ing the abject state to which the human mind may be reduced by superstition. The other objects of veneration in Nazareth, at every one of which indulgencies are sold to travellers, are, 1. The Work-shop of Joseph, which is near the Convent, and was formerly included within its walls; this is now a small chapel, perfectly modern, and lately whitewashed. 2. The Synagogue, where Christ is said to have read the Scriptures to the Jews, at present a church. S. A Precipice without the town, where they say the Messiah leaped down, to escape the rage of the Jews, after the offence his speech in the synagogue had occasioned. Here they shew the impression of his hand, made as he sprang from the rock. From the description given by St. Luke, the monks affirm, that, anciently, Nazareth stood eastward of its present situation, upon a more ele vated spot. The words of the Evange. list are, however, remarkably explicit, and prove the situation of the ancient eity to have been precisely that which is now occupied by the modern town. Induced, by the words of the Gospel, to examine the place more attentively than we should have otherwise done, we went, as it is written, "out of the city, unto the brow of the hill whereon the city is built," and came to a precipice corresponding with the words of the Evangelist. It is above the Maronite Church, and probably the precise spot alluded to by the text of St. Luke's Gospel. In the evening we visited the environs, and, walking to the brow of a hill above the town, were gratified by an interesting prospect of the long valley of Nazareth, and some hills between which a road leads to the neighbouring Plain of Esdraelon, and to Jerusalem. Some of the Arabs came to converse with us. We were surprised to hear them speaking Italian: they said they had been early instructed in this language, by the friars of the Convent. Their conversation was full of complaints against the rapacious tyranny of their governors. One of them said, "Beggars in England are happier and better than we poor Arabs." "Why better?" said one of our party. "Happier," replied the Arab who had made the observation, “in a good Government: better, because they will not endure a bad one." The second night after our arrival, as soon as it grew dark, we all stretched ourselves upon the floor of our apartment, not without serious alarm of catching the plague, but tempted by the hope of obtaining a little repose. This we had found impracticable the night before, in consequence of the vermin. The hope was, however, vain; not one of our party could close his eyes. Every instant it was necessary to rise, and endeavour to shake off the noxious animals with which our bodies were covered. In addition to this penance, we were serenaded, until four o'clock in the morning, the hour we had fixed for our departure, by the constant ringing of a chapel bell, as a charm against the plague; by the barking of dogs; braying of asses; howling of jackals; and by the squalling of children. CANA. We entered Cana, and halted at a small Greek chapel, in the court of which we all rested, while our breakfast was spread upon the ground. This grateful meal consisted of about a bushel of cucumbers, some white mulberries, a very insipid fruit, gathered from the trees reared to feed silk-worms; hot cakes of unleavened bread, fried in honey and butter; and, as usual, plenty of fowls. We had no reason to complain of our fare, and all of us ate heartily. We were afterwards conducted into the cha pel, in order to see the reliques and sacred vestments there preserved. When the poor priest exhibited these, he wept over them with so much sincerity, and lamented the indignities to which the holy places were exposed in terms so affecting, that all our pilgrims wept also. Such were the tears which formerly excited the sympathy, and roused the valour of the Crusaders. The sailors of our party caught the kindling zeal; and little more was necessary to incite in them a hostile disposition towards every Saracen they might afterwards encounter. The ruins of a church are shewn in this place, which is said to have been erected over the spot where the marriage-feast of Cana was held. It is worthy of note, that, walking among these ruins, we saw large massy stone water-pots, answering the description given of the ancient vessels of the country; not preserved, nor exhibited, as reliques, but lying about, disregarded by the present inhabitants, as antiquities with whose original use they were unacquainted. From their appearance, and the number of them, it was quite evident that a practice of keeping water in large stone pots, each 402 holding holding from eighteen to twenty-seven gallons, was once common in the country. HEAT OF THE CLIMATE. About three miles beyond Cana, we passed the village of Turan: near this place they pretend to shew the field where the Disciples of Jesus Christ plucked the ears of corn upon the Sabbathday. The Italian Catholics have named it the field "degli Setti Spini," and gather the bearded wheat, which is annually growing there, as a part of the collection of reliques wherewith they return burthened to their own country. The heat of this day was greater than any to which we had yet been exposed in the Levant; nor did we afterwards experience any thing so powerful. Captain Culverhouse had the misfortune to break his umbrella;-a frivolous event in milder latitudes, but here of so much importance, that all hopes of continuing our journey depended upon its being repaired. Fortunately, beneath some rocks, over which we were then passing, there were caverns, excavated by primeval shepherds, as a shelter from scorching beams, capable of baking bread, and actually of dressing meat: into these caves we crept, not only for the purpose of restoring the umbrella, but also to profit by