6 Letter to the Times,' January 21, 1869, by Edward M. Young, Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, giving an account of an attempt to enter the Mosque, April 27, 1864. Sir,—It may interest some to hear of a visit to the Mosque at Hebron of a less successful kind than the visits of your late distinguished correspondents. Arrived at the south-west entrance of the Mosque, my companion and I were, of course, refused admittance, but spying an archway to the left-hand, which appeared to lead only into a vaulted passage parallel with the west wall, as soon as our guide's back was turned we bolted through. The passage led to a staircase, and that to a gallery, and that to another staircase and another, all ruined, the remains, as it seemed, of what had once been a fort. We climbed round the tomb of Joseph, and finally found ourselves close to the minaret at the north-west angle of the Haram in a little ruined room, but a yard or so from the top of the wall. There was an aperture leading into the enclosure by a flight of steps, and this was closed by an old wooden door full of chinks, through which we peered down into the Court of the Mosque. Immediately beneath us was the roof of the cloister, where are the tombs of Jacob and Leah, surmounted by two very manifest domes. Two of the arches of the cloister fronting the Mosque were also visible, surmounted by another dome, which I supposed, by a comparison of Mr. Meade's plan, adopted by Dean Stanley, to cover the tomb of Sarah. The wall of the Haram, projecting far beyond the door, prevented a more extended view. I saw, however, that, by means of a bit of ruin to my right, I could set foot between the turrets of the Haram wall itself, and was proceeding to do so when our guide rushed up, pale with terror— r-on his own account, I presume—and beckoned me down. The situation was too interesting for me to notice him; but in a few minutes, just as I was scrambling on to the wall, there was an ugly rush of men and boys up the stair. I was pulled from my perch by the left leg, and driven down by the way I had climbed with no pretence of civility. As I passed out of the passage once more into the street I saw an aperture which seemed to be that of a small tunnel leading under the platform upon which the Mosque stands. Through this, I was told, the Jews are allowed at times to crawl and kiss the sacred rock of the cave. As I sat afterwards in my dragoman's tent, chatting with an old officer of the quarantine, I related the adventures, and asked what would have happened had I got down into the Mosque. He said nothing, but significantly drew his hand across his throat. But, said I, 'you did not cut the Prince of Wales's throat when he entered;' upon which he strenuously denied that the Prince had ever set foot in the Mosque. I maintained the point, and showed him the plan in the Dean's Lectures on the Jewish Church as proof. At this he gave way, and allowed that he had himself gone with the party into the Mosque, but insisted that the cave had not been entered. I submitted that this was not asked for. He then asserted with the utmost coolness that the Prince did attempt to enter the cave, but Abraham and Isaac came to the mouth and so scared him with their thunder-which he imitated that all fled out of the Mosque. It struck me that the legend of Ibrahim Pasha, mentioned by Dean Stanley, probably rests on a similar foundation. APPENDIX III. THE SAMARITAN PASSOVER. THE illustration,1 which I have endeavoured to furnish of the original Jewish Passover from the Samaritan Passover, was drawn from a description given to me in 1854 by Mr. Rogers,2 now Consul at Damascus. During my late journey with the Prince of Wales, I was enabled myself to be present at its celebration, and I am induced to give a full account of it, the more so as it is evident that the ceremonial has been considerably modified since the time when it was first recounted to me. Even to that lonely community the influences of Western change have extended; and this is perhaps the last generation which will have the opportunity of witnessing this vestige of the earliest Jewish ritual. The Samaritan Passover is celebrated at the same time as the Jewish-namely, on the full moon of the month of Nisan. In the present instance, either by design or by a fortunate mistake, the Samaritan community had anticipated the 14th of the month by two days. It was on the evening of Saturday the 13th of April that we ascended Mount Gerizim, and visited the various traditional localities on the rocky platform which crowns that most ancient of sanctuaries. The whole communityamounting, it is said, to one hundred and fifty-two, from which hardly any variation has taken place within the memory of man -were encamped in tents on a level space, a few hundred yards 1 See Lecture V. p. 107. His account has since been printed in his sister's interesting work, Domestic Life in Palestine, 281. An account is also given in Professor Petermann's Travels (i. 236-239). He witnessed it in 1853. below the actual summit of the mountain, selected on account The women 2 of its comparative shelter and seclusion.1 shut up in the tents. The men were assembled on the rocky terrace in sacred costume. In 1854 they all wore the same sacred The preparation. 