FREEMASONRY
IN THE
HOLY LAND
Or,
Handmarks
of
Hiram's Builders
By Rob Morris
FOREWORD (2005)
By Ralph Omholt, PM
Most know Morris’ name as the founder of the Order of the Eastern Star, however, Morris contributed radically more to the “Blue Lodge;” as Grand Master of Kentucky and as a Masonic lecturer – add an impressive list of books.
“Freemasonry in the Holy Land” is a Masonic Saga which deserves preservation and renewal as a great piece of Masonic literature. Among other matters, Rob Morris makes valuable observations on history which deserve to be made available for ‘cut-‘n-paste’ research access.
Until recently, many of Freemasonry's finest books were approaching the ‘extinct” list. One of those was “Freemasonry in the Holy Land;” not just a book, but a true Masonic saga! Time had, unfortunately, rendered it amongst the ‘rare’ titles.
Given the ‘mysterious’ declining state of Freemasonry (as of 2005), Morris also serves as an important icon of the Craft; as in his time, great men did great things and received appropriate credit – in their own lifetime. Thus, Morris reminds the craft to pay ALL due wages.
Morris’ 1868 adventure and consequent book are not just an interesting collection of travel, history, geography, culture, archaeology and adventure; but also a sample of the thought processes and attitudes of the mid-1800s. Among other details, Morris’ book was supplemented by artists - not photography - given the budding science of photography – then a new technology and art.
Now, the wonders of computer technology have restored a great book to modern times. Again, this work was also produced as a page-by-page ‘photograph’ of the original book.
Thus, the reader may read from a computer screen, print the content, or manipulate the files, with a ‘text-to-speech’ conversion program.
By way of comment, Morris'“Poetry of Freemasonry” (400 pages) has been comparably restored, as was the 1878 biography of Morris, “The Well Spent Life.”
TO
HIS EXCELLENCY MOHAMMED RASCHID,
PASHA - GENERAL OF SYRIA
HONORED SIR AND BROTHER:
IN my first interview with the zealous band of Freemasons, lovingly at labor in their foyer maconnique at Smyrna, it was reported to me that the Governor‑General of Syria and Palestine, the brave, wise, and learned Mohammed Raschid, is one who delights to wear the Masonic apron, having shared joyfully in the mystic confidences of their fraternal group. And the brethren at Smyrna rejoiced to speak of the intelligence, urbanity, and Masonic skill of their renowned brother at Damascus, and favored me with letters of credence and introduction.
Early upon my arrival in Damascus, therefore, I hastened to pay my respects to your Excellency, and to present you the greetings of a half‑million American Masons, who are working (in more than six thousand lodges) the same principles of Divine truth, justice, and fraternity in which you, yourself, were inducted in your Masonic initiation at Smyrna. At the same time I laid before your Excellency the peculiar mission upon which I had embarked, and solicited your valued approval and patronage.
I have now to acknowledge the very hearty manner in which your Excellency responded to my request; you afforded me the wisest counsel, and extended to me such aid as none can give so effectually as yourself.
Finally, when the plan of the present volume was matured, and I solicited, by letter, the honor of dedicating it to him to whom I am so much indebted, your Excellency granted me the favor, with an urbanity which is in keeping with all I had previously known and enjoyed of your character.
4 DEDICATION.
Since my return home, I have spoken in more than six hundred lodges, and reported to them the results of my Oriental study and labor. Everywhere I have made grateful mention of our distinguished Brother, the Vali of Syria; of his bravery in war, his wisdom in council, the respect and love of his people, and particularly his kindness to the American brother who had journeyed so far in pursuit of Masonic light. Should you, at any period, honor our country with a visit, your Excellency will find that this story of your kindness to the strange brother has come here before you; that the lineaments of your countenance are well known to us, and that a welcome awaits you, such as but few visitors have ever received from the Masonic fraternity. Would that your Excellency might so favor us! Would that the mother‑land of Freemasonry might send such a representative to this great asylum of freedom, where the principles of the ancient Order have unrestricted sway, and every man feels that in his birth Ye is the equal of every other! May it please your Excellency: Our earthly lot differs most widely. Your name is spread afar as one to whom God has intrusted the government of a people. Our forms of faith are diverse. In language, customs, and modes of thought, we are cast in different moulds; but in Masonic UNITY we are one, and one in Masonic FAITH. As our hopes, and aims, and labors are one, we, trusting in one God, and doing, each of us, what we believe to be His expressed will, do humbly expect a common reward when we have passed that common lot which none can escape. To the Divine power, therefore, I tenderly commend your Excellency, both for this world and for that which is to come.
TO H. E. MOHAMMED RASCHID
This book, Freemasonry in the Holy Land, is, by permission, most respectfully and most fraternally
DEDICATED
PREFACE
I OFFER this book to the Masonic public, in redemption of my pledges to the generous friends who furnished me the means both for my expedition of 1868, and for publishing the book itself. That I have been more than three years getting it up, speaks, I think, for the thorough manner of its preparation.
Agreeably to original promise, "the book is adapted to the plainest reader; one that the owner will take home and read in his domestic circle, and afterwards lend to his neighbors to read; equally a reference‑book to the student, and a hand‑book to the traveller; large enough to embrace so great a subject, yet no effort has been spared to compress the information. The Common Gavel has been used remorselessly in striking off excrescences. Written in the spirit of the Holy Writings, French and German infidelity has not made sufficient inroads into American Masonry, that less than nineteen‑twentieths will welcome additional light upon the Divine authenticity of the Bible, and such light I have attempted freely to diffuse through this volume.
