Haifa; or, Life in modern Palestine. Laurence Oliphant
of Diana and the foot of Mount Pion there is not a stone, so that the probability is that the temple was situated amid groves of trees. On the hill there are stones, or, rather, rocks, enough, but they are of huge size, and for the most part natural. Of actual city comparatively few remains still exist. No doubt its columns and monuments and slabs have supplied materials for the ornamentation and construction of many cities, and the convenience of getting to it by sea has materially aided the spoilers. Still, the site of ancient Ephesus affords abundant material for conjecture, and the more one studies the local topography the more difficult is it to picture to one's self what the ancient city was like.
From historical association it must ever remain one of the most interesting spots in the East, while, even from a purely picturesque point of view, the wild and rugged grandeur of the scenery amid which it is situated cannot fail to stamp it upon the memory. As I believe it is intended to continue excavations, we may hope for still further results, and there can be no doubt that, when once the obstacles which are now thrown in the way by the present government, to all scientific or antiquarian research in Turkey, are removed by the political changes new pending in the East, a rich field of exploration will be opened, not at Ephesus alone, but throughout the little-known ruined cities of Asia Minor.
Haifa, Nov. 27, 1882.—The more you examine the countries most frequented by tourists, the more you are perplexed to comprehend the reasons which decide them to confine themselves to certain specified routes, arranged apparently by guides and dragomans, with a view of concealing from them the principal objects of interest. There is certainly not one tourist in a hundred who visits the Holy Land who has ever heard of Athlit, much less been there, and yet I know of few finer ruins to the west of the Jordan. To the east the magnificent remains of Jerash, Amman, and Arak-el Emir are incomparably more interesting, and these, of course, are also almost ignored by tourists; but that may be accounted for by the fact that special permission from the government is required to visit them, while an impression still exists that the journey is attended with some risk. Practically this is not the case. It takes a long time to remove an impression of this kind, and it is the interest of a large class of persons who live on blackmail to keep it up. But in the case of Athlit there is no such drawback. Probably the neglect with which it is treated is due largely to the fact that no scriptural association attaches to the locality, and people would rather go to Nazareth than examine the majestic remains of Roman civilization, or the ruder superstructures of crusading warfare.
The easiest way to reach Athlit is to go to it from Carmel. As the monastery there is a most modern structure, about fifty years old, tourists often get as far as that, because the guide takes them there; but they know nothing of the mysteries of this sacred mountain, second only to Sinai, in the estimation of the modern Jew, in the sanctity of its reputation, and they turn back when, by riding a few miles down the coast, they would follow a route full of interest. The road traverses a plain about two miles in width. On the left, the rugged limestone slopes of the mountain are perforated with caves—in the earliest ages of Christianity the resorts of hermits, from whom the order of the Carmelites subsequently arose. Here tradition still points out the spot where the crusading king, St. Louis of France, was shipwrecked; and in a gorge of the mountains may still be seen the foundations of the first monastery, near a copious spring of clearest water, where the pious monarch was entertained by the first monks, whom, out of gratitude, he enabled subsequently to establish themselves upon the site occupied by the present monastery, and to found an order which has since become celebrated. Along this line of coast there is an uninterrupted stretch of sandy beach, upon which the full force of the Mediterranean breaks in long lines of rollers, and which would afford an interesting field of study to the conchologist. Among the most curious shells are the Murex brandaris and the Murex trunculus, the prickly shells of the fish which in ancient times yielded the far-famed Tyrian purple. The Phoenicians obtained the precious dye from a vessel in the throat of the fish.
Instead of following closely the line of coast, I kept near the base of the Carmel range, reaching in about two hours from Carmel the village of El Tireh, where the mosque is part of an old Benedictine monastery, the massive walls of which have been utilized for religious purposes by the Moslems. Their worship has had little effect upon the inhabitants, who are the most notorious thieves and turbulent rogues in the whole country side. They are rich enough to indulge their taste for violence with comparative impunity, as they can always square it with the authorities. Their village is surrounded with a grove of thirty thousand olive-trees and the rich plain, extending to the sea, is nearly all owned by them. Indeed, their evil reputation keeps other would-be proprietors at a distance. Here the plain begins to slope backward from the sea, so as to prevent the water from the mountains from finding a natural outlet, and in summer the country becomes miasmatic and feverish.
From El Tireh, where the inhabitants treated me with great civility, I crossed the plain, and in an hour more reached an insignificant ruin called El Dustrey, a corruption of the crusading name “Les Destroits,” or “The Straights,” so called from a gorge in the limestone ridge, which here separates the plain from the sea. This very remarkable formation extends for many miles down the coast. It is a rugged ridge, varying from twenty to fifty feet in height, and completely cutting off the sea beach from the fertile plain behind. Here and there it is split by fissures, through which the winter torrents find their way to the sea. Skirting this ridge, we suddenly come upon an artificial cutting, just wide enough to allow the passage of a chariot. At the entrance, holes were cut into the rock on both sides, evidently used in ancient times for closing and barring a passage-way. The cutting through the rock was from six to eight feet deep and from sixty to eighty yards in length. The deep ruts of the chariot-wheels were distinctly visible. Here and there on the sides steps had been cut leading to the ridge, which had been fortified.
Passing through this cutting, we debouch upon a sandy plain and a reedy marsh, in which my companion had the year before killed a wild boar; and here we were in the presence of a majestic ruin. Immediately facing us was a fragment of wall, eighty feet high, sixteen feet thick, and thirty-five yards long. It towers to a height of one hundred and twenty feet above the sea, and is a conspicuous landmark. It has been partially stripped of the external layer of carved stone blocks, and has furnished a quarry to the inhabitants for some centuries. The wall had evidently once continued across the base of the promontory upon which the ancient fortress and town were built. Passing up a rocky passage and under an archway of comparatively modern date, and which could still be closed by means of massive wooden doors, we enter the enceinte, and discover that the whole promontory is underlaid with huge vaults. It became also evident that the immense fragment I have described was the outer wall of a large building, for on the inside were three ribbed, pointed arches, supported on corbels, representing on the left a bearded head, on the right a head shaven on the crown, with curling hair on the sides; in the centre a cantilever, with three lilies in low relief. As the roof had fallen in, the spring of the arches alone remained. The whole was constructed of blocks of stone about three feet long, two feet high, and two feet wide. The promontory upon which all this solid masonry had been erected was washed on three sides by the sea. It rose above it precipitously to a height of about fifty feet. The area was occupied by a miserable population of possibly a hundred squalid, half-clad Arabs, whose huts were built among the ruins, thus preventing any effectual examination of them. It would be difficult to conceive a greater contrast than is presented by these wretched fellahin and their burrowing habitations with the splendour of the edifices and the opulence which must have characterized the former inhabitants. Here and there we see a fragment of a granite column, while, when we reach the brink of the cliff which forms the sea-face of the promontory, we are again surprised at the stupendous scale of these ancient works, and of the sea-wall built out upon a ledge of rocks, exposed to the full fury of the waves, and still standing to a height of forty or fifty feet.
To the right of the promontory, a wall, the base of which is washed by the waves, is perforated by three arches. It presents a most picturesque appearance. The southern face is, however, the most perfect. Here there were