Just as among the cities there are those mostly or altogether Moslem and others mostly or altogether Christian, so with the villages. While the Moslem population greatly outnumbers the Christian, yet there is a very considerable Christian population. Râm Allâh, Bayt Jâlâ, eṭ-Ṭayyibeh and Jifnâ are Christian villages. In Bîr ez-Zayt, ‛Ayn ‛Arîk and ‛Âbûd the Christians exceed the Moslems. In el-Bîreh and Ludd the Christians are comparatively few. A Christian village is known from afar by its more prosperous look, and the Christian quarters of a mixed village are also distinguishable by the same favorable marks. [Illustration: PEASANTS ON WAY TO MARKET WITH PRODUCE] [Illustration: BEDAWÎN HORSEMAN] Christian villages have powerful ecclesiastical establishments behind them which work energetically to secure rights for their constituents. Church life in the country is political life, and church dignitaries are adepts in politics. The wealth and cleverness of the church are employed to hold fast all traditions and all concessions which favor the Communion and to hinder excessive injustice from overtaking the members. There results a firm bond of union between the native membership and the ecclesiastical establishment. The Communion is a religious nation, as it were. The Christian native is not subject to army service, as only Moslems are thus eligible. This disability works to the industrial advantage of the Christians, who pay an extra tax or tribute in lieu of service. Centuries of this condition of things have developed the industrial abilities of the Christian population in spite of discriminations against them in the courts and in administration. A kind of religious status is now recognized in the relations between the Moslem and the Christian peasants. The Moslem stands hard by his faith and the Christian of the Greek Orthodox Church will scorn the thought that Christ and the Bible may be for Moslems. Religious sects in the East remind one of volcanic islands; they are either ablaze with the fierce fires of an eruption or else they are overlaid with the ashes of an extinct fire. Between crazy fanaticism and cold inanition there are no warm impulses of unselfish evangelism.