the opportunity, thus offered, of unpacking our thermometers, and ascertaining the tenperature of the atmosphere. It was now twelve o'clock. The mercury, in a gloomy recess under ground, perfectly shaded, while the scale was placed so as not to touch the rock, remained at one hundred degrees of Fahrenheit. As to making any observation in the sun's rays, it was impossible; no one of the party had courage to wait with the thermometer a single minute in such a situation. All the pleasure of travelling, at this season of the year, in the Holy Land, is suspended by the excessive beat of the sun. A traveller, wearied and spiritless, is often more subdued at the beginning than at the end of his day's journey. Many rare plants and curious minerals invite his notice, as he passes slowly along, with depressed looks fixed upon the ground; but these it is impossible for him to obtain, It appears to him to be an act of unjustifiable cruelty to ask a servant, or even one of the attending Arabs, to descend from his horse, for the purpose of collecting either the one or the other. All nature seems to droop; every animal seeks for shade, which it is extremely difficult to find. But the cha mæleon, the lizard, the serpent, and all sorts of beetles, basking, even at noon, upon rocks and in sandy places, exposed to the most scorching rays, seem to rejoice in the greatest heat wherein it is possible to exist. THE MOUNT. As we advanced, our journey led through an open campaign country, until, upon our right, the guides shewed us the Mount where it is believed that Christ preached to his Disciples that niemorable sermon, concentrating the sum and substance of every Christian virtue. We left our route to visit this elevated spot; and, having attained the highest point of it, a view was presented, which, for its grandeur,independently of the interest excited by the different objects contained in it, has no parallel in the Holy Land. Its From this situation we perceived that the plain, over which we had been so long riding, was itself very elevated. Far beneath appeared other plains, one lower than the other, and extending to the surface of the Sea of Tiberias, or Sea of Galilee. This immense lake, almost equal, in the grandeur of its appearance, to that of Geneva, spreads its waters over all the lower territory, extending from the north-east towards the southwest, and then bearing east of us. eastern shores present a sublime scene of mountains, extending towards the north and south, and seeming to close it in at either extremity; both towards Chorazin, where the Jordan enters; and, the Aulon, or Campus-magnus, through which it flows to the Dead Sea. The cultivated plains reaching to its borders, which we beheld at an amazing depth below our view, resembled, by the various hues their different produce exhi bired, the motley pattern of a vast car. pet. To the north appeared snowy summits, towering, beyond a series of intervening mountains, with unspeakable greatness. We considered them as the summits of Libanus; but the Arabs belonging to our caravan called the princi pal eminence Jebel el Sieh, saying it was near Damascus; probably, therefore, a part of the chain of Libanus. This sum, mit was so lofty, that the snow entirely covered the upper part of it; not lying in patches, as I have seen it, during summer, upon the tops of very elevated mountains, (for instance, upon that of Ren Nevis in Scotland,) but investing all the higher part with that perfect white and and smooth velvet-like appearance which snow only exhibits when it is very deep; a striking spectacle in such a climate, where the beholder, seeking protection from a burning sun, almost considers the firmament to be on fire. OTHER REVERED SITES. As we rode towards the Sea of Tiberias, the guides pointed to a sloping spot from the heights upon our right, whence we had descended, as the place where the miracle was accomplished by which our Saviour fed the multitude: it is therefore called The Multiplication of Bread; as the Mount above, where the Sermon was preached to his Disciples, is called The Mountain of Beatitudes, from the expressions used in the beginning of that discourse. This part of the Holy Land is very full of wild animals. Antelopes are in great number. We had the pleasure of seeing these beautiful quadrupeds in their natural state, feeding among the thistles and tall berbage of these plains, and bounding before us occasionally, as we disturbed them. The Arabs frequently take them in the chace. The lake now continued in view upon our left. The wind rendered its surface rough, and called to mind the situation of our Saviour's Disciples, when, in one of the small vessels which traverse these waters, they were tossed in a storm, and saw Jesus, in the fourth watch of the night, walking to them upon the waves. Often as this subject has been painted, combining a number of circumstances adapted for the representation of sublimity, no artist has been aware of the uncommon grandeur of the scenery, memorable on account of the transaction. The Lake of Gennesareth is surrounded by objects well calculated to heighten the solemn impression made by such a picture; and, independent of the local feelings likely to be excited in its con templation, affords one of the most striking prospects in the Holy Land. It is by comparison alone that any due conception of the appearance it presents-can be conveyed to the minds of those who have not seen it; and, speaking of it comparatively, it may be described as Jonger and finer than any of our Cumberland and Westmoreland lakes, although perhaps it yields in majesty to the stupendous features of Loch Lomond in Scotland. It does not possess the vast ness of the Lake of Geneva, although it much resembles it in particular points of view. Along the borders of this