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THE CURSE UPON JERICHO.

that valley there is a wood, as admirable for its fruitfulness as for its delight; for it is intermingled with palm-trees and opobalsamum. The trees of the opobalsamum bear a resemblance to fir-trees. On a set season of the year they do "sweat balsam." But, alas! the palm-trees, the balsam and the fruitfulness, or at least the cultivation, have departed; for although the country is covered with verdure for some distance below and around this fertilizing fountain and the streams which flow from it, yet the indolence of the inhabitants, who are still proverbial for their vices, has suffered even the fertile parts of the plain to be occupied with thorns and useless shrubs.

How different the scene once presented here, and what recllections does this interesting region evoke from the past! Upon those mountains beyond the river on the east side of Jordan, Moses once stood and surveyed the promised land which he might not enter. Upon the opposite bank the warlike successor of Moses marshalled the people, bidding the priests of the Lord go over with the ark of the covenant; and Jordan was stayed, while two millions of the children of Israel passed dry-shod into the good land promised to their fathers. Prophets of God had power given them to smite the rivers, 'and they were divided hither and thither;' to change the fountains of bitterness and death into streams of life and fertility. Upon this plain stood the walls of a wealthy and a warlike city, frowning defiance to a host of besieging men, and then, by the power of God, falling down at the sound of their trumpets, 'so that the people went up into the city, every man straight before him.' These fields, once so fruitful, fed their thousands and tens of thousands, and the happy and prosperous inhabitants sat here amid their groves of balsam, and under the shadow of the palm-trees. All is departed. Jericho is no more! the curse is upon her

still!

With a feeling akin to melancholy we averted our eyes and prepared for our return to the Holy City. The plain of the Jordan being nearly three thousand feet lower than Jerusalem, the way led us up steep hills, for a considerable distance. They were utterly bare of all vegetation, composed of rocks and sterile soil, and well suited to the tradition which affirms them to be the scene of our Lord's Temptation. We met many of the Mussulmans on their return from the

VALLEY OF REPHAIM · RACHEL'S DEATH.

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tomb of the Prophet Moses, and indeed during the whole period of our stay in Jerusalem, large numbers of them were constantly passing and repassing upon this mendacious pilgrimage. We reached Jerusalem at 4 P. M., having been on horseback nearly thirteen hours, besides the journey of the day before, but amply repaid for our great fatigue by an excursion of the deepest interest and most fruitful in reminiscences.

EXCURSION FROM JERUSALEM TO BETHLEHEM.

Wednesday, April 11th.-We set out in the morning to go to that little city so dear to the heart of every Christian, where our Lord was manifest in the flesh. Leaving Jerusalem by the Jaffa or Bethlehem gate, we took the road which leads across the Plain of Rephaim, or as it is called in the Scripture, the Valley of Rephaim, or of the Giants; the scene of so many of the battles between David and the Philistines. The road, for the most part, is over a succession of dry and barren hills, interspersed with valleys that give some signs of fruitfulness, while goats hang upon the sides of the rocks and obtain from them the scanty subsistence which they require. There are many traditions upon this road which arrest a momentary attention, and some which attract the heart and arouse a deeper feeling. Among those which are doubtful we may place that of the village where the Prophet Joel is said to have lived, the ruins of the house of Simeon nearer to Jerusalem, and the tree under whose shade the Virgin Mother rested with the infant Jesus, when about to present Him in the temple! We fear the fountain at which the wise men were waiting when they saw the star must be placed in the same class.

But far more credit is due to the constant tradition which points out the site of Rachel's burial; though the early monument that marked the place, has long since disappeared under a Muslim tomb. With this interesting spot are connected associations of the most affecting character. Here one of the mothers of the children of Israel died, after the birth of the 'Son of her Sorrow,' whom his father called by the more auspicious name of Benjamin. In after years, and

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RACHEL'S TOMB― RAMAH.

just before his own death, when he was far away from her grave, and in the land of Egypt, he recalls the circumstances of her departure: 'And as for me, when I came from Padan, Rachel died by me in the land of Canaan in the way, when yet there was but a little way to come unto Ephrath; and I buried her there in the way of Ephrath; the same is Bethlehem.' (Gen. xlviii. 7.) The Patriarch, who was thus so sadly and suddenly bereaved of her whom he best loved, had set up a monument upon this very spot which we now contemplate: And Jacob set a pillar upon her grave: that is the pillar of Rachel's grave unto this day.' (xxxv. 20.) Not far distant is a village, supposed to be upon the site of the ancient Ramah, which, as its name signifies, must have been seated high up among the hills. Here were once heard the lamentation and great mourning when Rachel wept for her children and refused to be comforted! How might Ramah, in after times, have again heard the voice of lamentation, had it foreseen the woes of the children of Rachel because they rejected Him for whose sake the blood of her unconscious Innocents was then shed!

The situation of the village, which occupies the probable site of the ancient Ramah, upon a high and prominent point in the mountain scenery of this solitary region, and its associations, render it an object of interest at a distance. Gibeah, also, must have been in this neighborhood, as appears by the relation in the book of Judges (xix); for when the day drew 'toward evening' the Levite and his company rose to depart from Bethlehem, and when they came over against Jebus, which is Jerusalem,' they would not rest there, because it was then a 'city of the Jebusites;' so the Levite 'said to his servant, Come, and let us draw near to one of these places to lodge all night, in Gibeah, or in Ramah.' As we approached Bethlehem the valleys grew more fertile, and the hills were covered by small groves of olives, with a few vineyards. The little city, which contains about three thousand inhabitants, who are chiefly Christians, is beautifully situated upon an eminence. The sides of the hills are cultivated, according to the ancient manner, in terraces, which support the olive-trees and the vineyards. Altogether the scene was very scriptural in its character; for the wine-presses were here, and the towers built to shelter those who watch the vineyards.