4 were costume. On this occasion most of them were in their ordinary dress. Only about fifteen of the elder men, amongst whom was the Priest Amram,3 were clothed in long white robes. To these must be added six youths, dressed in white shirts and white drawers. The feet both of these and of the elders were at this time of the solemnity bare. It was about half an hour before sunset, that the whole male community in an irregular form (those attired as has been described in a more regular order) gathered round a long trough that had been previously dug in the ground; and the Priest, ascending a large rough stone in front of the congregation, recited in a loud chant or scream, in which the others joined, prayers or praises chiefly turning on the glories of Abraham and Isaac, and contained in alphabetical poems of ancient Samaritan poets,5 Abu'l Hassan and Marqua. Their attitude was that of all Orientals in prayer; standing, occasionally diversified by the stretching out of the hands, and more rarely by kneeling or crouching, with their faces wrapt in their clothes and bent to the ground,6 towards the Holy Place It is only in recent times that the Samaritans (chiefly through the intervention of the English Consul) have regained the right, or rather the safety, of holding their festival on Mount Gerizim. For a long time before they had celebrated the Passover, like the modern Jews, and, as in the first celebration of the institution in Egypt, in their own houses. The performance of the solemnity on Gerizim is in strict conformity with the principle laid down in Deut. xvi. 15-'Thou shalt keep 'a solemn feast in the place which the 'Lord thy God shall choose '-and with the practice which prevailed in Judea till the fall of Jerusalem, of celebrating the Passover at the Temple. 2 Those women who, by the approach of childbirth or other ceremonial reasons, were prevented from sharing in the celebration, remained in Nablûs. 3 It is stated in Miss Rogers's Domestic Life in Palestine (249) that Amram is not properly a priest (the legitimate high priest-the last descendant, as they allege, of Aaron-having expired some years ago), and that he is only a Levite. He is, however, certainly called 'the priest '(Cohen). He has two wives. The children of the first died in infancy, and he was therefore entitled, by Samaritan usage, to take a second. By her he has a son, Isaac. But according to the Oriental Law of succession, he will be succeeded in his office by his nephew Jacob, as the oldest of the family. These youths were evidently trained for the purpose; but whether they held any sacred office, I could not learn. In the Jewish ritual, the lambs were usually slain by the householders, but on great occasions (2 Chron. xxxv. 10, 11) apparently by the Levites. 5 Petermann, i. 236. * Compare the attitude of Elijah (1 Kings xviii. 42; xix. 13). on the summit of Gerizim. The Priest recited his prayers by heart; the others had mostly books, in Hebrew and Arabic. The Sacrifice. Presently, suddenly, there appeared amongst the worshippers six1 sheep, driven up by the side of the youths before mentioned. The unconscious innocence with which they wandered to and fro amongst the bystanders, and the simplicity in aspect and manner of the young men who tended them, more recalled a pastoral scene in Arcadia, or one of those inimitable patriarchal tableaux represented in the Ammergau Mystery, than a religious ceremonial. The sun, meanwhile, which hitherto had burnished up the Mediterranean in the distance, now sank very nearly to the farthest western ridge overhanging the plain of Sharon. The recitation became more 3 The Priest turned about, facing his brethren, and the whole history of the Exodus from the beginning of the plagues of Egypt was rapidly, almost furiously, chanted. The sheep, still innocently playful, were driven more closely together. The setting sun now touched the ridge. The youths 2 burst into a wild murmur of their own, drew forth their long bright knives, and brandished them aloft. At this instant 3 the recitation from the Book of Exodus had reached the account of the Paschal Sacrifice; and the Priest recited in a louder key, to be heard distinctly by the sacrificers, 'And the whole assem. 'bly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it in the evening.' In a moment the sheep were thrown on their backs, and the flashing knives rapidly drawn across their throats. Then a few convulsive but silent struggles,—'as a sheep-dumb-that 'openeth not his mouth,'-and the six forms lay lifeless on the ground, the blood streaming from them; the one only Jewish sacrifice lingering in the world. In the blood the young men dipped their fingers, and a small spot was marked on the foreheads and noses of the children. A few years ago, the red stain was placed on all. But this had now dwindled away into |