m m m 
 
 RUNNER 
 
 JERUSALEM 
 
 A.GOODRICH 
 fe FREER <
 
 INNER JERUSALEM
 
 OUTER ISLES 
 
 BY 
 
 A. GOODRICH-FREER 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS BY ALLAN BARAUD 
 
 Price I2S. 6d. net. 
 Popular Edition, Price 55. net. 
 
 "This book is not simply the outcome of a holiday 
 visit. Miss Freer has spent summer after summer in 
 these islands. She has made friends with and obtained 
 the confidence of their inhabitants, and has moreover ex- 
 hausted all available written authorities The 
 
 result is a work which, while it may be termed popular, 
 contains a great deal of exact and authoritative ;informa- 
 tion. It may be cordially recommended as worthy of 
 
 perusal Considering that they (The Outer 
 
 Hebrides) are part of the United Kingdom it may be 
 surprising how little is known of them, even by the 
 average member of the Geographical Society." Scottish 
 Geographical Magazine.
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 BY 
 A. GOODRICH-FREER 
 
 AUTHOR OF " OUTER ISLES," ETC. 
 
 WITH ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 E. P. DUTTON b 5 COMPANY 
 1904
 
 BUTLER & TANNER, 
 
 THE SELWOOD PRINTING WORKS, 
 
 FROME, AND LONDON.
 
 PREFACE 
 
 NO one can be more conscious than the writer of a book 
 on Jerusalem, perforce the student of other books 
 on Jerusalem, that the production of yet another requires 
 a reason, if not an excuse. The special point of view of the 
 present work is set forth in the text, and I venture to hope 
 that it may have some value for those interested in studying 
 the practical outcome, psychological and religious, of a 
 history so unique even its Christian sanctity apart as 
 that of the Holy City. 
 
 The irresponsible aggregation of races, languages and 
 creeds collected in Jerusalem, and that lack of any standard 
 of public opinion which results from the entire absence of 
 a public press, combine to make it exceedingly difficult 
 to obtain accurate information upon any subject whatever. 
 I have devoted over two years, with certain special facilities 
 for investigation, to the personal study of Inner Jerusalem, 
 and have spared neither cost of many kinds nor pains, 
 in collecting material. For deductions I am personally 
 and solely responsible, without reference to the many kind 
 friends from whom I have received opinions and advice. 
 
 The names of many books occur in the course of these 
 pages, naturally of very varying merit. Those of value to 
 the merely English reader are, however, easily enumerated. 
 The story is told that an early edition of Murray's Guide 
 appeared with the motto, " The Bible is the best guide- 
 book to Palestine," and that the ensuing Baedeker retorted 
 with, " Palestine is the best guide-book to the Bible." 
 The Bible, Josephus and Baedeker together our cosmo- 
 
 v
 
 PREFACE 
 
 politan friend is nowhere more trustworthy than in Syria 
 /" form a fairly sufficient library. To make up " the twelve 
 best books " for the amateur visitor to Jerusalem, I would 
 add, first, G. A. Smith's Historical Geography of the Holy 
 Land, and next Clay TrumbulFs Studies in Oriental Social 
 Life, from which even the most unintelligent tourist may 
 learn what to observe. Next would come Besant and 
 Palmer's History of Jerusalem, and Post's Flora of Syria, 
 which perhaps is too technical for the amateur, though an 
 indispensable companion to even the shortest ramble for 
 the specialist. Then I would take Lady Burton's Inner 
 Life of Syria, and the still earlier Domestic Life in Palestine 
 by Miss Rogers (1855), however much I might be assured 
 by observers less profound than these very interesting 
 authors, that both were out of date. For lack of anything 
 equally informing among more modern writers, I would 
 finish my collection with Finn's Stirring Times, Robinson's 
 Biblical Researches, and Williams' Holy City, although all 
 N are over half a century old. 
 
 One who has plenty of leisure may select many articles 
 of interest out of the thirty and odd volumes of the Palestine 
 Exploration Fund. The learned will not fail to read 
 Curtiss' Primitive Semitic Religion, and Barton's Semitic 
 Origins, nor the devout the Early Pilgrims' Texts. Other 
 English and American works are of interest to those who 
 travel farther north, while a score of German, and half a 
 dozen French books, are essential to any serious student. 
 Life is not wholly at a standstill, even in Jerusalem, and 
 as this book has been passing through the press, certain 
 changes have occurred. Even science has arrived among 
 us, and the German Emperor's Institute for the study of 
 Oriental learning has completed its first year of work ; 
 how gratefully appreciated has been testified by the large 
 attendance, not only of the German population, as well as 
 of special students from the Fatherland, but of European 
 residents of both sexes, and also of Jews and Arabs, and, 
 
 vi
 
 PREFACE 
 
 perhaps more remarkable still, of members of religious 
 Orders, Greek and Latin. 
 
 The surpassing interest of the German Institution may 
 partly account for the fact that during the same period the 
 American School has not had a single new member. It is 
 obvious, however, that students will not travel 6,000 miles 
 unless in the hope of intellectual advantage, and it is a 
 tribute to the reputation of Professor Barton, author of 
 Semitic Origins, that the attendance should have reached 
 its maximum during the year of his directorship, 1902-3, 
 although Jerusalem was in quarantine, and even the railway 
 had ceased to run. 
 
 The Palestine Exploration Fund has lately been unusually 
 successful in its operations, and by the kindness of Mr. 
 Macalister, its representative in Palestine, I am permitted 
 to bring its history up to date (cf. chap. xxii). 
 
 " The mound of Tell el Gezer (excavations still in progress), 
 has proved very rich in remains of the earliest civilization 
 of Palestine. A neolithic Troglodyte race has for the first 
 time been discovered, and burial places of every age, from 
 the Amorite to the Christian period, opened, and their 
 contents investigated. The largest and most perfect 
 Canaanite High place has been found, and a cuneiform 
 tablet, proving the existence of an Assyrian occupation, 
 in the middle of the seventh century, B.C." 
 
 The discussion, by other archaeologists, especially those 
 German savants personally acquainted with this country, 
 of Mr. Macalister's very interesting discoveries and con- 
 clusions, will be eagerly looked for. 
 
 Those who are interested in the important question of 
 the future of women in the East cannot fail to be gratified 
 to note their craving for education, in its highest sense. 
 Although in the Mission School, containing forty-four 
 Jewesses, I found only six who belonged to this country 
 the rest being mainly Europeans the Evelina de Roth- 
 schild School, had it twice its accommodation, would be 
 
 vii
 
 PREFACE 
 
 more than crowded in a week, and it is to be observed that 
 payment is required for every child. It is under English 
 Government inspection, and can receive, at present, but 
 610 girls, including the kindergarten and technical classes. 
 On the opening day of term, I have seen the surrounding 
 roads so crowded with clamorous parents that the police 
 had to interfere. When the gates were locked, fathers 
 dropped their daughters over the wall ; and children, on 
 one occasion to the number of fifty have been smuggled 
 in by their companions. Not only a better preparation 
 for home-life is secured by the learning of cooking, needle- 
 work, cutting out, sanitation, laundry work and even 
 gardening, but the addition of other interests and of a 
 higher ideal of life, tends to the postponement of the early 
 marriages which are the degradation, mental and physical, 
 of the woman of the East. 
 
 Almost as much may be said of the 350 girls of the Moslem 
 Public school under the admirable training of the American 
 Colony ; and when we realize that the Jewish population of 
 Jerusalem is six times that of the Moslem, the numbers are 
 relatively even more surprising. 
 
 Among other changes it should be recorded that Jerusalem 
 has been enriched by a Swedish consulate, and that German 
 benevolence has founded a sorely needed Convalescent 
 Home on the Mount of Olives, the first of the kind in Pales- 
 tine, where the sufferers from malarial fever especially, may 
 find the change of air, which is so essential to the arrest of 
 their malady ; also that, as predicted in these pages, matri- 
 mony, after a quarter of a century's hesitation, has entered 
 the American Colony. 
 
 The crank is always with us, and has been lately reinforced 
 by a new Mission for the suppression, on Scriptural authority, 
 of breakfast-eating ; by the opening of a Glory Home 
 alleged to be educational, and the erection of a place of 
 worship with the practical view of casting out devils, of 
 whom it seems that a legion still remains in the Holy City. 
 
 viii
 
 PREFACE 
 
 On the other hand, one establishment for religious teaching 
 has not too soon been broken up by authority, for reasons 
 of morality which need not be detailed, while the head of 
 another has been imprisoned for cruelty to children, and 
 is awaiting trial for the death of his own son. It is unfortu- 
 nate for our prestige, religious and political, that such 
 institutions should have been established by English-speak- 
 ing people and in the name of Protestant religion, and the 
 circumstance may make it somewhat difficult for our re- 
 ligious teachers to reflect upon the sanity of the fakir or 
 the morality of the derweesh. 
 
 It is pleasant to be able to record that the Anglican Bishop 
 has lately imported two certificated nurses for attendance 
 upon the poor in their own homes, who, like those of the 
 French, German, Russian and Greek Hospitals, wear a 
 uniform in the streets, and concern themselves only with 
 the work for which they have been trained. 
 
 For help in understanding the people of the land to which 
 he has devoted talent and learning which might have adorned 
 a wider sphere, I am indebted, beyond all acknowledgment, 
 to the Rev. E. Hanauer, Chaplain to the Mission of the 
 London Jews' Society ; for direction in study of the Eastern 
 Church to the Rev. Doctor Dowling, Canon of St. George's 
 Collegiate Church, and of the Western to many members 
 of the Franciscan, Assumptionist, and Dominican Orders ; 
 for ever-ready kindness to H.B.M. Consul, Mr. Dickson ; 
 and to many Moslems, Greeks, and Jews for help in practical 
 inquiry. If I have been able to give, in any degree, an 
 accurate picture of certain features of Inner Jerusalem life 
 not described elsewhere, it has been due to the help and 
 courtesy which have never failed me among those of all 
 nationalities and of every creed." 
 
 " What," wrote Sir Francis Bacon, " What is truth ? 
 said jesting Pilate." 
 
 ix
 
 PREFACE 
 
 No one who has lived in Jerusalem need wonder that, 
 being a local magistrate, resident among the European 
 element of the population, " he did not stay for an answer." 
 
 But such things are, after all, accidents, and not essentials 
 of the life in Jerusalem, where human fallibility is easily 
 forgotten among ever-present testimony to eternal Truth, 
 and lack of charity where the very stones cry out reminder 
 of eternal Love. Hope, too, is more and more with us 
 and the light that lighteth every man has been kindled 
 if not by us, yet from elsewhere. In their institutions, 
 their philanthropy, their widening sympathies, their craving 
 for education, their demand for literature, Moslem, Jew, 
 and native Christian (and it may be, even some of us who 
 look on and learn) are drawing nearer to each other in com- 
 mon activity in the service of man and in common worship 
 of the One God. 
 
 A. GOODRICH-FREER. 
 
 HOTEL FAST, JERUSALEM, 
 October, 1904. 
 
 NOTE. I wish to disarm criticism, in one direction, by pointing out 
 that several chapters of Inner Jerusalem, though, with the exception 
 of that on Domesticities (reproduced by kind permission of the 
 Editors of Temple Bar) never published, were originally intended 
 for periodical publication, before it was foreseen that they would 
 develop into the proportions of a volume. This accounts for the 
 fact of the occasional repetition of an explanation, and for some 
 apparent inconsistency in spelling ; for the transliteration of Arabic, 
 like that of the name of Weller, is according to the taste and fancy, 
 and tends to follow that of the special author or particular language 
 which is one's unit of thought for the moment.
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 WHAT IS JERUSALEM LIKE_? 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Books of Travel Limitations of Nationality and Creed The Eng- 
 lish The Germans The Americans Society Language 
 Trade Medicine Intellectual Advantages Physical Aspect 1 
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 DOMESTICITIES IN JERUSALEM 
 
 Experiences of the Traveller Eccentricities of the Place Com- 
 mercial Aspect Climate andScirocco Water Supply Vegeta- 
 tion Insect Enemies Flora Anomalous Customs Coinage 
 Economy of Living . . . . . . .16 
 
 CHAPTER HI 
 
 " CRANKS " IN JERUSALEM 
 
 Individual Eccentricities Spittler of Basel The Millerites 
 Amen-ites Church of the Messiah Awaiting the Anti-Christ 
 The Overcomers ........ 35 
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 GOVERNMENT IN JERUSALEM 
 
 Advantages of Turkish Rule Position of Europeans Machinery 
 of Government Turkish Law Moslems Jews Sanitation 
 Prisons ..... ...... 47 
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 JEWS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 Population Distribution Racial Divisions Distinctive Character- 
 istics Irrational Almsgiving Schools Occupations Old 
 Customs still Extant Sophistries and Quibbles Alliance 
 Israelite Its Excellent Work Mission Work and Results 
 Views of Zangwill Charitable Institutions, English and Jew- 
 ish Abraham's Vineyard Relations with Jerusalem Pro- 
 gress of Re-Patriation . . ; . . . . .55 
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 RUSSIA IN JERUSALEM 
 
 "The Russian Tower" Religious Buildings Relations between 
 Greek and Russian Churches Population Pilgrimages 
 "Imperial Orthodox Society" Means of Education Greek 
 
 xi
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Patriarchate Russian Dissent Archimandrite Consulate 
 
 Acquisition of Territory Ambassador Influence on the West 
 
 Jealousies and Disputes . . . . . . .75 
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 THE GREEKS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 The Greek Church Its Antiquity Its Authority Latin Patriarchs 
 in Jerusalem, 1204-1260 End of the Eastern Empire The 
 Eastern Church Its Government Education of Clergy 
 Charitable and Philanthropic Undertakings Convents The 
 Greek Fire Misunderstanding and Exaggeration Early His- 
 toryAs it was in 1902 In 1820 98 
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 HERESIES AND SCHISMS IN THE EASTERN CHURCH 
 
 Various Churches in Jerusalem The Armenians, Syrians, Abys- 
 sinians, Copts Possibilities of Anglican Re-union Attempts 
 already made Points of Sympathy Chapel of Abraham 
 Common Beliefs Characteristics of the Eastern Church Its 
 Austerity, in Fasts, in Art, in Architecture St. George . . 115 
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 LATINS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 Palestine in Roman Times Early Pilgrims First Monasteries 
 First Latin Convent Beginning of Rivalry Papal Address 
 Vicissitudes Settlement in Jerusalem Hospital Knights 
 Hospitallers Latin Establishment in the Eleventh Century 
 Origin of Enmity between East and West Churches Francis- 
 cans Custodianship Hospitality and Philanthropy . . 131 
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 THE LATINS IN JERUSALEM TO-DAY 
 
 Revival of Patriarchate Advent of Religious Orders Their In- 
 dustries Dominican Lectures "Revue Biblique " Pilgrim- 
 ages Educational Advantages Uniats Visible " Communion 
 of Saints." . . . . . . . . .154 
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 MARTYRDOM IN JERUSALEM 
 
 Significance of Apparently Unimportant Details Mutual Relation 
 of Greeks and Latins Greek Promises The Pasha's Decision 
 Next Morning's Incidents The Pasha and the French Re- 
 
 xii
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 preservative Events of November 4 Public Feeling " Ab 
 solute Reparation " Sentences Episodes History Repeats 
 itself 167 
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 
 ENGLAND IN JERUSALEM 
 
 Early Associations Crusades Trade Anglo -Prussian Bishopric 
 Protestant Influence Lack of English Enterprise and Philan- 
 thropy English Bishopric Established ... . . 180 
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 
 ENGLISH CHURCH IN JERUSALEM 
 
 Anglican Bishopric Its Difficulties Missionary Societies Prosely- 
 tism Condemned Education Need of English Philan- 
 thropy Christ Church Statistics Medical Work Remarks 
 on Missionaries Absence of English Hospitality Remarks by 
 Lady Burton 193 
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 
 ENGLISH TRADE AND ENGLISH TRAVEL 
 
 Commercial Relations of England and Syria Jerusalem Water- 
 worksThe Arab of the East What he Thinks of the West 
 The Traveller, American and English ; according to Lady 
 Burton ; to Canon Dalton ; to Mark Twain ; to Clermont Gan- 
 neau The Dragoman The Soldier and Policeman ;; . . 209 
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 
 THE MOSLEM IN JERUSALEM 
 
 The Sachra Traditions Dome of the Rock Omar His Mosque 
 
 His Magnanimity Saladin Palestine and the Arab . . 221 
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 
 THE MOSLEM AS A CITIZEN 
 
 Arab Influence on Europe Aestheticism Cursing Acuteness 
 Literature Dress Aristocracy Forms of Prayer Tenets of 
 the Faith Philanthropy Institutions Hospital and Sisters 
 Tradition Pilgrimage to Tomb of Moses. . . . 232 
 
 CHAPTER XVII 
 
 THE MOSLEM IN HIS RELATION TO WOMEN 
 
 Marriage Customs Types of Womanhood Dress Physique Do- 
 mestic Education Debate on Women's Rights An Evening 
 
 xiii
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Party Household Occupations Needlework Children Vul- 
 garity A Moslem Establishment The " Sabeel " . . 251 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 THE MOSLEM FAITH IN JERUSALEM 
 
 The Spirit of the East The Influence of Islam The Career of Mo- 
 hammed His Relation to Jew and Christian -Religion among 
 Women Observance of Religious Duties The Lower Ani- 
 mals 266 
 
 CHAPTER XIX 
 
 THE MOSLEM IN THE HOLY PLACES 
 
 Mosques Sacred Sites of Common Interest Mosque at Hebron 
 Posted Prayers Mukrams Mukaddasi His Description of 
 Palestine Moslem Devotion in the Holy Land. . . .291 
 
 [CHAPTER XX 
 
 THE MOSLEM WOMAN IN JERUSALEM 
 
 Amusements Theatre Shopping Wedding Bath Reception 
 
 El Gelweh 301 
 
 CHAPTER XXI 
 
 CHRISTIAN WOMEN IN JERUSALEM 
 
 Training Occupations Comparisons between Moslem and Christian 
 .- Women Christians of the Working Class Manners Hos- 
 pitality Notable women Benefactresses .... 323 
 
 CHAPTER XXII 
 
 BIRD AND BEAST IN JERUSALEM 
 
 Alleged Cruelty in Jerusalem The Camel, Cat, Dog, Horse, Ass, Wild 
 Animals The Gazelle,* Jerboa, Hyena, Jackal, Coney Mar 
 Saba Sport The Partridge, Hare, Fox Wild Birds In the " 
 Temple Courts Storks, Sparrow, Swallow The Lizards . . 336 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 THE HUMANITIES IN JERUSALEM 
 
 Conventional Writing Poetry Art Literature and Science 
 Education Royal Visitors Sir Moses Montefiore Consular 
 Flags Jewish Intercession English Visitors The P.E.F. 
 German Exploration Holy Places Modern Buildings Edu- 
 cational Errors Examination Papers. ... . . .351 
 
 xiv
 
 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 FACING PAGE 
 
 1. Frontispiece. ......... 17 
 
 2. A General View of Jerusalem . . . . . .14 
 
 3. Lydda, the home of Dorcas ...'... 10 
 
 4. Olive Harvest (Gethsemane) ...... 28 
 
 5. In the Prison Courtyard ....... 54 
 
 6. Aged Jews 60 
 
 7. Olive oil presses ........ 70 
 
 8. The Mount of Olives and the Russian Tower ... 76 
 
 9. " He shall lead His flock " . . ... .80 
 
 10. The Damascus Gate 96 
 
 11. View of the Temple Area looking North . . . .130 
 
 12. View of the Temple Area looking South . . . . 152 
 
 13. Mosque of El Aksa 180 
 
 14. In the Temple Precincts 192 
 
 1."). House and tomb of Samuel ...... 208 
 
 10. Irrigation wheel ........ 210 
 
 17. Via Dolorosa ......... 216 
 
 18. El Aksa, "the further Mosque" 220 
 
 19. Absalom's Pillar 234 
 
 20. Village Sheiks 239 
 
 21. The Muezzin 240 
 
 22. Bethlehem Bride 254 
 
 23. The Cafe of the town 284 
 
 24. Moslem Women v 308 
 
 XV
 
 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 FACING PAGE 
 
 25. Salt Hills and Jordan . ... . . . 344 
 
 26. The River Jordan . . . . . . . . 346 
 
 J7. Garden of Gethsemane ....... 354 
 
 28. An Askkeiiazim Jew ....... 302 
 
 29. A Bedawi Camp 370 
 
 30. Bedawi man and woman ....... 374 
 
 31. Threshing floor .376 
 
 32. " Good measure " . 37& 
 
 xvi
 
 CHAPTER I 
 WHAT IS JERUSALEM LIKE? 
 
 BOOKS OF TRAVEL LIMITATIONS OF NATIONALITY AND 
 CREED THE ENGLISH THE GERMANS THE AMERICANS 
 SOCIETY LANGUAGE TRADE MEDICINE INTELLEC- 
 TUAL ADVANTAGES PHYSICAL ASPECT 
 
 IF you are going to give us a book about Jerusalem," 
 said a friendly publisher before we left England, 
 " do tell people what they want to know. Never mind 
 where Absalom's Tomb isn't ! " 
 
 " What is Jerusalem like ? " is what friends say in their 
 letters. " Of course we have read books of description and 
 archaeology ; but What do you do ? How do you dress ? 
 What language do you talk ? What do you eat ? What sort 
 of people do you meet ? How do they entertain ? Is it 
 healthy ? Would it be a nice place to take the children to ? 
 Is there any shooting ? Is there a good doctor ? Are there 
 any educational advantages ? Is there a decent hotel ? Is 
 it pretty country ? What is there to do besides going to 
 Holy Places and to church ? " 
 
 Such are some of the questions which I hope to answer 
 in the following pages, as well as some others which we have 
 ourselves been compelled to ask since coming into the 
 country two years ago, and which, in some cases, have not 
 been very readily answered. Those points which were 
 easily ascertained, especially those of the Absalom's Tomb 
 variety, I have ignored, not because we were indifferent 
 upon such matters indifference here would be brutal and 
 unintelligent but because they are already abundantly 
 
 1 B
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 dealt with, and are being dealt with further, at (so it has 
 been calculated) the rate of seven books a year, to say 
 nothing of the Quarterly Statement of the Palestine Explora- 
 tion Fund, the Revue Biblique, the American Journal of 
 Archaeology, a Russian journal admirably illustrated, but 
 of name untranscribable, the Zeitschrift des deutschen Palae- 
 stina-Vereins, and, probably, many other publications in 
 half a score of languages. 
 
 Of description, also, we have abundance, especially in 
 English, and the supply is perpetually renewed. We have 
 Three Weeks in Judaea, Snapshots in Galilee, Discourses with 
 Dragomans, Chats with Consuls, Causeries with Cook, Lectures 
 with Lunn, and Pilgrimages with Perowne. 
 
 What is more, the memory of many a weary Sunday 
 afternoon spent in the enforced society of works not less 
 accurate in observation nor learned in research, provokes 
 the reflection that there are persons, ignorant and indifferent, 
 who are but imperfectly responsive to discussion upon points 
 remote from their experience, and description of places of 
 which they never heard before. We recall unregenerate 
 days when we hated Biblical Researches, were bored by 
 The Giant Cities of Bashan, fled from The Land and the 
 Book, and looked upon The Wars of the Jews as a special 
 cruelty devised for the torment of young Christians who 
 lived two miles from church, beside a road inches deep in 
 mud on wet Sundays. Here and now, we are thankful if 
 we may touch the skirts of the garments of Robinson and 
 Burton, Burckhardt and Josephus ; we put George Adam 
 Smith under our pillows, and read Post and Tristram at 
 meals ; but that is because we have learnt to know and love 
 the Holy Land ; to find in her the heart of Christendom ; 
 the parent of history, the springs of human life, at once 
 the grave and resurrection-place of hope. She calls to us 
 with voices that are more imperious than that of the East, 
 as such ; with that of the past, for she has been the battle- 
 field of all nations ; of the present, for she is the common 
 
 2
 
 WHAT IS JERUSALEM LIKE 
 
 centre of all religions ; of the future, for to her, the meeting- 
 place of East and West, of all Monotheistic creeds, we look 
 for that re-union, which shall make Catholicism inclusive 
 as its name, and Christendom something more vital than 
 a geographical distinction. 
 
 Even in Jerusalem one cannot be always gazing at great 
 landscapes. They are, as Hannah More says, " seen through 
 small openings," and one's cosmic emotions are born out of 
 an aggregate of circumstances here, as elsewhere, small. 
 In Jerusalem, you can easily lead that simplified existence 
 for which doctors and thinkers alike are pleading. You 
 could not eat half a crown's worth of food in a day if you 
 tried ; you can get a lunch as good, so far as " good " 
 means well cooked, wholesome, and satisfying, for a franc 
 and a half, as at home for three and sixpence ; your clothes, 
 like those of the Israelites, wax not old, and when they do 
 it won't matter ; you are not troubled by social competi- 
 tions, for nobody keeps a carriage or entertains to the extent 
 of twenty pounds a year. Bishops and consuls have what 
 look like servants in livery, but they are really a kind of 
 policeman whom the Government obliges them to maintain. 
 
 There are, if you are English-speaking, no social distinc- 
 tions. You soon get accustomed to meeting in the draw- 
 ing-rooms of your friends with persons whom you would by 
 nature have rather expected to find elsewhere, and you learn 
 that those who are excluded, are not the ill-mannered or 
 uneducated, but those who speak in foreign tongues, or 
 still worse, who say their prayers in Greek or Latin. 
 
 There are not, of course, wanting persons of wider views, 
 but they are few and have sufficient tact to refrain from 
 amalgamating groups the separation of which nature so 
 clearly indicated at the Tower of Babel and in the Blessed 
 Reformation. Attempts have been made to meet upon the 
 broad basis of a tennis club, which once a week had tea, 
 but as no one discovered that tennis, as a society amuse- 
 ment, was in England past its prime, it was regarded as 
 
 3
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 worldly and died a natural death, only to be resuscitated, by 
 invitation, on the neutral ground of Judaism (reformed). 
 Here one might meet with half a score of nationalities, en- 
 joy good music, and, if so inclined, play Bridge, or even, 
 upon occasion, dance ; from which it may be deduced that 
 foreigners are frivolous, and that English, under the cir- 
 cumstances, is little spoken unless with the muscular 
 relaxation of the Levantine. 
 
 If your tastes incline to learning and archaeology, you have 
 again, for the most part, to subject yourself to the perils 
 of foreign tongues and other creeds ; to the Germans, who 
 may be Lutherans but are often Catholic, to the Italians 
 of the Patriarchal or Franciscan Clergy, to the French of the 
 Dominican or the Assumptionist orders. England is repre- 
 sented by a solitary savant from the Palestine Exploration 
 Fund, but America has a School of Archaeology, opened in 
 1900, which receives, irrespective of religion, nationality, 
 or sex, all students who are graduates of a university of 
 recognized standing. It has no local habitation, and only 
 one professor, annually renewed, and, however learned, 
 as new as are his pupils to the Holy Land. The students 
 have gradually risen in number till there were once five. 
 The English Missionary Societies, who have been longer 
 in Palestine than any Europeans except the Franciscan 
 friars, are entirely indifferent to such interests, although, to 
 one of their clergy the Rev. Edward Hanauer, Jerusalem 
 born archaeology is indebted in a degree of which the pub- 
 lic, especially in Jerusalem, knows little, his learning hav- 
 ing been given to the world mainly over the signatures of 
 those who have profited by his conversation. 
 
 One would suppose that the English point of view as to 
 the division of the world of Jerusalem into English and 
 foreigners, might be conceivably modified by the fact that 
 certain foreigners are Protestants. 1 Unfortunately, however, 
 
 1 " Protestant " is, in Turkey, the official name for all beliefs 
 collectively which are not Moslem, Jewish, Latin or Greek. There 
 
 4
 
 WHAT IS JERUSALEM LIKE 
 
 for the cause of social unity, they are also Germans ; and 
 although we have prospered at home for a couple of centuries 
 under a German dynasty, we are here unable to hold out the 
 hand of fellowship to those who own the hospital which 
 nurses the English sick, and the post which for the most part 
 conveys the English letters, to whom, moreover, we owe 
 most of the shops which purvey our European comforts 
 and conveniences. 
 
 The visit of the German Emperor in 1898 is still marked 
 with a white stone in the history of Jerusalem. Roads were 
 made, gates were opened, the town was even cleaned in his 
 honour, and he showed his warm appreciation of the wel- 
 come, general, and well deserved, by the truly cosmopolitan 
 and Catholic spirit in which he presented to his subjects, in 
 the Holy City, two sites, one for the erection of a Lutheran, 
 the other of a Latin Church. Trade, agriculture and com- 
 merce in Jerusalem are never more flourishing than in the 
 hands of Germans. The suburb known as the German 
 colony is an admirable example of cleanliness and order. 
 It is, to all practical purposes, a picturesque German village, 
 having its own church, public hall, band, drill-hall, schools, 
 farm, gardens, and of course Bier Halle. Three immense 
 orphanages, a large general hospital and a children's hospi- 
 tal, maintained by the Germans, are the only Protestant 
 institutions of the kind upon any scale of magnitude in 
 Jerusalem. 
 
 There are, moreover, three or four groups of Americans 
 with whom, with the exception of certain Quakers at 
 Ramallah, it is equally impossible for the English to associate ; 
 and this is again another privilege reserved for the foreigners, 
 who have not been slow to discover that for baking, con- 
 fectionery, dressmaking, art-needlework, various decorative 
 handicrafts, photography, carpentry, for lessons in various 
 subjects, including painting and concerted music, as well as 
 
 one speaks always of the " Latin," not of the " Roman Catholic " 
 Church. 
 
 5
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 for much general benevolence and philanthropy, the Ameri- 
 can colonists, although doubtless unorthodox in religious 
 opinions, are without equal in Jerusalem. 
 
 Lady Burton, writing at the time when Sir Richard, then 
 Mr. Burton, was consul at Damascus, could not refrain from 
 quoting from an inquiring lady in one of Trollope's novels : 
 " Isn't a consul a horrid creature that lives in a seaport, and 
 worries merchant seamen and imprisons people who have no 
 passports ? He isn't a creature one knows. They are im- 
 possible, dear, impossible." 
 
 On the contrary, in Jerusalem, consuls are Society, not 
 in Society, but with the addition of the doctors, clergy, and 
 a banker or two, and some two or three persons not easily 
 classified, they are Society. 1 The Greek, and still more the 
 Latin clergy, largely well bred and scholarly gentlemen, 
 whose acquaintance is a privilege, are above or below it, ac- 
 cording to the point of view, but any way outside it, and the 
 rest of the European population are missionaries and Levan- 
 tines. The consuls worry about passports only in so far 
 as it is their business, by providing them, to save one from 
 being worried by the Turkish and other governments, and 
 they are popularly supposed to call up gunboats when pashas 
 are not amenable. 
 
 The consuls of Russia, France and Germany 2 have a 
 large and efficient suite 3 of their respective nationalities ; 
 
 1 Lady Strangford, than whom none should better know the 
 social life of Oriental towns, speaks of " the enormous power (of 
 consuls) in a quiet way, for improving or disimproving the people in 
 whose country they are placed." 
 
 2 The consuls of France, Italy, Russia and Austria take prece- 
 dence of all others as consuls-general. 
 
 3 " The French cancelliere is duly educated for his profession in 
 jurisprudence and notarial functions, which he enters by a competi- 
 tive examination, and acts as notary and keeper of the archives. 
 In the Levant he is always a young man of ability and practice." 
 (Finn, Stirring Times, ii. 379). 
 
 This is equally true of the employes of some other continental 
 Consulates. 
 
 6
 
 WHAT IS JERUSALEM LIKE 
 
 but it is characteristic of the fashion in which England 
 commends herself to the respect of this country that the 
 English consul, with some 200 1 persons in his jurisdiction, 
 has not a single English subordinate, so that the interests 
 of England in Jerusalem are largely in the hands of Arabs ; 2 
 and the consular agent at Jaffa, the port of Jerusalem and 
 gate of Palestine, was till lately a Jew, unsalaried, who 
 could barely speak English. 
 
 The American consuls seem to be chosen from among re- 
 tired ministers of religion (non-episcopal), and although they 
 represent a country which contributes an immense number 
 of visitors to the Holy Land, are alone among officials in 
 Jerusalem in being without any Consular residence. 
 
 France, Italy, Russia and Greece are largely occupied in 
 rivalry as to front places in then* respective Church cere- 
 monials ; the betting, to put it profanely, being upon France 
 in the one case, and Russia in the other. Spain, presumably, 
 is also required to figure in religious duties, and Germany 
 and Austria are much concerned in friendly rivalry of postal 
 service, to the great advantage of European residents. Hol- 
 land apparently has an existence ; for she hangs out a red, 
 white and blue flag on Sundays. Hanging out flags on 
 Sundays and saints' days is an important consular duty, 
 which is perhaps the reason why Holland is but little in evi- 
 dence ; as, apparently, the reformed religion does not con- 
 cern itself with saints. It is generally either a Greek, or a 
 Latin and Anglican, saint's day, so that we are seldom desti- 
 tute of flags ; and one is disposed to wonder whether the 
 Hollandisches Consulat feels at all " out of it." Her repre- 
 sentative, however, lives in sight of two windmills, and 
 
 1 The number of British subjects and protected persons registered 
 in the British Consulate during 1902 was 155. This includes heads 
 of families and single persons only, and is exclusive of wives and 
 of children under twenty-one years of age. 
 
 2 A question was asked on this point in the House of Commons, 
 on Nov. 11, 1902. It is hoped that it may lead to some arrange- 
 ment more becoming to our dignity as a nation. 
 
 7
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 though long disused they may serve to make him feel at 
 home in the absence of cleanliness and canals. 
 
 A consul, patriarch, or other person of distinction, does 
 not appear in public without his attendant cawass, a native 
 servant, who, when entering a church or other public place, 
 serves as beadle, and bangs on the ground with a silver-headed 
 stick to clear the way. This is not, as the critical tourist is 
 apt to call it, mere " swagger " ; for the dignitary in ques- 
 tion is merely fulfilling his part of the bargain under which 
 the Turkish Government makes itself responsible for his 
 safety, his contribution to the position being, naturally, 
 that he should not go about without a licensed attendant 
 sufficiently armed. Each official provides these servants 
 with suitable uniform, often very picturesque. As they are 
 generally soldiers, or potential soldiers of the Turkish army, it 
 follows that they are Moslems, which, as a rule, means that 
 they are good and faithful servants, and also that there will 
 be no religious complications ; for to convert a Moham- 
 medan is practically an impossibility. Probably also there 
 may be other points involved in the presence of the cawass, 
 whose existence ensures that an official cannot receive or pay 
 a visit without the cognizance of a potential spy, who is also 
 for the most part instructed in what goes on in his master's 
 house and among his household. He is certainly a pictur- 
 esque accessory ; the heavy stick, curly sword, and hanging 
 sleeves are common to cawasses of all nationalities, the 
 tarbush 1 to most. The Montenegrins who serve the immense 
 Russian hospices are perhaps the most ornamental, with 
 their closely fitting white cloth costumes, blue vests and red 
 sashes. The Russian consular cawasses are mysterious as 
 to their nether garments, which begin as petticoats gathered 
 into a band, continue in fashion more or less normal, and 
 end up, apparently, as stockings. The English, French, and 
 Italians have a general resemblance to each other, but are all 
 
 1 Better known to English as the " Turkish cap " or " fez," which 
 a sumptuary law imposes upon all Turkish subjects. 
 
 8
 
 WHAT IS JERUSALEM LIKE 
 
 alike imposing, with braided jackets, wide trousers, and a 
 general effect of blue and silver. 
 
 As may be gathered, social life in Jerusalem is convenient 
 in proportion to the number of languages in which one can 
 have intercourse with one's fellow-creatures ; and perhaps 
 a difficulty in acquiring foreign tongues may be a contribu- 
 tory cause of English exclusiveness. Almost all foreigners 
 can speak two or three languages, and most Arabs half a 
 dozen. The Jews, who compose more than two-thirds of the 
 population of Jerusalem, can speak, the rising generation at 
 least, French, German, or English, according as they have 
 been educated by the Alliance Israelite, the Lamel, or the 
 Anglo- Jewish Schools. Almost anybody in Jerusalem can 
 say " all right" when your own conversation flags, and if they 
 have been educated in the English schools they will say 
 " Not at all " when you say " Thank you " ; for as the Arabic 
 language contains no equivalent of " thank you " or "if 
 you please," they appear to think that a repartee is required, 
 and this is the hereditary phrase with which some missionary 
 of former times has endowed them. To say " all right " and 
 " very well," and to shake hands perpetually, is the Arab 
 conception of English manners, and to pay you extravagant 
 compliments (if he has anything to sell), his notion of French 
 politeness. 
 
 Shops, in Jerusalem, are kept by almost every nationality 
 except English ; but Germans, Greeks, and Jews predomi- 
 nate. French and Italian, or French and German, will carry 
 you anywhere, and you soon pick up enough Arabic for the 
 expression of your wants, especially if you don't take lessons. 
 With tafadal and a gesture, you can make almost any request, 
 with imshi you can say " Go away," with la in varied in- 
 tonations you can dissent, and with aiwa you can agree, 
 though it is an expression discouraged by the missionaries, 
 as having some remote connexion with " Allah " ; ivallah, 
 with which it is etymologically associated, meaning literally 
 " by God." It is, however, impossible to keep your conversa- 
 
 9
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 tion clear of religious phrases. You do not say " Good 
 morning," but " May your day be blessed " ; for " thank you " 
 you substitute " May (God) increase your goods." If asked 
 how you are, you say, " As God wills " ; and if asked your 
 opinion, intention, object, or desire (if you have entered into 
 the secretive spirit of the East), you will reply, " Do I know ? 
 God knows." 
 
 You can practise an Arabic accent by repeating the word 
 " umbrella " with separate emphasis on both 1's, and " Rachel 
 Ramsay," like a German with a tendency to say w for r. 
 But it is a magnificent language, and gains on one's respect 
 with increased acquaintance. An intelligent Syrian school- 
 master told us that he would rather be examined in English 
 grammar than that of his own speech, and my own teacher, 
 by way of encouragement, assured me that a Moslem 
 grammarian had reduced the rules to one thousand, though 
 a Christian had subsequently increased the number to fifteen 
 hundred. We have, in English, a score or two of Arabic 
 words, which is quite a nice little collection to begin with, 
 and some of them, such as " admiral, artichoke, algebra, 
 talisman and shawl," are quite useful, and it would not 
 be impossible to devise phrases which should introduce 
 " nadir, elixir, amulet, and lute." 
 
 The inhabitant of Jerusalem can be doctored in half a 
 dozen languages, and there is a German physician who 
 specializes in oriental diseases, and has especial facilities, 
 in certain directions, in the admirable leper hospital main- 
 tained by the Moravians, the only institution of the kind in 
 Jerusalem, if we except the work, under the protection of 
 the Turkish Government, of the French Sisters of Charity 
 at present, in this branch of benevolence, very inadequately 
 housed. 
 
 Of the work of the English Eye Hospital I shall have more 
 to say, but even in passing can mention it only with very 
 especial respect, and with satisfaction that there should be 
 one direction in which our country has, in Syria, surpassed 
 
 10
 
 WHAT IS JERUSALEM LIKE 
 
 all others, although others are also doing similar good 
 work on a smaller scale. 
 
 We English have no newspapers, and no club, and no 
 music, and not even any musical instrument worthy of 
 mention. A mechanical contrivance destitute of semitones 
 which played popular hymn tunes from the tower of the 
 church connected with the London Mission to the Jews, 
 has been lately silenced. There are pianos, and church 
 organs, and a choral society, but for music one of necessity 
 has recourse, as for much else, to the Germans and 
 the Russians, and to the churches of the Latins. A 
 library, mainly of theology, has been established in con- 
 nexion with St. George's (Anglican) Collegiate Church, and 
 about a hundred books, by no means up to date, in addition 
 to their own journal up to 1896, represent the library of the 
 Jerusalem Association of the Palestine Exploration Fund ; 1 
 but for the specialist literature of the Holy Land one must 
 once more seek the hospitality of the Germans or of the Latin 
 Orders : the Dominicans, Assumptionists, or of the White 
 Fathers at St. Anne's, who possess, moreover, the only 
 museums of general utility ; though at other convents, and 
 even among the Greeks and Armenians, there are collections 
 of value and interest. One cannot but regret that the P.E.F. 
 should not have added to much good work accomplished 
 in Jerusalem that of a small museum and library which 
 should stimulate the student, and compete, however humbly, 
 with other nationalities. The Dominicans and Germans are 
 alone in Jerusalem in offering antiquarian and archaeolo- 
 gical instruction to the general public. 
 
 It is much, however, that intellectual advantages are to 
 be had, although our own country is behind all others 
 in supplying them, that museums, libraries, antiquarian 
 lectures, cultivated and learned society, scientific research, 
 the enthusiasm of humanity, practical philanthropy, art 
 and music, all are here in this city of beauty and wonder ; 
 
 1 A Society henceforth to be known in these pages as the P.E.F. 
 
 11
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 the reward and insignia of wider views and larger hopes, of 
 the elimination of prejudice, and the recognition of the 
 universal Fatherhood of God. 
 
 As to the general physical aspect of Jerusalem, we may 
 turn to the ebullitions of a hundred pilgrims writing at 
 intervals during nearly two thousand years we can be 
 emotional with Chateaubriand and Lamartine, or common- 
 place with a distinguished ecclesiastic who said the other 
 day that it looked like a second-rate provincial town in 
 Italy. We can, moreover, refrain from adjectives, and look 
 at the view. 
 
 Let us pass to the balcony. It is the month of November ; 
 we are so fortunate as to be in Jerusalem out of the season, 
 and the " early rain " has fallen, lending colour and freshness 
 to a landscape which, till lately, has responded to the sun- 
 shine in tones of sepia and grey. The distant hills have a 
 delicate veil of green, and we know that all the sheltered 
 hollows are gay with little gardens of the autumn crocus, 
 and sweet with the breath of wild thyme and " the slender 
 galingale." 
 
 We stand, looking due east, almost at the middle of the 
 base of a wide horseshoe, the horizon bounded all around 
 by mountains. Beginning to our right, and realizing that 
 " Jordan rolls between," we see the Mountains of Moab, 
 perhaps of all things visible from Jerusalem, the sight upon 
 which one learns to gaze with the most unwearied affection. 
 Beyond are the Mount of Olives, Mount Scopas, and the hills 
 which unite the Jerusalem group with the Alpine range of 
 Palestine. Mount Scopas is crowned by what is marked 
 on the maps as " the English house," the country-house of a 
 Liverpool barrister, and the centre, during the spring 
 months, not only of art and hospitality, but also of a wide 
 philanthropy which puts to shame the prejudice and bigotry 
 of many of the " good works " of the Holy City. On the 
 Mount of Olives a group of Russian buildings, political per- 
 haps as much as religious, are the most conspicuous object ; 
 
 12
 
 WHAT IS JERUSALEM LIKE 
 
 below them the Church of the Pater, 1 and the Convents of the 
 Carmelites and Benedictines, and the church of the Domimis 
 floevit, where the view of Jerusalem over which " Jesus 
 wept," is still one of the most beautiful anywhere to be found. 
 Further northward the eye easily distinguishes the highest 
 point of the Mount of Olives, the Viri Galilaei, 2 on the slope 
 of which we see the dome of the Church of the Ascension. 
 
 In the nearer distance, again beginning to the right of the 
 horseshoe, is the city of Jerusalem, two and a half miles in 
 circumference, of which nearly the whole of the north wall 
 is visible. The north-east corner, the site of Tancred's 
 camp, is hidden from us by the immense hospice of Notre 
 Dame de France, with its church, theological seminary, and 
 hospital, but the fine battlemented wall nearly forty feet in 
 height, with its many towers, and broken only by the Da- 
 mascus Gate and the Gate of Herod, stretches down to the 
 foot of Mount Scopas. 
 
 Within the walls, once more beginning to our right, there 
 are first the great group of buildings belonging to the Fran- 
 ciscans ; 3 east of these a curious and complex group of which 
 the main feature is the Church of the Resurrection with 
 its two domes of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, and 
 of the Greek Catholicon respectively. Crowding round it, 
 are three mosques distinguishable by the graceful minarets 
 so characteristic of Jerusalem ; and, just beyond, the 
 German Church of the Redeemer, which occupies the site 
 
 1 Marking the spot where our Lord is said to have given His 
 prayer to the Apostles, which, in the cloisters, is engraved on 
 marble tablets in thirty-two different tongues. 
 
 2 Where the " Men of Galilee " were addressed on the morning 
 of the Ascension (Acts i. 2). 
 
 3 These include the great Convent and Church of San Salvador, 
 the Casa Nuova or Hospice for pilgrims, the dispensary, schools, 
 orphanages, library, printing press, dwellings for the poor, etc. The 
 nucleus of the buildings was a Georgian Convent acquired by the 
 Franciscans in 1551. It is thus by several centuries the oldest 
 conventual Latin building in Jerusalem, and perhaps for that reason 
 of architectural pretensions. 
 
 13
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 of the magnificent ruins of the Muristan, the monastery 
 founded by Charlemagne, later the centre of the hospi- 
 talities of the Knights of St. John of Jerusalem. Be- 
 yond this is a collection of synagogues, one of which, the 
 green dome of the Ashkenazim Jews, is alone visible from our 
 present standpoint. Passing over the Jewish quarter, the 
 , eye reaches the splendid dome of the Mosque, the centre of 
 the Haram area, which occupies one-sixth of the entire city, 
 a spot sacred alike to Jew, Christian, and Moslem. The 
 further wall of the Temple area is also the east wall of the 
 city, which again brings us back to the Mount of Olives, 
 with the Garden of Gethsemane and the Tomb of our Lady 
 at its feet. 
 
 Outside the walls, besides the French Convent of the 
 Assumptionist Order, already referred to, we have the very 
 handsome and extensive buildings of St. Etienne belonging 
 to the Dominican Order, with, perhaps, the handsomest 
 church in Jerusalem. They are just outside the Damascus, 
 formerly known as the St. Stephen's, Gate, and are built 
 upon the site of three ancient and successive churches com- 
 memorating the martyrdom of the Saint. At our feet is a 
 considerable suburb, largely Moslem, the houses well built, 
 detached and generally surrounded by court or garden, but 
 in placing disorderly and irrelevant, a road not being by any 
 means a necessary adjunct to a house in this country. 
 Immediately opposite to us is a little green knoll * covered 
 with Moslem tombs and undermined by the Grotto of Jere- 
 miah ; northwards the tower of St. George's Collegiate 
 Church peeps through a break in the surrounding olive gar- 
 dens. To our left, just across the road, is a little stone hall, 
 unlicensed and unconsecrated, which is what the Church 
 Missionary Society exhibits in Jerusalem as the outward and 
 
 1 Known as the Protestant Calvary and commonly called the 
 Green Hill in allusion to the well known hymn, though the adherents 
 of this very modern variant upon a tradition recorded over 1600 
 years are naturally few. 
 
 14
 
 WHAT IS JERUSALEM LIKE 
 
 visible sign of the beauty of holiness. Services are held 
 there twice on a Sunday, with Holy Communion once a 
 month. Behind us is the suburb affected by consuls. 
 
 It will thus be evident that from any point slightly ele- 
 vated the Holy City presents a compact though outspread 
 panorama. It is built on a plateau of about a thousand acres, 
 sloping from 2,589 feet at the north-west angle down to the 
 hill of the Temple, 2,441 feet above the Mediterranean, 
 the residential suburbs, outside the walls, being somewhat 
 higher. Its many domes and minarets make it, all question 
 of sentiment apart, an undoubtedly handsome city, and to 
 the white stone of which it is built it owes its characteristic j 
 aspect of eternal youth and eternal hope. 
 
 15
 
 CHAPTER II 
 DOMESTICITIES IN JERUSALEM 
 
 EXPERIENCES OF THE TRAVELLER ECCENTRICITIES OF THE 
 
 PLACE COMMERCIAL ASPECT CLIMATE AND SCIROCCO 
 
 WATER SUPPLY VEGETATION INSECT ENEMIES 
 
 FLORA ANOMALOUS CUSTOMS COINAGE ECONOMY OF 
 
 LIVING 
 
 THE people who think that to go to Jerusalem is to go 
 to the end of the world, fail to realize that it takes 
 but one day longer than to go to Cairo. At Port Said you 
 turn north instead of south ; one day by boat brings you 
 to Jaffa, and next afternoon, after seeing the house of 
 Simon the Tanner, and the tomb of Dorcas, you take the 
 train there is only one to Jerusalem. 
 
 In approaching Jerusalem one struggles between contend- 
 ing emotions of surprise and of familiarity. To take a 
 ticket at the Jaffa station and see one's luggage labelled for 
 Jerusalem on the American check system to have your 
 belongings examined and your tickets clipped by a person 
 in a pink petticoat with a brooch in the form of a railway- 
 engine to designate his official position to puff, however 
 slowly, across the plain of Sharon to look out of a carriage- 
 window at the cave where Samson hid, and at the vineyard 
 where he tied the foxes' tails together to pass close by the 
 house where Dorcas made clothes for the poor (which it is 
 to be hoped in nowise resembled the garments sent out 
 from her followers in England to unfortunate little " con- 
 verts " here) to pass the factory where the boxes are 
 
 16
 
 DOMESTICITIES IN JERUSALEM 
 
 made for Jaffa oranges, such as in England we beg from 
 the grocer for sitting-hens ; to see the oranges themselves 
 growing in gigantic clusters, deep ellipses of which the 
 English representatives are a poor mockery both in colour 
 and in form in all this, it is difficult from first to last to 
 distinguish between familiarity and surprise. 
 
 This is such a poor little thing in railway trains, although 
 its engine was made in Philadelphia, it hides itself in such 
 deep valleys, and gets so discouraged at the hills and so 
 terribly out of breath during the three hours and a half 
 which it takes to travel under forty miles, that one soon 
 learns to forgive its existence. 
 
 Up and up we go, slowly climbing for over 2,000 feet 
 the land which should be flowing with milk and honey 
 growing more bleak and desolate as we proceed. Here 
 and there is a distant village, and the Arab children come 
 racing down the precipitous hills on either side the line, to 
 throw bunches of flowers in at the window, and soon come 
 running after the train again to complain that the money 
 we have given them is not of the right coinage. It was 
 right enough twenty miles back in Jaffa, but coinage, 
 beggars, and mosquitoes, are annoyances that are always 
 with us. 
 
 The mountainous walls on either hand widen, and the 
 landscape takes a more human aspect. There is a man 
 ploughing with two yoke of oxen and a Highland caschrom ; 
 here a tower which some one has begun to build and is not 
 able to finish ; a sight which soon becomes familiar where 
 the thriftless, shiftless, children of the East seem seldom 
 able to count beyond a few piastres, over which they will 
 chatter and haggle with indefatigable enterprise. Finally, to 
 the north-east stands a city on a hill which cannot be hid, 
 and we have reached Jerusalem. 
 
 We give in our checks, show receipts for excess luggage, 
 firmly refuse to take a cab from the railway station to the 
 Church of the Holy Sepulchre which is our destination, are 
 
 17 c
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 told in excellent English by the young dragoman who takes 
 our affairs in hand, to " turn to the left and we cannot miss 
 the Jaffa gate," and, still with the same sense of mingled 
 astonishment and familiarity, we set out toward the most 
 sacred spot on the face of the whole world. 
 
 We are to walk about a mile due north. It is Bethlehem 
 which is behind, Jerusalem before us, and yet we are in the 
 land of suburbs a German suburb, a Jewish suburb ! 
 Away to our left against the sky-line are a minaret and two 
 windmills ; to our right the British Ophthalmic Hospital 
 looks down into the Valley of Hinnom ; here we pass the 
 Upper Pool of Gihon, where the steep cliff of Sion frowns 
 down upon the new pleasure gardens of the Pasha. 
 
 Life in Jerusalem is a life of anomalies and anachronisms. 
 To the looker-on it can never assume the definite colouring 
 of other places, it can never be even consistently religious, 
 as Rome is religious. Every street Arab speaks three or 
 four languages ; apart from tourists you have representa- 
 tives of half the nations of the world. You have a dozen 
 Consulates, you have a score of Convents, you have Jews, 
 Mohammedans and Christians ; you learn to understand 
 religious distinctions of which you never thought before ; 
 you find that the Greeks and Russians, like the Anglicans and 
 the English Church Missionary Society, worship apart, that 
 even among the Roman Catholics there are half a dozen 
 rites, that the country is administered by a government 
 which does not speak its language, and that the " native " 
 is of an older race than that which immigrated here under 
 Abraham four thousand years ago. 
 
 But Jerusalem is interesting, is lovable even, to those who 
 ever so little " hear the East a-caUing." One can have 
 emotions here of which in the West we know nothing. We, 
 who date events from the Norman Conquest, have a sense 
 of luxury in hearing the archaeologist speak of some wayside 
 tomb as " merely Graeco-Roman," in knowing that the 
 ancestors of races whom the missionary proposes to elevate 
 
 18
 
 DOMESTICITIES IN JERUSALEM 
 
 were probably Christians who, conceivably , dwelt in marble 
 halls while his were running about in woad. 
 
 It is natural enough among evidences of time and place 
 so diverse, that there should also be immense diversities in 
 all questions of civilization and convenience. The streets 
 of the city are unspeakably filthy ; happily, except for 
 worship (if he happens to be anything but an Anglican), 
 the resident has little temptation to go within the walls. 
 One does not go to market ; your servant or dragoman can 
 buy things at about half the price you would give, and will 
 enjoy spending half an hour in smoking cigarettes, drinking 
 coffee, and cheapening your dinner a franc or so, by a 
 metalik (about a sou) at a time. 
 
 Even in what Americans call " dry-goods " you can buy 
 nearly anything in Jerusalem, only you can seldom get 
 quite enough of it ; you are always a yard, or an ounce, or 
 half a dozen, short for whatever you want to make. All 
 products of the country, beautiful materials in cotton, linen, 
 and silk, are hand- woven and extraordinarily cheap and 
 good, and in the convents one can get excellent needle- 
 work ; French dressmaking up to the latest fashion-plates, 
 good boot-making, lace-making, laundry-work, metal-work 
 in gold and silver, and in combinations of silver and mother 
 o' pearl, and so on. One hardly expects to find a County 
 Council, but one could wish that it were not the custom 
 to put everything of every kind that is not wanted in the 
 house just outside the front door ; and that when they 
 water the roads, which is every time that the Pasha's car- 
 riage is expected, they would use water which had been less 
 often used before. 
 
 In a sense the Arab is clean. You cross a foul doorstep 
 to enter a spotless house. The floors are all stone, and they 
 are constantly damp, from perpetual swilling, so long as he 
 has any water to swill with. Perhaps it is because water is 
 at times an expensive luxury that he loves to waste it. 
 The white sheet, which is the outdoor dress of the women, 
 
 19
 
 is generally spotless, but it might be as well not to inquire 
 further. The kumbaz, or long cotton frock of the men, 
 generally shows traces of an unscientific wash-tub, but they 
 all carry themselves so well, and are so lithe and well set 
 up, so great a contrast to the slouching, heavy women, that 
 one is not too critical of details. This applies only to the 
 town: in the villages it is the women who are effectively 
 dressed and graceful. 
 
 The native cooking is good and extremely elaborate. 
 The Arab is never in a hurry, and some of the dishes take 
 many hours to prepare, though they are probably cooked 
 on a pinch of charcoal, in a thing like a tin pie-dish. I have 
 seen a tailor fry his dinner upon the charcoal in his box-iron, 
 and excellent coffee is prepared over a spark at which an 
 English cook could not light a pipe. 
 
 In Jerusalem we do not talk pluie et beau temps, but 
 cisterns and scirocco. At best the rainfall averages only 
 thirty or forty inches, and the rainy days may be counted 
 on one's fingers, so that we forget to make the customary 
 proviso " if it is fine." Except on a few odd days between 
 November and February it is always fine, and our June 
 anxieties are not as to damp school-feasts and flooded 
 garden-parties, but as to the amount of water in the cistern, 
 and whether the garden may be permitted to exist at all ; 
 for without water even the hardy scarlet geranium and 
 long-suffering marguerite lose heart after a time, and hang 
 down withered heads, so quickly faded that the blossoms 
 have not had time to fall ; and there are no showers of scarlet 
 petals or yellow pollen, such as proclaim their demise at 
 home. At afternoon teas, or when neighbours meet after 
 church (there is nowhere else to meet in particular), we com- 
 pare notes as to the contents of cisterns, mainly, and to the 
 distraction of the English new-comer, in metres. 
 
 No one, who can afford to do better, thinks of drinking 
 water from the cisterns, however well cleaned and cared 
 for ; as science, represented by the doctors, has declared 
 
 20
 
 DOMESTICITIES IN JERUSALEM 
 
 that cistern water, scirocco and mosquitoes, are responsible 
 for most of the characteristic ailments of the European in 
 Jerusalem ; and the first of these evils is the only one we 
 are in any practical degree able to control. There is quite 
 a trade in drinking-water, which comes mainly from the 
 Well of the Blessed Virgin, three miles away, at the little 
 village of Ain Karim, a well from which she must assuredly 
 have drawn water, if, as appears probable, this little village 
 of S. John in the mountains were really the home of Zacha- 
 rias and Elizabeth, and the birthplace of S. John Baptist. 
 But as health depends not only upon the water one drinks, 
 but upon the amount available for other purposes, the 
 capacity and contents of the cisterns or tanks for collecting 
 water from the surface of roofs and elsewhere, is a prominent 
 topic of interest. 
 
 Only the very shy venture upon the banality of " Isn't 
 it hot ? " but when in doubt as to other subjects one may 
 always risk a speculation as to scirocco. As a matter of 
 fact this very unpleasant wind, which comes from the south- 
 east, has all the characteristics of east wind elsewhere, 
 plus the aggravation that as it has a touch of south, and 
 comes to us across the arid deserts of Arabia, its vices are 
 hot instead of cold, and the more infernal in consequence. 
 It is, in short, fatal to vegetation, exhausting to the nerves, 
 irritating to the temper, parching to the skin, ruinous to the 
 hair and complexion, and destructive to domestic peace. 
 The lower animals are restless, children cross, and adults 
 behave like the influenza convalescent in Punch, the man 
 on the Stock Exchange, or other haunt of the stalwart and 
 unemotional, who says, " If you contradict me I shall cry." * 
 
 This aspect of the Jerusalem temperament is probably 
 
 1 The disagreeable characteristics of scirocco are due to the entire 
 absence of ozone. Dr. Chaplin, who, until Dr. Masterman's recent 
 hydrometric experiments near the Dead Sea had alone represented 
 British Science in Jerusalem, entirely failed to get the slightest 
 discoloration of ozone paper when the scirocco was at all severe. 
 
 21
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 merely an evil habit acquired in past Mays and Octobers, 
 the months of scirocco ; and if further excuse is needed, one 
 may always plead, for a large proportion of the population, 
 the absence, not only of occupation but of interest in a place 
 where there is little occasion for " servant " talk, where 
 there are no circulating libraries, no shop-windows, where 
 every one is intimate with every one else's wardrobe and 
 other possessions, where little worth mentioning is ever 
 achieved, where croquet and bicycles have not yet arrived, 
 and lawn-tennis, such as it is, is on the doubtful borderland 
 of piety, abandoned mainly to the world, as represented by 
 consuls, foreigners, and some half-dozen outsiders. 
 
 Moreover, if scirocco, and an ineffective existence, do not 
 suffice to palliate certain peculiarities of Jerusalem life, 
 there is yet one more excuse, which for some among us may 
 fairly be taken to outweigh all other sources of provocation 
 put together. 
 
 On Fridays and Sundays the Turkish Band performs, and 
 on every day of the week it practises ; all the instruments 
 independently at the same moment. Music, in Turkey, would 
 appear to imply mainly, attention to rhythm, and the 
 difference between playing and practising consists in the 
 combined observance of time, which the conductor beats, 
 not unsuccessfully, with his feet. They have two tunes, 
 " The Turkish March," which one recognizes through the 
 medium of one's recollections of " The Ruins of Athens " 
 (oh, shades of Beethoven and Rubinstein !), and another, 
 or others, which one never succeeds in recognizing at all. 
 There is no light and shade, no expression, unless a general 
 sense of distress visible on all surrounding European counte- 
 nances, may be taken as evidence of some kind of suffering, 
 imperfectly externalized. 
 
 " Aus meinen grossen Schmerzen 
 Mach' ich die kleinen Lieder " 
 
 might well be the motto of the official music of this country 
 
 22
 
 DOMESTICITIES IN JERUSALEM 
 
 assuredly the cause of at least some of its many evils and 
 misfortunes. 
 
 To return to scirocco. There is a superstition that it lasts 
 always for three days, which are, however, occasionally pro- 
 longed to eight or ten ; and it is worst that is, least 
 endurable in the otherwise most healthy and bracing 
 parts of Syria : Jerusalem, Nablous, and the mountains of 
 Galilee. Happily it is less frequent than is the east wind 
 in Western Europe, but it makes up in intensity for its lack 
 of duration. The wise shut doors and windows, and come 
 face to face with the enemy as little as may be ; and it is 
 only fair to hasten to say that otherwise the climate of 
 Jerusalem is as delightful as can well be imagined. The 
 hot, close nights of the English summer are unknown, as 
 witness the practical fact that even in July and August one 
 never sleeps without a blanket. Between ten o'clock and 
 three it is wise to remain indoors, as well as immediately 
 after sunset. The houses are so well built, that only under 
 very bad management need the thermometer ever rise above 
 75 or 80 indoors, even on days when to open the front 
 door is like putting one's head into an oven. 
 
 After sunset, as a rule, the wind rises, and often after a 
 hot day it amounts to a positive gale, so that when doors 
 bang and windows rattle, in a fashion worthy of Scotland, 
 it seems strange to preserve the calm certainty of cloudless 
 skies and gentle breezes to-morrow morning. The dews 
 are so heavy that one thinks of " the mist that went 
 up from the ground and watered the whole face of the 
 earth." 
 
 There is much vegetation ; grapes, figs, and olives ripen ; 
 pomegranate and oleander-blossoms flame ; and the blue 
 eryngo waves its pompons long after the ground has become 
 pale and hard, when rain has not been seen for three or 
 four months, and there is still a certainty of at least another 
 three months of cloudless sky, with not so much as a thunder- 
 storm to cool the atmosphere which, however, never 
 
 23
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 strikes one as exhausted and " used up," as so often happens 
 in a hot summer at home. 
 
 Of course, Jerusalem has its own special diseases ; but 
 these, even with common care (and not too much of it), the 
 reasonable traveller may quite easily avoid. If one stays 
 indoors during the prescribed hours, abstains from alcohol 
 more heating than the refreshing light wine of the country, 
 does not eat or drink too much, is careful as to salads, 
 especially as to where they are grown and washed, wears 
 woollen next the skin, avoids over-fatigue, and, above all, 
 seeks such protection as may be from dust, mosquitoes, 
 and sand-flies, one need not court headache under a pith 
 helmet, eye-ache under blue glasses, or self-consciousness by 
 perpetual libations of chlorodyne and quinine. 
 
 It is, perhaps, not too much to say that mosquitoes and 
 ; sand-flies are responsible for a very large proportion of the 
 ; fever and malaria which visit the Holy Land ; as good 
 water is generally attainable, and the Syrian almost always 
 boils his milk. The sand-fly is, on the whole, the worst 
 offender. He is to the mosquito what the hyena is to the 
 tiger, a low, prowling brute that knows nothing of fair play. 
 If, by your own mismanagement, the mosquito does get in- 
 side your bed-curtains, he at least sounds his trumpet before 
 him, and does his little best to play fair. You can approxi- 
 mately gauge his proportions and detect his whereabouts. 
 But the sand-fly is alike inaudible and invisible. You may 
 pin your curtains close, but he and his sail gaily through the 
 finest mesh. Clothing is no protection, Keating is no 
 discouragement. You smite him without injury ; you 
 triumphantly clap your palms together, certain of having 
 enclosed him, and when you open your hand he flies happily 
 away, only refreshed by the repast he has snatched upon 
 your " Mount of Venus," or in the hollow of your " line of 
 life." 
 
 The mosquito is always with us, but the summer invasion 
 of the sand-fly is far more to be dreaded even than the pro- 
 
 24
 
 longed residence of the nobler beast of prey, a phrase which, 
 by the way, reminds one that they are never so offensive 
 as in church. Indeed, for these and other reasons, great 
 and small (especially small), the programme of worship 
 should always include an immediate return home and entire 
 change of toilet. Even boots are but inadequate protection 
 from the denizens of Jerusalem dust ; and in the Holy 
 Sepulchre, often crowded and always ill-ventilated, one 
 becomes acquainted with things creeping innumerable. It 
 is at certain seasons, harvest-time especially, the refuge of 
 the winged creation ; from the common house-fly, fresh 
 from unspeakable wayside horrors, to the wary mosquito, 
 whom, even in death, one gazes on rather in horror than in 
 triumph, and with the reflection, " Whose blood have I 
 spilt ? " It is from the fact that his bite is probably also an 
 inoculation, that one attributes to him so large a portion of 
 responsibility in the dissemination of disease. Fortunately ^ 
 malarial fever requires eight to ten days to develop, and one 
 has plenty of time for self-defence in the shape of small 
 doses of quinine a useful prophylactic after any specially 
 severe assault from the enemy. 
 
 " The " Syrian " fever, one learns from an interesting 
 article by Dr. Masterman on Residence and Travel in 
 Palestine, is a generic term for various kinds of ague, but 
 ''it is," he adds, "practically certain that Malta fever 
 occurs. . . . When malaria is once in the system, the most 
 potent cause of its recurrence is chill. Chills are very 
 much more liable to occur in this semi-tropical climate 
 than at home, and both the resident and the traveller are 
 only too apt to think too lightly of them." 
 
 The winter is, in its way, as pleasant as the summer. A 
 fire is welcome in the evening, and it is desirable to carry 
 a wrap when you go out in the afternoon, for towards sunset 
 the air becomes chilly, and your dress is probably the 
 ordinary woollen house-dress, without extra covering, of 
 an English winter. This is, indeed, a land of perpetual 
 
 25
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 sunshine ; and whereas one hears of Arctic sufferings on the 
 part of visitors to places of Mediterranean winter resort, 
 except in hours (and one advisedly says hours] of actual 
 rain, Jerusalem never fails to smile. The mean annual 
 temperature is 63. One breakfasts out of doors in January, 
 and rejoices in the refreshing breezes of July. To the 
 sympathetic friends who wonder how one endures the 
 summer sunshine of Judea, one replies : " Don't you wish 
 you could keep the temperature of your bedroom at 65, 
 and feel certain of immunity from the little summer shower ? " 
 Moreover, they forget that we are nearly 3,000 feet above 
 sea-level, that a morning's ride will bring us within sight of 
 the Mediterranean, and a day's journey within reach of the 
 cool breezes blowing off the snow-clad peaks of Mount 
 Lebanon, 10,000 feet high. 
 
 Probably nowhere in the world can one find so many 
 varieties of climate. Although Palestine lies within the 
 subtropical zone of latitude 23J to 34, the levels of its 
 surface are so varied that, out of the eight zones recognized 
 in physiography, five are represented within this very 
 limited area. From the Mount of Olives, 2,723 feet above 
 sea-level, one looks down into the valley of the Dead Sea, 
 1,292 feet below it, so that in a morning's drive one may 
 encounter an entire change of flora and fauna ; one may 
 look upon the juniper of Sweden and the palm- tree of the 
 desert ; one may hear the skylark of our own Highlands, 
 and the long-drawn note of the grackle of the tropics. 
 According to Humboldt, the botanical character of any 
 scenery may be determined by reference to some sixteen 
 tribes of plants, and of these one-half are represented in 
 Palestine ; namely, palms, acacias, laurels, myrtles, pines, 
 willows, mallows, and lilies. One finds among the joyous 
 spring miracle of wild flowers, not only countless new 
 varieties, of form and colour undreamed of, but old friends 
 wonderfully glorified ; the mallow, and poppy, and honey- 
 suckle, and mouse-ear, and mandrake, and star of Bethlehem ; 
 
 26
 
 DOMESTICITIES IN JERUSALEM 
 
 the thistle, and clover, and linus, and flag-lily, of our fields 
 and hedgerows, all wonderfully varied and dignified ; as 
 well as the arums and cyclamen, crocus and anemone, scillas, 
 and a hundred other glories of our English garden, flaunting 
 by the wayside in glorious array and new magnificence, the 
 very apotheosis of the humbler types at home. 
 
 The Arab best loves flowers of strong scent, and it is 
 perhaps mainly owing to this that the stock, carnation, and 
 violet are cultivated wherever flowers are cultivated at all ; 
 and that other plants of familiar association, not always 
 inherently beautiful, have nevertheless a recognized place 
 in most gardens hedges of wormwood and fennel, or more 
 fragrant rosemary, and rows of every variety of pot-herbs, 
 including many new to the European visitor. As one walks 
 along the ill-smelling streets, one constantly comes across 
 groups of peasant-women, offering for sale great heaps of 
 herbs deliciously perfumed and bought largely by the 
 Russian pilgrims. There is a whole bazaar of drugs and 
 scented herbs and seeds and woods, many probably of 
 foreign origin ; not only the aloes, balm of Gilead, calamus, 
 cassia, cinnamon, frankincense, and myrrh, all obtained from 
 scented woods brought from still further east, but other 
 scents belonging nearer home ; the fruit-stalls are decorated 
 with garlands of orange-blossom, jessamine, stephanotis, 
 and tuberoses ; and the carpenters' shops are fragrant with 
 the delicious cypress-wood, of which the bridal chests are 
 made, and which, especially when freshly sawn, is sweet as 
 sandalwood. 
 
 One cannot wonder in contemplating either the good or 
 bad smells of Jerusalem that the Jews have special thanks- 
 givings for pleasant odours : " Blessed art Thou, oh Lord, 
 our God, King of the Universe Creator of fragrant woods, 
 Creator of fragrant plants Who dost bestow a goodly scent 
 on fruits Who Greatest all sorts of spices Who created 
 pleasantly scented oil," the special addition being selected 
 to suit the case in point. 
 
 27
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 It is only to the superficial observer that this is a barren 
 country. It was our own first impression, upon arriving in 
 December ; not that one has any right to complain that a 
 country does not look fertile in mid- winter, especially when 
 the grey-green of the olive contrasts everywhere with the 
 grey-brown of the bare hillsides. Even then, the children 
 were offering bunches of cyclamen, primroses, anemones, 
 at every station on the railway ; maidenhair and lady-fern 
 were waving in the recesses of every tomb. Within a very 
 few weeks, a delicate green hue began to creep over the 
 faded fields, and day after day, as one opened the eastern 
 window to the warm glow of sunrise, one noted how the 
 spring tints became deepened and diffused. The wondrous 
 glories of the Syrian spring are beyond all description, and 
 the wealth of golden harvest beginning in May lasted well 
 into June ; and now, in mid- August, when cisterns are 
 emptying, and rain is unhoped for, the hillsides are gloriously 
 green with the vines, not stiffly trained as elsewhere, but 
 lying on the warm bosom of mother earth, and clothing the 
 rocks and bare stone walls with the fresh glistening beauty 
 of foliage, green and fresh as April lime-trees, or the horse 
 chestnuts of Bushey Park before the first summer dust has 
 flecked their radiant youth. Golden apricots gleam under 
 dark green leaves, in trees which shelter the roadsides ; the 
 figs are ripening, and the olives are still in prospect : and so 
 here, as elsewhere, every month brings her own crown of 
 delight and beauty. The peasants are leaving their homes 
 in the narrow streets of the neighbouring villages, and 
 betaking themselves to the rough stone watch-towers which 
 shelter them when the fruit harvest is about to be gathered in. 
 
 Often, in this country, one is reminded of the customs of 
 the Western Highlands, as doubtless are those from other 
 lands of similar habits common to all elementary peoples ; 
 and the little groups of peasants carrying a few homely 
 household utensils, the children and domestic animals 
 snatching their own pleasures by the roadside, the little 
 
 28
 
 DOMESTICITIES IN JERUSALEM 
 
 picnics under a wayside tree, recall to mind the shealing 
 migrations of Sutherlandshire or the Hebrides. One thinks 
 too, in sight of the round towers made of unhewn stones 
 roughly piled together, perched in the corner of field or 
 garden, of " the lodge in the garden of cucumbers," which 
 in truth it often most literally is ; but the cucumbers are 
 far more dainty than ours, and ripen so much more quickly 
 that they have a savour especially their own ; be they the 
 ordinary cucumber of the western market or any of the 
 varieties of cucumbers, gourds, and melons, smaller and 
 more delicate than any known to us, which are so familiar 
 a feature in the Syrian dietary. 
 
 Jerusalem, for all its sacredness, is not without its humours. 
 It is topsy-turvy land. The native entering a sacred place, 
 takes off his shoes and keeps on his hat ; you begin to read 
 a book at the end ; the landlord pays the taxes ; your 
 servant walks in front of you instead of behind ; a man 
 calls himself not Mac, but Abu, not " the son of," but " the 
 father of " ; the men wear petticoats and the women expose 
 their legs while they cover their faces ; the theory of " ladies 
 first " is a novelty from Europe ; they put carpets on their 
 walls, and pictures on their ceilings ; you buy milk by weight. 
 'Any and 'Arriet are unknown ; the men dance together, 
 and in public places men and women sit apart ; giggling has 
 not yet been introduced, nor public-houses ; there is no 
 smoking of pipes, and no expectoration in the streets. 
 Swearing there is, but of a different type from the universal 
 English adjective. It takes longer, but it leaves some scope 
 for originality ; it is after the fashion of the 109th psalm, 
 only " more so." It is indirect, whether from inherent 
 politeness, or from deference to the law of libel. A man 
 curses, not the priest but the bishop who ordained him, not 
 you but any of your ancestors or relatives whom it occurs 
 to him to mention. 1 Courtesy requires the form of generosity 
 
 1 There are, however, certain oaths that are not lightly used, and 
 which are considered binding, such as the Half el Yamin el- 
 
 29
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 rather than of gratitude you must place all that you possess 
 at the disposal of your friend, but Arabic contains no word 
 for " Thank you." 
 
 Another of its humours is the coinage. It has practically 
 given up, as inconveniently small, the para, which was the 
 fortieth part of two pence ; but it retains the kabak, of the 
 size and weight of a crown piece and worth about a farthing 
 though marked at eight times that value, and formerly 
 worth about twopence halfpenny. 
 
 Everything is valued in piastres, but the coin exists 
 apparently mainly to be alluded to. When you do come 
 across it, it is worth a piastre and an eighth. There are 
 however, some two-piastre pieces worth two piastres and a 
 fourth, and locally known as " fleas," though not nearly so 
 numerous. 
 
 It is said that a Turkish pound was once worth only 100 
 piastres, now it is worth at the post-office 124 piastres, and 
 at the shops 136J, so that nothing is a measure of anything 
 else. In despair you fly to francs, and find that when you 
 pay in gold, your franc is worth nearly 5| piastres, but in 
 silver only 5 piastres. The commonest silver coin is a 
 medjidi, which is worth 23 piastres in the shops, or 20 at 
 the post or other Government offices, and is no proportional 
 part of a pound. The beshlik, the commonest " metal " 
 coin, for it is neither silver nor copper, is so called from the 
 Turkish words besh and lik " a piece of five "apparently 
 because it has no particular relation to that or any other 
 number, being worth 3 piastres in the shops and 2 at the 
 
 Arab, the faithful oath of the Arab, which is thus described by 
 a recent traveller : " Drawing a circle in the court where we 
 were reclining, he took a broken bit of a dry stem of grass between 
 his hands, and standing in the middle of the circle with great solem- 
 nity repeated the following, ' By the life of this stem and the Lord 
 the adored, and the line of Solomon the son of David, to him who 
 lies may none be born.' The circle, the unbroken line, symbolizes 
 truth, and the failure of posterity is the Oriental's most grievous 
 penalty." 
 
 30
 
 DOMESTICITIES IN JERUSALEM 
 
 post-office. The remaining common coin is a metalik, a 
 piece of tin rather smaller than a shilling and worth 12 paras. 
 Eight of them go to a beshlik, which is worth about 6d., 
 but they do not divide evenly into anything else. The 
 easiest common denominator is perhaps the humble para, 
 of which five make a kabak, 12 a metalik, 40 a piastre, 
 120 a beshlik, and 920 a medjidi. Only the Oriental could 
 have invented a coinage so inconsequent as this. Moreover, 
 when you have mastered the coinage and the weights and 
 measures of Jerusalem, you have to begin all over again 
 if you go anywhere else. Even in Bethlehem, eight miles 
 away, you must acquire a new set of names if not values. 
 
 The Holy City is not an expensive place to live in, for 
 although house-rent sounds about as dear as in any ordinary 
 English town, one has to remember that there are practically 
 no rates and the landlord pays the taxes. A house of ten 
 rooms with perhaps an acre of garden costs about 60 a 
 year, and one of six or seven with half an acre, about half 
 as much. Most houses have stabling, and the hall generally 
 serves as dining or drawing-room, as the case may be. They 
 are very well built, with the cupboards and recesses and 
 deep window-sills of a bygone period. 
 
 Labour is cheap. A good cook can be had at from twenty- 
 five to thirty francs a month, an indoor man-servant at 
 from thirty to thirty-five, a housemaid for a napoleon, a 
 boy for three or four medjidis, that is from twelve to sixteen 
 francs. 
 
 In Jerusalem the price of food varies greatly according 
 to season, and also according to the purchaser. You have 
 to pay for being a consul, or, if you are a woman, for wearing 
 a hat. Missionaries are not expected to pay lavishly, and 
 ladies living in pairs, as they always do, can keep a man 
 and a maid and a couple of donkeys, and save at least half 
 their professional income. It is fair to say, however, that 
 they have house-rent, medical attendance and passage 
 home on board ship free, eight or ten weeks' holiday in 
 
 31
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 the year, and six months every three years but then 
 every one cannot aspire to be a missionary ; and mere 
 doctors, and consuls, and clergy, have to work for their 
 living. 
 
 Meat is bought by the rottle, which is about six pounds, 
 mutton sometimes rises as high as seventeen piastres, though, 
 says my informant, "in June it fell to twelve piastres, when 
 the Greeks were fasting." A piastre being worth twopence 
 at the shops, we may take it that mutton varies from four- 
 pence to nearly fivepence halfpenny a pound. Lamb, early, 
 costs as much as eighteen piastres, or sixpence a pound ; 
 beef about fourpence, the fillet about sixpence. Partridges 
 are dear at eightpence each, and they are vastly superior 
 to their namesakes in England. A large turkey is worth 
 perhaps five shillings. Chickens cost a shilling or one and 
 twopence a pair, but it is best to buy them alive, and feed 
 them for two or three weeks. 
 
 Fruit is of course exceedingly cheap, as are also vegetables, 
 both being very varied, and of excellent quality. Fish, 
 heavily taxed when it is caught, is practically unattainable, 
 and milk is very dear in the summer months, but by an 
 arrangement with some of the convents one can get it at 
 about the English price fourpence a quart the year round. 
 Butter and cheese are very good when in season, but are 
 scarce during five or six months of the year. One can get 
 excellent white Bethlehem wine at half a franc a bottle, 
 and a sweet wine which has the effect of new port for less 
 than a shilling ; wholesale, of course, it is much cheaper. 
 Eggs in summer are about fourpence a dozen, though in the 
 season they rise to three for twopence. 
 
 Bread is about the same price as in England. Of course 
 no one eats cold meat, and all marketing is done daily in 
 the early morning ; ice, however, is attainable at very 
 moderate price. Foreign groceries and drugs are a little 
 dearer than in England. Leather and metal work are very 
 good, and shoes, made to measure at ten francs a pair, are 
 
 32
 
 DOMESTICITIES IN JERUSALEM 
 
 difficult to wear out, even on the Jerusalem roads, many of 
 which look as if a wall had been casually spilt upon them. 
 You can get a good riding-horse for five shillings, and a very 
 good victoria and pair for about sixteen shillings a day, and 
 for sixpence you can call in style upon any one within a 
 mile of Jerusalem. There are no omnibuses happily 
 but if you like to risk your company, that is to risk other 
 than human company, you can go in a carriage to Bethlehem 
 (for example), eight miles, also for sixpence. A porter will 
 carry anything anywhere for about five metaliks, or a little 
 over threepence. You may see one man carry a cottage 
 piano, or an iron girder, or a twenty-foot section of railway 
 line, though probably luggage of that sort commands a 
 special price. You tip with a franc, where in England you 
 would give half a crown, which is only in fair proportion to 
 wages ; and though your laundry costs you from two francs 
 to two and a half a dozen, it comes home snow-white, and 
 the price includes dresses and all the " white wear " essential 
 to the climate. If you wash at home, your laundry- woman, 
 often Russian or Armenian, costs about one and twopence 
 a day; but then skilled labour is dear, and you can get an 
 ordinary charwoman for about sixpence ! Furniture used 
 to be costly and scarce, but you can now get any design in 
 wood and metal-work copied at a very reasonable price in 
 the workshops of the Alliance Israelite. The less of carpets, 
 curtains, and general upholstery one has the better ; but 
 this is, naturally the happy hunting-ground for rugs, em- 
 broideries, and inlaid cabinet- ware. 
 
 Considering the advantages of climate, economy of living, 
 and convenience of access, entirely apart from other attrac- 
 tions and advantages even to those other than students and 
 artists, it is extraordinary that the number of English, 
 resident in Jerusalem from choice, may be counted on the 
 fingers of one hand. Among visitors even, their numbers 
 are many times multiplied by those of the Americans. On 
 account of its elevation the extremes of temperature are 
 
 33 D
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 much less perceptible than in other places in the same 
 latitude. To put the fact in familiar form, I have never 
 seen a candle " fainting " in the summer, and I have never 
 slept without a blanket ; on the other hand, in the course 
 of two winters, I have seldom worn an out-door wrap except 
 for driving. 
 
 The problem why people of small incomes, independent 
 of their surroundings, continue to struggle along in England 
 and America, becomes more perplexing as the struggle 
 becomes more difficult. Perhaps one solution is that 
 others may struggle the less, elsewhere. 
 
 34
 
 CHAPTER III 
 "CRANKS" IN JERUSALEM 
 
 INDIVIDUAL ECCENTRICITIES SPITTLER OP BASEL THE 
 MILLERITES AMEN-ITES CHURCH OF THE MESSIAH- 
 AWAITING THE ANTI-CHRIST THE OVERCOMERS 
 
 IT is a recognized fact that a large proportion of insanity 
 takes the form of religious mania, and as Jerusalem, 
 more even than Rome herself, is the gathering-place of 
 creeds, the holy place alike of Christian, Jew and Moslem, 
 nay more, as she unites the still wider disparities of sect and 
 sect, it is hardly surprising that all the more striking eccen- 
 tricities of Christianity seem to have been, at some time or 
 other, represented within her walls, from the self-tortured 
 ascetics of the earliest Christian centuries, down to the 
 latest extravagances fresh from America. 
 
 On the north of the Holy City is the settlement of the 
 American Colony, commonly known from their founder 
 as Spaffordites, on the south that of the Templars or 
 Hofmannites, both societies admirable for their order 
 and their industry, if somewhat erratic in theological 
 opinions. On the west we have the immense ruin of the 
 unfinished building in which, half a century ago, some 
 wealthy lady, apparently Dutch (although variously re- 
 ported as English, Belgian and German) proposed to house 
 the hundred and forty and four thousand who had been 
 sealed in the middle of their foreheads ; a scheme arrested 
 
 35
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 by the Government on the ground of the danger to society 
 involved in so large a gathering of Jews. 1 
 
 To the east, we have the mount of Olives, geographically 
 the rallying-place of an extraordinary variety of enthusiasts, 
 including a worthy Englishwoman who is alleged (probably 
 with some exaggeration) to be in constant readiness to 
 welcome Our Lord's return thither with a cup of tea. We 
 have Adventists and Lydites, and Seventh Day Baptists, and 
 Mormons, and votaries of Christian Science. We have had 
 a penitent Englishman who did penance for his sins by beat- 
 ing his wife because it was the punishment which caused 
 him the most pain. We have a worthy Englishwoman 
 who at over fifty years of age converted a modest competence 
 into portable property, and wandered out to Jerusalem 
 alone, with fifty-six pounds of luggage and one hundred 
 and fifty pounds of money, upon which, with the kindly help 
 of foreigners of another creed, she has lived for over twenty- 
 five years, convinced of the justice of her undertaking by 
 the fact that she had travelling companions whose relation 
 to each other permitted her to suppose her journey a fulfil- 
 ment of Jeremiah iii. 14 : "I will take you one of a city, 
 and two of a family, and I will bring you to Zion." 
 
 We have had a well-intentioned pilgrim who, deciding some- 
 what hastily that her turn of mind was ascetic, presented 
 herself at a strictly enclosed convent, entreating to be 
 accepted as a novice, and insisting (immediately upon 
 gaining admission, in spite of all representations as to the 
 length of novitiate required) on cutting off her hair. Having 
 discovered, however, in a few days, that she had no vocation, 
 she was next observed at the door of the hospice, where 
 her fellow-pilgrims had been received, imploring the advice 
 of some young theological students as to where in Jerusalem 
 she could get a wig a situation that probably afforded 
 them considerable amusement. 
 
 1 It is moreover alleged that she gave additional offence to the 
 Turkish government by raising a regiment of Servian revolutionaries. 
 
 36
 
 CRANKS" IN JERUSALEM 
 
 We have had a lady who, partly as a propagandist of 
 rational dress, partly in the interests of self-sacrificing 
 economy, wore skirts so exceedingly narrow that when she 
 fell down the church steps she was unable to recover her 
 feet ; and another (or perhaps the same) who provided 
 herself with inexpensive millinery by trimming her hat with 
 a cotton pocket handkerchief on which was printed an 
 Arabic love-song, of a nature so erotic as to afford consider- 
 able entertainment to the native element in the congregation 
 at Church. We have had a German who on principle left 
 his hair and beard to nature and dressed in a single and 
 scanty garment, but whose natural beauty and good 
 grooming decidedly commended his teaching, subject to 
 the state of the thermometer. We have had an Eng- 
 lishman who reduced his wardrobe to a Norfolk jacket 
 and knickerbockers, with results aesthetically less at- 
 tractive. We have a colony profanely known as the 
 Tishbites English and American presided over by " the 
 prophet Elijah." Scarcely a year goes by without the 
 arrival of some one who dares to assume a personality still 
 more sacred. Every greater festival is attended by various 
 strange-looking figures ; pious men who for the rest of the 
 year pass an eremitic existence in dens and caves of the 
 earth. We have defroques priests and declassees nuns, 
 generally leading truly penitent and devout lives, often 
 after some quaint and ascetic fashion. We have numberless 
 women of whom it is generally whispered that they have a 
 " past," and who, as the French untranslateably express it, 
 courent les eglises. We have irresponsible philanthropists 
 and " independent " missionaries, we have those to whom 
 obscure rites have been miraculously revealed, and votaries 
 of " Gordon's Calvary." We have a good many persons 
 of whom it may be conjectured that their nearest and dearest 
 long ago " wished them at Jericho," and who in the endea- 
 vour to oblige have stopped a few miles short on the way. 
 In fine, as a resident expressed the situation, at a time 
 
 37
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 when there was a talk of erecting an asylum for imbeciles, 
 we should not be altogether in the wrong " if we took down 
 the walls of Jerusalem, and built them up again, so as to 
 include the suburbs." 
 
 The Anglo-Israelite crank is of course one of the common 
 objects of Jerusalem life, and is of various degrees of 
 sincerity and reasonableness. His raison d'etre ranges 
 from pure ignorance and assertiveness up to the complex 
 eccentricities of a certain Doctor Sivartha, who by dint of 
 complicating the historical question by those of phrenology, 
 physiology, and astrology, succeeded in rendering the 
 so-called study a very serious affair. He was in Jerusalem 
 about 1878 and among the older inhabitants are some still 
 in possession of elaborate maps or charts showing that the 
 missing Ten Tribes consist of Norse, Saxons and Fellahs to 
 the number of fifty-one millions, while the Jews, recognized 
 as such, amount to only about a sixth of that number. 
 He produced, moreover, a plan of Salema, the New Jeru- 
 salem, showing the return of the missing tribes and assigning 
 to them their proper places in the Holy City according to 
 their relation (ascertained from Ezek. xlviii. and Rev. xxi. ) 
 with the mental faculties, of which, he observes, institutions 
 are but an outgrowth. Hence, to put it briefly, the various 
 departments of the New Jerusalem will be distributed in 
 accordance with human faculty as exhibited by phrenology ; 
 Asher, for example as Science over the eyes, Naphtali and 
 Judah above as Culture and Marriage, and Gad and Simeon 
 below as Art and Letters. 
 
 Though the effective colonization of the Holy Land mainly 
 by the Jews and the Germans becomes every day more 
 obvious and more definite, it was, like many other schemes 
 destined to ultimate success, for a long time in the hands of 
 a class very familiar to the student of Jerusalem, and who 
 can best be described as " cranks." Of some of these an 
 excellent account has been given by the Rev. J. E. Hanauer 
 (P.E.F. 1900), the first on his list being Spittler of Basel, 
 
 38
 
 "CRANKS" IN JERUSALEM 
 
 who proposed to establish lines of mission-stations radiating 
 from Jerusalem as a centre, the first of which was to consist 
 of twelve, leading in the direction of Central Africa, and 
 called after the twelve Apostles. The scheme began and 
 ended with the importation into Jerusalem, about 1847, 
 of four mechanics, who, after a time, found they had no 
 vocation for celibacy and other conditions of the mission, 
 and who all returned to secular life. In this they apparently 
 showed good judgment, as all four have been eminently 
 successful, each in his special career : Dr. Schick as the 
 greatest authority on underground Jerusalem, Palmer as 
 a highly respected teacher, the Rev. S. Miiller as the founder 
 of a German Mission at Bethlehem, while the fourth was, 
 perhaps, the pioneer of agricultural colonists. This was 
 Baldensperger, who proceeded to cultivate gardens at 
 Urtas which may be said to have led indirectly to the 
 existence of the Agricultural and Trades School, known as 
 Schneller's Syrian Orphanage, and (under his son) to the 
 establishment of the interesting apiaries at Wady Hanein, 
 Jaffa and elsewhere, a highly successful effort to produce 
 the honey hitherto almost unknown in the Holy Land, and 
 which is accomplished by moving the hives on the backs of 
 camels from one place to another, in search of this or that 
 form of pasture requisite for the bees. 
 
 A more eccentric scheme was that of a certain Mrs. 
 Minor, the wife of a rich Philadelphian merchant, who was 
 a disciple of the Millerites, a body of Methodists and Bap- 
 tists, who expected the second Advent on October 25, 1843. 
 When the day passed with no distinguishing features, they 
 discovered that the date should have been reckoned by 
 Jewish, not by Roman time, and that the catastrophe would 
 occur on October 25, 1844, at about 3 p.m. When this 
 day in turn approached, the whole party bid farewell to the 
 Sodomites of Philadelphia and went into camp at a little 
 distance, one, it is said, having left a notice on the shutters 
 of his shop : " Closed in honour of the King of kings." 
 
 39
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 Again the day passed and the trump of doom failed to 
 sound, but instead there came a high wind which blew 
 down the tents and obliged the Millerites to seek shelter in 
 the Sodom they had left " for ever." Then the prophetess 
 took to fasting, prayer, and the investigation of prophecy, 
 which led to the discovery that she was, in fact, Esther, 
 who " must go before the King and become God's instru- 
 ment to make ready the land of Israel for the King's return." 
 
 An Advent-brother shared the conviction (it is said with 
 no objection from Mr. Minor or the Advent-brother's wife), 
 and together they proceeded to Jerusalem, where, after 
 many vicissitudes, they arrived on May 15, 1849. There 
 they made the acquaintance of a certain Mr. Meshullam, 
 a Hebrew Christian, at whose hotel in Jerusalem they had 
 established themselves, and who owned some lands and 
 gardens in the direction of Bethlehem which it was revealed 
 to the prophetess she was destined to develop. What 
 became of the Advent-brother, history does not relate, but, 
 clear at last as to the intentions of Providence, Mrs. Minor 
 hastened back to the United States, whence she returned 
 widowed, but re-inforced by a large body of Millerites, 
 Presbyterians and Seventh Day Baptists, and a considerable 
 sum of money. Even Jews were attracted by the Seventh 
 Day observance of Sunday, and Sir Moses Montefiore himself 
 endorsed the scheme. But nothing could prevail against 
 the internal dissensions which soon arose. The colonists 
 did not approve of Mr. Meshullam, some even have gone 
 so far as to doubt his disinterestedness, and at the end of 
 a couple of years the community dissolved. Again there 
 was a residuum of good. Sir Moses Montefiore came to 
 the rescue and established some of the malcontents in an 
 orange-garden in the plain of Sharon, the seed of the move- 
 ment long afterwards known as " Zionism," for soon after 
 Mrs. Minor's death, in 1855, the American and German 
 element died out and the Jewish alone ultimately survived. 
 
 Another set, this time from Germany, calling themselves 
 
 40
 
 "CRANKS" IN JERUSALEM 
 
 the " Amen-ites " because they believed that prophecy 
 was about to receive the seal of Amen or fulfilment, arrived 
 about 1858. Their leader, however, never returned from 
 an expedition made to discover the Ark of the Covenant, 
 and the movement died a natural death. 
 
 The " Church of the Messiah," to the number of one 
 hundred and fifty three, appeared upon the scenes in 1866. 
 It was composed largely of Americans, including some 
 surviving Millerites, Latter Day Saints, Wesleyans and 
 others whose object was to " build up the waste cities," 
 and who, accordingly, began operations by erecting some 
 wooden houses brought with them from America. They 
 met with many discouragements from a fearful rate of 
 mortality and destruction of crops ; but again the little 
 venture served an unforeseen purpose, and their land passed 
 ultimately into the hands of the Templars, a colony of 
 Germans whose industry and admirable organization has 
 met with extraordinary success both in commerce and agri- 
 culture, and whose village south of Jerusalem is in itself a 
 valuable object-lesson, not only to the natives of the country 
 but, still more, to many would-be but ineffective European 
 philanthropists. The colony in Jerusalem was founded 
 in 1871, the sister colony in Jaffa in 1868. A third is now 
 being formed in the neighbourhood of Ramleh. 
 
