Chambers's Journal of Popular Literature, Science, and Art, No. 691

'The bad news is the date of Marian's mother's death, Lilian. She died when you were about two years old.'

She saw; rose to her feet, and stood for a moment with her hands extended, as though to ward off a blow, and then fell back into my arms.

'Lock the door, please, and help me. She must not be seen by others in her weakness,' I said, placing her amongst the pillows. 'She will soon be herself again.' Then I bade him throw open the windows, whilst I gently fanned her.

In a few moments she opened her eyes, and struggled to her feet.

'Was it a dream – was it?' she ejaculated, looking eagerly into my face. 'Ah, no!' She was powerless again for a few moments. But she was gaining strength, and presently insisted upon hearing the whole truth from Robert Wentworth's own lips.

He saw that it would be more merciful to comply now; and did so unreservedly. He had been too much interested to leave a stone unturned, although every step he took more plainly revealed what it was so painful to discover. He had taken Counsel's advice upon it, and his own judgment was confirmed: Mr Farrar's marriage with Marian's mother was a legal one, and Lilian's mother had been no wife in the eye of the law.

I may as well state here that Mr Farrar received the paper with his letters to Lucy Reed from Mrs Pratt, after her sister's death, just as they had been found. I thought that it was not at all probable Marian's mother had ever realised her position, or she would have taken steps to secure it. Most probably, Mr Farrar persuaded her that the document was in some way informal. There is just the possibility that he did not believe in it himself; and had gone through the ceremony to satisfy Lucy Reed, whilst she was with him during a tour in Scotland. Why he did not at once destroy the evidence against himself, when it came into his possession, since he never could have meant to acknowledge the marriage, is difficult to understand in a man of Mr Farrar's calibre – as puzzling as a murderer keeping the evidence of his crime about him. We only know that such things are not uncommon. It might have been that Mr Farrar kept the paper to remind him of Marian's claims upon him, though he never meant them to interfere with Lilian's. The latter's mother was a gentlewoman, young and beautiful. He had gratified both love and ambition in marrying her; and after her death, his love for her child engrossed his whole being. After a few moments' reflection, I said:

'They will be looking after us presently, Lilian. Would you like Mr Wentworth to explain to Mr Trafford?'

'Yes,' she whispered; her trembling hands clinging closer about me. Then, loyal and true to him, she added: 'But remember that I do him the justice to say that the loss of the – Only my shame will trouble him. He has so often wished I had not a penny.'

I could only gather her to my heart, with a look towards him.

His was the hardest task after all! He and I knew that now. He left us alone; and my Lilian and I tried to find strength for what was to come, as only such strength can be found. But Lilian would never be the same again. Her love to her father had been wounded unto death; and I saw that it was her mother – her cruelly wronged mother – who had all her sympathy now. I shall never forget the agony expressed in the whispered words, 'Mother! mother!'

We were not left very long alone. Robert Wentworth could barely have had time to tell the story, when Arthur Trafford came striding in by the open window.

'Good heavens, Lilian! what is this?' he ejaculated impetuously; adding, before she could reply: 'Wentworth tells me that – that you take this absurd affair seriously!'

'Seriously, Arthur?' she repeated, turning her eyes wonderingly upon him.

'I mean: he says you mean to act as though that ridiculous paper were genuine; but surely that is too absurd!'

'Is it not genuine, then?' she eagerly asked, her face for a moment brightening with hope, as she turned towards me: 'Is there any doubt about it, Mary?'

'I am sorry to say that I think there is not, Lilian,' I replied; feeling that it was less cruel to kill her hope at once, than indulge it. 'Mr Wentworth said he had taken Counsel's advice, you know.'

