PART I. Apparent piety of the sailors. Jonah at and iron; and from India and the East came spices, and ivory, and ebony, and apes, and peacocks, as we read in the accounts of the Jewish and Phoenician merchant navies. By the aid of this theory, we can reconcile the Biblical statements as to the time occupied by these ships of Tarshish in their expeditions once in three years. Those trading with the far East, or with Ireland or England, might require that length of time to complete their sales and purchases, and to return home. How do you account for the very pious and becoming language used by these heathen sailors, and the humble and penitent deportment of the king of corrupt Nineveh ? There is nothing very strange in this to Orientals, or to one familiar with them. Such language is universal. No matter how profane, immoral, and even atheistical a man may be, yet will he, on all appropriate occasions, speak of God-the one God, our God--in phrases the most proper and pious. We Americans are abashed and confounded in the presence of such holy talkers, and have not courage, or rather, have too much reverence for sacred things, to follow them in their glib and heartless verbiage. The fact is, I suppose, that Oriental nations, although they sank into various forms of idolatry, never lost the phraseology of the pure original theosophy. We are struck with this in all the Bible histories in which these people have occasion to speak of God and his attributes. The Canaanites could talk as devoutly as Abraham, and Nebuchadnezzar with as much propriety as Daniel. And the same is wonderfully true at the present day. A hard old Druse of Lebanon would edify a Payson or a Martyn. Indeed there is nothing in which modern custom corresponds more completely with the ancient than in this pious talk. There is scarcely an expression of the kind we are considering which has not its perfect parallel in the daily living language in the people around us. Place an Arab in the circumstances in which these old heathen are represented as acting and speaking, and his expressions will be so similar, even to the very words and peculiar idioms, as to suggest the idea that they have been learned from the Bible. And yet this cannot be, because the remark applies, in all its extent, to the wild Bedawîn, in whose tribe there never has been a Bible, nor a man able to read it, had there been one. In regard to the profound impression produced by the preaching of Jonah in Nineveh, we must suppose that he was attended by such credentials of his prophetic office and mission as commanded attention and belief. What these credentials were we do not know. Jonah was a "sign to the men of Nineveh," Perhaps he carried with him, or there had preceded him, such well-authenticated proofs of his wonderful preservation in the whale's belly as deeply alarmed the Ninevites, on whose account, in an important and portentous sense, the miracle had been wrought. Nor is it difficult to discover how such reports could have been spread abroad. The sailors of the ship could testify that they threw Jonah overboard in a tempestuous sea; very likely they saw him swallowed by the great fish. They would therefore be immensely amazed VI. to find him on shore, alive and well. Such a thing would now make a prodigi- CHAPTER ous noise in the world, and the news of it would fly from city to city with incredible speed. There is no reason to doubt, therefore, that the story of the prophet had preceded him to Nineveh, and prepared the way for the success of his preaching. Was that company of horned ladies near Neby Yûnas a party of pilgrims to Hornsthe shrine of the prophet? horned ladies. Yes; Druse sits (princesses), from Deir el Kamar. It is no uncommon thing to meet them here, either making or paying vows. The objects in view are very various. Some, whose sorrow is like that of Samuel's mother, seek relief from Jonah; others vow in times of sickness, either of themselves or of their friends, and come to fulfil them upon recovery, etc. etc. Do you imagine that these horns, that stand upon their foreheads like tent-poles for their veils, have any connection with those so often mentioned in the Bible? No. These tantours have grown, like other horns, from small beginnings Tantours to their present énormous size by slow degrees, and pride is the soil that nourished them. At first they consisted merely of an apparatus designed to finish off the head-dress, so as to raise the veil a little from the face. Specimens of this primitive kind are still found in remote and semi-civilized districts. I have seen them only a few inches long, made of pasteboard, and even of common pottery. By degrees the more fashionable ladies used tin, and length PART 1. Excommunicated. To exalt the horn. Horns of altars. ened them; then rivalry made them of silver, and still farther prolonged and ornamented them; until finally the princesses of Lebanon and Hermon sported gold horns, decked with jewels, and so long that a servant had to spread the veil over them. But the day for these most preposterous appendages to the female head is about over. After the wars between the Maronites and Druses in 1841 and 1845, the Maronite clergy thundered their excommunications against them, and very few Christians now wear thein. Many even of the Druse ladies have cast them off, and the probability is that in a few years travellers will seek in vain for a horned lady. I do