PART IV.
GOING ON PILGRIMAGE.
“Still onward winds the dreary way;
I with it.”
“A glorious morning!” was our remark as we met at breakfast on March 28th. “Just the day for a pilgrimage to Mar Saba.”
The hour was early, but long before we had risen the shouts of Ameen and a muleteer mingling with the tramp of horses announced the arrival of part of our escort.
The Arab is a restless as well as a vociferating person, and cannot comprehend why the average Saxon goes to bed regularly at night, sleeps till morning, and keeps awake all day. For himself, well, the hour of repose and the nature of his couch are matters of perfect indifference. He takes his dog sleep like Sairey Gamp imbibed her spirits—“when so dispoged.”
If you tell him your wish is to start at eight in the morning, behold, he is knocking at your door before sunrise, and imploring you to make haste. He is convinced in his own mind that the intervening hours will be spent in the absurdities of washing and dressing. If you remonstrate, he shrugs his shoulders, and you may presently hear him confiding to his friend, that “the English are a strange people. True, Allah made them, but He alone can understand them!”
We were very punctual on this particular morning, and at seven o’clock had mounted our rough little horses, whose wonderful necklaces and charms formed no small part of their equipment.
The muleteer highly entertained us. He was a round-faced, scantily-clothed youth, whose evident pride in his cattle was manifest as he pointed to their decorations. He greeted us with broad grins and “Bon jour!” These words being the only scrap of a foreign tongue he had picked up, they were employed in season and out of season. Whenever one of our party looked pleased, or nodded kindly to him, he would stiffen himself, beam on her, and, with a fine air, roll out the salutation, “Bon jour!”
Our cavalcade now formed up, and we started off in high spirits, prepared for any adventure that might fall to our lot. Ameen, of course, led the van, his black horse gorgeously dressed in trappings of “barbaric splendour,” and he seated on a wondrous saddle, his purple silk shawl or kaffieh tied round his head and falling behind in graceful folds over the voluminous abbah, or cloak. The pair were imposing-looking objects in dignified contrast to the ludicrous figures of “Bon Jour” and his beast, who followed next in the procession.
His horse was a fearful and wonderful creature, carefully guarded against the influence of the evil eye by fantastic festoons of blue beads and shells which depended from his neck and mane and tail. Stacked upon his back were cooking pots, luncheon baskets, sunshades, wraps, and other gear, flanked by bursting saddle-bags. In the midst of these articles sat “Bon Jour,” complacently ambling on in the jog-trot style peculiar to his tribe, his brown legs dangling down, his leathern belt decorated with
“A bottle on each side
To keep his balance true.”
We brought up the rear demurely enough, trying to get our mettlesome steeds under control, with the help of “Bon Jour,” who, turning round and facing us, would yell in Arabic one moment to them, and the next encourage us with—
“Nods and becks, and wreathèd smiles,”
and the inevitable salutation in the French tongue, looking for all the world like a travelling showman on parade!
The first part of our journey lay along the Bethlehem road, which was fairly good, but has, I understand, been vastly improved for the German Emperor’s visit. On either side were smiling plains and grey olive groves, dressed in the lovely fresh hues of spring. Carpets of delicate flowers were spread on the roadside—for there are no hedges in Palestine—the air was soft and pleasant and everything took its colouring from the joyous morning.
The tomb of Rachel claimed our attention for a moment. We were quite familiar with its appearance from the many illustrations we had seen, so that the simple dome-like structure on the wayside seemed an old friend. Pious Jews, Christians, and Moslems offer their prayers at its shrine, and apparently derive equal benefit from their devotions.
A little beyond, on the slope of a hill, the pretty village of Beit Jala gleamed and glittered in the sunlight. The city of Kish, the father of King Saul, originally stood there. Was it to that hill, I wonder, the young, handsome Saul, after his election as King of Israel, returned when he “went home to Gibeah, and with him a band of men whose hearts God had touched”?
An element of discord was not wanting as we rode through the peaceful valleys. Overhead wheeled a great vulture, hungrily waiting to swoop down on some dead carcase—a camel or a donkey perhaps—and devour its prey. On a crag close by sat a majestic eagle, his piercing eyes boldly fixed on the sun. The solitary bird seemed a fitting type of the departed glory of Israel.
It was pleasant further on to notice signs of human life. Shepherds were tending their flocks and playing on “David’s” pipes—a terrible instrument, by the way, giving forth horrible sounds suggestive of Highland bagpipes in the hands and mouth of a beginner—shepherd-boys were hurling stones from a primitive sling (knitted in worsted) with marvellous skill and true aim at an imaginary Goliath.
In contrast to these pastoral amusements, the solemn Moslem, with his shoes carefully removed, his face towards Mecca, performed his religious duties on the roadside, going through his prayers and prostrations unmoved by the curious glances of strangers and pilgrims from other lands.
We were now nearing the birthplace of our Saviour, through which city we had to pass. On the east is a narrow valley called the Shepherds’ Plain. Even on this early spring morning it looked a bare treeless spot, with stony slopes shining white, and a few crumbling ruins. It was here, according to tradition, that the angelic messengers announced the glad tidings to the wondering shepherds and sang the magnificent “Gloria in Excelsis.”
