ON THE STEAMER AT MIDNIGHT.-MONDAY, MARCH 15.

As I come on deck at this midnight hour, I turn my face towards the south, and say to myself "Open eyes, yonder is Joppa!" My first thought is, shall I ever reach that shore? Somehow I feel as if I never shall step upon Holy Land. It seems all a dream to me; like those dreams in which I reach after something and never reach it.

The city of Joppa sprawls all over a round hill, and the stars shine so bright over it, I can almost count the houses in it. Now I wonder which one belonged to Simon, the tanner, where Peter lived when he had his vision. (Acts x. 9-16). I fancy the cannon of Napoleon roaring through this bay, and how the victorious shouts of his troops sounded when he captured Joppa, March 3d, 1799. It must be the orange trees yonder that smell so deliciously on this midnight air. I see a palm-tree on the top of that hill in the middle of the town. My first sight of Joppa, by midnight, will never be forgotten.* It is sublime. We cast anchor northwest of the city, and as I come through the gangway and look southeast, the great constellation Scorpio, with its forty-four stars, hangs right over it, and sparkles with a brilliancy that is startling. Its principal star,

* The reader will at once detect the fact, already avowed in the title-page, that various hands were employed in the preparation of these pages. This leads to a variety of style, and just enough repetition to fix in the memory the important facts embodied in the volume. No confusion can result. Let the reader imagine himself perusing letters from four or five persons of different ages, and both sexes, who view the same subjects under the different lights natural to their respective degrees of experience.

Antares, always exhibiting a remarkably blood-red appearance, seems exactly in the range of the expanded tuft of a palm-tree that crowns the hill in the centre of Joppa. I shall never look on that starry group again without associating it with the tree, the town, and this glorious midnight hour. It is a strange coincidence that the Jewish astrologers, when they divided out the twelve constellations among the twelve tribes of Israel, gave Scorpio to Dan, and the town of Joppa yonder was a part of Dan.

I wonder whether Jonah, when he fled from the face of the Lord, from Joppa towards Tarshish, saw that crimson star Antares. It must have followed the guilty renegade like an avenging meteor. And yet, had he seen it, he might have turned back and gone to Nineveh, as the Lord commanded him.

When I was awaked by the call, "Yonder is Joppa," I was revelling in a sweet dream of home and friends; and much as I desired to secure the earliest glimpse of the everlasting hills of the Holy Land, yet, for the moment, I was sorry to be roused from the vision. But this feeling was instantly dispelled, for, as I stepped upon the deck, I discovered myself under a concave of celestial imagery, such as American skies can never exhibit. The stars in innumerable hosts and brightest radiance were out, and illumined the long, low line of the Palestine coast. Stephen, at his martyrdom, "looked steadfastly into heaven;" so, for a few minutes, did I, awe-struck, yet delighted, at the view. No wonder the Easterns worshipped these skies before they knew God. What a meaning that promise to Abraham expresses to me now: "Look now toward heaven and tell the stars if thou be able to number them. And He said unto him, so shall thy seed be."

The word Joppa, anciently signified "the watch-tower of joy and beauty." It is in such sweet connection I shall ever recall it.

And now, our country's passion for pilgrimage, which has carried the adventurous steps of Americans into every corner of the earth, has brought me here. Old Joppa rests under these older skies. The deep azure of the heavens, studded with the very dust of stars, and most brilliant constellations, is a picture never to be forgotten. These orbs witnessed the events of Bible history from Abraham to Jesus. The journeys of Peter from Lydda to Joppa, and from Joppa to Cæsarea; his vision of tolerance, and the flight of Jonah from this very harbor, are associated with the glitter of these diamond-sparks flashing above me. Oh, transcendently beautiful!

As the great anchor drops at the midnight hour, and I recognize that we are off the port of Joppa, I offer my grateful acknowledgements to Almighty God that He has safely brought us through the first stage of our journey. The city of Jonah and of Peter, of Andromeda and of Noah, shows, at this quiet hour, in its most attractive features. But, like all other Oriental towns, it appears best at night and at a distance.

DECK OF THE STEAMER, 6 A. M.

After a few hours' sleep, I have taken an early watch upon the deck of the steamer which we are to leave at eight. The noble vessel lies at anchor almost steady, though I perceive, by the motion of the small boats around us, that the sea rolls quite heavily. The foam upon the reef of rocks, between us and the shore, betokens the same agitation; the roar of the surf can easily be heard, although it is nearly two miles off. The captain says he never dares take his vessel nearer than we are now on account of the rocks. I remember in a French copy of the "Travels of Saewulf," an account of a storm in the Sea of Joppa, in the year 1102. The ships were driven from their anchors by the violence of the waves which first threw them aloft and then below, until they were aground or upon the rocks, and there beaten backward and forward and crushed to pieces. The violence of the wind would not allow them to put out to sea, while the character of the coast forbade their putting in to shore. Thirty very large ships were destroyed. More than one thousand lives were lost. As I look over the bay and think of the awful scene, I shudder at the recital. The captain informs us that in stormy weather his steamer passés this place without stopping. In such cases he carries his passengers on to Caiffa, if he is going north, or Alexandria, if he is going south. This is very much to their dissatisfaction.