not suppose that horns like these were worn by the Jews, nor, indeed, by any nation of antiquity. So remarkable an article of dress, had it been in existence, would certainly have been noticed by authors who enter so minutely into such matters as many did. The horns in animals, where the Creator alone planted them, were their weapons of defence; and man, who lays all nature under tribute to enrich his store of images and figures, very early made it synonymous with power, and then for what that will always confer upon the possessor. To exalt the horn-an expression often occurring in the poetic and prophetic parts of the Bible-means to advance in power, honour, and dominion. To defile it in the dust, is a figure drawn from the condition of a dying ox or stag, who literally defiles his horn in dust mingled with his own blood. It is painfully significant of defeat, disgrace, and death, and for a prince like Job it was to be dishonoured and utterly overthrown.1 It is not certainly known why the corners of altars were finished off with horns. Several ideas may have been combined in this custom. These horns may have been intended to symbolize the majesty and power of the being in whose honour the altar was reared, and to whom the sacrifice was offered; or the hint may have been suggested by the horns of the victims to be slain. As altars early became sanctuaries, it was natural that the suppliant should lay hold of the horns. In fact, there was often nothing else about them which he could grasp with his hand. This natural, significant, and very expressive act is often mentioned in the Bible. Job xvi. 15. We have now another long, low cape, called Nukkar Jedrah, even more rocky than es S'adîat. Are these parallel lines of rough rock, some sixteen feet apart, the curb- Roman stones of Rome's far-famed roads? They are; and they do not give a favourable idea of these ancient highways. But they were probably covered over with some sort of composition, not unlike the crushed rock of our modern macadamized roads. I have seen specimens of this in good preservation. One of my fair friends in America charged me to bring her some memento from the grave of Lady Hester Stanhope. Is not her ladyship's last restingplace somewhere in this neighbourhood? On a mountain top, about three hours to the south-east of us; and, as there is nothing of interest along the regular road, we can visit it, if you have no objections to a smart scramble over these hills. highways Lead on. No path can be more abominable than this slippery pavement. We must first provide for lunch. No experienced traveller in this country will forget the commissary department. I must also direct Salîm to go on to the bridge over the Owely, and there prepare dinner. We shall be ready for it A mounabout three o'clock. Now take that path up the steep face of the mountain on the left, and you will have enough to do to manage yourself and your horse without the trouble of conversation. Well, this is rough enough, certainly, and desolate too,-fit only for goats and their keepers. I see Arab tents, however. Yes; and there are villages also, hidden away in the wadies, with vineyards, and olive-orchards, and fields for corn, which produce no mean crop. What bird is this which abounds so much on these mountains? tain path *This eccentric lady, the niece of the celebrated William Pitt, among the brilliant society of whose house she used to move as a queen, retired after his death to Syria, took up her abode at Dabr June, and spent the latter part of her life in the strange manner described in this chapter She died in 1839.-ED.] FART I. The lap It is the English pewit, or lapwing, called by the natives Now, and Bu-Teet, and I know not what besides. The first name is derived from the fact that the bird appears here only in the depth of winter-now being a cold winter storm. I have seen them coming down the coast in large flocks on the wings of the wild north wind. They then disperse over these mountains, and remain until early spring, when they entirely disappear. They roost on the ground wherever night overtakes them. I have frequently started them up from under the very feet of my frightened horse when riding in the dark, especially along the spurs of old Hermon, and in Wady et Teim, between the two Lebanons. They utter a loud scream when about to fly, which sounds like a prolonged teet, and hence the name Bu-Teet--father of teet. It is the dukephath of Moses, translated lapwing in our version, and I think correctly, notwithstanding what some recent writers advance against it. It was classed by Moses among the unclean birds, and is so regarded now by the Arabs, who refuse to eat it. The upper parts of the body and wings are of a dull slate colour, the under parts of both are white. It has a top-knot on the hinder part of the head, pointing backward like a horn; and when running about on the ground, it closely resembles a young hare. The crown, or top-knot, never expands, The hed like that of the hed-hood or hoopoe. This latter bird is also found in the country, and the Arabic translation of dûkephath is hed-hood, and many modern critics have adopted this opinion, but erroneously, as I think. The hed-hood is a small bird, good to eat, comparatively rare, and therefore not likely to have been mentioned at all by Moses, and still less to have been classed with the unclean. The Bu-Teet is large and striking, and appears in hood. |