After dinner we were tempted by the notion of visiting these cities of the dead by moonlight, and were well repaid for the effort of crossing the rough ground of the intervening valley. There were no sensuous triumphs of Greek or Roman art, no glories of column and capital, but, perhaps still more impressive, the homes of peoples who had passed away when Greece and Rome were yet unborn. Here were streets trodden by men of like passions with ourselves: hastening to business or pleasure, meeting their brides or burying their dead. Here were chambers in which the drama of life had been played out over and over again—comedy as well as tragedy, birth and death; here the altars where vows had been fulfilled and the gods propitiated; gardens sanctified by the games of children, the laughter of youth; where ambitions, hopes, affections had been born—to die, or to live for ever. All around us spoke of the eternity of all but man—the stars, the hills, the flowers which return to us year by year—Carmel outliving its tragedies, Tabor its miracles; beyond the hills that ancient river, the River Kishon, hastening to the eternal sea. Man alone had passed away, leaving only the wreck of his labour, the ruin of his homes, to show where he had been. But yet another thought came to us. In a fold of yonder hills, where the moonlight rested tenderly, lay the little village of Nazareth, where long ago there dwelt a Man who
"Wrought
With human hands the creed of creeds
In loveliness of perfect deeds,
More strong than all poetic thought."
We carried our discussion no further. Surely here, as in that little village, had been men into whose lives had entered the beautiful and the true—which, in proportion as they resembled the life of that Man of Nazareth, must endure for ever.
It was the last night of the old year, and in each heart were memories and longings which might not be revealed. We walked back through the soft night air, each thinking of friends far away, gathered about winter fires, and speculating, perhaps, as to the whereabouts of their wanderers. When we had once more assembled in our friendly hut, and, thanks to "Baedeker's" kindly forethought, had drunk together of an excellent punch of tea and red wine, with a dash of kirsch-wasser, we felt constrained to go forth once more into the wide space beyond. Not a solitary light twinkled on the hillside; the village of Lejjun was sleeping: we were the centre of our world. The horses were tethered before our doors, and we were amused to observe that the force of habit persisted even in sleep, and that, so used were they to travelling en queue that, even in repose, they stood in a single row, head to tail.
"The shadows flicker to and fro:
The cricket chirps: the light burns low,—