Haifa, Oct. 1.—About half a mile in rear of our camp, at Ain-es-Sultan,
rose a precipice a thousand feet high, which culminated in the lofty
crest of a mountain called Quarantul. It derives its name from a
tradition which identifies it with the mount upon which Christ was
tempted for forty days in the wilderness. Of course, it is not the
mountain at all, or, at all events, there is not the smallest particle
of evidence to prove that it is, but that is a trifle where sacred sites
are concerned. The face of this precipitous cliff is honeycombed with
the black mouths of caverns. Sitting round our camp-fire at night we
observed lights gleaming from the sheer side of the rock. Otherwise
there was nothing to lead us to suppose that any of these caverns could
be occupied by human beings. But these fires excited our curiosity, and
we determined to pay the cave-dwellers perched so high above our heads a
visit.
The operation turned out a more dizzy one than I had anticipated. No
guide was necessary, for we could see the track winding like a thread up
the face of the precipice. For the first three hundred feet or so it was
all plain sailing, but then the ledge became horribly narrow.
Occasionally the path was so steep that it dwindled into rock-cut steps.
A false step would have sent you thundering hundreds of feet down into
the abyss. At one place the height was so dizzy, the foothold so slight,
that my nerve, which for this sort of work is not what it once was,
began to give way, and I ignominiously squatted down, with my face
turned to the rock, and tried to steady myself by forgetting that six
inches behind me was a yawning chasm, from which a pebble might have
been dropped plumb to the bottom. Retreat was as bad as advance, and
more humiliating. For the rest of the way I went on my hands and knees,
to the amusement of my companion, whose brain was not similarly
affected. I don't know anything more disagreeable than the irresistible
impulse which overtakes one sometimes to pitch one's self headlong over
a precipice of this kind.
At last, to my inexpressible relief, I reached the mouth of a cave, into
which I sprawled, panting, with thankfulness, but oppressed nevertheless
with the horrible consciousness that I had the return voyage still to
make. However, I dismissed this painful consideration for the moment,
and applied myself to the examination of the curious grotto which we had
reached. It was a sort of ante-chamber to a tunnel in the rock, passing
through which we came upon some dreadful steps out on the face of the
rock; but here there was a slight, rickety balustrade of wood, and at
the top stood a greasy old monk, a sight which, under the circumstances,
produced a more soothing effect upon my mind than such a sight usually
does. This ecclesiastical worthy received us with gracious smiles, and
led us through another tunnel into a sort of vestibule, which opened
into a chapel which had been constructed at the mouth of a cave, so that
the front facing the precipice was of masonry. Looking out of the window
which had been constructed in this wall, a stone might have been dropped
at least five hundred feet without touching anything till it reached the
bottom. This chapel was gorgeously fitted up, thanks to the
contributions of pilgrims whose heads must have been steadier than mine
was. It had a handsomely decorated screen covered with sacred designs
richly gilt. The apse was six feet in diameter, and the total length
from the inside of the apse to the back of the cave about twenty-five
feet, the breadth being about twenty. A door led out of this chapel into
a narrow passage and up two or three steps into another cave, or niche,
where there was a figure of a saint.
