CHAPTER XXXIV.
JAFFA, OR JOPFA.
April 10th (1857 CE).
...Let us now enter and ascend this campanile by its winding stairs of one hundred and twenty-six steps.
The entire height cannot be much less than one hundred feet.
Twenty-three years ago [1834 CE], after this tower had
been rudely shaken by an earthquake, which cracked nearly all the houses in Ramleh, and threw down many,
I ascended to see if it had been injured ; but it stood precisely as before, not a rent or crack from bottom
to top, and thus it has stood a hundred earthquakes uninjured. It is twenty-five feet square at the base, and
diminishes by graceful offsets, dividing it into different storeys, with various-- shaped windows and
architectural embellishments. The summit has been accommodated with a round tower and balcony, to fit it for
the muezzin of the mosque ; but this is obviously an anomalous addition to the original structure, and most
of it has been shaken down by those earthquakes which have had no effect on the body of the tower.
At the time I speak of, the whole of this country was in revolt against Ibrahim Pasha and Mohammed Aly of Egypt.
I was shut up in Ramleh for many anxious days, and often came to this lofty look-out to watch the movements of
the opposing forces with a heavy heart, for my family was in Jerusalem — the only Franks there, with one exception —
and the city was in the hands of the rebels. After returning from one of these sad and solitary watchings,
I wrote in my journal as follows :
The view from the top of the tower is inexpressibly grand. The whole plain of Sharon, from the mountains of Judea
and Samaria to the sea, and from the foot of Carmel to the sandy deserts of Philistia, lies spread out like an illuminated
map. Beautiful as vast, and diversified as beautiful, the eye is fascinated, the imagination enchanted, especially when the
last rays of the setting sun light up the white villages which sit or hang upon the many-shaped declivities of the
mountains. Then the lengthening shadows retreat over the plain and ascend the hill sides, while all below fades out
of view under the misty and mellow haze of summer's twilight The weary reapers return from their toil, the flocks
come frisking to their folds, and the solemn hush of Nature shutting up her manifold works and retiring to rest,
all conspire to soothe the troubled heart into sympathetic repose. At such an hour I saw it once and again, and
often lingered until the stars looked out from the deep sky, and the breezes of evening shed soft dews on the
feverish land. What a paradise was here when Solomon reigned in Jerusalem, and sang of the ' rose of Sharon !'
Better still will it be when He that is greater than Solomon shall sit on the throne of David his father ;
for ' in his days shall the righteous flourish, and abundance of peace so long as the moon endureth.
The mountains shall bring peace to the people, and the little hills, by righteousness.1
