United States or South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
We staid all night with the good monks at the convent of Ramleh, and in the morning got up and galloped the horses a good part of the distance from there to Jaffa, or Joppa, for the plain was as level as a floor and free from stones, and besides this was our last march in Holy Land. These two or three hours finished, we and the tired horses could have rest and sleep as long as we wanted it.
"We must see if we cannot supply that want at Jerusalem." Papa's interest in the subject was thoroughly waking up. We lunched at Ramleh. How present it is to me, those hours we spent there. The olive groves and orchards and cornfields, the palms and figs, the prickly-pear hedges, the sweet breath of the air. And after our luncheon we stayed to examine the ruins and the minaret.
'Twas the party of the new American Consul-General of Syria and Jerusalem, hastening to that city, with the inferior consuls of Ramleh and Jaffa to escort him. He expects to see the Millennium in three years, and has accepted the office of consul at Jerusalem, so as to be on the spot in readiness.
The Zerka, or Crocodile river, which traverses this plain, is the largest stream of Palestine west of the Jordan. There are several other streams crossing the plain from the mountains to the sea, but they usually cease to flow in the summer season. Joppa, Lydda, Ramleh, and Caesarea belong to this plain.
We staid all night with the good monks at the convent of Ramleh, and in the morning got up and galloped the horses a good part of the distance from there to Jaffa, or Joppa, for the plain was as level as a floor and free from stones, and besides this was our last march in Holy Land. These two or three hours finished, we and the tired horses could have rest and sleep as long as we wanted it.
On the 1st of March we slept at Ramleh, in a small convent occupied by two monks, who paid us the greatest attention. They gave us the church for a hospital. These good fathers did not fail to tell us that it was through this place the family of Jesus Christ passed into Egypt, and showed us the wells at which they quenched their thirst. The pure and cool water of these wells delighted us.
Sir Archibald Alison came out and took command of the force on shore, and, sallying out with 600 men, captured the waterworks at Ramleh an important position between the sea and the canal, and facing the camp of Arabi's army some four miles distant; here, for some time, artillery duels from time to time went on between the guns of the two armies.
His father had been chief emir at the court of the Tulunid princes, and, after the fall of this dynasty, remained in Egypt, where he occupied a post under the government. Intrigues, however, drove him to Syria, whither his partisans followed him. He first entered the army of the caliph, and, capturing the town of Ramleh, was given the governorship of Damascus as reward.
Its area is probably from 1400 to 1500 square miles, This low strip is along its whole course divided into two parallel belts or bands-the first a flat sandy tract along the shore, the Ramleh of the modern Arabs; the second, more undulating, a region of broad rolling plains rich in corn, and anciently clothed in part with thick woods, watered by reedy streams, which flow down from the great highland.
Some miles beyond, the road, at the time the infantry advance was made, had degenerated into a cart-track from the battering it had received from Turkish traffic. About ten miles from Ramleh was Latron, a malaria-haunted swamp in the rainy season and a plague-spot of flies in summer, and from here onwards the road became increasingly difficult and dismal.
Word Of The Day