The year 1824 was one of much activity. In February, Messrs. Fisk and Bird were the only missionaries at Jerusalem, Mr. King having gone to Jaffa. While successfully employed in selling the Scriptures to Armenian pilgrims in the city, they were apprehended, at the instigation of the Latins, and brought before Moslem judges on the strange charge of distributing books that were neither Mohammedan, Jewish, nor Christian. Holding up a copy of Genesis, the judge declared it to be among the unchristian books denounced by the Latins. Meanwhile their rooms were searched, and a crier was sent out into the city, forbidding all persons to receive their books, and ordering all that had been received to be delivered up. Their papers were examined, and some of them retained by the government. In a few days, however, through the prompt interference of the English Consul at Jaffa, their papers were all restored, and they were set at liberty. These proceedings becoming widely known, the result was, on the whole, favorable. Mr. Abbott, English Consul at Beirut, learning of the occurrence, wrote to the Pasha at Damascus, and the governor and judge at Jerusalem received an official order to restore to the missionaries whatever had been taken from them, and to secure for them protection and respectful treatment. The governor was shortly after superseded, for what cause was not certainly known; but many people, both Mussulmans and Christians, believed it was in consequence of his ill treatment of Messrs. Fisk and Bird. Mr. Damiani, son of the English Consul at Jaffa, had come to Jerusalem on their behalf, with a letter from his father to the governor. In company with this young gentleman, the missionaries visited Hebron in February, going by way of Bethlehem. About three miles south of Bethlehem, they came to what are called the Cisterns of Solomon, three in number, of large dimensions, on the side of a hill. Mr. Fisk was informed, that Jerusalem was supplied in part by an aqueduct, which carried its waters from those fountains.1 1 Dr. Robinson says that the modern aqueduct was mostly laid with tubes of pottery; but, northeast of Rachel's tomb, he saw "the traces of an ancient aqueduct which was carried _up the slope of the hill_ by means of tubes, or perforated blocks of stone, fitted together with sockets and tenons, and originally cemented." This was in 1842. Dr. Eli Smith drew my attention in 1845 to the same thing. Such stones are said to be seen nowhere else in that region.