rude tactics of a native force. The entrance-doors are low, narrow, and formed of iron 
or very thick wood. The Monks even pay and keep a regular guard of Arabs at the 
principal entrance; and in one of the towers a sentinel is constantly posted, to announce 
the approach, whether of travellers, or of Bedouins. 
But the Monks receive strangers with courtesy; and they not merely permitted the 
Artist to sketch their Chapel, but as their service was beginning before he had finished 
his design, they would not suffer him to lay aside his pencil. 
There are generally about thirty Monks resident, of the Greek Church, who employ 
themselves a good deal in cultivating the gardens which they have formed in little 
terraces on the slope of the mountain, by conveying earth from below. The Monastery 
boasts of great antiquity, and is said to have been founded twelve hundred years ago . 1 Its 
surrounding hermitages perforate the rocks in all directions, and might have contained a 
large population in the days of its renown. 
1 Boberts’s Journal. 
THE CHAPEL OF ST. SABA. 
The Chapel belongs to one of the chief Greek Monasteries of Palestine. It is ancient, 
and highly ornamented, though too much in the extravagant style of decoration frequent 
in the Greek churches. One of the pictures, which obviously excites the especial 
admiration of the pilgrims, is a representation of the Day of Judgment. The Deity is 
enthroned among angels and the spirits of good men. Beneath is a gigantic figure, 
weighing the souls as they ascend. On one side, an equally gigantic minister of punish¬ 
ment stands in the midst of flames. On the other, Elias is warring with Antichrist; 
and, in the background, the graves are giving up their dead . 1 Yet if a subject of this 
order goes beyond the limits of painting, it must be remembered that it has exercised 
the pencil of Michael Angelo. 
Still, the Chapel in its general effect is beautiful; and the Russian government has 
signalized its care of the Greek churches in the East by adding to it some very striking 
ornaments. A short period before the date of this sketch, a number of pictures had 
been sent by tbe Imperial command, principally of saints, with the flesh painted, but 
the draperies and backgrounds in chased silver. The Convent, too, had undergone a 
thorough repair, as was presumed, from the same Imperial patronage . 2 
Stephens’s Incidents of Travel. 
2 Eoberts’s Journal. 
