I obtained another clue to the positions of some of the cisterns within the enclosure, during the summer months of 1857. I had frequently visited the ground between the city-wall and the south-west part of the _Haram_, in order to search for old coins, and was struck with the luxuriance of the vegetation there, even in the driest weather. On asking the farmer for an explanation of this, I obtained no other answer than that it was due to God's grace. I did not of course doubt that this was a sufficient cause; but at the same time I was desirous of finding a more natural reason; the more so because, on certain evenings, I observed that he drew a large quantity of water for his plants from a cistern near the south-west corner of the _Haram_. I therefore asked him repeatedly, and in all kinds of indirect ways, (as is necessary in dealing with Arabs,) if his cistern contained much water; but he always evaded my question, and I was never able to overcome his reticence or outwit his craft. Even the offer of money produced no effect, and subsequently he refused to allow me to examine its interior; still, although baffled, I felt certain that this cistern was supplied from another inside the _Haram_, which was the true 'God's grace.' I found afterwards, as will be seen, that I was quite right in my supposition. I had also frequently remarked, during the rainy season, that the water running down the street in the central valley flowed into a large opening on the east side, level with the ground, to the south of the fountain near the bazaar leading to the _Haram_. From this I inferred that it found its way into the sewer which passes along the valley at a lower level. Some old men, who had for many years been employed in the repairs of the conduits, told me that I was right, and informed me at the same time that from this opening it was possible to go along underground and come out inside the _Haram_, by a conduit which entered a cistern on the lowest plateau, situated on the west side near the south end of the platform of the mosque _es-Sakharah_, and filled by the water that had drained from the street. Such was the information that I had obtained concerning the underground works of the Temple, up to the end of 1857. It had not enabled me to arrive at any positive conclusion, and I was puzzled about the conduit for blood, because the Rabbinical writers made it begin beneath the sacred rock on the south-west, in which direction I had not been able to discover any traces of it.