Let every subscriber, after reading the book, bear me testimony that I have kept the faith with him.
I have avoided the mysterious and romantic style so common amongst writers upon Palestine, and have cultivated the colloquial. One would think, to read standard accounts of the trees and birds in the Holy Land, that they are different from birds and trees in
6 PREFACE.
other countries. Not so. Making allowance for difference in climate, nature is the same everywhere, and so I have used every-day words in describing them. I have embodied as much practical information as possible; comparing things Oriental with things Occidental; things in the experience of patriarchs and prophets with things in the experience of an American observer. And yet I have endeavored to preserve the gravity and dignity due to a theme around which cluster all our hopes in life, in death, and in the world to come.
In the abundance of my preparations, and the acreage of my readings-up for this book, I have not unfrequently mingled others' thoughts with my own, and have entered them here often without special credit. In defence of this I can only say that such is the general usage of writers. If the reader, then, finds passages the property of other persons, he is at liberty to say so; I will not deny it; but, with the historian Rollin, I confess "that I do not scruple, nor am ashamed, to borrow that I may adorn and enrich my own history." My own credit, if any, shall consist in the skill with which I bind the beads of the chain together. In the thousands of notes and memorandums I have taken, it would be strange, indeed, if I could preserve the ear-marks of each.
In this book I have desired to popularize the study of the Scriptures, by removing some of the difficulties which the unlearned have found in reading them; by smoothing the way to obscure passages, so as to enable all to peruse the Sacred Book understandingly, and better to enjoy sermons and commentaries. Had the hundreds of thou-sands who make up the membership of our lodges this practical knowledge, how easy the teacher's task, in the coming generation, to diffuse the store of useful knowledge there is for mankind in this world!
If any object to the allusions and comparisons to American matters, so freely introduced through these pages, let me confess, old and
PREFACE. 7
cosmopolitan as I am, that patrics fumes igne alieno luculentior - the very smoke of my own native land seems brighter to me than the fire of any other. I trust, however, I have not exhibited this sentiment anywhere offensively.
As the narrative of Arculf's Pilgrimage to Palestine, in the eighth century, led to that passion for pilgrimage which has not yet died out, but has made the nineteenth the most illustrious century of all, so I earnestly hope the publication of this book, the first of its class, will inspire many a zealous tourist to visit those countries on Masonic errands, and many a penman in his closet to enlarge the literature of which I now make the commencement. To show that the web and woof of Masonic tradition are true, is, by an easy transition, to prove the figures of the pattern real and genuine.
In writing Arabic words I have endeavored, in general, to give such English letters as will express them to the ear rather than the eye For instance: instead of harem I write hareem, &c. Yet this rule is but imperfectly carried out, after all; for were I to adopt it rigidly Sultan would be Sooltarn; Koran, Korarn; Hassan, Hassarn, &c If the reader would learn the exact sound of Arabic words (a thing I never did), he must get an Arabic dictionary (and then he can't do it!) As so large a proportion of American Masons are professing Christians - the demonstration at Baltimore, Maryland, September, 1871, proving that our wisest and best members in very large numbers rejoice to bear the symbolical emblem of the MAN OF GOLGOTHA - I have not hesitated frequently "to name the name of Jesus" in this volume, although no one has so often and publicly demonstrated that Freemasonry was ten centuries old when the Star of Bethlehem arose. Nor can our Jewish brethren, many of whom have received a welcome into the American lodges, complain that I neglected the interests
8 PREFACE.
of their long‑persecuted but now emerging society while I was in the East. At the same time I have fully expressed my admiration for much of the character and many of the precepts of Mohammed, as embodied in the Koran. Avoiding the doctrinal points, and read in the spirit of fraternal love, as illustrated in the lectures of Freemasonry, that remarkable book, the Koran, might justly be taken as a comment upon the much older, far wiser, and most remarkable book ever written, THE OLD TESTAMENT of the Hebrew dispensation. To those who are accustomed, without the slightest examination, to denounce the Koran (as well as its author), I will simply say, with Isaiah (viii. 20), "To the law and to the testimony; if it speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in it." An unprejudiced mind will admit, not only that the Koran contains far more quotations from and references to the Bible, but is absolutely imbued more with the spirit of the inspired word than a dozen of the best "Saints' Books" found on the counter of any Catholic bookstore in New York. "To the testimony!"
In affixing the names of my Masonic countrymen freely to places renowned in history, I acknowledge, ubique patriam reminisci, that I remembered my native country in all places, and have attempted thus to join the West to the East by a new and more affecting tie. The Masons who raised nine thousand dollars and upwards to send me to Palestine, and enough, three years afterwards, to publish this volume, have earned the right to Masonic homes among the homes of the first Masons, and the allotment I have made may be yet very much more largely extended. Even though the idea be one strictly in the region of romance, I shall be greatly mistaken if it does not lead to larger explorations, freer offerings, and greater exertions in this direction on the part of generations yet to come.
To Professor A. L. Rawson, of New York, so well known as "The
PREFACE. 8
Oriental Artist," who has given his pencil exclusively, for a number of years, to Biblical illustration, I am indebted, not only for the maps and engravings in my volume, but for many practical and useful suggestions in the preparation of the work itself. Himself a thorough explorer in Eastern fields, he is giving his mature and experienced judgment to such works as Beecher's, Deems's, Crosby's, and other first‑class writers on Biblical themes; his own excellent "Hand‑Book of Bible Knowledge" meanwhile comparing favorably with the best of them.
