is El Kubbet es Sukkra, the Dome of the Rock. It is, in fact, only a very gorgeous and expensive building erected to cover the Holy Rock of Moriah, which Mohammed called one of the rocks of Paradise.

Crossing the open court, which is about 1500 feet long from north to south, and 1000 from east to west, I arrived at the foot of stone steps leading up to a large paved platform, in the centre of which rises the Dome of the Rock. The soldiers marched quietly forward, and we between their files, to the door of the building, over which hung a heavy curtain of leather and cloth. Pushing this up, we passed under and stood before the Rock.

The Sheik, Mohammed Dunnuf, long may he live! welcomed us with due respect, and apparently without anger.

Advancing to the centre, as soon as my eyes became accustomed to the dim light of the building, I found a lofty iron railing shutting me away

We went to the gateway. It was thrown open, and the soldiers waited to receive us. We marched into the area, and our feet stood on the holy soil of the great court of the Gentiles. Mount Moriah, where once stood the Temple of Solomon, is one of the hills within the walls of modern Jerusalem. The same space that was occupied by the ancient Temple and its inclosures is now occupied by the various Mohammedan buildings and the grand court of the Mosque El Aksa. A very common but erroneous notion has given to the mosque and its adjacent grounds the name of Mosque of Omar. Its title is, in fact, El Mesjid el Aksa, the Holy Place the Most Distant, that is, from Mecca, Medina being the nearer Holy Place. There is no mosque known to the Moslems as that of Omar. But a portion of the great mosque on the south side of the inclosure is called the praying-place of Omar.

The elegant building in the centre of the space, commonly called the Mosque of Omar, is not a mosque. It is a kubbet or dome-a name common to Mohammedan places of interest, whether sacred or only sepulchres. This

very centre under the lofty dome.

This was the Holy of Holies, and to this day the Jew believes that within that rock is the Ark of the Covenant, with its contents undecayed. It can not be doubted or denied that this rock was within the ancient Temple. It is forty or fifty feet long, and rises about twice the height of a man's head above the floor of the mosque.

There were fifty or more Mussulmans in the building when I entered, and as I approached the rock they turned their eyes on me furiously. It was certainly a breach of privilege in their view that they were not permitted to stone me then and there, as dead as Stephen. Notwithstanding their presence, however, I leaned against the iron lattice-work and gazed with an indescribable interest on that stone toward which more devout men had kneeled, when they prayed to God, than toward any other holy place on the surface of the earth.

There has been no age of the world, since the time of David, when there have not been hearts yearning toward the rock of the Temple-no period when somewhere on its broad surface there have not been men dying with faces turned thitherward, and dim eyes gazing through tears,

or through the films of death, to catch, with the first powers of supernatural vision, the longedfor view of the threshing-floor of the Jebusite, the Holy of Holies of Solomon. Blessed were my eyes that in the flesh beheld the spot where the daily incense was wont to be offered, where the Ark of God for so many generations rested, where the cherubim overhung the altar, and the visible glory of Jehovah was wont to be seen by the eyes of sinful men.

I walked around it, and gazed at it with earnest eyes, for on and over that spot men of ancient days had prayed to a God that heard and answered in the thunder.

The atmosphere seemed heavy above the Holy of Holies, as if the incense of old times were gathered in the dim air, making it oppressive.

"This way, oh Effendi," said Sheik Mohammed, and I followed him to a stairway that led down into a chamber under the rock, which is pierced with a hole directly through its centre. This cavernous chamber has two or three spots of interest to Moslems, since they say that here their great Prophet, and the Prophet ISA BEN MARIAM, and the Prophet Suleiman-to wit, Mohammed, Jesus, and Solomon-prayed. The kneeling-place of each is marked out; and further, they add that the rock itself is held in the air above the chamber, miraculously, without support. So Sheik Mohammed told

me.

I looked at him, and then at the walls which surrounded the room, and seemed to sustain the rock above. He saw my doubt.

"The walls hold nothing. When Mohammed came to Jerusalem on horseback and went to heaven, he was in this room with his horse, and he went up through the rock, leaving that hole; and then the rock followed him up, but he said 'Stop!' and it stopped just there, and had remained there ever since."

"But these walls, oh learned and wise Sheik?"

"These walls are built up for safety. It can not be known to man when it may please God to allow the rock to fall back. The walls will receive it then, and no one will be crushed."

"But perhaps God has already let it fall back. It may be that the walls hold it up now?" "It is impossible."

