THE SPELL OF THE EAST. 



or the shelter of some village hut if there is not, 

 where you will probably have to put up with the 

 supreme discomfort of having nothing but " the un- 

 divided twentieth of a shed to sleep under " ! 



One of the chief causes wherein lies the extra- 

 ordinary fascination of the Near East is perhaps its 

 associations with the peoples and the deeds so familiar 

 to us from our earliest days, and the changelessness of 

 the East which enables one to realise so forcibly the 

 conditions of life as depicted in the graphic pages of 

 the Old Testament. As you journey across the country 

 in the region of the two great rivers, Tigris and 

 Euphrates, whole chapters of Genesis assume a new 

 meaning for you, and you realise how it was that 

 " as they journeyed in the East they came to a 

 plain in the land of Shinar, and dwelt there." ^ You 

 too have journeyed in the East and found a plain — 

 the same plain — in the land of Shinar, for the land 

 of Shinar is the Shumir of the inscriptions and the 

 Chaldsea of to-day. 



As you journey over this plain you see spread out on 

 every side the great stage on which was enacted the 

 story told in the historical books of the Bible. Whether 

 you pass by the river of Gozan, where Israel remained 

 in captivity, or walk in the city of Sennacherib, or 

 stand among the ruined halls and temples of Nebuchad- 

 nezzar, or sit by the waters of Babylon, some portion of 

 the great story is brought vividly before your eyes. 

 You recognise, too, the local colouring which so sym- 

 pathetically tinges the language of the Old Testament 

 writers. It is only after you have toiled from dawn to 

 sunset over the sand-strewn waste of an eastern desert 

 that you appreciate the poetic beauty of such verses as 

 " rivers of water in a dry place, the shadow of a great 



1 Gen. xi. 2. 



