g opened up communication with the Grecians and Romans, marine
intercourse had become more frequent than before, a matter that the
Maccabaean family were proud of; and therefore they had ships carved on
the pillars, as might be observed by seafaring people who might go there;
yet, whatever the words might signify, they could not prove that Modin
was so far inland, and among the hills, as Soba.

However, in 1858, I went with my son and a couple of friends to inspect
the place itself, considering it at least worth while to make one's own
observations on the spot.

We passed through _'Ain Carem_, the _Karem_ of the Septuagint, to
_Sattaf_, and rested during the heat of the day in a vineyard, near a
spring of water and plots of garden vegetables, belonging to the few
houses that had been rebuilt after several years of devastation by
village warfare.

The approach to the place from any direction is through the very rough
torrent bed of the Wadi Bait Hhaneena, and along very narrow ledges upon
the sides of steep hills, quite as perilous as any that are used for
travelling in any part of the Lebanon; too dangerous to admit of
dismounting and leading the horse after the risk has once begun, by far
the safest method of advancing is to hold the reins very loose, and if
you wish it, to shut your eyes.

Opposite to Sattaf, directly across the valley, the Latins had lately
rebuilt a small chapel of former times, said to have been the prison of
John the Baptist; they name it the Chapel of the _Hhabees_, _i.e._, the
imprisoned one.

Leaving Sattaf we gradually ascended to Soba; at first through lemon and
orange plantations near the water, and then through vineyards with a few
pomegranate-trees interspersed.

It is noteworthy how, throughout most of the tribe of Judah, small
springs of water are found dribbling from the rocks, (besides the larger
sources of Urtas, Lifta, Faghoor 'Aroob, Dirweh, and Hebron,) which were
doubtless more copious in the ancient times, when the land was more
clothed with timber, and there were men, industrious men, aware of their
blessings, and ready to prevent the streams from slipping away beneath
the seams of limestone formation.

At Soba we mounted the steep hill to the _Shooneh_, or small look-out
tower at the summit, enjoying the breadth of landscape and the stretch of
the Mediterranean before our eyes.

In the village we found remains of old masonry, most likely the basement
of a fortificatio