A hundred paces from the arch of the Ecce Homo, I was shown on the left the ruins of a church formerly dedicated to Our Lady of Grief. It was on this spot that Mary, who had been at first driven away by the guards, met her son bending beneath the weight of the cross. This circumstance is not recorded by the Evangelists; but it is generally believed, on the authority of St. Boniface, and St. Anselm. The former says, that the Virgin sunk to the ground as if lifeless, and could not utter a single word:-nec verbum dicere potuit. St. Anselm asserts that Christ saluted her in these words: Salve, Mater! As John relates that Mary was at the foot of the cross, this account of the fathers is highly probable. Religion is not disposed to reject these traditions, which show how profoundly the wonderful and sublime history of the passion is engraven on the memory of man. Eighteen centuries of persecutions without end, of incessant revolutions, of continually increasing ruins, have not been able to erase or hide the traces of a mother going to weep over her son.

Fifty paces farther we came to the spot where Simon, the Cyrenean, assisted Jesus to bear his cross." And as they led him away, they laid hold upon one Simon, a Cyrenean, coming out of the country, and on him they laid the cross, that he might bear it after Jesus.”*

Here the road, which before ran east and west, makes an angle, and turns to the north. I saw on the right the place where dwelt the indigent Lazarus, and on the opposite side of the street, the residence of the obdurate rich man. "There was a certain rich man who was clothed in purple, and fine linen, and fared sumptuously every day. And there was a certain beggar, named Lazarus, which was laid at his gate full of sores, and desiring to be fed with the crumbs which fell from the rich man's table: moreover, the dogs came and licked his sores. And it came to pass, that the beggar died, and was carried by the angels into Abraham's bosom: the rich man also died, and was buried. And in hell he lift up his eyes, being in great torments."+

St. Chrysostom, St. Ambrose, and St. Cyril, have looked upon the history of Lazarus and the rich man as not merely a parable, but a real and well known fact. The Jews themselves have preserved the name of the rich man, whom they call Nabal.

Having passed the house of the rich man, you turn to the right, and again proceed in a westerly direction. At the entrance of the street, which leads up to Calvary, Christ was met by the holy women, who deplored his fate"And there followed him a great company of people, and of women, which also bewailed and lamented him. But Jesus turning unto them, said: Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for me, but weep for yourselves and for your chil dren."+

One hundred and ten paces farther is shown the site of the house of Veronica, and the spot where that pious woman wiped the face of the Lord. The original name of this female was Berenice: by the transposition of two † Luke xvi. 19-23. + Luke xxiii. 27, 28.

* Luke xxiii. 26.

letters, it was afterwards altered into Vera-icon, true image; besides, the change of b into v is very frequent in the ancient languages.

Proceeding about another hundred paces, you come to the Judicial Gate, by which criminals were led to be executed on Golgotha. That hill now enclosed within the new city, was without the walls of ancient Jerusalem.

The distance from the Judicial Gate to the summit of Calvary, is about two hundred paces. Here terminates the Via Dolorosa, which may be in the whole about a mile in length. We have seen that Calvary is at present com. prised in the church of the Holy Sepulchre. If those who read the history of the passion in the gospels are overcome with sacred melancholy and profound admiration, what must be his feelings who traces the scenes themselves at the foot of Mount Sion, in sight of the temple, and within the very walls of Jerusalem?

After this description of the Via Dolorosa, and the church of the Holy Sepulchre, I shall say very little concerning the other places of devotion in the city. I shall merely enumerate them in the order in which they were visited by me during my stay at Jerusalem.

1. The house of Anna, the priest, near David's Gate, at the foot of Mount Sion, within the wall of the city. The Armenians possess the church erected on the ruins of this house.

2. The place where our Saviour appeared to Mary Magdalen. Mary, the mother of James, and Mary Salome, between the castle and the gate of Mount Sion.

3. The house of Simon the Pharisee, where Magdalen confessed her sins. Here, in the eastern part of the city, is a church totally in ruins.

4. The monastery of St. Anne, the mother of the Blessed Virgin, and the grotto of the immaculate conception, under the church of the monastery. This convent has been turned into a mosque, but admission may be obtained for a trifling sum...

5. The prison of St. Peter, near Calvary. This consists of nothing but old walls, in which are yet shown some iron staples.

