The Middleburgh post. [volume] (Middleburgh, Snyder Co., Pa.) 1883-1916, 1890-11-20
AMONG THE BEDOUINS
THE ANo1ENr CUSTOM RE1oNs.
travelling in the Historic Land Of Tent.
ed Abodes.

ere are 10 encomp in the wiiderness. s.n-Num.
K, 81.
Night after night we have slept In tent In
Palestine. There are large villages of Bedou-
ins without house. and for three thousand
years the people of those places have lived in
black tents. made out OF dyed skins, and
when the winds and storms wore out and tore
loose those coverings others of the same kind
took their places.
Noah lived in a tent; Abraham In a tent.
Jacob pitched his tent on the mountain.
Isaac pitched his tent In the valley. LOT
4 pitched his tent toward Sodom. In tent
the woman Jael nailed Sisera, the general. TO
the ground, first having given him sour mill;
called "leben' as soporifc to make him
sleep soundly, that being the effect OF such
nutrition, as modern travellers can testify.
The Syrian army In n tent. The ancient
battle shout was ITO your tents, O Israel p
Paul was tent maker Indeed Isaiah, mag
nihcently poetic, indicates that all the human
race live under blue tent when he says God
'strctcheth out the heavens as a curtain and
spreadeth them out as tent 70 dwell in, "and
Hezekinh compares death to the striking OF a
tent saying, my age Is removed from me
as Shepherds tent"
In our tent in Palestine tonight I hear
something / never heard before and hope
never to hear again. IL is the voice of a
hyena amid the rocks near BY When Won
may have seen this monster putting his
| month between the iron bars Of menagerie
he is captive. and he gives Inundated
and suppressed cry. But yonder in the mid
night on throne Of rocks he has nothing 20
fear, aud he utters himself in loud, re-
sounding, terrific, almost supernatural
xsound. splitting up the darkness into a
deeper midnight. IL begins with howl and
rnds with a sound something like a horses
whining. IN the hyena's voice are defiance
Ind strength and bloodthirstiness and crunch
kof broken bones and death.
/ mn oil nd fn h.
Palestine is clear OF beasts of prey The
eopards, which Jeremiah says cannot
mango their spots, have all disappeared and
ne lions that once were common all through
his land. and used by all the prophets for
Illustrations OF cruelty and wrath, have re-
-eated before the discharges of gunpowder,
which they have an indescribable fear. But
Tor the most part Palestine is what IL origi-
paly was With the one execution OF N
wire thread reaching from Joppa TO Jeru-
salem and from Jerusalem TO Nazareth and
from Nazareth to Tiberias and from Ii
berias to Damascus, that one nerve Of civili-
zation, the telegraphic wire (for we found
ourselves only few minutes Off from Brook
Iyn and New York while standing by Lake
Galllee), with that one exception Palestine
Is Just asit always was.
Nothing surprised me so much as the per-
eistence OF everything. A sheep or horse
falls dead and though the sky may one min
ute before be clear Of all wings In five min
ntes after the skies are black with eagles
cawing screaming, plunging, fighting for
room, contending for largest morsels OF the
extinct quadruped. All, now understand
the force OF Christs illustration when He
raid; Nv heresoever the carcass Is there will
the eagles be gathered together" The long
.evity OF those eagles is wonderful. They
live fifty and sixty and sometimes a hundred
years. Ah, that explains what David meant
when he said: "rhy youth is renewed like the
eagles" saw shepherd with the folds Of
MS coat FAR bent outward, and l wondered
what was contained in that amplitude of ap-
parel, and said to the dragoman What
has that shepherd got under his coatY And
the dragomnn said: ut is very young lamb
he is carrying; IL is too young and too weak
Aand too cold to keep up with the flock" At
= that mOmen. saw tie lamb put its head out
nom the shepherds bosom and said: There
itsnow. lsaiahs description of the tender
ness OF God-he shall gather the lambs with
DIS arm and carry them In his bosom"
fassing by village home, in the Holy
Land, about noon l saw great crowd in
and around private house. ami said TO the
Gragoman; David. what is going on there:"
He said Somebody has recently died there,
and their neighbors go in for several days
after to sit down and weep with the be-
reaved." There it is, ! said, the old scrip
tural custom, And many of the Jews came
TO Martha and Mary 70 comfort them con-
ing passing by cemetery in the Holy Land
saw among the graves about fifty women
dressed in black, and they were crying: "Oh,
my childW "Oh, my husbandT 'Oh, my
fatherW "Oh, my motherw Our dragoman
Iold us that every morning, very early for
three mornings alter a burial, the women go
70 the sepulcher, and after that every week
very early for year. As | saw this group
lust after daybreak said: ''There it is again,
Pie same old custom referred 20 in Luke, the
evangelist, where he says, Certain women
(Which were early in the sepulcher.'n
But here we found ourselves at Jacobs
well, the most famous well in history, most
distinguished for two things, because ii be-
longed TO the old patriarch after whom il
WAS named, and for the wonderful things
which Christ said, seated On this well curb,
TO the Samaritan woman We dsmount
from our horses in Il drizzling rain, and our
dragoman, climbing up To the well over
The slippery stones, stumbles and fright
ems us all by nearly falling into IL. meas
,red the well at the top and found IL six feet
from edge to edge. Some grass and wesds
nnd thorny growths overhang It. In one
place the roof broken through. Large stones
Pmbank the wall on all sides.
Our dragoman took pebbles and dropped
Them In, and from the time they left his
band TO the instant they clicked ON the bot
om you could hear it was deep, though not
deep as once, for every day travellers are
pc OF Maundrell, the traveller, the well was
undred and sixty-five feet deep, now IL is
v seyenty-five So great Is the curiosity
the world 10 know about that well that
ring the dry season Captain Anderson
kcended into this well, at one place the
les so close he had 10 put his hands over his
Id IN order 10 get through, aud then he
nted away and lay at the bottom Of the
as though dead, until hours after recov-
he came 70 the surface.
\ is not like other wells digged down TO n
bntain that fills IL, but reservoir 10 catch
falling rains and 10 that Christ refers
en speaking to the Samaritan woman about
pirltual supply He said He would. If asked,
Se given her living water that is, water
pm flowing spring in distinction from the
Fer OF the well, which was rain water But
y did Jacob make reservoir there when
ere is plenty of water all around and
andance of springs and fountains and seem
ly no need Of that reservoir Why did
fcob so 20 the vast expense Of boring and
Agging well perhaps two hundred feet deer
first completed when, by going little
lay of, he could have water from other
Puntains at little or no expensey Ah, Jacot
as wise He wanted his own well. Quarrel
hd wars might arise with other tribes and
be supply Of water might be cut of, so the
bowels and pickaxes and boring instruments
ere ordered, and the well OF nearly foni
housand years ago was sunk through the
|olid rock
When Jacob thus wisely insisted on having