XLV. THE SACK OF PEARLS.

A traveler missed his way and lost himself in a sand desert. Nearly famished with hunger and thirst, he reached at length a shady palm-tree and a fresh fountain. Near the fountain he discovered a small bag lying on the ground.

"Thanks to God!" said the man, as he lifted the little bag, "these are perhaps peas, which will save me from starvation."

Eagerly he opened the bag, and exclaimed: "Alas! alas! they are only pearls!"

Worth more than gold and pearls, you see,
The little loaf that feedeth thee!

II.

Though he had now a bag of pearls worth several thousand dollars, the poor man was still in danger of starvation. But he prayed earnestly to God for help; and presently there came hastily riding on his camel, a Moor, who had lost the bag of pearls. He had compassion on the starving man, gave him bread and refreshing fruit, and took him along on his camel.

"Behold!" said the Moor, "how wonderfully God disposes all things! I regarded it as a misfortune to have lost the pearls; but God permitted it that I might return again and save your life!"

By little things Jehovah saves

His people from untimely graves.

XLVI.-GOLD.

Two brothers, Gustav and Ludwig, went across the seas to seek their fortunes in a strange land.

Gustav procured a piece of untilled land, with great industry turned it into a farm, and soon had bread to overflowing.

Ludwig went into the mountains to hunt for golden sand. Here he had to sustain himself in a miserable way on roots and the bark of trees; but he was successful, and returned at length with a bag of gold to his brother.

"See, brother," he exclaimed, "how lucky I have been. All this gold is mine! Only give me now something to eat; for I am weak and worn out by hunger."

"Good," said Gustav, "I will give you something to eat; but you must give me gold, weight for weight." This greatly offended Ludwig; but he had to submit to the demand, because he was too weak and exhausted to go farther.

When now, after a few days, Gustav was in possession of all his brother's gold, he said to Ludwig: "Here is your gold, my dear brother! I am not so mean as to take what is yours, I only wished to teach you that riches do not bestow happiness, and that the fruits of quiet industry are better than gold."

The wise in humble labor toil
And have their daily bread;
The foolish roving all abroad,
Starve in the golden bed.

FIVE DAYS IN THE HOLY LAND.

NOTES BY J. DAVID MILLER.

[Conclusion from last Number.]

LEAVING the Pools and the Tombs to themselves and alone in the Valley of Jehosaphat, we again turn our course homeward to Jerusalem, which place we reached in a fatigued state of mind and happy to find ourselves under the roof of the hospitable mansion of mine host, Hauser. In the evening we again paid a visit to our friend Warden Cresson, of Philadelphia, who entertained us in the handsomest manner possible, and presented us with a splendid olive-wood paper knife with "Jerusalem" written on both sides in Arabic characters. Leaving Mr. Cresson's house, we returned to our hotel and made preparations for returning to the Wabash at Jappa; and, accordingly, at 9 o'clock p. m. we left the Holy City for Jappa on our way to the ship, which place we reached, after a whole night's travel, about 11 o'clock on the 10th of November. We at once pursued our way to the wharf, where we found the "Reserve," one of the ship's boats, and in her took passage, and fifteen minutes past 12 o'clock we again trod the decks of the U. S. steam frigate Wabash, amid the cheers and congratulations of our numerous shipmates; but feeling very much fatigued from the privations of our trip, yet not regretting the time or money spent in the execution thereof.

NOTICES OF SPECIALLY INTERESTING PLACES.

BETHLEHEM.

We begin with Christ's birth place. It was of old decreed that Bethlehem should be the spot honored by the nativity; the prophet Micah, (v. ii.) 700 years before Christ, foretold, "Thou Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall He come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel." Providence ordained that the enrolment by the Romans should bring this word to pass; for the Virgin Mary went to Bethlehem and there "she brought forth her first born son and laid him in a manger."

When you read of a stable or manger you must not imagine such buildings as we use in this country. Stables in Palestine are almost invariably caverns or natural grottoes, in the sides of hills, and they are even now used by the shepherds to protect their flocks from the rains and from the heat. Such was the case at Bethlehem; and you must not therefore be surprised to hear that the spot is still known where Christ was born. It was a place so venerated by the early christians that its site was carefully handed down from generation to generation. Nor can there be any reasonable doubt that when we entered the cave, we were indeed at the place where this wonderful event occurred.

