CHAPTER XV.

HEBRON AND BEERSHEBA.

The fountain of Dhirweh is traditionally that at which St. Philip baptised the Eunuch, and traces of an old chapel are visible above it; but it seems improbable that chariots could ever have travelled along these stony mountain paths, and the road to Gaza by which the Apostle was travelling on that occasion should rather be sought in the plain.

Opposite to our camp was Bethsur, famous in Maccabean times—a stony hill with a ruined tower on the top. To the north we discovered a ruin called Kueizîba, perhaps Chozeba, the home of Bar Cochebas; and near it we found the head of Pilate’s great aqueduct to Jerusalem, never before traced to its real commencement, which is thirteen miles from Jerusalem as the crow flies, and forty-one and a half by the aqueduct, the fall being 365 feet in that distance.

Riding on the 10th of October to the hill above Dûra, we obtained a glimpse of the extreme southern boundary of the Survey. The view was fine; to the east was the great ridge on which stands the traditional tomb of Lot; on the west the Philistine plain lying in a hot haze which towards Gaza hid it entirely; on the south were rolling hills, isolated mounds, and a broad plain, with a dark patch near the Beersheba wells; and yet farther were grey misty ridges, the land appearing to descend in steps towards the Desert of Wanderings.

In returning to camp we passed through the luxuriant vineyards of the supposed Vale of Eshcol, carefully enclosed between dry-stone walls. The grapes, mellowed by the autumn mists, were in full beauty; the rich amber-green foliage covered the whole of the open valley; beyond was a stone town, and a fortress gleaming with a recent coating of whitewash, having a tall minaret above. A barren hill and a few grey olives rose behind. Such was our first view of Hebron, the ancient city which, as the Bible tells us, “was built seven years before Zoan (or Tanis) in Egypt” (Num. xiii. 22).

The results of the fuller acquaintance which we gained with the town, in three subsequent visits of several days’ duration, may here be gathered up. Hebron is a long stone town on the western slope of a bare terraced hill; it extends along the valley, and the main part reaches about 700 yards north and south, including the Mosque Quarter, and the Quarter of the Gate of the Corner. On the north is a separate suburb, named from the mosque of ’Aly Bukka, who died in 670 A.H.; on the south also, and west of the road, is another small suburb. The Haram stands above the middle of the main Quarter. The Sultan’s Pool—a large well-built reservoir, occupies part of the valley. West of the city is an open green below the Quarantine, surrounded by hills which are covered with olives.

The contrast between Hebron and Bethlehem has been already noticed; the town has a dead-alive appearance, and the sullen looks of the Moslem fanatics contrast with the officious eagerness of the Bethlehem Christians. There are some 17,000 Moslems in Hebron, according to the Governor’s account; and about 600 Jews are tolerated in the Quarter of the Corner Gate. The town is the centre of commerce for the southern Arabs, who bring their wool and camel’s-hair to its market. It has also a sort of trade in glass ornaments and in leather water-buckets, but the bustle and stir of Bethlehem are not found in its streets; the inhabitants seem wrapped in contemplation of the tombs of their forefathers, and boast that no pagan Frank has yet desecrated the holy shrines with his presence, or built his house in the town.

The place of chief interest in Hebron is the Cave of Machpelah containing the tombs of the Patriarchs. There seems no reason to doubt the genuine character of the site now surrounded by the Haram, and here again we have that valuable consent of traditions—Jewish, Christian, and Moslem, which seems to distinguish the true sites, from those less genuine concerning which two or more discordant traditions have arisen.

Only two trustworthy witnesses—Dean Stanley and Mr. Fergusson—have had the opportunity of describing the interior of this sanctuary; and it seems very doubtful if any living being has ever descended into the mysterious cavern beneath the floor since the Moslem conquest of Palestine; nor will it be possible to explore this cave so long as the Moslems have possession of the place, unless unexpected changes occur in their religious feelings. One curious story was, however, told me. It is said that when Ibrahim Pacha threatened the town, the inhabitants carried their property to the cave for safety. If this be true the area must be considerable, and the iron door on the north-west, mentioned by Captain Warren, may perhaps be the same iron door mentioned by Benjamin of Tudela as leading into the cave in the twelfth century.

The surrounding wall is one of the mysteries of Palestine, and a monument inferior only to the Temple Enclosure, which it resembles in style. It measures about 112 feet east and west, by 198 feet north and south, and has eight pilasters on the short sides, and sixteen oh the long, resembling those which I found, as before noticed, at the north-west corner of the Jerusalem Haram. The stones also are scarcely inferior in dimensions, and one is said to be thirty-eight feet long, and three and a half feet high; they are all drafted with the real Jewish draft, broad, shallow, and beautifully cut, as at Jerusalem. Judging from the similarity of style, one is led to ascribe the building to the Herodian period—a view supported by Mr. Fergusson in his able paper on the subject, his opinion being based on historical grounds.

Josephus speaks of monuments of the Patriarchs as existing in his day (B. J. iv. 9, 7), but is silent as to the enclosure. Had it, however, existed in the Old Testament times, we should surely find some record of its origin in the Bible; nor does it seem likely that it was built later than Herod’s time, for the earliest Christian pilgrim in 333 A.D. found it already standing.

The great walls are surmounted by two high white minarets on the south-east and north-west. The southern portion of the area is occupied by a Gothic twelfth-century building, presumably a church; the nave has a pointed roof and clerestory windows, the aisles are lower and their roofs rest against the fortress wall. Within are the cenotaphs of Isaac and Rebecca, supposed to stand above their true graves in the cavern. Outside the building, in separate chambers, are the tombs of Abraham and Sarah, flanking the entrance. On the north side of the open court Jacob and Leah have similar cenotaphs, covered, like the rest, with richly embroidered green cloths. A modern building is erected against the western fortress wall on the exterior. This is called the Tomb of Joseph, whose bones are said, by Josephus, to have been removed hither from Shechem—a story no doubt due to Jewish jealousy of the shrine at Shechem, which was in the hands of the Samaritans.

Cenotaphs like those in the present building are mentioned as early as 700 A.D. Rabbi Benjamin of Tudela states, however, that Jews were able in his days to descend, through an iron door, into the cavern, which was in three compartments, and where the real tombs were shown. The twelfth-century writers, in describing the fortress, which they quaintly name the “Castle of St. Abraham,” also call the cavern Spelunca Duplex, “the double cave”—a title probably derived from the Hebrew Machpelah, signifying “the place divided”: Sir John Maundeville, in 1322, states that one chamber was above the other.

An idea appears to have existed at an early period that Hebron was not originally built on its present site, but on the hill north-west of the modern town. Arculphus mentions this in 700 A.D., and Marino Sanuto in the fourteenth century says the same, both apparently referring to ancient ruins then visible in the direction of the present site of Abraham’s Oak. There are traces of the same theory in the writings of many intermediate visitors, and the Bible narrative itself seems to require a position opposite the Haram, if the true Machpelah be beneath that enclosure, for the cave was not in Hebron, but in a field “before Mamre—the same is Hebron” (Gen. xxiii. 19). Thus, though a new city may have grown up around the sacred tombs, even in Jewish times, the original Hebron, Mamre, or Kirjath-Arba of Abraham, must have had a different site; and it may be noted, that the principal springs, and many of the rock-cut tombs dating from the Jewish period, are now found north-west of Hebron.

