angle, clean and steep as of old. The -furrows were literally sown with fragments of broken pottery and -tesseræ. We crossed to a squared and heavy mass of fallen stones and -carved pillars lying slantwise against walls still strong in ruin, which -bears the name of Herod’s daughter’s palace; and then along the -colonnade to the great piles of masonry which guard the gate that looks -toward Cæsarea. Two massive towers are there, partly in ruins and soon -to be wholly so, for the cactus hedge is busy with its roots among the -stones, and is making its way through cracks to the very heart of the -towers. We sat there watching the sun sink into the sea, and thought of -all those faded splendours and crimes that make this spot so famous -among the tragic places of the world. It was the home of Jezebel, it was -the slaughter-house of Mariamne, both of whom must often have watched -the sunset from that gate. The ambitions of the ancient kings, the pride -and wealth and cruelty of Herod, the beauty and the misery of passionate -women, dead these many centuries—all seemed to people the place with -ghosts, as the twilight deepened. We turned to go back, and found -ourselves accompanied by the man who farms the hill—a tall, friendly, -and gracious man in long flowing robes. He held the hand of his little -five-year-old girl, a dark-eyed, sweet-faced child, dressed in a red -cloak crossed with blue and yellow stripes. Her hair was short, in -clustering curls of glossy black, with a blue bead cunningly inwoven -among them to keep off the evil eye.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_112" id="page_112"></a>{112}</span> She had her free hand entwined by -all its fingers in the wool of a pet lamb, which she steered along -sideways vigorously. How dead the mighty Herod and all the Roman glory -seemed in contrast with this simple picture of the eternal life of home!</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Where a multitude of men breathed joy and woe<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Long ago;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Lust of glory pricked their hearts up, dread of shame<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Struck them tame;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And that glory and that shame alike, the gold<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Bought and sold.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Now,—the single little turret that remains<br /></span> -<span class="i4">On the plains,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">By the caper over-rooted, by the gourd<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Overscored,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">While the patching houseleek’s head of blossom winks<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Through the chinks—<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Marks the basement whence a tower in ancient time<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Sprang sublime,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And a burning ring all round, the chariots traced<br /></span> -<span class="i4">As they raced,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And the monarch and his minions and his dames<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Viewed the games.<br /></span> -<span class="i6q">. . . . . . . . .<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Oh heart! oh blood that freezes, blood that burns!<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Earth’s returns<br /></span> -<span class="i0">For whole centuries of folly, noise and sin!<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Shut them in,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">With their triumphs and their glories and the rest!<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Love is best.<a name="FNanchor_18_18" id="FNanchor_18_18"></a><a href="#Footnote_18_18" class="fnanchor">[18]</a><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>It is not, however, merely with the chill of that which has been long -dead that Rome affects us in Syria;<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_113" id="page_113"></a>{113}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_015" id="ill_015"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 353px;"> -<a href="images/ill_017_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_017_sml.jpg" width="353" height="500" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">THE ROTUNDA AND CHAPEL OF THE HOLY SEPULCHRE.</p></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">it is with the living interest which attaches to all that touched -Christ, and entered in any way into Christianity. It is a far-reaching -generalisation which reminds us that “the great civilisations have -always risen in the meeting-places of ideas.”<a name="FNanchor_19_19" id="FNanchor_19_19"></a><a href="#Footnote_19_19" class="fnanchor">[19]</a> Historically it is -true that the times of greatest international struggle have been times -of heightened vitality, when the mingling nations were ready to receive -and to impart much, and to send forth a new spirit upon the world. -Nothing could be more providentially apposite, from this point of view, -than that Jesus should have been born “amid the fever of the -establishment of the Roman power in Judea.” He kept aloof, indeed, from -the Herodian people who lived delicately in kings’ houses, and from all -the Greek and Græco-Roman life of his day. Yet, as Dr. Smith has shown -us memorably, Jesus was no quiet rustic dreaming dreams and seeing -visions far from the life of men. He lived and died in close touch with -all that Rome, Greece, Egypt, Mesopotamia, Arabia had to show. Not for -the first time, nor for the last, did He see, in His temptation, “the -kingdoms of the world and the glory of them.” As this realisation -becomes more and more distinct, a new force is added to the contention -that His Gospel is the Gospel for the world. It was thought out and -first preached amid the throng of commerce, and while the din of battle -was as yet hardly silent.</p> - -<p>This contact of Jesus Christ with Rome, which under Paul’s hand was to -become the messenger and instrument<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_114" id="page_114"></a>{114}</span> of His kingdom, is vividly -associated with two hill-tops in Palestine. One of them is that height -near Nazareth, some ten minutes distant from the village well, the -description of whose outlook closes the chapter on Galilee in the -<i>Historical Geography</i> with the well-known passage about the boyhood of -Jesus. There, while He faced seawards, lay on the left hand below Him -the wine-coloured, battle-soaked plain of Jezreel, with squadrons of the -Roman army marching east and west along it; while on the right hand the -Sepphoris Road ran ribbon-like along the ranges, with its constant -stream of merchandise. The other hill-top is that known as “Gordon’s -Calvary” at Jerusalem—a low and rounded hillock just outside the -Damascus Gate. If this be indeed the site of Calvary, Christ was -crucified on a wedge of ground between a military and a commercial road; -and “they that passed by wagging their heads” may have been soldiers -from the Tower as well as merchants from the Northern Gate.</p> - -<p>Certain it is, at least, that Rome was about His cradle and His grave. -The earliest narratives of His earthly career bring Him to Bethlehem to -a Roman taxation; the latest story delivers Him to a Roman judge, to -Roman soldiers, and to a Roman cross.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_115" id="page_115"></a>{115}</span></p> - -<h3><a name="CHAPTER_III-ii" id="CHAPTER_III-ii"></a>CHAPTER III<br /><br /> -CHRISTIAN</h3> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">From</span> the invasion of warlike Rome we turn to that “Peace and her huge -invasion” which came to the Holy Land during the later days of the Roman -Empire. Before the time of Constantine the Church in Syria had grown and -spread with such startling vitality and promise of even more abundant -life as to bring down upon her the cruelty of persecutions. In the north -the Christian communities were mainly Gentile, in the south Jewish -Christians. They must have been intellectually as well as spiritually -vigorous, for the curious speculations and mystic dreams of the Gnostics -had already, in the second century, gained footing in Syrian -Christianity.</p> - -<p>With Constantine (324-337) Roman persecution ceased for ever. The Jews -were permitted to return to Jerusalem, and the construction of the -written Talmud began its career of three centuries. Julian, the last -emperor on the throne before the Empire divided into east and west, had -apostatised from the Christian faith<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_116" id="page_116"></a>{116}</span> before his ascension, and in 361 -he attempted the restoration of the temple in Jerusalem as a strength to -Judaism against Christianity. But the Galilean had conquered, and it was -the day of Christ. The recognition of Christianity as the religion of -the State began a new era, which ran on for a thousand years in the -Eastern Empire, until the siege of Constantinople changed the face of -Europe in 1453. The words of Dante will often recur to the student of -early Christian days in Palestine:—</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Ah! Constantine, what evil came as child<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Not of thy change of creed, but of the dower<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of which the first rich father thee beguiled.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">The reference is to the legend of “The Donation of Constantine,” by -which he transferred Rome and the states of the Church to the Papal See. -Christianity in Syria has run a strange career.</p> - -<p>Up to the time of Constantine the Church was at bay, fighting a -desperate battle against the Pagan world. At Cæsarea especially, but in -many another Roman town besides, native Syrians were forced underground -into caves and catacombs, or brought to the death in the public games. -Many records of this period survive. At Sidon, searching about among the -tombs which Renan has recently explored, we came upon a broken marble -slab—evidently the lintel of a church raised in memory of a local -massacre of Christians—with the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_117" id="page_117"></a>{117}</span> word <small>MARTURION</small> inscribed on it. The -martyr monuments of Syria are wonderfully full of peace, hope, and -assurance. Like Marius the Epicurean you feel, when first you come upon -them, that for the first time you are seeing the wonderful spectacle of -<i>those who believe</i>. You understand his impression of every form of -human sorrow assuaged—desire, and the fulfilment of desire working on -the very faces of the aged, and the young men obviously persons who had -faced life and were glad. And the same wistful sense of a sure word of -revelation comes upon the beholder as that which appealed to him. Surely -here the earth was for once not forsaken of the higher powers, but -visited and spoken to and loved!</p> - -<p>After Constantine the pilgrim takes the place of foremost interest, -which the martyr previously held. From 451, when an independent -patriarchate was established at Jerusalem, pilgrimages became very -frequent; and a century later there were hospices with 3000 beds in them -within Jerusalem, while trade of many sorts flourished by their aid. In -the oldest itineraries there are very curious accounts of these -pilgrimages; but two, which Colonel Conder gives, are especially quaint -and interesting. They refer to later pilgrimages, but are appropriate -enough to earlier ones. The first one is from Saewulf, giving an account -of his <span class="pagenum"><a name="page_118" id="page_118"></a>{118}</span>landing at Jaffa: “From his sins, or from the badness of the -ship,” he was almost wrecked, and his companions were drowned before his -eyes. The other is Sir John Maundeville’s—most fascinating, if most -unscrupulous, of travellers: “Two miles from Jerusalem is Mount Joy, a -very fair and delicious place. There Samuel the prophet lies in a fair -tomb; and it is called Mount Joy because it gives joy to pilgrims’ -hearts, for from that place men first see Jerusalem.”</p> - -<p>From the first, pilgrimage seems to have had its moral disadvantages and -special temptations. The Turkish proverb runs, “If your friend has made -the pilgrimage once, distrust him—if he has made the pilgrimage twice, -cut him dead.” And it would seem that the Christian pilgrim is not -altogether in a position to throw stones at his Moslem brother. Apart -from any sins to which the freedom of travel in a far land may be -supposed to tempt poor human nature, there are some which are <i>par -excellence</i> pilgrim sins. Thus we find in the seventeenth century the -Armenian patriarch complaining that the seat in the Chapel of St. Helena -in which he used to sit had been so hacked to pieces by relic-hunting -pilgrims that he was “frequently obliged to renew it.” The case was all -the harder because it was not from its association with the patriarch, -but because St. Helena had sat in it, that it was so much in request! If -Mark Twain be a true reporter, there are pilgrims who have inherited -<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_119" id="page_119"></a>{119}</span>that particular kind of moral frailty with remarkable fidelity to the -manners of their predecessors. Then again, the pilgrimages, which -everywhere stimulated trade, created an amazing amount of fraud in the -sale of false relics and other such traffic. Dr. Conan Doyle’s picture -of the pilgrim in France, who takes a nail from the box of a blacksmith -and sells it to unsuspecting soldiers as one of those which were driven -into the wood of the true Cross, is drawn from the life. Even on the -sacred spots themselves the simplicity of pilgrims has always been a -temptation to custodians. A tale is told of some one who, only a year or -two ago, dropped by accident a Bible down the dry shaft of Jacob’s Well. -The Bible was reclaimed within a few days, but when brought up it was a -mere mass of pulp. A large party of pilgrims had visited the place in -the interval, and had professed a strong desire to drink water from the -famous well. A small stream, conveniently diverted to the well mouth, -had enabled the priest in charge to gratify their desire by draughts of -water drawn from the depths before their eyes.</p> - -<p>The pilgrim is still extant. For well-nigh two thousand years he has -come and gone, a tourist who has always had an immense commercial value -for the Holy Land. The levy made on pilgrims at the gate of Jerusalem -was one of the principal causes of the Crusades, and it is hardly more -than a hundred years since a heavy tax was imposed upon every pilgrim -when he reached the gate of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. The -greater part of those who come now are Russians. Jaffa is full of them, -but they are to be seen in long caravans<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_120" id="page_120"></a>{120}</span> of pedestrians, with a donkey -or two bearing all their scanty luggage, as far north as Samaria and -Galilee. The men are typical Russian peasants, in the blouses and caps -that are so familiar. Their long hair may be fair or dark, but it is -always matted and coarse. The women, with their good, weather-beaten -faces, are uncommonly like old-fashioned peasant women from the northern -Scottish countrysides. Their head-dress is a simple kerchief, and their -hands grasp a rude pilgrim staff polished with much wear. The privations -of such pilgrimages must be very great. They involve the expenditure of -a lifetime’s savings, and a journey in many cases of at least six -months. Most of this is done on foot, and largely by people who are -growing old. There is no nation that could send forth such multitudes -except “rough but believing Russia.” The belief is everything. They are -very poor people, and very ignorant and simple. Yet many whose minds’ -conflict seems only to grow sterner in this land of contradictions, may -own without shame to a touch of something like envy as they see the -exaltation of their childish faith. They encompass the walls of -Jerusalem to the strains of Psalms, and march triumphantly to the sand -south of Jaffa for shells to authenticate their travels, such as those -which appear on the coats-of-arms of some European families, telling of -former pilgrimages. Mere children in intellect, the gleam in their eyes -tells that in their own pathetic way they have entered here into a -veritable kingdom of heaven.</p> - -<p>The objects of pilgrimage are somewhat gruesome in<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_121" id="page_121"></a>{121}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_016" id="ill_016"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 355px;"> -<a href="images/ill_018_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_018_sml.jpg" width="355" height="500" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">THE DOME OF THE ROCK (MOSQUE OF OMAR), AS SEEN FROM THE -PORCH ON THE NORTH SIDE OF THE MOSQUE EL AKSA.</p></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">their way. A favourite ambition used to be that of measuring the “stone -of anointing” in the Holy Sepulchre, in order to have the pilgrim’s own -winding-sheet made the same length. The great goal, however, is the -Jordan, whose banks at the period after Constantine used to be paved -with marble. In the old time a wooden cross was erected in mid-stream, -and the waters were blessed by a priest, after which the pilgrims -tumbled in with such haste that numbers of them were drowned. Here, too, -the winding-sheet is in evidence. Besides the flask of Jordan water -which they fill, they dip their own winding-sheets and those of friends -at home who have been unable to come in person, but have sent these pale -substitutes. It was not our good fortune to see the merry band of -pilgrims at the Jordan, though we met scattered groups of Russians in -many places. One other pilgrim we saw, and he accompanied us through -several days’ march northward. He was a jet-black Abyssinian—a lonely -and silent figure clad from head to foot in a loose robe of pure white -sackcloth. He went with us to Nazareth, the destination of his -pilgrimage. His only word in common with us was “Christianus,” and he -always bowed and crossed himself when he said it. All day long he walked -in silence in our company. He asked for nothing, but ate the meat he -received in singleness of heart, and sat apart watching the loading and -unloading of the baggage with the eyes of a great child.</p> - -<p>While so many Christians paid a passing visit to<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_122" id="page_122"></a>{122}</span> Palestine in the early -days, there were some who came to stay. It was the time of the rise of -monastic institutions, which first appear in the beginning of the fourth -century. Their history from the first is peculiarly associated with -Syria, into which they spread almost immediately after their start in -Egypt. Some of the most famous of the early recluses, including even St. -Symeon Stylites himself, were of Syrian origin.<a name="FNanchor_20_20" id="FNanchor_20_20"></a><a href="#Footnote_20_20" class="fnanchor">[20]</a> These ascetics were -the natural successors of the martyrs. The first hints of them are given -during the time of earlier martyrdoms, for it is recorded that -Christians as early as the Decian persecutions fled to the wilderness -and led a life there which was soon to become popular beyond all -possibility of forecast.</p> - -<p>It was not, however, until Constantine’s favour had secularised the -Church, or at least had made easy that life which hitherto had been so -dangerous, that the reaction set in which gave monasticism its great -hold on the world. This is generally explained as a matter solely of -protest against growing worldliness, or a development of that curious -kind of “other-worldliness” which finds in asceticism the surest means -of attaining earthly fame and heavenly reward. No doubt both these -elements are true. In the early ascetics there was a self-denial -prompted by the purest desire for escape from the defiling society of -their time into the spiritual cleanness of the faith, and from its hard -and coarse materialism into the delicate ideality and refinement of -Christian thought and feeling. It was<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_123" id="page_123"></a>{123}</span> also, on the other hand, a refuge -and an outlet for much of the inefficiency and moral worthlessness of -the time, which found in its freedom from social restraint and its wide -leisure things exactly to their own taste. But behind all this there is -another fact which is really the most significant of all. Monasticism -was “the compensation for martyrdom.” Readers of the letters of Ignatius -are familiar with that mania for martyrdom which during persecuting -times took possession of so many in the Church. In abnormal and extreme -conditions such as these, certain minds grow hysterical and lose their -perspective and sense of proportion altogether. In such minds a morbid -and passionate delight in pain develops into a sort of lust—a -<i>religiosa cupiditas</i>—for suffering torture, just as in the persecutors -cruelty becomes a lust for inflicting it. So asceticism offered itself -when martyrdom could no longer be had—“a voluntary martyrdom, a gradual -self-destruction, a sort of religious suicide.”<a name="FNanchor_21_21" id="FNanchor_21_21"></a><a href="#Footnote_21_21" class="fnanchor">[21]</a></p> - -<p>The new ideal passed through several successive phases. From an -unorganised and individual way of life within the Church, it developed -first into anchoretism about the beginning of the fourth century. In -barren and solitary places, where life at best was precarious and -physical enjoyment impossible, every cave and den had its tenant. On -Mount Sinai one hermit is said to have lived for fifty years in absolute -solitude, silence, and nakedness. As you ride down the terrific gorges -from Mar Saba to the Dead Sea, you<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_124" id="page_124"></a>{124}</span> pass along precipitous hillsides and -rock-faces which appear literally riddled with small caves and holes in -the rock and sand. These, which now serve for a covert from the heat for -passing shepherds, or for the lairs of jackals, were once populated by -hermits. Saint Saba is said to have collected the bones of no fewer than -10,000 solitary dwellers in this district, who had fallen victims to the -Carismians. And in many parts of Syria even now, a hillside which during -the day has seemed barren of all human habitation, is unexpectedly -illuminated with hermits’ lights—those “hands praying to God”—in the -dark. The enthusiasm with which this dreary life has filled some of its -devotees may be realised in the following lines from an epistle of St. -Jerome:—“O desert, where the flowers of Christ are blooming! O -solitude, where the stones for the new Jerusalem are prepared! O -retreat, which rejoices in the friendship of God! What doest thou in the -world, my brother, with thy soul greater than the world? How long wilt -thou remain in the shadow of roofs, and in the smoky dungeon of cities? -Believe me, I see here more of the light.”<a name="FNanchor_22_22" id="FNanchor_22_22"></a><a href="#Footnote_22_22" class="fnanchor">[22]</a></p> - -<p>It was in cloister life, however—at first in smaller communities and -then on the large scale of many cloisters gathered under a common -rule—that early Christianity reached its full development. Besides the -native establishments, there was, in the first centuries after -Constantine, a cloud of religieux, flying like homing doves across the -sea to alight and quietly settle down<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_125" id="page_125"></a>{125}</span> on holy soil. These -establishments had many faults. They perpetuated little sectarian -differences and exaggerated them into quite ridiculous importance. The -very lamps that hang in the oldest churches are denominational, and are -divided with a childish arithmetic among rival sects. The insistence of -these on their respective rights is such that a guard of armed Moslem -soldiers has to be kept perpetually on the spot to keep the peace. Yet -there is a splendid dash of courage in this part of Church History, -which cannot possibly have been all in vain. It must have been an -exciting life in some of the outpost stations in these old days. “It is -true,” says Warburton of one monastery, “the monks were occasionally -massacred by the Saracens, Turks, and Carismians, but their martyrdom -only gave fresh interest to the spot in the eyes of their successors.” -No doubt these establishments drained the world of some of its best -manhood, and diverted much greatly needed energy from family life and -state loyalties; yet, on the other hand, these were the soldiers of the -Cross who then fought the paganism of the world and conquered it.</p> - -<p>Monastic establishments still remain, and supply much-needed inns to -many thousands of poor travellers in Syria. They vary by very wide -degrees of difference from one another. By far the worst place we saw in -Palestine—one of the worst perhaps that could be seen anywhere—is the -convent of Mar Saba near the Dead Sea. Coming out on the high ridge of -the Judean mountain country, we caught a glimpse of two towers,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_126" id="page_126"></a>{126}</span> which -we have already described,<a name="FNanchor_23_23" id="FNanchor_23_23"></a><a href="#Footnote_23_23" class="fnanchor">[23]</a> square and blind, and so pitilessly -unsuggestive that they seemed, as it were, built into the desert, or -part of its fantastic offspring. They were the most unhomely buildings -we had ever seen, and they are the nearest point to which women are -allowed to approach the monastery, lady travellers being accommodated -with cells there if they have not tents. By and by we passed between -them, down a road so steep as to be practically a stairway, on every -step of which loathsomely dirty beggars sat plying their trade. In the -courtyard to which this entrance led were two monks, fat and -stupid-looking, who brought out strings of beads, rosaries, and crosses -of their own manufacture for sale. Having, apparently, absolutely -nothing to do, the making of these things may be taken for sign of -enterprise and commercial genius, but as time is evidently valueless, -they sell their work very cheap. To the right is a rock, hollowed out -into a chamber or broad gallery, which is sacred as having been the -shrine of Saint Saba’s devotions. The entrance is violently coloured in -washes of blue and white paint, so crude and aggressive that it quite -robs the pictures in the interior of their horror, and prepares you to -look with unclouded eye upon the skulls which fill the grilled recesses. -One of these skulls is set in front, to receive the kisses of devout -pilgrims. It is deeply worn and polished. When it has actually been worn -through to a hole it will be replaced, as others<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_127" id="page_127"></a>{127}</span> have been before it. -Across the courtyard you follow narrow stairs and galleries that run -irregularly along the edge of a precipice; for the monastery has affixed -itself to the face of a cliff four hundred feet high. It clings there, -supported by huge flying buttresses that spring from the depths below in -a fashion which, as one writer says, remind you of pictures of -Belshazzar’s feast. The cells of the monks, little disconnected -“lean-to” sheds or caves, have the Greek cross upon their doors, and the -often-repeated inscription, “O Christ, abide with us!” Here and there -are a few plants in pots, or a feeble attempt at rearing vegetables in -little garden patches which fill in any foot of level among the -many-cornered buildings; while in one cranny grows the solitary -date-palm which Saint Saba planted more than 1300 years ago. At every -few yards you pause to look over a low balustrade into the gorge, which -here is a sort of yellow-ochre gulf, with all the horror but none of the -rich depth of colouring that belongs to frightful abysses. Over these -walls the monks throw meat to the jackals which come and fight for it -below. Occasionally, as we passed, a face was visible at a window, -generally either wizened and dried up, or with a white, neurotic -appearance that was almost more repulsive. Everywhere dirt reigned -supreme—unspeakable filth in open drains and putrid litter. In one -place, where the smell was sickening, a monk was lying asleep by the -side of a broken drain, covered with flies in great black masses on his -face and arms.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_128" id="page_128"></a>{128}</span> In another place an abominable-looking dish of food, -fly-blown and disgusting, was pushed with a spoon in it half through a -hole broken in the bottom of a cell door. And everywhere throughout this -palace of disgust was to be read the prayer, “O Christ, abide with us!”</p> - -<p>That was the worst. Mar Saba is a sort of combination of prison and -asylum, where lunatics are kept under the charge of monks condemned to -this place for heresy or immorality. Other monasteries we saw, of a very -different kind. Our tents precluded the necessity for our making any of -these our home for the night, but in many cases it would have been very -pleasant to do so. On the top of Tabor, at Tell Hum on the Sea of -Galilee, and in other places, we were received and entertained with the -most cordial and generous hospitality. The clean and spacious -guest-chambers are open to all comers. They are adorned with photographs -of various sorts, and often contain a cabinet of rare local curiosities. -The brothers in charge of these establishments were fine genial men, -courageously facing the risks of fever in deadly spots, or varying their -hospitable labours on the heights by long seasons of study (for some of -them are distinguished scholars); but always ready to meet a stranger as -a friend, and to chat with him in French or German, over a pipe of -Western tobacco, about the great world from which they had gone so far.</p> - -<p>In all these ways the many-sided life of the old Christian days lingers -and may still be seen. But it<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_129" id="page_129"></a>{129}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_017" id="ill_017"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<a href="images/ill_019_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_019_sml.jpg" width="500" height="304" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">THE DOME OF THE ROCK (MOSQUE OF OMAR).</p> - -<div class="blockquot"><p>From the barracks near the site of the Tower of Antonia. The north -porch of the Dome of the Rock is towards the spectator; to the left -is the Dome of the Chain; to the right, in the middle distance, is -the Mosque of El Aksa.</p></div> -</div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">lingers more impressively in the most ancient of the churches which date -from this period. There is in Palestine an astonishing number of ruins -of old Christian churches, many of them dating back, at least so far as -their foundations go, to the Byzantine period. There are many modern -churches, but they are not as a rule impressive. Even when, as in the -Russian church at Gethsemane, the building is in itself rich and costly, -it is so irrelevant as to rouse a feeling of rebellion.