n with a young man in the
Holy City, bora of American parents at Sidon, who had been educated in
America and was now on his way back to his birthplace to spend his life
in the sacred fields as a missionary. He was thoroughly equipped for
roughing it, with a splendid physique and perfect health, imperturbable
spirits, and a rare command of classic and vernacular Arabic. He wanted
to go to Beirut with as few _impedimenta_ as possible, and, after some
talk, we merged our two parties into one. Our preparations for the
journey were of the simplest sort. We agreed to dispense with dragomans
and cooks and tents and trust to the land for food and shelter. We
engaged three good horses and a muleteer. We strapped our baggage on
the muleteer's horse, drew lots for the choice of the other two, and
turned our faces northward.

It was long before daybreak, one Monday morning, when we stole quietly
out of the Jaffa gate and took the road for Nablous. We were leaving
behind us the most sacred spot on earth to Jew, Catholic, Greek, and
Protestant; but from the road that stretches out before the Jaffa gate
all the holy places of Jerusalem are invisible. The round dome over the
Sepulchre was hidden behind the city's wall and the intervening houses.
The Dome of the Rock, as the beautiful mosque of Omar is called, the
most striking and brilliant object of the whole city from the Damascus
gate, is beneath the hill of Golgotha. Only the Valley of Hinnom, and
the Hill of Evil Counsel, and the slopes leading to Bethlehem, caught
our parting gaze. But an American Protestant turns his back upon the
Holy City with a very different feeling from that of the old Crusaders.
He cannot see the Turkish Mohammedan soldiers guarding the tomb of
Christ without a choking sensation in the throat, but he believes that
life has nobler battles for him than fighting the unbeliever for the
empty sepulchre of his Lord. The surroundings of all the sacred places
are so inharmonious that, while he can never regret his pilgrimage, he
can scarcely regret that it is over. We rose in our saddles, and,
turning, took our last look at the Holy City with very mingled emotions,
and then settled down to the hard day's work before us.

We were on the great pilgrim-route, which twenty centuries ago was
annually crowded with pilgrims from the north hastening to Jerusalem for
the Passover feast. The Child of Nazareth, when, at the age of twelve,
he went for the first time to the T