Nor is this all. The following sentence is as applicable as if it had been written with special reference to this special country: “A land without ruins is a land without memories; a land without memories is a land without history. But twine a few sad cypress leaves around the brow of any land, and, be that land bleak, barren, and beautiless, it becomes lovely in its consecrated coronet of sorrow.” Palestine is a land of ruins. It is strewn with ruins from one end to the other. How could it be otherwise? Has it not been the battle-ground of the nations. Did not Belshazzer come hither from Babylon and Cyrus from Persia? Did not Alexander come from Greece and Hannibal from Carthage? How often did the Ptolemies of Egypt, and the Caesars of Rome, march their devastating legions through this fair land? Think, too, of those brave knights of the eleventh and twelfth centuries, who fought as never men fought before, trying to wrench this Holy Land from the iron grasp of the Saracen and Moslem. That was the darkest and bloodiest period of this world’s history. This was the scene of action. The very dust is historic. Every tree has heard the tramp of armies, and felt the shock of battle. Every stone has a tale to tell. In every community there are stories many, and legends not a few. Yes, Palestine is a “land of ruins.” It has not a “few,” but many “sad cypress leaves twined around its brow.” And, truly, it has become “lovely in its consecrated coronet of sorrow.” And more. All history is interesting, yet “crosses and crucifixions take the deepest hold on the hearts of men.” The word Palestine is inseparably associated with that “name which is above every name.” Here Christ was born; here he lived; among the ancestors of these people he “went about doing good.” In these waters He was baptized; these hills were the pulpits from which he preached His own everlasting gospel; while the stones of the valley, the birds of the air, and the lilies of the field, furnished Him with apt illustrations to explain and enforce divine truth. So in this Holy Land there are “memories which make it holier, and a cross which is even in itself an immortality!” Hence I ask, “can any one who likes novelty, and loves nature, who appreciates history, and worships the Lord Jesus Christ, who has a head on him, and a heart in him, fail to enjoy tent life in the East,” or “five hundred miles in the saddle through Palestine and Syria?” If any, speak; for him have I offended. Not one; then none have I offended. So let us be up and going, taking a different route, and moving more rapidly this time than before.