Page:Palestine Exploration Fund - Quarterly Statement for 1894.djvu/35

Rh level the decline I think it was not the flooring of a building but of a street, or rather a piazza, or open place, in front of the houses, for as a street it could not have extended far towards the south, as the high scarp is there. On the east side of the pavement is the mouth of a cistern, and along the edge of the pavement remains of a former wall, not thick, which I think formed the parapet of the paved square, which, if this were so, may perhaps be the roof of a row of rooms below. At the northern end things were different, but it is not uncovered enough to form an opinion of it. Coming from the west is a water channel cut in the rocks. Forty feet east of the large rock scarp a trench was made into the ground about 20 feet deep, when an opening appeared which was closed up again until the work of excavation is resumed. West of this site No. 7 stood formerly a building of rather modern date, inserted in the Ordnance Survey Map $1⁄2500$, about 15 years ago it was removed, when the Nebi Daûd people took the stones of it to build new houses. When I arrived in Jerusalem in 1846 this building was shown to me as standing on the place where St. Peter, after denying the Lord, wept bitterly, and, as I understand matters, it may really be the right place, and probably the brethren may find traces of the Cock-crow Church there. I cannot say the reason why they have not diggeddug [sic] there, but in so many other places without result, in so far as it concerns this church. Perhaps they do not know of the former existence of the building.

No. 8. Nearer to the city they also made some excavations, but without result, as in no place did they reach the rock.

Along the western main road they made a boundary wall only as high as the surface of the road—the surface of their ground being situated-about 3 feet lower. At its end, where the road begins to bend towards the Nebi Daûd gate of the city, a new entrance door is made, and the former watch-house removed. Eastwards a higher boundary wall is made, and also a piece below from the sharp angle corner southwards. The rest is enclosed by poles and iron wire grating.

I am sorry that the ground belonging to the brethren does not extend so far that there is hope of being able to dig at the site where very likely the old city gate might be found; I am also sorry to say that from the mode in which the work is done many things escape observation, and will be buried again for centuries. If the brethren dig at a place they have to remove the earth, and often they put it in places which were not thoroughly examined before, and then plant vines and other plants or trees there, and give up further excavation.



1. A minaret of the "Haram Esh Sherif," the one standing on the western wall and near the Mahkama and Bab es Silsileh, was hitherto