"Why?"

"Bismillah-it can not be."

I will not linger here to describe minutely the many points of interest within the inclosure of the ancient Temple. I went into the great mosque of the inclosure on the south side, known usually as the Mosque El Aksa, and examined its vast details. This was a Christian church, built by Justinian, and afterward the Hospital of the Templars, who derived their name from it. Thence I descended to the massive crypts under the Temple site. These are among the most interesting objects in Jerusalem.

I have sometimes wondered when the visible presence of the Lord above the ark of the covenant ceased, and whether it was not at that moment when the ascending Saviour bore with him to heaven the mercy-seat, no longer between the folding wings of the cherubim but now at the front of the throne above.

and abolition of temples and shrines. Unlike

"Oh-ah-yes, by all means;" and so we climbed the east wall that overhangs the valley of Jehoshaphat, and saw the spot where the bridge will end on the west, over which the righteous will pass safely to the feet of the Prophet; while the wicked, finding it the edge of a sword-blade, will fall into the depths below, which will then be deeper than all dreams of hell.

There was still one spot of great interest to visit. The Beautiful Gate of the Temple has long been closed. The solid wall on the east side has no passage through it; but the spot where it once was is marked by the remains of a stately edifice, of which a portion stands, supported by two splendid columns. The Moslems call it the Tomb of Solomon. It is a large chamber, evidently once the interior of the gate, and nobly ornamented.

This gate opened toward Bethany. By it Christ often entered and passed out. By it I strongly incline to think they led him in when he had been seized in the Garden of Gethsemane, in the valley below. Many tender and holy memories filled my mind and flooded my eyes as I stood in this room, the ground of which was holy, however modern the columns of the roof. Who can doubt that I worshiped God with earnest heart on the sacred hill of Moriah?

At last my feet stood on the most holy place of earth. At last I stood where Abraham offered Isaac-where David worshiped at the threshing-floor of Araunah the Jebusite-where Solomon prayed, "Now therefore arise, O Lord God, into thy resting-place, thou and the ark of thy strength!"-where then "the glory of the Lord filled the house"-and where, in later times, the glory of the Lord incarnate walked in the presence of men.

Once more I say, I am a free-thinker. I I could worship there, though the Temple was fallen, the holy place defiled--though Jew, and Turk, and Infidel, in turn, had mocked and spit upon the memory of the God of David even there-though I stood there surrounded by darkskinned, furious-eyed Moslems, and there was nothing where the glory once was to remind me that there was in heaven an avenging God.

rusalem to Galilee. Our retinue was stately. Our long line of horses, mules, and servants indicated no poverty, and, though strangers in the land, we had yet where to lay our heads, for our tents were pitched a little way beyond, and we lacked nothing of luxury or comfort.

But on the plain of Shechem, at the foot of Gerizim, with the wind sighing over our heads, and the sunshine pouring down the valley, as if it loved the hallowed ground where the weary Man of Sorrows offered to the woman of Samaria the waters of life, there was a divine voice in the air speaking those words of sublime import, ending the old dispensation, dismissing the glory of the Temple of Solomon, annulling the Law of Moses and of centuries, the holy voice which declared the hour already come when, neither in Jerusalem nor yet in Gerizim, should men worship the Father of heaven, but only and wherever men could worship Him in spirit and in truth.

"The Father seeketh such to worship him." The man is not who could worship coldly or falsely on the plain of Shechem, by the well of Sychar.

A group of Bedouins, at a little distance from us, were smoking calmly, while others were preparing a simple evening meal. The sun was going down. One of the most interesting subjects of my own memory just here was the fact that my brother had once been here before me, and was, on this very spot, saved from a Bedouin spear by the nobleness of his companion, who threw himself before his weaker friend. Singularly enough that same friend who saved my brother was now my own traveling companion, and I listened with the deepest interest to his story of the scene. It certainly seemed strange that two boys from the old white meeting-house in the up country had wandered off to this well of Jacob in the Land of the Lord.

Close by was the tomb of Joseph. A little Mohammedan building marks the spot, well authenticated by tradition and by history as the piece of ground which Jacob gave to his son.

That evening I went into the Samaritan synagogue in Nablous; but of this I have given a full description in "Tent Life in the Holy Land." I wandered on to Nain, Nazareth, Tabor, and Tiberias. I sang old psalms on the shore of the

VOL. XV.-No. 88.-Hн

the up-country meeting-house in the long gone

In many temples of old Phenician country, in ruined walls where the praise of Baal had given place to the worship of Jupiter, on the sunny side of Hermon, in the moonlight that made the Tower of Lebanon that looketh toward Damascus a glory, I looked up to heaven -the changeless heaven over all the changes of humanity.

