VIEW OF MOUNT CARMEL-ACRE. 311 lower down the slope. We encamped by full moonlight, with many camels and flocks all sleeping round. In the tent, we felt again called to peculiar thankfulness, and all the more on account of the painful uncertainty of our minds regarding the fate of poor Antonio. There seemed great force in the words of the Psalm, "Keep me, O Lord, from the hands of the wicked; preserve me from the man of violent deeds."* (July 18.) We struck our tents by sunrise, and pressed on toward Acre, now in sight. From the height, we obtained the finest view of the whole extent of Mount Carmel which we had yet seen. An intervening swel hid the river Kishon, but the fine range of Carmel stretching eight miles into the country, rising higher as it recedes from the sea, the monastery on the northern point, the white walls of Khaifa at its foot, the Bay of Acre between us and it, and the blue Mediterranean beyond, were all gleaming in the morning sun. There are many mounds of earth in the plain of Acre, apparently artificial, cast up probably in crusading times, and used in war. The plain itself is said to be eighteen miles in length and six in breadth, beautiful and well watered. We crossed the dry bed of a stream, which flows into the sea a little way south of Acre. This is the ancient Belus or Sihor-Libnah, that is, "Sihor of the white promontory." The Palus Cendovia in which it rises, is said to be found six miles in the interior. In another part of the channel, nearer the sea, we found the water flowing in it. Before entering Acre, we passed through a large encampment of the Pasha's troops. The tents were all arranged in military order, but the men seemed to be under little discipline. Entering the gate of Acre, we proceeded through the crowded and well-furnished bazaar. Every where soldiers were parading the narrow streets, and it seemed to be the most lively eastern town we had yet visited. The fortifications of Acre appeared to us by no means very formidable, although there were many strong forts and other buildings. No doubt, its walls and towers must have been much stronger in former days, and its remarkable situation, as the key of this part of the land, has ever made it a post defended and attacked with desperate obstinacy. We were conducted to the Latin Convent, as the best 4 .Ps. cxl איש חמסים 312 place for refreshment; and as we had hitherto seen al most nothing of the monks of Palestine, we were not unwilling for once to pay a visit to their secret recesses. Our visit to them was not like that of Paul to the Christians of Ptolemais, when he "saluted the brethren, and abode with them one day."* The main object of the visit, on either side, was that of giving and receiving a traveller's fare. No price is exacted, but the visitor is expected to leave behind an adequate remuneration for the provision furnished. The monks we found to be coarse men, with no appearance of seriousness, or even of learning. The news of the day seemed to form the whole of their conversation. We were led into a large hall, with a plain wooden table and benches round. Here half a dozen of the fraternity sat down with us, while two of them served. One repeated a Latin grace in a coarse irreverent manner, and then many dishes of solid food, fowls, meat, and vegetables, were brought in on a large board and handed round. The polite invitation to take our place at the table was, “Favorisca noi" ("Do us the favour"). After dinner, one of their number left us to embark in a vessel that was to take him to the convent on Mount Carmel; the rest sat with us a while, and talked over our providential escape from the Bedouins. LATIN CONVENT-MONKS-ESCAPE OF ANTONIO. Meanwhile, to our great joy, our servant Antonio made his appearance. The story of his adventure was very much what we had suspected. Having gone back to Sephourieh in search of the cloak, and not finding it, he rode quickly after us in order to regain our company. But meeting a woman on the road of whom he inquired the way, he was directed to a route different from that which we had taken. He had entered the valley at the very time when we were waiting for him at the old khan, and had not proceeded far, when six or eight Bedouin Arabs, fully armed and mounted on horseback, rushed out upon him. They demanded who he waswhat he was doing there-where he was going-and where his company were. Antonio forged a story in reply, saying, that he was servant to a scribe, who had gone on before with a company of twelve men, and would be out of their reach. The Arabs said that he must come with them; and immediately with their long lances pricked his horse up to the hills. When they had got him out of sight of the road, they tied him hand * Acts xxi. 7. ESCAPE OF ANTONIO-RESPONSIVE SONG. 313 and foot and led away his horse, after asking such questions as, "Can it stop suddenly in the midst of a gallop!" They then stripped him of every article of dress, and one brought out a large club stuck with nails, threatening to beat him to death; but he entreated them to spare him, crying out, that he had given them every thing, and that his death would do them no good. At length they left him bound in this state, till the sun went down. While all this was going on, we had passed in the valley below; and the fact of their attention being occupied with our poor servant, was thus in the hand of Providence the means of our preservation. After sunset they came and loosed him, and led him a little way further up among the hills, that he might not soon be able to find his way to the public road, and give information against them. Then bidding him find his way home, they left him. The poor lad, in a state of nakedness, sat all night upon a tree to escape the wild beasts. He said that his face and upper part of his body were as if bathed in water, the perspiration pouring down in streams from the effects of fear. From the same cause, his mouth was filled with bile, and his voice almost