The East

by William Young Martin

Unlike Cairo, carriages of any kind are rarely seen—the streets, in fact, being very unsuitable for them. The city is largely undermined. Under the Temple Court is a fine subterranean arched building, generally called Solomon’s stables, into which we descended, and near them are some water cisterns of great extent, also underground. The storage of spring and also of rain water seems to have been a very important matter, and the remains of such cisterns and aqueducts are very numerous, chiefly underground.

Entering by a simple hole under the walls near the Damascus Gate on the north, we were each provided with a lighted candle, and crept rather than walked in a distance of 100 feet or so, when we found ourselves in an underground vault, or series of vaults, of great extent. They vary in height from five to thirty feet, looking like natural overhead archways of limestone rock, with here and there a pillar left for support. It is supposed they were excavated for supplying building stones for the city in ancient times, and the impression conveyed to my mind, after exploring this vast and dark range of caverns, was the instability of some portions of the city overhead.

The excavations being made by the London Palestine Exploration Society, of which the Earl of Shaftesbury is President, have led to important discoveries underground in Jerusalem, and no doubt will yet throw much light upon its ancient history, as well as that of the land of Palestine throughout, which seems mainly a land of ruins. Indeed, indications have already been obtained that the whole country is very much one vast sepulchre of ancient cities, buried under the stones and rubbish of their own ruins, the débris of hills, and the dust of ages. If so, many doubts frequently expressed as to the excessive population of the land, as indicated in the Bible records, will be removed. I called upon the secretary (a medical gentleman), whom I found professionally engaged at the fever hospital of the city; but he mentioned that the operations of the Society were at that time in abeyance; they have since been resumed, however.

We generally dined about six o’clock, at the table d’hôte, which was served after the French fashion. I wish to give, if I can, a description of the building of this hotel, as it is characteristic of very many houses in Jerusalem and other cities of Palestine. Situated in a street about twenty feet wide, we enter by an inside narrow and steep flight of stone steps, strong and solid looking, but not finer than that by which we would approach a hay-loft in this country. The landing consists of a platform, which also forms the roof of the ground flat of the building—how occupied I could not find out. Surrounding this landing—which looked like a paved or asphalted court in the open air—is a range of houses forming the second story of the erection, and containing also a third story above it, ascended by an inner flight of open stone steps. Here were the dining-room and parlour of the hotel—plainly furnished rooms, with windows looking into the inner court or platform, and others looking down into the street. The other rooms were variously occupied for bedrooms and other purposes. Mine was a full-sized room, about ten feet high, with a roof in the form of a very flat arch. The building was thus almost completely fireproof, perhaps the reason being that there are almost no timber trees in Palestine worthy of the name, nor indeed much wood of any kind.

In the little parlour adjoining I one day noticed an English gentleman sitting alone, evidently sorely wounded, and very unwell—like the man who fell among thieves. I found he was from England—a partner in a highly respectable and well-known mercantile house, and in fact a correspondent of my own. He had, as I afterwards found, a clerk as travelling companion to take charge of him. A man of excellent business talents, he had recently fallen one more victim to intemperance, and was now making this tour to be out of temptation’s reach. So far, I understood, it was quite a failure. Alexandria and the steamers had proved too potent trials for him; and at Ismailia, notwithstanding his being strictly watched, he had—to get at the beer shops at the harbour—escaped during the night by the window of his bedroom, but, falling in the descent, had broken his arm and created some scenes amongst the Arabs, which his attendant had got settled up at some trouble and cost. Fortunately there is no Bow Street there, and no penny-a-liners. He said he was not enjoying his journey; indeed his getting up to Jerusalem at all had proved a tedious and most trying difficulty. I pitied him, and his companion too. He talked very sagely, but took no interest in anything around, and so there seemed little hope for him; and so soon as able to sit on horseback, he proposed to return. Although his condition was painfully obvious to all, he told me quite confidentially that he had met with an accident in his journey. He seemed a sad wreck morally, mentally, and physically—the first perhaps includes all; but having been “a man of mind” once, let us hope he has “come to himself” ere now. I mention this incident because I have been told that sending such cases to travel in Egypt and Palestine is—when the expense is not a barrier—by no means very uncommon.

Jerusalem is best seen from the Mount of Olives, the summit of which is about 100 feet higher than the city walls. It is separated from the city by a deep gorge—extremely steep, especially on the Jerusalem side—called the Valley of Jehoshaphat; flowing through it is the Brook Kedron, which we found almost dry, although the rains had only ceased falling the previous week. From this brook on the east of Jerusalem commences the ascent of the Mount; and here also, I confess, my disappointment was extreme. The Mount of Olives was associated in my mind with the ideas of beauty, of rich verdure, shady groves, and stately trees, but instead there were barren rock, almost no soil, and here and there a few trees stunted in height, with their trunks hollow, and wrinkled with age, growing out of the dry ground. There was very little verdure of any kind other than the leaves of the few very aged evergreen olive trees, which afforded a partial shade from the sun, then shining brightly overhead; but where were the luxuriant fig and the palm trees? My life-long pleasant illusions were completely dispelled. More especially was this the case in the garden of Gethsemane, or what is now called such. This is a roughly walled-in corner of the lower margin of the Mount, in possession I think of the Latin Church. There have been some attempts made at giving it the appearance of a garden—a few rudely-made walks, lined with a shabby low wooden fence, and some efforts at cultivation made—but with poor success. The enclosure contains some seven olive trees, large and spreading but not proportionally lofty, centuries old, propped up to keep them from falling, and having their large hollow trunks filled with loose stones; also two or three modern cypresses. A few paltry pictures of devotional subjects are affixed to the enclosing wall, not artistically superior to the children’s halfpenny pictures of a dozen years ago. The Mount being then, as is generally understood, unenclosed and bounded by the public road, it is very difficult to suppose that Jesus could here have retired for privacy, as we read He did on that eventful evening.

Indeed, this consideration suggests doubts as to this being the site of Gethsemane at all, or if it is, shows that the Mount of Olives of the present day must be but the shrunk-up skeleton of the richly wooded Olivet of the New Testament. And yet, of all the sacred places, as they are called, none satisfies the mind of the traveller for its undoubted genuineness more than this Mount of Olives. These remarks apply to Oliphet as seen fronting to Jerusalem, but there are a number of trees at its summit and north-west, but they are disappointing in size and luxuriance. Except by contrast with the surrounding barrenness, they could not boast of much beauty or comeliness.

Passing outward from Jerusalem by the St. Stephen’s or eastern gate of the city—inside of which is the pool of Bethesda, substantially built of stone, large and deep but empty and uncared for—we pass through a crowd of Moslem tombstones, then by the spot of St. Stephen’s martyrdom, from which in a steep slanting direction we descend a narrow roadway down to and across the small bridge of the Kedron. Here, at the corner of the wall of Gethsemane, commences the ascent over the Mount of Olives in the direction of Bethany, and being also the main road from Jerusalem to Jericho, it is a good deal frequented.

Over the mountain, and a short way down its eastern slope, is the little village of Bethany, which was, perhaps more than any other, the home of our Saviour during His residence in Judea. This road must have been traversed by Him daily to and from Jerusalem, very probably accompanied by His friend Lazarus; and few travellers fail to stand upon the summit of Olivet, and imagine themselves on the spot from which He beheld the city and wept over it, and from which perhaps were uttered the words, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets!” The barren fig tree[4] imagination can very easily supply, and the whole view is calculated to bring many incidents of Scripture so strongly before the mind as never again to be forgotten. One feels certain of the truth of the history, as certain as any fact can be—then not being really acted out before the bodily eye.