at Bethel, as Jacob did, and close their dim eyes,
and dream, perchance, of angels descending out of
heaven on a ladder. It was very pretty.
But I have recognized the weary head and the dim
eyes, finally. They borrowed the idea—and
the words—and the construction—and
the punctuation—from Grimes. The
pilgrims will tell of Palestine, when they get home,
not as it appeared to them, but as it appeared to
Thompson and Robinson and Grimes—with the
tints varied to suit each pilgrim’s creed.
Pilgrims, sinners and Arabs are all abed, now, and
the camp is still. Labor in loneliness is irksome.
Since I made my last few notes, I have been sitting
outside the tent for half an hour. Night is the
time to see Galilee. Genessaret under these
lustrous stars has nothing repulsive about it.
Genessaret with the glittering reflections of the
constellations flecking its surface, almost makes me
regret that I ever saw the rude glare of the day upon
it. Its history and its associations are its
chiefest charm, in any eyes, and the spells they weave
are feeble in the searching light of the sun.
Then, we scarcely feel the fetters. Our thoughts
wander constantly to the practical concerns of life,
and refuse to dwell upon things that seem vague and
unreal. But when the day is done, even the most
unimpressible must yield to the dreamy influences
of this tranquil starlight. The old traditions
of the place steal upon his memory and haunt his reveries,
and then his fancy clothes all sights and sounds with
the supernatural. In the lapping of the waves
upon the beach, he hears the dip of ghostly oars;
in the secret noises of the night he hears spirit
voices; in the soft sweep of the breeze, the rush
of invisible wings. Phantom ships are on the
sea, the dead of twenty centuries come forth from
the tombs, and in the dirges of the night wind the
songs of old forgotten ages find utterance again.
In the starlight, Galilee has no boundaries but the
broad compass of the heavens, and is a theatre meet
for great events; meet for the birth of a religion
able to save a world; and meet for the stately Figure
appointed to stand upon its stage and proclaim its
high decrees. But in the sunlight, one says:
Is it for the deeds which were done and the words
which were spoken in this little acre of rocks and
sand eighteen centuries gone, that the bells are ringing
to-day in the remote islands of the sea and far and
wide over continents that clasp the circumference
of the huge globe?
One can comprehend it only when night has hidden all
incongruities and created a theatre proper for so
grand a drama.
CHAPTER XLIX.
We took another swim in the Sea of Galilee at twilight
yesterday, and another at sunrise this morning.
We have not sailed, but three swims are equal to
a sail, are they not? There were plenty of fish
visible in the water, but we have no outside aids
in this pilgrimage but “Tent Life in the Holy
Land,” “The Land and the Book,” and
other literature of like description—no
fishing-tackle. There were no fish to be had
in the village of Tiberias. True, we saw two
or three vagabonds mending their nets, but never trying
to catch any thing with them.
Copyrights
The Innocents Abroad — Volume 05 from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.