The Crusaders had other traditions connected with this neighbourhood. The grave of Abner was then shown within a church in Hebron, probably the same place now found in the house of a Moslem. The grave of Esau was fixed in a suburb of the town, as also those of Adam and Judah, which have now disappeared. The open green, west of the town, was known as the “Field of Damascus,” apparently because owned by the Sultan of Damascus. The place where Cain killed Abel was a little farther south, and on the north was the cave in which Adam and Eve lived for a century, which appears to have been the modern rock-hewn spring called ’Ain-el-Judeideh, “the excavated fountain,” which is covered by an arch and reached by steps. Here Adam mourned for Abel, and hence the spot is called by some chroniclers the Vale of Tears; here also Adam was made of the red earth of the place. Hebron was considered to have obtained its name Kirjath-Arba, “city of four,” from the four patriarchs, including Adam—an explanation derived from the Rabbinical commentators, but not in accordance with the reason given in the Bible, “And the name of Hebron before was Kirjath-Arba, which Arba was a great man among the Anakim” (Josh. xiv. 15).

On our last visit to Hebron we were shown an ancient Jewish tomb with nine graves, or kokim, close to ’Ain-el-Judeideh, and to this we obtained the curious name Kabr Hebrûn, “the grave of Hebron.” We did not, however, learn the origin of the title, or the source of the tradition. A little higher up the hill is a ruined monastery, in a corner of which the tomb of Jesse is shown.

The Oak (or plain, as our version renders it) of Mamre has been shown at various times in different directions. Jerome places it at the modern Râmeh, where is a fine unfinished stone enclosure with a large well. The walls measure 162 feet north and south by 214 east and west, and one stone is fifteen feet long. A little farther east the remains of Constantine’s basilica are distinguishable, and the great enclosure may perhaps be the market where the Jews were sold by Hadrian, after the fall of Bether.

The present site of the Oak is farther south, and the magnificent tree stands among the vineyards north-west of Hebron. It is called Ballûtet Sebta, “the oak of rest,” and has branches fifty feet long, one of which was broken by the snow in 1857. This Oak is thought to be more than two hundred years old, but cannot be the one seen by Sir John Maundeville, for it is covered with leaves, whereas that which was shown to Sir John he calls “the dry tree.” “They say,” he continues, “that it has been there since the beginning of the world, and that it was once green, and bore leaves till the time that Our Lord died on the Cross, and then it dried, and so did all the trees that were then in the world.” Jerome, however, is more moderate in his assertions, and speaking of the northern site of Mamre at Râmeh, distant two miles from modern Hebron, and now called “Abraham’s House” by the Jews, he says that the Oak was still visible, and worshipped by the peasantry in the days of Hadrian, but disappeared during his own time. We have thus no certainty as to the position of Mamre or of the Oak, which Josephus places only six furlongs from Hebron (B. J. iv. 9, 7).

There are two other springs near Hebron which deserve notice; one is east of the “Oak of Rest,” and is called ’Ain Kheir ed Dîn, “Spring of the chosen of the faith,” perhaps in connection with Abraham’s history. The second is more important, because almost undoubtedly a Biblical site.

After his interview with David, Abner set out on his way to Jerusalem, and had gone as far as the Spring of Sirah, when Joab’s messengers overtook him and brought him back to Hebron, where he was murdered in the gate (2 Sam. iii. 26). Now on approaching the modern town by the old paved road to the north, the first spring beside the way is called Sârah. Like the Hebrew Sirah, the word means “withdrawn,” and the title is, no doubt, due to the fact that the spring is under a stone arch, at the end of a little alley with drystone walls, and is thus withdrawn from the high-road. This place may therefore be considered as one of the few genuine sites in the neighbourhood of Hebron.

On the 22nd of October we marched south, to camp at Yuttah, the ancient Levitical town of Juttah, five miles south of Hebron.

We were now entering on a new district, differing in character from the rest of the Judean hills. In the neighbourhood of Yuttah, Dûra, and Yekîn, the country descends by a sudden step, and forms a kind of plateau, divided into two by the great valley which runs from north of Hebron to Beersheba, and thence west, to Gerar, and the sea. The plateau is about 2600 feet above sea-level, and 500 feet below the general level of the Hebron watershed. It consists of open wolds and arable land, the soil being a white soft chalk, geologically a later formation than the hard limestone of the hills. There are no springs in this region, but the water, where not contained in tanks and cisterns, sinks through the porous rocks, and runs in the valleys below the surface of the ground. On the south another step leads down to the white marl desert of Beersheba; on the west are the Philistine plains; on the east, 300 feet below, is the dreary Jeshimon, or “solitude.” The plateau has only two inhabited villages on it, but is covered with ruins. It is dry and treeless, but rich in flocks and herds. It seems to have been the country of the Horites, for the place is riddled with caves intended for habitations, and the name of this troglodytic race is preserved in the titles of two of the ruined towns.

The plateau formed part of the district called Negeb, or “dry land,” in the Bible; and here, in the southern part of the possessions of Caleb we should seek for Debir, which he gave to his daughter; for the Choresh Ziph, where David and Jonathan met; and for the hill of Hachilah, where David hid from Saul.

One is at once struck with the fitness which the plateau presents for the adventures of the fugitive bandit chief who was destined to become the king of Israel. The inhabitants, like Nabal of Carmel, are rich in sheep and oxen. The villagers of Yuttah owned 1700 sheep, of which 250 belonged to the Sheikh. All along the borders of the Jeshimon and Beersheba deserts there is fine pasturage, to which the peasants descend in spring-time, having made some sort of agreement with the neighbouring Bedawîn to protect them from other tribes. Thus we find perpetuated the old system under which David’s band protected the cattle of Nabal.

The story of David’s wanderings is one of the most interesting episodes of the Old Testament, and we have now so recovered its topography, that the various scenes seem as vivid as if they had occurred only yesterday. First we have the stronghold of Adullam, to be described later, guarding the rich corn valley of Elah; then Keilah, a few miles south, perched on its steep hill above the same valley. The forest of Hareth lay close by, on the edge of the mountain chain where Kharas now stands, surrounded by the “thickets” which properly represent the Hebrew “Yar,”—a word wrongly supposed to mean a woodland of timber trees.

Driven from all these lairs, David went yet farther south to the neighbourhood of Ziph (Tell Zîf); and here also our English version speaks of a forest—the “Wood (Choresh) of Ziph,” where David met with Jonathan. A moment’s reflection will, however, convince any traveller that as the dry, porous formation of the plateau must be unchanged since David’s time, no wood of trees could then have flourished over this unwatered and sun-scorched region. The true explanation seems to be that the word Choresh is a proper name with a different signification, and such is the view of the Greek version and of Josephus. We were able considerably to strengthen this theory by the discovery of the ruin of Khoreisa and the Valley of Hiresh (the same word under another form), close to Ziph, the first of which may well be thought to represent the Hebrew Choresh Ziph. Should this word appear as a proper name in the new English Version, a very marked improvement will be made in what might be called the orientalising of the Bible, substituting the actual language of the land, for that essentially English tone which has been imparted to the narrative by the expressions of translators to whom the East was less familiar than their own fair country.

The treachery of the inhabitants of Ziph, like that of the men of Keilah, appears to have driven David to a yet more desolate district, that of the Jeshimon, or “Solitude,” by which is apparently intended the great desert above the western shores of the Dead Sea, on which the Ziph plateau looks down. As a shepherd-boy at Bethlehem, David may probably have been already familiar with this part of the country, and the caves, still used as sheepcotes by the peasant herdsmen, extend all along the slopes at the edge of the desert.

