An ancient chapel within the barrack is pointed out as the spot where Jesus was crowned with thorns; possibly it was originally dedicated to the Passion of the Redeemer. Its plan is a square, the length of a side being about 16 feet; above it rises an octagonal dome, supported by a drum of the same shape. Four sides (alternate) of the octagon are replaced in the lower part by small pointed arches, in order to adapt this form of the drum to the square plan of the building. A pointed doorway in the south wall leads into a small square chapel, with a niche on each side. The arrangement of the arches, the form, and the ornamentation of the building, resemble Roman architecture; but the work shews it to be of the period of the Crusades. Quaresmius[471] is the first to mention this chapel; no notice of it occurring in any author anterior to his time. It is now used as a storehouse of barley for the artillery-horses. Turning to the east on leaving the barrack, we find in its north wall a doorway built up; half of which is Saracenic work in red and white stone. Through it our Lord is believed to have left the Prætorium; and the staircase which was transported to the Church of S. John Lateran at Rome is said to have been the very one by which he descended. When I examined this door at the end of 1854, its lowest part was two feet above the level of the street, having a semicircular step built into the pavement, which was pointed out as a fragment of the sacred staircase. I was surprised that the Christians had not taken care to remove it; especially as they had had an opportunity when the barrack was built by Ibrahim Pasha, who would have readily granted their request. In 1857 the military commandant constructed a raised footpath (one foot high) along by the barrack-wall, and the step was covered up without any one making the slightest attempt to preserve it. The tradition about this place is very untrustworthy; the configuration of the ground does not confirm it, and the Bible does not mention that our Lord ascended or descended any staircase. The present street runs entirely over accumulated rubbish, which at this point is 16 feet thick above the old level of the valley, so that the door must at that time have had a flight of at least 28 steps to form a communication with the bottom of the valley; and the lowest part of the door itself is 15 feet below the level of the inner court of the barrack, which would require 25 steps more; so that altogether there must have been some 53 steps in all. This would not be an unlikely approach to a barrack, but it is most improbable that the Antonia would have had such a weak point in its defences on the most important side as this stone staircase would have been. The valley which divided Moriah from Bezetha has been entirely overlooked by the believers in the 'Scala sancta.' Again, it is well known that the Prætorium was in the interior of the Antonia; how then could this door