since Rachel was buried there, several buildings have crumbled to dust and been replaced by pious hands.
The authenticity of the spot is vouched for by all who have written on the subject, and the tomb is one of the few shrines which Jews, Christians, and Moslems agree about in their traditions, and have not seen fit to quarrel over. We made a short halt, and one of our party read aloud from the Bible the brief and touching narrative of Rachel’s death. It had a new and fresh interest to us, and we all listened attentively to the simple story.
Bethlehem is on a rather steep hill-side, and presents an appearance of terraces as one looks at it from a short distance. It has the low mud walls and flat roofs of most Syrian towns, and apart from its historical interest, and the possession of the Church of the Nativity, it is of little importance. As we approached it, the convent on the eastern side presents an appearance, not unlike that of a baronial castle of the Rhine or Danube, and recalls to us some of the walls that frown upon those famous rivers or overlook the lovely valleys of Western Germany. Coming nearer, the soft lines of the picture become clearly defined, and as we enter the city and thread its streets, we find that it is not unlike Jerusalem and Jaffa and other places in Syria, through which we have journeyed.
There is no hotel at Bethlehem, and the influx of strangers consequent upon the Christmas festivities had filled the Latin convent to its fullest capacity. We determined to begin our camp life here, and so sent our tents forward in the morning, to be ready for our arrival.
We found them pitched in a little field just outside the town, and close to the “Milk Grotto,” where tradition relates that the Virgin and Child hid themselves from the fury of Herod, sometime before the flight into Egypt. Here the Virgin nursed the Child, and the soft stone is said to have the miraculous power of wonderfully increasing women’s milk. Bits of it are carried to all parts of the world for this purpose. The Abbe Geramb says of it:
“I make no remarks on the virtue of these stones, but affirm as an ascertained fact, that a great number of persons have found from it the effect they anticipate.” Of course we visited the grotto, which was a sort of chapel, j lighted with lamps. The “Doubter” asserted his lack of faith in the virtue of the stone, but nevertheless he brought away some of it, but refused to give the customary gratuity to the custodian, much to the disgust of the latter.
From the Milk Grotto we went to the Church of the Nativity, beset at every step, as we were at every moment on the streets of Bethlehem, by venders of ornaments of olive wood and mother i of pearl. The church, if we include the buildings connected with it, covers a large area, as it belongs to three rival sects of Latins, Greeks, and Armenians, and each has a convent or monastery connected with it. The church itself is about one hundred and twenty feet by one hundred and ten, and is divided into a nave and four aisles by Corinthian columns, which support horizontal architraves.
The pavement and roof are in very bad condition, and the whole church looks as if it would soon tumble to pieces. It was built by the Empress Helena, in the early part of the fourth century, and is probably the oldest monument of Christian architecture in the world.