I am bound to say that my enthusiasm was not kindled by the sight of those holy fields. Indeed, my preconceived ideas received a rude shock—as they often did during our travels—and I came to the woeful conclusion that on the whole it was more pleasing to visit in imagination the sacred spots in Palestine than go on pilgrimage to the actual places.
Just as the sun pointed to nine o’clock, we were entering the straggling city of Bethlehem. We had, as in all Oriental towns, to pick our way carefully through the narrow undulating streets with their hillocks of rubbish and valleys of mud. We were occasionally jammed up against a wall to avoid too close contact with the strings of camels laden with stone for repairing the roads for the expected Imperial visit.
“Bon Jour” of course indulged in lively altercations with the camel drivers; he also unceremoniously pushed aside men, women, and children who happened to be in the line of route. Miss B. told us that a quantity of very bad language was freely dispensed on both sides, but it apparently bred no ill feeling, as we afterwards saw “Bon Jour” and one of the men, who had most violently assaulted him with words, walking amicably across the square.
One cannot fail to be greatly struck by the bright hopeful looks both of the city and its inhabitants, who, we were told, were all Christians. Indeed, it was plainly visible in the thriving aspect of the place and energy of the people, who were busily employed, that Moslem inertness had no stronghold here. The sound of the hammer, the whirr of the wheel, and the grating of the file fell pleasantly on the ear as the industrious workers fashioned the great pearl shells into beads, brooches, and beautifully carved ornaments.
The men and women of Bethlehem are much fairer in complexion than other natives of Syria. The girls are celebrated for their beauty, their large soft blue eyes and brown hair giving them a European look which is almost startling. Their lovely dress adds to their picturesqueness, and the tall cap, covered with gold and silver coins, which the married women wear, gives height to their graceful figures.
There was not much time on this occasion to make more than casual observations, for time was pressing. We rode into the great square and dismounted near the Church of the Nativity, which now stands inside the fortress Monastery of the Virgin.
While our guides took the horses to be watered, we wandered about the open cemetery, alternately “meditating among the tombs” of the brave Crusaders who lie buried there, and watching the animated scene in the portion of the square used as a market.
We laughed heartily at one unwary traveller who, having yielded weakly to the persuasive powers of an importunate shopman, was literally besieged by half-a-dozen others. The unfortunate object of these attentions looked simply desperate, the perspiration pouring from his face as his enemies pulled him this way, pushed him that, shouting and yelling in the Arabic tongue, and gesticulating menacingly with one hand while they held on to him with the other. He could not understand, poor fellow, a word they said, and evidently thought they were going to murder him. We saw him finally dragged into a shop by the two strongest, while the other four waited outside for their victim to emerge, when the attack would be resumed. We wondered whether his friends would come to the rescue!
The few remaining minutes at our disposal were spent in visiting the famous study of St. Jerome, a gloomy cell cut in the rock in the vaults of the Church. It was here the great Father spent so many years of his life in translating the Scriptures into the noble Vulgate. He was helped in his herculean task by Paula and her daughter Eustochia—learned Roman ladies—who followed Jerome to Bethlehem and founded a convent there over which he presided. Their tombs, with that of Eusebius, are in the vaults. The Grotto of the Nativity we left for another day.
We were joined in the square by a fine-looking Arab, with loins girded, and his bare feet thrust into red shoes. He saluted us gravely and with much dignity. Pointing to an ancient rifle (which was slung across his shoulders and was patched up in an original and striking manner, calculated to burst if by any chance it was loaded), he informed us that he had been appointed our escort across the wilderness and, further, that he would guard our lives and property as he would his own.
Miss B., who translated his remarks, told us not to be alarmed, for if by any chance we should be attacked by robbers, Mustapha would be two miles ahead of us, and we should run no danger of being killed by the explosion of his gun! This we felt was severe on our aristocratic-looking defender.
The horses and their attendants now came up, “Bon Jour’s” beast more grotesquely laden than before. We were soon in the saddle, and winding round the eastern corner of the Monastery, turned our backs on civilisation, and entered the dreary wilderness called in Scripture Jeshimon or Solitude.
For the next four or five hours we rode through this region, which in winter must be ghastly indeed. Even the glory of the spring flowers, which thinly covered its otherwise naked, soft, chalky slopes, failed to enliven it. Everything but the flowers was of one colour—the glaring ridges, the fantastic peaks, the sharp spurs, the rugged rocks, the narrow ravines with their stony beds, the camels, the foxes, and the dogs all were a kind of tawny yellow.
BETHLEHEM. (From the painting by Paul Linke.)
We saw neither tree nor water. A few black tents of the Bedawîn formed a welcome relief from the blinding glare. Not a sound disturbed these solitudes, except the occasional bark of a dog in the tents below. Ameen told us that the people living in this region are distinct from other races, their dialect is different from that of other districts, their traditions, habits, and dress are those of an entirely different people.