Again it was a summer-like afternoon.

“Now, Miriam—the day's travel is well-nigh over-courage for a little longer; I see the valley yonder, and the Temple can not be far away."

The air was sultry. We had left Damascus two days before, paused in the valley of the Barrada one night, and on a plain among the hills of Anti-Lebanon another. This day had been very tiresome. We had crossed a ridge of high snow-covered hills, in a freezing wind, and then had descended to a valley of intolerable warmth, so that as evening approached we were nearly worn-out, and Miriam sat her horse with so languid an air that I half expected her to fall off on the next attempt at a gallop.

But we were now approaching the broad valley of the Leontes, which lies between Lebanon and Anti-Lebanon, on which the ruins of Baalbec stand in stately splendor. A faint gallop down a grassy slope, through a group of mud houses dignified by the name of village, then along the bed of a brook for a hundred rods, and we emerged from Anti-Lebanon and saw before us the great temples of the worshipers of the Sun.

I remember that once, when I saw a Parsee bow in silent adoration at the rising glory of his god, I was not surprised at his idolatry; for he looked not beyond the sun to a Sun-kindler; and now, when my eye rested on the vast ruins of the fanes that were once consecrated to the same deity, it seemed not so strange that two thousand years ago men worshiped the same object, since then, as now, it came up in the morning with the pomp of a god, and went down in the west like a king retiring, but only for a while, to return again in the same array of majesty. We worship immutability. It was that steadfast, immutable character of the sun that the men of Baalbec worshiped; his life and light-giving powers were secondary attributes. The one grand idea that commanded worship was the characteristic of God, which they saw reflected in his light, and fancied that they saw in its originality, the changelessness of Deity. He had seen thrones crumbling. He had seen earthquakes shaking the world and hurling down mountains. Beyond Olympus, beyond the pillars of Hercules, he had gone daily to his abode, and had come daily again in the morning to behold the temple they built to his worship. Moss grew on the capitals, and he shone on the moss. Grain by grain the dust of the temple crumbled and fell and was borne off on the wind, and he shone on crumbling column and

A soft summer morning came upon the plain. My tent was pitched under the corner of the eastern wall, and from its door I looked up at the splendid capitals of the group of columns that still stand up to receive the first rays of the morning sun.

There was a group of Arab children around the tent door when I came out. They raised a shout as the Howajji made his appearance, and dashed off like frightened sheep around the corner of the temple area. Then all was silent, except the dashing stream from the great fountain of Baalbec, which ran swiftly by the tent, and talked aloud to sun and sky and ruin as it had talked for thousands of years. Sun, ruin, and stream were the only remains of those grand old days in search of whose memorials I had come to this spot, and each was profoundly mysterious in voice. I could learn no more from one than from the other.

The founders of Baalbec are unknown. The ruins are apparently relics of successive generations of nations. The temples stand on a lofty artificial platform, part of the sustaining wall of which is celebrated for three stones whose size is unexampled elsewhere in the world. The three measure in length one hundred and eightythree feet, each being sixty-one feet long, by fifteen broad, by about thirteen in thickness. These vast hewn stones lie in a wall which is built up otherwise with small stone, evidently the work of a less gigantic race of men; less gigantic either in mental or in physical structure. Doubtless the platform is of comparatively late time. These stones are relics of a former race and age which was old in Greek and Roman times.

But I have nothing to do with discussion or description here. I am but to speak of my own worship. How on that summer Sunday morning I climbed the fallen rocks, fragments of the old glory, and found a place within the temple walls where the old sun looked down on me and laughed gleefully all the Sunday afternoon as he beheld the wandering American with his carpet spread on the green turf in the very centre of the once gorgeous temple of Heliopolis; and how I stood by the fountain and saw him go down behind the ruins, leaving them flushed with sad splendor-a mockery of their decay. On that summer Sabbath in a distant land there was a scene that thrills my soul as I write these lines. Time, triumphant, had conquered an old man. One of majestic mien, gray locks, and reverend countenance, who had accomplished his threescore years and ten, lay dead, and men gathered around him to do the last homage to his dust. But a few days ago and the old man's heart went out with earnest love toward his wandering boy, and he longed to hear once more his voice rich with stories of Egypt and Jerusalem. But now the old