</p> - -<p>Most of the ancient churches have utterly vanished, like that roofless -basilica which Constantine built on the supposed scene of the Ascension -on the Mount of Olives. In other cases they are mere heaps of ruin, like -the remaining fragments of the Church of Jacob’s Well, which was built -about the middle of the fourth century, and has been several times -rebuilt since then. This church takes most travellers by surprise. They -go expecting an out-door scene, with all the harvest breeze of the -Scripture story on it. They find a newly built white wall, glaring in -the sunshine. Through a gate in this wall they are admitted by certain -broken-down-looking persons in the greenish-black garments of the Greek -clergy. Within the gate, a few steps bring them to the edge of a sort of -oblong pit full of masonry. It is the nave of the old church, and the -splendidly carved pillars of its white stone show how beautiful it must -have been. A door in the sunk side-wall opens upon a groined vault newly -rebuilt. In the dim light you can discern in the centre a rough stone -altar, with candles and lamps and a couple of execrable pictures of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_130" id="page_130"></a>{130}</span> -Christ and the woman of Sychar. On the ground before the altar is a flat -stone perforated with a hole two feet in diameter. This is the cover of -the well, and a second clerical person, badly marked with smallpox, lets -down a twist of lighted candles by a long rope, while a little green -lamp of silver hangs above, dripping oil steadily down the well. Surely -this is the infatuation of reverence! If there is any memory of Jesus -which is essentially of the open air, it is this incident of the Well of -Samaria. Yet reverence must build its dark chamber, and proceed to -illuminate with candles the spot where Jesus sat and saw the miles and -miles of waving fields, white already to harvest. No doubt the church -dates from the fourth century; but what right had even the ancients to -build a church here, to keep men busy with their sectarianism on the -very spot where they and all the world were told that the hour was come -when neither in this mountain nor yet at Jerusalem would the Father be -worshipped, but in spirit and in truth?</p> - -<p>There are, however, two great churches of this ancient time which waken -feelings very different from these; they have been for centuries the -centres of Christian interest and devotion in the land, covering, as -they are supposed to do, the sites of the birth and death of Jesus -Christ. In some respects they are alike. The outsides of them are -huddled and packed together, a heterogeneous mass of apparently -unrelated buildings. The insides are not, like the houses, Rembrandt -studies in intense light and shadow. By some skilful arrangement, the -sunlight seems to be caught and diffused in a pale<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_131" id="page_131"></a>{131}</span> luminous twilight -that sinks gradually to darkness in chapels and recesses, and blends -with the light of many lamps and candles not unpleasingly. The Church of -the Holy Sepulchre is the gift of St. Helena, mother of Constantine, and -was consecrated by her in <small>A.D.</small> 336. Tradition relates how, at the age of -seventy-nine, she made her pilgrimage to Jerusalem, was baptized in -Jordan, discovered the true Cross, and built the church upon the spot of -its discovery. Our guide-book tells us of an ante-chamber “where -Oriental Christians are in the habit of removing their shoes, though we -need not follow their example.” Yet the Crusaders entered it barefooted, -though with songs of praise, a thousand years ago; and the impulse of -most Christians, however little they may be disposed to believe in the -identity of the sacred sites within, will be to share the veneration of -the Easterns. Not that what we see now is the original building. That -was a rotunda and a basilica, the former quite other than the present -rotunda, as we know from the fact that it formed the model for the -Mosque of Omar. It has suffered many things from assault, from decay, -from fire, and from rebuilding. In the twelfth century the whole group -of detached shrines and monuments was included for the first time in one -huge and complicated building. Probably no such patchwork in stone is to -be seen elsewhere in the world. Yet each rebuilding found many of the -older materials ready for its use, and incorporated them in the newer -work. Thus the columns at the eastern door are supposed to have come -from some ancient<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_132" id="page_132"></a>{132}</span> pagan temple, and the present foundations of the -pillars belong to the old rotunda. The capitals of many pillars are -Byzantine, while the pink limestone column which is embedded in the wall -to the right of the eastern entrance is also very ancient.</p> - -<p>It is a strange conglomeration of imaginary associations and real value -of material. The atmosphere is at times dreadful enough within to -justify that daring little touch of realism in the French bas-relief -over the door, where some of the spectators at the raising of Lazarus -are holding their noses with their hands! The chapel of the Empress -adjoins the altar of the Penitent Thief; Adam and Abraham jostle each -other for standing ground under the sacred roof; the stone of anointing -has been “often changed” according to the guide-book, and the column of -scourging “judging from the narratives of different pilgrims, must -frequently have changed its colour and its size”—yet pilgrims poke a -stick at it and kiss the part that has touched the stone to-day. Every -incident of the world’s great tragedy is commemorated there, from the -footprint of Jesus to the silver socket in the rock where His Cross was -erected. Futile enough all this, and even wearisome. But the worship of -fifteen hundred years is neither futile nor wearisome. And that worship -seems to detach itself from the legends and find its embodiment in the -marvels of precious stone that are gathered there. As one sees the slabs -of costly stone with which the rock is overlaid—the ruddy yellow slab -of the “anointing,” the red and white polished limestone of the central -shrine,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_133" id="page_133"></a>{133}</span> the green serpentine and the black basalt—one remembers the -tomb which the Roman bishop ordered in St. Praxed’s, with its -“peach-blossom marble,” its lump of <i>lapis lazuli</i>, “blue as a vein o’er -the Madonna’s breast,” and its block of jasper, “pure green as a -pistachio-nut.” But there is a difference. The stones of the Holy -Sepulchre were given in love: they are the tribute of many souls whose -adoration was the noblest feature of their times.</p> - -<p>The Church of the Holy Nativity at Bethlehem is a simpler and, to many -minds, a more impressive structure. It consists of a broad nave, -entirely screened off from what lies beyond, with two rounded transepts -and a rounded apse behind the screen—this trefoil-shaped inner building -being the church proper. One of the transepts is the property of the -Armenians; the other, together with the great altar in the apse, belongs -to the Greeks. Below the great altar-rail (“in the breast of God,” in -Dante’s language) is the cave of the Nativity, with steps leading down -to it from either transept. A Mohammedan soldier stands at the bottom to -keep the peace between Christians. The transepts and apse are ablaze -with lamps and hangings. Below, the “manger” is overlaid with coloured -marble, and the rock is entirely covered with yellow silk cloth, on -which are stamped the insignia of the Franciscans—an arm of Christ -crossed with an arm of St. Francis, both shewing the print of nails in -the palms of their hands. All this, and the air of raree-show that -exhibits so many spots where somebody or other stood, destroy any<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_134" id="page_134"></a>{134}</span> -lingering credulity of which a man may still find himself capable; they -make one rather ashamed, and glad to escape. But the nave is mighty in -its simplicity, and no less mighty in its wealth of historical -association. It is a great severe oblong basilica, with four rows of -massive pillars giving double aisles. Old glass and old mosaics add -their appropriate wealth of sombre beauty. The rafters, replacing -Constantine’s beams of cedar from Lebanon, are the gift of Philip of -Burgundy. Lead for the roof was sent by Edward IV. of England. Most -impressive of all is the old plain font of polished stone, with its -Greek inscription—not, like so many such inscriptions, a record of the -donor’s name, but a prayer for God’s blessing upon those who gave -it—“whose names are known to Thee only.” Opinions differ as to the -plausibility of the claim to the site of our Lord’s nativity; but this -church was built by Constantine, and the Vulgate was written in it by -Jerome. And since that time the feet of countless millions of -worshippers have trodden its stone pavement—a consecration in itself -worth many traditional sanctities.</p> - -<p>In this chapter we have sought to gather the most obvious survivals of -that old Christian invasion of Palestine which followed next after the -Roman. Almost inevitably we find ourselves quarrelling with the -legendary lore that has stultified so many venerable buildings and -associations. Yet in its legends too the early Church survives, and some -of them embody eternal truths in forms of rare beauty. Take three of the -legends of the Holy Sepulchre by way of example. They show the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_135" id="page_135"></a>{135}</span> spot -where the one-eyed soldier Longinus, who pierced the side of Christ, -received back the lost eyesight at the touch of a drop of the blood. -There, too, is the cleft in the rock through which blood flowed from the -Cross down into the tomb of Adam, whose corpse came to life at once. And -there, on Easter Eve, the sham miracle of the “Holy Fire” has been -enacted annually for at least a thousand years. Who can miss the -underlying truth beneath these legends? They are, for all but the -ignorant and the gross, symbols of the eternal healing and quickening -power that the love and sacrifice of Christ exert on humanity and even -on His enemies. The torch-bearers, who kindle their fires at the blaze -on Easter Eve, and speed thence to Bethlehem and other towns to light -from it the candles waiting on many altars, tell their own exhilarating -lesson. Two other legends may be mentioned, which the Western world owes -to the Syrian Church—those of St. George and St. Christopher. St. -George, who was a Roman soldier under Diocletian, was martyred in <small>A.D.</small> -303. His memory, mixed up with the Greek myth of Perseus and Andromeda, -and with Crusader stories of Richard Cœur de Lion, stands for the -victory of faith over paganism. St. Christopher would only follow the -strongest, and finding that his master the devil was afraid of Christ, -renounced his service and set out to seek Him who was strongest of all. -The point of the story is that, after seeking Christ far and wide, he -found Him while he was performing the humble task of carrying passengers -across a river. It is characteristic<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_136" id="page_136"></a>{136}</span> of the pilgrim point of view that -legend has fixed this scene not by some homely German stream but at the -fords of Jordan, where he is said to have carried the infant Christ -across upon his shoulder. Even of such legends no wise man will speak -with scorn. They, too, are monuments of that conquest of Christ which -gives its meaning and its glory to the Christian invasion.</p> - -<p><a name="ill_018" id="ill_018"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 414px;"> -<a href="images/ill_020_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_020_sml.jpg" width="414" height="500" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">INTERIOR OF THE MOSQUE OF EL AKSA, FROM THE SOUTH-EAST.</p></div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_137" id="page_137"></a>{137}</span></p> - -<h3><a name="CHAPTER_IV-ii" id="CHAPTER_IV-ii"></a>CHAPTER IV<br /><br /> -MOSLEM</h3> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">Mohammedanism</span> is the religion which is everywhere in evidence in the -East to-day. From the smart Turkish officer who drops in to smoke a -cigarette with you in the tent after dinner, and discusses European -politics in excellent French, down to the beggar who beseeches you in -the name of Allah for a pipeful of tobacco or the end of your cigar, -your acquaintance in Syria is Moslem. From the consecration of the -Church of the Holy Sepulchre to the Moslem capture of Jerusalem was -exactly three hundred years. When, in 637, Jerusalem fell, Damascus had -already fallen, and Antioch was to follow next year—all within sixteen -years of the beginning of the Mohammedan era. The conquest was -inevitable. First Persia and then the scattered tribes of pagan Arabs -had proved too much for the Byzantine empire in Syria. Then the man -appeared who understood his opportunity. The Eastern world was in -confusion. Heathens constituted the ruling race, the Jews were scattered -in their dispersion, and the Christians torn into many fragmentary -heretical<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_138" id="page_138"></a>{138}</span> sects. It was the moment for a great union of scattered -forces. The Arabs were united by the new faith in God, for which they -abandoned their paganism with a marvellous willingness. The bond of -union with Christians and Jews was the common ancestry in Abraham by -which Mohammed hoped to rally and unite the Syrian world. One sharp -battle at the Yarmuk threw Syria open to his advance, and the crisis of -the faith was past.</p> - -<p>Mohammed has been declared an impostor, who from first to last won his -way by cleverness without faith; he has been idealised as a hero and -prince of heroes in the religious world. Dean Milman, perhaps, is wisest -when he says, “To the question whether Mohammed was hero, sage, -impostor, or fanatic ... the best reply is the reverential phrase of -Islam: ‘God knows.’<span class="lftspc">”</span> One thing is certain, viz., that he founded a -religion which proved itself capable of wakening response from the -Semitic East with a swiftness and a completeness never elsewhere known. -It would be a matter of rather serious consequences to affirm that such -sweeping success is possible without any vestige of honest faith on the -part of its own prophet.</p> - -<p>Arabia found Islam a religion after her own heart. The conquest of the -Arabian mind, and that sudden transference of religious and political -loyalties which changed it from chaos into cosmos, is little short of -miraculous. In the words of one of the severest critics of Islam: “In -<small>A.D.</small> 570, Abdullah, the son of Abd el Muttalib, a Mecca merchant,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_139" id="page_139"></a>{139}</span> went -on a trading trip from Mecca to Medina and died there; the same year his -wife, Amina, gave birth to a boy, named Mohammed, at Mecca. One hundred -years later the name of this Arab lad, joined to that of the Almighty, -was called out from ten thousand mosques five times daily, from Muscat -to Morocco, and his new religion was sweeping everything before it in -three continents.”<a name="FNanchor_24_24" id="FNanchor_24_24"></a><a href="#Footnote_24_24" class="fnanchor">[24]</a> In many ways the new religion was congenial to -Arabia. “Although it made a most vigorous effort to conquer the world, -it is, after all, a religion of the desert, of the tent, and the -caravan, and is confined to nomad and savage or half-civilised nations, -chiefly Arabs, Persians, and Turks. It never made an impression on -Europe except by brute force; it is only encamped, not really -domesticated, in Constantinople, and when it must withdraw from Europe -it will leave no trace behind.”<a name="FNanchor_25_25" id="FNanchor_25_25"></a><a href="#Footnote_25_25" class="fnanchor">[25]</a> It gave the heathen Arabs, in -exchange for their precarious dependence on incalculable and wayward -gods, the sublime conception of “Islam,” the absolute surrender to the -One God, whom it declared to be Almighty, All-Wise, and All-Merciful. -For the rest, its secret was simplicity. It drove straight for its -object, sacrificing art, appetite, the purity of home life, the -spirituality of religious imagination, and some of the accepted -moralities of conscience. What was left was a creed and standard, -somewhat impoverished truly, but workable and uncompromising. A thousand -difficult questions were avoided, and one of those forces set in<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_140" id="page_140"></a>{140}</span> play -before whose rough simplicity finer and more delicate things are swept -away.</p> - -<p>Mohammedanism meets the traveller at every turn in Syria. Now and then a -dervish is encountered—the extremest sort of Moslem. It would seem -difficult to develop a mystic school within the pale of so clear-cut a -faith as Mohammedanism; yet it has been done. But the Mohammedan -dervishes escape from this despised material world by the vulgar process -of hypnotising themselves by the repetition of the word “Allah” or “Hu,” -or by whirling in circles until they are stupefied. This they call the -ecstatic state, and when they have reached it they are said to perform -many violent tricks, stabbing their flesh or eating broken glass, -without appearing to feel pain. In Syria they are by no means impressive -in appearance. Here and there you meet one, with hair crimped in long -thin pointed wisps, and sticking out in a wiry fashion from his head in -all directions. The dazed and rather weak look in the eyes is suggestive -of a strayed reveller rather than a holy man, but the people hold them -in great reverence.</p> - -<p>Another occasional freak of Mohammedanism is the religious procession, -which is conducted on the principle of a rival show to the Christian -fêtes. It starts on Good Friday from Jerusalem to visit the tomb of -Moses—a late fiction, somewhat daring in its contradiction to the old -belief that the tomb of Moses was known to no man. It is amusingly -described by witnesses, but appears to be rather a poor affair on the -whole.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_141" id="page_141"></a>{141}</span></p> - -<p>These extravagances apart, one is never out of sight of Mohammedan -religion for an hour of travel in Syria. The worship, like old idolatry, -seems to have claimed every high hill and every green tree for its own. -It has settled itself, in the very seat of old Judaism, on the sacred -area of the temple. Almost every one of the prominent hills of Palestine -is crowned with a little building, domed and whitewashed, opening in a -porch in front, and containing a single empty chamber. This is the weli -(<i>i.e.</i> monument, not necessarily tomb) of a Mohammedan saint. What the -terms of canonisation may be, it is perhaps best not to inquire too -minutely. Many of these departed saints are said to have been prophets, -but the discoverer of coffee has his monument in Mocha, to which great -processions come, and there is more than one weli in Palestine -commemorative of a dead robber chief. Not the less sacred are they to -the Mohammedans. In various parts of the country we were puzzled by -little piles of stones, gathered and arranged in considerable numbers on -the tops of long ascents or passes, and bearing a curious resemblance to -the cairns which in certain districts of the west of Scotland mark the -spots at which funeral processions have halted to change the -coffin-bearers. The explanation of these little piles is very simple. -When a Mohammedan comes to the hill-top, and looking around him sees a -weli shining in the distance, he offers up a prayer, and drops a stone -there, to call the attention of the next comer, that he also may look -and pray. Very <span class="pagenum"><a name="page_142" id="page_142"></a>{142}</span>picturesque and quaint these little holy houses are; -serving, like the hermit’s tower of old in Western lands, for landmarks -as well as for shrines—the white light-houses of the inland.</p> - -<p>It is not at the white tombs only that the Moslem prays. Five times a -day, at the call from the mosque, he is summoned to his devotions. -Often, indeed, it is inconvenient to worship at some of these hours, and -it is permissible to say the prayer five times in succession in the -evening, when there is most leisure. Sometimes he carries with him his -rosary, to help his memory with the ninety-nine beautiful names of -Allah, and in railway trains or steamers wealthy gentlemen are to be -seen cherishing a string of amber beads which appear more like the -property of young girls than of grown men. To perform his devotions the -Syrian goes to a fountain, when that is possible, as it is part of the -ritual to wash the hands before praying; but the Arab, spreading his -carpet in the shade of his camel, far away upon the desert, where no -water is to be had but the precious drops in his leathern bottle, is -permitted to wash his hands and lips with sand instead. That which -impresses every spectator is the extraordinary faculty for abstraction -which is manifested. The Moslem seems to have at command the power of -annihilating the world around him, and entering the unseen. His eyes are -open, but you may pass within a yard of them and they will not seem to -see you. They are fixed on the far distance, as if, over the Southern -edge of the world, the man saw the Holy City towards which he bows, with -its Kaaba and its black stone. He might be crystal-gazing, or watching -the horizon for a sail at sea.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_143" id="page_143"></a>{143}</span> People may be dancing and singing by his -side, but he does not see them nor hear. Bathing once in the waters of -Elisha’s fountain at Jericho we had a memorable instance of this. We -found the pool empty and the walls undergoing repair. A lad who had -charge of the place was persuaded in the usual fashion to let down the -door of a sluice and so allow the pool to fill, greatly to the detriment -of the newly mortared wall. When we had stripped, the owner of the place -appeared, and we rose to the surface from a dive to hear a controversy -going on, with violent gesture and apoplectic fury, which marks a high -point in our register of vituperation. The water seemed on the whole to -be the safest place, and we kept to it until suddenly we perceived that -a great silence had fallen on the landscape. Looking anxiously to see -what had happened, we found the owner on his knees, praying by his own -spring. We dressed without delay, and had to pass in front of him to -reach the tents, but he never seemed to know that we had passed.</p> - -<p>The muezzin, or call to prayer from the minaret, is one of the most -affecting of all Eastern sounds. Men are chosen for this office with -singularly mellow and rich voices; they intone, with a very musical -little cadence in a minor key, the first chapter of the Koran, and -sometimes other prayers. At the great Mosque of Damascus, a solitary -reciter calls from the slender minaret, and is answered from the balcony -of the broader one across the court by twenty voices in unison. While -the waves of rich sound float out over the city, and are caught and -faintly echoed from<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_144" id="page_144"></a>{144}</span> scores of other minarets, one remembers how that -voice has rolled forth already over innumerable villages from Bengal -westwards, and men have paused from their labour to pray according to -their lights.</p> - -<p>Islam is usually supposed to have been the “Ishmaelite in church -history,” with hand against every man from the first. Really, when it -was Arabian, as it remained for four centuries, it was very tolerant, -and the Christian pilgrims, priests, and monks were little disturbed. -But in 1086 the Seljuk chiefs of wandering Turkish tribes came into -possession, and the days of suspicion and that heavy cruelty which is -characteristic of the stupid began. There were massacres of monks on -Carmel and elsewhere then, and such a state of general tyranny and -oppression that the cry reached the West, and the Crusades began. The -Crusades, as they dragged their slow length along, did not tend to -better understandings; and after Saladin’s conquest of Jerusalem, we -read that the walls and pavement of the Mosque of Omar had to be -purified with copious showers of water distilled from the fragrant roses -of Damascus. The relations between Moslem and Christian in the land -to-day are happier, and the intercourse of increasing trade and travel -is breaking down old partitions here as elsewhere. Yet little love is -lost between the professors of the rival faiths even now. Dr. Andrew -Thomson relates how, in recent years, “it had been observed that at a -particular period of the day the shadow of the great Mosque of Omar fell -upon a certain Christian burying-ground. Even the honour of</p> - -<p><a name="ill_019" id="ill_019"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<a href="images/ill_021_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_021_sml.jpg" width="500" height="337" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">THE TEMPLE AREA AND THE MOUNT OF OLIVES, FROM MOUNT ZION.</p> - -<div class="blockquot"><p>The dome on the right is that of the Mosque of El Aksa, and that on -the left is the Mosque of Omar. Between these domes, and just below -the principal group of cypresses, is the “Wailing Place.” The hills -in the background are the Mount of Olives.</p></div> -</div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_145" id="page_145"></a>{145}</span></p> - -<p class="nind">blessing conveyed by so sacred a shadow was grudged. The public -authorities in Jerusalem were strongly urged to have the Christian -cemetery removed to some more distant place, and it required all the -combined influence of the European consulates to prevent a scandalous -order to this effect from being issued.” The Ordnance Survey party was -on several occasions attacked, and even fired upon. In fanatical Moslem -cities like Hebron and Nablus, travellers have to conduct themselves -with the utmost discretion, and even then will probably be stoned with -more or less effect according to the courage and the marksmanship of the -thrower. The Christians return the animosity with a kind of impatient -ridicule, which seems to indicate a lack of refined piety on their part. -Our camp-waiters were Christians, and they used to give us very freely -their opinions on the theological differences between them and the -Mohammedans. There would be a reverent if somewhat startling account of -the Holy Trinity, and then, in scornful contrast: “Mohammedans only -One,—and Mohammed all the rest!” The scorn is hardly to be wondered at -when one remembers the intellectual level of the powers that be. This is -forced upon one’s notice by countless tales of the custom-house and -censorship officials. A map of ancient Palestine was objected to because -“there were no maps in those days!” An engineer, telegraphing about a -pump, was arrested because the message read: “One hundred revolutions!” -In certain Bibles the text was erased, “Jesus Christ came into the world -to save sinners”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_146" id="page_146"></a>{146}</span>; and it was directed that the word “Christians” should -be substituted, as there were no sinners in the Turkish empire! After a -certain amount of that regime, one would no doubt put new meaning into -the prayer which invokes God’s mercy “upon all Turks,” as well as on -infidels and heretics!</p> - -<p>In spite of all this there is a good deal of interchange between the two -faiths, or at least of borrowing on the part of Islam from Christian -tradition. So many points have the two in common, that a theory has been -broached on which Mohammed appears only as the Judaiser (as it were) of -later days, who saw the difficulty that Christians had in working with -general principles, and set himself to simplify the situation by -reducing Christianity to a stereotyped system. Carlyle distinctly calls -Islam “a kind of Christianity.” However this may be, there is no -question as to the immense amount which Syrian Mohammedanism borrows -from the Jewish and Christian Scriptures. Countless tombs and other -monuments are dedicated to Joshua and other Old Testament worthies. -This, of course, may be due to the fact that many Moslem saints have -borne the old names, and as time went on their memories came to be -confused with those of their more famous namesakes. Samson’s exploits -especially have appealed to the Mohammedan imagination, and he appears -under the <i>incognito</i> of “Ismân Aly,” among many other names. St. George -is a very popular saint for Moslem worship. It startles us still more to -find that in the great fire at Damascus numbers of Moslems threw -themselves<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_147" id="page_147"></a>{147}</span> into the flames in the attempt to rescue the head of John -the Baptist; while a copy of the Koran—one of the original four -copies—which lay below the relic, was forgotten and destroyed.</p> - -<p>The most extensive and curious point of contact between the two -religions is found in those mosques which were formerly built as -Christian churches, and then appropriated by the conquerors. The Grand -Mosque of Damascus is a conspicuous case in point. It is built on the -site of a pagan temple, part of whose hoary front still stands, a -magnificent fragment of ancient heavy masonry and carving now brown and -grey with age. On the ruins of the temple rose the Christian church of -St. John the Baptist, whose date is about the beginning of the fifth -century. After the Mohammedan conquest the church became a mosque, and -fabulous sums were spent on its decoration. It has twice been destroyed -by fire, and is now being restored after the last of these -destructions.<a name="FNanchor_26_26" id="FNanchor_26_26"></a><a href="#Footnote_26_26" class="fnanchor">[26]</a> The restoration has a very brand-new appearance, yet -it is magnificent with its wealth of marble and of other costly stone. -The Mosque of Samaria, conspicuous from a distance by its minaret is -another Christian church reconstructed for Mohammedan worship. There was -a sixth-century basilica here, but the present mosque is built out of -the material of the Crusader church which replaced that. The severity -and bareness of its stone walls and pillars are relieved only by one -touch of colour—the flags and the lovely green pillars of the pulpit. -The wall at the pulpit’s side has been recessed into a<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_148" id="page_148"></a>{148}</span> mihrab or niche, -which points towards Mecca and so gives the worshipper his bearings. In -the crypt, where the Crusaders believed they had the tomb of John the -Baptist, large slabs of polished marble attest the former wealth of -decoration, and these slabs are of peculiar interest because of one -curious little fact. It was customary to carve on Christian buildings -the sign of the Cross—a Maltese cross, set within a circle. Such a -cross may be distinctly seen on one of the stones close to the embedded -pillar at the south door of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. On the -marble slabs of the crypt in Samaria these encircled crosses are to be -seen; but the Mohammedans have chipped away the uprights of them, -leaving only the meaningless horizontal bar bisecting the circle, and -the obvious mark of the chisel in their rough workmanship leaves the -uprights also faintly visible. Perhaps the most interesting case of all -is the Mosque el Aksa, close to the Mosque of Omar, within the temple -area. This is that “far-off place of prayer” which Mohammed counted -among the most holy shrines in the world. Founded by Justinian as a -Christian basilica, it was converted into a mosque by Omar, and adorned -with unheard-of lavishness by Abd el Melik, who overlaid its doors with -gold and silver plates. Since then it has passed through many -adventures. Widened to efface some suggestion of cruciform shape, its -breadth became unmanageable, and six rows of pillars support the roof. -The roof has fallen in, and earthquakes have broken the building more -than once, so that most of the masonry is comparatively<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_149" id="page_149"></a>{149}</span> modern, the -great arches of the structure which supports the dome being “anchored” -by wooden beams which throw horizontal bridges from capital to capital -in Arab fashion. The green-and-gold mosaic with which the interior of -the dome and the upper portion of the adjacent masonry is covered, -cannot be very old, though their dim and antique beauty is worthy of the -older art. The pulpit, richly inlaid with Aleppo work of ivory and -mother-of-pearl, was Saladin’s gift seven hundred years ago. But that -which most of all attracts the eye and fascinates the imagination is the -aspect of the pillars, whose variegated colours are peculiarly rich and -harmonious. Up to a certain height they are polished to the shining -point by the garments of worshippers rubbing against them as they pass; -above that they are smooth, unpolished stone. The capitals, and some at -least of the columns, are very ancient, and may have stood in the -original basilica.