CHURCH OF ST. GEORGE.

105

mains of this edifice without being struck with the air of grandeur which it bears, and deeply impressed by its long and eventful history. The material of which it was built is a hard yellowish limestone, that takes a fine polish and is very durable,

Lieutenant Conder, of the Palestine Exploration Fund, remarks that "This church is an instance of the rapid demolition of many such edifices in Palestine. When visited by M. du Vogüé the south apse was

CHURCH OF ST. GEORGE.

quite perfect; but now that it has

been restored by the Greeks, and

a modern church made out of the first two bays of the nave and north aisle, the southern one has been quite destroyed, and I did not remark any traces of its apse." Lieutenant Conder found in the mosk a pier and pillar belonging to the south aisle, and he supposes that the total length of the edifice was within one hun

dred and thirty or one hundred and fifty feet, and the breadth about eighty feet. The date of the present ruins, he thinks, may be some time in the twelfth century.

Ludd is a flourishing village of some two thousand inhabitants, embosomed in groves of olive, fig, pomegranate, mulberry, palm, sycamore, and other trees, and surrounded every way by a very fertile neighborhood. The inhabitants are evidently industrious and thriving, and the country between this and Ramleh is being occupied by their flourishing orchards. Rarely have I beheld a rural scene more delightful than this presented when I rode from Ramleh hither through the fields in early harvest-time. A thousand reapers and gleaners were abroad and busy when the morning sun shot his first rays down through the olive-trees, which half hid, half revealed the merry harvesters-men, women, and children—the first reaping, the second gleaning, and the children at play, or watching the flocks and herds, which were allowed to follow the gleaners. But no description can reproduce such a tableau.

Like most other towns in this country, Ludd has seen better days, and that, too, in times not very remote. There are remains. of large and well-constructed buildings mingled in with the modern huts, and several extensive soap factories are now also deserted and falling to decay. These times of recent prosperity were probably when Jaffa was abandoned on account of the pirates, for in those days the trade of Syria and Palestine was carried on over land. Large caravans came from Aleppo through the Bŭkâ'a and Wady et Teim; from Bagdad and Damascus across the Jaulan, by Jisr Benat Ya'kôb; and from the Hauran by Beisan; all meeting near Lejjun, the ancient Megiddo, passing down by Antipatris to Ludd, and thence to Ramleh, Gaza, and Egypt. That was the time when the long lines of khâns, caravanserais, and castles were needed and maintained. But no sooner did the sea, freed from pirates, offer a cheaper mode of conveyance than this entire system was abandoned, and commerce sought the nearest ports along the coast to its destination. Hence all these khâns have gone to ruin, and those great highways are deserted. Many other towns besides Ludd and Ramleh have lost by this change of route, and the cities on the coast have gained in equal if not greater proportion.

WOMEN GRINDING AT THE MILL.

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Let us ride through the village to get a better idea of a place which has figured so largely in Jewish, Macedonian, Roman, Saracenic, Frank, Arab, and Turkish dynasties.

This little circuit has afforded me a beautiful illustration of Script

meant by the preacher when he says, "The grinders cease because they are few the sound of the grinding is low."" Jeremiah also saddens his picture of Israel's desolation by Nebuchadnezzar with

Eccles. xii. 3, 4.