East of Ziph is a prominent hill on which is the ruined town called Cain in the Bible; hence the eye ranges over the theatre of David’s wanderings.

On the south are the wolds of the Negeb plateau, with the plains of Beersheba beyond. On the east is the “Solitude,” with white peaks and cones of chalk, and deep, narrow watercourses, terminated by the great pointed cliff of Ziz, above Engedi, and by the precipices over the Dead Sea, two thousand feet high. Here, among the “rocks of the wild goats,” the herds of ibex may be seen bounding, and the partridge is still chased on the mountains, as David was followed by the stealthy hunter Saul. The blue sea is visible in its deep chasm, and is backed by the dark precipice of Kerak, “scarred with a hundred wintry watercourses.”

The great hump of rock on which Maon—the home of Nabal—stands, is seen to the south, and rather nearer is the Crusading castle at Carmel, where were Nabal’s possessions; the ruined mound of Ziph is to the west, and Juttah among its olives. Thus the whole scenery of the flight of David, and of Saul’s pursuit, can be viewed from this one hill.

The stronghold chosen by the fugitive was the hill Hachilah, in the wilderness of Ziph, south of Jeshimon. This I would propose to recognise in the long ridge called El Kôlah, running out of the Ziph plateau towards the Dead Sea desert, or Jeshimon—a district which, properly speaking, terminates about this line, melting into the Beersheba plains. On the north side of the hill are the “Caves of the Dreamers,” perhaps the actual scene of David’s descent on Saul’s sleeping guards.

Pursued even to Hachilah, David descended farther south, to a rock or cliff in the wilderness of Maon, which was named Sela Ham-mahlekoth, “Cliff of Divisions” (1 Sam. xxiii. 2-8). Here he is represented as being on one side of the mountain, while Saul was on the other.

Now between the ridge of El Kôlah and the neighbourhood of Maon there is a great gorge called “the Valley of Rocks,” a narrow but deep chasm, impassable except by a detour of many miles, so that Saul might have stood within sight of David, yet quite unable to overtake his enemy; and to this “Cliff of Division” the name Malâky now applies, a word closely approaching the Hebrew Mahlekoth. The neighbourhood is seamed with many torrent-beds, but there is no other place near Maon where cliffs, such as are to be inferred from the word Sela, can be found. It seems to me pretty safe, therefore, to look on this gorge as the scene of the wonderful escape of David, due to a sudden Philistine invasion, which terminated the history of his hair-breadth escapes in the South Country.

On the 5th of November we moved once more south, and encamped at Dhâherîyeh, a village which, there seems to me to be every reason for supposing to be the ancient Debir, a place not identified before the Survey. The name has the same meaning, derived from its situation on the “back” of a long ridge; and the position between Shochoh (Shuweikeh), Dannah (Idhnah), Anab (’Anâb), and Eshtemoa (Es Semû’a), seems very suitable (Josh. xv. 48). The place, moreover, is evidently an ancient site of importance, to which several old roads lead from all sides. The springs near Debir given to Achsah (Judg. i. 15) might well be the beautiful springs of Dilbeh, about seven miles north of the town, and the identification seems to me to be amongst the most valuable of those due to the Survey.

On the 10th of November I proceeded, accompanied by Sergeant Armstrong, to Beersheba, to complete the south boundary of the map. We had with us only one servant, one groom, the scribe, a guide, and the Sheikh of Dhâherîyeh, for whom I had a great liking. We took two tents, five mules, and three horses, carrying also provisions for three days and one theodolite. The rest of the expedition remained at the village.

Following a long valley, we arrived at a broad undulating plain, grey and dry, like the muddy basin of a former sea. The hills end very suddenly, and the boundary is thus sharply defined between the lands of the settled population and the district of the Bedawîn, who, though nomadic, cultivate a little tobacco and barley round Beersheba.

The scenery was tame and featureless, with a single dark Tell in front, and white marl peaks capped with flint to the west. The heat and glare were oppressive, and we were glad at noon to rest under a white chalk cliff, and were able to realise the force of the poetic language of Isaiah, “The shadow of a great rock in a weary land” (Isaiah xxxii. 2).

We ascended the Tell or mound of Seb’a, which is two and a half miles east of the Wells of Beersheba, and thence we had a fine view of the great boundary valley which limited our work on the south, joining the long ravine which comes down from Hebron, and running west in a broad, flat, gravelly bed, between high walls of brown earth. The pebbles were white and dry, yet water-worn, for, as we found in the following spring, a river will occasionally flow for hours along the Wâdy bed. East of us there were remarkable white chalk hills called El Ghurrah, and on the west a low ridge shut out the maritime plain. To the north were the hills of Judah, dotted with lotus-trees, and to the south stretched the endless Desert of Wanderings.

No mules appeared, and we therefore rode down towards the wells, passing by innumerable burrows of the jerboa, and by numerous herds of camels, with a distant view of black “houses of hair.” At length we spied a tent, and our servants talking with mounted Arabs near the principal well. At the same moment I saw a pigeon by one of the wells, and fired, killing it on the spot. I noticed that the Arabs rode away immediately after, and I found that they had been insolent, and had ordered the servants to take down the tent, but, seeing a well-armed party approaching, and conceiving a great respect for a gun that could kill at such a distance, with characteristic Bedawîn caution, they made off before we came up.

The desert of Beersheba is a beautiful pasture-land in spring, when the grass and flowers cover the grey mud, as in the Jordan Valley; but in November it is very desolate; not a tree exists near the wells, and only the foundations of a flourishing fourth-century town remain.

Our tents were by the principal well, which is twelve feet three inches in diameter, and over forty-five feet deep, lined with rings of masonry to a depth of twenty-eight feet. A second well, five feet in diameter, exists about 300 yards to the west, and on the east is a third, which is dry, twenty-three feet deep, and nine feet two inches in diameter. The sides of all the wells are furrowed by the ropes of the water-drawers; but we made one discovery which was rather disappointing, namely, that the masonry is not very ancient. Fifteen courses down, on the south side of the large well, there is a stone with an inscription in Arabic, on a tablet dated, as well as I could make out, 505 A.H., or in the twelfth century. This stone must be at least as old as those at the mouth, which are furrowed with more than a hundred channels by the ropes of seven centuries of water-drawers.

The wells have no parapets, and I nearly fell into the dry one, so little was it visible until quite near; round the two which contain water there are rude stone troughs, which may be of any age—nine at the larger, five at the lesser well.

The sun began to set, and we hurried back to observe the pole-star from the Tell, but were foiled by a rising bank of clouds. Returning to camp, we secured our horses with fetters and tethers, so that they could not be stolen, and then retired to sleep in peace.

We now found how useful dogs may be in camp. In the spring our colley had saved the horses at Sulem, and I had intended to take him on our rather risky visit to Beersheba, but somehow he was left behind, and thus not one of our faithful guards was with us. During the night a thief came into the tents: he ripped up the saddle-bag containing our provisions, and took them all with him, and he even came to the head of my bed and stole Bulwer’s “Disowned,” but only took it about a hundred yards from camp. It is evident that he must have crept on his stomach, since he only took what was near the ground and left my watch lying on the table, and (which was for the moment more important) he also left me my boots, though he removed the tin washing-basin. Our plates, bread, chickens, and some barley in a nosebag, he (or they) stole from the servants’ tent, all this being nearly accomplished in about ten minutes.

