was incarcerated, and here too was the scene of Peter's denial. The fathers of this convent assert that the stone on which Christ's body was laid, when in the tomb, was adroitly taken from thence in a time of civil dissension by some of their fraternity, and placed beneath the altar of their own chapel.

There are so many interesting recollections awakened by the name of mount Sion, that one scarcely knows how to reconcile the poverty of its actual existence with the mysterious splendour thrown over it by the prophetic writings. Its elevation above the city is not more raised than the Aventine hill above the Roman forum; but if the height were to be estimated from the base in the valley of Gehinnon, from which it rises abruptly, it might perhaps be found equivalent to some of the lowest hills which encompass Bath: the surface is a pale white, approaching to yellow, with very little appearance of vegetation: it is at present applied as a cemetery for the Catholic, Greek and Armenian Christians. The house in which the Virgin expired is supposed to have been on this elevation, and our attendants believe they can point out the precise spot which it occupied. Here also is the church of the Canaculum, erected on that part of the

mountain where our Saviour celebrated the last supper: it is now consecrated to the service of Mahomet, and therefore inaccessible to any but Moslems. The sepulchre of David is also enclosed within the precincts of a Turkish mosque, and consequently invisible to Christians.

LETTER IX.

To S. So-E, Esq.

Je viens donc à ces petits détails qui piquent la curiosité, en raison de la grandeur des lieux dont on parle. On ne se peut figurer qu'on vive à Athènes et à Sparte comme chez soi. JERUSALEM sur-tout, dont le nom réveille tant de mystères, effraie l'imagination; il semble que tout doive être extraordinaire dans cette ville extraordinaire.

MY DEAR SIR,

DE CHÂTEAUBRIAND.

Jerusalem, August 20, 1817.

WERE a person carried blindfold from England and placed in the centre of Jerusalem, or on any of the hills which overlook the city, nothing perhaps would exceed his astonishment on the sudden removal of the bandage. From the centre of the neighbouring elevations he would see a wild, rugged, mountainous desertno herds depasturing on the summit, no forests clothing the acclivities, no water flowing through the valleys; but one rude scene of savage melancholy waste, in the

midst of which the ancient glory of Judæa bows her head in widowed desolation. On entering the town, the magic of the name and all his earliest associations would suffer a still greater violence, and expose him to still stronger disappointment. No "streets of palaces and walks of state," no high-raised arches of triumph, no fountains to cool the air, or porticos to exclude the sun, no single vestige to announce its former military greatness or commercial opulence; but in the place of these, he would find himself encompassed on every side by walls of rude masonry, the dull uniformity of which is only broken by the occasional protrusion of a small grated window. "From the daughter of

Zion all beauty is departed.”

The finest section of the city is unquestionably that inhabited by the Armenians: in the other quarters the streets are much narrower, being of a width that would with difficulty admit three camels to stand abreast of each other. The bazaars are here, as in other Asiatic towns, confined to a particular division, an arrangement which prevents the increase of artisans beyond a certain limit. The total of inhabitants is variously stated, and the results of course drawn from very imperfect sources. The highest estimate makes the

number amount to twenty-five thousand. Of these

there are supposed to be,

Jews from 3 to... 4000

This is a very slender aggregate, compared with the flourishing population which the city once supported; but the numerous sieges it has undergone, and their consequent spoliations, have left no vestige of its original power. Jerusalem under the government of a Turkish Aga, and Jerusalem as it existed in the reign of Solomon, present a still greater contrast than Athens during the administration of Pericles, and Athens under the dominion of the chief of the black eunuchs. We have it upon judgment's record,' that "before a marching army a land has been as the garden of Eden, behind it, a desolate wilderness!" The present appearance of Judæa has accomplished the awful warnings of the prophet in all their terrific reality.

1 Joel ii. 3.