Visit to the Mount of Olives to procure olive root. Cabinet work from it. Attempt, by a Fancy spell, to raise up again the ancient city of Jerusalem. Its appearance. Fortifications. Towers. Royal palace. Stupendous wall supporting the Courts of the Temple. Outer Cloister. Solomon’s Porch. Court of the Gentiles. Inner Cloister. Gate called “Beautiful.” Court of the Jews. Court of the Priests. Altar. The TEMPLE. Its dazzling faÇade. Noble entrance. Skill of the Architect. Vestibule. Grape-vine of Gold. The Sanctuary. Its furniture. Holy of Holies. Effect of this place on Pompey. Walls of the edifice. Stones of amazing size. Frame work of the city. Villages and gardens around. Effect of the contrast between the Temple and Mount of Olives. The millions coming up to the Passover. Their Hymns. The Roman army. Titus takes a view of the city. Events foretelling its doom. The horror-stricken prophet.

The olive root makes beautiful cabinet work; and, desirous of procuring some from the Mount of Olives to be worked up for my friends, I took one day an interpreter and a couple of natives, and ascended the mountain to see if I could purchase some. Southward of Absalom’s monument is the village of Siloa, standing in what appears to have been a quarry; and consisting partly of houses erected on the rocky platforms, and in part of caves cut in the side of the declivity. This was quite deserted; but near the summit of the mountain I was fortunate enough to find a house with occupants, from whom I purchased the privilege of cutting some roots.[64] It may afford an idea of the state of the arts at Jerusalem, when I mention that the best axe which we could find in the city was a species of blunt grubbing-hoe; and that we actually grubbed through the thick roots; and this, they informed me, is the usual way of cutting wood in that country. Mr. Nicholayson had owned an English axe, but his Arab guards had carried it off at the conclusion of the siege.

Soon after commencing operations on the trees, we found ourselves surrounded by a dozen wild looking men, who seemed to have started up from beneath the ground, where probably they had been concealed in the caves and artificial pits with which the country abounds. They were induced, by the offer of a trifling compensation, to assist us; and while they were tugging away at the wood, I sat down a few yards off to make some plans and sketches of the city. In half an hour the interpreter came to say that they had all fled; and on returning I found that not an individual of them was to be seen. The soldiers at the city gate below had spied them out with their glasses, and a detachment had been sent up to seize them; but they were too cunning, and escaped; and as we stood by the tree, we heard them, in their flight, calling to the soldiers, and using epithets that were any thing but complimentary. I have introduced this simple circumstance, however, not so much for its own sake, as to give me an opportunity of carrying the reader once more to the top of the Mount of Olives. And here I wish him to sit down at the spot which I have just been occupying on the central eminence, and gaze down on this place of wonderful history, and of tender and thrilling association. But my object is not to speak of the present city of Jerusalem; I wish to blot out all that picture, defaced in so many places by wretchedness and unsightly ruins, and to place before his imagination the ancient city of Jerusalem, when she sat upon these hills in her jewelled ornaments,—when “glorious things were spoken of thee, O city of God.”

Often as that city is upon our lips, I believe there are few persons who have an idea of its extraordinary splendor in the olden times; for it was a place not only unique, and of strange religious interest, but also of wonderful magnificence. The period of Solomon’s reign might perhaps be selected as that when its effect was most imposing; but I prefer for our picture the time, of the Agrippas, because, while the splendor of Jerusalem was scarcely less than in the reign of Solomon, we have, by the aid of Josephus, more ample materials for forming a judgment of its appearance; and this, too, with a slight exception, was the city whose streets our Saviour trod, and over which, while observing it from a spot just below us here on the Mount of Olives, he wept in the sad anticipation of its downfall.

And now look northward, and westward, and southward, and notice how, from these distant heights, the land slopes gently downward; bending hitherward as if in reverence, and to add dignity to the consecrated spot. Now look downward. Behold now I spread over the place the spell of a sober and chastened Fancy. I call up again the buried objects of other days. City of the olden time—arise!

See, this is the ancient Jerusalem!

