How wonderful are the cities that man hath builded:
Their walls are compacted of heavy stones,
And their lofty towers rise above the tree-tops.
Rome, Jerusalem, Cairo, Damascus,—
Venice, Constantinople, Moscow, Pekin,—
London, New York, Berlin, Paris, Vienna,—
These are the names of mighty enchantments:
They have called to the ends of the earth,
They have secretly summoned an host of servants.
They shine from far sitting beside great waters:
They are proudly enthroned upon high hills,
They spread out their splendour along the rivers.
Yet are they all the work of small patient fingers:
Their strength is in the hand of man,
He hath woven his flesh and blood into their glory.
The cities are scattered over the world like ant-hills:
Every one of them is full of trouble and toil,
And their makers run to and fro within them.
[page 66] Abundance of riches is laid up in their store-houses:
Yet they are tormented with the fear of want,
The cry of the poor in their streets is exceeding bitter.
Their inhabitants are driven by blind perturbations:
They whirl sadly in the fever of haste,
Seeking they know not what, they pursue it fiercely.
The air is heavy-laden with their breathing:
The sound of their coming and going is never still,
Even in the night I hear them whispering and crying.
Beside every ant-hill I behold a monster crouching:
This is the ant-lion Death,
He thrusteth forth his tongue and the people perish.
O God of wisdom thou hast made the country:
Why hast thou suffered man to make the town?
Then God answered, Surely I am the maker of man:
And in the heart of man I have set the city.
IV
MIZPAH AND THE MOUNT OF
OLIVES
I
THE JUDGMENT-SEAT OF SAMUEL
Mizpah of Benjamin stands to the northwest: the sharpest peak in the Judean range, crowned with a ragged, dusty village and a small mosque. We rode to it one morning over the steepest, stoniest bridle-paths that we had ever seen. The country was bleak and rocky, a skeleton of landscape; but between the stones and down the precipitous hillsides and along the hot gorges, the incredible multitude of spring flowers were abloom.