'Oh, I suppose it may be genuine enough for the kind of thing!' he said, with an effort to speak lightly. 'But of course, none in their senses would for a moment dream of acting upon it. At the very best, it would be only a very doubtful marriage, arranged, I daresay, to satisfy a not too scrupulous girl's vanity. The thing is done every day; and I am sure, on reflection, you will not be so Quixotic as to' —

'If the paper is legal, I must do what is right – Arthur,' she murmured in a low broken tone. 'Do you think it would be right to blacken your mother's good name and give up the – All your father wished you to have? The truth is, you have not reflected upon what your acknowledgment of that paper will involve, Lilian. You cannot have given any thought to the misery which would follow. Any true friend of yours would have recommended you to at once put that paper into the fire. – Is that it?' he added, catching sight of the paper which Robert Wentworth had put down on the table before me whilst he was speaking, and which I had neglected to take up. 'Yes, by Jove, and that settles the matter!' catching it up and tearing it into shreds. – 'I am your best friend, Lilian.'

'No, no, no! O Arthur, the shame of it!'

'Do not be distressed, dear Lilian; you forget that is only my copy of the original,' I said; 'Mr Trafford is spared.'

He tried to laugh. 'Of course I was only in jest, Lilian. But, seriously now, you should remember that Marian Reed has been brought up to consider herself what she is. But you – It cannot be possible that you would commit an act which would brand your own mother with shame!' He was quick to see what weapon struck deepest, and did not hesitate to avail himself of it.

She shrank under his words, with a low cry. Seeing that he was so blind as to imagine that she would yield through suffering, I sternly said: 'Cannot you see that you are wounding her to no purpose, Mr Trafford? Lilian will do what she believes to be right, come what may.'

'Not if there is no interference – not if she is allowed to use her own judgment, Miss Haddon;' turning fiercely upon me. 'Unfortunately, she has chosen bad advisers!'

'O Arthur!'

'Come out with me, Lilian! I am sure I shall be able to shew you the folly of this,' he pleaded. 'No, no; I cannot change! – Do not leave me, Mary,' she entreated, holding fast to me.

'Dear sister,' I whispered, 'I think it will be better for me to leave you for a few moments. It will be sooner over, and you will find me in the garden presently.' And gently unclasping her hands, I left her alone with Arthur Trafford.

UNDERGROUND JERUSALEM

As is pretty well known, Jerusalem, the City of David, rendered glorious by the Temple of Solomon, has undergone extraordinary vicissitudes; has been sacked and burned several times, the last of its dire misfortunes being its destruction by Titus in the year 70 of our era, when there was a thorough dispersion of the Jewish race. This ancient city, however, which is invested with so many sacred memories, always revived somehow after being laid waste, but in a style very different from the original. As it now stands, Jerusalem is a comparatively modern town, built out of ruins, and only by difficult and patient explorations can portions of its ancient remains be identified. Of the old memorials the most remarkable are those underground; that is to say, in vaults and obscure places only to be reached by excavation. The notification of this fact brings us to a brief but we hope not uninteresting account of what in very recent times has been done, and is now doing by the Palestine Exploration Society, by means of extensive excavations, of which a carefully written description is given in Captain Warren's Underground Jerusalem.

In February 1867, Captain (then Lieutenant) Warren started for Palestine with three corporals of Engineers, and on the 17th arrived at Jerusalem after a prosperous and uneventful journey. The city does not seem to have struck him as being either picturesque or beautiful. 'It is a city of facts,' he says, 'and but little imagination is required to describe it.' Yet when viewed from the Mount of Olives, with the hills of Judah stretching to the south, and the rich valley of the Jordan glowing like a many-hued gem beneath the vivid sunlight, and the mountains of Moab cleaving with their purple beauty the soft clear blue of the Syrian sky, he does not deny to it a certain charm; but his heart was in his work, and his work lay in the old walls, particularly those which marked the almost obliterated inclosure of the Temple.