inaudible. As soon as the light of morning dawned, he came down from the tree, and found out the road to Acre. The first person he met was the Pasha's dromedary post, who gave him a small piece of clothing,-and then he reached a village where the people supplied him with more. After this he made out his way to Acre, and sought for us at the convent, where he found us to his unfeigned joy and ours. We could not but perceive the special providence of God in our escape, and again we had reason to sing as at Mount Tabor, "Our soul is escaped as a bird out of the snare of the fowlers; the snare is broken and we are escaped." Even the monks seemed to acknowledge the hand of God in it. At night, we heard Antonio and the other servants of our company, singing a song of vengeance on the robbers. It was in the style of those songs we had usually heard from Arabs, a single voice leading, and then a chorus responding, with clapping of hands. It was to this effect Single voice-"The curse of Allah rest!" Single voice-"The sword of Allah come!" 314 ACRE-VICE-CONSUL-AGA-SYNAGOGUE. In style, this resembled Psalm cxxxvi, though in senti ment it was the reverse of its strain of thankful love. We visited the English Vice-Consul, Mr. Finch, an intelligent Jew, who speaks German, Italian, and a little English. He showed us every attention, and when we told him the whole matter, his remark was, "that surely we were upon God's errand; otherwise God would not so protect us." He conducted us to the Governor, or Aga, a mild, placid old man, with an immense turban, and long beard, seated in state upon a carpet in one corner of his chamber. Taking off our shoes at the door,* we sat down on the floor, and related our story, Mr. Calman and Antonio being the narrators. He caused his secretary to write it down, and promised to send twenty soldiers to the Wady Abilene to find out the robbers. Probably, he thought no more of the matter after we had left him. While we were in the court, a poor man came in to complain that his garden had been plundered by the Arabs. The days are not come when "violence shall no more be heard in thy land."+ We were anxious to visit the Jews of Acre. Meeting one in the bazaar, we invited him to partake with us of some melons with which we were refreshing ourselves. He consented, and three others soon joined us. They then led us to their synagogue, a very humble one, with a short inscription on a pane of glass above the door. About a dozen Jews gathered round, one of whom recognised us, having seen us at Tyre. They said that there are sixty of their brethren residing here. We had some interesting conversation with three young men, one of whom eagerly read a chapter in the New Testament, though his companion stood by, watching us very suspiciously, and apparently uneasy at seeing his friend so employed. An old man then came into the synagogue, and mounted the reading-desk. He placed a jar of water beside him, then opened his prayer-book, washed his hands, and put on his Tallith. We were informed that he meant to spend six hours in prayer that day, and the jar of water was intended to keep his throat from becoming dry during his exercise of bodily devotion. How remarkably this illustrates the words of Christ, "Wo unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye, for a pretence, make long prayer; therefore ye shall receive the greater damnation."‡ * Perhaps this oriental custom is derived from Exod. iii. 5. PLAIN OF ACRE-VILLAGES-NAKOURA. 315 The same afternoon we left the walls of Acre behind us, ittle thinking how soon they would be laid in ruins. We halted for a time at an aqueduct on the north of the town, which is evidently an ancient work, and is still used, having a hundred arches entire. Passing a small village called Ismerieh, we came to Mezra, where a fine stream from the hills runs into the sea, and where is a beautiful garden belonging to Ibraim Pasha. It is enclosed by a row of tall cypresses, while within the lemon and other fruit-trees of the East were clothed with the richest foliage, and fragrant shrubs and richly coloured flowers diffused their delightful odours. Many small villages are scattered over this beautiful plain. On the right, a little off the road, stand Sheikh Daud, once a Christian village, and Zeitoun. In the plain where is the spring of water by which the aqueduct is supplied, is El Capri, and on the hill Tersecha, and not far off a monumental pillar, Kulat Jedin. After these we came to El Hamsin. Still further north, and on the shore, lay Zeeb, three hours from Acre. It is the ancient Achzib. It has a high situation near the sea, and is surrounded with palm-trees. A shepherd in the neighbourhood of this place was playing on his pipe at the head of his flock—a sweet soothing sound in the stillness of evening, and all the sweeter because so rarely heard in Palestine. After one hour more we came to Boussa, situated in carse ground, and bordered with trees. Here the fertile plain of Acre ends, and the low range of swelling hills that form its eastern boundary for twelve or thirteen miles run out into the sea, forming a high rocky promontory. Looking back from the height, the view of the plain, enclosed by the hills on the one hand and the sea on the other, was rich and beautiful. The plain along the coast south from Carmel, the plain of Tyre, and the plain of Acre, are all very like each other, although the last seems to be the most fruitful. The sun went down behind the Mediterranean Sea as we passed a small ruined fort or khan on the highest point of Nakoura. The khan of Nakoura is nearly an hour further north, and we made haste to reach it before dark. The graceful gazelles were sporting along the shore, and bounding on the rocky heights above us. Sandys mentions that, in his time, leopards and boars used to come down from the brushwood of these hills, but we neither saw nor heard of any. We slept that night in a stubble-field near the khan of Nakoura; and |