That the present text is often corrupt, there is abundant evidence to prove. That Josephus wrote descriptions which he knew to be exaggerated, it is more difficult to show. Eastern descriptions always lack the exactitude which belongs to the Western mind, and hyperbole seems to be inseparable, in Eastern thought, from elegant description. In the case of Josephus, also, personal feeling undoubtedly interferes. On visiting the spot, one cannot fail to notice how exaggerated is his description of Jotopata, which he defended, and how the ingrained conceit of the Semitic mind appears in his account of his own doings; but at Masada we shall have cause to admire the fidelity of his detailed account of the fortress.

It must also be noticed that far greater correctness of detail is to be found (as would naturally be expected) in his descriptions of events occurring, and of places existing, during his own lifetime, and that for this reason his first production—the Wars, is far more valuable than his compilation of the Antiquities, though even in this he draws from early sources external to the Old Testament.

Here at Cæsarea we have a description of the port and public buildings which contains undoubted inaccuracies. He represents the port as equal in size to the Piræus, but it measures scarcely two hundred yards across either way, whilst the famous harbour of Athens was three quarters of a mile long and over six hundred yards in breadth. Josephus also speaks of the mole on the south side of the harbour as being “two hundred feet.” This can hardly mean in length, for the present measure is more than a hundred and thirty yards, and, if he means in breadth, the estimate is exaggerated, for the greatest width at present is eighty-five feet.

Thus, without taking any notice of the great length given for the stones sunk to form part of the breakwater, we find that Josephus estimates the harbour as equal to one of twenty times its capacity, and the mole at over double its real width. It must indeed be remembered that he wrote neither at Cæsarea nor at Piræus, and that exact surveys had then no existence. Yet this case is sufficient to prove that the measurements twice given (Ant. xv. 9, B.J. i. 21) are unreliable, and the descriptions exaggerated.

In shape the port of Cæsarea was not unlike the Piræus. The southern mole was adorned with towers, and had three colossi at the end, supported on two huge blocks of stone; on the north side a reef ran out, and was also adorned with three colossi on a tower. A temple of white stone stood opposite the mouth of the port, and of this the foundations appear still to exist—a wall with niches for statues, well worthy of examination as being of white stones, whilst all the other buildings are of brown-coloured masonry. In this temple were colossal statues of Cæsar and of Rome.

An amphitheatre, still remaining, was also built, to the south by the sea, capable of holding, as Josephus says, a vast number, for its diameter is 560 feet, and it could contain 20,000 persons. The theatre appears to have been within its circuit, where it still remains, but the hippodrome, over 1000 feet long, seems unnoticed by the historian. It is to the east, and in it are the remains of a goal post of granite, a magnificent truncated cone seven feet six inches high, once standing apparently on a base, a single block of red granite thirty-four feet long. How such blocks were moved it is difficult to imagine; nor was the material to be obtained in Palestine, being a fine kind of granite, so hard that the peasantry endeavouring to cut the stele into millstones, have only penetrated a few inches into the stone.

The wall of the Roman town was traced, and found to embrace an area of four hundred acres; but Crusading Cæsarea was much smaller, being only about thirty acres, within a rectangle of six hundred yards by two hundred and fifty.

Cæsarea was considered, after the fall of Jerusalem, to be the capital of Palestine. Sometimes it was spoken of as part of the “land” by the Jews, sometimes it was excluded. Jews, Syrians, and Samaritans dwelt in it, and the place was the scene of many bloody feuds between them. In the Talmud the port (Leminah), and the famous promenade along the mole are noticed, but I find no ancient account of the great aqueducts which brought water to the city, otherwise supplied only by a single well. One of these is carried from springs on the Carmel hills, a distance of eight miles, on arches with a double channel, and is perhaps the finest engineering work in the country, evidently of Roman origin; the second, or low level, brings water from the pool above the dam in the Crocodile River. The manner in which the rocky ridge along the coast is pierced, and long rock-staircases cut down to the tunnel, with the separation of the two channels when crossing the great marshes, are indications of high scientific education in the builders. The native tradition says that the two aqueducts were made, by two daughters of a king, for a wager as to who should first convey water to the capital.

The history of Cæsarea is one of many vicissitudes. It became a bishopric in 200 A.D., and was the home of Origen and of Eusebius. The Franks took it in 1001, when the green glass dish, called “the Holy Grail,” was found by the Genoese. Saladin conquered it in the fatal year 1187; but its walls were again erected by Gautier d’Avesnes, in 1218, and the place was taken back by the Moslems the same year. Ten years later it was again taken, and again fell. In 1251 it was re-fortified by St. Louis; but the invincible Bibars destroyed it in 1265. The restorations of St. Louis are still plainly distinguishable from the older work of Gautier.

On the south side of the town the Crusading towers project into the sea along the great mole, and stand probably on the site of Herod’s tower Drusus. On the north the pillars of the Roman town have been used up to form a long jetty, running parallel with the reefs; and other shafts have, as at Ascalon, been built into the walls. On the top of the southern hill, within the Crusading walls, are the foundations of the fine cathedral, and to the north is a second smaller church. These are the only public buildings which remain distinguishable, and the whole extent, within the Roman enceinte, is now but a mass of fallen masonry, excepting the dark, dismantled towers and scarps of the thirteenth-century fortress, and the shapeless tower on the mole.

In our rides to and from Cæsarea, we constantly had reason to admire the faint, harmonious colouring of the wild flowers on the untilled plain. Cæsarea was surrounded by fields of the yellow marigold, which produced a bad kind of hay-fever, and gilded our legs in riding. Ancient ruins in Palestine are, in spring, easily distinguished, by the growth of this plant, and of the marsh-mallow. Other flowers were also conspicuous—the red pheasant’s eye, in some cases as big as a poppy; blue pimpernels, moon-daisies, the lovely phlox, gladioles, and huge hollyhocks. Swarms of “painted-lady” butterflies fluttered over the mallows; the hoopoes had just arrived, and were fanning their crests up and down in the oak boughs; the storks were solemnly marching over the plain; and the air was full of the white-footed lesser kestrel, also a migratory bird.

Early in April the corn was ripening under the oaks; but a great portion of the plain is covered with marshes, among which the Ghawarni Arabs, who are almost independent, have their camps. The tracks through the boggy land are known only by themselves, and the government is thus unable to do more than inflict a poll-tax on them. Here the shaggy brown buffaloes might often be seen sunk, like hippopotami, in the deep, muddy stream, the nose and horns only visible—for the peculiar set of the neck allows the head to be extended quite horizontally, the nose, ears, and eyes in line, as in the hippopotamus.

We made diligent inquiry as to the crocodiles, and visited Abu Nûr, the miller on the river. He took us up a ladder into the loft above the mill, where we sat in state on carpets, as he prepared coffee, our eyes blinded with wood-smoke, and our ears deafened with the whirl of the mill-wheel. The old man promised to do all in his power—“Inshallah,” he would get us a crocodile. He also criticised my riding-whip, which he pronounced good, but not equal to one he had seen, which could also be used as a chair and umbrella, with a sword-blade inside.

The Arabs and Turkomans of the plain are rich in flocks and herds. Long lines of the Syrian fat-tailed sheep, black goats, and small red oxen covered the plain. The rich people in the hills had sent down their horses for spring grazing, and camps were pitched, round which forty or fifty fine horses were picketed, feeding on the grass and flowers. Here also I noticed the peculiar fashion of sewing the ears of donkey colts together, to make them stand up, and of splitting the cows’ ears, so that they appear to have two pairs of horns as well as ears.