 In 1885 there arrived a party of Saxons under the guidance 
 of a miner who had received information from the Evil One 
 as to the immediate incarnation of the Anti-Christ, whom 
 they were directed to await in Jerusalem. Unfortunately 
 for their finances he tarried, and the party was soon reduced 
 to extreme poverty, whence they were rescued, as many in 
 need have been rescued, by the kindness and benevolence 
 of the American Colony, who are also credited with various 
 deviations from orthodoxy, religious and social, but of whom 
 little seems known with certainty, but that they are indus- 
 trious, orderly, beneficent and extraordinarily successful 
 in all that they undertake baking, confectionery, weaving, 
 
 41
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 photography and much else, including the management of 
 a large government school for Moslem girls, the only 
 one, as far as I can learn, which has ever been confided to 
 the care of Christians. 
 
 Owing to the general, though surely not inevitable, aliena- 
 tion caused by differences of creed, nationality and language, 
 to the absence of newspapers and the consequent dependence 
 upon gossip for information, there are probably few European 
 settlements where facts are liable in a certain section of 
 the community to distortion so gross as in Jerusalem, 
 where the unknown is commonly taken, not for the sublime 
 but for the discreditable. For this reason in speaking of 
 the American Colony of Overcomers, I withhold all references 
 to the unpleasant accretions of scandal which have gathered 
 about them, mainly, I am bound to say, among the English- 
 speaking population of the Holy City, for within then- 
 hospitable walls I have met representatives of all that 
 makes " Society " among the continental inhabitants of 
 Jerusalem. The little I am able to relate concerning them 
 is at least at first hand. 
 
 About the year 1879, Mrs. Spafford, an American lady 
 on her way to Europe for the education of her children, 
 saw her entire family drowned before her eyes. She tele- 
 graphed to her husband the pathetic message, " Saved 
 alone," and returned at once to her desolate home. A 
 woman of sensitive, restrained nature, not without a dash 
 of genius, and of a naturally religious temperament, the 
 tragedy made an ineffaceable impression upon her very soul. 
 She believed that God, in His infinite wisdom, had spared 
 her life because He had work for her to do, and from that 
 time forward she, her husband, and a small group of friends 
 devoted their lives and substance to the poor of Chicago. 
 After a time, however, this work seemed to her an insufficient 
 expenditure of her zeal; she believed that yet more was 
 required of her, with the result that in 1881, with a small 
 following, now including two little daughters, the Spaffords 
 
 42
 
 "CRANKS" IN JERUSALEM 
 
 arrived in Jerusalem giving themselves to work and 
 prayer, living theoretically in a Theocratic Communism, 
 knowing no Head but Christ, and no Law but the Law of 
 Love. 
 
 As the community enlarged, it assumed certain new 
 features. They necessarily increased their premises, and 
 to meet their added requirements engaged in various trades 
 and occupations with a degree of success to which I have 
 already, more than once, referred. They soon became 
 known as " the Overcomers " from the motto which they 
 assumed, " This is the victory that overcometh the world, 
 even our faith," their own designation of " The American 
 Colony " having become somewhat inexact, owing to the 
 large proportion of admixture of other nations, mainly 
 Swedes but including also some English and at least one 
 Scot, and one Hebrew-Christian, the Jerusalem name for a 
 " converted Jew." 1 
 
 Theoretically their scheme of life is one to admire ; 
 industrious, philanthropic, effective. Practically one can- 
 not but note certain extravagances liable to introduce 
 an element of danger. Their system may be not inaptly 
 described as a parody of monasticism. Their working 
 principles are practically those of poverty, chastity and 
 obedience, of holy simplicity and holy humility, although 
 they would themselves not so express it. The condition 
 of poverty is that of a common purse from which each is 
 free to take what he or she desires, desire however being 
 limited by the principle that all wishes for earthly advantage 
 must be overcome, again a kind of parody on the Catholic 
 doctrine of detachment. 
 
 The condition of chastity is not in itself an end, but again 
 an opportunity to overcome. Love is of God, they say, 
 and like the Love of God must embrace all His creatures, and 
 that equally. Husband and wife, parent and child, friends, 
 
 1 I believe their present numbers to be approximately fifty-five 
 Swedes, thirty-eight Americans, and twenty of various nationalities 
 
 43
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 compatriots, must not look upon each other as nearer or 
 dearer than other fellow-beings, and therefore, until the 
 desire for intimate relation is overcome, such relation is of 
 the nature of sin. The position strikes one as being analo- 
 gous with that of the man who proposed in Lent to conceive 
 a desire for self-mortification and to proceed to mortify 
 that desire. Marriage under such conditions is regarded as 
 at present impossible, although as they progress towards 
 perfection (and, presumably, no longer desire it) it may 
 conceivably be permitted. 
 
 The condition of obedience, except to God Himself, is 
 one they definitely deny ; but as each must submit his will 
 to that of his neighbour it follows that the will of the last 
 of the series must be supreme, and unless appearances and 
 probabilities are very misleading, the will in question is 
 that of Mrs. Spafford herself, who is said to exercise an 
 influence by some regarded as hypnotic. 
 
 The conditions of humility and simplicity are involved 
 in those of a communal life without regard to previous 
 social environment, and in common labour for the common 
 weal. Naturally, however, the nature of the work is, as 
 in conventual institutions, apportioned with some reference 
 to individual fitness, the better educated occupying 
 themselves with educational work, those originally of the 
 working classes largely the Swedes performing the more 
 menial duties ; those who understand commerce attending 
 to the shop, those who have had manual training working 
 as carpenters, tailors, dressmakers, farmers, and so on, as 
 the case may be. 
 
 The degree of influence which they exercise over the 
 native population of Jerusalem is, in contrast with that of 
 other institutions, astonishing. It is probably not too 
 much to say that among those who frequent the colony 
 for instruction in language, music, painting and various 
 industries, there are representatives of every creed and 
 every nation in this modern Babel of Jerusalem. With 
 
 44
 
 "CRANKS" IN JERUSALEM 
 
 the exception of the Soeurs de Charite, to whom the Munici- 
 pality entrusts its hospital, its lepers and the visitation of 
 those who are sick and in prison, they alone, of all Christians, 
 have won the confidence and friendship of the Moslems, 
 who not only employ them professionally as managers of their 
 Public School, but who, of all classes including the Pasha 
 himself, as well as the effendis and officers in the army, 
 allow the ladies and children of their establishments to 
 visit them freely, an intercourse which, from the point of 
 view of culture and of arts and letters, cannot fail to exercise 
 excellent effect. 
 
 It is in connexion with their success in this direction, 
 as well as with the exceptional conditions of the mutual 
 relations of the sexes within their walls, that their detrac- 
 tors have mainly concerned themselves, without, however, 
 so far as, after diligent inquiry, I and others have hitherto 
 discovered, producing any first-hand evidence of their 
 allegations. It is impossible, however, to deny that those 
 who desire occasion for the overcoming of temptation in 
 more than one obvious direction must have abundant op- 
 portunity for its exercise, or that to those who, under the 
 circumstances, rise superior to the temptations of jealousy, 
 heart-burning, disappointment, humiliation and rivalry 
 which their daily life must abundantly provide, we may 
 justly attribute a degree of merit which should excite our 
 warmest admiration ; and this the more that they are with- 
 out all supernatural help beyond that of the Light that 
 lighteth every man that cometh into the world. They 
 confess their sins, in public gatherings, one to another, 
 but have no priestly absolution ; they have no sacraments, 
 holding that in their daily relations in the law of love 
 every meal becomes a Eucharistic feast. If on the one 
 hand there is no evidence of social irregularity, if we 
 are free to extol gratefully their liberality, temperance, 
 charity, brotherly love and diligence, it were, on the 
 other, vain to deny what to the Catholic must appear 
 
 45
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 heresy both Arian and Gnostic, and a recklessness of 
 danger which, to most of us, must seem a daily defiance 
 of the prayer, " Lead us not into temptation, but deliver 
 us from evil." 
 
 46
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 GOVERNMENT IN JERUSALEM 
 
 ADVANTAGES OF TURKISH RULE POSITION OF EUROPEANS 
 MACHINERY OF GOVERNMENT TURKISH LAW 
 MOSLEMS JEWS SANITATION PRISONS 
 
 ABUSE of the " unspeakable Turk " is as much a recog- 
 nized conventionality as abuse of the weather, and 
 often with about as much understanding of the needs and 
 position in question a position which many would do well 
 to study in Jerusalem, asking themselves seriously and in- 
 telligently what would be best for the Holy City, if, as seems 
 highly improbable, the " sick man " were to die. 
 
 Is there any European power which, for the non-Moslem 
 population, would, to put it mildly, keep the peace among 
 conflicting religions, as, owing to its indifferent attitude, 
 the Turkish Government contrives more or less to do ? 
 Would a ruler of the Greek faith continue to the Latins the 
 unique privileges of then: position in Palestine ? Would 
 the followers of His Holiness tolerate the Greeks ? Would 
 either endure the Protestant ? Would the Protestants be 
 certain to " play fair " ? How would any Christian Power 
 regard the ever-increasing importance of the Jews ? Would 
 the Jews themselves continue existing privileges to the 
 Christians ? How much individuality, nationality, would 
 any or all of these leave to the indigenous race of the coun- 
 try, compared with whom the Arab is a mere mushroom, 
 and the Hebrew himself a parvenu ? 
 
 47
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 " Strange as it may sound in European ears," writes one 
 who for nearly twenty years was British Consul for Jerusa- 
 lem and Palestine, 1 "it is nevertheless true that the laws 
 under which Palestine and Turkey are governed are, in 
 themselves, excellent. They are based upon the principles 
 of Justice and Humanity justice for true believers more 
 particularly humanity for all. . . . With all their incom- 
 pleteness it must be said that the regulations from Constanti- 
 nople are a blessing to the inhabitants. They are far better 
 now than the original laws of the Twelve Tables were to the 
 Romans ; yet the Romans are regarded as the great nation 
 of antiquity characterized by the practice of jurisprudence." 
 Nevertheless " it is better to be governed by a good man than 
 by good laws," said the Greek philosopher, a reflection which 
 is often in one's mind in this Holy City of Jerusalem ! 
 
 It is at least something to feel confidence in the system 
 if not in its administration. The existence of a worthy 
 ideal leaves room for ultimate hope which could scarcely be 
 ours were the case reversed ; and we are at least left free to 
 dream of a time when baksheesh, the key-note of the lament 
 of Turkish provinces, shall be no more. 2 
 
 1 See Stirring Times, or Records from Jerusalem Consular Chronicles 
 of 1853 to 1856, by James Finn. The sphere of the Jerusalem 
 consul is now considerably diminished. In the stirring times which 
 preceded the Crimean war it was a position which counted for 
 something in European politics. 
 
 2 The Englishman who grumbles, often justly enough, at the 
 occasional payment of baksheesh to the officers of the Municipality 
 in Jerusalem, should, however, remember not only that he is exempt 
 from military service and from payment of rates and taxes, but that 
 in London, in this year of grace, we are paying an Income tax 
 of Is. 3d. and a School Board rate of over Is. 2d. in the pound. He 
 may, moreover, regard " baksheesh " as the Turkish equivalent for 
 various imposts not exacted in the Turkish dominions ; licences for 
 armorial bearings, carriages (hackney carriages only are taxed by 
 the Municipality), game, stamps on documents and receipts, succes- 
 sion-duties, liveries, plate, bonds, patent medicines, dogs, gun 
 licences, etc., etc. The taxes to which the resident in Turkey is 
 subject are briefly enumerated. Rates there are none. Taxes, 
 
 48
 
 GOVERNMENT IN JERUSALEM 
 
 Meantime, to the minute philosopher, there are institu- 
 tions in Jerusalem more degrading to humanity than the 
 Turkish Government, acquisition and expenditure of bak- 
 sheesh more dishonest, bigotry and fanaticism more un- 
 charitable, because, from a Christian standpoint, in defiance 
 of a higher culture, and in the name of a nobler creed. 
 
 The European has indeed little cause for complaint. What 
 should we say in England if Turkish subjects who had oc- 
 casion of dispute or who had offended against the law of the 
 realm declined to refer the matter to the nearest magistrate, 
 to accept judgment from British authority, and insisted 
 on taking the case before their own representative in Bryan- 
 ston Square ? 
 
 Yet permission for such procedure and not fine or im- 
 prisonment for contempt of court is granted to us by Tur- 
 kish courtesy in the Holy Land. Europeans refer all ques- 
 tions of law to their respective consuls ; a dispute between 
 two Englishmen would be tried before the British Consul, 
 between an Englishman and a German before the consul of 
 the plaintiff, the interests of the defendant being watched 
 over by the dragoman of his own Consulate, who, if not the 
 lawyer one would wish for under the circumstances, would 
 at least (except in the case of an Englishman or American) 
 be of his own nationality. If between an Englishman and 
 a Moslem, it would be tried by the Turkish authorities, 
 the consul having the right to watch the case, cross-examine 
 witnesses, and secure for his protege the full benefit of the 
 
 within the City of Jerusalem, none. Outside, on house and land 
 property, less than one per cent., always paid by the landlord. Cer- 
 tain lands, not so taxed, pay a tithe on production, or on what they 
 carry ; for sheep and goats about 1\d. per head ; on beasts of burden 
 nothing, except when sold, when 5d. per head is charged on camels, 
 asses, oxen, and horses. Succession-duty is about Id in the shilling. 
 Exoneration from military service about 8s. per annum. Duty on 
 imports 8 per cent., on exports 10 per cent. Licences are required 
 to let carriages, and to sell stamps, tobacco and spirits. Here at 
 \east there is small cause for complaint !. 
 
 49, a
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 Moslem law. The exercise of such judicial functions, on the 
 part of the consul, is, of course, unknown in any Christian 
 country ; it is only in Turkey, China, and Morocco that 
 foreigners have the right of being governed by their own 
 laws, with which, let us suppose, for sake of argument, that 
 their consuls are acquainted. 
 
 The machinery of the Turkish Government in Jerusalem 
 is controlled, primarily, by the Pasha, who is appointed from 
 Constantinople. He is assisted by a municipal Council 
 (Majless), composed of five or six Moslems, a Latin, a Greek, 
 an Armenian and a Jew ; thus representing, in very fair 
 proportions, all of the Sultan's subjects except the Protes- 
 tants, which, numerically, are indeed a quantity which may 
 safely be neglected, though one would have supposed that 
 the two Protestant powers, England and Germany, would 
 have sought representation for those of their own religion, 
 England as having the oldest-established European Consu- 
 late, 1 Germany on account of her importance in Syria in 
 commerce, agriculture, and navigation. 
 
 The Government has in Jerusalem officers corresponding, 
 among others, with our Secretary of State (Directeur des 
 Correspondences) ; Charity Commissioners (Comptable des 
 Legs-pies) ; Minister of Education (Directeur de Vinstruc- 
 tion publique) ; Registrar- General (Directeur du Registre 
 Imperial) ; Minister of Finance (Caissier) ; Minister of 
 Agriculture (Chef-succursal d* Agriculture), and in some de- 
 gree of Lord Chancellor (Directeur de la caisse des orphelins). 
 The Municipality has also its medical and veterinary de- 
 partments, its hospital and dispensary, and, of course, its 
 police, of which the discipline, on public occasions, is ad- 
 mirable, though the custom among the night-watchmen 
 of sounding a whistle as signal to each other, is little less 
 preposterous than were the noisy boots, until very few years 
 
 1 The English Consulate was established in 1838, the Prussian 
 in 1841 ; France and Sardinia came in 1843. 
 
 50
 
 GOVERNMENT IN JERUSALEM 
 
 ago, worn by the town police of Great Britain. The new 
 comer in Jerusalem is sometimes surprised by the scanty 
 number of police-officers, until further knowledge of the 
 country reveals to him the fact that, owing to the practically 
 entire absence of public drunkenness and public immorality, 
 to the almost entire impossibility, within the walls, of vehi- 
 cular traffic, and to the minimized danger from fire where 
 wood is barely used in construction, their services are but 
 little needed. Soldiers and tax-officers are to be found at/ 
 every gate of the city, and those bringing in goods are liable 
 to payment of various tolls. 
 
 The law of the Turkish courts is technically the law of the 
 Koran, but, as Lord Stratford de Redcliffe has pointed out, 
 " The Koran is far from being that inelastic code of laws 
 which many suppose. It has long ceased to be an exact 
 mirror of Islamism as practised by the Ottoman authorities." 
 It appears, however, that the principles of the Koran and its 
 commentaries are those which direct the advice and opinions 
 of the Mufti, who is something between an archbishop and a 
 consulting barrister, who, learned in the sacred books, 
 presides in a sort of Court of Arches, and deals out abstract 
 justice to John Doe and Richard Roe, or, as they are called 
 in the East, Zaid and Omar. As only fictitious cases are 
 brought before him, he cannot exact payment on results 
 like the Kadi, a judge of a more practical kind, and is there- 
 fore less likely to be affected by interest, prejudice, or bak- 
 sheesh. The Kadi presides over the Mahkameh, or Court of 
 Civil Law, and receives three per cent, on the value of the 
 suit, paid by the one in whose favour the judgment is given. 
 
 Trial by jury is unknown, but many cases are brought 
 before the Majless, an assembly usually of ten or twelve, who 
 decide in conformity with the code of Secular Jurisprudence, 
 as distinguished from the Koran. 
 
 Jerusalem is defended by a garrison averaging from one 
 thousand to fifteen hundred men, military service being 
 compulsory, as in most European countries ; Jews and 
 
 51
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 Christians who are Turkish subjects pay a commutation 
 poll-tax of less than eight shillings per head. 
 
 It is in many respects upon the Moslem population that 
 the Turkish yoke presses most heavily. Their position is 
 somewhat anomalous. On the one hand the Supreme Head 
 of the State de facto or de jure is the successor of the Prophet 
 and the Caliph vice-regent of God and to obey him is a 
 religious duty. On the other, to the Syrians, the Turk is, 
 equally with the Arab or the Hebrew, an alien, a perpetual 
 reminder that they are a conquered race ; while to the Arab 
 he is the descendant of the Tartar conquerors of Arabistan, 
 the representative of the modern reform which is a perplexity 
 to their faith a departure from the pure Moslemism of the 
 Koran. 
 
 The Jew, like the European under consular protection, has 
 his special privileges. The Chief Rabbi ranks next to the 
 Pasha, and is always presented with a key of the city gates 
 when a new Sultan comes to the throne. The key is associ- 
 ated with a religious ceremonial, and is blessed and anointed 
 with oil and spices. Accounts differ as to whether its pos- 
 session is permanent, but it would seem unlikely, otherwise 
 why should the presentation be renewed ? As large bak- 
 sheesh is paid for what seems, if temporary only, a useless 
 privilege, one must conclude that there is for the Jews 
 some esoteric signification, some allusion to the repossession 
 of the city of their forefathers ; some prophetic gratification, 
 in the process of its return, of, as it were, bestowing it upon 
 the Turkish authorities ; some symbolic satisfaction in 
 being, if only for the moment, in virtual command of the 
 situation. One cannot but feel glad that they should find 
 consolation in so small and temporary a distinction ; for 
 even now, in, comparatively speaking, the days of their 
 prosperity, when Jerusalem, as a city, is in many respects 
 so much benefited by their presence, they have many 
 inevitable humiliations. Jewish children, girls especially, 
 have to be protected mainly from other children, Christian 
 
 52
 
 GOVERNMENT IN JERUSALEM 
 
 and Moslem, on the way to and from school ; one frequently 
 wonders at the patience the heritage of centuries with 
 which Jews ignore the insults shouted after them in the 
 streets ; and, considering how much they contribute as 
 citizens to the welfare of Jerusalem, it is sad that large sums 
 of money should be paid for permission to pray beside the 
 western wall of the Temple enclosure, to the villagers of 
 Siloam for not disturbing the graves east of the village, and 
 to the Arabs for letting alone the Jewish share of the Tomb 
 of Rachel on the road to Bethlehem. 
 
 The Chief Rabbi is, moreover, the supreme judge of the 
 Beth Been, their " House of Judgment," in which disputes 
 between Jews are decided and wrongs redressed. For all 
 questions, other than those which can be referred to a re- 
 ligious tribunal, the Jew, as a European, must refer to the 
 consul of the country to which he belongs, who will decide 
 his quarrel if with one of his own nationality, or watch 
 his case in the Serai if his dispute be with a Moslem. 
 
 The municipal authorities are intermittently active in 
 matters of sanitation. It is an immense advantage to 
 Jerusalem that, with the exception of what amounts to 
 half a dozen scullery taps supplied from what are called 
 the Pools of Solomon, alleged to be much older than that 
 monarch, the city has no common water-supply, so that 
 general contamination from infected sources is practically 
 impossible. Each institution, group of houses, in the better 
 parts each house, provides for its own collection of rain- 
 water there is no other, and one has to live in Palestine to 
 appreciate the constant Bible references to cisterns, to the 
 blindness of the people " who hewed them out cisterns, 
 broken cisterns, that can hold no water ! " Probably it 
 was largely to the nature of her water-supply and to her 
 elevated position (from 2,500 to 3,000 feet above sea-level) 
 that the city owed her immunity from cholera in 1902-3, 
 when many villages around were suffering, and extraneous 
 cases were even brought into the town. But it is only fair 
 
 53
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 to record the activity of the town council ; the beggars were 
 returned to their own villages, houses were compulsorily 
 cleaned and whitewashed, fines for accumulation of decay- 
 ing matter inflicted, and the streets sprayed with a dilution 
 of carbolic acid. The Moslem public schools were closed, 
 an example promptly followed by the C.M.S, although the 
 schools of the L.J.S., the Anglican schools of St. George's, 
 and those of the Jews, Greeks, Latins, Armenians and Ger- 
 mans kept open doors with no ill effects, and with, in many 
 cases, large additions to their numbers, as parents were 
 naturally thankful to have their children removed from the 
 risks, mental and physical, of over six months' idleness, and 
 the dangers of street life. The efforts of the Government 
 were ably seconded in certain directions. The Jews and 
 some of the continental consuls issued sanitary directions to 
 every householder with whom they were concerned ; and 
 some, especially the Jews and the Russians (for orderliness 
 and sanitation Russia has no rival in Jerusalem), made ad- 
 mirable preparations for their own people so as to be ready 
 to deal with the enemy at a moment's notice. 
 
 There is one Government institution in Jerusalem which 
 it would be easy, rather perhaps than fair, to condemn as an 
 almost unmixed evil, and that is the prison, which, however, 
 it is alleged, is under consideration with a view to funda- 
 mental changes. The prisoners are so unsuitably housed, 
 their condition is so insanitary, their classification, or rather 
 their aggregation, so disorderly, they are subject to so much 
 extortion, they are so dependent upon the alms of the 
 benevolent or the support of their friends, that one is 
 forcibly reminded of our own Fleet or Marshalsea, as depicted 
 by Dickens or Besant, although those of Jerusalem are, 
 happily, owing to abundance of outer air, and the seclusion 
 of women, less of a disgrace to civilization than those of 
 our own country, as described by John Howard or 
 Elizabeth Fry. 
 
 54
 
 CHAPTER V 
 JEWS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 POPULATION DISTRIBUTION RACIAL DIVISIONS DIS- 
 TINCTIVE CHARACTERISTICS IRRATIONAL ALMSGIVING 
 SCHOOLS OCCUPATIONS OLD CUSTOMS STILL EX- 
 TANT SOPHISTRIES AND [QUIBBLES ALLIANCE 
 ISRAELITE ITS EXCELLENT WORK MISSION WORK 
 AND RESULTS VIEWS OF ZANGWILL CHARITABLE 
 INSTITUTIONS, ENGLISH AND JEWISH ABRAHAM'S 
 VINEYARD RELATIONS WITH JERUSALEM PROGRESS 
 OF RE-PATRIATION 
 
 THIS chapter aims at no criticism of Zionism or other 
 movement on behalf of the Jews of Palestine ; it is 
 not inspired by teachings of Hertzl or Nordau on the one 
 hand, or of Reich or Zangwill on the other. It is perhaps 
 even fair to say that it proceeds less from any personal ad- 
 miration or affection for the people with whom it deals than 
 from respect for their genius, sympathy with their sufferings, 
 and appreciation of their achievements. 
 
 We are so accustomed to think of the modern Jew as a 
 recent immigrant to Palestine that it is somewhat surprising 
 to find that Jerusalem is virtually a Jewish city. Out of 
 about 60,000 inhabitants some 40,000 are Jews; a large part 
 of the trade of the town is in their hands ; not only have 
 they overflowed in all directions their own quarter within 
 the walls, but they have established themselves in various 
 colonies, amounting to some half-dozen villages all within a 
 mile or so from the city gates. The Jewish population is said 
 to have increased tenfold or more in sixty years. From 
 
 55
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 the religious point of view it includes the Orthodox or 
 Rabbinists, who are far the most numerous, the Chasidim 
 or Cabalists, and the Karaites, a very small body who 
 study the Scriptures only. From the national point of 
 view they may be divided roughly into ( 1 ) Ashkenazim, who 
 speak mainly Yiddish, a jargon composed of German and 
 Hebrew, and who are mostly Germans, Poles, Russians and 
 Roumanians ; and (2) Sephardim, who speak mainly Spanish, 
 and who come from the south-west of Europe. There are 
 Jews also, from Yemen in Arabia, from Africa, from Persia, 
 from England and France, and a considerable number 
 from America, whither they go for just sufficient time 
 to get naturalized. 
 
 For the practical purpose of studying their institutions, 
 however, one may divide them into three groups : (1) the 
 Students of the Law, whose raison d'etre is wholly religious, 
 who look upon Jerusalem as the Sacred City, in which all 
 occupations are irrelevant ; (2) the Alliance Israelite, French 
 > in origin and management, to whom Jerusalem is the Aus- 
 tralia of the Jews, a happy hunting-ground, a career, a com- 
 mercial enterprise ; and (3) the Anglo- Jewish Association, 
 which is its English equivalent, with a considerable element 
 of orthodoxy, and as much religion as is consistent with 
 some defiance of rabbinical prejudice ; even, in the case of 
 its most important institution (the Evelina de Rothschild 
 Girls' School), of actual excommunication. 
 
 The Chief Rabbi takes rank next to the Sultan himself, 
 and the tendency of the Jews being, naturally enough, 
 to centralization and self-government, they form a distinct 
 community, never for any purpose amalgamating with any 
 other, separate in locality, in religion, and in custom. 1 
 
 1 A touching illustration of the strong national feeling of the Jews 
 occurs incidentally in the account by Consul Finn of a visit paid to 
 Sir Moses Montefiore in Jerusalem by certain Rabbis. " Are we 
 to speak in a language of the Gentiles ? " they asked of his secretary, 
 Dr. Loewe. " No ; but in our own language," was the reply. 
 
 56
 
 JEWS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 One soon gets rid of the English superstition that a Jew is 
 known by his nose, the only " Jewish " nose I have seen in 
 Jerusalem being attended by a cockney accent ; but other 
 marks of difference remain, as, for example, the side curls 
 worn by most of the Ashkenazim, in literal obedience to the 
 precept, " Ye shall not round the corners of your beard " ; 
 so, too, in the case of the Russian Jewess, the wearing of 
 the wig. The married woman, " uncovered, dishonoureth 
 her head," and it was as a mark of dishonour that the Jew- 
 esses of Russia were forbidden to wear the veil or shawl or 
 opaque net common elsewhere, and took to wigs in conse- 
 quence ; so, too, the fur cap, originally an insulting dis- 
 tinction, now accompanied by the long coat, often of plush 
 bordered with fur the voluntary costume of the Ash- 
 kenazim of Jerusalem. These are perhaps the most un- 
 satisfactory members of the Jewish population, certainly 
 the most dirty and unattractive. There is a theory that 
 they are descended from Issachar, who was a student, 
 whereas Zebulun was a merchant, and it is largely from them 
 that the Talmudists, the modern Pharisees, the true ob- 
 structionists of Jewish progress, are drawn. 
 
 Zangwill has somewhere the phrase, speaking of the Jews, 
 " the rich gave unscrupulously," and it is perhaps no figure 
 of speech to say that unscrupulous charity has been the 
 modern curse of Jerusalem. It is owing to the irrational 
 almsgiving, to the system of vicarious pilgrimage, that, 
 among other evils, this class of obstructionists has been 
 fostered. Their theory is, that Jerusalem is a place for 
 study and that those who are able and prepared to give them- 
 selves exclusively to meditation on the Law, should carry 
 out this duty on behalf of those who are otherwise occupied. 
 The money, sent in immense quantities to Jerusalem, is 
 regarded as tribute, and excites not the smallest gratitude. 
 It is collected by special agents known as the Sheluchim, 
 who, it is said, receive forty per cent. Mr. Montague 1 
 1 Jewish Life in the East. 
 57
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 Samuel quotes the case of one such agent who had enjoyed 
 a tour of two years and pocketed 5,200. This tribute or 
 haluka is a powerful instrument in the hands of the Rabbis, 
 and those engaged in education have a hard struggle to 
 keep the schools open at the time of distribution, as haluka 
 is often refused to those known to be " progressive " in 
 whatever direction. Even when Sir Moses Montefiore sent 
 money that those in the Torah or Law Schools might learn 
 Arabic, the vernacular of Jerusalem, it was returned to him 
 as a mere temptation to distraction. The language en- 
 couraged is the Yiddish, which those engaged in education 
 are trying so hard to eliminate. The Talmudic Schools 
 cluster round the Ashkenazim Synagogue, and number 
 some hundreds of boys from five to fifteen years of age. 
 Their instruction is limited to the reading of Isaiah, Pro- 
 verbs, Job and Daniel, with the Talmudic or oral law, upon 
 which they meditate while violently rocking themselves 
 backwards and forwards in conformity with the text, "All 
 my bones shall praise the Lord." It would be interesting to 
 inquire how far this custom, also practised by the Moham- 
 medans, is of purely oriental origin, and how far the expla- 
 nation is an afterthought, after the manner of folklore. 
 
 The evils of the magnificent, if somewhat " unscrupulous," 
 charity which has been so conspicuous in Jerusalem, have 
 of late become abundantly obvious, sometimes in directions 
 upon which it would be painful to insist. Suffice it to say 
 that in the year 1900 Baron Edmund de Rothschild, whose 
 munificence to his co-religionists is well known to all inter- 
 ested in the question of Jews in Palestine, set the example 
 of withdrawing his colonies from private management and 
 of transferring them to the care of the Colonization 
 Association. It is hoped that under the added impetus 
 of divided responsibility, and regard for public feeling, a 
 higher standard of morality, not only financial, but social, 
 may be achieved. 
 
 The question of the agricultural colonies does not arise 
 
 58
 
 JEWS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 in connexion with the Jew in Jerusalem, but we may say, 
 in passing, that they are a valuable adjunct to other edu- 
 cational effort, and that they help to provide an answer to 
 the increasingly difficult problem of the ultimate destiny of 
 the girls and boys now being trained and stimulated to as- 
 pirations and ambitions which, at this period of transition, 
 may be hard to satisfy. To ordinary agricultural work 
 extending over at least 70,000 acres of land, the colonists 
 have now added such occupations as floriculture, perfume 
 distilleries, soap-making, apiculture, cattle-breeding, fruit- 
 preserving, tobacco-growing, silk-worm cultivation, wine- 
 making and poultry-keeping. 
 
 Of certain customs kept alive under the influences of the 
 Talmudists one can think only with respect. One is interested 
 to note that, in reminder of the Temple destroyed, no house 
 is ever entirely finished ; one stone at least is left unplastered 
 and shows conspicuous in its native baseness in some promi- 
 nent part of hall or chamber. So too in some, if not all of 
 the agricultural colonies, the priest's portion of one per cent, 
 of the garden, is still set aside, but as there are now no priests 
 technically pure to receive it, it is annually buried in the 
 ground ; moreover, no fruit is gathered from a tree during 
 its first three years of blossoming. Again, it is an interesting 
 reminder to Jew and Christian alike, that on every road 
 as one goes out from Jerusalem, at a distance of 2,000 yards ; 
 from the city gate, one passes beneath a wire supported 
 by two posts to mark the limit of the Sabbath day's 
 journey. It is less pleasing, but not uncharacteristic 
 of place and people, to find how this, among other rules, is 
 evaded by means of a religious fiction called eruhh, that 
 is, mixture or connexion of places. Such fictions occupy 
 ten chapters of the Seder Moed, and are ascribed to 
 Solomon. It is not unusual for Jews to deposit food on 
 the previous evening at places 2,000 yards apart on the 
 route they desire to follow, thus establishing a series of 
 fictitious homes ; or they will set up doorposts or lintel 
 
 59
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 at the end of the street, thus creating the fiction that the 
 street is all one house. 
 
 The story is told, that not long ago, on the occasion of the 
 visit on the Sabbath of an illustrious person whom the 
 Jews were anxious to honour, they circumvented the 
 difficulty of going out to meet him, by making a wooden 
 gateway which they pushed before them, thus fictitiously 
 remaining in the city all the time. 
 
 It is said that before the present definite stand was made 
 in the interests of education, the rabbis would forbid the 
 teaching of certain subjects upon the most frivolous pre- 
 texts ; French for example because in conjugating the verbs 
 savoir and se marier the student must repeat j'ai su and 
 various forms of marie, which would familiarize him with 
 the names Jesu and Marie ; or geography because of the 
 names of saints involved in dealing with such towns as 
 St. Petersburg, San Francisco, etc. ; or arithmetic, because 
 the signs of multiplication and addition were those of the 
 cross. Such a story would seem incredible if it were not that 
 in the year of grace, 1902, the Evelina de Rothschild School 
 was forbidden to fly the Union Jack in honour of the Coro- 
 nation of King Edward, not because it was English, but 
 because it bore the cross, and they must needs compromise, 
 in defiance of etiquette by the way, by using the royal 
 standard ! 
 
 The study of the Jew in Jerusalem is the study of anoma- 
 lies and anachronisms. Side by side with the observance of 
 Levitical precepts and Pharisaic interpretation we have so 
 up to date an institution as the Alliance Israelite with its 
 essentially French atmosphere, and its inherent modernness. 
 
 Its immense buildings stand within a stone's throw of a 
 quaint relic of the earlier days of Jewish immigration, before 
 the various recent building societies and admirably organized 
 villages were established. This is the curious Box Colony, 
 so called because literally built of old boxes, mainly the tin 
 boxes which contain petroleum, and the wooden cases in 
 
 60
 
 JEWS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 which these tins are packed. By degrees, however, the 
 occupants, many of them Persians, others Yemenites, an 
 industrious and orderly community, are moving into neat 
 red- tiled houses, many close by, others in a more distant 
 suburb known as the Colony of the Hundred Gates. 
 
 Founded in 1860 for the protection and secular advance- 
 ment of the Jews, in 1871 the Alliance connected itself with 
 the Anglo-Jewish Association, and about the same period 
 founded perhaps the first of the Agricultural colonies of 
 Palestine, the very successful Farm School of Jaffa which 
 has between two and three hundred resident students, and 
 which, after payment of all expenses, makes a profit of over 
 1,000 per annum. The Farm School of Djedeida, though 
 later in origin, seems, in its degree, equally successful and 
 already numbers over a hundred students. 
 
 The immense but strictly utilitarian buildings of the 
 Alliance are surrounded by what will shortly be a forest of 
 olive and eucalyptus trees, in itself a fact of real sanitary 
 importance to the neighbourhood. Everything is of the best 
 and most modern, but everywhere one notices what is not 
 too common in Jerusalem, the care with which public money 
 has been expended. The scrupulous cleanliness and order, 
 the presence of trees and flowers, and the abundance of 
 fresh air and even, what is here more difficult to obtain, of 
 fresh water, are the points which first strike the attention 
 of the visitor, who can do little more than enumerate his 
 after sensations and surprises. 
 
 We are taken to the carpenters' shops, where cabinet- 
 making and joinery of every kind is in progress ; to the metal 
 workshops, where " beaten " work is being carried on ; 
 where a round plate of copper, from England, is by degrees 
 beaten into a graceful coffee pot which would be an orna- 
 ment to any studio ; to the forge, where wrought ironwork 
 (of the designing of which we learn more later) is being 
 carefully copied from drawings to which the apprentices 
 constantly refer ; to the blacksmith's, where rows of lads are 
 
 61
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 making the tools required by their companions in other trades, 
 and where we are shown a motor-engine, the first piece of 
 such machinery brought into Jerusalem. Passing across a 
 shady courtyard, and one must live in this country to know 
 how rare a luxury this is, we enter a huge workshop where one 
 or two carts and carriages are being repaired, the one branch 
 of industry which has not been a success, because few people 
 own carriages in Jerusalem, and those from whom they are 
 hired have some reluctance in paying for their manufacture 
 and repair, while, unlike other articles, they are not adapted 
 for export. 
 
 Mounting to an upper floor we reach what may be called 
 the nursery of other trades the admirable Art Schools 
 where drawing and modelling are taught and the designs 
 made from which those below are working. Here, 
 we are told, are no Moslems ; elsewhere we have found 
 those of all races and religions except the Ashkenazim 
 Jew, as we soon inferred from the absence of side 
 curls. The Moslem, even when emancipated enough to 
 defy the prohibition to make images, has, we learn, 
 no turn for Art, an interesting contribution to the 
 study of heredity. Here are rows of lads carving in wood 
 and stone from models in clay, as well as from the round and 
 the flat chairs, panels, decorative groups and friezes. We 
 are shown the model of two camels, one erect, the other 
 kneeling, copied first in clay from nature, accurate in 
 measurement and proportion, the hundredth part of life- 
 size, perfect in anatomy and the reproduction of muscle, 
 and attitude one had almost said gesture. Would that 
 the tourists who keep alive the trade in the olive-wood 
 abominations thrust upon their notice in the city, could 
 contrast their " camel-shaped " glove-boxes and inkstands 
 with so real a work of art as these ! 
 
 In a further room lads are drawing working out prob- 
 lems in mechanics and engineering, or reproducing types of 
 architecture, some from models, some working only with 
 
 62
 
 JEWS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 the assistance of a note-book. Dante, Venus, Apollo, the 
 young Augustus, look down familiarly from the walls 
 never in all their wanderings perhaps have they found them- 
 selves in surroundings more unexpected than these ! For 
 two hours every day all must study here whose work is of the 
 nature of designing, or even of copying designs, and the 
 enthusiastic Russian artist who moves briskly among the 
 lads seems to have inspired them with true reverence for 
 Art. 
 
 In another building we find a new experiment, not of the 
 Alliance but of the Jewish Colonization Association, housed 
 here for the moment. This is the weaving of cotton and 
 linen fabrics, curtains, covers for the ever present divan, 
 and a thinner material, [usually striped, used for the 
 Kumbaz, the Arab dress, worn by men all over the 
 country, a material excellent in colouring, wear and 
 texture, and which "no family should be without." At 
 present they have not undertaken dye-work, an industry 
 very rudimentary in Jerusalem, but it is to be hoped that 
 this too will be added to their enterprises. 
 
 Again descending, and leaving to our left the as yet un- 
 finished technical school for girls, we pass through further 
 plantations of olives, firs, and eucalyptus, and look in at the 
 great dining-hall, where 200 poor boys are fed daily, on the 
 theory, not always observed at home, that unless a child eat, 
 neither shall he work. Most of these are also clothed and 
 provided with shoes by the Alliance. We pass also the 
 gymnasium, and enter the school-building, which, alike in 
 its economy and its liberality, would shame many of our 
 most vaunted institutions at home. It is calculated to hold 
 a thousand students, but only a part of it is as yet in use. 
 French is the universal language ; Hebrew also is spoken ; 
 " jargon " is forbidden. Arabic, the vernacular, is taught, 
 and also Turkish, the official language. There are repre- 
 sentatives of every religion, and of every class, from the 
 son of the Pasha to the two hundred, who in orderly rank 
 
 63
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 are being led down below to dine. Out of the 368 in the 
 school, 67 are paying pupils. They are just dispersing, and 
 we have no opportunity for observing more than the order 
 and cleanliness of the arrangements, and the perfection of 
 schoolroom apparatus. 
 
 Little can we wonder that, as the headmaster expresses 
 it, the Rabbis " make war on the Alliance," which is truly 
 opposed in all its working to the obstructionist principles 
 of the Ashkenazim. It is for this reason that the students 
 are taken so far as the Jewish element is concerned almost 
 exclusively from the Sephardim, upon whom the Rabbis 
 have far less hold, and who have little share in the haluka. 
 
 Unhappily for Jerusalem, it seems as if no question of 
 current history or politics can be considered apart from 
 some form of religious bias, and the relation between Chris- 
 tians and Jews in Jerusalem seems to consist of two kinds 
 of prejudice that of the Latins, who (with the exception of 
 the Educational Orders of the Peres de Sion, and of the 
 Sisters known as the Dames de Sion) ignore them, and of 
 the English missionaries, who spend considerable force of 
 various kinds in the somewhat futile attempt to convert 
 them. 
 
 In estimating the attitude of the Jews, rather than in 
 criticizing that of the missionaries, a few figures may be 
 informing. Between 1839 and 1847 1 (the Society having 
 been at work since 1823), thirty-one adult Jews were bap- 
 tized an average of about four a year. Between 1849 and 
 1896, 2 including infants as well as adults, there were 492 
 baptisms, an average of ten and a quarter a year, probably 
 half of those being infants. In the year 1901, according 
 to the report of the Society, the baptisms (children and 
 adults) had risen to thirteen. The Jewish population being 
 at the lowest about 30,000, the percentage of converts, 
 
 1 Life of Bishop Gobat, p. 241. 
 
 2 See Missions to Jews, p. 91, a publication of the London Jews' 
 Society. 
 
 64
 
 assuming, as I am officially informed I may, that half of 
 those baptized are adults, would be less than one in 4,000. 
 The expenditure of the Society was over 7,000, or about a 
 thousand pounds a convert. 
 
 As to the sincerity of the conversions it would perhaps be 
 unfair to hazard an opinion. Mr. Zangwill, however, who 
 cannot be accused of glossing over the faults of his race, is 
 very definite upon this point. 
 
 " No Jew has ever apostatized except to fill his purse or 
 his stomach, or to avoid persecution. Getting grace they 
 call it in England ; but with poor Jews it is always grace after 
 meals . . . Two Spanish Jews who had ' got grace ' were 
 waiting to be baptized at Burgos Cathedral, There was a 
 great throng of Catholics, and a special Cardinal was coming 
 to conduct the ceremony, for their conversion was a great 
 triumph. But the Cardinal was late, and the Jews fumed 
 and fretted at the delay. The shadows of evening were 
 falling on vault and transept. At last one turned to the 
 other and said, ' Knowest thou what, Moses ? If the father 
 does not arrive soon, we shall be too late to say 
 
 Bishop Gobat's testimony is equally strong. "I tremble 
 
 whenever the missionaries send me a convert, for either 
 
 he is insincere from the beginning, or, if he commence by 
 
 being sincere, he will soon be spoilt by the flattery of the 
 
 friends of Israel in England." (Gobat, Life of, p. 289.) 
 
 This is a Moslem's view of the same question : 2 
 
 " English people bought land for converted Jews at Jaffa 
 
 and built houses for them. If one was carpenter they gave 
 
 him tools, they gave these Jews horses, donkeys and car- 
 
 riages (carts), and ploughs, and gave each one shilling for 
 
 1 The afternoon prayer of the Jew, said at the hour of the Evening 
 Sacrifice as the Catholic prays at the Angelas. Possibly referred 
 to in the verse, " And the lifting up of my hands as (or at the time of ) 
 the evening sacrifice." 
 
 - With the Bedouin, Gray-Hill. Appendix. 
 
 65 F
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 every day. Those Jews took all, and when they were rich 
 they ran away back to other Jews. I think only five or 
 six remain. 
 
 " Once, when I was going from Jaffa to Jerusalem, I found 
 people beating one Jew. It was near Ramleh. He have 
 been eating and drinking, and he jump on his horse and run 
 away without paying. They went after him and caught him. 
 They beat him too much. I said, ' How much is it ? ' They 
 tell me ' seven piastres ' (about Is. 2d.). I pay it. He tell 
 them he have no money. Then I want to know whether 
 it was true he have none. So I ask him. He say, ' Yes, I 
 have plenty money, but I did not want to give it. I thought 
 I could run away on my horse.' He paid me. He give me 
 one medjidie, and I take seven piastres, and give him the 
 rest. He was a converted Jew. I ask him, ' Are you Protes- 
 tant ? ' He tell me, ' Oh no, I go by them, and tell them I 
 am very poor, and they give me house and clothes and one 
 shilling every day. When I have enough I leave them.' 
 
 "Never any Jew is converted. They only laugh at Eng- 
 lish. You know that court of church of Holy Sepulchre at 
 Jerusalem. No Jew can pass there. If he do they kill 
 him. Christians have one firman from Sultan that if any 
 Jew go there and they catch him they may kill him." 
 
 Perhaps, to speak it profanely, there is less temptation to 
 conversion for the working Jew in Jerusalem than else- 
 where, for as a large proportion of workshops and markets 
 are in their own hands and in those of the Mohammedans, 
 they can work six days a week, and so the sacrifice to re- 
 ligious principle is less than in most other places. It is 
 commonly alleged that a Jew's religion costs him five shil- 
 lings in the pound more than the Christian's, for, as has been 
 well said, " it consists largely in meats and drinks and in loss 
 of time." Animal food has, at all costs, to be killed in a 
 special manner, and with considerable waste, as the hind- 
 quarters cannot be eaten, and it often happens that the beast 
 or bird, after having been killed, is condemned for some 
 
 66
 
 x. 
 JEWS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 impurity. Then, in addition to the loss of Sunday in a 
 Christian country, there are so many fasts and festivals that 
 the working year is reduced by at least another score of days. 
 
 If so little has been effected in the past, when the Jews 
 themselves had few charitable and philanthropic agencies, 
 what can be the prospects for the future, now that they them- 
 selves have every sort of charity and institution magnificently 
 supported and admirably organized ? Of what use is it 
 to have spent 12,000 upon the erection of an English 
 Hospital for Jews, and 2,000 a year upon the maintenance 
 of its staff, when they have four hospitals and several skilled 
 physicians of their own ? men able to converse with them 
 in their own tongues, of which as many as fourteen are some- 
 times required in a single morning ; hospitals of which a 
 synagogue is a necessary adjunct and a knowledge of the 
 100 odd laws which are involved in their ritual an almost 
 essential feature 1 
 
 We read in the last Report of the English Hospital that by 
 association with Christians " a great deal of the prejudice, 
 the barrier between Christ and His Jewish people, is broken 
 down." However, in spite of the fact that even out-patients 
 are expected to receive religious instruction, the results, 
 statistically speaking, are not very striking ; it is added, by 
 way of illustration, " We had hopes of a young Yemen Jew 
 coming out and confessing Christ. He was very ill, but we 
 could not keep him any longer in the hospital on account 
 of the nature of his disease." Nearly a thousand patients 
 received treatment, involving, for the most part, attendance 
 at prayers, and of these there were " hopes " of one tenth 
 of one per cent. ! 
 
 However great his confidence in the skill and kindness of 
 English doctors and nurses, no true Jew would risk the 
 danger of dying in a Christian hospital and consequently 
 of being refused the rites of burial by his co-religionists. 
 Moreover, at Passover time, no Jew would dream of 
 remaining in Gentile surroundings, and accordingly the 
 
 67
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 hospital is then entirely emptied of all its patients. 
 When we consider what would be the result, say, upon St. 
 Bartholomew's, if no patient could risk dying within its 
 walls, nor of remaining there during the Christmas week, it 
 is obvious that serious cases can seldom be received ! Of 
 minor complaints, eye ailments are infinitely the most 
 numerous in Palestine, and these are admirably provided for 
 by the magnificent English Ophthalmic Hospital, in which, 
 according to the latest Report (1903), over a thousand opera- 
 tions were performed and over 5,000 cases treated. The 
 patients are of all religions, and none is forced upon their 
 notice. 
 
 One can only admire the strength of the conviction which 
 leads to the subscription, mainly in England, of over 7,000 
 a year for the support of this and a small amount of edu- 
 cational work in Jerusalem, on behalf of, possibly, the richest 
 nation in the world, and (towards each other) one of the 
 most charitable. 
 
 In former times, when the rich Jews did but little for the 
 small number of their race then living in Jerusalem, the 
 notion of bribing them to Christianity with medicine and 
 lesson books might conceivably be less unpractical than 
 now, when we can give them nothing except the religion 
 they reject, with which they are not at least as well, often 
 far better, provided on their own account. They have, 
 except the Germans, the finest hospital, the only proper 
 disinfecting laboratory, the only wholly isolated wards for 
 the reception of diphtheria and small-pox patients, the 
 only poor-house, the only mad-house, the only Hospital for 
 Incurables, 1 the only School of Art, the only effective Tech- 
 
 1 It is, however, only just to say that at the Convent of the Soeurs 
 de S. Vincent de Paul, which is open to misery of every age and 
 creed, may be found the old and infirm, idiots and the incurable. 
 They also receive and teach the blind, as do the Jews, the Germans 
 and a benevolent English lady whose solitary perseverance should 
 recommend her work to the kindness of those who would wish Eng- 
 lish charity to be better represented in Jerusalem. 
 
 68
 
 JEWS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 nical Schools, the only Weaving School, the only Public 
 Library, and the only newspaper in Jerusalem. They have 
 the only Girls' School under English Government inspection 
 and properly trained certificated teachers (the Evelina de 
 Rothschild School), the only Cookery School for girls, the 
 only place where young women are taught gardening, 
 domestic economy, laundry work and first aid to the 
 injured. Their needlework excels even that of the 
 convents, which is saying a great deal ; and their 
 Kindergarten, of some 250 children, is directed by a 
 teacher trained at the Froebel School in Dresden ; 
 while the headmistress, a highly educated Englishwoman, 
 is a Queen's scholar holding first-class Government diplo- 
 mas, and of considerable experience in both primary 
 and secondary schools. The children have all the ad- 
 vantages which result from such experience in the way 
 of proper desks properly placed in reference to light 
 a point, where sound eyes are a rare exception, of infinite 
 importance, and which, so far as I have seen, is ignored 
 everywhere else. They have all the best and most modern 
 English text-books, and the whole 600 children, whatever 
 their nationality, are taught in English and in pure Hebrew, 
 no word of " jargon " being permitted. They come from 
 homes of every class, the richest in Jerusalem as well as 
 from those of almost incredible poverty, but all pay some- 
 thing, according to their means a gratifying tribute to the 
 desire for education and improvement. 
 
 What chance has the best-intentioned institution of the 
 London Jews' Society against such work as this, although its 
 Girls' School, numbering, according to its last Report, thirty- 
 nine boarders, is doubtless a centre of home-like and kindly 
 influences ? Its Boys' School takes itself more seriously, 
 and there the teaching seems to be of excellent quality, 
 inasmuch as, especially in the relations between master and 
 scholar, it aims at education rather than instruction. The 
 boys are encouraged to manly games, and their summer 
 
 69
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 holiday- camp gives them opportunities for the study of 
 natural history, and for swimming and photography. 
 
 The mission has also a day-school under the charge of 
 devoted ladies, which is not only free, but which obviously 
 also clothes many of those who attend it, as judging 
 from cut, fit, quality and workmanship, the frocks and 
 blouses could have been produced nowhere but at an 
 English " working-party." One cannot but wish that 
 the Dorcases of some kindly parish could see their handi- 
 work side by side with the graceful dresses of the women 
 of Syria. 
 
 The mission expends some 1,500 a year on a House of 
 Industry, but a visit to the workrooms of the Technical School 
 of the Alliance Israelite can only suggest to the unprejudiced 
 observer the reflection that whether the Jew has a future in 
 Jerusalem or no, his present is not of a nature to require 
 Christian patronage or Christian alms. 
 
 One modest piece of work, truly demonstrating the spirit 
 of the charity that " is not puffed up," is to be found in a 
 quiet corner a mile or so from Jerusalem, bearing the 
 pleasantly suggestive name of Abraham's Vineyard, or, in 
 Arabic, Kerm el-Khaleel, the Vineyard of the Friend (of 
 God). Its history is simple and reasonable. It was founded 
 as long ago as 1852, when very little material aid was given 
 to the poor Jews at Jerusalem, by Mrs. Finn, the wife of the 
 then English consul, for the object of giving work to a com- 
 paratively small number of the very poor. There is no 
 quid pro quo exacted of attendance at prayer-meetings ; 
 it is merely an object-lesson in that spirit of the human 
 charity which was brought down from heaven by a Jew, 
 " despised and rejected of men." A piece of ground of ten 
 acres, redeemed from the bare hillside, was enclosed, 
 cultivated and planted with vines and olive-trees, and as it 
 became more obvious that the immigration of Jews was an- 
 nually increasing quite out of proportion with the accommo- 
 dation then provided, a quarry was opened on the vineyard, 
 
 70
 
 OI.IVK OIL PRESSES, FOR CRUSHING THK FRUIT, AND FOR 
 
 PRESSING OUT THK Oil..
 
 JEWS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 stones cut and dressed, and a house erected, the first built by 
 Jews outside the walls of Jerusalem, in order to teach those 
 who came from the cities how to execute practical work of 
 the kind. In 1882 Mrs. Finn, who had returned to England, 
 established in connexion with the Vineyard the Society for 
 Relief of Persecuted Jews, and it is said that there is im- 
 mense competition for the privilege of working here at its 
 various industries. Seventy men are daily employed. One 
 important work is the construction of cisterns, hewn out of 
 the solid rock the storage of water (which has a definite 
 commercial value) being a very important feature of 
 Jerusalem husbandry. Agriculture on such a small scale as 
 the size of the estate permits is also carried on, and the mere 
 spectacle of the exquisite finish and orderliness of the ground 
 must have practical value in this land of slovenliness and too 
 often dirt, even in public institutions where one would least 
 expect to encounter it. There are also carpenters' work- 
 shops, the stone excavated from the cisterns is dressed and 
 sold, and an excellent toilet-soap is made from pure olive- 
 oil combined with alkali from the Dead Sea. One cannot 
 help wishing that the English Jews would help to enlarge 
 and extend so admirable a piece of work, which enters into 
 no competition with any institution of their own, and, in 
 point of fact, relieves them from a burden otherwise incum- 
 bent upon themselves. A pleasing incident which lately 
 occurred reveals something of the good feeling of the people 
 themselves. It was on June 25, 1902, the day when the sad 
 news reached Jerusalem of the postponement of the Corona- 
 tion. The projected festivities, organized mainly by the 
 missionaries, included no entertainment for the old and poor 
 of Abraham's Vineyard, so there was no selfish regret in the 
 petition preferred to the manager, that they might be allowed 
 time to pray for the King's restoration to health. Permission 
 being given, they asked that His Majesty's name might be 
 spelt out to them, when they prayed separately for every 
 letter of Albert Edward, the significance of letters and num- 
 
 71
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 bers being a part of the esoteric teaching of the Jewish 
 faith ! 
 
 It is interesting to note, in this connexion, the very kindly 
 feeling towards England which, in spite of their extreme 
 rigidity, is entertained by certain of the Ashkenazim, and 
 which is said to be an inheritance of gratitude for the fact that 
 their synagogue is built on ground obtained for them by the 
 intercession of Lord Napier. The building is, of its kind, 
 very handsome, and contains elaborate silver chandeliers, 
 and an Almenar (centre pulpit), of olive-wood and wrought 
 iron. During the Boer War a special prayer on behalf of 
 the English arms was circulated for daily use among the 
 congregation. The reading of Psalms 18, 20, 24, 27, 35, 83, 
 and 144 was recommended, and then followed a lengthy 
 and eloquent prayer : " For the troops of our English brethren, 
 who stand this day in battle with their enemies " who are 
 further referred to as " the enlightened English people, chosen 
 to tread and rule vast parts of the earth, and whom Thou hast 
 strengthened for their uprightness and hast given them for their 
 inheritance vast lands of the Gentiles, that they may breathe 
 to their inhabitants a generous spirit and a love of righteous- 
 ness and right, who have given freedom and righteous laws 
 to every creature, and have spread wisdom and knowledge in 
 all their dominions according to the pleasure of Her Majesty 
 the Queen, who is full of righteousness and kindness . . . yea, 
 the English nation, which protects and shields Thy people 
 Israel from oppression . . . O King, Dweller of Jerusalem, 
 may the Redeemer come to Zion. Amen" 
 
 Professor Margoliouth has pointed out what is, I venture 
 to think, endorsed by observation of the relations between 
 the various religionists in Jerusalem, that the Jews are more 
 kindly disposed towards the Mohammedan than towards the 
 Christian. The reason he assigns is, that " though Mo- 
 hammed himself hated the Jews, the terms they got in 
 Mohammedan countries were, on the whole, so favourable, 
 that the feeling towards Mohammed, which is reflected in 
 
 72
 
 JEWS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 early Jewish literature, is very different from the feeling 
 about Christ. The persecution of the Jews has not only 
 rendered conversion difficult by making Christianity odious, 
 but still more by making Judaism dear." 
 
 In the eyes of the Jew Mohammedanism has at least one 
 practical differentiation from Christianity as represented by 
 its more Protestant adherents that, much as it may despise 
 him and his religion, it has at least no desire to super-impose 
 any other. 
 
 Of the relation of the Jew with Jerusalem, as his former 
 home, the scene of the history of his race, it is not possible to 
 speak at any length. To the casual observer his position is 
 essentially modern : he is an immigrant, a foreigner, more 
 distinctly so perhaps than even in London or New York. 
 He is rigorously excluded from even the courtyard of the 
 Holy Sepulchre, even when, as recently happened, he is 
 represented by a distinguished English novelist with, as 
 far as one knows, no anti-Christian prejudices. From the 
 Temple area, now entirely in the hands of Moslems, he 
 voluntarily excludes himself, lest, it is said, he should acci- 
 dentally profane the Holy of Holies, though it would seem 
 that without the Divine Presence and the presence of the 
 Tables of the Law the Holy of Holies could not virtually 
 exist. It is in the well known Wailing Place that one realizes 
 that the Jew is a homeless exile, heir to all the sufferings of 
 what Zangwill has called " the long cruel night in Jewry 
 which coincides with the Christian era." There, not only at 
 the conventional hour on Friday afternoon, when the Jews 
 assemble in large numbers, but all day, and every day, and 
 even, at certain seasons, all night, one may witness scenes of 
 obviously real personal sorrow. On the ninth day of the 
 month Ab, a time when for nine days the Jews fast from 
 meat and wine, when there are no marriages and no 
 rejoicings, then above all it is, in the words of their own 
 litany, that " for the palaces laid waste, for the Temple 
 destroyed, for the walls laid low, for the glory which has 
 
 73
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 gone, for the great ones perished," they " sit solitary and 
 weep." As has been well said by a recent writer in the 
 Tablet (March 15, 1902), "it is not for us to interpolate our 
 interpretations of the workings of Divine Providence into 
 the application of the doctrines of the Sermon on the 
 Mount even to the race of the unjust judges of our Saviour. 
 That race was His . . . The modern Jew, descended 
 after nineteen centuries from those who preferred Barabbas, 
 is entitled to be judged, in the relations of policy and 
 citizenship, as what he is the devotee of deathless 
 tradition, the bearer of an undying nationality, the victim 
 of his patriotism and religion." 
 
 When one sees the work effected by the Jewish Colonisa- 
 tion Association, by the Anglo-Jewish Association, and by 
 the Alliance Israelite, one realizes that even unscrupulous 
 charity cannot wholly degrade, nor Rabbinical obstruc- 
 tionism entirely depress, a people whom repeated dispersions 
 have failed to disunite, and two thousand years of perse- 
 cution have not sufficed to destroy. If numerical superior- 
 ity be a criterion of possession, and achievement a measure 
 of power ; if the higher civilization be that of the more 
 effective philanthropy, and true part and lot in the soil be that 
 of him who restores it to cultivation; then, mysterious as 
 may seem to us the workings of God's providence, the deep 
 tragedy of their existence, the dark problem of their destiny, 
 is approaching solution, and Jerusalem is for the Jews. 
 
 74
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 RUSSIA IN JERUSALEM 
 
 "THE RUSSIAN To WEB " RELIGIOUS BUILDINGS RELA- 
 TIONS BETWEEN GREEK AND RUSSIAN CHURCHES 
 POPULATION PILGRIMAGES " IMPERIAL ORTHODOX 
 SOCIETY " MEANS OF EDUCATION GREEK PATRI- 
 ARCHATE RUSSIAN DISSENT ARCHIMANDRITE CON- 
 SULATE ACQUISITION OF TERRITORY AMBASSADOR 
 INFLUENCE ON THE WEST JEALOUSIES AND DISPUTES 
 
 T N a recent examination in a Christian school in Jeru-' 
 * salem, the question was asked, " Where is the Mount 1 
 of Olives, and what took place upon it ? " The answer was, i 
 " To the east of Jerusalem, and the Russian Tower took I 
 place upon it." 
 
 To the average boy in Jerusalem every point upon the 
 Mount of Olives, the Mosque of the Ascension, the Church 
 of the Pater, the Chapel of the Credo, the Church of the 
 Dominus flcevit, the Garden of Gethsemane, the, Grotto of 
 the Agony, the Church of the Tomb of Our Lady, the Tombs 
 of the Prophets, and the Viri Galilicei, aU suggestive of 
 historical association, are as familiar as are, to the young 
 Londoner, Charing Cross or the Zoological Gardens ; and 
 the boy's reply has probably been a long-standing subject 
 of mirth and reproach among his fellows, or at any rate it 
 would have been if the school in question had been a girls' 
 school. 
 
 Nevertheless, the naif remark donne a pen-ser. It is 
 
 75
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 charged with a political significance, possibly even a re- 
 ligious significance, of which but a very small proportion of 
 those " at home " are in any degree aware. 
 
 The Russian Tower is what is commonly known as a 
 " Belvedere." It is six stories high, it is ascended by 214 
 steps, and it presents the finest panorama in the country. 
 Northward, over Mount Scopas, one can follow the new 
 high-road which has already reached to Bethel, and is, 
 ultimately, to open up the way to Nazareth. Eastward, 
 nearly 4,000 feet below, lies the Dead Sea, and the valley 
 of the Jordan is clearly visible although seven hours' ride 
 distant ; and on a clear day one sees even further, to the 
 town of Kerak, twelve hours distant, an important military 
 station, and a seat of Turkish government. It is a town 
 of over 20,000 inhabitants and has a garrison of some 2,000 
 infantry and 350 cavalry ; it is a very important stronghold 
 as well as a considerable centre of commerce with the desert 
 tribes. Westwards we look towards the Mediterranean ; 
 and south, in the direction of Bethlehem and Hebron. It 
 is obvious, therefore, that the Russian Tower is a quite 
 important incident to have " taken place upon " the Mount 
 of Olives, and that, visible from the Mediterranean on the 
 west and to the boundary of Syria on the east, it is a valuable 
 strategic position, worthy even of the country by which 
 it was devised. 
 
 It should, however, be mentioned that the Russian Tower 
 is merely a feature in a group of buildings strictly religious 
 in their purpose a church, a hospice for pilgrims, and the 
 residence of the Archimandrite. A few miles west of 
 Jerusalem lies the beautiful village of Ain Karim, and there, 
 on a hill-top commanding a view both of the Mount of Olives 
 and of the Mediterranean, the Russians began to build a 
 similar tower, which, however, presents a somewhat truncated 
 appearance, a repetition of the same style of structure 
 having been disapproved, it is alleged, by the Government 
 authorities, who, like the English County Councils, claim 
 
 76
 
 RUSSIA IN JERUSALEM 
 
 the right of architectural criticism. Here also the Tower 
 is, again, merely a feature of an adjacent group of religious 
 buildings a chapel, a hospice, and an establishment for 
 nuns, who live, not in community, but in separate dwellings. 
 
 Bearing in mind then the occasional union of religious 
 with secular objects, it may be interesting to glance at the 
 position occupied by Russia in connexion with the Holy 
 City. 
 
 Jerusalem has no commerce, no manufactures, no agri- 
 culture ; in no part of the town itself could you drive for 
 more than a couple of hundred yards ; the majority of the 
 streets are inaccessible even to the camel, which does most 
 of the goods traffic of the country, and a good many even 
 to the horse. The donkey is the omnibus of Jerusalem, 
 and as it is trained to walk up and down the steps of which 
 most of the streets consist, you can generally arrive at your 
 front door or do your shopping without dismounting. 
 En revanche, however, Jerusalem has probably more lan- 
 guages and more religions than any town in the 
 world. Her politics are questions of sites, questions, 
 however, but indirectly connected with archaeology; her 
 most important languages, Arabic, the native language, 
 apart, are those in which these questions are carried on, 
 namely French and German ; and her dominant religions 
 are those of the Greek and Latin Churches. 
 
 The Holy Places, which are the "sites" in question, 
 more especially the Holy Sepulchre and the Church of; 
 Bethlehem, are under the protection of the Franciscans, \ 
 who since 1230 have been the recognized custodians of the 
 Holy Places, and as they are, for the most part, Italians, , 
 and as their superior, the Pere Custode, is invariably 
 Italian, it might have seemed natural that Italian, rather 
 than French, should be cited as for them the language of 
 debate. But this brings us face to face with the curious 
 complication that whereas the Franciscans are the guardians 
 of the Holy Places, France is the guardian of the Franciscans. 
 
 77
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 A similar international anomaly meets us when we come 
 to consider the question from the other side that of the 
 Greeks. To most of us in England, the Orthodox Eastern 
 Church is associated equally with the Holy Synod of Russia, 
 and with the older Patriarchates of Constantinople, Antioch, 
 Alexandria and Jerusalem, and it is a little perplexing 
 to the new comer to find that the Russian priest cannot, 
 theoretically, officiate at the Greek Altar of the Holy 
 Sepulchre, that a perpetually recurring dispute is the 
 election to some bishopric or patriarchate of a nominee of 
 the Greek or Russian congregations respectively, and that 
 he who would understand in what sense, and that not an 
 unimportant one, Jerusalem is making history, must, in 
 the absence of local newspapers, never lose sight for one day 
 of the relations, not merely between the Latin and the Greek, 
 but of the further complication of Greek and Russian. 
 
 Of all this the Russian Tower upon the Mount of Olives 
 is the effective prototype. It is situated between Church 
 and Presbytery, but it moreover looks towards the Turkish 
 defences on the east, and towards the fleets of the Mediter- 
 ranean on the west. 
 
 Statistics are hard to arrive at where there are no registers 
 of births and deaths and no census ; but if we may accept 
 the figures given in Baedeker, the resident orthodox Greeks 
 number about 6,000, a number which is more than doubled, 
 perhaps trebled, every year by the immigration of Rus- 
 sian pilgrims, almost entirely of the peasant, even of the 
 poorest peasant classes. Between Christmas and Easter 
 (the Greek Christmas falls eight days later than ours) at 
 least 8,000 pilgrims, men and women, arrive in Jerusalem, 
 many of them coming from the interior of Russia, from 
 distances so great that it is said the pilgrimage often 
 occupies two years ; for the piety, if not poverty, of the 
 devout Russian demands that the journey shall be made, 
 whenever possible, on foot. 
 
 Such an immigration cannot be without important 
 
 78
 
 RUSSIA IN JERUSALEM 
 
 consequences, both in Jerusalem and in the home sur- 
 roundings of the people themselves ; and it is obvious that 
 the piety of the Russian peasantry is an instrument to be 
 seriously reckoned with. The national Church has a hold 
 upon them possibly unparalleled in history. It has been 
 long bound up with the fortunes of the country, it has been 
 subject to no changes, no reformations ; it is the Church of 
 the people as such, a part of their history. Their monas- 
 teries are the fortresses of the country and have been con- 
 stantly put to practical use against the foreign invader ; 
 the Czar is in a special sense the symbol of the unity of the 
 Church and the nation ; their Church is the largest national 
 Church in the world, and their passion is for pilgrimage. 
 That this is racial rather than inherent in their religion 
 has been well demonstrated by a recent writer on The 
 Teaching of the Russian Church (Arthur C. Headlam, B.D., 
 1897). 
 
 " There are few contrasts greater than that of passing 
 from a Greek monastery on Mount Athos to the great 
 Russian houses. There is no sight in Palestine more im- 
 pressive than that of the devotion, and enthusiasm, and 
 endurance of the Russian pilgrims " (p. 27) ; and again, 
 " Just as we might say that one great characteristic of the 
 English Church was practical philanthropy, or of Germany 
 a devotion to theological study, or of Scotland a taste for 
 metaphysical and theological discussion, so of Russia we 
 might say that it was religious devotion. . . . The half 
 religious, half political movement which presses Russia 
 ever southwards to the Holy Places is one of the forces 
 which will mould history in the future much more surely 
 than the skill of its statesmen. Russia is a religious power 
 not to be despised, one of the great factors which will mould 
 the religion of the future." 
 
 Those only who have been eye-witnesses of such scenes 
 as are of daily occurrence in the Holy Land can appreciate 
 the practical working of Russian devotion. One must 
 
 79
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 travel with a pilgrimage, say from Beirut to Jaffa, and 
 see, perhaps, 700 packed close on a shelterless deck on 
 a December night. Leaving one's quarters, comfortable 
 only by contrast, in the first class, one ascends to look 
 upon them ; there is not space to approach near. In spite 
 of the cold and the open air, the smell is almost unbearable ; 
 most of them are sea-sick, a few are munching lumps of 
 hard black bread. One poor woman has died in the night, 
 and her baby of a few months old wails bitterly. Astern 
 a tall young priest, bareheaded, whose neat golden chignon, 
 mysteriously hairpinless, is a perplexity to the occidental 
 understanding, is leading a hymn, and many a weary head 
 is raised from the bare boards to share in the sweet melody. 
 Arrived at Jaffa every pilgrim devoutly and repeatedly 
 crosses himself on setting foot in the Holy Land ; many a 
 bearded man stoops to kiss the sacred soil, while tears of 
 real emotion arc falling from the eyes of men and women 
 alike. Most of them will walk the forty miles, the nearly 
 three thousand feet of ascent between this and Jerusalem. 1 
 Arrived there they will proceed to every shrine in the Holy 
 Land. You will meet them toiling painfully homeward 
 from the Dead Sea, bathing at every sacred pool, drinking 
 at every historic fountain, approaching on hands and knees 
 to every spot of religious association, crossing themselves 
 and praying wherever the slightest pretext for devotion 
 may be found. 2 Scores of them remain all night in the 
 
 1 A magnificent bell was sent from Russia for the church at 
 Jerusalem. Disembarked at Jaffa no vehicle, no beast of burden, 
 could be found capable of transporting it to Jerusalem. It was 
 finally conveyed the entire distance by the women of a Rssians 
 pilgrimage. This was in pre-railway days. 
 
 2 In the centre of the courtyard of St. George's Collegiate Church 
 (the new church of the Anglican See of Jerusalem) is a " Founder's 
 Cross " of wrought iron. A Russian pilgrim, visiting it one day, 
 inquired the meaning of the cross, when it entered into the heart of 
 a sinful little Arab to aver that it was the burying place of a great 
 saint, upon which the Russian carried to his friends the good news 
 of a new holy spot, and they spent the rest of the day in prostrations
 
 ._t
 
 RUSSIA IN JERUSALEM 
 
 Church of the Holy Sepulchre, and every morning at day- 
 break you hear them singing in wonderful harmonies on their 
 way to the hospice. At Christmas or Epiphany they take 
 their only sleep, packed like sardines on the floor of the 
 church in little parties or family groups, of whom one, even 
 in sleep, is embracing the great brass samovar which is 
 their centre of physical comfort. At Easter you find the 
 same scene in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre at Jerusalem. 
 On the Saturday of the Greek fire, though the " miracle " 
 does not occur till midday, the close-packed crowds, one is 
 told, have been in their places since three o'clock of the day 
 before. They are always pleasant and good-tempored, ready 
 to greet you with a smile and to accept gratefully the smallest 
 joke. They ask for nothing ; on the contrary, they are the 
 main cause of the importunity of the beggars, who for 
 the most part entirely disappear when the last Russian 
 boat has gone home. When the first warm days of May 
 bring in the scirocco they die off like flies, and the sweet 
 singing in the streets is that of the mourners as the funerals, 
 often two or three at a time, are hurried to the Russian 
 burying-ground on Mount Sion ; the faces of the uncoffined 
 dead peaceful and quiet in death, as in life, suggesting, before 
 all else, that their pilgrimage has truly led them to the 
 " haven where they would be." Some h'ttle party which 
 set out from its far-distant village has left a hostage or two 
 in sacred soil and will take home a shroud or two the less ; for 
 the coarse cotton cloth, accurately measured against the stone 
 upon which, it is said, the body of our Lord was washed, and 
 a bunch of candles which have been lighted at the " holy" 
 fire, are part of the return burden of every pilgrim, the 
 eagerly welcomed gift for the dear ones at home, laid aside 
 for the day when their time too shall come for the eternal 
 sleep. 
 
 The annual, if temporary, immigration of so many 
 
 and genuflexions, until the return home of authority, when the young 
 Arab was suitably dealt with. 
 
 81 G
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 strangers into so small a town as Jerusalem, where, to the 
 indigenous population, order, discipline, and foresight are 
 unknown, would entail, if not efficiently organized, con- 
 siderable, perhaps even serious, discomforts upon the per- 
 manent and temporary population alike. Nothing, however, 
 could be more admirable than the perfect discipline of the 
 whole movement, and its organization by the " Imperial 
 Orthodox Society of Palestine ' is efficient in every 
 detail. 
 
 The Society was founded in 1847 for the encouragement 
 of pilgrimage, but its work did not become actively important 
 till after the Crimean war. Hitherto all pilgrims of the 
 Greek Church Greeks, Russians, Bulgarians, etc. had 
 been lodged in the various Greek convents \\dthin the town ; 
 but under the auspices of the Society an entire colony has 
 by degrees been erected on the north-west side of Jerusalem 
 in an excellent and open situation. It consists of hospices 
 for single men and women and for families respectively, and 
 includes a very handsome cathedral, a large hospital, shops 
 selling Russian provisions for the convenience of pilgrims, 
 the offices of the Society, and large and well kept gardens 
 which, in shadeless Jerusalem, are an especial boon. The 
 Russian Consulate is in premises adjoining. There are also 
 a certain number of superior apartments which can be 
 engaged by visitors of the higher classes. In its earlier 
 days the Society was under the direction of the Grand 
 Duke Sergius, brother of Alexander III. It now numbers 
 at least 1,500 members, and includes the Emperor, the 
 Royal Family, the Ministry and many distinguished ecclesi- 
 astics. All receive a medal in gold, silver or bronze, 
 according to their distinction and the value of their services ; 
 and the Society has its own flag and coat of arms. 
 
 The difficult and formerly dangerous transport by land 
 and sea is now greatly facilitated. The pilgrim, before 
 taking ship at Odessa, deposits sufficient money for his 
 journey to Jerusalem and his return, amounting to not less 
 
 82
 
 RUSSIA IN JERUSALEM 
 
 than thirty-six roubles. 1 They are, then, like Cook's tourists, 
 provided with a book of tickets half of which will take them 
 to Jerusalem, while the other half is, for safety, deposited 
 on arrival at the bureau of the Society. The pilgrims bring 
 stores of provisions and above all tea, and it is to be remarked 
 that hot water can always be instantly procured in any 
 haunt of the Russian peasant. On arriving in the Holy 
 Land they are met by the Cawasses of the Society, who 
 during their visit, usually of three months, take entire 
 charge of their affairs and invariably accompany them in 
 any journeys in the interior of the country. These men 
 are Dalmatians and Montenegrins, generally of splendid 
 physique and dressed in the dignified costume of their 
 country. 
 
 For prolonged expeditions, such as that from Jerusalem 
 to Nazareth, the pilgrims must undergo inspection by the 
 medical officer. They are preceded and followed by 
 Cawasses mounted and armed with cutlass and revolver, 
 and accompanied by a priest, a doctor, a Sister of Charity, 
 and others ; also by an ambulance, a hospital-tent and 
 reserve animals for the use of any pilgrims exhausted by 
 the way. The advance-guard arranges for the food and 
 housing of the pilgrims. The danger to health of remaining 
 during the summer when water is scarce and the climate 
 might prove trying to those accustomed to temperature so 
 different limits the pilgrim-season to practically about 
 half a year, and, for convenience of housing, those arriving 
 for the Christmas ceremonials generally leave before Easter, 
 and those arriving for Easter remain at most till after 
 the Assumption. After the beginning of July the pilgrims 
 may be counted by scores only. 
 
 1 Coins in Jerusalem are constantly changing in value. If we 
 accept Baedeker's valuation of 15 piastres to a Russian rouble, this 
 sum would be worth about five Napoleons, which clearly demon- 
 strates that the Russian Government finds it worth while largely to 
 subsidize as well as " personally conduct " these immense pilgrimages. 
 
 83
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 From time to time the work of the Society is inspected 
 by its officers, or other competent persons. M. Mansouroff 
 has written two works on the Russian pilgrim in Jerusalem, 
 after studying the subject carefully on the spot for some 
 months. M. Philippow. Controller of the Empire, and a 
 member of the Holy Synod, spent the Easter of 1894 at 
 Jerusalem ; and in 1899 M. de Nelidoff, Russian Ambassador 
 to Rome, paid a lengthened visit to this, the companion 
 Holy City. It should also be mentioned that pilgrims are 
 conducted even as far as Sinai whenever a group of not 
 less than ten persons shall express a desire for this difficult 
 journey across the desert ; thus carrying the example of 
 Russian piety to the district of the monastery of St. 
 Catherine, now under Russian protection. 
 
 The Latin Orders have some excellent hospices, mainly 
 frequented by " paying guests," but even their wonderful 
 capacity for organization has invented nothing to compare 
 with that of the Imperial Society of Russia, nor indeed is 
 it required, for their religious pilgrims are comparatively 
 small in number, and, as a rule, not far removed from the 
 ordinary tourist in purpose. 
 
 Hitherto, however, Russia may be said to have concen- 
 trated her efforts mainly in the direction of pilgrimages, 
 and indeed no more effective means of propaganda, social 
 and political, if not religious, could be devised. The purely 
 philanthropic work of the Latin Church, her orphanages, 
 her asylums for the old, the blind, the deformed, the imbecile, 
 her training schools, her workshops, have never been imitated 
 even by the Greek Church, much less by the English mission- 
 aries. 
 
 In education, however, Russia has now seen her way to 
 some individuality of effort, and in this direction she has 
 already far distanced her co-religionists the Greeks, although 
 it was only in April of 1902 that she received a firman 
 empowering her to open schools at will. Since then, over 
 a hundred schools have been opened in Galilee alone. 
 
 84
 
 RUSSIA IN JERUSALEM 
 
 Russia has seen, as the Latin Church long since saw, that 
 in the intelligent, quick-witted Arab, properly trained, and 
 under the right influence, she might find a powerful ally 
 and propagandist. It is the rule rather than the exception 
 in the villages around Jerusalem to find that the pere cure 
 is a native, an example which the English missions would 
 have done well to follow, and which has been inculcated by 
 the Anglican bishop in Jerusalem. Such a priest is a man 
 of like passions with the people, understanding their lan- 
 guage, nature, and temperament as no occidental can ever 
 hope to do. Probably conscious of the weakness of their 
 own position, the Greek and the Protestant have never 
 wholly trusted the Arab, and consequently are apt to report 
 him unworthy of confidence. It is by no means uncommon 
 to find Arabs in the Latin convents, both men and women ; 
 indeed two orders, the Peres Blancs d'Afrique, and the 
 Sceurs du Rosaire are largely recruited from the native 
 population. The English, however, seldom admit natives 
 to positions of full confidence, and the Greek monks of the 
 Holy Sepulchre went so far as to refuse to house Monsignor 
 Gerasimos, then an archimandrite, afterwards Patriarch 
 of Antioch, when he arrived there as secretary to Monsignor 
 Nicodemos, on account of his Arab origin, and in spite of his 
 well known piety and erudition. 
 
 The first time that Russia fully revealed a contrary 
 policy was at the time when Bulgaria separated herself 
 (1872) from the Patriarchate of Constantinople, and was 
 consequently anathematized by the three Patriarchs of 
 Constantinople, Antioch and Alexandria. Monsignor Cyril, 
 Patriarch of Jerusalem, alone refused to express disapproval, 
 thereby drawing upon himself the indignation, not only of 
 his brother ecclesiastics, but of his flock in Jerusalem, with 
 the exception of its native element ; which, it may be con- 
 ceived, had a certain personal sympathy with the position 
 of the Bulgarians and with their desire for freedom. Russia, 
 who had long worked for the dissociation of the churches 
 
 85
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 of the principalities of the Balkans from the Patriarchate 
 of Constantinople, showed signs of quiet satisfaction, and 
 the native thus became, as it were, for the first time the 
 pioneer of Russian policy in Palestine. The Greek monks, 
 in sign of displeasure, closed schools, churches and hospitals 
 against the native element, upon which Russia, unable at 
 that time to open schools on behalf of the Arabs, by sympa- 
 thy and practical aid encouraged a considerable number of 
 young natives to come to her own seminaries for education. 
 Hitherto the only places available for the higher education 
 of the Arab had been in the schools of the Latins and in 
 the admirably efficient College of American Missionaries in 
 Beirut. A Greek elementary school, preparatory to the 
 Seminary of the Convent of the Cross, was indeed open to 
 all, but higher studies were not encouraged, and the native 
 students of the more advanced course, averaged but a very 
 small proportion of the whole. Now, however, they had 
 easy means of first-class instruction among those of their 
 own faith ; in Russia they were admitted to hold offices 
 civil and military, and to become professors, and when they 
 returned to Palestine as priests or teachers it was with a 
 grateful sense of duty towards their benefactors. 
 
 Even the chance visitor to the churches of the Russians 
 and Greeks, respectively, cannot but remark the great 
 difference in at least the outside presentation of the same 
 religion, in the contrast of the beautiful and harmonious 
 music of the one with the barbarous nasal twanging of the 
 other ; cannot but admire the decoration, the really beautiful 
 pictures to be found in the Russian Cathedral and in the 
 church at the foot of the Mount of Olives, as well as the 
 greater cleanliness and orderliness of all their ecclesiastical 
 appointments . 
 
 In this connexion, however, it is only fair to emphasize 
 the fact that, so far as one can see, Russia is not walking 
 in another path, but only ahead of her co-religionists. 
 Their jealousies and oppositions are racial, not religious. 
 
 86
 
 RUSSIA IN JERUSALEM 
 
 The Greek Church has benefited largely by Russian liber- 
 ality, not only in gifts to convents and in contributions to 
 the general support of her institutions, but also in special 
 gifts for the beautifying of the Catholicon of the Holy 
 Sepulchre. The display of cloth of gold and silver, 
 of jewelled mitres, of pectoral chains and crosses, of mon- 
 strances and reliquaries, to be seen in the festival processions, 
 could hardly have been collected without the liberality of 
 the wealthier nation, 1 a liberality all the more generous 
 that the Greeks have been extremely tenacious of their 
 privileges and have made constantly renewed difficulties 
 as to three points which the Russians have greatly at heart, 
 namely, permission, if only once in the week, for a mass 
 said by the Russian Archimandrite either at the altar upon 
 Calvary or at the Holy Sepulchre ; the admission of 
 Russian monks to serve as guides to Russian pilgrims 
 visiting the Holy Sepulchre ; and the residence of a Russian 
 Archimandrite within the walls of the Greek convent. 
 
 The Greek Patriarchate at Jerusalem has always been 
 " a close borough," and it need hardly be said that to place 
 it on a broader footing has long been the policy of Russia, 
 equally with the utilization of the Arab, although those who 
 allege that she would internationalize the office and would 
 throw it open to the candidature not only of Russians, but 
 of Arabs, Bulgarians and Servians, may possibly overstate 
 the case. It is, however, certain that in spite of much 
 opposition, fortified by an appeal to the Patriarchates of 
 
 1 It is alleged that the Russian pilgrims are a considerable source 
 of ecclesiastical revenue, as it is calculated that each spends, on an 
 average, some 10 in the country, of which a considerable proportion 
 is paid for candles, masses, and fees to priests on various occasions. 
 Moreover it is said that, after their return home, additional and 
 supplementary offerings are forwarded, amounting in the aggregate 
 to many thousands of pounds, sums which naturally, though in- 
 tended for the Greek priests at the Holy Places, have to pass 
 through the Russian Consulate, a fact which, all else apart, might well 
 and naturally suggest the importance of obtaining a national share 
 in the ceremonies of Bethlehem, the Holy Sepulchre and elsewhere. 
 
 87
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 Constantinople and Jerusalem, Russia has succeeded in 
 placing a native upon the Patriarchal chair of Antioch, and 
 in obtaining his official recognition by the Sultan. The 
 patriarch of Antioch has his residence at Damascus, which 
 has long been a centre of Syrian " orthodoxy," and has 
 had several native bishops, and it is even alleged that it 
 was in view of this candidature that Damascus was raised 
 from a vice-consulate to a consulate. It is at least difficult 
 to assign any other reason in a city where there are few 
 resident Russians and where Russia has little commercial 
 interest. 
 
 Another point in Russian policy, somewhat akin to her 
 protection of the Arab, is her alleged inclination to protect 
 what may be called the " dispossessed sects." Those who 
 fondly imagine that it is only among dissenters from Angli- 
 canism, or in the Reformed Churches of the Continent 
 that heresies and schisms tend to multiply, should visit 
 Jerusalem and try to grasp the significance of the 
 varieties who worship in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre 
 alone. There are two sects whom the Russians might 
 conceivably annex, and who, if not very numerous, might 
 at least be counted upon to strengthen her hands against 
 then 1 common opponent, the Latin Church, namely, the 
 Georgians and the Abyssinians: The Georgian Christians, 
 have been since 1802, legally subject to Russia, so that to 
 befriend them is only natural, although one may question 
 whether she is likely to go so far as to attempt to restore 
 to them their former share of the Holy Sepulchre, namely, 
 the Chapel of Adam and one of the altars on Calvary, of 
 which the Greeks took possession after the fire of 1808. 
 
 Russia is also kindly disposed, it is said, towards the 
 Abyssinians, who formerly possessed the Chapel of St. 
 Helena, now in the hands of the Armenians, and the Chapel 
 of the Opprobrium, now owned by the Greeks. Moreover, 
 they formerly possessed the right of sharing in the cere- 
 monial of the Greek Fire, a performance by the way which, 
 
 88
 
 RUSSIA IN JERUSALEM 
 
 it is said, is seriously disapproved by the Russians, who, not 
 only better instructed themselves, but more ambitious for 
 their people, would willingly have it discontinued. Russia 
 is indeed the religious protector of the Greeks, Armenians, 
 Syrians, Copts and Abyssinians, who all follow the oriental 
 rites and profess practically the same faith. 
 
 Although by the treaty of 1774 with the Sublime Porte, 
 Catherine II became protector of " the orthodox " in the 
 Ottoman Empire, and thus of the pilgrims to Palestine, 
 which even then outnumbered those of the Latin Church, 
 it was not until 1844 that a representative of the Russian 
 Church, in the person of an Archimandrite, arrived in Jeru- 
 salem, and not until 1858, after the Crimean war, that a 
 consulate was established, shortly after which Russia began 
 to acquire property. Naturally her ambition was, like 
 that of all religious bodies in Jerusalem, to gain possession 
 of ground in or about the Holy Sepulchre, and, difficult 
 as it was, even this has been accomplished, a church and a 
 hospice erected, which if Russia should ever succeed in 
 acquiring the intervening buildings of the Abyssinian 
 convent, would be brought into actual touch with the 
 coveted sacred spot. Now, moreover, in addition to the 
 immense estate north of the city she has a share of the 
 garden of Gethsemane, where a beautiful church has been 
 built at the cost of the Imperial family (consecrated in 1888) ; 
 also considerable property on the Mount of Olives, at 
 St. John's, Jaffa, Jericho, Nazareth, Tiberias, Ramallah, 
 and indeed almost all the historical places in the Holy 
 Land. Although, as already mentioned, it is only since 
 1902 that general permission has been obtained for 
 building schools in Palestine, nevertheless they have 
 multiplied rapidly, to the provocation of great jealousy 
 among the Greeks in all parts of the country, at Tiberias, 
 Nazareth, Damascus and even in the wild and distant 
 Hauran, east of the Jordan. In 1890, at the desire of the 
 Emperor, considerable additions were made to the ecclesi- 
 
 89
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 astical staff, and in 1893 an Ambassador was established 
 at Rome, probably having regard to the relations of Russia 
 with Palestine, where the Greek and Latin Churches are 
 more especially brought into touch, and where every event 
 has its religious aspect. 
 
 According to an article in IS Echo d 1 Orient (1898) Russia 
 even proposes to enter the fields of higher education, which 
 hitherto, in Syria, have belonged exclusively to the Jesuits 
 and the American missionaries; who have carried on an 
 admirable rivalry in arts, science and medicine at 
 Beirut. 
 
 So far, what we have had to say upon the presence of 
 Russia in Palestine, has been, on the whole, of good work 
 accomplished, of something practical achieved among her co- 
 religionists, the Greeks, or among the people of the country. 
 But we may not forget the lesson taught us by the " incident 
 of the Russian Tower " ; we must remember that as it 
 stands upon that lofty eminence, the most conspicuous 
 object in the whole district, impossible to ignore, a part of 
 the perspective of the country, ostensibly a feature of its 
 religious life, so also Russia fixes her gaze, not only 
 upon the East with its interests, its faith, its distant hope, 
 but upon the West, with its civilization, its history, its 
 traditions. So far, we have dealt with the relations between 
 Russia and Greece, which, despite racial and political 
 difference, have nevertheless for object the propaganda of 
 the same faith. From the point of view of religion, they 
 unite against a common foe, and, so far, the work of Russia, 
 as we have seen it, has been creative, constructive, synthetic. 
 We have now the more difficult task of attempting to review 
 her attitude in Jerusalem towards the Western faith, and 
 here we find that her influence, naturally enough, tends to 
 be disintegrating, destructive, aggressive. 
 
 Thanks mainly to the policy which has permitted, until 
 lately, that the Church of England should present herself 
 in the Holy Land hand in hand with the " Reformed 
 
 90
 
 RUSSIA IN JERUSALEM 
 
 Church " of Germany, 1 the " Protestant " influence in 
 Jerusalem has long been an almost negligible quantity 
 except as represented by Germany. Figures are here 
 difficult to arrive at, but the latest English Baedeker 
 quotes 1,400 Protestants as against 4,000 Latins and 6,000 
 Greeks ; or in both cases, counting sects, 4,250 Latins and 
 7,000 Greeks ; the two combined being about one-third 
 more than the Mussulman population. Germany has a 
 handsome new church, the gift of the Emperor, a hospital 
 under the very efficient care of the Kaiserwerth deacon- 
 esses, the only Leper Hospital in Syria, and large and 
 flourishing schools and orphanages of so practical a kind 
 that it is rumoured that, unlike other missionary institu- 
 tions, they produce craftsmen, trained nurses, and even 
 domestic servants. But with this Russia is not concerned. 
 For Russia the Latin Church means France, however 
 anomalous it may be that France should, anywhere, be 
 definitely identified with religion: Many French Orders 
 are largely represented in Jerusalem : the Assumptionists, 
 Dominicans, Benedictines, the Peres Blancs d'Afrique, 
 the Freres Chretiens ; and among women, the Sisters of St. 
 Vincent de Paul (who, it is interesting to note, are entrusted 
 by the Turkish Government with the charge of the Municipal 
 Hospital), the Sisters of St. Joseph, and the Sisters of the 
 Rosary. In addition to these sisters, whose active good work 
 is equally beyond all measure and all praise, there are the 
 less useful Orders of the Carmelites, the Clarisses and the 
 Marie Eeparatrices. There is also the unique Order of 
 the Soeurs de Sion, whose work is especially among the Jews. 
 The Franciscans, who are in charge of 55 sanctuaries, 
 9 convents, 18 mission churches, and 34 chapels, and 
 
 1 One can hardly wonder that the fact is thus stated by Alphonse 
 d' Alonzo, formerly attache at the French Consulate in Jerusalem : 
 " Les adeptes de Luther se firent representer sur le sol de la Terre 
 Sainte ; un eveque protestant designe par 1'Angleterre et 1'Alle- 
 magne unies s'y installa." 
 
 91
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 have over 4,000 children in their schools, are, techni- 
 cally, international, speaking eleven different languages ; 
 but, as has already been pointed out, their Superior, 
 the Pere Custode, is, by tradition, always Italian, and, 
 in their capacity of Guardians of the Holy Places 
 they are under the protection of France. We thus arrive 
 at the anomaly that whereas, until the comparatively 
 recent local activity of Russia, the Greek religion was 
 under the sole protection of the Turk, the Latin religion is 
 under the protection of the French ; hence we have the 
 Latin religion protected by a power which is not religious, 
 and the Greek religion by a power which is not Christian. 
 One must, however, regard the question of the Holy Places 
 as too large to be merely national. They are supported 
 by men and by alms, not only from the whole of Western 
 Europe, but from America as well ; indeed the active interest 
 and actual work done by the new world in and for the Holy 
 Land would be a revelation to those who have not had 
 occasion to consider the question on the spot. Russia is 
 therefore in daily and active relation with two powers 
 Greece whom she is trying to drag along, France whom she 
 is trying to repulse. All that she can gain for herself 
 if possible, but if not, for Greece, or even for the Syrians, 
 Copts, Armenians, Abyssinians is so much subtracted 
 from France ; here the privilege of saying an additional 
 Mass, there of lighting a lamp, of using a doorway, or even, 
 it may be of sweeping a stair. 
 
 The heart of Jerusalem, its Holy of Holies, and alas ! 
 its battlefield, is the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Here, 
 as in the Holy Stable of Bethlehem, while the Christians 
 pray, the Turkish soldiery must sit by to see that they do 
 not steal, nor even murder. This is no figure of speech. 
 Under the altar which marks the birthplace of our Lord 
 there is a silver star which belongs to the Latins. In 1847 
 it was stolen, it is believed, by the Greeks. Replaced in 
 1852, another attempt to carry it off was made in 1873. 
 
 92
 
 RUSSIA IN JERUSALEM 
 
 Close by the same spot in 1893 the Latin sacristan was 
 killed, and three of his companions injured by the Cawass 
 of the Russian pilgrims, who fired his revolver on being 
 requested to make way for the passage of the procession ; 
 and, so lately as in November 1901, seventeen Franciscans 
 were severely wounded by the Greeks in the courtyard 
 of the Holy Sepulchre. 
 
