At the first crowing of the cock, all was in motion; their host was making the last arrangements for his departure, the neighbours entered to announce that the march was about to begin. Refreshments were offered to the travellers, and especially to Elisama; but he declared with earnestness, that, even amidst the idolaters of Egypt, he had scarcely ever allowed himself to taste food early in a morning, and much less would he do so in Israel, and in the city of David, and on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. The commotion in the street became greater and greater, and it was scarcely dawn, when they set forth. All the doors of the houses were open, all the roofs were covered with persons watching their departure. Helon, as he passed through the streets of Hebron in the ruddy light of the dawn, and by the palm trees at the gate, was reminded that Hebron was one of the oldest cities in the world, even older than Zoan in Egypt;^[91] that it had been conquered by Joshua, and given as a portion to Caleb, the bravest and most faithful of the explorers of the land;^[92] that it had afterwards become a city of the priests, and had been for seven years the residence of David; that it had been taken by the Idumeans, and reconquered by the Maccabees,^[93] and once more incorporated with Judah. But when he had passed the gate, and gained a view of the lovely valley full of vine-yards and corn-fields, and looked around on the region where patriarchs had tended their flocks and pitched their tents, and lived in friendly communion with Jehovah, all the high and enthusiastic feelings of the preceding day were renewed in his mind. From all the cross-roads, men, women, and children were streaming towards the highway to Jerusalem. They had scarcely proceeded a sabbath-day’s journey, when they saw the grove of terebinths; cymbals, flutes, and psalms resounded from the midst of it, and hundreds were standing under the turpentine-tree of Abraham, a tree of immense size and wide-spreading branches. Helon entered the grove of Mamre with feelings of religious veneration. Here Abraham had dwelt, here the angels had appeared to him; beneath these trees Isaac had been promised, and the rite of circumcision instituted; here Ishmael had been born, and driven from his father’s tent; and not far off was the cave of Machpelah, where Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebecca, Jacob and Leah were buried.^[94] And on this spot, consecrated by so many recollections, the children of these patriarchs were now preparing to depart, on their festal pilgrimage to Jerusalem. The occasion and the place seemed to banish from all hearts every other feeling but piety and good-will; mutual greetings were exchanged; friends and relations sought each other out, and associated themselves for the journey, and all faces beamed with joy. “It is time to set out,” said some of the elders to the judge of Hebron: “already has the priest asked the watchman on the temple, Does it begin to be light towards Hebron?” The priests and elders led the procession; the people followed, and the slaves with the camels were placed in the midst of them, the Levites had distributed themselves with their instruments among the multitude, and as they set forward they sung this psalm:

It is impossible to conceive of the soul-felt exultation with which this psalm was sung, and of its effect on old and young. Now the voices rose, like the notes of the mounting lark, on the summit of the hills, now sunk again in the depths of the valleys. How differently did it operate now upon the heart of Helon, and when he sung it before to his solitary harp on his roof in Alexandria! How did he bless the memory of Samuel, who had given his schools of the prophets the harp and the flute;^[95] and of David, who, bred up among them, did not forget them even when seated on his throne,^[96] but appointed Levites for the cultivation of music; and himself often laid down his sceptre, to assume the harp. It was on such a pilgrimage, with such accompaniments, that the sublimity and force of the psalms, and the superiority of Jewish poetry, made itself fully felt.

Helon was astonished at the effect which they had upon himself and all around him. The youths and maidens bounded for joy, and tears of pleasure stood in the eyes of the aged. Those who were going up for the first time to the festival looked and listened to those who had already been there, as if to hear from them an explanation of the full meaning of what they sung. The old heard in these festive acclamations the echo of their own youthful joys, and while their hearts swelled with the remembrance of the feelings of their earliest pilgrimage, they beat yet higher with gratitude to Jehovah, who had permitted them, in their grey hairs, to behold such glorious days for Israel, the Syrian tyranny overthrown, and Hyrcanus seated on the throne.

Sublime are the acclamations of a people freed from a foreign yoke! But here was more. It was the fraternal union of a whole people, in the holiest bond of a common faith, going up to appear before the altar of Jehovah, and to commemorate the wonders of love and mercy which he had manifested towards their forefathers. They seemed a band of brothers. “In Alexandria,” said Helon, “Jew is against Jew, and family against family—but here is one holy people, loving each other as the children of one Israel, joint heirs of one great and blessed name.” Every one had bidden adieu to the occupations and the anxieties of ordinary life. They had come to give thanks and to pray, and no sounds but those of thankfulness and prayer were heard among them. The hostilities and alienations produced by self-love and the collision of interests appeared to have been left at home, and the general joy dispersed every melancholy feeling which an individual might have been disposed to indulge. On these pilgrimages they seemed as free from care as the people of old, when, rescued from Egyptian bondage, they were fed by manna from heaven, on their way to the land that flowed with milk and honey. Jehovah had promised to protect the whole country, so that no enemy should invade its borders, while the people went up, thrice in every year, to appear before him^[97]—how much more confidently might each father of a family intrust his own household to his protection! Nothing was more remarkable than that the aged and the weakly were able to bear this journey of thirty-six sabbath-days’ journies, over hill and dale, without complaining of fatigue. It seemed as if the strong had given to the weaker a portion of their own vigour; or rather, as if Jehovah himself had strengthened the feeble knees for this journey. They expressed these sentiments, by singing, immediately after the former, the following psalm:

It was a beautiful sight, when the procession came from the plain among the hills. The rocky walls, between which their path sometimes lay, re-echoed with their songs. Helon withdrew a little from the line, to an eminence which commanded a view in both directions, and could see the train, covering both the ascent and the descent of the hill, spreading over the plain, and winding like a wreath around the hill beyond.

In every town and village to which they came, they were received with shouts of joy. Before the doors of the houses stood tables with dates, honey, and bread. New crowds of persons, dressed in their holyday attire, were waiting at the junction of the roads, in the fields, and at the entrance of the towns, and joined themselves to the long procession. Here and there before the houses, in the fields or in the vineyards, stood an unclean person, or a woman, or a child, who had been compelled to remain at home, and who replied with tears to the salutation of the passing multitude. It seemed as if the people carried all joy with them from the country to Jerusalem, and only sorrow was left for those who remained behind. Before a house in Bethshur, stood a fine boy of ten years old. Tears streamed from his large dark eyes, and the open features of his noble countenance had an expression of profound grief. His mother was endeavouring to comfort him, and to lead him back into the court, assuring him that his father would take him the next time. But the boy listened neither to her consolations nor her promises, and continued to exclaim, “O father, father, let me go to the temple! I know all the psalms by heart.” He stretched out his arms to the passers-by in earnest entreaty, and happening to see among them a man of the neighbourhood whom he knew, he flew to him, and clinging to his girdle and his upper garment, besought him with tears to take him with him, till the man, moved by his earnestness, asked his mother to allow him to go, promising to take care of him till he should find out his father.

“And this,” said Helon, “is the object of children’s longing in Israel; so early does the desire of keeping the festival display itself! Brought up in Palestine, he felt it would have been with him exactly as with the child.”child.”

They now passed through a wood and then descended a lofty hill whose slope was wholly covered with vines. In the valley before them lay the pools of Solomon. They slackened their pace, and the following psalm was sung:

They were now arrived at the pools of Solomon, into which the brook Etham was received, and which had formerly supplied Jerusalem with water, by means of a costly aqueduct. The three pools lay on different levels, one below another, on a sloping ground. Around each was a double row of noble palms, in which the whole of this spot abounded. Here, beside the springs and in the refreshing shade of the trees, the pilgrims encamped to rest at noon. They had accomplished twenty-six sabbath-days’ journies of their march and ten yet remained.

This aqueduct of Solomon’s was a stupendous work. The fountain of Etham, whose waters the pools received, was about one hundred and fifty paces above them. The pools were of an oblong form, the highest one hundred and sixty, the second two hundred, the lowest two hundred and twenty paces in length, and all ninety paces in breadth. The celebrated gardens of Solomon lay beneath these reservoirs, and were a work equally admirable in their kind. They lay in a rocky valley, enclosed by high hills, and were five hundred paces long and two hundred broad. A solitude, which had nothing in it wild or savage, made them a delightful retreat. In the stillness of this glen, amidst fruit-trees of every variety, the king might find a noble recreation from the cares of royalty. From these extraordinary gardens Solomon derived his imagery, when he said, “A garden enclosed is my sister, my spouse;my spouse;”^[98] and when he speaks in the same passage of a spring shut up, and a fountain sealed, we are reminded of the fountain of Etham, which Solomon is said to have sealed with his own signet ring. Both may serve to explain the words of the Preacher. “I made me great works, I builded me houses, I planted me vineyards; I made me gardens and orchards, and I planted trees in them of all kind of fruits; I made me pools of water to water therewith the wood of green trees.”^[99] Both the reservoirs and the aqueduct appeared, by the solidity of their construction, to have been designed to last for ever, and were worthy of the king by whom they were made, and of his times, of which the Book of Chronicles declares, that “Silver was in Jerusalem like stones.”^[100] Our travellers blessed his memory, as they drank, beneath the shade of the palms, the refreshing draught of the cool rock water. It was just mid-day, the heat of the sun was intense, and all longed for repose and coolness.