On the 8th of April we moved south to Zeita, on the edge of the hills. From this camp no discoveries of much importance were made; but we visited two Crusading towers which formed fine stations in the plain—one at Kâkôn, a place mentioned, in 1160, by Benjamin of Tudela, as being the ancient Keilah; the second at Kŭlŭnsaweh (which means “mitred”), where is a beautiful hall, probably part of the Castle of Plans, built by the Templars in 1191.

On one of our expeditions along the coast from Mukhâlid, we perceived, to our astonishment, unknown rocks or islands out at sea. Soon, however, I saw that our islands were moving, and came to the conclusion that they were drifting wrecks or rafts, wrecked vessels being very common all along this harbourless coast; but presently the blocks broke up and soared into the air; they were two large flocks of pelicans, rocking on the summer sea.

The country near the coast was here all of blown sand, with scattered bushes, and, farther inland, are dunes of semi-consolidated red sandstone. Near Jaffa there are low oak-bushes, which spring from the roots of a forest, now entirely felled; and, east of our camp, an open woodland exists, with a ruin called Umm es Sûr, “mother of the wall.” In this name we see probably remains of Assur, the name of a forest near the coast, through which the English and the Templars fought their way before arriving at Arsûf, during the famous march of Richard Lion-Heart.

The Emîr of the Howârith Arabs was camped near us, and pressed us to visit his tent, which was pitched in the middle of the plain among coarse grass and thistles—a low black camel’s-hair cloth stretched over rude poles, and the sides closed in with reed matting. The women’s apartment was on the north, shut off with matting; on the south and west the tent was open. Carpets were spread, and gay-coloured pillows strewn on the ground. The Emîr’s black slave, Sheikh Saleh, and a little black demon, his head all shaven except the shûsheh, or top-knot, took our horses. The Emîr was not content with our sipping coffee; he insisted on our eating salt with him. A sound of grinding arose behind the matting, and two good-looking women in the dark blue, sweeping, long-sleeved robes peculiar to Bedawin, went off to fetch water, with large jars balanced on their heads. The elders of the tribe sat, half asleep, around us, one being remarkable for a fine pair of silver-mounted pistols.

Other guests began soon to arrive, on good grey mares. The young men were shaved, all but their mustachios, and gaily dressed, having red leather top-boots with tassels. One had baggy trousers of chocolate colour, and the usual square lambskin jacket, wool inside, which is worn in winter; in his hand was a spear, fifteen feet long. They alighted, touching head, lips, and heart to the Emîr, who clasped their hands and kissed them on each cheek. The Arabs do not, as a rule, actually kiss, but lay their foreheads together and make a sound of kissing with their mouths.

The Bedawin are immensely superior to the peasantry in politeness and quietness of manner. Life in the country of the Arabs is really nearer civilisation, in many respects, than that among the villagers, and nothing is a greater error than to speak of the Bedawin as savages. My pleasantest expeditions were always those among the “houses of hair,” and with the wild Arabs we had far less difficulty in dealing than with the Fellahin.

The conversation was curious. We gave the Emîr our staple bit of astonishing information, that the English Queen had more Moslems under her rule than the Sultan; and he inquired how long we had ruled India. One of the elders disagreed with our reply, and said the English had held it only forty-five years. The Emîr made him a cutting answer, and he collapsed.

About one p.m. dinner appeared. A wooden bowl, nearly four feet in diameter, was carried in on a mat. It was piled with rice and portions of roast lamb just killed, with bread and vegetables below, and melted butter over all. We despised the three brass spoons, and, washing our right hands, boldly plunged them in, squeezing the rice into balls. A negro attended with a green glass tumbler of water. As soon as we retired, hungry Arabs slowly filled the vacant places, at the invitation of the Emîr, who only tasted a few mouthfuls until his guests were fed. The dogs licked up the scraps, and the calves walked in and lay by us in the shade. Soap and water, coffee and tobacco followed, and we retired, sending a small tin of gunpowder to our host in the evening.

Our camp was not a pleasant one; the peasantry were surly, and the Arabs dangerous. Almost every night attempts were made to steal our horses and mules, and were only frustrated by the vigilance of Habib, who lay, gun in hand, by the line of tethered animals, and fired on the thieves more than once. The place was also infested with scorpions, and I was stung by one in six places along the leg, before I could get off my riding-breeches in which it had hidden. Habib licked the bitten places carefully, having, as he assured me, once eaten a scorpion, and thus obtained the power of healing the stings; this is a common idea among the natives; the stings were certainly less painful than on a former occasion.

The view from the Mukhâlid camp was very extensive; the Carmel ridge and the Mahrakah peak were plainly seen, with the whole broken line of the watershed blue in the distance, and white villages on little knolls, sharply defined against the shadow of the long flat curve of Ebal; the crater of Sheikh Iskander, with the lower plateau to the north, was distinctly shown against the sky-line, and, yet more distant, appeared the Safed mountains and a silver thread of snow on Hermon, one hundred miles away. To the south, the eye roamed over low sand-dunes with patches of red and of bright yellow, with a few scattered oaks, over corn-land, and, farthest off, a long line of cliff, with a promontory on which the town of Jaffa was seen distinctly. Thus the panorama from Hermon to Jaffa embraced a distance of 120 miles.

On the 7th we marched up into the hills, to a place called Kefr Zîbâd, and experienced a frightfully hot sirocco. The treeless plain was scorched with heat, the flowers all dead and the corn all reaped. The grey hills, the olives, houses, and ruins, had a fossilised appearance, and, over all, a terrible leaden sky was spread; the poor dogs hid from the sun in the thorny bushes, and had to be thrown into every pond that was passed to cool them.

Next day was as bad, but, on the 9th, the fresh breeze from the sea came back, and the work became less arduous. The country was one scarcely visited before by Europeans, and the villagers were in some cases so alarmed by our appearance and our arms, that they fled in the greatest terror; but a report got about that we were sent by the Sultan, to see which of the villages had become ruinous, and hence we became favourites, and every possible ruin in the village lands was shown to us with the greatest eagerness, as it was supposed that taxes would be remitted in proportion to the amount of desolation.

At one place called Bâka the great gig umbrella over the theodolite attracted much attention; and here, as at Kâkôn, the chief delight to elderly men was a peep through the theodolite telescope.

“What do you see, O father?” cried the less fortunate who crowded round the observer.

“I see Hammad and his cows, two hours off, as if he were close here!” replied the delighted elder.

Here also we were near Kûr, the head-quarters of another of the great native families like our old friends the Jerrâr; and the head of the house—which is called Beit Jiyûs, came to see me with some twenty followers. My knowledge of Arabic was still most rudimentary, and I found conversation very difficult; but the old man was quite happy, staring at all the European novelties, and exclaiming at all he saw and heard: “O prophet! O Lord Mohammed! Mashallah!”