As far as I could understand from the monk, who spoke Greek, and very
bad Italian, somewhere here was the spot where Christ stood when he was
tempted. The walls of the chapel were covered with frescoes. The large,
cavernous vestibule was the dwelling-place of the monk, with whom was
associated a younger sort of acolyte, who lived in a cave overhead,
which was reached by a flight of stone-cut steps from the back of the
vestibule. There was also a small inner cave, fitted with a door, in
which they kept their stores. The old man told me he had lived here like
an eagle in an eyrie for ten years without even descending to the plain
below. I wondered how he kept his health without taking exercise. All
hermits who live on the sides of precipices should, I think, have
treadwheels of some kind fitted up for them, or rotating cages like
those in which Italian white mice take their exercise. I don't think our
old friend, however, led a very ascetic life, so far as eating and
drinking are concerned. He insisted on our staying to drink some
excellent coffee, after which he produced a bottle of very good mastic,
or spirit made from corn and flavored with anise-seed. I observed some
fresh green salad and cauliflower on his side-table, which the Arabs
bring him from their gardens at the foot of the hill. He had also an
abundant supply of good Arab bread. His water is supplied from a
cistern, of which there are several attached to the caves. He told me
that eight of these were at present inhabited, but most of them were
higher up. He was the spiritual superior of them all, and although there
was another chapel in ruins, his was the only one in which service was
performed. He invited me to continue my explorations to the caves higher
up, but my mind was so much occupied with thinking how I was to get down
as to exclude from it any idea of going higher up. Altogether this
hermit was a jolly, hospitable old fellow, and it would be as cruel to
pick him out of his hole and drop him into the busy world as it is to
pick a periwinkle out of his shell with a pin.
Partially shutting my eyes and presenting my rear to the enemy, I
crawled backwards down the giddy steps, and just at an uncomfortable
corner came upon a jet-black man in a sort of priestly garb, who turned
out to be an Abyssinian hermit. He has no connection with the
establishment I had been visiting, having his own cell and his own
church all to himself. His bosom was stuffed with manuscripts in
Ethiopian characters. Under any other circumstances I would have
endeavored to converse with so rare a specimen of ecclesiastical
humanity; but how can a man engage in a theological discussion in an
unknown tongue, hanging between earth and heaven on six inches of
slippery rock? I felt rather inclined to say _vade retro Satanas_—not an
inappropriate remark, considering the mountain I was on; and yet the
poor man meant well, and, indeed, gave me an arm. He does not stick to
his perch, however, like the old raven I had been visiting above, but
usually resides in Jerusalem, visiting his cave during the forty days of
Lent and at other stated periods.
We now determined to bid adieu to Jericho and the Mount of the
Temptation and to strike across country into Samaria. This would take us
over an unbeaten track and show us a country very imperfectly known. We
trusted to finding our way by asking it, or by picking up local guides
when we were utterly at a loss. By this means, although one runs a
considerable risk of being benighted, or of having to scramble over
almost impracticable mountain paths, you get a better chance of
stumbling upon objects of interest than by following a more trodden
route. For more than two miles we skirted in a northeasterly direction
the base of the lofty cliffs of the Jebel Quarantul. On our right a
copious steam, which has its rise in a fountain called Ain Duk,
irrigated an extensive tract of land, which was green and well
cultivated. If there had only been population enough to develop it
properly it would be a most productive region. There were all the
evidences that in ancient times its resources were not thus neglected.
Everywhere the remains of stone watercourses and aqueducts were visible,
one bridge in particular having no fewer than three tiers of arches one
above another. The construction was ingenious and peculiar. At the
bottom or narrowest part of the ravine which it spanned was one huge
pointed arch. Immediately over this were four pointed arches, while at
the side of them was a fifth, double the height of the others, the
foundations of which were in the steep side of the ravine. Above these
again were six more pointed arches which supported the aqueduct. Thus
there were altogether twelve arches, and of these only two were the same
size. The old Roman masonry of which they were composed was still in a
very good state of preservation. Near this aqueduct were also the
substantial remains of an old Roman road.
