1. _It is an ancient land._—Before Rome was cradled by Tiber—before the storied strifes of the Gods in Hellas, before Troy and the great glory of the Trojans were, even before history was this wonderful land. 2. _It is an historic land._—Much of the world’s destiny has been decided in this little strip of coast and mountain land, between the Jordan and the sea. Here armies have camped and battles have been fought. The restless feet of merchant traders have beaten its highways, the white wings of merchant vessels have flitted to and from its ports with the wealth of the world. 3. _It is a diminutive land._—A little triangle bounded by the sea, the Jordan and her mountains, and the desert, it seems hardly large enough for all the mighty events that have occurred within it; 180 miles from farthest north to south, and 90 miles for its greatest breadth from west to east, measures the country in all its extent. 4. _It is a storied land._—Where such a treasure house of tales as in that old Bible? The land and its book have figured in all the literatures of the _Occidental_ ages. Knights and paladins have trod its vales and mountains; saint and crusader have watched at night beneath its stars. 5. _It is a land of famous mountains._—Ebal and Gerizim, Hor and Nebo, Olivet and Tabor, Gilboa and Hermon. What scenes rise to the mind as we name them! Carmel and Quarantania; struggle and victory; Elijah, Immanuel. 6. _It is a land of remarkable waters._—A single river—the Jordan, from north to south—rising in the extreme north from springs so hidden as to have long been unknown, loses itself in that sea of desolation, Lake Asphaltites, the Dead Sea. The mid-world sea, the mother sea of great nations, washes the western shores, and Galilee shines like a diadem in her mountain setting. 7. _It is a land of many names._—The land of Canaan, the land of the children of Heth, Philistia, Palestine, the Promised Land, the Holy Land, the land of Judah, Immanuel’s Land. 8. _It is an impregnable land._—Its hills, rock-ribbed, rise one upon another, covering the whole face of the land, and forcing all travel of army or caravan through the few passes in which the great northern plain terminates. Hence Esdrelon became of necessity the country’s battle ground. A united people made the country a fear to its force. 9. _It was a populous land._—Beyond belief almost are the records of the people who lived within these few square miles. Cities and villages laid so close to each other that their environs almost met. The people thronged in them, and in the well tilled country about them, so that centuries of war, foreign and civil, and repeated depletions left them still in their decadence a troublesome foe to the veterans of Rome.