of Solomon.” It was, however, earlier than this that Miss Burdett-Coutts had entertained the philanthropic purpose of supplying the inhabitants of Jerusalem with water, and the preliminary survey was made with the view of ascertaining how the water could best be brought there.
Dr. Chaplin states that the fountain at Solomon’s Pools was known as early as 1687 and been visited by travellers ever since. It was described by Henry Maundrell. The site of the “ancient gardens of Solomon” is not definitely known, and probably never will be known; but allowing that it was in the valley below the pools, it is not correct to say that the gardens were watered from the pools. The gardens there are watered by the fountain of Urtas and by the rains which flow down the sides of the hills, which latter occasionally cause destructive floods. So abundant is the spring that in ancient times an aqueduct led from it to the Frank Mountain.
If the aqueduct now being made is to pass down the valley below the pools, be carried on to Bethlehem, and then past Tantour . . . past Mar Elias . . . and across the historic Plain of Rephaim, great skill and care will be required in its construction, owing to the rise and fall of the surface of the ground. The ancient high-level aqueduct, which did not first go down the valley or on to Bethlehem, appears to have been on the siphon principle, and was of excellent workman-
ship, as shown by portions of it still existing, and especially by the stone pipes bearing inscriptions which have been saved from destruction by the Augustinians securing them for their museum.
The lower aqueduct, which at least once within the last twenty-five years or so has been repaired by the Turkish authorities and brought water to Jerusalem for a time, runs on a level round the eastern slopes of the hills, and nowhere mounts to the Plain of Rephaim. It would be much easier to follow this course now, although it is longer, and information which has reached us from another source is to the effect that it is to be done.
The statement that on the wall of the rock- hewn tunnel, between the Virgin’s Fount and the Pool of Siloam, the workmen recorded in rude Hebrew that the tunnel was built by Hezekiah is quite incorrect, Dr. Chaplin asserts. The inscription makes no mention of Hezekiah. Professor Sayce says that “the name neither of the king who caused the tunnel to be made nor of the engineer who executed the work, is men tioned.”
Unquestionably all efforts to revitalize Jerusalem by means of fresh water supply should be encouraged. The drought of last year was terribly hard on the inhabitants, forcing them to expend the money ordinarily devoted to other necessaries for the purchase of water.
The Zionism of the Occidental Jew
IT is clear that Zionism cannot have the same significance for the Jew of the West as for the Jew of the East. To this fact I have never been blind, and since my first appearance in public, I have always laid stress upon it. But not all of us have kept it constantly before our eyes. Consequently, certain mistakes are made in the propaganda, which necessarily cause discord, mutinies, disappointment and discouragement.
To our brethren in the East Zionism meansabsolutely everything. It means their life, bothas individuals and as a nation, materially andmorally. It means their reinstatement in humandignity, their redemption from slavery. theirdaily bread and their honor. It is the key toculture, and the bridge leading to the great high-
way of progress. Forthe Jew in Russia, Roumania, Galicia, and, perhaps, even in Persia,"the question is simple: ‘Would you perish? Would you decay in filth and squalor? Would you become dull and brutish, be treated worse than cattle, bethe object of greater scorn than the convict? Well and good: then remain what you are. Sink deeper in the filth and mire; do not stir or strive; do not exert yourselves. But if you would be freed from your misery, if you would obtain your rights as a man and acitizen, be placed in the same social, economic, and moral conditions in which other civilized peoples carry’ on their struggle for existence, then join Zionism, strengthen it with your numbers, raise it to a political and an economic power, a power which must be reckoned with. Itistrue, you will not