After taking some observations from near the well, we started for Tell el Mihl, fourteen miles east of Beersheba. Our faces were turned towards the road by which Rebecca had come to Beersheba: like Isaac we lifted up our eyes, and “behold the camels were coming.” As far as the view extended the plain was covered with hundreds of them, each moving alone towards the wells, each casting before it a long shadow in the light of the rising sun. Dusky, half-naked boys sat on the humps, and, arriving at the well, they stripped off what clothes they had on, and let down to the water the goat-skin bags which served them as buckets, drawing them up with great rapidity in time with a rude chant, and evidently vying in the rate of watering their herds; both the wells were besieged, and a thick crowd of camels had collected before we left.

We once more passed the Tell and found another smaller well near it. Marching east, we came on flocks of sheep, with a few goats among them, driven mostly by girls under twelve years of age—the age no doubt of Leah when Jacob first came to Haran. As is still the custom of the Bedawîn, the girls over fourteen were no doubt, in Jacob’s time, withdrawn to the privacy of the women’s apartments in the tents, and this seems to agree with the account of Jacob’s kissing his cousins, for if they were more than children such a salute would surely have been quite contrary to Eastern ideas of propriety. Small as the flocks appeared, from the great extent of the plain, the smallest contained at least twenty head, and the average was over one hundred, so that we came across at least eight hundred in all. This gives an idea of the immense number of the flocks which exist in this apparently sterile desert, where it seems impossible that they can find anything to eat in autumn.

We also saw large coveys of the sand-grouse or pintail, which is not found in the hills of Palestine, though in summer it comes up the Jordan Valley; the crops of those we shot were full of hard round seeds and of small pebbles.

The journey was tedious, and the scenery very monotonous. Ten miles from Beersheba we came upon another ruined town with two wells, also containing water. The place has lost its old name, and is now only known as El Meshâsh, “the water-pits.” It must have been a very important town, yet hitherto it has escaped notice, other travellers having gone by routes east and west of the place, and never across country; thus the discovery was left for us, and the utility of systematic survey once more exemplified.

After travelling for miles without seeing a living thing, we came suddenly on this site, with brown ruins, and a crowd of dusky naked men drawing water in a frenzied manner, and a few women in sweeping garments, driving diminutive donkeys laden with black water-skins.

Tell el Milh is a third site of character similar to the last; it is the Malatha of the fourth century, and possibly the “City of Salt” (as the modern name signifies) noticed in the Bible (Josh. xv. 62). There is here a great hillock with Arab graves on the top, ruins of an extensive town, and on the north two wells, just like those at Beersheba. Crowds of horses, goats, sheep, and camels surrounded them, and the song of the water-drawers was loud and wild.

We sat down under the steep bank of the valley, north of the wells, and very soon a crowd of naked savages collected above us. They demanded “bucksheesh,” and made rude remarks as to our being Christians. “Look at the big watch,” said one, observing our aneroid; “Look at the guns and pistols,” said another. Some of the chiefs (who wore clothes) came down to talk to our Sheikh, and, putting their foreheads against his, made a sound representing the kiss of peace. The Sheikh, though not a Bedawî, seemed not at all afraid of the crowd, and abused the wild Arabs roundly, telling them to be off. As for us, we turned our backs on them and smoked in peace.

I ordered all the provisions we had left to be served out to the party, for the natives had eaten no breakfast. Just as darkness came on we heard the song of the messenger from our main camp, and he came in dead tired, after trotting for eleven hours on a rough mule: with him came one of our soldiers on his mare, followed by its colt, which was also much fatigued.

We made great preparations in the shape of traps for thieves, but none came. That evening, the 11th of November, 1874, nearly proved the close of my existence, for I was seen, in the dusk, at some little distance, and my servant fired, mistaking me for a Bedawî robber, the ball passing very near my head. During the night we slept but little, being in constant fear of losing the horses, or of a night attack from the Arabs.

By seven next morning we had set off for the hills, and passed by the ruined towns of Ghurrah, S’awi (perhaps the ancient Jeshua), and Haura, which are noticeable for the walls of flint-conglomerate, possibly very ancient, surrounding their sites; in the afternoon we reached Dhâherîyeh, and found all well except Sergeant Black, who was suffering much from dysentery. Sheikh Hamzeh, the well-known guide from Hebron, and Abu Dahûk, chief of the Jâhalîn Arabs, were in camp. I had arranged with them to start for Beersheba on the 10th, and had gone without them as they did not come on that day. This lesson in punctuality was very useful when I again required their services.

On the 19th of December, Lieut. Kitchener joined the Survey party. The work was then interrupted by violent gales, and subsequently by illness in the party which wintered in Jerusalem, whence Sergeant Black was invalided home early in January.

CHAPTER XVI.

THE LAND OF BENJAMIN.

Bethel at the present day is one of the most desolate-looking places in Palestine; not from lack of water, for it has four good springs, but from the absence of soft soil on its rocky hills. All the neighbourhood is of grey, bare stone, or white chalk. The miserable fields are fenced in with stone walls, the hovels are rudely built of stone, the hill to the east is of hard rock, with only a few scattered fig-gardens, the ancient sepulchres are cut in a low cliff, and a great reservoir south of the village is excavated in rock. The place seems as it were turned to stone, and we can well imagine that the lonely patriarch found nothing softer than a stone for the pillow under his head, when on the bare hill side he slept, and dreamed of angels.

It is very remarkable that in this narrative the word “place” occurs in a manner which suggests that it is used with a special significance. Jacob came not to any city, but to a “certain place” (Gen. xxviii. 11), the stones of which formed his pillow.

The word “place” (Makom) occurs five times in the same chapter, and the place called Bethel is distinguished specially from the neighbouring city of Luz (verse 19). The same word (Makom) is used to denote the sacred places of the Canaanites (Deut. xii. 2), and in the Talmud to denote the shrines held to be lawful for Israel before the Temple was built.

It is thus, perhaps, a sacred place that is intended as having been Jacob’s refuge on his way; and we at once recall the altar which Abraham raised between Bethel and Ai—towns which, as now identified, were only two miles apart. Abraham’s altar must have been close to the city of Luz, subsequently named from it Bethel, “the House of God;” and it was perhaps from the stones of this ancestral shrine that Jacob’s pillow was made.

Bethel continued to be a religious centre after the establishment of the Tabernacle at Shiloh, in the time of Phineas, grandson of Aaron. We find the Ark established—at least during the campaign against the men of Gibeah—at Bethel; for there can be no reasonable doubt that Josephus is right in supposing the place called in our version “the House of God,” to be the town of Bethel (Judg. xx. 26, 27; Ant. v. 2, 10), as will be seen by comparison of the strategical lines occupied by the besieged Benjamites of Gibeah, one of which was the “highway which goeth up to Bethel” (verse 31). Even in the time of Samuel, sacrifice seems to have been offered at Bethel (1 Sam. x. 3), and the establishment of a Calf Temple by Jeroboam at Bethel was thus no innovation, but merely the restoration of an ancient high place. The extraordinary mixture of true and false worship which thus seems to have occurred—Bethel being the school of the prophets of Jehovah, while the Calf Temple still stood there—is a subject well worthy of consideration.