Finally, if any one with dyspeptic tendencies feels to object to the attempt at humor that may possibly be detected in some of these pages, I bare my back to the lash. I did laugh while going, without guard or guide, through the once inspiring but now depressing lands of the tribes - laughed often and freely, and, even at the end of four years, my cachinations are renewed when I think of certain experiences connected with my journey. The ghost of old laughs thus haunting me so long and persistently, and giving its spirit to my ink, She reader is at liberty, without further dispensation, to laugh too.
THE LAND OF MILK AND HONEY.
"A good land and a large . . . a land flowing with milk and honey." (Dent. vi. 3, xi. 9, etc.)
O land of wondrous story, old Canaan bright and fair,
Thou type of home celestial, where the saints and angels are!
In heartfelt admiration we address thy hills divine,
And gather consolation on the fields of Palestine.
In all our lamentations, in the hour of deepest ill,
When sorrow wraps the spirit as the storm‑clouds wrap the hill,
Some name comes up before us from thy bright immortal band,
As the shadow of a great rock falls upon a weary land.
The dew of Hermon falling yet, revives the golden days;
Sweet Sharon lends her roses still, to win the poet's lays;
In every vale the lily bends, while o'er them wing the birds
Whose cheerful notes so marvellously recall the Saviour's words.
From Bethlehem awake the songs of Rachel and of Ruth,
From Mizpah's mountain‑fastness mournful notes of filial truth;
Magdala gives narration of the Penitent thrice‑blest,
And Bethany of sister‑hosts who loved the gentle Guest.
Would we retrace the pilgrimage of Jesus Christ our Lord,
Behold his footsteps everywhere, on rocky knoll and sward;
From Bethlehem to Golgotha, his cradle and his tomb,
He sanctified old Canaan and accepted it his home.
He prayed upon thy mountain‑side, he rested in thy grove,
He walked upon thy Galilee, when winds with billows strove:
Thy land was full of happy homes, that loving hearts did own,
E'en foxes and the birds of air - but Jesus Christ had none.
Thou land of milk and honey, land of corn and oil and wine,
How longs my hungry spirit to enjoy thy food divine!
I hunger and I thirst afar, the Jordan rolls between,
I faintly see thy paradise all clothed in living green.
My day of life declineth, and my sun is sinking low;
I near the banks of Jordan, through whose waters I must go:
Oh, let me wake beyond the stream, in land celestial blest,
To be forever with the Lord in Canaan's promised rest.
DIVISION FIRST ‑ FACING THE EAST
Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might; for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave, whither thou gout. - Eccles. ix. 10.
Examine the condition of the Masonic institution, in the land of its nativity. Observe those unaltered customs of the Orientals, whose types are preserved in the rituals of our lodges.
Inspect the traditional sites of Tyre, Gebal, Lebanon, Joppa, Succoth, Jerusalem, etc.
Collect relics of ancient days and specimens of the natural productions cf the land. - Numbers, xiii. 21
CHAPTER I
CONCEPTION AND PREPARATIONS
EVERY one who has undertaken to instruct Freemasons, must many times have yearned to visit Palestine, the mother‑land of ancient affiliations, - the Orient, the home of Abraham and David, - of Solomon and Zerubbabel, - of Jesus and Mohammed, - the School of the Sacred Writings. So many references to that country are contained in the Masonic rituals, it is a marvel that no one of us had made explorations there prior to 1868.
In common with my fellows in Masonic work, I had keenly experienced the Crusader's impulse "to precipitate myself upon the Syrian shore;" and often cast about me for the means to gratify the yearning. In the autumn of 1854, I came so near accomplishing this wish, that, by the favor of a loan of $1,000 from the Grand Lodge of Kentucky, joined to the liberality of other friends, I reached New York, having my face earnestly "set towards Jerusalem." But here an unlucky accident frustrated my hopes, and turned me back to the Occident. Fire, which has so often proved my foe, consumed the Judson House, in which I was a lodger, and by destroying my papers and clothing, etc., so disarranged the scheme, that I could not carry it out successfully at that time.
Yet, for all that, though advancing years, and the res angustœ in domi, the hard realities of life, interposed with a purpose almost in‑exorable, I never once resigned my determination to go to Palestine, but always in my Masonic descriptions spoke of "those traditional localities which some day I am resolved to visit." In the mean‑time, I continued the practice, established long before, of reading whatever publications promised to shed light upon the Lands of the East; and in church, Sunday‑school, and elsewhere, lectured on the subject with a minuteness of detail that compelled me to study the theme in its various historical and scientific associations. This, in fact, served to educate me against the time when it might please the
CONCEPTION AND PREPARATIONS. 13
G. A. O. T. U. to grant me a furlough for the Oriental tour. In purchases of books for my Masonic collections, I gave prominence to those upon Oriental matters, as my old library, now in the keeping of the Grand Lodge of New York, will show. In brief, I sought to emulate the spirit of old Thomas a Kempis in his saying, homo fer vidus et diligens ad omnia paratur - the earnest and diligent man is prepared for all things - and in the meantime found comfort in the promise of Virgil:
Forsan et hæc olim meminisse juvabit;
Durate et vosmet rebus servate secundis;
It may possibly be joyful some day to recall these trials; bear up against them, therefore, and be ready for better times when they come.
