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the very names are unknown of the kings and counsellors of the earth who constructed (these) desolate places for themselves. They are destroyed from morning to evening: they perish for ever without any regarding it. Doth not their excellency which is in them go away? they die, even without wisdom,'" Job iii. 14; iv. 20, 21.

Next in interest to the Khůzneh stand the remains of a great open amphitheatre, wholly hewn out of the solid rock in which it is embosomed. The diameter of the bottom is one hundred and twenty feet; with thirty-three rows of seats, rising one above another in the side of the cliff behind. Above the seats a row of small chambers is excavated in the circle of the rock, looking down upon the scene below. The upper seat of the gallery measures about four hundred feet. This theatre could easily accommodate at a time five thousand of the votaries of pleasure. The cliffs on each side are full of tombs; while in front, along the face of the eastern cliffs, the eye of the spectator rests on a multitude of the largest and most splendid sepulchres. Strange contrast ! where a taste for the frivolities of the day was at the same time gratified by the magnificence of tombs. Amusement in a cemetery! a theatre in the midst of sepulchres!" The incongruity strikes the most indifferent observer. But, alas! it is not confined to lands that are dark and idolatrous. In our own country, the burialground and the theatre are not unfrequent

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neighbours. The sounds of woe which fill one house are echoed by the sounds of revelry from another. Even in the midst of the plague which desolated London and other parts two centuries ago, there were many who, while others were weeping and praying, betook themselves to pleasure with all the energy of despair, and said, "Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die." The voice from Petra awakens the thoughtful reader to say, "O my soul, come not thou into their secret; unto their assembly, mine honour, be not thou united."

A conspicuous object, called the Deir, or Convent, next claims attention. The defile which leads to it commences at the north-west corner of the valley. It is exceedingly rough and broken; but it is rendered practicable by flights of steps cut in the terraces of the solid rock wherever they are necessary. The tombs at its entrance are plain. One of them, about half way up the ascent, is rather of large dimensions, and is called peculiarly the Maghárah, or "Cave." Advancing up the defile, the traveller is much struck with the picturesque and fantastic appearance of the divided and overhanging rocks of pink and purple on each side of him, and with the monuments of nature and art which here and there, looking through the long and irregular vista, he sees in the valley below.

Winding to the top of the defile, Dr. Wilson came to a considerable platform, mostly inclosed by rocks, where the Deir, the principal object

on this high and retired spot, presented itself to his view, in all its imposing grandeur and beauty, though not perfection of art. It is wholly cut out of the solid rock, which is herc so regular and compact, that scarcely a single flaw could have been originally revealed in it. It has suffered very little, either from the waste of time or the stroke of the hand of man, except in the steps by which there is the ascent to its door, and the parts which are with it on a corresponding level. Its front, occupying the greater part of the mass of the rock out of which it is cut, has two stories, with niches with pedestals between the pillars by which it is ornamented. Within, it is perfectly simple. There is there a large room, of the same height as the door, varying from forty-nine to thirtyfive feet in length, by about forty-two in breadth, and terminating in a recess of five and a half by three paces, containing an elevation like an altar, with four steps on each side. There is not the slightest doubt, both from its appearance and the nature of the road to it, that it was used as a public temple. The ground before it is nearly level. Opposite to it, however, there is a lofty rock, with excavations on which several steps are cut, by which the ascent to it can be made. Our traveller sat upon it for some time, greatly enjoying the marvellous scene around him, and particularly looking upwards, over the elevation and abysses, tc Mount Hor, from which he had first seen this, the highest portion of Petra.

The most striking feature of the ruins of this city consists not in the fact that there are occasional excavations and structures like those above described, but in the innumerable multitude of such excavations, along the whole extent of perpendicular rocks adjacent to the main area, and in all the lateral valleys and chasms; the entrances of very many of which are variously, richly, and often fantastically decorated, with every imaginable order and style of architecture. The cliffs upon the east and west present the largest and most continuous surfaces, and here the tombs are most numerous. But the spur upon the eastern cliffs formed by the wady below the Khuzneh, as well as other smaller spurs and promontories and single groups of rocks, both in the north and south, are also occupied in like manner, All these sepulchres, as they are usually regarded, of course looked down upon the city of the living; but others, again, are found in retired dells and secret chasms, or sometimes among the heights on either side, to which flights of steps cut in the rock lead up in several places, as in the case of the Deir, which is more than half an hour distant from the area of the city.

CHAPTER V.

IDUMÆA AS IT IS, continued.

Design of the excavations-Age of the ruins of Petra-Opinions of the Fellahin-East India excavations-Present inhabitants of Edom-Scriptural customs--Wells-Encampments -Blood-revenge-Arab warfare-Adventure of Dr. Wilson -Hospitality-Arab wealth-Woman-The knowledge of footsteps-Prophecy-Testimony of travellers-Voice of Edom.

THERE are two interesting questions which arise out of the preceding description of Petra, relating to the design of the excavations, and their age.

As to their design, How far are these excavations to be regarded merely as sepulchres? and were any of them intended as abodes for the living? "I had formerly received the impression," says Dr. Robinson, referring to the latter supposition, "that very many of them were to be so considered; and, indeed, that a great portion of the ancient city had been composed of such dwellings in the clefts of the rocks.' But after attentive observation, we could perceive no traces of any such design. The smaller and unornamented excavations are entirely similar to the numerous sepulchres around Jerusalem, and the one have no more the

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