Truly it is a magnificent place; a picture of rare and exquisite beauty set in a frame of brilliants. Recovered from our surprise, and the eye having grown more familiar with the unique spectacle, we turn now to examine it in detail. And, first, observe the walls by which it is begirt; what a proud and formidable array of strength is here. The massive battlements seem to set all earthly power at defiance, while the stones of immense size excite our wonder, not only by their prodigious size, but by their peculiar and careful finish. That wall on the north is eighteen feet in thickness, and with its battlements and turrets is forty-five feet in height; it runs zigzag, so that each part may be raked from the towers, of which there are ninety in this wall. The towers, thirty-six feet square, are of solid masonry, and are crowned each with two stories or suites of rooms, in which architectural beauty is consulted as well as strength, and which are of great magnificence. The angles in the wall are acute, receding considerably from the towers; and the whole structure, as it sweeps around the city, looks like a mountain of solid and immoveable rock. At its north-western angle, high above all the rest, rises the tower of Psephinus, massive below, but in its upper part marked by graceful, though still heavy architecture; it is octangular, and attains an elevation of one hundred and twenty-seven feet.

Within this, separating Acra from Bezetha, is another wall, a solid mountain of masonry, presenting high angular walls, battlements, and towers of exceeding strength; and here, south of Acra, on the edge of Zion, is a third line of similar defences, making, with the steepness of the ascent, a bulwark by no means less formidable than the rest; and on the southern and western sides of this mountain, grow up from the edge of the high rocky precipice, by which it is there begirt, lines of broad and high stone-work, presenting an utterly hopeless barrier to an assailant. “Walk about Zion, and go round about her; tell the towers thereof; mark ye well her bulwarks; beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth is Mount Zion. The kings were assembled, they passed by together; they saw it, and so they marvelled; they were troubled, and hasted away.”

The chief glory of these defences of Zion, however, is a nest of towers there at the north-west angle, “which, for largeness, beauty, and strength, are beyond all that are in the habitable earth.” They were built by Herod, and called after his friend, his brother, and his wife. They stand at a point where the elevation of Mount Zion, contracting into narrow limits, becomes more remarkable, and thus presents their altitude and elaborate architectural beauties in a more striking point of view. One of them is placed in the sharp angle, and is called the tower of Hippicus. It is 46 feet square; and to an elevation of 55 feet is composed of firm and solid masonry, the stones with which it is built being 36 feet in length, by eighteen in width, and nine in height; above this enduring mass is a reservoir 36 feet in elevation; next above this is a double range of magnificent chambers of ornamental yet massive architecture, making an additional height of 46 feet; and above these rise battlements and turrets, the whole height of the tower being 146 feet.

A short distance from it we behold the tower Phasaelus, 72 feet square and 164 in height. Seventy-two feet of this elevation consists of stones like those in the tower just described; and the rest is composed of heavy stone work faced with colonnades; of richly ornamented chambers, and of battlements and turrets.

The third tower of Mariamne, named by Herod after his wife, is smaller than these, but of exquisite beauty, and richly adorned with ornaments; it attains an elevation of 91 feet.

All these look immediately down upon the royal palace, also on Mount Zion; and here the eye is wearied with tracing the labyrinth of courts, the succession of porticos adorned with rich and curious pillars, the ranges of lofty windows, giving light to halls where statuary and carved work have added their embellishments, and where the vessels are of silver and gold. And in the courts below and in the gardens are rare trees, and fountains, and brazen statues, and winding streams. No cost or skill has been spared in this palace by a prince whose resources were of the most ample kind. These palaces and courts and towers are the Kremlin of Jerusalem.

Observe now that long bridge, with its lofty arches, a striking feature in this scene, and adding greatly to its picturesque effect. It rises high above the dwellings of Acra, and, stretching quite across that portion of the city, connects the precincts of this palace with the Temple. But let us hasten to turn our attention to the Temple. The city has yet many striking objects that solicit our attention; the lofty and frowning castle of Antonia, palaces in great numbers, private edifices of remarkable architecture, brought out into strong relief by the uneven nature of the ground, invite our notice; but the wonderful Temple, grand, mysterious, awful, is here before us, and the eye glances impatiently at other objects. Let us turn then, and suffer our eyes to dwell and feast on this.

And it is indeed a glorious sight. It stands here all before us, the walls that support its courts rising from the very depths of the valley of Jehoshaphat, and towering aloft to an astonishing, a giddy height. It was a bold and daring conception—that of carrying up this mountain of stone-work to such a stupendous elevation. This wall here fronting us is 729 feet in height![65] On the northern and western sides, owing to the inequality of the ground, the elevation is somewhat less.

