144 A SCENE OF GRANDEUR. drous displays of Sinai have been visible to the assembled host of Israel; that here the Lord spoke with Moses; that here was the mount that trembled and smoked in presence of its manifested Creator! We gazed for some time in silence; and when we spoke, it was with a reverence that even the most thoughtless of our company could not shake off. I read on the very spot, with what feelings I need not say, the passage in Exodus which relates the wonders of which this mountain was the theatre. We felt its truth, and could almost see the lightnings and hear the thunders, and the "trumpet waxing loud." I had stood upon the Alps in the middle of July, and looked abroad upon their snowy empire; I had stood upon the Apennines, and gazed upon the plains of beautiful Italy; I had stood upon the Albanian Mount, and beheld the scene of the Eneid from the Circean promontory, over the Campagna, to the eternal city and the mountains of Tivoli; I had sat down upon the Pyramids of Egypt, and cast my eyes over the sacred city of Heliopolis, the land of Goshen, the fields of Jewish bondage, and the ancient Memphis, where Moses and Aaron, on the part of God and his people, contended with Pharaoh and his servants, the death of whose "firstborn of man and beast in one night" filled the land with wailing; but I had never set my feet on any spot from whence was visible so much stern, gloomy grandeur, heightened by the silence and solitude that reign around, but infinitely more by the awful and sacred associations of the first great revelation in form from God to man. I felt oppressed with the spirit that seemed to inhabit the holy place. I shall never sit down upon the summit of Sinai again, and look upon the silent and empty plains at its feet; but I went down from the mount a better man, determined so to live as to escape the terrible thunders at the last day, which once reverberated through these mountains, but have long since given way to the Gospel of peace. I could scarcely tear myself away from the hallowed summit, and wished that I too could linger here forty days in converse with the Lord. VOL. I.-N 146 SUKSAFEH THE TRUE SINAI. CHAPTER XV. SINAI. Suksafeh the True Sinai.-Tape-Measures better than Traditions.-Acknowledgments to Dr. Robinson.-Dr. Olin's independent Observations.No Place for Doubt.-Descent from the Mountain.-Garden of the Convent.-Activity of the Arab Boys.-The Rock of Moses in Horeb.-Impressions. Last Night in the Convent.-Departure. I HAVE before remarked that it was Dr. Robinson's able argument that induced us to visit the peak El-Suksafeh. Now that his views have been made public, it seems hardly possible that any sane man could visit the localities and doubt the accuracy of his conclusions. I am surprised, beyond measure, that any affect still to consider Gebel Mousa the true Mount Sinai. Yet in a very recent book of Travels* the following passage occurs: "I am still inclined to believe Gebel Mousa to be the Sinai on which the law was delivered: I am not willing to have the truth of these old traditions doubted, and their scenes transplanted. I do not think there is sufficient reason to dispute so long and firmlyestablished a tradition; for it appeared to me that there was enough room in the valley beneath, and the entrance of the wady which diverges from it, to accommodate the large numbers who were witnesses of the delivery of the law; and I have since heard from those who actually measured the level space at the base and in sight of Gebel Mousa, that the area is greater than that which El-Rahah would afford." As for the poetical associations that seem to have so * A Tour in Egypt, Arabia Petrea, and the Holy Land, in 1841-2, by Rev H. P. Measor, M.A. London, 1844. DR. OLIN'S INdependent OBSERVATIONS. 147 strong a hold upon this writer, I have nothing to say How much weight such a disposition adds to his testimony is another question. He seems to be one of those men in whose eyes tradition of any kind is a sacred thing; who close their own senses and strangle their own reason in obedience to the voice of authority, be it only ancient. Perhaps "those who have since measured the level space at the base," &c., are men of like spirit; and if so, we may account for their singular mensuration. A tape-measure is no rule for the gentlemen of this school; feet and inches count nothing against traditional cobwebs. Yet even tradition itself, while it fixes the sacred mount at the Sinai of the monks, has never pretended that the encampment was at its base on the southeast, but, in singular opposition to the tenour of the Scripture narrative, has placed it in the very valley El-Rahah itself. Having expressed freely my own acknowledgments to Dr. Robinson's great work, it is proper that I should state that Dr. Olin, who visited the East in 1839-40, came to the same conclusions with Dr. Robinson in regard to the position of the true Sinai, without having known of the results obtained by the latter traveller. The same dissatisfaction with the monkish Sinai that led Dr. Robinson, as it had Lord Lindsay and others before him, to reject its claims as unfounded, was felt by Dr. Olin; and very much the same observations and reasonings led both to fix upon Suksafeh as the true Mount of the Law. This independent judgment of two eminently sensible and wary observers confirms strongly the justice of the views which they have severally advanced. I must repeat what I have said in substance before, that I cannot but wonder that this discoveryfor such it is-should have been left for Dr. Robinson 148 ACTIVITY OF THE ARAB BOYS. or any other, after so many travellers have visited these sacred places. One would think that no extraordinary sagacity was requisite to work out a problem, the elements of which are so completely given in the Scriptural account, and in the natural features of the spot whose localities must satisfy the conditions of that account. Our own satisfaction, on looking down from the summit of Suksafeh, was complete and perfect. was not room for the shadow of a doubt. There At last we prepared to descend from the sacred mount. Two hours brought us to the garden wall of the convent, into which we gained access by means of a rope through a small door, some twenty feet from the ground, into the garden itself. It is not in a high state of cultivation, but yet seemed to us, in comparison with the desert world around, to be luxuriant and delightful beyond description. From the garden, a small iron door admitted us into a dark passage under the convent buildings, through which we passed into the open court. This garden entrance is the only way of access to the interior of the convent, except the window in the front wall already mentioned. These precautions were, and perhaps still are, necessary as a protection against the Arabs, none of whom are admitted within the building on any pretext. During our long rambles on the mountains, we had many opportunities of observing the address and activity of the Arab boys. They are mountain goats in agility. They would absolutely, without putting their hands to the rocks, walk up and down precipices where we could scarcely crawl on our hands and feet, or slide down in any way. One of them, but ten years of age, carried my cloak on his shoulder all day long; and another, still younger, named Mit, who measured just four |