The prophecy of Hosea, and that of Amos as well, connect Bethel and Bethaven in such a way as to make it appear that they were the same place. Such is the opinion of the Jewish commentators, and we may thus perhaps trace the origin of the present corruption of Beitîn for Bethel back to the early time of Jeroboam. Bethaven, however, means “house of naught,” and the title was originally given to the desert east of Bethel, because of its barren character, though in the prophecy there is a play on the word: “Gilgal (freedom) shall go into captivity, and Bethel shall come to naught” (Aven).

Another town of almost equal interest existed in the same neighbourhood, namely Ai, east of Bethel, a place which was quite unknown in the fourth century, but concerning the general position of which there is but little dispute. The various notices in the Bible (Gen. xii. 8; Josh. viii. 9-14) define its situation with much exactitude, as being east of and close to Bethel (Josh. xii. 9), with a valley north of the town, and low ground to the west, where an ambush might be set unseen from the city, while on the opposite side was a plain (verse 14). This description applies, in a very complete manner, to the neighbourhood of the modern village of Deir Diwân, and there are here remains of a large ancient town, bearing the name Haiyân, which approaches closely to Aina, the form under which Ai appears in the writings of Josephus. The special meaning of the Hebrew word rendered “beside,” but meaning “close to,” forbids us to accept any of the alternative sites at greater distances from Bethel, which some writers have advocated. Rock-cut tombs and ancient cisterns, with three great reservoirs cut in the hard limestone, are sufficient to show this to have been a position of importance. To the west is an open valley called “Valley of the City,” which, gradually curving round eastward, runs close to the old road from Jericho by which Joshua’s army would probably have advanced. To the north of the site there is also a great valley, and the plain or plateau on which the modern village stands close to the old site, expands from a narrow and rugged pass leading up towards Bethel, which is two miles distant on the watershed.

Beside this pass and north of the ruins, is a large terraced knoll, very stony, and crowned by a few olives—a conspicuous object in the landscape. It is called simply Et Tell, “the mound,” and a connection has been supposed between this name and the fact that Joshua made Ai “a heap (Tell in the Hebrew) for ever.” The place does not, however, show traces of having at any time been covered by buildings, and the rock-cut tombs and cisterns above noticed seem too far from it to indicate Et Tell as the exact site of Ai; being close to the pass, it has, moreover, no valley such as would seem fitted for the ambush immediately west of it.

From this Tell a fine view is obtained towards the plains of Jericho. The village of Deir Diwân is seen on its little plateau in the foreground, while the desolate hills of Benjamin rise beyond, with the chain of the Quarantania Mountain, hiding the western half of the Dead Sea and of the plain of Jericho, though the mouth of Jordan and the eastern ranges of Moab with Mount Nebo are visible, forming the extreme distance.

Advancing a few miles farther south, we come on the scene of one of the most romantic of Old Testament stories—the attack made by Jonathan and his armour-bearer, on the Philistine camp, near Michmash.

A great valley, as we have seen above, has its head west of Ai, and curving round eastwards it runs to Jericho: about two miles south-east of Ai it becomes a narrow gorge with vertical precipices some 800 feet high—a great crack or fissure in the country which is peculiar in this respect, that you only become aware of its existence when close to the brink, for on the north the narrow spur of hills hides it, and on the south a flat plateau extends to the top of the crags.

On the south side of this great chasm (the true head of the Kelt valley) stands Geba of Benjamin, on a rocky knoll, with caverns beneath the houses and arable land to the east. Looking across the valley, the stony hills and white chalky slopes present a desolate appearance; and on the opposite side, considerably lower than Geba, is the little village of Michmash, on a sort of saddle, backed by an open and fertile corn-valley. The existence of this valley no doubt accounts for the place having been famous for its barley, so that the Talmudic proverb, “to bring barley to Michmash,” represents exactly our “carrying coals to Newcastle.”

The pass between these two towns appears to have been more than once the place of meeting between the Jews and their enemies, though to a military man it seems curious that the main road along the watershed should not always, as it did in Maccabean times, have formed the line of Jewish defence north of Jerusalem.

The town of Geba, south of the valley, is generally understood to be that notorious in the history of the extermination of the tribe of Benjamin, and to have been the place where Jonathan smote the garrison of the Philistines (1 Sam. xiii. 3). If this be so, then it must apparently be the “hill of God” (Geba-ha-Elohim) where was the garrison of the Philistines (1 Sam. x. 5), and where some of Saul’s family seem to have lived (verse 14). Thus Geba of Benjamin seems to be connected with Gibeah of Saul, but the latter name appears to have applied to a district as well as to a town, for the neighbouring city of Ramah is said in one passage to have been “in Gibeah” (1 Sam. xxii. 6).

Josephus tells us of a village called Gabaoth Saule which was by the Valley of Thorns, and about thirty stadia from Jerusalem. This reminds us at once of the name Seneh, “thorn” or “acacia,” which was applied to one of the crags at the place where Jonathan crossed to the Philistine camp at Michmash. The modern name of the great valley between Geba and Michmash is Suweinît, or the “valley of the little thorn-tree” (acacia), and if this identification of the Valley of Thorns with Wâdy Suweinît be correct, the town of Gibeah of Saul is apparently to be placed at the present Jeb’a, though the distance given by Josephus is not exact.

The site of the Philistine camp at Michmash, which Jonathan and his armour-bearer attacked, is very minutely described by Josephus. It was, he says, a precipice with three tops, ending in a long sharp tongue and protected by surrounding cliffs. Exactly such a natural fortress exists immediately east of the village of Michmash, and it is still called “the fort” by the peasantry. It is a ridge rising in three rounded knolls above a perpendicular crag, ending in a narrow tongue to the east with cliffs below, and having an open valley behind it, and a saddle towards the west on which Michmash itself is situate.

Opposite this fortress, on the south, there is a crag of equal height and seemingly impassable; thus the description of the Old Testament is fully borne out—“a sharp rock on one side, and a sharp rock on the other” (1 Sam. xiv. 4).

The southern cliff, as we have noticed above, was called Seneh, or “the acacia,” and the same name still applies to the modern valley, due to the acacia-trees which dot its course. The northern cliff was named Bozez, or “shining,” and the true explanation of this name only presents itself on the spot.

The great valley runs nearly due east, and thus the southern cliff is almost entirely in shade during the day. The contrast is surprising and picturesque between the dark cool colour of the south side and the ruddy or tawny tints of the northern cliff, crowned with, the gleaming white of the upper chalky strata. The picture is unchanged since the days when Jonathan looked over to the white camping-ground of the Philistines, and Bozez must then have shone as brightly as it does now, in the full light of an Eastern sun.

The watchmen of Saul in Gibeah of Benjamin must have seen clearly, across the chasm, the extraordinary conflict of two men against a host, as the “multitude melted away and they went on beating down one another.” The noise in the host was also, no doubt, clearly heard at the distance of only two miles, and the army would have crossed the passage with comparatively little difficulty by the narrow path which leads down direct from Geba to Michmash, west of the Philistine camp. Thence the pursuit was towards Bethel, across the watershed, and headlong down the steep descent of Aijalon—that same pass where the first great victory of Joshua had been gained, and where the valiant Judas was once more in later times to drive back the enemies of Israel to the plains.