The business connected with certain prisoners taken from a tribe which had attacked Corporal Armstrong on the 3rd May, near Mukhâlid, now took me to Nâblus. It appeared that all the offenders had been allowed to leave prison, apparently in consequence of monetary arrangements with persons in authority; yet no sooner was it understood that I was to be expected in Nâblus, than they were recaptured and produced for me to see. The Deputy-Governor invited me to attend their examination by the Mejlis, or Town Council, where a curious scene was presented. The Kâdi sat on a diwân, in the whitewashed room serving as a justice hall—a stout man (Kâdis become fat for a well-known reason), his eyelids drooping, his dress a long robe striped yellow and white, with a short blue cloth jacket and the huge white turban—emblem of superior holiness and incorruptibility; and by him, a thin clerk, in a red fezz and white clothes. The military element was represented by a colonel in blue, with gold sleeves, his frock-coat unbuttoned, as is usual with Turkish officers. Other members were less remarkable. Mr. Elkarey, the missionary, kindly escorted me, and interpreted for me. The majesty of the council was upheld by a guard at the door, and a smart sergeant in black would have been almost European in appearance, but for a green silk comforter over his coat.

Two prisoners, both horribly squalid in appearance, were brought up. They did not deny that they belonged to the Nefei’at, or “club-bearing Arabs.” One was a very short man, his face dreadfully pitted by small-pox, and with only one eye; the second, a very tall, thin man, of a Don Quixote type of face, with beautiful white teeth. Evidence was first taken of the two together, then of each separately, by which means their various versions were made to prove contradictory. The tall man wept and wrung his hands; the little man held up a corner of his shirt, and shook it, to testify his innocence, repeating many times that he “feared God.” The Kâdi inquired whether they were Howareth dogs, Belauneh dogs, or Nefei’at dogs, and invoked destruction on most of their relations. The other councillors shouted all at one time, and some stood up on the diwân, after which fresh pipes and coffee were brought. A witness was called, and, while he was coming, the case of a big miller and his man was taken up; and in the middle of it in came the old high-priest of the Samaritans, looking like Moses in Millais’ picture, attired in coffee colour, with the crimson turban, and accusing a debtor of defrauding him of a shilling, which the latter denied, winking at the judge in secret. Presently the Vice-Governor came in, a man of peculiarly sanctimonious appearance, and notoriously corrupt. The shouting was then redoubled, three cases apparently being all tried and decided at once.

The scene was a farce as far as justice was concerned, but the policy which always appeared to me best was to insist only on imprisonment, and to make sure this was actually enforced, leaving it to the authorities to inflict some sort of monetary punishment, without my asking for fines, well knowing that once in prison, a Syrian does not get out without paying something to somebody. This line of conduct made us quite popular with some governors, whose incomes were ridiculously small.

On Friday, the 23rd of May, we again marched south, and suffered even more than in the last move. First of all, no camels could be got, until the Sheikh of the village had been solemnly warned of the result of disobeying the Sultan’s firman; then, all the long day through, a scorching sirocco blew from the east, and the road was almost impassable, across valleys a thousand feet deep, including the great boundary of Kânah. The heat was even worse next day, the glass being over 106° F. in the shade; at Gaza, the same day, it stood at 118°, while in Beyrout most of the mulberry-trees were killed by the wind, and the silk crop failed. On the third day, the Sunday, I was waked in the afternoon by a churning noise, and saw a whirlwind coming rapidly through the olive-grove towards the camp, tearing up the thorny plants, the stubble, dust, and small stones, whilst all round a dead calm prevailed. Fortunately, its path was to one side of the tents, and it passed by without doing any damage. Next morning the fresh west wind returned, and surveying became once more a possibility.

The country round us was some of the wildest in Palestine. The villagers had never before seen a Frank, and on the maps it is almost a blank. The hills were stony, but very fine groves of beautiful old olive-trees existed all round the villages.

Here, on the 30th of May, I received an addition to the party, by the arrival of Corporal Brophy, R.E.

Many fine ruins existed round us, showing that it is probably to the agency of man, rather than to the gradual action of weather, that the utter destruction of ruins in more accessible parts of Palestine is to be ascribed.

A good instance of the valuable finds made by the Survey party in this unknown district, is that of the ruin called Deir Serûr. Here we discovered the site of an important town, with public buildings of good masonry, and rock-cut tombs, evidently a place of great importance. This conspicuous site is not marked on any modern map, nor described by any previous traveller, so far as I have been able to find. On a map of the last century, an episcopal town of the fifth century called Sosura, is, however, shown in just the position of this ruin of Serûr, and the character of the buildings seems to agree with this identification.

At Kurâwa we found also a rock-cut sepulchre, with a classic façade, rivalling any of those at Jerusalem, and apparently to be attributed to the first or second century of the Christian era; yet, on this fine monument, there is not a single letter of inscription to tell the names of its former occupants. These are but single instances of the large number of interesting discoveries, in central Palestine, which are stored up in the memoir of the map.

On the 3rd of June we moved again south, and crossed the most difficult valley we had yet encountered. It was nearly a thousand feet deep, and only a narrow goat-walk led down its precipitous sides, above which hangs the fine ruin called Deir Kŭl’ah, the “Convent Castle.”

This valley forms the boundary between Judea and Samaria, and runs into the plain near Râs el ’Ain. We were obliged to follow its course westward for some distance before it became possible to take the pack-animals up the other side.

Our new camp at Rentîs was in more open ground, and but little remained to be done in order to join on to the old limits of the Survey on the south. A hole in the work was, however, here left in the plain which weather forbade our attempting to fill in, and, as nearly all our horses were laid up with sore-back and lameness, the summer rest, which we had now earned, came none too soon to save the party from demoralisation.

Two places of great interest came within our district from the Rentîs camp, namely, Tibneh, in the hills to the east, and Râs el ’Ain to the west: the first supposed by some to represent Timnath Heres, the burial-place of Joshua; the second, Antipatris, built by Herod the Great.

Tibneh is a ruined site on one of the great Roman roads from Lydda and Râs el ’Ain to Jerusalem. A mound, or Tell, stands on the south bank of a deep valley, surrounded with desolate mountains; by it, a clear spring issues from a cave; to the south-west is a beautiful oak-tree, the largest I saw in Palestine, called by the natives Sheikh et Teim, “the Chief, the Servant of God.” South of the Tell, the hillside is hollowed out with many tombs, most of which are choked up. One of these has a porch with two rude pilasters, and along the façade are over two hundred niches for lamps; the trailing boughs of the bushes above hang down picturesquely, and half cover the entrance. Within there are fifteen Kokim, or graves, and through the central one it is possible to creep into a second chamber, with only a single Koka. Other tombs exist farther east, one having a sculptured façade; but the tomb described is the one popularly supposed to be that of Joshua.

It seems to me very doubtful how far we can rely on the identity of the site with that of Timnath Heres. It is certain that this is the place called Timnatha by Jerome, a town of importance, capital of a district in the hills, and on the road from Lydda to Jerusalem, the position of which is fixed by references to surrounding towns. But the Jewish tradition, and also that of the modern Samaritans, points to Kefr Hâris as the burial-place of Joshua, as already noticed in Chapter II. It is remarkable, however, that a village called Kefr Ishw’a, or “Joshua’s hamlet,” exists in the immediate neighbourhood of the ruin of Tibneh.

With regard to Antipatris, we have fortunately far greater certainty; but the place is of less interest, being mentioned in the Bible only as the limit of St. Paul’s night journey from Jerusalem (Acts xxiii. 31). It was well known in the fourth century, but its site was lost to the Crusaders, who identified it at Arsûf, the ancient Apollonia, where also the more ignorant supposed Ashdod to have stood. It is only within the last twenty years that attention has been directed to the true site.

