The Worthington advance., 1881-08-11
THE DEADSEA.
The Wlord and Wonderful Beauty Of
.- Much.mallGnod REGION.

-
Much-maligned Region. :.
Theo Cuyler. in the New York Evangelist.
Our afternoons march over the bleak,
treeless and brown mountains Of the wilder
ness was inexpfessibly tresOme until We
came in sight Of tho Dead Sea. Il lay 1000
feet below us-a mirror Of silver, set among
the violet mountains of Moab. More pre-
ciPitous decents over, rocks and sands
brought us, by shutdown, to the two towers
OF the most unique monastery the globe.
The famous convent Of Mar Saba is worth
journey to Palestine. For thirteen CEN
turies that wonderful structure has hung
against the walls Of the deep. awful
gorge Of tho Kidron. - s.. =!
1t is colossal swallows nest Of stone,
built to the height Of 800 feet against the
precipice, and inhabited by sixty mo ks of
the Greek church-genuine Mauicheans,
and followers of st. Saba and st. John Of
Damascus. No woman's foot has ever en-
tered the convent walls. Instead Of wo-
mems society they make love to the birds,
who come and feed of tho monks hands.
Every evening they toss meat down to the
Wild jackals in the gorge below. At sun
set climbed over the extraordinary build
church. and into the chapal or cave Of St
Nicholas, which contains the Rhastly skull:
of the monks who were slaughtered by
Chosroes and his Persian soldiers and
gazed down into the awful rsvine beneath
tie convent walls. Some monks in black
gowns were perched as watchmen on the
lofty towers; others wandered over the
stone pavements in sort Of aimless vacuity.
What an attempt to live in an exhausted
| receiver?
9'he monks gave US hosp;table welcome.
| sold us canes aud woodwork, and furnished
us lodgings on The divans of two large stone
parlors. One o. the religious duties of the
brotherhood IS to keep vigils, and through
the night bells were ringing and Changing
to call them to their devotious. The YER
min in the lodging rooms have learned to
keep up their vigils also; and as the result
our rty-with Que exceptio had a
sleepless night. have such talent for
sleeping. and, like Pat, "pay attention to
it" so closely. that l was able to defy even
! the tleas and mosquitoes Of Iar S .bss. BY
daylight the next morning we heard the
great iron door of the convert clang be.
hind US like the glte of Bunyan's sDoubt-
! toi)some descent o the desolate cliffs to
the shore of the Dead Sea. That much
j maligned sea has q weird and wonderful
beauty.
We look bath in i's cool, clear waters
and detected no difference from q bath t
Coney leland, except that the water has
! such density that we floated on it like pine
| shingles. No fish from the salt ocean can
live in it; but it is very attractive to the eye
on a hot MONDAY. A scorching ride We
had across the barren plain of the sacred
Jordan, which disappointed me sadly. At
the place where the tsraelites crossed and
our Lord was baptized it was about 12O feet
wide. 1t flows rapidly, and in a turbid
current OF light stone color. In size and
appearance it was a perfect counterpart of
the Muskingum, a few miles above Zanes-
vile. Its useless waters ought to be turned
off to irrieate its barren valley which might
he changed in:o garden. For beauty tho
Jordan will net compare with Elijah's brook
Cherith, whose bright, sparkling stream
went flowing past our lodging place atJeri-
cho: We lodged over night in Greek con-
vent (very small), and rode next morning
TO see the ruins Of the town made famous
by Joshua, Elijah, Zaccheus, and the re-
storation of Bartimeus to sight. Squalid
Arabs haunt the sacred spot.