 Some of the occasions of dispute are so trivial that one 
 hesitates to describe them, so difficult would it be for any 
 one not on the spot to focus such incidents correctly. And 
 in truth they are, in most cases, the occasion, not the cause ; 
 the causes often being far to seek, difficult to explain, and 
 of extreme complexity. Moreover one has to realize 
 the enormous importance in this country of precedent. 
 In 1852, the Government, doubtless perplexed by the 
 counter claim of rival Churches over questions of ritual 
 and privilege, little adapted to the Moslem understanding, 
 issued a firman ordaining the statu quo, extending over 
 the Holy Sepulchre, the Church at Bethlehem as well 
 as the Tomb of the Virgin at Gethsemane, in which the 
 Latins have now lost all rights. This, naturally enough, 
 each party has ever since been scheming to evade. In 
 1888, for instance, during the visit of the Grand Dukes 
 Sergius and Paul, the Russian archimandrite said Mass in 
 the Holy Sepulchre, contrary to precedent, on three con- 
 secutive days, against which the Latins felt bound to 
 protest. On the other hand, during the Congress of the 
 Holy Eucharist in 1893 the Latins allowed the " united " 
 Catholics of some other rite to say Mass on Mount Calvary, 
 upon which the Greeks lodged a complaint with the Governor. 
 It is a most literal case of " great landscapes seen through 
 small openings," and in some cases one must be on the spot 
 to appreciate their magnitude. 
 
 The Greeks and French, as it were, got the start of Russia, 
 who manifested little interest in the Holy Places, as such, 
 until they became of some political significance. In 1841 
 
 93
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 France established a consulate and became the recognized 
 protector of the Latin Church. In 1847 Pope Pius IX re- 
 vived the Latin patriarchate. In 1857, after the Crimean 
 war, Russia for the first time actively occupied herself with 
 the affairs of the Holy Land, and, together with France and 
 Turkey, signed the protocol on the subject of the re-con- 
 struction of the dome of the Holy Sepulchre, a fact of the 
 more importance that, on the last occasion of its repair, 1808, 
 the matter had rested almost exclusively in the hands of 
 Greece, the opportunity when she annexed many privileges 
 confirmed to her by the statu quo, to the satisfaction 
 of Russia and the humiliation of France ; an instance 
 sometimes quoted in illustration of the difficulties of the 
 Latin position. The Czar, it is said, on those rare occasions 
 when he resorts to arbitration instead of gaining ends by 
 subtlety and diplomacy, never allows his party to experience 
 a check, whereas France is interested only from the political, 
 and cares practically nothing for the religious side, as such. 
 
 In 1897 at Bethlehem another long disputed case of 
 violation of the statu quo was again lost to the Franciscans. 
 The Grotto of the Nativity is approached by two staircases 
 from north and south, opening into the Latin and Greek 
 Churches respectively. On the evening of the Greek 
 Easter, which coincides with our Epiphany, a Greek pro- 
 cession sought egress through the former, and as a matter 
 of precedent was resolutely opposed by the Franciscans. 
 The Russian Consular Agent, who was present, was loud 
 in protestation ; first the Governor of Bethlehem and then 
 the French Consul were sent for, and, greatly to the 
 surprise of those whom he " protected," the Franciscans 
 were required to withdraw. 
 
 Thus, on one side or the other, is precedent created, and 
 where so many opposing forces meet on so small a battle- 
 field, as for example five creeds within the walls of the 
 Holy Sepulchre, the very smallest encroachment becomes 
 of consequence. It would be no impossibility for either 
 
 94
 
 RUSSIA IN JERUSALEM 
 
 France or Russia to absorb the rights of the nation she 
 protects, and by diminishing the number of the combatants 
 enlarge the extent of the interests at stake. Now and then 
 some point in dispute is settled by the appearance of yet 
 another claimant. A curious example of this was afforded 
 when the Latins and Greeks were unable to settle their 
 rival claims to the church discovered at the Pool of Siloam; 
 While the quarrel was proceeding the Mohammedans ran 
 up a minaret and the matter was decided. 
 
 Russia has not yet succeeded in obtaining proprietary 
 rights in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, but their 
 acquisition is by no means impossible, though both Greeks 
 and Latins are, for once, of the same opinion as to the 
 expediency of restraining her ambitions in this direction. 
 Policy or poverty may conceivably appeal to either the 
 Armenians or the Abyssinians on her behalf, and the more 
 often the statu quo is violated in small things the easier 
 will it be, when the time comes, to carry the matter with a 
 high hand, as at Bethlehem in 1897. A Russian journal 
 the Mosh Vedom of January 2 and 14, 1894, has not hesi- 
 tated to put the suggestion into words. " As the Armenians 
 are not in communion with our Church we can act in relation 
 to them without compunction, the more that they are the 
 oppressors of the inoffensive and simple African Christians 
 (Abyssinians) to whom it will be possible to offer liberal and 
 advantageous terms." 
 
 Year by year, it is said, towards the time of the Greek 
 Christmas, application is made to the protecting authority 
 for permission to prevent the unseemly passage of the 
 Greek procession by the north staircase at Bethlehem, 
 and year by year the authority finds new methods to " put 
 the question by." One can hardly expect religious enthu- 
 siasm from a nation which politically owns no religion, 
 and to be obliged to attend officially at long religious func- 
 tions in which he may not be personally interested must pall 
 upon the most devoted servant of his country, even though 
 
 95
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 the service will be delayed for him however late he may 
 arrive, though his attendants will be tolerated whatever 
 their manners and customs, and even when he is placed in 
 a conspicuous position in an arm-chair of early Victorian 
 design, covered tastefully in green reps with purple and 
 magenta stripes. 
 
 But that these things are not so trivial as they may seem 
 at first sight, was abundantly demonstrated by the tragedy 
 of November 1901, described in a later chapter. It was 
 again a question of statu quo and again an instance of a 
 trifling occasion and a serious cause. The Greeks disputed 
 the right of the Franciscans to sweep certain steps in the 
 courtyard of the Holy Sepulchre, and on a certain day 
 prepared themselves for attack by taking on to the roof 
 heavy stones, and, it is even said, burning tow to hurl from 
 the security of their lofty position upon their defenceless 
 victims in the court below. The Franciscans would not 
 even defend themselves, much less resent attack, until 
 they received orders from headquarters, but merely occupied 
 the steps, and by their mere presence defended the position. 
 
 The Turkish soldiers, always on guard at the entrance, 
 were called out, and order was at length restored, happily 
 without the firing of a single shot, for the slightest sign of 
 disorder would almost certainly have been followed by an 
 emeute. It is alleged that a considerable number of 
 " roughs " were waiting for the smallest excuse to make 
 a rush for the church, and the treasure it contains. As 
 usual upon all public occasions, the Turkish soldiers were 
 orderly and prompt. One never fails to admire their quiet, 
 one had almost said their respectful, conduct at the Holy 
 Places which for them can have neither interest nor 
 meaning. 
 
 It is satisfactory that when after nearly nine months' 
 delay the matter was at length brought to trial, a new pre- 
 cedent was established, which may lead to very important 
 results and be far reaching in its ultimate issues, namely, 
 
 96
 
 Tm: DAMASCUS GATE
 
 RUSSIA IN JERUSALEM 
 
 that the Germans and Italians were brought before their 
 respective consuls instead of the matter being decided 
 between the French and the Turks, as would have been 
 the ordinary procedure. 
 
 Truly the crust of civilization is still somewhat thin in 
 the East, and one cannot but feel that the position is tem- 
 porary and the period one of transition. The Russians, as 
 we have seen, can show a consistent policy and magnificent 
 organization ; France, ineffective on the political side, 
 upholds institutions of practical piety and good works ; the 
 Greeks maintain a dignified independence ; the Arabs 
 are developing a divine discontent ; Germany exercises 
 a magnificent philanthropy ; the Jews excel in num- 
 bers, in combination and in hope. England ? well 
 England is busy elsewhere. Meanwhile Turkey is in 
 possession. What next ? The Syrian himself, who has 
 lived on the soil since long before the Mosaic immigra- 
 tion, who was a Christian when our ancestors offered human 
 sacrifice, raises his indifferent eyes to Heaven~and says, 
 "Do I know? God knows." Laalam 9 Allah yaallam. 
 
 97
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 THE GREEKS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 THE GREEK CHURCH ITS ANTIQUITY ITS AUTHORITY 
 LATIN PATRIARCHS IN JERUSALEM, 1204-1260 END 
 OF THE EASTERN EMPIRE THE EASTERN CHURCH 
 ITS GOVERNMENT EDUCATION OF CLERGY CHARIT- 
 ABLE AND PHILANTHROPIC UNDERTAKINGS CONVENTS 
 THE GREEK FIRE MISUNDERSTANDING AND EXAG- 
 GERATION EARLY HISTORY As IT WAS IN 1902 IN 
 1820 
 
 ONE of the most perplexing of the many social prob- 
 lems which confront the resident in Jerusalem is 
 that of the presence of the Greek element, national and 
 religious, perplexing at first on account of its novelty, 
 afterwards even more on account of such elements as 
 increased familiarity cannot fail to present. Most of us 
 know, vaguely, that the inhabitants of Greece, Russia, 
 and certain of those smaller states of Europe which are 
 always having rebellions, massacres and earthquakes, 
 belong to the Greek Church ; we know that a certain part 
 of London, north of Hyde Park, is known as " Asia Minor," 
 and that there you may meet ecclesiastics in flowing black 
 robes, hats which appear to be put on upside down, copious 
 beards, and chignons. The " runagates " who go about 
 from church to church, and in consequence " continue in 
 scarceness," will add that the service-books are magnifi- 
 cently decorated, and the music hardly to be described 
 as such. Arrived in Jerusalem, you may easily learn that 
 the Greeks more than twice out-number the Latins and 
 
 98
 
 THE GREEKS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 more than five times the miscellaneous body known 
 as " Protestants " ; that when the Greeks are fasting' 
 which occurs on about 226 days in the year, meat is cheap ; 
 that they quarrel a good deal with the Latins, resent the 
 immigration of the Russians, and own many convents 
 and houses in and about Jerusalem. One soon arrives at 
 the further stage of discovering that not only is the Greek 
 Church obviously divided into Greek and Russian, having 
 separate churches, convents, and schools, but that the 
 Greeks are further subdivided into some six or seven 
 varieties at least. 
 
 Probably nowhere else but in Jerusalem could one so 
 effectively learn that England and America are not the 
 only happy hunting grounds for the supporters of " false 
 doctrine, heresy, and schism " ; the difference being that 
 here dissent is hoary with antiquity, and (comparatively) 
 reputable by association with Church Councils. " The 
 Sunnites," says Lady Burton, " excommunicate the Shiahs, 
 both hate the Druses, all detest the Ansariyehs, all despise 
 the Jews. The higher classes want place and power, the 
 lower, money and European protection. . . . The fourteen 
 Christian sects wrangle at the Holy Places. Others have 
 come to teach us better." She might have added that the 
 "others " only do not wrangle at the Holy Places because they 
 are excluded, a fact which they do not appear to regret. 
 
 To the Western Churches, Latin and Anglican alike, 
 it cannot but be startling, probably offensive, to be told 
 that they are a schism, a dissent from the oldest church 
 in the world, the " Greek Orthodox " ; and yet, in a certain 
 historical sense, the statement is susceptible of proof. 
 
 " The Church of Rome," says Dean Stanley, " is a Greek 
 Church a colony of Greek Christian and Grecized Jews. 
 " Greek Christianity," says the author of one of the best 1 
 recognized books of reference on the subject, " is the parent 
 of Latin Christianity, and the Churches of Rome and 
 
 1 Eighteen Centuries of the Orthodox Greek Church, A. H. Hore, 1899. 
 
 99
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 England are really, in the present divided state of Chris- 
 tendom, separated limbs of the Greek Church." Dean 
 Milman puts the position thus : " For some considerable 
 (it cannot but be an indefinable) part of the first three 
 centuries the Church of Rome, and most, if not all, of the 
 Churches of the West, were, if we may so speak, Greek 
 religious colonies ; their writers Greek, their Scriptures 
 Greek, and many vestiges and traditions show that their 
 ritual, their liturgy, was Greek. ..." 
 
 Of the three hundred Bishops present at the Councils 
 of Nice, 325 A.D., eight only represented the Western Church ; 
 and at the Council of Constantinople, when the heresy of 
 Macedonius was condemned and the Nicene Creed formu- 
 lated, not a single Western Bishop was present. It has 
 been remarked by several writers that the Greek language 
 was the more adapted for dealing with the subtleties of 
 heresy, the Latin for the science of dogmatic theology. 
 
 " Whatever we may think," says Dr. Wordsworth, 
 Bishop of Salisbury, 1 " of the claims of the modern Greeks 
 to be descendants of the countrymen of Homer and 
 Thucydides, we cannot doubt that the Greek Church has 
 a continuous succession from the great Fathers, Athanasius, 
 Basil, the Gregories, Chrysostom, and the rest. 2 . . . 
 Even the most uninstructed English Churchman is familiar 
 with, and has a veneration for, the Nicene Creed, the faith 
 defended by St. Athanasius, and the liturgy of St. Chry- 
 sostom, and when he opens his Prayer-Book is reminded 
 of all three, even " (he adds characteristically) " though 
 the reminders be wanting in strict literal accuracy." 3 
 
 1 In a lecture on The Church of England and the Eastern Patriarchate 
 delivered at Oxford, July 1898. 
 
 2 Shall we forget that " the rest " include Polycarp, Justin Martyr, 
 Clemens Alexandrinus, Ignatius and Gregory Thaumaturgus ? 
 
 3 The reference is mainly to the dispute upon the filioque clause 
 in the Nicene creed, the Eastern Church alone preserving the original 
 form " which proceedeth from the Father,'" whereas both the Western 
 Churches have added the phrase, " and the Son." 
 
 100
 
 THE GREEKS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 The six General Councils, whose decisions were accepted 
 throughout Christendom, were all held in the East, and 
 conducted in the Greek language. The Eastern Church, 
 in a certain historic sense, can show claim to be, not only 
 the Mother Church of Christianity, but also the parent 
 of Theology. Among the early Fathers, Tertullian alone 
 wrote in Latin, and even he was resident in Carthage. The 
 principal writers of early ecclesiastical history were all 
 Greeks : Eusebius, Socrates, Sozomen, Theodoret. A 
 synod of the Greek Church held at Laodicea in 367 A.D. 
 determined the canon of Scripture. It was not till the 
 pontificate of Damasus (366-384) that the Vulgate edition 
 of the Bible was translated at Bethlehem by St. Jerome, 
 and that the Scriptures first became Latinized, having 
 hitherto been commonly known only in the form of the 
 Septuagint and the Greek Testament. 
 
 The first bishop of the Christian Church was St. James, 
 Bishop of Jerusalem ; the earliest centre of Greek Chris- 
 tianity was Antioch (Acts xi. 11), presided over, according 
 to ecclesiastical tradition, for seven years by St. Peter, 
 for which reason Pope Innocent I claimed for it a special 
 dignity. Evidence goes to show that the See of Rome 
 was not created till between 64 A.D. (when we know that 
 St. Peter was at Babylon) and June 29 A.D. 68, the date 
 of his martyrdom in Rome. After Constantino, the first 
 Christian Emperor, had, in 327, removed the seat of 
 Government to Constantinople, Rome, Constantinople, 
 Antioch, and Alexandria were raised to the dignity of 
 patriarchal sees, though, strange to say, Jerusalem did 
 not receive a corresponding distinction till the Council 
 of Chalcedon in 451. It is easy to see how, while the 
 ecclesiastical authority of the East was divided among 
 four, Rome, having undivided power, and, moreover, 
 being at a distance from the rival influences of secular 
 authority, soon became, not only a more important patri- 
 archate than any other, but even than the four distributed 
 
 101
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 authorities combined. The Greek Church, on the other 
 hand, suffered continual tyranny and martyrdom under 
 the oppression of successive conquerors Arabs, Mon- 
 gols, Turks ; and perhaps one may venture to doubt 
 whether, under the combined pressure of schism and perse- 
 cution, she might not have disintegrated altogether, had 
 it not been for, perhaps, the mightiest conquest of the 
 Christian Church, her conversion of Russia, King and 
 people, Church and State, wholly and bodily, in the year 
 980. 
 
 From the first, Constantinople, " the New Rome," was 
 a Christian city, possessed of the finest position in the 
 world, the outpost, as it were, between Europe and Asia ; 
 from the eighth to the tenth century the strongest military 
 power in Europe, holding her own against Persians and 
 Goths, Saracens and Bulgarians, Seljouk and Ottoman 
 Turks ; strong under a long succession of able administrators, 
 enriched by commerce on land and sea, producing art 
 which became the parent of the wider schools of Italy, 
 maintaining, as few nations have succeeded in maintain- 
 ing, a steady legal standard of coinage. 
 
 In 380 Christianity was established (under Theodosius) 
 as the state religion, 1 and it is to be noted that when, in 
 800, Charlemagne asserted himself as the head of the 
 Roman Empire, it was " not by professing to revive the 
 Empire of the West " (extinguished three hundred years 
 before, in 476), " but by getting himself recognized, as, 
 in some sense, the representative of the eastern Emperors." 2 
 He is thus spoken of in the annals of his time as the 68th 
 Emperor in order from Augustus, the 67th being Con- 
 
 1 The Emperor, from the time of Constantine, had been supreme 
 in matters religious as well as civil, and the title by which the Em- 
 peror styled himself X/H.O-TW TTIO-TOS /3ao-iAevs TWV Pto/xaitov is equi- 
 valent to the English " Defender of the Faith." 
 
 2 Rev. H. F. Tozer, The Church and the Christian Empire Epochs 
 of Church History. Series edited by Mandell Creighton (Bishop of 
 London), 1888. 
 
 102
 
 THE GREEKS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 stantine VI (780-797), and was crowned by Pope Leo III 
 on Christmas Day, 799. 
 
 It will be remembered that, in 1204, after the fourth 
 Crusade, Jerusalem became for fifty-seven years a Latin 
 kingdom, and that Latin patriarchs, with Latin clergy, 
 succeeded to the Greek patriarchs, and Greek clergy, who 
 for seven centuries and a half (451-1204) had held the 
 Patriarchal See. 
 
 The Franciscan Order of Friars Minor arrived in Jerusalem 
 in 1219, but the Latin Patriarchate was not revived till 1847. 
 During the interval, however, the Franciscans, often at 
 noble cost of life and liberty, succeeded in maintaining, on 
 behalf of Western Christendom, their influence and position 
 as Guardians of the Holy Places. 
 
 The Eastern Empire ended in 1453, having existed for 
 eleven centuries. The last sign of life was an attempt at 
 reconciliation with the Western Church, though it is perhaps 
 not quite easy to believe that the attempt, at that par- 
 ticular period of her conscious decline, can have been wholly 
 disinterested. Four points, then as now, made approxima- 
 tion impossible. Although some concession to the Greeks 
 was offered it was not accepted, as was the case in the more 
 recent amalgamation of Abyssinians, Armenians, Copts 
 and Syrians, with the Church of Rome. The points in 
 dispute can only be briefly indicated as relating to the pro- 
 cession of the Holy Spirit (i.e. the use of the filioque clause 
 in the Creed), the use, for sacramental purposes, of un- 
 fermented bread, the doctrine of purgatory, and of the 
 supremacy of the Pope. 
 
 The theory of a national Church, definitely established at 
 the fifth General Council of Justinian, 553, has never been 
 wholly lost sight of. It was to be controlled by the supreme 
 authority of the Emperor, and to yield to Rome the respect 
 due from the younger to the elder, a respect now entirely 
 a thing of the past. This idea of nationality has become 
 stereotyped in the East, and is the idea politically recognized. 
 
 103
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 Thus, for example, the United Armenians are regarded as 
 the Armenian Catholic nation. Anything like the niter- 
 national subjection to the Pope, so essential a feature of the 
 Latin Church, is entirely lacking. 1 
 
 The Eastern Church is governed by four patriarchs : 
 1. Of Constantinople, who has jurisdiction over at least 
 7,500,000 mainly in Turkey in Europe, but also in Asia, 
 north of the territory of the Patriarch of Antioch. 2. Of 
 Alexandria, who has supervision over Egypt, where, how- 
 ever, the orthodox amount only to about 6,000, as the 
 religion of the country is that of the Copts. 3. Of Antioch, 
 who governs about 80,000 in Cilicia, Syria and Mesopo- 
 tamia. 4. Of Jerusalem, who controls some 50,000 in 
 Palestine. 
 
 In communion with these patriarchs, but not subject to 
 them, are the Churches of Greece, Cyprus, Russia, Servia 
 and Roumania, Montenegro and the three independent 
 national Churches in Austro-Hungary. 2 
 
 A charge very commonly brought against the Orthodox 
 Church, especially in relation to the Greek as distinguished 
 from the Russian branch, is that of the ignorance of their 
 clergy. Their deficiencies are now clearly recognized, the 
 more since the importation of educational advantages into 
 Syria by the Russians. The Sy nodical letter relating to 
 the establishment of the new Greek Seminary in Jerusalem 
 enumerates, among other objects, " That our Church be no 
 longer deprived of educated ministers, that the peculiar 
 
 1 In view of the formerly anomalous position of the Anglican 
 Church in Jerusalem, one can hardly feel surprised that the term 
 " Protestant " is the official, indiscriminate designation of all in the 
 kingdom of Turkey who are not Latins, Greeks, or Moslems, without 
 reference to national or religious distinction, except in the case of 
 the converted Jew, who is always distinguished as a " Hebrew Chris- 
 tian." The story is told of a dragoman who supposed himself to be 
 an American because he had been baptized by the American Pres- 
 byterians in Beirut. 
 
 2 Compare the relation of the church of England with the epis- 
 copal church of America. 
 
 104
 
 THE GREEKS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 people entrusted to us may not remain destitute of adequate 
 and properly equipped Guides, that lack of learning and of 
 knowledge may not prevail among us, that the thirst for the 
 Divine Word the worst of evils may not afflict the sacred 
 flock, but that it may be seasoned with salt, itself good and 
 well-seasoned." 
 
 The educational difficulties do not exist in Jerusalem only. 
 Except in Athens, the Greek Church has no university ; 
 little indeed beyond elementary schools, for the theological 
 colleges are but few in number, and their time is, necessarily, 
 from lack of other provision for general education, taken 
 up with secular studies. It seems that only four such 
 colleges are extant : at Constantinople, Athens, Tripolitza 
 (in the Peloponnesus) and at the Monastery of the Holy 
 Cross at Jerusalem, 1 founded in 1858, but, even since that 
 time, thrice closed. It was re-opened last in 1893, and has 
 now, it is said, fifty students, the full number which it is 
 possible to provide for. 
 
 It is maintained by the Greek Community of the Holy 
 Sepulchre, is under the superintendence of their Patriarch, 
 and the staff is preferably, but not entirely, ecclesiastical. 
 There are a library (where we noted the complete works of 
 Sir Walter Scott), a museum and a laboratory ; and a course 
 of musical instruction is included in the curriculum of the 
 college. Students are admitted between the ages of seventeen 
 and twenty-two, and must pass a preliminary examination in 
 Greek, arithmetic, political geography, elementary catechism, 
 and sacred history, and be able to read in Arabic. They are 
 educated and boarded, and, if needful, clothed, at the ex- 
 pense of the Monastery, but seventy-five Turkish pounds 
 must be deposited by some responsible person as guarantee 
 
 1 This fine old convent, possibly founded by St. Helena, was for 
 many centuries the property of the Georgians, though for a time, 
 in the thirteenth century, in the hands of the Moslems. It was 
 last restored in 1643. It is, among the Greeks, the traditional site 
 of the tree of which our Lord's Cross was formed. 
 
 105
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 that they will fulfil all requisite conditions, proceed to take 
 orders, and be obedient to the Patriarch in all things. The 
 course covers seven years, of which the last two are purely 
 theological ; they are examined twice a year, and, should 
 they fail in the final examination for a theological diploma, 
 may be once only " referred to their studies," after which, 
 on failing a second time, they forfeit their deposit and leave. 
 One constantly meets them in the neighbourhood of their 
 convent, dressed in black cassocks, and the peculiar brimless 
 hat of the Greek clergy. 
 
 There are, in Jerusalem, large elementary schools both 
 for boys and girls, a hospital with excellent buildings and 
 well-arranged wards, orderly and well cared for by nurses 
 who seemed to be mainly Russian, and much admirable 
 organization for ministering to the needs of the poor. 
 There are weekly doles of bread, with the addition, on 
 festivals, of wine the simple wholesome wine of the country. 
 During a recent alarm of cholera, when the surrounding 
 district was in quarantine and trains and road traffic sus- 
 pended, and when, in consequence, food and other neces- 
 saries rose in price, arrangements were made by the Greeks 
 to supply the poor on reasonable terms. There is at the 
 Church of the Holy Sepulchre a small but well arranged 
 museum testifying to the recent stimulus of interest in local 
 archaeology. There are many convents sixteen at least, 
 of which most are within the walls of the city, and of which 
 two at least are for women, though I am bound to say that 
 we have not been able to discover that the latter serve any 
 useful purpose. The nuns showed us their churches, but 
 when asked what they did, replied that they cooked their 
 food and cleaned the house, and seemed surprised that any- 
 thing further should be expected of them. They wore no 
 habit. 
 
 Philanthropy has always been an essential part of the 
 religion of the Eastern Church. St. Basil (368) founded 
 almshouses and hospitals, Justinian (528) a penitentiary, 
 
 106
 
 THE GREEKS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 the Emperor Isaac Angelus (1185) a hospital and hospice 
 for a hundred travellers free of charge, and the Church 
 devoted herself at an early period to the consideration of 
 the slavery problem. 
 
 Among all the exaggerations of travellers' tales, is there 
 any subject which has been treated more unfairly than that 
 of the Greek fire ? The scene has been too often described, 
 but the quotation of a few facts may interest the reader. 
 The ceremony is very ancient, and though no record 
 exists of its institution it is thought to have taken its rise 
 at the time when much encouragement was given to pil- 
 grims, under the reign of Charlemagne. It was first de- 
 scribed by a traveller, Bernardus the Monk, in 867. " Within 
 this city, besides others, there are four principal churches, 
 connected with each other by walls one to the East, which 
 contains the Mount of Calvary, and the place in which the 
 Cross of our Lord was found, and is called the Basilica of 
 Constantino ; another to the South ; a third to the West, in 
 the middle of which is the Sepulchre of our Lord, having 
 nine columns in its circuit, between which are walls made 
 of the most excellent stones, of which nine columns, four are 
 in front of the monument itself, which with their walls 
 include the stone placed before the Sepulchre, which the 
 angel rolled away, and on which he sat after our Lord's 
 resurrection. . . . On Holy Saturday, which is the Eve of 
 Easter, the Office is begun in the morning in this Church, 
 and after it is ended the Kyrie Eleison is chanted, until an 
 angel comes and lights the lamps which hang over the afore- 
 said Sepulchre ; of which the patriarch gives their shares 
 to the Bishops and to the rest of the people, that each may 
 illuminate his own house." 
 
 A Moslem historian, Masudi, wrote in 943 : " The Christians 
 assemble for this festival from out all lands. For on it the 
 fire from heaven doth descend among them, and they kindle 
 therefrom the candles. The Moslems also are wont to 
 assemble in great crowds to see the sight of the festival. 
 
 107
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 The Christians hold many legends thereanent, but the fire 
 is produced by a clever artifice, which is kept a great secret." 
 
 As early as the eleventh century detractors arose, who 
 denounced the Miracle of the Fire as an imposture to the 
 Caliph Hakem, and the persecutions of the Christians, the 
 destruction of the Holy Sepulchre in 1010, ultimately the 
 Crusades, were probably the consequence ; though the 
 facts are as seldom remembered as cause and effect, as is 
 the reconstruction of the dome of the Church of the Holy 
 Sepulchre, remembered as the occasion, if not the cause, of 
 the Crimean war. The Christian writer, Abelfaragius, tells 
 us that " The author of this persecution was some enemy 
 of the Christians, who told Hakem that when the Christians 
 assembled in their Temple at Jerusalem to celebrate Easter, 
 the chaplains of the Church, making use of a pious fraud, 
 greased the chain of iron that held the lamp over the Tomb 
 with oil of balsam ; and that when the Arab officer had 
 sealed up the door which led to the Tomb, they applied a 
 match, through the roof, to the other extremity of the 
 chain, and the fire descended immediately to the wick of the 
 lamp and lighted it. Then the worshippers burst into tears, 
 and cried out Kyrie Eleison, supposing it was fire which fell 
 from heaven upon the Tomb ; and they were thus strength- 
 ened in their faith." 
 
 Undoubtedly large numbers of ignorant peasants, per- 
 haps even others who have less excuse, are, to this day. 1 
 
 1 It may be worth while to compare with this superstition of the 
 Russian and Oriental pilgrims, ignorant peasantry for the most part, 
 the following paragraph, which I quote from Finn's Stirring Times, 
 ii. 462, and which he borrows from Lambarde's Topographical 
 Dictionary (no reference given). 
 
 " I myself, being a child, once was in Paul's Church at London at 
 a feast at Whitsontide, wheare the comyng of the Holy Ghost was 
 set forth by a white pigeon that was let to fly out of a hole that is yet 
 to be seen in the midst of the roof of the great ile, and by a long 
 censer, which descending out to the same place almost to the very 
 ground, was swinged up and down at such a length that it reached 
 at one swepe almost to the west gate of the church, and with the 
 
 108
 
 THE GREEKS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 similarly "strengthened in their faith," but there is now abso- 
 lutely no dramatic machinery whatever. The Patriarch of 
 Jerusalem, accompanied by a Greek and Armenian ecclesi- 
 astic, walks into the tomb, leaving the door open. Like his 
 predecessor, who over fifty years before the Norman Con- 
 quest is mysteriously alleged to have " applied a match," 
 the Patriarch, by some means, ignites whole bundles of 
 candles, which are handed, through the window, to the eager 
 crowd without ; to the Greeks on the north side, to the 
 Armenians on the south ; lastly to the Coptic and Syrian 
 ecclesiastics who are waiting in the doorway outside. In a 
 moment, as it seems, the waiting thousands, within and 
 without, have lighted candles and torches at the sacred 
 flame ; and not the Church only, but the courtyard is so 
 ablaze with lights, that it is no exaggeration to say that 
 within, at least, the daylight is extinguished. Mounted 
 messengers are already on their way to Bethlehem and to the 
 coast, each carrying the sacred flame carefully shielded in 
 a lantern, and, in a few minutes, the orderly, courteous and 
 well disciplined Turkish police have cleared the whole scene, 
 and the crowd has dispersed into the streets. 
 
 It is during the long hours of waiting that the disorder is 
 alleged to occur. Such may have been the case in former 
 days, but now a cordon of police surround the Holy Sepulchre, 
 and neither entrance nor movement can be effected, except 
 at certain intervals, and under strict organization. The 
 police have been at their posts so long 1 that some are almost 
 fainting, and not only water, but even smelling-salts are 
 handed round at the command of the observant officers, 
 whose courtesy, dignity, one had almost said reverence, in 
 
 other to the queer stairs of the same, breathing out over the whole 
 church and companie a most pleasant perfume of such swete thyngs 
 as burned therein." 
 
 1 Moreover, in 1902, Easter happened to fall within the Fast of 
 Ramadan, so that matters for the Moslem police were complicated 
 by exhaustion. 
 
 109
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 presence of a scene so utterly contrary to all their prejudices, 
 is beyond all praise. We could not but remark that we had 
 often seen police, vergers, and beadles in churches and 
 cathedrals at home and on the continent, who might well 
 profit by their example. One must take into consideration 
 the very small theatre of a scene so immense, the presence 
 of a vast concourse of strangers, many of whom are un- 
 sympathetic, others even bent on creating disturbance ; 
 the Latin gallery crowded with those who, while behaving 
 with all the respect due to the place in which they are 
 assembled, can hardly be expected to entertain much cordial 
 feeling towards those so unhappily their rivals in the 
 possession of the Holy Places ; the Armenians, Copts, 
 Syrians, Abyssinians, all anxious to take part in an occasion 
 upon which their legal status is, to say the least, doubtful 1 ; 
 the crowd of Russian pilgrims, hundreds of whom have been 
 waiting in the church for at least twenty-four hours, and many 
 of whom have been travelling, mainly on foot, for months 
 on purpose to be present; the tourist curiosity-mongers, 
 craning necks and raising opera-glasses, from various points 
 of vantage provided by their respective Consuls ; and, above 
 all, the Greeks themselves, conscious, undoubtedly, of 
 criticism, of being on the defensive, aggressive perhaps, 
 as it is only human on such occasions to be. 
 
 It is fair, however, to acknowledge that peace and order 
 are rather to the eye than to the ear. It seems an impos- 
 sibility to the Arab to be silent. Work and amusement 
 alike are accompanied by song. From morning till night 
 they shout, sing, scream, crack their whips ; the very dogs, 
 donkeys, camels of Syria make more noise than those of any 
 other place within civilized ken, and here, with all the 
 stimulus of expectation, of the presence of crowds, of excite- 
 
 1 At what precise period the Latins ceased to take part in the 
 ceremony is not known. However, as early as 1697, Maundrell 
 writes : " The Latins take a great deal of pains to expose this 
 ceremony as a most shameful imposture and a scandal to the 
 Christian religion." 
 
 110
 
 THE GREEKS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 ment, conceivably even of religious devotion, it is not 
 reasonable to suppose that they will keep silence. In 
 endless succession, one or another starts a song which the 
 crowd takes up, for the most part relevant, and even reli- 
 gious in character. A favourite ejaculation, recited anti- 
 phonally, is 
 
 " Our candles are in our hands And towards the Tomb we 
 are praying." Or again, twenty, fifty times without stopping, 
 they cry 
 
 " Hatha Kuber Said na Sabt en nar wa aed na Wa 
 hatha Kuber Said na" 
 
 " This is the Tomb of our Lord The seventh day is the 
 fire and our feast And this is the Tomb of our Lord." 
 
 Why they are specially anxious to insult the Jews, who 
 are certainly not present, as no Jew dare show himself even 
 in the court of the church, it would be hard to say, but 
 another favourite song runs thus 
 
 " O Jews ! O Jews ! 
 Your feast is the feast of devils, 
 Our feast is the feast of Christ, 
 Christ who has redeemed us, 
 And with His blood has bought us. 
 We to-day are happy 
 And you are sorrowful. 
 
 " O, the Jews ! the Jews ! O, the Infidels ! 
 Your feast is the feast of the dead, 
 And our feast is the feast of Christ ! " 
 
 Now and then, when the cordon is opened to admit of 
 newcomers, there are cries of " God save the Sultan ! " or 
 in a momentary pause, of 
 
 " The resurrection of Christ has redeemed us from our 
 sins ! " 
 
 The crowd is so dense in the small space that there is not 
 the slightest difficulty in hoisting the leaders on to the 
 shoulders of the multitude, nor of their moving about freely 
 when once up. We counted seven at one time thus 
 
 111
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 mounted, a phenomenon one has read of, and hitherto 
 supposed to be among the figures of speech peculiar to 
 newspaper reports. 
 
 The author of Days in Galilee (ed. 1900, p. 272) writes 
 that the Acting Russian Consul of the period said to him, 
 " I was with the Patriarch 1 on one occasion when there were 
 present several bishops and some other gentlemen. The 
 Patriarch said on that occasion, ' The Church does not 
 claim to work a miracle, it is but an emblem of the spread 
 of the Evangel through the world.' ' 
 
 The Easter panic of 1834, described in Curzon's Monas- 
 teries of the Levant could hardly recur in these days, as was 
 well demonstrated when, in 1895, the Greek crowd made an 
 attempt to prevent the entry of the Armenian Patriarch 
 into the Chapel of the Angels the ante-chamber of the 
 Holy Sepulchre to which, as usual, he sought to accompany 
 the Greek Patriarch. The bugle at once sounded, the soldiers 
 came to the rescue, and the disorder was promptly quelled, 
 though a few persons were injured from the extreme pressure 
 which naturally follows the movement of a crowd within so 
 small an area. 
 
 The orthodox procession round the Holy Sepulchre is 
 followed by that, even more ornate as to vestments, banners, 
 and jewels, of the Armenians, with whom are grouped the 
 Copts, Syrians and Abyssinians, who have no legal status in 
 Jerusalem and no representatives at the Porte. 
 
 The Armenians, however, who have long shown a tolerant 
 spirit towards all anti-Chalcedonians or anti-Melchites, take 
 charge of their political affairs, for since 1830 the Porte has 
 recognized but two oriental Patriarchs, the Armenian and 
 the Greek. 
 
 The author of Christian Researches in the Mediterranean 
 describes the ceremony of the Greek Fire in the year 1820. 
 He mentions, as a fact, that the sum of 16s. 8d. was paid by 
 
 1 Probably Gerasimos. This learned Greek, universally respected , 
 died in February, 1897. 
 
 112
 
 THE GREEKS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 every person for admission, but that the crowd was, not- 
 withstanding, enormous. He naively concludes, " What I 
 have written " (i.e. as to various ceremonials, mainly Latin) 
 " will suffice to show you what takes place annually round the 
 Tomb of Christ. May we not hope that the exertions of the 
 Bible Society in the diffusion of the Scripture, which the 
 Pilgrims will be enabled in future to purchase at the very 
 gates of the Sepulchre and carry home to then* families and 
 friends, will tend progressively to inspire a purer and more- 
 exalted spirit ? " 
 
 The spirit of devotion, especially of the Latin and Russian 
 pilgrims of the present time, strikes one as singularly " pure 
 and exalted " as compared with that of the English tourists, 
 although the Bible Society has not yet been permitted to 
 sell books to them in the Court of the Holy Sepulchre. 
 Pilgrims are not, however, entirely deprived of incentive to 
 the study of Scripture. The very large college of the 
 Dominicans exists in Jerusalem solely for the study of the 
 Bible in its natural surroundings ; the Brothers of St. Anne 
 have a Biblical museum, designed to illustrate every article 
 and every custom mentioned in the New and Old Testaments, 
 and in the handbook issued to the Latin pilgrims of Jerusalem 
 by the Assumptionists, who annually organize and receive 
 within their walls the largest caravans which have ever 
 visited Jerusalem, we find the following passage : 
 
 " Notre livre, c'est la Bible, PAncien et le Nouveau Testa- 
 ment. Etudions-le avec amour. La vue des Lieux Saints 
 nous en donnera 1' intelligence. . . . Lisons notre Nouveau 
 Testament et suivons, pas a pas, les traces misericordieuses 
 du Sauveur Jesus." Moreover, both in this more popular 
 guide-book, as well as in the more recondite Guide Lievin 
 issued by the Franciscans, the sacred story is given 
 in full, in the words of the Gospel, of every site connected 
 with the history of our Lord, an incitement to reverence 
 and meditation which has not been imitated in any English 
 handbook, so far as I am aware. 
 
 113 I
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 It is interesting, moreover, to find that even the Bible 
 Society had ultimately to accept the aid of the Eatin Church 
 in introducing the Scriptures into Palestine. The Rev. 
 James Connor, also travelling for the Bible Society, writes 
 (op. cit. p. 452) : " All that I have seen and heard during 
 my travels in Syria has led me to the firm conviction that 
 no edition whatever of the Arabic Bible which differs in any 
 respect from the text sanctioned in Rome will be accepted 
 in these countries. ... I have conversed with many of the 
 Catholic ecclesiastics on the Bible Society and its labours of 
 Christian charity, and never have I heard one voice lifted 
 up against it ; all that they require is that the edition be 
 conformable to the Authorized Text." The Society took the 
 hint and shortly issued a reprint of the Propaganda edition. 
 
 114
 
 HERESIES AND SCHISMS IN THE 
 EASTERN CHURCH 
 
 VARIOUS CHURCHES IN JERUSALEM THE ARMENIANS, 
 SYRIANS, ABYSSINIANS, COPTS POSSIBILITIES OF 
 ANGLICAN RE-UNION ATTEMPTS ALREADY MADE 
 POINTS OF SYMPATHY CHAPEL OF ABRAHAM COMMON 
 BELIEFS CHARACTERISTICS OF THE EASTERN CHURCH 
 ITS AUSTERITY, IN FASTS, IN ART, IN ARCHITECTURE 
 ST. GEORGE 
 
 HERESIES upon such points as the nature and will, 
 Divine and Human, of our Lord, have effected the 
 separation from the Greek Church of some half-dozen 
 bodies, all represented in Jerusalem, namely, the Copts, 
 Armenians, Abyssinians, and Syrians, further complicated 
 by " United " Copts, Armenians, Abyssinians, Syrians, and 
 Orthodox * (under these circumstances called " Melchites "), 
 that is, representatives of the Orthodox Greek, and of the 
 four separated Churches, who have joined themselves with 
 the Roman Catholic Church, in some cases preserving certain 
 peculiarities of their own, such as administering the Sacra- 
 ment in both kinds, use of the vernacular language for mass, 
 and marriage of the clergy before ordination. 
 
 1 The title " Orthodox," which, like that of " Catholic," may be 
 felt by those not in sympathy to be somewhat question-begging, 
 serves to differentiate about one hundred millions of persons who 
 hold fast to the decrees of the (Ecumenical Councils, to which may be 
 added some six millions more, who reject them in one or more parti- 
 culars. 
 
 115
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 Of these bodies, the most prosperous in Jerusalem, at 
 all events is that of the Armenians, whose very fine Church 
 of St. James is quite one of the " sights " of the Holy City. 
 The Armenians are the earliest example of the conversion 
 of the entire nation, indeed perhaps the oldest native 
 Church in existence, converted in 276 by the preaching 
 of St. Gregory, the Illuminator. They are said to be rich, 
 and indeed the magnificence of the decoration of their 
 church and the possession of some really fine works of art, 
 would suggest, what is rare in the East, the undisturbed 
 possession of property for a considerable period. They 
 have the reputation of being shrewd and apt in business, 1 
 and of being much engaged in trade throughout Asia and 
 India, which may account for the presence, in their churches, 
 of treasures conceivably Chinese or Japanese, of wonderful 
 mellow blue tiles, of silk carpets, inlaid work of tortoise- 
 shell and mother of pearl, and, above all, a collection of 
 magnificent monstrances, jewels, lamps, vestments, mitres, 
 and altar frontals, some of which might well be the pride 
 of any art-museum in Europe. One altar frontal might 
 probably tell a curious story, could such things speak. Its 
 obvious design is that of a " sun in splendour," with ac- 
 companying corner devices, heavily and richly embroidered 
 in gold thread. A vague perception of an imperfectly 
 disguised background, invited closer attention, and there 
 we discovered, exquisitely and daintily embroidered, a 
 beautiful piece of seventeenth century French needlework 
 a Watteau scene of, to say the least, worldly tendency, 
 unfinished telling its own pathetic story of intentions 
 frustrated, perhaps by death, or possibly by change of 
 views on the part of the skilled embroideress, who, it 
 may be, had turned to the religious life, and had dedicated 
 this, the labour of years, to the service of God and of the 
 Church. 
 
 1 Hence the saying that " it takes two Arabs to cheat a Jew, two 
 Jews to cheat a Greek and two Greeks to cheat an Armenian." 
 
 116
 
 HERESIES IN THE EASTERN CHURCH 
 
 The Armenians are said to be religious and church-going, 
 and number, in Syria and Palestine, some 4,000 souls. 
 Their own Chronological History of Jerusalem is the received 
 authority upon their history and opinions. The conventual 
 buildings of the Armenians are perhaps the most picturesque 
 in Jerusalem, and, including two churches, and the resi- 
 dence of the Patriarch, cover a large part of the plateau of 
 Mount Zion. Their fine old garden, which contains some 
 stately trees, is probably the remains of the pleasaunce of 
 Herod's Palace. There is accommodation for 3,000 persons, 
 including some 200 monks, a theological seminary for thirty 
 or forty students, who enter at the age of sixteen for a five 
 years' course of instruction, and who, if they fail in reaching 
 the required standard, are expected to enter the monastic 
 life for thirty years. There are also what may be described 
 as secondary or high schools for about a hundred boys and 
 girls. The Armenians excel in various manual arts, and 
 have, attached to the convents, admirable printing and 
 bookbinding establishments. They have a valuable library 
 and a museum of antiquities. They possess convents not 
 only in Jerusalem, but also at Bethlehem and Jaffa, and 
 share in common rights with Latins and Greeks at various 
 Holy Places. They possess two chapels within the precincts 
 of the Holy Sepulchre, those of St. James and St. Helena ; 
 the latter, which might be made one of the handsomest, as 
 it is one of the largest in the sacred pile, they unaccountably 
 neglect, and it is scantily decorated with strings of ostrich 
 eggs, specially characteristic of the Armenians, although 
 found in other oriental churches, and considered a symbol 
 of faith, as the bird is said to hatch them by her steady gaze. 
 
 They have been in Jerusalem from the earliest days of 
 the Christian Church, and their own historians record the 
 visit of a queen during the time of the Apostles. The title 
 of Patriarch of Jerusalem dates only from the twelfth 
 century, but there are many remains of older churches 
 belonging to them, and it is said that at one time they 
 
 117
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 possessed a considerable share of the Mount of Olives. 
 Their convent on Mount Zion is on the alleged site of the 
 house of Caiaphas, and they possess part of the stone said 
 to have closed the Holy Sepulchre, of which part only 
 remains at the tomb of our Lord. 
 
 It is said that the Armenian separation rests upon no 
 demonstrable heresy, but upon a mere misunderstanding 
 consequent upon the accident that the See was not repre- 
 sented at the Council of Chalcedon 1 (in 451), in consequence 
 of a fearful persecution raging in Armenia, an attempt of 
 the Persians, then rulers of the country, to enforce the 
 doctrines of Zoroaster. These unhappy people, destined 
 in all ages, it would seem, to religious persecution, had 
 already resisted an attempt of the Emperor Maximin to 
 enforce Paganism upon them, rather more than a century 
 earlier. One Armenian tradition is noteworthy as illus- 
 trative of their conservatism and continuity. They are 
 said to reckon time from the date of the first Armenian, 
 who, it seems, was contemporaneous with Shem ; so for 
 the date of 1903 they use 4391. They have also a secondary 
 method, of dating from the year 551 A.D., which in the 
 Lehrbuch der Chronologic is thus explained. In the year 
 351 A.D., a certain Andreas of Byzantium made an Easter 
 calendar for 200 years, which, at the end of that period, 
 was found to be incorrect, and it was adjusted in the year 
 551, from which year they have since calculated. 
 
 The Syrian is perhaps one of the most interesting of the 
 independent Churches. Like the Armenians they separated 
 
 1 It is an interesting point that Etchmiadzen, at the foot of 
 Mount Ararat (their great ecclesiastical centre, the Patriarch being 
 superior to all Bishops and Patriarclis) is now in the hands of Russia, 
 a fact which may conceivably lead to re-union. 
 
 In Newman's edition of Palmer's Visit to the Russian Church (p. 166) 
 it is stated that the Patriarch of Constantinople himself, had said 
 the Armenians might safely be reunited to the Orthodox Church, 
 only that " the Greeks would cry out that we had made union with 
 the heretics." 
 
 118
 
 HERESIES IN THE EASTERN CHURCH 
 
 after the Council of Chalcedon, their heresy being as to the 
 Divine and Human nature of our Lord ; but though con- 
 demned as Monophysites, they do not seem to have been 
 separately incorporated until about a century later, when 
 they received the nickname, which still clings to them, of 
 " Jacobites," from Jacob " Baradai " (the man of rags, so 
 called from the humility of his dress), Bishop of Edessa, 
 who became their leader, and at his death, in 578, left 
 a large community amounting, it is alleged, probably with 
 exaggeration, to 80,000, now represented in Jerusalem by 
 a single monastery and church, and perhaps some fifteen 
 families. One may perhaps venture to think of them as 
 the lineal representatives of those who listened to the teach- 
 ing of our Lord and His Apostles, as the oldest Christian 
 Church in the world, that which at Antioch was " first called 
 Christian." The language of their ritual is Syriac, still also 
 in use among the Maronities of the Lebanon, a language of 
 Syria before the introduction of Arabic, and probably that 
 used by our Lord Himself. Its alphabet is still often 
 employed even where the words themselves are Arabic, and 
 was a mark of distinction between Syria and the more 
 Judaized Palestine as far back as nearly a thousand years 
 before Christ. Their Church, by a well authenticated 
 tradition, is said to be on the site of the house of John Mark, 
 and contains a painting said to be by St. Luke. 1 
 
 1 The late Dr. Schick, facile princeps upon questions of Jerusalem 
 topography and archaeology, thus describes the Church of St. Mark. 
 " This is an old building somewhat variously restored. The gate 
 leading from the street first into the convent and about a dozen 
 paces further to the church, has some remarkable decorations. It 
 is said to be the gate at which St. Peter knocked . . . The font is 
 shown as a very old relic, even as coming down from the times of the 
 Apostles. Blackburn says of this Church, ' It is supposed to have 
 been the first ecclesiastical building of the Christians.' Although 
 this assertion cannot be proved, still it is probable that the erection 
 of all these small and simply formed churches at Jerusalem, falls in 
 the early Christian time before Byzantine art became flourishing." 
 (Quarterly Statement, P.E.F,, October 1895.) This group of 
 
 119
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 It was a sensation not to be forgotten to pass by the site 
 of the Prison of St. Peter, where the present wall consists, 
 in part, of stones probably belonging to a much earlier 
 building, where sections of columns and arches have been 
 roughly squared to take their place among more modern 
 material, to enter by a door at least representing that at 
 which St. Peter knocked when the maidservant took him 
 for his own ghost, and to drink coffee with the stately Bishop 
 and his chaplains ; to be privileged to handle then- beautifully 
 decorated works bound in marvellous silver, chased and 
 repousse, and adorned with veritable gems of the illumina- 
 tor's art, caligraphy of incredible delicacy and minuteness, 
 and bold representations of Gospel scenes. They celebrate 
 mass, not only in their own church, but also at altars in the 
 Holy Sepulchre, and at the Church of the Tomb of our Lady. 
 They entertain a few pilgrims yearly, and in spite of the 
 attenuated number of the faithful, live in modest dignity, 
 mainly upon the proceeds of a small property near the 
 Jaffa Gate. Their habits are simple and ascetic, they have 
 five lengthened fasts during the year, when both clergy and 
 laity abstain not only from flesh and eggs, but even from 
 wine, oil, and fish. Their Patriarch always takes the name 
 of Ignatius in memory of the disciple of St. John thrown to 
 the lions in A.D. 115, who was the first Bishop of Antioch, 
 and from time to time they have produced distinguished 
 scholars, Gregory Abelpharagius (d. A.D. 1286) poet, physi- 
 cian, philosopher, historian, and divine, being the one best 
 known to the western world. 
 
 Although, in Jerusalem, they have a new and handsome 
 church outside the walls, as well as an ancient one within 
 the precincts of the Holy Sepulchre, the Abyssinians belong 
 
 churches includes seven of unquestioned interest : the Church of 
 the Olive Tree and the Prison of Christ, both in the Armenian 
 Convent ; the Churches of St. Thomas, St. James, the Three Marys, 
 St. Mark, and Mar Jirius (Saint George). They are probably identical 
 with " the seven synagogues " mentioned by the Bordeaux pilgrim 
 in the fourteenth century. 
 
 120
 
 HERESIES IN THE EASTERN CHURCH 
 
 to one of those races, whose destiny seems to be that of 
 submission to others. One is not, therefore, surprised that 
 they are dependent upon the Coptic Patriarch for the choice 
 of their nominal bishop, who, however (notwithstanding 
 statements to the contrary) is never called Caiholicus, 
 who has no power of ordaining Metropolitans or 
 Bishops, who is not allowed to be of their own race, 
 and who, as a rule, is ignorant of their language, 
 although it is, in great degree, the language of their ritual. 
 They have begged the Armenian Patriarch of Jerusalem to 
 send them a bishop, but he has not yet felt justified in 
 interference. They have a convent, a curious kraal-like 
 settlement, in the court which surrounds the dome of the 
 Armenian Chapel of St. Helena (in the Church of the Holy 
 Sepulchre). On the west side are some half-ruined houses 
 of two stories high ; on the south and east are groups 
 of small buildings little more than huts, each containing 
 a single family, those in Orders, unless monks, being 
 allowed to marry. Their church is a low, projecting building, 
 which the priest is courteously ready to show. Their 
 ecclesiastical language is Ethiopic, they are tall, and of good 
 carriage, but almost painfully fleshless, encumbered with 
 clothing about the neck and shoulders, bare, men and 
 women alike, about the legs. Their manner is dignified 
 and reposeful, although one learns, on excellent authority, 1 
 that " They remain an almost unique specimen of a semi- 
 barbarous Christian people. Their worship is strangely 
 mixed with Jewish customs ; dancing forms part of their 
 ritual, as it did among the Jews ; the Sabbath is still 
 observed as well as the Lord's Day ; circumcision is prac- 
 tised." " They are," says Dean Stanley, " the only true 
 Sabbatarians of Christendom, observing the Jewish Sabbath 
 as well as the Christian Sunday." 
 
 Like the Jews, they eat the flesh of such animals only a 
 chew the cud and have cloven feet. 
 
 1 Tozer, op. cit. p. 83, 
 121
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 " The Abyssinian Church," writes Rev. A. H. Hore (Op. 
 (cit., p. 270), " presents the spectacle of the benign influence 
 of the Gospel struggling with the cruel surroundings of 
 a savage life ; a strange mixture ... of devotion, super- 
 stition, and barbarism, combined with Christianity." 
 
 Their earliest teaching dates probably from the year 316, 
 when they were Christianized by Frumentius of Tyre, who 
 was wrecked upon their coast, and who was afterwards 
 consecrated first Bishop of Alexandria ; though they them- 
 selves give a different account of their history, which is 
 interesting, as in part explaining the story of their mys- 
 terious relations with Judaism. Abyssinia, they say, is 
 the same as Sheba, and when their Queen was converted 
 to Judaism on the occasion of her visit to Solomon, she 
 brought back the Hebrew religion. Moreover, by Solomon, 
 she became the mother of her successor Menelek, which 
 accounts for the opening clause of the Profession of Faith 
 of their Emperor Claudius : 
 
 " In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of 
 the Holy Ghost ; one God. This is my faith and the faith 
 of my Fathers, Kings of Israel, and the faith of my flock, 
 which is within the precincts of my kingdom." 
 
 Their conversion to Christianity they attribute to the 
 eunuch of Queen Candace, converted by St. Philip. 
 
 The Coptic, or Egyptian Church, is somewhat associated 
 with the Abyssinians, 1 who may be indeed described as an 
 
 1 Bishop Gobat, writing to King Theodore (June 13, 1863), says : 
 " Your Majesty will be grieved to hear of all the wrong that is done 
 to your subjects, the Abyssinian priests and pilgrims in Jerusalem. 
 . . . The Copts and the Armenians have already taken the Chapel 
 belonging to your Majesty, and now they want to take whole convents 
 by force. . . . Formerly the English Consul protected the Abyssinians, 
 but now there is a new Consul, who has no order from the Queen of 
 England to protect them." 
 
 The bond between the Abyssinians and Copts seems to have been 
 formerly even closer than now. A volume of travels of 1822 : Chris- 
 tian Researches in the Mediterranean, speaks of the Abyssinians shar- 
 ing the Convent of the Copts, and saying their Mass in the Churches 
 
 122
 
 HERESIES IN THE EASTERN CHURCH 
 
 offshoot of the Copts, if we accept the more tenable, though 
 the less romantic hypothesis, that it was founded from 
 Abyssinia in the fourth century. The Church, said to have 
 been founded by St. Mark, was, in its early days, famous for 
 its learning, and its separation from the Orthodox Church 
 on the condemnation of the Monophysite heresy, was an 
 event of great consequence. The Church, even in Egypt, 
 is now but a poor remnant of its former prosperity, and has 
 but four bishops where formerly it had twelve. 
 
 Then" Bishop of Jerusalem generally lives at Jaffa, pos- 
 sibly because the Copts possess but scanty accommodation 
 in Jerusalem. They have a convent, hospice, and a chapel 
 within the courtyard of the Holy Sepulchre, but all poor, 
 and, if one may judge from appearances, without ambition 
 or attempt at improvement. At Easter they receive a good 
 many pilgrims, which may or may not be a source of income. 
 
 As having endured, possibly, more persecution than any 
 other Church in the world, the Copts are entitled to our 
 reverence and respect, and it is interesting to reflect that 
 their language, however much debased, is probably related 
 with that to which Moses listened at the Court of Pharaoh. 
 Their clergy are poor and ill-educated, and, it is alleged, 
 often become priests to evade military service. Few even 
 understand the language of their own service-books, but 
 the increasing tendency to read the liturgy in Arabic has 
 not yet reached Jerusalem. 
 
 Of the " United " oriental Churches, we shall speak in 
 connexion with the work of the Latins. As to the possibility 
 of re-union between the Greek and Anglican Churches, it is 
 not for a mere outside observer, and that in the limited area 
 
 of the Copts and Armenians, by whom they were for the most part 
 supported. 
 
 Lady Burton, in her Inner Life of Syria, vol. ii., also speaks of the 
 Chape! of St. Helena as belonging to the Abyssinians, who, she says, 
 " allow the Armenians to use it for a certain payment in bread and 
 soup." 
 
 123
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 of Palestine only, to express an opinion. Upon the broad 
 basis of religious charity, unity is, of course, always to be 
 desired, or rather, divisions are to be deprecated ; otherwise 
 the advantages to be gained by fusions of prejudices are, 
 in this instance, not entirely obvious, nor are we, so far as 
 one can gather, regarded by the other side as wholly desir- 
 able allies. The presentation of the Church of England in 
 Jerusalem, until the consecration of St. George's Collegiate 
 Church in 1898, has not been such as to commend its teach- 
 ings to those of other Churches, accustomed to frequent 
 worship, obedience to our Lord's injunction of fasting, 
 reverence to sacraments, and observance of Church seasons 
 and of holy days. The Greek Church has never questioned 
 the validity of Anglican orders the great stumbling-block 
 in regard to re-union with the Latin Church and has 
 always received all expressions of desire for re-union with 
 entire courtesy, apparent readiness to entertain friendly 
 relations, and a masterly inactivity. The earliest official 
 attempt at approximation on the part of England seems to 
 have been made in the year 1723, and repeated in 1866-8. 
 Later there was a correspondence with Archbishop Tait, 
 described in a document addressed by the Greek ecclesiasti- 
 cal authorities to Canon Dowling in 1901 as " truly brotherly 
 letters, full of pure and enlightened Christian love, which were 
 exchanged in the year of grace 1899 between His Holiness the 
 late Patriarch of Constantinople, and the most Reverend 
 Frederic, Lord Archbishop of Canterbury and Primate of all 
 England." A permanent committee has since been formed 
 to discuss points of difference, especially as to the teaching 
 of the English Church in relation to the infallibility of 
 Church Councils, to faith and good works, sacraments, predes- 
 tination, and, above all, the " procession of the Holy Spirit." 
 No expression of kindly feeling could be more gratifying 
 to the English Church than the fact that it is owing to 
 Greek liberality that her clergy should have an opportunity 
 of celebrating the Holy Eucharist within the precincts of 
 
 124
 
 HERESIES IN THE EASTERN CHURCH 
 
 the Church of the Resurrection, more commonly, but less 
 correctly, known as that of the Holy Sepulchre. In 1885, 
 on Palm Sunday, the very Reverend C. R. Hale, D.D., Dean 
 of Davenport, Iowa, celebrated at the altar of the Chapel 
 of the Greek Monastery of Abraham, and from time to time 
 others have availed themselves of the privilege. This, 
 England's one slender link with any of the Holy Places of 
 Jerusalem, is only too little known, the very existence of 
 the chapel being ignored in every English guide-book so 
 far as I have discovered, although Baedeker devotes two 
 lines to the existence of the monastery for the sake of refer- 
 ring to the size of its cistern. It stands, probably, upon 
 part of the site of the first Latin convent built in Jerusalem 
 by order of Pope Gregory the Great in the year 601. 
 Destroyed by Chosroes, it was rebuilt by Charlemagne, 
 and under the name of St. Mary Latin served as a hospice 
 for pilgrims, among whom, in 870, was Bernard the Monk, 
 whose records are so valuable a treasure to the historian. 
 This again was destroyed by Hakem, but rebuilt some ten 
 years later with the same dedication. The little chapel is 
 one of at least three places in Jerusalem in which the 
 sacrifice of Isaac is located. It contains some curious 
 frescoes, notably one of the flight of Lot from Sodom, 
 another of the sacrifice of Abraham. It has been hand- 
 somely restored and decorated, mainly by the English, 
 somewhat to the regret of the archaeologist. Anglicans 
 visiting Jerusalem are naturally exceedingly grateful for 
 such a privilege, the more that England lost 1 her only chance 
 
 1 One is tempted, however, to regret the loss the less, upon reflect- 
 ing on the possible consequences to the world of archaeology when 
 one reads the following passage written by a distinguished American 
 antiquary and archaeologist, Dr. Peters. " In 1894, in the grounds 
 of the English Bishop's Church, north of the Damascus gate, a tomb 
 of the heathen period with a painted fresco was discovered. That 
 is the only painted tomb hitherto found in the neighbourhood of Jeru- 
 salem. I regret to say that the fresco is now exposed to the air and 
 the painting has been utterly ruined." 
 
 125
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 of erecting an altar of her own in any site of sacred as- 
 sociations, when, after the Crimean War, she refused the 
 gift of the site of an early Christian church beside the 
 probable Pool of Bethesda and over the alleged birth- 
 place of our Lady, where now one of the most beautiful 
 churches in Jerusalem, as well as school, seminary, library 
 and museum, have been raised by the " White Fathers " 
 of St. Anne. 
 
 This Church is described by De Vogue as being, after the 
 Holy Sepulchre, the best preserved edifice in Jerusalem, as 
 having come down to us just as it was built in the first half 
 of the twelfth century, and as being, as such, a complete 
 example of the architecture of the Crusaders and the type 
 of all their religious monuments (De Vogue, Eglises de la Terre 
 Sainte, p. 233). 
 
 On occasion of an Anglican celebration, the Greek Patri- 
 arch makes all preparations, and provides the bread and 
 wine. A costly service of sacred vessels, presented to him by 
 friends in England, is kept for the purpose, and as Bishop 
 Blyth, in his Second Charge, points out, such kindly hospi- 
 tality to a foreign rite is " full of hope for the restoration 
 of the Church's unity," and indeed there are certain points 
 which seem to indicate the possible approximation of the 
 Greek and Anglican Churches ; in both, two sacraments 
 only are accounted " generally necessary to salvation," 
 and in the Greek, as in the English Prayer Book, the real 
 presence is expressed without being defined. Both make 
 use of a tongue " understanded of the people," both com- 
 municate fasting. Both reject the doctrine of Indulgences. 
 The views of the Eastern Church upon this subject are 
 effectively expressed by Philaret, who says, "It is not 
 difficult for sinners to give gold and receive heaven, and for 
 the pastor to give heaven and receive gold. But it is not 
 so easy to get the real kingdom of God. It is taken by 
 force." 
 
 Those who best know the tendency of the Eastern Church 
 
 126
 
 HERESIES IN THE EASTERN CHURCH 
 
 are wont to declare that, despite the phenomenal length of 
 its services, it is a Church of the people, just as it tends to 
 become, wherever it be, the Church of the Nation ; and as 
 in the case of the Jews, there may be in their faith some 
 of that emotion of patriotism which is inherently absent in 
 the Church Catholic. Attachment to the faith is a matter 
 of course ; the congregations are mostly of men ; there is no 
 false shame in confessing religion ; the Christos Aneste of 
 the Easter greeting, as one hears it even in the streets, is a 
 contrast to our " Merry Christmas," which is at least 
 suggestive. 
 
 The liturgies of St. Basil and St. Chrysostom are familiar 
 to many Anglicans in the devotional works of Bishop 
 Andrew. Their vestments, with certain differences of 
 ornamentation, correspond with the alb, maniple, stole, 
 chasuble and pall. There is a certain austerity which is 
 probably, like their art, a survival. Their pictures are all 
 more or less after the school of Cimabue. They are without 
 tenderness, and are to the humanity they represent what 
 the conventional flower of decoration is to the primrose or 
 lily of daily life. This, however, does not apply to the Slav 
 or Russian Church, which, at least in Jerusalem, possesses 
 many pictures of serious art value. In contrast also to that 
 of the Russians, the Greek singing, also a survival, is a nasal 
 drawl which has not even the rhythm of Arab music. The 
 Russian singing is absolutely unique, and is inconceivable 
 to those who have not heard it. Even the pilgrims, often 
 old men and women, weary perhaps and hungry, lighten 
 the fatigue of then* journey or the monotony of waiting 
 by singing, which is really exquisite. The trained singing 
 of their churches fills one with wonder and astonishment. 
 It is not only beautiful, it is a tour de force. Their chants 
 and melodies, sung harmoniously and in parts, have, more- 
 over, a distinct accompaniment, preludes, final cadences, 
 sustained notes, persisting beyond what one would suppose 
 the possibilities of the human voice, and one looks around, 
 
 127
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 despite one's knowledge that no musical instrument is 
 tolerated, for the organ or deep-toned viol, which has pro- 
 duced so marvellous an illusion. One reflects with gratitude 
 upon the oversight which has prevented some entrepreneur 
 from importing a choir of Russian peasantry in national 
 costumes, for the entertainment of English Society. 
 
 The austerity of the Eastern Church is noticeable in the 
 direction of then- fasts, and one can well understand the 
 phrase, " long as Lent." For some 226 days in the year 
 they fast clergy and laity alike abstaining not only from 
 meat, but from eggs, cheese, milk, butter, and even from 
 fish, not absolutely of the bloodless kind, such as shell-fish, 
 the octopus, and such like. They fast, not only in Lent and 
 Advent, and on various odd days in the year, but also 
 from Whitsuntide to St. Peter's Day, and again for the first 
 fortnight of August, previous to the great festival of the 
 Dormition of the Virgin, when, here in Jerusalem, they 
 visit her alleged tomb, in which they place a figure for the 
 stimulus of devotion. It is a great festival, and one well 
 worthy of the observation of all interested either in its 
 religious aspect or merely as " local colour." 
 
 The very ancient subterranean church known as the 
 Tomb of our Lady is a stone's throw from the Garden of 
 Gethsemane, and is venerated almost as widely as the Holy 
 Sepulchre. There are altars, not only for Armenians and 
 Abyssinians, as well as Greeks and Copts, but even a praying 
 niche for Moslems ; and the assemblage of worshippers is 
 indeed varied. Day and night the devotion continues ; 
 there is the nasal drone of the Greek, the devout quiet of 
 some passing Latin, the sweet litany of the Russians. At 
 night the floor is not strewn, but packed with resting pil- 
 grims, and the scene, day and night, is illuminated with 
 hundreds of lamps, many of them in gold and silver, and of 
 antique or foreign workmanship. The air is heavy with incense 
 and with rosewater, which add to, rather than relieve, the 
 oppression of the atmosphere, for the underground church, 
 
 128
 
 HERESIES IN THE EASTERN CHURCH 
 
 mainly an aggregation of grottoes or caves, is without light 
 or ventilation, except through the door. In addition to the 
 fasts kept by the laity, the monks observe fourteen days in 
 September previous to the great festival of the Exaltation 
 of the Cross, when the true Cross, carried away by Chosroes, 
 was restored to Jerusalem by the Emperor Heraclius, who 
 himself bore it into the Holy City. 
 
 Sunday is so absolutely a festival that fasting on that day 
 is entirely forbidden, as also on Saturday, except in 
 Holy Week, for they manifest their respect for the Old 
 Testament by reverence for the Jewish Sabbath, a custom 
 which one can but regard with respect. Thus in Lent, 
 when the fast is emphaszied by the absence of the consecra- 
 tion of the sacred elements, Saturday, as well as Sunday, 
 is excepted, and the presanctification which takes place on 
 Sunday is of five loaves only, one for each of the first five 
 days of the week. Their austerity is manifested also in 
 the churches, which are not only often small, and generally 
 dim with ornament, destitute of seats, even the misereres 
 for the monks but little used, but in which a high screen 
 (the iconastasis) entirely veils the sacrarium, so that the 
 laity are unable to participate by sight in the mysteries 
 of their faith. 
 
 A minor point of contact between the Anglican and the 
 Oriental is the common regard for St. George, who, in Syria 
 generally, is widely venerated. He is confused alike with 
 Elijah and with Perseus, also a local hero. 1 
 
 1 To Jaffa, Japho, or Japhoo, as it is variously called, an ancient 
 myth assigns the locale of the legend of Perseus and Andromeda ; 
 humorists have asserted that the monster slain by Perseus was the 
 identical whale that swallowed Jonah, and which desired to make 
 a second and more permanently successful experiment. The bones 
 of a huge monster were long an object of curiosity on this coast. 
 
 As early as the sixth century a church stood over the tomb of 
 St. George, at Lydda, a village not far from Jaffa. It has been many 
 times destroyed, but was finally restored by' the Greeks in 1870. 
 The Moslems have their own variants of the tradition of St. George, 
 
 129 K
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 " They like St. George, these Arabs," explained a Latin 
 priest, himself a native, doing true missionary work in a 
 remote village. " They like St. George a handsome man, 
 a large horse, a big lance. They like, too, St. Elias, a large 
 nose, a big beard he who kills the priests of Baal, who 
 spills their blood ; but these pale saints who pray always " 
 and he concluded with the expressive Arab gesture of wiping 
 one's hands together, and so being rid of the subject. 
 
 It is true enough that, here in Jerusalem, one realizes 
 with exceptional vividness the unhappy divisions of the 
 Church of Christ, but it is, fortunately, equally true that 
 one becomes conscious here, as nowhere else, that what is 
 divided is still Christendom. Here, in this Babel of lan- 
 guages, this Pentecostal aggregation of nationalities, this 
 exhibition of national principles, one is constantly struck 
 not only by the differences, but by the homogeneousness 
 of mankind. The points of contact, the inherent sympathies, 
 become more and more apparent, and more and more one 
 learns that the true Catholicism is not that which obliterates 
 nationality and the many-sidedness of human nature, but 
 that in which it is sanctified and absorbed, that which 
 allows for difference of the expression of emotion which 
 is universal as it is eternal. 
 
 one of which, obviously in allusion to the dragon, is that Mohammed 
 declared that Christ would slay the Antichrist at the Gate of Lydda. 
 
 130
 
 VIEW OF THE TEMPLE AREA (LOOKING NORTH).
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 LATINS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 PALESTINE IN ROMAN TIMES EARLY PILGRIMS FIRST 
 MONASTERIES FIRST LATIN CONVENT BEGINNING OP 
 RIVALRY PAPAL ADDRESS VICISSITUDES SETTLE- 
 MENTS IN JERUSALEM HOSPITAL KNIGHTS HOSPITAL- 
 LERS LATIN ESTABLISHMENT IN THE ELEVENTH CEN- 
 TURY ORIGIN OP ENMITY BETWEEN EAST AND WEST 
 CHURCHES FRANCISCANS CUSTODIANSHIP HOSPITA- 
 LITY AND PHILANTHROPY 
 
 JERUSALEM is but a small town of 60,000 inhabitants, 
 standing on a plateau of about 1,000 acres. Pales- 
 tine, the little province of which it is the capital, is but 140 
 miles long, with an average breadth of 40 miles, its acreage 
 about that of the principality of Wales. Jerusalem, Hebron 
 and Samaria were the only mountain cities known to the 
 Jews, and as such are often described in such terms as to 
 make one think of them as of great elevation, yet the Temple 
 area is but 2,400 feet above the Mediterranean, and 
 Hebron stands 400 feet lower than the summit of Helvellyn. 
 The traveller Burchard (1280)), so much praised for his 
 accuracy, has a friendly trick of measuring distances by 
 familiar comparison. The river Jordan, he says, is from 
 Jericho as Epping is from London, the lake of Sodom and 
 Gomorrah is from Jericho as Gravesend from London; the 
 Valley of Gethsemane is from Jerusalem " as Ratcliffe Fields 
 lyeth from London." A writer to the Times a few years 
 
 131
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 ago (October 1880) alleged that the revenue of Palestine 
 amounts to something less (residence here would lead one to 
 suppose something considerably less) than 200,000 per 
 annum, and suggested that the European powers should 
 raise ten millions and buy it, which, fortunately perhaps, 
 for all concerned, the European powers refrained from 
 doing. That this little country should be endeared to the 
 religion and patriotism of all Jews, to the cult of all mono- 
 theists, to the hearts of all Christians, is conceivable enough, 
 but in estimating the causes which have made it a battle- 
 field for at least 4,000 years, we must not lose sight of the 
 fact of its geographical importance, of its position as the 
 highway connecting Europe, Asia and Africa, which, all 
 questions of sacred association apart, is and has been 
 adequate cause for the continued struggle, political, reli- 
 gious, racial, of which for so long it has been the scene. 
 
 Historians tell us that Palestine has always been coveted. 
 Two thousand years before Christ, we are told, Gudea, 
 king of Mongolia, hewed cedars in Lebanon, and brought 
 granite from Sinai ; that the Hittites of the north fought 
 their way as far as Hebron ; that 1320 years B.C. Palestine 
 passed into the hands of Setha I, king of Egypt ; that the 
 Hebrews fought with the tribes of Canaan, and were them- 
 selves vanquished by Assyria ; that Asiatic influence was 
 succeeded by Greek, by Roman, by Frankish, by Arab, by 
 Egyptian, by Turkish. And, in its degree, the struggle con- 
 tinues, and the various nations represented in the Holy City 
 seldom combine except to ask as the case may be why 
 Russia, more than other nations, should be allowed to build, 
 why Germany to transcend in opportunity for and success 
 in excavation, why France should claim to be the protector 
 of Holy Places, why Jews should have been permitted to 
 buy some 130 square miles of agricultural land, why Eng- 
 land should do nothing in particular, not even run a post- 
 office or keep a shop, which one might have supposed to be 
 quite in her line of business. 
 
 132
 
 LATINS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 One must come to Syria in order to get rid, among other 
 superstitions, of the notion so carefully instilled into the 
 stories of our childhood, that our Lord was born in an obscure 
 country, imperfectly civilized, quiet and secluded, thinly 
 populated, that He lived only among the poor, and preached 
 only a simple gospel for the unlearned. As Sir Walter 
 Besant has well put it : 1 
 
 " There was no part of the Roman Empire better known, 
 more jealously guarded, more anxiously watched. Nor was 
 it a quiet and secluded country. He who wandered among 
 the hills and valleys of Galilee was never far from some great 
 and populous city. On the seaboard there were Tyre and 
 Sidon, Ptolemais and Antioch; on the other side were 
 Caesarea Philippi and Tiberias. . . . The land was densely 
 populated ; there were schools in every town ; there was a 
 wealthy society ; there was a learned society ; there was a 
 Romanizing section ; there was a Judaizmg section ; there 
 were everywhere Rabbis, merchants, centurions, legionaries, 
 townsmen and peasants. But it was not as a rustic preach- 
 ing to rustics that our Lord went about. It was as one who 
 had learned in the schools of the rabbis, as one who was 
 allowed to teach in the synagogues that He went forth, not 
 in an obscure corner of the Roman Empire, but in a part 
 thoroughly well known, full of Roman civilization, busy 
 and populous, where at every turn He would meet with 
 something to mark the empire to which it belonged. . . . The 
 one Figure remains. He wanders about the shores of the 
 Galilean lake, and before Him are the splendid buildings, 
 the strong walls, all the magnificence of a noble Roman city." 
 
 In these days of train service, telegraph service, machinery 
 and a population which is heir to all the ages, the resources 
 of Jerusalem are strained to the utmost, if, as very occa- 
 sionally has happened, 8000 or 9000 pilgrims arrive about the 
 time of Easter. What must have been the possibilities, the 
 
 1 Address to the P.E.F., 1892. 
 133
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 organization, the accommodation two thousand years ago 
 when, as is alleged, two millions (or let us halve, quarter 
 that estimate) annually visited the Holy City to make their 
 Passover offerings ? France, Russia and Germany have 
 beautified the modern town with costly buildings, but even 
 in architecture the contrast with the past is at least as 
 great, and when we sorrow with the exiled Jew beside the 
 fragment (1,600 feet) of wall at which he is allowed to weep, 
 when we look up at the fifty feet of gigantic masonry towering 
 above our head, and realize that fifty, perhaps eighty, feet 
 are buried below us, we too grieve with yonder little group 
 of mourners, the orthodox congregation of ten, who are 
 chanting, " For our walls laid low, for our Majesty departed, 
 for our great men perished, we sit here and weep ! " 
 
 Even in its days of utmost desertion, from the destruction 
 of Jewish Jerusalem by Titus * (70) to its reconstruction as a 
 pagan city by Hadrian in 136, it is obvious that, for reasons 
 other than religious, it can never have been a wholly for- 
 gotten or neglected spot. The Christians were banished to 
 Pella just before the siege of Titus, and, according to all 
 ancient authorities, began to return immediately after it, 
 from which time the continuity of Christian occupations 
 (even were it not testified by the succession of fifteen bishops 
 up to the time of Hadrian) has never been disputed. 2 
 Hadrian might raise a temple of Venus on one sacred spot, 
 a temple of Jupiter on another, but the very effort to oblite- 
 rate the associations, even in the minds of the indifferent, 
 would but tend to preserve them. Mark Twain's name is 
 
 1 It is an interesting contribution to the fact of the political con- 
 sequence of Jerusalem that the city was besieged at least twenty- 
 seven times between the first recorded siege of Jebus to the last, by 
 the Kharezmians in 1244. That of Titus, one of the most destruc- 
 tive, was the twenty-second. 
 
 2 Those whose object is to dispute the succession of the bishops 
 do so on the ground that it is first recorded by Eusebius, who, how- 
 ever, quotes from Hegesippus, who quotes from what he calls 
 " old records." 
 
 134
 
 LATINS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 not precisely that one would look for in such a connexion of 
 ideas, but what he said when under the influence of one of 
 the sacred places of the Holy City is, for many, more practi- 
 cally convincing than more learned arguments : 
 
 " One fully believes that he is looking upon the very spot 
 where the Saviour gave up His life. He remembers that 
 Christ was very celebrated long before He came to Jerusa- 
 lem ; he knows that His fame was so great that crowds 
 followed Him all the time ; he is aware that His entry into 
 the city produced a stirring sensation, and that His reception 
 was a kind of ovation ; he cannot overlook the fact that 
 when He was crucified there were very many in Jerusalem 
 who believed that He was the true Son of God. To publicly 
 execute such a personage was sufficient in itself to make the 
 locality of the execution a memorable place for ages ; added 
 to this, the storm, the darkness, the earthquake, the rending 
 of the veil of the Temple, and the untimely waking of the 
 dead, were events calculated to fix the execution and the 
 scene of it in the memory of even the most thoughtless wit- 
 ness. Fathers would tell their sons about the strange affair, 
 and point out the spot ; the sons would transmit the story 
 to their children, and thus a period of 300 years would easily 
 be spanned, at which time Helena came and built a church 
 upon Calvary to commemorate the death and burial of the 
 Lord, and preserve the sacred place in the memories of men ; 
 since that time there has always been a church there. It is 
 not possible that there can be any mistake about the locality 
 of the Crucifixion." 
 
 It was not at all events until the year 1741 that it occurred 
 to any one (a certain Jonas Korten x ) to question the identity 
 of the two most sacred spots in the Holy City, the scenes of 
 the death and burial of our Lord. And when, in 352, the 
 Emperor Constantine desired Macarius, bishop of Jerusalem, 
 to build " an oratory on the place of the Resurrection," the 
 only question or difficulty of which we hear was as to what 
 
 1 Beise Altona, pp. 210-12. 
 135
 
 amount of the original rock or other mark of identity would 
 be found in situ. 1 
 
 Two years before the consecration of the Church of Con- 
 stantine the anonymous Bordeaux Pilgrim walked from 
 France to Palestine, as thousands of poor Russian men and 
 women walk from remote parts of their own country every 
 year, even in our own day. The next pilgrims of whom we 
 have historical record are devout women not a few : Sylvia, 
 Paula, Eustochia, Melania. The idea of pilgrimage was not 
 a new one, nor confined to Christians. Pilgrims made their 
 way to the sacred stone of Mecca long before Mohammed, 
 just as Chinese pilgrims braved untold dangers in pursuing 
 their way to the Holy Land of Buddha, and as even the 
 Azteks of Mexico so the Spaniards reported had long 
 been accustomed to travel for worship at different shrines. 
 The result of the movement, of this passion of expiating the 
 indifference of nearly two hundred years (136-313) was a 
 gradually increasing immigration of European Christians. 
 
 " The land where the seed of the Crucified Sower had so 
 marvellously fructified, where r grew the first ear of that corn 
 which was to be multiplied indefinitely, and to furnish the 
 religious needs of the world for centuries with the bread of 
 the Spirit ; the nursery of a creed whose cradle was a tomb 
 and whose flag a gibbet this little land became the object 
 of a special adoration, a kind of topolatry, when the Church 
 mounted with Constantine the throne of the Caesars, and 
 assumed the Imperial diadem, after having so long worn a 
 martyr's crown. So great was this love of Holy Places, and 
 so passionate the desire to expiate the cruel mysteries of 
 
 1 Eusebius, Vita Con-st. xxx.-xxxii., on the discovery beneath the 
 Temple of Venus of the Cave. " No power of language seems worthy 
 to describe the present wonder. For that the token of that most 
 Holy Passion, long ago buried under ground, should have remained 
 unknown for so many cycles of years until it should shine forth to 
 His servants, truly transcends all marvels for the nature of the 
 wonder as far transcends all capacity of man's reason as divine 
 things surpass in permanence those which are human." 
 
 136
 
 LATINS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 which they had been the theatre, that during the whole 
 Byzantine period Judaea was overrun by monks and trans- 
 formed into one vast convent." 1 
 
 Although there was a colony of monks at Tekoa, the birth- 
 place of Amos, founded by St. Chariton, who died in 410, St. 
 Jerome was probably the first to encourage definitely what 
 Montalembert has called " that permanent emigration which 
 during the first years of the fourth century attracted so large 
 a number of Romans and other occidental Christians towards 
 Egypt and Palestine." 2 Other monasteries there were, 
 erected by men known in the Greek Calendar, St. Euthymius, 
 St. Zozimus, St. Saba, but evil days came upon all in 614, 
 when 300 monasteries, hospices and oratories were destroyed 
 by order of Chosroes. 
 
 Only fifteen years later, however, under the Emperor 
 Heraclius, we hear of the erection of monasteries on the 
 banks of the Jordan, in the Valley of Jehoshaphat, on Mount 
 Zion, and the Mount of Olives ; at Bethlehem, Bethany, and 
 Mount Tabor. Pilgrims, among whom Arculf and Willibald 
 were prominent chroniclers, flocked in immense numbers to 
 the Holy Land, and we learn from John the Deacon, 3 the 
 biographer of St. Benedict, that Gregory the Great sent the 
 Abbe Probus to Jerusalem, with large sums of money for the 
 construction of a hospice, and that to the end of his life the 
 Pontiff never ceased to provide the religious of Jerusalem 
 as well as those of Mount Sinai with the resources necessary 
 for their maintenance. 
 
 However, it is not till the end of the eighth century that 
 we have actual documental evidence of the existence of a 
 Latin convent in Jerusalem. In the " golden days " of 
 Haroun er Raschid, to whom so many good things are attri- 
 buted, the Holy City was, in a certain sense, placed under 
 
 1 Clermont Ganneau, P.E.F. 1875. 
 
 2 Montalembert, Moincs d 1 Occident, i. pp. 165-6. 
 
 3 John Diac. ii. c. 52. 
 
 137
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 the protection of Charlemagne, to whom were transmitted a 
 relic of the true Cross, and later the keys of the Holy Sepul- 
 chre, of Calvary, and of the city, with a standard, at the 
 hands of two priests, one from the Mount of Olives and one 
 from the Convent of Mar Saba. The Emperor kept his guests 
 with him, at Aix la Chapelle, until four months had elapsed 
 from the time of their starting, and then dismissed them 
 with rich presents for the churches of Jerusalem. 
 
 The convent on the Mount of Olives thus represented at 
 the Imperial court was undoubtedly Benedictine, as we learn 
 from the Itinerary of Bernard the Monk, who travelled in the 
 Holy Land in 870, and who enumerates a " Hospice for 
 pilgrims and a Church dedicated to the Blessed Virgin, to 
 which belong a fine library, the gift of the Emperor Charle- 
 magne, a dozen houses, fields, vines, and a garden in the 
 Valley of Jehoshaphat." 1 We hear later of other communica- 
 tions passing between the two great powers, and a letter still 
 remains to us, of unique interest, and of which, if only as 
 proof of the fashion in which history repeats itself, it is worth 
 while to give some account. 
 
 On Christmas Eve, 809, in the Grotto of the Nativity at 
 Bethlehem, began the first of that series of hostilities between 
 the Greeks and Latins which, in the same place, and even 
 at the same holy season, have been so often repeated. We 
 ourselves witnessed a like scene on the eve of Christmas, 
 1902, and many times, often in still severer form, have the 
 same annoyances occurred during the thousand years inter- 
 vening. The alleged causes vary : in 809 the Latin priests, 
 while in the act of prayer, were assaulted, and an attempt 
 made to drive them from the church, on the charge of 
 heresy. That question having been threshed out, the allega- 
 tion, in later ages, has been not of heretical unfitness, but of 
 trespass. 
 
 The letter which the monks addressed to Pope Leo III 
 
 1 Bernard ap Tobler, Itinera Hierosolymitana lat,, 1880. Genevae, 
 p. 314. 
 
 138
 
 LATINS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 was the parent of many later appeals to the powers of the 
 West, religious and civil. 
 
 " We, who are Frankish pilgrims (Franci peregrini) in 
 this holy city of Jerusalem, so far from the seat of Rome, are 
 a part of the flock confided to your care. John, a monk of 
 St. Saba, has dared to accuse us of heresy us, Franks of the 
 Mount of Olives 1 and to suspect our orthodoxy. Neverthe- 
 less, our faith is that of the seat of Rome ; that which we 
 sing, we have heard it in the chapel of the Emperor Charles ; 
 that which we believe, we find in the Homilies of St. Gregory 
 and in the rule of St. Benedict, which the Emperor has given 
 to us. Vouchsafe therefore to let us know what you think 
 of the sentiments of the Fathers on the subject of the Filio- 
 que, and to remind your son, the Emperor Charles, that we 
 heard, in his chapel, the words qui ex Patre Filioque procedit. 2 
 Vouchsafe also to receive, with favour, our delegates . . 
 and to remit us your orders by their hands. We all, your 
 humble servants, Dominic, Theodore, Arimond, Gregory, 
 John, Leo, and all the community of the Mount of Olives, 
 commend ourselves to your charitable prayers, and we pray 
 the Saviour to bless and exalt His holy Church." 
 
 This letter contributed to the convocation in November, 
 809, of the Council of Aix la Chapelle, in which the question 
 of the Procession of the Holy Spirit was discussed. 
 
 After the death of Haroun er Raschid in 809, civil war 
 broke out in Syria between the respective followers of his 
 two sons. Churches and monasteries were pillaged, though, 
 
 1 M. le Comte Riant (Etude- sur VEglise de Bethleem) regards this 
 as a probable indication of the presence of a Benedictine establish- 
 ment at Bethlehem, associated with that of the Mount of Olives. 
 The Commemoratorium of Charlemagne contains a possible allusion 
 to such a community. 
 
 2 It will be remembered that this addition to the Nicene Creed of 
 the filioque clause, " who proceedeth from the Father and the Son," 
 began in Spain, after the Council of Toledo, in 589. In the ninth 
 century it was customary in Gaul and in Germany, and, upon the 
 demand of the Emperor Henry, was adopted by Pope Benedict VIII 
 in 1014. 
 
 139
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 as we have already seen, the Benedictine convent was again 
 in possession of its property in 870, at the time of the visit 
 of Bernard the Monk. As time went on, however, the power 
 of the West, which had been strong with the individual 
 strength of Charlemagne, was overshadowed by that of the 
 Emperors of the East. 
 
 They were unable nevertheless to protect the Holy Land 
 against the fanaticism of the Caliph Hakem, who, it is said, 
 was incited against the Christians less by the Moslems than 
 by the Jews. In 1010 the Holy Sepulchre was profaned, the 
 church destroyed, and the patriarch put to death. However, 
 by some change of mood, some say by the influence of his 
 mother, who was a Christian, others, in consequence of 
 a quarrel with the Jews, Hakem permitted the rebuilding 
 of the Holy Places, funds being provided, in great part, by 
 the immense number of pilgrims who were flocking to Jeru- 
 salem from all parts of Europe. 
 
 With the facilitation of travel there came, naturally 
 enough, increase of commerce, which was largely in the 
 hands of merchants from Lombardy and Amalfi, upon whom 
 the Caliphs and wealthy Syrians came to be dependent for 
 European luxuries, and whom they were in consequence 
 ready to protect. 
 
 It thus became possible to secure the consent of the 
 Government to the establishment, in the Christian quarter of 
 the city of Jerusalem, in the neighbourhood of the Holy 
 Sepulchre, of a permanent d welling for the Amalfi merchants 
 and for other Christian travellers. In order that this might 
 be placed in the charge of resident Europeans (the monks of 
 Syria, in consequence of Byzantine influence, being entirely 
 followers of the Greek rites), a band of monks, in charge of 
 an abbe, was brought from Italy, and the monastery and 
 church originally erected by Charlemagne, henceforth known 
 as St. Mary of the Latins, 1 restored for their use. In 1023 
 
 1 So called from their use of the Latin rites. The title was applied 
 equally to all the three houses which were erected on this site. There 
 
 140
 
 LATINS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 the Sultan Mouzzafer granted a firman (still to be seen in 
 the archives of the Franciscans in Jerusalem) according pro- 
 tection to all Franks belonging to religious Orders established 
 in the Holy City. 
 
 The pilgrimages included many women, and this led to the 
 establishment of a second hospice and convent, known as 
 S. Mary the Less. As, considering the difficulties of travel- 
 ling there would doubtless be many sick, the erection of a 
 hospital, with a chapel dedicated to St. John, was the next 
 development, and as it was in the hands of pious laity, con- 
 verts or oblates of the Order, it became ultimately the 
 cradle of the world-famous Order of St. John of Jerusalem, 
 Knights Hospitallers 1 , and, to use the term they themselves 
 employed, Guardians of the Poor. 
 
 is considerable evidence that the clergy thus introduced were Bene- 
 dictines from the Abbey of the Sainte Trinit6 de la Cava, who were 
 established by St. Alferius and followed the Cluny use, thus first 
 brought into Palestine. This very popular Order gave origin to 
 the contemporary saying : Esse ubique asseres Cavenses et passeres. 
 There was special suitability in the choice of this community to 
 serve in Jerusalem, for southern Italy was still nominally dependent 
 on the Byzantine Empire, and the monks, being almost Greeks by 
 nationality, would the more easily establish themselves among those 
 of the Eastern Church. The pious monks of Jerusalem and of La 
 Cava carried on the traditions of the Amalfitan foundation, and I 
 learn from the present Prior of the Order of St. Benedict in Jerusalem 
 that Baldwin accorded to the vessels of La Cava the right of naviga- 
 tion among the ports of his kingdom, for the exchange of merchan- 
 dize, bringing necessaries for the Religious Houses, and carrying 
 back the produce of the East. Similar special facilities are still 
 accorded to the religious Orders in Jerusalem by certain lines of steam- 
 boats. 
 
 1 The controversy as to the possibly later and independent origin 
 of the Knights of St. John, who, according to some, followed not the 
 Benedictine but the Augustinian rule, has perhaps been laid to rest 
 by the discovery of charters of the Hospital bearing date 1083-4-5, 
 which make it evident that the Hospital existed before the Crusades, 
 and that it was directed by Benedictines (Saige, De Vaneiennete de 
 Vhopital Saint Jean de Jerusalem ; also Delaville le Roulx, De prima 
 origine Hospitaliorum hierosotymitanorum, 1885). It is worthy of 
 remark that, even before this discovery, Vertot, while assigning the 
 
 141
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 The Crusades by no means diminished the frequency of 
 pilgrimages, even apart from the immense number of clergy 
 who, either as chaplains or as voluntary followers, came in 
 the train of the Church militant. 
 
 I have dwelt at possibly undue length upon certain points 
 distinctly and definitely Latin in the history of Christianity 
 in Jerusalem, previous to the Crusades, in order to make it 
 evident that the rites and teaching of the occidental Church 
 were not, as many would have us suppose, a new importation 
 consequent upon the Frankish immigration from the west 
 and north of Europe. We have documental evidence that 
 for some seven hundred years the two rites had existed side 
 by side, although that of the East had undoubtedly been the 
 stronger, as belonging to the empire and nearest to the seat 
 of government. It was, for example, with the Greek or 
 
 Augustinian rule to the subsequent foundations of the Canons of the 
 Holy Sepulchre and the Knights Templars, makes no such mention 
 in connexion with the Knights Hospitallers, whom he always speaks 
 of by their later designation of Knights of Malta, and whose origin 
 he quaintly describes as having arisen among the patients of the 
 Hospital. Though he, perhaps erroneously, thus assigns the later 
 date, his account of the initiation of the Order is too picturesque to 
 omit. " Several young gentlemen who had just had an happy experi- 
 ence of it (that is of ' the great charity of the Hospitallers, who spared 
 no pains for their relief '), renounced all thoughts of returning into 
 their own country, and devoted themselves, in the House of St. John, 
 to the service of the poor and pilgrims . . . Though Godfrey by 
 this means lost some gallant men who had done him great service, 
 he could not but look upon their change with joy and perhaps with 
 pious emulation . . . The hospital was in a little time enriched with 
 a great number of lands and manors as well in Europe as in Palestine." 
 He then describes how, at the suggestion of the Abbe G6rard, after 
 the taking of Jerusalem, both the Brothers and Sisters of the Order 
 were invested with the black mantle and white linen cross of Jeru- 
 salem, and " at the foot of the Holy Sepulchre took the vows of 
 poverty, chastity and obedience " (Vertot, History of the Knights of 
 Malta, vol. i. pp. 19-20, ed. 1728). 
 
 ':> We gather from Matthew Paris, however, that this dress was after- 
 wards changed. Postmodum verd tempore Eugenii Papae cruces de 
 panno rubeo suis assuerunt mantellis, ut a caetaris possent hoc signo 
 discerni. (Matt. Paris, Hist. AngL, ed. 1640, p. 67.) 
 
