ᏢᎪᎡᎢ

IV.

Tomb of Jehoshaphat.

Gethse

mane.

natives throw stones against and spit at it as they pass by. This tomb has been much broken on the north side, and an opening made into a small sepulchral chamber within the solid part of it.

Close to this monument, on the north-east, is the reputed Tomb of Jehoshaphat, and from it the valley may have taken this name. It has an ornamental portal in the perpendicular face of the rock, but the sepulchre is wholly subterranean, and in no way remarkable. I examined these monuments with special pleasure and interest, not because they really had any connection with the individuals whose names they bear, but because they remain very much as they were at the time of our Saviour. I know not whether there is a single edifice, or part of one, in Jerusalem, upon which his eye of compassion rested, when from this Olivet he beheld the city and wept over it; but these sepulchral monuments appear now just as they did then to Him, and he must have often seen, admired, and spoke of them.

From these tombs I went north to look at the subterranean Church and Sepulchre of St. Mary. It was closed, and so was the so-called Garden of Gethsemane, a short distance to the south-east of it, and I could only examine the outside wall.

The authenticity of this sacred garden Mr. Williams says he chooses rather to believe than to defend. I do not even choose to believe. When I first came to Jerusalem, and for many years afterward, this plot of ground was open to all, whenever they chose to come and meditate beneath its very old olivetrees. The Latins, however, have, within the last few years, succeeded in gaining sole possession; have built a high wall around it, plastered and whitewashed; and, by planting it with trees, seem disposed to make it like what they suppose it was when our Lord retired thither with his disciples on that mournful night of his "agony." Whatever may be thought of this idea, all travellers regret the exclusiveness which makes access difficult, and renders it impossible for most of them to visit the spot at all. The Greeks have invented another site a little north of it, and, of course, contend that they have the true Gethsemane. My own impression is that both are wrong. The position is too near the city, and so close to what must have always been the great thoroughfare eastward, that our Lord would scarcely have selected it for retirement on that dangerous and dismal night. In the broad recess north-east of the Church of Mary there must have been gardens far larger and more secluded; and, as we have before suggested, it is nearly certain that all the gardens around the city were thrown open, during the great feasts, for the accommodation of the pilgrims, so that he could select the one best adapted to the purpose for which he retired from the crowded city. I am inclined, therefore, to place the garden in the secluded vale several hundred yards to the north-east of the present Gethsemane, and hidden, as I hope for ever, from the idolatrous intrusion of all sects and denominations. The traditions in favour of the present location, however old, have but little weight, and fail to convince the mind; and there is no reason to think that a single tree, bush, or stone on either of these had

any connection with the mysterious agony of the Son of God, when "his sweat CHAPTER was, as it were, great drops of blood falling down to the ground."

gin.

XLI.

As to the Church and Sepulchre of the Virgin Mary, I have had more than Church of one opportunity to examine it. There is a descent of sixty steps to the church, the Virwhich, consequently, lies almost entirely under the bed of the Valley of Jehoshaphat. The steps, however, are partly outside and partly within the door which leads down to the body of the church. Seen from above, when this is lighted up, the church presents a most striking appearance. On the right of the descent are shown the chapel and tombs of Joachim and Anna; that of St. Joseph on the left; and toward the east of the church is the supposed tomb of Mary, bearing a general resemblance to the Holy Sepulchre, and probably modelled after its pattern. The various altars bear witness to the divisions of Christendom, and its joint occupation by the various countries contributes to perpetuate their miserable feuds; nor does the influence of Gethsemane, which is hard by, seem to allay their animosity, or to inculcate Christian charity. There are other sepulchres in and around Jerusalem which are well worth ex- Sepulamining. They are found in astonishing numbers along the south side of chres. Hinnom; and, indeed, almost everywhere within and without the city, where the accumulated rubbish is removed, these tombs are met with, generally hewn into the perpendicular faces of the rocks, made in quarrying for building stone. They are of all sizes and shapes. Some are merely single rock-graves; other are small rooms, entered by a door in front, and having two, three, or more niches for the bodies; others, again, are much more extensive—a sort of catacomb, room within and beyond room, each having several niches. The best examples of these are the Tombs of the Kings and those of the Judges. Tombs of Those of the kings are in the olive grove about half a mile north of the the Kings Damascus Gate, and a few rods east of the great road to Nablûs. A court is sunk in the solid rock about ninety feet square and twenty deep. On the west side of this court is a sort of portico, thirty-nine feet long, seventeen deep, and fifteen high. It was originally ornamented with grapes, garlands, and festoons, beautifully wrought on the cornice; and the columns in the centre, and the pilasters at the corners, appear to have resembled the Corinthian order. A very low door in the south end of the portico opens into the antechanıber-nineteen feet square, and seven or eight high. From this three passages conduct into other rooms, two of them, to the south, having five or six crypts. A passage also leads from the west room down several steps into a large vault running north, where are crypts parallel to the sides. These rooms are all cut in rock intensely hard, and the entrances were originally closed with stone doors, wrought with panels and hung on stone hinges, which are now all broken. The whole series of tombs indicates the hand of royalty and the leisure of years, but by whom and for whom they were made is a mere matter of conjecture. I know no good reason for ascribing them to Helena of Adiabene. Most travellers and writers are inclined to make them the sepulchres of the Asmonean kings.

