In the map[16] just spoken of, I have sketched also the line of the present city walls, as I found it could be done without producing confusion, and I thought the reader would like to be able to see how much of the ground of the ancient city is occupied by the modern Jerusalem. The traveller to the present city, at least the Protestant traveller, is excessively annoyed at every step with traditions in which he cannot believe, and with having localities pointed out in which he can place no confidence whatever; and the effect is bad in a great many ways. It not only disturbs sadly the feelings with which he would wish to walk over the grounds of Jerusalem, but, sickened and disgusted, he is apt to run into the opposite extreme of incredulity, and reject even where there is proper grounds for belief. I have now before me large extracts which I made from a book called El Devoto Peregrino, or “The Devout Pilgrim,” published at Madrid in 1654, by P. F. Antonio of Castile, Commissary General of Jerusalem for Spain, and Guardian of Bethlehem,[17] in the last of which places he had spent a number of years. It offers a good specimen of the accounts of places that are thrust on the visitor to Jerusalem, and as it is a book of high authority, I will by and by give some of the extracts at length. In this work he points out edifices, at present standing, and which it must be evident are comparatively modern structures, as the houses of Pilate, of Simon the Pharisee, where Mary Magdalene washed our Saviour’s feet with her tears, of St. Ann, of the Rich Man, &c. &c.; and this in the face of authentic history, which informs us that the city, when taken by Titus, was, with the exception of a few towers, levelled with the ground, and that a ploughshare was made to pass over it. There is scarcely an event of any description, mentioned in the New Testament as occurring in or about Jerusalem, of which they do not designate the exact locality; and to all this they have added traditions so absurd as to be beyond all belief, to say nothing of their childishness. All this is repeated to the visitor to Jerusalem, and produce a revulsion of feeling not only disagreeable but dangerous; and men whose faith is not previously settled, or who do not like the trouble of sifting the truth from error, I believe would be apt to be injured by such a visit. And it appears to me that most Protestant visitors, and our missionaries also, have been betrayed by these feelings into an excess of scepticism, which has led them to reject some things against sound and proper evidence. We must not reject all because some is false, any more than we would reject all species of coin because some is spurious; a wise man will be led by the fact that there is spurious money, to believe that there is good money some where; and therefore, these tales, instead of provoking utter scepticism, while they make us cautious, should at the same time lead us to suppose that there _is_ ground for belief.