We reached his side and looked. There was a low line of wall, a minaret, a black dome, a few flat roofs, and, in the midst, a group of dark, slender cypresses, and olives, and palms.

There lay Jerusalem dead in the white noon. The desolation of the wilderness moaned at her gates. There was no suburb of trees or houses. She lay upon a high hill in the midst of hills barren as those we had passed. There were no sights or sounds of life. The light was colourless; the air was still. Nature had swooned around the dead city. There was no sound in the air; but a wailing in my heart-" O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that stonest the prophets, and killest those that are sent unto thee!"

CHAPTER VI.

O JERUSALEM!

JERUSALEM stands upon the point of the long reach of table-land over which we had approached it, as upon a promontory.

The ravines between the city and the adjacent hills are the valleys of Jehoshaphat and Hinnom. The Mount of Olives is the highest of these adjacent hills, and commands Jerusalem. It is crowned by a convent, deserted now; and at its foot, toward the city, on the shore of the brook Kedron, is the Garden of Gethsemane-a small, white-walled inclosure of old olives.

There are no roads about the city. It is not accessible for carriages, nor would its narrow streets permit them to pass. This profound silence characterises all the Eastern cities, in which wheels do not roar, nor steam shriek, and invests them, by contrast, with a wonderful charm. The ways that

lead to the gates of Jerusalem are horse-paths, like dry water-courses. No dwellings cluster about the city, except the village of Siloam, a town of "bad people," a group of gray stone houses on the steep side of the deepest part of the valley of Jehoshaphat. In that valley, also, is the tomb of Absalom, a clumsy structure, but one of the most conspicuous objects outside the walls; and the graves of the Jews covered with flat slabs, the great number of which crowded together, seems to pave parts of the valley. Pools and fountains are there also, sacred in all Christian memories.

Toward the south-east from the city the mountain lines are depressed, and the eye escapes to the dim vastness of the Moab Mountains, brooding over the Dead Sea. From the Mount of Olives you see the Dead Sea, dark, and misty, and solemn, like Swiss lakes seen from mountains among mountains. The hillsides around the city are desolate. But in the valley bottoms, on the soil that has washed from the hills, are olive groves; and in the largest and fairest stands a ruin of no great antiquity, but picturesque and graceful among the trees. This ruin, and the mossy greenness and fresh foliage around the pool where "the waters of Siloam go softly," are the only objects which are romantic, rather than grave, in the melancholy landscape.

These are the features of that bright and arid, but still melancholy, landscape. It lies hushed in awe and desolation; and sad as itself are the feelings with which you regard it.

One only figure is in your mind; but, remembering him and all his personal and traditional relations with the city, the single pure romance which flashes across the gravity of its history, returns to you as you gaze. Looking wistfully from the walls, you hear again, as under the olivetrees in the mountains, the barbaric clang of the Crusaders' army. Listen, and listen long. The finest strain you hear, is not the clash of arms or the peal of trumpets. The hush of this modern noon is filled with the murmurous sound of chanted psalms; and, along the olive valleys toward Mount Olivet, you see the slow procession of the Christian host, not with banners, but with crosses, to-day, pouring on in sacred pomp, singing hymns; and the hearts of Saracens within the walls are chilled by that strange battle-cry.

Under the Syrian

Night and silence follow. stars, this motley host, driven by fierce religious fury from the whole civilised world, kneels in its camp around Jerusalem, singing and praising God. The holy sound dies while we listen, and the clash of arms arises, with the sun, upon the air.

Jerusalem bleeds rivers of blood, that flow down the steep mountain sides, and a roar more terrible than the raging sea curdles the hot silence of noon. The clash of arms dies, with the sun, upon the air, No Muezzin at twilight calls to prayer. But, in the Court of the Temple, ten thousand of his faith lie slain, and the advancing Crusaders ride, to their horses' bellies, in blood. It is the 15th of July, 1099, and that evening Jerusalem is, for the first time, properly a Christian city.

But once more, while we yet stand lost in these memories of the city, an odour, as of rose-water, sweetens the air. The Christian bells have ceased

ringing suddenly. A long procession files from the gates, and the voice of the Muezzin again vibrates through the city. It is Salah-ed-deen, Sultan of the Saracens, who is purifying the mosque of Omar, who is melting the Christian bells, and dragging the Christian Cross through the mire; but who, receiving the Christian prisoners with gracious courtesy, repays their sanguinary madness with oriental generosity, sending them away loaded with presents, and retaining in the city the military friars of St. John, to nurse the sick.

Thus bold and defined, like its landscape, are your first emotions in Jerusalem.