In 1867, circumstances proved somewhat encouraging to the fulfillment of my purpose. The opening of various lines of steamships from Europe to the Syrian coast was a favorable incident. The enlarged privileges granted by the Turkish government to foreigners sojourning in the Holy Land enabled a person in 1868 to explore twenty-fold more than he could have done in 1858, and forty-fold more than in 1848: The publication of scores and hundreds of books of travel in Palestine obviates the necessity of a man's wasting time in merely playing the tourist, and justifies me in beginning, the moment of arrival, the work of exploration. The invaluable aids afforded the Bible student by such publications as Robinson's, Barclay's, Thomson's, etc., are so much more than mere books of travel, that the reader may in effect transport himself, by their assistance, to the Land of the Bible, being enabled to see with their eyes and hear with their ears whatever is needed to illuminate the sacred pages. In my domestic circle, the growing up of the younger members of my family, and the marriage of the elder, rendered father's presence at home less a matter of necessity than heretofore.
One thing more: my labors in the various departments of Masonic history, rituals, poetry, etc., seemed measurably terminated. Having .no money‑capital of my own for purposes of publication, and the fields of Masonic literature affording little profit to authorship, I felt that in the issuance of seventy‑four Masonic publications I had given sufficient evidence of my devotion to the old institution, and might justly claim exemption from further labors and losses in that direction, and enter upon a new field. Finally, a reasonably vigorous constitution, never impaired by excessive living or intemperance,
14 CONCEPTION AND PREPARATIONS.
some knowledge of the Scriptures in their original and translated forms, a large course of reading in matters relating to Oriental countries, a circle of Masonic friends reaching round the globe, and a strong will to execute whatever I undertook - these formed the encouragements that bore me out, at the age of fifty, to begin the service of Masonic exploration of the Holy Land, conceived so many years ago, of which the present volume is the record.
But how a Masonic exploration? What has the Masonic institution to do with the Holy Land? These are no questions for Freemasons to ask; but as my work will fall into the hands of, and perhaps be read by, those who are not of the "mystic tie," the query may properly be answered here. I respond, then, that the Holy Scriptures are the instruction books of the Lodge; and that a perfect knowledge of the Holy Land is needful to a perfect knowledge of the Holy Scriptures.
In 1867, then, I set upon the following plan to secure the necessary funds for my enterprise; I made up a list of Holy Land specimens, such as the fraternity were most likely to value - such as I should most value, in the way of Biblical and Masonic illustrations, a catalogue embracing specimens of the woods, waters, earths, coins, fossils, etc., from Palestine, and proposed to supply them, at a specified rate, to those who would advance me money for the pilgrimage. The following extracts from my published proposals belong to the history of this enterprise: "Those contributors who advance ten dollars, each shall be supplied with one hundred and fifty objects from the Holy Land, including specimens of the ancient building‑stone of Jerusalem, Joppa, and Tyre; shells from the Sea of Galilee and Joppa; agates from the Arabian deserts; ancient coins; rock‑salt from Usdum; an herbarium of ten plants; the traditional corn, wine, and oil of Masonry; earth from the clay‑grounds near Succoth, etc., etc." Contributors of five dollars, three dollars, and two dollars, respectively, were promised smaller cabinets composed of similar objects; those of one dollar, the Journal of the Expedition. A map of the Holy Land, arranged for Masonic purposes, was also a portion of the premiums promised.
Having decided upon the plan of appeal, l visited one hundred and thirty lodges in Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Illinois, West Virginia, Nebraska, and New York, and addressed the fraternity. I began by occupying an hour or two with recitations of Masonic poems, such
CONCEPTION AND PREPARATIONS. 15
as the Level and the Square, the Letter G., the Holy Bible, Our Vows, the Drunkard's Grave, the Five Points of Fellowship, the Emblems of the Craft, etc., and then laid before them my propositions for a Masonic mission to the Holy Land. In general, the offer was favorably responded to. The season, unfortunately, was one of extreme closeness in the money market, and portions of the country visited were suffering from scanty harvests. Some of my hearers probably deemed my proposals Quixotic; many others contributed the lowest amount asked for, viz., one dollar; yet nearly four hundred of them gave me ten dollars each, trusting, as' they said, to my pluck to accomplish the end proposed, or willing to show their respect for an old and industrious laborer, who came before them with an appeal so reasonable and practical.
The whole number of contributors was 3,782; the aggregate of contributions was $9,631. Out of this, according to my proposals, provision was made for two years' support of my family; my own expenses, and those of my agent, Mr. G. W. Bartlett, while collecting the money; the expenses of the Oriental tour, for myself and Mr. Thomson; freights upon shipments of specimens; printing six issues of the Holy Land Journal for 3,782 contributors; printing catalogues, etc.; and preparing, labelling, packing, and forwarding nearly 70,000 specimens. It can readily be seen that the amount advanced me was short of my needs; the deficit, in fact, exceeded $1,200, and this I was compelled to make up out of the proceeds of lectures on my return home.
It is in evidence of the practicability of the plan upon which this money was collected, that a noted traveller is now (1872) before the public with proposals, borrowed from my programme, to furnish objects of natural history on South America " to those who will advance him the necessary outfit for the journey to that country." By way of encouragement, I commend to him the adage of Periander of Corinth, one of " the Seven Wise Men " of antiquity; industries nil impossibile, anything can be accomplished by an industrious man! In my addresses to the Lodges I proposed
1. To explore that remarkable plain - once the centre of intellectual light and the school of the seven liberal arts and sciences, also of commerce, religion, and letters - the Plain of Phoenicia.