After a short rest the sacks and wine-skins were unpacked from the camels, while others produced their humble stores from their mantles or their bosoms. The upper garments were spread for carpets, on which they lay for rest, or crouched to eat. Now you might see that these pilgrims were a band of brothers. It is true, the very poorest had brought something with him. For weeks before, ever since the feast of tabernacles, they had denied themselves, in order to save something for this festival; and on this day at least the command of Moses might appear to have been literally fulfilled, “There shall be no beggar among you.” But besides this the rich had provided for the poor a supply of those things which on ordinary occasions they were not able to procure themselves. Some sent to the old men a cup of generous wine, or regaled the children with confectionary and fruits. From Tekoah, the birthplace of the prophet Amos, which was not far off, came asses loaded with the celebrated honey of Tekoah; and from Beth-Cherem, celebrated for its wines, others with large and sweet raisins. From the cheerful mirth which pervaded the whole assembly, and the delightful coolness of the water and the trees, they seemed more like a company celebrating, in a fine evening, the festival of the new moon, than a caravan halting at mid-day. No one felt the heat or complained of weariness, except a few aged and weakly persons, who indulged themselves in a short rest.

Behind a hill the walls of Tekoah were discerned in the distance, and beyond it the desert of Tekoah, the free pasture of the bees, for whose honey the town was celebrated. “Does not this scene remind thee of the prophet-herdsman of Tekoah?” said Elisama to Helon. “How should it not,” replied Helon, “when I see his prophecy almost fulfilled before my eyes?”^[101]

They waited another hour in this pleasant valley, till the great heat of noon was moderated. During this time some youths came to Helon, and said to him, “Though you speak our language you are not a youth of Judah, your turban betrays you.” Helon informed them that he was an AramÆan Jew, a native of Alexandria indeed, but one who had chosen Jerusalem, in preference to Leontopolis. They acknowledged him with joy as one of themselves, and invited him to accompany them in a walk around the encampment. Helon gladly accepted the offer.

What a multitude of interesting groups presented themselves on every side, as they wandered from one palm tree to another! Every party as they passed offered them wine, mead, honey, dates and the like, and greeted them with friendly words. Boys had insinuated themselves among the circles of the men, and listened, with fixed eyes and open mouth, to every word which they uttered respecting Jerusalem and the festival. The boy whom Helon had seen weeping so bitterly before the solitary house had found out his father, was lying in his lap and repeating to him the psalms which he had learnt. A group of maidens were listening to a description of the magnificent vestments of the high-priest. They pastpast by a company of men, who were speaking of the heroic deeds of Hyrcanus and the Maccabees, and rejoicing that Edom and Samaria had been made subject by him to Israel. One feeling of joy pervaded all bosoms, but it expressed itself in various ways, according to the age or sex of each.

One group rivetted the attention of Helon so long, that he did not leave them till it was near the time of departure. Under almost the furthest palm trees sat seven robust young men, with an equal number of women and several children. “This is Mardochai of Ziph, with his children and children’s children,” said one of the youths who accompanied Helon. They approached him, took him by the hand, and congratulated him upon being able to go up to the feast, with such a train of his descendents. “Yes,” exclaimed the old man, while tears trembled in his dark eyes, “Jehovah hath abundantly blessed me. I see my offspring, like the sand on the seashore—children and children’s children, to the number of fifty souls!”

This aged pair had not for several years gone up to the festival: but their children had now persuaded them to appear once more before Jehovah. They had been the last in the procession, and their sons and daughters had been obliged almost to carry them in their arms—a burthen which they had joyfully sustained—for they had refused either to ride or be conveyed in a carriage. “Where could a psalm of degrees be more in its place?” said a lively youth of the company. At the word several of them ran to fetch their musical instruments, and standing around the deeply moved old man, they sung the following psalm:

During this time others had come up, and soon the news was spread through the whole assemblage, that Mardochai of Ziph was once more among them; and nearly all the pilgrims came and formed a circle about him. The judges and elders of Hebron were among them, and all greeted the venerable pair and wished them peace.

“Ye shall lead the procession!” said an elder of Hebron! “The place of honour belongs to you. The pilgrims of Hebron cannot advance with any blessing better or more rare.”

The sons took their father, the daughters their mother, in their arms, the priests and elders followed, and the march began again to complete the ten sabbath-days’ journies which they were still distant from Jerusalem.

Far from the expressions of joy being exhausted by all the songs and acclamations of the morning, they seemed only to be beginning, when they set forward again. From the pools of Solomon they took their way through the hills to Bethlehem. The cymbals, cornets, and timbrels of the Levites struck up their music again, and many a soul-inspiring psalm was heard from the lips of an assemblage now swollen to several thousand persons. In a pilgrimage to the temple, could he be forgotten, whose pious heart first conceived the wish to build a house for Jehovah? The warrior-bard was commemorated in the following psalm:

It seemed as if the multitude could not leave the last strophe, which they repeated over and over again. They then went on to the second part of the psalm, which was probably sung at the dedication of the temple, and repeated in the same way the elevating words with which it concludes,

The instruments now struck in with a louder tone, and the multitude lifted up its voice, as the words of Jehovah were repeated.

