select as a site for their fortifications, spread out at its base some
score of low and miserable hovels, and we have before us an improvised
pattern of a village which recalls in a striking manner Zerin or Beitin,
or any other small modern town which gathers the dwellings of its
fellahin round some central stone building--whether it be a hostelry for
benighted travellers, or an ancient castle of the Crusading age.

[Illustration: 189.jpg THE MODERN VILLAGE OF BEITIN (ANCIENT BETHEL),
SEEN FROM THE SOUTH-WEST.]

Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph.

There were on the littoral, to the north of Gaza, two large walled
towns, Ascalon and Joppa, in whose roadsteads merchant vessels were
accustomed to take hasty refuge in tempestuous weather.* There were to
be found on the plains also, and on the lower slopes of the mountains,
a number of similar fortresses and villages, such as Iurza, Migdol,
Lachish, Ajalon, Shocho, Adora, Aphukin, Keilah, Gezer, and Ono; and,
in the neighbourhood of the roads which led to the fords of the Jordan,
Gibeah, Beth-Anoth, and finally Urusalim, our Jerusalem.** A tolerably
dense population of active and industrious husbandmen maintained
themselves upon the soil.

* Ascalon was not actually on the sea. Its port, "Maiumas
Ascalonis," was probably merely a narrow bay or creek, now,
for a long period, filled up by the sand. Neither the site
nor the remains of the port have been discovered. The name
of the town is always spelled in Egyptian with an "s "--
Askaluna, which gives us the pronunciation of the time. The
name of Joppa is written Yapu, Yaphu, and the gardens which
then surrounded the town are mentioned in the _Anastasi
Papyrus I_.

** Urusalim is mentioned only in the Tel el-Amarna tablets,
alongside of Kilti or Keilah, Ajalon, and Lachish. The
remaining towns are noticed in the great lists of Thutmosis
III.

[Illustration: 191.jpg Page image]

The plough which they employed was like that used by the Egyptians and
Babylonians, being nothing but a large hoe to which a couple of oxen
were harnessed.* The scarcity of rain, except in certain seasons,
and the tendency of the rivers to run low, contributed to make the
cultivators of the soil experts in irrigation and agriculture. Almost
the only remains of these people which have come down ti us consist of
indestructible wells and cisterns, or wine and oil presses hollow