ur tent at sundown and dream of the vanished palm-groves, the gardens
of Cleopatra, the palaces of Herod, the soft, ignoble history of that
region of fertility and indolence, rich in harvests, poor in manhood.

Then it seems as if some one were saying, "I will lift up mine eyes unto
the hills, from whence cometh my help." There they stand, all about us:
eastward, the great purple ranges of Gad and Reuben, from which Elijah
the Tishbite descended to rebuke and warn Israel; westward, against the
saffron sky, the ridges and peaks of Judea, among which Amos and
Jeremiah saw their lofty visions; northward, the clear-cut pinnacle of
Sartoba, and far away beyond it the dim outlines of the Galilean hills
from which Jesus of Nazareth came down to open blind eyes and to
shepherd wandering souls. With the fading of the sunset glow a deep blue
comes upon all the mountains, a blue which strangely seems to grow
paler as the sky above them darkens, sinking down upon them through
infinite gradations of azure into something mysterious and
indescribable, not a color, not a shadow, not a light, but a secret
hyaline illumination which transforms them into aerial battlements and
ramparts, on whose edge the great stars rest and flame, the watch-fires
of the Eternal.

III

"PASSING OVER JORDAN"

I have often wondered why the Jordan, which plays such an important part
in the history of the Hebrews, receives so little honour and praise in
their literature. Sentimental travellers and poets of other races have
woven a good deal of florid prose and verse about the name of this
river. There is no doubt that it is the chief stream of Palestine, the
only one, in fact, that deserves to be called a river. Yet the Bible has
no song of loving pride for the Jordan; no tender and beautiful words to
describe it; no record of the longing of exiled Jews to return to the
banks of their own river and hear again the voice of its waters. At
this strange silence I have wondered much, not knowing the reason of it.
Now I know.

The Jordan is not a little river to be loved: it is a barrier to be
passed over. From its beginning in the marshes of Huleh to its end in
the Dead Sea, (excepting only the lovely interval of the Lake of
Galilee), this river offers nothing to man but danger and difficulty,
perplexity and trouble. Fierce and sullen and intractable, it flows
through a long depression, at the bottom of which it has dug for itself
a still deeper crooked di