Our brave little horses accomplished that fearfully hot journey in grand style; they carried us up those awful rocks and along the edges of precipitous steeps which filled our minds with horror.
Ameen and “Bon Jour” sang their monotonous Arabic songs in shrill keys, or dozed in their saddles. Mustapha untiringly walked on with his peculiar swinging gait, often lost to sight, but turning up again, bearing in his hands bouquets of exquisite flowers, which he offered to us with a grace of manner which added much to the pretty gift.
The heat grew more and more intense. Not a breath of wind gave relief. I can well believe one writer, who says, “There are probably few places in Asia where the sun beats down with as fierce a heat and irresistible power as in the desert of Judah.”
It was two o’clock before we dismounted and sat down under the shadow of a square tower known as the Ladies’ Tower and built on a knoll. A narrow fissure divides it from the Monastery of Mar Saba into which no woman is allowed to enter.
We were tired and hungry, but Ameen soon unstrapped the luncheon baskets and spread out on the rock the hard-boiled eggs, the sardines and other dainties for our meal. We fell to with much spirit, while Ameen and Mustapha went to the convent to boil water and make us refreshing tea.
Our first visitor was a yellow dog, thin and mangy, who snapped up hungrily the morsels of food we threw to him. Then a dozen or so dark heads belonging to young girls and boys popped up above the edge of the rock; these were followed by a couple of wild-looking men, from the Bedawîn encampment below. They all stared solemnly at us and smiled at our manner of eating, but they did not beg.
Presently a couple of Arab youths, smartly dressed (for they were servants to a party of travellers who were camping close by), made their appearance, and, perching themselves on a crag, gathered the ragged Bedawîn together, and held forth with great animation, the audience listening with open mouths.
Miss B. amused us by translating the address which excited so much interest. We were the subject of it.
“The Frangi ladies,” the Arab youth said, “are like men. They do things like men—they ride, they gallop, they run! They eat what they like. They go where they like—they never ask their husbands! All the Frangis are rich; they have flocks and goats and camels. They can buy the whole world if they like. They have seen the whole world, and they can speak the Arabic!”
This was the climax, the topstone of the pinnacle of virtues and accomplishments of this marvellous race of beings. The Bedawîn looked incredulous. Miss B. said a few words to the youth in Arabic, when the whole company raised a shout of delight exclaiming—
“See! Hark! She speaks our language like the Holy Prophet! Praised be Allah!”
The Convent of Mar Saba is built on the side of a precipice, four hundred feet high. It clings to the cliff, while its walls are supported by huge buttresses. It is brown, like everything else in the district. Deep silence surrounds it. There it stands, melancholy and alone, without a tree or shrub in sight. Every breeze is shut out by great crags. The sigh of the wind is never heard. Solitude and death seem to reign everywhere. We heard that the wretched inmates—monks exiled for crimes or small offences—become as fossilised as their surroundings.
It was in 480 A.D. St. Saba and St. Euthymius, following the general custom of ascetics, established the first nucleus of the present monastery.
There is a solitary palm growing high up on the side of the building, said to have been planted by the Saint, which sprang up bearing dates without stones on the same day.
There is also a cavern in the rock (into which we did not go) where the Saint lived with his lion, which at first had occupied the whole of the cave, but, finding the Saint refused to be ejected, he gave up the contest and contented himself with a cupboard three feet square, where he slept.
One traveller says that “the monks may scarcely read the valuable manuscripts in their library, yet they hide them carefully from the eyes of heretics. Within the walls they may neither smoke nor eat meat, yet raw spirits find their way past the porter, as we were able to prove. A more hopeless, purposeless, degraded life can scarcely be imagined than that of such hermits.”
Elizabeth and I, accompanied by Mustapha, descended into the Fire Valley, as the huge gorge is called, by which the waters of Jerusalem are carried down to the Dead Sea. It was dry now, and as we looked up at the stern frowning monastery and its solitary palm tree with its bright green leaves, our spirits were depressed, and we hastened on.
It was in that melancholy prison that St. Bernard conjured up the vision of beauty and happiness expressed in his hymn—
“Those eternal bowers
Man hath never trod,
Those unfading flowers
Round the throne of God,
Who may hope to gain them
After weary fight?
Who at length attain them
Clad in robes of white?
* * * * *
While we do our duty
Struggling through the tide,
Whisper Thou of beauty
On the other side.
What though sad the story
Of this life’s distress—
Oh, the future glory!
Oh, the loveliness!”
The monk St. Stephen, in the eighth century, lived here and wrote the famous Greek hymn, the well-known English version beginning with the touching verse—
“Art thou weary, art thou languid,
Art thou sore distrest?
Come to Me, saith One, and coming
Be at rest.”
The remainder of our party met us at an appointed spot, and almost in silence we rode home through the Kedron Gorge, arriving in Jerusalem just as darkness fell.
S. E. Bell.
[“OUR HERO.”]
A TALE OF THE FRANCO-ENGLISH WAR NINETY YEARS AGO.
By AGNES GIBERNE, Author of “Sun, Moon and Stars,” “The Girl at the Dower House,” etc.