You perceive that in order to obtain greater strength, the walls are not perpendicular, but somewhat slanting, so that with the ascending nature of the ground in the courts above, the whole structure has somewhat of a pyramidal form. The stones of which it is composed are of prodigious size, yet are fitted together with the greatest care, and in addition to the security afforded by their magnitude, are strengthened internally by means of iron clamps. This wall is above 730 feet in length on each side; it forms an exact square, and the whole interior space being filled up, we have thus a vast mountain raised by human labor, a stupendous structure that must excite the astonishment of all succeeding ages. But this is only the ground work, the substructure for the great Temple and its sacred courts. Look upward now; you see along the edge of this wall, far up at its giddy elevation, where the brain reels as it attempts to measure the depths below, you see a cloister or ornamented colonnade, on the outside ornamented with architectural embellishment, and yet more remarkable still for massiveness and strength, as if to guard from the assaults even of the wildest fancy the sacred precincts of the Temple. This cloister is 55 feet wide, and consists on the outside of a range of chambers, and within or towards the Temple, of a double row of marble columns 46 feet in height, each column consisting of a single block of white marble; the entablature gives to the whole cloister or colonnade an elevation of more than 60 feet. At the southern end, instead of two, are four rows of columns, each column six feet in diameter and 27 in height; the heaviness of the shaft being relieved by fanciful flutings at the base, and by rich leaf-shaped capitals, like those which we consider as belonging to the Corinthian order. This end is called Solomon’s Porch;[66] it consists of a nave, if I may use the term, 45 feet wide, and in height 100 feet, with side aisles, each 30 feet wide, and 50 in height. It is an enchanting spot, and fanned at that high elevation with a perpetual breeze, and is a favorite resort; but, indeed, where, in this whole colonnade, forming a complete circuit of 2900 feet, is a spot that is not marked by exceeding beauty and magnificence? At each angle you perceive towers of elaborate architecture, crowned with turrets or pinnacles, where, gazing downward, the senses recoil with horror from the frightful depth.

But this is only the commencement of the grandeur of this wonderful Temple. Within this cloister is an open court, running also quite around; it is paved with marble, and its level is broken by a few steps of ascent, also passing along the whole circuit of the court. This is the court of the Gentiles; and inscriptions on columns are seen at intervals, forbidding this class of people to advance nearer to the Temple. Along the inner edge of this court runs another cloister, consisting also of a row of chambers, with a single colonnade in the interior, or looking toward the Temple. In the space allotted here to the chambers, the ground has taken an ascent of seventeen feet from the court of the Gentiles, but the colonnade itself is on level ground, the pillars being, as in the outer colonnade, forty-six feet in height, and making, with the entablature, likewise a full elevation of more than sixty feet; but from the rise of the ground this colonnade is twenty feet higher than the other.

In this cloister, fronting us on the east, is the “Beautiful Gate;”[67] and truly, no one need be directed to mark its surpassing magnificence. It is ninety-one feet in height by seventy-three in width; the doors are of massive Corinthian brass, covered on both sides, as are also the jambs and lintels, with plates of gold and silver, sometimes plain, sometimes in fretted work, or raised into figures in low or in high relief. On either side of the doorway is a tower, seventy-three feet high, adorned with columns twenty-one feet in circumference. On the northern and southern sides of this cloister are eight other gates, of less magnitude, but covered in a similar manner, as are also their jambs and lintels, with plates of gold and silver; and strengthened also like the former, with towers and massive columns.

Passing through this, we are once more in an open court, paved with marble, and rising by steps towards the central point. The eastern side of this court is allotted to the worship of the Jewish women, while that on the north and south is divided off for the men. At the inner edge of this court is again another wall; it is of marble, only a few feet in height, and is richly ornamented with sculpture; it separates the court of the Jewish worshippers from the inmost court of all, the court of the Priests.

And there, at the eastern side of this inmost court, in the open air, at the apex of this stupendous Pyramidal structure, canopied only by the heavens, stands the Altar of Burnt Sacrifice. It is a colossal structure, being twenty-seven feet in height and ninety-one feet on each of its sides. The ascent is by an inclined plane on the south.