Proceeding in this way they reached Bethlehem Ephratah, “little among the thousands of Judah,” and yet so highly honoured. Both its names allude to the fertility of the country in which it stands. Bethlehem signifies the place of bread; and Ephratah, fruitful. In its luxuriant pastures Jacob fed his flocks; in its fertile fields Boaz was reaping when he found his kinswoman Ruth. Here his seven sons were born to Jesse, and here the man after God’s own heart grew up, till the day when he came forth to avenge the honour of his people on the boastful heathen.

Bethlehem is a small town, six sabbath-days’ journies from the holy city. It is situated upon a narrow, rocky ridge, surrounded by vallies and hills, having an extensive view over the diversified country in its neighbourhood, the region around Jericho, the Dead Sea, and the Arabian mountains. Before its gates you look to the plain of the valley of Rephaim, and all around is the garden of God. The Kedron flows through its fruitful fields, which are thickly set with olives and figtrees, with vines and corn. But its greatest glory is that of which Micah prophetically speaks, “And thou Bethlehem Ephratah, who art little among the thousands of Judah, out of thee shall he come forth that is to be Ruler in Israel, whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting.”^[102]

In Bethlehem they met with another company of pilgrims, coming from Lachish, Adullam, and Libna, which lie westward of Bethlehem. All who could, endeavoured to make Bethlehem in their way to Jerusalem on these occasions. It was the city of David, the road passed by the grave of Rachel, and it was dear to many, as the city to which the greatest of all the promises had been given.

The elders of the different cities had soon agreed about the order of the march from Bethlehem to Jerusalem. The venerable pair, Mardochai of Ziph and his wife, were borne before, the elders followed, but without any distinctive badge, and the people arranged themselves as they chose. Some time, however, elapsed before they set out. There were greetings of friends and acquaintance, who met after a long interval; those who had travelled furthest needed refreshment. At length the Levites began their music and their songs, and the people set forward. They had soon descended from the heights of Bethlehem into the valley of Rephaim. As the living stream poured down from the hills, among the corn-fields and mulberry-groves of the vale, this was the praise of Jerusalem which ascended in a mingled strain of voices and instruments.

When they had proceeded about two sabbath-days’ journies, or a little more, from Bethlehem, they approached the grave of Rachel.^[103] At another time this place of the rest of Jacob’s beloved wife, the hardly earned recompense of his labours, might have produced some melancholy emotions, but now such thoughts were banished by the universal joy. Helon remarked to Elisama, that this was not the time of which their prophet had spoken: “In Rama was heard a voice, lamentation and bitter weeping; Rachel weeping for her children.”^[104] “May it be always so with the children of Israel,” replied Elisama.

The eager haste of the multitudes now increased with every step, and their impatience for the first sight of Jerusalem was expressed in the following psalm:

Expectation had reached the highest pitch. The last strophes were not completely sung; many were already silent, eagerly watching for the first sight of Jerusalem. All eyes were turned towards the north; a faint murmur spread from rank to rank among the people, only those who had been at the festival before continued the psalm, and these solitary scattered voices formed a solemn contrast with the silence of the rest of the multitude. Helon’s heart was in his eye, and he could scarcely draw his breath. When the psalm was concluded, the instruments prolonged the sound for a moment, and then all that mighty multitude, so lately jubilant, was still as death.

All at once the foremost ranks exclaimed, Jerusalem, Jerusalem! Jerusalem, Jerusalem! resounded through the valley of Rephaim. “Jerusalem, thou city built on high, we wish thee peace!” The children dragged their parents forward with them, and all hands were lifted up to bless.

The high white walls of the Holy City cast a gleam along the valley: Zion arose with its palaces, and from Moriah the smoke of the offering was ascending to heaven. It was the hour of the evening sacrifice. Scarcely had the multitude recovered a little, when they began to greet the temple and the priests:

They had now reached the termination of their march. The day of preparation was beginning; the following evening was the Passover. From the gates of Jerusalem came forth, in every direction, the pilgrims who had already arrived and the inhabitants of the city, to welcome the new comers from Hebron and from Libna. The venerable pair, Mardochai of Ziph and his wife, who were still borne in front, received the blessings of all who met them.

Close by the gate, some one from behind laid hold of Elisama; “Art thou Elisama of Alexandria?” Elisama turned round and recognised Iddo, an old and faithful friend of his family. The old men met with inexpressible delight, and Elisama presented Helon to Iddo. The pilgrims had now reached the city, and were dispersing in different directions to their respective quarters. Iddo conducted the strangers through the Water-gate to his house on the open place.