 142
 
 LATINS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 Oriental Church that Omar made terms, and the Greek is to 
 this day technically known as " the Orthodox," and is that 
 officially recognized ; so that " the Patriarch of Jerusalem " 
 invariably means the Greek Patriarch, and " the Christian 
 Church " that holding the Greek creed. From very early 
 days there had always been the four main points of differ- 
 ence, the recognition of Papal authority, the filioque clause 
 in the Creed, the doctrine of Purgatory and the use of un- 
 leavened bread in Communion ; but with few exceptions, 
 the good understanding between the Greeks and Latins had 
 been little interrupted, and although the Greeks were prob- 
 ably alive to the fact that Rome would not hesitate to seize 
 an opportunity for establishing religious just as much as 
 temporal supremacy, it was only with the foundation of the 
 temporal kingdom that the differences became irreconcil- 
 able. 1 
 
 The establishment of the Latin kingdom in 1099 led 
 naturaUy to the reorganization of religious matters, accord- 
 ing to the faith of the Western Church under Latin clergy 
 with Latin patriarchs. We read that the Patriarch of 
 Jerusalem had as suffragans four archbishops, nine bishops, 
 the Master of the Knights of St. Lazarus, nine mitred abbots 
 and five priors, all of the Latin rite ; with moreover fifteen 
 native prelates Armenians, Syrians, Jacobites and Greeks. 
 
 1 Thus Milman would appear to ignore somewhat the previous 
 conditions, when he writes, " The establishment of Latin Christianity 
 in the East was no less a foreign conquest (than the Empire). It 
 was not the conversion of the Greek Church to the Creed, the usages, 
 the ritual, the Papal supremacy of the West ; it was the foundation, 
 the superinduction of a new Church, alien in language, in rites, in its 
 clergy, which violently dispossessed the Greeks of their churches 
 and monasteries and appropriated them to their own uses." Fleury 
 would seem to enter more into the spirit of the age, when he says, 
 " The Greeks always believed that the Latins had an eye to their 
 empire, and what happened (after the second Crusade) too well justi- 
 fied their suspicions. The conquest of Constantinople brought 
 about the loss of the Holy Land and made the schism of the Greeks 
 irreconcilable." Fleury, Sixtime Discours sur PHistoire Ecdesiaa- 
 tique. 
 
 143
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 Twenty monasteries of these various rites were comprised 
 within the limits of this patriarchate. 1 The position of the 
 Patriarch was much strengthened by the creation of the 
 Sepulchrans or Canons of the Holy Sepulchre, who swore 
 obedience to no prior or abbot, but to the Patriarch only. 2 
 This synod consisted of five abbots and a prior, all of mitred 
 dignity. His spiritual seigneury was co-extensive with that 
 of the king. The Benedictines, hitherto the only, still re- 
 mained the chief, representatives of the Western Church, 
 and in addition to their convents, churches, hospices and 
 hospital already mentioned, they established other hospitals 
 and schools in connexion with religious houses in the Valley 
 of Jehoshaphat, on Mount Tabor, at Bethany, Antioch, and 
 Nazareth, altogether to the number of about a dozen. It 
 is interesting to notice that those popes most active in pro- 
 moting the Crusades belonged to the Benedictine Order, 
 and their houses continued to flourish and to exercise con- 
 siderable power up to the time of the Moslem conquest of 
 Jerusalem in 1187, when they retired to Acre, which, from 
 the presence there of the Knights of St. John, has been since 
 called S. Jean d'Acre in place of its former name of Ptolemais. 
 Historians teach us that the apparently unconquerable 
 enmity between the eastern and western branches of the 
 Church dates from the period of the fourth Crusade, which, 
 from being a war of defence of the Holy Places, was diverted 
 into an attack upon the eastern Christians. Constantinople 
 was attacked in April 1204. The empire was in a state of 
 internal disruption, with two rival emperors, Alexius V and 
 Theodore Lascaris, each with his own following. " Never 
 was victory more cruelly abused. The conduct of the 
 champions of the Cross in their hour of victory formed a sad 
 
 1 Rey, Les Colonies jranques de Syrie aux XII* et XIII" Siecles, 
 267-8, 1883. 
 
 2 William of Tyre complains that the original order of twenty 
 Augustinian Canons under a prior was changed by the Patriarch 
 Arculphus. 
 
 144
 
 LATINS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 contrast with that of the Mussulmans under Saladin, 1 when 
 the latter conquered Jerusalem." The account given by 
 the Pope himself, Innocent III, is too horrible for transla- 
 tion ; he had done his utmost to prevent the deviation of 
 the purpose of the Crusade, but naturally did not refrain 
 from seizing the opportunity of extending his power and 
 that of the Church. " The consequence of the Pope's 
 action was and still is that the Greek Church spurns the idea 
 of returning to union with the Roman Church." 3 
 
 Innocent IFI himself wrote : " How is it possible that the 
 Greeks should ever return to unity when they have been 
 treated in such a manner, that they regard the Latins as 
 dogs ? " 
 
 After the period of the Crusades, the Franciscans, the 
 peaceful Crusaders of the Holy Land, may be regarded as, 
 for nearly seven hundred years, the representatives of Latin 
 Christianity in Palestine. When Pope Innocent III dreamed 
 that he saw the grand church of St. John Lateran falling into 
 ruins, held up only by the poor brown-frocked figure whom 
 he had that day waved from his presence when St. Francis 
 heard in vision the voice of the Crucified, saying, " Go re- 
 build my house, which, as thou seest, is falling into ruins," 
 may not the meaning, at least in some degree, have related 
 not only, as supposed, to the material structure of St. Damian, 
 or the three ruined churches of Assisi, not only generally to 
 the living Church of Christ which he restored to a new and 
 higher life, but to those sacred spots in the Holy City of 
 which the sons of St. Francis were hereafter to be the 
 Guardians ? 
 
 There is no documental evidence of the date of their 
 arrival. One tradition is that the earliest Franciscans in 
 the Holy Land were hermits, living in cells hewn in the 
 
 1 It is a recognized fact that the Saracens always respected the 
 Holy Places. 
 
 2 Eighteen Centuries of the Orthodox Greek Church, Hore, chap. xii. 
 
 3 Hore, op. cif. 
 
 145 L
 
 rocky foundation of the Benedictine Convent of St. George, 
 in the Black Mountain near Antioch, about the year 1210, 
 but the more usual version, which, however, is not incon- 
 sistent with the other, is that their first appearance was in 
 the year 1219 under the leadership of St. Francis himself, 
 who was already on friendly terms with the Sultan Melek 
 el-Khamel, whom he had indeed hoped to convert. In the 
 year 1229 this same Sultan ceded the Holy City to the 
 Emperor Frederic II, so that for a time the safety of the 
 Christians was assured, and it is the fact of his excommunica- 
 tion which gives us our first definite date in the history of 
 the Franciscan occupation, for in 1230 Pope Gregory IX 
 sent two Franciscans as legates of the See to arrange matters 
 in regard to the Emperor in Palestine, 1 expressing the desire 
 that the Patriarch would give them every assistance. 
 
 Dr. Schick, who has preserved many gems of history 
 which would otherwise have been utterly lost, describes a 
 long tunnel-like vault in the Armenian Convent of Zeitun, 
 shown to him as having afforded refuge to the Franciscans 
 in 1244, when the Kharezmians destroyed their convent on 
 Mount Sion. 
 
 The earliest evidence of political acknowledgement of the 
 Order is, so far as I can discover, in a firman dated 1250, in 
 which the Sultan Melek el-Aschraf mentions twelve sultans 
 who had protected the Franciscans, the first-named being a 
 brother of Melek el-Khamel, the friend of St.Francis. Another 
 firman, dated 1295, by the Sultan Daher gives permission to 
 the religious of Mount Sion to restore their convent ; while 
 another, only fourteen years later, is addresed " to the re- 
 ligious Franciscans of the cord," - and speaks of them as 
 
 1 The Bull still exists and begins " Si ordinis Fratrum Minorum." 
 See Calahorra, Chronica de Syria y Terra Santa, vol. ii. ch. vi. Another 
 Bull, dated 1257, Alexander IV, is addressed to the religious of the 
 province of the Holy Land, showing that they must have attained 
 to some considerable number. 
 
 2 Sir John Maundrell in 1322, and de la Brocquierein 1432, speak 
 of the " Christians of the Girdle," but this may be an allusion to the 
 
 146
 
 occupying the Convents of the Coenaculum, the Holy Sepul- 
 chre and Bethlehem. 
 
 The convent on Mount Sion was on the alleged site of the 
 " Upper room furnished," or Coenaculum, which has so 
 many associations for the Christian (St. Lukexxii., St. John 
 xx., possibly Acts ii. 1-4 ; also Acts i. 13, and, according 
 to a very old tradition, Acts vi. 1-6). A church seems to 
 have existed upon this site from very early times, and is 
 mentioned by the Bordeaux Pilgrim (333), by St. Jerome 
 (382 letter 86), byArculf (670), Willibald(722), and Bernard 
 the Wise (870). Saewulf (1103) speaks of it as in ruins ; but 
 in 1212 Willebrand of Oldenbourg speaks of a fine convent 
 largum et pulchrum aspectu cenobium ; and it appears to 
 have been handsomely restored by the Crusaders and served 
 by the canons of St. Augustine up to the dissolution of the 
 Frank kingdom of Jerusalem in 1187. The Franciscans 
 took formal possession of the church and convent in 1342, 
 when it was purchased for them by Robert of Sicily, and 
 handed to the Papal See on the condition that the Francis- 
 cans should be regarded as its custodians in perpetuity 
 (Nov. 21, 1342) ; and then it was that they built, out of 
 existing material, the little Gothic chapel which still covers 
 a part of the nave of the earlier and larger crusading build- 
 ing. 
 
 The title of Guardian of Mount Sion, still possessed by the 
 Custode of the Franciscan Order, is all that remains to them 
 of this, their earliest possession. Moslem, or, according to 
 some, Jewish jealousy of the tomb of David, alleged to exist 
 on the same spot, led to the expulsion of the Franciscans in 
 1551. 1 
 
 fact that the Caliph Motawakkel in 856 had ordered Christians and 
 Jews to wear a leathern girdle for distinction. De la Brocquiere 
 speaks of the " Cordeliers " of Bethlehem as being under great sub- 
 jection. Their vicissitudes were certainly frequent. 
 
 1 I give this date on the authority of Calahorra, Chronica de la 
 provincia de Syria y Terra Santa, iv. chap. xv. p. 395, though later 
 ones are elsewhere commonly given. He tells us that the order for 
 
 147
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 A firman dated 700 of the Hejira, 1309 of our era, giving 
 to the Custode power to execute repairs to the church of 
 the Holy Sepulchre, shows that the Franciscans were at that 
 time in possession there, and moreover, in 1363, by means 
 of an arrangement made with the Sultan Chabab ben Hassan 
 by Jeanne, Queen of Naples, they had permission to build a 
 convent on a former Benedictine foundation, near the alleged 
 tomb of the Virgin ; but neither site provided sufficient 
 accommodation for themselves and for the hospitality for 
 which they were already famous. 
 
 The advancement of the Franciscans had been contem- 
 porary with the decline of the Georgians or Iberians, who 
 have been described as in some sort their rivals, or at least 
 their predecessors, in the care of the Holy Places. They 
 too had encouraged pilgrimages, established some dozen of 
 religious houses, entertained strangers, made rich offerings 
 to the Holy Sepulchre, and possessed, according to their 
 historian Jossilian (Georgian Hist. cap. viii.) " half Golgotha." 
 Baumgarten, who visited Jerusalem in 1507, speaks of their 
 establishment on Mount Calvary. They had been originally 
 settled in Jerusalem by the liberality of Constantine, who 
 bestowed a grant of land on their king out of sympathy, it 
 is said, for his having made, like Helena, a pilgrimage at an 
 advanced age. They were now politically enfeebled, and 
 unable to support their establishments in Jerusalem, among 
 others that of the convent and church of St. John the Divine, 
 originally built by King Vachtang about 446, and which 
 they were now glad to sell to the Franciscans, to whom it 
 
 expulsion was given by Soliinan the Magnificent in 1549 and executed 
 two years later at the time when Paul Marino was the energetic 
 and capable Custode. An old and very rare book of travels by 
 Pierre Belon de Mans, who visited the Holy Land in 1553, speaks of 
 thirty Franciscans having been ejected from their convent on Mount 
 Sion and their church turned into a mosque. He adds that 
 they had been re-instated at the instance of the French ambassador 
 at Constantinople. 
 
 148
 
 LATINS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 became the Casa Nuova or Nova, the New House. 1 The 
 church, which is the Latin parish church of Jerusalem, has 
 latterly been practically rebuilt and surrounded by a 
 convent, also enlarged, so as to accommodate one hundred 
 religious. The Casa Nova is reserved for a hospice, and 
 having been restored and enlarged by American liberality, 
 is now capable of accommodating between two and three 
 hundred guests, who are received irrespective of creed, sex 
 or nationality, and permitted to remain for twenty-one days.^ 
 
 For another 300 years the Franciscans remained the sole 
 Guardians of the Holy Places and of the Latin faith in Jeru- 
 salem, gradually enlarging their sphere and widening their 
 ambitions, so as best to serve what they themselves call 
 their triple mission of defending the Holy Places, showing 
 hospitality to pilgrims, and " preaching the Gospel where 
 it was inaugurated by Jesus Christ Himself." 
 
 The president of the Friars Minor has no dignity of abbot or 
 prior, but his title of Custodian of the Holy Places is a greater 
 
 1 The visit, to the new guest-house, of Prince Radzwil in 1583 is 
 described by Mouravieff, Guide-Indicateur de la Terre-Sainte, par Le 
 Frere Lievin, O.F.M., 1897, c. xxxviii. a book to which in many 
 matters relating to Franciscan history in Jerusalem, I once for all 
 acknowledge my indebtedness. 
 
 2 I recall one occasion when, at the Casa Nova in Jerusalem, the 
 guests at table represented the following languages : English (which 
 included a Gaelic-speaking Scot and an American), French, German, 
 Italian, Spanish (including a representative of South America as well 
 as of the Peninsular), Greek and Russian. There was a missionary 
 from China, and an English officer from India, and there were ser- 
 vants present who spoke Turkish and Arabic. A Franciscan, having 
 to give out a notice of interest to all present, after one despairing 
 look round the table, addressed us in Latin. Mark Twain, who 
 frankly owns to anti-ultramontane prejudice, writes, nevertheless, 
 " There is one thing I feel no disposition to forget, and that is the 
 honest gratitude I, and all pilgrims, owe to the convent fathers in 
 Palestine. A pilgrim without money, whether he be a Protestant 
 or a Catholic, can travel the length and breadth of Palestine and in 
 the midst of her desert wastes find wholesome food and a clean bed 
 every night, in these buildings." No one will interfere with his. 
 religious views, and no one will ask him to pay. 
 
 149
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 distinction than mitre or crozier. Some of the sites have 
 been lost to them, however good may have been their original 
 title by firman or purchase. They lost, as we have seen, the 
 Coenaculum, although by the courtesy of the present pro- 
 prietors they are permitted to say Mass within the enclosure 
 during twenty-four hours at every Whitsuntide. Although 
 a firman of 1363 put them in possession of the Benedictine 
 Church at the alleged Tomb of the Virgin, which was con- 
 firmed to them in 1757 by a new firman from Constantinople, 
 the Greeks took possession of it two years later. Their 
 privileges are now shared among all rites (Greeks, Armenians, 
 Copts, Abyssinians, and Syrians, even Moslems), except 
 those of the Latin Church. 
 
 The Franciscans have also lost certain rights at Beth- 
 lehem, where the Greeks alone have now an altar on the 
 alleged site of the birth of Jesus, as well as an old privilege 
 of saying mass once a year in two Armenian churches, that 
 of St. James and that said to be on the site of the House of 
 Caiaphas. They have, however, within late years restored 
 and again utilized certain old shrines, such as the Church of 
 the Dominus Floevit on the Mount of Olives and the 
 chapels of the Flagellation and of Bethphage. 
 
 In other departments of their mission their activity has 
 never ceased. They afford hospitality for a period, longer 
 or shorter according to the accommodation, at Jaffa, Ramleh 
 ( Arimathea), Jerusalem, St. John in the Mountains, Bethle- 
 hem, Nazareth, Qoubebeh (the alleged Emmaus), Mount 
 Tabor, and Tiberias. 
 
 In the department of education for their Order they are 
 especially active, and receive novices from every part of 
 Europe and from America, both north and south. In addi- 
 tion to the central house in Jerusalem there is a special novi- 
 tiate at Nazareth, from which the young students are sent 
 out to study, in succession, the humanities at St. John's, 
 philosophy at Bethlehem and theology at St. Saviour's. 
 
 They make no encroachments upon the work of other 
 
 150
 
 LATINS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 churches, but their missionary influence is reinforced by an 
 extensive and highly organized philanthropy. They have 
 doctors and dispensaries in all directions, orphanages for 
 boys and girls, schools, both primary and secondary, for 
 both sexes ; technical schools of almost every trade, in which 
 steam-power is utilized as well as hand- work, and large print- 
 ing and bookbinding establishments. They have also a very 
 large number of houses and apartments which are assigned 
 to the use of widows and the indigent poor, and their daily 
 distribution of food is said to amount to over 1,000 Ib. in 
 weight. 
 
 It would be a very easy task to criticize these charities, 
 and to say that the poor of Jerusalem are pauperized, that 
 they have become ungrateful, and receive benefits as of right, 
 that they are idle, and will often refuse work when they can 
 get it, which is all true enough, though not wholly peculiar 
 to Jerusalem. Undoubtedly, in that they are far the largest 
 donors the Franciscans are mainly responsible for this, but 
 it should be remembered that it would have been easier for 
 others to withhold the large amount of superfluous charity 
 lately added to the already existing benefits of the friars, 
 than for them to subtract the bounties, undoubtedly far too 
 liberal, which have for so long existed. I have discussed the 
 matter with many among them, and have heard them deplore 
 it in terms quite as unqualified as the most modern econo 
 mists could desire. There are, however, many difficulties 
 which time alone can surmount. Many benefactions were 
 founded in the days when to become a Christian was liter- 
 ally to " leave all," and when it was absolutely necessary to 
 supply a convert with shelter, food, and, above all, protec- 
 tion. Such a claim has hi some cases become hereditary, 
 or funds, centuries ago dedicated to this purpose, cannot well 
 be diverted, or recent efforts to re-appropriate gifts have 
 been misrepresented in the various countries where they 
 originated. Possibly some weight may even attach to the 
 
 trend of circumstances such as they were indicated by 
 
 151
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 a well dressed woman of middle age, speaking more or 
 less four languages, and apparently in excellent health, who 
 however came to us to beg for assistance. We offered her 
 manual work, well paid, which, however, she declined on 
 the plea that " her stomach was fatigued." At the outset 
 of our interview she inquired, for obvious reasons, to what 
 confession we belonged, and proceeded to inform us that 
 during many years of weak health she had received help 
 from the Franciscans, that they now helped her no more, 
 nor did the Armenians, and that she had since seen that 
 Protestantism was the only true faith ; in proof of which 
 she presented us with a manuscript copy of Rock of Ages, 
 for which she expected to receive a franc. Later, somewhat 
 dissatisfied with our interview, she retired, expressing dis- 
 gust at the insincerity of Franks, and exclaiming, "I go 
 Greek ! " There would be some dozen or so of sects for her 
 to fall back upon after that, with a variety of " cranks " for 
 ultimate resort. 
 
 The Franciscan, with his brown frock and white cord, his 
 capuch, his sandals, the white umbrella over his defenceless 
 head, is, so to speak, rooted in the soil of Jerusalem, a part of 
 the life, even of the very landscape. The Order is largely 
 Italian, though theoretically international ; the custode 
 must always be an Italian, the vicaire a Frenchman, the 
 procurator a Spaniard. The Spaniards have been for cen- 
 turies large benefactors to Jerusalem, seeking, it may be, to 
 atone by money gifts for the fact that they alone of all 
 European nations took no part in the Crusades. When, on 
 occasions of great ceremony, gorgeous vestments and em- 
 broideries are donned in the processions at the Church of 
 the Holy Sepulchre it is quite an interesting lesson in 
 heraldry to study the coats-of-arms of the donors em- 
 broidered at the foot, and to notice how large a proportion 
 are Spanish and Austrian. Lamartine estimated the gifts 
 of Europe to the Jerusalem Franciscans as amounting to 
 15,000 per annum, a sum exceeded, it is said, during the 
 
 152
 
 YIK\V OK TIU-: TEMPI. E AREA (LOOKING SOUTH).
 
 LATINS IN JERUSALEM 
 
 last year by France, " infidel France," alone. 1 A part of 
 their possession is, from time to time, invested in real estate, 
 their property in Jerusalem and the neighbourhood being 
 larger than is generally known, a fact which affords some 
 security to their position as guardians of the Holy Places 
 custodians only, it should be remembered, the Sultan being 
 in many instances the proprietor. 
 
 1 Laurence Oliphant has some forcible remarks on this point. 
 " The French Government, which has been ejecting monks and nuns 
 and closing religious establishments and making laws against reli- 
 gious instruction in France, is very particular about the religious 
 principles of its representatives in Syria ; as a member of the 
 French Government recently remarked, ' Religion is only useful as an 
 article of export. ... It is by the manufacture and protection of 
 Holy Places that republican France extends and consolidates her 
 influence in these parts.' " (Haifa, p. 55, et ante,) 
 
 153
 
 CHAPTER X 
 THE LATINS IN JERUSALEM TO-DAY 
 
 REVIVAL OF PATEIAKCHATE ADVENT OF RELIGIOUS 
 ORDERS THEIR INDUSTRIES DOMINICAN LECTURES 
 " REVUE BIBLIQUE " PILGRIMAGES EDUCATIONAL 
 ADVANTAGES UNIATS VISIBLE " COMMUNION OF 
 SAINTS " 
 
 THE modern history of the Latins in Jerusalem dates 
 from the revival of the patriarchate in 1847. 
 Founded originally at the Council of Chalcedon in 451, 
 powerful, as we have seen, during the Prankish kingdom, 
 with seigneury conterminous with that of the King himself, 
 the office fell into abeyance with the dissolution of the 
 Christian Government, and the last remnants of his authority 
 and dignity passed ultimately into the hands of the Fran- 
 ciscan Custode. He it was who, according to Lady Hester 
 Stanhope, continued, even in her time, the right of granting 
 licences carrying special advantages and exemptions to 
 vessels trading in the Levant, and bearing the Jerusalem 
 flag of five crosses, red on a white field, on the theory that 
 they were carrying goods for convents the possible origin 
 of the free or reduced passages still given by certain lines 
 of steamships to the religious of Jerusalem. He it was 
 who exercised all episcopal functions, and who issued 
 licences for the power of absolution. It is, however, alleged 
 that even he, as well as all other foreigners in Jerusalem 
 (there were no consuls in those days), was obliged to begin 
 
 154
 
 THE LATINS IN JERUSALEM TO-DAY 
 
 every authoritative document with the formula, " There 
 is no God but God, and Mohammed is His prophet ! " 
 
 The first patriarch was Joseph Valerga, a Piedmontese, 
 and a man said to possess especial talents of organization. 
 An English consul had been appointed during the Egyptian 
 occupation nine years before, and a French envoy had 
 arrived in 1841, although France had long practically 
 possessed a representative, for Maundrell, in 1697, speaks of 
 the French consul at Sidon as having the title of Consul 
 of Jerusalem. 1 During the same year, Sardinia sent a 
 representative of the titular king of Jerusalem, who, when 
 that dignity came to an end in 1849, was succeeded by an 
 Italian consul. By a very ancient understanding, France 
 was regarded as the protector of all Latins in Jerusalem, 
 although there has been a recent movement on the part of 
 Italy and of Germany, to relieve her of the charge of their 
 own subjects. Finn 2 tells a story, of which, however, I can 
 hear nothing elsewhere, that in 1847 the Franciscans, 
 enraged at the apathy of the French consul as to the 
 abstraction by the Greeks of their silver star from the altar 
 at Bethlehem, threatened to place themselves under Turkish 
 rule, to register at the British Consulate, and to let all 
 Europe know the reason why. (Cf. infra. 176, " Martyr- 
 dom in Jerusalem "). 
 
 To forget the part which France has played in Jerusalem 
 
 1 Maundrell adds that the consul " is obliged by his master, the 
 King of France, to make a visit to the Holy City every Easter under 
 pretence of preserving the sanctuary there from the violations, and 
 the friars, who have the custody of it, from the exactions of the 
 Turks." He further describes how he himself accompanied him, 
 and went to " the Latin Convent, at which all Frank pilgrims are 
 wont to be entertained. The guardians and friars received us with 
 many kind welcomes." He further relates that, owing to the inter- 
 vention of France, and " according to the tenor of the capitulation 
 made in the year 1673, " the Holy Sepulchre had, since 1690, been 
 appropriated to the Latins," though it be permitted to all Christians, 
 of all nations, to go into it for their private devotions." 
 
 2 Finn, Stirring Times, vol. i. 
 
 155
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 on behalf of Christendom would, however, be ungrateful 
 indeed. Not to speak of the initiation of Occidental 
 Christianity in Palestine, one may almost say 
 that the history of the Crusades and of the Christian 
 kingdom is, in a great degree, the history of France. 
 As soon as Christianity again became a power in Jerusalem, 
 we find France exercising her influence on behalf of the 
 injured. It was by the interference of Francis I. that the 
 Franciscans were released from imprisonment in the Tower 
 of David, by order of Soliman, in 1537, and by the action 
 of the French Ambassador in Constantinople that they 
 were restored to their rights in the Church of the Tomb of 
 the Virgin, originally bought from the Sultan, and usurped 
 by the Greeks in 1666. 
 
 The interference of Louis XIV in 1673 resulted in a treaty 
 with the Porte, which officially recognizes France as pro- 
 tectress of the Holy Places and of their Guardians, and which, 
 moreover, in its thirty- third article, expressly declares that 
 " the Franciscans shall be henceforth respected in the posses- 
 sion of all their sanctuaries, both within and outside of 
 Jerusalem," a right which was so far understood that when, 
 three years later, the Greeks contrived to possess themselves 
 of other sanctuaries, they were at once restored to their 
 owners upon the requisition of France. A firman, obtained 
 by the Count of Vergennes, Ambassador of France, in 1757, 
 renewed the formal concession of the claim of the Fran- 
 ciscans to rights over the principal sanctuaries of Jerusalem. 1 
 
 In 1808, after the partial destruction by fire of the chapel 
 covering the Holy Sepulchre, the Greeks obtained permission 
 to restore what was necessary, but the alterations for which 
 they made this the pretext were the occasion of much 
 heart-burning among the Franciscans and others ; and, 
 
 1 A succession of victories over Moslem troops by the Emperor 
 Leopold I of Austria in 1699 led to a further understanding with the 
 Porte, and on the part of Austria, that the Franciscans were not to 
 be disturbed in their possession of the Sanctuaries. 
 
 156
 
 THE LATINS IN JERUSALEM TO-DAY 
 
 accordingly, when the rebuilding of the cupola became 
 necessary about the middle of the century, the French 
 Ambassador, Lavalette, in bringing the matter before the 
 Porte, took occasion to obtain a formal agreement known 
 as the statu quo ante, confirming the Latins in all the rights 
 which they held at the time of the interference of the Sultan 
 on their behalf in 1740, and at that of the firman of rights 
 granted to France in 1757. This is now the basis of all 
 negotiation with the Porte on the subject of Latin rights 
 in Jerusalem. It has been mentioned elsewhere that the 
 question of the rebuilding of the cupola of the church led, 
 indirectly, to the Crimean war, and that the restoration of 
 the roof was finally diplomatically achieved by the com- 
 bined efforts of France, Russia, and Turkey. Three empires 
 availed no more with the local plumber than does the 
 average housekeeper ; the roof has ceased to be weather- 
 tight, and is in sad need of interior decoration. Let us 
 hope it may be arranged without an international war, 
 and before the marble chapel which it shelters (built by 
 the Greeks, and singularly ugly) shall have further suffered 
 from the early and the latter rains. 
 
 After a digression (which international courtesy ap- 
 peared to demand) we may return to the consideration of 
 the new life introduced into the Holy City by the new 
 activities of the revived Patriarchate. The Patriarch has 
 jurisdiction over all Palestine and Cyprus, and he visits 
 every parish in his diocese every three years, either per- 
 sonally or by proxy of his coadjutor, who is titular Bishop 
 of Capitolia, in Decapolis. The most important institution 
 directly connected with the Patriarchate is a large seminary 
 for native youths, which, though not necessarily, prepares 
 for the secular priesthood, especially with a view to provide 
 acceptable parish priests for remote districts, east of the 
 Jordan, in the mountains of Gilead, or the remote plateaux 
 of Moab. It is interesting, in view of the quality of the 
 singing in churches where the choir is drawn from the 
 
 157
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 native schools, to note that special attention is given, as 
 by the Russians, to music, with encouraging results, demon- 
 strating that the pain inflicted upon Europeans by native 
 parish choirs is not inevitable. 
 
 The arrival of the Patriarch was followed, within the 
 century, by that of twenty-five religious Orders, of whom 
 eighteen are resident in Jerusalem. Three of these are 
 contemplative Sisterhoods, the Carmelites, Clarisses, and 
 Reparatrices ; two are here primarily for their own study, 
 the Dominicans and Assumptionists, though incidentally 
 doing valuable work for the public good ; while the remain- 
 ing thirteen are occupied in various forms of philanthropy. 
 The work of the Christian Brothers is, as elsewhere, edu- 
 cational ; the Sisters and Fathers of Notre Dame de Sion 1 
 were founded for work among the Jews ; the " White 
 Fathers " have a training school for natives, and themselves 
 wear the tarbush and white burnous of the country. They 
 have also a school of music, and Jerusalem owes much to 
 their excellent band. They are a society of united Greeks 
 founded by Cardinal Lavigerie, and doing valuable work 
 as missionaries, mainly in Africa. The Sisters of St. Joseph 
 and of St. Francis are occupied mainly with parochial 
 schools and female orphanages, the Sisters of the Rosary, 
 themselves mainly Syrians, with the education of native 
 girls ; the Sisters of St. Charles and the Lazarist Fathers 
 have schools, dispensaries, orphanages, and a hospice for 
 the German element in the population of Jerusalem, and 
 the Benedictine Convents on the Mount of Olives have 
 also schools and orphanages for the outside villages. The 
 
 1 This unique Order was founded by Ratisbonne, himself a Jew 
 who died in 1884. The Society numbers about 1,000 members, and 
 has Houses in England, Paris, and America. There are about 
 eighty orphans, in addition to Technical Schools and a Seminary 
 for students, at St. Peter's in Jerusalem, about 100 girls in the school 
 at the Ecce Homo Convent, and 100 more at St. John's. The sisters 
 have also a dispensary for Jews. The schools are not entirely Jewish. 
 Some of those " professed " are of Jewish parentage. 
 
 158
 
 THE LATINS IN JERUSALEM TO-DAY 
 
 Freres de S. Jean de Dieu, though perhaps their institution, 
 with its hospital and dispensaries at Tantour, are nearer to 
 Bethlehem than to Jerusalem, are too valuable to escape 
 mention. Before the admirable American and Scotch 
 medical missions had reached Syria ever since 1879 they 
 have been doing just that work which is best calculated to 
 commend the Christian teaching to the Arab mind ; a little 
 band of qualified medical men, dispensers, and nurses one 
 physician and one surgeon at least among them being men 
 of high eminence who have given up distinguished positions 
 to devote themselves to the service of the poor, in a country 
 where medical work of a high class is sorely needed. They 
 receive patients of any creed or nationality, or visit them 
 in their own homes ; they have a surgery and dispensary 
 at Bethlehem, and are often to be seen as consultants in 
 Jerusalem. They have no arriere pensee of conversion, 
 and no subscription lists. 
 
 There is one other Order whose philanthropy deserves 
 especial mention, that of the Sisters of St. Vincent de Paul. 
 Surely never was such varied misery relieved under one 
 roof ! Their buildings, though vast, are quite inadequate 
 to their purpose. The Sisters themselves have no separate 
 cells, but are housed, like their patients, in dormitories. Their 
 chapel is almost bare ; all that can be spared from the merest 
 necessities of life is spent upon others. Under that kindly 
 roof we find orphanages for boys and girls, an asylum for 
 the aged and bedridden, for the blind, the crippled, the 
 deformed, the mentally afflicted (neglected by all other 
 Christian societies in Jerusalem, 1 cared for by Jews and 
 Moslems only, and by the latter with no appliances of science, 
 barely of civilization). Here, too, we find a creche, a refuge 
 for foundlings, children often literally cast out, some of whom 
 have been found mangled by pariah-dogs. All creeds, all 
 
 1 Except in so far as Jerusalem patients may find their way to 
 the Asylum of Waldemie;-, a German-Swiss whose unique and beau- 
 tiful institution is supported mainly by Scotland and America. 
 
 159
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 nationalities, both sexes, are welcomed, the only condition 
 being that of misery too great for admission elsewhere. All 
 who are in any degree capable are employed ; shoemaking, 
 weaving, tailoring, carpentry, lace-making, laundry work, 
 knitting, mending, dressmaking, embroidery, all are done 
 and are done well. The blind learn to read and write, as 
 well as various crafts, and have also quite an effective band. 
 Here a boy with no arms and a crippled foot is doing a 
 sum in fractions with his remaining member, the working 
 of which is neat, legible, and correct ; there a half-witted 
 lad is serving as eyes to the blind, a second nature with 
 him, for his crippled frame was bent out of human likeness 
 from his having led during all the years of his growth an 
 animal existence at the hands of his father, a beggar, blind 
 and lame, who dragged himself about by means of leaning 
 on the child's shoulders, which, even as he grew taller, the 
 father compelled him to maintain at the low level con- 
 venient to himself. Here, in a bright airy work-room, a 
 number of girls, directed by a couple of Sisters, are making 
 fashionable dresses for the ladies of Jerusalem, silk shirts 
 for Moslem effendis, delicate fabrications of lace and tucks 
 for Christian babies. And, as if the maintenance and 
 clothing of so large a family were not enough responsibility 
 for the good Sisters, yonder are great stacks of useful gar- 
 ments for the outside poor, the results of the industry of a 
 working-party of native Jerusalem ladies organized and 
 directed by the Sisters. Elsewhere, as has been shown, 
 other daughters of this great household are tending the 
 Government hospital for Moslems, nursing the prisoners, 
 ministering to the lepers. And everywhere one sees bright 
 and happy faces, and evidences of good health. 
 
 A special word of gratitude from the outside public 
 should be said for the work of the Dominicans, whose 
 presence in the Holy Land, directly for the purpose of 
 studying the Bible in its own land and in its own languages, 
 is indirectly a boon to all students in Jerusalem, the general 
 
 160
 
 THE LATINS IN JERUSALEM TO-DAY 
 
 public being admitted every winter without condition (and 
 without payment) to the weekly lectures, by specialists, on 
 subjects of local interest. Students of the Bible and the 
 Holy Land are also indebted to them for their monthly 
 publication, the Remie Biblique, which, in respect of 
 illustrations and maps, and often in the interest of its 
 articles, perhaps excels any other journal of current 
 Palestinian inquiry. 
 
 About twenty years ago the Augustinians of the Assump- 
 tion, among whose many good works that of facilitating 
 pilgrimages has a prominent place, conceived the idea of 
 conducting a pilgrimage of penitence to the Holy Land. In 
 those days hotels were few, the Franciscans possessed the 
 only hospice generally available, the conveniences of travel 
 were less even than now, and, although both Pius IX and 
 Leo XIII had encouraged the project, it appeared to many 
 to be a scheme very difficult of practical realization on any 
 large scale. Even Church room seemed to be insufficient 
 for any considerable number of worshippers, the new 
 Churches of St. Saviour, of St. Anne, of the Ecce Homo, of 
 the united Armenians and Greeks, of the Sceurs de Saint 
 Joseph, and of the Reparatrices to speak only of Jerusalem 
 were not yet built ; there was no railway, the roads to 
 Jericho, to St. John's (Ain Karim), to Ramallah, were not 
 yet made. Nevertheless, the pilgrims came, to the number 
 of over a thousand. The next year more were again found 
 to brave an exceptionally difficult journey. The occasion 
 is remembered as " the pilgrimage of storms." Their 
 arrival was delayed till Jerusalem was crowded with Easter 
 visitors ; the Franciscans could receive but seventeen of 
 the 400 additional guests. In 1884 the organization was 
 more complete, the success was incontestable, and, at the 
 disinterested suggestion of a Franciscan, the pilgrims 
 taxed themselves to the amount of 80,000 francs (3,200) 
 for the purchase of the estate now known as that of Notre 
 Dame de France, the immense hostelry capable of receiving 
 
 161 M
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 500 guests. In 1888 it was ready for use ; in 1889 the 
 chapel was begun, and the pilgrimages have continued 
 to increase every year in numbers and in devotion. The 
 arrangements, both for those who come direct from Jaffa 
 to Jerusalem, and for those who, landing at Beirut, visit 
 Damascus and ride down through Galilee and Samaria, 
 are admirable in every detail, including the presence of a 
 nurse for the sick. Each pilgrimage brings a cross, often 
 of the traditional proportions, which, after being carried 
 along the Via Dolorosa, is conveyed back home and planted 
 in some sacred spot ; among others have been Montmartre, 
 Paray le Monial, Lourdes, and St. Michel. In 1902 there 
 were two, one carried by priests, the other by laity. 
 
 In spite of the multiplication of philanthropic agencies, 
 the new religious Orders in Jerusalem have, happily, not 
 tended to the subdivision of means of education for natives. 
 There are special schools in connexion with orphanages 
 and with the blind ; there are the technical schools at the 
 Convents of Ratisbonne and of the Sceurs de Charite, and 
 there are the schools of the Christian Brothers for secondary 
 education, resorted to by the sons of tradesmen, officials 
 and others, of all creeds and nationalities. But the 
 primary parish schools remain, as they have always done, 
 in the hands of the Franciscans. They have made a difficult 
 stand on behalf of education, for until after the Crimean 
 war in the year 1858, when they first obtained a firman, 
 their work was carried on against obstacles which at times 
 seemed well-nigh insurmountable. But the Arab has a 
 considerable degree of intellectual activity of a certain 
 kind ; 1 they never lacked pupils, and they never failed, 
 on the establishment of a convent, at once to open a school 
 for children of six years old and upwards, who, at the age 
 
 1 The Rev. G. E. Post, a member of the American College in 
 Beirut and specially conversant with the Arab temperament, credits 
 them with " curiosity, perceptivity, memory, versatility, but with 
 little judgment, logic, or originality." 
 
 162
 
 THE LATINS IN JERUSALEM TO-DAY 
 
 of twelve, had the opportunity of learning a trade from some 
 master-workman, Christian or Moslem. In 1645 the 
 Chapter-General decided that the children were to be further 
 encouraged to study by a mid-day meal, the nature of 
 which is specified mainly vegetable soups, polenta, rice, 
 and cheese. 1 An Italian writer 2 of the year 1790 expresses 
 his surprise at finding excellent masons, carpenters, me- 
 chanics, locksmiths, and furniture-makers in Jerusalem, 
 a fact which was explained by the training received in the 
 schools of the Franciscans. 
 
 A few years before the first grant of a firman we find 3 
 that the Friars had established fifteen schools for boys and 
 nine for girls ; that among the teachers, twenty-two were 
 religious and twenty secular ; and that they were suitably 
 provided with books, maps, and furniture, the scholars 
 numbering 1,278, of whom 446 were girls. The report 4 for 
 1903, enumerates thirty-one schools, attended by 2,680 
 boys, and eleven schools, attended by 700 girls. These 
 do not include the large number of orphanages which 
 abound in all directions, especially for girls. 
 
 No account of Latin Christianity in Jerusalem would 
 be in any degree complete without reference to those con- 
 fessions which have seceded from their original government 
 and have submitted themselves to that of the Pope ; hence 
 spoken of commonly as " united." The united Greeks, or 
 Melchites, have been already referred to as the royalists, or 
 King's men, who submitted in 451 to the edict of the 
 Emperor in favour of the Council of Chalcedon, when the 
 Syrians, Copts, and Armenians were condemned. Their 
 Patriarch takes his title from Antioch, Jerusalem, and 
 
 1 Elzear Horn, Locorum etc. veterum Terrae Sanctae, 1725-44, 
 pp. 222-3, ed. 1902. 
 
 2 Marita Istoria dello state presente di Gerusalemme, vol. i., 1790, 
 p. 70. 
 
 3 P. Bassi, Stato delle Missioni di Terra Santa nellanno 1851, vol. ii. 
 p. 339. 
 
 4 Status descript. Custodiae Terrae, Sanctae, 1903. 
 
 163
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 Damascus, and has been hitherto represented in Jerusalem 
 by a Vicar ; there is, however, a recent rumour of the 
 probable appointment of a Bishop. They retain the 
 Byzantine rite, recited in Arabic, which is printed parallel 
 with the Greek. They possess the Chapel of the Credo on 
 the Mount of Olives and the Chapel of St. Veronica at the 
 Sixth Station of the Cross, as well as the College, Church, 
 and Museum known as St. Anne's. 
 
 The united Armenians date only from the middle of the 
 last century, and are not numerous. They are in the care 
 of a Vicar Patriarchal, and possess the Church which marks 
 the fourth station of the Via Dolorosa, whose unfinished 
 condition still roofless for many years, although on the 
 site of some interesting ruins of a Benedictine convent 
 strikes the visitor as somewhat of a reproach to the wealthier 
 institutions and to the large numbers of pilgrims and 
 " religious " who every Friday take part in the procession 
 of the Via Dolorosa. The united Copts are quite modern, 
 and are very few in number. The united Abyssinians 
 are under the care of the Lazarist Fathers, and worship at 
 their own altar in the Church of the Patriarchate. The 
 united Syrians, who date only from the end of the 
 eighteenth century, have their own Vicar-Patriarchal, and 
 are about to build a church and hospice for themselves 
 near the Damascus Gate outside the walls of the city. 
 
 The Maronites, said to be the most latinized of all the 
 uniats, are not largely represented in Jerusalem, although 
 it is said that there are some 200,000 of them, mainly in 
 Syria. Their churches, vestments and ritual are practically 
 undistinguishable from those of Rome, but they have their 
 own Patriarch and their own customs as to the marriage 
 of the inferior clergy, and other points. They are to be 
 found mainly in the Lebanon district, where they serve, 
 from the student's point of view, the valuable purpose of 
 keeping alive the Syrian or Aramaic language ; though 
 often their announcements, church notices, etc., may be 
 
 164
 
 THE LATINS IN JERUSALEM TO-DAY 
 
 found actually in the Arabic tongue, although written in 
 the Syrian alphabet ! They became fully united with 
 Rome in 1600, but their Patriarch was present at the 
 General Council of the Lateran as long ago as 1216, under 
 Innocent III. They are protected by the French, but 
 were, nevertheless, cruelly massacred by the Druses in 1860 
 to the number, it is said, of about 10,000. Even to the 
 present time, their convents and churches resemble for- 
 tresses rather than the peaceful homes of ecclesiastics. 
 They have shown some literary interest, have had since 
 1584 a college in Rome, and the work of their author 
 Assemarni on oriental subjects was recognized by Gibbon 
 as a classic. 
 
 Once a year, in the church belonging to the superb 
 convent of the Reparatrices, one may assist, during nine 
 days before the carnival, at the unique occasion profanely 
 and locally known as " the Carnival of the Rites." This Order, 
 whose business it is to pray for those who do not pray for 
 themselves, then collects together representatives of the 
 whole of Roman Catholic Jerusalem, of every rite, nation- 
 ality, and Order, to pray for those who may be specially 
 tempted at the Carnival ; and it is an opportunity not to 
 be had elsewhere of studying liturgical variations. The 
 Mass is said according to every rite, six in all, sermons are 
 preached in at least half-a-dozen languages, the Orders 
 come on different days with their choirs, their students, 
 their orphans, their cripples, as the case may be. Every 
 patriarch, every bishop, is there in turn ; all bring their 
 habitual vestments, customs, uses. Nowhere else, in the 
 world, not even in Rome, is there a similar occasion. 
 
 But perhaps the scene which above all others impresses 
 one most with the actual living fact of the Communion of 
 Saints, is that which presents itself daily at the Holy 
 Sepulchre. The Franciscan friar, guardian of the shrine, 
 shares his responsibility with the Greek, whose aged Empress 
 was the first to beautify the spot, sixteen centuries ago. 
 
 165
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 There the Syrian worships in the language in which the 
 Master taught, there, the gentle Abyssinian, silent and 
 restrained, contrasts vividly with the Russian pilgrim, who 
 has walked for months, it may be, to do reverence in the 
 Holy City, and who is kissing the very stones in a passion 
 of adoration. Here we note the Armenian, proud of his 
 religious descent from the earliest Christian pilgrims to the 
 Holy Land, there the swarthy Copt, there the Maronite, 
 faithful under the most appalling religious persecution of 
 modern times, and here the St. Thomas Christian from 
 India, partner with the Syrian in his humble share of the 
 holy shrine ; while even the Moslem, while denying the fact 
 of His death and resurrection, is yet respectful to the 
 teaching of the Master. The scene is one which testifies 
 to the homogeneousness of Christendom, 1 or to its unhappy 
 divisions, according to the point of view. One may be 
 conscious of differences of creed, or of a common love for 
 the risen Lord ; one may note fanaticism, superstition, 
 savagery, or one may remember the dictum, "in essentials 
 unity, in non-essentials liberty, in all things charity." He 
 is not here, He is risen, but man, His servant, made in His 
 likeness, even the least of these His brethren, remains, and 
 his presence is evidence of the persistence, in spite of all 
 disenchantment, all disappointment, of the hope that 
 remaineth, of our common brotherhood, our common 
 sonship. 
 
 1 " Catholicism does not obliterate or absorb national character, 
 it consecrates it ; and conversely each national character grasps a 
 special aspect of the Catholic faith, which it is its vocation to guard." 
 (Biggs, Six months in Jerusalem, p. 336.) "Do not these very divi- 
 sions afford an indirect illustration of the extraordinary vitality of 
 the new kingdom ? " (Liddon, Divinity of our Lord, p. 124.) 
 
 166
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 MARTYRDOM IN JERUSALEM 
 
 SIGNIFICANCE OP APPARENTLY UNIMPORTANT DETAILS 
 MUTUAL RELATION OF GREEKS AND LATINS GREEK 
 PROMISES THE PASHA'S DECISION NEXT MORNING'S 
 INCIDENTS THE PASHA AND THE FRENCH REPRE- 
 SENTATIVE EVENTS OF NOVEMBER 4 PUBLIC 
 FEELING " ABSOLUTE REPARATION " SENTENCES- 
 EPISODES HISTORY REPEATS ITSELF 
 
 " There are three kinds of martyrdom ; the first both in will 
 and deed, which is the highest ; the second, in will but not in 
 deed ; the third, in deed but not in will." WHEATLEY. 
 
 THOSE who have acquainted themselves with the his- 
 tory of the events which occurred in the courtyard 
 of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in November of the 
 year 1901, must feel that the title, borne by the Franciscans, 
 of Guardians of the Holy Places, is not an empty one. 
 Again and again have they signed with their blood the 
 deed of entail which conveys this proud distinction. 
 
 The accounts of the matter which have been published 
 in England, in all cases meagre, have been, moreover, so 
 often coloured by prejudice and party-feeling that I think 
 it worth while to describe the incident with some detail, as 
 I am enabled to do so at first hand. The quotations are 
 throughout from the pen of one of the Franciscans of the 
 Convent of San Salvador, the headquarters of the Order in 
 the Holy Land. 
 
 167
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 As has been already seen, so many privileges, so much 
 territory has been wrested from the Franciscans by force 
 or artifice during the last century, that the duty of 
 zealously preserving what remains to them is, as Guar- 
 dians of the Holy Places, all the more rigidly incumbent. 
 The large square common to Latins, Greeks and Armenians 
 in front of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre is, however, 
 surrounded on three sides by buildings, which, with the 
 exception of one small Armenian chapel, are entirely in 
 the hands of the Greeks. The only share now left to the 
 Franciscans is a short flight of steps leading up to a small 
 chapel, built against the fagade of the church itself, and 
 which it is, of course, their duty to keep clean, sweeping 
 the steps and the adjoining stone-flagging every day, not 
 merely for the sake of order, but, as is the local custom, in 
 token of proprietorship, a duty which they have exercised 
 from time immemorial. 
 
 Towards the close of October 1901 the sacristan reported 
 to the Gustos of the Holy Land, that the Greeks had 
 interfered with his work, and sought to hinder its exe- 
 cution. It was at first supposed that the interference was 
 merely a piece of fanaticism, but when the molestations 
 were daily repeated, fears were entertained that the matter 
 might have some connexion with other annoyances of 
 recent occurrence, and that what seemed separately events 
 of small importance, might in the aggregate have serious 
 significance. These had arisen partly out of some discussion 
 as to certain repairs which the Greeks had executed during 
 the night without reference to the joint Latin authority, 
 and partly out of certain other repairs and alterations 
 sanctioned by Greeks, Latins and Armenians, but as to 
 which the Greeks had assumed a degree of authority in 
 excess of that of the others. The matter had, however, 
 been to all appearance amicably settled, and the Greek 
 Guardian, Euthymios, acting in the absence of his Patriarch, 
 had made suitable excuses, and had been loud in professions 
 
 168
 
 MARTYRDOM IN JERUSALEM 
 
 of friendship even so lately as October 29, when he made 
 a personal call upon the Gustos, the Custodial Vicar, Father 
 Prosper of Marennes, being present. He professed entire 
 ignorance as to the matter of the steps, and promised that 
 there should be no further ground for complaint. 
 
 When the interference still continued, the Gustos sent a 
 dragoman to remind him of his promise, and received a reply 
 in a somewhat different key from the former, to the effect 
 that he would look into the matter and send word as to his 
 decision. On the evening of November 2 the decision 
 arrived, to the effect that the Greeks would certainly pre- 
 vent the Franciscans from sweeping the flag-stones, upon 
 which the Gustos at once communicated with the Pasha, 
 who accordingly ordered that two policemen should be in 
 attendance the next morning. Their presence, though it 
 availed to protect the friars from actual molestation, would 
 have effected little against the fifty or more Greeks, who 
 were awaiting any excuse for creating a disturbance. How- 
 ever, the Franciscans showed great discretion, swept their 
 steps, made a dignified protest against the enemy's hin- 
 drance of their duty, and withdrew, attended by their 
 dragoman. 
 
 The Consul-General of France was unfortunately absent 
 from Jerusalem, but his ChanceUor was sent for, the matter 
 explained to him, and he at once proceeded to the Pasha, 
 who was anxious to effect a compromise on the subject of 
 the sweeping, which, however, the Gustos absolutely de- 
 clined. Meantime, the Greek Guardian had sent for the 
 Franciscan dragoman, who was permitted to visit him, but 
 only on his own responsibility, not as representing the 
 community of San Salvador. To him also was proposed 
 a like policy of compromise. I give the Franciscan argu- 
 ment upon the subject in their own words. 
 
 ' The rejection of the Pasha's proposal was not at all 
 unreasonable on the part of the Most Rev. Gustos. How 
 could he consent to accept as an alms from the Greeks a 
 
 169
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 portion of a right which was his in its entirety ? Besides, 
 as every one knows, the rights, whether great or small, 
 which the Gustos and his Franciscan confreres maintain 
 and defend at the Holy Shrines are maintained and de- 
 fended not as their own possession, which they can dispose 
 of at will, but as the rights and property of the Church and 
 the whole Catholic world." 
 
 The day ended with the receipt of a message from the 
 Pasha promising to support the Franciscans in the exercise 
 of their rights, pending further inquiry. 
 
 Next morning accordingly the friar-sacristan set about 
 his sweeping, the dragoman and a priest (who had just said 
 his Mass in the little chapel at the head of the steps) looking 
 on. A crowd of Greeks had already gathered in the court, 
 and eight or ten Greek monks, with their Vicar, some 
 carrying brooms, stood at the foot of the steps. When 
 they reached the flag-stones the usual molestation began, 
 in spite of the presence of a Turkish official and two 
 policemen. 
 
 " The two Franciscans and their dragoman protested 
 on the spot against the unwarranted interference, appealing 
 to the Pasha's order, which guaranteed them the right to 
 sweep that flagging. But the Greeks paid no regard either 
 to the Pasha's order or to the remonstrances of the two 
 Franciscans. The Turkish official and policemen thereupon 
 interfered. . . . When the Father saw how things stood, 
 he left the dragoman there to prevent the Greeks from 
 sweeping the flagging, as they had already tried to do, and 
 himself hastened to report the occurrence to the Gustos. 
 Other Franciscans meanwhile, who had been engaged in 
 private devotions before the Holy Sepulchre, came out of 
 the Basilica when they heard the commotion, and took 
 their stand at the side of their dragoman." 
 
 The Gustos at once sent his Vicar down to the scene of 
 disturbance, and despatched a messenger to the French 
 Consulate, who returned with the assurance that undoubtedly 
 
 170
 
 MARTYRDOM IN JERUSALEM 
 
 all would be well for the Franciscans. Meanwhile, the 
 Pasha sent down additional police and some soldiers, with 
 two commandants, one of the military and one of the police. 
 The Franciscans also were reinforced by others of their 
 community. 
 
 " Their only object in going to the place was that their 
 presence there might serve as a quiet but positive protest 
 against the unlawful aggression of their Greek neighbours. 
 They would remain here in the face of all danger, until the 
 Pasha either made good his promise of the preceding night 
 or sent other orders." 
 
 Meantime, the crowd of Greeks was increasing every 
 moment. When from time to time dispersed by the soldiers, 
 great numbers disappeared into the doorways of the sur- 
 rounding Greek buildings, whence they easily gained access 
 to the roof of the Basilica and Convent, from which they 
 looked down on to the Franciscans below, sitting quietly 
 on the steps, their hands in their sleeves, confident in the 
 assurances of protection which, for the third time, reached 
 them at noon from the representative of the Protector of 
 Christianity in the East. 
 
 " You on your part must patiently await the outcome 
 of the event," wrote the French representative. " You 
 know that in this country everything is done slowly. . . . 
 Let us show by the correctness of our bearing that we know 
 how to await the hour when peace will be restored. Though 
 absent, I am occupied with and watch over the preservation 
 of your interests." 
 
 For once, however, things were done less slowly than 
 usual in the East. While the defenceless Franciscans 
 " showed the correctness of their bearing," the Greeks 
 were gathering upon the flat roofs all around, even within 
 a few feet of them, occupied with the accumulation of 
 means of assault piles of stones, and of rags, and bottles 
 of petroleum. 
 
 " At about half-past nine the number of Greek monks 
 
 171
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 had increased considerably. Many of them were not 
 monks at all, but well known brigands disguised as monks 
 to take part in the wretched work. They were armed 
 with hatchets, stilettoes, daggers, pistols and short heavy 
 clubs. Many unsheathed daggers, and knives, concealed 
 with little care by those who generally made no feint to 
 hide such weapons, revealed the murderous intent of the 
 Greeks. Even pistols glistened among the ample folds of 
 the orthodox Greek habit." 
 
 About three o'clock the Gustos received a visit from the 
 French representative, the Vicar being present. " He 
 came to speak about the difficult situation, to see whether 
 no way could be devised for the Friars " (who had now sat 
 patiently for about seven hours with their hands in their 
 sleeves) " to assert their rights without further exposing 
 themselves to danger." 
 
 While they were talking, the bells of the Greek Convent 
 rang out an ominous tocsin. A friar rushed into the 
 room announcing that the assault on the unarmed Fran- 
 ciscans had begun, followed by a second friar with the 
 intelligence that a number of them were lying dead, for 
 all that any one knew in pools of their own blood. The 
 French representative now, for the first time, directed his 
 steps to the scene. 
 
 " The first act of open hostility was committed by those 
 on the terraces above, who began to spit on the Franciscans, 
 seated quietly on the steps before their chapel. The soldiers 
 were informed of this indignity, but they interfered to stop 
 it only in a very indifferent manner. At the same moment 
 the Greek monks closed in and took possession of the lower 
 steps. The Franciscans were thus pressed within narrow 
 quarters, which made it easy for the Greeks to stone them 
 altogether. . . . Since the forenoon the Greek sacristan 
 had been standing ready with the bell-rope in his hand. 
 He now rang the bells as a signal for the attack. The 
 Greeks rushed on in crowds priests, students, church 
 
 172
 
 MARTYRDOM IN JERUSALEM 
 
 assistants and others. . . . From the terraces stones were 
 uninterruptedly rained down on the poor friars. Several 
 of them were struck, and fell down with heads laid open. 
 A few were able to escape into the chapel. But even there 
 they were not safe ; for the Greeks, denouncing them in 
 opprobrious terms, continued to throw stones at them 
 through the window which faces Mount Calvary. Those 
 who were prevented from fleeing into the chapel were 
 subjected to acts of the greatest cruelty. ... If they 
 attempted to escape or to defend themselves as well as they 
 could with their bare hands, they were dragged among 
 the crowd on the plaza, where they were beaten with clubs 
 and wounded with daggers, knives, and hatchets. . . . 
 Some venerable old brothers who came out of the Basilica 
 were thrown to the ground with remorseless cruelty, wounded 
 and trampled underfoot." 
 
 " All save the Greeks now fled from this indescribable 
 scene of carnage and bloodshed. Mohammedan and Latin 
 women shrieked for dread, and many fainted on the spot. 
 But the Greek women who thronged the terraces did not 
 show any signs of terror. Instead, they supplied the men 
 with stones to cast down on the Franciscans. The cheer 
 which the Greeks generally employ at marriage festivities 
 resounded on all sides. 1 Meantime, at risk of his life, one 
 of the friars made his way out into the Sion quarter of the 
 city and succeeded in obtaining additional military assist- 
 ance. We owe thanks to God that these soldiers came 
 as early as they did ; for the Greeks on the terraces were 
 just preparing to throw their burning rags, soaked in 
 petroleum, on the wounded friars lying below, and thus to 
 complete by fire their work of murderous assault. The 
 
 1 This is the special and characteristic sound of joy among Ori- 
 entals, made by a rapid vibration of the tongue against the teeth. 
 It would sound like the prolonged whistle which a street-boy makes 
 by putting his fingers into his mouth, if such a whistle could be pro- 
 duced with a tremolo. 
 
 173
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 fact that the friars made no attempt to defend themselves 
 is another instance of God's providential care. For, if they 
 had done so, we have the testimony of well informed people 
 for the assertion that the Greeks would have made use of 
 their pistols. In that case the carnage would have been by 
 far more frightful." I am able to add, on good authority, 
 that a large number of the roughest characters of the city 
 were waiting, ready armed, for the first pistol-shot to 
 announce that the worst had begun, in order to rush in 
 and loot the precious ornaments of the Holy Places. 
 
 Fifteen Franciscans and their interpreter, a Syrian, 
 were carried, all severely, some dangerously wounded, into 
 the Convent. The list of then 1 injuries, signed by two 
 prominent Jerusalem doctors, a Frenchman and an Italian, 
 as well as by the physician of the Municipality, lies before 
 me, and, reading over the horrible details, one can only 
 marvel, looking back, that all have, by the mercy 
 of God, survived, though there are many whose injuries 
 will be felt for life. The honours are, as to nation- 
 ality, widely distributed. Five are Italians, two Germans, 
 one French, one Spaniard, one Dutch, two Russian, 
 three Syrian, and one let us feel proud of the 
 fact English. Three were priests. One of the most 
 serious cases was that of a Russian, who had doubtless 
 been made the subject of special malice in consequence of 
 his personal history. He was one of the few survivors 
 from one of the frequent shipwrecks off the dangerous 
 Jaffa coast. The friars of the Franciscan Convent, as is 
 their wont, received and tended the homeless sufferers, and, 
 as a token of gratitude to God for his deliverance, he ac- 
 cepted the Latin creed, and, in further gratitude to his 
 preservers, became one of their number. His onerous 
 work at the Holy Sepulchre, where the conditions of life 
 are especially uncomfortable and insanitary, exposed to 
 the daily scorn of the Greeks, is evidence, if evidence were 
 needed, of his sincerity. 
 
 174
 
 MARTYRDOM IN JERUSALEM 
 
 Public feeling in the matter was strong. The Franciscans 
 had the sympathy, not only of those of their own faith, but 
 of even the Moslems, who loudly expressed their regret for 
 the sorrow which had befallen the Brothers of the Cord, their 
 name for the Sons of St. Francis. 
 
 " The French representative shortly visited the scene of 
 the late attack. He did not hesitate to address the Turkish 
 officers there in a manner that did honour to the consular 
 dignity which he held. Among other things he said with 
 fearlessness and vehemence . . . Reparation must abso- 
 lutely be made absolutely" 
 
 The French protectorate, however, practised the policy 
 which they had thrice recommended to the defenceless friars, 
 and showed " by the correctness of their bearing that they 
 knew how to wait." 
 
 The quotations which follow are from a communication 
 sent from the Convent of St. Salvador to the Commissariat 
 of the Holy Land in the United States, under date June 3, 
 seven months after the occurrence. 
 
 " Ever since the events of November 4, 1901, the entire 
 Catholic world is looking to the East, asking itself the 
 question whether to-day, in this age of civilization, atrocities 
 such as have been committed at the Church of the Holy 
 Sepulchre shall go unresented and unpunished. How 
 justifiable this question is, may be seen from the fact that 
 until to-day diplomatic negotiations have not shown the 
 slightest result." The writer proceeds to explain that, 
 from motives of policy, France had acted throughout in 
 concert with Russia, the protector of the Eastern, as France 
 is of the Western Church in Jerusalem. Russia apparently 
 had suggested that a call of apology on the part of the 
 Greek Prefect of the Holy Sepulchre would be, under the 
 circumstances, a polite attention, but the Gustos, still 
 mourning over the protracted sufferings of his sixteen 
 wounded sons, did not consider the proposal, as "an abso- 
 lute reparation," adequate. " However, the matter is not 
 
 175
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 yet disposed of, and negotiations have not yet been brought 
 to their final conclusion. When the German and Italian 
 consuls (having seven of their compatriots among the 
 wounded) saw France's indifference in obtaining satisfaction 
 for the flagrant wrong done to the German and Italian 
 Fathers and Brothers, they took their defence into their own 
 hands." 
 
 Finally, on July 10, eight months after the occurrence, 
 the case was brought up for trial before not only, as usual, 
 the French Protector of Christianity, but before the Italian 
 and German Consuls and the dragomans of other Consuls 
 also concerned. No accused Greek appeared ; they had 
 had plenty of time to get away. Sixty were accused, 
 thirty-one sentenced, of whom three were archimandrites, 
 nine monks, and nineteen seculars. The Archimandrite 
 Pachromios was sentenced to nine months' imprisonment, 
 three of the monks to four months, four to three months, 
 one secular to three months, seven seculars and one archi- 
 mandrite to one month, the remainder to short periods of 
 one or two weeks. Writing after the lapse of two years 
 after the trial, I cannot learn that any of these sentences 
 have been carried out. 
 
 The story from beginning to end is one which needs no 
 comment. Even those who are not privileged to feel the 
 sympathy of a common brotherhood and a common cause, 
 must at least feel the responsibility of a common humanity. 
 " Lives there a man with soul so dead " that he is not 
 ashamed to think that here in the Holy City, in the 
 twentieth century, it should be possible for an armed crowd 
 to deliberately organize an assault on a score of unarmed 
 men, bareheaded and barefooted, who, pledged to obedience, 
 and under orders " to show by the correctness of their 
 bearing that they knew how to wait," sat for hours with 
 folded hands until driven from their post by showers of 
 stones ? 
 
 The city of Jerusalem is supposed to contain about 
 
 176
 
 MARTYRDOM IN JERUSALEM 
 
 thirteen thousand " Christians." Not one solitary man 
 came to the rescue. 
 
 Two episodes deserve especial mention. When the Vicar 
 Custodial, a man of fifty years of age, returned from his 
 afternoon interview with the Custos, " four Greek monks 
 surrounded him at once, striking at him with clubs, one 
 with a hatchet. The hatchet had already inflicted one 
 slight wound, 1 and was just raised by the monk who 
 wielded it for a more telling blow, when three men rushed 
 to the rescue of the Father." Two of these were Arabs and 
 one a Turk. This last was the only officer not rewarded 
 by distinction or promotion at the general distribution of 
 favours by the authorities. 
 
 A Turkish officer was seriously wounded by a Greek 
 monk and lost his eye. " As this might have been followed 
 by serious consequences for the cause of the Greeks, they 
 left nothing undone to conciliate the soldier. They visited 
 him in the hospital, 2 each time leaving several gold pieces 
 under his pillow, until he had fully recovered. They later 
 on settled the matter with him for the sum of about five 
 thousand francs, and induced him to testify that he was 
 wounded, not by a Greek, but by one of the Franciscans, 
 although it was amply proven that none of the Franciscans 
 carried a weapon." 
 
 A Franciscan has described the touching scene which 
 occurred in the refectory of the Convent at the hour of 
 supper on that unhappy fourth of November, the many 
 empty seats, the sad countenances of those present. The 
 aged Custos was overcome with grief. He praised the 
 courage for sacrifice of those who lay suffering on their 
 beds of pain. He called them martyrs of duty, fearless 
 protectors of the Holy Shrines and Saints of God, in that 
 they shed their blood in so holy a cause and so precious a 
 
 1 Described by the surgeon as " exposing the skull." 
 
 2 He was so fortunate as to be tended by Dr. Cant, in the British 
 Ophthalmic Hospital. 
 
 177 N
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 charge as that which has been entrusted to the Sons of 
 St. Francis. . . . Their mission in the Orient," he said, 
 " afforded them frequent opportunities for illuminating 
 the pages of their Order's history with their blood freely 
 and gladly shed." 
 
 So much has been said in certain quarters as to the 
 alleged readiness of the Franciscans to receive offence, that 
 it may be interesting to recall that, in the year 1856, an 
 almost similar fray occurred in the Holy Sepulchre, not 
 between Greeks and Latins, but between Greeks and 
 Armenians. It was during the very week in which, in 
 Jerusalem as well as in Europe, every one was rejoicing in 
 the restoration of general peace after the Crimean war. 
 Te Deums were sung in every church, and a decree had been 
 issued by the Government, publicly read in the Jerusalem 
 Serai, in which, among others, had occurred the following 
 admirable announcement on the part of the Sultan : 
 
 "As all forms of religion are and shall be freely professed 
 in my dominions, no subject of my Empire shall be hindered 
 in the exercise of the religion that he professes, nor shall 
 be in any way annoyed on this account." 
 
 Scarcely had the echo of this liberal sentiment on the part 
 of a Moslem died away, scarcely were the illuminations in 
 honour of the Peace extinguished, when, on the Greek 
 Easter Eve, a disturbance broke out within the sacred 
 precincts on the occasion of the Holy Fire. It was no 
 accidental outburst under sudden provocation. Pilgrims 
 provided themselves with stones and cudgels, and a further 
 supply of weapons was thrown down from a window in the 
 gallery communicating with the Greek Convent. Certain 
 details of the scene bore a curious resemblance to those of 
 the later occasion. In each case the Commandant of the 
 troops and some of his men were hurt, a Turkish officer 
 was severely wounded with a knife, and over twenty on 
 each side were seriously injured. On this occasion, unfortu- 
 
 178
 
 MARTYRDOM IN JERUSALEM 
 
 nately, part of the fray occurred actually within the sacred 
 edifice, and many valuable pictures were torn, Church 
 ornaments destroyed, and some silver lamps and silver 
 chains subtracted. 
 
 As on the latter occasion, one victim was especially selected 
 for assault ; a lad was stabbed on face and neck by the 
 Greeks on account of his having paraded a sort of Guy 
 Fawkes effigy of the Emperor of Russia during the late 
 illuminations. 1 
 
 1 Finn op. cit. ii. xxxvi. 
 
 179
 
 EARLY ASSOCIATIONS CRUSADES TRADE ANGLO-PRUS- 
 SIAN BISHOPRIC PROTESTANT INFLUENCE LACK OF 
 ENGLISH ENTERPRISE AND PHILANTHROPY ENGLISH 
 BISHOPRIC ESTABLISHED 
 
 THE association of England with the Holy Land has 
 always been somewhat capricious and ineffective 
 a single gravestone in the Court of the Holy Sepulchre, 1 
 the share taken by Edward IV in restoring the roof 2 
 
 1 This gravestone, which forms part of the pavement almost in 
 front of the door of the Holy Sepulchre, commemorates Philip 
 d'Aubigny, the lord of the Castle of Devizes in Wiltshire, guar- 
 dian to Henry III, and Governor of the Channel Islands. We learn 
 from Matthew Paris that he was one of the twenty-four barons who 
 signed Magna Charta, 1215, and that he afterwards joined the Sixth 
 Crusade. He was at Acre in 1222, with the Emperor Frederic II, 
 when Jerusalem was recovered in 1228, and remained with the 
 Crusaders till his death shortly before their expulsion by the Sultan 
 of Egypt in 1236. The stone is now very much defaced by the fre- 
 quent passage of feet, from which it was preserved until 1864, by 
 being covered with a block of masonry, but an emblem, probably a 
 cross, surmounts the Hie jacet and the name is still visible. From 
 earlier records, however, we learn that the inscription was as follows : 
 
 " Hie jacet Philippus de Aubinedi cujus anima 
 requiescat in pace. Amen." 
 
 The coat of arms is a heart-shaped shield bearing four fusils in fess. 
 
 2 Whether any English work really remains is more than doubtful. 
 Edward IVs share was the lead, that of Philip of Burgundy, the 
 wood ; and about 200 years later, the Turks stripped the roof of its 
 lead in order to make bullets. 
 
 180
 
 V
 
 ENGLAND IN JERUSALEM 
 
 of the Church of St. Mary at Bethlehem, and the grave * of 
 the murderers of St. Thomas of Canterbury in the Haram 
 Area, being the sole material links at present discoverable. 
 Certain historians have sought to show that Constantine, 
 who did so much for Jerusalem, was born at York, but 
 according to Gibbon (Decline and Fall, chap, xiv.) the place 
 of his birth, as well as the condition of his mother, Helena, 
 far from being established, have been the subject, not only 
 of literary, but of national, dispute. For the first associa- 
 tion with England we have to turn to a mention made 
 by St. Paula, one of the two Roman ladies who followed 
 St. Jerome, and who writes to her friend, Marcella, about 
 390 A.D. : " The Briton, when separated from our world, if 
 he has made any progress in religion, leaves the setting sun 
 and seeks a place known to him only by fame and the 
 narrative of the Scriptures " (ad Marcellam, ii. 2). The 
 Briton, it is to be feared, had unfortunately made no pro- 
 gress in religion at that period, which was nearly two hundred 
 years before even St. Patrick or St. Columba, and, so far as 
 we know, the first Briton to " leave the setting sun " in 
 favour of the Holy City was Willibald, a nephew of St. Boni- 
 face, who, with seven companions, went to Palestine in 754, 
 and was imprisoned by the Saracens. Happily they were 
 redeemed by the private liberality and influence of a 
 merchant, who represented to the King that they came 
 " from the west country where the sun sets, and we know 
 
 1 They are buried within El Aksa or " the further Mosque," so 
 called in opposition to that of Mecca, which was for nearly seventy 
 years the home of the Knights Templars. This was originally, 
 although desecrated and probably in part destroyed meanwhile, the 
 Church of St. Mary, otherwise the Church of the Presentation, built 
 by Justinian in the fifth century. There, not far from the entrance, 
 their graves are still pointed out. As part of the penance ordained by 
 Pope Alexander III, they came to Jerusalem Hovenden says to 
 the " black mountain," possibly Jebel Musa, still celebrated for its 
 black stone, and were buried at Jerusalem. " Quorum superscriptio 
 haec est. Hie jacent Miseri qui^martyrizaverunt beatum Thomam 
 archiepiscopum Cantuariensem. ' ' 
 
 181
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 of no land beyond them but water only," to which the King 
 replied, " Why ought we to punish them ? They have not 
 sinned against us give them leave and let them go." And 
 even the backsheesh of four deniers which other prisoners 
 had to pay was remitted to them. Two accounts of the 
 travels of St. Willibald have come down to us one by one 
 of his companions in travel, but written some time after 
 and from memory ; the other by an English nun, said to 
 have been named Roswida, who had personally listened to 
 the Saint's narrative, and whose manuscript was corrected 
 by himself. It has all the advantages and drawbacks one 
 might expect from a scribe who made up in personal interest 
 what she lacked in literary experience. She devotes nine 
 chapters to an account of the Saint's childhood, and heaps 
 up adjectives to give weight to her convictions. As she 
 herself says, " I pluck twigs from the lowest branches with 
 what small skill I possess, and offer these few things to 
 serve you as a memorial. On the other hand, the very 
 simplicity and naivete of her work has led to the record 
 of details which, like those of Boswell or Pepys, undoubtedly 
 add interest of a kind which we should not have found in 
 more dignified biography. 
 
 Her descriptions of Calvary, the Holy Sepulchre, the Pool 
 of Solomon's Porch, the Tomb of our Lady, the Church of 
 the Ascension, are the more valuable as contributions to the 
 discussion of the authenticity of the present sites, that they 
 contain just those small points of detail which are valuable 
 helps in identification. She relates that after his return to 
 Rome he was called upon to describe his adventures to the 
 Pope, Gregory III, who " turned all these subjects over in 
 pleasant and familiar conversation," after which " this 
 strenuous athlete of our good God " was made a bishop, and 
 " immediately many commenced to flock together from all 
 sides from those provinces and from other far-off regions." 
 
 The pilgrimage of Arculphus, though he himself was 
 French, is interesting to us, for his association with 
 
 182
 
 ENGLAND IN JERUSALEM 
 
 Adamnan and with the Venerable Bede. The pilgrim on his 
 way home got out of his course, and the ship, intended for 
 Bordeaux, was wrecked on the coast of lona, where Arculphus 
 was hospitably entertained by Adamnan, who took notes 
 of his descriptions, and even preserved a rough plan of the 
 Holy Sepulchre. 
 
 Ten years after the death of St. Augustine, Palestine was 
 conquered by the Persians, churches were destroyed, the 
 faithful martyred, and the Cross, discovered by St. Helena, 
 carried away by King Chosroes in 614, and not restored till 
 his defeat in 628 by the Emperor Heraclius. 1 But a new 
 power was now rising into importance. Among the Arabs 
 of the Euphrates, as well as among those of Syria and the 
 Hauran, revolutions, both civil and religious, had taken 
 place, and the rule of the Khalifs and the sway of Moham- 
 medanism were practically contemporary. The year of the 
 death of the Prophet (632) was that of the succession of the 
 second Caliph, Omar, under whom Jerusalem, Damascus, 
 and Antioch were captured, and finally lost to the Greek 
 Empire ; and whose name should ever be held in gratitude 
 by the Christian, to whom he showed a kindly toleration, 
 which has been rare even in succeeding ages. A second 
 benefactor to the Christians was the famous Haroun er 
 Raschid, who entered into friendly relations with Charle- 
 magne, the contemporary of our own Egbert, and in whose 
 time the hospice for pilgrims in Jerusalem, founded by 
 Gregory the Great, was reconstituted. 
 
 The Latin kings did much for the cultivation of Palestine. 
 Although looking back and merging the century of their 
 rule into the general perspective of the age, it seems to us 
 as if nothing were accomplished but fighting, building 
 churches, and establishing Orders, it is probably fair enough 
 to say that the little kingdom of Palestine enjoyed a greater 
 
 1 The reader may be reminded that its return, carried into the 
 Holy City by the Emperor himself, is the origin of the Festival 
 (Sept. 14) of the Exaltation of the Cross. 
 
 183
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 amount of peace and prosperity than most of her sister 
 kingdoms of the period. Records still existing i tell us of 
 cisterns constructed, of schemes of irrigation, of forests, and 
 corn-fields, and vineyards, and olive-gardens ; of fields of 
 corn, and doura, and rice, and lentils, and beans, and 
 sesame ; of flax, cotton, and indigo ; of melons, peas, and 
 cucumbers ; of apricots and pomegranates, oranges, almonds, 
 bananas, and figs. Sugar, now practically abandoned, 
 must have flourished in considerable quantities, for the 
 crusading mills may still be seen, as well as olive and wine- 
 presses in abundance, ah 1 pointing to cultivation enormously 
 Colonel Conder estimates it as ten times in advance of 
 anything now known, although the Jewish and German 
 colonists are doing much to restore the former conditions. 
 
 It is pleasant to be able to remember that there was a 
 time when England was, however, honourably associated 
 with the Holy Land ; that Robert of Normandy mortgaged 
 his fief to his brother, and with the money thus raised joined 
 the Holy War for the expiation of his sins against his father ; 
 that he took with him Stephen of Blois, father of our King 
 Stephen, who. however, deserted the expedition at Antioch ; 
 and that Henry II took the Cross, though he did not live 
 to bear it. His son, the Lion-Hearted, who in his zeal 
 said, " I would sell London if I could find a purchaser," is 
 one of the great heroes of the Holy War ; and the fact, 
 preserved for us by Richard of Devizes, shows that the 
 genus Englishman was in course of evolution, for he reached 
 Palestine without being sea-sick, as was Philip of France. 
 Francus ma-re nauseam, says the historian. Edward I, the 
 last Crusader, had correspondents in Jerusalem the Master 
 of the Templars, and Sir Joseph de Cancy, a worthy York- 
 shireman who tried to incite him to renew the exploits of 
 his youth, when he entered Palestine with a little army of 
 7,000, of whom, however, very few were English. 
 
 We may also remember that our King Alfred the Great 
 
 1 Rey, Colonies Franques, 235-252. 
 184
 
 ENGLAND IN JERUSALEM 
 
 contributed his share to the royal alms for the support of 
 the monasteries of Palestine. Charlemagne, who founded 
 (at least) three religious houses, with hospices and churches, 
 sought to assure their future maintenance by the initiating 
 of annual subsidies ; Louis le Debonnair continued the pious 
 custom by means of taxation, and in the eleventh century 
 we find Pope John VIII, Alfred of England, and the kings 
 of Hungary laying themselves under contribution. 
 
 It is interesting to know that one of the most remarkable 
 specimens of twelfth century workmanship to be found in 
 the British Museum is the Breviary of Queen Millicent, a 
 zealous benefactress of the church in Jerusalem. It is in 
 the Byzantine style of binding, with sides of carved ivory 
 and silver, and a cross embroidered in gold on the back. 
 It will be remembered that she was the half Armenian 
 daughter of Baldwin II, and that she married Fulk, Count 
 of Anjou, who (by his first wife) was father of Geoffrey 
 Plantagenet, and grandfather of Henry II of England, 
 through whom the Plantagenets inherited Anjou. 
 
 In 1574, England made a treaty with Murad III, and in 
 1583 the Levant Trading Company was started under the 
 auspices of Queen Elizabeth. Among the many ways in 
 which the unhappy King Charles I sought the advantage of 
 the Anglican Church was that of extending her influence to 
 the East, where already, for over 400 years, the Franciscan 
 Order of Friars Minor had been firmly established as 
 Guardians of the Holy Places. Archbishop Laud made a 
 collection of Oriental MSS., which was greatly enriched 
 by the presentation to the King in 1628 of the price- 
 less Codex Alexandrinus of the New Testament, now in 
 the British Museum, by Cyril Lucar, Greek patriarch of 
 Alexandria. Moreover, Laud conceived a design that there 
 should be " a Church of England in all Courts of Christendom 
 in the chief cities of the Turk and other great Mahometan 
 princes, and in all our factories and plantations, in every 
 known part of the world, by which it might be rendered as 
 
 * 185
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 diffused and Catholic as the Church of Rome." * In spite, 
 however, of the immense commercial relations between 
 England and the East, and of the reign of the " Turkey 
 Merchant," nothing was done until the establishment, nearly 
 two hundred and fifty years later, of the Anglican Bishopric 
 in Jerusalem. 
 
 The story of this renewal of our relations opens about 
 the year 1840, when the English, together with the 
 Austrian banners, were displayed in Palestine (over Acre), 
 probably for the first time since the days of Richard I. 
 It was an hour of weakness for Turkey. Egypt, Crete 
 and Syria had been wrested from her grasp. Was there not, 
 for the first time since the Crusades, a chance of establishing 
 a Christian kingdom in the Holy Land ? But no ! the 
 gospel of the balance of power was more potent than the 
 desire for the Gospel of Christ, and the Western powers, 
 fearful of adding force to Russia by the subtraction of 
 influence from Turkey, re-established the supremacy of the 
 Porte. Their opportunity for making terms went by, and 
 Jerusalem was given back to Islam and the Grand Turk. 
 When we see to-day what English influence has done for 
 Egypt, we are the more sensible of the value of the oppor- 
 tunity, so gratuitously lost. Philhellenism, Philjudaismeach 
 in turn urged its claims ; colonies of English, of Germans, 
 were projected ; a protectorate under the Porte on some 
 such lines as directed the Danubian Provinces was suggested ; 
 the existing activities of the American missionaries at 
 Beirut, 3 the potential activities of English societies, all 
 these were brought before the notice of Lord Palmerston, 
 
 1 William Laud. Rev. W. H. Hutton (Leaders of Religion Series), 
 p. 165. 
 
 2 The traveller, Eliot War burton, writing in 1848, while regretting 
 that there was not in Syria an English missionary who had taken a 
 University degree, speaks in the highest terms of the Americans, 
 who had even then fifteen schools under " devout and zealous men, 
 who, though Presbyterians, have probably produced a deeper effect 
 than is at present apparent." (The Crescent and the Cross, ch. xxiii.) 
 
 186
 
 ENGLAND IN JERUSALEM 
 
 of the English Government, but the only practical upshot of 
 the matter was that mysterious alliance between the Church 
 of England and the Church of Prussia, which resulted in the 
 mixed bishopric, appointed alternately by England and 
 Prussia, an idea unique in the history of the Anglican 
 Church, invented by the King of Prussia, who not only 
 liberally contributed half the expenses, 15,000, but allowed 
 England first choice of a bishop. She chose Michael Solomon 
 Alexander, a Jew from Posen, who was baptized at Plymouth 
 at the age of twenty-six, ordained priest at Dublin at twenty- 
 eight, and who then taught Hebrew in King's College. 
 London, until, at the age of forty-two, he became bishop 
 at Jerusalem. He was accompanied by Ewald, another 
 Jew, and found a missionary, a Jew of Schleswig, already 
 at work in the Holy City, a representative of the Society for 
 Promoting Christianity among the Jews, presided over by 
 Lord Shaftesbury. It is interesting to note a remark by 
 the editor of the Memoirs of Bishop Oobat in relation to 
 this very period : " Among the Christians of Great Britain 
 the idea began to gain ground that the time of the prophesied 
 conversion and restoration of Israel was at hand, but of the 
 return of the Jews not a trace was to be discovered " 
 (op cit., p. 223). 
 
 Bishop Alexander died in 1845, and was succeeded by 
 Samuel Gobat, elected by the King of Prussia. Some 
 glimpse of the anomaly of the position may be gathered 
 from his own biographer, who tells us that Herr Zeller, the 
 father of Frau Gobat, " was shocked ; for it was his opinion 
 that no bishop could be saved ; the temptation to worldli- 
 ness would be too strong " (op. cit., p. 227). Herr Werner, 
 another friend, writes : " By speech a Frenchman, you are 
 a German in sympathies, and have become an Englishman 
 by virtue of your connexion with the British Mission." 
 
 One cannot help being struck, even in the case of a man 
 of such undoubted ability and personal piety as Bishop 
 Gobat, by one peculiarity of the Protestant attitude of 
 
 187
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 mind, which, even after some seventy years of experience, 
 is apparently just as strong among the uninformed to-day, 
 that of attributing to French political influence the successes, 
 religious and educational, of the Latin Church. In 1847 he 
 writes : " I fully agree with you that the combined efforts of 
 French and Roman policy, of which education is the most 
 powerful auxiliary, are calculated greatly to increase the 
 influence of France in Syria. But the more I reflect on this 
 subject, the more I feel our want of means to counteract 
 that influence, either in a political or religious point of view. 
 I do not think, however, that the greatest difficulty will be 
 with the natives ; although in this respect, also, the French 
 emissaries, whether Jesuits or Sceurs de Charite, 1 have a great 
 advantage over us in the fact that they can begin their 
 operations, wherever they go, with co-religionists, who not 
 only have no prejudice of importance against them, but who 
 have also been accustomed to look to them for protection " 
 (op. cit. p. 236). 
 
 There is no doubt that esprit de corps is stronger 
 among the Latins than is at all to be looked for among the 
 miscellaneous and subdivided varieties of Protestantism 
 represented in the Holy City ; but, as a matter of fact, the 
 only religious Order at that time in Jerusalem was the 
 definitely international Order of Friars Minor, commonly 
 known as Franciscans, of whom the Superior must always 
 be an Italian, the next in office a Frenchman, 2 and the 
 procurator a Spaniard. 
 
 1 It is thoroughly typical of the ignorance which so often charac- 
 terizes the attacks of one religious body upon other communities, 
 that there are not, and never have been any Jesuits in Jerusalem, 
 and that the Sceurs de Charite did not arrive till 1886, forty years 
 after the writing of the above passage. The pioneers of the Sceurs 
 de Saint Joseph, whose foundation in Jerusalem dates from 1848, 
 may conceivably have arrived. The Franciscans had been the 
 Guardians of the Holy Places for 650 years, and the priests associated 
 with the newly restored Patriarchate had just appeared upon the 
 scene. No French order of priests came to Jerusalem before 1878. 
 
 2 It is interesting, in view of the present relation between the 
 
 188
 
 When the English Bishopric was founded in Jerusalem 
 the field was practically unoccupied ; the Anglican Church, 
 had she chosen to avail herself of it, had as good a chance 
 as any other ; the Franciscans were mainly occupied with 
 their task of discovering, securing and maintaining the 
 Holy Places, their educational work had hardly begun ; 
 the ten religious orders of priests, with the two brother- 
 hoods, the twelve sisterhoods, by whom they have been so 
 nobly seconded, men and women from all continents and 
 both hemispheres, had not yet arrived, and England might 
 have founded the schools, hospitals, asylums, orphanages, 
 institutions of secondary and technical education, refuges, 
 which she has chosen to leave to those of other faiths and 
 other nationalities, Christian and Jewish ; and English, 
 instead of French, might have become the secondary 
 vernacular of the Jerusalem of to-day. Had the Church in 
 England been disestablished and disendowed, had her 
 representatives been placed under a foreign protectorate, 
 had her hierarch become a prisoner in his own house, had 
 the representatives of her faith been chased with ignominy 
 from the country to which they had given love and work 
 and life, one might have understood, in some degree, the 
 causes of failure ; but it is our England, with her state 
 religion, her endowments, her enormously wealthy missionary 
 societies, who to-day must hide her diminished head, who 
 to-day in Jerusalem must ask the Mohammedans to provide 
 her with house-room, the Germans to nurse her sick, the 
 Latins to show hospitality to her pilgrims, the Americans 
 
 Government of France and the religious orders, to realize that their 
 claim to be Protectors of Christianity in the East rests not merely 
 on conditions of policy and treaty, but on their further claim to be 
 the hereditary successors of the Crusaders. The Holy War was 
 preached by Peter the Hermit, a Frenchman ; its conditions were 
 established at the Council of Clermont, a French Council ; the Frank 
 kings and conquerors, Godfrey de Bouillon and Baldwin, were French- 
 men, as was also Saint Louis the Saint of the Crusades, the hero of 
 the final attempt. 
 
 189
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 to make her Arabic translations, to print her books, to 
 educate her sons, to prepare them for professions and to 
 provide them with diplomas. To the Jews we offer a 
 hospital which their own in almost every respect transcends, 
 and which is closed, except on terms practically prohibitive 
 to all but the rich among Christians ; * to others we offer 
 only untrained teachers, amateur colporteurs of medicine, 
 and a Gospel which, for the most part, we, in so far, 
 omit to illustrate. In proportion as we reverence our 
 National Church, as we desire the spread of the faith, we 
 shall open our eyes to our real position in the land to 
 which we owe all that has made our England great among 
 the nations. 
 
 In Jaffa, the seaport of Jerusalem, and the gate of the 
 Holy Land, where, with the few exceptions of those who 
 reach the interior on horseback, every " Protestant " 
 entering Palestine must pass, what do we find ? In the 
 month of September 1902 we found schools closed for the 
 holidays, the missionaries away, a hospital closed for the 
 summer (the time of greatest physical need in Palestine), 
 and within the gates of the German Colony a bare room 
 with the inscription, " Church of England. Services, 
 Sundays, 10.30 and 3 (the three o'clock service being dis- 
 continued)," and then we quote political conditions as the 
 cause of our failure to appeal to the sympathies of the 
 Palestine Moslem ! 
 
 The immense hospital tended by the Sceurs de Saint 
 Joseph was full ; the sisters had lately moved from the large 
 schools they have outgrown into still worthier buildings with 
 every modern educational improvement, which might well 
 be the envy of any School Board in England ; we found 
 teachers who give their lives (unsalaried) to God's service ; 
 orphanages, asylums, dispensaries, secondary schools, where 
 
 1 Fortunately the French and German hospitals are open gratis, 
 or on moderate terms, irrespective of creed or nationality. 
 
 190
 
 ENGLAND IN JERUSALEM 
 
 the machinery never stops, and the least of these our 
 Lord's brethren is cared for 365 days in the year ; churches 
 where we may worship at any hour of the day on seven days 
 in the week. In a population of 33,000, we find 1,700 Latins 
 and 200 Protestants, and those largely German ; we meet in 
 all parts of the city the kindly sons of St. Francis walking two 
 and two, like the disciples of old, seeking those who need 
 their practical help, and ever ready to offer courtesy to 
 the passing stranger or show hospitality to all, irrespective 
 of faith, position, sex or nationality ; and then we regret 
 " our want of means to counteract the French influence 
 either in a political or religious point of view." 
 
 It seems to have been almost by a freak of destiny that 
 here, where life, history, politics, science, art, society even, 
 all turn upon the pivot of religion here with the eyes of 
 Christendom upon her here where sheer force of rivalry 
 seems to put each Creed upon its mettle, England should 
 have placed herself in a unique and anomalous position 
 never attempted elsewhere in the whole course of her 
 history. 
 
 The biography of Bishop Gobat is evidence enough of 
 the weakness of the position : " His large heart was full of 
 brotherly love for the truly devout among the German and 
 Swiss evangelicals. He was also filled with reverence for 
 the ancient firmly established ordinances of the Episcopal 
 Church, a state of feeling which his office rendered obliga- 
 tory and his humility made easy. . . . Did he desire to 
 ordain priest of the Church of England some candidate from 
 Switzerland, who had already received a quasi-ordm&tiou at 
 home, the step was disapproved of at Berlin. Did he permit 
 a non-episcopally ordained functionary to preach in Christ 
 Church, this was turned to his reproof in other quarters," 
 and so on. Was ever an honest man placed in so impossible 
 a position ? The book is a human document which should 
 be carefully read by any one seeking to estimate justly the 
 present position of Anglicanism in Jerusalem. 
 
 191
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 Bishop Gobat died in 1879, and his successor, Bishop 
 Barclay, in 1882. The anomaly which had existed for 
 forty-one years died a natural death, and it was not till 
 after five years' interregnum that the position was re- 
 constituted, and Doctor Blyth, Archdeacon of Ran- 
 goon, was consecrated as Bishop of the Anglican Church in 
 Jerusalem on St. Luke's Day 1898. 
 
 192
 
 IN THK TKMIM.K PRECINCTS.
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 ENGLISH CHURCH IN JERUSALEM 
 
 ANGLICAN BISHOPRIC ITS DIFFICULTIES MISSIONARY 
 SOCIETIES PROSELYTISM CONDEMNED EDUCATION 
 NEED OF ENGLISH PHILANTHROPY CHRIST CHURCH 
 STATISTICS MEDICAL WORK REMARKS ON MISSION- 
 ARIES ABSENCE OF ENGLISH HOSPITALITY -REMARKS 
 BY LADY BURTON 
 
 r I ^HE definite and authoritative expression of a desire 
 -I for the presence of an Anglican Episcopate came from 
 the Patriarchs of the Greek Church in Jerusalem and 
 Constantinople, but Bishop Blyth, in giving the history of 
 the movement, 1 does not hesitate to add that " the same 
 professed desire for the unity of the Church in Christ, with 
 the same personal kindness towards ourselves and the same 
 hope of peace, is expressed by the Latin Church as by our- 
 selves and by the Churches of thepEast." " The circumstances 
 of the Bishopric," reports the Bishop himself in one of his 
 earliest charges, " are peculiar : the majority of the clergy 
 are in the employ of Missionary Societies which even to 
 minute details direct the affairs of missions in their London 
 office. This has its advantages from their point of view 
 it enables them to bring their ' home influences ' to bear 
 upon all questions ; but from a diocesan point of view it 
 has its grave drawbacks it makes a separation perhaps 
 more distinct than that of living in another diocese might 
 do between various bodies of clergy ; it interferes with unity 
 
 1 The quotations from the Bishop are taken in all cases from his 
 published charges. 
 
 193 O
 
 of work ; it allows an undesirable scope to individual eccen- 
 tricity ; it paralyses common and concerted action and 
 progress and weakens anything like diocesan unity. In 
 whatever sense the Anglican Church is here represented 
 amongst other communions, our Church is affected and 
 compromised by action taken under the standard of the 
 Church of England by any association which, on their 
 private rules, act independently of, or counter to, the policy 
 of the Bishop ; and to the extent that I notice this, I would 
 have it regarded by the Church which is affected by it, for it 
 is keenly and justly noted by the Churches around us " . . . 
 " The policy pursued by our missions has gathered powerful 
 foes against them. It is no secret that Government action 
 has been repeatedly invoked against our schools on requisi- 
 tion by other Churches on which aggression has been made." 
 The two Missionary Societies, one devoting itself to Jews, 
 the other avowedly to Mohammedans, the one dating from 
 1823, the other from 1851, 1 naturally became tinged with 
 the accommodating laxity which made possible the condi- 
 tions of the joint bishopric, and which has probably done 
 more than any fact in the entire history of the English 
 Church to injure her in the eyes of other Churches. The 
 time may come when the influence and example of St. 
 George's Collegiate Church, 2 strictly " moderate " as is its 
 teaching, will convince them that the Anglican Church is 
 not merely a sect of the " Protestants " of whom they speak 
 wholesale, who keep no fasts, and reverence no saints, 
 whose Offices are recited by laymen, whose churches are 
 closed from Sunday to Sunday, who communicate at any 
 hour of the day, who are indifferent to bishops and other 
 authority, who practically allow their women to preach, 
 and, above all, who seek to proselytise among other branches 
 
 1 The mixed Bishopric was founded in 1841. The London Jews' 
 Society seems to have arrived in 1841, although in their own publica- 
 tions they date from 1823 ; the Church Missionary Society in 1851. 
 
