The soil of the Jaffa plain is naturally of great fertility. Even the negligent tillage of the peasantry produces fine harvests. The Germans ploughed deeper, and were rewarded by a crop of thistles, which to a good farmer would have been a subject of satisfaction as proving the existence of virgin soil, only requiring to be scoured by other crops for a year or two in order to yield fine harvests of corn. At this time of year, the barley had been gathered in, and only the dry stubble was left. Our first ride was not a long one, as we only intended to reach Ramleh that night, and we arrived before sundown in sight of the town, which is first visible from a rise of ground on the road. The long olive-groves here formed a dark oasis in the treeless plain, and above them rose the beautiful tower of the “Forty,” belonging to the fine old ruined building called the “White Mosque,” built in the fourteenth century by the son of Kalawûn. The Forty were, according to the Moslems, companions of the Prophet; according to the later Christian tradition, forty martyrs of Cappadocia. A second mosque, now in use, exists in the middle of the town. This I was afterwards able to visit, and found it to be probably the most perfect specimen of a fine twelfth century church in Palestine, unchanged except that the beautiful western doorway is closed, a prayer recess scooped in the southern wall, and the delicate tracery of the columns defaced by whitewash and plaster--a vandalism not peculiar to Moslem restorers. This fine church, which we were the first to examine and plan, is probably that visited by the old English pilgrim Sir John Maundeville, dedicated according to him to the Virgin, “where Our Lord appeared to Our Lady in the likeness which betokeneth the Trinity.” Ramleh, like many another town in this ruined land, is full of contrasts of past prosperity and of present squalor and decay. The walls of fine stone houses are enclosed in wretched hovels of mud. Here and there an ornate Cufic or Arabic inscription is left, telling of Moslem conquerors and munificent Caliphs; but the bazaars are deserted, and starved dogs and helpless lepers meet the eye on every side.