This edifice in the latter days of its glory, after it had been partially rebuilt by Herod the Great, was a splendid building. To enable us to realise its gigantic proportions, Captain Warren tells us that the southern face of the wall is at present nearly the length of the Crystal Palace, and the height of the transept. The area within its walls was more extensive than Lincoln's Inn Fields or Grosvenor Square, and the south wall offered a larger frontage and far greater height than Chelsea Hospital. It was built of hard white stone, and was enriched with a variety of coloured marbles, with graceful columns, with splendid gates overlaid with gold and silver, with gilded roofs, and with all the gorgeous detail of costly arabesque and carving. So rich was it in its dazzling magnificence, that it aroused the envy and cupidity of all the nations around, and finally fell with the city it adorned before the conquering arms of Titus. The Roman general tried in vain to save it; fired in the wild fury of the onslaught, it was consumed to ashes; and its very foundations so obliterated by the superincumbent rubbish, that for ages its precise site has been unknown. In fact the only sites in Jerusalem which were known with absolute certainty were the Mount of Olives and Mount Moriah. Now, in consequence of the discoveries made during the course of his excavations, Captain Warren has been able to identify the walls of the Temple and to make a plan of its courts. He has also found the spot where the little Hill of Zion formerly stood, the Valley of the Kidron, and the true position of the Vale of Hinnom; but to accomplish all this he has had many difficulties to contend with, quite apart from the necessary labour attending the excavations. The civil and military pachas did all in their power to hinder him, and would not allow him to begin to dig at all until a firman from the Sultan arrived authorising his operations. In the interval of enforced leisure, before the Vizieral permission arrived, he paid some necessary visits in Jerusalem, and then made arrangements for a tour in the lonely wilderness country which stretches to the east of the city.

A camp-life, we are told, is at once the most healthy and the most enjoyable in the East. In summer, the domed houses of Jerusalem are intolerable from heat and unpleasant odours; but out on the wide open upland, with a good horse, galloping along the dewy plains in the fresh exhilarating morning breeze; or stretched at night on a carpet of wild-flowers, lazily watching the pitching of the tent; or following with idle glance the myriads of bright-hued birds that dart like rainbow-tinted jewels from branch to branch of the fragrant wild myrtle – there is no land like Palestine for enjoyment. Look where you will, the view is interesting; that village nestling on the hill-side is Nain – the Fair; that picturesque rounded hill clothed to the summit with wood is Tabor; yonder dazzling snow-crowned mountain is Hermon; and far off in the hollow of the plain, silent and still, you may see gleaming in the sunshine the sullen waves of that mysterious Sea that ages ago ingulfed the guilty Cities of the Plain. Around you, too near sometimes to be pleasant, are the black tents of the Bedouin, true sons of the desert, whose wild life has a zest unknown to the courts of kings: greedy of bakshish, arrant thieves, and utterly reckless of human life, the Bedouins can be very unpleasant neighbours; and Captain Warren conceived, probably with truth, that the Bedouin encamped near him had all the will to be troublesome, but fortunately lacked the power.

Having examined the aqueducts which anciently brought water to the Pools of Solomon, Captain Warren visited and explored a curious cave at Khureitûn, or rather a series of four caves opening into each other, which appeared to him to be the veritable Cave of Adullam, where David and his band of malcontents found refuge.

Permission from the Grand Vizier having arrived, and the necessary interview with Izzet Pacha being over, the excavations were at once begun, and then the magnitude of the proposed operations was for the first time fully realised by Captain Warren. He had heard vaguely that modern Jerusalem was built upon sixty feet of rubbish; but he found that the layers of accumulated debris extended to one hundred and thirty, and sometimes two hundred feet in depth. For workmen, he had the peasantry around, who were unaccustomed to the use of the spade and barrow. They worked only with the mattock, and used rush-baskets for carrying out the earth. Another obstacle to progress was the want of wood; not a plank was to be obtained except at a fabulous price. In spite of all these difficulties, however, he discovered in the first four months a portion of the ancient city wall; he identified the real Kidron Valley, which runs into the present one, and is choked up with rubbish to the depth of one hundred and fifty feet; and ascertained that the present brook Kidron runs one hundred feet to the east of, and forty feet above the true bottom of the stream. Thus it would seem that the desolate inclosures of modern Jerusalem, its paltry and yet crowded bazaars, and its gloomy narrow streets, entomb with the beauty and glory and hallowed memories of the past, even those landmarks of nature which we are accustomed to consider most changeless and imperishable. Beneath its wastes lie forgotten valleys and hills, streams which have ceased to flow, and fountains which have long been empty and sealed.

Having obtained the necessary apparatus from England, Captain Warren sunk shafts into the mounds of ruin near Jericho; but found only a few jars of ancient pottery, which crumbled into dust whenever they were exposed to the air.

