He had some feeling too for a distant view.  He wrote of Samaria:  ’The site was very beautiful; the view stretched right to the Sea of Joppa and to Antipatris and Caesarea of Palestine, and over the whole mountain of Ephraim down to Ramathaym and Sophim and to Carmel near Accon by the sea.  And it is rich in fountains and gardens and olive groves, and all the good things this world desires.’  But it would be going too far to conclude from the following words that he appreciated the contrast between simple and sublime scenery:  ’It must be noticed too, that the river, from the source of Jordan at the foot of Lebanon as far as the Desert of Pharan, has broad and pleasant plains on both sides, and beyond these the fields are surrounded by very high mountains as far as the Red Sea.’

In dealing with Gethsemane and the Mount of Olives, religious enthusiasm suppresses any reference to scenery.

These descriptions shew that the wealth and fertility of the country were praised before its beauty, and that this was only referred to in short, meagre phrases, which tell less about it than any raptures without special knowledge.

It was much the same with Phokas, who visited the Holy Land in 1135.[2]

He was greatly impressed by the position of Antioch, ’with its meadows and fruitful gardens, and the murmur of waters as the river, fed by the torrents of the Castalian spring, flows quietly round the town and besprinkles its towers with its gentle waves ... but most to be admired of all is the mountain between town and sea, a noble and remarkable sight—­indeed, a delight to the beholder’s eye ... the Orontes flows with countless windings at the foot of it, and discharges itself into the sea.’

He thought Lebanon very beautiful and worthy its praise in Holy Scripture:  ’The sun lies like white hair upon its head; its valleys are crowned with pines, cedars, and cypresses; streams, beautiful to look at and quite cold, flow from the ravines and valleys down to the sea, and the freshly melted snow gives the flowing water its crystal clearness.’

Tyre, too, was praised for its beauty:  ’Strangers were particularly delighted with one spring, which ran through meadows; and if one stands on the tower, one can see the dense growth of plants, the movement of the leaves in the glow of noon.’

The plain of Nazareth, too, was ’a heaven on earth, the delight of the soul.’

But recollections of the sacred story were dearer to Phokas than the scenery, and elsewhere he limited himself to noting the rich fruit gardens, shady groups of trees, and streams and rivers with pleasant banks.

Epiphanius Monachus Hagiopolitae, in his Enarratio Syriae, was a very dry pioneer; so, too, the Anonymus de locis Hierosolymitanis; Perdiccas, in his Hierosolyma, describes Sion thus:  ’It stands on an eminence so as to strike the eye, and is beautiful to behold, owing to a number of vines and flower gardens and pleasant spots.’