Josephus describes Antipatris as a city in the plain, close to the hills, in a position well watered, with a river encompassing the city, and with groves of trees. Now, as there is but one river in the plain of Sharon, anywhere, near the required part, and as there is on that river but one important ancient site, surrounded by water and near the hills, we can have little doubt as to the locality of the town, first apparently identified by the late Consul Finn, in 1850; but, in addition to this, we have, in the old itineraries, various measurements to surrounding places which, though not quite exact, still serve to indicate the same site. They are as follows:

These measurements on the Survey bring us to the Râs el ’Ain, a large mound covered with ruins, from the sides of which, on the north and west, the River ’Aujah (the Biblical Mejarkon, or “yellow water”) gushes forth, a full-sized stream.

A confusion has arisen between Antipatris and a town called Caphar Saba, in consequence of the loose description, given by Josephus, of a ditch dug by Alexander Balas, “from Cabarzaba, now called Antipatris,” to Joppa (Ant. xiii. 15, 1); but the same author afterwards explains that Caphar Saba was a district name, applied to the plain near Antipatris (Ant. xvi. 5, 2).

In the Talmud, the two towns, Antipatris and Caphar Saba, are both noticed in a manner which leaves little doubt that they were separate places. Of Antipatris, we learn that it was a town on the road from Judea to Galilee, the boundary of “the Land” on the side of Samaria; and, as I have noted above, the great boundary valley actually runs into the plain at this point. But while Antipatris was a Jewish city, Caphar Saba was in the district which was considered foreign ground, as within Samaritan territory; and an idolatrous tree existed there, perhaps now represented by the great sacred tree at Neby Serâkah, close to Kefr Sâba, five and a half miles north of Râs el ’Ain.

Antipatris, with two other places, Jishub and Patris, is mentioned as a station at the entrance to “the King’s Mountain,” as the Jews called the Judean hills. This agrees with its situation at the base of the hills, the other places being, perhaps, Sûfin and Budrus, in the same district.

The site thus fixed, by the Survey measurements, is one naturally better fitted for an important town than any in the district. The name has indeed vanished, being a Greek title derived from the name of Herod’s father, and always awkward to the mouths of the natives; but the stream, the mound of ruins, and the neighbouring hills, remain; the deep blue pools of fresh water well up close beneath the hillock, surrounded by tall canes and willows, rushes, and grass. A sort of ragged lawn extends some two hundred yards southwards, and westwards the stream flows rapidly away, burrowing between deep banks, and rolling to the sea, a yellow, turbid, sandy volume of water, unfordable in winter, and never dry, even in summer.

The ruins of Herod’s city are now covered with the shell of a great Crusading castle. The knights seem to have taken the name Mirr, or “Passage,” applied to a hamlet near the ford, and transformed it into Mirabel, by adding “bel,” a word which occurs in the names of several of their fortresses, such as Belfort, Belvoir, etc. The castle is flanked with round towers, and resembles that of Capernaum (near ’Athlît), on a larger scale. It was here that Manasseh, the cousin of Queen Melisinda, was besieged, in 1149, by Baldwin III., and obliged to capitulate. In 1191 Mirabel was dismantled by Saladin, on the approach of King Richard, in common with Plans, Capernaum, and many other castles; nor does it appear to have been subsequently restored.

CHAPTER VIII.

DAMASCUS, BAALBEK, AND HERMON.

On Tuesday, the 24th of June, I set out, at the head of my party, on a march to Damascus, along the French road. We wound slowly up the sides of Lebanon, here covered with pines, and veiled above with fleecy clouds, which, when the wind blows from the sea, gather daily on the summits, and swell the grapes by a soft damp mist, giving great potency to the Lebanon wine. Arriving at a height of over three thousand feet, we lost sight of the plain and the white city, and marched on in the mist until two p.m., only resting at a little mud cottage, where was a stream of icy water. We then began to descend, and beneath us was spread out one of the finest views in Syria. The broad flat plain of the Litany River separates the two ranges of Lebanon and Anti-Lebanon, and runs north and south, with the river in the middle. The outline of Anti-Lebanon was beautifully varied, with a long succession of blunt peaks, rolling ridges, knife-edged spurs, divided by deep narrow ravines, the whole bathed in the soft bright afternoon sunlight; some hills were thin and blue in the distance, some rocky and rugged in front, while the shadows were already creeping slowly up the feet of the mountains and across the plain. The Bukei’a, as the plain itself is called, was all yellow with corn, the white road, skirted by tall poplars, running across it; and, on the south, the background was formed by the dark ridge of Hermon, on which a solitary streak of snow still remained.

In a couple of hours we reached the plain, the horses being much fatigued, and one unfit for riding. We remained for the night at a miserable wooden house at Stûra.

On the first day we had ridden twenty-nine miles in seven hours. We were now once more in the saddle by 7.30 a.m., and accomplished forty-one miles in eight hours (including stoppages), the baggage animals also arriving at Damascus the same day.

Our way lay at first across the plain, which is well watered, and covered with corn-fields. Herds and flocks and black Arab tents were visible everywhere; the storks were still abundant, their long necks stretched out above the barley, and their shadows sailing along, as they wheeled above in great circles, before leaving for the north; the swallows, also, sat in long rows on the telegraph wires. Soon, however, after crossing the river, we began to enter the pass of Wâdy el Kurn, and the bare grey hills, steep crags, and wilderness of Jentisk, succeeded the more fertile scenery of the Bukei’a. Here were no signs of animal life, beyond an occasional eagle or vulture. The old yellow diligence, with three mules at the pole and three horses in front, rumbled past us down the hill. Soon a rocky range, with castellated crags, appeared in front, and we ascended hills of glaring white chalk, with here and there a black basaltic seam; at length the top of a poplar appeared in front, and we rested, for nearly an hour, by a mud stable, near a beautiful spring in the yellow rocks, round which the ruddy-coloured little oxen lay, chewing the cud, in blazing sunlight.

The country grew yet more barren as we advanced—a succession of rolling hills of an ochre colour, with here and there a steep grey crag. About two p.m. we arrived at a barren plateau, across which the road led—a streak of blinding white. In front was a range of steep hills like those left behind; great black shadows came sliding down the slopes, and so along the plain and up the eastern ridges; behind were banks of fleecy cloud, but above us a broiling sun and cloudless heaven, while before us not a trace of Damascus was to be seen. It was, indeed, wearisome work, toiling over this plateau, uncheered by any distant view of the goal, and with the apparent necessity of climbing another mountain range; great, therefore, was my relief when the road dived suddenly down into a narrow winding valley.

The scenery now became very remarkable, resembling most that of a Sinaitic oasis. The crags on either side were glaring in the sun, reddish-yellow in colour, without even a bush or shrub on the slopes, and with an intensely blue sky above; but below them, in the valley, the road led beside a swirling stream, which ran rapidly over boulders and pebbles, under the cool shadow of tall poplar groves, and gardens of cool, green foliage. The grass grew rank beside the path, trailing vines, peaches, plums, and other fruit-trees flourished on either bank. A paradise was, in short, set in a frame of most barren desert, an oasis between bare crags of sun-scorched limestone. The white road wound down the valley, which became constantly more luxuriant, whilst the hills grew higher and glared more desolate. On every side tributary streams gushed down, and we began to pass by white villas, with primitive frescoes on the walls, by groups of veiled ladies on white donkeys, and by rich merchants on fine mares. At last the valley opened, and our cavalcade, of seven horsemen, came cantering down an avenue of poplars, until, turning a sharp corner, we came suddenly in sight of the entrance to Damascus.

