ix CASTLE OF SUBEIBEH 227 



Hermon, 10,000 feet. Here, indeed, are all the 

 elements which must have possessed a charm very dear to 

 the heart and mind of Him who made them all. They 

 are all present still, but where are the towns and 

 villages through which He moved, doing good to all ? 

 Where is the busy hum of men men occupied with the 

 daily toil of life which attracted Him here above all 

 spots for the three years of His great work amongst 

 mankind ? Where are they ? Gone, absolutely gone, 

 and their place knows them no more ! The ruins, 

 buried deep midst beds of the rankest weeds through 

 which a man can scarcely struggle, may be rightly 

 identified, and probably they are some of them ; but if 

 it be so, they lie hidden and almost forgotten. Round 

 the shores of Galilee a dead silence reigns, broken only 

 by the cry of a goatherd from time to time. No sail 

 crosses the blue waters of the Sea of Galilee now ; 

 desertion, utter abandonment, is the spirit of the place. 

 Chose a capital camp, and after resting till 3.30, 

 went to the great source which comes like the other 

 sources I have alluded to ; born a river at its start, 

 roaring from the precipice's foot at the back of the 

 town. It really has a mysterious, uncanny look to see 

 the river most renowned in all the earth, given birth to 

 in no tiny rivulet, but in vast powerful streams by the 

 Holy Mountain, the noble Hermon, sacred from the 

 days of man's oldest history to the dwellers in Canaan. 

 Afterwards walked up to the extraordinary castle at 

 the top of the hill. This is the old castle of Subeibeh, 

 built partly by Herodian princes, Saracens, and 

 Crusaders. The ruins, which are magnificent, are 

 quite as extensive as Windsor Castle ; it is on the very 

 crest of a most inaccessible hill, 1500 feet above 

 Bania. The bastions and walls still left are massive to 

 a degree. Both Trench and I were delighted to find a 



Q 