 2 The Church built, and the Collegiate foundation organized, by 
 Bishop Blyth. 
 
 194
 
 ENGLISH CHURCH IN JERUSALEM 
 
 of the Christian faith. It is in vain to show them the calendar 
 of the Book of Common Prayer, in vain to call their attention 
 to rubrics, in vain to produce authoritative statements as 
 to the objects of the Societies. " Ye say and do not " 
 is, very naturally, their reply. Of " the English High 
 Church " they speak with unfailing respect, but the very 
 name they bestow upon it is evidence of their very natural 
 inability to perceive, after sixty years' active demonstration 
 to the contrary, 1 that it represents the national faith of 
 England, and not merely the views of a party which happens 
 to differ from the missionaries. One can hardly expect, 
 perhaps indeed one would hardly desire, that they should 
 understand that the Church Missionary Society in Palestine 
 is, to quote Bishop Blyth, " an abnormal mission presenting 
 features quite unique, and in most respects, unlike any 
 other mission of that Society with which I am acquainted. 
 I think fair weight must be given to this difference, for I 
 should be sorry indeed to attach to the whole missions of 
 the C.M.S. the strictures which I must sometimes pass upon 
 their special work in this country." 
 
 " I had thought that you were born at the Reformation 
 and that Martin Luther was your patriarch," was the obser- 
 vation of a Greek prelate, and no doubt he represented the 
 views of the Latins and Greeks who have observed and 
 criticized those English in Jerusalem who appear to have 
 consistently sought to alienate the sympathies of those of 
 
 1 Although the Church Missionary Society has some twenty-five 
 clergy in Palestine they have not a single consecrated church, and 
 many of their stations are left for weeks together without sacraments, 
 in the charge of deacons, whose ordination as priests for some myste- 
 rious reason they are chary of accomplishing. In some stations 
 they have a room reserved for service, but too often one finds, as 
 Bishop Blyth regretfully expresses it, " the irreverence of Baptism, 
 where there is nothing set apart to do duty for a font, and of the 
 Holy Communion on the loan of the inky and rickety schoolmaster's 
 table." He relates that a native, being reproved for smoking cigar- 
 ettes during service, replied, " Why not ? this is not a Church. You 
 are not a clergyman. We are only having a meeting." 
 
 195
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 other creeds. 1 Though definitely prohibited even by their 
 own Society from all attempts to proselytise among other 
 members of the Christian faith, they have persistently 
 sought every opportunity of so doing ; a policy which 
 endangers the continuance of all English work in the 
 country. By the original convention of 1841, assigned by 
 the Archbishop of Canterbury and the representative of 
 the Prussian Government, " the Bishop," they agreed, " is 
 specially charged not to entrench upon the spiritual rights 
 and liberties of the Churches of the East, but to confine 
 himself to the care of those over whom they cannot right- 
 fully claim any jurisdiction." " Thus," it is added, by our 
 own primates in 1887, on the establishment of the Anglican 
 Bishopric, " to make English proselytes of the members of 
 those Churches, to make it the worldly interest of the poor 
 to attach themselves to us, to draw away children against 
 the wishes of their parents, is not after the spirit or usage 
 of this foundation." 
 
 That such entire disregard of conventions understood, 
 and promises definitely given and received is recognized 
 as confined to the work of the C.M.S. is obvious not only 
 from the friendly reception accorded to Bishop Blyth by 
 the Greek and Latin Patriarchs and the Bishops of the 
 Syrian, Coptic and Armenian Churches, but also because 
 he is happily able to record conduct more scrupulous on 
 the part of the only other English Mission of any long 
 standing in the Holy Land, that of the Society for the Pro- 
 motion of Christianity among the Jews. 
 
 " There is the same presence around these missions of 
 other Christian Churches who might pleasantly swell a 
 congregation. Yet the London Jems' Society keeps to its 
 
 1 It should be noted that the Services in the German Church are 
 reverent, orderly and aesthetic, and that the Lutherans of Jeru- 
 salem'are punctilious in respect of ritual and observance of Feasts. 
 They are too much occupied with practical philanthropy to at- 
 tempt proselytism. 
 
 196
 
 ENGLISH CHURCH IN JERUSALEM 
 
 single aim ; 1 neither by education nor by any other means 
 does it aggress upon other Churches. There is not a single 
 such convert on their roll, nor child in their schools" 
 
 One can hardly feel surprise at the Bishop's expression 
 of regret at " the employment in our missions of teachers, 
 preachers, catechists and native clergy trained originally 
 for the work of those who are not in communion with our 
 Church," the English Church, alone perhaps of all the 
 creeds represented in Jerusalem, having as yet no training 
 college, and indeed no school which can claim to be much 
 more than elementary. Those desirous of education in 
 any degree advanced must seek it among the Latin or Greek 
 religious Orders, or in the Jesuit or the Presbyterian American 
 College at Beirut. Indeed, all higher educational movement 
 for men or women, technical, secular or religious, is in 
 
 1 It is worth while to quote from a letter of the Duke of Kent, 
 May 4, 1813, in relation to the foundation of this Society. After 
 excusing himself from a meeting on account of the Duchess of York's 
 birthday, he says : " I am most sincerely and warmly interested in 
 the success of the grand object which they have in view, which I 
 consider not only highly laudable, but at the same time most impor- 
 tant ; always, however, bearing in mind that every idea of prosely- 
 tism must be excluded therefrom, the freest exercise of conscience 
 upon all matters of religion being, in my own opinion, the only basis 
 on which the plan can thrive. . . . Although holding, as I do, the 
 Christian religion, agreeable to the manner in which it is professed 
 and taught in the Established Church of this country, to be the 
 purest guide to true happiness and morality, still I could not consider 
 a right spirit of Christian benevolence as going beyond the extending 
 our arms to receive into the bosom of our Church either the Jew or 
 Mahometan who, from unbiassed conviction, becomes a convert to 
 Christianity." It is fair to add the words of Bishop Gobat, by whom 
 the C.M.S. was originally invited to Jerusalem : " I have never wished 
 to make converts from the old Churches," i.e. to proselytise in the 
 Greek or Latin Churches, and again : " Let them remain in their own 
 Churches, and there confess their Saviour and His truth." 
 
 It is interesting to note that even the American missionaries, who 
 are under no political obligation hi the matter, have from the first 
 been aware of the dishonourable nature of all attempts at prosely- 
 tism. Robinson, writing of 1838, remarks : " The object of the Ameri- 
 can Missions to Syria . . . was not to draw off members of the Ori- 
 ental* Churches to Protestantism." {Biblical Researclies, section vi.) 
 
 197
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 Jerusalem in the hands of Germans, Americans, or Jews. 
 The many changes and improvements which have followed 
 the establishment of an Anglican Bishopric will, before long, 
 include the promotion of higher education, and indeed the 
 schools already existing in connexion with St. George's are 
 in advance of any educational work hitherto done by the 
 English in Jerusalem. 
 
 The occupation of Palestine by the Crusaders lasted 
 barely a century, but it sufficed to cover the land with 
 countless monuments of devotion. It is literally impossible 
 to explore any ground of an acre or two in extent within, 
 say, a radius of two miles from the Holy Sepulchre without 
 coming upon traces of churches and fortresses of considerable 
 artistic merit, but during the last hundred years English 
 zeal and English money have not availed to erect half a 
 dozen buildings religious or philanthropic, and of those, St. 
 George's alone has any architectural pretentions whatsoever. 
 
 Christ Church, the oldest centre of English missionary 
 enterprise in Jerusalem, is a small building eminently early 
 Victorian in style, with its font in front of the altar, begun 
 with the help of Lord Shaftesbury in 1842 and built at the 
 cost, it is alleged, of over 17,000. 1 
 
 The Rev. George Williams, B.D., who was Chaplain to 
 Bishop Alexander, and whose volumes on The Holy City 
 are among the most readable and accurate upon the subject, 
 has the following note (vol. ii. p. 584, second edition), a 
 contribution to those many humiliations to which, as 
 English, one is constantly subjected in Jerusalem. 
 
 "I cannot but regard it as an unfortunate circum- 
 stance that the land selected for the English Church 
 (i.e. the English Missionary Church) was the property 
 of the Jacobites, 2 unjustly confiscated by the Turks, 
 
 1 The Church was paid for partly by voluntary subscriptions from 
 England ; Germany contributed 200 and a Miss Cook over 20,000. 
 The very beautiful and richly decorated Collegiate Church of 
 St. George's was erected at a cost of 3,000. 
 
 2 The Jacobites deserve the especial consideration of all who call 
 
 198
 
 ENGLISH CHURCH IN JERUSALEM 
 
 and especially that their venerable Church of St. James 
 the son of Alphaeus should have been used as a de- 
 pository for lime and other building materials. Even 
 though we place no faith in their local traditions and 
 regard the sacred places with indifference ourselves, it 
 were surely well to bear with their weakness in this respect 
 and avoid the appearance of a contemptuous or irreverent 
 violation of scenes associated in their minds with the most 
 awful events of sacred history. ... If we think that we 
 have everything to teach and nothing to learn, we are 
 wanting in the first qualification for the task which we have 
 set ourselves the spirit of humility." 
 
 Mr. Williams' prophecies as to the effectiveness of our 
 Missions (as at present organized) made in 1847 have been 
 but too sadly fulfilled. He regards them not only as intro- 
 ducing false doctrine and heresy in relation to the Anglican 
 Church, but as provocative of schism in the Churches of the 
 East. He makes the suggestion that " a medical staff of 
 Christians devoting themselves to the service of the Jews 
 without any private ends might perhaps have imperceptibly 
 exercised a salutary influence upon the unbelievers. It 
 would have seemed to them like a moral miracle." This 
 suggestion would appear to have been at one time accepted, 
 as in Mr. Montagu Samuel's Jewish Life in the East, 1881, 
 we read that Dr. Chaplin (as well as Dr. Schick), the medical 
 officer of the L.J.S., was much esteemed by the Jews, " as 
 he is very good to them, never preaches a syllable of Chris- 
 tianity, is always ready to visit them at their residences 
 without charge." This silent oratory of good deeds is 
 now relegated to Latins, Greeks, Russians, Germans and 
 Moravians, who nurse the sick of all denominations in 
 
 themselves Christian as the representatives of those Syrians who 
 followed our Lord here in His own native land, and who still pray 
 in the language in which He taught. How can other Churches 
 regard the fact that our one point of contact with them is the desecra- 
 tion of one sanctuary and the spoliation of another ? 
 
 199
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 their own homes, as well as in admirable hospitals, without 
 any demonstration of " private ends " ; but as an important 
 Jewish official remarked in relation to the English Hospital, 
 " Mais $a ne fait rien. Ce n'est pas la bas qu'on attrape le 
 Christianisme, et ga fait des economies pour nous autres ! " 
 
 Christ Church is in the hands of the London Jews' Society, 
 while the C.M.8. has a little chapel outside the city, 
 where, on Sundays, services are held in Arabic. Some of 
 the major fasts and festivals are now observed at Christ 
 Church, and, thanks to the zeal of the Rev. J. E. Hanauer, 
 there is a daily service in Hebrew, theoretically for the 
 Hebrew Christians, but which, one erroneously supposes, 
 must be eagerly appreciated by the missionaries whose work 
 is the conversion of the Jews and whom one innocently 
 assumes are, of course, as a primary condition, fluent 
 Hebrew scholars and glad to familiarize themselves with 
 that language on its devotional as well as on its practical 
 side. 
 
 In the interests of charity one has to bear in mind 
 constantly the fact that the present generation of mission- 
 aries has, so to speak, not yet outgrown the long associa- 
 tion with those of the Lutheran faith, and that by them 
 the idea of obedience to Bishops and to the Book of 
 Common Prayer is as yet but imperfectly understood ; 
 but in regard to the observance of Feasts and Fasts, Bishop 
 Blyth has well said, " Is there any excuse to be accepted 
 in a land where the Apostles lived and walked with our Lord, 
 and where they founded His Church, and where the Blessed 
 Virgin set before womankind the example of her beautiful 
 life of modesty, reverence and obedience for the neglect 
 of the days set apart by every branch of the Church, as 
 by our own, for their commemoration ? I may well speak 
 plainly on this point, since a clergyman said to a native 
 brother, ' Every one knows that those days are now obsolete 
 and are only observed by extreme ritualists ! ' 
 
 Of the work of the Society for the Promotion of Christianity 
 
 200
 
 ENGLISH CHURCH IN JERUSALEM 
 
 among the Jews something is said in the chapter concerning 
 Jews in Jerusalem, and on the same analogy observations 
 concerning the work of the Church Missionary Society 
 should be relegated to the chapter upon Mohammedans in 
 Jerusalem ; but although the enormous amount of money 
 spent upon the Palestine Mission is theoretically subscribed 
 for the conversion of Mohammedans, then* work seems to 
 have so little practical relation with Mohammedanism that 
 it is only with a chapter upon the English that the subject 
 seems to have any obvious connexion. 
 
 As there are no heathen in Palestine, and the Society is 
 technically prohibited from interfering with other Chris- 
 tian Churches, it is to be presumed that their statistics 
 concern their relations to Moslems only. The following 
 figures are extracted from their reports for the years 1895- 
 1901 inclusive. 
 
 1894-5 Expenditure, 16,011 95. 2d. Local receipts, 
 
 119 16s. 5d. Adult baptisms none. 
 In 1895-6 Expenditure, 15,006 85. 3d. Local re- 
 ceipts, 136 3s. lOfd. Adult baptisms, one in 
 Jerusalem, one in Jaffa. 
 
 In 1896-7 Expenditure, 14,762 Os. lid. Local re- 
 ceipts, 110 18s. 2d. Adult baptisms, none. 
 In 1897-8 Expenditure, 15,917 11s. Id. Local re- 
 ceipts, 112 2s. 9d. Adult baptisms, none. 
 In 1898-9 Expenditure, 14,972 17s. 5d. Local 
 receipts, 135 6s. 7d. Adult baptisms, six, all in 
 Gaza, which by a curious coincidence is the only 
 station contributing nothing whatever to local 
 receipts. 
 
 In 1899-1900 Expenditure, 16,710 14s. lid. Local 
 receipts, 94 2s. lOcl. Adult baptisms, one, at 
 Gaza. 
 
 In 1901-2 Expenditure, 20,989 4s. 6d. Local re- 
 ceipts, 431 6s. 2d. Adult baptisms, none. 
 Thus we observe that in seven years there has been a 
 
 201
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 total expenditure in Palestine of 114,370 Is. 9^., towards 
 which the country itself has contributed 1,139 16s. IQd. 
 The number of adult baptisms has been nine. This we 
 may take as an average annual expenditure of 16,338 
 lls. Sd. ; average local receipts (presumably from school 
 fees and local subscriptions), 162 16s. 8d. ; average 
 baptisms, If, at the cost of 12,707 15s. 9d, per head. 1 
 
 The Society has been at work for over half a century, 
 and had the start of all bodies but the L.J.S. and the Soeurs 
 de St. Joseph. The country of Palestine is about the size 
 of Wales. We cannot wonder that Bishop Gobat should have 
 written to Von Bunsen, in 1848, " That there can be no 
 question of proselytising among the Moslems, is a matter 
 of course." 
 
 One naturally inquires whether it is on philanthropic 
 work that so large an income is expended ? 
 
 The Report of 1894-5 complains that Government had 
 stopped the medical work recently begun at a certain town 
 because the missionary in charge " not being a properly 
 qualified medical man, cannot practise in the Turkish 
 Empire." In the British Empire they would probably find 
 that the police would go further than stopping the work. 
 The Turkish Empire has apparently learnt some lessons 
 on this point, as now even a properly qualified medical 
 man must, here as elsewhere, have his diplomas endorsed 
 by the medical faculty, and it is reported that two men were 
 lately imprisoned for resorting to a reputable M.R.C.S. 
 and M.B. Lond. who had neglected to comply with the 
 usual and very necessary conditions (C.M.S. Report, 1900). 
 
 The C.M.S. appears at one time to have attempted 
 a printing press, as in 1900 it is reported that a child's 
 book was issued, and during some of the previous 
 years we hear also of the issue of a Church History of the 
 first seven centuries, a grammar of Arabic particles, an 
 
 1 Jews are cheaper. The average cost of a Jewish conversion is 
 1,200, as has been already seen. 
 
 202
 
 ENGLISH CHURCH IN JERUSALEM 
 
 almanac, and Discourses upon the Sermon on the Mount by 
 the Rev. H. E. Fox. Although Jerusalem is the head- 
 quarters of Arabic-speaking Missions, no literary work 
 worth mentioning has been accomplished ; and for books, 
 as for trained teachers, the English Church depends upon 
 the American Presbyterians at Beirut. 
 
 In 1891, the Mission, for the first time, established a 
 hospital at Gaza ; four others have since been added, none, 
 however, within two days' journey of Jerusalem. 
 
 In Jerusalem itself the Society is represented by a small 
 church, where there are, on Sundays, services in Arabic, 
 an iron room for classes and prayer meetings, a secondary 
 school known as the Preparandi, which according to a late 
 report had seventeen students, and a primary school 
 founded by Bishop Gobat, which seems prosperous and 
 effective, and contains seventy-eight boys, who are taught, 
 among other matters of useful knowledge, drilling, cricket 
 and football, all, for reasons obvious to the student of 
 oriental psychology, of especial value to the Arab races. 
 
 The report is made under the headings of six stations 
 Jerusalem, Jaffa, Gaza, Nablous, Nazareth and Salt. 
 
 In the Report for 1900 we read for the first time of the 
 C.M.S. having undertaken work at Bethlehem, so literally 
 the cradle of Christianity. The inhabitants of the town 
 and neighbouring villages were, however, long ago Christian- 
 ized by Greeks, Latins and Armenians. The English Mission 
 has no church and no clergy, but the immense crowd of 
 white-veiled women and barefooted men, seated on the 
 floor of the large Latin Church, not only every Sunday but 
 on all Holy Days (which are kept with great precision), 
 is a very striking spectacle. There are, moreover, well 
 worked and long established German mission stations with 
 handsome churches and various philanthropic institutions, 
 orphanages, dispensaries and schools both at Bethlehem 
 and the neighbouring village of Beit Jala. There was 
 formerly an English mission admirably worked by Miss 
 
 203
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 Jacomb, sent out nearly half a century ago by some obscure 
 society now extinct, a lady whose memory and practical 
 work is still revered among the natives. 
 
 The missionaries do not live in community, as economy 
 might suggest, but the ladies occupy houses singly or in 
 pairs. Each has 100 a year, house-rent and medical 
 attendance, and living is exceedingly cheap. The 
 climate is on the whole salubrious mean temperature 
 62. Moreover, most of the schools have nearly three 
 months holiday in the year, and every three years, according 
 to the latest arrangements, the missionaries may go home for 
 six months, expenses paid. In certain cases, to meet the 
 views of anxious parents, return is even more frequent. 
 This, it is said, is necessary for health. I do not find that 
 any other European residents, consuls, medical men or 
 their families, require so frequent a variety ; indeed, on 
 careful inquiry, I believe that the usual term of residence 
 for the official classes averages about six years, though many 
 remain for much longer periods. Of those engaged in 
 religious work in other Churches it is unnecessary to speak. 
 The majority are here for life ; and though in most cases, 
 certainly in that of the women, their work is unspeakably 
 more severe, they utterly ridicule any suggestion of injury 
 to health. I have consulted on this point not merely those 
 who, coming from southern lands, may possibly be the 
 better acclimatized to Palestine, but Swedes, Russians, 
 French, Swiss, Dutch, Germans, Canadians and sons and 
 daughters of the United States. Even English, Scotch 
 and Irish appear to have greater powers of endurance and 
 sustained effort when dissociated from missionary societies. 
 
 Of course it is only fair to remember that these have no 
 fatigue of social claims, that they live in communities of 
 scores and hundreds and have no need to take thought for 
 the morrow, that their associates and friends are in some 
 cases little children, in others the homeless, the sick, the 
 crippled, the aged, the leprous, even the criminal. To 
 
 204
 
 visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction and keep 
 oneself unspotted from the world seems to be economical 
 even to health and spirits as well as to the purse of the 
 subscriber. I note, for example, that during the years 
 1894-1900 inclusive the cost of Palestine missionaries 
 under the heading of " outfit, passages, allowances for 
 home leave, children and shipping " amounts to 5,959 
 185. 9d., an annual average of over 883, which, now that 
 more frequent leave is permitted, will presumably be con- 
 siderably increased. 
 
 The Church missionaries have, moreover, certain advan- 
 tages of which one does not hear in connexion with other 
 employment, and one reads in their reports, not only of 
 gratuitous training, but even while students, of allowances 
 for dress and travelling an advantage which students for 
 the Army and Navy, the Church, Medicine or the Law, 
 presumably also preparing for the service of their fellow- 
 creatures, though under conditions of less assured payment, 
 might regard with legitimate envy. 
 
 The Church of England alone, among all religions, has 
 no provision for hospitality to strangers. Greeks, Russians, 
 Abyssinians, Copts, Armenians, Germans, Austrians, 
 French, have all their national hospices, and the 
 Assumptionist Order at Notre Dame as well as the Francis- 
 can Fathers at the Casa Nuova are prepared to receive 
 over 500 and 200 pilgrims respectively, irrespective of 
 sex, creed or nationality, not only entertaining them 
 with all suitable hospitality, but making arrangements for 
 their visits to all places of pious pilgrimage. In travelling 
 over the country, moreover, all creeds and nationalities 
 are kindly welcomed in the guest-houses attached 
 to the monasteries, Greek, Latin and Russian alike. 
 As long ago as October 1848 Bishop Gobat, in his Circular 
 Letter, admitted the need of the English community in 
 this direction. After commenting with no doubt deserved 
 severity upon the conduct of the Protestant immigrant, 
 
 205
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 he continues : " From the foregoing remarks it must become 
 clear to every one how desirable it is that a hospice should 
 soon be established for the reception of such travellers to 
 aid them in their want and degradation. Then it is not 
 fair that Protestant artizans should absorb the alms of 
 Roman Catholics." A German Protestant Hospice has 
 since been established, and England alone sets no example 
 of welcome to the immigrant, she alone organizes no pil- 
 grimages, offers no hospitality, facilitates no religious 
 ardours, fails even to provide care or shelter for the sick 
 among her own people. 
 
 In reflecting on the practical efficacy of mission work 
 one's thoughts naturally turn towards our earlier British 
 missionaries, St. Patrick, St. Columba, St. Augustine, St. 
 Boniface and even to Henry Martin, Judson, Heber, or 
 Paterson. But, neglecting such examples, let us only 
 quote from the Baptist missionary, David Livingstone, 
 who assuredly cannot be accused of entertaining " popish " 
 proclivities. Of the ancient monks, the earliest to follow 
 the teaching of our Lord's own missionaries, to go without 
 purse or scrip, he writes, " They did not disdain to hold 
 the plough. They introduced fruit-trees, flowers, vege- 
 tables, in addition to teaching and emancipating the serfs. 
 Their monasteries were mission stations which resembled 
 ours in being dispensaries for the sick, almshouses for the 
 poor, and nurseries of learning." He was not, of course, 
 referring to mission work in Palestine in saying " ours." 
 
 I am, however, officially assured that philanthropic 
 work is purposely and definitely excluded from the objects 
 of the C.M.S. with the exception of the five medical missions 
 which figure in the last report as receiving the apparently 
 very inadequate and disproportionate allowance of 1,287 
 out of an expenditure of nearly 21,000^; so that it is in 
 vain to plead for the establishment of such civilizing agencies 
 
 1 Of. the allowance for holidays, p. 205. 
 206
 
 ENGLISH CHURCH IN JERUSALEM 
 
 as technical and industrial schools where the boys and girls 
 of towns and villages might be taught the Christianizing 
 influences of orderly homes honestly earned ; perhaps one may 
 venture to hope however that the time may come when 
 at least some definite and recognized standard of education 
 may be exacted from those who come out here to teach ; 
 that the examination in the Arabic which it is their business 
 to acquire after their arrival in the country shall, as well 
 as that of the schools in which they teach, be conducted 
 by some extraneous authority and that the study of 
 the Koran should be incumbent upon those whose concern 
 is presumably religious discussion with those of the Moslem 
 faith. Unhappily, as the Moslems have now provided 
 themselves with excellent educational advantages and many 
 valuable philanthropic institutions, as charity and alms- 
 giving are an inherent part of their religion, the time has 
 now passed when an example such as has long been offered, 
 among Protestants, by the Lutherans, Moravians, the 
 Church of Scotland, the American Presbyterians and the 
 Society of Friends might have been usefully associated 
 with the work of the Church of England. 
 
 Lady Burton describes a scene which might equally occur 
 almost anywhere in Syria in certain Protestant schools to- 
 day. " I once asked a group of girls what they learned in 
 school. I shall not quote their answer, but after a long tirade 
 I said, ' Can you make bread and butter or cook ? '" She 
 might have added " or wash, or iron, or clean the house, or 
 do plain needlework, or cut out your own clothes, or even 
 carry a parcel without complaint ? " and now, as well as 
 then, she might have received, as I have three times received, 
 the negative, the contemptuously negative answer, she 
 describes. Now, as then, she might vainly seek throughout 
 the houses of European residents and the hotels of Jerusalem 
 for any mistress who would take a " Protestant " servant, 
 man or woman, while she could get any one else to serve 
 her ; and that despite the obvious convenience of a religion 
 
 207
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 which demands no week-day churchgoing, no fasts, no 
 early communions, no inconvenient confessions. Now, as 
 then, she might conclude, " we had better let education 
 alone till we understand our business better, and until 
 we have learnt to introduce our virtues and leave our 
 vices at home." 
 
 208
 
 NKBI SAMWEEI., THE Iloi'SE AND TOMB OF SAMUEL.
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 ENGLISH TRADE AND ENGLISH TRAVEL 
 
 COMMERCIAL RELATIONS OF ENGLAND AND SYRIA JERU- 
 SALEM WATERWORKS THE ARAB OF THE EAST 
 WHAT HE THINKS OF THE WEST THE TRAVELLER, 
 AMERICAN AND ENGLISH ; ACCORDING TO LADY 
 BURTON ; TO CANON DALTON ; TO MARK TWAIN ; 
 TO CLERMONT GANNEAU THE DRAGOMAN THE 
 SOLDIER AND POLICEMAN 
 
 ENGLAND'S share of responsibility for the Holy Land, 
 whether she accept it or not, is the more obvious 
 when we consider what, in regard to so small a country, is 
 the surprising extent of her commercial relations. The 
 most important item of trade in Palestine is oranges, of 
 which, says a recent Blue Book, almost the whole were sent 
 to the United Kingdom, the total value being 86,525, an 
 increase of 12,310 on the previous year. The next in 
 importance among the exports are wine and spirits, manu- 
 factured mainly in Jewish and German colonies, and which 
 during the year 1901 increased in value by 13,510 (i.e. 
 35,350 as against 21,840). It does not appear who 
 are the principal purchasers, but from the fact that 
 in the shipping returns Austro-Hungary takes the second 
 place after England one may suppose that she repre- 
 sents some share of the liquor traffic in addition to 
 her own traffic in mail bags and passengers. Great 
 Britain was represented by 140 vessels, Austro-Hungary 85, 
 Russia 79, France 66. One would have expected olives in 
 
 209 p
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 some form to be an article of trade, but they do not appear 
 in the statistics, unless as represented by soap, which has 
 been exported to the amount of 57,000, showing an increase 
 of 13,000. 
 
 The imports are catalogued under sixteen clauses, of 
 which it seems as if only cotton goods, hardware, cloth and 
 coal are likely to come from England. The last item, 
 however, will, happily for English housekeepers, be shortly 
 superseded, as even the railways are now using Turkish coal 
 from the mines of Zougouldak, which is lower in price and 
 exempt from duty. On the other hand, oil engines, used in 
 the gardens for irrigation purposes, have come into favour ; 
 and though Germany seems to have supplied most of 
 those lately imported, the Jerusalem Consul, Mr. Dickson, 
 expresses the opinion that " manufacturers at home would 
 do well to study the matter, as there is a prospect of a 
 growing demand for such engines should the orange trade 
 continue to prosper as it has hitherto done." 
 
 There is an element of humour in the accounts published, 
 in various directions, of the new Jerusalem waterworks. 
 " In the way of public works," continues our Blue Book, 
 " the most noteworthy undertaking during the year 1901 
 was that for supplying Jerusalem with water, which was 
 brought in iron pipes from a spring situated about seven 
 miles distant south of the city and known as the Sealed 
 Fountain of Solomon's times." It is very picturesque to 
 see the citizens of Jerusalem, men with goatskins carried 
 on their backs, or with donkeys carrying empty kerosene 
 cans, pannier fashion ; women with jars on their heads, 
 crowding round the fountain on the Bethlehem road to fetch 
 water, in the rainy season without price, in summer to buy ; 
 but as the modern aqueduct, in contrast with that attributed 
 to Solomon, is a wrought-iron pipe a few inches in diameter, 
 laid, for a considerable part of its way, over ground, any 
 little London boy armed with a straw and a tin tack would 
 quench his thirst at a lower rate than five piastres a cubic 
 
 210
 
 IRRIGATION WHEEL AND CAMEL.
 
 ENGLISH TRADE AND TRAVEL 
 
 metre, the price quoted to us to-day. Indeed, there are 
 many directions, which it might not be judicious to indicate, 
 in which the Street Arab could " give points " to his Oriental 
 cousin. 
 
 Certainly he is a better sportsman, and would scorn the 
 Jerusalem method of fighting, juvenile or adult ; knives are 
 drawn on very small provocation, and we have personally 
 seen a man disabled for taking too low a fare for a carriage, 
 which, however, is only trades-unionism; or for trying to 
 draw water out of his turn, or when a stronger than he had 
 a mind to precede him ; but these again are only the methods 
 of Nature herself. Even Whitechapel would cry shame on 
 combatants who, after fighting at arms' length for some 
 minutes, their long sleeves flying in the air, finally close,biting 
 each other's shoulders, pulling each other's hair, scratching 
 each other's faces and finally rolling together in the dust, 
 when the uppermost will seize a stone the Holy Land 
 formation lends itself to such weapons and belabour his 
 adversary on head, face, hands or breast as most easily 
 accessible. One realizes among the children of Nature that 
 the traditions of the Ring have certain advantages, and we 
 have seen the English horsewhip produced on some such 
 occasions with considerable satisfaction. Perhaps it is the 
 same lack in the Arab nature which makes them poor 
 sportsmen, which impels the men to walk about hand in 
 hand, and kiss, really kiss each other on railway platforms, 
 Mark Twain, in another connexion, remarks that a man 
 would not be likely to kiss one of the women of this country 
 of his own free will and accord, and man, he argues, is a 
 kissing animal. 
 
 It is said that when, about the middle of last century, 
 Europeans began to flock to the Holy Land, it was the 
 fashion for the ladies of the country to faint with horror at 
 the frank impropriety of the dress of the men, since, one 
 regrets to say, widely adopted by the Syrians themselves. 
 The author of Hadji Baba presents their views on the sub- 
 
 211
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 ject of Europeans in general in a fashion that may fairly 
 afford us a very becoming lesson in humility. He puts his 
 remark into the mouth of the king's physician, commenting 
 upon his rival the Frank doctor. 
 
 " The lower part of his dress was particularly improper, 
 and he kept his boots on in his room, without any con- 
 sideration for the carpet he was treading upon, which 
 struck me as a custom subversive of all decorum. I found 
 that he talked our language, for as soon as he saw me he 
 asked me how I did, and then immediately remarked that 
 it was a fine day, which was so self-evident a truth that I 
 immediately agreed to it." 
 
 A truth has to be indeed self-evident before an Arab will 
 agree to it, not for lack of wit to perceive your point, but 
 for lack of inclination to speak with directness in any con- 
 nexion. In general the answer to such a remark (which, 
 however, no one makes in a country where for months 
 together it is never anything else but fine) would be 
 " Mashattah." It is as Allah wills. 
 
 Of a certain " tribe of people called Ingliz," he relates that 
 " they are the most unaccountable people on earth, who live 
 in an island and make penknives. They are powerful in ships, 
 and in watches and broadcloth unrivalled. Allah, the 
 almighty and all-wise, to some nations giveth wisdom, and 
 to others folly. Let us bless Him, and our Prophet, that 
 we are not born to eat the miseries of the poor English 
 infidels, but can smoke our pipes in quiet on the shores of 
 our peaceful Bosphorus." 
 
 Of Americans he knows but little, but that " they are all 
 infidels as much as those of the old world, and by the 
 blessing of Allah will all grill in the same furnace." 
 
 The word " traveller," as used in Palestine, has gained in 
 extension, and signifies neither a commission agent nor one 
 entitled to drink at a public-house within church-going 
 hours on a Sunday. In Jerusalem it is used in opposition 
 to " pilgrim." The traveller, as a rule, is British or American ; 
 
 212
 
 ENGLISH TRADE AND TRAVEL 
 
 he frequents the hotel rather than the hospice ; he dines 
 probably sleeps before visiting the Holy Sepulchre. He 
 is no lineal descendant of Arculf or Saewulf or Felix 
 Fabri. He brings little information, and what he takes 
 away is derived from the guide book or even from the 
 dragoman. He commonly speaks no language but his own, 
 and is reduced, for further association, to the city Christian. 
 Few have loved and therefore observed and known the East 
 like Lady Burton, and on this point she writes, " The Afgan, 
 the Kurd, the Mogharibeh, the Bedawin, are superior to the 
 City Moslems, and the City Moslems are superior to the 
 Jews and the City Christians," meaning of course the con- 
 verts, not those who were Christians centuries before 
 Christianity reached Great Britain. 1 
 
 Canon Dalton has observed the ways of the English 
 traveller. " In former days no one went to Palestine unless 
 he was desirous of enlarging, or giving reality to, the impres- 
 sions he had derived by study at home. But now as far as 
 the majority of the English-speaking visitors are concerned 
 it is not so. ... The religious feelings of some few are 
 undoubtedly stirred sympathetically by the hurried con- 
 templation of the sacred places of the Greeks and Latins, 
 but others are moved in quite another way." He then re- 
 lates the case of an intelligent and distinguished officer, who 
 attempted to discourage him from going to Palestine, be- 
 
 1 This is a point on which Lady Burton is equally explicit. " The 
 fresh and ardent missionary's usual manner of accosting a Syrian 
 is, " Do you know Jesus ? " The Syrian receives him courteously 
 and answers him affably, but the moment his back is turned he 
 bursts out, " May Allah burn his mother. Know Him ! I should 
 think we did, better than he does. Was not He born among us, 
 lived among us, died among us and for us, and spoke our own lan- 
 guage was He not one of our own people ? Who would know Him 
 if we don't ? " 
 
 A missionary naively tells the following story in one of the C.M.S. 
 reports, " I asked a man what he would say to the Lord Jesus when 
 He came in judgment. He smiled and replied gently, ' I will say 
 " welcome " to Him.' " 
 
 213
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 cause, he said, " after beholding the various surroundings of 
 the Holy Sepulchre you will find it hard to believe in the 
 truth of the Christian religion at all." " The truth is," Canon 
 Dalton regrets, " such persons, in their hurry, do not pene- 
 trate beyond the exterior to that which lies beneath. They 
 are in reality doing themselves just what they blame those 
 whom they call superstitious for doing in another way. 
 They are slaves to an external materialism. If, for instance, 
 they make the descent to the wondrous ravine of the Jordan, 
 unlike anything else on the face of the globe, past the three- 
 fold interesting site of the prehistoric, the Jewish and the 
 Herodian Jericho, haunted by martial memories of Joshua's 
 raid with the vanguard of the Beni Israel, and by those of 
 more than one romantic and picturesque episode belonging 
 to the prophetic school, by memories of the Egyptian 
 Cleopatra, of Herod's funeral that here wound its way, of 
 Dives and Lazarus and the last journey of Jesus, of the 
 Essenes and the early Christians, and of much else, these 
 persons carry away chiefly a remembrance of the roughness 
 and aridity of the road thither, and of the smallness of the 
 muddy Jordan stream when they reached it, and are apt to 
 consider the river itself, as Naaman at first did, a fraud." l 
 
 Mark Twain, for ah 1 his humanness and tolerance, has also 
 something to say of the English-speaking traveller ; among 
 other points as to his occasional barbarity. He describes 
 how the poor, broken-down, galled, saddle-sore horses were 
 brutally overridden, that the Sabbatarian might not have 
 it on his conscience that he had travelled on Sunday. 
 
 " We pleaded for the tired, ill-treated horses, and tried to 
 show that their faithful service deserved kindness in return, 
 and their hard lot compassion. But when did self-righteous- 
 ness know the sentiment of pity ? What were a few long 
 hours added to the hardships of some overtaxed brutes 
 when weighed against the peril of those human souls ? It 
 was not the most promising party to travel with, and hope 
 
 1 The City and the Land, 217-218. 
 214
 
 ENGLISH TRADE AND TRAVEL 
 
 to gain a higher veneration for religion through the example 
 of its devotees. They lecture our shortcomings unsparingly, 
 and every night they call us together and read to us chapters 
 from the Testament that are full of gentleness, of charity, of 
 mercy, and then all the day they stick to their saddles, clear 
 up to the summits of these rugged mountains and clear down 
 again." 
 
 He resents, moreover, the conduct of the " lost tribes of 
 America " upon their arrival in the Holy Land, as one 
 equally resents the conduct of the " lost tribes " of England. 
 The native accepts them all together as English-speaking, 
 just as the observant among other Churches accept them 
 altogether as " Protestants," till one has come to feel the 
 presence of the English or the Americans an anxiety, and 
 " Protestant " a term of reproach. 
 
 Yet one is ready to say with Mr. Clemens, " I have said I 
 like them, and I do like them but every time they read me 
 a scorcher of a lecture I mean to talk back in print." He 
 talks back further, justly enough, on the subject of their 
 relic-mongering and on that of their appearance ; on the 
 stale old superstition which enforces blue spectacles, and 
 green umbrellas, the heating and superfluous " rag wrapped 
 round and round their hats and dangling down their backs " 
 the short stirrups, the flapping elbows, the ladies with a 
 schism about the waist. " When one sees this outrageous 
 picture exposed to the light of day, he is amazed that the 
 gods do not get out their thunderbolts and destroy them 
 off the face of the earth. I would not let any such caravan 
 go through a country of mine." What does not amaze one 
 is that the very Arabs have learnt the phrase " V Anglais 
 pour rire." 
 
 " Few countries are more travelled in than Palestine," 
 says M.Clermont Ganneau, " and in few are the manners and 
 customs of the people less known. We may truly say that 
 the population of Oceania, of the extreme East, of Central 
 Asia, of India, of Egypt, and even of the Bedawin tribes 
 
 215
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 east of the Jordan are now more familiar to us than that 
 of this little corner of the earth so often trodden by European 
 travellers. Tourists, pilgrims and savants pour into the 
 country, but all, nearly without exception, for different 
 reasons neglect to notice and to render any account of the 
 only thing which is entirely fresh and untouched the 
 natives of the place." 
 
 He proceeds to ascribe much of this ignorance to the mode 
 of travelling to which the European is condemned in Pales- 
 tine. " He has to hand himself over to the mercy of the 
 inevitable dragoman, an obstructive animal, peculiar to the 
 social fauna of the Levant, and combining the functions of 
 interpreter, maitre d'hotel, guide and courier. . . . While on 
 the Nile he is kept in his place ; as a servant in Syria he 
 becomes a master and a despot. An amusing picture might 
 be drawn of the misfortunes of those who have become the 
 prey of these gentry, but I will merely mention the great 
 drawback to their presence, viz. that it hinders all direct 
 contact with the peasants and has the effect of a scarecrow 
 on the suspicious people whose confidence is of supreme 
 value to the investigator." 
 
 Dragoman imposition is not a new feature of Palestine 
 travel. Maundrell (1697) describes those in attendance on 
 his party as insisting on their hiring donkeys at five ducats 
 which they could buy anywhere else at two. 
 
 " For myself," he remarks, " who had hitherto ridden on 
 a camel, and had no intention of changing, I desired they 
 would tell me how I could ride a camel and an ass at the same 
 time. The governor [of Gaza] decided in our favour, and 
 ordered that we should not be forced to hire any asses from 
 the moucres." 
 
 That there are honest and well behaved dragomans, men 
 to whom the tourist should feel grateful for much intelligent, 
 kindly and often self-sacrificing help and companionship, 
 few would presume to deny, but it is equally futile to deny 
 that there are others, especially among the younger ones, 
 
 216
 
 VIA DOI.OROSA.
 
 ENGLISH TRADE AND TRAVEL 
 
 whose insolence, arrogance and ignorance are quite suf- 
 ficient not only to deter the unwary traveller from repeating 
 his, especially her, visit, but from encouraging that of others. 
 
 In 1895 it was ordered by the Government that all Jeru- 
 salem dragomans should pass an examination as to what 
 they are to tell visitors to the Holy Places, but even a cer- 
 tificate from a Mussulman effendi is not entirely satis- 
 factory as a guarantee of information on Bible history or 
 the discoveries of European archaeologists. Moreover, the 
 tourist in this, as in much else, has himself to blame. So 
 long as he is content to accept such statements as that the 
 Ten Commandments were ordained at the Church of the 
 Paternoster, that our Lord was tempted on the Mount of 
 Olives, that the Sacred Body lay three days and three nights 
 upon the Stone of Anointing, that the Ark of the Deluge 
 rested upon the Sakrah (the Rock within the Temple Area), 
 that the stations in the Via Dolorosa mark the places where 
 the twelve Apostles stood to watch our Lord go by 1 so 
 long will such statements continue to be made and so long 
 does he richly deserve this and anything else he gets. 
 
 Nor can one exonerate our compatriots in another and 
 perhaps even more serious direction, more serious because 
 in this case women are the offenders, although, poor things, 
 they have occasionally incurred punishment perhaps even 
 beyond their deserts. One could hardly have supposed it 
 possible that it could occur to any educated, not to say 
 
 1 In the Chapel of the Apparition, alleged to be the spot where 
 our Lord appeared after His resurrection, a portion of the Column 
 of Scourging is preserved under a network, in order to protect it 
 from the hyper-devotion of pilgrims and the desecration of tourists. 
 In order, however, that the former, especially the Russians, who love 
 to salute all sacred objects, may not be wholly disappointed, a piece 
 of stick is kept, with which the column may be touched, so that, 
 although at second hand only, it may be saluted. This the 
 dragoman of exceptional ignorance has dubbed the " Bod of Moses," 
 and in Cook's Guide, corrected by a well known orientalist, 
 edition 1900, incredible as the statement may appear, it is solemnly 
 described as such (p. 89). 
 
 217
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 respectably conducted, Englishwoman to think of her 
 dragoman in any category other than that in which one 
 places her cabman, her shopman, her footman, or any 
 other useful person who ministers to her necessities, and at 
 first sight one is tempted to regard, as a gratuitous insult, 
 the serious warning which an English clergyman, travelling 
 in Palestine in the year 1899, has thought it desirable to 
 issue in his book (Days in Galilee, Rev. A. A. Boddy, 
 F.R.G.S., page 334). Unhappily, no observant woman can 
 remain through even a single tourist season in Jerusalem 
 without admitting with shame and confusion that the con- 
 duct of her sisters, American and English, has exposed 
 womanhood to the disgrace of the necessity of such a warning. 
 Possibly they are not aware that what might pass as mere 
 levity in a country of other manners and other traditions 
 cannot fail to be more seriously interpreted where reserve 
 and dignity are among the elementary attributes of woman ; 
 and that what at home might possibly pass as merely 
 vulgar is here otherwise classified and otherwise under- 
 stood. From time to time, however, one hears with satis- 
 tion that some Englishman, brother or friend, has inflicted 
 reprisals upon the dragoman in the form of the " thrashing " 
 which is precisely what the occasion invites. When Lady 
 Burton wrote, in 1875, warning young ladies not to marry 
 Lebanon " princes," Englishwomen had not yet sunk to the 
 lowest stage of flirting with or marrying their couriers, but 
 even against the pseudo-prince she sounds a shrill note of 
 warning. 
 
 " If you see a Syrian with a handsome face pervading 
 society in a green and gold jacket, and wearing a fez, admire 
 the costume and be hospitable and kind to the wearer, but 
 do not fall in love and marry. This is what will happen if 
 you neglect my advice ; you will arrive at a mud hut in the 
 Lebanon, and from morning to night you will be surrounded 
 by native women who look upon you as a " dispensation of 
 Providence." 
 
 218
 
 Probably in these days, when wider experience and more 
 liberal education has opened the eyes of even Syrians in mud 
 huts, the unhappy Englishwoman might think herself for- 
 tunate if she were looked upon as anything so respectable. 
 
 One of the grievances most frequently insisted upon by 
 those whose visits to the Holy Places are without true 
 sympathy and breadth of view is the " disgrace " of the 
 presence of Turkish officials in churches held by Latins, or 
 Greeks, or both. Have we not soldiers at the door of our 
 king's palace or even at the Chapel Royal ? have we not 
 police at all ceremonials in St. Paul's Cathedral, or for the 
 matter of that at any cathedral or museum in Europe ? 
 and if one is in a country where the police and soldiers are 
 all Turks x or Arabs, as the case may be, whence shall the 
 guardians of the place be otherwise provided ? Further, 
 why should their presence be a reproach ? Is it reasonable 
 to suppose that the admirable order which characterizes all 
 the Holy Places can be maintained without official regula- 
 tions and enactments ; when they are, not only at festivals, 
 but all the year round, visited daily by crowds as various 
 as those of the Feast of Pentecost ? It is no exaggeration 
 to say that in any one day the Latin worshippers may 
 include pilgrims from England and America as well as from 
 every country on the Continent of Europe ; the Greek 
 mainly from Eastern Europe, from Northern Africa and from 
 Western Asia ; at the shrines of either, one finds men of 
 every colour, almost of every speech, literally from " China 
 to Peru," and the Russian pilgrim is always with us. Never 
 have we heard a single case quoted of intentional lack of 
 reverence, or breach of order on the part of any pilgrim, 
 Greek or Latin, no matter whence. To the English and 
 American alone is reserved the proud distinction of such 
 
 1 As a matter of fact, only the superior officers are Turks. The 
 Christian subjects of Turkey are exempt from military service on 
 payment of a compensation tax. 
 
 219
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 conduct as daily shames us here. The author of Six Months 
 in Jerusalem writes : 
 
 " I never saw the soldiers exhibit a demeanour so frivolous 
 and scoffing in regard to the Holy Places as many English 
 churchfolk thought it not indecent to adopt ; and on their 
 own principles such persons might have felt that in the 
 presence of the unbeliever it would be as well to show some 
 loyalty to the Life which in its courtesy and meekness lies 
 at the basis of Christendom " (p. 65). 
 
 We have been asked by a Franciscan custodian whether 
 " Protestants " habitually wore their hats in their own 
 churches, or whether it is only on the most sacred spot in 
 Christendom that it is necessary to speak somewhat strongly 
 before an Englishman would show the common respect 
 ordinarily due to another man's house. Lady Burton 
 observes that apparently " Gratitude is not incumbent upon 
 a tourist" ; otherwise, to those who have no reverence for 
 the Divine, one might suggest gratitude to the human, to 
 the Brothers of St. Francis, who, on behalf of Christendom, 
 and often at the cost of their blood, have held and main- 
 tained the Holy Places of Palestine for 700 years. 
 
 220
 
 EL AlCSA, "THE FURTHER MOSQUE."
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 THE MOSLEM IN JERUSALEM 
 
 THE SACHRA TRADITIONS DOME OP THE ROCK OMAR 
 His MOSQUE His MAGNANIMITY SALADIN PALES- 
 TINE AND THE ARAB 
 
 THE two visits made by Mahomet into Syria were 
 at the age of twelve and of twenty-five years, 
 and long before the period of his mission. His con- 
 nexion with the Holy City, however, rests on nothing 
 so material as a journey across the desert. " I declare the 
 glory of Him who transported His servant by night," we 
 read in the Koran (xvii. 1), "from the Mosque at Mecca to 
 the further Mosque at Jerusalem," the " mosque " 1 being 
 taken, be it remembered, as denoting the whole Haram 
 area, the site of the Hebrew temple and its surroundings. 
 The prophet rode his winged steed, Al Bucak (the lightning), 
 and was escorted by the angel Gabriel. After worshipping 
 in the sacred precincts they ascended by a ladder of light, 
 and, passing through seven heavens, stood in the presence 
 of Allah, from whom Mahomet received instructions which 
 have sanctified for ever the Rock and the Haram Area in the 
 sight of all the faithful. 
 
 This is, however, for the Moslems, by no means the begin- 
 ning of the history of the Sachra. They have a tradition 
 
 1 The term " Mosque of Omar," to denote the Dome of the Rock, 
 is used only by tourists, irresponsible guide-books, and dragomans. 
 The Mosque of Omar is a very small mosque in the neighbourhood 
 of the Holy Sepulchre. 
 
 221
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 that Jerusalem, El Kuds, was built by angels, who were 
 pilgrims to the sacred rock 2,000 years before Adam ; that 
 the ark of Noah rested there, as is proved by the visit of the 
 dove with a leaf from the Mount of Olives, and they believe 
 it to have been the scene, not only of Abraham's sacrifice 
 (though of Ishmael not Isaac), but also of Jacob's vision, as 
 well as of Araunah's threshing-floor. 
 
 " This stone of the Sachra is that which God be He 
 exalted and glorified commanded Moses to institute as 
 the Kiblah. After this command had come down, and 
 Moses had instituted the Sachra as Kiblah, he himself lived 
 but a brief time, for of a sudden was his life cut short." 
 
 It does not appear that its association with the Ark of the 
 Covenant has any special interest for them, although they 
 too have a story of a lost ark, originally sent down from 
 Paradise with Adam, from whom it descended to Seth and 
 Abraham, from whom Ishmael received it as the eldest son. 
 When it came to Kedar it was claimed by Jacob, hence its 
 possession by the younger branch. One tradition asserts 
 that, together with the rod of Moses, it is now lying at the 
 bottom of the Lake of Tiberias, another that it is buried 
 beneath the rock itself. 
 
 The following ejaculations are said to be incumbent upon 
 all visitors to the mosque. As the worshipper enters, he 
 says, " Lord, pardon my sins and open to me the doors 
 of Thy mercy " ; and as he goes out, " Lord, pardon my sins 
 and open to me the doors of Thy grace." He must always 
 keep the rock on his right hand, thus reversing the ritual of 
 Mecca. As he enters the cave containing the altars (probably 
 Crusading) where David and Solomon, and the niches where 
 Abraham and Elijah, are said to have prayed, he says, " O 
 God, pardon the sinners who come here, and relieve the injured,' 1 '' 
 words worthy of notice, as it is often alleged that the Moslem 
 faith teaches no intercession for others. The Sachra, like 
 the well known spot in the Greek Church of the Holy 
 Sepulchre, 'is the centre of the world as well as eighteen miles 
 
 222
 
 THE MOSLEM IN JERUSALEM 
 
 nearer heaven than any other spot on the earth's surface, 
 and beneath it is the source of all the sweet water which 
 flows over all lands. 
 
 They have a saying, which, however, sounds as if of Jewish 
 origin, that " Palestine is the centre of the world, Jerusalem 
 the centre of Palestine, the Temple the centre of Jerusalem, 
 the Holy of Holies the centre of the Temple, the Ark the 
 centre of the Holy of Holies, and in front of the Ark was a 
 stone called the Foundation of the World." 
 
 The Sachra, when a threshing-floor, was owned by two 
 Moslems who were brothers, one married, the other single. 
 One August night, when the corn had been threshed out and 
 divided between them, each was sleeping by his heap to 
 guard it, as is still the custom. In the course of the night, 
 the married brother, lying awake and reflecting on the 
 harvest, said to himself, " I am now a rich man ; I have wife 
 and children as well as abundance of corn. My poor brother 
 is lonely : why should I have so much more than he ? At 
 least I can make it up to him in corn," and so he removed a 
 portion from his own heap to that of his sleeping brother. 
 Soon after, the brother in his turn awoke, and he bethought 
 himself how much more he possessed than was needful for 
 one who had neither wife nor child. Were he to offer a 
 share to his brother, he might refuse to accept it, so, rising, 
 he took a large portion of his heap and added it to that of 
 his sleeping brother. In the morning each was surprised to 
 find his share what it had been originally, but God had 
 marked the deed, and decided to make the Sachra the place 
 of prayer for all the world. 
 
 It is here, moreover, that on the morning of the Resurrec- 
 tion the Angel Israfil will blow the last trumpet ! In the 
 east wall of the Haram Area is a fragment of a pillar built in 
 horizontally, as often occurs in Jerusalem, where any piece 
 of ancient masonry is made to serve any purpose convenient 
 at the moment, and which, moreover, projects considerably 
 beyond the face of the wall. From this projection a thread, 
 
 223
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 fine as a hair, will be cast over to the Mount of Olives, 
 across which all men will pass for judgment, Jesus sitting on 
 the Jerusalem side, Mahomet on the Mount of Olives. The 
 faithful will pass in safety, the faithless will fall into the 
 Valley of Jehoshaphat beneath. But there is an intermediate 
 class upon whom the Prophet will have mercy, and, so says 
 an ancient legend, will himself pass over in the form of a 
 sheep so as to shelter them as fleas in his fleece. A gloss 
 suggests the variant that it is in his sheepskin coat that 
 they will find refuge. Judging from the analogy of such 
 coats as are worn by the fellahin, there will be no failure of 
 accommodation . 
 
 There is a tendency in many books of travel to belittle 
 the beauty of the Dome of the Rock. It is satisfactory to 
 quote the words of two recognized authorities on Oriental 
 subjects. Professor Hayter Lewis writes : 
 
 "It is undoubtedly one of the most beautiful buildings 
 existing, and I cordially agree with these eloquent words of 
 Mr. Ferguson, ' The one thing I was least prepared for was 
 the extreme beauty of the interior of the building. I re- 
 member perfectly the effect of the Taj Mahal and the other 
 great imperial tombs of Agra and Delhi, and I am tolerably 
 familiar with most of the tombs and tomb-like buildings in 
 other countries. But as far as my knowledge extends, the 
 Dome of the Rock surpasses them all. There is an elegance 
 of proportion, and an appropriateness of detail, which does 
 not exist in any other building I am acquainted with. Its 
 mosaics are complete and beautiful in design, and its painted 
 glass, though comparatively modern (sixteenth century), is 
 more beautiful than any in this country. These, combined 
 with the mystery of the Great Rock, occupying the whole 
 floor of the sanctuary, make up a whole, so far as I know, 
 unrivalled in the world.' ' 
 
 Perhaps the strongest impression which one carries away 
 is not that of the marvellous, the perhaps unrivalled, richness 
 and harmony of colouring, the dignified repose of form a 
 
 224
 
 repose so absorbing in its grace of unity that one is deprived 
 of the power of attention to detail but rather a sense of 
 the extraordinary contrast between the perfection of the 
 work of art and the simplicity of the work of nature ; the 
 glory of light and colour, of rich material, the pride of 
 invention, the triumph of painter and craftsman, the liber- 
 ality of the rich, the praise of the mighty dead, mellowed 
 by centuries of waiting, sanctified by generations of wor- 
 shippers, baptized by the blood of thousands, expressive of 
 the hopes, aspirations, prayers of millions of our fellow- 
 creatures, and all for what ? a piece of bare brown rock, 
 rudely cropping out of the ground, sacred alike to Moslem, 
 Jew and Christian, to the readers of the Koran, of the Old 
 Testament and of the New. Description here would be 
 even more futile than elsewhere ; for magnificent and impres- 
 sive as is the Dome of the Rock even from the point of view 
 of art, it is to this shock of contrast that one is largely 
 indebted for the emotion it cannot fail to inspire in any 
 soul sensitive to beauty, alive with imagination, responsive 
 to the suggestion of memory. 
 
 Here is no treasure encased in shrine of marble like the 
 Holy Sepulchre, hung with silken tapestry like the Cave at 
 Bethlehem, making difficult appeal to faith like the footstep 
 on the Mount of Ascension, enclosed in gold and precious 
 stones like a dozen relics at a dozen altars in the churches of 
 the Holy City, but the bare bosom of our mother earth, 
 prototype of all that is most sacred, all which most cries 
 aloud for reverence in the common things of daily life. 1 
 
 While Mohammed was collecting his earliest followers Syria 
 
 1 The Sachra, a bare, rugged, unhewn piece of rock, roughly a 
 parallelogram, 60 feet by 45 feet, standing about 4 feet 9 inches 
 above the marble pavement at its highest point, and one foot at its 
 lowest ; it is one of the missal strata (i.e. the upper of the two strata 
 which form the Jerusalem plateau) ; it is hard and of a grey, in 
 places of a reddish, colour, and has a dip of twelve degrees in a direc- 
 tion of eighty-five degrees east of north. The surface of the rock 
 bears the marks of hard treatment and rough chiselling. 
 
 225 Q
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 had been wrested from the Eastern Empire by Chosroes, 
 King of Persia ; but while one Arab was making a new reli- 
 gion, another was creating a new empire, and in 634, twelve 
 years after the Hegira, Jerusalem fell into the hands of Omar, 
 the second of the Kaliphs, a man whose political energy had 
 welded a homogeneous nation out of the immemorial nomadic 
 desert tribes of Arabia. 
 
 The monarch who had made emperors to tremble on then: 
 thrones, entered the Holy City, not as a conqueror but as a 
 pilgrim attired in simple Bedawi costume, a sheepskin coat 
 and coarse cotton skirt. The story is told in the Muihir al 
 Ghirdm (The Exciter of Desire, i.e. to visit the Holy City), an 
 unpublished work by a native of Jerusalem, written in 
 A.D. 1351. 1 
 
 " Now at that time there was, over the Rock of the Holy 
 City, a great dung-heap, which completely masked the 
 Mihrab of David, and which same the Christians had put 
 here in order to offend the Jews, and, further, even the 
 Christian women were wont to throw here their cloths and 
 clouts, so that it was all heaped up therewith. . . . Now 
 when Omar had come to the Holy City and conquered it, 
 and saw how there was a dung-heap over the Rock, he 
 regarded it as horrible, and ordered that it should be entirely 
 cleared. And to accomplish this they forced the Nabath- 
 aeans 2 of Palestine to work without pay. On the authority 
 of Jabir ibn Naf ir, it is related that when Omar first exposed 
 the Rock to view by removing the dung-heap, he commanded 
 them not to pray there until three showers of heavy rain 
 should have fallen." 
 
 The spitefulness of the Christians had laid up for them a 
 retribution which is a lasting sorrow to the whole of Christen- 
 
 1 The passage is quoted in Palestine under the Moslems, Guy Le 
 Strange, 1890. 
 
 2 The Nabathaeans were a tribe of heathen Arabs who were settled 
 in Petra about 300 B.C., whence they penetrated into Palestine 
 according to some authorities, the ancestors of the Samaritans. 
 
 226
 
 THE MOSLEM IN JERUSALEM 
 
 dom, as we learn from another historian, the Greek Theo- 
 phanes : * 
 
 " Anno Domini 635. In this year Omar began to restore 
 the Temple at Jerusalem, for the building, in truth, no longer 
 then stood firmly founded, but had fallen to ruin. Now 
 when Omar inquired the cause, the Jews answered, saying, 
 ' Unless thou throw down the Cross which stands on the 
 Mount of Olives, the building of the Temple will never be 
 firmly founded.' Thereupon Omar threw down the Cross at 
 that place in order that the building might be made firm ; 
 and for the same cause innumerable crosses in other quarters 
 these enemies of Christ did likewise overthrow." 
 
 Deplorable as was such a retribution, we nevertheless owe 
 much to the magnanimity and liberality of the conqueror. 
 Eutychius 2 is the authority for the well known story of the 
 courtesy of Omar in relation to the Holy Sepulchre. 
 
 " Omar entered the city and sat down with Sophronius in 
 the innermost part (inpenetrali) of the Church of the Sepul- 
 chre. The time of prayer approached, and Omar wished 
 to pray. ' Pray here,' said Sophronius. ' Not here,' 
 answered Omar. Sophronius now led him into the Basilica 
 (ad templum), and spread a carpet in the middle of it that 
 Omar might pray. As he again refused the Patriarch led 
 him outside to the steps by the entrance to the Church of 
 Constantine, looking towards the East. Here Omar prayed 
 alone. Afterwards he asked, ' Do you know why I would 
 not pray inside ? ' ' How could I know that ? ' said 
 Sophronius. Omar replied, ' If I had prayed inside the 
 church, it would have been lost to you. After my death the 
 Moslems would have taken it from you : for they would 
 soon have said, " Here Omar prayed ! " 
 
 Omar then gave to the Patriarch a written document by 
 
 1 Chronographia Bonn., 1839, vol. i. p. 524. 
 
 2 Annals of Eutychius Patriarch of Alexandria, d. 940. The 
 quotation is from Dr. Max von Berchem, who translates from Selden's 
 Latin version, vol. ii. 284-90. 
 
 227
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 which he decreed that the Moslems might pray only singly 
 on the steps ; further, " that they should neither assemble 
 there for prayer, nor the voice of the Muezzin over there 
 summon them to it." 
 
 At Bethlehem, too, we owe much to this same magna- 
 nimity. The Arabic historian, Yakut, writing in the 
 thirteenth century, relates : 
 
 " Bait Lahm is the place where Jesus was born. . . . 
 There is here a church the like of which is none other in the 
 country round. When the Kaliph Omar was come to Jeru- 
 salem, a monk of Bait Lahm approached him and said, ' I 
 would obtain mercy of thee for Bait Lahm.' Said Omar, ' I 
 know naught of the place, but would fain see it.' When Omar 
 was come there, he said to the people, ' Ye shall have 
 mercy and safe conduct, but it is incumbent upon us that 
 in every place where there are Christians we should erect a 
 mosque.' The monk answered, ' There is in Bait Lahm an 
 arched building, which is built so as to be turned towards 
 your Kiblah ; take this, therefore, and make of it a mosque 
 for the Muslims, and do not destroy the church.' So Omar 
 spared the church, saying his prayer in that arched building 
 and made -of it a mosque. . . . The Muslims have never 
 ceased to visit Bait Lahm in pilgrimage, and go to this 
 arched building to make their prayers therein one generation 
 after another, which same is the building of Omar." 
 
 After Omar, the hero of Arab history perhaps, one might 
 almost say, of Arab literature is the great Haroun er 
 Raschid (" the Just "), contemporary with Charlemagne, and 
 with our own King Egbert. Those were the days of a united 
 Islam, an Islam which extended from India to Egypt, which 
 traded with China, which studied philosophy, which sent an 
 elephant to the emperor and gave The Arabian Nights to 
 the schoolboys of a thousand years. With a magnanimity 
 which was worthy of Omar, which perhaps is unparalleled 
 in the world's history, which puts to shame the prejudices 
 and bigotries of creeds and nationalities, Haroun, ruler of 
 
 228
 
 THE MOSLEM IN JERUSALEM 
 
 Islam, sent, it is related, to Charlemagne, ruler of Christen- 
 dom, the keys of the Holy Sepulchre with an invitation to 
 rebuild the churches of the Holy Land. 
 
 But these great rulers passed away and Islam and 
 Christendom alike were split up by sects and local prejudices ; 
 and Palestine became the battlefield, first of Moslem with 
 Moslem, Egyptian, Arab, Turk, and then finally of Christen- 
 dom and Islam as such. 
 
 A country which was little more than a perpetual battle- 
 field was no place for peaceful pilgrims. The hour came 
 and the man ; the humble monk kneeling at the Holy 
 Sepulchre heard the voice, " Arise, Peter. The time is come 
 that My servants should be succoured, and that My Holy 
 Places should be free." 
 
 In four years Godfrey, the Galahad of the Crusades, knelt 
 on that same spot in thanksgiving that Jerusalem was 
 restored to Christendom and the Holy Sepulchre was free. 
 But a year later, at only forty years of age, he was brought 
 to the sacred spot for which he had given his life and laid 
 at the foot of Calvary. 1 The learned Q.uaresimus wrote his 
 fitting epitaph 
 
 Hie jacet inclitus dux Godefridus 
 
 De Bull on, qui totam istam terrain 
 
 Acquisivit cultui Christiano, 
 
 Cujus anima regnet cum Christo. Amen. 
 
 Saladin, too, had in him something of the large-heartedness 
 of Omar and Haroun, but the incidents which are recorded 
 as illustrating his gentleness and patience are of a nature to 
 exhibit him as the worthy enemy rather than as the friend 
 
 1 As the savagery of the Jews who accompanied Chosroes was 
 especially vented on monuments erected by Christian, reverence, so 
 Christian jealousy has been expended on the destruction of the tombs 
 of Godfrey and Baldwin I. When the Greeks took possession of 
 the Chapel of Adam in 1808 they removed all traces of these 
 sacred resting-places lest the Latins should make them the occasion 
 of claims for possession. 
 
 229
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 of the Frank. Colonel Conder, who may perhaps have 
 something of the warrior's appreciation of the soldier as 
 well as the man's admiration for the hero, is not sparing in 
 his eulogy : 
 
 " Since Omar and Mohammed no Moslem like Saladin 
 had arisen, and after him none other such arose . . . 
 brave and just, merciful to all, tolerant even of Latin priests, 
 and wisely prudent as well as determined and active. 
 Among all who opposed him he found but one who was his 
 equal, in Richard Lion- Heart, the hero of the third Crusade." 
 
 If to speak Arabic makes an Arab, then the inhabitants 
 of Judaea are Arabs, but in no other sense. The Arab was 
 not here in the time of our Lord. He is to Palestine what 
 the Saxon is to Britain. Haroun er Raschid was contem- 
 porary with Egbert, Selim I, who brought in the Turkish 
 rule with Henry VIII. The Arab came in with the Kaliph 
 Omar, one of Mohammed's earlier converts, and what is left 
 of him is to be found mainly in the towns. 
 
 ' The odd popular prejudice," writes Clermont Ganneau 
 (Q.S. 1875), " which obstinately believes that the Mussulman 
 Arabs, who became masters of Syria after the defeat of the 
 Greek troops, took altogether the place of the original 
 inhabitants of the country, and are in fact the people whom 
 we find there now, cannot be too strongly combated." 
 
 The conquerors imposed, or perhaps only introduced a 
 religious enthusiasm. These new immigrants, like their 
 former invaders the Jews, were also the sons of Abraham, only 
 that they descended from Ishmael rather than from Isaac, 
 and the new dogma was that of Mohammed the Camel Driver, 
 not that of Jesus the Carpenter in whom many of them 
 believed. They disturbed nothing ; they found a decaying 
 civilization, the sciences and arts ; the architecture and 
 traditions of Greece and Rome, which to these children of the 
 desert were of no account. They looked for revenue, and 
 here revenue could come only from the soil. Of agriculture 
 they knew nothing, but they exacted labour from those who 
 
 230
 
 THE MOSLEM IN JERUSALEM 
 
 did, and under these conditions the original inhabitants 
 remained, and to a great extent, like the Celtic races of 
 Scotland and Ireland, outlived their conquerors, as they 
 had also outlived the Jew and the Greek. The Crusades 
 and the rule of the Franks have left their traces mainly in 
 stone, though here and there one meets, in the most unex- 
 pected places, with fair-haired and red-haired children with 
 the blue eyes and broad palms of the European. 
 
 In 1517, Jerusalem, with the rest of Syria and Egypt, 
 passed into the hands of the Turks, and since then has 
 formed part of the Ottoman Empire. In the year 1542 
 Suleiman restored the walls of the city, building those 
 portions now described as " modern," though contemporary 
 with Henry VIII of England. Since then the Holy City 
 has had no history until we come to the nineteenth century, 
 when England mysteriously interfered to restore her to 
 Turkey, after she had made desperate efforts at self -emanci- 
 pation ; and when the Crimean war broke out as the result 
 of a quarrel as to the rebuilding of the dome of the Church of 
 the Holy Sepulchre. Following upon this we have the arrival 
 of various religious bodies, the earliest from America ; 
 England sent two missionary societies, Germany various 
 bands of practical philanthropists, Roman Catholic Europe 
 a score or more of religious Orders to supplement the work 
 of employing, teaching, nursing, in which the Franciscans 
 had been already employed 500 years. Russia, France, 
 Italy, Germany have raised handsome buildings in all direc- 
 tions till Jerusalem without the walls is a more extensive 
 city than that within. Within the last decade England too 
 has begun to erect a monument not unworthy of her prestige, 
 the very handsome church and college of the Anglican 
 bishopric. 
 
 231
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 THE MOSLEM AS A CITIZEN 
 
 ARAB INFLUENCE ON EUROPE AESTHETICISM CURSING 
 ACUTENESS LITERATURE DRESS ARISTOCRACY 
 FORMS OF PRAYER TENETS OF THE FAITH PHILAN- 
 THROPY INSTITUTIONS HOSPITAL AND SISTERS 
 TRADITION PILGRIMAGE TO TOMB OF MOSES 
 
 WE are wont to forget the share which the Arabs have 
 had in the civilization of Europe. The very words 
 we have borrowed from their language are themselves 
 evidence of lessons as to the things they represent. From 
 Skeat (p. 760), we may take the following examples : 
 admiral, amulet, artichoke, alcove, alcohol, chemise, cipher, 
 camlet, elixir, lute, magazine, maltress, mohair, nadir, sofa, 
 shrub, sarsenet, saffron. From Damascus we received the 
 damson, from Ascalon the shalot, from Syria generally the 
 maize. Possibly the earliest versions known to Northern 
 Europe of Aristotle, Plato, Galen, Hippocrates came to us 
 from a Nestorian Arab physician, who died in 876 A.D. 
 The china and metal work of Europe owe much to Arabic 
 influence; Venetian glass is copied from the Syrian art, 
 beautiful specimens of which are still constantly found. 
 The Arabic numerals facilitated mathematics all over 
 Europe, the study of mathematics and astronomy was 
 promoted among Latins by the Syrian Jacobites, the arts 
 of painting, sculpture, and engraving came from the Arabs, 
 while the ecclesiastical art of the Italian churches of the 
 
 232
 
 THE MOSLEM AS A CITIZEN 
 
 time of Cimabue may be seen in its earlier development on 
 the walls of the Church of the Nativity at Bethlehem. 
 
 Spain was a great centre for the dissemination of Oriental 
 learning. Science studied at Cordova and in Andalusia had 
 been brought thither from Bagdad. The troubadours of 
 Languedoc sang under the influence of Arab poets, who 
 learnt the art of rhythm from the cadences of the earlier 
 parts of the Koran. 
 
 The aestheticism of the Arab is externalized in language 
 rather than in plastic art. We ventured to attempt a 
 defence against an artist friend, who condemned Oriental 
 art as rudimentary, on the line that Jews and Moslems alike, 
 owing to the conditions of their religion, lacked practice and 
 opportunity for its development. We were met by the 
 counter argument that both Moses and Mohammed, anxious 
 for the credit of their followers, diplomatically forbade any 
 attempt at competition in directions in which they would 
 inevitably be surpassed by those of other nations. 
 
 Except in the " fancy work " executed in certain schools, 
 in which early Victorian combinations and aniline dyes are 
 patriotically perpetuated, an Arab never makes a mistake 
 in colouring. From the red, green and white of the women 
 of Ramallah, or the red, blue and yellow of the women of 
 Bethlehem, from the red sash, or blue kumbaz of your 
 donkey-boy, or the orange handkerchief twisted round the 
 scarlet tarbush of your cook, up to the mosaics of the 
 Dome of the Rock or the decoration of the Alhambra, 
 the Arab never strikes a false note. If he makes a carpet, 
 the two ends are seldom of the same width ; if he builds a 
 house, the recesses, doors, windows have seldom any cor- 
 respondence. The Moslem theoretically, though I know 
 of many exceptions puts no pictures on his wall, but away 
 on the ceiling twelve feet overhead he sketches bold com- 
 binations from the alphabet in colours of 'the same quality 
 as those of his turban or kumbaz, always supposing that he 
 is left literally to his own devices. His idea of adapting 
 
 233
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 a house for European occupation is to decorate the ceilings 
 with a stencilled design, which suggests a Nottingham lace 
 curtain lined with washing-powder blue, or Swiss land^ 
 scapes upside down. 
 
 I used as a child to wonder to what nationality the 
 furniture belonged, of which that in the average dolls'-house 
 was the copy ; sideboards and wardrobes, of which the 
 greater part of the surface was devoted to decoration, while 
 a minimum of drawer or cupboard occupied their central 
 anatomy ; chairs upon which one could only perch, and 
 tables which existed mainly for the liberal exhibition of legs. 
 Wherever they may have originated, they are now in the 
 Levant, together with equally impossible upholstery in 
 striped silk, and plush of designs which, originally invented 
 by lady novelists in descriptions of " oriental magnificence," 
 were produced by speculative manufacturers, and, by a 
 process of inversion, may now be found in houses where a 
 " salon " is reserved for visitors, but where the owners tuck 
 up their legs and smoke narghillehs in the leewan as soon 
 as the visitors have departed. Much of this comes from the 
 Lebanon, which is practically a province of France, and 
 where the kind of French taste which expresses itself in 
 gilding and artificial flowers is superimposed upon the 
 Oriental desire for display. In Jerusalem it exists mainly 
 among the inferior officers of consulates, where Levantines 
 and Arabs pose as Europeans, modify their names, and 
 speak French, or even Italian, with the muscular relaxation 
 which in English we call " a cockney accent," and the 
 criard voice which never fails to proclaim literally, loudly 
 to proclaim the secret of their extraction. The men pay 
 calls in white kid gloves, and the women in toilets realized 
 from descriptions in the ladies' papers. 
 
 But to return to the original proposition, in language the 
 Arab is an aesthete. He not only has an immense vocabu- 
 lary from which to select the precise terms in which to 
 express, not his thought perhaps, but rather the phrase in 
 
 234
 
 ABSALOM'S PILLAR.
 
 THE MOSLEM AS A CITIZEN 
 
 which best to conceal it, but he has also at command an 
 extraordinary number of proverbs, allusions, even allego- 
 ries and fables, the subtlety and delicacy of which would 
 be entirely lost upon those of the same social grade further 
 west. Like the Gaelic perhaps like many languages as yet 
 unspoiled by conventional uses Arabic may be described 
 as excellent " to swear in, to make love in, and to shuffle 
 out of a bargain in." For erotic songs, the East is, of 
 course, unrivalled, and few would venture on the attempt 
 to out-swear an Arab. In a bargain the Arab could probably 
 be beaten by a Jew, a Greek, or an Armenian, especially in 
 Arabic. When he begins to swear, or rather, when he really 
 warms to the subject, all minor considerations of the unities 
 are absolutely transcended. He will curse the father of his 
 own son, he will curse the harem of his she-donkey : " May 
 your house be destroyed and the house of your master," he 
 will say to a servant who annoys him. Cursing is a recog- 
 nized way of expressing emotion. For two thousand years 
 the Jewish child has been taught to throw a stone at Absa- 
 lom's Pillar, as a visible token of the curse which rests on 
 filial disobedience ; and a part of the ritual of the Mecca 
 Pilgrimage is the throwing of stones in the valley of Mena. 
 This custom, at least time-honoured, is held by some anti- 
 quarians to account for the existence of certain cairns to 
 be found here in various places in the neighbourhood of 
 dolmens and ancient monuments still held sacred. By 
 analogy with the cursing-stones of Celtic races in Scotland 
 Ireland, Wales, and Brittany, we may suppose them to be 
 associated with the saint whose imprecations upon an 
 enemy are desired, possibly in connexion with some wish 
 or vow, of which the stones are the witness. 1 There are 
 some forcible examples of cursing in the Koran, though 
 
 1 Alike in the East and among the Celts we find rags and frag- 
 ments of clothing fastened in Holy Places, either as evidence of 
 pilgrimages, witness of a vow, or as points de repere for the concen- 
 tration of transferred sickness or sorrow. 
 
 235
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 Mohammed was inferior to the Psalmist in the art of effect- 
 ive and picturesque imprecation. The details of the Com- 
 mination Service become more impressive in the country 
 which gave them birth when one realizes that any mis- 
 chievous child can remove his neighbour's landmark the 
 single row of separated stones which to this day serve to 
 indicate what in Scotland we call the Marches, where per- 
 verting the judgment of the stranger and the fatherless, 
 taking reward to slay the innocent and smiting his neigh- 
 bour secretly is mainly a question of baksheesh. 
 
 Both in small things and great the Arab is extraordinarily 
 acute. The porter of an hotel is a veritable Sherlock 
 Holmes in the rapidity with which he takes in a situation 
 and " reckons up " the group of strangers whom he admitted 
 five minutes before. In the wider philosophy of life they 
 are equally subtle, if not always genial, as one learns from 
 their common sayings : " The friends of this world are but 
 spies on our conduct," " Silence is the protection of the 
 ignorant," " The pain of death is less than that of an un- 
 welcome companion," " He who hates not, loves not " ; 
 or, to ascend to a higher level, we may quote, " Spoil not 
 an act of kindness by talking about it," " To adjourn a bad 
 action is to begin it," " Peace of mind is a habit that does 
 not wear out," " One-third of faith is knowledge, one-third 
 modesty, and the rest generosity." All these are of value 
 as practical rules of life, and the same type of social philo- 
 sophy is inculcated in most of their stories. 
 
 Their very acuteness is, in a certain sense, a difficulty 
 to the student whatever the direction of his inquiry. The 
 Arab has two tendencies, common, perhaps, to elementary 
 races, and notably among the Celts one of giving a pleasant 
 answer, the other of concealing what is in his mind. The 
 advice given by M. Clermont Ganneau as a result of many 
 years' study of then' character is precisely that which we 
 have ourselves found useful in dealing with the Highlanders 
 of Scotland, when equally in quest of folk-lore and local 
 
 236
 
 THE MOSLEM AS A CITIZEN 
 
 colouring. " The art of questioning Arabs," he writes, 
 " consists in knowing when to shut your mouth and keep 
 your eyes and ears open, listening so as to draw them on to 
 tell stories, and thus gradually extracting information while 
 carefully abstaining from asking questions calculated to 
 suggest ideas to minds so credulous and so easily influenced." 
 It is our privilege to visit occasionally at the house of a 
 well educated Moslem friend, on whose bookshelves we 
 have found works, among others, by Sir Walter Scott, 
 Emerson, Blackmore, Shakespeare, Zola, Georges Sand 
 Daudet, Jules Bois, and Bourget, and who hastily dropped 
 a copy of Rousseau out of sight behind the rest, a tribute 
 to the presence of womanhood which we found suggestive 
 and interesting. The ladies of the household, his mother 
 and sister-in-law, receive us kindly, and the children, a girl 
 and two boys, are Avell-mannered and intelligent, the girl, 
 contrary to popular theory, holding her own with the boys 
 here as elsewhere. Now that thanks to the Turkish 
 Government and the American Colony Moslem girls are 
 receiving a superior education we cannot fail, in presence of 
 those bookshelves, to express curiosity as to how those who 
 have learnt no foreign languages will utilize their powers of 
 reading. The Arabic poetry is, we are assured, " very 
 difficult " ; the Thousand and One Nightsh&ve in them much 
 which is " not good," but there are now, it is said, some 
 translations of Romances, and we find among the list of 
 publications by the Arabic presses in Beirut many books 
 well deserving attention. The Jesuits, besides theology, 
 have given the Arabic-speaking people of Palestine the 
 opportunity of reading a considerable number of the best 
 standard works in history and science. The American 
 press also has published many books which cannot fail to 
 influence a people to whom modern literature is practically 
 unknown. There are some forty volumes of science, 
 naturally somewhat elementary, including such subjects as 
 astronomy, geology, chemistry, anatomy and hygiene, 
 
 237^
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 besides specialist works for the use of the students of their 
 excellent medical school. Algebra and geometry are now 
 again at home in the language which was among the first 
 to give them utterance ; geography and history are each 
 represented in some dozen volumes ; grammars of various 
 languages are, of course, numerous, and among " miscel- 
 laneous " works one is glad to hail many old friends. There 
 are Robinson Crusoe and Swiss Family Robinson in part 
 payment for what the schoolboy owes for The Arabian 
 Nights. There is Self -Help, about which one feels a trifle 
 uncertain, for while the lesson of industry is everywhere of 
 value, that of frugality is here more than superfluous, and 
 Smiles' biographies are written to a tune which, in Oriental 
 surroundings, has something of the vulgarity of the street 
 musician. Peep of Day and its companion volumes, the 
 Schonberg Cotta Family, Mrs. Sherwood's Little Woodman, 
 and, above all, Black Beauty, are books one is glad to meet 
 in any tongue. A good many books have been published 
 at the expense of private persons, which is enough to account 
 for anything ; but one feels a certain psychological curiosity 
 as to what the subtle Arab mind deduces from such works 
 as Miss Havergal's Little Pillows, Jessica's First Prayer^ 
 or The Prince of the House of David. 
 
 From Misery to Happiness, by John Bunyan, means, let 
 us suppose, the Pilgrim's Progress, a work which could not 
 fail to delight those to whom the idea of pilgrimage is 
 familiar, and to whom allegory is a common form of speech. 
 It is conceivable that sermons by Spurgeon and Moody may 
 appeal to some ; they are to be had by the score ; and the 
 numerous tracts on intemperance are, judging from the 
 analogy of many nations recently Christianized, a fitting 
 accompaniment to other gifts of European civilization. The 
 two English Missionary Societies which have been in the 
 country eighty and fifty years respectively, have done nothing 
 to satisfy the intellectual appetite which, presumably, it is 
 the avowed purpose of their educational institutions to 
 
 238
 
 VILLAGE SHEIKS.
 
 THE MOSLEM AS A CITIZEN 
 
 create. It is fortunate that Americans and Jesuits should 
 have done so much to supply our deficiency. Even the 
 Arabic translation of the Book of Common Prayer is pub- 
 lished by another Society, that so widely respected, for 
 Promoting Christian Knowledge. 
 
 Many of the Moslems belonging to the oldest and most 
 distinguished families are engaged hi trade, and even to 
 keep a shop is apparently no derogation of dignity, especially 
 now that, for very practical reasons, it literally does not pay 
 to work for the Government, and there are no learned pro- 
 fessions to fall back upon. There are few doctors, there are 
 no clergy, and, as a profession per se, no lawyers. There is 
 an enforced military service, but in Palestine the officers in 
 the army are mostly Turks. Life in the Holy Land is not 
 costly, and a good many live as landed proprietors on a 
 small scale. The Moslem gentleman, except in certain 
 cases where, unfortunately for himself, he has taken to 
 European costume, is of very dignified appearance. All 
 Turkish subjects must wear the tarbush, or fez, which, in 
 his case, is rendered more becoming by the handkerchief 
 twisted about it. Out of doors he wears the jibir, a substi- 
 tute for the abba of the lower classes, and something of a 
 compromise with Prankish fashions. It is a long coat, 
 hanging perfectly plain from neck to heel, and with a low 
 collar like an Anglican priest's. It is often made of very 
 fine cloth, and is becoming and dignified. There are certain 
 old families, the descendants of the associates of the 
 Prophet, who came to Jerusalem with Omar, and whose 
 very names, unlike European nomenclature, convey assur- 
 ance of their social position. These are : El Husseini, 
 descendants of the prophet himself ; El Ellami, Et Tahboub, 
 En Sabi, Huddai, Nammar, Khaldi, Jawani, Jarallah, 
 Ersasi ; Dijani and Ed Denaf, who are the servants of the 
 Haram, and have hereditary charge of the Dome of the 
 Rock. 1 
 
 1 As these names have been misquoted in certain travellers' books, 
 
 239
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 It is what we should call " good form " to be precise in 
 religious duties, and in passing through Government offices, 
 the Bureau of the Police, and so on, it is edifying and start- 
 ling to European ideas to see the employes leaving their 
 desks and retiring into a corner to pray. The clerks in 
 Whitehall and Somerset House may have good reasons for 
 despising the unspeakable Turk and other Moslems ; but it 
 cannot be denied that he pays more respect to his Maker 
 than they ! Five times a day must he kneel toward the 
 East, and recite, so to speak, the equivalent to the Creed 
 and the Lord's Prayer. 
 
 There are three Orders of Nuns in Jerusalem, whose con- 
 cern it is to pray for those who do not pray for themselves, 
 Those who do neglect this duty in Jerusalem have at least 
 no -excuse of want of even verbal reminder, for from all 
 parts of the city, five times a day, the Muezzin proclaims 
 the obligation. His voice, at earliest dawn, rings with 
 special clearness over the quiet city where, though the 
 fellahin are already bargaining their fruit and vegetables, 
 thousands of citizens are still sleeping. 
 
 " God is most Great f God is most great" he proclaims, 
 facing the morning miracle of sunrise. " / testify there is 
 no God but God ! I testify Mohammed is God's messenger ! 
 Come ye and pray ! Come ye and pray ! It is better to pray 
 than to sleep f There is no God bat God f " And one cannot 
 but remember that out of the six or seven thousand Moslems 
 of the Holy Cit}^ some thousands, at least, must be respond- 
 ing to the call. 
 
 The Mohammedan opens the door of his shop, or bureau, 
 with the invocation, '' O opener of the day ! gracious 
 One ! restorer of property ! bountiful One ! " There 
 is a whole racial history in that " O restorer of property ! " 
 Sitting, it may be, in the early morning on the hill-side 
 opposite the Damascus Gate, and watching the effendis 
 
 this list has been revised by one whose social position among Moslem 
 Arabs is beyond question. 
 
 240
 
 THE MUEZZIN CALLING THE HOUR OF PRAYER.
 
 THE MOSLEM AS A CITIZEN 
 
 making their way from the Moslem suburb towards the 
 Serail for the administration of the laws of their country ; 
 the fellahin, basket-laden, coming into the market; the 
 Bedouin with camels bearing grain and wood ; the police, 
 the soldier, the tax-gatherer, all with the demure gait of 
 the town Arab, one is irresistibly reminded of " the weary 
 souls by thousands meekly stealing," and one wonders the 
 less that places of business should be opened with an appeal 
 to the " Restorer of property." The anonymous editor 
 of Kinglake's Eothen (in Methuen's Little Library) writes 
 of certain customs of this country : " The swindling 
 is so palpable and yet so gravely decorous in its external 
 forms that it ceases to shock ; it is so universal that in the 
 end no one seems to have suffered much wrong. To vary 
 the celebrated remark about the Scilly Islanders, one may 
 say that these people gain a precarious livelihood by taking 
 bribes from one another." (Introduction, xx.) 
 
 Besides the Salat, the obligation of praying five times a 
 day the Moslem must daily recite the Creed, " There is no 
 God but God, and Mohammed is the prophet of God." He 
 must keep the yearly fast of Ramadan by refraining during 
 a month from food, drink or smoking from sunrise to 
 sunset, he must give a tenth of his property in alms, and if 
 possible he must make the pilgrimage to Mecca. Some who 
 have the means, but lack health or leisure, perform this 
 last duty by proxy, praying for a substitute, as in the 
 case of many Russian pilgrims to Jerusalem. 
 
 These, the five pillars of the faith, are a part of the 
 " Obligatory action " incumbent on every one, whether man 
 or woman, who has arrived at years of discretion, to know 
 and observe. It consists of eight things, which are classified 
 as things indispensable, necessary, traditional, lawful, 
 unlawful, abominable and pernicious. These categories are 
 an interesting study in casuistry. The things indispensable 
 have been already enumerated. They are, perhaps, on 
 the analogy of Sacraments, for he, " who believes them 
 
 241 R
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 not (may God preserve us) is an infidel." He who 
 neglects the things necessar} 7 , which are of the nature of the 
 works of supererogation, such as voluntary almsgiving, 
 deserves hell-fire, but is not an infidel. He who omits 
 things traditional, such as circumcision, is open to reproach. 
 He who does things meritorious shall receive his reward. 
 He who does things lawful is praiseworthy. Things un- 
 lawful, such as rebellion against parents, lead to the tor- 
 ments of hell, and " he who calls things unlawful, lawful 
 (which God forbid), is an infidel." (One cannot refrain 
 from the reflection that, according to Moslem standard, 
 a large proportion of modern literature is tainted by 
 infidelity !) Things abominable are blameworthy but 
 do not deserve torment ; they include carelessness in 
 ritual, such as praying at, instead of before, sunrise. Things 
 pernicious are ritual-neglect of a more serious nature, such 
 as inattention while at prayer, or eating during a fast. 
 Moreover, there are twelve indispensable conditions of 
 prayer, four of ablution, one of almsgiving, three of pil- 
 grimage, three of fast, and it is well to remember that in 
 a religion without priests, sacraments, confession, or, neces- 
 sarily, public worship, yet, withal, with a strict system of 
 rewards and punishments, so elaborate a ritual lays a heavy 
 responsibility upon individual conscience. 
 
 The common assertion that modern religion is divorced 
 from life is by no means a fair generalization. There is, for 
 example, much room for private charity ; at the Festival 
 of Beiram, for instance, when every household that can 
 afford it, sacrifices a sheep, in remembrance of the sacrifice 
 of Ishmael (sic), there is always abundance given to those 
 who cannot themselves do what is ceremonially required. 
 
 The other day a wealthy Moslem was about to celebrate 
 the circumcision of his son, a boy of about twelve years. 
 The ceremonial tends to become the occasion of an elaborate 
 and costly hospitality, and he accordingly allowed it to be 
 known that any parents unable to afford the expense on 
 
 242
 
 THE MOSLEM AS A CITIZEN 
 
 their own account might bring their boys to share in the 
 proposed festivity. Over fifty little boys attended, and all 
 received a suit of clothing proper to the occasion, and they 
 and their friends were entertained and fed. 
 
 Every day, what in England we should call a soup-kitchen 
 is opened for the poor, irrespective of creed. The charity 
 has a small original endowment, but is now so widely 
 extended that the endowment would be inadequate were it 
 not for the gifts of the faithful, often taking the form of 
 votive or thanksgiving offerings a sheep, it may be, or a 
 sack of rice or meal. 
 
 Until the Jews lately established an asylum it must be 
 admitted, on lines more scientific the Moslems alone 
 made provision for the insane. 1 Like the Jews of the time 
 of our Lord, they assume (who knows with what justice ?) 
 that insanity is due to the presence of an evil spirit, and 
 their treatment is based on the theory of exorcism, of 
 making his tenement unpleasant. 
 
 They, however, distinguish between the insane " who 
 hath a devil" and a congenital idiot, whom they treat as 
 " God's fool," on the supposition that his soul is in heaven. 
 Dr. Chaplin (Q.S. 1894), in relation to certain nervous 
 diseases, common, especially among young women, in 
 Palestine, tells us that such patients are sometimes shut up 
 under the Haram Area, or chained to a pillar in the church 
 at el Khudr (i.e. St. George), or sent to the Cave of Elijah. 
 He adds, "It is said that benefit is often derived from this 
 method of treatment ; the awful sacredness of the place, 
 the silence, the solitude, producing a kind of shock to the 
 nervous system, which proves beneficial. The remedy is 
 akin to the sudden fright which cures hiccup, swallowing 
 live spiders for ague. . . . The chain with which patients 
 are bound to a pillar in the church at el Khudr is, perhaps, 
 
 1 Waldmeier, a German Swiss, has established an Asylum in the 
 Lebanon, which is, from the point of view both of science and bene- 
 ficence, worthy of the highest respect. 
 
 243
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 that which was shown to Felix Fabri in the fifteenth century 
 as the chain with which St. George had been bound. Brother 
 Felix relates that he and his companions put it round their 
 necks out of devotion." 
 
 There is an admirable Moslem hospital, supported by 
 Government, and in itself a fact of interesting significance 
 under the management of the Sisters of St. Vincent de Paul, 
 commonly known as Sisters of Charity. The order and 
 completeness of all arrangements are abundant testimony 
 that it could not be in better hands. The building is admir- 
 ably planned ; there is well organized accommodation for 
 out-patients, the dispensary, and operating-room, wards on 
 a separate floor for women, a Mosque, accessible at all 
 hours ; supervision of doctors, native and European, care- 
 fully trained Arab-speaking nurses, the frequent attendance 
 of a Moslem committee of management, and a separate 
 building, under the charge of police, for criminals needing 
 medical attention. 
 
 There is a carefully tended garden for the use of con- 
 valescents, and it is pleasant to notice everywhere, even in 
 the dispensary, the presence of flowers. The rules of the 
 Order forbid the attendance of the Sisters upon obstetric 
 and syphilitic cases and at certain operations ; but in 
 the cause of humanity even these are set aside if the case is 
 urgent or the auxiliary nurses inadequate. The Sisters are 
 a magnificent illustration of the grand rule " laborare est 
 orare." Even the ritual requirements of their faith have 
 to be arranged with a view to the exigencies of service, and 
 their daily Mass is heard at four o'clock in the morning, in 
 order that their patients may not lack their work, even 
 when gaining by their prayer. " We try to feel that at 
 least our actes are said before the Muezzin calls the Moslems 
 to prayer," * said one of them. " We like to be the first to 
 
 1 In addition to the morning cry of the Muezzin, the Dervishes 
 go about the town, especially at the time of Ramadan, beating a 
 drum to call the people to prayer, and crying out, " Oh, Moslems ! 
 
 244
 
 THE MOSLEM AS A CITIZEN 
 
 knock at Heaven's gate on behalf of our poor sufferers." 
 They take no mean advantage of their relation to their 
 patients in order to interfere with their faith. " If our 
 work does not speak the example of our Master, our poor 
 words would have little chance," said a young Alsatian, 
 whose very countenance was in itself a lesson of calm 
 happiness and selfless devotion. We asked what happened 
 when the patients realized the approach of death. "Oh, 
 their teachers come and visit them, or they pray with each 
 other. They are full of God's praises ; it is very edifying." 
 In an outside building, carefully locked and guarded, we 
 found a poor criminal convicted of murder. He was dying 
 of diabetes, but he had every comfort, every possible 
 alleviation of his sufferings. The Sisters visited him con- 
 tinually, but the policeman in charge was also his nurse, 
 and we could not but observe in his conduct more of com- 
 passionate ministration than of the stern guardian. We 
 arrived about a quarter to four in the afternoon, when the 
 policeman was engaged at his third hour of prayer, Ikindi ; 
 and the presence alike of the Sister and the Lady, the rahbat 
 and the sitt, availed nothing to distract his attention from 
 his devotions. That would have been one of the " things 
 pernicious." The essential ritual accomplished, however, he 
 rose, and, still continuing to pray aloud, unlocked the door 
 and admitted us. The poor patient had been removed 
 from the comfortable iron bedstead to a mat upon the stone 
 floor, reverting, by his own wish, in the extremity of suffer- 
 ing to his normal habits. As his attendant entered, still 
 praying aloud, he made a feeble effort to perform the Rakaat, 
 the ritual genuflections, as his lips moved in praise of " the 
 Compassionate, the Merciful, the King of the day of 
 judgment," whose summons he was hastening to obey. 
 
