custom in the houses of the Turks and Christians. The ladies presented themselves with an ease and address that surprised me, and recalled to my memory the pleasing society of Europe. This difference of manner arises from many of the Jewish families in Jerusalem having resided in Spain or Portugal, when the females had rid themselves of the cruel domestic fetters of the East, and, on returning to their beloved land, had very properly maintained their justly acquired freedom and rank in society. They almost all speak a broken Italian, so that conversation goes on without the clumsy aid of an interpreter.

"It was the feast of the Passover, and they were all eating unleavened bread; some of which was presented to me as a curiosity, and I partook of it merely that I might have the gratification of eating unleavened bread with the sons and daughters of Jacob in Jerusalem; it is very insipid fare, and no one would eat it from choice. For the same reason I went to the synagogue, of which there are two in Jerusalem, although I visited only one. The form of worship is the same as in this country, and I believe in every country which the Jews inhabit. The females have a separate part of the synagogue assigned to them, as in the synagogues in Europe, and in the Christian churches all over the Levant. They are not, however, expected to be frequent or regular in their attendance on public worship. The ladies generally make a point of going on the Sunday, that is the Friday night or Saturday morning, after they are married; and being thus introduced in their new capacity, once a year is considered as sufficient compliance, on their part, with the ancient injunction to assemble themselves together in the house of prayer. Like the votaries of some

Christian establishments, the Jewesses trust more to the prayers of their priests than to their own.

"The synagogues in Jerusalem are both poor and small, not owing to the poverty of their possessors, but to the prudential motives above-mentioned."

"The Jewesses in Jerusalem speak in a decided and firm tone, unlike the hesitating and timid voice of the Arab and Turkish females; and claim the European privilege of differing from their husbands, and maintaining their own opinions. They are fair and good-looking: red and auburn hair are by no means uncommon in either of the sexes. I never saw any of them with veils; and was informed that it is the general practice of the Jewesses in Jerusalem to go with their faces uncovered; they are the only females there who do so. Generally speaking, I think they are disposed to be rather of a plethoric habit; and the admirers of size and softness in the fair sex, will find as regularly well-built fatties, with double mouldings in the neck and chin, among the fair daughters of Jerusalem, as among the fairer daughters of England. They seem particularly liable to eruptive diseases; and the want of children is as great a heart-break to them now as it was in the days of Sarah.

^" In passing up to the synagogue, I was particularly struck with the mean and wretched appearance of the houses on both sides of the streets, as well as with the poverty of their inhabitants. Some of the old men and old women had more withered and hungry aspects than any of our race I ever saw, with the exception of the caverned dames at Gornou in Egyptian Thebes, who might have sat in a stony field as a picture of famine the year after the flood. The

sight of a poor Jew in Jerusalem has in it something peculiarly affecting. The heart of this wonderful people, in whatever clime they roam, still turns to it as the city of their promised rest. They take pleasure in her ruins, and would lick the very dust for her sake. Jerusalem is the centre around which the exiled sons of Judah build, in airy dreams, the mansions of their future greatness. In whatever part of the world he may live, the heart's desire of a Jew, when gathered to his fathers, is to be buried in Jerusalem. Thither they return from Spain and Portugal, from Egypt and Barbary, and other countries among which they have been scattered; and when, after all their longings, and all their struggles up the steeps of life, we see them poor, and blind, and naked in the streets of their once happy Zion, he must have a cold heart that can remain untouched by their sufferings, without uttering a prayer that the light of a reconciled countenance would shine on the darkness of Judah, and the day-star of Bethlehem arise in their hearts.

"The Jews are the best cicerones in Jerusalem, because they generally give the ancient names of places, which the guides and interpreters belonging to the different convents do not. They are not forward in presenting themselves, and must generally be sought for."

ICHNOGRAPHY, POPULATION OF THE CITY, &c.

CHATEAUBRIAND gives the following statement of the ichnography of the city. The three principal streets are, harat* bab el hamond (the street of the gate of the column, or Damascus gate), crossing the city

* More properly tarrek, street, harat signifying lane.

from north to south; souk el kebir, the street of the great bazar, running from east to west; and harat el allam, the Via Dolorosa, running from St. Stephen's gate to Calvary. Besides these, he enumerates seven other smaller streets: harat el Muslmin, the street of the Turks; harat el Nassara, the street of the Christians, leading from the church of the Sepulchre to the Latin convent; harat el Arman, the street of the Armenians, to the east of the castle; harat el Youd, the street of the Jews, in which are the shambles ; harat bab hotta, the street near the temple; harat el zahara, the public quarter; and harat el Maugrabé, the street of the Maugrabins. These Maugrabins, he states, are the people of the west of Barbary. 66 Among them are included some descendants of the Moors, driven from Spain by Ferdinand and Isabella. These exiles were charitably received in the Holy City; a mosque was built for their use; and bread, fruits, and money are yet distributed among them. The heirs of the proud Abencerrages, the elegant architects of the Alhambra, are become porters at Jerusalem, who are sought after on account of their intelligence, and as couriers are esteemed for their swiftness. What would Saladin and Richard say, if, suddenly returning to the world, they were to find the Moorish champions transformed into the door-keepers of the holy sepulchre, and the Christian knights represented by brethren of the mendicant order! " *

The Mussulmans reside chiefly round the harám schereeff; the Christians, in the neigbourhood of their own convents. Those of the Roman Catholic persuasion live near the convent of St. Salvadore, in the north-west corner of the city. Those of the Greek

* Travels in Greece, &c. vol. ii. p. 89.

church reside lower down the hill, towards the southeast, near the small and ruined convent of St. John, which is at present occupied by Syrian Christians. To the south, and nearly on the summit of Mount Zion, stands the Armenian convent of St. James, by far the most magnificent in Jerusalem, having a spacious walled garden attached to it. The Armenian patriarch, a dignified old man, resides in the convent, together with the bishop, and a number of the inferior clergy. The apartments are small, but well furnished with sofas and rich Persian carpets. "Every thing belonging to it," says Dr. Clarke, "is Oriental." The usual dress of the Armenian clergy is dark blue; they even carry it so far as to wear pocket handkerchiefs of the same colour. "The dresses in which they officiate are the most sumptuous," says Dr. Richardson, "I ever saw, excepting on some of the dignitaries in St. Peter's at Rome." Their church is also the richest, and largest, and most numerously attended of all the Christian churches. According to Maundrell, there are two altars set out with extraordinary splendour, "being decked with rich mitres, embroidered copes, crosses both silver and gold, crowns, chalices, and other church utensils without number. In the middle of the church, is a pulpit made of tortoise-shell and mother-of-pearl with a beautiful canopy or cupola over it, of the same fabric. The tortoise-shell and motherof-pearl are so exquisitely mingled and inlaid in each other, that the work far exceeds the material." Mr. Buckingham does not notice the pulpit, but describes three altars, fronting the door of entrance; these are, he concurs in stating, as splendid as wealth could make them. "The church," he says, "though small, is of a lofty height, and crowned by a central dome, and being entirely free of pews or stalls of any de