for the baptism a stream abundant in its waters, and also one which from the peculiarity of its position belonged not to cities but to the wilderness.

On the banks of the rushing stream the multitudes gathered-the priests and scribes from Jerusalem down the passes of Adummim-the publicans from Jericho on the south, and the Lake of Gennesareth on the north; the soldiers on their way from Damascus to Petra, the peasants from Galilee, and ONE from Nazareth, through the opening of the plain of Esdraelon. The tall reeds or canes of the jungles waved, "shaken by the wind;" the pebbles of the bare clay hills around, to which the Baptist pointed as capable of being transformed into the children of Abraham; at their feet rushed the refreshing stream of the never-failing river. There began that sacred rite which has since spread through the vast baptistries of the southern and oriental churches, gradually dwindling to the little fonts of the north and west; the plunges beneath the water diminishing to the few drops which, by a wise exercise of Christian freedom, are now in most churches the sole representatives of the full stream of the descending river.

The history of the Jordan river naturally brings us to that vast inland lake-that Sea of Death, into which its waters flow. The fabulous legends of the Dead Sea, which formerly obtained unlimited credence, have been exploded by the intelligent scrutiny of Mr. Stanley. The popular error that it emitted sulphureous exhalations is attributed to the shining surface of the water, aptly compared to molten lead, combined with the rising thin mist of its own evaporation. That no living thing could inhale the air impregnated with the emanations of the lake and exist, has been disproved by the testimony of all travellers who have witnessed the volitations of birds to and fro upon its surface with perfect impunity. In fact, its intrinsic interest requires no accession of the marvellous. It is the lowest sheet of water in the world, being thirteen hundred feet below the level of the Mediterranean. Its form is described as a bowl, so deep, and of such a strange of merature, that it cannot be filled and so flowing. But its chief peculitheir bondage exceeding saltness of its 1 principally by its sou

thern boundary of fossil-salt, and the rapid evaporation of its accessories. It has been supposed to be the saltest water in the world; but the salt in the waters of the lakes of Central Asia surpass that of the Dead Sea. The saline particles in the water of Lake Elton (which is situated on the steppes east of the Volga, and supplies a great part of the salt of Russia) are twenty-nine per cent., that of the Dead Sea contains twenty-six and a-quarter per cent. The great salt lake of Utah in America is considered by the Mormons so like the Dead Sea, as to encourage their belief that they have found on its shores a second Land of Promise, and in its river a second Jordan. As the Jordan nears the Sea of Death, its banks become incrusted with salt, and lose the verdure which characterised its previous Desolation is stamped upon

course.

its features; whatever living animals are carried down by the waters of Jordan are speedily destroyed.

Hence arises the unnatural buoyancy and the intolerable nausea to taste and touch, which raise to the highest pitch the contrast between its clear, bitter waves, and the soft, fresh, turbid stream of its parent river. Strewn along its desolate margin lie the most striking memorials of this last conflict of life and death; trunks and branches of trees, torn down from the thickets of the river jungle by the violence of the Jordan, thrust out into the sea, and thrown up again by its waves, dead and barren as itself. The dead beach

so unlike the shell-covered shores of the two seas between which it lies, the Sea of Tiberias and the Gulf of Akaba, shelves gradually into the calm waters. A deep hazethat which in earlier ages gave the appearance of "the smoke going up for ever and ever"-veils its southern extremity, and almost gives it the din horizon of a real

sea.

The volume before us contains other and very interesting chapters on the 66 Holy Places," and the scenes of the Gospel history; but these require to be thoroughly studied to be appreciated, and perhaps we have already said sufficient to give a general idea of the manner in which the proposed plan that of describing "the country through the eyes of the Bible, and the Bible through the eyes of the country "-has been carried out.

We have incorporated Mr. Jones's Dictionary of the names occurring in the Old Testament with Mr. Stanley's

travels, because, though such a help is not needed, (Mr. Stanley having affixed an explanation of Scripture names to his volume,) yet it is a work calculated to be most useful for reference, where full particulars as to the derivation and meaning of words are required. The want of such a work has long been felt. In acquiring the Hebrew language, it will be invaluable. To the Biblical student, it will interpret and elucidate many parts of Scripture, and prove of paramount importance from its deep historical researches.