6. Zebedee's house, situated very near St. Peter's prison; now a spacious church belonging to the Greek patriarch.

7. The house of Mary, the mother of John Mark, where St. Peter took re fuge when he had been set at liberty by the angel. It is a church, the duty of which is performed by the Syrians.

8. The place of the martyrdom of St. James the Great. This is the Armenian convent, the church of which is very rich and elegant. Of the Armenian patriarch I shall speak hereafter.

The reader has now before him a complete view of the Christian monuments in Jerusalem. Let us now visit the exterior of the holy city.

It took me two hours to get through the Via Dolorosa on foot. I made a point of daily revisiting this sacred road as well as the church of Calvary, that no essential circumstance might escape my memory. It was, therefore, two

o'clock on the 7th of October, when I finished my first survey of the holy places. I then mounted my horse with Ali Aga, the drogman, Michael and my servants. We went out by the gate of Jaffa, to make the complete circuit of Jerusalem. We were abundantly provided with arms, dressed in the French fashion, and fully determined not to submit to any insult. Thanks to the renown of our victories, the times are greatly altered; for, during the reign of Louis XIII, his ambassador, Deshayes, had the greatest difficulty in the world to obain permission to enter Jerusalem with his sword.

Turning to the left as soon as we had passed the gate, we proceeded southward, and passed the Pool of Beersheba, a broad, deep ditch, but without water; and then ascended Mount Sion, part of which is now without the city.

The name of Sion doubtless awakens grand ideas in the mind of the reader, who is curious to hear something concerning this mount, so mysterious in Scripture, so highly celebrated in Solomon's Song-this mount, the subject of the benedictions or of the tears of the prophets, and whose misfortunes have been sung by Racine.

This hill, of a yellowish colour and barren appearance, opens in form of a crescent towards Jerusalem, is about as high as Montmartre at Paris, but rounder at the top. This sacred summit is distinguished by three monuments, or more properly by three ruins: the house of Caiaphas, the place where Christ celebrated his last supper, and the tomb or palace of David. From the top of the hill you see, to the south, the valley of Ben-Hinnon; beyond this the Field of Blood, purchased with the thirty pieces of silver given to Judas, the Hill of Evil Counsel, the tombs of the Judges, and the whole desert towards Hebron and Bethlehem. To the north, the wall of Jerusalem, which passes over the top of Sion, intercepts the view of the city, the site of which gradually slopes from this place towards the valley of Jehoshaphat.

The residence of Caiaphas is now a church, the duty of which is performed by the Armenians. David's tomb is a small vaulted room, containing three sepulchres of dark-coloured stone; and on the spot where Christ held his last supper, stands a mosque and a Turkish hospital, formerly a church and monastery occupied by the fathers of the Holy Land. This last sanctuary is equally celebrated in the Old and in the New Testament. Here David built himself a palace and a tomb; here he kept for three months the ark of the covenant; here Christ held his last passover, and instituted the sacrament of the Eucharist; here he appeared to his disciples on the day of his resurrection; and here the Holy Ghost descended on the apostles. The place hallowed by the last supper was transformed into the first Christian temple the world ever beheld, where St. James the Less was consecrated the first Christian bishop of Jerusalem, and St. Peter held the first council of the church. Finally, it was from this spot that the apostles, in compliance with the injunction, to go and teach all nations, departed without purse and without scrip, to seat their religion upon all the thrones of the earth.

Having descended Mount Sion, on the east side, we came at its foot, to the fountain and pool of Siloe, where Christ restored sight to the blind man. The spring issues from a rock, and runs in a silent stream, according to the testimony of Jeremiah, which is contradicted by a passage of St. Jerome. It has a kind of ebb and flood, sometimes discharging its current like the fountain of Vaucluse, at others retaining and scarcely suffering it to run at all. The Levites sprinkled the water of Siloe on the altar at the feast of Tabernacles, singing, Haurietis aquas in gaudio de fontibus Salvatoris. Milton mentions this spring, instead of Castalia's fount, in the beautiful invocation with which his poem opens:

-Heav'nly Muse, that on the secret top

Of Oreb or of Sinai didst inspire

That shepherd who first taught the chosen seed
In the beginning how the heav'ns and earth

Rose out of chaos; or if Sion hill

Delight thee more, and Siloa's brook that flow'd
Fast by the oracle of God; I thence

Invoke thy aid to my advent'rous song.

