and the exact
seven places where he fell under the weight of the cross: you are shown
the house of the rich man and that of Lazarus, both of them Turkish
buildings, although, as that story is related in a parable, no real
localities ever can have been referred to. Near the house of Lazarus
there were several dogs when I passed by, and, on my asking the guide
whether they were the descendants of the original dogs in the parable,
he said he was not quite sure, but that as to the house there could be
no doubt. The prison of St. Peter is also to be seen, but the column on
which the cock stood who crowed on his denial of our Lord, as well as
the steps by which Christ ascended to the judgment-seat of Pilate, have
been carried away to Rome, where they are both to be seen on the hill of
St. John Lateran.

The mosque of Omar stands on the site of the ancient Temple of Solomon,
which covered the whole of the enclosure which is now the garden of the
mosque, a space of about 1500 feet long, and 1000 feet wide. In the
centre of this garden is a platform of stone about 600 feet square, on
which stands the octagonal building of the mosque itself, the upper part
being covered with green porcelain tiles which glitter in the sun:
below, the walls are paneled with marble richly worked and of different
colours: the dome in the centre has a wide cornice round it, ornamented
with sentences from the Koran: the whole has a brilliant and
extraordinary appearance, more like a Chinese temple than anything else.
This building is called the Acksa el Sakhara, from its containing a
piece of rock called the Hadjr el Sakhara, or the locked-up stone, which
is the principal object of veneration in the place: it occupies the
centre of the mosque, and on it are shown the prints of the angel
Gabriel's fingers, who brought it from heaven, and the mark of the
Prophet's foot and that of his camel, a singularly good leaper, two more
of whose footsteps I have seen in Egypt and Arabia, and I believe there
is another at Damascus, the whole journey from Jerusalem to Mecca having
been performed in four bounds only, for which remarkable service the
camel is to have a place in heaven, where he will enjoy the society of
Borak, the prophet's horse, Balaam's ass, Tobit's dog, and the dog of
the seven sleepers, whose name was Ketmir, and also the companionship of
a certain celebrated fly with whose merits I am unacquainted.

We are told that the stone of the Sakhara fel