2. To visit the secluded recesses, high among he Lebanons, where the remaining groves of cedar are found.
3. To search for those caves and bays at the base of Lebanon where the "flotes" of timber were made up for shipment to Joppa.
16 CONCEPTION AND PREPARATIONS.
4. To sail down the coast to Joppa, in the track of Hiram's mariners.
5. To examine the ancient port of Joppa with systematic care.
6. To follow diligently upon the tracks of the Syrian architects, journeying from Joppa to Jerusalem; and to seek for the highway by which they penetrated the precipitous cliffs and bore upward their ponderous burdens.
7. To make thorough inspection of everything relating to Solomonic times, in and about Jerusalem.
8. To visit the plain of Jordan, especially the clay‑ground between Succoth and Zarthan, where the brazen pillars and other holy vessels appertaining to the Temple were cast.
9. To explore the places named in Masonic lectures, such as Jerusalem, Bethlehem, Sodom, Jericho, Bethel, Hattin, Damascus, Bethany, Joppa, Tyre, Gebal, Lebanon, and others.
10. To make full collections of objects illustrating Masonic traditions and Biblical customs, these to be distributed generously to contributors on my return, upon plans previously arranged.
The following cuts of my Masonic flag are appropriate here:
The idea of this was suggested by the flag used in Dr. Kane's Arctic Explorations of 1853. His banner, the square and compass, still extant in the archives of Kane Lodge, No. 454, New York City, was displayed at his masthead while passing down New York Bay, and, at the extreme northern termination of his journey, it was set up in the snow‑drifts.
This little flag of mine accompanied me through all my wanderings.* The breeze that sighs across the granite reefs of Tyre blew out its silken folds, showing upon one side the initial‑symbol of him
* The emblem of The Broken Column is my "Mark‑Master's Mark," adopted at my exaltation in Lexington Chapter, No. 17, Lexington, Mississippi, in 1848.
CONCEPTION AND PREPARATIONS. 17
whose name was adored equally in Phœnician - and Jewish Lodges; on the other, the architect‑symbol of him whose noble end dignifies the purpose and the work of every Mason's Lodge. Fastened upon the boughs of one of Lebanon's grandest cedars, it suggested a mysterious meaning to the sturdy limbs and evergreen foliage of the tree. Waved before the entrance of a rock‑hewn tomb at Gebal, it seemed to call around me the spirits of those who, three thousand years ago, well understood its symbolical lessons. Fluttered in the gale that lifts the waters over the rocky ledge at Joppa, it recalled the days when the great fleets of Tyre came, "like doves to the windows," deep‑laden, into this harbor, the square and compass on their foresails. Fluttered over the walls of Jerusalem, and in the deep quarry that underlies the city, it spoke in prophetic tones of the good time coming, when the Mason‑craft shall yet build up Jerusalem, and the God we worship be worshipped there and everywhere.
The course pursued by the various Masonic journals in regard to this enterprise was almost uniformly generous in the extreme. Their columns were freely thrown open to my propositions; their editorial pens shaped words of encouragement and good counsel. It will not be deemed invidious if I mention by name the Evergreen (Dubuque, Iowa); the Masonic Review (Cincinnati, O.); the Voice of Masonry (Chicago, Illinois); the National Freemason (New York); the Masonic Monthly (Boston, Mass.); the Dispatch (New York), and the Freemason's Monthly Magazine (London, England), as taking the lead in brotherly encouragement and approval. Even Brother Findel, the German Masonic historian, whose theory of a modern origin of Freemasonry "does not recognize the importance of light from the East," still gave me "the brotherly word," and pledged me a cordial greeting in his own country. How truly has Sallust said: idem velle et idem nolle ea demum firma amicitia est; to possess the same likes and dislikes is, in point of fact, the foundation of lasting friendship. No words of mine can express my sense of all this kindness, and the friends of the Masonic Holy Land Mission of 1868 should bear in mind, what my own experience warned me of at the time, that an active opposition from either of those influential organs of Masonic sentiment might greatly have retarded the entire scheme.
No official expression was asked for from Grand Lodges, or other Masonic organizations; but it is proper to say that among the most generous supporters of my explorations were the Grand Masters of Iowa (Reuben Mickle); Nebraska (
O. H. Irish); Minnesota (C: W
2
18 CONCEPTION AND PREPARATIONS.
Nash); New York (S. H. Johnson); Canada (Wm. M. Wilson), and a large number of present and past Grand Lodge officers, of the first eminence, who forwarded me good words and material aid.
An assistant being deemed desirable, D. W. Thomson, of Illinois, formerly Grand Lecturer of that State, and a singularly zealous advocate of Ancient Craft Masonry, was accepted in that capacity. In the matter of collecting specimens, his services were of great utility; while his travelling experience, industry, and uniform good‑nature and honesty rendered him an agreeable companion upon the journey.
Prior to my departure for New York, the following lines were composed and extensively disseminated, as a farewell, by correspondence and through the press:
MIZPEH.
They took stones and made an heap. And Laban said: This heap is a witness between me and thee. Therefore was the name of it called Mizpeh: for he said, The Lord watch between me and thee, when we are absent one from another. - Genesis xxxi. 46.
MIZPEH! well named the patriarchal stone,
Once fondly reared in Gilead's mountain‑pass;
Doubtless the EYE ALL‑SEEING did look down
Upon that token of fraternal grace:
And doubtless HE who reconciled those men,
Between them watched, until they met again.