 Oh, God's people ! I'm a Dervish of God's way. Get up to your 
 morning meal ; the prophet visits you the prophet redeems you ; 
 your. Creator will not forget you " a cry which, incidentally no 
 doubt, procures for themselves an invitation to breakfast. 
 
 245
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 The occasion when one obtains the most impressive view 
 of the Mohammedan inhabitants of Jerusalem is that of the 
 annual pilgrimage to the alleged Tomb of Moses at Nebi 
 Musa. There is a pretty legend that Moses complained of 
 the loneliness of his grave, and that God, to console him, 
 promised him an annual pilgrimage. We learn, however, 
 from the Rev. E. Hanauer, of a local tradition which, if less 
 romantic, is more probable, that the origin of the pilgrimage 
 was political rather than religious, and that it was a device 
 for gathering together a large body of Moslems during the 
 period when the Holy City was crowded with Christian 
 pilgrims. It is quite useless to quote that " No man knows 
 that Sepulchre, and no man saw it e'er," because its where- 
 abouts was revealed to a holy dervish in a dream, and every 
 spring hundreds of Moslems perform devotions there which 
 last for a week. Their traditions on the subject of that 
 Vale in the Land of Moab, originally published by Frere 
 Lievin, have been often quoted. The story, which is long 
 and elaborate, relates in brief that to Moses God had given 
 the privilege that, although 120 years of age, he should 
 never die till he voluntarily stepped into his grave. For 
 the sake of his charge, he studiously avoided the neighbour- 
 hood of sepulchres, a habit which, in these days, would in 
 Jerusalem oblige one to remain indoors. 
 
 Nevertheless he must fulfil the demands of destiny. One 
 day, while walking among the mountains, he saw four angels 
 disguised as workmen the better to deceive him. They 
 were engaged hi cutting a sepulchre in the heart of the 
 rock, but on being asked the nature of their occupation, 
 they replied, " We have been sent to prepare a retreat for 
 the most precious treasure of our King. Our task is nearly 
 done, and we are only awaiting the arrival of the treasure 
 itself." The sun was hot, and the cool cavern in the hillside 
 offered inviting shelter. Moses, heated and weary, asked 
 permission to enter and stretched his limbs upon a stone 
 bench in the remotest corner, upon which the workmen 
 
 246
 
 THE MOSLEM AS A CITIZEN 
 
 offered him with all signs of respect an apple of exquisite 
 colour and perfume. He accepted it, to appease his 
 thirst, but had barely carried it to his lips, when he fell 
 into eternal slumber, upon which his soul ascended on high, 
 borne upon the wings of the ministering angels from the 
 spot where his body reposes to this day. 
 
 In proof of the story, the rock of which the sepulchre is 
 composed is outside white as the angels of light, and 
 within dark as the angels of death. 
 
 Frere Lievin materializes the position by pointing out 
 that the sepulchre is within the remains of a convent, 
 possibly one of the most ancient in Christendom. It was 
 founded in the fourth century by St. Euthymius, 1 and 
 destroyed by Chosroes in 616. The Moslems, upon their 
 arrival in the country, conceiving the idea that it was a spot 
 of especial sanctity, built a minaret out of the ruins, estab- 
 lished a guard of Dervishes, and bestowed upon it the above 
 tradition. 
 
 All the strict Moslems of Jerusalem, and great numbers 
 from the country, who assemble in advance, unite in pilgrim- 
 age, preceded by the green flag, long preserved for the 
 occasion in the family of the Husseini. The women line the 
 roads for a couple of miles, sitting in tight-packed rows in 
 their white sheets (the izzar) and with their faces covered by 
 veils of figured muslin (the mandil), which make them look 
 as if they had a disease or deformity. 
 
 The strict Moslem considers silk unclean, so the simplicity 
 of the linen wrapper is no indication of poverty. Moham- 
 medan women, out of doors, make no pretence to the gay 
 colouring and rich material of the Jewess. 
 
 The pilgrims assemble in the Haram Area, and as they 
 leave the adjacent gate of St. Stephen a gun is fired and a 
 detachment of soldiers comes sweeping down the hill to 
 
 1 The learned Dominican, Father Vincent, a specialist in Jeru- 
 salem archaeology, is, however, of opinion, that the convent in 
 question was more probably at the Khan el Ahmar. 
 
 247
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 clear the road for the advancing procession, which consists 
 of some hundreds of Moslems, chief among whom is the 
 Mufti. Naturally but a small band accompanies the flag 
 to its ultimate destination, where they remain for a week, 
 and which is occasionally the scene of disorder and even 
 tragedy. Already one sees the elements of intense excite- 
 ment, and by the time they return the following week there 
 will have been various accretions, emotional and real, which 
 account for the presence already of Turkish troops along the 
 line of pilgrimage. Here, two rival tribes coming from 
 opposite directions chance to meet, and a miniature battle 
 takes place under our very eyes ; indeed, we ourselves are 
 driven to take shelter behind some tombs, and on our 
 return find traces of blood shed on the very spot where we 
 had been standing. Here is a Dervish with sheesh, a skewer 
 hah 6 a yard long, through both cheeks, which he frequently 
 withdraws and replaces, amid the plaudits of the crowd. 
 Here a fanatical group are vehemently cursing us, our 
 fathers and mothers, our camels and our asses, dogs of 
 Franks that we are ! Here, again, a gradually increasing 
 group has hypnotized itself into a state of ecstasy, and for 
 a good half hour, with hardly a pause, has been executing a 
 monotonous dance, repeating ceaselessly the formula known 
 as the Zikr ; that is, the mentioning of the name of God. 
 
 ' ' La illdlah ilia lldh," " There is no God but God. ' ' The 
 rhythm is thus accentuated, and the repetition is on four 
 notes, which, ceaselessly repeated, have a stupefying effect 
 of which we, mere spectators even, are unwillingly conscious. 
 A writer in the P.E.F., who watched the same ceremony 
 in a mosque in the town, calculated that the formula was 
 repeated about thirty times a minute during three periods 
 of ten minutes, and for a shorter period with greater rapidity, 
 making about a thousand repetitions during an hour and 
 three quarters. 
 
 Others are executing a sort of dance, always upon the 
 same spot, beating time with their hands the while, and 
 
 248
 
 THE MOSLEM AS A CITIZEN 
 
 shouting " Allah ddeem, Allah, Allah hei " (" God is everlast- 
 ing, God is living." ) Their cries and their movements become 
 more and more rapid, they are panting and breathless, the 
 singing is intermittent, and finally there is but an occasional 
 gasp of " hei," and at last the leader, himself exhausted, 
 suddenly stops, and one expects to see them collapse upon 
 the ground ; but no, some one is at hand with a bottle of 
 water, from the spout of which all drink in turn and are 
 ready to begin again. 
 
 There is a tourist superstition that every green turban, or 
 mantle, indicates a pilgrim to Mecca or a descendant of the 
 prophet. As a matter of fact, the green mantle was originally 
 a literary decoration given by the prophet to one Kaab ebn 
 Zoheir, who so enchanted him by the recitation of a poem 
 that he took off his own cloak and threw it over the shoulders 
 of the poet, an action which signified protection. The 
 recipient placed so high a value upon his possession that he 
 refused the sum of 10,000 dirhems of silver ; the Kaliph 
 Moawyia, the would-be purchaser, got it at last, however, 
 on the poet's death, on payment of double that sum. It 
 was long preserved by the Kaliphs of the Moaweeya and the 
 Abassides successively, but was finally burnt on the capture 
 of Bagdad by the Tartars in the thirteenth century. The 
 green attire is now worn for devotion, or even eccentricity, 
 and has ceased to be distinctive of family or piety. A not 
 unusual method, however, of publishing the fact of pilgrim- 
 age to Mecca is by, so to speak, affixing a certificate to the 
 front door. Pictures roughly painted upon the stone door- 
 way represent the dangers that have been braved ; the 
 forests, wild beasts, and in some cases the ship and railway 
 train, while the sanctity of the owner is exhibited by the 
 inscription of texts and pious ejaculations. Whatever may 
 be the nature of the hold upon the Moslem of his religion, 
 whether the complication be political, social, or domestic, 
 certain it is, as Bishop Gobat himself put it, " that there 
 can be no question of proselytism among the Moslems is a 
 
 249
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 matter of course." That a certain number of Jews should 
 have apostatized to Mohammedanism is not altogether sur- 
 prising, as the monotheistic character of its creed would 
 appeal to them more readily than Trinitarianism misunder- 
 stood. Gratz (Oesch. des gudenthums, vi. 303) appears to 
 ascribe the apostasy of the Jews during the twelfth century 
 to the degeneracy and superstition that had then taken 
 hold of eastern Judaism, and also, partly, to the temporal 
 successes of the Arabs. 
 
 Even so late as 1840, after the cruel persecution of the 
 Jews, consequent upon the disturbances in Syria, the with- 
 drawal of the French protectorate in the north, and the 
 restoration of Turkish authority, Moses Abulafia, a member 
 of a well known family which has furnished many distin- 
 guished Rabbis and Talmudic scholars to various towns of 
 Palestine, assumed the turban to escape further torture. A 
 writer in the Jewish Encyclopaedia [v. Apostates] remarks, 
 " In general, it may be said, that the apostates to Islam 
 exhibited no great animosity toward their former brethren. 
 Those that went over to the side of Ishmael never forgot 
 that he and Isaac were both sons of Abraham ; and the 
 reason for this is probably to be found in the tolerance which 
 Mohammedans almost universally showed to the Jews." 
 
 250
 
 CHAPTER XVII 
 
 THE MOSLEM IN HIS RELATION TO 
 WOMEN 
 
 MARRIAGE CUSTOMS TYPES OF WOMANHOOD DRESS 
 PHYSIQUE DOMESTIC EDUCATION DEBATE ON 
 WOMEN'S RIGHTS AN EVENING PARTY HOUSEHOLD 
 OCCUPATIONS NEEDLEWORK CHILDREN VULGARITY 
 A MOSLEM ESTABLISHMENT THE "SABEEL" 
 
 MARK TWAIN, who always combines as much direct 
 fair thinking as is compatible with the tendency to 
 take the conventional view of Palestine, remarks : 
 
 " Mosques are plenty, graveyards are plenty, but morals 
 and whisky are scarce. The Koran does not permit Moham- 
 medans to drink. Their natural instincts do not permit 
 them to be moral ... it makes our cheeks burn with 
 shame to see such a thing permitted here in Turkey. We 
 do not mind it so much in Salt Lake City " (New Pilgrim's 
 Progress, chap. iii.). 
 
 The immorality in question consists of the permission to 
 multiply wives up to the number of four, which, according 
 to history, would be moderate in Salt Lake City a per- 
 mission of which, however, the Moslem seldom avails him- 
 self ; the upper classes because except in royal circles, 
 in which here, as elsewhere, certain irregularities are per- 
 mitted the march of civilization and perhaps a more 
 modern standard of domestic comfort has carried them 
 beyond this relic of patriarchal barbarism ; the lower, 
 
 251
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 because, among other reasons, such an indulgence would be 
 too costly. This custom, like much else in the Moslem 
 faith, was probably borrowed from the Jews, among whom, 
 Scriptural example apart, the Mishneh allowed an ordinary 
 Jew four wives, a king eighteen. The great Hillel made 
 divorce quite as easy as it is among Moslems ; and a woman 
 who was ugly, ill-dressed, or a bad cook, then as now, had 
 small chance of a permanent situation (Gittin, ix. 10). 
 
 Even in the early days of the Victorian era, however, 
 before those of modern modifications, it did not neces- 
 sarily follow that a Moslem household was more unhappy 
 than an English one. The traveller Warburton observes 
 that " the Eastern woman seems as happy in her lot as her 
 European sister, notwithstanding the plurality of wives 
 that her lord indulges in or ventures upon. For her 
 there is no more disparagement in occupying the second 
 place as a wife than there is in Europe as a daughter. 
 ... In the hareem there is as much order and 
 decorum as in an English Quaker's home ; it is guarded as 
 the tiger guards his young ; but its inmates consider this 
 as a compliment, and fancy themselves neglected if not 
 closely watched " (The, Crescent and the Gross, chap. vi.). 
 
 There are three kinds of women, says an Arab tradition : 
 those who have patches on the knees, like those who pray ; 
 on the breast, like a dog that scratches itself ; and on the 
 back, like an ass that is beaten ; which distinctions are 
 thus accounted for. When Noah had a daughter, and a 
 sheikh came with the usual congratulations, the patriarch 
 replied in the usual form of an offer of marriage " upon 
 the choice of your hand," and the sheikh accepted the 
 proposal. With more politeness than forethought he did 
 this a second and yet a third time, and when the girl grew 
 up she had three bridegrooms to satisfy. To the first he 
 gave his daughter, and to the second and third his she-ass 
 and she-dog, changed into the likeness of women ; and from 
 these three are descended the three varieties the womanly 
 
 252
 
 THE MOSLEM IN HIS RELATION TO WOMEN 
 
 woman, the ass-woman, stupid and self-willed, and the 
 dog-woman, who, like the dog of the East, screams for the 
 least thing, and delights in running about the streets and 
 stirring up unpleasant matters better left alone. One 
 would be sorry to suggest that the same classifications 
 might be found elsewhere ; and in fact the woman of the 
 East seems to be, in many respects, nearer to the brute 
 than to the human creation. The Greek woman may have 
 succeeded hi looking graceful in flowing robes and shapeless 
 draperies ; the Oriental too often succeeds only in looking 
 obtrusively female, although, in grace of carriage and move- 
 ment, she might have given points to Venus or Diana. It 
 would appear, however, that she deliberately cultivates 
 as beauties physical peculiarities offensive to the eye 
 of Northern Europe. This is less perceptible in girl- 
 hood, but when a woman becomes a mother in her early 
 teens, and lives in a country where the olive branch is more 
 than conventionally regarded as a decoration, one can 
 hardly wonder that its frequent multiplication should early 
 produce the results one deprecates. 
 
 When one compares the physique of the Arab and the 
 Jewish races, as represented in Jerusalem, one cannot but 
 reflect that Ishmael must have been much better-looking 
 than Isaac ; or, perhaps, as it is chiefly among the women 
 that the fact strikes us, it might be fairer to say that one 
 can hardly wonder, considering their respective ages, that 
 the daughters of Hagar should be so much more pleasing 
 in appearance than those of Sarah. " The Harim freely 
 unveiled before me," says Lady Burton (Inner Life of 
 Syria), " and I thought what a fine chance the izzar and 
 mandil would be for some of us ! " The izzar and mandil, 
 which so entirely mask both face and figure, are, however, 
 essentially the dress of the women that is, the Moslem 
 women of the towns ; and for beauty one must as a rule 
 go to the villages, where the graceful dress, the white veil 
 thrown back from the face hanging to the waist, or some- 
 
 253
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 times to the edge of the dress, modify the abandon of 
 the figure ; above all, where the habits of walking barefoot 
 and of carrying burdens on the head, lend dignity and ease 
 to the carriage, very different from the slouching shuffle 
 of the townswomen in ill-made shoes and superabundant 
 wrappings. 
 
 At Bethlehem, Ramallah and Nazareth, 1 the women are 
 gorgeous in raiment of needlework, each district, often each 
 village, having its distinctive dress, woven, dyed and 
 embroidered at home the acquisition of an embroidered 
 robe and a head-dress of coins being the girl's principal 
 outfit for matrimony. In the Moslem schools at Jerusalem, 
 or where there are convents, as well as where there are 
 Jewish schools, the girls are taught to become useful wives, 
 to wash, bake, sew and cook ; but the English missionaries 
 have done nothing in this direction, though they had been 
 here many years before convents were established or 
 Government schools organized. Now, after half a century 
 of lost opportunity, their aid is no longer required ; and 
 woman, here as elsewhere, is beginning to take her fair 
 share of the responsibilities as well as the work of life. 
 
 In spite of much that is alleged to the contrary, there is, 
 and always has been among the Arabs, a certain chivalrous 
 recognition of the higher womanly qualities. In the time 
 of the Mamelukes criminals were led to execution blindfold, 
 because, if they met a woman and could but touch her 
 garments, they would be saved ; and only the other day 
 we were privileged to attend the meeting of a club of some 
 scores of young Syrians, among whom were a fair sprinkling 
 of the " gentler sex," in order to listen to a debate by Arabs 
 
 1 The beauty of the Nazareth women was not lost upon the 
 fathers of the Early Church. Antoninus Martyr writes : "In 
 eivitate tanta est gratia mulierum Hebraearum ut inter Hebraeas 
 pulchriores non inveniantur, et hoc S. Maria sibi concessum dicunt 
 Provincia paradise similis in tritico in frugibus similis ^Egypto sed 
 praecellit in vino et oleo promis ac melle." 
 
 254
 
 A BETHLEHEM BRIDK.
 
 THE MOSLEM IN HIS RELATION TO WOMEN 
 
 and Syrians, in the country of the Turk, upon the position, 
 education and rights of women ! Among the speakers, 
 although many different points of view were presented 
 and various degrees of culture advocated, there was not, we 
 were told, one wholly dissentient voice. Much applause 
 was elicited by a certain story of a man who asked for the 
 best and the worst food in the world, to whom was brought 
 twice over a dish of tongues, an apologue of the value of 
 women, reminding one of Tennyson's 
 
 " Men differ but as heaven and earth, 
 But women, best and worst, as heaven and hell." 
 
 The arguments used, perhaps for the first time in this 
 country, were just those which are most familiar to us, the 
 heirs of all the ages : that woman has wide responsibilities, 
 that she is not only in herself important to the comfort of 
 others, but the guardian and companion of childhood, and 
 that the child is father of the man. It is fair, perhaps, to 
 add that the women present looked, for the most part, wholly 
 uninterested in the question, and were themselves eloquent 
 testimony to their own need of development. They were per- 
 fectly decorous and orderly ; they did not whisper or giggle 
 or make eyes at the men, as the same class of girls would do 
 at any meeting in any schoolroom in England ; but they 
 sat uncomfortably on the unaccustomed chair, stuck their 
 feet out in front of them, looked stolid, and when refresh- 
 ments were handed round, ate and drank in eager silence, as 
 if thankful to welcome something tangible at last ! 
 
 Their common sayings testify, if not always in compli- 
 mentary fashion, to the influence of women. " It is useless 
 to try and explain a matter quietly to an angry woman," 
 say the Arabs. ' ; Allah has given man a mind, a long spirit 
 and a beard, whereas to most women he has given only a long 
 tongue." 
 
 The author of Haji Baba, who has so thoroughly entered 
 into the spirit of Oriental life, puts into the mouth of one 
 
 255
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 of his characters the remark, That when a woman meddles 
 with anything " pena be Khoda, it is time to put one's trust 
 in God!" 
 
 The conventional reproach of women is as a rule that of 
 vanity and chatter. For vanity the woman of Palestine 
 has but little scope as understood by a European. When 
 she has a new dress it is exactly like the last ; like her grand- 
 mother's, probably like her grandchild's. We are not, of 
 course, referring to those to whom the English missionaries 
 have introduced ill-cut blouses, draggle-tailed skirts, sailor 
 hats and brown shoes, but of those who at the most have 
 exchanged the mandil and izzar for the modest white kerchief 
 or the graceful mantilla of black lace, so general among the 
 congregations of the Greek and Latin churches, that one 
 speculates as to its having been copied from pilgrims from 
 Spain or other coasts of the Mediterranean. What she lacks 
 in variety of dress, however, she makes up in ornaments, 
 and her jewels are often beautiful in workmanship and 
 design. 
 
 On a certain occasion, however, when we were privileged to 
 attend a large evening party of Moslem ladies, we regretted 
 to see that some of the more fashionable were wearing 
 " Parisian diamonds " and dresses which looked as if they 
 had been bought at a July sale in Oxford Street and slept in 
 since. All, however, arrived in the orthodox mandil and 
 izzar, carrying in their hands embroidered squares such as 
 are bought at Liberty's for table-centres and chair-backs 
 the object of which was soon displayed. It seemed to be 
 etiquette for the hostess to meet each guest, help to remove 
 the double sheet of white calico in which she was enveloped, 
 and wrap it in the embroidered square for identification 
 when it was time to leave. 
 
 The etiquette of the occasion, though it permitted certain 
 relaxations to which we are unaccustomed, appeared to be 
 extremely rigid in other directions. Social distinctions were 
 marked, not by precedence in entering or leaving the room, 
 
 256
 
 THE MOSLEM IN HIS RELATION TO WOMEN 
 
 but by selection of seats. The hostess was not required to 
 look in any local Debrett for the oldest title, as each lady 
 settled her own affairs by the simple process of elbowing out 
 any one whom she considered out of place. We, dogs of 
 Franks that we are, had ignorantly taken our seats upon the 
 divan destined for our betters, who very shortly contrived 
 by pressure right and left to make our tenure impossible, 
 when we meekly withdrew to isolation and cane chairs. 
 
 All, even those in European costumes, wore high dresses, 
 and to be decolletee is regarded as gross indecency. The 
 custom among a certain class of continental ladies of baring 
 their necks in the day-time, and which has been imitated 
 by the Levantines, is commented upon here by natives in 
 language so exceedingly definite that one can hardly refrain 
 on public occasions from begging the ladies to put on a shawl 
 and spare our blushes. Naturally one dines among Euro- 
 peans in the same costume as at home. Another point 
 of etiquette was involved in the fashion of greeting. The 
 inferior in age or position takes the hand of the other and 
 raises it to her lips and forehead, and when there is no such 
 obvious inferiority there is a friendly contest as to which 
 shall perform the graceful salute. The commonplace hand- 
 shake is, however, now becoming only too general. The 
 ladies smoked abundantly, and when the first chill of cere- 
 mony had worn off, tucked up their legs as well as the dignity 
 of sitting on chairs and divans would permit, many kicking 
 off their shoes for greater convenience. Those who were 
 nursing-mothers had their babies brought to them for re- 
 freshment, and when cakes were handed round there were 
 some who turned them over with their fingers in order to 
 select the specimens they fancied. They ate and drank the 
 whole evening ; coffee, weak tea with rose-water in it, 
 lemonade and tumblers of water, accompanied by spoonfuls 
 of jam. The children of the household sang, danced and 
 acted little dramas for their amusement, but their manners 
 in this connexion had so entirely " that repose which marks 
 
 257 s
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 the caste of Vere de Vere " that they displayed no interest 
 whatever. 
 
 One little girl, who looked too childish to go to parties, 
 seemed so sad and weary that we asked the cause, and heard 
 that she came from a distant village, and had been lately 
 married to a husband who had made no effort to conceal 
 his disappointment, not in her character or acquirements, 
 but in her appearance. The poor little thing was just at 
 the stage when, at home, she would have had long black legs, 
 short shapeless frocks and a pigtail ; when her joys would 
 have been puppies and fairy stories, and her sorrows vulgar 
 tractions and French verbs ! Here, a stranger in Jerusalem, 
 without even a girl friend, she sat silent in pathetic dignity, 
 her eyes full of unshed tears because her husband neglected 
 her for being too thin ! 
 
 The idleness of which the Mohammedan woman is accused 
 differs in kind from that of the idle Englishwoman, owing 
 to the scarcity of shops, the absence of change of fashion, 
 the duration of her clothing (which, unless she buys 
 European material, is usually of excellent quality), and 
 her innocence of the arts of reading and writing, at least 
 among those of the elder generation. She has no magazines, 
 newspapers, nor fashion plates ; no tennis, no croquet, no 
 bicycle, no motor car ; but she pays visits, gossips, goes out 
 to afternoon tea, which probably consists of coffee, cakes and 
 sweet syrup, with true suburban enthusiasm. Her house is 
 spotless ; her furniture, probably covered with white, is 
 trimmed with needle lace infinitely tedious to make, the only 
 material being a needle and thread. She supervises the 
 cooking, which is inconceivably elaborate, some of the dishes 
 needing many hours to prepare. 
 
 We have seen beautiful needlework in the hands of 
 members of two communities in Jerusalem one Latin, 
 the other American " orders " on behalf of the Pasha, 
 in both cases cut out and arranged in every detail by 
 his wife ; we have seen Moslem ladies industriously work- 
 
 258
 
 THE MOSLEM IN HIS RELATION TO WOMEN 
 
 ing for the poor, not only making, but, what to many women 
 is more meritorious, mending for children or for the old. We 
 have asked what became of widows or old women alone in 
 the world, and almost debarred by custom and tradition 
 from going out into the world to earn a living. 1 Why should 
 we ask such a question ? Surely they have children, or, if 
 not, they can return to their parents, or at the worst they 
 have friends ! 
 
 The possession of children is taken for granted. The first 
 question asked when one visits a native house here is gene- 
 rally : " Have you one boy or two ? " The form of the 
 question is courteous. It is intended on the one hand to 
 give you an opportunity for the possible triumph of announc- 
 ing a larger number, on the other to protect you from the 
 humiliation of having to own to only girls. On one such 
 occasion we explained that though of mature years we were 
 unmarried, and that such a condition of things was not 
 wholly unknown among English ladies, even those possessed 
 of a dowry equivalent to many camels, and of appearance 
 which, according to our standard, is quite passable. Our 
 hostess sighed wearily as she looked around at her numerous 
 olive-branches, and remarked, " It is better so." " Elle a 
 enfante a douze ans," frankly explained a son of about four- 
 teen, who was studying at the school of the " Christian 
 Brothers," and could recite passages from Hamlet and 
 Macbeth. 
 
 One learns from books that girl children do not count ; 
 perhaps that may be so among the peasants, but in the 
 Moslem homes of Jerusalem the little girls seem to receive 
 their full share of affection and attention, and now even of 
 education. 
 
 Even among the peasants, however, a girl has not merely 
 her uses, but her practical value. When she is born the 
 disappointment is broken to the anxious father in the phrase 
 " Blessed be the bride," a reminder that when marriageable 
 
 1 Not wholly ; some are engaged in teaching, some in needlework. 
 
 259
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 she will be worth from about 16 upwards to 50 or more, 
 according to her age, utility and appearance. At twelve 
 years old she can carry the pitcher to the well, knead, bake, 
 cook ; if there be but one boy in the family, she has probably 
 acted the part of shepherd. 
 
 Here, however, as elsewhere, a woman occasionally makes 
 herself cheap, and a lady was pointed out to us whose first 
 husband, it is alleged, in moments of domestic difference 
 taunted her with the fact that he got her for a donkey with- 
 out a tail. Left a widow possibly with means she has since 
 acquired a second husband under conditions more worthy. 
 
 We have seldom met with instances of marriage so shock- 
 ingly early among Moslems as among native Christians 
 and Jews, possibly because of the greater social restraint 
 usual among the better class followers of the prophet. 
 
 There are unfortunately certain Arabs and other inhabi- 
 tants of Syria who disgrace themselves by appearing to 
 consider the title of " Arab " disgraceful, who seize upon 
 the most ridiculous pretexts to Frenchify or Anglicize their 
 names, and who in educating their children to pass as Euro- 
 peans, seek their own individual advantage instead of the 
 elevation of their country. The woman, as being naturally 
 less advanced than the man, suffers and loses most. In dis- 
 carding her native dress and assuming one in which she looks 
 about as much at home as an English soldier in a Highland 
 kilt, she loses her grace, her " cachet," her dignity, and is as 
 ridiculous as the English tourist who borrows a Bethlehem 
 dress to be photographed in. Her magnificent hair, 1 which 
 in a plait as broad as your hand was tucked into her belt to 
 be out of the way, is wasted in a fashionable coiffure ; the 
 stately carriage, robbed of the veil which lent it grace, be- 
 comes a mere strut ; her figure, with its Oriental abun- 
 dance, not to say abandon, reluctantly corseted, degenerates 
 
 1 The Jewish traditions represent God as plaiting the hair of Eve 
 before presenting her to Adam. 
 
 260
 
 THE MOSLEM IN HIS RELATION TO WOMEN 
 
 into inevitable coarseness where it was at least potential^ 
 statuesque. 
 
 M. Clermont Ganneau has pointed out that in Palestine, as 
 often elsewhere, the depositories of tradition, the custodians 
 of ancient forms and beliefs, are the women. It is from them 
 that one might learn, as no one has yet learnt, at least for 
 publication, ancient customs of dances and funerals, songs 1 
 of occasions of joy and sorrow, and suggestive traditions of 
 the toilet, of tattooing and of embroidery. It is they who, 
 by refusing to buy any other kind, have perpetuated the 
 patterns of their jewels and their painted boxes, in a country 
 where the indigenous art has been always of the most rudi- 
 mentary kind ; whose straw dishes, shield-shaped, beautiful 
 in colour and simple of design, are probably what they were 
 a thousand years ago ; who have associated with certain 
 villages their own special dress, water-bottles, vessels for 
 grain and house decorations. 
 
 That no one, at least that no English person, 2 has collected 
 information from the women, is easily explained by the fact 
 that the strict separation of the sexes has prevented any 
 man from taking advantage of the possibilities, and that the 
 only women who have had the opportunity, the missionaries, 
 have not been of a type to avail themselves of it, useful and 
 valuable as it would be to the antiquarian, the anthropolo- 
 gist, the humanitarian, and, one would have imagined, the 
 intelligent religious teacher. 
 
 There are some curious anomalies in the position of Moslem 
 women in Palestine. It is said that one must not speak to a 
 Mohammedan of his shoes or of his wife ; nevertheless, I 
 
 1 In a collection of over a thousand Bedouin songs, made by a 
 certain Hamasa of Abu Tammam, forty-five of the authors men- 
 tioned are women. 
 
 2 One must, however, except the works so valuable to the 
 psychological student, of Lady Burton and Miss Rogers, The 
 Inner Life of Syria, and Domestic Life in Palestine, written before 
 the days when the Englishwoman had excluded herself from the 
 confidence of the native. 
 
 261
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 have myself heard a Moslem speak with gentleness and 
 respect of his mother, his sister-in-law and his nieces ; he 
 did not happen, although over thirty years of age, to have a 
 wife. Another invited us to his house in order that we 
 might have the privilege of seeing his wife, the daughter of 
 an important sheikh and a very beautiful woman. She is 
 the mother of many daughters, but of no son. We asked 
 whether he proposed to supplement or even divorce her. 
 " No, indeed," he replied ; " she is a good wife, and it is the 
 will of Allah ! " He belongs to a well-to-do family, and has 
 several brothers, each of whom has but one wife. They all 
 live on their own property in houses adjoining. In more 
 than one the tesselated pavement of a crusading church 
 crops up through the mud-floor of the kitchen. " These are 
 holy things, and the house is blessed," said our hostess. In 
 cleanliness and order the house was certainly blessed, and 
 we were struck by the fact that the eldest girl, though 
 apparently about sixteen years of age, handsome and well- 
 off, was not yet appropriated. 
 
 " That which I have in my house," or " the thing which 
 is within," are curious euphemisms for the honoured name of 
 " wife " ; but though I have not seen the suggestion made, I 
 venture to think that such phrases may not be intended, as 
 the Occidental supposes, in pure insult. Wherever there is 
 fear of the Evil Eye, or of the Powers of Evil, 1 there is usually 
 some effort made at distracting their attention. Thus a 
 Moslem will speak of his children as " the protected ones " ; 
 of a cemetery as " the house of the living " ; of the Wely of 
 his village as " the father of the Crescent," " the strength 
 of the faith," in precisely the same spirit in which a High- 
 lander will say blue when he means green, lest he attract the 
 attention of the fairies. The Moslem, and often the Jew, 
 in this country will avoid the mention of the number five, 
 possibly from association of ideas with the fingers every- 
 
 1 See chapter on " The Powers of Evil," in Outer Isles (Messrs. 
 Constable, 1902), by A. Goodrich-Freer. 
 
 262
 
 THE MOSLEM IN HIS RELATION TO WOMEN 
 
 where displayed as protection against the Evil Eye. "How 
 many eggs for a piastre ? " you ask. " The number of your 
 hand," is the reply. 
 
 The Moslem house, whether large or small, generally shows 
 traces of its origin in the days when, for protection and for 
 concealment of its inmates, it turned dead walls to the road 
 and gave entirely on to a central court. Many of these still 
 exist : the house is of one storey, the rooms domed, the 
 roofs flat ; in the older houses the roofs are walled, but 
 pierced with what look like drain pipes, enabling the women 
 to look out without being seen. The communication with 
 the outer world is by a passage having a door at either end. 
 The eunuch of the story-books is now replaced by a peasant 
 servant, who violates no proprieties if she answers the door 
 and bargains with tradespeople. In humbler homes it is 
 very common to see a man colloguing through a crack, the 
 door being open an inch or two, and the woman with whom 
 he is dealing behind it. Within, one finds a number of 
 entirely independent dwellings, large or small, according to 
 the requirements of the owner. The court is often filled 
 with shrubs and flowers, planted probably in kerosene tins, 
 such being the flower-boxes of the country, but often painted 
 or otherwise decorated. In one room you will find the 
 mother of the master of the house, perhaps a widowed or 
 unmarried sister ; in other rooms the wife, or, let us sup- 
 pose, wives, though we have not met with any such instance. 
 The Moslem law forbids any man to keep two wives in one 
 house, which also helps to account for the fact that a " house " 
 here means the section of an aggregation of independent 
 rooms, or suites of rooms. The next stage in the history of 
 the Moslem house is the covering in of the courtyard, giving 
 a handsome central room or rooms, often divided by pillars 
 and paved with marble. It is often so arranged by division, 
 at perhaps a third of its length, as to furnish a handsome 
 entrance hall or leewan, used as a reception-room, on to 
 which open the public rooms, or rooms for the gentlemen of 
 
 263
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 the household, often brothers or sons of the householder. 
 The inner part, or beit diwan, a sort of general salon, is the 
 centre upon which open the doors of the private rooms of 
 the ladies. The kitchens are often outside, and as a rule are 
 mere cupboards containing a small charcoal stove, which 
 would be the scorn of a European cook, in spite of the fact 
 that of its kind Arab cookery is generally excellent, especi- 
 ally as to rice, vegetables, sweet cakes and puddings, and 
 of course coffee. 
 
 As the Moslems are in Jerusalem the landlords of the 
 English, who, alone among Europeans, have little property 
 (with the recent exception of St. George's Collegiate build- 
 ings), an effort has been made to meet European tastes, and 
 houses are now very generally built with an upper floor, and 
 often, unfortunately for the sanitary and the picturesque, 
 with tiled and sloping roofs. 
 
 In this case the upper floor is usually a duplicate of the 
 lower, and provision is commonly made by means of an outside 
 staircase for division into two separate houses, should the 
 Moslems at any time occupy the building themselves. It is 
 generally easy to ascertain whether the house is in Moslem 
 or Christian occupation by a glance at the sabeel, or recess 
 for water, which the pious Mohammedan always constructs 
 in his outer wall, and which by a beautiful custom is in 
 memory of the dead, and as a covenant with God for the 
 protection of the house, kept full of water for the refresh- 
 ment of passers-by, water being one of the luxuries as well 
 as one of the urgent necessities of the country. If the house 
 belongs to a Christian, the sabeel is usually blocked up with 
 stones, leaving the promise of the reward for the giving of a 
 cup of cold water to be inherited by those on behalf of 
 whose souls we have been spending about 16,000 a year for 
 half a century. A striking example of the fact may be seen 
 where two Moslem-built houses stand side by side on the 
 high road as one enters Jerusalem. Here, at all hours of 
 the day, one meets fellaheen coming in from distant villages, 
 
 264
 
 THE MOSLEM IN HIS RELATION TO WOMEN 
 
 from the mountains, bringing vegetables, fruit, cheese, 
 eggs, or game to the market; asses laden with wood and 
 coal ; camels bearing an incredible weight of stones from 
 some distant quarry; all weary and heavy laden, for the 
 way has been long and dusty, shelterless and arid. Here 
 man and beast can squat beneath the shelter of the 
 wall, and the tough, dry bread they carry with them is 
 dipped in water and distributed among the little group. 
 A few paces beyond is another sabeel, but the house is rented 
 by the English Missionaries, and the wayfarer turns away 
 weary and disappointed to find it choked with dust and 
 ashes. 
 
 265
 
 CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 THE MOSLEM FAITH IN JERUSALEM 
 
 THE SPIRIT OF THE EAST THE INFLUENCE OF ISLAM THE 
 CAREER OF MOHAMMED His RELATION TO JEW AND 
 CHRISTIAN RELIGION AMONG WOMEN OBSERVANCE 
 OF RELIGIOUS DUTIES THE LOWER ANIMALS 
 
 Reposeful, patient, undemonstrative, 
 
 Luxurious, enigmatically sage, 
 
 Dispassionately cruel, might look doom 
 
 On all the fever of the Occident. 
 
 The brooding mother of the unfilial world 
 
 Recumbent on her own antiquity, 
 
 Aloof from our mutations and unrest, 
 
 Alien to our achievements and desires. 
 
 Too proud alike for protest or assent 
 
 When new thoughts thunder at her massy door ; 
 
 Another brain dreaming another dream. 
 
 Another heart, recalling other loves. 
 
 Too gray and grave for our adventurous hopes, 
 
 For our precipitate pleasures too august ; 
 
 And, in majestic taciturnity, 
 
 Refraining her illimitable scorn. 
 
 IF Mr. William Watson, as is alleged, were inspired by 
 a cat to the writing of these lines on the genius of the 
 East, it was undoubtedly a Persian cat a cat whose ances- 
 tors had " heard the East a calling," who, though she had 
 accepted the beef and mutton of England, the salmon and 
 sardines, the cow's milk and Brussels carpets, together with 
 the damp, the draughts, the precarious weather, the society 
 of her short-haired cousins, had done so with " majestic 
 taciturnity, refraining her illimitable scorn." 
 
 266
 
 THE MOSLEM FAITH IN JERUSALEM 
 
 The East is courteous, too courteous, as well as " too 
 proud for protest or assent, when new thoughts thunder at 
 her massy door." She passes the palm of her right hand 
 over the palm of her left ; the palm of her left over the palm 
 of her right, and says, " Maktub " " It is decreed." The 
 West " gives voice to our adventurous hopes." She closes 
 dreamy eyes, and murmurs, " Inshallah " " If God will." 
 We lay at her feet our mutations and unrest, our achieve- 
 ments and desires, our dreams, our loves, our hopes. To 
 India we bring a civilization which is barbarism compared 
 to her own in ages before we came into existence ; to Syria, 
 the religion which was hers while we were burning human 
 sacrifices and dressing in blue paint ; to Egypt, education 
 and politics, which are child's play to the memories of 
 sphinx and pyramid ; and, " with another brain dreaming 
 another dream, another heart recalling other loves," she 
 awakens for one moment's contemplation of our offerings, 
 and " reposeful, patient, undemonstrative," above all 
 " enigmatically sage," looking it may be " doom on all the 
 fever of the Occident," barely changing her attitude, "re- 
 cumbent on her own antiquity," she asks only, " Ana 
 aalam ? Allah yaalam." " Do I know ? God knows." 
 
 It is the attitude of Orientalism, above all of Islam, the 
 religion of which the name signifies the resigning or devoting 
 one's self, on the theory that the devotion be entirely to 
 God and to His service. The ostrich, says the Oriental, 
 is the symbol of faith ; she hatches her eggs x by expec- 
 tantly looking upon them. " Everything comes to him who 
 waits," is assuredly the motto of the East ; she is " the 
 brooding mother of an unfilial world." 
 
 " The East," says Disraeli, " is a career." It is not, as 
 the tourist supposes, a museum of antiquities through which 
 to scamper, Baedeker in hand. Jerusalem is not to be under- 
 stood in the course of a " pious picnic," or other personally 
 
 1 The churches of the Greeks and Armenians are commonly decor- 
 ated with eggs as a sacred symbol. 
 
 267
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 conducted tour, still less in the prejudiced purview of a Pro- 
 testant crusade. 
 
 " A horror of the common groove, of the cab-shafts of 
 civilization, of the contamination of cities, of the vulgarities 
 of life, takes its hold of me," writes Lady Burton ; " and 
 I yearn for the desert to recover the purity of my mind, and 
 the dignity of human nature, to be regenerated among 
 the Arabs." 
 
 It may be a dream, a farce, a pose, a vision born of self- 
 suggestion, a hypnotization, what you will ; but only in 
 some such mood, the mood of patience, of detachment, the 
 mood of the poet who makes, not of the critic who destroys, 
 can one approximate, however faintly, to that sympathy 
 which alone is understanding of the East. 
 
 The East, so far as one knows it here, is mainly the 
 East of Islam. The sons of Isaac, through " the long 
 cruel night in Jewry which coincides with the Christian era," * 
 have lost, with much else, something of their Orientalism ; 
 the sons of Ishmael alone, save those few who have some 
 modern veneer of Christianity, 2 are all children of the desert 
 still. To us of other dreams, Islam makes, and seeks to 
 make, no appeal ; it is a faith which contains none of such 
 elements as the cynic conventionally supposes to be, in vary- 
 ing degrees, essential to the spiritual pabulum of the Western 
 soul. 
 
 What is it which, with Paganism, Judaism, Christianity 
 before them for alternative, attracted that little group of 
 Eastern thinkers who are the ancestors of the two hundred 
 millions of our fellow-creatures, whose creed is " resignation 
 to the will of the One God " ? incomparably the largest 
 band of adherents to any one creed in the entire human race 
 and in the course of human history ? 
 
 It is not that influence of priestcraft by which the Pro- 
 testant accounts for the existence of the Catholic, Roman or 
 
 1 Zangwill. Children of the Ghetto. 
 
 2 The Syrians, be it remembered, are not Arab. 
 
 268
 
 THE MOSLEM FAITH IN JERUSALEM 
 
 Anglican, for they have no priests, no sacerdotalism what- 
 ever ; it is not the " religion-made-easy " by which the 
 Catholic accounts for the Protestant, for they pray, men, and 
 often women, five times a day, and abstain from all food 
 from dawn to sunset thirty consecutive days in the year. 
 It is not that the absence of ecclesiasticism lightens the cost 
 of religion, for they must give a definite share of all posses- 
 sions to the poor, and a tenth of the margin that is left. It 
 is not that idle repose in hereditary conservatism which 
 satisfies the mere Sunday church-goer, for is it not written : 
 
 " It is not righteousness that ye turn your faces in prayer 
 towards the East and the West, but righteousness is of him who 
 believeth in God and the Last Day, and the angels, and the 
 Scriptures, and the prophets, who giveth money for God's sake 
 . . . who is constant at prayer, and giveth alms, and of 
 those who perform their covenant . . . and who behave them- 
 selves patiently in adversity, and hardships, and in time of 
 violence : these are they who are true and fear God" EL 
 KORAN, c. ii. 
 
 It is not the sensuousness of which the colder North 
 accuses the votary of Ultramontanism, for they have neither 
 music nor incense ; they have no Sacraments ; no vestments ; 
 they are even commanded to come before God in simple 
 clothing, for Islam has a special blessing for those who are 
 poor in spirit. It is not that fear of public opinion which 
 is the temptation of those who " assemble themselves to- 
 gether," for their religion is individual, its ritual independ- 
 dent of place. At the hour of prayer the Moslem ceases 
 from his occupation as the devout Catholic at sound of the 
 Angelus, makes the necessary ablutions, and, turning his face 
 towards Mecca, offers his praise to " the All-Compassionate, 
 the All-Merciful." It is not the easy-going irreverence 
 which so often accompanies a lack of ritual, for none may 
 come into the presence of God nor even touch the Sacred 
 Book without due ablution, for " the practice of religion is 
 founded on cleanliness, which is the one half of the faith, 
 
 269
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 and the key of prayer, without which it will not be heard by 
 God. 1 " It is not the human yearning for certainty, for 
 dogma ; for the whole faith is involved in the unity of God 
 and submission to His will ; on the other hand, it is not the 
 carelessness of living which lack of dogma facilitates, for it 
 is a creed of works as well as faith, of rewards and punish- 
 ments, of the futility of a death-bed repentance. 
 
 " No repentance shall be accepted from those who do evil until 
 the time when death presenteth itself unto one of them, and he 
 saith verily, I repent now ; nor unto those who die unbelievers ; 
 for them nave we prepared a grievous punishment" EL 
 KORAN, chap. iv. 
 
 \ It is not that it makes easy the conditions of the religious 
 life, for it is not too much to say that the teaching of the 
 Koran comprises not only all the Commandments, but the 
 spirit of all the Beatitudes. It is not individual irresponsi- 
 bility, for their creed teaches no absolution, no propitiation, 
 no atonement, no doctrine of the fall, no mitigation of sin 
 by hereditary taint. " All men have sinned, but it has been 
 each his own fault, acting independently and not because 
 of anything antecedent." 2 It is not, as superficial readers 
 of the Koran have alleged, that they are promised a Para- 
 dise of material pleasures only. After describing these, we 
 are told that there are prepared, beside all this, " such feelings 
 as eye hath not seen, nor hath ear heard, nor hath it entered 
 into the heart of man to conceive . . . that he will be in the 
 highest honour with God, that shall behold His face . . . 
 that all other pleasures of Paradise will be forgotten and 
 lightly esteemed, and not without reason, since every other 
 enjoyment is equally tasted by the very brute beast who is 
 turned loose into luxuriant pasture." 3 
 
 It is not even, as commonly alleged, laxity of morals, 
 
 1 Sale's Koran : Preliminary Discourse, sec. iv. 
 
 2 Sir William Muir, The Kordn, in series of Non-Christian Re- 
 ligion-Systems, p. 54. 
 
 3 Sale's Kordn : Preliminary Discourse, sec. iv. 
 
 270
 
 THE MOSLEM FAITH IN JERUSALEM 
 
 for although usury and betting and drink and " the social 
 evil " are found in the East, as elsewhere, it is as a rule the 
 Jew and the Christian by whom they have been introduced, 
 and by whom they are supported. The long neglected 
 Jewish law that the woman of evil life shall be stoned is still 
 active in Islam. The Christian Government of the British 
 Empire may legalize her existence, and organize her rela- 
 tions with our armies ; the disciples of Moses may trade and 
 traffic in human bodies and souls ; but the poorest peasant 
 among the Mohammedans takes the life of the daughter who 
 has lost her virtue, and swears an eternal blood-feud against 
 him who has done her wrong. 
 
 Polygamy, urges the bigot, with his usual lack of informa- 
 tion, polygamy, with all its laxity, is the mask for Moslem 
 immorality. That Mohammed (himself faithful for twenty- 
 five years to one wife, though in old age he unhappily 
 declined from his own standard), in reforming the example 
 of the Old Testament saints, then still in vogue among the 
 children of Ishmael, did not venture upon further severity 
 than the limit of four wives, is to be regretted ; but as a 
 matter of fact, at least in Syria, the possession of more than 
 one wife is, except among the lowest classes, increasingly 
 rare. Personally we have not met with a single instance, 
 though such undoubtedly exist. That immoral relations 
 with slaves formerly existed, 1 is unfortunately as true as that 
 they existed among our own Christian brethren until the 
 suppression of the slave-trade in 1833. That divorce is easy 
 among Mohammedans is as unhappily true as that it is easy 
 in many Christian countries, including England, where, how- 
 ever, it is more expensive, and therefore the privilege mainly 
 
 1 Sir William Muir points out that the prophet himself always 
 released his slaves, and that his relations with his domestic servants 
 were so friendly that he mentions some fourteen or fifteen of them 
 by name. " They are the servants of the Lord," he wrote of the 
 slaves, " and are not to be tormented." It is related that in honour 
 of the prophet's sixty-third birthday, sixty-three slaves were set 
 free. 
 
 271
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 of the upper classes. I appeal again to the erudition and 
 experience of Sir William Muir. 
 
 " The comparison of Christian with Mohammedan ethics 
 is not altogether free from difficulty. The Moslem advocate 
 will urge the precedent of Jewish polygamy, and also the 
 social evils which he will assert to be the necessary result of 
 inexorable monogamy. The Koran not only denounces any 
 illicit laxity between the sexes in the severest terms, but 
 exposes the transgressor to condign punishment. For this 
 reason, and because the conditions of what is illicit are so 
 accommodating and wide, a certain negative virtue (it can 
 hardly be called continence or chastity) pervades Moham- 
 medan society, in contrast with which the gross and syste- 
 matic immorality of every European community may be 
 regarded by the Christian with shame and confusion. In 
 a purely Mohammedan country, however low may be the 
 general level of moral feeling, the still lower depths of fallen 
 humanity are comparatively unknown. The social evil and 
 intemperance, prevalent in Christian lands, are the strongest 
 weapons in the armoury of Islam. We point, and justly, to 
 the higher morality and civilization of those who do observe 
 the precepts of the Gospel, to the stricter unity and virtue 
 which cement the family, and to the elevation of the sex ; 
 but in vain, while the example of our great cities, and too 
 often of our representatives abroad, belies the argument." 
 
 And so, while we sing " they call us to deliver their land 
 from error's chain," let us realize that here, in Moslem cities, 
 we may send out our youngest maid with no further caution 
 than not to get her pocket picked ; we may take a cab, 
 certain that our driver, unless he be a Christian, will not be 
 drunk. We have no fear that our lads will take to racing 
 or gambling! unless it be among the Christian tourists of 
 places such as Cairo, or the British Government officials 
 farther East ; we may take a stroll by moonlight, certain that 
 
 1 Sir William Muir, The Koran : its Composition and Teaching, 
 p. 62. 
 
 272
 
 THE MOSLEM FAITH IN JERUSALEM 
 
 our eyes will not be offended by such sights as the most care- 
 fully protected of our daughters is familiar with in the 
 Strand or Piccadilly ; * that we shall not even interrupt the 
 osculation of avowed and legitimate sweethearts, nor find 
 the gardener with his arm round the housemaid's waist ; that 
 here lasses dress carefully for love of pretty things, and 
 laugh because they are young and merry ; that there is no 
 ogling and no giggling and no loitering at street corners, for 
 'Arry and 'Arriet are not. To be " as drunk as a lord " is 
 no part of the ambition of even the most idle and the most 
 unworthy, and the poorest girl carries herself with the 
 dignity which, before the invasion of the nouveau riche, 
 was supposed, among Europeans, to be the speciality of 
 the duchess. With ourselves for example of all 
 Christian charity, of brotherly love, of morality of life, 
 for all contrast with a creed which makes such demands 
 upon its votaries as theirs ; with a religion of which its 
 adherents are not so modern as to be ashamed ; with a social 
 system free from all which we habitually summarize as 
 " vice," one can hardly wonder that the statistics of con- 
 version are less encouraging than the readers of religioua 
 journals are commonly led to suppose. 
 
 Though the history of Islam is familiar to most, it may be 
 well to remind ourselves briefly of such of its essential 
 features as continue to influence the Moslem in the Jeru- 
 salem of to-day. 
 
 Mohammed, the son of Amina and Abdallah, was born at 
 Mecca about 570 A.D. ; of the family of Hashim, of the 
 tribe Koreish ; hereditary custodians of the Kaaba, the 
 sacred stone which stands to the descendants of Ishmael 
 in the same relation as the Ark of the Covenant to the 
 
 1 Lady Strangford has well said (Preface to Stirring Times), " In 
 an annual volume of the Rescue Society of London it may be truly 
 said there are more sorrowful horrors detailed as happening in the 
 heart of our civilized capital than in ten years of Turkish provincial 
 history." 
 
 273 T
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 descendants of Isaac ; the centre of their traditions, the 
 essential cause of their most sacred edifice. 
 
 Like his ancestors, Mohammed kept sheep and drove 
 camels. Early left an orphan, and obliged to earn his own 
 living, he followed a trading caravan to Syria at the age of 
 twelve. At twenty-five he went thither again, and on his 
 return married his employer, a lady of higher rank than 
 his own, but considerably his senior, 1 in whose society he 
 practised all the domestic virtues. After her death, 
 twenty-five years later, when he had reached the mature 
 age of fifty-four, and fourteen years after the commence- 
 ment of his mission, he deteriorated in this direction. 
 
 It was not until forty years of age that he became con- 
 scious of a mission, although many of his utterances, now 
 included in the Koran, may belong to an earlier period ; 
 as, for example, the Fdtihat, which, from its frequent use 
 in public and private worship, may be said to be, to the 
 Mohammedan, what the Lord's Prayer is to the Christian : 
 
 Praise be to God, the Lord of Creation, 
 
 The All-Merciful, the All-Compassionate ; 
 
 Ruler of the Day of reckoning, 
 
 Thee we worship, and Thee we invokejior help. 
 
 Lead us in the straight path 
 
 The path of those upon whom Thou hast been gracious, 
 
 Not of those that are the objects of wrath or that are in error. 
 
 As in other religions, women were among the earliest 
 converts, and for the first five years of Mohammed's mission 
 few beside would hearken to his message ; the world then, as 
 in all ages, being ready to scoff at what it failed to under- 
 stand ; to treat as a charlatan the man whose limitations 
 were fewer than its own. The world has always its " This 
 will never do " for the genius who transcends, in what- 
 
 1 It is worthy of remark, however, that in enumerating the joys 
 of heaven, Mohammed again and again promises to the faithful, 
 wives " of the same age," and that when he induces his friend Zaid 
 to espouse a lady considerably his senior, he promises him paradise 
 as a compensation. 
 
 274
 
 THE MOSLEM FAITH IN JERUSALEM 
 
 ever direction, the petty limitations of conventionality. 
 Mohammed's " revelations " did not spare such as these. 
 
 Because he is to Our Signs an adversary, 
 
 I will afflict him with fierce calamity ; 
 
 For he imagined and devised mischief in his heart. 
 
 May he be damned ! how he devised ! 
 
 Again may he be damned ! how he devised^! 
 
 Then he looked, 
 
 Then he frowned and scowled ; 
 
 Then he turned his back and looked contemptuously ; 
 
 And he said, Verily this is nothing but Magic that will be wrought, 
 
 Verily this is no other than the speech of a mortal. 
 
 Truly, the Oriental, from the Psalmist onwards, has 
 known how to curse ! 
 
 " The teaching of the Goran," says Sir William Muir, 1 
 "is up to this stage very simple. Belief in the Unity of 
 God, and in Mahomet 2 as His messenger, in the resurrec- 
 tion of the dead, and retribution of the good and evil, are 
 perhaps the sole doctrines insisted upon ; and the only 
 duties to be observed^ prayer and charity and honesty in 
 weights and measures, truthfulness in testimony, chastity 
 and the faithful observance of covenants." 
 
 Perhaps no feature of the Mohammedan faith strikes 
 one in Jerusalem as more pleasing than its note of " Live 
 and let live." You may constantly see the Bible among 
 other specimens of the European literature which the pre- 
 sent, and still more the rising, generation are learning to 
 value so highly. In their desire for education they are 
 equally ready to attend the schools of the Latin or Anglican 
 according as they desire to cultivate the French of the 
 Freres Chretiens or the English of the Bishop's school. 
 Latterly, many, including the son of the Pasha, have 
 attended the admirable schools of the Alliance Israelite 
 the French Society for the Advancement of the Jews. If they 
 
 1 Life of Mahomet : from original sources, p. 79, ed. 1878. 
 
 2 Sir William Muir always uses the transliteration Mahomet and 
 Coran. 
 
 275
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 show any misgiving as to our study of the Koran, it is only 
 lest we may defile it by " unwashen hands." Sir William 
 Muir has written a valuable treatise * to show "that un- 
 equivocal testimony is borne by the Goran to the Jewish 
 and Christian Scriptures as current in the time of Mahomet ; 
 that the evidence extends equally to their genuineness and 
 authority ; and that there is not a hint anywhere through- 
 out the Goran of their cancelment or interpolation . . . 
 No expression regarding either the Jewish or Christian 
 Scriptures ever escaped the lips of Mahomet other than 
 of implicit reverence, although he taught that the Goran 
 contained everything necessary " x (op. cit. p. 157). 
 " Verily in this book are contained sufficient means 
 of salvation unto people who serve God" (Sura xxi.). 
 Our learned author goes further : he shows us that the 
 same bigotry and lack of charity which is the present cause 
 of our unhappy divisions, the multiplication of sects, and 
 propagation of schisms, was practically the cause of the 
 de-Christianizing of the faith of Mohammed the ultimate 
 alienation of two hundred and odd millions of our fellow- 
 creatures, a number said to be on the increase. 
 
 " It was the opposition of the Jews and estrangement of 
 the Christians, as well as the martial supremacy of Islam, 
 that imperceptibly, but inevitably, led to the universal and 
 exclusive authority of Mahomet and the Goran. The 
 change by which the prophet dispensed with previous reve- 
 lation was made in silence " (op. cit- p. 157). 
 
 Before the alienation caused by " Jewish opposition and 
 Christian estrangement," his policy had been upon lines 
 which might have profoundly modified the whole of human 
 history which might have hastened " the one fold under 
 one Shepherd " for which the world still waits, but of which 
 at present, it would seem, it is not worthy. 
 
 " The Jew was still to follow the Law ; and in addition 
 
 1 The Testimony borne by the Koran to the Jeivish and Christian 
 Scriptures. 
 
 276
 
 THE MOSLEM FAITH IN JERUSALEM 
 
 he was to believe also in the New Testament and in the 
 mission of Jesus. The Christian was to hold fast by his 
 Gospel. . . . The necessity of conforming to their respec- 
 tive Revelations is urged upon Jews and Christians in the 
 strongest terms. The Jews of Medina are repeatedly sum- 
 moned to judge by the Book, that is, by the Old Testament ; 
 and are warned against the danger of accepting a part only 
 of God's Word, and rejecting a part ; there are many pas- 
 sages such as the following : 
 
 " Oh ye people of the Book ! (the Jews) ye do not stand upon 
 any sure ground^ until ye set up both the Law and the Gospel, as 
 well as that which hath been sent down unto you from your Lord 
 . . . And we caused Jesus, the Son of Mary, to follow in their 
 footsteps, attesting the Scripture, viz. the Law which preceded 
 Him. And we gave Him the Gospel, wherein are guidance and 
 light, attesting the Law which precedeth it, a direction and an 
 admonition to the pious : and that the people of the Gospel 
 (Christians) may judge according to that which God hath re- 
 vealed therein ; and whosoever doth not judge according to that 
 which God hath revealed, they are the wicked ones." 
 
 " Thus," observes Sir William Muir," the former revela- 
 tions were to be believed in coUectively as the Word of God 
 by all the faithful of whatever sect. 1 The Old and New 
 Testaments were further to be followed implicitly, the former 
 by the Jews, the latter by the Christians, and both were to 
 be observed by Mahomet himself when determining their 
 respective disputes" (op. cit. p. 156). 
 
 The world was lying in wickedness in the sixth century as 
 in others, and one cannot but regret the " Jewish opposition 
 and Christian estrangement " which diverted into alien 
 channels the sweet reasonableness of teaching such as this. 
 Again, to quote Sir Wiliam Muir, " from time beyond 
 
 1 A distinguished Jerusalem Moslem observed to us the other 
 day that although he desired the success of the Japanese arms 
 he must not pray for an idolatrous people against those who 
 worshipped the One God. Ts it with as wide a charity that we 
 pray for " Jews, Turks, Heretics, and Infidels ? " 
 
 277
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 memory, Mecca and the whole peninsula had been steeped 
 in spiritual torpor. The slight and transient influences of 
 Judaism, Christianity, or philosophical inquiry upon the 
 Arab mind had been but as the ruffling here and there of the 
 surface of a quiet lake ; all remained still and motionless 
 below. The people were sunk in superstition, cruelty and 
 vice. Their religion was a gross idolatry, and their faith 
 rather the dark superstitious dread of unseen beings, whose 
 goodwill they sought to propitiate and whose displeasure to 
 avert, than the belief in an over-ruling Providence. The 
 life to come and retribution of good and evil were, as motives 
 of action, practically unknown " (op. cit. p. 169). 
 
 What was the teaching of the prophet we have already 
 seen ; we refer again to Sir William Muir for a description 
 of its effects. " What a change has thirteen years pro- 
 duced ! A band of several hundred persons had rejected 
 idolatry, adopted the worship of one God, and surrendered 
 themselves implicitly to the guidance of what they believed 
 a revelation from Him ; praying to the Almighty with fre- 
 quency and fervour, looking for pardon through His mercy, 
 and striving to follow after good works, almsgiving, chastity 
 and justice. They now lived under a constant sense of the 
 omnipotent power of God, and of His providential care over 
 the minutest of their concerns. In all the gifts of nature, 
 in every relation of life, at each turn of their affairs, indivi- 
 vidual or public, they saw His hand " (op. cit. p. 169). 
 
 For this faith they suffered exile and martyrdom, aliena- 
 tion of friends, the spoiling of their goods. " Oh, son of Awf," 
 said the prophet to a rich man, " verily thou art amongst the 
 rich, and thou shalt not enter Paradise but with great difficulty. 
 Lend therefore to thy Lord, so that He may loosen thy steps." 
 And he departed by Mohammed's advice to give away all his 
 property. 1 It is one among many instances of the reason- 
 
 1 The prophet taught that the poor would enter Paradise 500 years 
 before the rich, and said that when he himself went thither he saw 
 that they formed the majority of the inhabitants. 
 
 278
 
 THE MOSLEM FAITH IN JERUSALEM 
 
 ableness of the prophet's teaching, that he sent for him again, 
 and told him, by Gabriel's desire, that it would suffice if he 
 used hospitality and gave alms. 
 
 The more one is brought face to face with the subsequent 
 failure of the prophet to maintain, to the end, the high 
 standard of personal conduct which had impressed those 
 about him for twenty-five years, the more that one observes 
 the deterioration in practice of his followers, the lowered 
 ideals, the confusion of thought, the increasing tendency to 
 ecclecticism in doctrine, the widening estrangement from 
 Christianity the more one realizes that in the lives of 
 nations, as of man, " there is a turn " in their affairs which, 
 once missed, can never be recovered ; so much the more one 
 is tempted to speculate as to what might have been the 
 effect upon the history of the larger half of the population 
 of the world had Christian toleration and Christian charity 
 been more active and more Christ-like thirteen centuries 
 ago. 
 
 The overtures of rapprochement, once repelled, were never 
 again attempted after the Mecca period, i.e. after the thir- 
 teen years of the prophet's mission immediately preceding 
 the Hegira. 1 The Koran contains many passages referring 
 to the history and teaching of the New Testament, as, for 
 example, the story of the birth of St. John Baptist, and 
 that of the birth of our Lord ; the first being for the most 
 part almost in the words of St. Luke, the latter containing 
 such variations as constantly arise in any story orally pre- 
 served. There are references to our Lord's miracles, to the 
 healing of the leprous and the blind, and of the raising from 
 the dead. Jesus Christ is spoken of as " the Word of God," 
 and as " His Spirit, which He breathed into Mary." 
 
 " Ye people of the Book ! (the Jews] commit not extrava- 
 gances in your religion ; and speak not of God aught but the 
 
 1 The English reader may be glad to learn that this word, meaning 
 " emigration," is pronounced with a soft g and with the accent on 
 the first syllable. 
 
 279
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 truth. For verily the Messiah Jesus, Son of Mary, is an 
 Apostle of God, which He placed in Mary, and a Spirit from 
 Him " (Sura 4, Koran). 
 
 Mohammed makes no reference to the Sacrament of Bap- 
 tism ; he misunderstands the doctrine of the Trinity, which 
 was supposed to include the " Mother of Jesus " ; he taught 
 that Jesus was not crucified, but that another had died in 
 His likeness, and he but imperfectly apprehended the Sacra- 
 ment of the Eucharist. 
 
 " When the Apostles of Jesus said, Jesus, Son of Mary, 
 is Thy Lord able to cause a Table to descend upon us from 
 Heaven ? He said, Fear God, if ye be faithful. They said, 
 We desire that we may eat therefrom, and that our hearts be set 
 at ease, and that we may knoiv that Thou verily hast spoken 
 unto us the truth, and that we may be witnesses thereof. Then 
 spake Jesus, Son of Mary. God our Lord ! send down unto 
 us a Table from Heaven, that it may be unto us a Feast-day 
 unto the first of us and unto the last of us, and a sign from Thee ; 
 and nourish us, for Thou art the best of nourishers. And God 
 said, Verily I will send it down unto you ; and whosoever after 
 that shall disbelieve amongst you, surely I will torment him 
 with a torment wherewith I shall not torment any other creature " 
 EL KORAN, chap. v. 
 
 The example of " Mary, Mother of Jesus," is quoted for 
 the imitation of women (Sura, p. 66), who are to be " sub- 
 missive unto God, believers, pious, repentant, devout, fasting," 
 and in many respects Islamism did much to improve their 
 position, though naturally it retained, in many things, the 
 standard of the period, Christian and pagan alike. " If we 
 put aside the depressing influence which the constraint and 
 thraldom of the married state has exercised upon the sex at 
 large, the unmarried freewoman has nothing to complain 
 of. In one particular, viz., the inheritance by the son of his 
 father's wives, she was delivered by Mohammed from a gross 
 and intolerable abuse. No freewoman can be forced, under 
 the code of Islam, to marry against her will ; and so long as 
 
 280
 
 THE MOSLEM FAITH IN JERUSALEM 
 
 single she is mistress of her actions " (Muir, op. cit. p. 347). 
 
 There is a superstition among Christians that Moslem 
 women have no part in religious privileges and obligations, 
 and no hope of a future life. Not only is such an idea at 
 variance with the whole tenor of their teaching, but it is 
 definitely contradicted by express passages in the Koran. 1 
 Several Moslem ladies have assured us that they always pray 
 at the canonical hours, that is, five times a day, and seemed 
 surprised, not to say hurt, that we should think it possible 
 they should do otherwise. In one household where we were 
 visiting we expressed a desire to see a real Mohammedan 
 rosary, 2 such as is used for prayer, as distinct from the muti- 
 lated toy consisting of thirty-three beads, only one-third of 
 the authorized number, which all Mohammedan, and most 
 Christian, Arabs are constantly handling at leisure moments 
 " perles pour s'amuser," said one, when we asked its use. 
 " My mother has one," said our host, just as naturally as 
 most young Englishmen would turn to their mothers for, let 
 us say, a copy of S. Thomas a Kempis, or The Christian Year. 
 
 " Women without souls," says Lady Burton, " may be 
 Christian, not Moslem. Thomas Aquinas may have adopted 
 Aristotle's ' mulier est erratum naturae et suas occasionatas et 
 per accidens generatur, atque ideo est monstrum.' We do not 
 go down amongst the men, but have a tribune with a grating, 
 the same as we have in Catholic convents. It is only a 
 
 1 See Koran, chaps. 3, 4, 13, 16, 40, 48, 57, etc. 
 
 2 The Moslem rosary is intended to contribute not to prayer but 
 to meditation. The ninety -nine beads in their three sections are so 
 many reminders of the attributes of God ; the hundredth, which is of 
 a long shape, roughly that of a minaret, is for " reminder," and 
 serves, in its way, the purpose of the Muezzin. It is a call to prayer. 
 The attributes are all expressed in one word, such as Compassionate, 
 Saviour, Defender, Creator. Sometimes, however, such words are 
 untranslatable into our less comprehensive language, and one falls 
 back upon whole phrases " O Thou who wilt assemble us in the day 
 of Judgement," " O Author of the Resurrection," " O Thou 
 to Whom nothing is impossible," " O Thou who dost accept our 
 repentance " and the like. 
 
 281
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 belief among the vulgar and ignorant that the Moslem allows 
 women no souls. The women go to Es Salat (that is, the five 
 periods of prayer) and perform the same Rekat (i.e. prostra- 
 tions) and make the same genuflexions as the men, only un- 
 seen." 
 
 Women also keep the thirty days' fast of Ramadan, 1 when 
 neither food nor drink is taken from dawn to sunset. We 
 happened once to meet a large number of Moslem ladies 
 at an evening entertainment during Ramadan, and 
 could not but notice how much they ate and drank (it 
 was only cake and coffee and sweet syrups !), and how many 
 cigarettes they smoked ; but how should we ourselves behave 
 at an " At Home " if we had eaten nothing since yesterday's 
 dinner ; if, moreover, we were released from the criticism 
 of the other sex, who might have reported at their clubs how 
 many times " Miss So-and-So " went down to the supper 
 room ; and if, moreover, we had carried on our usual occupa- 
 tions in the meanwhile ? for it is commonly understood that 
 absolutely no grace is allowed in consideration of the fast. 
 Two of the ladies present were even nursing mothers, 2 and 
 the nurses in attendance from time to time brought up neat 
 little tight white parcels (nothing so lax as " bundles " or 
 " packets," but tidy little parcels) for maternal services. 
 How many English women would be capable of keeping Lent 
 by an absolute fast from dawn to sunset and attendance 
 at five offices a day ? How many laymen ? How many 
 priests ? Business goes on just as usual : the magistrate is 
 on his bench, the tradesman in his shop, the children at 
 school, the soldier or policeman at his post. Moreover, one 
 must remember that these are Arabs, to whom frequent 
 coffee and cigarettes, and among the older men the long 
 continuous sedative of the narghileh, are almost more neces- 
 sary than fresh air. 
 
 1 The month when the Koran was given to mankind. 
 
 2 It should, however, be noted that " dispensation " is given to 
 travellers, sick persons (which includes all whose health might suffer, 
 such as nursing or expectant mothers), old people, and young children. 
 
 282
 
 THE MOSLEM FAITH IN JERUSALEM 
 
 We have seen the Arab soldiers, the Turkish officers, 
 almost fainting at their posts in the vitiated atmosphere of 
 the Christian churches, when they were keeping the peace 
 among those * to whom, at least among the laity, the virtue 
 of fasting in any such sense as theirs is practically unknown, 
 and yet always courteous, always long-suffering, though we 
 might almost hold them justified for any irritability and 
 impatience of the kind for which " nervous exhaustion " is 
 considered an excuse. Happily, the Christian festival can- 
 not often synchronize with the Moslem fast, as the use by the 
 Mohammedans of the lunar month, changes the period of its 
 occurrence by about a month every year. It is trying when 
 the fast occurs during the exhausting heat of summer, or, 
 as happens once in thirteen years, when the fast occurs twice 
 in a single year. 
 
 The Mohammedan is something of a Puritan, and his 
 iconoclasm exceeds even theirs. Tradition says that 
 when the prophet purified the Temple of the Kaaba 
 of the 360 idols which it contained, he sent a crier through 
 the streets of Mecca to proclaim : " Whoever believeth in God, 
 and in the day of Judgement, let him not leave in his house any 
 image whatever, that he doth not break in pieces." Probably 
 so extreme a measure was necessary to the times, just as the 
 utter destruction of heathen associations had been necessary 
 in the times of Moses and Joshua, and may have gone far to 
 destroy polytheism ; but it has had lamentable consequences 
 in the persistent mutilation by the Arab peasants, even of to- 
 day, of all images of man or beast found in tomb or temple, 
 
 1 The author of Six Months in Jerusalem (Rev. Charles Biggs, M. A.) 
 observes : " Ancestral traditions must be taken into account if the 
 modern missionaries to Islam are to succeed. Some part, at least, 
 of the failure of Protestant efforts has been due to carelessness and 
 want of courtesy . . . Nor is it surprising that men, who in Ramadan 
 will live on one meal in each twenty-four hours, should question the 
 spirituality of a religion whose missionaries are never seen to mark 
 any day or season with the denial of physical appetite." 
 
 283
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 sculpture or mosaic, and thus in many a loss, serious to art 
 and archaeology. 
 
 One is, in these days, frequently told that the Moslem is so 
 far deteriorating that he does not obey the precepts of his 
 own religion, but is occasionally guilty of drinking wine. As 
 a matter of fact, commentators consider it doubtful whether 
 the Koran contains any such absolute prohibition, though 
 there are various precepts, such as the following : 
 
 " They will ask thee concerning wine, and casting of lots. 
 Say, in both there is great evil, and (also) advantages to man- 
 kind ; but the evil of them is greater than the advantages of 
 them" ; and again 
 
 " Verily, wine and the casting of lots, and images and 
 divining arrows, are an abomination from amongst the works 
 of Satan : shun them therefore, that ye may prosper" 
 
 " Verily, Satan seeketh that he may cast among you enmity 
 and hatred through wine and games of chance, and hinder you 
 from the remembrance of God, and from prayer. Will ye not 
 then refrain ? EL KORAN, chap. ii. 
 
 The larger proportion no doubt refrain from wine, and 
 although chess, draughts, cards, backgammon and tric-trac 
 are played at every street corner in Jerusalem, doubtless 
 many of the players are Christians, for in Ramallah, an 
 entirely Christian village, possessed by some half-dozen 
 sects, we have counted a dozen groups of men playing cards 
 and dice by the roadside in the course of a quarter of an 
 hour's walk. Usury is absolutely forbidden, and strict 
 Mohammedans will not even bank their money, but prefer 
 to invest it in building. Their houses are picturesque, and 
 exceedingly well built, and the English missionaries, the 
 only settlers in Jerusalem who, unlike all other religious 
 bodies, Greek, Latin, Anglican, or Protestant, do not live 
 in community, but on the far more costly plan of separate 
 houses, are obliged to rent them almost entirely from 
 Moslems, other bodies being established in suitable premises 
 which are their own property. 
 
 284
 
 Tin; CAFK OK :IIE To\vx.
 
 THE MOSLEM FAITH IN JERUSALEM 
 
 The prophet not only recommended, but himself practised, 
 poverty ; and Ayesha, his young wife, who long survived him, 
 relates that for months together he did not get a full meal, 
 but would live on the " two black things," dates and water. 
 He would also go without light or fire. But such sacrifice, 
 to be acceptable, must be deliberate, and not spendthrift. 
 " Give unto him who is of kin to you his due, and also unto the 
 poor, and the traveller. And waste not thy substance profusely, 
 for the profuse are brethren of the devils, and the devil was un- 
 grateful unto his Lord" EL KORAN, chap. xvii. 
 
 He considered the silk clothing, commonly worn, as effemi- 
 nate, and desired that women should be modestly dressed. 
 " Speak unto thy wives and daughters and the wives of the 
 believers, that they throw around them a part of their mantles 
 . . . Speak unto the believing women that they restrain their 
 eyes . . . and display not their ornaments" EL KORAN, 
 chap. xxiv. In spite of such asceticism, the prophet was 
 fastidious ; he delighted in sweet scents, and hated onions 
 or garlic, and he washed his hands in a decoction of the wild 
 palm tree ; he was also very particular in the care of his 
 hair, eyes and teeth. 
 
 The theory of sacrifice seems to have been associated less 
 with the idea of atonement than of charity. To this day, 
 when an animal is vowed to God, 1 it is that it may be given 
 as food to the poor. 
 
 " Unto every people we have appointed rites that they may 
 commemorate the Name of God over the brute beasts with which 
 He hath provided them . . . and the victims have we made unto 
 you as ordinances of God. From them ye receive benefit. 
 Commemorate therefore the name of God over them a-s they stand 
 disposed in a line, and when they fall slain upon their sides 
 eat thereof, and give unto the poor, both to him that is silent 
 and him that beggeth. Thus have we given thee dominion over 
 
 1 As for recovery from illness, for a safe return from a journey, for 
 the birth of a son, all such cases have come under our personal 
 notice in Jerusalem. 
 
 285
 
 them that ye may be thankful. Their flesh is not accepted of 
 God, nor yet their blood ; but your piety is accepted of Him." 
 EL KORAN, chap. xxii. 
 
 The sight of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of sheep and 
 lambs crowding into the gates of Jerusalem at the time of the 
 Feast of Beiram is horribly pathetic, for all are destined to 
 be sacrificed in memory of the sacrifice of the son of Abraham. 
 Probably however the average of such mortality is a low 
 one, as in an ordinary way the Arab is but little of a meat 
 eater. It is well known that his beautiful white teeth soon 
 deteriorate in domestic service from the use of European 
 food, chiefly from exchange of his own nutritious whole- 
 meal bread for the adulterated innutritious substitutes of 
 civilization. 
 
 The charge of cruelty to animals is constantly brought 
 against the Moslem. Indifference to animal suffering is a 
 feature not of Islam, 1 but of Orientalism, and nowhere 
 have we remarked it as so prominent as in the largely 
 European and Christian town of Port Said. You may see 
 quite as much cruelty in any London thoroughfare, as many 
 homeless cats, overdriven horses, and, until recent legisla- 
 tion, starving dogs. 
 
 It is also a Christian superstition that the Mohammedan 
 regards the dog as unclean which here he would be almost 
 justified in doing, as they are the much needed scavengers 
 of Oriental cities but we are assured by various Moslems, 
 in justification of their owning them as pets and companions, 
 that it is only with the saliva of the dog that they are for- 
 bidden to come into contact. The Koran especially directs 
 that dogs should be trained for sport, and the Arab grey- 
 hound is one of the fleetest and most beautiful of his race. 
 (EL KORAN, chap, v.) 
 
 1 Ceremonial purity (i.e. the washing of the face, arms, head, feet 
 and ankles) is one of the " indispensable conditions " of prayer, five 
 times a day, and may not^be omitted if water is to be had, unless 
 " a man fears that he or his beast may remain waterless." 
 
 286
 
 THE MOSLEM FAITH IN JERUSALEM 
 
 The Moslems are more daring than most Christians in their 
 views as to the responsibility of the lower animals. " The 
 end of the Resurrection, the Mohammedans declare to be, 
 that they who are so raised may give an account of their 
 actions, and receive the reward thereof. And they believe 
 that not only mankind, but irrational animals also, shall be 
 judged on this great day ; when the unarmed cattle shall 
 take vengeance on the horned till entire satisfaction shall be 
 given to the injured." 1 (Will the fox and the hare, the 
 victim of the vivisectionist, the tortured and the starved, 
 take vengeance to the point of " entire satisfaction " upon 
 man ?) 
 
 Two animals at least are to be admitted into Paradise : 
 Ezra's ass who, having died beside his master, was with him 
 restored to life after 100 years (Sale's Koran : Preliminary 
 Discourse, section 4), and the dog of the Seven Sleepers 2 who 
 conveyed to them God's will in the words, " I love those 
 who are dear unto God ; go to sleep therefore and I will guard 
 you." The prophet gives us an analogy to our Lord's lesson 
 on God's care for the sparrows : " How many beasts are 
 there which provide not their food ! It is God Who provideth 
 food for them and you, and He both heareth and knoweth." 
 EL KORAN, chap. xxix. Mohammed draws lessons also from 
 the ant, the spider, the bee, the war-horse, the elephant, and 
 other animals, and often addresses God as " the Lord of all 
 creatures." 
 
 We all read in the schoolroom the story of the prophet's 
 cutting off a part of his robe rather than disturb the cat who 
 had gone to sleep upon it, and there are many stories of the 
 prophet's affection for his own animals ; of his horses, Sabek 
 (running water), named from the easiness of his paces ; 
 
 1 C. P. Bayle, Diet. Hist., Art. " Rorarious." 
 
 2 El Koran, Chap. 18. See Sale's note in loco. " The Mohammedans 
 have a great respect for this dog, and allow him a place in Paradise 
 with some other favourite brutes." They call him Katmir, and write 
 his name on letters sent to a distance as a charm against miscarriage. 
 
 287
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 Sabah, with whom he raced and won ; and Murtaji (the 
 neigher). Also he had a white mule which he gave to his 
 wife Ayesha ; another, Fizza, which he gave to a friend. 
 He disapproved of mules, and said, " No one would propose 
 so unnatural a cross save he who lacked knowledge." 
 He had two favourite asses and a riding camel named Adhba 
 of great speed. Yet one day an Arab passed it when 
 at its fleetest pace, and his Moslems were chagrined ; but 
 Mohammed reproved them, saying, " It is the property of the 
 Lord, that whensoever men exalt anything, or seek to exalt 
 it, that the Lord putteth down the same." He had also a 
 favourite milch camel, and Ayesha had one called Samra. 
 He had seven goats, and when his favourite among them 
 died he had the skin preserved as a remembrance. " There 
 is no house," he would say, " possessing a goat, but a bless- 
 ing abideth thereon, and there is no house possessing three 
 goats but the angels pass the night there praying for its 
 inmates until the morning." 
 
 It is said that among the Moslems there are thirty-two 
 Orders of Holy Men (Dervishes), although we can hear 
 of four only as existent in Jerusalem at the present time. 
 The most widespread are the Nashberidies, who, like the 
 " third order " in certain Christian communities, remain in 
 the world while observing the rules to which they have vowed 
 submission. Others, more rigid, live in greater seclusion, 
 and are apparently required to have a vocation, as they 
 undergo a novitiate of 1,001 days. The only properly 
 mendicant order is that of the Bektashies. 
 
 The rule against taking life, even that of a caterpillar, is 
 common to all Dervishes, and indeed an aversion to doing so 
 is general among Orientals. 
 
 A friend who had humanely drowned half a score of super- 
 fluous puppies, had occasion, later in the day, to reprove her 
 servant for neglecting to provide the mother, who was shut 
 up in charge of her remaining infant, with requisite food. 
 " You call me cruel that I make one dog hungry," he expos- 
 
 288
 
 THE MOSLEM FAITH IN JERUSALEM 
 
 tulated, " you who killed ten dogs this morning ! " There 
 is a custom called diyyet, by which, if a man kills a pariah 
 dog, the animal is hung up by its tail, and he is obliged to buy 
 as much wheat as will cover the body from the muzzle to the 
 tail, to be made into bread and given to the surviving com- 
 panions of his victim. It is, moreover, not unusual for a 
 Moslem on his death-bed to leave a sum of money for bread 
 for the same purpose, or, when in trouble, to make a vow to 
 devote a given sum to feeding the kilab (or wild dogs), and 
 it is pleasant here, where we hear so much of Mohammedan 
 cruelty and of hatred to the " unclean beast," to meet the 
 Moslem, followed by a servant carrying the votive offering, 
 which he is himself distributing among his suffering fellow- 
 creatures. 
 
 In passing a sentry-box, or guard-house, or watchman's 
 lodge, one constantly notices a prosperous cat established 
 comfortably upon the bed of the occupant, as a rule a Moslem 
 soldier in the Turkish army ; and it is said that a year or two 
 ago a serious disturbance was raised in a certain district by 
 the fact that a tax-gatherer or other official, billeted upon 
 the village, had insisted upon the killing of a pet lamb for 
 the gratification of his own appetite. The public feeling 
 upon the point was so greatly excited that not only was the 
 soldier imprisoned, but the custom of billeting him upon the 
 natives was discontinued by authority of the Government. 
 
 When Muir published his Life of Mahomet somewhere 
 about the year 1856 a reviewer made much of the fact that 
 though the author seemed little disposed to admit any 
 pretensions inconsistent with a firm and exclusive faith in 
 the Christian revelation, he nevertheless thought it no part 
 of his duty to descend to misrepresentation or reviling of 
 the founder of another creed ! The march of civilization 
 and the work of which Sir William Muir and Professor 
 Max Miiller were the pioneers have relegated observations 
 such as this to the dark ages of theological criticism. 
 
 Freeman, in his Lectures on the History of the Saracens, writing 
 
 289 u
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 purely as an historian, and not as theologian or orientalist, 
 fully admits the greatness and the lofty conduct of the 
 prophet during the first fifty years of his career, and the 
 impeccability of his monogamous domestic relations during 
 twenty-five years of married life. The degeneracy of the 
 last twelve years, less than a fifth of the whole, he speaks of, 
 justly enough, as a time when the prophet, like Alexander or 
 Solomon, had become corrupted by success. It is, however, 
 characteristic of the sort of criticism of which the odium 
 iheologicum is a prominent feature, that Mohammed's life is 
 commonly represented as one of unqualified depravity, 
 whereas it would compare favourably with that of most of 
 those Old Testament heroes of whom he claimed to be the 
 successor. 
 
 290
 
 CHAPTER XIX 
 THE MOSLEM IN THE HOLY PLACES 
 
 MOSQUES SACRED SITES OF COMMON INTEREST 
 MOSQUE AT HEBRON POSTED PRAYERS MUKRAMS 
 MUKADDASI His DESCRIPTION OP PALESTINE 
 MOSLEM DEVOTION IN THE HOLY LAND 
 
 WHEN we realize that for over 1,300 years the Holy 
 City has been, with the short interruption of the 
 Frank kingdom, in the power of the Mohammedans, to 
 whom our sacred places are also, in their degree, objects of 
 reverence, we have indeed strong reason for gratitude for 
 the forbearance which has taken from us so little, compara- 
 tively, that is precious. While regretting perhaps their 
 possession of the Temple area, which the early Christians, 
 however, delighted to desecrate, we have occasion to rejoice 
 that for the last few years we have had liberty to visit its pre- 
 cincts, a liberty which one feels to be the more kindly when 
 one hears the graceless scorn which the tourist pours upon 
 local traditions of which he commonly fails to grasp the 
 esoteric if not the more obvious meaning. It is said that 
 the earliest recorded visit of a Christian was that of Bonomi 
 the artist, who, with two friends, contrived not only to 
 enter disguised as a Mohammedan, but even to make 
 sketches of the Haram Area. 
 
 The remains of a church originally built by Constantine, 
 but many times destroyed and restored, upon the alleged 
 site of our Lord's Ascension, are now utilized as a praying- 
 
 291
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 place for Mohammedans, who re-erected the Crusading 
 Chapel upon the former ground -plan ; but, on the Festival 
 of the Ascension both our own and that of the Greeks, 
 which varies, and may occur a fortnight later than ours, 
 it is courteously put at the disposal of the Christians, 
 and in the dome itself, as well as in the courtyard, altars 
 are placed, and Masses said, from earliest dawn till late 
 in the morning of the feast day. 
 
 Other spots about Jerusalem, none the less sacred from 
 association that they are not necessarily admitted by the 
 historian and the archaeologist, are now in Moslem hands ; 
 the Pool of Siloam, the Tomb of Rachel, Mizpah where 
 Samuel judged Israel, with many others among which 
 that most endeared to Christendom by centuries of 
 reverence is the Coenaculum, the scene of the Last Supper, 
 of our Lord's appearance after the Resurrection, of the 
 appearance of St. Thomas, of the election of St. Matthias, of 
 the Miracle of the Day of Pentecost, and which was known 
 as a sanctuary by St. Cyril as early as 350. 1 
 
 Moreover, the early pilgrims venerated this same scene 
 as the site of the residence and death of the Virgin, and 
 the spot was, very naturally, chosen by the Franciscans 
 soon after their arrival in the thirteenth century as a centre 
 for their church and conventual buildings. The jealousy 
 of the Jews 2 revealed to the Moslems that these buildings 
 included the possible tombs of David and Solomon, and in 
 1551 the Franciscans were compelled to seek new quarters, 
 and their church, built about 1342, became a mosque. The 
 loss has been the more felt by those who suffered it, that 
 
 1 The tradition is supported by Modestus 611-34 ; Sophronius 
 634-38 ; Arculfus, 670 ; Bede, 720 ; Bernard the Monk, 870 ; and 
 others. 
 
 2 One story told is that a rich Jew of Stamboul, who wished to 
 pray at the Tomb of David, was refused admission to the Franciscan 
 Church, and that he revenged himself, on his return to Constantinople, 
 by abusing the Pashas for not themselves taking charge of places 
 sacred to their faith, and thus suggested the appropriation. 
 
 292
 
 THE MOSLEM IN THE HOLY PLACES 
 
 whereas many traditions are held in common by Moslem 
 and Christian, that of the Institution of the Lord's Supper 
 in "the Upper Room furnished" is to the present pos- 
 sessors without interest. 
 
 The building is of two storeys, but only into the upper one 
 is the Christian admitted ; and here we are shown a distant 
 view of a sarcophagus covered with a cloth of crimson and 
 gold, said to be a replica of the actual tomb of David still 
 existing in the lowest of three chambers one above another 
 and exactly similar. 
 
 The spot upon which, according to legend, Judas betrayed 
 our Lord is separated by a wall from the Garden of Geth- 
 semane, since 1848 in possession of the Franciscans. From 
 Maundrell, who visited Jerusalem in 1697, we learn a tradi- 
 tion to which I have never seen any allusion, but which 
 has a special interest in our present connexion. 
 
 " About eight paces from the place where the Apostles 
 slept is a small shred of ground, twelve yards long and one 
 broad, supposed to be the very path on which the traitor 
 Judas walked up to Christ saying, ' Hail Master,' and kissed 
 Him. This narrow path is separated by a wall out of the 
 midst of the garden as a terra damnata, a work the more 
 remarkable as being done by the Turks, who, as well as 
 Christians, detest the very ground on which was acted such 
 an infamous treachery." l It may be remarked that the 
 word " Turk " is loosely used for " Moslem " by early 
 writers, as it is to this day by the French. 
 
 One of the very rare instances of reversion is that 
 of the Church of St. Anne, built over the reputed 
 birthplace of the B.V.M. (a tradition supported by 
 Theodosius 530, St. Anthony 570, St. Sophronius 636, 
 
 1 A tradition preserved by the Abbe Azais (1852,) relates 
 that it was then customary for Moslems, when seriously ill, to 
 be brought by their friends and laid upon the rock bed of the grave 
 of Lazarus, that the same spot which restored life to the dead might 
 also restore health to the sick and suffering. 
 
 293
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 St. John Damascene 760), and close by the alleged 
 Pool of Bethesda. A church existing there in the sixth 
 century was rebuilt as a convent for nuns in the twelfth 
 century ; desecrated by Saladin, it became a Moslem college. 
 It was restored to France after the Crimean w ar 1 and is 
 now once more a convent and also a college for Greek 
 Catholics, under the " White Fathers " of St. Anne. 
 
 Another interesting example of common interest in a 
 holy site is that of the Chapel of the Tomb of the Virgin 
 at the foot of the Mount of Olives. Originally built at 
 least as early as the fifth century destroyed by the Persians, 
 said to have been immediately rebuilt and to have been 
 prayed in by Omar, again destroyed and again rebuilt 
 by Millicent, daughter of Baldwin it is now mainly the 
 property of the Greeks, is very occasionally used by the 
 Latins, and has altars belonging to the Armenians and 
 Abyssinians, and a prayer niche of the Moslems. 2 The 
 Mosque, from which the Christian is most rigorously ex- 
 cluded, is, however, that at Hebron, the alleged resting- 
 place of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and of their wives, 
 Rachel excepted. From time to time, by special favour, 
 a Christian is admitted the sons and grandsons of Queen 
 Victoria, the late Marquess of Bute, President Grant of 
 America, Sir Moses Montefiore, and others ; but the Moslems 
 
 1 This site, so immensely interesting in all its sacred associations 
 as well as so valuable to the antiquarian, was offered as a gift to Eng- 
 land and declined by the enlightened Government of the period. 
 
 2 This community of reverence, however, can hardly be said to 
 justify a statement made in the P.E.F., 1881, p. Ill, that 
 ' ' In holy places many high masses are celebrated both by 
 Mohammedans and Christians." The same author informs us 
 (op. cit. p. 114), that the village inn is, " for the Moslems, town hall, 
 casino, and church all in one," and also that " you may there join 
 in the prayers of the priests." The author, who was for twenty- 
 six years a missionary in Palestine and pastor of the Protestant 
 Arab community, might have found it useful to inform himself 
 that the Moslems, whom he desired to convert, were not accus- 
 tomed to high masses, churches, priests, nor to joining in the wor- 
 ship of the Catholic communities. 
 
 294
 
 THE MOSLEM IN THE HOLY PLACES 
 
 of Hebron are more fanatical than any to be met 
 elsewhere. Not only are they but little accustomed to 
 Europeans, although Hebron is but five hours from 
 Jerusalem, but the place is one of special sanctity. Like 
 the Jews of Jerusalem, who drop petitions into the crevices of 
 the sacred walls of the Wailing Place, some of the more 
 uninstructed there also deposit prayers in a hole in the 
 natural rock adjoining the Mosque. One which was 
 perhaps unfairly subtracted by a visitor, I am able to quote 
 as a specimen of the petitions thus forwarded. One can 
 feel nothing but reverence for its natural pathos. " May 
 it be the will of Our Father in Heaven, by the merit of our 
 fathers the saints. May he have mercy on the woman 
 Haya, the daughter of Aaron ; and on Abraham Isaac, 
 the son of Aaron ; and Etta, daughter of Aaron ; and Sippa 
 daughter of Aaron. May he send a perfect recovery to 
 the poor sufferers, in particular to the woman Haya ; 
 also a good old age." * 
 
 " Upon every high hill and under every green tree," all 
 around Jerusalem and indeed all over Palestine, to the 
 number, it is said, of over 300, there are mukrdms ; small 
 cubical buildings covered with a dome, and very often the 
 mausoleum of some Weli or Sheikh (saint or holy man) 
 often reverenced by Jews and Christians as well as by 
 Moslems. Here articles deposited are safe from theft ; 
 votive gifts are made, and lamps lighted, as offerings for the 
 sick. They are sometimes the objects of pilgrimage, and 
 of processions at the Festival of Beiram, and as they contain 
 a mikrab (prayer niche) are often resorted to for prayer. 
 
 1 We have also read several such messages found in another 
 place, which, as accessible to tourists, I will not specify. In these 
 we have observed that in most cases the mother is specially men- 
 tioned, a feature usual in Jewish prayers, as in charms, amulets and 
 incantations. Some ascribe the origin of this custom to the words of 
 David, " I am thy servant and the son of thine handmaid." Others 
 give the more common-place explanation that it may be that the 
 father's identity is sometimes less certain than that of the mother. 
 
 295
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 They are frequently tombs, but not necessarily so, as is 
 obvious from their multiplication. Thus Joseph has two, 
 at Nablus and Hebron, Jonah has four, Daniel five, Isaac, 
 said to be difficult to propitiate (though, by the way, it 
 was not he, but Rebekah, who was " weary of her life " 
 because of her daughters-in-law), has one in Galilee as well 
 as that at Hebron. Some of the dedications are to Old 
 Testament characters such as those already named, some 
 to New Testament saints, such as St. Matthew, St. John 
 Baptist, St. Paul, St. Anne ; some to special aspects of 
 Moslem tradition such as Gabriel and St. George. 1 
 
 The earliest Moslem historian of social Jerusalem, Mukad- 
 dasi, was born, as his name signifies, 2 in the Holy City in 
 946. After making a pilgrimage to Mecca in 965, he deter- 
 mined to devote himself to the study of geography, and spent 
 twenty years in travelling through all the countries of 
 Islam, to qualify himself for writing his book, which he 
 began in 985, and of which perhaps the most interesting 
 part is his study of Jerusalem. He reports at great length 
 upon the products of Syria, and his classification is worth 
 quoting. 
 
