importance, that it at length came to be regarded as the capital of the kingdom, till Samaria deprived it of that honour. But Shechem still throve. It subsisted during the exile, and continued for many ages after, the chief seat of the Samaritans, and of their worship; their sole temple being upon the mountain of Gerizim, at whose foot the city stood.* As intimated already, Shechem re-appears in the New Testament. It is the Sychar of John iv. 5, near which the Saviour conversed with the Samaritan woman at Jacob's Well. The anonymous city in Acts viii. 5, where Philip preached with such effect, may have been Sychem, though many would refer that narrative to Samaria, the capital of the province. It is interesting to remember that Justin Martyr, who follows so soon after the age of the apostles, and who suffered at Rome about A.D. 163, was born at Shechem. About forty years after the death of Christ, Shechem was considerably enlarged and beautified by the emperor Vespasian, who gave it the name of Neapolis (the new city), which it still retains in the Arabic form Nâbulus, being one of the very few names imposed by the Romans in Palestine which has survived to the present day. The name occurs first in Josephus, and then in Pliny. It has since been corrupted into Naplous, Nablous, or Napolose, as it is now variously designated. It is the heir, under a different name, of the site and honours of the ancient Shechem, the "city of Samaria, which is called Sychar," whose history extends over a period of nearly four thousand years. It was as old as Bethel or Hebron, but, unlike them, its interest does not terminate with the Old-Testament records, for one of the most remarkable and touching incidents related respecting our Saviour happened here. There were converts to the Christian faith at this place in the time of our Saviour; and it is probable that a church was gathered here by the apostles, and that it early became the seat of a bishopric. The names of several of its bishops are found among the subscriptions to the councils of Ancyra, Nicæa, and Jerusalem. In A.D. 487, the Samaritans rose against the Christians, killed many of them, and cruelly maimed the bishop. In consequence of this act they were driven from Mount Gerizim; and a church was built there in honour of the Virgin. This building was frequently attacked by the enraged Samaritans, and the emperor Justinian surrounded it by a strong fortress as a defence against them. On the invasion of Syria by the Moslems, Neapolis peaceably surrendered; and when the Crusaders captured Jerusalem, it as peaceably yielded to them. Like the other cities of Palestine, however, it suffered severely by the long wars between the Crescent and the Cross. It was repeatedly plundered; its churches and altars were polluted, and its people exposed to the most fearful atrocities. The bulk of the population of Nábulus is, of course, made up of Mohammedans: besides whom there are said to be about five hundred Greek Christians, one hundred and fifty Sama

On the expulsion of the Samaritans from Samaria by Alexander, for their having killed Andromachus, the governor of Syria, they took refuge in Shechem, which has been their chief seat ever since.

ritans, and some forty or fifty Jews. The enmity between the Samaritans and Jews is as inveterate as it was in the days of Christ. The main street follows the line of the valley from east to west, and contains a well-stocked bazaar. Most of the other streets cross this: here are the smaller shops and the workstands of the artisans. Most of the streets are narrow and dark, as the houses hang over them on arches, very much as in the closest parts of Cairo. The houses are of stone, and of the most ordinary style, with the exception of those of the wealthy sheikhs of Samaria who live here. They have domes upon the roofs as at Jerusalem. There are no public buildings of any note. There is a welcome appearance of life and bustle in the streets, notwithstanding they are on the whole more gloomy and tunnel-like than any in Syria,-as if the ground was so precious that enough could not be spared even for an open thoroughfare. But probably security is aimed at ; everyone is afraid to venture any considerable distance into the country. The Moslem inhabitants have a bad character, and deserve it. They have been long notorious for fanaticism and turbulence.* They are almost always in a state of semi-rebellion; obeying when it suits their fancy, and resisting, literally to the knife, when their passions are roused. The Christians and the Samaritans only live by sufferance,-always scorned, often insulted, and occasionally spoiled and oppressed. The inhsbitants of this mountain district exhibit many physical and moral traits distinguishing them from the other Syrian tribes. They bear the impress of their ancestry; but Perrier remarks that to the turbulence and other bad qualities inherited from them, the Nablousians superadd the vices of the Arabs. The following anecdote illustrates their fierce party-spirit. In 1834, it is said, some children of the village of Beit-el-Ma amused themselves with gathering anemones, and plucking and scattering the bright leaves of the flowers. As the relations of these children were known to be of the Yeomeni faction, a mob of Nablousians of the Kess party immediately assembled in arms, vowing vengeance for this so-called insult to their adopted colour and emblem. Several villages were sacked, and a hundred and thirty individuals lost their lives in consequence of this frivolous quarrel.