The town of Ramah was, as above noticed, in the district of Gibeah, which surrounded Geba and reached to Migron (1 Sam. xiv. 2), or to “the precipice” of the Michmash Valley. Ramah was a well-known town of Benjamin, but it is not generally regarded as that Ramah, or Ramathaim Zophim, which was Samuel’s home and burial-place.

THE VALLEY OF MICHMASH. To face Page 256.
THE VALLEY OF MICHMASH.
To face Page 256.

As regards this famous subject of controversy, it is safest to say that we do not know where Ramathaim Zophim was; like all controversies; it arises from the fact that there is very little absolute information to be obtained on the subject. The main points to be observed seem to me to be: first, that the city was in Mount Ephraim; secondly, that a place called Sechu lay on the road from it to Gibeah; thirdly, that Samuel belonged to the family of the Kohathites who possessed Beth-Horon (1 Chron. vi. 67), from which it might be argued that his native town was probably near Beth-Horon; lastly, that the name Ramathaim Zophim means “the heights of the views,” so that it is natural to expect a position commanding an expensive prospect. These considerations seem to point to Râm Allah, east of Beth-Horon on the west slopes of Mount Ephraim, overlooking the maritime plain, and in confirmation of this proposition we find a ruined village called Sûeikeh, perhaps the Sechu of the Bible (1 Sam. xix. 22), on the high-road from Geba to Râm Allah.

There are yet two sites to be noticed which are equally indeterminate—the sacred cities of Nob and Mizpeh; but the Survey has done little to throw light on this question. There is however a remarkable connection between the two places which leads to the supposition that they were either close to one another or, perhaps, identical. The names Nob, “a high place,” Mizpeh, “a watch-tower,” suggests a similarly commanding position. Nob was for many years the place where the Tabernacle stood, as we may infer from the Bible, and as we are expressly told in the Mishna: Mizpeh in like manner was the gathering-place of Israel, “where they prayed” (1 Macc. iii. 46). Nob was on the high road to the capital, seemingly in sight of Jerusalem (Isaiah x. 32), and Mizpeh was “over against Jerusalem.” Mizpeh is not mentioned in episodes where the name of Nob occurs, nor does Nob occur in passages where Mizpeh is noticed.

Most writers, including Mr. Grove and Dean Stanley, place Mizpeh in the neighbourhood of the modern Sh’afât, or between it and the hill Scopus. From either place Jerusalem is visible, and either would suit the order in which Nob occurs in the lists (Neh. xi. 32), between Anathoth (’Anâta) and Ananiah (B. Hannîna); but this is a good instance of the uncertainty which must always remain as to ancient sites, unless the old names can be recovered. There are plenty of Nobs and of Mizpehs in Palestine, but in positions quite inapplicable, whereas, in the right direction there is no name of the kind (so far as has yet been discovered) for Sh’afât is not apparently derived from Mizpeh, but is a name very like that of Jehosaphat, and the natives of the place say that it was called after a Jewish king. In Crusading times the town seems to be also mentioned under the title Jehosaphat.

The early Christians placed Mizpeh in quite another direction, and Nob at Beit Nûba, which is famous in the history of Richard Lion-Heart. Their site for Mizpeh was near Sôba, west of Jerusalem, and here we found a ruin with the title Shûfa, which in meaning is equivalent to the Hebrew Mizpeh, but this place cannot be described as “over against Jerusalem,” and its recovery is thus a matter of minor interest.

There is one other site which has been proposed for Mizpeh, though it is merely a conjecture and not a name which might lead to the identification; this site is the remarkable hill called Neby Samwîl, north of Jerusalem. The place is conspicuous from the tall minaret which crowns the old Crusading church on the summit, and within the church is the cenotaph now revered by the Moslems as the tomb of Samuel,—a modern monument covered with a green cloth.

The Crusaders, with their usual contempt for facts, fixed on this hill as the ancient Shiloh; they also called it Ramah, and added besides a title of their own. “Two miles from Jerusalem,” says Sir John Maundeville, “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.”

The tradition which places Samuel’s tomb here seems, however, to be only recent. Rabbi Benjamin of Tudela, who is a tolerably safe guide as regards Jewish sacred sites, discredits the story and speaks of a change of site. “When the Christians took Ramleh, which is Ramah, from the Mohammedans,” says the Rabbi, “they discovered the sepulchre of Samuel the Ramathi, near the Jewish Synagogue, and removed his remains to Shiloh, where they erected a large place of worship over them called St. Samuel of Shiloh to the present day.”

This statement, though exhibiting an amount of ignorance quite equal to that of the Christian twelfth-century writers, still serves to show that the tomb at Neby Samwîl does not come into the category of sites recognised by the Jews; and the ancient name of the hill of St. Samuel remains unknown. There is nothing at the site necessarily older than Crusading times, though the fine water-supply to the east would point to the suitability of the neighbourhood for an ancient city. At the foot of the mountain, hidden among olives, we discovered Hazzûr, evidently the ancient Hazor of Benjamin (Neh. xi. 33). On the top of the mountain we planned the old church, the rock-cut scarps and stables, with other Crusading remains; but we found no Jewish tombs near the modern village. Perhaps this commanding situation was first chosen for a fortress by the Latin Kings of Jerusalem, and afterwards came to be regarded as an old site; the very difficult approach, the magnificent panoramic view, and the numerous springs, including “the King’s spring,” “the Emir’s spring,” etc., would have indicated the place as a fitting position for a fortress, flanking the two main north roads to Jerusalem.

Looking down from the roof of the church, one sees the old site of Gibeon (El Jib) on a rounded hillock to the north, with its famous fountain under a cliff south-east of the village. Dean Stanley has proposed to recognise in Neby Samwîl the high-place of Gibeon, so famous for the dream of Solomon when visiting the Tabernacle then erected at the spot; but it must not be forgotten that the distance between the two places is a mile and a quarter, and that a broad valley separates them. We can now only conjecture the name by which Neby Samwîl was known in Bible times, because the ancient name—if ever there was one—has been for ever lost, while the mediæval tradition of the tomb of Samuel has furnished an appellation familiar to the Moslem peasantry, who now reverence the place just as they do Christian traditional sites, in Jerusalem, in Samaria, and at St. Matthew, south of the capital.

ENGEDI.
ENGEDI.

CHAPTER XVII.

THE DESERT OF JUDAH.

On the 25th of February I once more took the field, with a light and compact expedition, my intention being to push as rapidly as possible through the desert west of the Dead Sea, as far south as the line of Beersheba. Lieutenant Kitchener was scarcely convalescent from a very severe attack of Jericho fever, and our headman, Habib, was also unfit for hard work. So, as I expected to meet with very rough weather, and to have to undergo extraordinary fatigue, it seemed prudent to leave the two invalids in comfortable quarters, until the desert work was done, and the easier task of surveying the Philistine Plain could be undertaken.

I determined to follow in this case the same policy which had been successful in the Jordan Valley, and to go down among the Arabs without any previous formalities. Most travellers who have passed through this desert—the Jeshimon or “Solitude” of the Bible—have summoned the Arab chiefs to Mâr Sâba or Hebron, and there entered into stipulations with them, which have not, as a rule, been carried out; but we had a strong party, we knew the language and the ways of the Bedawîn, and it was therefore safe for us to proceed in a manner which would be impossible for Europeans strange to the country.