This approach to the city is not favourable to a just appreciation of its peculiar beauties. In front of the houses there is a sort of green, covered with short grass, and divided by the river. A large white mosque, with two tall minarets, was in front, and the castle to the right; but no great wall, as at Jerusalem, bounds the city, which has, in spite of domes and minarets, rather the appearance of a straggling village of mud houses, with windows of wood lattice, flat mud roofs, and overhanging upper stories.

We stopped at the hotel, and at once became acquainted with the real glory of Damascus—namely, its interiors. The house was built round an ample paved court, its inner walls of stucco, painted in horizontal bands of white, red, and blue. In the centre was a large square basin, surrounded by little jets, whence the water trickled slowly. It was shaded by tall lemon and orange-trees, peaches, and plums. On one side of the court opened the diwân, a cool, lofty apartment, with raised floors surrounded by low sofas, and with an octagonal fountain in the narrow central passage. The roof of this central part was more lofty, and clerestory windows let in a subdued light. The diwân walls were marble, and the roofs of inlaid woodwork, gorgeously painted on a dark-brown ground.

Damascus is an oval town divided into two unequal portions, the largest to the south, by the river Barada (the ancient Abana). The houses appear to be principally of mud, or sun-dried brick, with wooden frames; but the public buildings and better private dwellings are of stone. The bazaars form the heart of the town, and ramify in various directions. To Europeans there is something very curious in the collection of fifty or sixty small shops, in one street, all selling the same article. Thus, from the meat-market one strolls into a long, covered lane, where red and yellow slippers are sold; thence into the fragrant scent bazaar, or to the grimy silversmiths’ smithies, or to the long rows of shops where silks and embroidered stuffs are sold. Each salesman sits calmly, on the raised floor of the little pigeon-hole, surrounded by shelves on which his goods are packed, smoking his V-shaped water-pipe, or engaged in prayer, and apparently quite indifferent as to custom.

The bazaars are delightfully cool and shady, and the absence of wheeled vehicles makes them very quiet. They are very narrow, and consequently much crowded. Huge camels, loaded with firewood, come rolling by, and oblige you to crouch against the wall to avoid the sweep of the load. Ladies in long veils, white, or checked with blue with embroidered edges, walk by in yellow knee-boots, or slippers with a sort of thick-soled leather golosh drawn over them. Some are mounted on the white donkeys, which have a thick protuberance to the two sides of their necks—a sort of fold running sometimes all along the back. The saddles on which they are perched aloft, with their feet in front over the animal’s neck, are of red morocco and velvet.

The peasants wear blue, baggy trousers, gathered in at the knee. The Maronite women, with rich apple-red cheeks, have a black band bound over the forehead. Among these the fierce Bedawin are mingled, dark and dusky in complexion, gaunt and stealthy in mien. The broad-shouldered and moustachioed Kurds are again quite distinct, and contrast with the ghastly faces and weakly figures of the townsmen born—the fanatical Softas and Ulema, in their long pale gabardines and scanty white turbans, incarnations of narrow bigotry and ignorant hate. The bazaar is roofed in, with openings at intervals, and the ever-changing crowd is dimly visible in the shadow, or lit up by a beam of sunlight from the roof.

The great charm of the scene consists in its unmixed Oriental character. No French fashion or Gothic building destroys the general effect. You walk in the Damascus of the “Thousand Nights and a Night,” and the grim story of the wooden roof-prop at the corner, from which you may chance any day to see a criminal hanging, reminds you of the justice of Haroun-er-Rashid. Here, through a grating, you look in on the tomb of Saladin’s brother, under its green pall; there, into the cool court of a khan, or the outer chamber of a bath. Dark-eyed beauties, who are not ashamed to show their tattooed faces and nose-rings, meet you at every corner; and, if you know the city well, you may penetrate into the recesses of the wicked bath-houses, or visit the slave-market. Damascus is still the scene of intrigue and passion, as of old; the yearly poisonings are incredibly numerous, and the place is one of the chief strongholds of that obstinate fanaticism which refuses to see anything good in the manners and civilisation of the “heathen.”

The great mosque epitomises the history of Damascus. Once a heathen temple, then a Christian church, it is now a Moslem sanctuary. By a covered street with a great fountain beside it, we arrived at the bronze gates, on which the Sacramental cup is twice repeated, with Arabic inscriptions nailed on above. The enclosure is not as large as that of the Jerusalem Sanctuary; the mosque stretches for 800 feet along the south side, and is about 300 wide. The court is paved, with a central fountain beneath a dome, where Moslems wash before prayer. Broad cloisters run round the court, supported on classic columns.

The building itself is divided by columns into a nave and aisles, and the floor covered with carpets. Four mihrabs, or apses, for prayer, are made in the south wall, belonging to various sects, and each is flanked by tall wax torches from Mecca. A long row of worshippers stood before the central mihrab—soldiers and civilians, old and young, facing the wall and praying together, led by a Sheikh with a melodious voice.

An old water-carrier brought us sweet water from the holy well of the Prophet Yahyah (John the Baptist), to the east of the mosque. The whole sanctuary is whitewashed; but patches of the old glass mosaic, which once covered all the walls, are still visible, and the effect must formerly have been very magnificent.

The mosque has three minarets—that of the Bride to the north, a square, blue tower, from the upper gallery of which four stout Muedhens were chanting, in beautiful time and shrill falsetto notes, the call to prayer, a cry which can be heard like a bell over the entire city. The second minaret is that of “Our Lord Jesus”—a slender grey needle, upon the summit of which the Moslems believe that Christ will descend in the last day. We ascended the third minaret, in the south-west corner, by a winding stair of one hundred and ninety steps, leading to a wooden gallery, whilst forty more lead up to a narrow ledge beneath the little dome.

From this point a really characteristic view presented itself. On every side was a flat expanse of mud roofs, only broken here and there by a little whitewashed dome, and set in a dense rich belt of deep green, extending for a mile from the houses on every side. Beyond the gardens were ranges of hills, barren and desolate, brown and white in colour, and terminated by the steep Hermon ridge.

The charm of the view, however, was due to the interiors. Each house was built round an open court, with a cool central fountain, and with green trees, some of great size, overtopping the roof. The courts were paved with marble, and galleries of carved woodwork ran around them; the walls were banded in courses of black and white marble, or coloured blue and red. Above the roofs rose the countless minarets, in endless variety; some blue or green, square and squat; others of beautiful grey stone, with richly ornamented stone pendants, wood lattices, and Arab or Cufic inscriptions; some whitewashed and crowned with a sort of snuffer-shaped roof, others domed. Bristling against the green bed in which the mud city lies, they gave a rich variety of effect, which is lost in the narrow lanes or roofed bazaars.

Damascus is a centre of the faith, second only to Mecca. The Greek cathedral is hustled into a corner, and guarded by a great white minaret. A second great mosque is built on the west, outside the town, its architect having lost his head for so placing it, to be given back to him—so says the grim Arabic inscription—when the sanctuary stands in the middle of Damascus. On the west of the town is a brown fortress, outwardly formidable, inwardly a ruin—fit emblem of Turkish rule.