 " Know that within the province of Palestine may be 
 found gathered together six and thirty products that are 
 not found thus united in any other land. 
 
 1 Conder gives a list of some forty-eight such dedications, 
 and adds, p. 140, " As in England the fairies were feared, so in 
 Palestine the peasantry will not, if they can avoid it, speak of 
 a Wely (saint) by his full name ; they prefer a complimentary 
 nickname, such as ' the good Sheikh of the raft, ' the lady of 
 childbirth,' ' the famous Sheikh,' ' the father of the Crescent,' 
 ' the strength of the faith.' These divinities have a local power 
 extending to a greater or less radius ; within this circle they are 
 feared, and it is said that a man would rather confess a murder 
 than allow himself to be perjured in swearing on the tomb in the 
 Mukram of his village. Whether the complicated mass of tradition, 
 the growth of so many centuries and the product of three religions, 
 can be disentangled ... I leave others to judge." P.E.F., 1876. 
 
 2 One of the many names of Jerusalem is Beit al makdis or Mu- 
 kaddas ; thus Mukaddasi means a Jerusalemite. 
 
 296
 
 THE MOSLEM IN THE HOLY PLACES 
 
 " Of these, the first seven are found in Palestine alone ; 
 the following seven are very rare in other countries ; and 
 the remaining two and twenty, though only found thus 
 gathered together in this province, are, for the most part, 
 found one and another singly, in other lands." Among the 
 first seven he includes " the pine-nuts 1 called Kuraish-bite," 
 among the second the sugar-cane, no longer found in the 
 country, but cultivated widely in Syria in the middle ages. 
 The remaining twenty-two include the excellent wild 
 asparagus of the country, the truffle, " also snow and 
 buffalo-milk ! " He also includes the orange, then a novelty 
 imported from South-western Asia, and a sweetmeat called 
 kubbat, still (deservedly) popular, made of carob-sugar, 
 almonds and pistachio nuts. 
 
 He also mentions, among objects especial to Jerusalem, 
 rosaries, mirrors, lamp jars, and needles. Apparently 
 then, as now, for some reason not obvious to the Occidental 
 understanding, building operations were not carried on in 
 winter, in spite of the absence of frost and rarity of snow ; 
 for among other uses of Christian phrases he quotes that 
 " When St. Barabara's feast [December 4] comes round, 
 then the mason may take to his flute." He also speaks of 
 Whitsuntide as the time of heat, the Feast of the Cross 
 [i.e. the Exaltation of the Cross, September 14] as the time 
 of grape-gathering, and the Feast of St. George [April 23] as 
 the time of sowing seed. 
 
 He says that the Christians are the scribes of the country, 
 for " the Muslims, unlike the men of other nations, do not 
 hold letters a profitable study." However, he admits 
 later that Jerusalem has certain intellectual privileges 
 and advantages, 
 
 Mukaddasi is more than eloquent in his description of his 
 native city. After dilating on her natural advantages 
 (and he is so far prejudiced as to say " her markets are 
 
 1 The fruit of the Strobili pini eaten with rice boiled in gravy, one 
 of the pleasantest of many good native dishes. 
 
 297
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 clean "), he proceeds : "In Jerusalem are all manner of 
 learned men and doctors, and for this reason the heart of 
 every man of intelligence yearns towards her. All the year 
 round, never are her streets empty of strangers. 1 As to 
 the saying that Jerusalem is the most illustrious of cities 
 is she not the one that unites the advantages of this world 
 and those of the next ? . . . Wine is not publicly consumed 
 and there is no drunkenness. The city is devoid of houses 
 of ill-fame. . . . Allah ! may He be exalted ! has gathered 
 together here all the fruits of the lowlands and of the plains, 
 and of the hill country, even all those of the most opposite 
 kinds." 
 
 It is only just to quote also that he admits and not less 
 truly that " Jerusalem has some disadvantages. Thus 
 it is reported, as found written in the Torah of Moses, that 
 Jerusalem is as a golden basin filled with scorpions. Thus 
 you will not find anywhere baths more filthy than those of 
 the Holy City. 2 Learned men are few and the Christians 
 numerous, and the same are unmannerly in the public 
 places. In the hostelries the taxes are heavy on all that is 
 sold. ... In this city the oppressed have no succour, the 
 meek are molested, and the rich envied. Everywhere the 
 Christians and Jews have the upper hand." Most of his 
 statements still hold good, but the last is somewhat surpris- 
 ing in reference to a period a hundred years before the first 
 Crusade. But Mukaddasi is an observant person, and his- 
 tory tends to repeat itself. 
 
 1 The Persian traveller, Nasiri Khusran, writing in March, 1047, 
 tells us : " From all the countries of the Greeks and from other lands, 
 the Christians and the Jews come up to Jerusalem in great numbers 
 in order to make their visitation of the Church (of the Resurrection) 
 and the synagogue that is there." 
 
 2 Thackeray and Mark Twain in after ages report somewhat to 
 the same effect. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu and Lady Burton 
 contrast the baths of Palestine with those elsewhere. Thackeray, 
 however, remarks pleasantly that he did " not know before what 
 saponacity was." 
 
 298
 
 THE MOSLEM IN THE HOLY PLACES 
 
 During the period of Moslem rule, Jerusalem, though 
 the Sacred City, was never the capital of Palestine, a dignity 
 reserved for Er Ramleh in the south, and Damascus in the 
 north. As containing the sacred rock and other holy sites 
 it was second only in sanctity to Mecca and Medineh, was 
 called by Mohammed Mesjid el Aksa the Mosque farthest 
 away from Mecca and as such, a place of pilgrimage. 
 We read in the travels of Nasiri Khusran in 1047 : 
 
 "The men of Syria and of the neighbouring parts call the 
 Holy City by the name of Kuds (the Holy), and the people 
 of these provinces, if they are unable to make the pilgrimage 
 (to Mecca), will go up at the appointed season to Jerusalem 
 and there perform their rites, and upon the feast-day slay 
 the sacrifice as is customary to do (at Mecca) on the same 
 day. There are years when as many as twenty thousand 
 people will be present at Jerusalem during the first days of 
 the month (of pilgrimage), for they bring their children also 
 with them in order to celebrate their circumcision." 1 
 
 The institution of a new opposition Mecca on the ruins 
 of the Hebrew Temple, also a centre of Monotheism, is in fact 
 a matter of history belonging to the period of the rival 
 Khalifate of Damascus (661-679), and was an attempt to 
 discourage pilgrimages to Mecca, initiated by Mohammed's 
 enemy, Abu Sofian Khalif, in Damascus, for sufficiently 
 obvious reasons. Mecca, however, remains the Holy City 
 of Islam, although the Kaliph bears the title of Hdmi el 
 Haramein, " guardian of the two sanctuaries " ; and when 
 we lightly discuss the future of the Holy Land, and speculate 
 as to what European crown it would most suitably adorn, 
 we forget that we are not proposing merely to subtract an 
 unimportant Turkish province, but to rob 200,000,000 of 
 our fellow-creatures of the sanctuary of their religion. It is 
 
 1 The Moslems do riot necessarily circumcise in infancy as do the 
 Jews, but at almost any age, as a rule between six and ten. If a 
 Moslem dies uncircumcised the ceremony must be performed before 
 burial, that he may not go uncircumcised into the presence of Allah. 
 
 299
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 probably even a new thought to most of us that the Dome of 
 the Rock, the site of Solomon's Temple, has been considerably 
 longer the uninterrupted possession of the sons of Ishmael 
 than it ever was of the spns of Isaac, and that the One God 
 has been worshipped on the threshing-floor of Araunah the 
 Jebusite some five centuries longer in the Arabic, than ever 
 in the Hebrew tongue. 
 
 300
 
 CHAPTER XX 
 THE MOSLEM WOMAN IN JERUSALEM 
 
 AMUSEMENTS THEATRE SHOPPING WE DDING BATH 
 RECEPTION EL GELWEH 
 
 r I ^HE Moslem woman has few amusements beyond that 
 A of receiving and visiting her friends. Social festivities 
 take place largely out of doors, and there are some half- 
 dozen spots around Jerusalem, more or less shady, where, 
 in the afternoon, you are sure to find groups of women drink- 
 ing coffee and eating sweets and nuts. You may track 
 them by nut-shells. The natives, when they are not smok- 
 ing, are eating ; on board ship, in railway carriages, in bed, 
 on visits, up to the very doors of the churches, they eat. 
 They have but one substantial meal a day in the evening 
 but unless they are smoking, they nibble all the rest of the 
 time, except of course the better educated among the men. 
 The men, however, have their cafes, where they smoke 
 water-pipes, drink coffee and play cards or tric-trac at 
 intervals all day. The effendis, on their way back from the 
 serai, sit on little rush stools at the doors of the shops all 
 the way up the Jaffa Road, just as if our young men from 
 Downing Street and Whitehall were to have chairs brought 
 out to them under the awnings at Lewis & Allenby's or 
 Marshall & Snelgrove's. If you have a message for one of 
 them, you leave it at the shop he frequents the substitute 
 for the club or restaurant. The men, moreover, can, if they 
 choose, go to the theatre, which flourishes even in the Holy 
 
 301
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 City, but is mainly frequented by Greeks. When we our- 
 selves experimented in this amusement, there were a 
 few women in the boxes. The acting was excellent ; the 
 natives are born actors, and I think we all felt the emotions 
 intended ; but as the play was conveyed in dumb-show, 
 except where in certain cases it was supplemented by 
 modern Greek, we were uncertain of the plot, which was 
 highly military and political, and it was variously explained 
 as the siege of Troy or of Ladysmith. We remained about 
 three hours, but our Greek servant, who did not return till 
 midnight, said we had missed the better half, and must go 
 again. "For the love of God, master, you must go ! You 
 will forget all your anxieties all your relations ! " a revela- 
 tion perhaps of Dimitri's domestic concerns. 
 
 In the morning the Moslem women often go shopping. 
 They are large bundles wrapped up in white cotton or purple 
 silk sheets, with ball-room slippers and wooden clogs. It 
 takes six to choose a piece of stuff and an immense expendi- 
 ture of coffee, cigarettes, time, and the endurance of the 
 shopkeepers, and any other customers present, to decide how 
 much they shall pay for it. " The word of a Frank," the 
 phrase which plays so romantic a part in travellers' tales, 
 but as a matter of fact is equivalent to our " sharp practice," 
 is the final statement of your intentions " the last price " in 
 any commercial transaction. It means that contrary to local 
 custom, and consistently with Frankish habits, you don't 
 want coffee, cigarettes, argument, but are willing to pay a 
 quarter of the price asked or go. It is a custom not 
 appreciated, for that " time is money " and " business is 
 business " are facts which few Arabs have yet mastered. 
 
 It is on the occasion of a wedding that the Moslem woman 
 is in her element. The object of her existence is to be mar- 
 ried and have children. The husband is householder, 
 provider, father ; it is the merest chance if he be friend, or 
 companion, for she probably never sees him till the knot is 
 tied, for even if, as commonly happens, she marries a near 
 
 302
 
 THE MOSLEM WOMAN IN JERUSALEM 
 
 relative, there is, in the upper classes, no companionship 
 between even children of opposite sexes. 
 
 We have been fortunate in seeing weddings of various 
 classes and degrees of dignity, but an invitation into the 
 exclusive circle of the Moslem effendi is not to be easily 
 had on an important and festive occasion. At last, 
 however, we were bidden to a wedding under just the con- 
 ditions we would have chosen not showy, as among the 
 nouveaux riches, but in the innermost circle of the gentle 
 classes of Jerusalem. 
 
 We go first to the bridegroom's house, or rather dwelling, 
 for the house is shared with his two brothers and then: wives 
 and children, having in common a large central hall or 
 lewan, a dining-room and a kitchen; the sleeping-rooms, 
 which serve also for boudoirs, being the only private apart- 
 ments. 
 
 He belongs to one of the most distinguished, though not 
 perhaps one of the most prosperous families in Jerusalem. 
 The advantage, in point of means, is with the lady, who, 
 moreover, is, by some dozen years, the senior, which may be 
 taken to equalize matters, she also being of the old aristo- 
 cracy of the city. 
 
 She is an orphan, we are told, living with an only brother 
 under conditions of such domestic tranquillity as have led 
 to a somewhat unusual postponement of marriage, a great 
 number of eligible proposals having been refused on her 
 behalf. 
 
 All this is explained to me en route by the kind friends to 
 whose intercession I am indebted for the invitation. 
 
 We are met at the gate by a little boy of perhaps ten years 
 of age, who might have looked very well in a native kumbaz, 
 or even in the sailor-suit or kilt which in our eyes would be 
 suitable to his time of life, but who, in ill-cut drab coat and 
 trousers, a shirt front, and elaborate necktie surmounted by 
 a scarlet tarbush, is sufficiently grotesque. He is, however, 
 a somewhat important personage, being the only son of the 
 
 303
 
 head of the family, who occupies a handsome house by the 
 side of that we are now entering, and whose wife, from her 
 position in the faniily, acts as hostess upon the present oc- 
 casion. The fact that she is known only as the " mother of 
 Mousa," the quaint little figure that has escorted us from the 
 carriage to the house-door, is one of those features of the life 
 here, which so often exhibit what seems to us an extraordin- 
 ary lack of the sense of proportion ; for the mother of Mousa 
 has a very distinct individuality and will long remain in 
 my memory as one of the most beautiful and gracious gentle- 
 women it has ever been my good fortune to meet. During the 
 eight hours in which we remain her guests, mere items in 
 a crowd of several score, the consciousness of her graceful 
 and kindly hospitality never fails us ; she is a perfect hostess, 
 calm, dignified, yet attentive to every trifle by which she 
 may give pleasure to others. 
 
 We are to remain here until the time arrives for fetching 
 the bride from her own home, but we find no lack of enter- 
 tainment. We are introduced into the bed-room of a sister- 
 in-law of the bridegroom, herself the bride of a year ago, 
 and the proud possessor of an infant son. Seated on the 
 floor, in front of a large wardrobe with plate-glass doors, 
 two or three ladies are putting the finishing touches to their 
 toilet, a fact which does not in the least embarrass them, for, 
 after bidding us a kindly welcome, they return to their 
 former position and continue to stick flowers in their hair 
 and to put on necklaces and brooches. To acquire their 
 names was out of the question, but I resolved to differentiate 
 them as the " mauve brocade," the " maize silk," and the 
 " blue satin," a mental process which was also a failure, as 
 each changed her dress at least three times during the re- 
 mainder of the day ! 
 
 It was equally out of the question to ascertain who was 
 who, for the relationships of the leading families here are 
 as complicated and as intricate as those of royalties at home, 
 and for the same reason of frequent, in fact enforced, inter- 
 
 304
 
 THE MOSLEM WOMAN IN JERUSALEM 
 
 marriage. Moreover, age is no criterion in a country where 
 there may be only thirteen years' difference between mother 
 and daughter, and where a woman is a grandmother at 
 thirty. 
 
 A little girl of about ten was anxious to exhibit her new 
 frock and henna-stained hands, and I was equally glad to 
 examine them in detail. The finger ends, to the depth of 
 perhaps an inch, were stained a ruddy brown, a few lines 
 were traced on the back, but the real triumph of art was on 
 the palms, which were adorned with a conventional bud 
 and leaf in lozenge-shaped groups like a lodging-house wall- 
 paper, and I observed that most of the ladies carried their 
 hands palm forwards, so that the decoration should be seen 
 to full advantage. 
 
 This is perhaps the best opportunity to describe the cir- 
 cumstances under which such a work of art is achieved. 
 Unfortunately I was not present upon the precise occasion 
 in question, and can only speak from recollection of a similar 
 incident elsewhere. 
 
 About two days before the marriage, the bride, accom- 
 panied by all her most intimate friends, adjourns to the bath, 
 Hammdm, which is, in every respect, essentially the same 
 institution as the Turkish bath anywhere else. 
 
 On the occasion to which I refer the friends were very 
 numerous, for friendship is a great feature of Oriental life, 
 and it is even said that a woman without gossips will find 
 it difficult to get to heaven, for social freedom and harmony 
 procures forgiveness of sins. Friends must be faithful to 
 each other through good and evil report, and it is a command 
 of the Sunnah 1 that, alike in pleasure and in prayer, de- 
 ceased friends should not be forgotten. 
 
 Besides all the usual functions of the Turkish bath, the 
 
 soaping, the lavement, the massage, which are here performed 
 
 to the perfection of luxury, a temptation of the flesh it would 
 
 take a saint to resist, one has certain additions in the em- 
 
 1 i.e. According to the traditions and law of the Prophet. 
 
 305 X
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 ployment of perfumes and of a species of hypnotization in 
 which the Oriental bathing- women are adepts. 
 
 But the preparation of the bride involves special features 
 in which no woman not married or about to be married is 
 allowed to share, and which few are privileged to witness, of 
 which the principal is the use of the nura, a very powerful 
 depilatory 1 consisting, apparently, largely of quicklime. 
 With this, even the down of the face is removed, with a 
 result one must be an Oriental to admire, as the skin is 
 left with a hard, and almost raw appearance, which the 
 lustrous powder, subsequently applied, does not greatly 
 ameliorate. It is a good omen if one of the bride's com- 
 panions be a woman who has lately become for the first time 
 a mother. The lighted candle which, during a part of the 
 performance, she holds in her hand, and which served at 
 her own wedding-feast (under circumstances to be described 
 later), is as a matter of courtesy offered for the bride's ac- 
 ceptance. While reposing in the cooling room she is expected 
 to partake not only of the coffee offered to all present, but of 
 some special food which appeared to consist of yolks of eggs 
 and of seeds. A great deal of time was spent at this stage, 
 many of the ladies going to sleep, a very natural consequence 
 of a process at once exhausting and soothing. After this, 
 a certain amount of toilet was de rigueur, a somewhat classical 
 peplum, or at most a sheet having hitherto sufficed ; there 
 was much brushing and plaiting of hair, and resumption of 
 bangles, and much merriment, sometimes in directions 
 startlingly inconsistent with extreme etiquette in others. 
 Truly was it a case of Honi soit qui mal y pense. The 
 Oriental women are only grown up children after all, and 
 their play is little more than kittenish. Next came the 
 artists the inevitable Sheikhats the professional advisers 
 on all matters relating to the health, beauty and domestic 
 
 1 The esoteric meaning of this process will be obvious to the 
 anthropologist. 
 
 306
 
 THE MOSLEM WOMAN IN JERUSALEM 
 
 affairs of the women a combination as it were of Truefitt, 
 Harley Street doctor, and the Matrimonial Gazette. 
 
 All the women who were preparing for the approaching 
 festivities submitted, in some degree, to treatment, some 
 having the hands alone decorated, others having kohol 
 applied to the eyes, others again having the front of the 
 foot and the toe-nails henna-stained, the bride alone being 
 treated with any great elaborateness. 1 The process was a 
 kind of stencilling, stiff and formal as to design, which ex- 
 tended in a sort of trellis-pattern over the neck and breast, 
 a survival possibly of the tattooing still customary among 
 the Bedu. 
 
 After purification and decoration at the Hammam the 
 bride remains apart, taking no share in what goes on around 
 her which brings us back to our point of departure, the 
 companions whom we found awaiting the hour for fetching 
 her to her new home. 
 
 Coffee was served and sweetmeats handed round, and then 
 our kind hostess, learning that this was my first presence at 
 such an entertainment, asked if we would like to see the 
 preparations made for the reception of the bride. We were 
 accordingly conducted to her room, which was large and 
 handsome, though somewhat dark, owing to the fact that 
 the windows to begin with too high to see out of were, 
 moreover, blocked with piles of silk-covered lehafs or 
 wadded quilts, and, with the long, hard bolsters which serve 
 as pillows, a necessary part of the bride's outfit, partly for 
 purposes of hospitality, partly for ordinary use, as the very 
 ornate sleeping arrangements we were about to see are re- 
 garded as ornamental rather than useful, except on festive 
 occasions. 
 
 The handsome marble floor was strewn with costly and 
 beautiful carpets, the " prayer-carpet," however, a real work 
 
 3 Not so, however, in the case of the heroine of the present chapter, 
 who, as far as I could discover, had only her hands decorated and 
 that very moderately. 
 
 307
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 of art, in rich shades of red and blue silk, being folded and 
 laid aside for the bridegroom's use. Two sides of the room 
 were occupied with low divans richly covered with crimson 
 velvet, heavily embroidered in gold thread. There was a 
 very handsome inlaid wardrobe, with plate-glass doors ; a 
 chest of drawers, many cupboards in the thickness of 
 the wall, and a bedstead which, though small, was the most 
 conspicuous article of furniture in the room. By birth a 
 mere Tottenham Court Road cast-iron bedstead, it was 
 idealized by the Oriental imagination into a very apotheosis 
 of repose, surmounted by draperies caught up with branches 
 of palm and sprays of orange flowers. The counterpane was 
 of such fineness that it might have been passed through 
 a ring, a rose-coloured silk pillow it is etiquette that there 
 should be but one was covered with the finest linen, open- 
 hemmed and bordered with lace ; the very vallance was a 
 miracle of tucks and insertions, with frillings having tucks 
 and insertions de nouveau. On the deep window-seat, 
 upon one of the X shaped book-rests with which Liberty 
 has familiarized us, lay a Koran, open at the Sura of Joseph, 
 possibly by way of inculcating conjugal fidelity. 
 
 Beside it was a young cypress-tree, heavily decorated with 
 gold-leaf, and enveloped in a veil of red gauze, and a dish of 
 seeds, also carefully covered over ; palm-leaves decorated 
 with gold leaf were arranged in groups upon the wall, and 
 some phials, also covered with gauze, probably contained the 
 dose of camphor, rose-water and certain seeds which, it is 
 said, should never be omitted by the bride who wishes to 
 avoid the misfortune of being the mother of a daughter 
 instead of a son and heir. 
 
 On the chest of drawers were arranged some nargilehs, 
 coffee-cups and trays. Anything you do not find upon 
 the furniture in an Arab house should be sought for 
 on the floor, for the Arab sits down, and as a rule 
 low down, for most of the functions of life, from stone- 
 cutting to coffee-grinding, from making a horseshoe 
 
 308
 
 MOSLEM WOMEN ATTIRED IN MANDII.S AND IZZAKS.
 
 to embroidering a dress. Accordingly, we were not 
 surprised to find on the floor the toilet apparatus, con- 
 sisting of ewer and basin in beaten brass, a delight to the 
 eye, but not, to English notions, of any special utility as a 
 substitute for our more homely " tub." On a tray, also on 
 the floor, we discovered a collection of dainty shoes, gold 
 and silver-embroidered on coloured satin, adapted in some 
 degree for daily use by insertion, each pair in its own clogs, 
 generally of dark, hard wood, inlaid in mother-of-pearl, a 
 few of the best pairs being roughly shaped into the likeness 
 of a shoe and, one would suppose, the better adapted for 
 walking. 
 
 Beside the bed lay a richly-embroidered velvet wrapper 
 folded envelope-wise, into which we were allowed to peep, 
 and which contained the toilet of the bridegroom, new to 
 the smallest detail. Indeed, we audaciously penetrated 
 even into drawers and wardrobes, for our kind hostess said, 
 " Look and inquire as much as you like ; if we came to a 
 wedding at your house, we should want to ask about every- 
 thing," a permission of which we gladly availed our- 
 selves. 
 
 Countless dresses, in every shade of delicate silk, hung in 
 the wardrobe, many of them very elaborate, made with a 
 vague yearning after European outline and decorated with 
 the inartistic meaninglessness which bespeaks much study 
 of fashion-plates, which, in fact, solved for us the life-long 
 problem, " Who is found to wear the garments depicted 
 in ladies' papers ? " There were piles of mandils, squares of 
 coloured muslin, stamped with the large sprawling pattern 
 with which the Oriental woman covers her face ; there was 
 a choice of izzars, the silk sheets with which she envelops 
 her entire person, when she goes out of doors, and which 
 consists of two skirts, connected by a drawing-string at the 
 waist, the upper one being raised to cover the head. There 
 were piles of dainty linen of shapes which went far to explain 
 the lack of outline in the figure of the Oriental woman ; there 
 
 309
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 were cosmetics from Paris, rosewater from Damascus, and 
 silk gloves that set our teeth on edge. 
 
 All this while visitors had been collecting, and by the 
 time we had finished our inspection the room was full of 
 women, some handsomely dressed and jewelled, others ap- 
 parently poor, but probably relatives, for the Arabs, like the 
 Highlanders, make family, rather than wealth, the criterion 
 of distinction, and, indeed, one of their rules for the choice 
 of a wife is " Take a woman of a clan, even if she be on a 
 mat " ; that is, if her sleeping-mat spread on the ground be 
 her only possession. Among them were several nursing- 
 mothers with their infants, " for good luck," it was explained, 
 an explanation, by the way, so frequently offered as all- 
 sufficing, that I soon fell back upon such knowledge of 
 folk-lore and tradition as I possessed as offering information 
 at least less generic than the invariable answer which they 
 themselves seemed to consider sufficient. 
 
 On religious points especiaUy, I found information difficult 
 to obtain. The contract of engagement appears to be the 
 only occasion of religious ceremonial and consists in prayer 
 and in reading the first Sura of the Koran ; the marriage 
 itself is regarded as merely the sequel to the earlier and 
 equally binding performance. We, however, elicited, among 
 other details of the final denouement of the drama, that 
 the beautiful prayer-carpet, with its distinctive design 
 roughly representing a minaret, would not be used on the first 
 occasion of prayer by the newly married pair, but that the 
 bridegroom, on retiring at the end of the public festivities, 
 would make his devotions kneeling upon the lady's train. 
 The first seven days of matrimony are regarded as devoted 
 to festivity, and any elaboration of ritual is considered as 
 superfluous and unfitting ; but it is recommended that the 
 bride should ask for the blessing of Allah upon her relations 
 with the family of her husband, a point in which the poor 
 thing must indeed often stand in need of supernatural 
 guidance ! 
 
 310
 
 THE MOSLEM WOMAN IN JERUSALEM 
 
 I could not resist some further discussion in this direc- 
 tion. Our beautiful hostess declared herself specially 
 fortunate, for not only had she, with her husband and chil- 
 dren, a house to themselves, which she acknowledged to be a 
 great advantage, but, moreover, her husband had all the 
 perfections of the hero of a lady's novel, an allegation which 
 she proceeded to support by the narration of many incidents 
 in which she seemed convinced that any other man would 
 have shown impatience or resentment. I observed that 
 the other ladies present made no remark. The temptations 
 to jealousy can be but few in Moslem circles ; and though it 
 is alleged that divorces are frequent, it should be remembered 
 that they are never on account of conduct such as is discussed 
 shamelessly in our own newspapers ; for it is ordered that a 
 Moslem woman, convicted of immorality, shall be put to 
 death. Even to bring an accusation of misconduct is here 
 a very serious matter, and the accuser, if unable to sub- 
 stantiate it, upon a solemn and thrice repeated oath, is 
 also condemned to death, so that in the matter of the 
 seventh and ninth commandments their standard, and at 
 least theoretically their conduct, is infinitely superior to our 
 own. 
 
 It is also worthy of mention that, either by her mother, 
 some near female relative, or, failing that, by the Sheikhat, 
 a well brought up girl is always instructed in what is sunnat 
 in reference to her future conduct as a bride, which 
 involves, in addition to the usual responsibilities, certain 
 recondite points of ritual, so that it is imperative even 
 more than in other cases, that she should not be left to 
 the " light of nature." 
 
 About five o'clock we were invited to take supper a few 
 specially honoured guests round a table in the dining-room j 
 the remainder upon mats in the hall. The whole meal was 
 served at once, and you ate of the dishes in any sequence 
 that occurred to you. Each of us had a plate, a knife, a 
 spoon and fork, a table-napkin and a large flat cake of 
 
 311
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 excellent bread. We helped ourselves with our own 
 spoons, and cleaned our plates with bread, when the nature 
 of the succeeding course suggested a lack of harmony with 
 the last. 
 
 Everything was well-cooked and nicely served ; among 
 novelties were mutton stewed in lebben, a kind of butter- 
 milk ; mutton admirably farpi with ingredients hard to 
 guess at ; cabbage served with slices of lemon ; rice variously 
 cooked and coloured, sweet and savoury ; a delicious blanc- 
 mange made with many varieties of nuts and seeds ; and a 
 compote of apricots and prunes which was not only good, 
 but extremely gratifying to my curiosity, for I had long 
 desired to taste, as now, the dish that I was assured was made 
 out of the sheets of apparently brown paper, which I had 
 often observed in the market, and which consist of dried 
 apricots subsequently soaked, and used as the basis for 
 compotes of other fruits. The water offered as beverage 
 was not inviting wine is, of course, absent, and as 
 frequent cups of coffee are provocative of thirst, we sighed 
 vainly for the unattainable teapot. 
 
 Finally a long string of carriages drove up to the door, 
 the ladies quickly draped themselves in mandil and izzar, 
 and put on their clogs ; collected the omnipresent contingent 
 of unmanageable children, and we were off. As we were 
 going to the home of an heiress it was somewhat surprising 
 to be driven into the heart of the city, turned out at a point 
 beyond which it was impossible for carriages to pass, con- 
 ducted through slums that would disgrace Whitechapel, 
 and after ducking under arches, scrambling down steps, 
 slipping over unspeakable filth in a pitch-dark tunnel, finally 
 hauled up a squalid stone staircase, and we were in the 
 midst of the festive scene ! 
 
 We were greeted with showers of rose-water, and with the 
 curious cries peculiar to occasions of rejoicing. We were 
 hurried into a great hall, so closely packed with women that 
 it was difficult to take our bearings, but at length a way 
 
 312
 
 THE MOSLEM WOMAN IN JERUSALEM 
 
 was made for us through the crowd, and we found ourselves 
 seated on a divan facing the audience. 
 
 I use the word " audience " advisedly, for the divan 
 served as a stage, in the midst of which, upon a chair, raised 
 above everything else, sat an absolutely motionless figure 
 draped in a striped silk sheet, which fell over chair and all, 
 and lay in folds about her feet. Our hostess, who was 
 privileged, both as cousin of the bride and sister-in-law of 
 the groom, with characteristic kindness brought up a glass of 
 lemonade and, lifting a corner of the veil, put it to the lips 
 of the prisoner so unhappily circumstanced, and seemed to 
 offer caressing and encouraging words. 
 
 In front of the stage, upon a round table composed of an 
 immense brass tray upon a stand, stood a crowd of some 
 scores of lighted candles of yellow wax, decorated with 
 leaves and sprays of foliage. Behind this was placed a row 
 of chairs reserved for the professional merry makers a 
 gigantic negress, who played skilfully upon the zither, and 
 some other women who sang and thrummed the tambourines 
 made of skins stretched upon an earthenware foundation, 
 which are essential to Oriental festivities. At intervals 
 coffee was handed round, followed by cigarettes, sweet- 
 meats, lemonade, or preserved fruits ; and suddenly, at a 
 signal from the negress, the mistress of ceremonies, the 
 music ceased, and a rush was made at the lighted candles. 
 In an instant the table was cleared, the tray overturned, 
 the decorations scattered on the ground. Only a small pro- 
 portion of the crowd could be the happy possessors of the 
 coveted treasures, said to be most particularly provocative of 
 " good luck " more exact information was lacking. Our 
 hostess was careful to see that we had our chance, and we 
 are still awaiting the issue ! Then the band struck up 
 again, the zither, the tambourines, and some cymbals out 
 of tune with the tambourines. The space cleared by the 
 disappearance of the table was reserved for a professional 
 dancer, who now appeared upon the scene. I had recently 
 
 313
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 read a description of such a one, written by a young Syrian 
 whom I knew as one of educated taste, and was curious 
 to realize the picture he had evoked in the following terms : 
 
 " Dressed in her best, with neck, face, head and hands 
 all gleaming with jewels and gold, with a silk handkerchief 
 waving in the one hand, and a graceful curve made to the 
 hip with the other, and with her sweet abashed eyes rivetted 
 on the ground, the handsome Syrian woman dances to the 
 sound of music. Many are the movements and curves she 
 makes. Like a delicate palm tree swayed by the gentle 
 breeze, she moves to and fro," and so on. 
 
 Autre race autre mosurs ! There was a more or less hand- 
 some Syrian woman, there were the jewels and the gold and 
 the silk handkerchief but for the rest ! Probably the ladies 
 present would have fainted with horror at the sight of our 
 dancing we were thankful to look away from theirs, but 
 I don't know that any other eyes were " abashed " except 
 our own. 
 
 Presently, to our relief, the young woman subsided and 
 singing began again. There was so much noise that the 
 words were undistinguishable, but I have since learnt that 
 they were probably somewhat as follows : 
 
 God be with you, maiden ; weeping is vain. 
 
 Your fate is declared. Whatever you desire in your father's 
 
 house, 
 Now is the time to bring it with you. 
 
 The time to go has come. Up with you O bride ! The night- 
 ingale has sung. The cock has crowed. 
 Under your bridegroom's windows merchants are standing : 
 They have jewels to grace those pretty hands. 
 
 There was a sound of shouting without. The singing 
 ceased, the women hastily veiled themselves ; there was sil- 
 ence as three tall men entered the room sheiks of the Temple 
 in picturesque smoke-coloured robes (jubr), with snowy tur- 
 ban uncles and brother of the bride. Our hostess advanced 
 
 314
 
 THE MOSLEM WOMAN IN JERUSALEM 
 
 raised her veil, and respectfully kissed both hands of the 
 oldest her father. The uncles advanced to the feet of the 
 bride ; each ungirded his sword, heavy with massive scabbard 
 and silver mountings, and both were passed over her head, 
 where they hung round her neck by a cord, a sign that she 
 was now under authority, swaying to right and left, almost 
 touching the ground, as, moving for the first time, she rose 
 to her feet. It was now the brother's turn to approach her, 
 in order to conduct her to the bridegroom's house. We 
 could not but feel that it was a high tribute to the qualities 
 which had provoked such fraternal tenderness, that he 
 burst into tears and rushed from the room. An awkward 
 pause followed. The negress, whose function seemed to be 
 to elicit gaiety, struck up a song. The guests responded, 
 there was hand-clapping, and the usual indescribable shrilling 
 of the lips ; the words probably as follows : 
 
 O bride, your look is like the moon, 
 
 Your face is as round as a tray. 
 What has been showered upon you in your home 
 
 Is as nothing to what is your gain in marriage. 
 
 In a few minutes the brother returned, a dignified elderly 
 man, with long beard and downcast eyes. The bride descen- 
 ded from her throne, assisted at every step, for, enshrouded 
 as she was, to see her way was impossible. The crowd 
 closed in behind her and we at once made our way through 
 the darkness and slush to find our carriages. The rain was 
 now falling in torrents, but this, too, we were told, was 
 " good luck," a promise of the fertility of Mother Earth. 1 
 
 The immediate family of course went first, so that by the 
 time we reached the bridegroom's house the bride was 
 installed. The hall was fuU of servants and dependants ; 
 the negress was there too, and the professional dancers and 
 singers, and, in addition, some five or six white-robed 
 Sheikhats gliding about, superintending generally, passing In 
 
 1 Compare the English saying : " Happy is the bride that the 
 rain rains on." 
 
 315
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 and out of the bride's chamber, making various arrangements 
 consistent with their professional duties. There was some- 
 thing in their mysterious presence, something disagreeably 
 suggestive of " undertaking," of an immolation, a sacrifice ; 
 and it was with a shudder of repulsion that we turned to a 
 scene not less weird, but more social in its aspect. 
 
 The dining-room had been cleared of the table and the 
 four or five chairs which constituted its furniture, cushions 
 had been placed upon the floor all round the room, a single 
 lamp burnt sulkily upon the window-sill, and in the corner, 
 propped up against the wall, sat the cynosure of all eyes, the 
 bride, still motionless and still veiled. 
 
 Presently came a summons to my companion " Would 
 she dress the bride ? " She consented, and I was allowed 
 the privilege of assisting her. We repaired to the corner, 
 got down upon the floor, and proceeded to unpack the em- 
 broidered silk envelope which contained all the necessary 
 articles of toilet ; a pink silk dress trimmed with lace, a 
 creation of the Sceurs de Charite, pink embroidered shoes, 
 the bridal veil, the box of cosmetics and perfumes, a box of 
 additional ribbons and laces, and a comb which a decently 
 groomed horse would have resented, coarse, jagged, and of 
 the impracticable variety known as a tooth-comb. 
 
 Next, the veil was removed, and a fine, strapping 
 woman of a year or two over thirty exposed to view ; her 
 eyes were closed, her face destitute of expression, her limbs 
 lax : she was playing her part to perfection. She had an 
 immense " pig- tail " of jet-black hair to be coiffe for the first 
 time. We sent for another comb. We removed the long 
 shapeless white dress that she wore and found another 
 exactly like it underneath, and another below that. The 
 dress, more or less of European design, into which she had to 
 be got, had a waist band of unprecedented proportions, but 
 even so we looked at each other in silent despair. The 
 shapeless corsets, our only ally, promised little assistance, 
 and one of us murmured : "It will take a couple of strong 
 
 316
 
 THE MOSLEM WOMAN IN JERUSALEM 
 
 men to do this." Nevertheless, with much perseverance on 
 our part and much fortitude upon that of the bride, the 
 thing was done, her only sign of life a shake of the head, when 
 my companion asked if she were hurting her. The magnifi- 
 cent hair was made up into a Psyche coil, and then we fell 
 to upon the creation of a complexion. The grease-paint 
 lay so nicely on the well-curved throat, that it seemed a 
 pity not to add a little extra, and as time and endurance did 
 not fail, we proposed to make the dress slightly decollete, a 
 suggestion repudiated with horror by the crowd of onlookers, 
 who were most of them sitting at the moment in attitudes 
 which exhibited their garters. Truly propriety is a question 
 of custom ! 
 
 The toilet finished, it only remained to put on the jewels, 
 which were produced out of a leather bag by one of the group 
 of elderly women who had played secondary lady's maids. 
 A necklace, consisting of thirty large gold coins of a favourite 
 Hungarian variety, worth slightly more than two napoleons 
 and a half each, reached to her waist. Two ropes, each of 
 twenty-eight strands of seed pearls, came next. Then a 
 large diamond locket was produced. There was no chain, 
 and we sought in vain for a pink ribbon, and finally took 
 refuge in a yellow one, which looked pink in the lamp light, 
 not without some qualms that it would be put on again by 
 daylight next morning, and would pass into history as English 
 taste. Then came various brooches ; then so many dia- 
 mond sprays that the beautiful Psyche knot looked like a 
 show cushion in a jeweller's window. Rings and bracelets 
 were placed on hands and wrists. There seemed space for 
 nothing more ; but at the last moment a bunch of flowers 
 was handed over, which we were required to distribute on 
 head and breast, a semi-transparent lace veil was thrown 
 over her head, and that act in the drama was complete. 
 
 Sounds of music and shouting outside. " Behold the 
 bridegroom cometh " arose to our lips, and we hastened into 
 the outer hall to witness his entrance. 
 
 317
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 A man never counts for very much at his own wedding, 
 but the position of a defenceless Moslem, alone in a crowd 
 of a hundred excited women, is even less than usual to be 
 envied, not that an Arab is given, as a rule, to self-conscious- 
 ness, false shame, or kindred discomforts. A chair at the 
 bottom of the room by the door at the extreme end from the 
 bride's exit was assigned to him, the women not privileged, 
 either as relatives or professionals, veiled themselves ; a few 
 small boys clustered about him ; we received front places 
 in the crowd for ourselves, and presently the sound of music 
 in the distant room announced that the bride was on the 
 way. She appeared as the centre of a brilliant illumination, 
 her attendants carrying large flat wax candles, each having 
 three wicks and all richly painted and decorated. 
 
 The etiquette of the occasion requires the exhibition of 
 extreme reluctance, combined with all the allurements of 
 an accomplished beauty, a probable survival of the actual 
 resistance still offered by the women of certain tribes of the 
 Bedu, to what is practically marriage by capture, and in 
 which the throwing of stones and the use of teeth and nails 
 as weapons of defence are as much a part of the etiquette 
 of the occasion as the carefully rehearsed performance at 
 present under consideration, and known as El gelweh. 
 
 As the bride advanced and reached the bottom of the 
 avenue of onlookers, in a direct line with her husband, still 
 distant some thirty or thirty-five feet, we were able to 
 watch her attentively. Her eyes were still closed, her 
 hands, held palm outwards, in front of her chest. She was 
 surrounded by the professional assistants. Two white-robed 
 old women supported her from behind, another on either 
 hand ; the gigantic negress moved in front facing the bride, 
 making believe to encourage and cheer her progress, but 
 in reality contriving now and then to drive her backwards, 
 so as to prolong the performance to the very utmost. The 
 singers and dancers in the crowd took up their songs from 
 time to time under the direction of the negress. The women 
 
 318
 
 THE MOSLEM WOMAN IN JERUSALEM 
 
 on either side of her carried the swords (now decorated with 
 flowers), so as to form an archway over her head. All joined 
 in the songs, led by the professionals, and accentuated by 
 much clapping of hands and clicking of lips. 
 
 " Reel and sway and go to sleep," they sang, over and 
 over again, " and should we reproach you, say, To-day am 
 I yet among the maidens." 
 
 And in truth she reeled and swayed to their hearts' con- 
 tent a thorough mistress of the etiquette of the situation. 
 She staggered from side to side, and every step was taken 
 with an exaggerated movement of the hips, which was much 
 applauded, although in truth in no sense beautiful in Occi- 
 dental estimation. 1 Perfect as was her acting, one sometimes 
 lacked the key to the part. One was occasionally at a loss 
 to know whether her role were that of amorousness or 
 reluctance, whether she were playing the " Bride of Lam- 
 mermoor " or the heroine of the " Song of Songs." 
 
 All this went on for, perhaps, half an hour, by which time 
 she had advanced about ten feet. Then the negress indi- 
 cated a change in the programme. The cymbals and tam- 
 bourines were clanged with added energy, the singing became 
 louder and more rapid, the negress and her band turned in 
 the direction of the bridegroom. 
 
 " Strain your eyes and see her ! " they sang ; "see her, and 
 the diamonds .she wears. All that you have paid for her 
 is less than the worth of her finger-tips." 
 
 The bridegroom, a young Arab, of two or three and 
 twenty, dark and hirsute, with, like so many of his race, a 
 cast in his eyes, had hitherto appeared somewhat bored and 
 indifferent. Thus urged, however, he began to enter into 
 the spirit of the play, and at a signal from the mistress of the 
 ceremonies, he rose, and walked briskly down the room to 
 where the bride had now halted, still swaying from side to 
 side. He lifted her veil, and there was a pause and a dead 
 silence, while he, presumably for the first time, contem- 
 
 1 It is one of the beauties specially celebrated in Arabic poetry. 
 
 319
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 plated her charms. I had an uncharitable desire to warn 
 him that her roses were ours, and that to-morrow the bril- 
 liant complexion would have departed, but he showed no 
 particular enthusiasm, not even the shyness which, we were 
 told, it was customary to exhibit ; put down the veil with 
 the air of wrapping up a recent purchase, and returned to his 
 seat. 
 
 From this time the proceedings, though not more rapid, 
 were somewhat more lively. It seemed to be proper to 
 encourage the bride with extravagant compliments, whether 
 to stimulate the ardours of the too business-like groom, or 
 to console the lady, we could not decide. 
 
 Every verse was sung again and again with occasional 
 slight variations improvized by the negress. 
 
 You are welcome, you are twice welcome, 
 God spare the bridegroom who bought you ; 
 And since he has brought you here, 
 No evil shall befall you. 
 
 From this consoling general sentiment we advanced to 
 personalities 
 
 You are a first-fruit like the cucumber of October, 
 
 Many are the girls of our city, but for birth and breeding have 
 
 we sought you. 
 
 Your waist is so thin that it won't feed the hungry ant, 
 You are so good that you are obedient to your mother-in-law ; 
 You are a box of spices that has filled the air with balm. 
 
 We were getting metaphysical, and the recollection that 
 she had been well saturated with Eau-de-Cologne de Gelle 
 Freres was, I was aware, a materialistic irrelevance. 
 
 The irrepressible negress again came forward, the music 
 was stopped, and she began a performance on her own 
 account. The bride's charms and accomplishments were to 
 be shown off a coffee cup was put into her hand, and, with 
 her eyes still closed, she went through the pantomime of 
 making coffee ; a needle which it is important should be 
 
 320
 
 THE MOSLEM WOMAN IN JERUSALEM 
 
 threaded with green silk was given to her, and she sewed 
 an invisible seam ; an egg, seeds, leaves in turn, served some 
 concerted purpose, always under the direction of the negress. 
 Then, as in the course of the last hour she had arrived 
 within a dozen feet of the always seated bridegroom who, 
 it may be mentioned, had been exceedingly attentive to the 
 later developments yet another act of the play was entered 
 upon. 
 
 With much gesticulation, apparently intended to convey 
 to the unhappy man that his long-suffering patience must 
 endure yet longer, the procession was stopped, and with 
 shrieks of laughter and much mysterious pantomime, the 
 negress, aided by the Sheikhat, proceeded to manipulate the 
 bride's appearance. We held our breath as she stuck 
 additional flowers into the coiffure we had so carefully 
 arranged, turned and twisted the bride's veil, directed her 
 how to hold her hands, how to make certain gestures, the pur- 
 port of which was to us not obvious ; drew attention to the 
 fashion of bending the hips, which seemed to us so unsightly, 
 and, finally, as a tour de force, stuck scraps of fern leaves 
 all over her face and invited us to admire " the Bedu," 
 from which we gathered that the patches represented 
 tattooing. The poor girl looked so utterly exhausted that 
 at every moment we feared that the play would become 
 real, and she would faint in good earnest. However, the 
 longest day comes to an end, and in another five minutes, 
 with eyes open and hands at rest, she was seated by the bride- 
 groom's side. The singers and musicians burst out anew, 
 relatives pressed forward to congratulate, and after a few 
 minutes of reception of friends the bridegroom took the 
 exhausted damsel by the arm, and, at a pace very different 
 from that hitherto adopted, she was re-conducted down the 
 room ; the Sheikhat pressed forward to open the door of the 
 nuptial apartment, our hostess and some half-dozen ladies 
 entered with them, and we saw them no more, though it is 
 only just to say that such is the inexhaustible hospitality of 
 
 321 Y
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 such occasions, that we were invited to pursue our investi- 
 gations farther, and were confidently assured that fellow- 
 guests would not be lacking. The pschycologist is avowedly 
 merciless, but even in the cause of science one must draw 
 the line somewhere, and we felt that the poor girl should be 
 allowed at least her first domestic meal with peace, if per- 
 haps not with appetite. 
 
 The gaiety of the negress was inextinguishable, although, 
 we learnt casually, she had but a few days before buried her 
 second husband, a white man ! 
 
 As we had understood that a ceremonial akin to the old 
 English custom of " throwing the stocking " was among 
 those about to occur behind the closed doors, and as the 
 presence of a handsome woman is always considered pro- 
 pitious on such occasions, we had been glad to observe that 
 our beautiful hostess had remained with her charge, and it 
 was probably in allusion to the superstition involved that 
 the ugly negress made repeated feints of seeking entrance, 
 to be dragged away with shrieks and laughter by the rela- 
 tives present. 
 
 We were glad to escape, and take our final coffee quietly in 
 the room of one of the sisters-in-law, where I gladly noted 
 we were shortly joined by our hostess and the other near 
 relatives, and I ventured to express sympathy with the 
 fatigue involved in such continuity of attention as a peri- 
 phrasis for congratulating the happy pair on being left alone 
 at last ! It was a vain hope a further reception was ex- 
 pected of them, and no guest would think of repose that night 
 further than could be snatched upon the floor, where, indeed, 
 many were stretched, anyhow and anywhere, wrapped in 
 silk coverlets ! 
 
 Truly Oriental magnificence and luxury do not take into 
 account the humble joys of occasional solitude ! 
 
 322
 
 CHAPTER XXI 
 CHRISTIAN WOMEN IN JERUSALEM 
 
 TRAINING OCCUPATIONS COMPARISONS BETWEEN MOSLEM 
 AND CHRISTIAN WOMEN CHRISTIANS OF THE WORKING 
 CLASS MANNERS HOSPITALITY NOTABLE WOMEN- 
 BENEFACTRESSES 
 
 IT is but natural that woman, numerically the larger 
 half of creation, should have figured considerably in 
 these pages, but, although we have looked at her from the 
 Moslem and from the Jewish point of view, except incident- 
 ally as a missionary or as a Sister of Mercy, Latin or German, 
 we have seen less of her from the Christian standpoint, 
 possibly, perhaps, because the outlook is not wholly 
 encouraging. 
 
 A large proportion of the so-called Protestant element 
 of Jerusalem is German, and the German girls in the indus- 
 trious and orderly little German colony have much the 
 same prospects and objects in life as German girls else- 
 where. Of French there are not a dozen, and the Levantiners, 
 who account themselves such, are, like the English of the 
 same type, for all purposes of psychological inquiry, natives. 
 The Convents and the German Deaconesses train large 
 numbers of girls in practical domestic work and useful house- 
 hold industries. Of these a fair number themselves take 
 up the religious life, and some are sent as teachers to other 
 institutions, while many marry for the Arab well knows 
 how to appreciate the money-getting and money-saving 
 results of a useful training. It is alleged that those brought 
 
 323
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 up in the English schools often become school-mistresses. 
 I never yet heard of any one employing them as servants, 
 and, indeed, have never met a domestic servant who was not 
 Latin, Greek, German, or Armenian. Jewish indoor servants 
 are obviously inconvenient, on account of ceremonial 
 differences, about which, in Jerusalem, they are very strict ; 
 and a Moslem townswoman cannot take service at all 
 except in a harem, while the fellaheen women are mainly 
 employed in agriculture, sometimes as porters, not to say 
 beasts of burden, sometimes as driving, or even, yoked with 
 a donkey, as drawing the plough. A friend tells me that 
 on a certain occasion he saw a man lamenting the death of 
 his mule, which had fallen by the wayside. His wife stood 
 meekly afar, not venturing even to proffer sympathy. 
 After a time she was beckoned up, the dead animal unloaded, 
 and the burthen handed over to her. She was about to set 
 off, thus weighted, when, with a curse on her idleness, she 
 was once more recalled, and the pack-saddle added to her 
 encumbrances. 
 
 From the point of view of such a husband, woman has 
 a definite value, which is duly considered at the time of 
 purchase a wife being valued under such conditions as so 
 much muscle and endurance, just as, in other countries, 
 she may be considered as equivalent to so much money, 
 business connexion, social position, or other advantage. 
 Whether the position, Moslem or Christian, of beast of 
 burden for the farm be really inferior to that among the 
 wealthier Oriental households, of cow for the nursery, is 
 purely a matter of individual fancy. 
 
 One is, of course, thankful that there should be some 
 12,000 Christians in Jerusalem, of whom some 1,400 are 
 Protestants, mostly German, and one earnestly wishes new 
 life to the mission-fields such life, for example, as the 
 Americans and the Scotch Medical Mission have introduced 
 in Syria, the Quakers in the Lebanon, and the Germans in 
 their many Christian colonies all over Palestine and Syria ; 
 
 324
 
 but when it comes to practical relations with the native, 
 and speaking solely from the social point of view, one is 
 bound to acknowledge that in the Holy City (of course, with 
 certain welcome exceptions) the native Christian is as 
 inferior to the Moslem as is the Hebrew Christian to the 
 unadulterated Jew. 
 
 This is especially true in reference to the wealthier classes, 
 with whom one comes into social relation in hotels, or 
 business relation in shops and elsewhere. The Moslem 
 effendi, in spotless turban and kumbaz, dazzling linen, silks 
 and satins which invite to dreams of luxurious tea-gowns, 
 or even, on occasions of less ceremony, in the dignified 
 jubr, at least looks like a gentleman, and as such contrasts 
 effectively with the Christian, who in the morning probably 
 wears frock-coats of all colours and preternatural length, 
 stiff collars and cuffs but poorly adapted to a hot climate, 
 gem rings, yellow shoes, a tartan necktie, and a scarlet 
 tarboosh. The Moslem's silent contemplation of his 
 narghille (water-pipe) may not be edifying, but it does 
 not violate the unities and irritate one's senses like the 
 smell of arak and the litter of cigarettes. The Moslem is 
 always courteous, generally silent, and one readily pardons 
 but too sympathetically, perhaps his cat-like air of 
 supercilious indifference. The Christian may be courteous, 
 is seldom silent, and is frankly inquisitive. 
 
 One would like to know how far the contrast might hold 
 good if one had the opportunity of pursuing it among the 
 women in really intimate relations in their own homes ; as 
 perhaps no cultured woman, unless it be Lady Burton and 
 the ladies of the American Colony in Jerusalem, have ever 
 had the good fortune to be permitted to do. The Moslem 
 woman is hospitable and courteous, and if merely a part of 
 the nursery furniture, at least of good quality as such, 
 well groomed, well dressed, pleasing to the eye, a little 
 wistful perhaps, pathetic with the pathos of an intelligent 
 caged animal. But she is not a dowdy dressed like a fashion- 
 
 325
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 plate, such as is to be seen in its perfection at Beirut, and in 
 its degree at all the summer hotels in the country. The 
 Moslem religion enforces ablution, and, so far as the women 
 are concerned, a decent reserve, therefore we owe it to the 
 Christians only that the keepers of native hotels, however 
 luxurious and expensive, should fail to understand why the 
 members of one party should not be content to occupy a 
 single bedroom, irrespective of age, sex, and relation. We 
 have personally established the contemporary occupation 
 of one room by father, mother, three children, two elderly 
 relatives, and two female servants. It is true there were 
 four beds. On another occasion a husband, wife, brother- 
 in-law, and female cousin, to whom had been assigned 
 three rooms, in a Latin hospice, abandoned two of them upon 
 some trifling pretext, and the Brother in charge told us 
 that the frequent occasion for remonstrance against similar 
 indifference to common decency was the painful side of his 
 pleasure in dispensing hospitality. 
 
 The Christians of the working classes are often Latin and 
 Armenian, but more largely Greeks in the towns, and 
 Maronites in the Lebanon. There is one entire Bedawy 
 tribe of Christians (Latin) and some few Christian villages 
 in the Jerusalem district, many of them of very unsavoury 
 reputation. The Christian native women one meets in the 
 streets of Jerusalem are necessarily of the lower classes, or 
 they would not be there a fact which would explain the 
 extreme roughness of their manners, were it not that many 
 times a poor fellah woman or a rough, good-natured girl 
 from Siloam or Lifta (Moslem villages) has protected us 
 against the frank egotism of the superior Christian from 
 Bethlehem, who sweeps before her anything which impedes 
 the progress of her unaccountable bulk. The Moslem, man 
 or woman, may be indifferent, even supercilious, but is never 
 impertinent and never servile. The native Christian, here 
 as elsewhere, is what other Christians have made him, 
 whether the other Christian be the teacher working in the 
 
 320
 
 CHRISTIAN WOMEN IN JERUSALEM 
 
 interest of religious statistics, or merely the tourist in the 
 interest of his own passing convenience or amusement. 
 
 The congregations of the Protestant Churches in Jerusalem 
 belong almost exclusively to the genteel classes, and are 
 Europeans, Levantiners, and a few Syrian Christians, all 
 in their Sunday clothes, generally of European cut ; the 
 younger men and women having an increasing tendency to 
 hats, which, as opposed to the veil and tarbush, the last 
 mark of Oriental distinction, are, from the point of view 
 of the picturesque, much to be regretted. 
 
 In the Latin, Greek, and Armenian Churches the poor 
 are always with us, every day and at all hours, not neces- 
 sarily from motives of piety, as we of the West understand it. 
 Indeed, especially among the women, one is struck alike 
 by the earnestness and by the frank indifference of the 
 worshippers. Dean Church l thus expresses the fact. 
 " The sort of orderly inattention and stealthy gossip that 
 goes on with us, you never see here. They are either 
 attending in earnest or not pretending to attend at all, 
 and they seem to pass abruptly, without any hesitation or 
 concealment, from devotion to mutual salutation and 
 smiles." Brightman's remarks on the same point have 
 often recurred to us at sight of the entire area of a large 
 Oriental Church covered on the one side with kneeling 
 figures in white sheets, on the other with forms, equally 
 devout in attitude, covered with striped kumbaz or brown 
 abbaye, the men and women, it should be observed, mutually 
 ignoring each other's presence. " If it seems to one that in 
 the East personal edification is too much lost sight of, it 
 must be remembered that with us the idea of public worship 
 is equally lost sight of in the pursuit of individual edifi- 
 cation." 2 
 
 I once ventured to remark upon the conduct of the 
 native women to a Pere cure in a Syrian town ; upon the 
 
 1 Life and Letters, p. 29. 
 
 2 Brightman, op. cit. p. 24. 
 
 327
 
 way in which they alternate their prayers, said aloud, to 
 the disturbance of their neighbours, with conversation, 
 equally frank and unrestrained, with those about them ; 
 upon their custom of bringing wailing infants, whom no 
 one attempts to pacify, and older children, who wander 
 about unrebuked. " What can we do ?" he replied. " Of 
 reverence, as we understand it, they know nothing, and there 
 is a certain piety in their very familiarity. If we speak to 
 them, they say, Are we not at home ? Is not this our 
 Father's house ? Le bon Dieu tiest pas mechant comme 
 ceux qui s'en plaignent f " 
 
 Bundled up in such a quantity of clothes that each native 
 woman requires the space of two or three Europeans, and 
 possessed, moreover, of the extraordinary development of 
 hip consequent on many generations of perpetual squatting, 
 the native woman at worship takes possession of any place 
 it may occur to her to covet by the simple process of placing 
 herself immediately in front of the person occupying it, and 
 proceeding to kneel down ; upon which, time being the 
 condition of two bodies in the same space, and space the 
 relation of two bodies in the same time, one has no choice 
 but to seek the conditions of life elsewhere. At Bethlehem, 
 where the native woman, devotionally inclined, achieves her 
 ends by sheer bulk and persistence, like the camel, whose 
 manners she imitates, grumbling included, we have some- 
 times had to remove ourselves four or five times during a 
 single Mass. On profane occasions the Christian villager 
 may be, and often is, courteous and agreeable, especially in 
 her own house, but in church there seems to be a received 
 tradition that the laws of ordinary politeness are temporarily 
 suspended. 
 
 There is yet another view of woman which is somewhat 
 forced upon one's notice in a country in which the monastic 
 life is perhaps one of the most prominent of social insti- 
 tutions. 
 
 Many of us have our own views as to the advantages of 
 
 328
 
 CHRISTIAN WOMEN IN JERUSALEM 
 
 the celibacy of the clergy and its utility from the point of 
 view of social relations, even apart from those, more directly, 
 of religion ; but most, I think, would consider its enforce- 
 ment as one of the personal sacrifices necessary to the 
 ascetic life that a priest renounces marriage as he renounces 
 property, as a thing good, it may be, in itself, though to be 
 avoided under certain circumstances women and wealth 
 alike being of the nature of distraction, not, one would fain 
 hope, necessarily of evil. 
 
 The extreme hospitality and courtesy which the religious 
 Orders of Jerusalem of all creeds are ever ready to show to 
 guests of either sex and every nationality would suggest 
 that their outlook was somewhat exaggerated by Charles 
 Kingsley when he makes the Abbot in Hypatia express his 
 views as to what is conventionally known as the " gentler 
 sex." 
 
 " Have I not bidden you never to look on the face of 
 women ? Are they not the firstfruits of the devil, the 
 authors of all evil, the subtlest of all Satan's snares ? Are 
 they not accursed for ever for the deceit of their first mother, 
 by whom sin entered into the world ? A woman first 
 opened the gates of hell, and until this day they are all 
 portresses thereof." 
 
 The perpetuation of such an attitude would indeed, in 
 this country, show the basest ingratitude, for at every 
 step of the advance of the Christian faith some woman has 
 stood by with helping hand. It is unnecessary to recall 
 those holy women " last at the Cross and earliest at the 
 grave," but one may well be reminded that almost the 
 first evidence we have on the subject of the traditional 
 sites is that of Sylvia of Aquitaine, 1 whose narrative of her 
 visit in 385 is second only in interest to that of the Bordeaux 
 pilgrim. Were not Paula and Eustochia the devout fol- 
 
 1 This interesting document was found in 1883 by Signor Gamur- 
 rini, librarian at Arezzo in Tuscany. 
 
 329
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 lowers of S. Jerome, 1 with their contemporary Melania 
 (c. 361) the mothers of all the pilgrims of after ages ? 
 
 The first congregation of corporal works of mercy in 
 Jerusalem was probably that of the Knights of S. John, 
 known variously as Knights Hospitallers, Knights of the 
 Cross, of Rhodes, and of Malta still represented at Tantour, 2 
 between Jerusalem and Bethlehem, and universally 
 respected for their charity and surgical skill. It was 
 founded by one Gerard, a Crusader, about 1099, and very 
 shortly after was followed by its modest counterpart, 
 founded for Dames Hospitalieres by a Roman lady named 
 Agnes. 
 
 Was not Mary of Portugal, a tertiary of the Order of 
 S. Francis and a pilgrim to the Holy Sepulchre, one of the 
 earliest martyrs to the faith, attached to a cross and burnt 
 in the court of the Church of the Resurrection ? 3 Have 
 we not, for our example, the traditions of Pelagia, and of 
 Mary of Egypt, who here, in the Holy City, showed public 
 sorrow for a sinful life, like Mary Magdalene of old ? 
 
 Even in pre-crusading times woman played her part in 
 the Holy Land. " Christian Jerusalem has known three 
 principal periods of prosperity, incarnated in three glorious 
 
 1 Nevertheless, at the risk of spoiling our argument as to the value 
 of the example of woman, I cannot resist reference to the inter- 
 relations of these ladies from the standpoint of an entertaining 
 human document. S. Jerome, the confessor of Paula and Eustochia, 
 formerly the close friend of Rufinus the confessor of Melania, but 
 latterly separated from him on the ground of some religious differences, 
 made use of his disciples as a weapon of offence, pointing out the fact, 
 of which it is conceivable they were not unconscious, that whereas 
 they were the daughters of the Scipios, Melania was merely a wealthy 
 parvenu. He condescends to even further personalities, and points 
 out that the word " Melania " means black, and that ' her name was 
 the living image of her soul.' " (Thierry, IS Emigration Romaine en 
 Terre Sainte. ) 
 
 2 Protestant representatives of the same rule are also to be found 
 in the German Hospice in the city of Jerusalem, and in the English 
 Hospital for Ophthalmia on the Bethlehem road. 
 
 3 Quaresimiis, vol. ii. chap. vi. 
 
 330
 
 CHRISTIAN WOMEN IN JERUSALEM 
 
 names, those of Helena, Eudocia, and Justinian. It is, 
 thanks to the liberality of these powerful benefactors (of 
 whom two were women) that the Holy City, in the first 
 half of the fourth, fifth, and sixth centuries respectively, 
 was covered with great and glorious monuments " (Official 
 Guide of the French Pilgrims to Jerusalem, p. 128). Of 
 Helena, the Mother of Constantine, to whose piety 
 and liberality are attributed the foundation not only of the 
 Churches of the Holy Sepulchre and of Bethlehem, but a 
 great number of shrines only second in importance in all 
 parts of Palestine, it is unnecessary to speak. Eudocia, 
 of whom it is related that, at a time of much discussion in 
 the Church, she was herself restored to orthodoxy, is further 
 remembered as the foundress of churches, hospitals, and 
 almshouses. It is said also that she rebuilt the walls of 
 the Holy City, and was buried in the Church of S. Stephen, 
 which she had herself erected on the site of his martyrdom. 
 According to some, she beautified the Church of Bethlehem, 
 and erected the Church of the Grotto of Gethsemane. 
 
 The Benedictines owe the importance of one of their 
 earliest edifices to Arda, the wife of Baldwin I. The 
 Sanctuary of S. Anne, said to be the birthplace of Our Lady, 
 originally built and served by the hermits of Mount Carmel, 
 was restored by Helena and again by Justinian, when it 
 passed into the hands of the Latins. Saewulf (1103) 
 describes it as served by a few poor nuns, but when Arda 
 took the veil it became a rich Abbey, and was still further 
 established under Judith (or Ivette), the daughter of 
 Baldwin II, about 1144. This same princess afterwards 
 organized another convent at Bethany, out of funds pro- 
 vided by Melisande, the wife of Fulk, who, upon her death, 
 in 1161, was buried in the Benedictine Church of the Tomb 
 of Our Lady, the spot being still shown. 
 
 The Franciscans arrived in Jerusalem, according to 
 tradition, in 1219, and occupied a small convent on Mount 
 Sion, more or less by grace of the Canons Regular of S. 
 
 331
 
 Augustine. It was not till 1333, however, that they ob- 
 tained anything like a firm footing, when, thanks largely to 
 Sancha, wife of Robert of Sicily, they were presented with 
 a site bought from the Sultan for seventeen millions of gold 
 ducats, and handed over to the Pope, on condition that the 
 Franciscans should be guardians in perpetuity of the 
 Coenaculum, the first of the many Holy Places associated 
 with their Order. It was at this time also, and by the same 
 intercession, that they obtained possession of the so-called 
 Chapel of the Apparition in the Holy Sepulchre. The 
 Pope, Clement VI, accorded the desired Bull, which was 
 addressed to the queen herself as Nuper carissimi in Christo, 
 given at Avignon, November 21, 1342. They proceeded to 
 build a church on the spot with some material of ruined 
 churches already at hand. Some ten years later Sophia 
 of Archangel, a rich Florentine lady, bought the ground 
 surrounding their convent, and built the first establishment 
 for pilgrims confided to the care of the Franciscans, which 
 included also a hospital, placed by Urban VI, in 1365, under 
 the charge of the Sisters of S. Martin and of S. Claire. It 
 was, moreover, a woman, the Marquise de Nicolay, who, in 
 1872, presented to the Franciscans the site recognized by 
 Papal authority as that of the Emmaus of S. Luke, upon 
 which a convent and an oratory were first built, and 
 where, in 1902-3, in consequence of further excavations 
 and the discovery of a Crusading church, alleged to enclose 
 the house of Cleophas, a handsome church was erected on 
 the old foundations. Thus, the Franciscans owe, in some 
 degree, to women their first convent, church, hospice, 
 hospital, the only chapel in the Church of the Resurrection 
 to which they have an exclusive right, the first Papal Bull 
 in their favour in the Holy Land, and one of their latest 
 and most treasured sites. 
 
 Another possible site of the village of Emmaus, and of 
 the home of Cleophas, known as Amwas Nicopolis, was 
 also bought and presented to the Latins (now in the hands 
 
 332
 
 CHRISTIAN WOMEN IN JERUSALEM 
 
 of the Trappists) by a woman, Mile, de Saint Cricq 
 Dartigaux, who bore the cost of considerable research in 
 1880 by the architect Guillemot. 
 
 To the Princesse de la Tour d'Auvergne (d. 1891) we owe 
 the purchase and preservation of the Church of the Pater, 
 said to be the site where the disciples received the Lord's 
 Prayer. The Scandinavian pilgrims record its existence, 
 and the Danish bishop Sweyn and his brother were buried 
 there about 1152. The Princess established the Carmelites 
 in the restored Convent in 1876. 
 
 When Chosroes II had accomplished his work of destruc- 
 tion, it was his wife, a Christian, and the sister of Maurice, 
 Emperor of Constantinople, whose intervention made it 
 possible to Modestus, then a monk in the Convent of S. 
 Theodosius, to reconstruct the Church of the Resurrection 
 within the short space of fifteen years. When Hakem had 
 ordered the Governor of Ramleh, near Jerusalem, to destroy 
 all Christian churches, it was his mother, Mary, the sister 
 of the patriarchs of Jerusalem and of Alexandria, who 
 obtained for the Christians the privileges they had lost, 
 and permission to rebuild. 
 
 The time would fail us to tell of many other benefactresses 
 to the Holy City ; of gifts to the Benedictines l made by 
 the Viscomtesse Pisellus, confirmed by Baldwin I (1114) ; 
 of the gifts of orchards and gardens by Papia, the wife of 
 Eustache Grenier ; of lands given by Cecilia, " sister of the 
 King of Jerusalem," 1126 (probably Baldwin II), by Adeliza, 
 his daughter, 1134, of Hodierne, wife of Helie of Tyre, 1140, 
 a practical woman, whose offering includes a wood, a mill, 
 and certain villas. In 1176 one Gilbertus, with Lizina his 
 wife, and Anne his sister, sold property at Ravenna for the 
 benefit of the Benedictine Abbey at Jerusalem ; in 1187 
 Amaury, Viscount of Nagreouse, with the consent of his 
 wife, Theophania, ended a difference with the Abbey on the 
 subject of boundaries, probably a greater sacrifice than the 
 
 1 See Charters published in the Revue de L'Orient Lutin, vol. vii. 1-2. 
 
 333
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 gift of lands. In 1196 the Empress Constance, Queen of 
 Sicily, signed a deed approving of privileges granted in 
 Jerusalem by her husband, Henri VI. In 1198 Amaury IX, 
 King of Jerusalem, and his wife Isabel, gave " hore mil 
 unum molendinum equorum " in the town of Acre. 
 
 There seem to have been some large-souled women in 
 those days, and one is glad to find, now and then, tokens 
 that their value was appreciated. The so-called Tombs of 
 the Kings, for example, which are among the most inter- 
 esting remains in Jerusalem, have no concern with those 
 kings of Israel and Judah, so difficult to remember, who 
 slept with their fathers, in consequence of which somebody 
 else reigned in their stead, but are the Tombs of Queens, 
 chief among whom was Helena of Adiabene, in Kurdistan, 
 who was converted to Judaism, and arriving, says tradition, 
 in Jerusalem about the year 44 A. D., at the time of the famine 
 prophesied by Agabus, sent to Egypt for grain and to 
 Cyprus for figs, and thus merited the beautiful sarcophagus 
 alleged to belong to her. 1 Various other persons of quality 
 were buried around her, the only one whose name we 
 know being a certain Princess Sarah, though, as her son 
 Izatis is reported to have had twenty-four daughters 
 (in addition to twenty-four sons), we may assume that 
 she lies among her own kindred. 
 
 It is interesting to note that the only two examples 
 remaining intact of sepulchres guarded by the rolling stone, 
 so interesting to all Christians, are this, of Helena, and 
 another, perhaps even more perfect, though less visited, of 
 another woman of distinction, Mariamne, the wife of Herod. 
 Another interesting tomb, practically ignored of tourists, 
 is that of " Chouchangane, mother of Ardavan," to whom 
 
 1 The Arabic author, Mejr ed din, A.D. 1391, speaks of a certain 
 Dame Tonshok, whom he describes as the munificent Queen 
 Dowager of Adiabene, who endowed the soup-kitchen for the poor 
 which is still kept up in Jerusalem by Moslems, who may be seen 
 daily dispensing help to the needy, irrespective of creed. 
 
 334
 
 CHRISTIAN WOMEN IN JERUSALEM 
 
 was awarded, let us hope by filial piety, a beautiful mosaic 
 decoration, probably of the fifth century, consisting of 
 bunches of grapes, fishes, a cock and a lamb, specimens 
 valuable to the student of early religious symbolism. Per- 
 haps not less useful to posterity was a certain Roman lady, 
 Lucilia Pampilia, whose ex voto offering of a marble foot, 
 obviously of the time of Adrian, has earned the gratitude 
 of archaeologists for enabling them to restore the character 
 for antiquity to the so-called Pool of Bethesda, which, 
 mentioned by the Bordeaux pilgrims (in 333), by Cyril of 
 Jerusalem (d. 386), and described by Eusebius and S. 
 Jerome, had been lost sight of after the fourteenth century 
 till the discovery mentioned encouraged Mauss, the French 
 archaeologist, to further researches, with the result of 
 discovering a piscina of undisputed antiquity, certainly of 
 earlier date than the ecclesiastical remains near by dedicated 
 to S. Mary and to S. Anne, the first of which was first men- 
 tioned in 530 by Theodosius. Six metres below the soil a 
 curious mural painting was discovered, probably repre- 
 senting the miracle at the Pool. 
 
 335
 
 CHAPTER XXII 
 BIRD AND BEAST IN JERUSALEM 
 
 ALLEGED CRUELTY IN JERUSALEM THE CAMEL, CAT, DOG, 
 HORSE, Ass, WILD ANIMALS THE GAZELLE, JERBOA, 
 HYENA, JACKAL, CONEY MAR SABA SPORT THE 
 PARTRIDGE, HARE, Fox WILD BIRDS IN THE TEMPLE 
 COURTS STORKS, SPARROW, SWALLOW THE LIZARDS 
 
 I HAVE already ventured to suggest that the cruelty 
 of the Orientals is, in no sense, a consequence 
 of the Moslem faith, and that the worst offenders are 
 among the Jews and Christians. A large number of the 
 public conveyances belong to the Jews, and the overload- 
 ing and beating of their horses is one of the most pain- 
 ful features of street life in Jerusalem. It is, however, 
 one which should make us more than thankful for the Mosaic 
 institution of the Sabbath, as the Jewish horse and ass are 
 probably the only beasts in the Holy City who are entitled 
 by law to a seventh day of rest, and an even longer period 
 for recuperation at the time of festivals. It is the Jews who 
 buy up the living wrecks of other stables, and put them 
 upon the abominable tread-mills, where the poor things toil 
 till they drop dead at their posts. Although it is an 
 ancient custom among the Beduin to cut the ears of sporting 
 dogs, with the notion of quickening their sense of hearing, 
 it is Christian civilization which has introduced the bar- 
 barism, increasingly prevalent, of cutting the ears of asses, 
 and the ears and tails of domestic dogs, it is the tourist, 
 
 336
 
 BIRD AND BEAST IN JERUSALEM 
 
 whose selfishness, taking advantage of native indifference, is 
 responsible for the pain and exhaustion which, whenever a 
 traveller's caravan enters Jerusalem, cries aloud to Heaven 
 from galled and saddle-sore and broken-kneed horse and 
 mule and ass, in this land whe're man, responsible for the 
 brute creation, was first taught that " Blessed are the 
 merciful." 
 
 There is a tradition that the riding of horses was the 
 exclusive privilege of Moslems, 1 and forbidden to Jews and 
 Christians, but that they found means to evade the prohi- 
 bition ; and in the time of Mohammed Ali his subjects 
 complained that they were thereby insulted. The Con- 
 queror tactfully contrived to evade the difficulty by sug- 
 gesting that it was undoubtedly improper that the faithful 
 should be put in an inferior position, but it was always 
 possible to vindicate their exalted claims by riding on 
 camels, and, as a matter of fact, the camel is almost exclu- 
 sively the property of the Moslem population. As a beast 
 of burden he is a necessity of the country, where not only 
 grain and charcoal, but building materials, stone, marble, 
 lime, wood, have to be carried over plain and mountain, 
 where roads are practically unknown. 
 
 To the picture-books of our youth we owe the superstition 
 that a dromedary is a camel with two humps. As a matter 
 of fact, the dromedary is to the camel what the hunter is 
 to the cart-horse, a lighter and swifter specimen of the same 
 genus, and the two-humped camel is never seen in this part 
 of the world at all. He is not " the ship of the desert," 
 but belongs to regions farther north to Turkestan, Thibet 
 and China. The camel, as we know him here, is undoubtedly 
 the camel of the Bible, of whom we first hear as part of a 
 
 1 The picture of a Moslem on horseback defiling the Holy Places 
 was one of the means of arousing the Third Crusade. To this day 
 the entrances to most of the Crusading and Early Christian Churches 
 are partly blocked up, leaving doorways only about five feet high, 
 a reminiscence, it is said, of desecration as well as a means of defence. 
 
 337 Z
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 present which Abraham received from Pharaoh, and which 
 next appears as in use among the Ishmaelites for carrying 
 merchandise of spices, balm and myrrh (Gen. xxxvii. 25). 
 The camel, as it seems to us, never ceases to fascinate, 
 never begins to charm. He is the only quadruped of my 
 acquaintance with whom I have never desired to entertain 
 individual and friendly relations, not from any instinctive 
 dislike, but because he seems to stand outside of, and apart 
 from, the rest of the brute creation. The sheep, in whom 
 one also feels but a limited personal interest, is, so naturalists 
 tell us, the relic of a very early age ; he has never advanced, 
 he exhibits no vestiges, no potentialities. His environment 
 has changed, but he has resisted adaptation. The camel 
 seems to have come down direct from a rudimentary 
 landscape, which he decorated, as he does now, with a 
 frieze of curves, grey against a turquoise sky, from a world 
 of great spaces and simple requirements. There were 
 giants in those days, but there were no roads, and he could 
 shuffle along in the dust without looking in (not, however, 
 that he ever displays the smallest interest or curiosity) at 
 second floor windows. He is unsympathetic, uninterested, 
 disdainful, and he smells like the British Museum reading" 
 room at four o'clock on a winter afternoon. While he is 
 being loaded he grumbles the whole time ; once afoot, he 
 displays no emotion but lofty and impersonal disdain. I 
 have seen the same expression on the face of a dowager 
 whose daughter is flirting with a younger son ; of an heir- 
 apparent in reduced circumstances when introduced to the 
 American who has " rented " the family place ; of a Roman 
 Catholic 'vert when confronted with the village curate ; of 
 a professional clever woman when one talks to her of clothes. 
 The camel, as I know him, comes somewhere between 
 Mark Twain's and Rudyard Kipling's ; he is less of a tame 
 ineptitude than the one, less of an intentional aggravation 
 than the other. Let us take the poet first ; the creature 
 apparently irritates him " with 'is silly neck a bobbin' like 
 
 338
 
 BIRD AND BEAST IN JERUSALEM 
 
 a basket full of snakes." He gets absolutely angry with 
 " the commissariat camel puttin' on 'is bloomin' frills." 
 
 'E'll gall, an' chafe, an' lame, an' fight 'e smells most awful vile ; 
 'E'll lose 'imself for ever, if you let 'im stray a mile. 
 
 The 'orse 'e knows above a bit, the bullock's not a fool, 
 The elephant's a gentleman, the battery mule's a mule, 
 But the commissariat cam-u-el when all is said and done 
 'E's a devil, and an ostrich, and an orphan-child in one. 
 
 Mark Twain's requirements were less, and therefore he had 
 the less to resent. " We have been trying for some time to 
 think what a camel looks like, and now we have made it 
 out. When he is down on all his knees, flat on his breast 
 to receive his load, he looks something like a goose swimming, 
 and when he is upright, he looks like an ostrich with an 
 extra set of legs. Camels are not beautiful, and their long 
 under lip gives them an exceedingly ' gallus ' expression. 
 They have immense, flat, forked, cushions of feet, and they 
 make a track in the dust like a pie with a slice cut out of 
 it. They are not particular about their diet. They would 
 eat a tombstone if they could bite it." 
 
 It would not do for most of the beasts of the Holy Land 
 to be particular about their diet. Vultures, pariah dogs 
 and stray cats are probably the best fed, being the scavengers 
 of the country. As you walk down the Vale of Siloam, or 
 Silwan, as one learns to call it here, you note perhaps that 
 some of the tomb-dwellers have gone out for the day 
 leaving a dead donkey opposite their front door, and, with 
 a shudder, you go on your way past Aceldama (we pronounce 
 Akeldama here, not as the Vicar did in the Second Lesson 
 last Sunday) along Gehenna, conjuring up visions of the 
 unspeakable horror of Moloch-worship, of the children made 
 to pass through the fire ; and returning a couple of hours 
 later and glancing half involuntarily at the memento mori 
 of the morning, you are startled to note that a gleaming 
 skeleton remains, where so lately Brother Ass reminded us 
 
 339
 
 of a life of hardship and labour and final suffering and 
 death. The vultures overhead, the yellow dogp slinking 
 out of sight, are already on their way to finish the work 
 begun by human hands at the slaughter-house below the 
 village of Bethany, on the road to Jericho. Was there ever 
 a land in which associations are so strangely intermixed 
 as here ? 
 
 The cat is a clean animal, and Solomon put his seal on 
 him. He flourishes in Jerusalem to-day with all the dignity, 
 vanity and independence of cats everywhere else. Though 
 the Jews must certainly have known cats in Egypt, there 
 is no trace in art or language that they were domesticated 
 in Syria. The Arabs have indeed the word Jcatt, but its 
 very resemblance to the English cat, the French chat, the 
 German katze, the Danish Jcat, the Celtic cath, the Italian 
 gatto, all derived from the Latin catus, itself a late word, is 
 apparent evidence that the creature was not early domesti- 
 cated. The Sanscrit word, it is interesting to recall, is 
 marjara, " the clean animal." The wild cats of Syria are 
 two, the felis chaus, which is really a lynx, and the felis 
 Syriaca, which, to the eye of the amateur, differs in no 
 respect from the wild cat of Europe. It will be remembered 
 that the only Biblical reference to the cat is in Baruch, in 
 a passage which certainly suggests that he was then reckoned 
 among the wild animals. In reference to the forsaking of 
 the idols of Babylon we read, " Upon their heads and bodies 
 sit bats, swallows and birds, and the cats also " (Baruch 
 vi. 22). The long-haired cat, the household favourite in 
 Jerusalem, is an importation here as in Europe, but the 
 climate is favourable, and he multiplies and prospers. Milk 
 is scarce, but rats and mice abundant, and in every shop in 
 the city, and in the courtyard of every monastery, he 
 thrives and suns himself, generally in the ill-marked black 
 and white variety, which testifies to the absence of " the 
 fancy." 
 
 The dog, which has been in most countries, and in all 
 
 340
 
 BIRD AND BEAST IN JERUSALEM 
 
 ages, the friend of man, was, as we learn from Scripture, 
 never understood or appreciated by the Jews, and to this 
 very day, although so numerous in Palestine, they seem to 
 have usurped the character elsewhere bestowel upon cats, 
 and to own allegiance to places rather than people. In 
 every village one enters, a tribe of furious, half-wild dogs 
 rush out, with the dog instinct of protecting their sur- 
 roundings ; the very word in Hebrew and Arabic for dog, 
 kelb, is thought by some to be onomatopoeic, and to signify 
 their yelping character. Even the absolutely homeless dog 
 who scavenges the city streets by night, and serves a useful 
 purpose in sorting the rubbish heaps outside the city walls, 
 for animal or vegetable matter, is said to have^ his own 
 district, and the dogs of one neighbourhood allow no immi- 
 gration or poaching from those of another. All day they 
 wander outside the walls, but " at evening let them return, 
 let them make a noise like a dog, and go round about the 
 city. Let them wander up and down for meat, and grumble 
 if they be not satisfied." Beside the pariah dog of the towns, 
 there is a species of sheep-dog, not unlike a large collie, said 
 to be faithful and brave in defence of his flock : and, above 
 all, there is the beautiful Persian greyhound, not to be 
 surpassed for grace, or coat, or agility, or gentleness of 
 disposition, by any of the products of civilization. He is 
 much valued among the Beduin for hunting the gazelles. 
 He has the long darting paces of the English greyhound, 
 but in appearance reminds one rather of the Irish deer- 
 hound, if an Irish deerhound, with his well opened eye, 
 can be imagined, of pelage the colour of his own, but in 
 texture exquisitely silky, and with ears and legs daintily 
 feathered. We have seen various European dogs in 
 Jerusalem, but they seldom thrive, and the race, too often 
 the individual, rapidly deteriorates. 
 
 The Arab steed, from the point of view of the European 
 rider, is, as one gets him in Jerusalem, a much overrated 
 animal. With arched neck, light of limb, head held high, 
 
 841
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 mane and tail in their pristine beauty, accoutred with gay 
 housings, a necklace of blue beads about his neck for preser- 
 vation from the Evil Eye, an ornament formed of two tusks 
 hanging upon his breast, mounted by a Beduin Sheikh 
 with flowing headdress and balanced lance, he is part of 
 a picture so harmonious that one almost resents it as 
 theatrical. Or again, with fringed clothing and picturesque 
 peaked saddle, ridden by a Moslem effendi with gay turban 
 and lithe Oriental carriage, prancing and curvetting, and, 
 as the Arabs say, doing fantasias, all a part of his careful 
 training, he is again a subject for song and story. But the 
 overworked, nervous, uncertain creature, whose mouth has 
 been spoilt by tourists, whose temper by constant change 
 of stableman, with the viciousness of stupidity, and the 
 irresponsiveness of the ill-used, is not a pleasant animal to 
 ride. He can amble and gallop, but has never been taught 
 to canter, and his trot is disagreeable. The Bedu, as a 
 rule, ride mares : the chances are that the worn-out steed 
 you obtain from a miscellaneous stable is an " entire " 
 animal, with all the nervousness and irritability of his 
 kind, overlaid with the sheepish demeanour consequent 
 upon his circumstances, and liable to betray you at any 
 moment. Travelling in a caravan, one is generally en 
 queue, and your mount is more than docile, but get him 
 alone on the high road, and you may chance to find your 
 hands full. 
 
 Fortunately, it is possible to obtain really serviceable 
 donkeys of a degree of grace and spirit of which, as associ- 
 ated with the humble ass, we of the West know nothing. 
 Like the horse, the donkey is usually " entire," and 
 occasionally, regardless of his rider, takes to fighting his 
 companions. He is likewise addicted to braying, which 
 disconcerts the unwary, but on the whole he is agreeable 
 enough, can go a good pace for a moderate distance, has 
 great endurance, and is very surefooted, which is a great 
 advantage in a country where roads are few, and one is 
 
 342
 
 BIRD AND BEAST IN JERUSALEM 
 
 constantly confronted with the perpendicular, slipping 
 about on rocks, or seeking cautious foothold in the dry bed 
 of a torrent, or on " paths " which suggest the casual spilling 
 of a Yorkshire wall. The Oriental ass is, intellectually as 
 well as physically, superior to his Western cousins. It is 
 quaint to pass a long string of camels carrying enormous 
 weights, looking the more immense for the narrow path 
 along which, tied head to tail, they mechanically tread in 
 each other's footsteps, with about as much individuality 
 as the carriages of a railway train. The pioneer trotting 
 along in front of the string of a dozen or fifteen of these 
 huge beasts, who chooses the path, receives the master's 
 orders, keeps the whole thing going, is a little donkey, who, 
 alert and brisk, is responsible for the whole caravan. 
 Equally preposterous is it to see an ass and a camel ploughing 
 together, not tandem, which might have some advantages, 
 but abreast, the strength of the one supplemented by the 
 intelligence of the other. 
 
 There is here no indignity in riding upon a donkey, and, 
 indeed, under certain circumstances, there is no choice as 
 to means of locomotion. The native women are hardly 
 ever seen upon horses, though sometimes on camels, when 
 they have quite a luxurious little platform, which probably 
 accommodates luggage and a child or two into the bargain, 
 and is sometimes protected by an awning. On a donkey 
 they sit astride ; for the conventionality which requires 
 that the face should be concealed, strikes the average by 
 leaving entire liberty in the matter of legs, and several 
 inches of the striped stockings popular in this country are 
 commonly visible. 
 
 Among the unrehearsed effects sometimes attendant 
 upon such occasions, much mirth was recently evoked 
 among the audience of a missionary lantern-lecture on the 
 " Life of our Lord." " Fancy Sitte Miriam on a side- 
 saddle ! " was the universal exclamation when a picture of 
 the flight into Egypt was presented. The spectacle of a 
 
 343
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 bedstead in the picture of the Annunciation was considered 
 equally ridiculous in a country where a mat, or, at the 
 best, a mattress, is the usual sleeping accommodation. 
 We have been in houses of persons really well to do in which 
 a bedstead, with mosquito curtains and handsome silk 
 coverlet, was part of the furniture of the reception-room, 
 not intended for use, but, like the lustres, Bohemian glass 
 vases and artificial flowers, a recognition of a stage of culture 
 aesthetically, in truth, inferior to their own. 
 
 Among the unfamiliar wild animals one is likely to see, 
 even in the neighbourhood of Jerusalem, are the gazelle, 
 jerboa, hyena, jackal, and coney. Many others there are, 
 for the fauna of Palestine is very varied, owing to the con- 
 trast and variety of climate : indeed, it is said that over 
 eighty mammals are to be found. The beauty and grace 
 of the gazelle is proverbial ; it makes a delightful household 
 pet, trotting up and down stairs after its friends like a dog. 
 It requires the utmost care, however, as dogs are its natural 
 enemies, and the domestic favourite often falls a victim to 
 some strange visitant. The jerboa, too, is easily tamed. 
 They are like miniature kangaroos, with fur like chinchilla, 
 and legs of very disproportionate length ; the fore legs very 
 short, the hind legs as long as the body, about five or six 
 inches. The tail, by which they steer their leaps, is about 
 eight inches long, and has a brush at the end. It is a gentle 
 creature, and, though rat-like, has not the unpleasant 
 smell of the pet rats of one's school-days. The hyena 
 prowls within a short distance of the city, skulking among 
 graveyards and in rock-cut tombs, and towards dusk is often 
 seen, seeking for prey. The jackals, unlike the fox, are 
 gregarious, and the unhappy beasts whom Samson sent 
 into the cornfields of the Philistines were almost certainly 
 jackals. To catch three hundred creatures so solitary as 
 the fox would have been difficult. The jackals probably 
 are also " the little foxes that spoil the vines," and the vine- 
 yards are still carefully protected against them. They are 
 
 344
 
 SALT Hn.i.s NEAR THE DEAD SEA.
 
 BIRD AND BEAST IN JERUSALEM 
 
 very daring, and only the other day a favourite dog belong- 
 ing to a lady in Jerusalem was killed by jackals in her own 
 garden killed probably for food. Happily, they were 
 disturbed, and the body recovered. The coney is not, as in 
 England, a rabbit, but a species of the genus Hyrax, neither 
 a rodent nor a ruminant ; and, though not so large as a hare, 
 his only relatives are the hippopotamus and the rhinoceros. 
 He is found in the direction of the Dead Sea, notably in the 
 gorge of the Kedron, in the wild valley of Mar Saba, where 
 the earth seems as if all turned to stone, and where the 
 aggregation of hermitages which now compose the convent, 
 a settlement of Greek monks, clings to scanty ledges on 
 the face of the great stone precipice seven hundred feet 
 high. Here man is so solitary, his relation to Nature so 
 much more proportionate than elsewhere, that the very 
 jackals come up for food, and the blackbirds are fed daily 
 at stated hours. 
 
 The European residents in Jerusalem seem to have no 
 tendency in the direction of " sport " further than an 
 occasional pot-shot in the valley of the Jordan. Perhaps 
 they lack the impetus of close times, game laws, and gun- 
 licences. When a fox gets on their land they shoot him, 
 and as often as not they catch partridges in traps with 
 decoys. Such ways seem to have always been the custom 
 of the country, for your Jew will never make a sportsman. 
 David's complaining that Saul's persecution of him " was 
 as when one doth hunt a partridge in the mountains," refers 
 to the custom, still extant, of hunting down partridges and 
 killing them with throw-sticks, for the Greek partridge, 
 the large and excellent variety most common in Syria, 
 seldom takes to wing, but hides behind rocks, and so is 
 chased from point to point. In Ecclesiasticus (xi. 30) we 
 read, " Like as a partridge taken in a cage " (doubtless 
 for decoy purposes), " so is the heart of the proud, and like 
 as a spy watcheth he for thy fall." 
 
 The hare is not very often in the market, and those which 
 
 345
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 one buys have usually been shot. The Beduin sheikhs, 
 however, the only sportsmen of the Holy Land, pursue 
 them both with hawk and hound, as also, one regrets to 
 say, the gazelle. The Arabs eat hares' flesh, but it is dis- 
 dained by the Turks and prohibited to the Armenians by 
 religious scruple, as it was, according to Caesar, to the 
 ancient Britons. 
 
 According to authorities, the fox of Judea is the common 
 fox of Europe. All I have chanced to see, however, and 
 which were " put up " by the dogs when riding over waste 
 land and among tombs, were larger and lighter in colour 
 than any I have seen in Great Britain, and may have been 
 of the kind described by Dr. Tristram as belonging to the 
 wooded districts of Galilee, the Canis Syriacus of Colonel 
 Hamilton Smith. 
 
 The birds of Palestine were enumerated by Dr. Tristram 
 as amounting to some 350 varieties, and the English visitor 
 finds with pleasure that the catalogue includes about 172 
 species familiar in Great Britain ; and here, in the country 
 of many tropical varieties and some of rare if not unique 
 species, like the graakle and the sun-bird of the Dead Sea 
 district, one may find the lark, the robin, the cuckoo, stone- 
 chat, sandpiper, great-tit, and scores of other familiar friends. 
 
 The crested lark is very common, and here, as in some 
 other countries, he is a special favourite. In the Heb- 
 rides he is called the lark of Mary. Here too he has 
 his tradition. Solomon, as is well known, understood the 
 language of the birds, but the feathered creation, never- 
 theless, refused him allegiance, and all flew away except the 
 lark, to whom he awarded a crest as a distinction. The 
 raven was the ringleader, and was caught and imprisoned; 
 and has been in chains ever since, as any one may see from 
 his manner of walking. There is another raven, with lighter 
 feathers on the neck, the marks of Noah's fingers, for he, 
 and not corvus corax, was, according to Arab tradition, the 
 messenger from the ark. The red dove, common in Pales- 
 
 346
 
 THF. RIVER JORDAN.
 
 BIRD AND BEAST IN JERUSALEM 
 
 tine, is associated by tradition with the blood of our Lord ; 
 the owl, of which there are many species in Palestine, 
 figures in stories of Lilith, the first wife of Adam, and the 
 Arabs have a tradition of one species which they call bana, 
 who is undoubtedly an incarnation of this childless and 
 jealous wife, for she tears the flesh from the faces of sleeping 
 children. 
 
 It is a pleasant picture to see the Elijahs of to-day feeding 
 the ravens of the Brook Cherith, where the ravens fed the 
 Elijah of old. The northern end of the ravine is honey- 
 combed with hermitages, still inhabited by brown-robed 
 ascetics of the Greek confession, and in the monastery at 
 the head of the glen, where for convenience of communica- 
 tion with the world a few live in community, one may be 
 privileged to see the aged Superior, who for a lifetime has 
 loved and lived among them, sharing his meal of bread 
 and fruit with the wild creatures of the glen. 
 