In closing our review of Mr. Stanley's work, we desire to express our high opinion of the exactness of detail pervading his descriptions, which renders his recital as agreeable as it is instructive. It enables those who have never travelled in the same track, to picture in their mind's eye scenes so graphically portrayed. Our author is also endowed with a qualification in which he excels all preceding narrators, the admirable power of realising the likeness of places by comparison with similar localities more familiar to general readers. His volume, indeed, maintains a striking contrast with the usual recitals of Eastern travels. Throughout it, we see little of Mr. Stanley; we have before us a picture of the countries of which we seek to be informed. There are no egotistical recitals of petty dangers magnified into narrow personal escapes; there are no self-glorifying interviews with ministers or pachas; no obtrusive mention of literary researches; but its pages testify to

the persevering industry of the traveller, in his fulfilment of a long cherished project to the evident ability, the sound discrimination, the apt judgment of the author; and to the fervent piety of the Christian. If at times its unavoidably fragmentary style prove tedious, yet we are amply recompensed by its solidity, a quality which we recollect struck us in our perusal in years gone by of his life of Arnold. From the circumstance that a large portion of an article on "Sacred Geography" has been transferred from the pages of the Quarterly Review to the preface of this work, we infer that Mr. Stanley is its author also. At the close of that article it is remarked that the field of sacred geography had not yet been ransacked; hardly any travellers since Burckhardt having left the beaten track in the desert of Sinai-the country east of the Jordan being then only known through a few hasty incursions-the southern frontier of Judea had at that time been investigated by but one single traveller. While the roll of oriental discovery is not even yet closed; while there is still room for the energy of another Burckhardt, for the science of another Niebuhr, for the research of another Robinson, we cannot but think that Mr. Stanley has most ably availed himself of the opportunity of leaving behind him "such an image of the union of energy and vigour, with calmness, justice and reverence, as even the vacant mind of the Syrian peasant and of the Arab chief will long retain as the likeness of an Englishman and a Christian."

WE entered Nicosia by the only finished gate which it contains, that of Famagosta. It is a well-constructed subterranean passage, with a large vaulted apartment in the midst. The Venetians were the architects, of course, and as the Turks found it they have retained it. The other two gates were unfinished when the Venetians left, and continue unfinished to the present

day. We rode leisurely thro', admiring the massive masonry and wellshaped dome of the vaulted centre. When the Moslem first took possession of Nicosia, Christians were not allowed to ride thro'. They were obliged to dismount and walk. Even to the present day, the Cypriot Greek, if unattended by a consular cawass, must fee the soldier on guard, and

fee him well too, to obtain permission to retain his seat.

Dealers in sherbet and coffee, smoking, as usual, invited us to partake of their beverages as we entered the central apartment, which is large, and well lighted from above. We were too anxious however to regain the shelter of a house after our dusty ride, to delay.

Emerging from the gloom of the subterranean passage, we found the variety of beggars we had left without by no means to be compared with that within the city.

Tourists in the west of Ireland have frequently remarked upon the variety of rags which Paddy presses into his service as clothes. But in the wildest regions of Connemara or Tipperary, the eye must be inexperienced indeed which cannot distinguish a coat from a pair of pantaloons, a waistcoat from a shirt, however patched and pieced. In Nicosia, however, the habiliments of the people are looser and more varied in pattern than with us of the west, so that speculation is set on edge over and over again to endeavour to discover what garments they can be, or what intended for, which you see displayed in ragged squalidness on every side. As you peep into the little dens in which the poorer part of the population are crowded together, you see in the court-yard adjoining for the most miserable and meanest of Nicosian hovels has its own court-yard-a line stretched across, bearing a collection of rags, interesting to the mathematician from their varied shapes, and to the painter from their oddly contrasted colors. Triangular, quadrilateral, semicircular, cylindric, and oblong pieces of cloth, divided into half a dozen or more compartments each, depend from these lines, the edges projecting far below the body of the garment, in attenuated ribbons of the most various dimensions; some ending in saw-like excrescences with trailing threads below, others in a suggestive knot, forcing the conclusion upon the observer's mind, that the different portions of the garment would part company were it not for that knot.

Nor do these rags vary more in shape and color than in size-some, altho' few in number unquestionably -approach the dimensions of a small bed-sheet; others, varying from the

limits of a decent handkerchief to that of a diminutive doll's apron. Some, the major part, came from Manchester or Glasgow originally; some from the silk looms of France and Italy.

