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It was bathing at noonday in the chilly source of the Abana, "River of
Damascus," that gave me the cholera, so Dr. B. said. However, it
generally does give me the cholera to take a bath.
The incorrigible pilgrims have come in with their pockets full of
specimens broken from the ruins. I wish this vandalism could be stopped.
They broke off fragments from Noah's tomb; from the exquisite sculptures
of the temples of Baalbec; from the houses of Judas and Ananias, in
Damascus; from the tomb of Nimrod the Mighty Hunter in Jonesborough;
from
the worn Greek and Roman inscriptions set in the hoary walls of the
Castle of Banias; and now they have been hacking and chipping these old
arches here that Jesus looked upon in the flesh. Heaven protect the
Sepulchre when this tribe invades Jerusalem!
The ruins here are not very interesting. There are the massive walls of
a great square building that was once the citadel; there are many
ponderous old arches that are so smothered with debris that they barely
project above the ground; there are heavy-walled sewers through which the
crystal brook of which Jordan is born still runs; in the hill-side are
the substructions of a costly marble temple that Herod the Great built
here--patches of its handsome mosaic floors still remain; there is a
quaint old stone bridge that was here before Herod's time, may be;
scattered every where, in the paths and in the woods, are Corinthian
capitals, broken porphyry pillars, and little fragments of sculpture; and
up yonder in the precipice where the fountain gushes out, are well-worn
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