lake may still be seen the remains of those ancient tombs, hewn by the earliest inhabitants of Galilee, in the rocks which face the water. Similar works were before noticed among the Ruins of Telmessus. They were deserted in the time of our Saviour, and had become the resort of wretched men, afflicted by diseases, and made outcasts of society; for, in the account of the cure performed by our Saviour upon a maniac in the country of the Gadarenes, these tombs are parti. cularly alluded to; and their existence to this day (although they have been neither noticed by priests nor pilgrims, and have escaped the ravages of the Empress Helena, who would undoubtedly have shaped them into churches) offers strong internal evidence of the accuracy of the Evangelist who has recorded the transaction: "There met him out of the tombs a man with an unclean spirit, who had his dwelling among the tombs.' PLAIN OF ESDRAELON. Here, on this plain, the most fertile part of all the land of Canaan, (which, though a solitude, we found like one vast meadow, covered with the richest pasture,) the tribe of Issachar " rejoiced in their tents." In the first ages of Jewish History, as well as during the Roman Empire, the Crusades, and, even in later times, it has been the scene of many a memorable contest. Here it was that Barak, descending with his ten thousand from Mount Thabor, discomfited Sisera and "all his chariots, even nine hundred chariots of iron, and all the people that were with him," gathered from Harosheth of the Gentiles, unto the river of Kishon;" when "all the host of Sisera fell upon the edge of the sword; and there was not a man left;" when "the kings came and fought, the kings of Canaan in Taanach, by the waters of Megiddo." Here also it was that Josiah, king of Judah, fought in disguise against Necho, king of Egypt, and fell by the arrows of his antagonist. So great were the lamentations for his death, that the mourning for Josiah became an ordinance in Israel." The great mourning in Jerusalem," foretold by Zechariah, is said to be as the lamentations in the Plain of Esdraelon, or, according to the language of the prophet, "as the mourning of Hadadrimmon in the Valley of Megiddon." Josephus often mentions this very remarkable part of the Holy Land, and always under 66 the the appellation of "The Great Plain." It has been a chosen place for encampment in every contest carried on in this country, from the days of Nabuchodonosor, king of the Assyrians, (in the history of whose war with Arphaxad, it is mentioned as the great Plain of Esdrelom,) until the disastrous march of Napoleon Buonaparte from Egypt into Syria. Jews, Gentiles, Saracens, Christian Cru saders, and Anti-Christian Frenchmen, Egyptians, Persians, Druses, Turks, and Arabs, warriors out of every nation which is under heaven," have pitched their tents upon the Plain of Esdraelon, and have beheld the various banners of their nations wet with the dews of Thabôr and of Hermon. A tolerably accurate notion of its extent, in this direction, may be obtained from a statement of the time we spent in crossing it. We were exactly seven hours thus employed; proceeding at the rate of three miles in each hour. Its breadth, therefore, may be considered as equal to twenty-one miles. The people of the country told us it was two days' journey in length. NAPOLOSE, OR SICHEM. The view of this place much surprised us, as we had not expected to find a city of such magnitude in the road to Jerusalem. It seems to be the metropolis of a very rich and extensive country, abounding with provisions, and all the necessary articles of life, in much greater profusion than the town of Acre. White bread was exposed for sale in the streets, of a quality superior to any that is to be found elsewhere throughout the Levant. The governor of Napolose received and regaled us with all the magnificence of an Eastern sovereign. Refreshments, of every kind known in the country, were set before us; and when we supposed the list to be exhausted, to our very great astonishment, a most sumptuous dinner was brought in. There is nothing in the Holy Land finer than the view of Napolose, from the heights around it. As the traveller descends towards it from the hills, it appears luxuriantly embosomed in the most delightful and fragrant bowers; half con cealed by rich gardens, and by stately trees collected into groves, all around the bold and beautiful valley in which it stands. Trade seems to flourish among its inhabitants. Their principal employment is in making soap; but the manufactures of the town supply a very widely extended neighbourhood, and they are exported to a great distance, upon camels. In the morning after our arrival, we met caravans coming from Grand Cairo; and noticed others reposing in the large olive plantations near the gates. The traveller, directing his footsteps towards its ancient sepulchres, as everlasting as the rocks wherein they are hewn, is permitted, upon the authority of sacred and indelible record, to con template the spot where the remains of Joseph, of Eleazar, and of Joshua, were severally deposited. If any thing connected with the memory of past ages be calculated to awaken local enthusiasm, the land around this city is pre-eminently entitled to consideration. The sacred story of events transacted in the fields of Sichem, from our earliest years is remembered with delight; but, with the territory before our eyes where those events took place, and in the view of ob jects existing as they were described above three thousand years ago, the grateful impression kindles into ecstasy. Along the valley, we beheld "a company of Ishmaelites, coming from Gilead," as in the days of Reuben and Judah, "with their camels bearing spicery and balm and myrrh," who would gladiy have purchased another Joseph of his