So, looking eastward o'er the angry sea,
The wintry blast, inhospitably stern, -
Counting the scanty moments left to me
Till I go hence, - and haply not return, -
I would, oh! Brethren, rear a MIZPEH too,
Beseeching GOD to watch 'twixt me and you.
It was HIS providence that made us one,
Who otherwise " perpetual strangers " were:
HE joined our hands in amity alone,
And caused our hearts each other's woes to bear:
HE kindled in our souls fraternal fire,
Befitting children of a common SIRE.
In mutual labors we have spent our life;
In mutual joys sported at labor's close;
With mutual strength waned against human strife;
And soothed with mutual charity its woes:
So, sharing mutually what GOD hath given,
With common faith we seek a kindred Heaven.
CONCEPTION AND PREPARATIONS. 19
Bring stones, bring stones, and build the heap with me!
Rear up a MIZPEH, though with many tears: -
Before I trust me to you stormy sea,
Hither with memories of many years!
Come round me, mystic Laborers, once more,
With loving gifts, upon this wintry shore.
Bring Prayer: the WATCHER in the heavens will heed;
Bring Types significant of deathless hope:
Bring Words in whispers only to be said:
Bring Hand‑grasps strong to lift the helpless up:
Bring all those Reminiscences of light
That have inspired us many a wintry night.
Lay them on Mizpeh! and the names revered
Of those who've vanished from our mystic Band:
Are we not taught that, with the faithful dead,
In Lodge Celestial, we shall surely stand?
Oh, crown the pile with names of good and blest,
Whose memories linger, though they be at rest
Finished: and so I hope whate'er betide,
Though wandering far toward Oriental sun,
He who watched kindly on that mountain‑side
Will watch between us till the work is done:
LORD GOD ALMIGHTY! whence all blessings are,
Behold our 3/Wpm and regard our prayer!
Be my defender while in foreign lands;
Ward off the shafts of calumny accurst;
My labors vindicate, while MIZPEH stands,
And hold my family in sacred trust;
Should I no more behold them, fond and dear,
I leave them, Brethren, to Masonic care.
Finally, if in haste, or careless mood,
Forgetting pledge sealed in WORD DIVINE,
I've wounded any of the Brotherhood,
Impute it not, this parting hour, a sin:
Forgive: to! HE by whom all creatures live
Grants us forgiveness, e'en as we forgive!
One of the journals alluded to (the National Freemason) said of these lines: " The sentiments are touching and appropriate, and strictly in accordance with the conciliatory character of their author. How‑
20 CONCEPTION AND PREPARATIONS.
ever much some of the Brotherhood may have differed with Brother Morris in regard to his plan for Uniformity of Work, none who know him but will accord to him a pure and disinterested purpose. The confidential friend of such men as William B. Hubbard, Philip C. Tucker, Charles Scott, Salem Town, Henry Wingate, and other choice spirits of the generation that is fast dropping into the grave; the man who has published seventy-four different volumes of a Ma-sonic character ; the admitted good fellow, ' genial, witty, and wise,' of Masonic circles, everywhere, and withal the man who, at the age of fifty, has yet to find anything in his pocket to compensate him for labors given to the best interests of Freemasonry,—he cannot leave our shores for a long and laborious tour into Oriental countries without bearing with him, the ' God bless the old enthusiast! may his return be blest !' "
So far as baggage, books, and introductions are concerned, I found it unnecessary to encumber myself inconveniently. Two suits of clothes and half a dozen books were quite sufficient. As to reading, a man going to Palestine must go carrying his reading in his head; he will get but little time to accumulate it there. Thomson's Land and Book; Osborne's Past and Present of Palestine, and a few others, amply sufficed me for reading on the journey. So far as clothing is concerned, the tailors in Beyrout will make you up suits quite as good and one half cheaper than New York tradesmen. I had written a few leading Brethren, B. B. French, J. W. B. McLeod Moore, and others, soliciting letters of general introduction, and the request was cordially granted; but I never found occasion to use them. Cosmopolitan Consistory, New York city, kindly presented me an elegant diploma of the thirty-second degree. My own diploma as a Master Mason and member of Fortitude Lodge, No. 47, LaGrange, Kentucky, was, however, the only document I ever found occasion to use. Even my passport, which I had taken the precaution to procure from Washington, with some trouble and expense, was of not the slightest service to me, although I would recommend every traveller to take one.
After these preliminaries, it suffices to say that I took passage from New York, Sunday morning, February 2, 1868, having some-thing in common with those of whom the poet long ago sang -
Bound for holy Palestine,
Nimbly we brushed the level brine,
21 CONCEPTION AND PREPARATIONS.
All in azure steel arrayed:
O'er the waves our banners played,
And made the dancing billows glow;
High upon the trophied prow
Many a warrior‑minstrel swung
His sounding harp, and boldly sung. - T. Wharton.
CHAPTER II CROSSING THE ATLANTIC
ELABORATE this chapter for the benefit of that large class of readers to whom " the ocean wave " is a romance, and who peruse the smaller incidents of travel with a relish. The critic may sneer at my title, " Crossing the Atlantic," ill‑naturedly affirming that a thousand voyagers have al‑ready described the occurrences of ocean‑life, and that nothing new can be said upon the subject. Very likely; yet to many of those who will peruse these "Hand‑marks," the pennings of other East‑ern travellers are as though they were never written. I have discovered, since my return, that nothing in a traveller's recollection is too trivial to interest those who do not travel, and that the most interesting facts in the tourist's journal are those which personally he may deem too trifling for publication. Hence I make this chapter of daily life upon the sea.
