“We have a country, the inheritance of our fathers, finer, more fruitful, better situated for commerce, than many of the most celebrated portions of the globe. Environed by the deep-delled Taurus, the lovely shores of the Euphrates, the lofty steppes of Arabia and of rocky _Sinai_, our country extends along the shores of the Mediterranean, crowned by the towering cedars of _The Lebanon_, the source of a hundred rivulets and brooks, which spread fruitfulness over shady dales.... A glorious land! situate at the farthest extremity of the sea which connects three-quarters of the globe, over which the Phœnicians ... sent their numerous fleets to the shores of Albion, near to both the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf; ... the central country of the commerce between the east and the west. Every country has its peculiarity; every people their own nature.... No people of the earth have lived so true to their calling from the first as we have done. “The Arab has maintained his language and his original country; on the Nile, in the deserts, as far as _Sinai_, and beyond _Jordan_, he feeds his flocks. In the elevated plains of Asia Minor the Turkoman has conquered for himself a second country, the birthplace of the Osman; but Palestine and Syria are populated. For centuries the battlefield between the sons of Altai and of the Arabian wilderness, the inhabitants of the West and the half-nomadic Persians, none have been able to establish themselves and maintain their nationality: no nation can claim the name of Syrian. A chaotic mixture of all tribes and tongues, remnants of migrations from north and south, they disturb one another in the possession of the glorious land where our fathers for so many centuries emptied the cup of joy and woe, and where every clod is drenched with the blood of our heroes when their bodies were buried under the ruins of _Jerusalem_....”¹ ¹ _The Times_, Thursday, December 24, 1840, _p._ 4. Illustration: _Painted by G. Richmond. R.A.D.C.L._ _Engraved by T. L. Atkinson_ _Sir_ MOSES MONTEFIORE, _Bart._, _F.R.S._ _From a mezzotint engraving (proof before all letters) lent by Israel Solomons_ CHAPTER XXII. SIR MOSES MONTEFIORE The project “for Cultivation of the Land in Palestine” ――Abraham Shoshana and Samuel Aboo――Sir Moses and Lord Palmerston――Great Britain’s protection of the Jews in the East ――Lord Aberdeen――Sir Stratford Canning――Dr. Edward Robinson ――Burghas _Bey_――A new journey to the East.