The Topeka state journal., 1919-12-19

And men go up and men go down,
| But follow still the star!
And this is humble Bethlehem
In the Judean wild;
| And this Is lowly Bethlehem
| Wherein mother smiled;
Yea. this is happy bethlehem
That knew the Little Child!
i Aye this is glorious Bethlehem
| Where he drew living breath
| (Ah, precious, precious Bethlehem.-~
So every mortal saith
| Who brought to all that tread the earth
| Lies triumph over death.
o little town. little town,
Upon the hills afar,
You call to us, thing sublime,
Across the great grey vases Of time,
| For men 70 up and men go down,
Clinton scollard.
Bethlehem is real. 1t is a place to
which travellers may go. 1 have been
there myself within the past six
months. Myriads of devout pilgrims
from this western hemisphere will
present paralysis of normal life is
cured. New highways have been
opened by the war; SO that one may
now go from London to Bethlehem by
rail, with only two brief ferriages on
the way.
| Bethlehem is in itself not the most
beautiful of Judean towns: probably
that distinction -oday belongs to Ain
Karin, where Elizabeth dwelt and
John the Baptist. the kinsman of
| Jesus, was born; and where Mary went
to visit her cousin before the birth of
the babe of either. Today, Bethlehem
| has lost much of its oriental character,
because of the many modern Chris
tian buildings in it. which devotion and
missionary zeal have reared. The pop
ulation is mostly Christian; and the
main industries ara the working in
mother -of-pearl and olive-wood. Beth
| lehemites are distinctive in both dress
and appearance, probably owing to
CRUSADER blood and influence:
A Pen Picture of Bethlehem.
/ On terraced hillside with the
| limestone rock outcropping. and vine
yards tucked away on tiny ledges, and
olive trees growing on the stormy soil,
is built the little town of Bethle-
hem" with it's gray, square. flat
| rooted limestone houses, standing al
most solidly along narrow streets.
| Thru the dOorways the visitor from
Jerusalem, which is only five miles
away may see the men and women
toiling at primitive lathes amid the
dust of mother-of-pearl. Alas. the
workers are not many now, for war
| and starvation took a heavy toll of
Bethlehem. The shops where mother
/ of-pearl articles are sold are few and
meager, and their principal sale is of
|
| diers.
! British troops guard the town of
| Bethlehem today, and keep watch by
the manger. For long years Turkish
| soldiers guarded the Church of the
Nativity, which houses the ecclesfatics
of three warning Christian faiths
Greeks, Latins and Armenians. Now
genial Tommy stands at the en-
| trance to the crypt containing the
manger, "To keep the priests from
1 -s,-f ~ IA
others lamps" he says. Sectarian
strife shows at its worst at the Church
of the Nativity and the Church OF the
Holy Sepuichre.
The Oldest Christian edifice in the
world covers the traditional and uni
versally accepted site of the nanger.
| On this hillside was the village khan.
where Mary and Joseph lodged, and
| the stable, as is still the usage, was
| the cave room cut into the limestone,
with the manger hewn out of the liv-
| ing rock. Outwardly, the church is
unprepossessing, with door SO small
that it admits but one person at
| time. Within, the partition which
| ecclesiastical jealousy had erected has
! been removed by British influence.
and the proportions of the church as
it was in Crusader times may be seen.
The entrance to the subterranean
manger-crypt is down thru a side
| chapel.
| The Storied Hills.
While the town of Bethlehem has
entirely changed. the surrounding
scenery remains the same. These are
the very hills upon which the shep-
herds watched their floSks by night.
| These fields, across which we looked
at a glorious moon arising above the
mountains of Moab, beyond the opal
escent waters of the Dead Sea, were
| once flooded with a celestial glow
more wonderful than the sunsets we
| have watched here. Silent no%U at
eventide, the echoing hills then re-
sounded to the strains of an angelic
chorus.
| 1t was here. on the very spot where
we stand. that the greatest of mes
! sages, straight from heaven, was
heard by a group of workingmen:
"Glory to God in the highest,
| And on earth. peace among men, in whom
he is well pleased"
To the traveller standing on Bethle-
| hem hillside the sweet old story
| seems newly real 1t was a place.
event, aA well as a universal message.
| When we Iocalize it. we understand
more vivid1yfits ever-present meaning.
/ The old carol seems like an interpreta-
ton written yesterday:
"It came upon the midnight clear,
| That glorious song of old.
From angels bending near the earth
To touch their harps of gold:
Peace IN the earth. good will to men,
| From heavens ALI gracious h1ns
1.-THE world in solemn stiffness lay,
| To hear the angels sing.
| "Stiil thru the cIoyen skies they come,
| With peaceful wings unfurled,
And still their heavenly music floats
/ Ger all the weary world:
Above Its sad and iowly plains
They bend lowering wing,
And ever DER its Babel-sounds
The blessed angels-Sing.
| "And ye, beneath iife's crushing load,
Whose forms are bending low,
Who toll along the climbing way
With painful steps and slow
Look nowl for glad and goideE hours
Come swiftly on the wing:
Oh. rest beside the weary road,
And hear the angels sing.
For 10, the days are hastening on,
BY prophet bards foreteld,
When with the exer-cfreIing years
Comes round the age OF gold;