THE HOLY SEPULCHRE.

Waikato Argus, Volume I, Issue 65, 5 December 1896, Page 1 (Supplement)

THE HOLY SEPULCHRE.

In the old Willi, rough as a rock, their appears a shapeless opening, narrow and low, and by a series of descending steps we come upon a place overhung by high, sombre walls in front of the Basilica of tha Holy Sepulchre. Here it is customary to uncover, as soon as the Holy Sepulchre conies into view. People pass there bareheaded, even when simply crossing it to continue the route through •Jerusalem. It is crowded with poor men and women, praying pilgrims, and vendors of crosses and chaplets, who spread out their wares upon the venerable and worn (lags, Among the pavements and among the steps appear here and there the socles, still embedded, of columns which formerly supported basilicas that were raised long ago at periods hard, if not. possible, to fix, All is a heap of ruins in the city which has undergone '2O sieges, which every fanaticism had .sacked. The high walls, whose stones of a reddish brown form the sides oi' the place, are convents or chapels. One might fancy tint they were fortresses. In the background, higher and more sombre than all, stands the broken ami worn mass which forms the facade of the Holy Sepulchre, and has all the appearance of irregularities of a great rock. It has two enormous porticos of the twelfth century, bordered by ornaments strange and archaic. One is walled up, and the other, wide open, leaves in view in the obscurity of tke interior thousands of little flames. Chants, cries, and discordant lamentations, lugubrious to the ear, escape from this opening, mingled with the odour of incense.

On entering we find ourselves in a sort of vestibule, revealing the magnificent depths, where innumerable lamps are burning. Turkish guards, armed as if for a massacre, occupy the entrance. Heated like sovereigns on a large divan, they look with scorn upon the passing adorers of this place, which from their points of view, is the disgrace of Mohammedan Jerusalem, and which the ferocious among them never hesitate to call " el Kommah " (filth). Oh, that unexpected and never- to-be - forgotten impression which one receives on entering there for the first time ! Here is a labyrinth of dark sanctuaries of all period and all aspects, communicating by bays and porticos, superb colonnades, little doors, and openings like the entrances to caverns. Some are elevated like high tribunes, where we notice in obscure corners groups of women wearing long veils ; others underground where we brush against spectres along the sides of the black and damp rock ; and all this is a sort of half night, except here and there great rays of light, which intestify the neighbouring obscurity, the whole infinitely starred by the little flames ot golden and silver lamps which descend in thousands from the vault. And everywhere we find crowds moving along, or standing grouped according to their nationalities around the tabernacles. Psalmodies, lamentations, and joyous chants till the high vaults and vibrate in the sepulchral sonorities below—-the nasal mclopa.ua of the Greeks, broken by the. shouts of the Kopts—and in all of these voices there is an interminingling of grief and prayers, blending the discords in a manner indescribably strange, and sounding like the great wail of humanity, the last cry of its distress in the presence of death. The rotunda with a high cupola, into which we first enter and from which we can imagine the. obscure chaos of the other sanctuaries, is occupied in tho centre by a grand kiosk of marble of semibarbarous beauty and loaded with silver lamps. It encloses the stone of the sepulchre. All around this holy kiosk the crowd gathers or remains stationary. On one side then;are hundreds of moujiks and matouchkas kneeling upon the flags. On the other ate the

women of Jerusalem, standing upright and wearing long white veils. One would take them to be antique virgins in this dreamy penumbra. Further on we find Abyssinians and Arabs prostrated, with their foreheads on the flags; Turks with drawn sabre?, and people of all communieat.ionsand of all languages. One does not remain long in this almost suffocating portion of the Holy Sepulchre, which is the. very heart of this mass of basilicas and chapels. .Processions pass on in single tile, eacli individual bowing his head. The entrance is through a little marble door carved and ornamented. Tiie sepulchre is wuhin, encased in limbic, upon which there are innumerable icons and lamps of gold. At the same time with me there passed a Russian soldier and a poor old woman in rags and an Oriental woman dressed in garments of brocade. All kissed the covering of the tomb and wept. Others followed them—indeed there is an eternal proeess : on of pilgrims, touching and moistening with their tears those very same stones. The altars of all the different faiths are so thoroughly mixed here that priests and processions go astray. They force their way through the crowd, carrying censers, and preceded by soldiers in arms, who strike the sonorous flags with the ends of their halberds. <; Room tiicrc '■ : ' Here come the Latins, that pass like a golden chasuble, " One side ! ' Leading his flock, here conies the bishop of the Syrians with a iong white beard. Then come the Greeks, still wearing Byzantine ornaments, or Abyssinians with their dark faces. They march on in their sumptuous vestments preceded by children carrying censers, and the crowd makes way for them, Accompanying this human tide there is a kind of continuous rumbling, t' lo incessant sound of psalmodies and little bells,—Atlantic Journal.