We bought in Jerusalem three gaily-coloured head-shawls and one pair of red leather boots as presents. Thus prepared, we marched straight to the nearest Arab camp and pitched close by, without asking leave; and so we became, as it were, the guests of the Sheikh, and were received hospitably. The result of this policy—which was considered risky in Jerusalem—was, that we spent only five pounds in presents and payments to guides, whereas, in just the same length of time, a former party had given thirty pounds. The saving effected in the Jordan Valley was at the same rate; and including the visit to Beersheba, and the other occasions when we went into the Bedawîn districts, we saved, I believe, about £100 for the Palestine Exploration Fund by this method of treating the Arabs. A peculiarity of the Survey of Palestine which should be fully recognised, is the very cheap way in which it was carried out. If it be remembered that the expense in the field was only one penny per acre, it will, I think, be allowed that a very severe economy of time and money was effected, in order to survey a country containing 6000 square miles so completely, in so short a period as five years, and in spite of the hindrances due to long winters, and to seasons of sickness. To keep a party of about sixteen men and sixteen animals (not including those required for moving camp) at the rate of one shilling and sixpence per diem for a man and one shilling for a horse, required constant attention and careful planning, in order to prevent a single day in the field from being wasted.

In the afternoon of the 26th of February, 1875, we reached Wâdy Hasâseh, “the valley of gravel,” and found a triangular encampment of thirty black tents. The tribe was that of the Tâ’amirah, or “cultivating Arabs,” so called because they have actually degraded themselves by sowing barley, which they sell in Bethlehem. They have a very bad name as thieves and murderers, but we found them extremely willing and civil, and the chief, ’Abd el Gâder (as they called him), was a capital fellow. The tribe is remarkable for wearing the turban, which none of the other tribes use, the heads of the Bedawîn being usually either bare, or covered with the kufeyeh, or shawl. The Tâ’amirah also wear shoes, instead of sandals, and they are indeed not true Bedawîn, but of the same stock with the peasantry.

We now found that the storm which had driven us to Jerusalem in the winter had saved us from greater misfortunes. Even after the winter rains had fallen, we still found hardly any water in the desert, and there can have been none before the wet season, at the time of our first attempt to reach this district; in addition to which, the climate had been so unhealthy during the past autumn, that if we had gone down into the desert at that season we should, in all probability, have had a repetition of our Jericho experience, under circumstances even more unfavourable.

On the 27th of February the Survey began, Sergeant Armstrong marching out with one Arab in the Engedi direction, while Corporal Brophy accompanied me northwards. The country was almost impassable, and our progress was painfully slow. In four and a half hours of hard riding we advanced only six miles, so deep were the valleys which we were obliged to cross. Our guides were disgusted, and ’Abd el Gâder was afraid of the high-fed and frolicksome mule which we gave him to ride, feeling sure, as he repeated with a resigned air, that it would end by breaking his head.

We gained a lofty peak, called Er Rueikbeh, where we put up the instrument, and got our observations finished, just as a haze or fog began to spread over the view. This afterwards cleared off, but threatened at first to develop into a simoon, or dust-storm, such as we had once before experienced in the Jericho plains in autumn.

The wonderful strength of the Arabs was here exemplified, for at least one thousand feet below us was an encampment, from which three men came running up to the top of the hill, and they never ceased to shout as they came, and mounted up with wonderful swiftness, though one of them was quite an old man.

The view from the height was most extraordinary; on every side were other ridges equally white, steep, and narrow; their sides were seamed by innumerable torrent-beds, their summits were sharp and ragged in outline. These ridges stood almost isolated, between broad flat valleys of soft white marl scattered with flints, and with a pebbly torrent-course in the middle. There was not a tree visible, scarcely even a thorny shrub; the whole was like the dry basin of a former sea, scoured by the rains, and washed down in places to the hard foundation of metamorphic limestone, which underlies the whole district, and forms precipices two thousand feet high over the shores of the Dead Sea.

The various observations which we were able to make as to the habits of the Arabs, will form part of a subsequent chapter; it is sufficient here to say that, though mere unlettered and ignorant savages, they have a system of patriarchal government, a code of laws, morals, and habits of hospitality and courtesy, which represent a rude kind of civilisation, surpassing in many respects that of the peasantry, whom they despise; but it is only by living long among these interesting nomadic tribes, that one can really understand their motives and ideas.

On the 28th February I visited and surveyed part of the country south of Wâdy Hasâsah, and of Wâdy el Ghâr, accompanied by Sheikh ’Abd el Gâder only.

About noon we halted, under a blazing sun, in the middle of a plateau of glaring white soil. A distant hillock was visible, on which sat a solitary figure, singing a rude chant with considerable energy. Soon after, a most extraordinary person approached us; an elderly man, with grizzled beard and the true dusky complexion of the Bedawî, which differs from the mahogany colour of the peasants and of the Tâ’amirah; he had on a ragged indigo-coloured head-shawl, a sheepskin jacket, and a very short shirt; his well-braced calves and thighs were bare, and his feet, shod with sandals, were remarkable for the fine ankles. Over his shoulder was slung a brass-bound flint-lock gun of portentous length; and thus arrayed, he came jumping from rock to rock, like one of the wild goats of his own desert, leading with him a boy of about ten or twelve, who was clad simply in a shirt that once had been white.

This extraordinary figure came up close to the very feet of my guide, whom he knew, and saluted him in the usual curt, imperious manner, adopted by the Bedawîn when treading on uncertain ground. Their creed is that a man should always appear terrible to his enemies, for which reason nothing more disconcerts them, when affecting a menacing frown, than a quiet smile or a question of a humorous nature; the champion at once feels himself ridiculous, and generally grins or looks foolish.

I was seated on the ground, eating an orange, and threw away the skin, which the old Bedawî at once seized and devoured. He then made signs to me to mount my horse, and also signs indicative of a wish to smoke, if I felt inclined to provide the tobacco. We went slowly back, as I now saw that we were in the territory of a strange tribe, and was doubtful how far my guide might be on good terms with them. As we came to the foot of a hill, two more Arabs appeared, starting from concealment; at first they seemed afraid, and then ran down full speed. One was a young man, with a long gun; the other was a boy with a club, which he whirled over his head with a threatening mien. ’Abd el Gâder gravely rebuked him, and he dropped the weapon, saluting in the gruffest voice he could assume, with the same short, sharp accent, which reminds one most of the snorting of a goat or sheep when it advances in alarm on a strange dog. Perhaps this demeanour is intended to show how brave and independent the Bedawî feels, while really hiding a considerable amount of inward trepidation.

The young man seized my bridle, but he let go on receiving a gentle kick from my offside boot, and fell in with the party behind, eagerly inquiring who I was. ’Abd el Gâder was not, I think, at his ease, but he showed great coolness, explaining that I was an English Consul, come to see the condition of the country. A Consul, it must be understood, represents the highest dignity amongst Europeans in the Bedawîn eyes, as a “Milord” does among the Lebanon mountaineers.

The immediate result of this announcement was a burst of eloquence from the Arabs. “Look at our country, O Consul!” they said; “it has no water, no vineyards, no corn; when will you come and give us water, and make us vineyards?” I replied with a comprehensive nod of the head and the remark that “God made the country for the Bedawî.” These people seem to have a firmly-rooted conviction that Christians can command the rain, and that they had once made vineyards in this part of the wilderness.

The new-comers next descended to the more engrossing, if less poetic, topic of tobacco, but I pretended not to understand. These Arabs smoke “hunting-pipes” with a stem half an inch long, and generally fill them with dried stalks or wood-chips. They always ask either for tobacco or for gunpowder.

