GAZA. 
Gaza stands on the summit of a hill, half-a-mile from the sea. The hill is about 
two miles in circumference at the base, and appears to have been once wholly enclosed 
with fortifications. This position, the solidity of the ancient defences of cities, and 
a numerous brave population within, might promise security; yet the advantage of 
its possession or pillage was always too tempting; and its history has been a succession 
of sufferings at the hands of every invader of Palestine. 1 
Approaching by Beit-Gebrin, the country exhibits a pleasing landscape of corn-field 
and pasture, interspersed with clumps of trees and olive-groves, some of which are 
of great antiquity. The aspect of Gaza is imposing at a distance. As usual in 
Oriental cities, the illusion vanishes on entrance. But its connexion with the caravans 
renders it a place of considerable traffic, and consequently of considerable opulence. 
Yet this wealth is confined to the principal traders, for the multitude live in that 
miserable state of discomfort, which, however it has become a second nature to the 
Asiatic, startles every sense, and gives pain to every feeling, of the European. 
“ There are no remains of its former grandeur standing,” observes the Artist; 
“but that it must once have been filled with fine architecture is evident, from the 
pieces of wrought and sculptured marble everywhere built into the walls of the houses. 
Its seven Mosques appear to have been erected chiefly of those ruins. In passing- 
through a wretched suburb, I remarked a number of beautifully sculptured capitals 
piled one above another to support the roof of a hovel! Marble and granite columns, 
in different degrees of preservation, are found in every quarter; and in the Cemetery, 
in which our tents were pitched, lay a magnificent Corinthian capital, in the purest 
taste.” 2 
The troops in the Engraving were two regiments of Egyptian Light Dragoons 
and Lancers, on their march from Gaza to Sidon, armed in the European manner, 
and the whole in very effective equipment and condition. 
A history of this City would be one of the most striking vicissitude; but our 
space limits it to a mere outline. Gaza was among the earliest cities of Canaan 
mentioned in the Old Testament. 3 It next became memorable as one of the “Five 
Cities” of the five Lords of the Philistines. It next was taken by the tribe of Judah; 
and then reverted to the Philistines, in one of those lapses of the Israelites into 
heathen vice, which inevitably delivered them over to be scourged by the tyranny 
of the heathen. To restore them, Samson was sent as the Divine champion, and 
Gaza was the scene of one of his astonishing exploits, and of that memorable catastrophe 
in the Temple of Dagon, “in which the dead whom he slew at his death, were more 
than they which he slew in his life,” 4 Gaza was finally subdued by David, and 
formed the border of Solomon’s kingdom. 
Its history next became mingled with those of the great military nations which ' 
arose in the west of Asia, To Egypt, Gaza was the key of Palestine and Syria. It 
1 G. Robinson’s Travels. 2 Roberts’s Journal. Kinnear, 209. 
“ Genesis, x. 19. 1 Judges, xvi. 