There is, however, but little of the original scene; for the pious have built altars and hung golden lamps burning ever before the holy shrine in honor of the nativity. Here we witnessed the superstitious ceremonies of the many christian sects, and though misguided in their devotions, their zeal might well deserve admiration and put to shame the colder feelings of many who profess a purer faith.

A traveler in Palestine treads on hallowed ground; but the shrines he visits, and the high places he reverences, are not associated with those memories which in other lands awaken his interest. The red battle field, the old mossy tower and the battle-mented wall do not recall the names of those who were great captains in their day, and upon whom partial time had bestowed something of the heroic. He does not tread in the track of some invincible phalanx led by a ruthless conqueror, or wend his way towards the birth-place of some great poet or astute statesman. Not that Palestine is without its te ditions of war and warriors, of sages and bards, but that they are swallowed up in an all-absorbing history; and the pilgrim's mindedly fixed upon one sublime remembrance, his heart is touched by sad passion, and it is in the spirit of hope and faith he pursues his pilgrime. A calm, sequestered grave-yard, in a lone and deserted laud, where no sounds are heard save that of feathered songsters singing their morning and evening chants, and that of the rude blasts of the winter winds! Few are the graves, still fewer those of note or interest; but there is one--a simple, modest stone-which attracts the attention of the passer by. A plain cross of iron is placed over it horizontally, so that when the sunlight streams in through the sheltering elms the shadow falls upon the grave in the semblance of a cross. Thus the bones of Him, whose pious zeal this beautiful memorial perpetuates, lie ever in the shadow of the cross. And even so, to my fancy, the glorious land of Palestine sleeps ever in its shadow. Not a plain, not a brook, not a hamlet, but to the eye of faith the cross is hovering over it. Day by day, and year by year, on the shores of the sea of Galilee, on the awful mount of transfiguration, by the waters of the sacred Jordan-most blessed of all rivers! on the hills that hang over Jerusalem, and in the darkness of the Garden of Gethsemane, the cross was builded up, and baptised with many tears, until it was raised upon the hill of Calvary, and the great mystery of the incarnation fulfilled! They sleep-these meadows, these hills, these valleys-they sleep in the shadow of the cross.

Where now the pomp which Kings with envy viewed?
Where now thy might which all those Kings subdued?
No martial myriads muster in thy gate;

No suppliant nations in thy temple wait;
No prophet bards, the glittering courts among,
Wake the full lyre and swell the tide of song!
But lawless force and meagre want are there,
And the quick darting eye of restless fear;
While cold oblivion, 'mid thy ruins, laid,

Folds his dark wing beneath the ivy shade.

But though the glory of Judea has departed, and the poet's description of its desolation is scarcely overcolored, yet there is no other land which so attracts the love and reverence of the christian, and surely no land to which his thoughts can more fitly travel on a Christmas Eve.

to the sorrowful heights of Calvary, with its memories of human crime and human hard-heartedness, that we turn; but to the holy places of Bethlehem, where, 858 years ago, the Divine love first became visible in the human form to the human eye. Ah! that solemn Christmas night, when the star traveled onward through the heavens until it rested over the lowly roof, and streamed in through the casement of the house of Joseph and Mary. The writer recently turning over the pages of the Dictionaire Encyclopedique, chanced upon an allusion to Bethlehem which seemed to him most admirable from its simple brevity. The passage runs as follows: "Bethlehem, a little village of Palestine, where was born in a manger, and at midnight, Jesus Christ." In these words, few but significant, is summed up the history of the human race.

There are two Bethlehems in Palestine, but the birth-place of our Saviour is, and was, distinguished as Bethlehem Ephrath or Ephratah. This word Bethlehem (house of bread or flesh) refers, in all probability, to its situation in a fertile and corn-growing district.

Bethlehem is pleasantly situated upon a 31 about six miles southeast of Jerusalem, and three miles from the f nous "pools of Solomon." On its left, slopes a considerable valley, Beet Jal, or the Yellow House, through which there runs a rippling brook. Stretching away to the eastward, for nearly 20 miles, are ample plaias, crowned with the olive and the vine, until a ruder, rougher soil bears witness to the evil influence of the waters of the Dead Sea.