It was now April, the loveliest month in the Syrian year, and the valley of the Jordan, which a few more weeks would transform into a parched brown desert, was in all the flush and glory of its green luxuriance. The wide plain glowed in the tender flush of the dawn like one vast emerald, while countless flowers unfolded their dewy petals, rich with rainbow tints of beauty, as if Iris were about to weave a gorgeous mantle for the departing summer; while hurrying onward to its dark mysterious Sea rushed the rapid river, its waters gleaming like crystal through the flowering branches of oleander which fringed its banks.

When out on this expedition, Captain Warren made the acquaintance of the Samaritans at Nâblus, and saw them hold their Passover in front of their ruined temple on Mount Gerizim. It was a striking scene, such as the gloomy brush of a Rembrandt might have loved to paint. As night darkened down over the landscape, it lent to the rugged wildness of the surrounding scenery a dim indistinctness, which gave vastness to its savage outlines; while in the foreground, tall ghoul-like figures in long white robes flitted about from one reeking oven-mouth to another, watching the sacred Passover lambs as they were in process of being roasted or rather charred with fire; while the moonlight straggling through the mist mingled with the smoky glare of the torches, and lit up from time to time the dark keen wily faces of the worshippers, crafty and yet fierce, expressive of the mingled courage and guile with which, although few in number, despised and demoralised, they have yet held and still hold their own.

The portions of the plain of Jordan at present under cultivation are very limited, and the crops raised consist of wheat, cucumbers, and tobacco.

During this tour Captain Warren had for guide or guard a certain Sheik Salah, who he says 'was really a good fellow; and if he had not talked so complacently of marrying an English wife, I should have felt quite friendly to him. This was his hobby. He had a great desire to go to England for this purpose; evidently supposing that he had only to appear there to take his choice of the first in the land.'

After three months of wandering through the country, Captain Warren returned to Jerusalem, to find fresh difficulties staring him in the face. The Turks did not keep faith with him; and he was obliged to prosecute the dragoman of the English Consulate, who had imposed upon him.

On the 10th of September his right-hand man, Sergeant Brattles, was taken into custody; and concluding, like the Apostle Paul, that he was a citizen of no mean nation, he refused to walk out of prison, when asked to do so, until the charges against him were investigated. This ended in his speedy release; and the works went on, resulting in the discovery of the gymnasium gardens built by Antiochus Epiphanes, the pier of the great arch destroyed by Titus, and a very ancient rock aqueduct, which was found to be cut in two by the wall of Herod's Temple. An old arch was also discovered, which Captain Warren conceives to be a portion of a bridge connecting Solomon's palace with the eastern side of the valley. Extending their researches by means of the rock-cut aqueduct, they were so fortunate as to find also an old drain, through which they crawled, and examined the whole wall as far as that well-known portion of it commonly designated 'The Jews' Wailing-place.' This aqueduct was so large that a man mounted on horseback might have ridden through it, and proved of great service to the exploring party until they found it cut through by the foundations of a house. During this month also they discovered the great south wall of the Temple. It has two entrances, known as the Double and Triple Gate; and besides these a single gate with a pointed arch was discovered leading to the vaults called Solomon's Stables. These vaults are of comparatively recent date (of the time of Justinian); but it struck Captain Warren that this single gate being at a place where the vaults were widest, was probably over some ancient entrance. He sunk a shaft beside it, and after much labour succeeded in clearing out an ancient passage lined with beautifully cut stones, with a groove at the bottom cut for liquid to flow along. This he concluded was the channel for the blood of the beasts slain in sacrifice, and he wished to push forward straight to the altar and ascertain its position, but was forced to desist by the opposition of the Turks. To this was added money difficulties, from which he was soon happily relieved, and enabled with a light heart to begin excavations within the area of the Temple. On the south-west side there is a double tunnel called the Double Passage, which is one of the most sacred of the Moslem praying-places. With great difficulty and only by a ruse, this hallowed spot was at last examined; but nothing of importance was obtained from it. The same may be said of a remarkable expedition into a sewer, which was certainly plucky, even heroic, but barren of any great result.

