The hot springs on the shores of the lake a half mile from the city, which were famous in the days of the Romans, are still used. They are in many respects similar to those of Carlsbad, the waters containing sulphur, chloride of magnesia, and iron. They are good for skin diseases, and if they were under American management might be made to pay well. One of the most interesting and valuable institutions in this city is the hospital belonging to the Scottish missionaries. It has thousands of patients a year and is doing great good. I came here from Nazareth riding over the mountains of Galilee. The road is fairly good, although it is up and down hill all the way. About six miles from Nazareth I stopped at the village of Cana where our Lord was a guest at the wedding feast and turned the water into wine. I even saw the stone jars or tubs which the people who own one of the churches there say were the jars used for that miracle. They are kept inside the church, and it took several fees to get to them. They are great limestone receptacles, looking much like mortars, and it is likely that wheat was ground in them by means of a pestle. I also visited the spring at Cana. As there is only one, it must have been from there that the water which was turned into wine was obtained. Four camels, six sheep, and two cows were drinking at it as I stopped, and a half-dozen girls with water-bags were waiting for their family supply. It is probable that Cana was much larger and more prosperous in the days of our Saviour than now. CHAPTER XXIV THE ZIONIST MOVEMENT There are fifteen million Jews in the world to-day, scattered over the face of the earth. Their ancestors once lived and ruled in Palestine, a country now no bigger than our own state of Vermont. For centuries, while peoples of alien faiths possessed their ancient land, each Jew kept warm in his bosom a belief that the Promised Land would one day be restored to him and the Holy City rebuilt to the glory of Jehovah. During the last century Jews the world over began to discuss practical means for making the age-long dream of their people come true. This discussion grew into an organized movement which has rolled up in size like a snowball. Zionism, as it is called, is giving the statesmen of Christendom, as well as the Jew and the Mohammedan, a mighty problem to wrestle with. It involves the biggest colonization scheme since the settlement of America, as well as religious and political controversies likely to keep the world stirred up for a good many years to come. [Illustration: The Koran describes Paradise as a place of green trees with a river flowing between—hence the Arabs’ devotion to Damascus, which they call the “Pearl of the East”] [Illustration: It was down this wall, they say in Damascus, that the Apostle Paul was lowered in a basket at night when he escaped from his Jewish enemies in that city]