We reached a high, narrow saddle, when suddenly, from a hollow, six more men, fully armed, sprang up and joined the others, who were apparently the advanced scouts. I rode in front at a slow pace, and carefully refrained from looking round or showing any signs of uneasiness, as Bedawîn eyes are very sharp in watching for symptoms of alarm which may encourage them to bully. I confess that it is unpleasant to be followed by ten loaded guns, in the middle of a lonely desert, without a European to help in case of a fight, or any protection beyond the very doubtful one of a single Bedawî of another tribe.

The wild figures hovered round, half clad and entirely savage, skipping like wild goats, and gesticulating energetically: and I could not but think of David’s band of outlaws, who had once scoured this very wilderness, hiding in the hollows, or descending on the unwary sleepers by night. Powder and tobacco alone make the difference between the ancient and the modern nomads, and show that even the Bedawî is not untouched by modern civilisation.

At length we reached the boundary valley, and descended into it. Looking back, I saw the K’aabneh, perched on fragments of rock, watching to see that we really kept in the Tâ’amireh district; and, satisfied at last, they filed along a goat-track on the white cliff above us, and disappeared just as we stopped at a well. ’Abd el Gâder was much relieved, and he took care to tell me that his influence alone had prevented my being killed and robbed on the spot.

On Monday, the 1st of March, we moved to Engedi, accompanied by ’Abd el Gâder and by six of his men. Our road was across rolling downs of white marl, only remarkable for the jerboa burrows. We passed by the graves of some of the Rushâideh Arabs, who had been killed, I believe, by the Egyptians, and our guides reverently kissed the tombstones, which were marked with the tribe Wusm, or sign. By one o’clock we reached the top of the cliffs over the spring, 2000 feet above the Dead Sea, where is a flat plateau, with cliffs on three sides, bounded by two magnificent gorges, which run down towards the shore; and on this plateau we camped.

The cliffs are vertical, but their feet are covered by a steep slope of soft débris. Both the gorges have springs in them, and both run with water in winter. The northern gorge is the finest, and as we looked down we could not but shudder when an Arab said quietly, “A man once fell from the top of this cliff.”

The Arabs wished us to go down to the spring; but it would probably have cost us the loss of several of the pack animals if we had attempted to take them, loaded and fatigued as they were, down the winding track cut in the face of the precipice. I decided to camp above, and sent the beasts down unloaded to drink. They took an hour to go down, and another to come up, and all that time, as we watched from above, a stone might have been dropped on to their saddles. We afterwards found a hollow in the rocks above the cliffs with rain-water in it; and on this the whole party, with twenty-two animals, lived for two days, at the end of which time the water was exhausted.

Next morning I descended the pass to the warm spring of Engedi, 1340 feet beneath our camp; there is no scene more vividly impressed on my memory than that of this magnificently rocky and savage pass, and the view from the spring which is given in the illustration.

The spring itself, 83° F. in temperature, comes out from under a great boulder, and the water streams over a steep cliff, the course being marked by a fringe of vegetation beside the cascade. There is a little sloping plateau with remains of a square drystone platform, not unlike an altar; and round the spring there is a cane-brake and thicket of Solanum and prickly bushes, with the ’Osher trees, or “apples of Sodom,” growing above, the fruit of which consists chiefly of skin and white pith, but is hollow within, while the leaves of the tree are thick and fleshy. Among these thickets the beautiful black grackles, with gold-tipped wings, with the bulbuls, and hopping thrushes, were the only living things visible.

The view extended across the calm blue sea to the great eastern precipices. The broad tongue of the Lisân ran out only some few feet above the water-level, and high above, the great Castle of Kerak, with its towers and bastions, stood distinct and white on its rocky scarps, taking one back in imagination to the middle ages.

On the south the scene was equally grand. The long western beach of the sea stretched away with a succession of little white capes running out into the blue water, and, above this, the great cliffs—bastion beyond bastion of castellated crags divided by great gorges, succeeded one another. A steep slope of débris lay at their feet, and beneath this was a second line of white terrace—the Siddim cliffs, which are shores of a former lake. A dark, square, rocky promontory was capped by a building conspicuous against the sky-line, being part of the fortress of Masada, and yet farther off the salt mountain of Usdûm, and the blue range of the Arabah closed the view, but were half hidden by the smoke of burning reeds in the marshes south of the lake.

Descending six hundred feet from the spring, by the ruins of former gardens, we rode northwards for about half a mile, and then, leaving our horses at a spot where the boulders were too rough to allow them a footing, we toiled along the shore for two and a half miles, in search of the sulphur springs discovered by Dr. Tristram. Scrambling over cliffs, or walking in the water round promontories, we reached the place; but the season had brought only a little rain to this part of the desert, and the springs were dry, being only recognisable by the strong local smell of the sulphur. Along this desolate shore we found the pickled bodies of fish from Jordan, and here and there a palm stem, carried over from the east, while in the hollows of the rocks we noticed the waves splashing up, leaving little pools which dried rapidly, and made a white bed of crystalline salt on the stones.

On the morning of the 3rd of March, we were visited by a kind of simoon, a violent wind, accompanied by a dusty mist which hid the sea. Our tents were in the greatest danger of being blown over the cliff, and they soared up like balloons, being only kept back by turning out the whole party to hold the ropes.

I now saw reason to credit the stories of fighting having occurred farther south, and it seemed well to have some one with us who was known to the Jâhalîn Arabs. I sent therefore to Hebron, and in the evening old Sheikh Hamzeh—the well-known guide whom Professor Palmer employed, and who accompanied Dr. Tristram—came into camp. Though over eighty years of age, he had walked all the way, seventeen miles, in about six hours.

Next morning we parted from our Tâ’amireh friends, for whom I had a great liking, and we marched south. None of the animals had been watered for about twelve hours, and the eagerness with which the horses rushed over slippery rocks to a pool left by the rains was not surprising.

Our new camp was on an open plateau, nine miles from Engedi, beside a rock-cut tank, full of water, and the water full of frogs—the only supply for drinking within several miles. This place is called Bîr esh Sherky, “the Eastern well.”

Rain fell during the night, but the morning was fine, and we set out to visit the magnificent fortress of Sebbeh, or Masada, the last Jewish stronghold after the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus. Old Hamzeh was mounted on a pony and rode gaily before us, flourishing his pipe, while his white beard floated in the wind, as he carolled a war-song in a very cracked voice.

We had five of the Jâhalîn Arabs with us, whom we had picked up from the neighbourhood; they were the hardiest runners I have ever seen in any country, their muscles being strung like whipcord, and their lungs magnificent. Scantily clad, shod with sandals, and armed with long fowling-pieces, which were brass-bound, with flint locks, they trotted in front of the horses as we cantered.

After passing over undulating hills, we reached the head of a gorge finer than any we had seen before, and crossing the shingly bed of the great valley, we climbed on to a white plain, at the end of which, eight miles from camp, we perceived an isolated square block of hill, with a flat plateau at the top, and vertical walls of rock all round. This crag has a great valley on either side, and a narrow plain beneath it on the east, reaching to the Dead Sea shore. As we descended into the northern gorge, we saw a large herd of what I at first took for gazelles, but as they cantered across the plain their great rounded horns showed them to be the Beden, or ibex, the “wild goats” of the Bible, which abound among the precipices in this pathless waste.