And just beyond it, is the TEMPLE. This looks also to the eastward, and as we attempt to gaze upon it in this bright morning sun, now darting its rays across the Mount of Olives, our dazzled eyes turn away, pained by the glorious sight. It presents a front one hundred and eighty-two feet long and of an equal height, all of which is covered with thick plates of gold. What a magnificent spectacle! What a grand termination to this stupendous structure, towering upwards from the deep valley towards the clouds. Cast your eye downwards, and let it range over the immense masses of chiselled rocks, wrought into regular shape, enriched with architectural device, and piled on each other till the senses are pained in endeavoring to take in the colossal fabric of more than seven hundred feet in height; glance at the huge mouldings into which the wall swells at its termination; mark the high colonnades of pure showy marble, that are ranged along the edge of this mighty structure; see within this the marble tesselated pavement, ascending by flights of steps, and encircling the mountain; and then again another range of light marble porticos sweeping quite around; mark the pavement, again ascending by unbroken flights of marble steps; and here, at length, crowning the whole magnificent work, is the gorgeous Temple, its front one hundred and eighty-two feet high, decked with elaborate architectural embellishments, and covered with massive gold.

And “the Lord is in his Holy Temple, let all the earth keep silence before Him.”

Yes, in this gorgeous edifice, raised to such a stupendous height, wrapped in a splendor that the eye can scarcely look upon; deep within the edifice in a spot of mysterious darkness and solitude, is shadowed forth the presence of Jehovah; and this Temple belongs not to Jerusalem, but to the whole world. And He, the Deity, whose very name is awful, and should be used with reverence, hath blessed this spot with his peculiar presence; and it is meet that man should look upon it with deep and solemn feeling. “How amiable,” said the Psalmist, when far distant, “how amiable are thy tabernacles, O Lord of Hosts. My soul longeth, yea, even fainteth, for the courts of the Lord; my heart and my flesh crieth out for the living God. For a day in thy courts is better than a thousand. I had rather be a door-keeper in the house of my God, than to dwell in the tents of wickedness.”

In this eastern front of the Temple is an open and ornamented door-way, 46 feet wide and 128 feet in height. The architect of this edifice was a man of skill. He knew well the powerful effect produced by the prevalence of high ascending lines in a building, and in the Temple he has taken advantage of this effect, and with the best results. How fine is the appearance of this grand and lofty door-way, open also so as to give a view of the rich vestibule just within! Our thoughts and our feelings, whatever they may be, are not checked at the very threshhold, but are allowed to penetrate to a short distance; they are not excluded from the edifice; they enter sufficiently to make us a part of it; and yet it is not made common by being all exposed; sufficient of it remains shut up to excite our wonder, to cherish feelings of respect, to inspire that awe which arises from mystery.

He who may enter this lofty door-way, will find himself in a vestibule at right angles with his path; it is 36 feet wide, 92 in length, and 164 feet in height. The wall in front of him is all covered with plates of gold, which, like that on the exterior front, is in various forms, smooth and highly burnished, or in patterns of embossed work, or in figures of various kinds. From the lofty ceiling, which the eye is pained in attempting to reach, hangs down a golden vine, with leaves and fruit of the same metal, and so colossal are its dimensions, that the clusters of grapes are six feet in length.[68] Our foot may not be placed within this vestibule; but through the large open door-way we can discover much of the splendor by which it is distinguished. In the golden wall that bounds our vision at its further side, is a door-way twenty-nine feet wide by 100 in height, covered by a Babylonian curtain, of blue and scarlet and purple, richly embroidered, and of wonderful workmanship. Its ample folds conceal a door, which, like the wall, is covered with plates of gold, plain or in various patterns, and of exceeding richness.

He who enters this door will find himself in The Sanctuary. This is a chamber thirty-six feet wide and seventy-two in length, and 109 in height; its height, however, cannot be reached by the eye; for this chamber is in darkness, except the obscure light shed upon it by several lamps. Daylight cannot penetrate it, unless occasionally a feeble glimmering through the door-way; a mysterious obscurity is left to pervade it, and the vision, turning upward, combats for a while the deepening shadows, and is then repelled by utter darkness. The furniture of this room is simple, for it contains only the Table of Shew-bread, and the Golden Candlestick, and the Altar of Incense. While the incense ascends silently, and keeps the chamber filled with perpetual odours, the softened light of the Seven Golden Lamps of the Candlestick falls upon a table with twelve loaves of bread, one for each tribe; as if, by this simple emblem, the staff of his life kept here in memorial, man would gratefully acknowledge by whom his existence is prolonged, and whence are derived its blessings. There is something in this quiet and simple scene, a subdued and humble, yet grateful character in its speech, that is very impressive.

