CHAPTER XXX. STRANGE HOLY LAND LIFE. THE sinful Jericho and saintly Mar Saba yet remained to be seen at the finish of our third day's encampment in the valley of the Jordan. We take the hut-like village of what Elias called "all bad people" on the way to the rock-cut monastic castle. In thus giving the sinners precedence of the saints in our visits we take things properly, for philosphic as well as for topographical reasons. Poor raddled vice has but a short time of it in the world compared with self-preserving virtue, which, being of eternal qualities, can well wait. Jericho the vicious, or what now occupies its site, and called Riha, had been before us for days and nights where Jericho in some shape had stood from the days of Abraham. We had, however, looked upon the necessary visit as coldly as upon a call on poor relations, and so postponed it. sense. Now that it had to be done, we were still quite tardy about it, and stayed attending to the calls of the Dead Searash-polishing thereby with our backs the several tent-poles, as being what lawyers call " easements." The wretched old place that Jericho appeared to be was unattractive to every We knew by experience of Jerusalem and Bethany how many senses were likely to be offended there. We did not wish to add, either, to our cutaneous trouble, and to go into Jericho was to do so beyond doubt. It was likely we should want a tent-pole apiece on our return, or may be one of the potsherds with which Job scraped himself for similar ailment. A surprise awaited us, however. The inhabitants of Jericho had noticed our tents, and also that we had not visited them. Noticing things constitutes all their apparent employment, as we afterwards found. They spend a life of observation and reflection, varied by a search for vermin. In this last occupation they have not far to seek. It would otherwise most likely be given up by them, as are all other useful industries. As we went not to them a deputation of the citizens most presentable had been determined upon, which now came up, introduced by our sheik, who, during the interview and subsequent performances of the troupe, officiated in the fashion of the "chorus" to a Grecian play. The deputation turned out to consist wholly of females. It was not possible, however, to say at first of what sex they were from their personal appearance and style of dress. The most noticeable thing about them was, next to their ugliness and dirty look, their blue-coloured lips and tattooed chins. The dress was of but one article-a tattered gaberdine, that had once been blue, and was partly twisted around the waist, and where not so used a girdle of entwined grass supplied its place. One of these unprepossessing women carried a sword-used as a theatrical "property," as it afterwards appeared. They introduced themselves by standing in a row, and bowing three times. The sheik then explained that they were about to give us a dance. It scarcely seemed the thing for a forenoon entertainment, but suited our lazy humour that morning, and afforded further time for that polishing of the tent-poles that had now become our chief exercise. The "corroborree" was then begun, and lasted for half an hour. There was no accompaniment to it, save that made by the vocal efforts of the dancers. There was more of hoarseness than music perceptible in that, and viewed as a drawing-room entertainment the affair was a failure. We wanted Elias to translate the shouts to which the steps taken were timed, and by the help of Antoine, the cook, I got it down in writing, and was assured that I pronounced it rightly. Spelling it as pronounced, it was "Nackerley Aho!" -only that, and nothing more. The variations played upon it in modulations of voice, from a whisper and a squeak to a shout and a roar, made all the more of it. The performance was not encored. We learned that the expression we so heard and copied had reference to some botheration caused by insects, and was the Arabic original of the American "Shoo-fly." Those two words of the dancers, with the additional ones of "Neharac syade," which is Arabic for "Good morning," constituted, I think, all that we learnt of the language. We made it, however, go a wonderfully long way. With our Americans, one or the other form of words henceforth answered the appeals for "backsheesh" that we had to listen to a dozen times a day. Hitherto we had had to pass the outstretched hands without a word of sympathy, for lack of language; but now a polite greeting was satisfactorily substituted-satisfactory to us, at all events. Charity depends upon one's means and feelings, but politeness costs nothing. It was fortunate that either of the two expressions suited just as well. A neat intimation not to bother one was as satisfying as the good-morning greeting. The troupe now sat around, while one of them went through a wild dance with the property sword. It was used in every conceivable way for which it was never intended. She danced above it, in Scotch fashion, as it lay upon the ground, and under it as held in either hand, and sometimes both, over her head, and around it as held in one hand, and then inside its circle as she passed it from hand to hand with great rapidity. It was occasionally thrown up in the air, but always cleverly caught, and then flourished in triumph. It was a style of thing that should properly have been done by a man, and not by one of the sex more accustomed to fans than swords; but the folks of Jericho are like to the French in leaving much work to the women. With this sword performance the entertainment ended-Elias distributing the backsheesh, which was, of course, "the Memories of Jericho. 393 be all and the end all" of that business, as it is of most others. As illustrating prophecy and applying to this dance, one of our party has happened upon the 13th chapter of Isaiah, in which the curse upon Babylon is likened to that passed upon the cities of that plain on which we now look. He reads the 19th verse-" It shall never be inhabited, neither shall the Arabian pitch tent there nor shepherds make their fold there. Wild beasts of the desert shall be there, and their houses shall be full of doleful creatures, and fowls shall dwell there and satyrs shall dance there." Elias wants us to start for Jericho with the returning troupe as an escort, but they were as objectionable for company as were Falstaff's regiment of his own raising-and for similar reasons. When they had got out of sight, however, we started for their wretched village, that we might see nearer, and therefore more unpleasantly, what now represents the cities which have stood upon its site, and tread ground so memorable in Biblical story. As what is before us is so little worth looking at, we let our mind's eye wander on the way to what has gone before, and in which all the interest of Jericho lies. The valley we are crossing is that one upon which the Israelites looked down, after their wilderness wanderings, from yonder mountains of Moab. To this place Joshua, in whose book we read the story, despatched the spies from the other side Jordan whom Rahab so well received and counselled. Elias tells us that he will show us where her house stood, but we don't seem anxious about it. From the good report of these spies the Israelites came over, and made that singular siege, by seven circuits of the city, and that blowing of trumpets and shouting at which the city walls fell, and the invaders took possession. Joshua put a curse against the rebuilding of Jericho, that retarded its restoration for five hundred years. It threatened the builder with the loss of his whole family, which is said to have happened to Hiel, of Bethel, who rebuilt it. It was here that Herod, greatest of the name, had a palace, an amphitheatre, and other notable buildings, and here he died. The general mourning that he desired to be made at his decease would not, he feared, be a genuine one. He determined, however, to make it so by imprisoning his nobility and directing their death concurrently with his own. As he died in the happy hope of the execution of his orders, and as they were never carried out, all parties were equally pleased. He is only one of some millions who have died, and will die, deludedly happy about the effect of their testamentary directions. In that second Jericho which the New Testament speaks of, stood the house of Zaccheus, said to be now marked by the still standing wall and tower, in which was performed the miracle of giving sight to the blind told of by St. Luke. The city continued in Roman possession until the time of the Turkish conquest, after which general decay seems to have set in there, as elsewhere all over the land. Syria's sun may be said to have then set, her day closed, and her part and lot in the world became henceforth, as now, only the memories of a great past. We think of some lines of a modern poet, in which she sketches a picture of desertion, desolation, and death— "And let the doors ajar remain, In case he should pass by anon : The spinning of Syria was then done and ended, and all the wheels were stilled. The doors remained ajar until they fell from their hinges, and the deserted wheels fell with them. Those that, like ourselves, "pass by anon," see it all. The Crusaders, to their credit, made an effort to resuscitate the dead place, by introducing the plantation of sugar-cane hereabout, during some of their eight crusades and years of occupation. When their day was over, and Turkish power again became as it continues, dominant, no cultivators were |