The Keniseh or synagogue of the Samaritans is a small plain edifice, with a curtained recess on the left hand as you enter, in which they keep their sacred writings one of these, a copy of the Pentateuch, they allege to be of

* They have always been accustomed to abuse and maltreat all those from whose religious tenets they dissent. Christians and Jews are especially obnoxious to them. They are usually more tolerant to the Samaritans on ordinary occasions. But during the outbreaks that occur periodically, all are alike subject to insult and danger, Ibrahim Pacha, after a bloody struggle, subjected them for a time; but when the government of Syria was restored to the Turks, the people of Nábulus relapsed into their old system of infuriate resistance to all authority, and scenes of violence and bloodshed frequently occurred. Within the last few years there seems to have been an improvement in the manners of these turbulent citizens, and strangers who have visited the town have met with no incivility. Whether this change is more than temporary remains to be seen,

great antiquity. The structure itself may be three or four centuries old. After the Assyrian conquest of Israel, and the removal of its people into captivity, colonies from the east were placed in their deserted cities. In the Book of Kings we read that when the king of Assyria had carried the children of Israel away captive, he "brought men from Babylon, and from Cuthah, and from Ava, and from Hamath, and from Sepharvaim, and placed them in the cities of Samaria instead of the children of Israel." The country having been desolated by war, wild beasts multiplied, and became the terror and scourge of the new inhabitants. The barren heights of Hermon and Lebanon, and the deserted jungles of the Jordan valley, are to this day, said to be, infested with bears, panthers, wolves, and jackals. The strangers attributed the calamity to the anger of the local Deity, of whose peculiar mode of worship they were ignorant. They therefore petitioned for Jewish priests to instruct them in religious rites; and after they had heard their teachings, 'they feared the Lord, and served their own gods." (2 Kings xvii. 24—41.) Such, according to some, was the origin of the Samaritans. If altogether foreigners, they were probably instructed in some of the leading points of the Jewish religion by Jewish priests; though still retaining the gods of their own nations. The possession of the Pentateuch may have dated from the time of Rehoboam; at all events it is sufficiently accounted for by the partial adoption of the Jewish creed by the colonists. In after times the Jews refused to acknowledge them in any way, and would not permit them to place a stone on the walls of the second Temple, though their refusal cost them many a trial. (Ezra iv.) Being thus cast off by the Jews, the Samaritans resolved to erect a temple of their own on Gerizim, which had doubtless been one of the high places where they had worshipped their false gods. (2 Kings xvii. 29, 32.) The immediate occasion seems to have been the circumstances related by Nehemiah. The date of the temple may be fixed at about B.C. 420. Shechem now became the metropolis of the Samaritans as a sect.

Many Jews who would not submit to the rigid interpretation of the ceremonial law, and the strict rule of Ezra and Nehemiah, threw in their lot with the Samaritans, who were regarded by the Jews with intense hatred. When Antiochus Epiphanes threatened with death all who took part in the rites of the Jewish religion, the Samaritans repudiated their connexion with it and the Jews, and claimed to be descendants of the Sidonian worshippers of Baal. John Hyrcanus destroyed their temple on Gerizim, B.C. 129. Samaritan worship still continued to be performed there, but there is no record of the temple having ever been rebuilt.

Four times a year they go up to Mount Gerizim in solemn procession to worship. These seasons are: The feast of the Passover, when they pitch their tents upon the mountain all night, and sacrifice seven lambs at sunset; the day of Pentecost; the feast of Tabernacles, when they sojourn here in booths built of branches of the arbutus; and, lastly, the great day of Atonement in autumn. They still maintain their ancient hatred against the Jews; accuse them of departing from the law in not sacrificing the Pass

