GALILEE
NEITHER old “sacred” {123} himself, nor any of his helpers, knew the road
which I meant to take from Nazareth to the Sea of Galilee and from thence
to Jerusalem, so I was forced to add another to my party by hiring a
guide. The associations of Nazareth, as well as my kind feeling towards
the hospitable monks, whose guest I had been, inclined me to set at
naught the advice which I had received against employing Christians. I
accordingly engaged a lithe, active young Nazarene, who was recommended
to me by the monks, and who affected to be familiar with the line of
country through which I intended to pass. My disregard of the popular
prejudices against Christians was not justified in this particular
instance by the result of my choice. This you will see by and by.
I passed by Cana and the house in which the water had been turned into
wine; I came to the field in which our Saviour had rebuked the Scotch
Sabbath-keepers of that period, by suffering His disciples to pluck corn
on the Lord’s Day; I rode over the ground on which the fainting multitude
had been fed, and they showed me some massive fragments—the relics, they
said, of that wondrous banquet, now turned into stone. The petrifaction
was most complete.
I ascended the height on which our Lord was standing when He wrought the
miracle. The hill was lofty enough to show me the fairness of the land
on all sides, but I have an ancient love for the mere features of a lake,
and so forgetting all else when I reached the summit, I looked away
eagerly to the eastward. There she lay, the Sea of Galilee. Less stern
than Wast Water, less fair than gentle Windermere, she had still the
winning ways of an English lake; she caught from the smiling heavens
unceasing light and changeful phases of beauty, and with all this
brightness on her face, she yet clung so fondly to the dull he-looking
mountain at her side, as though she would
“Soothe him with her finer fancies,
Touch him with her lighter thought.” {124}
If one might judge of men’s real thoughts by their writings, it would
seem that there are people who can visit an interesting locality and
follow up continuously the exact train of thought that ought to be
suggested by the historical associations of the place. A person of this
sort can go to Athens and think of nothing later than the age of
Pericles; can live with the Scipios as long as he stays in Rome; can go
up in a balloon, and think how resplendently in former times the now
vacant and desolate air was peopled with angels, how prettily it was
crossed at intervals by the rounds of Jacob’s ladder! I don’t possess
this power at all; it is only by snatches, and for few moments together,
that I can really associate a place with its proper history.
“There at Tiberias, and along this western shore towards the north, and
upon the bosom too of the lake, our Saviour and His disciples”—away flew
those recollections, and my mind strained eastward, because that that
farthest shore was the end of the world that belongs to man the dweller,
the beginning of the other and veiled world that is held by the strange
race, whose life (like the pastime of Satan) is a “going to and fro upon
the face of the earth.” From those grey hills right away to the gates of
Bagdad stretched forth the mysterious “desert”—not a pale, void, sandy
tract, but a land abounding in rich pastures, a land without cities or
towns, without any “respectable” people or any “respectable” things, yet
yielding its eighty thousand cavalry to the beck of a few old men. But
once more—“Tiberias—the plain of Gennesareth—the very earth on which I
stood—that the deep low tones of the Saviour’s voice should have gone
forth into eternity from out of the midst of these hills and these
valleys!”—Ay, ay, but yet again the calm face of the lake was uplifted,
and smiled upon my eyes with such familiar gaze, that the “deep low
tones” were hushed, the listening multitudes all passed away, and instead
there came to me a dear old memory from over the seas in England, a
memory sweeter than Gospel to that poor wilful mortal, me.
I went to Tiberias, and soon got afloat upon the water. In the evening I
took up my quarters in the Catholic church, and the building being large
enough, the whole of my party were admitted to the benefit of the same
shelter. With portmanteaus and carpet bags, and books and maps, and
fragrant tea, Mysseri soon made me a home on the southern side of the
church. One of old Shereef’s helpers was an enthusiastic Catholic, and
was greatly delighted at having so sacred a lodging. He lit up the altar
with a number of tapers, and when his preparations were complete, he
began to perform his orisons in the strangest manner imaginable. His
lips muttered the prayers of the Latin Church, but he bowed himself down
and laid his forehead to the stones beneath him after the manner of a
Mussulman. The universal aptness of a religious system for all stages of
civilisation, and for all sorts and conditions of men, well befits its
claim of divine origin. She is of all nations, and of all times, that
wonderful Church of Rome!
Tiberias is one of the four holy cities, {126} according to the Talmud,
and it is from this place, or the immediate neighbourhood of it, that the
Messiah is to arise.
Except at Jerusalem, never think of attempting to sleep in a “holy city.”
Old Jews from all parts of the world go to lay their bones upon the
sacred soil, and as these people never return to their homes, it follows
that any domestic vermin which they may bring with them are likely to
become permanently resident, so that the population is continually
increasing. No recent census had been taken when I was at Tiberias, but
I know that the congregation of fleas which attended at my church alone
must have been something enormous. It was a carnal, self-seeking
congregation, wholly inattentive to the service which was going on, and
devoted to the one object of having my blood. The fleas of all nations
were there. The smug, steady, importunate flea from Holywell Street; the
pert, jumping _puce_ from hungry France, the wary, watchful _pulce_ with
his poisoned stiletto; the vengeful _pulga_ of Castile with his ugly
knife; the German _floh_ with his knife and fork, insatiate, not rising
from table; whole swarms from all the Russias, and Asiatic hordes
unnumbered—all these were there, and all rejoiced in one great
international feast. I could no more defend myself against my enemies
than if I had been _pain à discretion_ in the hands of a French patriot,
or English gold in the claws of a Pennsylvanian Quaker. After passing a
night like this you are glad to pick up the wretched remains of your body
long, long before morning dawns. Your skin is scorched, your temples
throb, your lips feel withered and dried, your burning eyeballs are
screwed inwards against the brain. You have no hope but only in the
saddle and the freshness of the morning air.