and spirit, and the other like a horse of ten with us; and the sheik told me that he could count upon the services of both until they were thirty-five. Among all the recommendations of the Arabian horse, I know none greater than this; I have known a man, from long habit, conceive a liking for a vicious jade that no one else would mount; and one can imagine how warm must be the feeling, when, year after year, the best of his race is the companion of the wandering Arab, and the same animal may bear him from the time when he can first poise a spear, until his aged frame can scarcely sustain itself in the saddle.

Before leaving the valley, we found, in one of the gullies, a large stone veined in that peculiar manner which I had noticed at Petra; it had been washed down from the mountains of Wady Moussa, and the Arab told me that stone of the same kind was found nowhere else. Towards evening we had crossed the valley, and were at the foot of the mountains of Judea, in the direction of the southern extremity of the Dead Sea. That evening, I remember, I noticed a circumstance which called to my mind the wonderful accounts handed down to us by Strabo and other ancient historians, of large cities built of salt having stood at the southern extremity of the Dead Sea and the valley beyond. In the escapade of our runaway camels, bringing about the catastrophe which one of them had since expiated with his life, they had mingled together, in horrible confusion, contrary to all the

rules of art, so many discordant ingredients, that a great portion of my larder was spoiled; and, among other things, salt, almost as necessary to man as bread, had completely lost its savour. But the Bedouins, habituated to wanting almost every thing, knew where to find all that their barren country could give; and one of them, leaving the tents for a few moments, returned with a small quantity that he had picked up for immediate use, being a cake or incrustation about as large as the head of a barrel; and I afterward saw regular strata of it and in large quantities, in the sides of the moun tains.

VOL. II.-H

CHAPTER VII.

The Road to Gaza.-Unknown Ruins.-A Misadventure.-Pas toral Bedouins.-A Flower of the Wilderness.-The Ravages of War.-Testimony of an Eyewitness.

We started at six o'clock the next day, the morning rather cool, though clear and bracing; we were again among the mountains, and at about eleven a track scarcely distinguishable to my eye turned off to Gaza. To a traveller from such a country as ours, few of the little every-day wonders he is constantly noticing strike him more forcibly than the character of the great public roads in the East. He makes allowance for the natural wildness of the country, the impossibility of using wheel-carriages on the mountains, or horses in the desert as beasts of burden, but still he is surprised and disappointed. Here, for instance, was a road leading to the ancient city of Gaza, a regular caravan route for 4000 years, and yet so perfect in the wildness of nature, so undistinguishable in its appearance from other portions of the wilderness around, that a stranger would have passed the little opening in the rocks, probably without noticing it, and certainly without imagining that the

THE ROAD TO GAZA.

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wild track, of which it formed the entrance, would conduct him to the birthplace and ancient capital of David, and the holy city of Jerusalem. The solitary trail of the Indian over our prairies and forests is more perfectly marked as a road than either of the great routes to Gaza or Jerusalem, and yet, near the spot where these two roads diverge are the ruins of an ancient city.

Little, if any thing, has been known in modern days concerning the existence and distinguishing features of this road; and it is completely a terra incognita to modern travellers. All the knowledge possessed of it is that derived from the records of ancient history; and from these we learn that in the time of David and Solomon, and the later days of the Roman empire, a great public road existed from Jerusalem to Akaba, the ancient Eloth or Ezion-geber; that several cities existed upon it between these terminating points, and that their ruins should still be visible. Believing that I am the first traveller who has ever seen those ruins, none can regret more than myself my inability to add to the scanty stock of knowledge already in possession of geographers. If my health had permitted, I might have investigated and explored, noted observations, and treasured up facts and circumstances, to place them in the hands of wiser men for their conclusions; but I was not equal to the task. The ruins which I saw were a confused and shapeless mass, and I rode among them without dismounting; there were no columns, no blocks

of marble, or large stones which indicated any architectural greatness, and the appearance of the ruins would answer the historical description of a third or fourth rate city.

About three hours farther on, and half a mile from our path, on the right, was a quadrangular arch with a dome; and near it was a low stone building, also arched, which might have been a small temple. The Bedouins, as usual, referred it to the times of the Christians. For about a mile, in different places on each side of us, were mounds of crumbling ruins; and directly on the caravantrack we came to a little elevation, where were two remarkable wells, of the very best Roman workmanship, about fifty feet deep, lined with large hard stones, as firm and perfect as on the day in which they were laid. The uppermost layer, round the top of the well, which was on a level with the pavement, was of marble, and had many grooves cut in it, apparently worn by the long-continued use of ropes in drawing water. Around each of the wells were circular ranges of columns, which, when the city existed, and the inhabitants came there to drink, might and probably did support a roof similar to those now seen over the fountains in Constantinople. No remains of such roof, however, are existing; and the columns are broken, several of them standing not more than three or four feet high, and the tops scooped out to serve as troughs for thirsty camels. On the other side, a little in the rear of the wells, is a hill over