They are put out there to dry after having been washed, the reader undoubtedly supposes. You were never more mistaken, I assure you, good reader. They are put out there that they may be freed from the swarms of minute insects which harbour in them to the discomfort of their owners. Washing would be likely to make large portions of such garments part company with the remainder-it would, in fact, be a dangerous experiment which the poor in Nicosia have no wish to make.

As to the color, the brownish line of dirt more or less covers all, but still the bright crimson of one triangular patch contrasts strikingly with the yellowish green of another; the sombre black in this piece of silk with the sepia-tinted white of the calico in that.

Clad in such habiliments, the beggars of Nicosia swarm about the bazaars and gateways, and near the mosques every evening and every morning; the majority of them afflicted with some disease of the eyes, which gives them a peculiarly repulsive aspect. They congregate about the bazaars and gateways and mosques because the Turks are a charitable race, and every rich member of their community provides himself with a few piastres daily to distribute amongst these poor wretches as he goes to morning or evening prayers, or to or from his daily business in the bazaars. When the whining appeal of these mendicants is added to the call of the coffee and sherbet venders, the oaths of the fierce-looking Albanian traders, the shouts of the playful half-naked Greek children, and the shrieking of badly-oiled wheels, it may be easily imagined that the din which salutes the ear in the streets of Nicosia, particularly in the neighbourhood of any of the chief places of public resort, is by no means of the most harmonious or of the most agreeable nature.

But the visitor may easily find lines of streets in which there is no such discord, but abundance of quietness and repose. Let us turn from the Babel to the left here, down this narrow lane, in which an Albanian, armed

like a brigand, and with beard and mustachoes of portentous magnitude, is urging on his tired mule laden with merchandize. Rags, filth, disease, poverty, sloth are the characteristics of the neighbourhood-they are apparent on either side, in every quarter. The Greeks who are endeavouring to free their garments from the swarms of Levantine plagues in that house, ragged as they are, are wealthy when compared with the miserable wretches who are lying halfnaked in the midst of want and disease in the other. It is a lamentable picture-we must hasten thro'. The Albanian muleteer, fierce as he may look, and awful as may be the imprecations he utters, will keep to the side to let us pass.

We have emerged from the narrow lane and now tread a wider street, in which the inhabitants are few and far between-they are by no means so hopelessly miserable as those we left behind us on first emerging from the principal thoroughfare. They are the only samples of the middle class one is likely to see in Nicosia-people whose employments compel them to live away from the throng, and who are neither aristocratic in their pretensions, nor steeped in abject poverty. They have stores of various articles of merchandize in the neighbourhood of their dwellings, and are obliged to make use of the adjoining houses as workshops.

Passing beyond these, the thinly peopled portions of the city, we emerge at length upon the untenanted, the deserted region. Whole lines of streets are to be found in this condition in different portions of the suburbs. Wanting doors and windows, the London traveller would be likely to pronounce these regions, at first sight, to be new streets. He has seen such in Bayswater, St. John's wood, Pimlico, and other places where building has lately been carried on, in the great metropolis, to so remarkable an extent and at so rapid a rate. But the lines of houses in Nicosia, without doors and windows, are by no means of this character. They are streets, once busy with life, full of the hum and din of humanity swarming about its daily business. When the Venetians lorded it over the island, these streets were the abodes of flourishing multitudes, of business, comVOL. XLVIII.-NO. CCLXXXV.

merce, trade, enjoyment, life in all its varied phases, and with all its multitudinous joys and sorrows. The people, the commerce, the equipages, the sounds have all gone, and the traveller is inspecting the city of the dead. The walls are there, mute witnesses in attestation of Turkish supineness and mal-administration. All the woodwork has been torn away for firingthe walls, bleak, forbidding, desolate, alone remain, the substantial ghosts of the former city. A more melancholy thing than a walk thro' such a region is not to be easily met with anywhere. The hum of the distant inhabited quarter hardly reaches to these deserted suburbs: all is profound quiet-the silence of desolation and the grave.

Even these deserted streets, however, and untenanted ranges of houses, have their use.

