Bradford reporter. [volume] (Towanda, Pa.) 1844-1884, 1857-06-11
A RUINED CITY.

Petra, the excavated city, the long lost
capital of Edom in the scriptures and profane
writings, in every language in which lis name
occurs, signifies a rock, and through the sha-
dows of its early history we learn that its in
habitants lived in natural cefts or excavations
made in the solid rock Desoate as it is we
have reason to believe that it goes back to
the time of Esau, the " father Of Edom :" that
princes and dukes, eight successive kings, and
again long line of dukes dwelt there before
any king reigned in Israel :" and we recog-
nized it from the earliest ages as the central
point to which came the caravans from the in
terror of Arabia, Persia, and India, laden with
all the precious commodities of the East, and
from which these commodities were distribut-
ed through Egypt, Palestine, and Syria, and
all the corners bordering on the Mediterrane-
an, even Tyre and Sidon, deriving their pur-
pie and dyes from Petra Eight hundred
years before Christ, Amaziah, the King of Ju-
dea, I" slew of Edom in the valley of Salt, ten
thousand, and took Sclah (the Hebrew name
of Petra) by war" Three hundred years af
ter the last of the prophets, and nearly cen
tury before the Christian era the King of
Arabia issued from his palace at Petra, at
the head of fifty thousand men, horse. and foot,
entered Jerusalem, and, uniting with the Jews,
pressed the seige of the temple, which was on
ly raised by the advance of the Romans ard
in the beginning OF the second century, though
its independence was lost, Petra was still the
capitol of Roman province. After that
time it rapidly declined its history became
more obscure. For more than a thousand
years it was completely lost to the civilized
world and until its discovery by Burckhead
in 1912, except to the wandering Bedouin, its
very site was unknown.
And this was the city at whose door |
stood In a few words this ancient and ex-
traordinary city is situated within a natural
amphitheatre of two or three miles in circum-
ference, encompassed on all sides by rugged
mountains five or six hundred feet in height
The whole of this area is waste Of ruins
dwelng-houses palaces, temples, and trium-
phal arches, all PROSTATE together in undistin-
guishable confusion. The sides of the noun
tains are cut smooth, in a perpendicular direc
tion, and filled with long and continued ran
ges of dwelling houses temples and tombs, ex-
cavated with vast labor out of the solid rock ;
| and willie their SUBMITS present nature in her
widest and most savage form, their bases are
| adorned with all the beauty of architecture
and art, with columns and porticos, and pedi-
ments, and ranges of corridors, enduring as
the mountains of which they are hewn, and
| fresh as if the work OF generation that had
scarcely yet gone by.
In front of the great temple, the pride and
beauty of Petra-of which more hereafter
| saw a narrow opening in the rocks exactly
corresponding with my conception of the OBJ
ject which l was seeking A full stream OF
water was gushing through it, and filling uE
the whole mouth of the passage. Mounted
| on the shoulders of one of my Bedouins, got
| him to carry me through the swollen stream
| at the mouth of the opening and set me down
on dry place little above, whence began
| to pick my way, occasionally taking to the
houlders of my followers, and continued to ad
vance more than mile. | was, beyond all
peradventure, in the great entrance was seek
ing. There could not be two such, and ]
should have gone on to the extreme end o.