Tombs of the

Judges.

room.

The Tombs of the Judges are about a mile north-west of those of the kings. The vestibule in front of them is highly ornamented, but after an entirely different pattern from those of the kings. It faces the west, and from it a door leads into a room about twenty feet square and eight feet high. On the north side are seven loculi, seven feet deep, prependicular to the side of the Above these are three arched recesses, two feet and a half deep, probably for the reception of sarcophagi. Perpendicular to these recesses, two long loculi penetrate the rock from the back part. Doors on the south and east conduct to small rooms, which have three long niches perpendicular to their three sides, the doors occupying the fourth. There is also an arched recess over the loculi in these rooms. From the north-east corner of the anteroom a flight of steps goes down into a small vestibule, neatly cut, and ornamented by recesses and a slightly-arched roof like a dome. A passage leads into another chamber further east, nine feet square and six high, each of whose three sides has an arched recess parallel to it, from the back of which perpendicular loculi enter into the rock. In some respects this is a more remarkable catacomb than that of the kings, and the arrangement is more

varied and complicated. Why the name, Tombs of the Judges, is given, no CHAPTER one can assign any plausible explanation. In all directions from this locality,

XLI.

but especially toward the city, the strata of the mountain have been cut and carved into perpendicular faces by ancient quarriers, and in them are innumerable tombs, of every variety of pattern. Indeed, the prodigious extent of these quarries and tombs is one of the most striking indications of a great city, and of a long succession of prosperous ages, which the environs of Jerusalem furnish.

of the

Prophets

The Tombs of the Prophets are here, near the southern summit of Olivet. I Tombs have never examined them with much care, but they are regarded as very mysterious excavations by antiquarians. Mr. Williams thus describes them : Through a long gallery, first serpentine and then direct, but winding as you advance, one passes into a circular hall, rising into a conical dome about twenty-four feet in diameter. From this hall run three passages, communicatting with two simicircular galleries connective with the hall, the outer one of which contains in its back wall numerous recesses for the corpses, radiating

1 For Interior View, see p. 107.

PART

IV.

Grotto of

toward the centre hall. No inscriptions or remains of any kind have been discovered to elucidate the mysteries of these mansions for the dead.

The so-called Grotto of Jeremiah is beneath the high tell of Ez Zahera, Jeremiah about forty rods to the north-east of the Damascus Gate. This tell, no doubt, once formed the termination of the ridge [of Acra ?], and the rock between it and the wall of the city has been quarried away. Nor will the magnitude of this work stumble any one who examines the vast subterranean quarries within and beneath the city, the opening to which is nearly south of Jeremiah's Cave. The high perpendicular cuttings which sustain the wall are directly opposite to similar cuttings over the cave, and each is about fifty feet high. The yawning Cavern of Jeremiah extends under the cliff about one hundred feet, and there are various buildings, graves, and sacred spots arranged irregularly about it, walled off, plastered, and whitewashed. Under the floor of the cavern are vast cisterns. Lighting our tapers, we descended about forty feet, into the deepest one. The roof is supported by huge square columns, and the whole, neatly plastered, is now used as a cistern. The water was pure, cold, and sweet. This place is in Moslem hands, but the keepers allowed us to explore every part of it at our leisure. In any other part of the world it would be considered a remarkable work, but here, in the vicinity of such excavations as undermine the whole ridge within the city, it dwindles into insignificance. There is no evidence to connect it in any way with Jeremiah, and no modern theory has sufficient probability to claim attention.

Excava

tions under

ridge.

The excavations under the ridge which extends from the north-west corner of the Temple area to the north wall of the city are most extraordinary. I spent a large part of this forenoon examining them with a company of friends from the city. Passing out at the Damascus Gate, we ascended the hill of rubbish east of it, and just under the high precipice over which the wall is carried, we crept, or rather backed through a narrow opening, and, letting ourselves down some five feet on the inside, we stood within the cavern. Lighting our candles, we began to explore. For some distance the descent south ward was rapid, down a vast bed of soft earth. Pausing to take breath and look about, I was surprised at the immense dimensions of the room. The roof of rock is about thirty feet high, even above the huge heaps of rubbish, and is sustained by large, shapeless columns of the original rock, left for that purpose by the quarriers, I suppose. On we went, down, down, from one depth to a lower, wandering now this, now that way, and ever in danger of getting lost, or of falling over some of the many precipices into the yawning darkness beneath. In some places we climbed with difficulty over large masses of rock, which appear to have been shaken down from the roof, and suggest to the nervous the possibility of being ground to powder by similar masses which hang overhead. In other parts our progress was arrested by pyramids of rubbish which had fallen from above, through apertures in the vault, either natural or artificial. We found water trickling down in several places, and in one there was a small natural pool full to the brim. This trickling water has covered