</p> - -<p>The Mosque of Omar is not, strictly speaking, a mosque at all. The -mosque is El Aksa, and the more famous building is but a glorified -praying-station of the nature of a weli in its court. It stands near the -centre of a wide open space, practically the only such space in -Jerusalem, which occupies one-sixth part of the whole area of the city -within the walls. The enclosure is partly artificial, supported on vast -substructures of vaulted building which raise the enclosed ground to a -general level. The mosque is set up on a platform ten feet higher than -this level.</p> - -<p>Its history has been a strange one. Behind the time of its erection lies -all the story of the Temple,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_150" id="page_150"></a>{150}</span> whose sacred ark Jewish tradition affirms -to have been concealed here by Jeremiah. But that rock, whose red -outcrop breaks through the floor of the mosque, leads us back to a -dimmer past, and to the story of Abraham’s sacrifice upon Moriah, whose -site this is said to be. Various theories have been advocated as to the -place which the rock held in the arrangements of the Jewish temple. The -Jews of to-day have a legend that on it somewhere the Unspeakable Name -is written, and they explain the miracles of Jesus by the supposition -that He had succeeded in deciphering it. We, too, for whom its chief -interest and pathos lie in the fact that Christ came hither to worship, -and in the things that befell Him here, may accept the meaning at least -of that curious legend. For His own words were that He had declared to -men the name of His Father, and that declaration has truly revealed to -mankind the hidden meaning of their holiest things.</p> - -<p>It was in 680 <small>A.D.</small> that the first Mohammedan sanctuary was erected on -the temple area, but the date of the present building is two hundred -years later. It struck us as a curious fact a year ago in Damascus that -the burnt mosque was being rebuilt almost entirely by Christian masons. -Still more surprising is it to learn that the Mosque of Omar was built -by Byzantine architects and modelled on the Rotunda of the Holy -Sepulchre. Two hundred years later the Crusaders entered Jerusalem, and, -according to the dreadful story, “the carnage in the Mosque of Omar -swept away the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_151" id="page_151"></a>{151}</span> bodies of thousands in a deluge of human blood.”<a name="FNanchor_27_27" id="FNanchor_27_27"></a><a href="#Footnote_27_27" class="fnanchor">[27]</a> -Mistaking the Mosque for the veritable Temple of Solomon, they founded -there the Society of the Knights Templars, on whose armorial bearings -the dome appears. They converted the building into “Templum Domini,” and -planted a large gilded cross upon the summit of it. Traces of their -invasion still remain in the cutting of the rock to suit their altar, -and in the great wrought-iron enclosing screen. For almost a century the -Templum Domini remained in Christian hands, until 1187, when Saladin -conquered Jerusalem. His generosity and gentleness contrasted strangely -with the “loathsome triumph” of the Crusaders; but the first destination -of the triumphal march was the mosque, from whose dome the Cross was -hurled to the ground, and for two days dragged about the streets. From -that time the mosque has been one of the most exclusive places in the -world. Till recent years no Christian was permitted to enter it, and -Jews avoid it, lest they should unwittingly tread upon the ground of the -ancient Holy of Holies.</p> - -<p>The first impressions of the Mosque of Omar are very pleasing. There is -a barbaric splendour in its rich colouring and metallic glitter when -seen from a short distance, while the more distant view of it is one of -rare soft beauty. Its wide courts, too, give it a fresh and open-air -character which is very refreshing after the stifling dark heat and -closeness of the Holy Sepulchre. Above all it impresses one with its -grand simplicity.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_152" id="page_152"></a>{152}</span> The sharp-edge angles of the octagon are taken in at -a glance; the rock within is bare rock, and infinitely more impressive -than the silk and marble in which rock masquerades at Bethlehem. The -great number of its pillars, screens, reading-stands, and other -furniture, leaves little open room, and it feels rather a crowded than a -spacious place for worship. Yet, on the other hand, you are not wearied -with the complex symbolism of many of the ancient churches. The meaning -of this may be poorer, but at least it is plain. This means just a -perfectly shapely and highly coloured octagon, where men have worshipped -God for a thousand years in the least complicated way in which worship -has been done. Thus the mosque is typical of the faith and the policy -that created it. “I do not believe,” says Disraeli’s <i>Tancred</i>, “that -anything great is ever effected by management.... You require something -more vigorous and more simple.... You must act like Moses and Mohammed.”</p> - -<p>On the other hand, the enthusiasm for Mohammedan simplicity is sorely -tried when the first moment of almost awestruck feeling ends with the -advance of the guide. He is to shew you the wonders of the mosque, and -the torrent of mingled absurdity and superstition by which you find -yourself swept on is very trying to the would-be admirer of the faith -and its monument. First of all, there are the relics—the footprint of -Mohammed, and the hairs of his beard; the praying-places of Abraham and -Elijah and other “very fine, high-class people,” as our dragoman -described<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_153" id="page_153"></a>{153}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_020" id="ill_020"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<a href="images/ill_022_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_022_sml.jpg" width="500" height="361" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">THE WEST SIDE OF THE TEMPLE AREA.</p> - -<div class="blockquot"><p>From the barracks near the site of the Tower of Antonia. Above the -domed building in the right foreground rises Mount Zion. The rosy -hills to the left are the mountains of Judea.</p></div> -</div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">them to us; the round hole where the rock let Mohammed through when he -ascended to heaven, the hollow place in the roof of the cavern where it -rose to let him stand erect to pray, the tongue with which it spoke, and -the mark of the angel Gabriel’s finger when it had to be held down from -following him in his ascension. Still more disenchanting is the knot of -underground superstitions that desecrate the holy place, and rob it of -its freshness and healthy simplicity, like snakes in the garden. The -wild imagination of the East has pictured to itself the regions which -lie underneath this sanctuary in its own grim way. In spite of a very -obvious pillar, and a bit of white-washed wall to be seen in the cavern, -the rock is supposed to hover unsupported over the abyss. Beneath is -“the well of souls,” where the dead assemble twice weekly to pray. Some -think of these departed ones as those who wait for the Resurrection, but -a darker fancy holds that the gates of hell are here. The worshipper -feels the souls of the dead flitting about him, and prays with the cries -of the lost in his ears. Even the open spaces of the court are haunted -by unclean legends, and seem to be heavy with the odour of graveyard -mould. Here, at St. George’s dome, with the two red granite pillars in -front of it, is the place where Solomon tormented the demons; there, by -the eastern wall, is the throne whereon he sat when dead, the corpse -leaning on his staff to cheat them, until worms gnawed the staff -through, the body fell forward, and the demons found out the trick.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_154" id="page_154"></a>{154}</span></p> - -<p>In common decency, any place that lays claim to sacredness must have -something to say to worshippers regarding conduct; but the ethics of the -Mosque of Omar are a match for its impostures, alike in gruesomeness and -in impudence. They are all of the nature of magic tests, by which souls -are to be tried for their eternal fate. The little arcades at the top of -the steps of the platform are called “Balances” because the scales of -judgment are to be suspended there on the Great Day. The Dome of the -Chain owes its name to the circumstance that there a golden chain hung -at David’s place of judgment, which had to be grasped by witnesses and -dropped a link when a lie was told. A place in the outer wall is shown -from which a wire will be suspended on the Day of Judgment, whose other -end will be made fast on the Mount of Olives. Christ will sit on the -wall and Mohammed on the mount. Over this wire must all men find their -way, but only the good will cross, the wicked falling into the valley -beneath. In the El Aksa Mosque a couple of pillars stand very near each -other, so worn that they are perceptibly thinned. The space between them -bulges, in which a piece of spiked iron-work is now inserted. These were -another test for the final award—he who could squeeze himself through -the aperture, and he alone, had found the true “narrow way” to heaven.</p> - -<p>Frauds such as these force upon every visitor the question how far the -Mohammedans themselves believe them. The utter want of earnestness, or -anything that to a Western mind bears the resemblance of reality, is<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_155" id="page_155"></a>{155}</span> -painfully evident in the attendants who guide you through the mosque. -You are forced to respect its sacredness by purchasing the loan of -slippers to cover your boots, and you feel rather like one entering a -circus than a place of worship, when you have been transformed into an -illuminated caricature by means of one yellow and another red slipper. -Your guide, who wears the appearance of a convict in clericals, greatly -enjoys your picturesqueness, and makes haste to conduct you to a certain -jasper slab into which Mohammed drove nineteen nails of gold (which -look, however, indistinguishable from iron). A nail comes out at the end -of every epoch, and when all are gone the end of the world will come. -One day the devil destroyed all but three and a half of them, when the -Angel Gabriel, caught napping for once, stopped the mischief just in -time. Here you are invited to lay any coins you may chance to have about -you, and assured that if the coin be silver you will save your soul by -giving it. As the coins are tabled, the whole body of assistant clergy -assembles to count the collection.</p> - -<p>All this, and much else, is but the inevitable outcome of a worship that -gathers round a stone. It is a petrified worship, hard and dead as its -sacred rock. Nothing could be more pathetic than a window in El Aksa -almost darkened with little rags of clothing hung there by poor folk who -come to pray for their sick friends. If Syrian Christianity is corrupt, -it is at least not so pitiless as Syrian Mohammedanism. The very aspect -and situation of the rival shrines is symbolic.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_156" id="page_156"></a>{156}</span> The mosque does not -really love men, whether it really believes in God or not. It sits apart -in its wide enclosure, while the Church of the Sepulchre is huddled -indistinguishably into the thickest pressure of the life of men and -women in the city. The church seems, by its rugged and broken outline, -to sympathise with the shattered fortunes of the life around it; it is -grey and ruinous-looking, as if it had borne man’s sorrows and carried -them. The mosque, with all its beauty, seems to sit there like some -great sleek sphinx, watching everything, but sharing little and loving -none of the misery around it. In this city of ruins there is something -repellent about its smooth and self-complacent finish. No, the mosque -does not really love men; whether it really believes in itself and its -miracles or not is another of the many Mohammedan things which God only -knows.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_157" id="page_157"></a>{157}</span></p> - -<h3><a name="CHAPTER_V-ii" id="CHAPTER_V-ii"></a>CHAPTER V<br /><br /> -CRUSADER</h3> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">To</span> tell even in barest outline the long story of the Crusades would be a -task as impossible as it would be thankless. The magic of Sir Walter -Scott’s <i>Talisman</i> is happily not yet dead, and in some degree the -Crusader still lives as an actual and human figure in our imagination. -Many Christians who had come as pilgrims had settled in the land as its -inhabitants, and for four centuries after the Arabian conquest these -continued both their trade and their worship under the tolerably mild -Mohammedan rule. In the eleventh century all was changed by the Saracen -invasion. Pilgrims were extortionately taxed at the gates of Jerusalem; -their lives were imperilled, their persons and their devotions insulted. -The old commerce, which had grown to considerable proportions, was -ruined, and pilgrimage, from being a lucrative and pleasant service, -became an almost certain martyrdom.</p> - -<p>It was this state of affairs which sent Peter the Hermit through Europe -on his great campaign in 1093, and those extraordinary wars that raged -in Syria<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_158" id="page_158"></a>{158}</span> through two centuries bore the complex character of the -motives which had prompted them. From the departure of that motley -rabble which followed the Hermit to the East in the first Crusade, down -to the pitiful expedition of French children who started 30,000 strong -from Vendôme in 1212, there stretches perhaps the most picturesque -period in all history.<a name="FNanchor_28_28" id="FNanchor_28_28"></a><a href="#Footnote_28_28" class="fnanchor">[28]</a></p> - -<p>The mass of paradox and contradiction which that period presents is no -less striking. It was an invasion by the West, whose purpose was to -rehabilitate an Eastern faith. It was a religious war carried on by the -jealousies and ambitions of rival nations. It was the occasion of some -of the most statesmanlike government that the world has seen, and it was -accompanied from first to last by frequent outbursts of treachery, -massacre, and lust. It was the most airy dream and at the same time the -most effective practical force of its time. It was the expression of the -most ascetic severity and the most reckless luxury. Utterly futile, -commercially and socially disastrous, often wholly irreligious, it was -yet everywhere a massive and purposeful conception, in which the -determination and forcefulness of the West thrust their iron wedge clean -to the centre of this sleepy land. Its high idealism, curiously alloyed -with grosser elements both sensual and brutal, was yet able<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_159" id="page_159"></a>{159}</span> to preserve -through all the genuine spiritual fire of chivalry and of faith.</p> - -<p>Our task is simply to ascertain what all this stands for in the history -of Palestine, and what it has left behind it there as its memorial. In -two words, it stands for the contact of the East and West, and for their -separateness. Into Europe the Crusades brought much from the East. It -was due to them more than to all other causes that there was so immense -an increase of Eastern merchandise in Western markets—not of Jerusalem -relics only, but of Damascus ware and of Persian and even Indian produce -from beyond the great rivers. Their influence on architecture, too, is a -well-known fact of Western history. The Mosque of Omar rose on at least -three European sites, and the plan of many another piece of Byzantine -building and Arabesque decoration was brought home by the Crusaders from -the wars. Into the East, again, the Crusades brought much from the West. -From north to south of Palestine one meets with the remains and -memorials of that invasion. Theirs are the footprints most visible -throughout the land. Everything in Syria has felt the touch of them and -retained its mark. At every turn one finds something recognisable and -homely to Western ears and eyes—the name of a castle, the chiselling of -a stone, the moulding of metal—they are strangely familiar as they are -met so far away from home. Yet they survive as wreckage, and as wreckage -only. He who hopes to westernise the East is attempting a task in which -all must fail, whether they be soldiers or priests, missionaries or -statesmen.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_160" id="page_160"></a>{160}</span> The ancient Eastern life has long ago flowed back over the -relics of the Western occupation of Syria.</p> - -<p>The surviving traces are of many kinds. There are the descendants of -Crusaders, sprung of intermarriages with Eastern women, and still -preserving a distinctively European type in little suggestive details of -feature or of hair. Names such as Belfort, Belvoir, Mirabel, -Blanchegarde, or Sinjil (St. Giles), coming without apology next to the -Hebrew and Arabic names of villages in Palestine, strike one with very -much the same shock as old Scottish place-names do, alternating with -incorporated aboriginal ones, on the railway stations of the Australian -bush. Relics like the sword and spurs of Godfrey de Bouillon may, like -most other relics, be discounted, but not so the wonderful masonry of -castles and of churches which everywhere overawes the man accustomed to -modern walls. Winding our way with tight rein along the narrow and -crooked streets of Tyre, we suddenly plunged into the darkness and foul -air of the Bazaar. At the other end of it, emerging under a Gothic -archway, we found ourselves in the courtyard of a khan, a very dirty and -unpleasant place. Seeing nothing but unclean stables, we imagined that -our horses were to be put up here and perhaps fed, and we pitied them. -Then, to our astonishment, we discovered that this was the old Crusader -Church, where these broken and discoloured arches had once echoed the -hymns and prayers of European chivalry; and that somewhere among them -lay the bones of the great emperor so famous in<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_161" id="page_161"></a>{161}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_021" id="ill_021"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<a href="images/ill_023_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_023_sml.jpg" width="500" height="353" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">ENTRANCE TO THE CHURCH OF THE HOLY SEPULCHRE.</p></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">history and legend—“Der alte Barbarossa, der Kaiser Friederich.” Not -less affecting in its way was the discovery of a little patch of -snapdragon flowers on the ruined walls of Belfort Castle. We were -informed that the plant is not elsewhere found in Syria, and the -likelihood is that some Crusader’s lady brought it from the garden of a -far-off French or English home.</p> - -<p>The Crusader was at once the dreamer, the worshipper, and the fighter of -the Middle Age. The knight was not indeed the sort of man whom at first -sight we would suspect of dreaming. Could we see him riding down the -street to-day, we should probably be reminded of some village blacksmith -on a Clydesdale horse. Yet he had been dreaming dreams and seeing -visions. He was a gentleman and a man of feeling, though he had his own -rough ways of shewing it. Part of what had set him dreaming was the -instinct of travel and the literature of travel which in those days was -so quaint and picturesque. No doubt this travel literature was largely -due to pilgrims, but there were others then who could play no tune but -“Over the hills and far away.” Travellers’ half-remembered and -exaggerated adventures conspired with the fantastic imaginings of the -untravelled rustic to create that magic land beyond the horizon where -giants, monsters, and devils had their home. All the wistfulness, the -dream, and the desire of the ancient days are there. The chroniclers of -the time before the Norman Conquest are the most fascinating of -geographers, and the singers of Arthurian romance in the later days of -the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_162" id="page_162"></a>{162}</span> Crusades arrived at a geography which was an utter bewilderment, -the result of ages of vague travel and rumours from the Syrian seat of -war. Babylon and Wales and places with names wholly unpronounceable are -in sublime confusion, and the geography in general is that of -Thackeray’s Little Billee, who saw from his mast-head “Jerusalem and -Madagascar and South Amerikee.”</p> - -<p>Jerusalem always came first. “The Crusades,” as Sidonia says in -<i>Tancred</i>, “renovated the spiritual hold which Asia has always had upon -the North.” The spell of the East had come upon the West, and in that -there lay a reason for the Crusades deeper than any commercial or even -military attraction. The West was waiting for it. Behind the British men -of the twelfth century lay a heredity of patriotic legend connected -largely with the battle of Christianity against Paganism under Arthur. -There lay the foundation of much that was best in the crusading -enthusiasm. On their own soil they had followed the King and fought -under him for Christ. But to satisfy the hearts of these rough men it -needed more than all such practical life could yield them, even when -that life was so exciting as it was then. There is an infinite pathos in -the dream that was coming to clearness through those years. Discontented -with the glories even of Arthur’s court, longing for a spiritual -something which might give to chivalry its finest meaning, they sought -the Holy Grail. Until, well on in the twelfth century, the shadowy -figures of Walter Map and Robert de Borron<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_163" id="page_163"></a>{163}</span> formulate the romance,<a name="FNanchor_29_29" id="FNanchor_29_29"></a><a href="#Footnote_29_29" class="fnanchor">[29]</a> -we see it growing out of old pagan legends baptized by Christian -missionaries and blended with Bible stories. It emerges at last in the -romances of the French Trouvères, the summit and flower of all past -idealisms, the spiritual secret and gist of life, and the chief end of -noble men. This is all well known to those who interest themselves in -that spiritual search which is the main business of choice souls in all -ages, and which in that age took literary form in the Grail Quest. But -to us it is specially interesting to note that the century whose later -years received the Trouvère legend from Chrétien de Troyes began with an -event but for which that legend would never have assumed the form in -which it appeared. In 1101 Cæssarea was besieged and taken by Baldwin I. -“It yielded a rich booty. Among other prizes was found a hexagonal vase -of green crystal, supposed to have been used at the administration of -the sacrament, and now preserved in Paris. This vase plays an important -part in mediæval poetry as the Holy Grail.” The visionary aspect of the -Crusades is that which continually obtrudes itself as one reads their -history. Tasso’s <i>Gerusalemme Liberata</i> is full of it. Even so rough and -boisterous a hero as Richard is obviously a dreamer also. Nothing in all -this history is more striking than that fateful day when, after marching -to within seven leagues of Jerusalem, Richard commanded his army to -halt, and courted their murmurs during a<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_164" id="page_164"></a>{164}</span> month’s unaccountable -inaction. Performing unheard-of feats of valour in minor sallies, he -could only weep when he beheld the towers of the Holy City, and after -routing Saladin’s army in a great battle at Joppa, negotiated a truce -and wandered off to shipwreck and imprisonment, commending the Holy Land -to God, and praying that it might be granted him to return again and -recover it.<a name="FNanchor_30_30" id="FNanchor_30_30"></a><a href="#Footnote_30_30" class="fnanchor">[30]</a></p> - -<p>As worshippers, the Crusaders are famous figures in the Holy Land. It is -hard to reconcile the tales of wild debauchery which followed almost all -their victories, with the obviously genuine religious enthusiasm that -swept the hosts down weeping on their knees when they caught first sight -of Jerusalem. Yet the worship was sincere, and there were pure and -gentle spirits among them whom victory did not demoralise. They are -always, indeed, armed worshippers—at first a religious soldiery, -afterwards a military priesthood, as Stebbing puts it. This composite -character is well brought out in the two orders of knights, the -Hospitallers and the Templars. The former, working for the sick in the -Holy City, wore a black robe with a white cross upon the breast of it, -but when there was fighting to be done they covered this with a surcoat -of scarlet on which a silver cross was embroidered. They lived simply, -contenting themselves with such lodging and fare as were offered them, -and they were bound to keep themselves provided with a light which must -always be kept burning while they slept. The Templars<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_165" id="page_165"></a>{165}</span> pledged -themselves in even stricter vows, and were warrior-priests in the most -literal sense of the term. On the summit of Mount Tabor there is the -ruin of a Crusader church, whose broken walls still enclose the sacred -space where once men worshipped. Spacious and strongly built, the ruin -has a severe grandeur of its own. In the chancel an altar has been -rebuilt, and an upturned Corinthian capital set upon it, in the centre -of which is fixed a heavy iron cross. That iron cross seems to sum up in -its grave symbolism the very spirit of the Crusades. Many of their -churches were reconstructions of older Christian edifices, and most of -them have been transmuted into mosques, so that their ecclesiastical -architecture still remaining is as composite as their character and -their enterprise. Yet enough remains of what is distinctively their own -to show at once the massive strength and the decorative beauty of their -buildings. Its strength is that of men who were accustomed to build -fortresses; the buttressed walls are of immense thickness, and the -mortar is sometimes harder than the stone. Its beauty has been defaced -by the mutilation of much fine work, but from what is left we know how -well they carved; and there is a certain high solemnity about their -arches and columns which tells of men whose minds were large, strong, -and real.</p> - -<p>One curious fact, to which Conder often directs attention, is constantly -perplexing the traveller. Their identifications of sacred sites are -those of men whose enthusiasm far exceeded their knowledge. Had they<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_166" id="page_166"></a>{166}</span> -taken time to consult the Scriptures, or to read them with any -thoughtfulness, countless errors would have been avoided. But the -soldier instinct is very far from the critical, and they were impatient -to find the sites they wished to see. Anything was sufficient for a -clue. The name Jibrin suggested “Gabriel,” and a great church arose in -honour of the Archangel. Athlit was near the sea-shore, and the -Crusaders who lived there found Tyre and Capernaum in its immediate -neighbourhood. For reasons equally cogent, Shiloh was brought within a -mile or two of Jerusalem, Shechem became Sychar, and the heights of Ebal -and Gerizim were recognised as the Dan and Bethel of Jeroboam’s calves. -Most curious of all, the little hill of Jebel Duhy, on whose summit you -look down across the valley from the top of Tabor, was named Hermon, for -no other reason than that a psalm places the two together in its promise -that “Tabor and Hermon shall rejoice in Thy name.” Altogether, these -worshippers were in too great haste. “Crusading topography is more -remarkable than reliable.”</p> - -<p>Great as the Crusaders were in dream and in worship, it is their -fighting that remains for ever most impressive and most characteristic. -Of no men in history is the verse truer, in spite of all their -extravagances—</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Know that the men of great renown<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Were men of simple needs:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Bare to the Lord they laid them down<br /></span> -<span class="i2">And slept on mighty deeds.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">Looked at from a distance, the Crusades very generally wear the aspect -of a stream of vivid colour—a<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_167" id="page_167"></a>{167}</span> spectacular progress of Europe through a -corner of Asia, whose main feature is its brilliant picturesqueness. On -the spot the quality in them which is by far the most impressive is -their stern reality and fighting weight. The Crusader was doubtless one -who in his time played many parts, but whatever else he was, no one who -has seen the remains of his work will question that he was at least “a -first-class fighting man.” The figure of Richard, as it is preserved for -us in the records of the older historians, may be more or less -apocryphal, but it is at least true enough to crusading ideals, which -must have found many an actual realisation in these strong and fearless -soldiers of the Cross. We read of amazing captures of booty; of single -combats in which “the King at one blow severs the head, right shoulder -and arm of his opponent from the rest of his body”; of a conflict in -which only one Christian perished, while “the Turks lost seven hundred -men and above fifteen hundred horses.” At Joppa the king leaps out of -his ship before it can reach land, and rushes on the enemy. Three days -later he and his knights are surprised and have to fight half-naked, -some in their shirts and some even barefoot; yet they win. At another -time we see Richard plunging alone into the midst of the hostile army, -and fighting until Saladin’s brother sends him a gift of two Arab -war-horses to enable him to fight it out. Altogether such a hero was he, -that the Moslems asserted “that even the horses bristled their manes at -the name of Richard.” No wonder if in the popular imagination he became -for England hardly distinguishable from that<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_168" id="page_168"></a>{168}</span> St. George who had already -been identified with Perseus, who on these same sands had fought the -dragon for Andromeda.</p> - -<p>The grandeur of crusading warfare lingers in the mighty ruins of their -castles. Nothing could surpass the impressiveness of these castles, seen -on hill-tops from below, combing the sky with the sharp broken teeth of -their ruined towers, or rearing a black “mailed head of menace” against -the stars. Many of them are on the sites of older fortresses, and -actually stand on Jewish or Roman foundations. By far the most imposing -of such castles is that of Banias, which crowns that spur of Hermon at -which “Dan leaped from Bashan” long ago. It must have been capable of -quartering a small army, and the quantity of broken vessels confirms the -impression. Cisterns, vaulted and groined archways, mosaic floors, -dungeons, and every other luxury of their European homes had been -imported hither.</p> - -<p>The Crusaders ran a line of fortresses along that western edge of the -Jordan valley where Israel, as we saw, failed to protect the mouths of -her gorges. Belvoir, “the Star of the Wind,” guards from its lofty -promontory the passes immediately south of the Sea of Galilee. Bethshan -itself, where the Canaanites lingered to the standing shame of Israel, -shows the well-preserved remains of a crusader bridge and fortress. Not -less striking is the sea-board line of castles. Not only in such old -localities as Tyre and Sidon, Cæsarea and Joppa, did fortresses arise, -but on at least two quite new sites—those of Athlit and Acre.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_169" id="page_169"></a>{169}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_022" id="ill_022"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<a href="images/ill_024_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_024_sml.jpg" width="500" height="335" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">INTERIOR OF THE DOME OF THE CHAIN, LOOKING NORTH.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>Athlit is unmentioned in Scripture, and only the eye of seafaring -soldiers could have discovered how its little crease in the long -straight line of coast might be utilised for defence. Acre is “the Key -to Syria”; but it was left for the Crusaders to discover that fact.