We now crossed, for about three miles, a fine undulating country covered
with rich herbage, upon which large herds of cattle were feeding, and
followed most of the way an ancient cemented channel, about four feet
wide, which had formerly conveyed the waters of another stream to swell
those which had their origin at Ain Duk, and all of which were carried
over the aforementioned high level bridge. The stream which we were now
approaching was also surrounded by cultivated and irrigated land. The
whole of this plain in its richness and wealth of water far surpassed
anything my expectations had led me to anticipate. Near the base of the
mountains from which this fine stream issues are the remains of an
ancient fortress situated on a high mound or tell, called Khurbet el
Aujeh. The stream bears the same name. This is the sixth large stream
which I have counted gushing from these mountains in a distance of about
eight miles. My compass now told me that I must get up into the
mountains if I intended to strike the Jerusalem and Samaria road at the
point which I proposed. From information which I had taken before
starting I expected to find the track in question ascending the valley
from which the Aujeh issues, but we looked in vain for signs of any such
track. Indeed, on forcing our way up it a little distance, we found that
its precipitous sides closed in on us in a manner which effectually
barred all further progress. We were wondering what to do in our
dilemma, when, fortunately, we observed some peasants making some
irrigating channels, and from them, after much chaffering, we obtained a
guide. It is a singular thing that these poor peasantry, whose day's
labor in the fields cannot be worth more than ten cents to them, will
refuse fifty rather than leave what they are about and act as guides. On
this occasion it was with great difficulty that I bribed a man with a
dollar. To our surprise he took us straight to the base of an apparently
impracticable cliff and proceeded to climb up it. As my experience of
Palestine horses has convinced me that they can go almost wherever a man
can, provided you leave them to find their own way, we proceeded to
breast the limestone crags without misgiving, the only hardship being
that the day was hot and we had to climb them on foot. To scramble up a
thousand feet on a stretch by a path which was generally quite invisible
is no slight operation, and one which, in this instance, it would have
been impossible to perform without a guide, such impassable barriers did
the rocks seem to present until the guide showed us the way to
circumvent them. When we did reach what we fondly hoped was the summit,
it was only to find a barren, undulating wilderness stretching before
us, every now and then involving more climbing, for the elevation at
which we were destined to arrive before the end of our day's journey was
more than four thousand feet higher than the level from which we
started.
If the scenery by which we now found ourselves surrounded was rugged, it
was wild and grand in the extreme. Gloomy and precipitous gorges
intersect these mountains in every direction. Not a sign of a habitation
is visible anywhere, and with the exception of a single goatherd we did
not meet a human being for hours. The vegetation was also very sparse,
relieved, however, by great quantities of the fragrant white broom in
flower, and cyclamen and scarlet anemones. Even in the days of the
ancients it must have been a barren, uncultivated tract, but I was
repaid for the scramble across it by one or two evidences of extreme
antiquity of the greatest interest. The first of these consisted of four
huge prostrate slabs of stone. They were evidently the blocks which had
once formed a dolmen that had been overturned. Now, the interest of this
lies in the fact that no dolmen, or signs of a dolmen, has ever yet been
discovered in Judea, though eagerly searched for. There is only one
doubtful one in Galilee, but they are abundant to the east of the
Jordan. The reason assigned for this is that the tribes to the east of
the Jordan did not obey the command, when they entered the land of
Canaan, to “overturn the tables of stone,” to destroy the Canaanitish
altars, and to break or smash their pillars; while the tribes to the
west, especially Judah and Benjamin, were very particular in this
regard.
Here, I think, is the only evidence which has yet been found in Judea of
this interesting fact. This region was apparently one much dedicated to
Baal worship. I saw many stone circles and one or two alignments of
large stones, but the most curious was an enclosure about twenty-four
yards square, formed of rough, unhewn stones, each weighing a ton or
more, piled to a height of two or three upon each other. In the centre
was a circle, eight feet in diameter, of large stones, with a single
stone in the middle of it. This was a monument which evidently existed
from pre-Judaic times; but, although I attempted hurriedly to take its
bearings, I am afraid that in that wilderness of stone I should never be
able to find it again.
We were pretty well worn out when we reached at last the village of
Mugheir, the first inhabited place we had seen since leaving our camp
near Jericho, and where we proposed to call a halt for the refreshment
of man and beast. Meantime, as our tents and baggage had been sent by
another road, we began to feel extremely doubtful as to when we should
ever see them again.