It was on the second day of February, 1868, and, of all the days in the year, a bright, cloudless "Lord's day," that I mounted the steps of the steamship "France," Captain Grace, to witness the casting‑off of lines and her departure from Pier No. 47, North River, New York. The ferruginous mass moved reluctantly from her bed, seemingly regretful of the necessity of leaving the cosy seat on which she had reposed for two weeks. If, as the feminine pronoun implies, our ship has the tastes of a woman, she may well prefer her quiet berth, and the praises of the admiring crowds who have been so loud in their approval of her fine bust, figure‑head, and form, to the icy waves of ocean, and the cold criticisms of sea monsters who await her coming yonder, during a winter‑voyage of twelve days.
The moment of departure is a solemn one to me; the act of ‑ severing the last tie that binds me to my native land makes me sad. I cannot join in the parting words exchanged between ship and shore, but withdraw myself to a solitary place and consider, in a spirit of
GOING DOWN THE BAY. 23
prayerful inquiry the questions, Shall I again tread those streets? Am I really justified in making this pilgrimage; or is it mere romance that is taking me, at my years, upon so long a journey? And may I expect the blessing of the GRAND MASTER upon an enterprise so much out of the accustomed routine of my profession? In that hour of self‑examination, I solemnly declare it, I stood self‑vindicated and supported by the feeling that something more than mere curiosity had moved me to the work I had undertaken, and that I could rely upon the same HAND which had untiringly led me up and down through an itinerancy of fifty years.
For myself, I can honestly aver that I look to nothing but hard labor, economical fare, and dhigent study, during the months before me. In my traielling bags I have a judicious selection of works upon Oriental themes, with an ample supply of paper to fix my own observations. Members of the Masonic fraternity and others have forwarded me letters and credentials in generous supply. The moral and material encouragement of nearly four thousand friends is the basis 'of my mission, and I feel that the Godspeed of half a million more is wafted on the breezes behind me. And so in that mood, in a solitary corner of the busy ship, my thoughts review the situation.
In going down the bay I occupied the hours in writing parting letters to the members of my family, the wife of twenty‑seven years, and the seven children who call me father; also to a number of devoted friends whose words and deeds clung to me in parting moments with a tenacity that nothing can loosen; and so I swung out upon that ocean which in Bible times no sailor dared even cross, but which now is underlaid by telegraphic wires, connecting my home at La Grange with the City of Jerusalem itself.
Out of three steamers announced to sail from New York across the Atlantic, February 1st, I chose this of the "National Line" of Liverpool boats. For one hundred dollars, American currency, a first‑class passage was given, while the same accommodations in the " Cunard" line would cost one hundred and sixty‑five dollars. Both are English lines, as all the American steamships were driven from the sea during the civil war. There is also a German line which stops at Havre, France, going, and at Southampton, England, coming. It was on this line that I returned in July, but I cannot recommend it to the reader.
The France is a fine new vessel, this being her fourth voyage. Her tonnage is 2,428 tons. In length she is 405 feet; in breadth of
34 DESCRIPTION OF THE STEAMER.
beam, 42 feet; in depth, from the upper deck to the keel, 30 feet. Like all the vessels of this line, she is a screw‑propeller, that is, her instrument of propulsion is a screw set up at the stern, which, in the most mysterious manner and "in solemn silence," moves these five thousand tons of boat, and freight, and passengers, at the rate of ten miles an hour. As I could never see the screw, nor the machinery that moved it, I was fain to compare the whole apparatus to the silent, mysterious power that keeps in motion a well‑disciplined Lodge of Masons. The analogy would be perfect were it not that a steamship is of the feminine gender, while a Masonic Lodge is usually the reverse!* The steering apparatus of the France is, British‑fashion, at the stern, placed in a small, cramped‑up crypt, which holds a half‑dozen sailors, who turn the spokes of the wheel in the same inartistic style that the Phoenicians practised in the days of Sesostris. When an order is sent from the foreship to the stern, it takes as many messengers to pass it from one to the other as for a general of division to move Company C of the 53d Regiment into line of battle, or as the W. M. requires to get his will and pleasure known to the Lodge. But it would never do for an Englishman to adopt a Yankee invention, and so steering‑lines to their steamers and check‑ropes to their railroad trains are postponed until after the millennium.
Our fine steamer is built of rolled iron plates, thirty inches wide and one inch thick, riveted together in the manner of steam‑boilers, stanch and tight. There is not the least danger of these seams ripping; indeed, if the sewing‑machine man who calls quarterly at my house to sell me a machine, will only invent such a lock‑stitch as this, his fortune is made. We have three masts, and when the wind is fair, as it was the greater part of my voyage, the sails afford considerable assistance in propulsion. A reasonable supply of long‑boats, and life‑boats, and jolly‑boats are stowed along the sides of the vessel, suggesting that ocean‑life is uncertain, and it is best to provide in fair weather for foul. The speed of the vessel may be seen from the following table of distances run for the first eight days, computed every day at HIGH XII:
* In all our Masonic communications on board the France we were never unmindful of the fact that a lady was present, even the good woman France herself, and we governed ourselves accordingly!
25
OFFICERS AND CREW.
Monday, February 3, 260 miles.