</p> - -<p>Yet with all this might and purpose and strategic instinct manifest in -every mile of Syria, failure is written broad across the land in these -ruins. At two points the sense of it becomes especially acute. One is -the battlefield below the very mountain which tradition has assigned to -the preaching of the Sermon on the Mount. The horrors of that field were -such that even yet it is impossible to look without shuddering upon the -flattened top of Hattin, where the black basalt stands out from the -green slopes below. The Crusaders were rushed into the open plain, near -which Saladin’s cavalry were waiting for them, and they met his assault -unfed, unrested, and without even water to quench their thirst. -Throughout a long hot day they perished round the banner of the Cross, a -final element of horror being added when the Saracens set fire to the -scrub, and unhorsed knights were roasted alive in their armour. That was -the decisive battle of the Crusades, and Saladin marched after it -straight upon Jerusalem.</p> - -<p>The other point at which the failure of the Crusades has set up its -monument is at their own Athlit. The creation of their genius, and for -solidity and massive strength perhaps the most characteristic ruin in -Syria, it is also the saddest thing of all they have left for a -memorial. Near its rocks King Louis IX. of France<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_170" id="page_170"></a>{170}</span>—most unfortunate and -yet most saintly of all crusading kings—was shipwrecked. Here, too, at -the end of the thirteenth century, the Knights Templars made their last -retreat after the fall of Acre, and it was from its castle that they -departed—the last to abandon the last Crusade. Seen from the sea, the -compact and rounded promontory of Athlit presents the appearance of a -clenched fist menacing and defiant. Its history grimly corroborates the -imagination that here through centuries of decay the land as it were -gathers itself together, and thrusts out this grim headland in perpetual -defiance of the Western world.</p> - -<p>The Crusades stand for more in Palestine than it is easy to realise. The -comprehensiveness of their historical significance is by no means -exhausted when we have stated it in such paradoxes as those with which -our chapter began. They were indeed the greatest sham and at the same -time the greatest reality of Syrian history, but they were far more than -that. They were heirs to all the past of the country, and they did much -to perpetuate that past and to carry it on into the time to come. Even -from the Moslem life they wrestled with, they borrowed something. They, -and the chivalry which they fostered, are the most spectacular part of -Western history, and give a dash of brilliant colour to the grey life of -the Middle Ages. That brilliance is in part the splendour of the East. -The Crusader has borrowed from the Saracen at least a scarf for his -sword.</p> - -<p>It is chiefly as builders that the Crusaders remain in Syria exposed to -modern eyes, and in their<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_171" id="page_171"></a>{171}</span> building they have perpetuated and utilised -the other three invasions. From the first Christians they took over -their churches and rebuilt them, retaining something and adding more. -From the older Jewish architects they had almost as great an -inheritance. There seems no incongruity in the heavy stone mangers and -far-driven iron rings which they fixed in the walls of those tremendous -vaults on which the Temple area rests; and it is by a not unnatural -transference that tradition has given to these the name of Solomon’s -Stables. Solomon’s vaults they may have been, but as stables they were -of crusading origin. Their own building is a rough imitation of the -drafted stones of the Jews. The rustic work is much the same, only -rougher, but the plain chiselling is very far from the minute fineness -of the older workmanship. Altogether, they were fighters first and -builders second. Like the men of Nehemiah’s time, “every one with one of -his hands wrought in the work, and with the other hand held a weapon.... -Every one had his sword girded by his side, and so builded.” Nor did -they fail to utilise the work of Roman builders. At Cæsarea there is the -most striking instance of this, and one of the most suggestive facts in -the whole story of the Crusaders. Cæsarea was the most Roman of all -Syrian towns. Built as the seaport for Sebaste by Herod, it was the part -of Syria which travellers and governors sailing from Italy first -sighted, and it was designed to give them the impression of a land -Romanised. Herod’s delight in pillars is attested by the colonnades<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_172" id="page_172"></a>{172}</span> of -Sebaste, and the wealth of shaft and capital which marks the ruins of -all his cities. But in Cæsarea he seems to have excelled himself. The -Roman mole which forms the northern side of the harbour “is composed of -some sixty or seventy prostrate columns lying side by side in the water -like rows of stranded logs.”<a name="FNanchor_31_31" id="FNanchor_31_31"></a><a href="#Footnote_31_31" class="fnanchor">[31]</a> On the long promontory south of the -mole stands the Crusader Castle, notable for the circumstance that the -Crusaders built hundreds of lighter and shorter columns into their walls -to thorough-bind them, so that, in Oliphant’s exact and graphic words, -“the butts project like rows of cannon from the side of a man-of-war.” -Which thing is for an allegory; and one of the most eloquent of all -sermons in stone it is. Rome did more for Christianity than all its -friends, while she was as yet its enemy. Without her courts of justice -Paul would have had short shrift from his countrymen. Her roads and her -citizenship gave to the first missionaries of the Cross their exit upon -the world and their opportunity. Her laws gave them not protection only, -but a groundwork for much that entered into that theology which -conquered the thought of the world. Paul appealed unto Cæsar, and he -wrote to the Romans his gospel expressed in the forms with which they -were most familiar. And it was at Cæsarea that he made his appeal, doing -in flesh and blood what his disciples a thousand years later did in -stone—thorough-binding the walls of the building of Christian faith -with Roman columns.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_173" id="page_173"></a>{173}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="PART_III" id="PART_III"></a>PART III<br /><br /> -THE SPIRIT OF SYRIA</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">In</span> the first and second parts of this book we have been collecting -impressions of the Land and its Invaders. It remains for us in the third -part to gather these together into something which may enable us to -realise more clearly the general meaning and quality of the spirit of -Syria. In the main two things must be noted, and the first of them is -religious. Whatever else Palestine may be, she is certainly a land with -a God. The meaning of Syria is disclosed in her Israelite and Christian -periods, whose great fact and characteristic process is the revelation -of God to men on earth. All her other invasions have to reckon with that -fact. Some of them were bitterly hostile to it, but they were powerless -to efface it. Others were indifferent, entering Syria for ends of their -own; but history shews them bent over to God’s purposes and -unconsciously made the instruments of working out His will. That will -brought Israel to her land, isolated her there, hemmed her in, bore her -and carried her in everlasting arms on through her centuries, finally -was incarnate in her life. For Jesus Christ was a Syrian, and we must -orientalise our thoughts of Him before we can rightly understand the -Christian revelation.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_174" id="page_174"></a>{174}</span></p> - -<p>Not less clear is the second impression, which is that of the -unfinishedness and imperfection of all things Syrian. It is a place of -wreckage, new and old. But the peculiarity of that wreckage is that it -was always there, more or less. None of the ideals of the land were ever -quite realised. It was never completely conquered by the Israelites, -their ambition stopping short and their energy flagging before their -task was done. It was never completely cultivated, or made to yield its -full harvest of natural wealth. In countless small things this -incompleteness is evident. The contrast between the beauty of the -distant view and the disorder and slovenliness of the near has been -already noted. The post-office in Damascus is a quite good post-office, -so far as letters and telegrams go. But you inquire for these in a hall -which looks like a very dirty stable-yard with a very dirty fountain in -the middle of it, furnished with little rough-sawn wooden boxes for -private letters, such as no self-respecting grocer would pack with -oranges. Even the tombs, about which so much sacredness is supposed to -gather, are the untidiest of sepulchres. You may see a large and -expensive tombstone, shining white in the distance, with all the air of -aristocratic self-importance which man’s pride can lend to death; but -when you approach, it is railed off with bamboo and barbed wire which -might have been picked off a rubbish-heap. There are good roads in -places, but they lead to nowhere. Generally they collapse into mere -watercourses after a few miles, or they run on in a squared and measured -lane of sharp boulders down<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_175" id="page_175"></a>{175}</span> which no horse can walk. Nor is this -incompleteness a peculiarity of Turkish administration. Probably nothing -in Palestine is older than the landmarks which divide the fields. From -generation to generation these have been held sacred, laws against their -removal having been in force among the ancient Canaanites before the -conquest by Israel. So sacred are they that even murderers and thieves -will seldom dare to tamper with them. Yet through all the long past the -landmarks are said to have remained as the first men laid them -down—mere inconspicuous heaps of little stones, the easiest things in -the world to remove.</p> - -<p>When we take the unfinishedness of the land along with the revelation -and consider them together, we can hardly fail to gain a lesson of -far-reaching meaning. The great incompleteness of Syria—the thing in -which her life has been most lamentably unfinished—was her response to -the revelation of her God. She never was at pains to understand it; she -never fully opened her heart to its new progress, nor felt her high -destiny as the bearer of good tidings to the world. She never seriously -set herself to obey its plainest ethical demands. The wreckage is her -price paid for the neglect. No man nor nation can finish any task to -perfection, who has not done justice to such revelation of God as his -heart and conscience have received. It is truth to the inward light that -keeps us from losing heart and enables us to feel that energy and -patience to the end are worth our while. Right dealing with revelation -is the secret of all efficient performance. The combination in -Palestine<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_176" id="page_176"></a>{176}</span> of such revelation and such defect in strenuous action shows -us a land that has just missed the most amazing destiny on earth.</p> - -<p>It is in the remembrance of these thoughts that the chapters of this -part should be read. The Shadow of Death has fallen because these men -could not escape their knowledge of some greatness in death, more moving -than anything life had to show. The spectral is but a degenerate and -perverse form of their sense of God. The Cross gives its ethical -significance to the burden and sorrow of the land. Resurrection shows -signs even now that God has not yet done with Syria. But first, before -we treat these aspects of her spirit, let us look at it on its brighter -side—the smile and song of the land.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_177" id="page_177"></a>{177}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_023" id="ill_023"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<a href="images/ill_025_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_025_sml.jpg" width="500" height="357" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">INTERIOR OF THE DOME OF THE ROCK (MOSQUE OF OMAR), FROM -THE SOUTH-EAST.</p></div> -</div> - -<h3><a name="CHAPTER_I-iii" id="CHAPTER_I-iii"></a>CHAPTER I<br /><br /> -THE LIGHTER SIDE OF THINGS</h3> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">One</span> easily forgets, among the many sorrows of the Holy Land, that there -is any lighter side to the picture there. Yet such a side there is, and -always has been. Nature is not always severe, nor the spirit of man -melancholy, in the East. Both nature and man are sometimes found in -lighter vein here as elsewhere. Stevenson’s most charming good word for -the world he always defended so gallantly, is specially applicable to -the Syrian part of it.—“It is a shaggy world, and yet studded with -gardens; where the salt and tumbling sea receives rivers running from -among reeds and lilies.” Syria has always known the value of her -gardens, and felt the sweet enchantment of her reeds and lilies. Was not -her first story told of a garden where four such rivers flowed, and her -noblest sermon that whose text was “the lilies of the field” and “the -birds of the air”? What pleasantness of open nature there is in these -two latter expressions! What sense of field-breadth and sky-space, in -which the Preacher had room for breathing and for delight! Every -Israelite, sitting under his vine and fig tree, or going forth to -meditate in the fields at evening, knew this charm. From of old the -inhabitants have taken delight in exchanging roofs for bowers in their -fields and gardens, or for booths, built with green branches on their<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_178" id="page_178"></a>{178}</span> -house-roofs. Many a sweet vista is seen in Palestine framed in trellised -vines or in passion-flower swinging over a roofed fountain or a garden -house. The mountains were often bare and unhomely, for at no time can -any but a minor part of them have been cultivated; yet even the -wind-swept heights were inhabited by health and hope and gladness, and -when a shepherd passed by, or the reapers shouted in the harvest-fields, -the heart of the men of Israel sang aloud. In the words of the 65th -Psalm this exhilaration and childlike glee finds its most perfect -expression; we quote them in that old Scottish rhymed version which has -so singularly caught their spirit:—</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">They drop upon the pastures wide,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">That do in deserts lie;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The little hills on ev’ry side<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Rejoice right pleasantly.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">With flocks the pastures clothed be,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">The vales with corn are clad;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And now they shout and sing to thee,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">For thou hast made them glad.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>Similarly the Jordan, usually thought of with a certain gloom, and -rendered still more dismal by its persistent allegorical association -with death, is by no means so melancholy as it is supposed to be. Its -rise, indeed, was from a black cave, where ancient pagan worship erected -its shrines, seeing life issue there from the abyss of death. Its course -leads it far down, like the dark stream of classic fable, below the -surface of the earth and ocean. Yet there is no sense of all that<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_179" id="page_179"></a>{179}</span> as -one looks at it from any point in its course. The trees of Syria are -generally disappointing. For the most part solitary, or undersized where -there is a wood, many of them are decaying, and most of them are dull in -colour. But the vegetation of the Jordan is a bright exception. Even at -its lowest point, when it is hurrying over the last miles to the Dead -Sea, it flows through that rich boscage known as the “Swellings” or the -“Pride” of Jordan, where pilgrims cut their staves. It is to this part -of its course that the words in <i>Tancred</i> apply most exactly, “The -beauty and abundance of the Promised Land may still be found ... ever by -the rushing waters of the bowery Jordan.” Warburton, describing the same -scene in early morning, speaks of the awakening of birds and beasts -there, and then the sunrise, adding, “I lingered long upon that -mountain’s brow, and thought that, so far from deserving all the dismal -epithets that had been bestowed upon it, I had not seen so cheerful or -attractive a scene in Palestine.”</p> - -<p>The scents of the East add to the delightfulness of Nature on her -pleasant side. There are plenty of abominable smells there, but these -are in the towns and villages. The open country is continually -surprising and refreshing its travellers with new perfume. That this is -fully appreciated by the natives, no reader of the Bible can forget. -There we have the scent of spices and of wine; of the field, of water, -and of Lebanon; of budding vines, mandrakes, apples; of ointment, of -incense, and of raiment. In such references we see the East inhaling the -fragrance of the land with an almost<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_180" id="page_180"></a>{180}</span> passionate delight. It is all -there still. The scent of the desert after rain has been already -referred to, but the same aromatic perfume may be enjoyed by climbing -the hills above Beyrout, where every ground-plant seems to breathe forth -spices. Again, there are the blossoming trees, the heavy perfume of -orange-flower, and the simple fragrance of roses. Best of all, there is -the clean smell of ripe grain in the cornfields, and the fresh, briny -exhilaration of breezes from the sea.</p> - -<p>Such is the lighter side of Nature; and man is not by any means so far -out of touch with it as is often supposed. The severity of material -conditions and of historical experience has not been able quite to -suppress man’s gaiety. It is well that this has been so, for here -certainly the words of the Scots song are true enough: “Werena my heart -licht, I wad dee.” With so much of the darker powers of the universe -pressing hard upon them, one trembles to imagine what the spirit of -Syria would have been without those inexhaustible stores of gaiety that -break forth sometimes like her great river from the very darkness of the -abyss. Her laughter is not that of progressive lands looking to the -future in the great joy of an intelligent hope. It is rather a part of -her inalienable childhood, whose fresh sweetness and virginity have -somehow been permitted to remain through all her sorrows. Renan -describes the heroes of the Bible as “always young, healthy, and strong, -scarcely at all superstitious, passionate, simple, and grand.” There is -still some inheritance of such life, perpetually young and even -childish, in the Holy Land.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_181" id="page_181"></a>{181}</span></p> - -<p>The first appearance of an Eastern is grave and solemn, with an element -of contempt in it rather trying to the would-be jester or too familiar -stranger. But this is not wholly due to any weight of gloom pressing on -his heart. It has, with singular ingenuity, been traced to quite minor -and apparently insignificant causes, such as the wearing of flowing -robes by the men and the burden-bearing of the women. There can be no -doubt that both clothes and burdens exercise a powerful influence on -character; and it may well be the case that the management of their -garment has taught dignity to the men, while the carrying of heavy -waterpots has helped to make the women graceful and erect. There is also -the instinct of self-defence, and the constant remembrance of danger. -Every Eastern, however prosperous, impresses one with the idea that his -table is spread for him in the presence of his enemies. This leads -him—especially if he be an Arab—to assume a show of superiority and a -bullying swagger, which seem to the uninitiated quite impervious to any -thought of fun. But the mask is easily laid aside, and the gravest and -most contemptuous Syrian will suddenly collapse into harsh laughter or -forget himself in childish interest.</p> - -<p>It would be wonderful if it were otherwise. The East is full of -provocatives to mirth—not merely such as seem ridiculous to a stranger -because they are foreign, but things grotesque in themselves. Take the -one instance of the camel. Much has been written about him from many -points of view, but justice has never<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_182" id="page_182"></a>{182}</span> yet been done to the camel as a -humorous person. Yet he is the most humorous of all the inhabitants of -the East. Beside him, with his sardonic pleasantry, the monkey is a -mountebank and the donkey but a solemn little ass. He has been described -as “the tall, simple, smiling camel”; but on closer acquaintance he -turns out to be hardly so simple as he might be taken for, and if he -smiles, he is generally smiling at you. The camels you meet in Syria are -carrying barley with the air of kings, and regarding their human -companions with, at best, a sentiment of contemptuous tolerance. The -lower lip of a camel is one of the most expressive features in the whole -repertoire of natural history. The humours of this animal reached for us -their climax at Sheikh Miskin, while we were waiting for the Damascus -train. A camel had been persuaded to kneel in order to receive its load -of long poles brought by the railway. It was roaring steadily, in a -fiendish and yet conscientious manner. Ten men were loading it, of whom -one stood upon its near fore-leg, two fastened the poles upon its back, -and the remaining seven looked on and made remarks. The beast waited -until the poles were all but fixed—ten of them or so. Then it indulged -in a shake, which sent them rolling in all directions. Finally it was -loaded, with two of the sticks on one side and one on the other, their -ends projecting far out behind and in front. It rose, nearly ruining a -well-dressed Arab who had somehow got in among it. Just then the train -arrived and the camel fled incontinently, sidewise like a crab, -spreading the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_183" id="page_183"></a>{183}</span> fear of death in man and beast for many yards around, and -dragging a terrified driver, who hung on to its head-rope, across -towards the distant east. A loaded camel behaving in this fashion is a -deadlier weapon than a loaded gun.</p> - -<p>Now the native wit always appeared to us to have modelled itself on -camel drollery of this sort. It is generally personal, and its essential -function is to hit somebody. It lacks freshness, and has a certain -suggestion of a clown with “crow’s feet” under his eyes. Sometimes -indeed a Syrian indulges in jokes at his own expense, but more -frequently his facetiousness is at the expense of others, and it is -tolerably direct. The habit of nicknames lends itself to Oriental wit, -the lean man being described familiarly as “Father of Bones,” and the -stout man as “Full Moon of Religion.” Passing through a village some -distance off the usual route of travellers, we were surrounded with -villagers who asked the dragoman why we had come. “To take away your -country!” was the answer, and it was met with peals of laughter. Another -witticism which was immensely appreciated was the remark to some farmers -who were suffering from drought that we in England had stolen their rain -and it had made many people sick there. A boatman on the Sea of Galilee -was being chaffed unmercifully upon the fact that he had once tried to -commit suicide. He appealed, smiling, to one of the passengers as “My -Father,” and pled that he had been mad when he did that. A -fellow-boatman rebuked him for calling the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_184" id="page_184"></a>{184}</span> gentleman “father of a -lunatic,” and the whole crew was dissolved in laughter, the victim -himself heartily joining in the chorus. In Damascus we found a time-worn -Joe Miller in the shout of the nosegay-seller—a very musical cry, which -the guide-book translates “Appease your mother-in-law,” <i>i.e.</i> by -presenting her with a bouquet.</p> - -<p>From of old pleasure has been apt to degenerate in the luxurious East, -and the fun of Syrians shows abundant traces of such degeneration. Many -unpleasant elements mingle with it. One of the recognised forces in -Eastern life is <i>humbug</i>—barefaced bluff and transparent pretence, -which is apparently seen through and yet retains its potency. The -lengths to which this method may go are almost incredible, and cases are -on record of interpreters who have volubly translated a long English -address and afterwards confessed that they did not know a word of the -English language. At times, also, high spirits leads to savagery. The -men who were in charge of our animals were kind and even affectionate to -them, but their moods changed unaccountably. Your donkey-driver, -trotting behind his donkey, will sometimes encourage it with yelling -which would fill any animal less philosophical with the fear of instant -extermination, and he jocularly throws rocks at it until you stop him. -Worst of all, the Syrian humour constantly tends towards indecency of -the most bestial type. The song with which a musical donkey-boy relieves -the monotony of the journey is sometimes quite untranslatable. The -“body-dances,” which form the staple<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_185" id="page_185"></a>{185}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_024" id="ill_024"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 288px;"> -<a href="images/ill_026_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_026_sml.jpg" width="288" height="500" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">THE MOUNT OF OLIVES, FROM A HOUSE-TOP ON MOUNT ZION.</p></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">entertainment provided by wandering Arabs, are often pantomimic, and -their crude realism is unspeakably disgusting.</p> - -<p>Yet there is a very innocent and cheerful vein in the human nature of -Syria. At times it is irrelevant and trying. The camp guards, <i>e.g.</i> who -are hired from the nearest village to watch the sleeping tents, are apt -to beguile the hours of darkness in a manner hardly conducive to repose. -In most of our camps they were silent figures, flitting about in an -almost ghostly fashion, with perfectly noiseless footsteps. But -MacGregor complains of having had to pay his Egyptian guards “for -sleeping very loud to keep away the robbers.” Our difficulties were not -exactly the same as his, but in some places the guards kept singing as -they paced to and fro, and shouted cheerily to one another along the -whole length of the encampment, or whistled incessantly, and -occasionally fired guns to prove their vigilance. There is a sense of -spontaneity and heartiness about the mirth of the East which throws into -strong contrast its subtler and more gloomy characteristics. -Irresponsible and gay, Syrians seem to be grown-up children, and they -retain the ways of childhood. We rarely saw children playing games, but -bands of full-grown men were seen at times playing schoolboys’ field -games with much shouting. Everybody in the cities appears to be either -selling or eating sweetmeats. Sport is rare, but men go forth with guns -to shoot little birds like sparrows. One of the most curious sights of -Damascus is that of shopkeepers and artisans<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_186" id="page_186"></a>{186}</span> who go about the streets -followed by pet lambs instead of dogs, the wool of these strange little -creatures being dyed in brilliant spots of blue or pink.</p> - -<p>The kindliness of the East is as genuine and as pleasing as that of any -land in the West. It is not in evidence indeed when there is nothing to -call it forth. As you pass through the country, the villagers and -townsfolk regard you with indifference if not with scorn. But one must -remember the universal <i>acting</i> of the East—its devotion to -appearances, and its very curious ideas as to which appearances are most -becoming. With that in mind, the indifference and the scorn become less -alarming. You may find the whole spirit of the situation suddenly change -to one of the kindliest. A traveller who has fallen victim to one of the -malarial fevers which are so common in Syria at certain periods, will -never forget the tenderness with which his camp-servants come about his -tent inquiring, “Ente mabsut?” (Are you happy, or well?). When he -returns the inquiry the answer is, “Ente mabsut, ana mabsut” (If you are -happy, I am happy). At Sidon we had just arrived and had the tents -pitched in the open space next the burying-ground. It was Thursday, and -the graves were crowded with visitors—Mohammedan women in black, white, -or light-coloured robes. They did not seem very sad, even beside the -most recent graves, but gossiped and enjoyed their half-holiday, -disappearing before sunset silently, like a flock of pigeons to their -dovecots. The spectacle was theatrical and almost unearthly. It was<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_187" id="page_187"></a>{187}</span> -difficult to persuade oneself that these flitting figures were really -women at all; they seemed rather to be animated bits of landscape. Just -while we were watching this, and feeling all its dreamy remoteness from -human life as we had ever known it, two new figures appeared. They were -the gardener of a neighbouring garden and his young daughter Wurda -(Rhoda, Rose). She was five years of age, a tiny vision of black eyes -and hair, the hair being arranged in two pigtails down her back. She -brought a little bunch of roses for each of us, and as she gave them -kissed our hands with as sweet a shyness as any child anywhere could -have done. The incident, like that on the hill of Samaria, lingers on -the memory, and bears witness to a world of gentleness and kindliness -such as we had little dreamed of. Altogether there are abundant signs -that in ancient days there must have been much of that Syrian life -described by one scholar as “gay and bright, festive and musical—the -very home of songs and dances.” It is pleasant to know that although the -fortunes of the land have saddened her so terribly, there still remains -something at least of her former gaiety.</p> - -<p>Even the religion of Syria has its lighter side. Every student of the -Bible knows how much there was of rejoicing and fresh childlike -revelling in the situation, in the worship of ancient Israel. It is -peculiarly interesting to find that in the Semitic worship before and -apart from the invasion of Israel, so kindly and friendly a relation -subsisted between man and his gods. “The<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_188" id="page_188"></a>{188}</span> circle into which a man was -born was not simply a group of kinsfolk and fellow-citizens, but -embraced also certain divine beings, the gods of the family and of the -state, which to the ancient mind were as much a part of the particular -community with which they stood connected as the human members of the -social circle.”<a name="FNanchor_32_32" id="FNanchor_32_32"></a><a href="#Footnote_32_32" class="fnanchor">[32]</a> Accordingly it would appear that among these ancient -Semites the conception of sacrifice was by no means so gloomy as it came -to be later, when the moral tragedy of life was more clearly realised. -The idea was that of “communion with the deity in a sacrificial meal of -holy food.” They “go on eating and drinking and rejoicing before their -god with the assurance that he and they are on the best of jovial good -terms.... Ancient religion assumes that through the help of the gods -life is so happy and satisfactory that ordinary acts of worship are all -brightness and hilarity, expressing no other idea than that the -worshippers are well content with themselves and with their divine -sovereign.”