From the silversmiths’ bazaar we visited the exterior of the southern wall of the mosque, jumping over a narrow street, and running along the house-roofs. Here we found a fine Byzantine doorway, with a well-carved cornice, and along its frieze the famous Greek inscription: “Thy kingdom, O Christ, is an everlasting kingdom, and Thy dominion endureth throughout all generations.”

On the 4th of July we left this fascinating city for the cooler retreat in the mountains, where the English Vice-Consul was staying. Passing once more up the narrow valley, with its green groves amid desolate crags, we crossed the Saharah, or desert plateau, and, diverging towards the right, we made for a fine gorge, with high precipices. The Barada, a clear, broad, green stream, here comes slipping rapidly down over ledges of rock and through deep pools, and by its channel is the mud village called Sûk Wâdy Barada. The river makes a sudden bend at the gorge, and passes between high rocks, burrowed with tombs, which are in many cases inscribed with barbarous Greek texts. The stream falls over a low precipice, and forms a broad pool—a delightful bathing-place, reminding me on each visit of Naaman’s boast about this very river, “better than all the waters of Israel.” A more picturesque spot than this gorge, with its Roman road cut in the cliff, its cemetery, its tall poplars and rushing stream, its crags, above which is the traditional tomb of Abel, we did not again meet. This place is the ancient Abila, and its name is still recognisable in the tradition of Abel’s tomb, where, after carrying the corpse for a hundred years, Cain was allowed to lay it down. On the 24th of July we revisited the gorge, and inspected the antiquities. A tablet, cut in the side of the precipice above the ancient road, identifies the town as Abila, and is repeated again a little farther on; below it is an aqueduct tunnel, and lower down the valley, on the left bank opposite the village, are remains of a small temple. On this visit we discovered no less than six inscriptions previously unknown, all on tombstones.

Crossing the stream, just above the waterfall, by a single arch, we continued along the left bank. The Barada has worn a deep bed, and on either side the remains of petrified leaves and stems are visible in the rude conglomerate of the banks. The stream pours over boulders and broken blocks, and is half-covered with luxuriant bushes. Gradually ascending, the road leads into the long plain of Zebdâny—a sort of repetition of the Stûra plain on a smaller scale, flanked on the west by the ragged and castellated ridges of the Anti-Lebanon, and on the east by a range of equal height. The plateau is bare and treeless, except towards the north, where are groves of poplar. Through the centre runs the river, its course marked by green bushes. In the middle of the plain it springs up suddenly from a great blue pool, or small lake, of unfathomable depth, resembling the springs of Antipatris mentioned in the last chapter. The stream is here actually broader than at the gorge, and emerges in full volume from the earth. The basin is of hard yellow rock. At first the stream is sluggish, the banks clayey and grassy, fringed with tall canes; and the water of the pool is full of fish and frequented by water-fowl; lower down, however, the fall is very rapid, and, from the gorge to Damascus, the current is extremely quick.

The western mountains were already dark in the blue afternoon shadow, as we began to climb the white slopes to the east of the plain. Here, at a height 5000 feet above the sea, our summer camp was to be fixed, at the village of Bludân, below the Consul’s house.

On the 11th of August the Consul rode down to Damascus, accompanied by Mr. Wright and myself. On this occasion I was able to see something of Damascus by night, guided by the missionary; and in the afternoon we penetrated into one of the slave-markets, ascending a rickety staircase to a miserable wooden verandah, on to which the little rooms opened. In one chamber was a negress, gaily dressed, seated on a straw mat, and dandling a small black baby. She seemed in very good spirits; but her next-door neighbour was nursing a sick child, and looked unhappy enough. In the third room were three negresses, and a white girl, pale and thin, who, instead of greeting us in the jovial manner of the black women, drew her veil round her and fled into an inner chamber. Theoretically, the purchase of fresh slaves is forbidden in the Turkish dominions; but there are two of these slave establishments in Damascus—one just behind or in a mosque—and newly-imported slaves from Africa arrive here every year.

On the following day I was honoured by Hallet Pacha, Governor-General of Syria, with an invitation to accompany the Consul to breakfast. About ten a.m. we were driven through the bazaar, and arrived at the Pacha’s house, on a terrace above the green meadow, west of the town. A tent was spread in the garden, and the Governor, a man of immense corpulence, sat on a velvet sofa within. His staff sat round, wearing red fezzes and black frock-coats.

The Pacha belonged to the Old Turkish party, and cordially hated all “pagans.” The breakfast was studiously Oriental in character, no French dishes being allowed, and no wine offered. A great brass tray, on a plain wooden stand, formed a table for eight people. Among the guests were Mohammed S’aid Pacha—the fierce Kurd who broke in the mountaineers of Nâblus for the Turks—Holo Pacha, and other dignitaries. The first course consisted of tomato soup and macaroni, with lemons; rissoles of rice, and mutton cutlets in bread-crumbs followed, with little dishes of caviar, and bowls of leben, or sour milk, with cucumbers; next came a kind of sweet muffins; then six dishes of various vegetables stuffed with rice, and a broiled chicken; last of all, a huge pilau, and dessert of figs and melons.

Though hungry at first, I was quite unable to eat a quarter of the amount consumed by the Pacha, and ceased to wonder at the almost universal obesity of the Turkish dignitaries. The guests all ate from their hands; and the conversation was such as would not be countenanced in an ordinary barrack-room, though apparently much enjoyed by the Pacha and his staff.

To suppose this picture to be universally characteristic of Turkish high life would no doubt be an error; able and honest men are not altogether wanting among the Government officials of high standing, and Midhat Pacha, the immediate predecessor of my host, has since become famous as a patriot and statesman; but it is the misfortune of Turkey, that the majority of the governing class are men ignorant and fanatical, sensual and inert, notoriously corrupt and tyrannical, who have succeeded only in ruining and impoverishing the countries they were sent to govern.

On the 19th of August, the whole party proceeded, from Bludân, on a visit to Baalbek, where I was ordered to report on the condition of the ruins.

Descending from our mountain camp, we rode north-west, over the well-watered plain, with its long rows of poplars, narrow strips of green turf beside the streams, and long vineyards, with vines trained into little bushes, as in Burgundy. Thence we ascended a rugged path over the grey rocky slopes of Anti-Lebanon, and our view extended over the broad brown Bukei’a, and as far as the long gleaming ridge of Lebanon, “the milk-white mountain,” the outline of which is broken by cones and rounded tops, whilst below a dusky fringe of brushwood creeps up the slopes. After five hours’ riding, we began to descend, over downs of blinding white chalk, to the great plain, and at length came in sight of a village, lying low in an oasis of green trees, with a fine spring to the east, from which ran a stream fringed with willows and poplars.

The village, or town, of Baalbek is extensive and flourishing. At the gate of the governor’s house a fine statue, of colossal size, headless, and seated between sculptured lions, has been placed in a corner of the road. Passing through the main street, we rode on, between dry-stone walls, in a narrow lane, which had a perfect screen of poplars above; and, behind this, rose a huge tawny fortress-wall, like that of the Temple at Jerusalem; while, to the right, stood a little temple, staggering, as it were, after the last earthquake, the joints of the magnificent masonry yawning, and the columns and cornices bending over. The great wall is crowned by a Saracenic battlement, with loopholes, and its masonry is a perfect patchwork; but below, the ancient drafted ashlar, with Greek masons’ marks on the stones, remains intact.

