DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.12665#0274
258
INCIDENTS OF TRAVEL.
commotion among the barren mountains around it.
I had waited two or three days at the request of
the governor ; but hearing of nothing in particular
to prevent me, I determined to set out. The Si-
cilian priest who had proposed to accompany me
could not go ; and at about eight o'clock I was sit-
ting on my horse alone, outside the St. Stephen's
Gate, waiting for Paul, who had gone to the gov-
ernor for a letter which he had promised me to the
aga of Jericho. Attracted by the uncommon
beauty of the morning, half the population of Jeru-
salem had already gathered without the walls.
Joining a party of pilgrims, J followed once more the
path I had so often trodden across the Brook Kedron
and the Valley of Jehoshaphat; and, parting with
them at the foot of the Mount of Olives, I wound
around its base, and fell into the road to Jericho
and the Jordan. We must have passed Bethpage,
though there is nothing to mark where it stood ;
and in about an hour we came to Bethany, now a
ruined Arab village, though the monks still show
the house of Martha and Mary, the tomb of Laza-
rus, and even the barren fig-tree which was cursed
by our Lord. The tomb of Lazarus is a large ex-
cavation in the rock ; and the sepulchral chamber
is at the foot of a staircase of ten or twelve steps.
Not far from Bethany we came to a fountain
enclosed with marble, and soon after to a valley,
where, the monks say, our Saviour, in coming
from beyond the Jordan, at the prayer of the sis-
ters of Lazarus, reposed with the disciples. In
about two hours we were among the mountains.
INCIDENTS OF TRAVEL.
commotion among the barren mountains around it.
I had waited two or three days at the request of
the governor ; but hearing of nothing in particular
to prevent me, I determined to set out. The Si-
cilian priest who had proposed to accompany me
could not go ; and at about eight o'clock I was sit-
ting on my horse alone, outside the St. Stephen's
Gate, waiting for Paul, who had gone to the gov-
ernor for a letter which he had promised me to the
aga of Jericho. Attracted by the uncommon
beauty of the morning, half the population of Jeru-
salem had already gathered without the walls.
Joining a party of pilgrims, J followed once more the
path I had so often trodden across the Brook Kedron
and the Valley of Jehoshaphat; and, parting with
them at the foot of the Mount of Olives, I wound
around its base, and fell into the road to Jericho
and the Jordan. We must have passed Bethpage,
though there is nothing to mark where it stood ;
and in about an hour we came to Bethany, now a
ruined Arab village, though the monks still show
the house of Martha and Mary, the tomb of Laza-
rus, and even the barren fig-tree which was cursed
by our Lord. The tomb of Lazarus is a large ex-
cavation in the rock ; and the sepulchral chamber
is at the foot of a staircase of ten or twelve steps.
Not far from Bethany we came to a fountain
enclosed with marble, and soon after to a valley,
where, the monks say, our Saviour, in coming
from beyond the Jordan, at the prayer of the sis-
ters of Lazarus, reposed with the disciples. In
about two hours we were among the mountains.