<a name="FNanchor_33_33" id="FNanchor_33_33"></a><a href="#Footnote_33_33" class="fnanchor">[33]</a></p> - -<p>Of course the severer truth and cleaner conscience which Israel’s -revelation brought her gradually deepened the shadows on her religious -life. She substituted duty for happiness, the beauty of holiness for the -mere <i>joie de vivre</i>, and the tragic blessedness of forgiveness for the -careless pleasures of life. Yet to the end she retained and insisted on -the gladness of religion. The duty of joy was a command and not merely -an epigram for Israel. Dante himself was not more explicit in his -condemnation of perverse sullenness than was he who<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_189" id="page_189"></a>{189}</span> wrote, “Because -thou servedst not the Lord thy God with joyfulness, and with gladness of -heart, for the abundance of all things: therefore shalt thou serve thine -enemies.”<a name="FNanchor_34_34" id="FNanchor_34_34"></a><a href="#Footnote_34_34" class="fnanchor">[34]</a></p> - -<p>It is surely a very striking fact that the spots which all travellers -select as those in which the gladness of the land dwells most freely -still are Nazareth and Bethlehem. For beauty of feature and of dress, -and for their general air of pleasant and light-hearted gaiety, these -are the acknowledged centres. It was of Bethlehem that we felt this most -true. Its name, signifying “House of Bread,” is significant of plenty -and of comfort. Its associations, even apart from the song of angels -there, are sweet and gracious. While approaching it, you look across a -pleasant and lightsome landscape to the dim blue mountains of Moab, and -remember how Ruth looked across these very fields, when the reapers of -Boaz were working in them, to her distant home in those mountains. Here -it was that King David in his boyhood played and tended the flocks of -his father, and it was the water of that sweet well for which he longed -in the days of his adversity. These and a hundred other memories prepare -the traveller for a place of gracious and kindly sweetness.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_190" id="page_190"></a>{190}</span></p> - -<h3><a name="CHAPTER_II-iii" id="CHAPTER_II-iii"></a>CHAPTER II<br /><br /> -THE SHADOW OF DEATH</h3> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">We</span> now turn sharply to the other side of things, and it must be apparent -to every one that we are passing from the smaller to the vastly greater -element in the spirit of Syria. The text in Deuteronomy which we -quoted<a name="FNanchor_35_35" id="FNanchor_35_35"></a><a href="#Footnote_35_35" class="fnanchor">[35]</a> shows us joy commanded at the sword’s point, as if the nation -were unwilling and unlikely to obey easily the happy command. Even when -Jesus Christ repeats the injunction in His great words, “Rejoice and be -exceeding glad,” it is a defiant gladness He enjoins. The context shows -that the rejoicing is that of persecuted and slandered men. A recent -writer has bitterly described our march through life in the words: “We -uphold our wayward steps with the promises and the commandments for -crutches, but on either side of us trudge the shadow Death and the -bacchanal Sex.”<a name="FNanchor_36_36" id="FNanchor_36_36"></a><a href="#Footnote_36_36" class="fnanchor">[36]</a> The words sound profane to Western ears, but they -are not untrue of the spirit of Syria. It is of “the shadow Death” that -the present chapter treats.</p> - -<p>As primitive religion decayed and men lost their<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_191" id="page_191"></a>{191}</span> sense of kinship and -their easy and friendly relations with the old gods, they were left -alone with death, which everywhere stared them in the face and claimed -them for its own. Next to God, death is the most impressive fact in -human experience, with sin for its sting. When old and defective views -of God are passing away, two courses are open to men. As death closes in -upon them, and they feel its grasp upon their unprotected souls, they -may appeal from it to God, and find Him revealing Himself, with eternal -life for them in the knowledge of Him. This was what the noblest of -Israel’s thinkers did, and the growing revelation of the Bible was their -reward. God showed Himself to them in ever-increasing clearness, until -one and another and another of them found that the hand that grasped -them was “not Death but Love.” But another course is open. They may -enthrone death in place of the broken gods—“Death is king, and vivat -rex!” They may “say to corruption, Thou art my father; to the worm, Thou -art my mother, and my sister.” Then the emphasis of thought will fall on -the grave, and all men’s imaginations will grow morbid.</p> - -<p>The tombs of the Holy Land are of many patterns. In his <i>Haifa</i>, -Laurence Oliphant describes several different kinds of them, from the -cave-sepulchres, or the underground galleries, to the little wayside -graves or narrow holes driven into rock which seem such tightly-fitting -homes for the dead. There are, of course, the modern graves sacred to -the wives and children of missionaries who have laid down their lives<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_192" id="page_192"></a>{192}</span> -in the loving service of Christ and man. Buckle the historian sleeps in -the Christian burying-ground at Damascus, and Henriette Renan was laid -to rest in Byblus. These graves and others dear to the Western world -are, as graves have been since Abraham’s day, symbols of the strangers’ -inheritance and lot in the Holy Land. From these, back to the tombs of -hoariest antiquity, the country is bound by an unbroken chain of death. -Through all the centuries the dead have been thrust upon the notice of -the living in a fashion so obtrusive as to make this the most obvious -impression of the land. Most of the graves are those of persons now -unknown and quite forgotten. Small and great, common men and heroes, are -alike conspicuous in death. Each of the invaders has left his memorial, -and the sites of ancient cities are traced by help of their -burying-grounds.</p> - -<p>Moslem tombs are everywhere. Most of them are oblong structures of rude -but solid masonry erected over shallow graves. In some cases a painted -tarbush (fez-cap) marks the head and a little upright stone the feet. A -slight hollow is often cut in the flat top for birds to drink from. -Tombs are clustered among their iris-flowers beside the walls of -villages. They have crept up to the very summit of the hill which Gordon -identifies as Calvary. They have encroached on the palace of Herod’s -daughter at Samaria. They crowd the ground outside the built-up “Gate -Beautiful” at Jerusalem. There is, to our feelings, a certain indecency -in this promiscuous invasion of the grave: Mohammedans seem<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_193" id="page_193"></a>{193}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_025" id="ill_025"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<a href="images/ill_027_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_027_sml.jpg" width="500" height="397" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">THE CHURCH OF THE NATIVITY AT BETHLEHEM.</p> - -<div class="blockquot"><p>From a garden on the opposite hill.</p></div> -</div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">to bury their dead anywhere. The Crusaders have left fewer memorials of -themselves in the shape of tombs than one might have expected. -Barbarossa’s tomb we have already visited. For the rest, their memorials -are mostly those great buildings whose ruins stand to this day. Early -Christianity, too, has left its tombs—catacombs and single graves, -especially in the southern part of the coast, and eastwards in Hauran. -People of importance have sometimes more than one tomb, like St. George, -who is buried both in Lydda and Damascus. But the graves of humbler -Christians are more precious than these, for their inscriptions remain, -breathing forth the faith and peace with which Christ had blessed the -world. Such memorials of victory over death are inextinguishable lamps -hung in the sepulchres of Syria. And these lamps are kindled at the -Great Light. Never was symbolism more appropriate than that of the Holy -Fire in the Church of the Sepulchre. The very heart and soul of Syria is -a tomb—the reputed grave of Jesus Christ. To this day the chief pilgrim -song repeats with exultant reiteration the words, “This is the tomb of -Christ.” It is a song which has never been silent in the land. In the -Crusader camps a herald closed the day with the loud cry, “Lord, succour -the Holy Sepulchre”; and the sentinels passed the word from post to -post, “Remember the Holy Sepulchre.”</p> - -<p>It is not, however, the victory over death that impresses one as the -spirit of Syria. It is death itself, unconquered, mysterious, and dark. -Its Christian<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_194" id="page_194"></a>{194}</span> tombs are few and far between compared with the countless -multitude of sepulchres where there is no lamp alight. Most common and -most impressive of these are the Roman and Greek graves. The sands of -Tyre and Sidon are strewn with sarcophagi. Here a man’s magnificently -carved stone coffin serves for a drinking-trough, there a little child’s -stands alone and desolate near a river mouth. In Sidon the ancient -cemetery is on a scale whose rifled grandeur speaks volumes concerning -the vanity of earthly greatness. At Gadara, the eastward road is a -miniature Appian Way: hollow to the tread of horses as they cross the -excavated rock, and adorned with sarcophagi carved with crowns and -garlands, but bearing inscriptions without hope in them. Farther north, -on the eastern slopes of Hermon, we found a far older monument near one -of the Druse villages. We were crossing a little brook, when we noticed -that the bridge consisted of two huge monolithic slabs of limestone, -which, on examination, appeared to be the lids of ancient sarcophagi. -The carving on the ends was obviously intended to represent figures of -cherubim or some such winged creatures. The heads were gone, but the -plumage of the wings was very perfectly preserved. No one in the -locality knew anything about their origin. Their general appearance -seemed to connect them with the far East.</p> - -<p>The Jewish tombs are those which impress the imagination most with the -bitterness of death in Syria. They are so sad, with their antique -solemnity—so severely simple and unadorned. Where there is<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_195" id="page_195"></a>{195}</span> carving it -is almost always of Roman or Christian workmanship. A few stones with -such symbols as the seven-branched candlestick engraved on them are the -only unquestionable remains of ornamental Jewish work. Few of the Jewish -sepulchres have escaped appropriation by Gentiles. The more famous of -them have been appropriated by the Mohammedans, and early Christian -tradition is responsible for many other indentifications. The saints and -heroes of Israel, claimed also by Mohammedans and Christians, have -achieved a kind of funereal immortality which makes the whole land seem -one vast graveyard. Every prospect is dotted with tombs. The tomb of -Jonas shines white from its hill-top north of Hebron, that of Samuel -north of Jerusalem, while Joseph’s tomb commands the view where the Vale -of Shechem opens on the wider valley of Makhnah. None of them, however, -is at all so impressive as the tomb of Rachel, where a modern house and -dome cover a rough block of stone worn smooth with the kisses of -centuries of Jewish women. The wailing, as we saw it there, is a -memorable custom. The women were mostly elderly or aged, but they were -weeping real tears and wailing bitterly as they kissed the stone. It is -an old story that consecrates that rough stone, but how eternal is its -human pathos: “And they journeyed from Bethel; and there was but a -little way to come to Ephrath: and Rachel travailed, and she had hard -labour.... And Rachel died, and was buried in the way to Ephrath, which -is Bethlehem.”<a name="FNanchor_37_37" id="FNanchor_37_37"></a><a href="#Footnote_37_37" class="fnanchor">[37]</a></p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_196" id="page_196"></a>{196}</span></p> - -<p>The earlier fashion of Jewish work seems to have been the “pigeon-hole,” -in which the corpse was thrust into a little tunnel six feet long driven -at right angles to the rock face. Later, troughs were excavated to fit -the body along the line of the rock. In some instances these graves, -especially the former kind, are found in detached groups in wayside -rocks, whose perpendicular faces front the open air. For the most part -they are grouped in larger numbers within natural caves or subterranean -excavations, whose low doorway is blocked by a large circular stone -running in a groove. A later example of such a cave is that which is -shewn as the “new tomb” of Joseph of Arimathea, close to Gordon’s -Calvary. A few specimens of another sort, built of masonry without -cement, are to be found in Galilee.<a name="FNanchor_38_38" id="FNanchor_38_38"></a><a href="#Footnote_38_38" class="fnanchor">[38]</a> Nothing could be gloomier than -the constantly repeated ruins of ancient Jewish graves in Syria. No -day’s journey is without them. They meet you casually, as it were, at -every turning. They are not, indeed, quite dark like the pagan tombs; -but the twilight, in which the hope of immortality just broke the -darkness for ancient Israel, is grey and cheerless, and the contribution -of Jewish graves to the spirit of Syria is a very sombre one.</p> - -<p>The typical spot for this side of the spirit of Syria is the town of -Hebron.</p> - -<p>The lanes and the dark bazaar are filthy and foul-smelling. The mosque -is an impressive building, suggestive of military rather than devotional -ideas.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_197" id="page_197"></a>{197}</span> The Tomb of Abraham, which it covers, is one of the sights which -only a very few Christian eyes have seen. It is permitted to none but -Mohammedans to approach nearer the entrance to it than the seventh step -of the lane, or staircase, alongside its eastern wall. There is a hole -in that wall which is supposed to communicate with the cave below. Jews -write letters to Abraham, and place them in this hole, to tell him how -badly they are being treated by the Moslems. But the Moslem boys are -said to know that the hole has no great depth, and to collect these -letters and burn them before Abraham has seen them. The tomb is the very -heart and black centre of the Shadow of Death in Palestine.</p> - -<p>There is no part of man’s faith in which it is more necessary to be -thoroughgoing than in his thoughts about immortality. Egypt and Greece -furnish examples of great significance here. Egypt held an elaborate -doctrine of the future life, and it dominated all her thought concerning -this life. Men built their tombs and kings their pyramids as the most -important of their life’s achievements. The earthly house of the -Egyptian was but an inn where he spent a little time in passing; his -tomb was his eternal house and real home. Thus the tombs were glorified -copies of the dwelling-houses, either of the present, or more often of a -former generation.<a name="FNanchor_39_39" id="FNanchor_39_39"></a><a href="#Footnote_39_39" class="fnanchor">[39]</a> Greece, on the other hand, did not believe in a -life beyond the grave. Her funeral celebrations were<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_198" id="page_198"></a>{198}</span> full of -lamentation, and her inscriptions sound sad enough to us. But it was a -principle with Greece and Rome to decorate tombs exclusively with glad -symbols such as sculptured flowers and even dances.<a name="FNanchor_40_40" id="FNanchor_40_40"></a><a href="#Footnote_40_40" class="fnanchor">[40]</a> The point to be -observed about these is that neither of them was morbid. Morbidness -appears to avoid a robust faith or a frank scepticism,<a name="FNanchor_41_41" id="FNanchor_41_41"></a><a href="#Footnote_41_41" class="fnanchor">[41]</a> and to cling -about the thought which is neither sure of one thing nor another.</p> - -<p>Israel’s position in regard to the belief in immortality is extremely -difficult to define. It was obviously with her a thing of gradual -development, as her revelation opened its broadening light upon life’s -problems. He would be a bold critic who would sum up the situation of -Isaiah’s time as Renan does in the statement, “not looking beyond the -world for reward and punishment,” the Hebrew life “has a heroic tension, -a sustained cry, an unceasing attention to the events of the world.” -Everything goes to shew that long before the faith in immortality had -grasped the imagination and the belief of the people in general it had -been revealed to chosen spirits. As for the others, it had been working -its way among them, occupying their minds in speculation, and leading -them, as it were, among the shades of the nether world. There was -something in the genius of the nation which rendered this interest in -death quite inevitable. The natural bearing of the people has a strange -solemnity about it, which finds constant expression in<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_199" id="page_199"></a>{199}</span> pose and -gesture, and often strikes the stranger with sudden vividness. Women may -be often seen, especially when clad in thin white garments on holidays, -who might stand just as you see them as models for monumental sculpture. -Along with all its activities, there is a distinct sympathy with death -in the genius of Israel.</p> - -<p>This phenomenon is, of course, due to very complex causes. It is a -deep-rooted Semitic instinct, which seems to be not altogether unlike -that of the Egyptian feeling to the tomb as the real home. Some parts of -Arabia are very rich in sacred tombs and spots of holy ground, and -pilgrimages are made to these both by Moslems and by Jews. Long strings -of mules, laden with coffins, wend their way to such sacred places as -Nejf, and thousands of corpses are sent thither even from India.<a name="FNanchor_42_42" id="FNanchor_42_42"></a><a href="#Footnote_42_42" class="fnanchor">[42]</a> Old -tombstones are held in peculiar veneration by the more devout Arabs. The -well-known reverence with which the Syrian Jews regard the tombs of -their ancestors may be in part explained on the ground of patriotic -loyalty. Such scenes as those which may be witnessed at the tomb of -Rachel, remind us that a sense of the pathos of human life and its -mortality is also developed strongly and enters as a very real factor -into the spirit of Syria.<a name="FNanchor_43_43" id="FNanchor_43_43"></a><a href="#Footnote_43_43" class="fnanchor">[43]</a> Nor can there be any doubt that a certain -moral or didactic use of death is also characteristic of the East, such -as is expressed in the sententious rhymes of old graveyards<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_200" id="page_200"></a>{200}</span> in this -country. The reader will recall the famous instance of this, which Sir -Walter Scott has made familiar—the shroud which served for the banner -of Saladin, with its inscription, “Saladin must die.”<a name="FNanchor_44_44" id="FNanchor_44_44"></a><a href="#Footnote_44_44" class="fnanchor">[44]</a></p> - -<p>If, however, such elements have entered into earlier thoughts of death, -it is to be feared that Palestine of the present day has little of them -left. The great light of Christ illuminated the sepulchres of Christian -Syria; but with the Mohammedan conquest darkness fell again, and all the -morbid fascination of the grave reasserted itself. There is little -reverence for the ordinary man’s place of burial now, whether it be of -ancient or of recent date. Dr. Merrill tells how he has found Arabs -actually stealing graves, i.e. clearing out old ones to make room for a -newly-deceased body, on the plea that “the dead man who was buried there -could not possibly want his grave any longer.”<a name="FNanchor_45_45" id="FNanchor_45_45"></a><a href="#Footnote_45_45" class="fnanchor">[45]</a> On many a hillside -the rock tombs are rent and split, like pictures from Dante’s <i>Inferno</i>, -where they have been blasted open with gunpowder in the search for -treasure; and sometimes parties of natives may be seen prowling about a -hillside on that business. The find may consist of glass bracelets, -which have to be taken from the bone of a baby’s arm, or gold earrings -beside the skull whose face was once fair; but they excite no emotion -except that of money values. Laurence Oliphant had difficulty in -restraining the natives who searched with him from smashing the cinerary -urns they found, on<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_201" id="page_201"></a>{201}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_026" id="ill_026"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<a href="images/ill_028_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_028_sml.jpg" width="500" height="371" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">JERUSALEM—EXTERIOR OF THE GOLDEN, OR BEAUTIFUL, GATE.</p> - -<p>This gate, which was walled up by the Arabs after the conquest of -Jerusalem, forms a tower projecting from the Eastern Wall of the Temple -Area. The tombs in the foreground are part of the great Mohammedan -Cemetery extending along the Eastern Wall of Jerusalem.</p></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">the plea that “they are so very old that they are not worth anything.”</p> - -<p>With the decay of reverence for the dead, however, there seems to have -been a recrudescence of that morbid and charnel-house interest in death -which marks the spirit of the land. At times one is shocked by the -apparently total indifference displayed—houses being built close to the -mouths of graves or even, it is said, upon the roofs of them. Yet any -one who has seen a festival at a holy tomb, whether Jewish or -Mohammedan, must have realised the strong attraction by which death and -the grave draw men. A curious instance of this is that of the “Jews’ -Burning” at Tiberias.</p> - -<p>Tiberias has been a Jewish centre since the time of Vespasian. Before -that time, Jews avoided the city, because in building it Herod had -disturbed a burial-place. To-day, by a strange coincidence, it is a tomb -that gives it its special popularity for the Jews—the grave of the -famous Rabbi Meir. Conveniently near the tomb there are large baths, -whose warm and sulphurous water is considered highly medicinal. At this -tomb a curious spectacle may be seen on the second day of May each year. -Jewish pilgrims from near and far assemble, bringing with them their -oldest garments, which are immersed in a great cauldron of oil, and then -piled up and burned. The honour of setting fire to the pile is sold to -the highest bidder, and the sum paid reaches £15 or more.</p> - -<p>The same fascination of death, seen as it were past a byplay of -irreverence and grotesqueness, is felt in the burial customs as they are -seen to-day. At the Moslem<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_202" id="page_202"></a>{202}</span> funerals we saw there was no appearance of -mourning. The men were dressed in gay colours, and they trotted along -behind the corpse talking and gesticulating with an apparent gusto. It -may have been the unusual appearance of the thing which impressed -strangers more powerfully than natives; but to us it seemed that the -realism of death was here in more crude and aggressive consciousness -than in Western funerals. The corpse lay on a board, shoulder-high, with -a gorgeous crimson and purple pall covering his body and limbs instead -of a coffin. The head, wrapped tight in a napkin, rested on a pillow, -and the features of the face stood prominently out against the sky. The -man seemed, in an altogether gruesome way, to be <i>attending</i> his own -funeral, and to be thrusting the fact of his presence on the spectators.</p> - -<p>This may be subjective criticism, and it is always unfair to judge the -burial-customs of other peoples without intimate knowledge of their -origin and inner meaning. In one respect, however, it is certain enough -that the Shadow of Death rests upon the land of Syria. That is Fatalism. -We have all heard of the fatalism of the East; and strange stones have -become familiar, of soldiers selling cartridges to their enemies, of -villagers refusing to drain the swamp that was decimating them by its -malaria, or even to desist from poisoning their own springs with foul -water. “It is Allah!” ends all questioning and checks all energy. Yet -the constant recurrence of living instances of fatalism shocks the -traveller, however well he was prepared for them. A<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_203" id="page_203"></a>{203}</span> traveller asked a -Mohammedan in Damascus what they had done to the workman who upset his -brazier and burned the great mosque. “Oh nothing,” said he, “what should -we do?” “I should have thought you might have killed him.” “No,” he -replied; “in the West you say when such things happen, ‘It is the -devil’; in the East we say, ‘It is God!’<span class="lftspc">”</span> Still more impressive was a -conversation with one of the camp-servants during a long ride near -Jezreel. He had told the pathetic story of his life—how they had lived -comfortably till the father died, leaving no money; then came work, -begun too early and with no providence and little hope of success, until -it had come to be “eat, drink, sleep, then again, eat, drink, -sleep—then die and sleep, no more eat nor drink.” The Syrian character -of the present day has been well expressed on its negative side in three -traits. These are, want of concentration, want of will-power, and an -absolute want of the sense of sin. Of sin they literally do not -understand the meaning, the substitute for conscience being a dread of -the opinion of friends and of the public. They do not think about the -problem of evil as in any sense a practical problem. “The Lord said unto -Ahriman, I know why I have made thee, but thou knowest not”—that is -their philosophy of the moral mystery of things. Conder sums up the -situation in striking words: “Christian villages thrive and grow, while -the Moslem ones fall into decay; and this difference, though due perhaps -in part to the foreign protection which the native Christians enjoy, is -yet unmistakably connected with the listlessness<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_204" id="page_204"></a>{204}</span> of those who believe -that no exertions of their own can make them richer or better, that an -iron destiny decides all things, without reference to any personal -quality higher than that of submission to fate, and that God will help -those who have lost the will to help themselves.”<a name="FNanchor_46_46" id="FNanchor_46_46"></a><a href="#Footnote_46_46" class="fnanchor">[46]</a></p> - -<p>The spirit of Syria is darkened by a shadow of death that has grown not -only familiar but congenial, as darkness does to all who choose it -rather than the light. Strange that Syria should thus have “made a -covenant with death,” she from whom shone forth once the Light of the -World. But that was long ago. These many centuries this has been one of -that sad multitude of nations and of individuals who have sent forth a -spirit that has inspired and moved the world, and who yet themselves sit -desolate and listless.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_205" id="page_205"></a>{205}</span></p> - -<h3><a name="CHAPTER_III-iii" id="CHAPTER_III-iii"></a>CHAPTER III<br /><br /> -THE SPECTRAL</h3> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">THE</span> shadow of death is always haunted. A strong and pure faith peoples -it with angels, and is accompanied through its darkness by that Good -Shepherd whose rod and staff comfort the soul. When the faith is neither -strong nor pure, and when those who sit in darkness have been disloyal -to their faith, it is haunted by spectres, and its darkness becomes -poisonous. The fascination of the marvellous passes into “what French -writers call the <i>macabre</i>—that species of almost insane preoccupation -with our mouldering flesh, that luxury of disgust in gazing on -corruption.”<a name="FNanchor_47_47" id="FNanchor_47_47"></a><a href="#Footnote_47_47" class="fnanchor">[47]</a> This unclean spectral element is a very real part of -the spirit of Syria.</p> - -<p>The spell of the East is proverbial, and it is a more literal fact than -is sometimes realised. Even such a commonsense Englishman as the captain -of the <i>Rob Roy</i> confesses to a nameless fear that came upon him in the -solitudes of the upper Jordan.<a name="FNanchor_48_48" id="FNanchor_48_48"></a><a href="#Footnote_48_48" class="fnanchor">[48]</a> There is a well-known passage in -Eothen, where Kinglake describes the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_206" id="page_206"></a>{206}</span> calculating merchant, the -inquisitive traveller, the wakeful post-captain all coming under the -spell of Asia.<a name="FNanchor_49_49" id="FNanchor_49_49"></a><a href="#Footnote_49_49" class="fnanchor">[49]</a> The warmth and strangeness of the land may have -something to do with it; but the associations and the prevalent tone of -thought have more. Every one feels it whose imagination and heart are in -the least measure open to spiritual impressions.</p> - -<p>To analyse it or to specify the causes which have produced it were an -impossible task. Three things have to do with it very specially. There -is the habit of the Eastern mind in dealing with matters of fact. Truth -is not to the Oriental the primary moral necessity which it is to the -West. Vividness and forcefulness of presentation count for at least as -much. The Arab story-teller is said to close his enumeration of various -legends with the sacramental formula, “God knows best where the truth -lies,”—the truth being a matter of God’s responsibility, while to man -is committed only responsibility for being interesting. Again, in the -East, terror is a recognised force between man and man; and the great -forces of nature and the more occult forces of magic are recognised and -taken as part of the natural order. Religion also has had her share in -the “Great Asian Mystery.” This land is, to most devout persons, -altogether isolated and apart, as the place of a divine revelation such -as no other part of earth has known. There is a passage in -<i>Pseudo-Aristeas</i> where, describing his supposed embassy to Jerusalem, -he gazes at the constant waving of the veil<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_207" id="page_207"></a>{207}</span> in the Temple, which -screened from his view the holiest things of Israel. As it rippled and -swung in the wind it seemed to tantalise the gazer with the -never-fulfilled promise of a glimpse into the secret place.<a name="FNanchor_50_50" id="FNanchor_50_50"></a><a href="#Footnote_50_50" class="fnanchor">[50]</a> The -wistful sense of mystery in that letter gives a hint which is of -extraordinary significance on this subject.</p> - -<p>The geographical formation of the land and its strange colouring lend -themselves to the spectral and the uncanny. The Dead Sea presents the -most sinister landscape in the world. The opening paragraphs of Scott’s -<i>Talisman</i>, founded upon the description of Josephus, are certainly -overdrawn, yet in truth everything conspires to produce a sense of -ghostliness by these unearthly shores. A ring of “scalded hills” -encircles them, and a perpetual haze lies upon their waters. Their soil -is nitrous and their springs sulphurous. Blocks of asphalt lie among -their shingle; and fish, dead and salted, are cast up by the waves. -There is little life visible about them, whether of man or beast or -bird. Here and there the tempting Apple of Sodom grows, to appearance -the most luscious of fruits, but so dry that its core is combustible and -is used as tinder by the Arabs. A few feet above the summer level of the -sea runs an unbroken line of drift-wood washed down by winter floods and -left white and sparkling with crusted salt.</p> - -<p>Yet it was not the Dead Sea that seemed to us most unearthly, but that -more famous lake of which one thinks so differently. It would be a -curious and instructive<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_208" id="page_208"></a>{208}</span> task to collect the various impressions which -the Sea of Galilee has made upon travellers. Romance and piety conspire -to furnish many of its visitors with a predisposition to find it -surpassingly beautiful; and not a little could be quoted which owes most -of its touches to the imagination of the writer. A natural rebellion -against this has led to no less exaggerated expressions of -disappointment, and to accusations of ugliness which are simply untrue. -The fact is that ordinary canons of description are of no avail here. -The Sea of Galilee, even so far as natural appearance goes, must be -judged by itself.