Page:Palestine Exploration Fund - Quarterly Statement for 1894.djvu/229

Rh on the walls of the convent I copied only two, which copies I enclose here. The priest showed me also an ancient cross, which they have kept carefully in their church for several hundred years as a relic of great value, which was bestowed upon them by a king. It is a plain cross cut out of one piece of wood, about 5 inches long and 3 inches wide, and has this shape:

On the long arm is a deepening or excavation of inch wide and 1 inch long, now empty, but he said a fraction of the real cross of Christ was once there.

In heraldry, numismatics, &c., the cross was used in many and various ways, and of innumerable forms, but all this is rather after the Crusading time, so I have not to speak of it, but wish only to remark that on the sign or emblem of the Order of Stanislaus, 2nd class, with which the Emperor of Russia honoured me, there are in the four corners of the cross, instead of crosslets, four small Russian double eagles, imitating in some degree the Jerusalem Cross; further, that in Germany at the time when not every one could read and write, one who could not write might make his signature to any document with three crosses, thus: and attested by the scribe that the very man has with his own hand put these crosses in his presence. Such a document was legal, as good as if he would have put his name.



little amulet mentioned by Herr Schick as being perhaps of the same character as the five golden mice spoken of in 1 Samuel vi, 4-11, is not sufficiently characteristic to determine with certainty the particular animal from which it has been copied. In a general way it appears to represent one of the rat tribe; indeed it would do very well for the 