A STREET SCENE IN JERUSALEM.
From the top of the ship they began to fire the bags, bundles, and boxes of the deck passengers down into the broad boats that lay so thick at the ship's side as to hide the sea entirely. When they had thrown everything overboard that was loose at one end, they began on the poor pilgrims.
Women, old and young, who were scarcely able to stand up, were dragged to the ladders and down to the last step. Here they were supposed to wait for the boat into which the Arabs were preparing to pitch them, for the sea was still very rough. Now the bottom step of the ladder was in the water, now six feet above, but what did these poor ignorant Russians know about gymnastics? When the rolling sea brought the row-boats up, the pilgrim usually hesitated, while the bare-armed and bare-legged boatmen yelled and wrenched her hands from the chains. By the time the Mohammedans had shaken her loose, and the victim had crossed herself, the ladder was six or eight feet from the small boat; but it was too late to stay her now, even if the Arabs had wished to, but they did not. When she made the sign of the cross, that decided them, and they let her drop. Some waiting Turks made a feeble attempt to catch the sprawling woman, but not much. Sometimes, before one could rise, another woman—for they were nearly all women—would drop upon her bent back. Sometimes, when the first boat was filled, an Arab would catch the pilgrim on his neck, and she could then be seen riding him away, as a woman rides a bicycle. From one boat to another he would leap with his helpless victim, and finally pitch her forward, over his own head, into an empty boat, where she would lie limp and helpless, and regret it some more.
I saw one poor girl, with great heavy boots on her feet, with horse-shoe nails in the heels, fall into the bottom of a boat, and, before she could get up, three large women were dropped in her lap. Just then the boat, being full, pulled off, and I saw her faint; her head fell back, and her deathlike face showed how she suffered. It was rare sport for the Mohammedans.
"Jump," they would say to the Christians; "don't be afraid; Christ will save you!"
It was four P.M. when the last of these miserable people, who ought to have been at home hoeing potatoes, left the ship. An hour later a long dark line of smoke was stretching out across the plain of Sharon, behind a locomotive drawing a train of stock cars. These cars held the seven hundred pilgrims bound for Jerusalem. It will be midnight when they arrive at the Holy City, and they will have no money and no place to sleep. Ah, I forgot. They will go to the Russian hospice, where they will find free board and lodging. It is kind and thoughtful in the Russian church people to care for those poor pilgrims, now that they are here, but it is not right nor kind to encourage them to come. It will be strangely interesting to them at first, but when they have seen it all, there will be nothing for them but idleness. Nothing to do but walk, walk, up the valley of Jehoshaphat and down the road to Bethlehem.
JERUSALEM.
Nearly all the "places of interest" in and about Jerusalem have been collected together, and are now exhibited under one roof, in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Most travellers go there first, but they should not. One should go first to the Mount of Olives, survey, and try to understand the country. It is easy to believe that this is the original mount. There, at your feet, is the Garden of Gethsemane, and beyond the gulch of Jehoshaphat (for it is not a valley) is the dome of the marvellous Mosque of Omar. It is easy to believe, also, that the dome of this mosque covers the rock where Abraham was about to offer up his son, for it is surely the highest point on Mount Moriah.
Looking along the wall you can see the Golden Gate, with the decay of which, the Mohammedans say, will come the fall of Islam, just as the Sultan's power shall pass away when the last sacred dog dies. Looking down the cañon you see the old King's Garden, the pool of Siloam, the Virgin's Well, and, farther down, some poor houses where the lepers live. Still farther, fourteen miles away, and four thousand feet below you, lies the deep Dead Sea, beyond which are the hills of Moab. If you have been lucky enough to come up here without a guide or dragoman with a bosom full of ivory-handled revolvers and long knives, you will sit for hours spellbound. The guide tries too hard to give you your money's worth. He will not allow you to muse over these things, which are reasonably real and true, but will tell you the most marvellous stories, which you cannot believe. He will show you the grave of Moses, and I am told that the Scriptures say, "No man knoweth where his grave is;" yet, if you doubt, the guide feels hurt. He will ask you to harken to the "going in the mulberries," and if you say you don't hear he is surprised.