</p> - -<p>Journeying to it from Tabor, you ride across a rather characterless -tract of country. A jackal, a stray Circassian horseman, a low black -tent of the Bedawin, are the only signs of life. Suddenly the track, -sweeping up over the farther side of a shallow and rudely cultivated -valley, lands you on an unexpected edge, from which the ground falls -sheer away before you into the basin of the lake. This is not scenery; -it is tinted sculpture, it is jewel-work on a gigantic scale. The rosy -flush of sunset was on it when we caught the first glimpse. At our feet -lay a great flesh-coloured cup full of blue liquor; or rather the whole -seemed some lapidary’s quaint fancy in pink marble and blue-stone. There -was no translucency, but an aggressive opaqueness, in sea and shore -alike. The dry atmosphere showed everything in sharpest outline, -clear-cut and broken-edged. There was no shading or variety of colour, -but a strong and unsoftened contrast. To be<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_209" id="page_209"></a>{209}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_027" id="ill_027"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<a href="images/ill_029_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_029_sml.jpg" width="500" height="292" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">THE TOMB OF RACHEL.</p> - -<p>On the road from Jerusalem to Hebron. It is stated in the 35th chapter -of Genesis that Rachel died and was buried in the way to Hebron -(Ephrath).</p></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">quite accurate, there was one break—a splash of white, with the green -suggestion of trees and grass, lying on the water’s edge directly -beneath us—Tiberias.</p> - -<p>When, next day, we sailed upon the lake, coasting along the western -shore from north to south, we found ourselves again as far removed from -anything we had seen or experienced before. A casual glance showed utter -and abject desolation, and a silence that might be heard oppressed the -spirit. As the eye grew more accustomed, villages were discerned. But -what villages! With the same exception of Tiberias, they were brown -slabs of flat-roofed cubical hovels—let into the slope of the shore or -the foot-hills. And as we skirted closer along the beach, we descried -everywhere traces of ruined architecture. It appeared to form a -continuous ring of towers; columns broken and tumbled, but showing -elaborately carved capitals; aqueducts and retaining walls; fragments of -all sorts, and apparently of widely different styles of architecture. -Foliage is scanty, save for the thorn-trees and bamboo canes in which -the carved stones are often half buried. Here and there a plantation of -orchard trees hides a trim little German garden. At Tiberias a few palm -trees lend their graceful suggestion of the Far East.</p> - -<p>All this impresses one in a quite unique way. You try to reconstruct the -past—rebuild the castles and synagogues and palaces, and imagine the -life that sent forth its fleets upon the lake in the days of Jesus. Or -you more daringly attempt the future landscape, and imagine these -hillsides as scientific cultivation and the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_210" id="page_210"></a>{210}</span> withdrawal of oppressive -government may yet make them. But from it all you are driven back upon -the extraordinary present—petrified, uncanny, spectral—a part of the -earth on which some spell has fallen, and over which some ghostly -influence broods, silencing the daylight, and whispering in the -darkness. If, however, this sense of the ghostly be intenser here than -elsewhere, it is but an exaggeration of the spirit of the whole land.</p> - -<p>Nature in Syria seems always to have something of the supernatural about -her. Not only in the petrifactions of the Lejja and the silent stone -cities east of Jordan is this the case. The whole country offers you -stones when you ask for trees, and that mere fact of its stoniness is -enough to lend it the air of another world. As an indirect consequence -trees, when they are found, assume a factitious importance, and a -supernatural significance either for good or evil. Some of the fairest -plants of Syria are treacherous as they are fair. One of our company, in -gathering sprays of a peculiarly lovely creeper, somewhat resembling a -white passion-flower, had his hand wounded with invisible but virulent -needles which caused it to swell and gave great pain. The green spots, -where grass and trees abound, tempt the unwary to drink and rest in -them. But they are the most dangerous places in the land, and some of -them are deadly from malaria. On the other hand, a tree in a treeless -country is an object of preciousness inconceivable by any who have not -come upon it from the wilderness. In the distance it beckons the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_211" id="page_211"></a>{211}</span> -traveller with the promise of shade and water. Arrived beneath its -branches, life takes on a new aspect; kindly voices are heard in the -rustle of its leaves, and gracious gifts seen in its shadow and its -fruit. It is said that our fleur-de-lis pattern, often supposed to -represent the flower of the lily or the iris, is really an Eastern -symbol. The central stem is the sacred date-palm, while the side-lines -and the horizontal band stand for ox-horns tied to the stem to avert the -evil eye. It is no wonder if by the ancient Semites trees were regarded -as demoniac beings, or as growing from the body of a buried god.<a name="FNanchor_51_51" id="FNanchor_51_51"></a><a href="#Footnote_51_51" class="fnanchor">[51]</a> -Such traditions are no longer to be found in their ancient forms, but -they linger in a vague sense of the holiness of conspicuous trees, which -may be seen covered with rags of clothing hung on them by natives. A -like play of imagination has from time immemorial haunted the -pools—especially those whose dark waters made them seem -bottomless—with holy or unholy mystery. Still more terrible is the -superstitious dread with which the natives regard undrained morasses. -The Serbonian Bog on the south coast has from of old been regarded with -special fear, owing to its treacherous appearance of sound earth. The -marsh in which the Abana loses itself shares with the Serbonian Bog its -grim distinction, chiefly on account of its deep black wells, which the -natives take to be man-devouring whirlpools.</p> - -<p>In her grander and more impressive features, Nature is in Syria -constantly suggestive of the play of occult powers. Earthquake has left -its mark in many a split<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_212" id="page_212"></a>{212}</span> rampart and broken tower, and that of itself -is enough to give a peculiarly ghostly tinge to the spirit of any land. -The unspeakable loneliness of the desert has its own magic—a melancholy -spell which has no parallel in other lands. In the desert, too, the sky -conspires with the earth in its bewitchment. The mirage has power to -arrest and overawe the spirit with something of the same sense of -helplessness as that felt in earthquake. In the one case earth, in the -other heaven, are turning ordinary procedure upside down, and the -bewildered mortal knows not what is to come next upon him. The writer -has had experience of both, though with an interval of several years -between them. The mirage he saw to the east of the Great Haj Road in -Hauran. For some time the rocky hills of the Lejja had been the horizon, -shimmering dimly through the heat-haze. Suddenly, on looking up, he was -amazed to find that the hills had disappeared, and in their place had -come a long string of camels on the sky-line, with an island, a lake, -and a grove of palm-trees floating in the air above them. The sudden -apparition recalled on the instant a day in the Antipodes when he felt, -though at a great distance, the tremble of the New Zealand earthquakes. -Either experience is unearthly enough to explain many superstitions.</p> - -<p>In most lands the sea would have yielded a larger crop of unearthly -imaginations than has been the case in Palestine. For reasons which have -been already stated, Israel kept out of touch with the ocean. Yet, all -the more on that account, it is the case that almost<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_213" id="page_213"></a>{213}</span> every thought she -has of the sea is fearsome. Its immensity bewilders her with the -unhomely distances of the world, and the four winds strive savagely upon -it. The roar and surge of the shore are all she needs to remember in -order to impress herself with its terror. Now and then she thinks of the -Great Deep, and of its horrible inhabitants—leviathan unwieldily -sporting there, and other nameless monsters bred of the slime and ooze, -and the dead men who are waiting to float up from their places to the -Great Judgment, when their time shall come.</p> - -<p>Mention of the Great Deep reminds us of yet another prolific source of -the spectral element in Syrian thought. It was but natural that the -sound of underground rivers and their explanation by the theory of a -world founded on bottomless floods (the “waters underneath the earth”), -should have given to the whole land an air of possession by ghostly -powers. It may have been that same phenomenon which drew down the -imagination of Syria to the subterranean regions, or it may also have -been to some extent the hereditary greed of buried treasure, which every -nation whose buildings have been often overturned is likely to acquire. -Whatever be its explanation, the fact is certain that the underground -element is one which counts for much in the spirit of Syria. Alike in -Christian and in pre-Christian times there seems to have been a most -unwholesome dread of fresh air blowing about holy things. Sacred caves -and pits were among the most characteristic properties of ancient<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_214" id="page_214"></a>{214}</span> -Semitic religion.<a name="FNanchor_52_52" id="FNanchor_52_52"></a><a href="#Footnote_52_52" class="fnanchor">[52]</a> As for Christian tradition, it seems positively to -dread the open air. The Nativity in Bethlehem and the Agony in -Gethsemane have each their cave assigned to them, and many another site -has a cave either discovered or actually constructed for its -commemoration. Nature and history have combined to encourage the -underground tendency. Palestine is remarkable for the number and size of -its natural caverns, and it is not slow to add its imaginative touch to -the length of them, connecting distant towns with supposed subterranean -passages. These caves have been used as dwelling-places from very -ancient times. The strange cities of Edom and of Bashan are well known -to all as wonders. And not in these places only, but in many other parts -of the land, men have dwelt beneath the ground. In times of invasion, -for the solitude of hermit life, and in the terrors of persecution, -caves have offered natural places of refuge and of hiding, which have in -many cases been greatly enlarged by excavation. Besides those caverns -whose interest lies in the memory of ancient inhabitants, there are some -of an interest whose terror is not yet departed. These are the -cave-dwellings of lunatics, who in former times often chose the dead for -company and inhabited tombs. Now, in some places they are chained in -black recesses of mountain caverns, where their life must be horrible -indeed. There are also one or two caves in Syria which end in sudden -perpendicular shafts of great depth, where adulteresses are said to meet -their fate. Such<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_215" id="page_215"></a>{215}</span> modern instances may have reinforced the natural -fascination of the occult which subterranean places offer. But there is -something congenial to it in the spirit of Syria quite apart from these.</p> - -<p>If the natural features of Syria thus tempt men towards the ghastly side -of things, her history suggests plenty of material for superstition to -work upon. If the legend were true that no dew nor rain would moisten -the spot where a man had been murdered, Syria would be no longer an -oasis, but the driest of deserts. In a spiritual sense the legend is -truer than it seems. When, in his <i>Laughing Mill</i>, Julian Hawthorne -works out the idea of a mystic sympathy in Nature with crimes that have -been done by man, he is reminding us of something which every one of -sensitive spirit has more or less clearly felt. In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s -subtler tales the same idea is worked out in a fashion still more -convincing. There are times and places when it is difficult to resist -the conviction that the material world, in its dumb, unconscious way, is -yet burdened with the weight of man’s evil deeds. In Syria one can -almost hear “the groaning and travailing of the whole creation.” It -seems to be a land waiting the hour of its release, and meanwhile -shrouded in deeper mystery than any other land. Something has happened -here, you feel, which never happened elsewhere; something is going to -happen here again, when the time shall come.</p> - -<p>Nothing could better attest this fact than the extraordinary wealth of -legend in Syria. Fragments of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_216" id="page_216"></a>{216}</span> Bible story, changed and often distorted -by those who have retold them, are met with every day. Sometimes a story -has passed from Jews to Christians and from Christians to Mohammedans, -increasing steadily in marvellousness and decreasing in verisimilitude -as it passed. Samson, Goliath, and the prophet Jonah are notable cases -in point. A Mohammedan weli marks the spot where the latter was thrown -ashore; but the inventors of this legend have been inconsiderate. The -weli stands at the bend of a shallow sandy beach, where the whale must -either have itself come ashore to deposit the prophet, or have projected -him a distance of at least a hundred yards. A very curious instance of a -similar kind is that of the fall of Jericho as narrated in Joshua vi. -Conder gives two legends, both of which are obviously elaborated forms -of that account. One of these is a Samaritan story of iron walls, and -the other a Mohammedan one of a city of brass whose walls fell after -Aly, the son-in-law of Mohammed, had ridden seven times round them.<a name="FNanchor_53_53" id="FNanchor_53_53"></a><a href="#Footnote_53_53" class="fnanchor">[53]</a> -Still more curious is a legend related by the same author, which looks -like a Mohammedan version of the Wandering Jew. It tells how, at Abila, -Cain was allowed to lay down the corpse of his brother Abel after -carrying it for a hundred years. The whole story of the Herods has -infested the region of their crimes with the ghosts of their victims. In -Samaria the murdered Mariamne still seems to dwell in her honey, and -Herod and his servants to call her by name and force the pretence that<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_217" id="page_217"></a>{217}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_028" id="ill_028"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<a href="images/ill_030_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_030_sml.jpg" width="500" height="370" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">THE VALLEY OF HINNOM WITH THE HILL OF OFFENCE</p> - -<p>The upper portion of the picture to the left is the Hill of Offence, -with the village of Siloam on its lower slopes.</p></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">she is yet alive. The land is sick with ancient crimes whose blood -“crieth from the ground.”</p> - -<p>The religions of the land seem to be in league with the powers of -darkness for the propagation of magic lore. It is an extraordinary fact -that Syria has sent forth to the ends of the earth a religion that is -the Eternal Word of God to mankind, and yet herself has reverted to the -religious conceptions of ancient Semitic paganism. One of the most -fundamental of these conceptions was that of a religion whose essential -element is not belief but ritual.<a name="FNanchor_54_54" id="FNanchor_54_54"></a><a href="#Footnote_54_54" class="fnanchor">[54]</a> While in the West the free play of -reason has tested and interpreted Israel’s faith, and discovered in it -the unique revelation of the living God to man, the worshippers in the -Holy Land itself seem to treat that same faith wholly as a department of -magic lore. Certain rites have to be performed, no matter how -unintelligently, and that is all. All creeds alike share the blame of -this. Druse and Samaritan, Jew, Christian, and Mohammedan vie with one -another to-day in the poor ambition of making the religion of Jehovah -contemptible in the eyes of thinking men who investigate it as it is -practised on its native soil.</p> - -<p>Much of the magic of the East is decadent or decayed religion. On rare -occasions a marriage superstition may be met with, such as the -foretelling of marriage destinies by tying green twigs with one -hand,<a name="FNanchor_55_55" id="FNanchor_55_55"></a><a href="#Footnote_55_55" class="fnanchor">[55]</a> which appears to be the creation of pure romance.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_218" id="page_218"></a>{218}</span> But the -great majority of those superstitions which hold the Eastern mind in -bondage are evidently relics of pagan thought incorporated now in -Jewish, Christian, or Moslem creeds, and absorbing all the interest of -those who believe in them. If a Mohammedan saint’s bones flew through -the air from Damascus to Mount Ebal, the Christians can match the -miracle and more, for was not the very house of the Virgin carried off -by angels from Nazareth to Loreto lest the Moslems should desecrate it? -Magic dominates the mind of the East and explains everything there to -this day. Every inscribed stone runs the chance either of being honoured -by a place in the wall of a dwelling or of being heated with fire and -split with water, according to the sort of magic it is supposed to -represent. It is difficult to realise that the men you converse with are -actually living in the world of Tasso’s <i>Gerusalemme Liberata</i>, where a -dealer in black art, by his incantation,</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i4">unbinds the demons of the deep to do<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Deeds without name, or chains them in his cell,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And makes e’en Pluto pale upon the throne of hell.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">Yet such is undoubtedly the case. Even the saddle-bags you buy at -Jerusalem—those gorgeous labyrinths of shells and tassels—have a blue -bead concealed somewhere in them to return the stare of any evil eye -that may look upon your horse. To avert the same danger you will see -little boys dressed in girls’ clothes, and specially pretty children -kept dirty and untidy. Lest the dreaded eye should blight the fortunes -of a newborn babe the Jewish Rabbis sometimes hang up the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_219" id="page_219"></a>{219}</span> 121st Psalm -on the wall over mother and child. Magic is as useful a substitute for -science as it is for religion. It explains any phenomenon and clears up -any mystery without the trouble of investigation. All great buildings -must have been built by enchantment, so what is the use of speculating -as to their architecture? Western civilisation is, no doubt, a -remarkable affair, but it never occurs to an unsophisticated Syrian that -it is a matter for energetic emulation. The Frank has only been lucky -enough to learn the proper spell. It is easy to see how Syria, with such -views as these, is doomed at once to moral and intellectual stagnation.</p> - -<p>The vivid mind of the East is fertile in poetic imagination. Restless -and quick itself, it cannot conceive the Universe otherwise than as -living around it. Everything is alive and aware. All inanimate things -are personified; or, to speak more accurately, they are inhabited by -spiritual beings. Natural phenomena express the purposes of minds hidden -behind them. Every dangerous or adverse experience is regarded as the -work of malice. Human life is beset with ambushed spiritual enemies. The -advantage which their invisibility gives to these over the human -combatants would be enough to put fighting out of the question, were it -not that so many of the spirits are of feeble intelligence and may be -hoodwinked; while all of them have other spirits for their enemies who -may be enlisted on man’s side against them. These spirits are of many -kinds, but they may be classed in two groups, according to their -connection with natural phenomena or with death.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_220" id="page_220"></a>{220}</span></p> - -<p>Chief of the former group are the angels, good and bad; and the jinn, or -genii, whom Islam took over from the ancient paganism of Arabia. The -angels are God’s attendants, and have some functions entirely -independent of natural phenomena. Thus the two stones which mark a -Moslem’s grave show the stations of the angels who are to examine him; -and the tuft of hair on his shaven head is (like the Jewish sidelocks) -to enable the Angel Gabriel to bear the man to heaven. Yet the angels -are in many instances personified parts of nature, guardians of the -land, spirits of wind or fire or water, who are obviously the -descendants and the heirs of the ancient local gods.<a name="FNanchor_56_56" id="FNanchor_56_56"></a><a href="#Footnote_56_56" class="fnanchor">[56]</a> Thus the wicked -angels are supposed to have descended on Mount Hermon, and to have sworn -their oaths there—a belief which adds considerably to the importance of -the great mountain in Syrian estimation. The jinn are the demons of the -desert, lordly and terrible to all who have not the charm which masters -them, obedient as little children to those who have it. They are the -inhabitants of those whirling sandstorms which sweep across the waste. -Some superstitions of this kind may be connected with the former dangers -from wild beasts, which used to haunt the jungles of lower Jordan and -swarm up to the inland territories after an invasion had depopulated -them. Even now there may be seen in<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_221" id="page_221"></a>{221}</span> Palestine an occasional wolf or -leopard, to say nothing of the jackals which every traveller is sure to -see. Some of the fauna of Palestine are in themselves so strange as to -suggest unearthly affinities. The jerboa, for instance, the jumping -mouse of the desert, merits Browning’s description of him, when in -<i>Saul</i> he says, “there are none such as he for a wonder, half bird and -half mouse.” The lizards, too, seem anything but ordinary respectable -law-abiding animals as they twinkle to and fro among the ruins of old -buildings. It is said that Mohammed refused to eat lizards, considering -that they were the metamorphosed spirits of Israelites.</p> - -<p>The spirits that haunt sepulchres are either ghosts of the dead or -ghouls that prey upon their flesh. It is this class of apparition which -appears to have the strongest fascination for the Syrian mind; and its -graveyard lore is the natural sequel to the morbid interest in death -which formed the subject of our preceding chapter. Conder, whose book -gives much interesting information on this whole subject, found it -difficult to keep any Arabs about him at Fusâil, a few miles north of -Jericho, because of their fear of a ghoul in the ruins, who might chance -to desire a change of food were he to see them there. The dead appear to -have undergone a change for the worse in dying. The utmost caution and -politeness are required to prevent their ghosts from doing harm to the -visitors at their tombs, even in the case of men who, while in the body, -were hospitable and friendly persons. Some localities are regarded as -peculiarly dangerous, among<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_222" id="page_222"></a>{222}</span> which is the reputed site of the stoning of -Stephen and (according to Gordon) of Calvary, near Jerusalem. An Arab -writer of the Middle Ages advises the traveller not to pass that haunted -spot at night.<a name="FNanchor_57_57" id="FNanchor_57_57"></a><a href="#Footnote_57_57" class="fnanchor">[57]</a></p> - -<p>If, under ordinary conditions, life in Syria is overshadowed and -haunted, the dread becomes far greater when disease has come. The -explanation of disease is the same easy one as that which has deadened -science and distorted religion—magic again. Even when the true cause of -illness has been guessed, it has to be explained in ghostly language. -When plague has broken out in a locality the Jewish Rabbis make the -neighbours of the stricken house empty all jars and vessels, saying that -“the angel of death wipes his sword in liquids.” The malaria of swamps -is set down to the same cause, and it is probable that many of that -mixed multitude who are to be seen sitting chin deep in the hot -sulphur-springs of Gadara or Tiberias regard their cure as due to some -local spirit who happens to be benevolently inclined. In the -neighbourhood of the tomb of a Mohammedan saint, every accident or -ailment is regarded as the work of the dead man. Indeed the main idea of -Syrian medical science is that all or most sickness is possession by -demons, and a common cure is to bore or burn holes in the patient’s -flesh, by which the evil spirit may escape. The treatment of lunacy is -perhaps the saddest case in point. Until Mr. Waldmeyer built his asylum -at Beyrout, there was but one mode of treatment.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_223" id="page_223"></a>{223}</span> At certain monasteries -there are caves in which the insane are chained below huge stones, with -hardly space for movement, and are kept there for days in hunger and -filth, in order to drive out the devil. The test for devil-possession is -somewhat crude. The patient is shewn a cross. If he turns from it and -refuses to look he is possessed; if he shews no aversion to it he is -only unwell and is allowed to go. In the Beyrout asylum we were told -that no case of lunacy had been discovered which in any way differed -from the European types of the same disease. The record of cures there, -under the same treatment as that which is practised in the West, is a -most encouraging and hopeful one.</p> - -<p>It is true that the bright spirit of the East with its rapid changes and -its unquenchable sparkle of gaiety, has mitigated the horror and -oppressiveness of the spectral there. There are times when one would -almost fancy that the whole of their superstition was a pretence which -was never meant to be taken seriously. In Damascus, and probably -elsewhere, you may buy little rag-dolls supposed to resemble camels. -They are made of bones, covered with patches of many-coloured cloth, and -tricked out with tinsel and strings of beads. We bought two of these -from a young girl in “the street called Straight” for half a franc, and -bore them through the city with a crowd of idlers following us. We -learned afterwards that these were cunning devices to cheat the ghosts. -When you are very sick or in danger you vow a camel to your saint or -friendly spirit—this<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_224" id="page_224"></a>{224}</span> is how you pay your vow. Poking fun at Hades in -this fashion might seem a dangerous game, and one hardly to be -recommended while any lingering belief in the reality of ghosts -remained. Yet such is Syrian character. This sort of thing persists -along with a deep horror of the other world. The words of Job are not in -the least out of date in Palestine to-day: “Fear came upon me, and -trembling, which made all my bones to shake. Then a spirit passed before -my face; the hair of my flesh stood up. It stood still, but I could not -discern the form thereof; an image was before mine eyes: there was -silence, and I heard a voice.”<a name="FNanchor_58_58" id="FNanchor_58_58"></a><a href="#Footnote_58_58" class="fnanchor">[58]</a> The horror is all the deeper because -it appears to be seldom brought to clear statement. The spectral world -is undefined, and it has, therefore, all the added power of the unknown, -whose play upon the imagination is so much more strong and subtle than -that of any clear conception, however ghastly.</p> - -<p>In this chapter no attempt has been made to distinguish between the -superstitions of Jews, Christians, and Mohammedans in Palestine. As a -matter of fact, there is little to choose between them, and they have -much in common. It is true that every nation has some outlook or other -upon the world of spirits. But each has its own way of regarding the -apparitions; and the kind of spectre which a land believes in is no bad -indication of the tone of the land’s thought and character. About the -fairy-lore of Teutonic nations there is a child-like simplicity and -purity which make<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_225" id="page_225"></a>{225}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_029" id="ill_029"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<a href="images/ill_031a_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_031a_sml.jpg" width="500" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">THE VALLEY OF HINNOM, WITH THE HILL OF OFFENCE.</p> - -<p>The upper portion of the picture to the left is the Hill of Offence, -with the village of Siloam on its lower slopes.</p></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">that lore wholly refreshing and precious. The nymphs and Pan, whose -ancient monuments we have seen in ancient Palestine, were graceful. But -the spectral element in modern Palestine appears to be almost wholly -morbid and unclean,—the further decadence of a land that has made its -covenant with death. The life a Syrian peasant leads to-day is haunted -by ghostly terrors; it is a life led by leave of the dead, or by a -systematic cunning which plays off one malign spirit against another, or -succeeds in winning a point or two against the grave for the player. It -is a view of life than which surely none can be at once more impudent -and more melancholy.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_226" id="page_226"></a>{226}</span></p> - -<h3><a name="CHAPTER_IV-iii" id="CHAPTER_IV-iii"></a>CHAPTER IV<br /><br /> -THE LAND OF THE CROSS</h3> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">It</span> is a sad view of the spirit of Syria which the last chapters have -offered, yet it is but too true. We must linger yet a little longer -listening to “the sob of the land” before we turn to that which is at -once the explanation and the hope of relief for its long sorrow. Apart -altogether from the ghostly elements in this land of ruins, the mere -melancholy is persistent and depressing as one moves from place to -place. The gloom is so ominous, as to be at times suggestive of a -supernatural curse that broods upon everything with its depressing -weight. The khans outside of villages are in ruins; so are the bridges -over streams, and the castles on the hills. Amid such scenery it is -natural to remember the defeats rather than the glories of the past, and -the national history seems to be one long record of misfortune. In the -modern conditions of life in Palestine the long story of tears and blood -seems to be continued in the haggard desolation of its present.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_227" id="page_227"></a>{227}</span></p> - -<p>Two things especially must send this impression home even to the most -casual observer, viz. the heartlessness of toil and the prevalence of -disease. In every country much must always depend on the spirit in which -men labour. Where the walls of its cities rise to music, as the old glad -legends told of Troy and Thebes, there is hope and promise; but here -there is no song to help men’s toil. It is hard and joyless, with little -promise and less hope. With the death of these self-respect also dies; -and work, without incentives to anything which might tempt ambition, -remains merely as a hard necessity and a curse.