St. Landry democrat., 1890-10-11
Buying the Mount OF Olives.

AN INTERVIEW WITH THE MAN WHO MADF
THE PURCHASE.
The Liverpool gentleman who bought
a portion of the mount Of Olives, with the
purpose of fore5talling speculator who
proposed to bnild hotel there, is Mr.
Glay Hill. He is Liverpool solicitor OF
old standing and high position. He is,
however, d solicitor aud something more,
having found leisure TO devote himself TO
the cultivation of literature and the arts
with much devotion and success. "My
practical acquaintance with Palestine"
said Mr.. Hill to a correspondent in the
course of a conversation this week., 'ls
only recent. My first visit was paid four
years ago, but since then have each year
made tour in the country, and have en-
countered many viclssitudes, but found
great and growing delight. 1t is true l
have bought piece of land on or near the
mount of Olives. 1t is small plot at the
north end, and at the highest point of the
ridge on the east side of the Z dron val
ley. l am not sure, however, whether the
place is on the mount of Olives or ON
mount Scopus, inasmuch as if, as is gener-
ally supposed, the later is proIongation
Of the former, no one can precisely tell
where the one ends and The other begins,
The statement in the AthenRum that |
bought the land in order to forestall some
one else, whose intention was to build a
hotel is not correct. The first suggestion
| have heard that anyone proposed to build
hotel on the spot was in the Athen 4um
paragraph itself and | need hardly say
that myself have no such intention. The
erection l shall put up will be hardly
worthy of the dignity of the name of
house. 1t will be- what is known in that
locality as "salaamlik," a simple form of
dwelling suitable alike to the neigh bors
hood and the purpose for which I shall
use it," Mr.. Gray Hill in further CONVEX
sation related some exceedingly interest
ing discoveries Of an archaeological nature
which were made ON the site in question
during the visit of himself and Mrs. Gray
Hill last spring. 'These will be fully de.
scribed," he said, "by Herr Shieck, the
antiquary Of Jerusalem, in the next num-
Der of the quarterly statement of the Pal
estine exploration fund. 81 may say, how
ever" Mr.. Hill continued. "that we
found fight of steps which led down to
q dwelling cut in rock. There are many
dwellings of this kind in the Holy Land
supposed to have been occupied by the
original inhabitants of the country anterior
to the advent of the lsraelites The roof
of this dwelling had evidently fallen in
and carried with it all the superimposed
matter. We instituted a search, of course,
and were richly rewarded, We found
portion of column evidently Roman
work), some pieces of a stone cross, a little
bronze pot and some small Jewish coins
of the time of Herod. But that which in.
terested US most, perhaps, was stone
ball, which Herr Shieck pronounced to be
one of the projectiles used in the siege of
Jerusalem. such impliments of war fare
have occasionally been discovered about
the locality, and the probability of their
having actually been employed in the siege
of Jerusalem is strengthened by the fact
that, according to Josephus the camp of
titus was situated all along the ridge of
which the mount of Olives forms part.
Since we left the Holy Land" continued
Mr.. Gray Hill, 81 learn that several large
cisterns have been found under the sur
face, of which there was no indication
when we were there. Some rock cut
tombs have also been discovered. Cisterns
and tombs, of course, are very common
about Jerusalem, and many of the former
are in so well preserved condition as to
require only cleaning out and rece meDting
to DO avable for the purpose of holding
water. Indeed in all parts of Syria where
there are no streams cisterns of this kind
are met with, in numbers sufficient to in
dictate that the population in olden times
was much larger than at present. We
found many of them in the place where
we were detained last spring, in the noun
tains of Kerak, southeast of the Dead Sea-"
- Landau STAR