Joppa looks from this distance exceedingly picturesque. It covers a small hill about one hundred and fifty feet high, shaped like a hemisphere-the sea being on three sides of it. The hill is entirely covered with houses as thickly as they can be built, and the fortified wall that encircles it runs close under the base of the hill. Beyond the town I catch tantalizing glimpses of the unparalleled orange groves of Joppa which I so much long to see.

BLATTNER'S HOTEL, 10 A. M.

About 9 o'clock I played my last tune upon the ship's piano, "Home, Sweet Home." Then I said adieu, and we left, perhaps never to see the good ship again. A dreadful squabble was going

on among the boatmen who thronged the waters around us, in their tub-like crafts; and I was distressed to see one poor fellow knocked overboard. But he soon came to the surface, none the worse, but rather the cleaner for his submersion. We entered our boat, a current of sailors, Turks, Arabs, passengers, carpet-bags, dragomans and travellers.

I had bargained with one of the boatmen to land our party, and carry the baggage to the hotel for two dollars and a half. In dealing with these people my invariable rule is to make my contracts in advance, and have the price exactly understood. As I pay them honestly, according to my agreement, I compel them honestly to fulfil theirs. Our baggage was all ready packed on Saturday, and we had no occasion for delay. But before leaving this good steamer, which has brought us so pleasantly from Marseilles, a two weeks' journey, our party gathers together in the state-room, Bibles in hand, to acknowledge the mercies of Him who "hath ruled the raging of the sea; when the waves thereof arose He stilled them." (Ps. lxxxix. 9.) We read, alternately, the 107th Psalm, and Matthew, chapters i. to iv. We sing

"Nearer my God to Thee,"

those sweet lines. We join hands affectionately in that little apartment, and ask the Great Giver to fill the coming months with good things, and to restore us in due time to our own happy land. AMEN.

From the grand, swelling billows, we passed directly between dark, jagged reefs that front the town. Over these the creamy surf dashes in romantic agitation.

We landed safely, crushing the beautiful shells with which the shore is covered, and went directly through streets narrow, dirty and badly paved, to the English Hotel, where we are to remain until Wednesday. And now we join in congratulations and thanksgivings to God that we have reached the desired haven. Five weeks and two days was the length of our journey from New York. Already we inhale the rich aroma from orange groves and other odoriferous trees.

This hotel of Blattner's, three stories high, is built entirely of stone from foundation to roof. The steps, the lintels, the floor, the ceiling, all are of stone or cement. Owing to the scarcity of timber here, the builder is compelled to adopt the arch for supporting floors

and roofs. Over each small room one arched dome is raised; over a larger one like this are eight resting on four pillars, a central dome crowning the whole. This style is very graceful to the eye, and it makes a strong and durable building. The housekeeping is horrid. The common hall or passage way is really filthy; three sets of noisy, dirty children are playing there together. In an opposite room, with open door, a woman is dressing. The dinner table is of the cheapest material—a mere frame of rude plank-but the table-cloth is of the costliest damask. Several divans or sofas are ranged round the room covered with the same material. Yet the carpet is a coarse cotton one, full of holes, and dirty. A splendid grand piano in one corner is used as a side-board for the breakfast table. There are three large and costly clocks, all out of repair and useless; one a musical clock. Common colored lithographs of the Emperor and Empress of Austria hang on the walls. There is absolutely nothing English about the house except the name.

All my superstitious fancy that I shall never set foot on the shore of the Holy Land proves vain. When we left the steamer, more than fifty rowboats were round the ship, greedy for passengers. Such scrambling, such screaming, such howling! The boatmen fight like dogs. One of them was knocked overboard with a valise in his hand. He came up again, valise and all, and crawled back into the boat, and all the others laughed at him. He had a turban on his head and lost it in the water. Then I saw that his head was shaved smooth, all but a top-knot, like a Pawnee Indian's.

Our boatman was a Greek named Caracousi. He wore petticoats, and they tripped him up as he stepped along the seats. He had four other Greeks to row the boat, who all wore petticoats, too. Their oars are made different from ours. In the middle they bulge out large, having the upper end the heaviest, so the weight of the oar lifts itself out of the water. The boatmen stand up while rowing, and push their oars from them. They face the same way they

row.

As our boat rushed along, the water looked as blue as indigo. A reef of rocks was lying between us and the shore, having a passageway through it. This is pointed out by a tall granite column that stands as a guide on the right of the entrance. Our boat went through that opening with a dash. There were a great many small sail vessels inside the reef loading with oranges for Egypt; and an English brig was there, taking in a cargo of bones for England.