At the further end of this chamber is again a door-way covered by a thick veil of many folds. It opens into a square chamber thirty-six feet on each side, and 109 in height. In this chamber there is nothing at all. It is quite dark; and its deep obscurity and its vacancy are fit emblems of HIM who is invisible to mortal eye, and whom mortal thought can never reach. This is the Holy of Holies. It is entered only by the High Priest, and by him but once a year. Unadorned, and deeply shut up within the Temple, it is left to darkness, and silence, and impressive solitude.

When Pompey, after a toilsome siege, at length took this mountain by assault, he hastened to the Temple, incited both by curiosity, and by a desire to feed his eye on the wealth that had at length become his own; but when, having examined the Sanctuary in its dim mysterious light, and then, raising this veil, he stood in the Holy of Holies, and found no object, nought but an obscurity that his eye, as he gazed upward, sought in vain to pierce, a feeling of awe and dread seems to have come upon him; he left the Temple, having touched neither its furniture nor its treasure, and, calling off his troops, he gave orders to repair the injuries that had been occasioned by his assault.

The walls of this building are fourteen and a half feet in thickness, and are composed of stones forty-six feet long by twenty-one in width, and fourteen in thickness, interspersed with some that have the astonishing length of eighty-two feet.[69] The main body of the edifice, containing the Sanctuary and the Holy of Holies, is so narrow in proportion to its elevation, that it would be in danger from earthquakes if that were not guarded against by an outer wall nine feet from this, with which it is connected so as to form between them three tiers of cells, thirty in each tier; the upper part of the building is used as store-rooms for the furniture and utensils of the Temple. The vestibule, being at right angles with the body of the edifice, projects thirty-six feet on either side. The stone employed here appears to be a pure white marble, for those portions of the building which are not covered with plates of gold are of dazzling whiteness, so as to appear at a distance like a mountain covered with snow.

The whole mass, the foundation walls, the porticoes, the Temple, are indeed a wonderful structure; and with the sacred and solemn associations connected with them, form an object of surpassing interest and grandeur.

And now look down again upon the city and upon the fair region stretching all around. The ground on which Jerusalem is built, assists greatly, as you perceive, in giving it architectural effect. Babylon, Nineveh, Thebes, Memphis, those cities of ancient renown, were built on level plains, and with all their riches and greatness were in most parts tame and monotonous; but here the picturesque is added to greatness and splendor; the walls and towers overhang deep precipices; the lofty palaces are brought into stronger relief by their situations; each portion of the city, by harmony or by contrast, adds a charm to every other; and the Temple, like another sun chained to the dizzy heights of Moriah, sheds an effulgence over all.

Gaze now around. What a frame-work is there for the city of Jerusalem! See the villages, embosomed in gardens of deep verdure, sprinkled thickly over all the plains, which, ascending as they retire from the city, expose every object to our view. Here the houses stand in thick clusters, there they straggle along amid the overhanging trees; and the whole immense extent of country seems only a continuation of the city in a more cheerful form. And this Mount of Olives, what a beautiful object it must be when viewed from the city. Its graceful slopes, its gardens, its deep shade, its white cottages, its villas, where the wealthy love to retire, half exposed, half concealed, by the dense verdure; its groves and public walks; what an admirable picture they form; and alongside of the stupendous and glittering pyramid of Mount Moriah, each by contrast gives new beauties and new charms to the other. Where in all the world shall we find a scene equal to this?

And now glance your eye along these roads that come winding over the hills by which Jerusalem is encircled. See! The whole country seems awakened into an intensity of life and animation. It is the Passover. Far off as the eye can reach, the great highways and the narrow paths are covered with masses of living beings, thousands upon thousands pouring onwards, and still succeeded by other thousands, till it seems as if the whole habitable globe was sending its inhabitants and its tribute to this sacred city. And it does. Here are “Parthians and Medes, and Elamites, and the dwellers in Mesopotamia, and in Judea, and Cappadocia, in Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, in Egypt and in the parts of Lybia about Greece, and strangers of Rome, and Cretes, and Arabians,” in their various costumes, and speaking their various tongues. The number that assembles here on this occasion is about three millions. They come, some purely from religious feeling, some also for commerce; for the occasion is seized by dwellers in far distant countries for the interchange of commodities. As they approach the city, however, a common feeling takes possession of all of them, delight, reverence, awe, wonder, admiration. As they gain the summits of the distant hills, and catch a view of the Temple, they burst into shouts of joy, they prostrate themselves upon the ground, they break out into hymns of praise. The air seems burdened by the noises that unceasingly ascend; one while they are like the roar of the ocean; at another, they rise, and sink, and swell upward again into lofty strains of wonder and thanksgiving; the earth trembles under the moving to and fro of these countless multitudes. See—still they come, thousands and yet still countless thousands pressing onward towards the city. The eye is wearied with beholding them; the senses are pained and overwhelmed.

