Fort Worth weekly gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1890-10-02

did not encourage the undertaking.
Is most tedious ride to Nineyeh and {
desert. Now see an additional reason
why Jonah did not want to go to Nineveh
He not only revolted because of the dis
agreeable message he was called TO de-
liver at NIneveh, but because 1t was a
long way and tough and bandit infested
so he came here to Joppa and took ship.
But alas, for the disastrous voyagei He
paid his full fare for the whole voyage
-tdt the ship company did not fill their
part of the contract. To this day they
HAVE NOT PAID BACK
that passage money. Why people should
doubt the story of Jonah and the whale
is more of d mystery than the Bible
event itself. 1 do not need the fact that
Pliny, the distortion, records that the
skeleton of a whale forty feet long, and
with hide q foot and half thick, was
brought from Joppa to Rome. The
event recorded in the book of Jonah has
occurred thousand times. The Lord
has always whale outside the harbor
for the man who starts in the wrong d.
! rection. Recreant Jonah! l do not won-
der that even the whale was sick of him.
This prophet was put IN the Bible. not as
an example, but Us warning, because
| the world not only needs lighthouses
but buoys TO show where the rocks are.
The Bible story or him ends by showing
the prophet In fit of sulks. He was
mad because Nineveh was not destroyed
/ and then he went out to pOut and sat
under big leaf, using it for shade from
/ the tropical sun, aud when worm dis
| turbed that leaf and it withered, and the
/ sun smotc Jonah, he flew into great
/ rage and said: cit is better for me TO
. a h, to-
! because he had lost his umbrella! Be-
ware of petulance!
But standing here on the housetop at
| JoDpa, l look off upon the sands near
the beach, aud ] almost expect to find
them crimsoned and iucarnadined. But
no; the rains long ago washed away the
last sign or the Napoleonic massacre.
Napoleon was marching on through the
| coasts. He had here at Joppa 1000
Albanians, who had been surrendered as
prisoners of war, and under a promise
of protection. What shall he do with
them? 1t will be impossible for him to
take them along, and he cannot afford
to leave soldiers enough
TO GUARD THEM FROM ESCAPE.
1t will not be difficult for the man who
broke the heart of lovely Josephine and
who, when asked if the great losses of
life in his battles were not too dear q
price to pay for his victories, shrugged
his shoulders mirthfully and said, "You
must break the egg if YOU want to make
an omelet IL say, it will not be diff
cult for him to decide. The prisoners of
war, by his order are taken out on the
sands and put to death 1000 of them,
1000 of them, 5000 of them, 1900 of
them, massacred. And the blood pours
down into the sea, the red of the one
mingling with the blue of the other, and
making an awful maroon which neither
God nor nation can ever forget. Ye
who are fond of vivid contrasts, put the
two scenes of Joppa side by side, Dorcas
with her needle, and the immortal
butcher with his knife.
But standing on this Jopna housetop, l |
look off on the Mediterranean, and what |
is that strange sight l see? The waters
are black seemingly for miles. There |
seems to be a great multitude of logs |
fastened together. Oh, yes, it Is a great |
raft of timbers. They are cedars of Leb- |
anon which King Hiram is furnishing |
King Solomon in exchange for 20, GOO |
measures of wheat, 20 ZOO baths of oil, |
and 20, 900 baths OF wine. These cedars
have been cut down and trimmed in the
mountains of Lebanon by the 70 ZOO ak
and iron bolts are fastened together, and |
they are floating down to Joppa to be
taken across the land for Soomon's
temple now building at Jerusalem, for
we nave lost our hold of the nineteenth |
century and are clear back in the ages
The RATS of cedar ara guided into what
is called the Moon Pool, an old harbor
south of Joppa, now
FILLED WITH SAND, AND USELESS.
With long pixies the timbers are pushed
this way and that in the water. then with
levers, and many loud long $50,
heave!' as the carriers get their shoul-
ders under the great weight, the timber
Is fastened to the wagons and the lowing
oxen are yoked to the load. and the pro-
cession of teams moves on with crack of
whip, and drawled-out words which
translated, l suppose, would correspond
with the 'whoa, haw, gee!' of modern
teamsters, toward Jerusalem, which is
thirty miles away, over mountainous
distances, which for hundreds of years
detied all engineering. And these rough
cedars shall become carved pillars, aud
beautiful affairs, ana rounded bannisters,
and traceried panels, and sublime CELL
ing, and exquisite harps, and kingly
ohariots. AS the wagon train moves out
from Joppa over the plain of Sharon
toward Jerusalem. say to
myself, what vast numbers of
people helped build that temple of
Solomon, and what vast numbers of peo-
pie are now engaged in building the
wider, higher, grander temple of right
rising in the earth. Our
Christian ancestry toiled ut it, amid
sweat and tears, and hundreds of the
generations of the good, and the long
train of Christian workers still moves on,
and as in the construction of Solomon's
temple some hewed with the ak in the
far-away Lebanon, and some drove O
wedge, and some twisted withe, and
some trod the wet and slippery RATS on
the sea, and some yoked the OK, and
some pulled at the load and some showed
the plane, and some fitted the points,
and some heaved up the rafters, and
ALL HELPED BUILD THE TEMPLE.
though some of these never saw it, so
now let US all put our hands, and our
shout Iers, and our hearts to building the {
temple of righteousness, which is to fill
The earth; and one will bind wound, 6