</p> - -<p>Next to its heartless toil the uncured sickness of the land contributes -to the deep sadness of its spirit. Disease seems to stare you everywhere -in the face. Superstition and fatalism combined have blocked all -progress in medical science. The people are naturally healthy; and their -strong constitutions, kept firm by plain living, yield to medical -treatment in a marvellous way. But when any serious accident has -happened, or any dangerous disease infected them, they are utterly -helpless, and things take their course. The medicinal springs form an -exception to this rule, and seem to be the one real healing agency in -the country. Their bluish waters bubble with sulphuretted hydrogen, and -smell abominably, but they cure sicknesses of some kinds. For<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_228" id="page_228"></a>{228}</span> other -diseases there is no native cure. Those which are most in evidence are -ulcers and inflammatory diseases of the eyes. The natives appear to be -immune so far as malaria is concerned; but a peculiar kind of decline is -not uncommon, in which the emaciation is so great as to reduce the -patient to the appearance of a skeleton, with great lustrous eyes. It -need hardly be said that the characteristic disease of Syria is leprosy. -The first object which attracts the eye after you arrive at the railway -station of Jerusalem is an immense leper hospital. In a case which -created some sensation lately in the south of England, it turned out -that a fraudulent Syrian had been raising money for a non-existent -hospital at Tirzah, which was to accommodate eleven thousand lepers. Of -course the figure was a monstrous one, but the fact that it was invented -shews how terrible a scourge this is. It is a curious circumstance that -the inhabitants of towns do not contract leprosy. It appears in -villages, and the sufferers are at once driven out, to wander to the -larger towns, outside of which they settle in communities or beg by the -wayside. The view of the north-east end of Jerusalem from the Mount of -Olives shews a roadside which is always dotted with these pitiable folk. -For many travellers this is the road of their first journey from the -city, leading over Olivet to Bethany, and they are<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_229" id="page_229"></a>{229}</span> not likely to forget -that ride. Lepers, in all stages of hideous decay, line the roadside; -real or sham paralytics sprawl and shake in the middle of the path, so -that the horses have actually to pick their way among the bodies of -them. The epileptics appear to be frauds. Their faces are covered, but -they see what is going on well enough to stop shaking when the horses -have passed. The leprosy is all too real. Arms covered with putrid -sores, hands from which the fingers have one after another fallen off, -and husky voices begging from throats already half eaten out—these -cannot be imitated.</p> - -<p>As to the causes of Syrian disease, and leprosy in particular, there -seems to be much obscurity. Perhaps the word that comes nearest to an -explanation is uncleanness, and the promise of “a fountain opened for -sin and for uncleanness” may have a physical as well as a spiritual -significance. The land is incredibly contaminated with filth, as the -following quotation shews: “Sir Charles Warren tells us that the soil in -which he made some of his excavations was so saturated with disease -germs that his workmen were often attacked with fever, especially if -they had any sore or scratch on their hands.”<a name="FNanchor_59_59" id="FNanchor_59_59"></a><a href="#Footnote_59_59" class="fnanchor">[59]</a> It would be hard to -find words more significant than these.</p> - -<p>For this state of matters, and for its continuance from generation to -generation, many reasons may be given. The usual explanation of the -whole is the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_230" id="page_230"></a>{230}</span> government, with its soldiers and its taxation. The wild -notes of Turkish bugle-calls answering each other across Jerusalem sound -harsh, and as it were blasphemous, and further travel deepens the -resentment rather than removes it. When, behind all the present evils, -one remembers the past, with its massacres and all its other iniquities, -one’s heart grows hot. One Syrian, after narrating a specially -aggravated case of oppression, asked us if we knew “the story of the -prophets Ananias and Sapphira.” We said we had heard it; and he added, -“Ah, in <i>those</i> days God punished at once; now, <i>God waits</i>!” Dr. -Thomson somewhere quotes a proverb to the effect that, “Wherever the -hoof of a Turkish horse rests it leaves barrenness behind it”; and all -that is seen in Syria tends to prove that saying but too true. Every -possible experiment in misgovernment seems to have been made here. -Frequent change of governors, underpayment of officials, conscription of -the most ruinous sort, bribery, cruelty, fanaticism, laziness, -sensuality, and stupidity—all are to be seen open and without pretence -at concealment.</p> - -<p>Yet in the interest of truth it ought to be remembered that there is -another side to the story. The incident of the horse at Banias<a name="FNanchor_60_60" id="FNanchor_60_60"></a><a href="#Footnote_60_60" class="fnanchor">[60]</a> made -one understand how a Turk might answer his critics, with some show of -reason, that this was the only sort of government these people could -understand. Of course it might be again replied that it was oppression -that had brought this about. Yet it<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_231" id="page_231"></a>{231}</span> is perfectly clear that Syrian -character is very far from that of martyred innocence. From whatever -causes it has come about, the fact is certain that in many respects the -moral sense of Palestine is as depraved as that of her oppressors. Her -worst enemy is her own wickedness.</p> - -<p>Thus many elements enter into the desolation of the Holy Land, and make -it a place of decaying body and of shiftless spirit, but of all these -elements the ethical is supreme. The very look of the country suggests -this. It is not merely stony; as has been cleverly said, it seems to -have been <i>stoned</i>—stoned to death for its sins. The loose boulders of -Judea, and the scattered ruins of old vineyard terraces and village -walls, present all the appearance of flung missiles. This view of the -case is acknowledged freely by the inhabitants themselves, in whose -thoughts judgment has a prominent place. The buried cities of Sodom and -Gomorrah are favourite subjects of reflection with disciples of all the -creeds. A somewhat similar story is told of the Lake of Phiala, a -volcanic mountain lake south of Hermon. Tradition tells of a village -submerged below its waters “to punish the inhabitants for their -inhospitable treatment of travellers,” and there are many other stories -of judgment in the country. Yet the judgment always falls upon some one -else than the narrator of the story, who would not insult your -intelligence by supposing that you thought <i>him</i> in need of judgment. -Even in the familiar quotations from the litany chanted by the Jews at -their Wailing-Place, the confession of sin is conspicuous by its -absence. There is<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_232" id="page_232"></a>{232}</span> sore mourning over the departed glories of the land, -but the only sins confessed are those of priests and kings long dead. To -all creeds alike the essential element in religion seems to be ritual -performance, and the ideal life is accordingly not one of ethical -character but of formal correctness. And yet in the midst of all this -self-righteous complacency, any one can see that every part of the land -is being judged and is bearing the punishment of sin. Jericho, squatting -sordidly amid the ruins of its ancient Hellenism, looked down upon by -the severe and barren mountain where Jesus hungered, is a monument of -the reality of ethical distinctions as hard and practical facts. They -may be ignored, but they must be reckoned with in the end.</p> - -<p>Of the ethical significance of the fate of Palestine there cannot be a -moment’s doubt. It is here that the love and care of God have been met -and foiled by the sin and carelessness of man. In regard to its whole -moral and social life, there is one overmastering conviction which grows -upon the traveller from day to day. That conviction is, that it is a -land which requires and demands righteousness. Nature and man are in -close touch, and each depends upon the other. It is not a desert, where -no amount of labour can produce result; nor is it a luxuriant tropical -country whose fruits fall ripe and untoiled for into man’s hand. It -demands labour, but it answers to it. The least effort of man to be a -man and do his human work meets with immediate and generous response. -Neglected plains and valleys, once rich, are now a wilderness; the most -unpromising hillsides, where terracing and irrigation<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_233" id="page_233"></a>{233}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_030" id="ill_030"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<a href="images/ill_031_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_031_sml.jpg" width="500" height="361" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">THE ROCK-CUT TOMBS OF THE VALLEY OF JEHOSHAPHAT.</p> - -<p>These tombs are opn the eastern side of the alley facing the East Wall -of the Temple Area.</p></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">have kept the human side of the compact, are fertile. The labour would -indeed require to be hard and unremitting. Many of the streams are so -deep sunk in their channels that extraordinary enterprise would be -needed to raise their waters for irrigation or to conduct them from -higher levels in long conduits. Yet every remaining arch of an old -aqueduct, and every watermill whose wheel thuds round in its heavy way, -shew that such enterprise is possible. Each of those grooved and -checkered valleys where men with their naked feet open and close the -little gates of clay, and water the fat crops of onion and tomato, shews -how sure is the reward of enterprise. Similarly the terracing reminds us -that soil is as precious as water. Both must be laboured for and fought -for. It is the desert that naturally claims the land and sets the normal -point of view for its inhabitants. Syria is an oasis by the grace of God -and the toil of man.</p> - -<p>This alone would suffice to make Palestine an ideal training-ground for -a nation to learn righteousness. The whole theory of Providence which -dominates the earlier Old Testament, and lingers on in popular belief -through the New, is apparent on every mile of these valleys. That theory -was that even in the present life the sin of man will be immediately -punished by adversity, and his righteousness rewarded by prosperity. It -was a theory which had to be abandoned, and the whole marvellous story -of Job shews us the process of the nation’s discarding it. To us it -seems wonderful that it should have been able to survive at all in face -of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_234" id="page_234"></a>{234}</span> the inexplicable and at times apparently irrational facts of all -human experience. But the fact that in Syria nature’s rewards and -punishments are so certain and so immediate goes far to explain both its -origin and its persistence.</p> - -<p>Such thoughts as these regarding Syria inevitably lead towards one goal. -There is but one symbol in the world which expresses all that depth of -pain which we have found in the history of this sorely-tried land, and -at the same time forces on even the most thoughtless its moral -significance. That symbol is the Cross of Christ. It is still to be seen -very frequently in Syria, generally in its Greek form -<img src="images/cross.png" -style="vertical-align:middle;" -width="35" -alt="[Image unavailable: cross]" />. In this form it is more impressive than in the other. The -oblique lower bar represents a board nailed across the shaft for the -feet of the sufferer to rest on. The realistic effect of this is -surprising, for it brings home to one’s imagination in a quite new way -the terrible fact that men have actually been crucified.</p> - -<p>The later history and legend of the cross in Palestine is one of -singular and tragic interest. First of all there is the preposterous -story of St. Helena’s dream—the miraculous discovery of the three -crosses, and the miracle of healing which enabled her to distinguish the -cross of Christ from those of the robbers. Since then the sacred wood -has been tossed about from hand to hand, hunted for, bargained for -sinned for, died for. Its presence in their army comforted the Crusaders -in their misery; the sight of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_235" id="page_235"></a>{235}</span> it in the hands of the Saracens filled -them with despair. The restoration of it was among the chief demands -conceded by Saladin when he surrendered Acre to Richard; and when he -failed to deliver it, hostages to the number of 2700 were slaughtered in -sight of the Saracen camp. All through the Crusades it was the badge of -self-devotion to the holy wars, and a strange tale is told of an -occasion on which Louis IX., presenting robes to his courtiers according -to an ancient custom, had crosses secretly embroidered on them, so that -the wearers found themselves committed unawares to the Crusade.</p> - -<p>For 1500 years that symbol pointed to the site which the buildings of -the Church of the Holy Sepulchre cover. Godfrey was buried there, and -many a devout soul regarded it as the holiest of holy places. In the -middle of the nineteenth century the question of its authenticity was -raised; and General Gordon, who spent part of the last year before he -went to Khartoum, in Jerusalem, championed the identification of the -hill of Jeremiah’s Grotto, just outside the Damascus Gate, with Calvary. -His point of view was a strange one. It was suggested by the words -“place of a skull,” from which he developed the idea of the Holy City as -the body of the bride of Christ, this hill being the head, Zion the -pleura, and so on. The theory, so far as it regards Calvary, has -appealed to many competent judges who were very far from adopting the -mystical and emblematic views of Gordon. The hill is an old quarry, -within which Jeremiah is supposed by tradition to have written his -Lamentations. It is quite a little hill, whose short and scanty grass -was<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_236" id="page_236"></a>{236}</span> burnt up with drought when we saw it, leaving a surface of loose -sandy soil. A man crucified here would have the Mount of Olives in his -eyes behind some roof-lines of the city. By a curious coincidence a -rock-hewn tomb, with a groove running in front of the face of it for a -great stone which would close its entrance, has been discovered close -by. It is a grave with only one loculus in it, and it is temptingly like -one’s idea of the Garden Tomb of Joseph; but it is said to be -undoubtedly of later date than the death of Jesus. From one point in the -road, somewhat nearer the Valley of Jehoshaphat, the hollows and caves -of the hill, which here breaks along its length into a small precipice, -bear a striking resemblance to a chapfallen skull. Not that the features -can be examined in anything like accurate detail. But in the evening, -while the sun sets over Jerusalem and the shadows slowly deepen, the -resemblance is sufficient to strike one who had not heard that this was -the place so named. Many arguments have been urged for this new site. -Its proximity to an ancient Jewish cemetery is in favour of the -probability that Joseph’s tomb was there. It was close to the public -highway, as Calvary undoubtedly was. It is also significant that the -gate now known as the Damascus Gate was formerly called St. Stephen’s -Gate; and tradition affirmed that through it St. Stephen was led forth -to his martyrdom. It is probable that the martyrdom took place on the -public execution-ground, where, in the natural course of events, Jesus -and the robbers would also have been crucified. Finally, and most -important, recent explorations have discovered,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_237" id="page_237"></a>{237}</span> in various parts of the -city, huge Jewish stones which are believed by advocates of this theory -to be those of the wall which stood there in the time of Christ. By -completing the line of these stones a wall is reconstructed which -encloses the traditional Church of the Holy Sepulchre, while it leaves -Gordon’s site still outside. To get the Holy Sepulchre outside this -wall, as we know the place of the crucifixion was, it would be necessary -to imagine a sharp angular recess in the wall pointing inwards, with -Calvary filling the space within the arms of the angle. It matters -little where the spot was. Yet it would be interesting if the north side -of the city should ultimately claim Him from the west—Nazareth, as it -were, from Rome. The garden and the new grave belong to an English -committee of trustees endowed in 1901. It would indeed be a striking -thing if, after all the idolatry of sites which the vision of St. Helena -started, the real hill and garden where the world’s great tragedy was -enacted should prove to have gone past Roman and Greek worshippers both, -and to have been committed to the hands of Protestants.<a name="FNanchor_61_61" id="FNanchor_61_61"></a><a href="#Footnote_61_61" class="fnanchor">[61]</a></p> - -<p>No one who has stood upon that hill of Golgotha and thought of the -wondrous past can have failed to perceive a mystical and dark connection -between the crime which has rendered Jerusalem so famous, and all that -deathly and spectral fate which has befallen<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_238" id="page_238"></a>{238}</span> the spirit of Syria. As we -stand amid the deepening shadows of sunset on the spot where Christ was -crucified, a change seems to come, as the blood-red sky crimsons the -minarets and domes. It is no longer Christ that hangs upon the Cross, -but Palestine. No other land would have crucified Him. Had He come to -Greece He might have been neglected or ridiculed, but certainly not -crucified. For that it needed a religion as bitterly earnest, and at the -same time as morally decayed, as Judaism was then. And that same moral -and spiritual condition which set up the Cross for Jesus, has finished -its course by crucifying the nation that murdered Him. Most literally -this happened in the days when Titus used up all the trees near -Jerusalem to make crosses for Jews. But in Sir John Mandeville’s time -the legend had expanded to this, that at the Crucifixion all the trees -in the world withered and died. Certainly a blight came upon the land of -Palestine. It has sometimes been asserted that the nation which -crucified Jesus Christ can never again rise to national prosperity or -greatness. The forces at work in history are far too subtle and complex -to allow any one to say with assurance what the future may or may not -have in store for a race. But this at least is evident, that meanwhile -the Cross has marked this region for its own; the land is everywhere on -its Cross, and the obvious cause of this is the want of righteousness, -both in oppressors and oppressed. It is a land that cries aloud for -righteousness in its agony.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_239" id="page_239"></a>{239}</span></p> - -<h3><a name="CHAPTER_V-iii" id="CHAPTER_V-iii"></a>CHAPTER V<br /><br /> -RESURRECTION</h3> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">In</span> regard to the future of Palestine the outlook of different writers -varies perhaps as much as upon any similar question that could be named. -Every one is familiar with the Utopian dreams which optimistic -constructors of programmes cherish regarding it. On the other hand, -grave and thoughtful writers have sometimes felt the misery of its -present state so heavily as to abandon all hope for the future, and to -acknowledge the most discouraging views as to the possibilities before -the land. Apart from sentiment, or from some favourite method of -interpreting prophecy, the reasons for such pessimism are mainly two. -One is the change of climate, which appears from many indications to be -an unquestionable fact. The other is the destruction of terraces, and -the consequent washing away of soil from the higher regions of the -country. These are serious considerations, which cannot be ignored. If -this view be the correct one, the only permanent continuance of Syria -will be as a symbol of judgment, a kind of Lot’s-wife pillar among the -peoples, a sermon in stone upon<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_240" id="page_240"></a>{240}</span> the ethical principles which govern the -fortunes of nations. The land will remain as a proverb, but will never -again be a home.</p> - -<p>Yet neither these nor any other such forebodings seem to the ordinary -observer quite to be justified. If the climate has changed, may not that -be due to causes that can be remedied? By proper drainage of swamps and -planting of trees, it would seem perfectly possible to modify climatic -conditions to an extent at least sufficient to allow the hope of -prosperous agriculture and pleasant habitation. As to the terraces, if -they have been constructed once they may be reconstructed with hope of -result. There are tracts even in the desert itself where traces of -former cultivation may still be seen. If the uncivilised or -semi-barbarous tribes of the ancient time built up the land until -handfuls of corn waved on the tops of mountains, surely it is not too -much to expect that men armed with all the skill and appliance of modern -engineering may yet repeat the process. The instance of Malta has been -already cited; and, apart from that it is a very dusty world, and soil -accumulates as if by magic where man provides for it a place to rest on.</p> - -<p>It seems rash in one little qualified for the task to pronounce judgment -of any sort on the future of Palestine, yet the conviction that all is -not over with the land grows stronger, rather than weaker, with -reflection. Renan speaks of “the little kingdom of Israel, which was in -the highest degree creative, but did not know how to crown its edifice.” -Put in another<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_241" id="page_241"></a>{241}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_031" id="ill_031"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 306px;"> -<a href="images/ill_032_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_032_sml.jpg" width="306" height="500" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">THE NORTH-EAST END OF JERUSALEM AND MIZPAH, FROM THE -MOUNT OF OLIVES.</p> - -<p>The mountain above the city to the north, with mosque and minaret on its -summit, is the point from which the Crusaders had their first view of -Jerusalem.</p></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">form, this means that the Holy Land is a land of prophecies unfulfilled -or half-fulfilled. But each such prophecy was an inspiration, by which -the highest men saw possibilities for the nation, whose conditions the -lower men failed to realise or to fulfil. Yet the possibilities were -there, as to a great extent they still are there, and, as Coningsby puts -it, “the East is a career.” As to what those possibilities and that -career may actually be, the past history of the land may guide our -speculation. Here, as elsewhere, the lines of hope for the future are -pointed out by the failures of the past. The failure has been due to bad -morality and disloyalty to religious faith; the hope of success lies in -ethical and religious regeneration.</p> - -<p>When we sought for an explanation of the misery of Palestine we were -thrown back on the ethical aspect of the case. Had the land been -faithful to her high calling her story would have been very different. -Never was a country honoured with so lofty a trust as hers; never did a -country so often betray her trust. This was the despair of her ancient -lawgiver, and the burden of her later prophets. When Christ came to her, -she knew no better thing to do with Him than to break His heart and to -crucify Him on Calvary. Within the century Jerusalem was crucified in -turn; and soon a Christian Syria took the place of the perished Judaism. -That in its turn decayed. Its creed became artificial, its spirit -effeminate, and its morality corrupt. The spirit of Christianity had -sunk so low in Palestine before the Mussulman occupation as to manifest -its zeal<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_242" id="page_242"></a>{242}</span> by using every effort to defile that part of the Temple area -which they regarded as the Jewish Holy of Holies. The young faith of -Islam, fresh and vigorous, and not as yet embittered, made an easy -conquest of the effete religion, which has lived since then on -sufferance, lamenting its sufferings, but never realising its desert of -them. To this day the Christian travelling in Syria is oppressed by the -sense of its desertion. Christ has forsaken the desolate shores of the -Sea of Galilee. He walks no more in the streets of Jerusalem. It is the -old story—“They besought Him that He would depart out of their coasts, -and He entered into a ship, and passed over and came unto His own city.”</p> - -<p>Yet somehow it is impossible to believe that He has gone from the land -of His earthly home for ever. An incident which occurred to us in -Damascus dwells in our memory with prophetic significance. We had -visited the Great Mosque, which rose upon the ruins of an ancient -Christian church. The original walls were not entirely demolished, and -among the parts built into the new structure was a beautiful gate on -whose lintel may still be deciphered the Greek inscription, “Thy -kingdom, O Christ, is an everlasting kingdom, and Thy dominion endureth -throughout all generations.” To see this inscription we climbed a ladder -in the Jewellers’ Bazaar. At the height of some fifteen feet we stepped -upon a ledge of rather precarious masonry, and after a short scramble -along this came to the lintel, half concealed by a rubble wall running -diagonally across it. A stranger was with us, a devout Christian<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_243" id="page_243"></a>{243}</span> from a -town far south of Damascus. In the whole city nothing moved him so -deeply as this stone, and he exclaimed, “It was the Christians’ -fault—they were so rough, so rude, so ignorant—it was done by the wish -of God—<i>but He will have it again</i>.” And He <i>will</i> have it again, -sooner or later! When Omar heard that Mohammed was dead he would not -believe it, but proclaimed in the Mosque of Medina, “The Prophet has -only swooned away!” But Mohammed had died, and it is his dead hand that -has held the land these thirteen centuries. Christ, being raised from -the dead, dieth no more; and the future of the land lies with Christ. To -the Western world He has fulfilled His tremendous claim, “I am the -resurrection and the life,” not only in the hope of immortality, but in -the spring and impulse which His faith has given to national ideals. It -is impossible not to hope for a fulfilment of the promise to the land -where it was first spoken. Looking down from Tabor upon the hill of -Dûhy, one has sight of Endor to the east, while Shunem lies just round -the western slope, and between them is the village of Nain. It is as if -that hill were a sanctuary from Death, where the grave could not hold -its own. Palestine holds in trust for the world those empty graves, and -one grave above all others from which He Himself came forth. Surely she, -too, will rise, by His grace, in a faith and character purer than those -which she has lost.</p> - -<p>It would be impossible, within our present limits, to say anything of -the political or national outlook of Syria, or of the many schemes and -agencies which are<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_244" id="page_244"></a>{244}</span> dealing with such problems. The impression made by -Christian missions, however, must have a word of record before we close -these notes of travel. We have already described at considerable length -the sadness of Palestine. As you journey from place to place the -impression deepens. Sores, exposed and fly-blown, intrude themselves -into the memory of many a wayside and city street. The dirt and stench -of the houses make the sunshine terrible. After weeks of travel the -feeling of a sick land has deepened upon you until it has become an -oppression weighing daily upon your heart. Suddenly you emerge in a -mission-station, and an indescribable feeling of relief possesses you. -There is at last a sound of joy and health. These are the spots of -brightness in a very grey landscape, little centres of life in a land -where so much is morbid. The visiting of sacred places would be the most -selfish of religious sentimentalities if it were done without a painful -sense of helplessness against the misery that surrounds them. The only -thing that turns pity into hope in Palestine is the mission-work that is -being done there. No one can see that work without being filled with an -altogether new enthusiasm for missions. Across the sea, one believes in -them as a part of Christian duty and custom. On the spot, one thanks God -for them as almost unearthly revelations of “sweetness and cleanness, -abundance, power to bless, and Christian love in that loveless land.”</p> - -<p>The names of Christian missionaries are imperial names in Syria. It is, -indeed, an empire of hearts, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_245" id="page_245"></a>{245}</span></p> - -<p><a name="ill_032" id="ill_032"></a></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<a href="images/ill_033_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/ill_033_sml.jpg" width="500" height="354" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p class="c">THE PLAIN OF JERICHO, LOOKING TOWARDS THE MOUNTAINS OF -MOAB.</p> - -<p>The road in the foreground, stretching across the plain, is that from -Jerusalem to Jericho.</p></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">its coming is not with observation. But of its reality and power there -can be no question even now, and its sway is extending year by year. To -those whose Syrian travels have given them the vivid imagination, vivid -almost as memory, of the real fact of Christ in the past, this fact of -Christ in the present is as welcome as it is evident. They feel, and the -East too is feeling, that the Great Healer still goes about the land -doing good. The future, whatever its political course may be, is -religiously full of hope. It may take time—God only knows how long it -will take. The ancient miracles of Christ did not reveal the Healer to -the world in a day. Yet quietly and out of sight, the East is learning -that Christ is indeed the Healer of mankind. It does not as yet confess -this, even to itself. But the hearts of many sufferers know it, and -every Christian knows that certainly “He will have it again.”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_246" id="page_246"></a>{246}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="Index" id="Index"></a>Index</h2> - -<p class="c"><a href="#A">A</a>, -<a href="#B">B</a>, -<a href="#C">C</a>, -<a href="#D">D</a>, -<a href="#E">E</a>, -<a href="#F">F</a>, -<a href="#G">G</a>, -<a href="#H">H</a>, -<a href="#I-ind">I</a>, -<a href="#J">J</a>, -<a href="#K">K</a>, -<a href="#L">L</a>, -<a href="#M">M</a>, -<a href="#N">N</a>, -<a href="#O">O</a>, -<a href="#P">P</a>, -<a href="#Q">Q</a>, -<a href="#R">R</a>, -<a href="#S">S</a>, -<a href="#T">T</a>, -<a href="#U">U</a>, -<a href="#V-ind">V</a>, -<a href="#W">W</a>, -<a href="#Z">Z</a></p> - -<p class="nind"> -<a name="A" id="A"></a>Abana, <a href="#page_052">52</a>, <a href="#page_059">59</a>, <a href="#page_060">60</a><br /> - -Achor, <a href="#page_047">47</a><br /> - -Acre, <a href="#page_169">169</a><br /> - -Agriculture, <a href="#page_071">71</a><br /> - -Amphitheatres, <a href="#page_107">107</a><br /> - -Angels, <a href="#page_220">220</a><br /> - -Antipatris, <a href="#page_054">54</a><br /> - -Aqueducts, <a href="#page_104">104</a><br /> - -Arabia, Arab, <a href="#page_022">22</a>, <a href="#page_029">29</a>, <a href="#page_093">93 f.