 " I doo Sudar," " Come along, sir," he says in gentle 
 tones, looking upward into the empty space of clear blue 
 sky, and in a few moments there is a glint of gold, a shadow 
 of deep purple, and the dainty blackbirds of the Jordan 
 valley hover overhead and finally descend upon the out- 
 stretched arm of the old man, upon his shoulders, his head, 
 and the iron rail which protects the fragile platform overlook- 
 ing the precipice, at the foot of which the brook can but 
 trickle to-day in the March sunshine, but which in December 
 was a raging torrent. These graceful creatures, with feathers 
 iridescent against the sapphire sky, with orange-glancing 
 wing feathers, are not indeed the ravens of our picture-books, 
 but also they are not the prosaic " Arab " forced upon our 
 unwilling school-days as a more correct translation, and 
 here at least we may still for a moment cling to the loved 
 story. 
 
 -our meddling intellect 
 
 Mis-shapes the beauteous forms of things. 
 We murder to dissect, f 
 347
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 The people of Jerusalem are very fond of singing birds, 
 and cages constantly hang before the doors of house or 
 shop. Birds of all kinds still abound in the precincts of the 
 Temple, the " Happy birds that sing and fly, round Thy 
 altars, Lord, most high." " The sparrow hath found an 
 house, and the swallow a nest ; " the raven, the jackdaw, the 
 rook all find shelter around the House, which has been 
 dedicated to God longer than any spot on earth ; and, says 
 Dr. Tristram, " the Moslems cherish tenderly any birds 
 which resort to the Mosques, and woe betide the reckless 
 stranger who should meddle with them ! The storks seem 
 perfectly aware of their immunity, as do the doves and 
 other birds which rest in numbers in such situations " 
 (Nat. Hist. Bib. p. 160). 
 
 The storks indeed are everywhere welcome. They arrive 
 in great flocks about the third week in March, and for about 
 six weeks are to be seen in every cornfield. The Arabs call 
 them " father of legs," and greatly value their presence, 
 as they clear the land of snakes, lizards, frogs, and various 
 pests of agriculture. 
 
 A visit to the Holy Land goes far to clear away many 
 so-called " difficulties " of Bible interpretation. Most of 
 us who are familiar with the gay, chattering, gregarious 
 little sparrow, have wondered why the Psalmist, sleepless 
 from sorrow, should describe himself as a sparrow, " alone 
 upon the housetop." Here we become accustomed to a 
 sparrow which is non-gregarious (the petrocincla cyanea, 
 sometimes called the " blue thrush "), uttering a plaintive, 
 monotonous tone, and sitting sorrowfully alone upon the 
 housetop. There are, however, in addition, here as else- 
 where, countless flocks of the familiar passer domesticus, of 
 the passer cisalpina, of the true sparrow, passer montanus, 
 and, above all, of the so-called Spanish sparrow, passer 
 silicariiis, said to be in Palestine the most numerous of all. 
 
 The observant visitor soon discovers that the swallow of 
 Jerusalem, present in the ehimney and gable end, summer 
 
 348
 
 BIRD AND BEAST IN JERUSALEM 
 
 and winter alike, differs somewhat from the house-martin, 
 as well as, of course, from the swift and marsh-swallow, 
 also common ; and one learns that they are of a special 
 Oriental variety, the hirundo cahirica. 
 
 Perhaps the most familiar remaining creatures are the 
 various lizards, animals which seem to inspire in many 
 persons the same sense of horror as the snake. Personally, 
 I find them endlessly interesting. There is the chameleon, 
 whose attributes are real and not a fairy tale. I have kept 
 two, one of a species which basks on rocks, another of the 
 variety which prefers a tree, especially, it is said, a fig-tree. 
 Both turned red in an earthern flower-pot, brown in a 
 cardboard box, and a dull grey when nursed upon the sleeve 
 of a navy blue coat. They have hands which remind one 
 of the filaments of ampelopsis veitchii, and enormous throats, 
 which they inflate when excited, whether pleasurably by 
 abundance of flies, or the reverse by too much handling. 
 They have, moreover, tails which curl as neatly as a coil 
 of rope. Surely no other animal in the world has eyes so 
 extraordinary. They are placed well back in the head, and 
 not only move on a pivot, like a nautical telescope, but the 
 two pivots occasionally work in opposite directions, sug- 
 gestive, not so much of a squint as of a brain of which the 
 two lobes are independently and equally active. 
 
 The true lizards are also endless in variety and interest, 
 some said to be so venomous that the Arabs call them the 
 " father of leprosy." Most seem to be entirely harmless. 
 Many are about the size and colouring of sparrows, and, 
 as they dart along the ground, are difficult to distinguish 
 from birds. They have a trick, disconcerting enough, if 
 you catch them by the tail, of leaving it in your hands. 
 
 On the subject of these beasts, Mark Twain has one of 
 those outbursts of real sentiment for which one thanks 
 him cordially from time to time : 
 
 " Grey lizards, those heirs of ruins, of sepulchres, and 
 desolation, glided in and out among the rocks or lay still 
 
 349
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 and sunned themselves. Where prosperity has reigned 
 and fallen ; where glory has flamed and gone out ; where 
 beauty has dwelt and passed away ; where gladness was 
 and sorrow is ; where the pomp of life has been and silence 
 and death brood in its high places ; there this reptile makes 
 his home and mocks at human vanity. His coat is the 
 colour of ashes, and ashes are the symbol of hope that has 
 perished ; of aspirations that come to naught ; of loves that 
 are buried. If he could speak, he would say, Build temples, 
 I will lord it in their rums ; build palaces, I will inhabit 
 them ; erect empires, I will inherit them ; bury your beauti- 
 ful, I will watch the worms at their work ; and you who 
 stand here and moralize over me, I will crawl over your 
 corpse at the last." 
 
 After which cheerful reflections, it is but timely to change 
 the subject. 
 
 350
 
 CHAPTER XXIII 
 THE HUMANITIES IN JERUSALEM 
 
 CONVENTIONAL WRITING POETRY ART LITERATURE 
 AND SCIENCE EDUCATION ROYAL VISITORS SIR 
 MOSES MONTEFIORE CONSULAR FLAGS JEWISH 
 INTERCESSION ENGLISH VISITORS THE P.E.F. 
 GERMAN EXPLORATION HOLY PLACES MODERN 
 BUILDINGS EDUCATIONAL ERRORS ARAB EXAMINA- 
 TION PAPERS 
 
 IT is natural enough that there should be an immense 
 amount of conventional writing on the subject of the 
 Holy City. There are certain phrases which have long been 
 accepted with the same uninquiring acquiescence as the 
 tonsure in pictures of the apostles, or the Dutch or Italian 
 costumes in portraits of the Virgin. To quote examples 
 would be as easy as it would be unprofitable. It is plea- 
 santer and more edifying to remember how much we owe 
 to the Western Church for the rhythm of S. Bernard ; to 
 the Eastern for many hymns which have been made acces- 
 sible to the English reader by Dr. Neale ; and to the Anglican 
 for the poems of Keble, the local colour of which strikes the 
 visitor to Jerusalem as the more interesting that the poet 
 never visited the Holy Land. His accuracy was, like the 
 historical fidelity of Sir Walter Scott, that generic accuracy 
 which is a part of the intuition of genius; 1 something 
 
 1 I may add one little pebble to the great cairn of appreciation 
 of the accuracy of the author of The Talisman, by observing, that 
 in a recent reading of this story among the scenes described, I was 
 
 351
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 infinitely wider than the mere specific fidelity to detail which 
 belongs to science rather than to art, to the encyclopaedist 
 rather than to the poet. He wrote, for example, of the 
 shores of Gennesareth 
 
 All through the summer night 
 
 Those blossoms red and bright 
 Spread their soft breasts unheeding to the breeze, 
 
 Like hermits watching still 
 
 Around the sacred hill 
 Where erst our Saviour watched upon His knees. 
 
 Nothing could be more absolutely real than the generic 
 truth of the impression which those lines leave upon the 
 memory of the pilgrim, but the poet allowed seventy-one 
 editions to be published before he materialized the specific 
 fact that the blossoms were oleanders, and not rhododen- 
 drons, as hitherto stated in his note, to the exasperation of 
 the mere traveller. 
 
 As one wanders down the Valley of the Kedron below 
 Mount Sion, shaded with olive trees and honeycombed with 
 tombs still often utilized as dwellings, and where, alone in 
 all the Holy City one may find " fresh springs," with us an 
 ever favourite moonlight stroll, it is impossible not to recall 
 the lines 
 
 Or choose thee out a cell 
 
 In Kedron's storied dell, 
 Beside the springs of Love that never die ; 
 
 Among the olives kneel 
 
 The chill night-blast to feel, 
 And watch the moon that saw thy Master's agony. 
 
 impressed by the extraordinary fidelity of its local colour and 
 general atmosphere. The solitary exception is the presence of 
 rose-buds in Engadi which may, however, have been brought from 
 the Wadi Ward (Valley of Roses) ten hours north. The Saracen 
 welcome (ch. xxvii.), by the discharge of blunt arrows, is the 
 ancient equivalent of the " Gunpowder Play " (laab- el-bar ut) 
 described by Burton (Arabia vol. ii., 86), and which we have our- 
 selves witnessed. 
 
 352
 
 THE HUMANITIES IN JERUSALEM 
 
 The picture of the country, as the Israelites found it, is 
 touchingly realistic here, where one is still living among the 
 people whom they dispossessed. 
 
 The orphaned realm threw wide her gates, and told 
 Into freed Israel's lap her jewels and her gold. 
 And when their wondrous march was o'er, 
 
 And they had won their homes, 
 Where Abraham fed his flock of yore 
 
 Among their father's tombs ; 
 A land that drinks the rain of Heaven at will, 1 
 Whose waters kiss the feet of many a vine-clad hill. 
 
 Oft as they watched at thoughtful eve 
 
 A gale from bowers of balm 
 Sweep o'er the billowy corn, and heave 
 
 The tresses of the palm 
 
 Just as the lingering sun had touched with gold, 
 Far o'er the cedar-shade, some tower of giants old. 
 
 It was a fearful joy, I ween, 
 
 To trace the heathen's toil, 
 The limpid wells, the orchards green, 
 
 Left ready for the spoil. . . . 
 
 Here, where every day one meets with the foundations of 
 " some tower of giants old," with the traces of the 
 heathen's toil ; the cisterns which kept the orchards green, 
 which made possible the billowy corn all evidences of days 
 pre-Hebraic, days barely thinkable to us who look upon 
 Crusading times as remote, and count it an honour to date 
 from the Norman Conquest of our country here only can 
 one really appreciate the poet's accuracy. 
 
 Nor may our household vine or fig-tree hide 
 The broken arches of old Canaan's pride. 
 
 We are perpetually thanking Keble for some happy 
 epithet. When we drive down to Jericho we think of 
 
 1 To appreciate the accuracy of this, one has to realize that, in a 
 country without rain for more than half the year, without streams, 
 almost without springs, the grain and fruit harvest are entirely 
 dependent upon the dew. The dew clouds about sunset are often 
 sucli as to suggest a rainy morrow to the occidental. 
 
 353 A A
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 The rude sandy lea, 
 Where stately Jordan flows by many a palm. 
 
 After the early or the latter rain, we note 
 
 Green lake, and cedar tuft, and spicy glade 
 Shaking their dewy tresses, now the storm is laid. 
 
 Here it is true that not, as at home, the grass, but 
 
 The fresh green earth is strew' d 
 With the first flowers that lead the vernal dance. 
 
 Only those who know can fully realize the justness of the 
 epithet applied to " Tabor's lonely peak," to the dreary plain 
 beyond, " landscape of fear," to the lilies of the field spring- 
 ing when all rain is over but " bath'd in soft airs and fed with 
 dew," to loneliness accentuated, not by winds wailing amid 
 forest trees, but " the fitful sweep Of winds across the 
 steep, Through withered bents." 
 
 Here, when in the early morning the sweet rich cry of the 
 Muezzin and the bell of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre 
 contend which shall first arouse us to our morning prayer, 
 and one rises to open the window and look across the 
 sleeping city to the Mount of Olives where in many a dewy 
 dawn our Lord watched the mists ascending from the 
 Jordan valley and floating, as now, over the mountains of 
 Moab, one recalls 
 
 The moist pearls now bestrewing 
 Thymy slope and rushy vale ; 
 * * * 
 
 Not by manna showers at morning 
 Shall our wants be then supplied. 
 But a strange pale gold adorning 
 Many a tufted mountain side. 
 
 Perplexed and bewildered among the conflicting claims of 
 exact spots within Gethsemane, the Grotto of the Agony, the 
 grand old olive trees, the inner and outer garden, it is 
 infinitely restful to recall the lines 
 
 354
 
 THE GARDEN OF GETHSEMANE.
 
 THE HUMANITIES IN JERUSALEM 
 
 There is a spot within this sacred dale 
 
 That felt Thee kneeling touch'd Thy prostrate brow, 
 
 One Angel knows it. 
 
 Or again, at the Sacred Tomb, with all its adornments, 
 crude or costly, reminders at once of the homogeneousness 
 and of the unhappy divisions of Christendom, many may 
 recall that here assuredly was 
 
 The other holy garden 
 Where the Lord was laid. 
 
 The accretions of time, the accentuations of strife and 
 opposition, disappear, and one remembers only that 
 
 E'en the lifeless stone is dear 
 For thought of Him who late lay here, 
 And the base world, now Christ hath died, 
 Ennobled is and glorified. 
 
 The exultations of the devout S. Bernard belong to another 
 mood than that in which we respond to the tender local 
 colour of him of whom Stanley has so well said, " It is not 
 David only, but the Sibyl, whose accents we catch in his 
 inspirations." 
 
 There is a musical old Elizabethan poem of which some 
 few verses, beginning " Jerusalem, my happy home," are 
 popularly known, which arises spontaneously into one's 
 mind, not in Jerusalem, but along the road leading down to 
 S. John's (Ain Karim), the home of Zechariah and Elizabeth 
 in the sweet hill country, an hour's ride from the Holy City. 
 The little glen rejoices in one of the few springs to be found 
 in the district, and the hillsides are clothed with trees and 
 waving with gardens and cornfields. Here the women still 
 cluster about a well where the Virgin must often have filled 
 her water- jar ; and as one turns back eastward, perhaps in 
 the golden evening light, the memory of the Jerusalem of 
 to-day is glorified by thoughts of the past, and of the future ; 
 and borrowing from the scene around, the quaint old song 
 takes on a vivid reality 
 
 355
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 Ala, my sweet home, Hierusalem, 
 
 Would God I were in thee ; 
 Would God my woes were at an end 
 
 Thy Jy s that I might see ! . . . 
 For there they live in such delights, 
 
 Such pleasure and such play, 
 As that to them a thousand years 
 
 Doth seem as yesterday. . . . 
 Quite through the streets with silver sound 
 
 The flood of Life doth flow, 
 Upon whose banks on every side 
 
 The wood of Life doth grow. 
 Our Lady sings Magnificat 
 
 With tones surpassing sweet, 
 And all the virgins bear their part, 
 
 Sitting about her feet. 
 
 There is nothing that I know of in English verse that one 
 can set beside these gentle cadences, unless it be some of the 
 lines of Christina Rossetti, which have something of the 
 same effect of passionless desire, as of angels with folded 
 wings 
 
 Jerusalem of fire 
 And gold and pearl and gem, 
 Saints flock to fill thy choir, 
 Jerusalem. 
 
 Lo, thrones thou hast for them, 
 Desirous they desire 
 Thy harp, thy diadem, 
 Thy bridal white attire, 
 Palm -branches from thy stem ; 
 Thy holiness their hire, 
 Jerusalem. 
 
 She is nearer to the blithe utterances of the ecclesiastical 
 Latin versifiers in other lines, such as 
 
 Jerusalem makes melody 
 
 For simple joy of heart, 
 An organ of full compass she 
 
 One-tuned through every part. 
 While not to day or night belong 
 Her matins and her evensong, 
 The one thanksgiving of her tlirong. 
 356
 
 THE HUMANITIES IN JERUSALEM 
 
 Drummond of Hawthornden, in the lines Urbs Coelestis, 
 Jerusalem, written for a translation of the Primer or Office 
 of the Blessed Virgin Mary, sings in somewhat the same key, 
 and Richard Crashaw's verses, At Bethlehem, are the 
 inevitable lilt with which one descends the hill, leaving 
 behind the breezy tableland of Rephaim at the point where 
 the bright little town, with its Church of the Nativity and 
 to the east the Shepherd's Field, just come into view. 
 
 The Babe looked up and showed his face, 
 In spite of darkness it was day : 
 It was thy day, Sweet ! and did rise, 
 Not from the East, but from thine eyes. 
 
 Welcome all wonders in one sight, 
 
 Eternity shut in a span ! 
 
 Summer in Winter ! Day in Night ! 
 
 Heaven in earth ! and God in man ! 
 
 Great Little One, Whose all-embracing birth 
 
 Lifts Earth to Heaven, stoops Heaven to earth.1 
 
 Some of the most familiar of our hymns * were composed 
 in the gloomy Convent of Mar Saba, a spot inconceivably 
 desert, where all but the sky seems to be composed of solid 
 rock. No one who has ever taken that wild mountain ride 
 along the Valley of the Kedron, getting deeper at each step 
 into the heart of the lonely hills, where only the faint ghost of 
 human life glances out of that aggregation of solitary cells, 
 can ever fail to marvel at the vitality of the inner vision 
 which, amid such surroundings, could picture 
 
 Those eternal bowers 
 
 Man has never trod ; 
 Those unfading flowers 
 
 Round the throne of God. 
 
 1 Among others those of S. John Damascene (A.D. c. 780), " Tho 
 Day of Resurrection," " Those eternal bowers," " Come ye faithful, 
 raise the strain," ; of S. Stephen the Sabbaite, " Art thou weary ? 
 Art thou languid ? " To S. Andrew of Crete (and of Jerusalem, 
 660-732) we owe " Christian, dost thou see them ? " 
 
 357
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 or could greet the Easter sunrise with words so joyous as 
 in the song 
 
 'Tis the spring of souls to-day : 
 
 Christ hath burst His prison, 
 And from three days' sleep in death 
 
 As the sun hath risen. 
 All the winter of our sins, 
 
 Long and dark, is flying 
 From His light, to Whom we give 
 
 Laud and praise undying. 
 
 The whole world of Art owes a debt of gratitude to Holman 
 Hunt as a pioneer in the direction, afterwards pursued by 
 certain others, notably Tissot, whose artistic atmosphere is 
 so extraordinarily true that on several occasions I have 
 found an explanation of a certain sense of familiarity with 
 Jerusalem scenes and scenery, in the fact that I was already 
 acquainted with them in his pictures. When I had the 
 privilege of watching him in his studio in Paris at work 
 upon an immense canvass, representing the entry of the 
 Patriarch into Bethlehem, I little thought how soon I should 
 witness the very same in all its added bravery of movement. 
 
 Mr. Hunt's pictures, equally true, and with the distinction 
 of greater selection, make special appeal to those who have 
 entered into the spirit of the Holy Land. He arrived in 
 Jerusalem in 1854, at a period when, perhaps, England was 
 at her best, from the intellectual point of view in her 
 relation with the Holy City. Dr. Robinson of the United 
 States, the pioneer of all Palestine exploration, was there, 
 as well as some distinguished foreigners, Roth, Petermann, 
 and others. While Mr. Hunt was painting from living 
 models his " Finding of Christ in the Temple," Mr. Seddon, 
 in a tent pitched above Aceldama, was at work upon his 
 " Olivet and Siloam." The English, under Consul Finn, 
 had established an active literary society (of which one 
 member was a missionary) for the " investigation and 
 elucidation of any subject of interest, literary or scientific, 
 of any period whatever within the Holy Land." They often 
 
 358
 
 had valuable lectures from passing visitors of various creeds 
 and nationalities ; the Prince Consort, the King of Prussia, 
 the Earl of Aberdeen and others gave large contributions ; 
 the missionary bishop became a patron, the University of 
 Cambridge contributed 40 a year for the establishment, by 
 the English doctor, of a botanical garden ; various learned 
 bodies sent donations of scientific instruments ; weekly 
 meetings were held for the discussion of discoveries and of 
 gifts and loans ; learned foreigners became corresponding 
 members ; travellers, such as Layard, Burder and others 
 sent objects of interest ; manuscripts collected were, after 
 due study and discussion, handed over to the British Museum, 
 and the Rev. H. C. Reinhardt, a member, gathered and 
 exhibited one of the finest collections of Palestine coins then 
 in existence. 
 
 The excellent climatic conditions of Jersualem, with its 
 mean average temperature 62J, and the very unusual 
 opportunity for the study of European and Oriental lan- 
 guages, 1 suggested the foundation of a school of such a class 
 that it might not merely serve for the children of resident 
 Europeans, but be of value to families residing hi the Levant, 
 Egypt, and even India. Elder students would have a rare 
 chance for the study of history in a land in which the pro- 
 gress of nations had left so many traces, and many branches 
 of science could be pursued under considerable advantages. 
 The college was opened and a Head-master selected the 
 Rev.W. J. Beaumont, a Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, 
 holding high University honours the Chancellor's gold 
 
 1 It is interesting to note that even Hindustani is included among 
 the babel of tongues to be heard in Jerusalem, not only among the 
 Moslem pilgrims to the Haram, who are to be found in large numbers 
 in the hospices close to the Holy Place, but also among Jacobite 
 pilgrimages of S. Thomas Christians from the Malabar coast. The 
 Jews, too, and Armenians are in constant relation with India and 
 receive large numbers of pilgrims and merchants, so that one often 
 hears various languages of India in walking through the streets of 
 Jerusalem. 
 
 359
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 medal and Senior optime degree. The students, besides 
 resident Europeans, included Maronites from the Lebanon, 
 Oriental Jews, a Greek monk from Thessaly, and Germans 
 preparing for work in Abyssinia. 
 
 All that now remains of the hopes and achievements of 
 these good old days is the Literary and Scientific Society 
 so-called, of which the sole remaining object is to join in 
 subscription for certain periodicals. A few books remain in 
 an obscure room of the L. J. S. and the Botanical Garden 
 has ceased to exist. 
 
 Jerusalem has benefited, from time to time, by the pre- 
 sence of distinguished visitors, the earliest since the Crusades 
 being the unhappy Princess of Wales in 1816. Prince Albert 
 of Prussia followed next in 1843, and his former consort, 
 Princess Marianne of the Netherlands, in 1850. These came 
 and left no trace, but in 1855 the Consuls had become suf- 
 ficiently numerous to begin the quarrel for precedence which 
 the curious may still continue to observe on the occasion of 
 any arrival of interest. The ostensible object of this com- 
 petition was to honour the visit of the Duke and Duchess 
 of Brabant. 
 
 Belgium then, as now, had no Consul, 1 and the guests 
 were personally under the conduct of Austria. The Spanish 
 Consul prepared to receive them in two Spanish convents 
 (at Ramleh and Ain Karim), 2 which they were to visit on 
 
 1 One may venture to conjecture that now that so many members 
 of religious Orders having houses in Jerusalem are taking refuge in 
 Belgium the pious and hospitable little monarchy will not remain 
 long unrepresented. 
 
 2 The contention between the general claims of France and the 
 special claims of Spain in relation to the Spanish Convent at Ain 
 Karim broke out again in September, 1855. Apropos, perhaps, of 
 the general hoisting of consular flags which followed the fall of 
 Sebastopol, the friars, aided by the Spanish Consul, not only put 
 up the Spanish flag, but proceeded to erect a permanent iron cross, 
 However, a French Commissioner happened to be in Jerusalem at 
 the time. The French Consul, it seems, being absent, reinforced 
 by a crowd of peasantry from Bethlehem, and the Secretary of the 
 
 360
 
 THE HUMANITIES IN JERUSALEM 
 
 the way, claiming as well right of precedence in the Holy 
 Sepulchre ; claims which France, as the Protector of Christi- 
 anity in the East, successfully resisted. The Latin Patriarch, 
 equal to the occasion, addressed the royal visitors in French, 
 although himself a Sardinian, and although the King of Sar- 
 dinia, it should be remembered, had always claimed to be 
 King of Jersualem, a title, however, assumed by the Emperor 
 of Austria. All passed off, not only with perfect order, but 
 with all the parade and distinction important on an occa- 
 sion when precedents were undoubtedly established. Much 
 credit was due to the courtesy, tact and intelligence of the 
 Turkish Government at a time when the mutual relations 
 of various European countries with each other and with 
 Turkey were approaching a crisis not two years before the 
 Crimean war. It is interesting to remember that these 
 same royal personages were the first Europeans permitted 
 publicly to visit the Temple area. 
 
 The same year brought a visitor whose personality, 
 liberality and subsequent tragic fate have perpetuated his 
 memory in Jerusalem the Archduke Maximilian, after- 
 wards Emperor of Mexico. He and his companion, a royal 
 Duke of Wurtemburg, arriving merely as naval officers, 
 having left their ship at Jaffa, were met by the Pasha and 
 afterwards by the Roman Catholic ecclesiastics and Consuls 
 with all due ceremony. The Austrian Jews, moreover, 
 afforded them a joyous welcome ; but one unfortunate 
 incident occurred, which is worth remembering here, 
 where many delicate questions of precedence are of daily 
 occurrence. They visited the sacred places of Jerusalem 
 and Bethlehem as well as the Temple area, and then pro- 
 ceeded northwards. In sight of the Convent of Mount 
 Carmel the Archduke objected to place himself under the 
 hospitality of the French flag, and desired that during his 
 stay it might be replaced by that of his own country, a re- 
 Pasha (a Frenchman), achieved the removal of the Spanish Cross and 
 substituted a gilt one provided by the French authorities. 
 
 361
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 quest which, as Carmel is one of the Holy Places technically 
 acknowledged in the Sultan's dominions as under the pro- 
 tection of France, the good monks were unable to grant, al- 
 though it so happened that at the moment not one of their 
 number was a Frenchman ; and the royal visitors turned 
 away. A permanent memorial of their visit to Jerusalem is 
 the very fine bronze statue of S. Helena which beautifies the 
 Chapel of the Invention of the Cross, as well as some costly 
 lamps also presented by the archduke to the Church of the 
 Holy Sepulchre. He also restored the very ancient chapel 
 known as that of " The Flagellation." It had been desecrated 
 in 1618, but was restored to the Guardians of the Holy 
 Place in 1838 by the liberality of Ibrahim Pasha. 
 
 This same eventful year of 1855 is memorable in Jerusalem 
 for the introduction of fireworks. The occasion was that 
 of the Papal Bull of the Immaculate Conception, and 
 the buildings of the Franciscans were brilliantly illuminated 
 with lamps and transparencies ; many private houses 
 followed suit, and even the military Pasha contributed 
 squibs and rockets. The gay scene was repeated on March 
 3, 1902, on the occasion of the jubilee of His Holiness, 
 the addition of at least a score of immense Latin institu- 
 tions serving to multiply the sphere of festivity ; one sugges- 
 tive feature being the enormous cross of electric lights 
 standing out triumphantly against the dark blue heavens 
 crowning the Convent of Notre Dame de France and 
 shedding its pure radiance around. 
 
 Another important event of this year, 1855, was the 
 arrival the second, I believe, of his seven visits of Sir 
 Moses Montefiore, in charge of a large sum of money pre- 
 sented mainly by an American benefactor named Touro for 
 the use of the poor Jews of the Holy Land. At an earlier 
 visit, in 1849, he had inaugurated certain charities, and in 
 1854 M. Albert Cohn had founded the Rothschild Hospital, 
 the lying-in charity and the schools for girls, which are an 
 increasingly important feature of Jerusalem benevolence. 
 
 362
 
 AN ASHKENAZIM JEW.
 
 THE HUMANITIES IN JERUSALEM 
 
 The almshouses, dwelling-houses, dispensary, synagogue 
 and mill, which stand so conspicuously above the road to 
 Bethlehem, facing Mount Sion, were the practical outcome of 
 this visit, and this sale of land to a foreigner and a non- 
 Moslem was another important precedent in the history of 
 the relations of Jerusalem with the Turkish Government. 
 Sir Moses Montefiore being a British subject, 1 the deed was 
 witnessed in the British Consulate. It may be interesting 
 to remark in passing that some technical difficulty having 
 arisen some four or five years ago in the acquisition by the 
 Jews of the present buildings of the Evelina de Rothschild 
 schools, where 600 girls are taught in the English language, the 
 lease was made out on behalf of the Latin Patriarch, a tribute 
 to liberality of feeling on both sides, which in Jerusalem is of 
 especial value. Sir Moses, on the occasion of his visit, showed 
 equal liberality in another direction, in presenting the neces- 
 sary provision for the celebration, by two thousand people, of 
 the Moslem festival of the Corban Bairam. Music and 
 bonfires were kept up all night, and a large number of sheep 
 consumed in honour of the sacrifice by Abraham. 
 
 On the other hand, certain Askkenazim Jews of very 
 strict orthodoxy exhibited a contrary spirit of bigotry and 
 prejudice, which was at least self-sacrificing and consistent 
 where their nation had so much to gain or to lose ; for they 
 excommunicated the generous philanthropist in, it is said, 
 three synagogues. His additional offences against their 
 narrower views were two. In the first place, the purchase of 
 land in the Holy City is contrary to their principles. They 
 believe literally in the promise, " The land shall not be sold 
 for ever ; the land is Mine," (Lev. xxv. 23). Further, he 
 had visited the sacred enclosure of the Temple, a place for- 
 bidden to Jewish orthodoxy on account of the danger of 
 treading unconsciously on the spot where the sacred vessels 
 
 1 The deed of sale describes him as " The honourable person of the 
 Mosaic sect and ornament of the tribe ef Israel, who is a nobleman 
 of the Government of England." 
 
 363
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 of the law are buried, 1 or upon that of the Holy of Holies. 
 The less fanatical contend, on the other hand, that the 
 Talmud dispenses from the crime of sacrilege him who walks 
 over even what is sacred, if beyond a certain number of 
 cubits underground ; and the author of that very interesting 
 work Jewish Life in the East, himself a Jew, observes that 
 without the presence of the Deity the Holy of Holies no 
 longer exists. Moreover, he suggests that as, according to 
 other tradition, the Tables of the Law were removed by the 
 Prophet Jeremiah or stolen by the Assyrians, the danger is 
 minimised of trampling the Law underfoot. 
 
 In the autumn of 1855, after the fall of Sebastopol, the 
 Consulates established the custom of hoisting their national 
 flags on festival occasions, the Protestants on Sundays and 
 royal birthdays, others on all festivals of their respective 
 Churches also. Those of France, Austria, Spain and Prussia, 
 on their first appearance, were respectfully saluted by the 
 Turkish cannon, twenty-one guns being fired, as at a Moslem 
 festival. 
 
 Another event of this year important from several points 
 of view, religious and political, was the commencement of 
 the plan for the building of the Austrian Hospice. Hitherto 
 the hospitalities of Jerusalem towards the Western world 
 had been in the hands of the Franciscans only, and the royal 
 visits, Belgian and Austrian, may have suggested the policy 
 of reminding the Turkish authorities of the existence of 
 other Catholic powers beside the French. Another violation 
 
 1 The story is current in Jerusalem that only a year or two ago 
 some Moslem children, playing in the Temple courts, fell into one 
 of the immense reservoirs which underlie a large portion of the 
 Haram area, the storage of millions of gallons of water. The last 
 time one of these storehouses for the water supply had been cleaned 
 out, human remains had been discovered, and this recent event had 
 made the Moslems sensitive on the score of pollution. A Jew in 
 the neighbourhood volunteered to search for the bodies on condition 
 that he was carried to and from the cistern on another man's back, 
 so as not to set foot on the sacred soil. 
 
 364
 
 THE HUMANITIES IN JERUSALEM 
 
 of precedent was the employment, in the process of construc- 
 tion, of carts, a means of transportation not seen in Jeru- 
 salem since the Crusades, and which were the remains of 
 material provided for our troops for the construction of the 
 Balaclava railroad. 
 
 According to Macgregor (" Rob Roy ") the first carriage 
 seen in Palestine for many centuries belonged to an American 
 named Floyd. The first road of modern times was that 
 made in 1869, before the visit of the Austrian Emperor ; 
 later came that between Jerusalem and Hebron, with a 
 branch road to Bethlehem, those between Jerusalem and 
 Jericho, and between Jerusalem and Ain Karim, all com- 
 pleted about 1889. The carriage road up the Mount of 
 Olives was made in 1898, and the existing roads were further 
 improved in preparation for the visit of the Emperor of 
 Germany. The railway between Jerusalem and Jaffa was 
 opened in 1 892. The first bicycle seen in Jerusalem appeared 
 on the Jaffa road in 1898. Motor cars have been seen in 
 Beirut, but have not yet reached the Holy City. 
 
 This important year threatened to end disastrously with 
 a drought, and the anxiety felt upon the subject of rain can 
 scarcely be comprehended except by those who have lived 
 where there are no rivers, lakes, nor even springs, and where 
 the water supply is almost dependent upon the rain caught 
 in the domestic cistern. The Moslems inaugurated a pro- 
 cession of penitence : the chief men of the city, with the 
 Pasha, walking barefoot around the sacred Haram enclosure, 
 which occupies one-sixth of the entire city. The Jews, too, 
 fasted and prayed let us hope the Christians followed suit. 
 Finally, in despair, the Moslem authorities, who seem to 
 preserve a certain intermittent regard for the Hebrew faith, 
 appealed to their fellow-sufferers and offered to the Jews 
 free entrance into the Sacred Courts if they would assemble 
 there and beseech the mercy of Heaven. 
 
 This they declined, but asked permission to pray at the 
 Tomb of David, a jealously guarded sanctuary of Moslem 
 
 365
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 fanaticism, and receiving permission, assembled there on 
 December 17. Before evening the rain fell in torrents, and 
 a glorious rainbow spanned the Holy City. 
 
 England also has sent royal guests to Jerusalem ; our 
 present King accompanied by Dean Stanley in 1862; his 
 brother, Prince Arthur, in 1865, and his two sons, in 
 1882 : visits which resulted in useful books by Dean Stanley 
 and Canon Dalton. There have been other royal 
 European visitors, the German Emperor in 1898, and 
 his third son, Prince Adalbert of Prussia, in 1901. 
 
 The year 1902 has also seen some distinguished guests : 
 Prince Windisch Gratz on his marriage tour with the 
 Princess Elizabeth Maria, daughter of the unfortunate 
 Prince Rudolph ; and also the Prince Likomako-as, the Nado 
 of Abyssinia, whose visit is said to have reference to the 
 present erection, in the neighbourhood of the new Abyssinian 
 church and convent, of a house of residence for some mem- 
 ber of the royal family. It is hoped that their permanent 
 presence here may be of much benefit to their fellow- 
 countrymen. 
 
 Visits from the late Marquess of Bute in 1880 and the Duke 
 of Norfolk in 1900 will be long remembered by the poor and 
 by certain religious institutions. Among the few other 
 Englishmen of note who have been attracted as students or 
 pilgrims to the Holy City we may recall the names of General 
 Gordon, Lord Kitchener and Sir Charles Warren ; among 
 ecclesiastics, the Bishop of Salisbury, a staunch friend to the 
 work of the revived Jerusalem bishopric ; the Bishop of Argyle 
 and the Isles, Canon Tristram, Dean Stanley and Professor 
 Sanday. Among recent visits of well-known men of letters it 
 seems unaccountable that one should be able to name only 
 George Adam Smith, to whom students of Palestine owe an 
 immense debt of gratitude for his Historical Geography ; and 
 Zangwill, who has given us only too few sketches of the city 
 in which his father is a permanent resident. The visits of 
 Mrs. Oliphant and Dean Farrar should also be mentioned. 
 
 366
 
 THE HUMANITIES IN JERUSALEM 
 
 The first impulse towards scientific exploration in Palestine 
 was given by Dr. Robinson in 1838, and other Americans 
 soon followed in his footsteps. In suggestive contrast with 
 the more rapid methods and the greater self-confidence of 
 modern times, it is interesting to note that he had prepared 
 himself for his task by fifteen years of special study. Among 
 the more important of his successors were Lieutenant Lynch 
 in 1848, Dr. Barclay in 1858, Dr. W. M. Thompson, author 
 of the ever-popular work The Land and the Book, in 1859. 
 Professor Hackett in 1860 all Americans. 
 
 One valuable English work, The Holy City, written by 
 Williams, chaplain to Bishop Alexander, had appeared in 
 1845, and Porter had published interesting descriptions 
 (mainly of the north of Palestine) in 1855 ; the Germans 
 were characteristically busy with details the Herodian 
 architecture, the Valley of Jehoshaphat ; Wiinsch was 
 excavating in Jericho and Capernaum, the French were 
 archaeologizing in Gyrene when, in some degree the result of 
 the visit of the Prince of Wales in 1862, the Palestine Explo- 
 ration Fund was founded, in 1865. 
 
 Their first report was issued in 1869, so that the Quarterly 
 Statement numbers over thirty volumes. Although doubtless 
 of value for the specialist, a large amount of their contents 
 have for the general reader only the historic and incomplete 
 interest of last year's almanac ; there are, however, even 
 for the amateur, many chapters of permanent some of even 
 literary interest, notably those of Dr. Post and Dr. Bliss, 
 both of the American College of Beirut ; of M. Clermont- 
 Ganneau, Chancellor of the French Consulate in 1868, and 
 of Philip Baldensberger, whose personal knowledge of the 
 country has enabled him to collect information of unique 
 interest on the language and manners of the people. He is 
 one of an interesting family of Swiss extraction, other mem- 
 bers of which have done valuable work -of various kinds, 
 notably as apiculturists, on very original lines. They move 
 their hives about the country on camels, following up the 
 
 367
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 flowers in different districts, and thus securing four and even 
 five harvests of honey in the year. 
 
 It is difficult for the merely general reader, however 
 seriously interested, to distinguish between achievements 
 personally attractive and those of scientific value. Con- 
 scious of all that has been done by French and German 
 explorers, by the earlier American pioneers, and by certain 
 Jerusalem residents, notably Dr. Schick and the Rev. E. 
 Hanauer, the mere outside observer would be inclined to 
 point out as the results of widest general consequence the 
 survey l which has provided us with practicable maps, and 
 the publication of the thirteen volumes of The Pilgrims' 
 Texts, which have brought a considerable share of the 
 literature of the Holy Land within the reach of all ; which 
 have made it possible to every amateur of the subject to 
 know its history at first hand during the thousand years 
 which include the period of Constantine and Helena and 
 which end with Felix Fabri ; before the Reformation had 
 split Westepn faith into sects, and when men were able to 
 write simple narratives of what they had seen and heard, 
 with no arriere pensee and no parti pris ; when no dogma 
 was involved in the identification of sites, and the stones 
 " which remain unto this day " were not to be dismissed 
 as deliberate frauds, or explained away as monuments of 
 party politics and religious superstition. 
 
 By the kindness of Mr. Macalistcr, the present repre- 
 sentative of the Fund in Palestine, I am able to give a sum- 
 mary of what has been accomplished in the matter of prac- 
 tical archaeology. 
 
 1 It is interesting to remember that the first traveller to make a 
 map of the country was the pilgrim John Poloner (1421). The first 
 Palestine Survey was made by the Franciscan Bernardino in 1516. 
 It is said to be singularly accurate as to measurements. The latest, 
 with every advantage of modern methods and scientific precision, 
 is now in course of publication by the Germans. It will, it is hoped, 
 supplement and correct the many omissions and inaccuracies of that 
 of the P.E.F., inevitable in an earliest attempt. 
 
 368
 
 THE HUMANITIES IN JERUSALEM 
 
 I. Excavations at Tell el-Hesy [Lachish] by Professor 
 Flinders Petrie and (afterwards) by Dr. Bliss of the American 
 College in Beirut. 
 
 Chief Results. The determination of the history of pottery 
 in the country, affording a chronological scale by which to> 
 date all subsequent discoveries. 
 
 II. Excavations in and about Jerusalem by Dr. Bliss and 
 Mr. A. C. Dickie. 
 
 Chief Results. Determination of ancient southern limit 
 of the city at various periods, discovery of church at so-called 
 Pool of Siloam and of other important buildings. 
 
 III. Excavation by Dr. Bliss, assisted by Mr. Macalister, 
 of Tells (i.e. mounds of accumulated debris). 
 
 (a) Tell Zakariya (Azekah ?). 
 (6) Tell es Safi (Gath). 
 
 (c) Tell Judeideh (unidentified). 
 
 (d) Tell Sandahannah (Merash). 
 
 IV. Excavations at Tell ej-Jezari (Gezer) by Mr. Mac- 
 alister. 
 
 Chief Results so far. The determination of the period of 
 Egyptian influence in Palestine and of pre-Israelite methods- 
 of disposal of the dead. Discovery of Canaanite temple. 
 
 This site, originally identified by Clermont Ganneau in 
 1868, has proved to be of extreme interest, though not per- 
 haps as contributing to the " Biblical illustration " which is- 
 the avowed object of the Palestine Exploration Fund, which 
 may account for the fact that the published accounts of Mr. 
 Macalister's valuable discoveries have not the detail and 
 fulness of illustration which the archaeologist, as distinguished 
 from the religious teacher, might desire. The discovery of 
 a temple of Astarte, with all its properties and historical 
 suggestions, seems indeed a little incongruous with the pre- 
 vious work of the Fund, and has already been criticized as 
 affording " a surprising lack of antiquities of the Jewish or 
 later periods." The antiquarian and historian will be not 
 the less grateful for contributions to the knowledge of 
 
 369 BB
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 manners and customs, of faith and morals of the inhabitant 
 of Syria before the first Hebrew invasion ; how women 
 looked before Helen of Troy, how priests worshipped before 
 Aaron, how cities were built before Thebes, how sanitation 
 was practised before Leviticus, how the world lived when the 
 Sphinx and the pyramids were young. 
 
 It would seem, however, as if the future of Palestine 
 archaeology were in the hands of the Germans. Their rela- 
 tion to the country, to its agriculture, its commerce, its postal 
 service and its architecture, its education, their foundation 
 of the only European archaeological institution in Palestine, 
 with specialist professors of distinction sent out from 
 Germany, and, perhaps, above all, the work they have 
 already accomplished, enable them to secure firmans of 
 permission to excavate such as seem impossible to other 
 European powers. They have even secured protection for 
 their completed work a priceless boon in a country where 
 excavation is regarded by the natives mainly as affording 
 them a convenient quarry of stones already prepared for 
 use. At Baalbek, where within the last three or four years 
 they have uncovered and restored to a condition of security 
 one of the most perfect and extensive ruins in existence of 
 the Graeco-Semitic type, there is provision for its permanent 
 preservation, not only in the existence of an enclosure, but 
 of a marble slab which places the spot under the aegis of 
 two Powers ; declaring in Arabic and German that the 
 memorial is placed by the Sultan Abd-el-Hamid II, hi tes- 
 timony of his immutable friendship with his illustrious 
 friend the Emperor Wilhelm II and (notable words from a 
 Moslem) with the Empress Augusta Victoria, and in memory 
 of their visit to Baalbek in November, 1898. The immense 
 work is still in progress, under the auspices of four university 
 men, each a specialist in his own line, headed by an architect 
 of high distinction. They employ some two hundred work- 
 men, and have every mechanical convenience, including 
 tramways for the complete removal of debris a pleasing 
 
 370
 
 contrast to the usual method of carrying a few pounds at a 
 time to the very short distance possible on the heads of 
 women and girls, in baskets and kerosene tins. 
 
 At Tell el-mutesellim, the ancient Megiddo, the excavations 
 are now hi the hands of the German Society for the Explor- 
 ation of Palestine. The spot is of unique importance as the 
 junction of the highways of the nations of antiquity. An 
 ancient walled city has been found at the hitherto unpre- 
 cedented depth of forty feet. Two painted vases, still entire, 
 have been unearthed among the debris of 5,000 years, and 
 among minor objects a seal, which, if it be, as is probable, 
 that of Jeroboam II, is the oldest Hebrew inscription extant. 
 
 Other important work under the personal protection of 
 the Emperor of Germany is in progress near Zahleh in the 
 Lebanon, at Palmyra, and Amman the ancient capital of the 
 Ammonites. The most ancient specimen of Christian archi- 
 tecture known to exist is the ancient Mshetta, south-east 
 of Madeba, east of Jordan, which has been presented by the 
 Sultan to the Emperor. The fa9ade, a unique specimen 
 of early art, has been cut away entire from the crumbling 
 wall of stone and removed for safe keeping to Berlin, 
 instead of, as would otherwise happen, if preserved at all, to 
 Constantinople. 
 
 The Russians have been working at Palmyra, and have 
 been permitted to remove a customs tariff of the time of 
 Hadrian. 
 
 The Austrians have been excavating at Taanak, and have 
 made discoveries of supreme interest, including the very rare 
 find of an altar of incense. 
 
 Now that both Germany and America have permanent 
 archaeological schools in Jerusalem for the training of future 
 archaeologists, who will begin their work with a knowledge 
 of the country and of its language, we may hope for a more 
 systematic investigation of the treasures of Syria treasures 
 of so many races, so many cycles and so many creeds than 
 has hitherto been in any degree possible. 
 
 371
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 In Jerusalem, as may have been gathered, the main 
 interest of educated society centres round the past, a subject 
 upon which I might indefinitely enlarge if my initial under- 
 taking had not been that I would not worry my reader with 
 discussion on points such as where Absalom's tomb isn't, 
 a type of discussion which, even here, is in ninety-nine cases 
 out of a hundred absolutely unprofitable, because it is, 
 except among a few of the small number who possess any 
 archaeological knowledge, entirely unconnected with any 
 genuine antiquarian, historical, or even religious interest. 
 The dispassionate reader can have no conception of the 
 extent to which, in this connexion, a sane adult can 
 utterly refuse all inquiry into history, archaeology, proba- 
 bility, testimony, to what degree he can abandon himself to 
 his f eelings, lest he should be accused of being emotional ; to 
 hearsay evidence, lest he should be suspected of lending an 
 ear to tradition ; to the testimony of his senses, lest he should 
 have to reproach himself with being too readily convinced. 
 
 To such a one the holy places of Jerusalem, which are 
 indeed of very various degrees of merit so far as the evidence 
 for their authenticity is concerned, 1 make no appeal. They 
 
 1 The only sites which have never been seriously questioned are 
 those of the Temple and of the Church of the Nativity at Bethlehem. 
 Most of the stations of the Via Dolorosa have many times changed 
 their whereabouts. The Church of the Holy Sepulchre, built by 
 Helena and Constantino on the site preserved by the desecration of 
 Hadrian (who placed an image of Venus on the traditional Calvary, 
 of Jupiter on the traditional Holy Sepulchre) was first questioned 
 by a German named Jonas Korten, who visited Jerusalem in 1738, 
 and afterwards by a certain Dr. Clarke, who spent seventeen days 
 in Palestine in 1801, and wrote a book a year later. Between 1840 
 and 1876 sixteen theories were advanced; twelve critics argued 
 from their various points of view in favour of the original site ; four 
 against, one of whom, the learned Dr. Schick, the only one resident 
 in Jerusalem and really familiar with its topography, subsequently 
 changed his opinion and advanced a seventeenth theory, in 
 favour of the original tradition. The Rev. E. Hanauer, upon whom 
 Schick's mantle has undoubtedly fallen, is Iso in favour of the 
 tradition of sixteen hundred years. The alleged sites of Bethesda, 
 
 372
 
 THE HUMANITIES IN JERUSALEM 
 
 are mere rags of popery, their traditions, though they may 
 date back to times when there was not a Latin priest in 
 Palestine, even before the separation of the Church into 
 eastern and western branches, are nevertheless mere inven- 
 tions on behalf of " the scarlet woman." To such Gordon's 
 tomb is a god-send, and the Green Hill the apology for his 
 presence in Jerusalem. One may explain that the one is a 
 crusading stable, and that the other owes its alleged likeness 
 to a skull to the fact of a modern stone quarry, and the 
 presence of a couple of cisterns ; but to him it is the flag of 
 Protestantism, a corollary of his possession of the English 
 tongue. 
 
 Beyond the colouring of the mosque and the faade of the 
 Holy Sepulchre, there is nothing of artistic beauty in Jeru- 
 salem. The charm is in colour, not in form, in association, 
 in the persistence of historic custom, in the psychology of 
 the Oriental. The large new suburbs of the Jews are ugly 
 and purely utilitarian, those of the Germans have the irrele- 
 vant prettiness of a model village. The English have spent 
 incredible sums upon a hospital for the bodies and a church 
 for the souls of the Jews, with results which are gratifying 
 neither to the artist nor to the utilitarian. The Collegiate 
 Church of S. George, a fraction of a building intended to be 
 of the proportions of Oxford Cathedral, goes far to atone for 
 failure elsewhere. The modern French buildings of the 
 Dominicans (S. Etienne), in spite of French taste in stained 
 glass, are pleasing of their kind ; the restored Church of 
 
 Siloam, the site of the Ascension, the spot where " Jesus wept," 
 Bethphage, the scene of the Flagellation, the House of John Mark, 
 have all been preserved, with many others, by Crusading Churches, 
 on spots venerated by pilgrims of the fourth century. The church, 
 of which some remains still exist, built on the alleged site of the 
 ";large upper room," is probably the oldest sanctuary in Jerusalem. 
 Except for perhaps a year or two, when the Christians withdrew 
 to Pel la, there must always have been Christians in Jerusalem, and 
 the Oriental has the material kind of mind which clings to ocular 
 demonstration and is as well aware, as in Bible times, when the 
 stones remain there to his own day. 
 
 873
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 S. Anne follows early Crusading lines, and has considerable 
 archaeological interest ; the tiled chapel of Notre Dame de 
 France is effective hi colouring ; the large church built for 
 the accommodation of the Reparatrices is coldly handsome. 
 The decorations of the Greek churches are beneath criticism 
 crotchet, patchwork, Christmas-tree balls and artificial 
 flowers ; in the Russian alone one finds art, sometimes of 
 really high quality. There are beautiful and costly objects, 
 amid much that is crude, in the Armenian Church of S. 
 James ; and the new Lutheran Church of the Redeemer has 
 much purity and dignity of outline. 
 
 The new Moslem suburb is pleasing so far, though getting 
 perilously near to the type mysteriously called " Queen 
 Anne," from which, however, it may be ultimately preserved 
 by Oriental love of space and sense of dignity. 
 
 It is difficult to the mere onlooker to conjecture why, unless 
 from some inherent idleness or local superstition, certain 
 Europeans who have been for some fifty years educators 
 in Jerusalem (although, happily, the Moslems have more than 
 overtaken them), should cling to the idea that to occident- 
 alize is a part of the process of instructing the Oriental. The 
 Franciscans, however, have for centuries taught Arabic to 
 Arabs, combined with technical instruction and the acquisi- 
 tion of modern languages in cases where such were likely to be 
 of use. The White Fathers not only seek to elevate the 
 Oriental in his own surroundings, but they share his life, 
 even to the extent of themselves wearing the Bedouin bour- 
 nous and the Turkish tarbush. In the American schools the 
 study of three languages is compulsory ; one of which must 
 be Arabic with its literature and philosophy ; a second the 
 native language of the student, if he be other than Syrian, 
 such as Armenian, Greek, Hebrew, etc.; while the third may 
 be European or classical. In the Jewish schools of the 
 higher class, the Rothschild, Cohen or Alliance Israelite, 
 Hebrew is compulsory, combined with English, German, or 
 French respectively. In the great German orphanages the 
 
 374
 
 BEDAWI MAN AND WOMAN.
 
 THE HUMANITIES IN JERUSALEM 
 
 children are instructed in Arabic, which is also the language 
 they use among themselves. The English schools, however, 
 for some inscrutable reason, are conducted on the theory 
 that the Arabs or Jews, as the case may be, although their 
 ultimate destiny will almost inevitably be to marry Arabs 
 or Jews, to live among them, and to lead the lives of the 
 native population, will be the better for being temporarily 
 Anglicized, for speaking English with the mincing Levantine 
 accent, which is what most of them acquire, and for learning 
 English Church history ! English trades, laundry-work, 
 washing, mending, cooking, scrubbing, sanitation enter but 
 scantily, if at all, into the bill of fare, though possibly of a 
 nature more easily digested, as well as more nourishing, than 
 the diet supplied. The Arab is extraordinarily receptive 
 and observant, and utterly destitute of the mauvaise honte 
 which so often hinders the utilization of such acquirements ; 
 his very faults and failures are of special interest to the 
 student of human nature. 
 
 It has been our privilege to read the papers produced at 
 the examination of a certain school of the better type, and 
 we have found them so suggestive, so instructive in the 
 workings of the Arab mind, that I venture to reproduce a 
 few notes illustrating the effect of (more or less) useful 
 knowledge upon the Oriental understanding. To what end 
 are they instructed in Greek mythology, in the use of special- 
 ist or archaic English words, in the morals of the English 
 monarchy, the physiology of the rabbit, a beast unknown 
 in Palestine, in the relations of Antony and Cleopatra ? is 
 the kind of question one would put in an examination paper 
 for teachers. A compulsory examination for teachers, in 
 religion and arts, would work some very astounding revolu- 
 tions in Jerusalem. 
 
 Certain surprising statements as to New Testament 
 history may possibly have been due to the authorship of 
 Jews or Mohammedans. "St. Mark appears first time 
 to the disciples at Antioch. His parents were Zecharias and 
 
 375
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 Sapphira or Mary. He wrote also the Gospel of Revelation.'* 
 Another boy writes : " St. Mark made a school, put boys to 
 learn fighting as brave as ever can be." " St. John was put 
 in prison in the island of Cyprus, and there he wrote the whole 
 history of Jerusalem." " When Saul's asses fled away he was 
 told that the asses were upon the hills, so he went, and on 
 the way the Lord appeared, and said, ' Saul, Saul, percutest 
 thou me ? so he fell upon his face, and began to prophesy 
 with the prophets that were upon the hill." "St. John 
 was the youngest of the Lord's disciples. He was all the 
 time with Him and he wrote more than the others because 
 he used to see everything in his eye, but the others did not 
 see but heard." Among the plagues of Egypt are men- 
 tioned " Turning the water into wine, ashes in the air, tor- 
 toises, and lies." The last no one will dispute. 
 
 Sometimes one finds curious uses of language. The 
 following are mistakes arising out of such confusion of sound 
 or of memory as might occur in the case of any student of a 
 foreign tongue. Milliner is a man who works in a mill ; 
 stoic is a kind of stick ; hansom is not connected with hand or 
 some, but handsome, of fine appearance ; proxy is a kind 
 of verse called prose ; the feminine of lad is ass, and the 
 masculine of siren is sir. 
 
 Even the beginner in Arabic must see that something 
 more complex is involved in the following definitions, given 
 by those accustomed to a language in which all thought is 
 visual, in which everything seems to bring up an image of 
 some kind. " Easel, a kind of stand ; it comes from the 
 German Esel, which means ass, hence the word means a 
 stand to hang things on." Does not the schoolboy of Jeru- 
 salem a score of times a day see the patient donkey, laden 
 with saddle-bags, waiting to have things hung in them ? 
 Could the boy who said, " The bustard is a drunkered," have, 
 by chance, seen an English tourist " on the bust " ? There 
 is unconscious satire in the definition of Bedlamite as " half 
 a goat, and half a lion, from bedellium, a monster of the 
 
 37G
 
 A THRKSHING FLOOR.
 
 THE HUMANITIES IN JERUSALEM 
 
 'Greeks . " " Bayonet,>f rom Bayonne , was a minister of France , 
 who was very strict," suggests that the minister had a trick 
 of practical expression more familiar in Turkey than in 
 France ; " Buxom is from bow. A buxom boy is an obedient 
 boy because he can easily be bent" ; "lynch law is a very 
 sever law written in blood by an Athenian legislator." " A 
 constable is with the stable, who gives horses to eat." 
 " Heaven is the hanged one, the upper part." Some vague 
 association with the shank bone may have suggested that 
 " the human body is 1st trunk, 2nd shrunk, 3rd extremities. 
 The extremities is the remainder of the body." " Posseidon 
 is the god of the downward thing," and " the rabbit is an 
 outside beast." " A diving bell is the ways of the water 
 through the houses by canals or tubes made of iron.'* 
 Water " laid on " is a very rare luxury in Jerusalem, and 
 the boy had probably been struck by seeing tubes full of 
 water, diving underground. " Panic is a kind of disease, so 
 when they say he is panic-stricken it means that he is 
 diseased." " Gasconading is a man who visited the palaces 
 of the king of France and said, ' The stables of my father 
 is better than this, only somewhat larger.' ' Artichoke is 
 ' ' a kind of plant that grows in Jerusalem to make dinners 
 and suppers from." 
 
 One can only sympathize with the boy who wrote that 
 " loathing is water half hot, half cold." We all know that 
 variety of loathing. 
 
 A delightful touch of visualization associates widows with 
 black. A boy thus describes the memorial service of Queen 
 Victoria : "In the English church people were English, 
 French, Greeks, Abyssinians, Widows and Jews. The 
 English were praying for the Queen." 
 
 The spelling of Arabic is strictly phonetic, which may 
 account for the peculiarities of the following. " I was in the 
 school, and after came Amil tolthus (told us ; the Arabs never 
 stint an h) come and see Jabra, and we toll them, my ! 
 wat tis demater ? he toll-dus the turques beet him with the 
 
 377
 
 INNER JERUSALEM 
 
 nii'e ; how many boys was ? and toll-dus 2 boys ; and toil 
 them were are they ? and toll them went to the gate and 
 Master toll to Nicola to go and bring the bulish (police) and 
 he went and brotit in the scool and rot (wrote) his name, 
 and after come his brother and see him. His hand wass terr 
 (tore) and took him home." 
 
 The following is an account of the rabbit's adaptation to 
 environment. " The rabbit is like the fox, change of colour 
 of his fur in the towns cold, from the ashes colour to white. 
 In the summer it will be an ashes colour till the winter ; in 
 the winter and in the beginning of November his fur will 
 become white, and the white continued to grow allitill 
 till his skin will be covered and will be sow some weeks ; 
 then will changed ; and it is the last which became 
 white from his body, then his bowls will be changed, and 
 his back also, till his body changed and he will be all his 
 colour ashes and no place white." " Thomas a Becket was 
 a priest and got married to a Mohammedan girl, and it is 
 said that it is quite certain that he went to heaven." 
 
 There is a fine Oriental flavour in the accounts of Henry 
 VIII. " He quarrelled with the Pope because he was 
 engaged to a wife and he took another one." " He took 
 six wives, some he killed some he executed, and some he gave 
 to his generals." "Henry was a very strong man and he 
 married six wives. Some of them were executed and some 
 of them were died, but the last was survived on her husband, 
 and they were Katherine, Anne was executed. Jane Grey 
 of Aragon, Katherine, and the last Katherine, which sur- 
 vived on her husband." Asked " What do you know of 
 Antony and Cleopatra ? " a boy replies, " Instead of at- 
 tacking her he was fashanated by her beauty." Another 
 adds, " It was a great shame for the Romans so Octavius 
 came to attack him and Cleopatrera." 
 
 Those who have to endure the inconsequence of the 
 Mohammedan calendar, which varies eleven or twelve days in 
 every year, would naturally appreciate the virtue of Caesar, 
 
 378
 
 GOOD MEASURE, TRESSED DOWN AND SHAKEN TOGETHER, AND 
 RUNNING OVER." 
 
 S. LUKE vr. 38.
 
 THE HUMANITIES IN JERUSALEM 
 
 who was " a man of high spirit, who composed the Calendar 
 and he dived the year into 365 days, knowing the times and 
 the years ; and this shows that he was a great man and very 
 clever about reforming the Calendar." 
 
 It is interesting to know what the young Arab has to say 
 about the horse. As might be expected, he is held in high 
 esteem. 
 
 " The horse is a beautiful animal of those that have four 
 legs, he is bigger than the donkey. His ears are erect. He 
 is a beautiful animal. The people use him for riding 
 drawing carriages, carts and for driving mills, 1 sometimes 
 for carreeing things." Or again, " The horse is the largest 
 animal in the world ; he has long ears, he has a long feet 
 and they are bone " (this, I suspect, is not the scientific state- 
 ment of the real whereabouts of the ankle, about which so 
 many are in error, but that " feet " is merely used for 
 "legs "), "he has a long tail, his head is very big, he is a high 
 animal, and his back is broode, he can run faster than the 
 camel." 
 
 One feels that the book of Deuteronomy has lost in com- 
 plexity when one reads that " its general character is that 
 it was neatly written under the influence of Moses," and a 
 truly Arabic talent for " getting out of it " appears in reply 
 to the question, " What are the contents of the book of 
 LeviticusJ " " Its contents are many things " a criticism 
 which may be very suitably applied to the present volume ! 
 
 1 It is melancholy to see the horse or donkey on the treadmill, 
 the last sad occupation of the broken-down. 
 
 379
 
 INDEX 
 
 Abyssinians, 88, 109, 110, 120-122, 
 
 128, 164 
 
 Ain Karim, 21, 76, 355 
 America and American, 212, 215. See 
 Consul, Cranks, Missionaries 
 archaeology, 2, 4 
 College, Beirut, 86, 90, 190, 197 
 
 Colony, 5, 35, 41-46, 237 
 education, 90, 190 
 
 and Latins, 92, 149, 158 
 press, 237, 239 
 
 quakers, 5 
 
 Anglican Church. See English 
 Anglo-Israelites, 38 
 Animals, 26, 47, 48, 76, 77, 214, 
 286, 287, 337-49 
 
 cruelty to, 47, 214, 336 
 Arab and Arabic. See Moslem 
 
 t , Christian 19, 213, 234, 325, 326 
 
 convents in, 85 
 
 colour, love of, 233 
 
 cooking, 20 
 
 cursing, 29, 235 
 
 customs, 19, 181, 261, 325 
 
 dress, 19, 234 
 
 education, 85, 158, 255, 374 
 
 flowers, love of, 27 
 
 homes, 19 
 
 language, 9, 10, 77, 230, 232, 
 
 234, 374 
 
 levantine, 4, 6, 234, 260, 323, 
 
 375 
 
 literature, 237, 238 
 
 music, 22 
 
 race, 47, 230 
 
 sportsman, 210 
 women's rights, 255 
 
 Archaeology : 
 
 American, 2, 4,11,367-68,371, 
 
 374 
 
 Austrian, 371 
 
 English, 4, 125, 126. And see 
 
 P. E. F. 
 
 Archaeology, continued 
 
 German, 2, 4, 77, 132, 367-68, 
 
 370-71 
 instruction in, 11, 160] 
 
 Latin, 11, 77, 158, 160, 161, 
 
 247, 368 
 
 Russian, 2, 371 
 
 questions of, 1, 77 
 Archimandrite. See Russia 
 Armenians, 88, 89, 109, 110, 112, 
 
 115-18, 121, 128, 143, 151, 
 164, 178 
 Austria, 209, 371 
 
 Baalbek, 370 
 Baksheesh, 48, 49, 236 
 Bees. See Baldensberger. 
 Bible, 113, 114, 160 
 Bethlehem. See Church of Na- 
 tivity. 
 
 and Omar, 228 
 
 Cawasses (or cavasses), 3, 7, 83, 98 
 Cholera, 53, 54 
 Churches, 373, 374 
 
 St. Anne, 126, 293, 294, 331 
 
 Ascension, 291 
 
 Bethany, 331 
 
 Bethphage, 150 
 
 Byzantine, or pre-Byzantme, 
 
 120, 198 
 
 C.M.S., 14, 199, 203 
 Christ, 198, 199, 373 
 Coenaculum, 147, 150, 292, 331, 
 
 332 
 
 Dominus floevit, 13, 150 
 Emmaus, 332 
 flagellation, 150 
 St. George, 14, 80, 194, 197, 
 
 198, 231, 264, 373 
 Holy Sepulchre, 13, 17, 81, 87, 
 88, 89, 92, 94, 95, 105, 135, 
 156, 165, 227, 330, 331, 332 
 
 380
 
 INDEX 
 
 Churches, continued 
 
 St. Mary Latin, 140 
 ,, ,, Minor, 141 
 
 Nativity, 92-05, 138, 139, 150, 
 181, 228, 331 
 
 Notre Dame, 13 
 
 Pater, 13, 75, 164, 333 
 
 Redeemer, 13 
 
 Re'paratrices, 165 
 
 .Resurrection, 13, 135, 330, 333 
 See Holy Sepulchre 
 
 St. Saviour, 13, 149 
 
 St. Stephen, 331 
 
 Tomb of our Lady, 128, 150, 
 292, 294, 331 
 
 St. Veronica, 164 
 Consuls and Consulates, 360, 364 
 
 America, 7, 49 
 
 Austria, 7 
 
 England, 6, 7, 48, 49, 155, 210 
 
 France, 7, 50, 94, 95, 96, 155 
 et seq., 169, 360, 361 
 
 General, 6 
 
 Germany, 6, 49, 155 
 
 Greece, 7 
 
 Holland, 7 
 
 Italy, 155 
 
 Russia, 7, 89 
 
 Sardinia, 50, 155 
 
 Spain, 7, 360 
 Consular law, 49, 97 
 Convents. See Latin. 
 
 St. Anne, 113 
 
 Assumptionist, 14, 113 
 
 Benedictine. 13, 138 et seq., 144 
 
 Carmelite, 13 
 
 Coenaculum, 147 
 
 Dominican, 14, 113 
 
 Earliest, 125, 137, 144 
 
 Franciscan (St. Saviour's), 13, 
 145-53, 167 
 
 Georgian, 148 
 
 Greek, 82, 137 
 
 Mar Saba, 139 
 
 St. Mary Latin, 14, 140 
 ,, ,, Minor, 141 
 
 Russian, 79 
 Coinage, 17, 30 
 Copts, 89, 109, 110, 115, 121, 
 
 122, 123, 128 
 Cranks, 3, 35-46, 152 
 Crusades, 48, 143, 144, 145, 180, 
 
 186, 197, 220 
 Cursing, 29, 235, 236 
 
 Dragomans, 49, 213, 216, 217, 221 
 East, 2, 18, 266-68 
 
 England and English, 60, 70, 72, 
 73, 97, 181, 215, 218, 238, 
 260. And see Archaeology, 
 Consul. 
 
 Arab views of, 212, 215 
 
 Architecture, 198, 264, 284 
 
 Bethlehem, in, 203 
 
 Beit Jala, in, 203 
 
 Bishopric, mixed, 187, 189, 191 
 
 revived, 193 
 
 blind, care of, 68 
 
 Church, 187, 193-208 
 
 Conversions by, 64-69, 202 
 
 Eye-hospital, 10, 18, 68, 177 
 
 Hospital for Conversion of Jews, 
 
 67, 199, 373 
 - hospitality, 189, 205 
 
 law, administration of, 49 
 
 pilgrims, 181, 182 
 
 position of, 189, 100, 197; 
 
 former, 359 
 
 relations with Jews, 180-86 
 
 responsibility for, 203 
 
 how fulfilled, 186, 
 
 189, 197, 198 
 
 schools, 194, 197, 203, 206, 207 r 
 
 359 
 
 trade, 132, 185, 209 
 
 travellers, 33, 212-16, 366 
 
 women, 217, 218, 258,261,325 
 
 Firmans, 84, 141, 146, 148, 150, 
 156-57, 162, 163 
 
 of Statu quo, 93, 94, 157 
 Flowers, 12, 17, 23, 26, 27, 63 
 Food, 3, 32, 163. And see Moslem. 
 France. See Consuls. 
 
 influence of, 155, 188, 191, 247 
 
 and Jews, 9 
 
 protectorate of, 91, 93, 155, 156, 
 
 164, 169, 170, 175, 189 
 
 recognition of, 156, 157 
 
 and Russia, 91, 92 
 
 Schools. See Latin 
 
 trade, 209 
 
 George, St., 120, 129, 130, 243-44. 
 
 And see Churches. 
 Georgians, 88, 105, 148 
 German. See Archaeology, 
 
 suls 
 
 agriculture, 40, 50 
 
 Church, 91, 200 
 
 Colony, 5, 35, 41 
 
 colonization, 38, 209 
 
 Emperor's visit, 5, 91 
 
 hospice, 158, 206 
 
 381
 
 INDEX 
 
 Geiman, continued 
 
 institutions, 5, 39, 68, 91, '97, 
 189, 199, 203, 231 
 
 Jews, 9 
 
 Latins, 158, 164, 174, 176 
 
 - lectures, 11 
 
 - law, how administered, 49, 97, 
 
 155, 176 
 
 schools, 5, 39, 91, 197, 203 
 
 trade, 9, 39, 50, 209 
 Gordon's Calvary. Also Protes- 
 tant Calvary. 14, 37 
 
 Government,47-54. And see Schools. 
 
 - alternatives to, 97, 299 
 
 - characteristics of, 47 
 
 - hospital, 45, 91, 160, 244 
 
 machinery of, 50, 51, 54 
 
 - prisons, 45, 54, 244 
 
 - schools, 45, 237, 244 
 
 - tolerance of, 47, 49 
 Greek and Greeks, 98-130 
 
 - Anglicans and 99, 100, 123-26 
 
 - Arabs and, 85, 86 
 
 - austerity of, 128, 129 
 
 - Bishops, 101 
 
 - Church of, 103, 104, 115, 127 
 
 - clergy, 104, 105 
 
 - convents, 106 
 
 Councils, 99, 100, 101, 118, 163 
 
 - foundation of, 99, 103 
 
 - heresies of 99, 115-30 
 
 holy fire, 81, 88, 107-13 
 
 - Hospital, 106 
 
 hymns, 357 
 
 - orthodoxy, 89, 99, 100, 102, 
 
 115, 142, 143 
 
 - patriarch, 85, 87, 88, 103, 109, 
 
 112, 143, 185 
 
 - philanthropy, 106 
 
 - rites, 127, 129 
 
 Russia, relations with, 85, 86, 87 
 
 - schools, 86, 105, 106, 197, 199 
 
 trade, 9 
 
 Heresy and Schism, 115 30 
 
 of American Colony, 46 
 
 - of Eastern Church, 88, 100 
 
 of English missionaries, 195, 198 
 Holy Places, 136-37, 372. And 
 
 see Churches. 
 Bethesda, 294, 335 
 Bethlehem, 203. And see 
 
 Church of the Nativity. 
 Betrayal, scene of the, 293 
 
 disputes about, 77, 93, 94, 96, 
 
 99, 128, 138, 150, 167-79 ' \ 
 
 - evidence for, 135, 217, 292, 293 
 
 And see Fathers 
 
 Holy Places, continued 
 
 Gethsemane, 89 
 
 Guardians. See Franciscans 
 
 Mizpah, 292 
 
 Siloam, 95 
 
 Tomb of Rachael, 292 
 
 Via Dolorosa, 164 
 Hospices, 205, 364 
 
 earliest, 106, 137, 138, 149 
 
 Franciscan, 84, 149 
 
 French, 13 
 
 German, 158, 206 
 
 Gobat upon, 205 
 
 Greek, 82 
 
 hospitality of, 149-50 
 
 Russian, 12, 76, 89 
 
 Insect pests, 17, 24, 25 
 Institutions : 
 
 asylums, 68, 84, 159 
 
 blind, 68, 159, 160 
 
 cre'ches, 159 
 
 cripples, 68, 159 
 
 eye, 10, 18, 68, 177 
 
 hospitals, 45, 67, 68, 91, 106, 
 159, 160, 199, 203, 244 
 
 incurables, 68, 159 
 
 insane, 68, 159, 243 
 
 leper, 10, 45, 91, 160 
 
 orphans, 39, 91, 158, 159, 160, 
 163, 203 
 
 schools. See American, Eng- 
 lish, etc. 
 
 soup-kitchen, 243 
 
 Jacobites, 143, 198. And see 
 
 Syrians 
 
 Jaffa, 16, 17, 32, 33, 129, 190, 191 
 Jerusalem, amusements in, 3, 11, 
 
 301-2, 359, 360 
 
 - aspect of, 1, 12, 15, 134 
 
 - books on, 2. And see Authorities 
 
 - descriptions of, 12, 133, 296-98 
 
 - fireworks, 362 
 
 - humours of, 29, 210 
 
 - language, 9, 10, 77, 234, 359 
 
 - roads, 343, 365 
 
 - sanitary conditions of, 20, 23, 
 
 24, 25, 33, 53, 54, 204, 298, 
 359, 365 
 
 - sport in, 345 
 
 - temperament, 21 
 
 - trade, 9, 39, 50, 59, 77, 132, 184, 
 
 185, 209, 239, 284, 296, 297 
 
 visitors, royal, to, 360, 362, 366 
 Jesuits, 90, 188, 197, 237 
 
 Jews : 
 
 Abraham's vineyard, 70-72 
 
 382
 
 INDEX 
 
 Jews, continued 
 
 as agriculturists, 61, 132 
 
 Alliance Israelite, 9, 33, 56,60,63 
 
 almsgiving of, 57, 64 
 
 Association, Anglo-Jewish, 9, 
 
 66, 74 
 
 characteristics of, 57 
 
 - charity of. See Alms 
 
 - citizens, as, 55, 73, 131 
 
 - colonists, as, 38, 58, 59, 61, 63 
 
 - Colonization Association, 58, 
 
 63, 74 
 
 -- conversion of, to Christianitv, 
 
 64, 65-70, 202, 325 
 
 - conversion of, to Moslem faith, 
 
 250 
 
 - customs of, preserved, 57, 58, 
 
 59, 60, 73, 295 
 
 - exactions from, 53 
 hospitals of, 67, 68, 362, 363 
 
 - hospital for conversion of, 67, 
 
 199, 373 
 
 - House of Industry for con- 
 
 version of, 70 
 
 - in Holy Places, 73, 349 
 
 - language of, 9, 58, 60, 63, 67, 69 
 
 - loyalty of English, 71, 72 
 
 - and Latins, 64, 91, 158 
 
 - and Moslems, 72, 73, 250, 365 
 
 - population of, 55, 64 
 
 - privileges of, 52 
 
 - protection for, 52 
 
 - Rabbis, 58, 60, 64 
 
 - Chief, 53, 56 
 
 - schools of, 56, 60, 63," 69, 197, 
 
 254, 362, 363 
 art, 62, 68 
 technical, 9, 55, 59, 61, 63, 68 
 
 - torah, 58 
 
 - trade, 9, 59, 209. And see 
 
 Colonists 
 
 institutions, classification of, 56 
 
 - superiority of, 68, 69, 74 
 
 Sects : 
 
 Ashkenazim, 56, 64 
 Chasidim, 56 
 Karaite, 56 
 Rabbinists, 56 
 Sephardim, 56, 64 
 various, 56 
 
 synagogues, 14, 58 
 
 Zionists, 40-55 
 
 Knights of St. John, or Hospitallers, 
 14, 141, 144, 330 
 
 Labour, 3. 31, 33. And see Trade 
 Law, 48, 50, 51, 97 
 
 Lydda, 129 
 
 Latins and Latin. See Uniats. 
 
 agriculture, 183-84 
 
 - Arabs, 158 
 
 - buildings, 13, 125 
 
 charities, 151, 158, 159, 162, 
 
 163 
 
 Custode, 92, 147, 149, 154, 
 
 170, 172 
 
 educational institutions : 
 
 religious, 150, 157 
 secular, 151, 157, 158, 162 
 technical, 162, 163, 197 
 
 Franciscans, 91, 93, 103, 143- 
 
 53, 162, 165, 167-79, 188, 
 191, 220, 292, 331, 332. 
 
 history, ancient, 131 et seq. 
 
 modern, 146, 154 et seq. 
 
 institutions, 151, 157, 159, 190, 
 
 203 
 
 - Jews, 64, 73, 91, 158, 363 
 
 kingdom, 143 et seq., 183 
 
 and Moslems, 160 
 
 objects, 91, 113, 149, 158 
 
 Orders, 4, 85, 91, 158, 165, 188, 
 
 189, 190, 202, 231 
 
 patriarchate, 93, 94, 143, 154, 
 
 155, 157 
 
 pilgrimages, 160 
 
 Popes, 94, 101, 125, 127, 138, 
 
 139, 145, 146, 161, 182 
 
 protectorate, 92, 155, 177 
 
 schools, 150, 151, 157, 158, 160, 
 
 162, 163, 197 
 
 Mahomet, history of, 273 
 
 - in Jerusalem, 221, 225 
 
 mantle of, 249 
 
 morality of, 271, 274, 279, 289 
 
 steed of, 221 
 
 slaves of, 271 
 
 teaching of, 274-77 
 Maronites, 119, 164 
 
 Megiddo, 371 
 
 Mshetta, 371 
 
 Missions and Missionaries, 31, 204, 
 206, 213, 231, 254, 261, 283 
 
 American, 86, 90, 159, 186, 189, 
 
 197, 207, 231, 237, 324 
 
 English, 4, 18, 193, 203, 284 
 
 C.M.S., 188, 189, 190-207, 
 
 213 
 
 L.J.S., 67, 69, 196, 199, 200, 
 
 202 
 
 French. See Latin 
 
 German, 203, 207, 324 
 
 Jesuit, 90, 197, 237 
 
 Presbyterian, 197, 207 
 
 383
 
 INDEX 
 
 Missions and Missionaries, con- 
 tinued 
 
 Scotch, 159. 207, 324 
 
 Quaker, 5, 207, 324 
 Moslem. See Arab, Government 
 
 amusements, 284, 301, 302 
 
 aristocracy, 239, 247, 303, 310 
 
 art, 232, 233, 234 
 
 bath, 305-7 
 
 caliphs, 108, 140, 147, 183, 249 
 
 characteristics, 8, 236, 266, 325 
 
 charity. See Philanthropy 
 
 children, 259, 303, 312 
 
 club, 255, 301 
 
 dancing, 313, 314 
 
 dervishes, 248, 288 
 
 divorce, 252, 271 
 
 dress, 19, 211, 239, 247, 253, 
 
 256, 257, 260, 285, 302, 303-4, 
 309, 316, 325 
 
 education, 237, 254, 259, 275 
 
 entertainment, 256 et seq., 302 
 
 food, 20, 281, 301, 311 
 
 forbearance, 275, 277, 291 
 
 girls, 45, 237, 254, 259 
 
 green, 249 
 
 homes, 14, 233, 234, 263, 284, 
 
 303, 307-8 
 
 hospital, 45, 67, 160, 244 
 
 - Jerusalem, relation to, 291, 298 
 
 - literature, 237, 238 
 
 loyalty, 238 
 
 marriage, 258, 260, 280, 304, 305 
 description of, 302-22 
 
 - morality, 251, 270, 272, 273 
 
 290, 311 
 
 - mosques, 13, 14, 221, 222-24, 
 
 291-96 
 muezzin, 240, 244 
 
 - nationality of, 230 
 
 - philanthropy, 207, 242, 244, 
 
 245, 264, 278, 285 
 
 - physique, 253 
 
 - pilgrimage, 136, 246, 247, 249 
 
 - polygamy, 251, 252, 263, 271, 
 
 272 
 
 - prison, 54, 160, 244 
 
 professions, 239 
 
 schools, 45, 237, 254 
 
 superstitions, 262 
 
 swearing, 29, 235, 275 
 
 trade, 239, 284, 296, 297 
 
 women, 251-65, 280, 281, 282, 
 
 325 
 
 education, 44, 237, 254 
 
 manners, 257, 273, 304, 310, 
 
 325, 326 
 
 occupations, 256, 257, 259, 301 
 
 Moslem, continued 
 
 regard for, 254, 261, 262, 281. 
 Moslem faith : 
 
 attractions, 268-72 
 
 animals, 221, 286, 287, 289 
 
 charity, 212,213. And see Phil- 
 
 anthropy, Moslem. 
 
 Christianity, 201,202, 272,276, 
 
 280, 291-94, 297 
 
 circumcision, 212, 299 
 
 dogma, 280, 284, 285 
 
 Hebron, 294 
 
 iconoclasm, 283 
 
 Jews, 73, 250, 252, 276, 279,. 
 
 298, 299 
 
 Koran, 51, 235, 272, 274, 275, 
 
 276, 279, 280, 284, 285, 310 
 
 and life, 242, 278 
 
 ritual, 222, 241, 240-42, 269,. 
 
 281-82, 310 
 
 rosary, 281 
 
 sacred places, 221, 235, 246, 
 
 294, 291, 295 
 Omar in, 226-28 
 
 Sachra, traditions of, 221-24 
 
 Haram Area, 221-27, 243, 291, 
 
 299, 300 
 
 Museums, 11, 105, 106, 113, 117 
 Music, 11, 22, 69, 80, 86, 127, 128 r 
 158, 159. And see Russians 
 
 Nebi Musa, 246 
 
 Palestine, 131, 132, 133 
 Patriarch : orthodox, 85, 87, 88, 
 103, 227, 228 
 
 Latin, 94, 103, 143, 154, 157 
 
 various, 78, 85, 88, 104, 112,. 
 
 117, 120, 121, 163, 227 
 Population, 55, 64, 78, 91, 131, 137, 
 
 177 
 Protestant, 4, 91, 104, 191, 194, 
 
 207, 215, 220, 268, 269, 283,. 
 
 323, 324 
 
 Russia and Russian. See Consul 
 
 ambassador, 90 
 
 Arabs utilization of, 85, 86, 87" 
 
 archimandrite, 76, 87, 93 
 
 art, 86 
 
 buildings, 82 
 
 churches, 86, 89 
 Western C., 90-97 
 
 Czar, 82, 94 
 
 devotion, 78, 79, 80, 113 
 
 education, 84, 85, 90 
 
 and France, 91, 92, 94 
 
 384
 
 INDEX 
 
 Greeks, rivalry with, 78, 84, 86, 
 
 92 
 liberality to, 87 
 
 hospital, 82, 83 
 
 music, 80, 86, 127, 128 
 
 pilgrims, 78, 80, 82, 83, 84, 87 
 
 policy, 12, 76, 79, 85, 88, 89, 90 
 
 protector of orthodoxy, 89 
 
 property, 89 
 
 schools, 84, 86, 89 
 
 sects, protection of, 88 
 
 Society, Imperial Orthodox, 82, 
 
 84 
 
 tower, 75, 76, 90 
 
 Soldiery, Turkish, 51, 96, 109, 177 
 178, 205, 207, 219, 281, 289 
 
 exempted, 48, 51, 219 
 Suburbs, 12, 14, 15, 18, 35 
 Sultan, 52, 141, 146 
 Survey, 368 
 
 Syrian Church, 89, 109, 110,118-20, 
 143, 232 
 
 race, 218, 219, 230 
 
 Travellers, 33, 213, 298 
 
 Travellers, continued 
 
 brutality of, 47, 214 
 
 grace of, 215 
 
 intelligence of, 213 
 
 reverence of, 113, 219, 220 
 
 variety of, 219 
 
 - women, 215, 217, 218 
 Woman. See Moslem. 
 
 benefactors, 148, 181, 183, 185, 
 
 32935 
 
 Christian, 323-35, 326, 327 
 
 English, 215, 217, 218, 219 
 
 Fellah, 324 
 
 French, 323 
 
 German, 323 
 
 history in, 329-35 
 
 levantine, 323, 324, 326 
 
 - pilgrims, 136, 141, 181, 329 
 
 servants, 323-4 
 
 tourists, 215, 217, 218 
 
 tradition, depositories of, 181, 
 
 261, 325 
 
 work among, 45, 189, 261, 325 
 
 And see Institutions 
 Water, 19, 20, 21, 53, 184, 210 
 Wheeled vehicles, 365 
 
 NAMES OF PERSONS MENTIONED 
 
 Aberdeen, Lord, 359 
 Alexander III, 82 
 Alexander, Bishop, 187, 198 
 Alexius V, 144 
 Argyll, Bishop of, 366 
 
 Baldensperger, 39, 367 
 Barclay, Bishop, 367 
 Beaumont, 359 
 Bliss, 369 
 Blyth, Bishop, 192 
 Bonomi, 291 
 
 Caliphs, 108, 140, 147, 183, 249 
 
 Cant, Dr., 177 
 
 Catherine II, 89 
 
 Charlemagne, 102, 138, 139, 183, 
 
 228 
 
 Chosroes, 125, 129, 182, 229 
 Connor, 114 
 Constantino, 101, 102, 135, 148 
 
 d'Aubigny, Philip, 180 
 Dickson, Consul, 210 
 Dowling, Canon, 124 
 
 Finn, Mrs., 70, 155 
 Gudea of Mongolia, 133 
 
 Haroun er Raschid, 137, 139, 183, 
 
 228, 229 
 
 Helena, 105, 135 
 Heraclius, Emperor, 129, 182 
 Hertze, 55 
 Hunt, Holman, 358 
 
 Isaac Angelus, Emperor, 107 
 Jacomb, Miss, 204 
 Kent, Duke of, 196 
 
 Lascaris, Theodore, 144 
 Lucar, Cyril, 185 
 Laud, 185, 186 
 Lavalette, 157 
 Lavigerie, Cardinal, 158 
 
 Macarius, Bishop, 135 
 
 Mansouroff, 84 
 
 Masterman, Dr., 21 
 
 Maximilian, Archduke, 361-2 
 
 Meshullam, 40 
 
 Miller, 39 
 
 Minor, 39, 40 
 
 Montefiore, Sir M., 40, 58, 362, 363 
 
 Muller, 39 
 
 385 
 
 c c
 
 INDEX 
 
 Napier, Lord, 72 
 Nelidoff, de, 84 
 Nordau, 55 
 
 Omar, 227, 228, 294 
 
 Palmerston, Lord, 186 
 Patriarchs : 
 
 Paul, Grand Duke, 93 
 
 Peter the Hermit, 229 
 
 Philippow, de, 84 
 Pilgrims, early, 136, 137, 138, 147, 
 181, 292, 293, 329, 331 
 
 Reich, 55 
 Beinhardt, 359 
 Robinson, 2, 358, 367 
 Roth, 358 
 
 Rothschild, de, 56, 58 
 Royal visitors, 366. 
 
 Saladin, 229, 230 
 Seddon, 358 
 
 Sergius, Grand Duke, 82, 93 
 Schneller, 39 
 Shaftesbury, Lord. 187 
 Spafford, Mrs., 42, 44 
 Spittler of Basel, 38, 39 
 Stanley, Dean, 355, 366 
 Sultans, 141, 146, 183, 370-1 
 
 Theodosius, Emperor, 102 
 Thomas a Becket, 181 
 Thompson, 367 
 Tissot, 358 
 Touro, 362 
 
 Waldmeier, 159, 243 
 Wortley, Montagu, 298 
 
 Yakut,~228 
 
 AUTHORS AND WORKS REFERRED TO 
 
 Abelfaragius, 108, 120 
 Alphonse d'Alonzo, 91 
 Annals of Eutychius Selden, 227 
 Assemarni, 165 
 Azais, Abbe, 293 
 
 Baedeker, 83, 267 
 Bassi, P., 163 
 Berchem, Max von, 227 
 Bernard, Saint, 355 
 Bernardino, 368 
 Belon de Mans. Pierre de, 148 
 Besant, Sir W., 133 
 Biggs, Rev. C., 166, 283 
 Biblical Researches, 2, 197 
 Blackburn, 119 
 Bliss, 367, 339 
 Blyth, Bishop, 193 
 Brightman, 327 
 Brocquiere, de la, 146 
 Burder, 359 
 Burckhardt, 2 
 Burchard, 131 
 Burton, Sir R., 2, 6, 352 
 Lady, 6, 99, 123, 207, 218, 253, 
 261, 268, 281 
 
 Calahorra, 146 
 Chaplin, Dr., 21, 199, 243 
 Christian Researches in the Medi- 
 terranean, 112, 122 
 Chronica de Syria y Terra Santa, 
 
 146 
 
 Church Life and Letters, 327 
 Church and the Christian Empire, 
 The, 102 
 
 Clarke, DA, 372 
 Clermont-Ganneau, 137, 215, 230, 
 
 236, 261, 367, 369 
 Codex Alexandrinus, 185 
 Colonies Franques, Les, 144, 184 
 Conder, 296 
 Crashaw, 357 
 Creighton, Bishop, 102 
 Crescent and the Cross, The, 186, 
 
 152 
 Curzon, 112 
 
 Dilton, Canon, 213 
 
 Days in Galilee, 112 
 
 De Fanciennete de Fhopital, etc., 
 
 141 
 De prima origine Hospitaliorum, 
 
 etc., 141 
 D3 Vogue, 126 
 Dickie, 369 
 Diet. Hist. Bayle, 287 
 Disraeli, 266 
 
 Divinity of our Lord, 166 
 Domestic Life in Palestine, 261 
 Dcummond, 257 
 
 Eglises de la Terre Sainte, 126 
 
 I'Eglise de Bethleem, 139 
 
 Eighteen Centuries of the Orthodox 
 
 Greek Church, 99 
 Emigration Romaine en Terre 
 
 Sainte, 330 
 
 English works in Syria, 237, 238 
 Eothen, 241 
 Eutychius, Pat., 227 
 
 386
 
 INDEX 
 
 Fabri, 368; 
 
 Farrar, Dean, 3661 K 
 
 Fathers of Greek and Latin Church 
 
 100, 101, 106, 137, 140, 181, 
 
 247, 254, 336, 342, 
 Ferguson, 224 
 Finn, Consul, 6, 48, 108, 155, 179, 
 
 358 .; 
 Fleury, 143 
 
 Georgian Hist., 148 
 
 Gibbon, 181 
 
 Gobat, Bishop, 122, 187, 191, 202, 
 
 i 203, 205, 249 
 
 Gratz, 250 
 
 Guide Lievin, 113 
 
 Hackett, 367 
 
 Hadji Baba, 163, 211, 255 
 
 Haifa, 153 
 
 Hamaso, 261 
 
 Hanauer, 4, 38, 199, 246, 368, 372 
 
 Headlam, 79 
 
 Historians, Greek, 101 
 
 Holy City, The, 198 
 
 Hore, 99, 120, 145 
 
 Horn, Elzear, 163 
 
 Hutton, 186 
 
 Istoria dello etc. Gerusalemme, 163 
 Itinera Hierosolymitana, 138 
 
 Jewish Encylopaedia, 250 
 
 Jewish Life in the East, 57, 198, 
 
 364 
 
 John Diac, 137 
 Josephus, 2 
 
 Kaab ibn Zoheir, 249 
 Keble, 351-54 
 Kinglake, 241 
 Kipling, 338 
 Kordn, Sale's, 270 etc. 
 Muir's, 270 etc. 
 Korten, Jonas, 135, 372 
 
 Lamartine, 152 
 
 Lambarde, 108 
 
 Layard, 358 
 
 L'echo d 1 Orient, 90 
 
 Lectures on the History of the Sara- 
 cens, 289 
 
 Lehrbuch der Chronologic, 117, 118 
 
 Le Strange; 226 
 
 Lewis, Professor Hayter, 224 
 
 Liddon, 166 
 
 Lievin, P., 149, 247 
 
 Life of Bishop Gobat, 64, 187, 188, 
 289 
 
 Locorum etc.* Terr ae Sanctae, 163 
 Lynch, 367 
 
 Macalister, 368 
 
 Macgregor (Rob Boy), 365 
 
 Mahomet, Life of, 275, 289 
 
 Margoliouth, Professor, 72 
 
 Marita, 163 
 
 Masudi, 107 
 
 Matthew Paris, 142 
 
 Maundrell, 111, 146, 155, 216, 293 
 
 Max Miiller, 289 
 
 Meji ed din, 334 
 
 Milman, 143 
 
 Missions to Jews, 64 
 
 Moines d? Occident, 137 
 
 Monasteries of the Levant, 112 
 
 Moncalembert, 137 
 
 Mouravieff, 149 
 
 Muir, Sir W., 271, 277, 278, 289 
 
 Mukaddasi, 296-98 
 
 Muthir al Ghirdm, 226 
 
 Nasiri Khusran, 298, 299 
 New Pilgrim's Progress, 251 
 Neale, 351 
 
 Oliphant, Laurence, 152 
 Mrs., 366 
 Outer Isles, 262 
 
 Palestine under the Moslems, 226 
 
 Palmer, 39, 118 
 
 P.E.F.,2, 4, 119, 133, 248, 296, 
 
 367-69 
 
 Petrie, Flinders, 368 
 Petermann, 358 
 Pilgrims' Texts, 368 
 Poloner, John, 368 
 Porter, 367 
 Post, Dr., G. 2, 162, 367 
 
 Quaresimus, 229, 330 
 
 Reports, C.M.S., 1894-1902, 201, 
 
 202, 213 
 
 Reise Altona, 135 
 Revue Biblique, 2, 161 
 Revue de V Orient Latin, 333 
 Key, 144, 184 
 Riant, Comte de, 139 
 Robinson, 2, 197, 358 
 Rogers, Miss, 261 
 Rossetti, Christina, 355 
 Roulx, Delaville de, 141 
 
 Saige, 141 
 
 Samuel Montagu, 57, 199 
 
 Sandey, Professor, 366 
 
 387
 
 INDEX 
 
 Schick, Dr., 39, 119, 140, 198, 3(58, 
 
 372 
 
 Scott, Sir Walter, 105, 237, 351 
 Six Months in Jerusalem, 1 GO, 220, 
 
 283 
 
 Smith, Geo. Adam, 2, 300 
 Stanley, Dean, 99, 120, 355, 300 
 Stato delle Missioni, 103 
 Status descript., etc., 103 
 Stirring Times, 0, 48, 108, 155, 273 
 Strangford, Lady, 273 
 Stratford de Redcliffe, Lord, 5] 
 
 Talisman, 351 
 
 Teaching of the Russian Church, 79 
 
 Testimony borne by the Koran, etc., 
 
 270 
 
 The City and the Land, 214 
 Thierry, 330 
 Thompson, 307 
 Times newspaper, 132 
 Tobler, 138 
 
 Topographical Dictionary, 108 
 Tozer, 102, 121 
 Tristram, 2 
 
 Twain, Mark, 134, 149, 211, 214, 
 251, 338, 349 
 
 Vertdt, 141, 142 
 Vincent, P. 247 
 Visit to the Russian Church, 118 
 
 Warburton, Eliot, 180, 2.V2 
 Warren, 300 
 Watson, William, 200 
 Wheatley, 107 
 William of Tyre, 144 
 Williams, Rev. G., 198, 307 
 Wordsworth, Bishop, 100 
 Wiinsch, 307 
 
 Zangwill, 55, 57, 05, 300 
 Zeitschrift des deutschen Palaestina 
 Verains, 2 
 
 Cutler & Tanner, The Selwood Printing Works, Frome, and London. 
 
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