We now found ourselves riding, three abreast, through a dark tunnel of enormous masonry, and looked back on the green paradise of foliage; while in front a glaring dust-heap indicated the ascent into the great enclosure; hence we emerged into the centre of the ruins, with the famous Six Columns and the Temple of Jupiter in front.

So gracefully are these great buildings proportioned, that the mind fails at first to appreciate their enormous size. It is only when standing beneath the pillars, the bases of which, alone, are higher than a man’s stature, that one can believe the columns to be seventy-five feet high. Even the rich tracery of the roofs and cornices, is scarcely more striking than the orange rusty colour which the stone has assumed in weathering. As at Jerusalem, this colour is most remarkable on the side from which the winter storms beat on the ruins.

The position of the Kŭl’ah, or “Castle,” as the enclosure is called, is very low; but the plateau is supported on vaults some thirty feet high, the space enclosed being, roughly, 1000 feet east and west, by 400 north and south. On the east is a hexagonal structure, with a vestibule, to which a flight of magnificent steps originally led up, but was destroyed by the Saracens in converting the temple into a fortress.

The hexagon and the great court beyond, are surrounded with alcoves, most richly decorated, and once including statues, some of which now, no doubt, lie hidden beneath the rubbish. The domed roofs of the alcoves are all richly carved; in one, a head surrounded with a web of scaly wings; in another, a winged dragon straggling over the whole roof. The shattered shafts of granite columns lie before the recesses, and mounds of rubbish cover the floor.

A Christian basilica once stood close to the Sun Temple; but its dimensions are dwarfed by the huge columns, which seem to bear witness to the grandeur of the genius of their Roman founder, dwarfing the puny attempts of Byzantine art and intellect. The church is all gone, except the foundations. The great pillars of the Sun Temple have fallen one by one; but six weather-beaten survivors still resist the fury of the winter and the constant eating away of the frost, though their bases have all been sapped by the natives, in seeking for the metal cores run into the joints. The pillars are seventy-five feet high, and seven and a half feet in diameter; the cornice has a weight of nearly four tons to the square foot. As the capitals of some pillars are worn away, and the bases of all six are undermined, they cannot be expected long to remain standing, and any winter may bring the destruction of the most eastern column, and perhaps of the next two.

The method of erection of these gigantic masses of masonry remains a mystery. The Egyptian obelisks were monolithic, and could be swung into a vertical position; but the building up of the three great stones in a shaft, the placing of its capital, and the crowning labour of raising the cornice blocks into position, seem to require superhuman power, and the simple explanation of the Arabs, that the sons of the Jann were employed to pile the great masses, seems almost a tempting theory.

The most beautiful and perfect building is the smaller Temple of Jupiter, to the south. It is 118 feet long east and west, by sixty-five feet broad in the interior, with a porch twenty-six feet wide in front. The doorway, twenty-one feet broad, was spanned by a lintel in three pieces. The central block, or key-stone, weighing sixty tons, has slipped down, and is supported on a wall built by the Turks. Five attached columns, with fluted shafts, are built against each wall inside, and a rich cornice runs above them, whilst two rows of brackets, with canopies over them, once held statues between the pillars. The carving of the canopies is marvellously bold and intricate; every detail is sharply cut; the rosettes and graceful arabesques stand out almost separated from the stone. The wall across the temple, dividing off the altar part, is covered with graceful undulating figures, unfortunately headless; beneath are great vaults, covered with hard cement.

The door, forty-two feet high in the clear, has huge jambs in three courses, inside each of which a little staircase is hollowed out, ascending to the roof. The cornice above the door is perhaps the richest design of all; and, on the soffit, or under side, a great spread eagle is flanked by winged genii and wreaths. A correct drawing of one niche in Baalbek would take almost a day to do, and there are at least two hundred such niches.

The Temple of Jupiter is surrounded by a cloister, comparatively narrow—eight feet ten inches in the clear—its columns fifty-eight feet high. The low-arched roof above is covered with colossal busts in high relief, set in frames of rich design. The effect of height, obtained by the very great disproportion in width, is more striking than even that of the loftier Six Columns.

Nine pillars remain on the north side of the cloister, and the roof, with its sculptured kings, queens, and warriors holding palm branches, is intact; but the rich cornice is dropping piecemeal from above. On the south only three pillars remain standing, and one great shaft leans against the walls, its three stones still adhering firmly together.

The greatest marvel of Baalbek has, however, still to be noticed. The western fortress-wall is intact, and consists of drafted stones fifteen to twenty feet long; the third course from the ground is composed, however, of three huge blocks, each more than sixty-three feet long. In the quarry lies a fourth, sixty-eight feet long, thirteen feet eight inches broad, fourteen feet high, along which three horsemen might ride abreast; it is called the “pregnant stone,” from a legend which is also found connected with the great column of the Huldah gate in the Temple.

Such are the main features of this mightiest temple ever built by Roman genius. In size Baalbek dwarfs Palmyra, and equals it in richness of workmanship. No doubt the superabundance of ornamentation is a mark of decadence in art; but the magnificence of the proportions seems to allow of any amount of tracery, without injury to the effect as a whole.

The sun was getting low as I sat sketching the Six Columns, which stood out dark and desolate against the glowing sky. A stork stood on one leg on the cornice; his mate was in a nest below. As I turned eastward, the scene was yet grander. The Temple of Jupiter was in dark shadow, with a foreground of tumbled columns, like fallen giants, sprawling over crushed blocks and ruined cornices. The wall on which I sat was battered in by the thud of one huge shaft tossed against it. Beyond the temple, the rich tracery of the Moslem mihrab on the south wall was visible; and, behind this again, was the dark foliage of mulberries, poplars, and willows, and the bare grey hills tipped with crimson from the setting sun.

It was indeed an impressive scene; the majesty of the Pagan, the pride of the Moslem, superhuman power and inexhaustible fancy—all alike things of the past; and beyond the puny works of man, the “everlasting hills,” with the rose of evening on their summits, unchanged as they stood long before the golden plates of the great temple had first caught the dying beams, and as they may still glow evening after evening, long after the huge columns have crumbled to dust. The stork stood on one leg, and no doubt considered the matter; the stars came out one by one, and unbroken stillness prevailed throughout the ruins.

On the 21st we rode back to Bludân, and on Monday, the 8th of September, we again set out, this time in company with Mr. Kirby Green, on an expedition to the summit of Hermon.

The first day’s ride was a long one. Pushing rapidly over the Zebdâny plain, we reached, in three hours, the French road, and, crossing it, ascended a long valley, bare and grey with cliffs and a few oak bushes. We passed the famous temple called Deir-el-Ashaiyir, described by Captain Warren, and then lost our way; but were at length directed by a charcoal-burner—one of the very few natives whom we met—to the little village of Rukhleh, on the steep barren slopes of Hermon. Here we were joined by Mr. Wright and Sergeant Armstrong, from Damascus. We visited the ruins and copied several inscriptions.

There are at Rukhleh two temples, one called “the King’s Castle;” there is also a tower on a rocky knoll, and a Christian church built of the fragments of the temples. In the church-wall is part of a lintel representing an eagle, and a fine block with a head in bold relief, surrounded by a circle ornamented with honeysuckle pattern; the head is nearly five feet high.