over, and in various other points, as well as of corrupting the ancient text. Though they scrupulously avoid all friendship with them, and will neither eat with them, drink with them, nor pray with them, they have no objections, it seems, to transact a little profitable business with them. They appear to be the last remnant of a remarkable people, clinging for now more than two thousand years around this central spot of their religion and history, and lingering slowly to decay. Having survived the many revolutions and convulsions, which in that long interval have swept over this unhappy land, they are still a reed continually shaken with the wind, but bowing before the storm. The way up Mount Gerizim is by a steep, rough, rocky path from near the entrance of the valley. The summit of the range is described as forming a long flattish platform, broken by some undulations, from which the sides of the mountain fall abruptly. There are extensive remains of various kinds, among which are what seem to be the ruins of a large ancient village; but it is on the eastern brow, overhanging the plain, that the most striking objects are to be seen. Here is a smooth, bare surface of rock sloping down towards a natural cavern. This is the shrine of the Samaritans, profoundly venerated by them. They take off their shoes when they approach it, and turn towards it when they pray. It is their holy of holies. It seems almost certain that this was the site of the Samaritan temple, and that the holy of holies stood on this smooth rock. There are traces of old walls and massive stones around, which probably may have belonged to the building; and they most likely enclosed this peculiar spot, in rivalry of the sacred rock described as belonging to the Temple at Jerusalem. From the narrow cracks which cross the slippery face of the slope, dwarf shrubs spring up, which must have a difficult matter to find soil sufficient to keep them alive, small as they are. From the bottom of the slope the ground rises to a knoll, on which stands a vast ruinous structure of hewn stones, which seems to have been a strong fortress. In some places the walls are nine feet thick; and the building, which consisted of two adjacent parts, is about four hundred feet from north to south, and two hundred and fifty feet from east to west. At the four corners of the southern portion were square towers, and there was another in the middle of the eastern side. There is every reason to believe that the great ruin just described is that of Justinian's fortress. Beyond it is a small space of level ground, where the Samaritans encamp at the feast of the Passover. Here, in a small area, surrounded by stones, is a trough, about four feet long, in which the bones and remains of the paschal lamb are burnt, according to the command of the Jewish law; as are the handkerchiefs on which those who eat wipe their fingers when the repast is over. Near this is a circular pit, three feet in diameter, and about nine feet deep, in which the lambs are roasted, or rather baked. This pit is heated by burning wood in it, and then the lambs are suspended from a stick laid across the mouth, and are so arranged that no part touches the sides or bottom. The whole Samaritan community, men, women, and children, strictly observe the ceremonial enjoined by the law, and eat the flesh "in haste, with their loins girded, their shoes on their feet,

and staves in their hands." Nothing will induce them to allow any stranger to their faith to taste the paschal lambs; and the Turkish governor at one time, the Arabs at another, have extorted money from the sect when assembled for the Passover, compelling them to purchase immunity from a profanation of the sacred food. At length these demands became so oppressive that for years they were compelled to celebrate the feast in their own houses. The small community of Samaritans which still exists in ancient Shechem at the foot of their holy mountain is the sole remnant of the sect. In the third and subsequent centuries they were scattered throughout the east in great numbers, and at the close of the fifth century they even had a synagogue at Rome. Within the last two centuries they were to be found in Egypt, in Damascus, Gaza, and elsewhere; but now they are extinct every where except at Nâbulus, where they may number altogether about one hundred and fifty souls. They have a marked physiognomy, differing much from the Jewish cast of countenance; their noses are long and somewhat straight, complexions rather fair, lips thin, and they often have brown hair. They usually wear red turbans. They accept the Pentateuch as their sole guide in religious matters, and possess a very ancient manuscript copy, which they say was written by Abishua, the son of Phinehas, grandson of Aaron, and is consequently about three thousand three hundred years old! I went to see it in the Samaritan synagogue, and an old roll was taken from a small recess, in front of which hung an old embroidered curtain, and shown to me. I could not tell whether this really was the famous roll of the Pentateuch of which they boast, or whether it was a very old copy. Some say that the real roll is never shown except to members of the sect. The Samaritans keep the Sabbath, strictly praying in their own houses on the Friday evening, and attending public prayers three times on the Saturday; and they do not cook or light a fire during the day. Their worship is described as consisting of many prostrations, accompanied by recitations hurried over as if for a wager, and shouted at the top of the voice, whilst neither among priests nor people is there any appearance of solemnity or even of decent propriety. The community seems to be in tolerably good circumstances. The Samaritan boasts of one advantage over the Jew whom he hates; for he can sacrifice, as of old, on the holy mountain. The Jew cannot sacrifice on Moriah, and there alone would it be lawful for him to do so. It is related that some members of this little community were accused before the atrocious Djezzar, pasha of Acre, of having blasphemed the Mohammedan faith, by declaring that they alone, as possessing the true ancient religion of God, were entitled to paradise. Djezzar instantly summoned the chief men of the Samaritans, who entered his presence with dismay. Leaning on his hatchet, and surrounded with his cut-throats and executioners, he stared for a long while with the aspect of a tiger on the Samaritans, whose terrors he beheld with delight. "Filthy miscreants!" he cried at last in a voice of thunder, "what is the exact number of your people?" "A hundred and sixty," they replied, half dead with fear. "A hundred and sixty! and paradise is for you alone! Well,