Tuesday, " 4,260 "
Wednesday, " 5, 268 "
Thursday, " 6, 259 "
Friday, " 7, 265 "
Saturday, " 8, 272 "
Sunday, " 9, 272 "
Monday, " 10, 271 "
The remarkable uniformity of these daily footings‑up will strike the reader; steamship travel, under a settled condition of weather, being almost as regular as life upon the rail.
Our ship is officered by a captain and four mates, or ship's officers, as they are termed; the latter being hearty, well‑educated men, kept in training for promotion in due time: for as no man can be Master who has not served in training as Warden, so no man can be captain who has not served as mate. All the working charges of the ship are apportioned among these four, according to fixed rules of naval service. Besides these, there is a purser, who acts as quartermaster of the ship; a surgeon, six engineers, and assistants in abundance. The whole crew, from captain to chambermaid, numbers 104. Of course everything is intensely British, officers, crew, slush‑buckets, &c., even down to the acceptable sirloins of beef served daily to the passengers. The only thing on board that I can name American is the coal, and if the captain's expressed (and profane) opinion may be relied upon, even that were better British too. Every passenger on board, except three, talks about " going home " whenever Great Britain is named. Money is reckoned in " tuppences," and I had not been a week aboard before I could compute a considerable sum in ú., s., and d., a thing which, it is said, none but a born Briton ever could do before me! That mythic animal, the British unicorn, I is marked on all the ship's linen and furniture; in fact, Commodore Wilkes himself couldn't mistake the nationality of this steamer. Captain Grace is a rough‑featured, rough‑mannered sailor of thirty, taciturn and gruff, and most ridiculously misnamed; but, it is claimed, a thorough sailor. At all hours, by day and night, he is on the alert, and wet‑nurses the ship, in nursery language, like a mother hovering over her babe. His pay is £600 per annum, a short $3,000. The only time I ever spoke to him was one Sunday morning, when I asked him if he would conduct the service of prayers, as is customary on ocean steamers. He declined in a single word, an extremely short one, and then the conversation flagged.
26 A PHENICIAN BARQUE.
Nowhere will this portion of the grand Psalm cvii. read with such vividness, as when you are lying, of a quiet Sunday hour, in your state‑room at sea: They that go down to the sea in ships, that do business in the great waters; These see the works of the Lord and his wonders in the deep.
For he commandeth and raiseth the stormy wind, which lifteth up the waves thereof.
They mount up to the heaven; they go down to the depths; their soul is melted because of trouble.
They reel to and fro, and stagger like a drunken man, and are at their wit's end.
Then they cry to the Lord in their trouble, and he bringeth them out of their distresses.
He maketh the storm a calm, so that the waves thereof are still.
Then are they glad because they be quiet; so he bringeth they to their desired haven.
After this description of a first‑class Atlantic steamer in the year of grace 1868, the following picture of a Phcenician vessel of B. C. 1000 will afford a forcible contrast. In one of my chapters I will describe the size, construction, and capacity of this old Tyrian barque, such as those invincible mariners sailed in, when they gathered up the treasures of the Roman world, passing through the Straits of Gibraltar, turning to the right as far as Scotland and the Baltic Sea, and to the left as far as the African coast trended south‑wards, and bringing from all quarters the gold, the tin, the copper, the marble, the ivory, the spices needed in the erection, adornment, and worship, of Solomon's Temple.
REFRESHMENTS ON BOARD. 27
The size and tonnage of one of these Phoenician vessels would scarcely compare now with a Lake Erie sloop. But hearts of oak controlled them, and coastiLg all the way round the northern shores of the Mediterranean they came out into the ocean between their own "Pillars of Hercules," and following the sinuous lines of Portugal, Spain, and France, struck finally into the mouth of the broad Channel, and reached the place of their destination. The importance of in in hardening the copper, of which their cutting tools and war‑like implements were made, justified all these pains, risks, and the twelve 1 months' journeys necessary to procure it.
The particular matter upon which my pen was engaged, through the four weeks' journey from New York to Beyrout, was that of making an alphabetical agenda of places to be visited, and things to be done at each place. This, written out in a blank‑book, was made o full, by the time I reached Palestine, as to afford me all the assistance that a company of guides could have rendered. Under the head of "Tyre," for instance, I had more than one hundred distinct facts and suggestions in alphabetical form, by which, when I visited that city, my researches were very greatly expedited.
Of Cabin, or first‑class passengers, we have twenty‑four, with room for nearly one hundred; of steerage, or second‑class passengers, there are sixty‑four. The latter pay only twenty‑five dollars each, for which they receive good, wholesome victuals, and the services of the ship's surgeon. To us of the cabin every possible convenience is, of course, afforded. An experienced surgeon is one of the regular officers of the ship, and his skill is ever at our command. Chambermaids are in attendance upon the ladies, and state‑room stewards upon the gen‑ tlemen, all without extra charge. Three regular meals per diem are spread, besides a luncheon, which in itself is a meal.* Let me recall the eating arrangements: Breakfast is announced at 8 A. M., a sub‑ stantial British meal, accompanied by the best of tea and tolerable coffee. Luncheon is at High XII, presenting soups, cold meats in large variety, bread, cheese, and pickles. Dinner appears at 4 P. M., Supper at 71/2, the latter being made up of coffee, toast, bread, and cheese.
Besides these, a passenger who, for any reason, fails to report him‑ self at the regular hours, can be accommodated through the steward with a special supply of provisions, at any hour. The bar (fluid, not forensic) is stocked with wines, ales, and spirits, of a character rarely