The memorable town which witnessed the birth of David, as well as of Him whom the son of Jesse dimly foreshadowed stands favorably distinguished among the cities of Palestine for its external beauty and internal cleanliness. An accurate observer tells us that "the houses, even the meanest, are all roofed; and those small cupola's abound, which give to the towns and the houses of the Holy Land an air of comfort, and even of importance, in strong contrast with the dreariness of the uniform flat roofs, or oftener roofless mud walls of Egypt. Bethlehem is inhabited mostly by Christians, Roman Catholic and Greek. There is but one small mosque; few Mahomedans; no dent. The dress of the Christian women here is singularly graceful and becoming; probably little varied in fashion from those of Naomi and her daughter-in-law, who clave unto her, and said, thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God." The young women wear a light veil, or rather hood, not covering the features like the Turkish or Egyptian Cimaar, but descending on each side of the face, closed across the bosom, and showing the front of a low but handsome head-dress, usually composed of strings of silver coins, plaited in among the hair and hanging down below the chin as a sort of necklace. The mothers and old women wear a longer and darker robe.

Bethlehem has its historical, no less than scriptural associations. Here the Emperor Hadrian, earnest in his attempt to root out "the new heresy," and to desecrate its holiest places, raised a statue, and a shrine to Adonis, and ordained a series of splendid ceremonials. The statue, according to Jerome and Eusebius, was destroyed some seventy years later, by the Empress Helena, mother of the great Constantine, who erected over the grotto wherein the Saviour, it is supposed, was born, a splendid church, dedicated to St. Catharine, which is still extant. And not with other feelings than those of joy and hope. For it is not

Here, too, the devout Eusebius and the eloquent Jerome taught and practiced the christian faith.

At the easternmost extremity of the town, says Lord Nugent, in his "Lands Classical and Sacred," on the edge of a steep rock overhanging a plain of several miles in extent, stands the Franciscan Convent of the Nativity, containing within its precincts, what is said to be the place where the Saviour was born into this world. It is spacious and surrounded with lofty walls. The principal gate is small and low, with a strong iron door; and the whole building closely resembles a fortress. Within it stands St. Helena's Church, which has many points of similarity with the Church of St. Paul at Rome. The arched roof, said to be fashioned out of the Cedar-wood of Lebanon-rests upon two double rows of twenty-eight tall Corinthian pillars of marble; and the walls are adorned with gorgeous, if not particularly artistic, paintings and mosaics.

Beneath it, in a subterraneous chapel, is the place where the Nativity was accomplished, marked by a star of silver, on the pavement, and the inscription, "Hic de Virgine Maria Jesus Christus Natus est" (Here, of the Virgin Mary, Jesus Christ was born); and the "presspio," where of old "the manger" rested, now represented by an alabaster trough, "enclosed within a shrine hung with blue silk, and embroidered with silver. Lamps of gold and silver, and plates of glittering metals, cast a radiance upon the walls and pavement of these hallowed sanctuaries. Opposite the shrine of the manger is the chapel which marks the spot where the Magi or the wise men of the east deposited their offerings and worshipped the God-child. And in the same crypt are the chapel and tomb of Santa Paula and Santa Eustachia, two illustrious Roman ladies, who, in the third century, established in the sacred town a convent of nuns. Here, too, repose the remains of Jerome and Eusebius, contiguous to the cave wherein Jerome lived for nearly fifty years, and tran. slated into Latin the inspired pages of the New Testament.

There are other things to interest the traveler in Bethlehem and its vicinity-the mountain passes of Engedi, the fields of the shepherds, where they abode on the memorable night; the tomb of Rachel, who was "buried in the way to Ephrath, which is Jerusalem;" the village of Rama, where there was "a voice heard, lamentation and weeping, and great mourning," for Rachel bewailed her children; the fountain whence three mighty men of Judea drew water for the longing David; these must command the reverence of all to whom the pure religion of Christ is not a vanity and a sound.

Without the city walls the view to the right embraces the blue peaks of the mountains of Hebron, where, in the cave of Machpelah, was laid the dust of Abraham; and the valley of Mamre where Isaac sojourned. Still further off rise the heights of Engedi and Aelluilam; the rock which overhangs the cavern where David concealed himself from the wrath of Saul; the Frank mountain, supposed to have been the "Bethulia" of Judith; and far away the fertile plains of the vine-garlanded valleys of Judea.

Such is a brief outline of the holy places of Bethlehem, whither in the sacred Christmas time our thoughts may well be borne, to recall that prophetic song of the angels which shall yet in the fullness of time be