he tomb of
the Imam 'Ali there is a grove of large trees. At the summit of the pass
we rest for half an hour, to give our horses a breathing-space, and to
refresh our eyes with the glorious view westward over the tumbled
country of the Shephelah, the opalescent Plain of Sharon, the sand-hills
of the coast, and the broad blue of the Mediterranean. Northward and
southward and eastward the rocky summits and ridges of Judea roll away.

Now we understand what the Psalmist means by ascribing "the strength of
the hills" to Jehovah; and a new light comes into the song:

"As the mountains are round about Jerusalem,
So Jehovah is round about his people."

These natural walls and terraces of gray limestone have the air of
antique fortifications and watch-towers of the border. They are truly
"munitions of rocks." Chariots and horsemen could find no field for
their manoeuvres in this broken and perpendicular country. Entangled
in these deep and winding valleys by which they must climb up from the
plain, the invaders would be at the mercy of the light infantry of the
highlands, who would roll great stones upon them as they passed through
the narrow defiles, and break their ranks by fierce and sudden downward
rushes as they toiled panting up the steep hillsides. It was this
strength of the hills that the children of Israel used for the defence
of Jerusalem, and by this they were able to resist and defy the
Philistines, whom they could never wholly conquer.

Yonder on the hillside, as we ride onward, we see a reminder of that old
tribal warfare between the people of the highlands and the people of the
plains. That gray village, perched upon a rocky ridge above thick
olive-orchards and a deliciously green valley, is the ancient
Kirjath-Jearim, where the Ark of Jehovah was hidden for twenty years,
after the Philistines had sent back this perilous trophy of their
victory over the sons of Eli, being terrified by the pestilence and
disaster that followed its possession. The men of Beth-shemesh, to whom
it was first returned, were afraid to keep it, because they also had
been smitten with death when they dared to peep into this dreadful box.
But the men of Kirjath-Jearim were at once bolder and wiser, so they
"came and fetched up the Ark of Jehovah, and brought it into the house
of Abinadab in the hill, and set apart Eleazar, his son, to keep the Ark
of Jehovah."

What strange vigils in that little hilltop cottage where the young ma