</a>, <a href="#page_149">149</a>, <a href="#page_181">181</a>, <a href="#page_198">198</a>, <a href="#page_199">199</a><br /> - -Aramaic, <a href="#page_069">69</a><br /> - -Asceticism, <a href="#page_122">122</a><br /> - -Athlit, <a href="#page_169">169</a><br /> - -<br /> -<a name="B" id="B"></a>Baalbek, <a href="#page_108">108</a><br /> - -Banias, <a href="#page_055">55</a>, <a href="#page_168">168</a><br /> - -Barbarossa, <a href="#page_161">161</a><br /> - -Bashan, <a href="#page_044">44</a><br /> - -Beautiful Gate, <a href="#page_083">83</a>, <a href="#page_192">192</a><br /> - -Bethel, <a href="#page_008">8</a>, <a href="#page_102">102</a><br /> - -Bether, <a href="#page_098">98</a><br /> - -Bethlehem, <a href="#page_025">25</a>, <a href="#page_046">46</a>, <a href="#page_072">72</a>, <a href="#page_074">74</a>, <a href="#page_189">189</a>, <a href="#page_214">214</a>, 253<br /> - -Bethshan, <a href="#page_041">41</a>, <a href="#page_042">42</a>, <a href="#page_072">72</a>, <a href="#page_169">169</a><br /> - -Beyrout, <a href="#page_066">66</a><br /> - -Bible illustrations, <a href="#page_092">92</a>, <a href="#page_093">93</a>, <a href="#page_094">94</a><br /> - -Booths, <a href="#page_178">178</a><br /> - -Bridges, <a href="#page_057">57</a>, <a href="#page_104">104</a><br /> - -Burdens, <a href="#page_181">181</a><br /> - -<br /> -<a name="C" id="C"></a>Cæsarea, <a href="#page_102">102</a>, <a href="#page_163">163</a>, <a href="#page_172">172</a><br /> - -Calvary, site of, <a href="#page_078">78</a>, <a href="#page_083">83</a>, <a href="#page_114">114</a>, <a href="#page_196">196</a>, <a href="#page_222">222</a>, <a href="#page_235">235</a>, <a href="#page_236">236</a>, 276<br /> - -Capernaum, <a href="#page_064">64</a>, <a href="#page_101">101</a>, <a href="#page_105">105</a><br /> - -Carpets, <a href="#page_016">16</a><br /> - -Castles, <a href="#page_168">168</a><br /> - -Caves, <a href="#page_214">214</a><br /> - -Character, Syrian, <a href="#page_015">15</a>, <a href="#page_033">33</a>, <a href="#page_062">62</a>, <a href="#page_232">232 f.</a><br /> - -Children, <a href="#page_111">111</a>, <a href="#page_187">187</a>, <a href="#page_218">218</a>, <a href="#page_231">231</a><br /> - -Christianity, early, <a href="#page_115">115 f.</a><br /> - -Church of the Holy Sepulchre, <a href="#page_079">79</a>, <a href="#page_131">131</a>, <a href="#page_150">150</a>, <a href="#page_151">151</a>, <a href="#page_156">156</a>, <a href="#page_193">193</a>, <a href="#page_235">235</a><br /> - -Church of the Nativity, <a href="#page_133">133 f.</a><br /> - -Churches, <a href="#page_129">129</a>, <a href="#page_146">146</a>, <a href="#page_160">160</a>, <a href="#page_165">165</a>, <a href="#page_171">171</a><br /> - -Cities, <a href="#page_022">22</a>, <a href="#page_065">65 f.</a><br /> - -Clothes, <a href="#page_017">17</a>, <a href="#page_181">181</a><br /> - -Coast, <a href="#page_043">43</a><br /> - -Colour, <a href="#page_007">7 f.</a><br /> - -Commerce, <a href="#page_075">75</a>, <a href="#page_078">78</a>, <a href="#page_157">157</a>, <a href="#page_159">159</a><br /> - -Constantine, <a href="#page_115">115</a>, <a href="#page_116">116</a><br /> - -Cross, the, <a href="#page_147">147</a>, <a href="#page_234">234 f.</a><br /> - -Crusaders, <a href="#page_074">74</a>, <a href="#page_157">157 f.</a>, <a href="#page_192">192</a><br /> - -<br /> -<a name="D" id="D"></a>Damascus, <a href="#page_012">12</a>, <a href="#page_013">13</a>, <a href="#page_021">21</a>, <a href="#page_035">35</a>, <a href="#page_053">53</a>, <a href="#page_060">60</a>, <a href="#page_066">66</a>, <a href="#page_075">75</a>, <a href="#page_085">85</a>, <a href="#page_137">137</a>, <a href="#page_143">143</a>, <a href="#page_146">146</a>, <a href="#page_174">174</a>, <a href="#page_185">185</a>, <a href="#page_191">191</a>, <a href="#page_193">193</a>, <a href="#page_223">223</a>, <a href="#page_241">241</a><br /> - -Damascus Gate, Jerusalem, <a href="#page_053">53</a>, <a href="#page_083">83</a><br /> - -Dan, <a href="#page_054">54</a><br /> - -Dead Sea, <a href="#page_011">11</a>, <a href="#page_025">25</a>, <a href="#page_037">37</a>, <a href="#page_041">41</a>, <a href="#page_051">51</a>, <a href="#page_057">57</a>, <a href="#page_060">60</a>, <a href="#page_207">207</a><br /> - -Death, <a href="#page_076">76</a>, <a href="#page_190">190 f.</a><br /> - -Dervishes, <a href="#page_140">140</a><br /> - -Desert, <a href="#page_012">12</a>, <a href="#page_014">14</a>, <a href="#page_015">15</a>, <a href="#page_020">20 f.</a><br /> - -Detail, observation of, <a href="#page_032">32</a><br /> - -Dew, <a href="#page_051">51</a><br /> - -Disease, <a href="#page_222">222</a>, <a href="#page_223">223</a>, <a href="#page_227">227 f.</a>, <a href="#page_244">244 f.</a><br /> - -Dog River, <a href="#page_054">54</a>, <a href="#page_086">86</a><br /> - -<br /> -<a name="E" id="E"></a>Earthquake, <a href="#page_212">212</a><br /> - -East of Jordan, <a href="#page_022">22</a><br /> - -El Aksa, <a href="#page_147">147 f.</a><br /> - -Elijah, <a href="#page_061">61</a><br /> - -Elisha’s Fountain,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_247" id="page_247"></a>{247}</span> <a href="#page_143">143</a><br /> - -Esdraelon, <a href="#page_009">9</a>, <a href="#page_022">22</a>, <a href="#page_026">26</a>, <a href="#page_041">41</a>, <a href="#page_042">42</a>, <a href="#page_049">49</a>, <a href="#page_059">59</a><br /> - -Evil eye, <a href="#page_218">218</a><br /> - -<br /> -<a name="F" id="F"></a>Fanaticism, <a href="#page_188">188</a><br /> - -Fatalism, <a href="#page_201">201</a>, <a href="#page_202">202</a><br /> - -Fauna, <a href="#page_012">12</a>, <a href="#page_220">220</a>, <a href="#page_221">221</a><br /> - -Feasts, <a href="#page_188">188</a>, <a href="#page_201">201</a><br /> - -Fellahin, <a href="#page_022">22</a>, <a href="#page_069">69</a><br /> - -Flora, <a href="#page_012">12</a>, <a href="#page_067">67</a>, <a href="#page_161">161</a>, <a href="#page_207">207</a>, <a href="#page_209">209</a>, <a href="#page_210">210</a>, <a href="#page_211">211</a><br /> - -Future, <a href="#page_239">239 f.</a><br /> - -<br /> -<a name="G" id="G"></a>Gadara, <a href="#page_060">60</a>, <a href="#page_098">98</a>, <a href="#page_108">108</a>, <a href="#page_194">194</a><br /> - -Galilee, <a href="#page_009">9</a>, <a href="#page_045">45</a><br /> - -Games, <a href="#page_185">185</a><br /> - -Gardens, <a href="#page_177">177</a><br /> - -Gaza, <a href="#page_064">64</a><br /> - -Genii, <a href="#page_220">220</a><br /> - -Geography, <a href="#page_032">32</a>, <a href="#page_161">161</a><br /> - -Gethsemane, <a href="#page_214">214</a><br /> - -Ghosts, <a href="#page_190">190</a><br /> - -Gideon, <a href="#page_064">64</a><br /> - -Gilgals, <a href="#page_047">47 f.</a><br /> - -Glass, <a href="#page_016">16</a><br /> - -Gorges, <a href="#page_047">47</a><br /> - -Great Deep, <a href="#page_053">53</a>, <a href="#page_213">213</a><br /> - -Greece, <a href="#page_100">100</a>, <a href="#page_113">113</a>, <a href="#page_197">197</a><br /> - -<br /> -<a name="H" id="H"></a>Harod, Well of, <a href="#page_064">64</a><br /> - -Hattin, <a href="#page_169">169</a><br /> - -Hauran, <a href="#page_085">85</a><br /> - -Hebron, <a href="#page_009">9</a>, <a href="#page_046">46</a>, <a href="#page_064">64</a>, <a href="#page_074">74</a>, <a href="#page_075">75</a>, <a href="#page_090">90</a>, <a href="#page_196">196</a><br /> - -Hermits, <a href="#page_123">123</a><br /> - -Hermon, <a href="#page_009">9</a>, <a href="#page_011">11</a>, <a href="#page_041">41</a>, <a href="#page_044">44</a>, <a href="#page_051">51</a>, <a href="#page_054">54</a>, <a href="#page_055">55</a>, <a href="#page_220">220</a><br /> - -Herods, <a href="#page_056">56</a>, <a href="#page_101">101</a>, <a href="#page_110">110</a>, <a href="#page_171">171</a><br /> - -Hezekiah’s aqueduct, <a href="#page_053">53</a>, <a href="#page_088">88</a><br /> - -Holy Fire, <a href="#page_133">133</a>, <a href="#page_193">193</a><br /> - -Holy Grail, <a href="#page_162">162</a><br /> - -Hospitality, <a href="#page_035">35</a><br /> - -Houses, <a href="#page_016">16</a>, <a href="#page_067">67</a>, <a href="#page_075">75</a><br /> - -Huleh, Lake, <a href="#page_058">58</a>, <a href="#page_060">60</a><br /> - -Humour, <a href="#page_183">183</a><br /> - -<br /> -<a name="I-ind" id="I-ind"></a>Immortality, <a href="#page_197">197</a>, <a href="#page_198">198</a><br /> - -Inscriptions, <a href="#page_087">87</a><br /> - -Irrigation, <a href="#page_009">9</a>, <a href="#page_233">233</a><br /> - -Israelites, <a href="#page_088">88 f.</a><br /> - -<br /> -<a name="J" id="J"></a>Jacob’s dream, <a href="#page_005">5</a><br /> - -Jacob’s Well, <a href="#page_013">13</a>, <a href="#page_048">48</a>, <a href="#page_063">63</a>, <a href="#page_119">119</a>, <a href="#page_129">129</a><br /> - -Jaffa, <a href="#page_072">72</a><br /> - -Jehoshaphat, Valley of, <a href="#page_079">79</a><br /> - -Jericho, <a href="#page_026">26</a>, <a href="#page_049">49</a>, <a href="#page_105">105</a>, <a href="#page_227">227</a>, <a href="#page_232">232</a><br /> - -Jeroboam, <a href="#page_078">78</a><br /> - -Jerusalem, <a href="#page_045">45 f.</a>, <a href="#page_053">53</a>, <a href="#page_065">65 f.</a>, <a href="#page_076">76 f.</a>, <a href="#page_149">149</a>, <a href="#page_228">228</a><br /> - -Jesus Christ, <a href="#page_004">4</a>, <a href="#page_005">5</a>, <a href="#page_010">10</a>, <a href="#page_031">31</a>, <a href="#page_046">46</a>, <a href="#page_049">49</a>, <a href="#page_069">69</a>, <a href="#page_084">84</a>, <a href="#page_113">113</a>, <a href="#page_114">114</a>, <a href="#page_150">150</a>, <a href="#page_173">173</a>, <a href="#page_177">177</a>, <a href="#page_204">204</a>, <a href="#page_242">242</a>, <a href="#page_243">243</a>, <a href="#page_245">245</a><br /> - -Jews, <a href="#page_030">30</a>, <a href="#page_088">88 f.</a>, <a href="#page_195">195</a>, <a href="#page_201">201</a><br /> - -Jezreel, <a href="#page_041">41</a><br /> - -Job, <a href="#page_096">96</a>, <a href="#page_224">224</a>, <a href="#page_233">233</a><br /> - -John the Baptist, <a href="#page_146">146</a>, <a href="#page_147">147</a><br /> - -Jordan, <a href="#page_013">13</a>, <a href="#page_023">23</a>, <a href="#page_028">28</a>, <a href="#page_040">40</a>, <a href="#page_041">41</a>, <a href="#page_042">42</a>, <a href="#page_044">44</a>, <a href="#page_049">49</a>, <a href="#page_051">51</a>, <a href="#page_055">55 f.</a>, <a href="#page_065">65</a>, <a href="#page_121">121</a>, <a href="#page_178">178</a><br /> - -Joy, <a href="#page_188">188</a><br /> - -Judea, <a href="#page_008">8</a>, <a href="#page_009">9</a>, <a href="#page_024">24</a>, <a href="#page_034">34</a>, <a href="#page_045">45 f.</a>, <a href="#page_047">47</a><br /> - -<br /> -<a name="K" id="K"></a>Khan Minyeh, <a href="#page_064">64</a>, <a href="#page_105">105</a><br /> - -Kidron, <a href="#page_025">25</a>, <a href="#page_046">46</a>, <a href="#page_063">63</a><br /> - -Knights, <a href="#page_151">151</a>, <a href="#page_164">164</a>, <a href="#page_170">170</a><br /> - -<br /> -<a name="L" id="L"></a>Landmarks, <a href="#page_175">175</a><br /> - -Lebanon, <a href="#page_044">44 f.</a>, <a href="#page_051">51</a><br /> - -Legends, <a href="#page_062">62</a>, <a href="#page_069">69</a>, <a href="#page_103">103</a>, <a href="#page_134">134 f.</a>, <a href="#page_150">150</a>, <a href="#page_153">153</a><br /> - -Leontes, <a href="#page_044">44</a>, <a href="#page_058">58</a><br /> - -Leprosy, <a href="#page_228">228</a><br /> - -Lunacy, <a href="#page_222">222</a><br /> - -<br /> -<a name="M" id="M"></a>Maccabees, <a href="#page_100">100</a><br /> - -Magic, <a href="#page_003">3</a>, <a href="#page_029">29</a>, <a href="#page_154">154</a>, <a href="#page_205">205</a>, <a href="#page_217">217 f.</a><br /> - -Mar Saba, <a href="#page_025">25</a>, <a href="#page_027">27</a>, <a href="#page_123">123</a>, <a href="#page_125">125 f.</a><br /> - -Martyrs, <a href="#page_116">116</a>, <a href="#page_123">123</a><br /> - -Medicinal springs, <a href="#page_201">201</a>, <a href="#page_222">222</a>, <a href="#page_227">227</a><br /> - -Melancholy, <a href="#page_031">31</a><br /> - -Michmash, <a href="#page_047">47</a><br /> - -Miracle, <a href="#page_003">3</a>, <a href="#page_004">4</a><br /> - -Mirage, <a href="#page_212">212</a><br /> - -Missions, <a href="#page_095">95</a><br /> - -Mohammedanism, <a href="#page_002">2</a>, <a href="#page_074">74</a>, <a href="#page_137">137 f.</a>, <a href="#page_142">142</a>, <a href="#page_242">242</a><br /> - -Monastic establishments, <a href="#page_122">122</a><br /> - -Morasses, <a href="#page_211">211</a><br /> - -Mosaics, <a href="#page_102">102</a>, <a href="#page_168">168</a><br /> - -Mosques, <a href="#page_146">146</a><br /> - -Mosque of Omar, <a href="#page_053">53</a>, <a href="#page_079">79</a>, <a href="#page_080">80</a>, <a href="#page_131">131</a>, <a href="#page_144">144</a>, <a href="#page_149">149 f.</a>, <a href="#page_159">159</a><br /> - -Mount of Olives, <a href="#page_154">154</a><br /> - -Mountains, <a href="#page_040">40 f.</a>, <a href="#page_049">49</a><br /> - -Muezzin, <a href="#page_143">143</a><br /> - -Music, <a href="#page_031">31 f.</a><br /> - -Mystery, <a href="#page_206">206</a><br /> - -<br /> -<a name="N" id="N"></a>Nablus, <a href="#page_064">64</a>, <a href="#page_074">74</a>, <a href="#page_092">92</a><br /> - -Nain,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_248" id="page_248"></a>{248}</span> <a href="#page_068">68</a><br /> - -Names of places, <a href="#page_039">39</a>, <a href="#page_160">160</a><br /> - -Nazareth, <a href="#page_048">48</a>, <a href="#page_062">62</a>, <a href="#page_069">69</a>, <a href="#page_072">72</a>, <a href="#page_114">114</a>, <a href="#page_189">189</a>, <a href="#page_218">218</a><br /> - -<br /> -<a name="O" id="O"></a>Oppression, <a href="#page_229">229</a><br /> - -<br /> -<a name="P" id="P"></a>Past, the, <a href="#page_002">2</a><br /> - -Paul, St., <a href="#page_172">172</a><br /> - -Persecutions, <a href="#page_116">116</a><br /> - -Phœnicia, <a href="#page_010">10</a><br /> - -Pilgrimages, <a href="#page_117">117 f.</a><br /> - -Pools, <a href="#page_211">211</a><br /> - -Prayer, <a href="#page_142">142</a><br /> - -Providence, <a href="#page_233">233</a><br /> - -<br /> -<a name="Q" id="Q"></a>Quarantana, <a href="#page_005">5</a>, <a href="#page_046">46</a>, <a href="#page_049">49</a><br /> - -<br /> -<a name="R" id="R"></a>Rachel, <a href="#page_195">195</a><br /> - -Railway, <a href="#page_086">86</a>, <a href="#page_182">182</a><br /> - -Relics, <a href="#page_002">2</a>, <a href="#page_119">119</a>, <a href="#page_152">152</a>, <a href="#page_160">160</a><br /> - -Religion of Israel, <a href="#page_039">39</a>, <a href="#page_065">65</a>, <a href="#page_097">97 f.</a>, <a href="#page_173">173 f.</a>, <a href="#page_187">187</a><br /> - -Revelation, <a href="#page_097">97 f.</a><br /> - -Richard Cœur de Lion, <a href="#page_163">163</a>, <a href="#page_167">167</a><br /> - -Rivers, <a href="#page_051">51 f.</a><br /> - -Roads, <a href="#page_077">77</a>, <a href="#page_099">99 f.</a>, <a href="#page_174">174</a><br /> - -Rib Roy canoe, <a href="#page_057">57</a>, <a href="#page_091">91</a><br /> - -Romans, <a href="#page_056">56</a>, <a href="#page_077">77</a>, <a href="#page_083">83</a>, <a href="#page_098">98 f.</a>, <a href="#page_107">107</a>, <a href="#page_108">108</a>, <a href="#page_113">113</a><br /> - -Russians, <a href="#page_119">119 f.</a><br /> - -<br /> -<a name="S" id="S"></a>Safed, <a href="#page_090">90</a><br /> - -St. Christopher, <a href="#page_135">135</a><br /> - -St. George, <a href="#page_134">134</a>, <a href="#page_168">168</a>, <a href="#page_193">193</a><br /> - -Samaria, <a href="#page_009">9</a>, <a href="#page_045">45</a>, <a href="#page_047">47</a>, <a href="#page_048">48</a>, <a href="#page_102">102</a>, <a href="#page_110">110</a>, <a href="#page_146">146</a><br /> - -Samaritans, <a href="#page_092">92</a><br /> - -Sanur, <a href="#page_048">48</a><br /> - -Scents, <a href="#page_179">179</a><br /> - -Sea, <a href="#page_021">21</a>, <a href="#page_024">24</a>, <a href="#page_078">78</a>, <a href="#page_212">212</a>, <a href="#page_213">213</a><br /> - -Sea of Galilee, <a href="#page_011">11</a>, <a href="#page_015">15</a>, <a href="#page_037">37</a>, <a href="#page_058">58</a>, <a href="#page_059">59</a>, <a href="#page_208">208</a>, <a href="#page_209">209</a>, <a href="#page_210">210</a><br /> - -Shirky, <a href="#page_026">26</a><br /> - -Siloam, <a href="#page_053">53</a>, <a href="#page_076">76</a>, <a href="#page_081">81</a>, <a href="#page_088">88</a><br /> - -Sites, identification of, <a href="#page_165">165</a><br /> - -Smallness of the land, <a href="#page_037">37</a><br /> - -Solomon, <a href="#page_078">78</a>, <a href="#page_153">153</a><br /> - -Spectral, the, <a href="#page_205">205 f.</a><br /> - -Springs, <a href="#page_054">54</a><br /> - -Stones, Jewish, <a href="#page_082">82</a><br /> - -Straight Street, <a href="#page_103">103</a><br /> - -Sun, <a href="#page_014">14</a>, <a href="#page_016">16</a>, <a href="#page_028">28</a><br /> - -Synagogues, <a href="#page_079">79</a><br /> - -<br /> -<a name="T" id="T"></a>Tabor, <a href="#page_045">45</a>, <a href="#page_048">48</a>, <a href="#page_128">128</a>, <a href="#page_165">165</a><br /> - -Tattoo, <a href="#page_018">18</a>, <a href="#page_075">75</a><br /> - -Tell Hum, <a href="#page_128">128</a><br /> - -Tents, <a href="#page_022">22 f.</a><br /> - -Terraces, <a href="#page_050">50</a>, <a href="#page_240">240</a><br /> - -Terror, <a href="#page_206">206</a><br /> - -Tiberias, <a href="#page_090">90</a>, <a href="#page_091">91</a>, <a href="#page_201">201</a>, <a href="#page_209">209</a><br /> - -Titus, <a href="#page_084">84</a><br /> - -Tobacco, <a href="#page_093">93</a><br /> - -Toil, <a href="#page_227">227</a><br /> - -Tombs, <a href="#page_081">81</a>, <a href="#page_140">140</a>, <a href="#page_174">174</a>, <a href="#page_186">186</a>, <a href="#page_191">191</a><br /> - -Towns, <a href="#page_065">65 f.</a>, <a href="#page_071">71</a><br /> - -Travel, <a href="#page_002">2</a>, <a href="#page_161">161</a><br /> - -Trees, <a href="#page_067">67</a>, <a href="#page_210">210</a>, <a href="#page_211">211</a><br /> - -Truth, <a href="#page_206">206</a><br /> - -Tyre, <a href="#page_010">10</a>, <a href="#page_072">72</a>, <a href="#page_075">75</a>, <a href="#page_160">160</a><br /> - -<br /> -<a name="U" id="U"></a>Underground waters, <a href="#page_052">52</a>, <a href="#page_213">213</a><br /> - -Unfinishedness, <a href="#page_174">174</a><br /> - -<br /> -<a name="V-ind" id="V-ind"></a>Villages, <a href="#page_011">11</a>, <a href="#page_015">15</a>, <a href="#page_065">65 f.</a><br /> - -<br /> -<a name="W" id="W"></a>War, <a href="#page_049">49</a>, <a href="#page_050">50</a><br /> - -Welis, <a href="#page_141">141</a><br /> - -Wells, <a href="#page_062">62</a><br /> - -<br /> -<a name="Z" id="Z"></a>Zionists, <a href="#page_090">90</a><br /> -</p> - -<p class="c">THE END</p> - -<div class="footnotes"><p class="cb">FOOTNOTES:</p> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> <i>Eothen</i>, ch. xxiii.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_2_2" id="Footnote_2_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_2_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> The natives have at last borrowed the sloping red-tiled -roofs from the Franks who introduced them. Cf. a letter written by -Professor G. A. Smith to the <i>Spectator</i>, October 1891.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_3_3" id="Footnote_3_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_3_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> <i>Tent Work</i>, p. 54.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_4_4" id="Footnote_4_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_4_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> Cf. <i>The Semites</i>, Robertson Smith, chaps. iii. and v.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_5_5" id="Footnote_5_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_5_5"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> For these and other instances cf. <i>Historical Geography</i>, -p. 52, and Appendix I.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_6_6" id="Footnote_6_6"></a><a href="#FNanchor_6_6"><span class="label">[6]</span></a> Cf. <i>The Least of all Lands</i>, Principal Miller, ch. 1.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_7_7" id="Footnote_7_7"></a><a href="#FNanchor_7_7"><span class="label">[7]</span></a> Cf. p. 15.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_8_8" id="Footnote_8_8"></a><a href="#FNanchor_8_8"><span class="label">[8]</span></a> <i>The Rob Roy on the Jordan</i>, p. 129.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_9_9" id="Footnote_9_9"></a><a href="#FNanchor_9_9"><span class="label">[9]</span></a> Cf. <i>The Semites</i>, Robertson Smith, p. 97.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_10_10" id="Footnote_10_10"></a><a href="#FNanchor_10_10"><span class="label">[10]</span></a> <i>Rob Roy</i>, p. 102.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_11_11" id="Footnote_11_11"></a><a href="#FNanchor_11_11"><span class="label">[11]</span></a> <i>Tent Work</i>, p. 120.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_12_12" id="Footnote_12_12"></a><a href="#FNanchor_12_12"><span class="label">[12]</span></a> The <i>Rob Roy</i> has contributed gallantly to its -exploration. To her captain’s book this chapter is under many -obligations.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_13_13" id="Footnote_13_13"></a><a href="#FNanchor_13_13"><span class="label">[13]</span></a> <i>Tent Work</i>, chaps. xx., xxi.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_14_14" id="Footnote_14_14"></a><a href="#FNanchor_14_14"><span class="label">[14]</span></a> They are cut with a cross-chiselled margin, and rough -outstanding rustic work in the centre. Their size and weight are -enormous. One writer, whose sense of humour is hardly equal to his -knowledge of Scripture, in describing them is carried away into the -statement that “the Jewish architects, taught by their Phœnician -neighbours, bestowed special care upon the corners of their great -buildings. They show a finish, a solidity, and choice of material -superior to other parts.... And how beautifully expressive is the -language of the Psalmist, ‘our daughters are corner-stones, polished -after the similitude of a palace’—one of the corner-stones of this -angle weighs over a hundred tons”!</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_15_15" id="Footnote_15_15"></a><a href="#FNanchor_15_15"><span class="label">[15]</span></a> For an account of these and others cf. Palestine -Exploration Fund, Quarterly Statement, October 1901.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_16_16" id="Footnote_16_16"></a><a href="#FNanchor_16_16"><span class="label">[16]</span></a> See, however, Professor G. A. Smith’s <i>Jerusalem</i>, vol. i. -pp. 189, 190.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_17_17" id="Footnote_17_17"></a><a href="#FNanchor_17_17"><span class="label">[17]</span></a> <i>Haifa</i>, Laurence Oliphant, pp. 317, 318.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_18_18" id="Footnote_18_18"></a><a href="#FNanchor_18_18"><span class="label">[18]</span></a> “Love among the Ruins,” Robert Browning.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_19_19" id="Footnote_19_19"></a><a href="#FNanchor_19_19"><span class="label">[19]</span></a> <i>The Dawn of Art</i>, Martin Conway, pp. 58-76.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_20_20" id="Footnote_20_20"></a><a href="#FNanchor_20_20"><span class="label">[20]</span></a> St. Symeon was a shepherd from the borderland between -Cilicia and Syria.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_21_21" id="Footnote_21_21"></a><a href="#FNanchor_21_21"><span class="label">[21]</span></a> Cf. Schaff’s <i>Church History, Nicene and Post-Nicene -Period</i>, chap. iv.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_22_22" id="Footnote_22_22"></a><a href="#FNanchor_22_22"><span class="label">[22]</span></a> St. Jerome, Ep. xiv.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_23_23" id="Footnote_23_23"></a><a href="#FNanchor_23_23"><span class="label">[23]</span></a> Cf. pp. 27, 30.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_24_24" id="Footnote_24_24"></a><a href="#FNanchor_24_24"><span class="label">[24]</span></a> <i>Arabia, the Cradle of Islam</i>, Zwemer, p. 179.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_25_25" id="Footnote_25_25"></a><a href="#FNanchor_25_25"><span class="label">[25]</span></a> <i>Mediæval Christianity</i>, Schaff, p. 150.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_26_26" id="Footnote_26_26"></a><a href="#FNanchor_26_26"><span class="label">[26]</span></a> Written in 1904.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_27_27" id="Footnote_27_27"></a><a href="#FNanchor_27_27"><span class="label">[27]</span></a> <i>The Crusades</i>, Cox, p. 72.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_28_28" id="Footnote_28_28"></a><a href="#FNanchor_28_28"><span class="label">[28]</span></a> <i>The Crusades</i>, Cox, p. 215. Of these children only 5000 -crossed the Mediterranean. They were sold, when they landed, in the -slave-markets of Alexandria and Algiers.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_29_29" id="Footnote_29_29"></a><a href="#FNanchor_29_29"><span class="label">[29]</span></a> Map has the credit of introducing the Grail story into -Arthurian romance; Borron of adding the early part which traced it to -Joseph of Arimathea.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_30_30" id="Footnote_30_30"></a><a href="#FNanchor_30_30"><span class="label">[30]</span></a> Cf. <i>Chivalry and Crusades</i>, Stebbing, vol. ii. chaps. iv. -and v.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_31_31" id="Footnote_31_31"></a><a href="#FNanchor_31_31"><span class="label">[31]</span></a> <i>Haifa</i>, Laurence Oliphant, p. 189.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_32_32" id="Footnote_32_32"></a><a href="#FNanchor_32_32"><span class="label">[32]</span></a> <i>The Semites</i>, Robertson Smith, p. 29.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_33_33" id="Footnote_33_33"></a><a href="#FNanchor_33_33"><span class="label">[33]</span></a> <i>Ibid.</i> pp. 244, 257.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_34_34" id="Footnote_34_34"></a><a href="#FNanchor_34_34"><span class="label">[34]</span></a> Deut. xxviii. 47, 48.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_35_35" id="Footnote_35_35"></a><a href="#FNanchor_35_35"><span class="label">[35]</span></a> Deut. xxviii. 47, 48.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_36_36" id="Footnote_36_36"></a><a href="#FNanchor_36_36"><span class="label">[36]</span></a> <i>Robert Browning</i>, William Sharp, p. 203.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_37_37" id="Footnote_37_37"></a><a href="#FNanchor_37_37"><span class="label">[37]</span></a> Gen. xxxv. 16, 19.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_38_38" id="Footnote_38_38"></a><a href="#FNanchor_38_38"><span class="label">[38]</span></a> <i>Haifa</i>, pp. 270-272; <i>Tent Work</i>, p. 85.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_39_39" id="Footnote_39_39"></a><a href="#FNanchor_39_39"><span class="label">[39]</span></a> Cf. <i>The Dawn of Art</i>, Martin Conway, p. 95, etc.; <i>Some -Aspects of the Greek Genius</i>, Professor Butcher, p. 30.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_40_40" id="Footnote_40_40"></a><a href="#FNanchor_40_40"><span class="label">[40]</span></a> Cf. <i>Rationalism in Europe</i>, Leckie, ii. 197.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_41_41" id="Footnote_41_41"></a><a href="#FNanchor_41_41"><span class="label">[41]</span></a> Cf. the sprightly figure of Glaucon in Plato’s <i>Republic</i>, -B, x, § 9: “Do you know,” says Socrates, “that our soul is immortal and -never dies?” “By Jove, I do not,” replies Glaucon. “Are you prepared to -prove that it is?”</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_42_42" id="Footnote_42_42"></a><a href="#FNanchor_42_42"><span class="label">[42]</span></a> <i>Arabia, the Cradle of Islam</i>, Zwemer, xiii.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_43_43" id="Footnote_43_43"></a><a href="#FNanchor_43_43"><span class="label">[43]</span></a> The rags which are hung on trees or fences near certain -tombs suggest the medicinal value of holy places, which attracts men to -them from selfish interests.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_44_44" id="Footnote_44_44"></a><a href="#FNanchor_44_44"><span class="label">[44]</span></a> <i>Talisman</i>, xxviii.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_45_45" id="Footnote_45_45"></a><a href="#FNanchor_45_45"><span class="label">[45]</span></a> <i>East of the Jordan</i>, Dr. Merrill, p. 496.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_46_46" id="Footnote_46_46"></a><a href="#FNanchor_46_46"><span class="label">[46]</span></a> <i>Tent Work</i>, p. 314.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_47_47" id="Footnote_47_47"></a><a href="#FNanchor_47_47"><span class="label">[47]</span></a> <i>Marius the Epicurean</i>, Walter Pater, i. 44.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_48_48" id="Footnote_48_48"></a><a href="#FNanchor_48_48"><span class="label">[48]</span></a> <i>Rob Roy on the Jordan</i>, p. 260.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_49_49" id="Footnote_49_49"></a><a href="#FNanchor_49_49"><span class="label">[49]</span></a> <i>Eothen</i>, ch. viii.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_50_50" id="Footnote_50_50"></a><a href="#FNanchor_50_50"><span class="label">[50]</span></a> Cf. <i>Geschichte des Jüdischen Volkes</i>, Schürer, ii. 819, -820.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_51_51" id="Footnote_51_51"></a><a href="#FNanchor_51_51"><span class="label">[51]</span></a> Cf. <i>The Semites</i>, W. Robertson Smith, iii. v.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_52_52" id="Footnote_52_52"></a><a href="#FNanchor_52_52"><span class="label">[52]</span></a> Cf. <i>The Semites</i>, W. Robertson Smith, pp. 197, etc.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_53_53" id="Footnote_53_53"></a><a href="#FNanchor_53_53"><span class="label">[53]</span></a> <i>Tent Work</i>, pp. 68, 204.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_54_54" id="Footnote_54_54"></a><a href="#FNanchor_54_54"><span class="label">[54]</span></a> Cf. <i>The Semites</i>, Robertson Smith, pp. 16, 17.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_55_55" id="Footnote_55_55"></a><a href="#FNanchor_55_55"><span class="label">[55]</span></a> <i>East of the Jordan</i>, Merrill, p. 193.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_56_56" id="Footnote_56_56"></a><a href="#FNanchor_56_56"><span class="label">[56]</span></a> The early Christian belief that the gods of paganism were -demons has died hard, if indeed it be quite dead. The “weird horsemen” -who in windy nights are to be heard galloping down lonely valleys lead -us back to that interesting custom by which a horse was actually -provided in some of the temples of the Syrian Herakles, to that the god -might ride forth at night.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_57_57" id="Footnote_57_57"></a><a href="#FNanchor_57_57"><span class="label">[57]</span></a> <i>Haifa</i>, Laurence Oliphant, p. 300.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_58_58" id="Footnote_58_58"></a><a href="#FNanchor_58_58"><span class="label">[58]</span></a> Job iv. 14-16.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_59_59" id="Footnote_59_59"></a><a href="#FNanchor_59_59"><span class="label">[59]</span></a> <i>The Cradle of Christianity</i>, D. M. Ross, p. 60.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_60_60" id="Footnote_60_60"></a><a href="#FNanchor_60_60"><span class="label">[60]</span></a> See p. 36.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_61_61" id="Footnote_61_61"></a><a href="#FNanchor_61_61"><span class="label">[61]</span></a> Professor G. A. Smith, in his chapter on “The Walls of -Jerusalem,” has given the results of an exhaustive study of the most -recent research on this subject, and his conclusion is that “on our -present data it is hopeless to decide between the rival and -contradictory arguments.”—<i>Jerusalem</i>, vol. i. p. 249.</p></div> - -</div> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<img src="images/back.jpg" class="brdr" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /> -</div> - -<hr class="full" /> - - - - - - - -<pre> - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Holy Land, by John Kelman - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE HOLY LAND *** - -***** This file should be named 55958-h.htm or 55958-h.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/5/9/5/55958/ - -Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images available at The Internet Archive) - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions -will be renamed. - -Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no -one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation -(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without -permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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