Aqueducts appear to be the order of the day in underground Jerusalem. Near a curious double rock-cut pool, which Captain Warren conceives to be the Pool of Bethesda, a rock-cut passage was noticed by Major Wilson filled with moist sewage. It was four feet wide, and had five or six feet of sewage in it when Captain Warren and Sergeant Brattles examined it. They accomplished their perilous voyage by means of three doors, taking up the hindmost as they advanced; and being everywhere obliged to exercise the greatest caution, as a single false step might have precipitated them into the Stygian stream below, which would have proved to them a veritable Styx; for once in, nothing could have rescued them from its slimy abyss. Fortunately, no accident occurred; but they discovered nothing beyond the fact that it was one of the aqueducts which had brought water to the Temple from the north.

About this time the Jews began to take a great interest in the excavations. There are on an average about ten thousand of them in Jerusalem, gathered out of every nation under heaven; but the bulk of them are either Ashkenazim (German Jews) or Sephardim (Jews from Morocco). The Sephardim are a dark robust race, with the traditional hooked nose of the Jews; the Ashkenazim are more fragile; and their women are often very beautiful – tall and stately as Sir Walter Scott's Rebecca, with lustrous almond-shaped eyes, black glossy hair, a delicate complexion, and a bloom so vivid that it puts to shame the blush of the damask rose. It is the custom for all the Jews in Jerusalem to assemble every Friday at their Place of Wailing, under the west wall of the Temple court, there to lament aloud the calamities which have befallen their nation. It is a striking sight to see them at this mournful place of meeting. Differing in nationality, in dress, in language, in intelligence, in rank, they are united only by the curse, which has preserved them through centuries of persecution and exile, a separate and distinct people among the teeming myriads of the earth. There they lie before the curious gazer, old men and youth, matron and maid, prone on their faces on the pavement, or rocking themselves back and forward in their anguish; while the air resounds with their bitter wailing and lamentation, on which sometimes breaks harshly the loud laugh of the careless Frank, or the cold sneer of the haughty Moslem.

In January 1869 Captain Warren received a letter of instructions, directing him to abandon those portions of the work which did not promise immediate results. He had discovered in the Temple inclosure the north wall of Herod's Temple, but found it impossible to follow it up. He also came upon the old wall of Ophel, a portion of the first wall of the city. On stones in this wall were found characters which the most competent judges declared to be Phœnician; and also incised marks, such as are found on the old walls of Damascus and Baalbec.

About this time Lady Burdett Coutts offered to give twenty-five thousand pounds to supply Jerusalem with water, of which there is a great scarcity during the summer season; but the proposal ended in nothing, because the Turkish authorities shrewdly concluded that they would have to pay in the long-run for keeping in good order the aqueducts she restored. The want of water is one of the principal reasons why Palestine is at the present day so sterile and unhealthy. And this want of water is (as in other districts where woods are demolished) caused in a great degree by the destruction of the forests, and especially of the groves and vineyards which grew on the terraces along the hill-sides. The system of terracing, according to Captain Warren, has the effect of retaining the rain, which falls plentifully at certain seasons of the year, in its natural reservoirs about the roots of the trees and in the hollows of the rocks, instead of allowing it to tumble in wild torrents down the bare hill-sides, and rush headlong to the sea, wasting instead of dispensing all the rich blessings which water alone can give in a dry and thirsty land.

What is wanted, Captain Warren says, to make Palestine again a rich and fruitful country, 'is a good government, a large population, an energetic people, and a sufficient capital.'

Wheat grows luxuriantly in Palestine; and the grapes on the Sandstone formation are as highly flavoured as those of Muscadel, producing in the hill country of Lebanon an excellent wine. Very fine raisins are also dried in the east of Palestine; and the whole country abounds with sheep, goats, camels, horses, and mules. The mutton of Palestine is very poor, owing to under-feeding and to the accumulation of the whole fat of the animal in its enormous tail. Patches of tobacco are grown; and figs, oranges, lemons, and apricots flourish when they are carefully tended.

Jerusalem is not entirely without the industrial arts: there are seven soap factories; and a considerable traffic in grain, which is altogether in the hands of the Moslems. There are also five potteries, and many people work as stone-cutters and indigo-dyers.