Connecticut western news., 1890-11-19


 called the "Meadow of the Feast" While this ancient city was in the height of it's prosperity, on this Mead ow of the Feastn there was an annual ball, where the maidens of the city amid clapping cymbals and blare of trumpets danced in glee, upon which thousands of spectators gazed. But no dance since the world stood ever broke up in such a strange way as the one the Bible describes. One night while by the light of the lamps and torches these gayeties went on, 200 Benjanites, who had been hidden be- hind the rocks and among the trees. dashed upon the scene. They came not to injure or destroy, but wishing to set up households of their own, the women of their own land having been slain in battle, by preconcerted ar rangement each one of the 200 Ben jamites seized the one whom he chose for the queen of his home, and carried her away to large estate and beautiful residence, for these POO Benjamites had inherited the wealth of nation.
 As today near Shiloh we look at the Meadow of the Feast" where the maidens danced that night and at the mountain gorge up which the Ben jaminites carried their brides, we be- think ourselves of the better land and the better times in which we live, when such scenes are an impossibility, and amid orderly groups and with prayer and benediction, and breath of orange blossoms and the roll of the wedding march, marriage is solemnized, and with oath recorded in heaven two i'm mortals start arm in arm on journey to last until death do them part. Upon every such marriage altar may there come the blessing of him "who setteth the solitary in familiesr' Side by side on the path of life! Side by side in their graves! Side by side in heaven!
 But we must this afternoon, our last day before reaching Nazareth, pitch our tent on the most famous battlefield of all time-the plain of Esdraelon. What must have been the feelings of the Prince of Peace as he crossed it on the way from Jerusalem to Nazareth2 Not flower blooms there but has in it's veins the inherited blood of flowers that drank the blood of fallen armies Hardly a foot of the ground that has not at some time been gullied with war chariots or trampled with the hoofs of cavalry. It is a plain reaching from the Mediterranean to the Jordan. Upon it look down the mountains of Tabor and Gilboa and Carmel Through it rages at certain seasons the river Kishon, which swept down the armies of Sisera, the battle occurring in Mo- vember when there is almost always a shower of meteors so that 'sthe stars in their courses" were said to have fought against Sisera
 Through this plain drove Jehu, and the iron chariots of the Canaanites, scythed at the hubs of the wheels, hew- thousands in minute. The Syrian armies, the Turkish armies, the Egyp- tian armies again and again trampled it. There they career across it, David and Joshua and Godfrey and Richard C@ur de Lion and Baldwin and Sala- dina plain not only famous for the past, but famous because the Bible says the great decisive battle of the world will be fought there-the battle of Armageddon.
 A VALLEY OF SLAUGHTER.
 To me the plain was the more ab- sorbing because of the desperate bat ties here and in regions round in which the holy cross, the very two pieces of wood on which Jesus was supposed to have been crucified, was carried as standard at the head of the Christian host; and that night, closing my eyes in my tent on the plain of Esdraelon- for there are some things we can see better with eyes shut than open-the scenes of that ancient war came before me. The Twelfth century was closing, and Saladin, at the head of eighty thousand mounted troops, was crying: "Ho for Jerusalem! Ho for all Pales- tine!" and before them everything went down, but not without unparal- leled resistance. In one place one hundred and thirty Christians were surrounded b, many thousands of furi- ous Mohamlnedans. For one whole day the one hundred and thirty held out against these thousands.
 Tennyson's ''six hundred" when ''some one had blundered" were eclipsed by these one hundred and thirty fighting for the holy cross. They took hold of the lances which had pierced them with death wounds, and pulling them out of their own breasts and sides hurled them back again at the enemy. On went the fight until all but one Christian had fallen, and he, mounted on the last horse, yielded his battle ax right and left till his horse fell under the plunge of the javelin, and the rider, making the sign of the cross toward the sky, gave up his life on the point of a score of spears. But soon after the last battle came. History portrays it, poetry chants it, painting colors it, and all ages admire that last struggle to keep in possession the wooden cross on which Jesus was said to have ex- pired. It was battle in which min gled the fury of devils and the grand eur of angels. Thousands of dead Chris tians on this side. Thousands of dead Mohalnmedans on the other side.
 The battle was hottest close around the wooden cross upheld by the bishop of Ptolemais, himself wounded and dy- ing. And when the bishop of Ptolemais dropped dead the bishop of Lydda seized the cross and again lifted it, car rying itonward into a wilder and fiercer fight, and sword against javelin, and battle ax upon helmet, and piercing spear against splintering shield. Horses