Albuquerque daily citizen. [volume] (Albuquerque, N.M.) 1895-1903, 1903-04-11
The Pilgrimage to
Jerusalem
The.
Prayer
Festival

seeking out the holy spots of the city.
They toll painfully up the Via Dolor-
osa to Calvary, stopping to pray and
tell their beads at each of the seven
stations. They search out the Garden
of Gethsemane, with its gray old olive
trees. They find the house of Pontius
PLATE and the hall reputed to be the
prison into which the Roman governor
thrust the Savior, and all the time
there is q ceaseless play of local life
and color through the streets.
Praying and Selling.
Cooking as well as praying is going
on in the open air, and at all times.
trading. Shrewd oriental vendors line
the streets, and the rugs of Bokhara
unroIl themselves beside the laces of
Smyrna and the dates Of Arabia and a
thousand quaint and characteristic
bits of eastern handiwork, which in
the shops of the Occident would be
costly trifes. To study the faces and
costumes of the street merchants,
male and female; to observe the diff
ferent types, as yet untouched by the
railroad or the public school, just as
they have existed always in the heart
of the east, is enough to absorb the
interest without the ceremonials
which are taking place every day.
One of these is the washing of feet, in
imitation of the act of Jesus at the
Last Supper. The vast rotunda of the
Ch,rah 30 fhA Hn1u Gnnt,1phrn ic
crowded for the ceremonial. The
Greek patriarch of Jerusalem, always
a stately and imposing figure, with the
comeliness of the Greek race set of
by his splendid vestments, removes
one by one his silken robes, crusted
thick with gems and gold thread. He
takes off the magnificent jeweled
mitre, the great chain of gold wound
around his neck, the great cross of
blazing diamonds, six inches long. AT
last he stands forth clad in a simple
white robe, in imitation of the poverty
of Jesus.
He pours water from a gold pitcher
into a gold basin and goes from n to
another of the twelve priests who rep
resent the disciples, and who have
been busily getting off their shoes
meanwhile. He washes a foot of each
drying it with a towel, and then kiss
ing it. The last of all represents
Peter, and as Peter did, he objects tC
the Masters degradation in washing
his feet. He refuses to allow the rite
stands up and gesticulates violently
The patriarch brings the Testament
and shows him the passage describing
the original ceremony, and finally
Peter submits amid the applause o.
the audience.
Descent of the Sacred Fire.
But the greatest ceremony of all IL
heaven. The Greek branch still ad
heres to 1t, and the Christian tribe'
of Asia actually believe that the fir
descends straight from heaven by
miracle, to light the torch of tn
patriarch.
The heavenly fire comes down eacl
year exactly at 2 o'clock in the after
noon on the Saturday before Easter
The night before hundreds sleep o.
the ioor of the great rotunda to sc
cure good places for the ceremony
AS the hour approaches on Saturda,
the rotunda is packed to the doors
the streets without are packed to tn
gates of the city. The marble sepu.
chrc in the center is dark and silent
The patriarch is inside alone. If Their
is a soft scratch of a match no on
hears it. AS the clock strikes 2 a ligh
shines from the sepulchre. A shou