~- 
342, Deseripiton of Minerals from Palestine. 
superb mosque. The views of the edifice, (into which to 
Christian is allowed to enter,) struck this congear? so forci- 
bly, that he, unhesiiatingly, pronounced it e “the most 
magnificent piece of architecture in the Turkish empire, and: 
far superior io the mosque of St Sophig in Constantinople.” 
Mount Zion is siivate on the south side of the city. “On 
quitting the city by ‘Zion Gate.’and descending,” says Dr. 
Clarke, “‘inio a narrow dale, sloping towards the valley of 
Jehoshaphat, we observed, upon the sides of the opposite 
mouniain facing Mount Zion, a number of excavations in 
the rock. e rode towards them, their situation being very 
little elevaied above the bottom of tbe dale. upon its southern 2 
side. When we arrived, we instantly re -cognised the sort 9 
rc et which had so much interested us in Asia viinior. & 
They were all of the same kind of workmanship, exhibiting — 
a series of subterranean chambers, hewn with marvellous art, 
each cont-ining one, or many, repositories for the dead, like 
cisterns, carved in the rock, upon ihe sides of those cham- 
bers. The doors were so Lats that to look into any one of 
them. it was pecessnry to hon ; and 3 in some mete to 
to the grooves, by way of closing the entrances. such a 
‘nature a indisputably, the “tombs of the sons of Heth, 
ef the kings of Israel, of ‘Lazarus, and of Christ.” (Clarke.) 
These a were discovered by this English traveller, 
who adduces several weighty arguments to prove, that among 
them was the sepulchre of Joseph of Arimathea, in which the 
body of the Saviour was interred. ‘This supposition, he be- 
lieves, accords far better with the scriptural account of 
Christ’s interment, than that of the place, where the super- 
stitious Helena caused to be erected the “church of the 
Holy Sepulchre.” The cemeteries of the ancients were 
_ universally excluded from the precincts of their citres. These 
tombs are without the walls of both the ancient and modern 
city. The place where the church of the Holy Sepulchre 
stands. is within the walls of the present, and was within the 
walls of the old city. It is extremely probable, that the re- 
port of the'tomb of Christ being where the church now is, 
was one of the “‘ pious mts ” of the Catholics, invented for 
some re ason unknown to 
17. “North of Jerusa lem,” A light gray hornstone ; 
(atu splintery, translucemt at the edges, yields fire’ copt- 
