THE PRINCIPAL STREET IN BETHLEHEM

(With the Gate that leads to the Church of the Holy Manger, which is seen in the distance'.

THIEF IN THE CONVENT.

197

shown up-stairs into a plain room with a stone floor, containing five beds,-a few planks on iron trestles serving for bedsteads. After waiting a short time, we were invited down to a convent-dinner, which, like the one at Nazareth, consisted principally of macaroni or vermicelli soup; but the vermicelli was, as one of our half-educated servants said, "biled" in "ile," and was indescribably unpalatable, because, being fast-day, the monks were not allowed to let us have any "butter, milk, or meat." We made a pitiful repast, however, upon a few fish from Jaffa and some bread. After a short rest on our trestle-bedsteads, we were roused to attend service, when I found that some thief had made away with a little silver compass I had purchased in Sheffield, to use when on horseback. It was irrecoverably gone, with the guard-chain to which it was attached; and no one knew anything about it.

At ten o'clock we descended to the church, which is enclosed by the convent-walls. The larger room of the convent is ornamented with high but somewhat disproportionate Corinthian columns; and adjoining is the smaller chapel, where the services had already commenced. The interior presents a singular scene of drapery, lighted candles, canopies, old paintings, columns, and frescoes; and a perfect floor of turbans and little red Syrian Fez caps is before us, and more turbans are moving in through the doors. Among the crowd a European dress is occasionally seen; but the spectators in a very great majority are Syrians. And now the music on the organ becomes rather cheerful than sacred, and the priests are assembling and the "performances" in progress. If it were not for the fact that every impression which legitimately follows all we hear and see is in diametrical opposition to every idea of devotion, an intelligent worshipper would be so pained by incongruities that he would be driven away from the place by his own sense of the irreverence of the scene. This is the vicinity of the spot where the Saviour was born. This is near to the place where the angels sang the first heavenly

song that ever was recorded a song of the triumph of God's mercy and of his justice too-and this the night of the commemoration of such scenes and such holy and glorious consequences. I could have given my soul up

to the rapture of such thoughts had there been a correspondence in the form of worship and in the music; but it was not possible to feel so. The scene was so utterly at variance with all I had anticipated that for a time I was forced to forget even that I was in a church, or at Bethlehem, or in Palestine at all. Before the spectators were the priests and the paraphernalia of the altar. Over it was a small organ, the tones of which were tolerable. At first a Te Deum and some uncertain chants were played, and the impression was almost devotional; but soon the character of the music became that of oratorio, and occasionally I could hear a few bars from the music of Masaniello. The people in the meantime became quite talkative, and some were smiling and moving through the crowd. At last the dense mass is surprised by the sudden movement of some monks, who, with lighted candles, pass through the church, pushing one or two here, and passing there over and between others, lighting every corner and arch where candles had been secreted, until the whole church is lit up into a scorching blaze of light. Now look around. a sight presents itself! what sounds are heard! Syria are various classes by hundreds kneeling, crossing, and chanting, as if impelled by some sudden and mysterious influence. There in front, almost hidden by the glare of a hundred lights, is the organ, evidently managed by a skilful hand-a Neapolitan; but never did such violent and irreverent contrasts form the music of a church before. The grave and solemn, the majestic and the gay and brilliant, waltzes and cotillons and reels, follow each other with maddening rapidity; then suddenly there is a pause for a bar or two, as if to allow a horrified audience a moment to breathe. But no, they need no time. They have no desire to breathe a word of objection, All seem

What Here in

delighted and exhilarated; and the music quickens, and the same frightful irreverence pervades the performances of the organist.

On my right I have for some time noticed the costume and faces of a class of girls of whose beauty I have heard before. Large numbers are sitting upon the floor, some of them dressed most gorgeously. There is a calm luxuriance of expression upon features of most perfect outline, and eyes which set at defiance all my powers of description.

A movement takes place among the crowd. Incense rises thick and suffocating; the chants are louder and slower ; and the senseless ceremony commences of lifting a little wooden infant with glaring glass eyes, dressed in a white gown, to be seen and worshipped by the dense mass of human beings; after which an opening is made and general preparations commence to leave the chapel for the grotto beneath. Candles are passed from the monks to the people, and many accept; and, lighting them, amid clouds of incense and songs and chants and the sound of the organ and the conversation of hundreds, the mass moves onward to the grotto. This is supposed to be the place where our Saviour was born; and on the right, a few steps lower, is the place "where he was laid soon afterward." Above the spot where the Saviour is said to have been born, there are twelve lights burning, one for each apostle. On the right is another descent into what is called the cell of the manger. Overhead are ostrich-shells, from each of which is pendent a lamp said to be of gold; and the ceiling and sides are covered with red cloth, apparently cotton, which covers the rough rock. On the left I think the number of steps is nineteen, but on the right thirteen, and each eight inches high. Hence the floor of the grotto is nine feet below the church-floor. The room is only about ten feet wide by fifteen or twenty feet long, and about nine feet high. We were offered a candle with which to accompany the "Bambino," as the doll is called; but we chose to see by the lights of others, and, getting in

advance, we descended before the crowd. Here we again met some of the Bethlehemite girls, who recognised us quite graciously. I was told by residents that these girls, so celebrated everywhere, were as noted for their independence and moral character as for their beauty, and that repeated efforts had been unsuccessfully made at Jerusalem to obtain their services among the Frank ladies. They are supposed to be descendants of the Crusaders; but I could obtain no records or history in regard to them, and they have the appearance of a Caucasian origin.

We

Soon the crowd descended the steps, headed by a priest carrying the shocking little object about sixteen inches long, representing the infant Saviour. The incense and the crowd now become suffocating: we almost gasp for air; and yet there is no possible exit. The priest sings, and the little Syrian boys respond, and all press together in compound force. The head-priest puts the Bambino into the recess, getting down upon his knees and singing. I know not whether to call the scene ludicrous or horrid. The monk sings, putting his head so far into the grotto that the voice sounds like that of a man in some deep pit and in distress; and all the people keep silence. Then he removes the infant to the other cell, where it is left till morning. return to the chapel, and a half-hour is spent, during which some of the same waltzes are performed, and afterward all promenade out to bed. We now have but three hours for rest before breakfast; and yet some boys are in our room offering for sale large quantities of beads worked out of olive and tamarind seeds, and stained red. Some are for rosaries, others for ornaments. Long strings of small beads made of pearl-shell are also sold, and the pearl-shell itself, taken from the Red Sea, and engraved and carved with intaglios representing St. John and the Lamb, the Virgin, &c. Pieces of the rock stained by St. Stephen's blood, and some of the black rock from the Dead Sea, out of which bowls are carved, are also offered, and olive-wood beads, &c.