In the afternoon we continued our ride along a rugged mountain path, passing by Kefr Kûk, where are beautiful vineyards, and a plain, which in winter becomes a lake, the water rushing out suddenly, with a roaring noise, from a cavern, and flooding the whole area.

Passing by Aiha, where are remains of another temple, we hurried on to the large town of Rashaiyeh, built about half-way up the side of Hermon, and presenting a striking appearance, in the moonlight, with long slopes of vineyard, terrace above terrace—a cataract of green trailing foliage. Our entry was triumphal. The Lieutenant-Governor, on a grey steed, pranced forth to receive the English Consul’s party, at the head of an army of ten men, who formed line and presented arms. The cavalry—six irregulars in all—galloped somewhat wildly about, and one rider was kicked over his horse’s head; we then got jammed in a narrow street, the horses fought, and the Kaimakam (or Governor) was nearly kicked, and retired hastily.

The summit of Hermon was only about three hours distant from Rashaiyeh; so we did not start till late next day. A reception was first held in the little whitewashed room in which we slept. The Governor, the Kadi, the Druse Sheikh, the Greek Pope, the Protestant schoolmaster, and their friends, all came together to do honour to the Consul. At the farther end of the room sat three old Druses, seemingly dyers—as their hands were blue with indigo—who expressed extreme approval of every remark that was made, and laughed loudly at the slightest symptom of a joke.

According to etiquette, the Governor’s visit was returned in half an hour’s time. The military again turned out, and lemonade was brought by a soldier, who held an embroidered cloth under our chins as we drank. The Governor was old and fat, with a cough; he was informed that I came to look at the stars from the top of Hermon, and supposed it was because they could be seen better at so great a height, being so much nearer.

We commenced the ascent of some 5000 feet about 10.30 a.m., passing first through the fine vineyards, into which the bears often come down, from the summit, to eat grapes; thence along lanes with stone walls, passing bushes of wild rose, of oak, and of hawthorn, and honeysuckle in flower. We thus reached the bottom of the main peak, consisting entirely of grey rocks, worn by snow and rain into jagged teeth and ridges, covered with a loose shingle or gravel. It seemed impossible for horses, and still more for laden mules, to toil up; but the breeze grew fresher, and the bracing mountain air seemed to give vigour to man and beast. Resting at intervals, we gradually clambered up, passing by the little cave where the initiated Druses retire, for three or four months, and perform unknown rites. Ridge above ridge, of rock and grey gravel, appeared, each seemingly the last, each only hiding one above. Not an animal was to be seen, except an occasional vulture, and not a tree or shrub, for the snow covers all this part of the mountain till late in summer. By two o’clock we reached the summit.

A glorious panorama repaid us for our labour. South of us lay Palestine, visible as far as Carmel and Tabor, some eighty miles away; eastwards a broad plain, with detached hills on the dim horizon beyond; westwards the Lebanon and the golden sea; northwards, mountains as high as Hermon, Lebanon, and Anti-Lebanon.

As the sun sank lower, Palestine became more distinct, and appeared wonderfully narrow. The calm, green Sea of Galilee lay, dreamlike, in its circle of dark-grey hills. Tabor was just visible to the south, and from it the plateau ran out east to the Horns of Hattin. The broken chain of the Upper Galilean Hills, 4000 feet high, lay beneath the eye, and terminated in the Ladder of Tyre. The mole of Tyre stood out black against the gleaming water; and the deep gorge of the Litany could be seen winding past the beautiful fortress of Belfort. Dim and misty beyond, lay the ridge of Carmel, from the promontory to the peak of Sacrifice. The white domes in Tiberias were shining in the sun, and many of the Galilean towns, including Safed, could be distinguished.

The scene presented a great contrast on the east and west. In the brown, desolate, and boundless plain to the east, stood the distant green oasis of Damascus, and the white city, with its tall minarets. The flat horizon was broken only by the peaks of Jebel Kuleib, the “Hill of Bashan,” some seventy miles away. South-east of Damascus was the terrible Lejja district, a basin of basalt seamed with deep gorges, like rough furrows, and with isolated cones, into which one appeared to look down, so distinctly were the shadows marked inside the hollow broken craters. No trees or water relieved the dusky colour; but the great dust whirlwinds were swirling slowly along over the plains, the bodies, as the Arabs tell us, of huge malignant spirits, carrying destruction in their path. At the foot of the mountain little villages were perched on the rocks, and a stream glittered in a green valley. In most of these hamlets there is a temple facing the rising sun, which appears first from behind the great plain on the east.

On the west, high mountain walls, ridge behind ridge, reached out towards Beyrout, and, on the north, cedar clumps and ragged peaks, grey and dark with long sweeping shadows, were thrown in strong contrast against the shining sea.

The sun began to set, a deep ruby flush came over all the scene, and warm purple shadows crept slowly on. The Sea of Galilee was lit up with a delicate greenish-yellow hue, between its dim walls of hill. The flush died out in a few minutes, and a pale, steel-coloured shade succeeded, although to us, at a height of 9150 feet, the sun was still visible, and the rocks around us still ruddy.

A long pyramidal shadow slid down to the eastern foot of Hermon, and crept across the great plain; Damascus was swallowed up by it, and finally the pointed end of the shadow stood out distinctly against the sky—a dusky cone of dull colour against the flush of the afterglow. It was the shadow of the mountain itself, stretching away for seventy miles across the plain—the most marvellous shadow perhaps to be seen anywhere.

The sun underwent strange changes of shape in the thick vapours—now almost square, now like a domed temple—until at length it slid into the sea, and went out like a blue spark.

Our tent was pitched in the hollow, and six beds crowded into it. Until one in the morning we continued to observe the stars, but the cold was very considerable, though no snow was left, and the only water we had was fetched from a spring about a third of the way down, and tasted horribly of the goat-skin. In the morning I ran to the peak, and saw the sun emerge behind the distant plain, and the great conical shadow, stretching over the sea and against the western sky, becoming gradually more blunt, until it shrivelled up and was lost upon the hills beneath.

The top of Hermon consists of three rocky peaks; two, north and south, of equal height—the third, to the west, considerably lower. On the southern peak are the ruins called Kŭsr esh Shabîb—a rock-hewn hollow or trench, and a circular dwarf-wall, with a temple just below the peak on the south. On the plateau is a rudely-excavated cave, with a rock-cut pillar supporting the roof, and a flat space levelled above, probably once the floor of a building over the cave. Of all these objects of interest we made careful plans, as well as of the shape of the summit.

There is one remarkable natural peculiarity of Hermon still to be noticed—namely, the extreme rapidity of the formation of cloud on the summit. In a few minutes a thick cap forms over the top of the mountain, and as quickly disperses and entirely disappears.

In the accounts of our Lord’s Transfiguration, we read that whilst staying at Cæsarea Philippi, He retired with His disciples to a “high mountain apart;” and there can be but little doubt that some part of Hermon, and very probably the summit, is intended. From the earliest period the mountain has been a sacred place; in later times it was covered with temples; to the present day it is a place of retreat for the Druses. This lofty solitary peak seems wonderfully appropriate for the scene of so important an event; and in this connection the cloud formation is most interesting, if we remember the cloud which suddenly overshadowed the Apostles and as suddenly cleared away, when they found “no man any more, save Jesus only, with themselves.” (Mark ix. 8.)