And now the sounds abate and sink into a deep but continuous murmur. They are preparing for the Paschal sacrifice. The multitudes are divided into companies of from ten to twenty, and each company, by a deputy appointed for that purpose, is to offer in the courts of the temple a lamb without blemish or spot; the blood is to be sprinkled at the foot of the great altar, and the fat is to be cast upon it for a burnt offering. There will be 250,000 of these sacrifices.

See! the courts of the Temple, the flat roofs of the colonnades, are covered by the dense throngs; the walls and towers of the city, the terraces of the lofty dwellings of Jerusalem, are crowded by the multitudes; and the ascending plains around, and the slopes of the Mount of Olives, are all animated; it is an ocean of living beings.

And now they are silent all. Soon you will perceive a great cloud of smoke roll up from the altar and envelope the Temple, and then you will hear their hymns. There it is! and astounding! the millions of voices that ascend seem to burst the very heavens; the mountain shakes under the strange concussion.—Their Hymn.—

City of Jerusalem! art thou then to be a heap of ruins? Land of glory! art thou then to be a desolation? Temple of the living God, to which exceeding beauty and wonderful associations draw our hearts, art thou then to be laid in the dust, till not one stone shall be left upon another? It is even so.

The voices of the worshippers are suddenly hushed, for upon yon distant hills, to the northward, is the glitter of armor; and see, the heights are now all covered with a dense array of the legions of Rome. Their leader comes here to reconnoitre, and from this mountain looks down upon the glorious city.

It is a wonderful city, wonderful in its origin, in its history, in its present character; strange events, too, have been foretelling its doom, and terrible is to be its downfall.

A flaming sword was seen night after night, for the space of a year, suspended over the city; the inhabitants crowded to the Temple, they offered sacrifices, but still that bloody sword was over them; the timid buried themselves in their chambers and wept; the gay tried to forget it in debauch, but still it hung above the city, and the hearts of the stoutest at length quailed before it. It has lately disappeared, but they do not know whether to consider this as an omen for good or for evil.

Also the Beautiful Gate of the Temple, which requires twenty men to move it, one night, though secured by heavy bolts, opened of its own accord, as if to show that the spirits which had been keeping guard in the Temple were leaving it.

Also one night at Pentecost, as the priests were going to their duties in the inner court of the Temple, they felt a quaking of the earth, and then, as they stood to recover from their dread, they heard a whispering noise as of a multitude of people, saying, “Let us go hence.”

Even now, as we have been sitting here, a lonely and mournful, but loud voice, has been repeating in the lanes and in the high streets of the city, “Wo, wo to Jerusalem!” And for four years, by day and in the deep stillness of night, that melancholy cry has been unceasingly heard denouncing wo to the affrighted and cowering inhabitants. A plain countryman came up to the Feast of Tabernacles four years ago while the country was prosperous and at peace; and while engaged in the duties of this occasion became suddenly a changed man, and before the multitudes cried aloud, “A voice from the east, a voice from the west, a voice from the four winds, a voice against Jerusalem and the Holy House, a voice against the bridegrooms and the brides, and a voice against this whole people!” A dead weight of fear has ever since lain upon the spirits of the inhabitants, crushing the timid, and oppressing even the boldest. They have tried by every means to stop his mournful cry; they have beaten him till his bones were laid bare, but he made no supplication and shed no tears; they have carried him before the rulers, but he has not been awed to silence, nor to their queries and threats has he made any reply; he has associated with no one, but in the crowded city has made himself a solitary and a lonely man; he has not complained when ill treated and abused from day to day; he has not thanked those who gave him food; to each he has replied only by his usual exclamation of, wo to the city; the channels of all feeling, except a deep and dreadful horror, seem to have been frozen up. He rests but little; something within him hath murdered sleep. At midnight, when all nature is hushed in death-like repose, from amid the deep darkness his mournful voice is heard; and the mother starts and draws her infant to her breast, and the sentry on his post trembles at the prolonged and melancholy cry, “Wo, wo, wo to Jerusalem!”

The wo hath been poured out upon the unhappy city.

Eleven hundred thousand persons perished during the siege, by famine, pestilence, or by human violence. Ninety-seven thousand at its close were carried as captives into distant lands.[70]