brethren, and conveyed him, as a slave, to some Potiphar in Egypt. Upon the hills around, flocks and herds were feeding, as of old; nor in the simple garb of the shepherds of Samaria was there any thing repugnant to the notions we may entertain of the appearance presented by the sons of Jacob. It was indeed a scene to abstract and to elevate the mind; and, under emotions so called forth by every circumstance of powerful coinci dence, a single moment' seemed to concentrate whole ages of existence. In the time of Alexander the Great, Sichem was considered as the capital of Samaria. Its inhabitants were called Samaritans, not merely as people of Samaria, but as a sect at variance with the other Jews. They consisted principally of deserters from Judæa. They have continued to maintain their peculiar tenets to the present day. The inhabitants, according to Procopius, were much favoured by the Emperor Justi nian, who restored their sanctuaries, and added largely to the edifices of the city, The principal object of veneration among them is Jacob's Well, over which a church was formerly erected. This is si❤ tuated at a small distance from the town, in the road to Jerusalem, and has been visited by pilgrims of all ages; but particularly since the Christian æra, as the place where our Saviour revealed himself to the woman of Samaria. The spot is so distinctly marked by the Evangelist, and so little liable to uncertainty, from the circumstance of the Well itself and the features of the country, that, if no tradition existed for its identity, the site of it could hardly be mistaken. STATE OF CULTIVATION. We left Napolose one hour after midnight, that we might reach Jerusalem early the same day. We were, however, much deceived concerning the distance. Our guides represented the journey as a short excursion of five hours: it proved a most fatiguing pilgrimage of eighteen. The road was mountainous, rocky, and full of loose stones; yet the cultivation was everywhere marvellous; it afforded one of the most striking pictures of human industry which it is possible to behold. The limestone rocks and stony valleys of Judæa were entirely covered with plantations of figs, vines, and olivetrees, not a single spot seemed to be neglected. The hills, from their bases to their upmost summits, were entirely covered with gardens: all of these were free from weeds, and in the highest state of agricultural perfection. Even the sides of the most barren mountains had been rendered fertile, by being divided into terraces, like steps rising one above another, whereon soil had been accumulated with astonishing labour. Among the standing crops we noticed millet, cotton, linseed, and tobacco, and occasionally small fields of barley. A sight of this territory can alone convey any adequate idea of its surprising produce: it is truly the Eden of the East, rejoicing in the abundance of its wealth. The effect of this upon the people was strikingly pour trayed in every countenance: instead of the depressed and gloomy looks of Djezzar Pacha's desolated plains, health, hilarity, and peace, were visible in the features of the inhabitants. Under a wise and beneficent government, the produce of the Holy Land would exceed all calculation. Its perennial harvest; the salubrity, of its air; its limpid springs; its rivers, lakes, and matchless plains; its hills and vales;-all these, added to the serenity of its climate, prove this land to be indeed "a field which the Lord hath blessed: God hath given it of 1 the dew of heaven, and the fatness of the earth, and plenty of corn and wine.” JERUSALEM. No sensation of fatigue or heat could counterbalance the eagerness and zeal which animated all our party, in the approach to Jerusalem; every individual pressed forward, hoping first to announce the joyful intelligence of its appearance. We passed some insignificant ruins, either of ancient buildings or of modern villages; but, had they been of more im portance, they would have excited little notice at the time, so earnestly bent was every mind towards the main object of interest and curiosity. At length, after about two hours had been passed in this state of anxiety and suspence, ascending a hill towards the south-" Hagiopolis!" exclaimed a Greek in the van of our cavalcade; and, instantly throwing him self from his horse, was seen bareheaded, upon his knees, facing the prospect he surveyed. Suddenly the sight burst upon us all. Who shall describe it? The effect produced was that of total silence throughout the whole company. Many of the party, by an immediate impulse, took off their hats, as if entering a church, without being sensible of so doing. The Greeks and Catholics shed torrents of tears; and, presently beginning to cross themselves, with unfeigned devotion, asked if they might be permitted to take off the covering from their feet, and proceed, barefooted, to the Holy Sepulchre. We had not been prepared for the gran deur of the spectacle which the city alone exhibited. Instead of a wretched and ruined town, by some described as the desolated remnant of Jerusalem, we beheld, as it were, a flourishing and stately metropolis; presenting a magnificent assemblage of domes, towers, palaces, churches, and monasteries; all of which, glittering in the sun's rays, shone with inconceivable splendor. As we drew nearer, our whole attention was engrossed by its noble and interesting appearance. The lofty hills whereby it is surrounded, give to the city itself an appearance of elevation inferior to that which it really possesses. As we approached the city, the con course of people became very great, the walls and the road side being covered with spectators. An immense multitude, at the same time, accompanied us on foot; some of whom, welcoming the procession with compliments and caresses, cried |