Page:Palestine Exploration Fund - Quarterly Statement for 1894.djvu/126

102 be observed all along the coast, at Cæsarea, Acre, Tyre, Sidon, Gebal, &c. These formed the earliest harbours of history, seized upon by the Phœnicians with a sort of instinct, as suitable for small shipping; they built a breakwater out from the land at the south, leaving the entrance at the more protected north. Before history began this mysterious people started from their harbourless coast, and sailed to Cornwall and to the Canary Isles. In these islands the lecturer had seen the Phœnician inscriptions carved before the time of Solomon. They brought back with them the orange, the golden fruit of the Hesperides. This narrow coast was all their home; they wanted no land, but, like sea-birds, only nests in the rocks for their wives and little ones. He had visited the island of Ruad (the ancient Aradus), which also has its reef of rocks. Here he found a singular survival: it was absolutely covered with houses, but they contained only women and children. The men were all off on a voyage, to New York, to Liverpool, to Buenos Ayres. Here then were the descendants by blood and habits of the old Phœnicians.

The great system of plains along the Syrian coast, interrupted only by Carmel and the Ladder of Tyre, has had much to do with the history of the country. Here were fought the great battles of the nations. It has been the high road of armies for 5,000 years; the arterial military road between Egypt and Assyria, as testified by the tablets at Dog River, near Beyrout. Humanly speaking, these plains were the preservation of the Kingdoms of Israel and Judah. The armies marched with cavalry and chariots, they could not deploy and manœuvre, and so left undisturbed the mountain kingdoms. The plains made the wealth not the strength of Syria. David and Solomon were good strategists and never fortified the plains, but only the hills. When the alien armies marched across the plains the nations retired to the mountains, returning in times of peace to cultivate their corn.

Jaffa is famous as the landing-place of the materials for the Temple brought by the Phœnician allies. Ascalon is counted as a Philistine town, but really belonged to the Phoenician Tyre and Sidon. The house shown as that of Simon the Tanner is not an unlikely site; it is close to the town wall, satisfying the Jewish law that tanneries should be outside the city, and has a fine well of water. Cœur de Lion took Jaffa for the Crusaders. The sad and dark spot in its history is the cruel massacre of prisoners by Napoleon. The lecturer has talked with an eye-witness of this scene, which occurred near the place where the English Hospital now stands. Jaffa has doubled itself in thirteen years; its present growth being as rapid as its former decay, for after the Crusaders it became almost as deserted as Cæsarea is now. The famous oranges of Jaffa are of course not indigenous. Neither is the prickly pear, which comes from America. Reference was then made to the beautiful plain of Sharon. The rose of Sharon was identified with the sweet-scented narcissus. The rose, in the common understanding, is not indigenous in low lands.