CHAPTER VIII.

CAVE-REFUGEES.

Corruption of Christianity-Parnell-Hermitage of WarkworthSinaite territory-Nilus-His renunciation of the worldRetires to Sinai-His account of the Asiatics-Treatment of the emperor-Saracenic inroad-Writings of Nilus-The Christian life-Lot's refuge in a cave-David-Cave Adullam-Cave in Engedi-Elijah-At Carmel and Sinai-Grotto of the Apocalypse-Cave tragedy-Isle of Egg-The bandit's home-Herod and the Judæan robbers.

UNDER the reign of corrupted Christianity, and of perverted views of its duties and privileges, when the renunciation of the world was held to mean a personal separation from it, and bodily mortification was regarded as the highway to moral superiority, multitudes abandoned the "city full" to lead a recluse life in situations which Parnell has admirably sketched:—

"Far in the wild, unknown to public view,
From youth to age, a reverend hermit grew,
The moss his bed, the cave his humble cell,
His food the fruits, his drink the crystal well."

Lonely hermitages, consisting of a single compartment scooped out of the rock, or naturally provided and accommodated to receive their

relates, the houses answer in description to those mentioned by Xenophon, as being there in his day. "The inhabitants make a considerable excavation, which, according to the nature of the ground, gives them one, two, or three sides for their house, and then build up the remainder with huge stones, like Cyclopean walls. Upon this they lay very thick rafters, and then cover the whole with earth in so solid a manner, that it is difficult to say if you are walking upon a house-top, or upon the bare ground. They only leave one aperture at the top, which lights the room inhabited by the family." But the most extraordinary troglodytic site extant, and still partially occupied, is in the valley of Bameean, in Afghanistan, first made known by the lamented sir Alexander Burnes, in his Travels into Bokhara.

Bameean, supposed to represent the city founded by Alexander at the base of Paropamisus before entering Bactria, lies in a valley or dell. The hills on each side consist of a conglomerate, composed of indurated clay and pebbles, which renders their excavation a work of easy performance. For about eight miles innumerable caves have been scooped out, in which the great part of the population still

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reside. A detached hill in the middle of the valley is quite honeycombed by them, and is called the city of Ghoolghoola, consisting of a series of caves, one above another, which are said to have been constructed by a king named Julal. The deserted caves, partially choked up by accumulations of rubbish, are frequently dug into by labourers employed for the purpose, who find rings, coins, and other relics of their former occupants, which generally bear Cufic inscriptions, and are of a later date than the age of Mohammed. The mass of these cave-houses have no pretensions to architectural ornament, being no more than squared holes in the hills. Some of them are finished in the shape of a dome, and have a carved frieze below the point from which the cupola springs. The inhabitants, says Burnes, tell many remarkable tales of the caves of Bameean; one in particular -that a mother had lost her child among them, and recovered it after the lapse of twelve years. The tale, he remarks, need not be believed; but it will convey some idea of the extent of the works.

But, besides serving the purpose of ordinary human dwellings, it was in caves and grots, natural or artificial, that the shrines of several

of the hero-gods of antiquity were established, an artifice of the priests, adopted in order that the general wildness of such sites might impress with awe the minds of votaries, and impose human sounds upon the ear for Divine oracles. In one of the dells of Mount Helicon, the river Hercyna rises from two sources, called by Pausanias the waters of oblivion and recollection, Lethe and Mnemosyne. The united waters pass through a ravine, savage and gloomy, on their way to Lebedea. The rocks, bare and rugged, rise in fearful precipices to a great height; the silence of the place is only interrupted by the roaring of the stream dashing through it; groves interspersed along the bottom add by their dark foliage to the impressiveness of the spot; and render it a scene calculated to give effect to the rites of a mysterious and awful mythology. Here was the oracle of Trophonius, the mythic Baotian hero ;-a cave -the floor of which was sunk considerably below the level of the entrance, and consequently dark. The entrance had no steps, and the person who wished to consult the oracle, provided himself with a ladder for the descent. But a rigid discipline was gone through before access was granted, of a nature adapted to pre

pare the mind to receive, as supernatural, the strange sights and sounds of the place.

The Sibyls-a class of reputed prophetic women, belonging to the mythical ages of ancient history are represented, in some instances, as inhabiting caves, in which they received their pretended knowledge of future events, and communicated it in inspired verses. The most celebrated of the class, in the vicinity of Cumæ, a city in the Neapolitan territory, has her dwelling thus denoted in the page of Virgil:-"an ample dreary cave, the cell of the sibyl, awful at a distance, whose great mind and soul the prophetic god of Delos inspires, and discloses to her future events." Again he

states: "The huge side of an Eubœan rock is cut out into a cave, whither a hundred broad avenues lead, a hundred doors, whence rush forth as many voices, the responses of the sibyl." With force and eloquence, he describes the distraction of the priestess, a piece of acting to confirm the impression of her communion with invisible powers;-"The god! lo, the god-on a sudden her looks change, her colour comes and goes, her locks are dishevelled, her breast heaves, and her fiercely untoward heart swells with enthusiastic rage: she appears in a