Some relate that this spring suddenly issued from the ground to allay the thirst of Isaiah when the prophet was sawed in two with a wooden saw by the command of Manasses; while others assert that it first appeared during the reign of Hezekiah, by whom we have the admirable song, beginning: I said in the cutting off of my days I shall go to the gates of the grave.”

According to Josephus, this miraculous spring flowed for the army of Titus, and refused its waters to the guilty Jews. The pool, or rather the two pools of the same name are quite close to the spring. They are still used for washing linen as formerly; and we there saw women, who ran away abusing us. The water of the spring is brackish, and has a very disagreeable taste; people still bathe their eyes with it, in memory of the miracle performed on the man born blind.

Near this spring is shown the spot where Isaiah was put to death, in the manner above mentioned. Here you also find a village called Siloan; at the foot of this village is another fountain, denominated in Scripture, Rogel. Opposite to this fountain is a third, which receives its name from the Blessed Virgin. It is conjectured that Mary came hither to fetch water, as the daughters of Laban resorted to the well from which Jacob removed the stone. The Virgin's fountain mingles its stream with that of the fountain of Siloe.

Here, as St Jerome remarks, you are at the foot of Mount Moria, under the walls of the Temple, and nearly opposite to the Sterquilinarian Gate. We advanced to the eastern angle of the wall of the city, and entered the valley of Jehoshaphat. It runs from north to south between the Mount of Olives, and Mount Moria; and the brook Cedron flows through the middle of it. This stream is dry the greatest part of the year, but after storms, or in raipy springs. a current of a red colour rolls along its channel.

The valley of Jehoshaphat exhibits a desolate appearance: the west side is a high chalk cliff, supporting the walls of the city, above which you perceive Jerusalem itself; while the east side is formed by the Mount of Olives and the Mount of Offence, Mons Offensionis, thus denominated from Solomon's idolatry. These two contiguous hills are nearly naked, and of a dull red colour. On their desolate sides are seen here and there a few black and parched vines, some groves of wild-olive-trees, wastes covered with hysop, chapels, oratories, and mosques in ruins. At the bottom of the valley you discover a bridge of a single arch, thrown across the channel of the brook Cedron. The stones in the Jews' cemetery look like a heap of rubbish at the foot of the Mount of Offence, below the Arabian village of Siloan, the paltry houses of which can scarcely be distinguished from the surrounding sepulchres. Three antique monuments, the tombs of Zachariah, Jehoshaphat, and Absalom, appear conspicuous amid this scene of desolation. From the dullness of Jerusalem, whence no smoke rises, no noise proceeds; from the solitude of these hills, where no living creature is to be seen; from the ruinous state of these tombs, overthrown, broken, and half open, you would imagine that the last trump had already sounded, and that the valley of Jehoshaphat was about to render up its dead.

On the brink and near the source of Cedron, we entered the garden of Olivet. It belongs to the Latin fathers, who purchased it at their own expense, and contains eight large and extremely ancient olive-trees. The olive may be said to be immortal, since a fresh tree springs up from the old stump. In the citadel of Athens was preserved an olive-tree, whose origin dated as far back as the foundation of the city. Those in the garden of Olivet at Jerusalem, ́are, at least, of the time of the Eastern Empire, as is demonstrated by the following circumstance. In Turkey, every olive-tree found standing by the Musselmans when they conquered Asia, pays one medine to the treasury; while each of those planted since the conquest is taxed half its produce by the Grand Signior. Now the eight olive-trees of which we are speaking are charged only eight medines.

At the entrance of this garden we alighted from our horses, and proceed. ed on foot to the stations of the Mount. The village of Gethsemane was at some distance from the garden of Olivet. It is at present confounded with this garden, according to the remark of Thevenot and Roger. The first place we visited was the sepulchre of the Virgin Mary: it it a subterraneous church, to which you descend by a handsome flight of fifty steps; it is shared by all the Christian sects, nay, even the Turks have an oratory in this place, but the Catholics possess the tomb of the Virgin. Though Mary did not die at Jerusalem, yet, according to the opinion of several of the fathers, she was miraculously buried at Gethsemane by the apostles. Euthymius relates the history of this marvellous funeral. St. Thomas having caused the coffin to be opened, nothing was found in it but a virgin robe, the simple and mean garment of that queen of glory, whom the angels had conveyed to heayen.