lates to be about two miles, making allowance for the winding ascent; but he adds, that others have imagined the same path to be not less than four miles. Hasselquist conjectures that it is a league to the top, the whole of which may be accomplished without dismounting, a statement amply confirmed by the experience of Van Egmont and Heyman. These travellers relate that "this mountain, though somewhat rugged and difficult, we ascended on horseback, making several circuits round it, which took up about three quarters of an hour. It is one of the highest in the whole country, being thirty, stadia, or about four English miles. And it is the most beautiful we ever saw with regard to verdure, being every where decorated with small oak-trees, and the ground universally enamelled with a variety of plants and flowers. There are great numbers of red partridges, and some wild-boars; and we were so fortunate as to see the Arabs hunting them. We left, but not without reluctance, this delightful place, and found at the bottom of it a mean village, called Deboura, or Tabour, a name said to be derived from the celebrated Deborah mentioned in the book of Judges."

But this mountain derives the largest share of its celebrity from the opinion entertained among Christians since the days of Jerome, that it was the scene of a memorable event in the history of our Lord. On the eastern part of the hill are the remains of a strong castle; and within the precincts of it is the grotto, in which are three altars in memory of the three tabernacles that St Peter proposed to build, and where the Latin friars always perform mass on the anniversary of the Transfiguration. It is said

there was a magnificent church built here by Helena, which was a cathedral when this town was made a bishop's see. On the side of the hill they show a church in a grot, where they say Christ charged his disciples not to tell what things they had seen till he should be glorified.

It is very doubtful, however, whether this tradition be well founded, or whether it has not, as Mr Maundrell and other writers suspect, originated in the misinterpretation of a very common Greek phrase. Our Saviour is said to have taken with him Peter, James, and John, and brought them into a high mountain "apart;" from which it has been rather hastily inferred that the description must apply to Tabor, the only insulated and solitary hill in the neighbourhood. We may remark with the traveller just named, that the conclusion may possibly be true, but that the argument used to prove it seems incompetent; because the term "apart" most likely relates to the withdrawing and retirement of the persons here spoken of, and not to the situation of the mountain. In fact, it means nothing more than that our Lord and his three disciples betook themselves to a private place for the purpose of devotion.

The view from Mount Tabor is extolled by every traveller. "It is impossible," says Maundrell, "for man's eyes to behold a higher gratification of this nature." On the north-west you discern in the distance the noble expanse of the Mediterranean, while all around you see the spacious and beautiful Plains of Esdraëlon and Galilee. Turning a little southward, you have in view the high Mountains of Gilboa, so fatal to Saul and his sons. Due east you discover

the Sea of Tiberias, distant about one day's journey. A few points to the north appears the Mount of Beatitudes, the place where Christ delivered his sermon to his disciples and the multitude. Not far from this little hill is the city of Saphet, or Szaffad, standing upon elevated and very conspicuous ground. Still farther, in the same direction, is seen a lofty peak covered with snow, a part of the chain of Anti-Libanus. To the south-west is Carmel, and in the south the hills of Samaria.*

The plain around, the most fertile part of the Land of Canaan, being one vast meadow covered with the richest pasture, is the inheritance where the tribe of Issachar "rejoiced in their tents." Here it was that Barak, descending with his ten thousand men from Tabor, discomfited Sisera and all his chariots. In the same neighbourhood Josiah, king of Judah, fought in disguise against Necho, king of Egypt, and fell by the arrows of his antagonist, deeply la mented. The great mourning in Jerusalem, foretold by Zechariah, is said to be as the lamentations in the Plain of Esdraëlon, as the mourning of Ha

*The following extract, from the unpublished journal already so often referred to, will amuse the reader:-"We arrived at the foot of Mount Tabor. It is, in its general outline, a round regularshaped hill, but is rocky and rough enough when it is to be ascended. It has many trees, mostly Valonia oaks. It stands on the east of the great Plain of Esdraëlon, up a recess formed by Mount Hermon on the one side, and the hills towards Nazareth on the other. Its height from the plain I should guess at 1000 feet. We ascended the greater part of the way on mules. On the top of the hill is one of those large cisterns, or granaries, so often alluded to before. There was one also near Jennin, which we observed in coming in. I have since seen them in numerous other places, which puts an end to Dr Clarke's Pagan Remains. The whole of the Great Plain is fully cultivated, yet we could hardly see a single village, which adds to the peculiarity of its appearance,-one sheet of cultivation without a rock or tree."