66

Look in at the windows of this mansion, once, doubtless, occupied by a lordly Venetian, and you will see several cattle penned up, cropping a scanty meal of stubble and straw-like hay. When they have been kept here for some length of time, the well-manured ground will bear a plentiful crop of tobacco or mulberry-shoots, with very little labour on the part of the proprietor. There again the mournful head and melancholy-looking ears of a donkey thrust out of the window indicate the character of the present inhabitants. You might fancy the fellow was musing on the instability of human things, so sagacious does he look, as he turns upon us his lack-lustre eyes, and rolls round the long ears on the pivot of his scull." It was men, it is donkeys. Where princes, and chiefs, and rulers lived, he lives and not he only, but a whole troop of donkeys like himself. Peep in, and you will see them all doing their utmost to gather a scanty meal from the thistles that once covered the ground where the floor had been. Donkeys are favourites of the Cypriots. Their quiet meditative ways evidently touch a sympathetic chord in the breasts of their human masters. The donkey is a lazy, luxurious fellow, fond of ease and comfort, and averse to all unnecessary exertions, and so is his lord the Cypriot Greek. That there are donkey-races in the neighbourhood, and that the dissipated youths of Nicosia crowd to such in great numbers, are not facts sufficient to

X

invalidate the truth of my assertion. Ambition to outstrip his fellow-donkey may be roused in the bosom of the most asinine of the long-eared race, particularly if his muscles have been allowed to rest for some time before, and demand exercise; just as a desire to obtain more money than his fellow-man, will make the most indolent of Cypriot Greeks rouse himself occasionally to unwonted exertionsexertions the very thoughts of which make him subsequently shudder.

When the oxen, or the sheep, or the donkeys have occupied the floor of the deserted mansion long enough, they are removed, and the soil is scratched with a primitive plough, a plough to which no agricultural society of Athens, three thousand years ago, would have given any prize. Tobacco, or the mulberry, or pomegranates, or cucumbers, or melons are then planted, and yield luxuriant crops for a few seasons. Other deserted tenements are being similarly prepared in the mean time, and by the time the fertility of these has been exhausted those are fit for planting. Such are the uses to which the long lines of empty houses are put in Nicosia. The stranger, peeping in at the lengthened vista of desertion which stretches away between the bare walls on either side, is often surprised to find the scene picturesque rather than repulsive. The wild fig, or pomegranate, or the melon-vine, will creep up the walls and cover them with the pleasantest of decorations, designs of nature's own invention, designs of bright green leaves and glowing yellow fruit, such as the artist would in vain endeavour to imitate on the walls of a palace, for the heavy dews keep the colours fresh and the leaves ever glistening. The floor again stretched out between these picturesque ramparts is thick with mulberry-shoots awaiting transplantation. The windows alone, which seem to admit more light than can find admittance above, serve to remind the stranger that these were originally intended as abodes for humanity, and that where cattle are penned and luxuriant vegetation thrives, there ought to be smiling homesteads, and the cheerful sounds of domestic labour and enjoyment-the happy laugh of childhood, and the graver enjoyment of age.

"A very strange scene truly, and a melancholy," I remarked to a young Greek who accompanied us thro' this deserted quarter, (6 probably in all Europe there is nothing like this." "Are there not such buildings everywhere?" he asked innocently.

To him Nicosia was all the world, and what he saw there he believed to be the ordinary type of things. The contrast presented by such scenes, and those which strike the observer in the finest street of the town, is curious and note-worthy.

In the broad Market-street, as it is called, altho' it has long ceased to contain a market, the Serai or Pasha's palace, a right royal structure, is upon our right, whilst a succession of mosques is to be seen upon our left. The Greek archbishop's palace, altho' inferior to the Pasha's in architectural pretensions, is yet a building of imposing dimensions and elaborate architecture. The chief officers of government, the Cadi, the Mufti, the head Moollah, and others, have also residences their official residences-in this central Market-street. The hummums, or baths, with their domed roofs, rise amongst these palaces and private houses, gloomy-looking but by no means unpicturesque objects. The minarets of the mosques, and the cupolas of the palaces, and the domes of the baths, and the flagstaffs of the consular residences, are all sufficient to give to the Marketstreet a striking and imposing appearance. Nor is the stranger's interest diminished when he turns from the houses to the inhabitants, from the palaces to the people. Equipages of gaudy colors, and accompanied by gaudy liveries, may be seen coursing down the street, drawn by four, and even six horses-the latter number being a special distinction, however, of his Highness the Pasha. The foot-paths, which are regular and well-paved, are not crowded by any bustling throng; but grave Turks and gay Greeks, ladies in envious rolls of voluminous cloth with bandaged faces, and others displaying all the charms of their faces and necks, may be seen flaunting in the richest silks of Syria and the isles of the Archipelago-almost invariably, too, in the most brilliant colors. Richly-caparisoned horses bear their owners to business or amusement, some dressed as they