mound, in the center of a triangular space, where three valleys meet. Here there is a well of sweet and excellent water, and round it olives, figs, locust-trees, and evergreen oaks grow. A party of Bedouins were watering their camels at the stone trough connected with the well. Under the pleasant tree-shadows we rested, and on a bank of wild thyme and sweet marjoram we spread our simple provisions—"a basket of Summer fruit," a few thin cakes of flour, and some new wine. At the entrance to an extensive cavern, in the base of a hill opposite to us, a group of peasants were sleeping. The cave, like many smaller ones which we had seen, had been fashioned originally by nature, but man had at some period or other smoothed the inner wall, and made a dwelling there.
When we remounted, we passed through a partially-cultivated district. Groves of olive-trees bordered the dry bed of a Winter torrent, and patches of vines, and vegetables, and stubble-fields appeared on the terraces, till we came to higher and steeper hills in the neighborhood of Ajalon, covered with sage and wild lavender. The heat was sensibly increasing till about noon, when a pleasant breeze arose. This is generally the case in the hill country in the Summer time, the breeze rises at about twelve, lasts for an hour or two, and cools the air. We came into a cultivated region again, announcing a village near, and soon saw the white walls of the square castle-like houses of Abu Ghosh, on a hill-side, and the fine ruins of an ancient Christian church to which a Franciscan convent was formerly attached. We dismounted at its large arched entrance; the groined roof and clear-story, supported by tall massive columns, are in good preservation. This building is now used as a stable and khan, but has often served the purpose of a fortress. It is very long since it echoed the litanies of the Franciscans, for they were expelled about the middle of the thirteenth century, when the sultan of Egypt conquered Jerusalem.
A cousin of the robber chief, the celebrated Abu Ghôsh,
