CHAP. XIV.

CANA.

About a quarter of we arrived there at half past seven. a mile before we entered the village, is a spring of delicious limpid water, close to the road, whence all the water is taken for the supply of the village. Pilgrims of course halt at this spring, as the source of the water which our Saviour, by his first miracle, converted into wine'. At such places it is certain to meet either shepherds reposing with their flocks, or caravans halting to drink. A few olive-trees being near the spot, travellers alight, spread their carpets beneath these trees, and, having filled their pipes, generally smoke and take some coffee; always preferring repose in these places, to the accommodations which are offered in the villages. Such has been the custom of the country from time immemorial.

We entered CANA, and halted at a small Greek chapel, in the court of which we all rested, while our breakfast was spread upon the ground. This grateful meal consisted of about a bushel of cucumbers, some white mulberries, a very insipid fruit, gathered from the trees reared to feed silk-worms; hot cakes of unleavened bread, fried in honey and butter; and, as usual, plenty of fowls. We had no

reason

(John ii. 1.) is often called Cana Minor. St. Jerom describes it as near to Nazareth: "Haud procul inde (id est à Nazareth) cernetur Cana, in quâ aquæ in vinum Hieron. tom. I. epist. 17. ad Marcellam.

versæ sunt."

(1) John, ch. ii.

(2) A tradition relates, that at this spring St. Athanasius converted Philip. We were thus informed by the Christian pilgrims who had joined our cavalcade; but it was the first intelligence we had ever received, either of the meeting, or of the person so converted.

reason to complain of our fare, and all of us ate heartily. We were afterwards conducted into the chapel, in order to see the reliques and sacred vestments there preserved. When the poor priest exhibited these, he wept over them with so much sincerity, and lamented the indignities to which the holy places were exposed in terms so affecting, that all our pilgrims wept also. Such were the tears which formerly excited the sympathy, and roused the valour of the Crusaders. The sailors of our party caught the kindling zeal; and little more was necessary to incite in them a hostile disposition towards every Saracen they might afterwards encounter. The ruins of a church are shewn in this place, which is said to have been erected over the spot where the marriage-feast of Cana was held. It is worthy of note, that, walking among these ruins, we saw large massy stone water-pots, answering the description given of the antient vessels of the country'; not preserved, nor exhibited, as reliques, but lying about, disregarded by the present inhabitants, as antiquities with whose original use they were unacquainted. From their appearance, and the number of them, it was quite evident that a practice of keeping water in large stone pots, each holding from eighteen to twenty-seven gallons, was once common in the country.

About three miles beyond Cana, we passed the village

of

CHAP. XIV. Chapel of the

Village.

Reliques.

(3) "Nicephorus gives an account of it, and says it was built by St. Helen." Mariti's Trav. vol. II. p. 171. Lond 1791.

(4) "And there were set there six water-pots of stone, after the manner of the purifying of the Jews, containing two or three firkins apiece." John ii. 6.

CHAP. XIV.

Turan.

Caverns.

Intense Heat.

of Turan: near this place they pretend to shew the field
where the Disciples of Jesus Christ plucked the ears of corn
upon the Sabbath-day'. The Italian Catholics have named
it the field "degli Setti Spini," and gather the bearded
wheat, which is annually growing there, as a part of the
collection of reliques wherewith they return burthened to
their own country. The heat of this day was greater than
any to which we had yet been exposed in the Levant; nor
did we afterwards experience anything so powerful. Captain
Culverhouse had the misfortune to break his umbrella;
a frivolous event in milder latitudes, but here of so much
importance, that all hopes of continuing our journey de-
pended upon its being repaired. Fortunately, beneath some
rocks, over which we were then passing, there were
caverns, excavated by primeval shepherds, as a shelter
from scorching beams, capable of baking bread, and actually
of dressing meat' into these caves we crept, not only for
the
purpose of restoring the umbrella, but also to profit by.
the opportunity thus offered of unpacking our thermometers,
and ascertaining the temperature of the atmosphere. It was
now twelve o'clock. The mercury, in a gloomy recess
under ground, perfectly shaded, while the scale was placed
so as not to touch the rock, remained at one hundred degrees
of

(1) Luke vi. 1. Matth. xii. 1. Mark ii. 23.

(2) Small reservoirs for containing water, of great antiquity, some in the form of basons, appeared in these caverns.

(3) We afterwards ate bread which had been thus baked, in a camp of Djezzar's troops, in the Plain of Esdraelon; and the first Lieutenant of the Romulus frigate ate bacon so dressed in Aboukir.

of Fahrenheit. As to making any observation in the sun's rays, it was impossible; no one of the party had courage to wait with the thermometer a single minute in such a situation.

CHAP. XIV.

nomena.

explained.

Along this route, particularly between Cana and Turan, Basaltic Phæwe observed basaltic phænomena. The extremities of columns, prismatically formed, penetrated the surface of the soil, so as to render our journey rough and unpleasant. These marks of regular, or of irregular crystallization, Their Origin generally denote the vicinity of a bed of water lying beneath their level. The traveller, passing over a series of successive plains, resembling, in their gradation, the order of a staircase, observes, as he descends to the inferior stratum whereon the water rests, that where rocks are disclosed by the sinking of the soil, the appearance of crystallization has taken place; and then the prismatic configuration is vulgarly denominated basaltic. When this series of depressed surfaces occurs very frequently, and the prismatic form is very evident, the Swedes, from the resemblance such rocks have to an artificial flight of steps, call them Trap; a word signifying, in their language, a staircase. In this state Science remains at present, concerning an appearance in Nature which exhibits nothing more than the common process of crystallization, upon a larger scale than has hitherto excited attention *. Nothing is more frequent in the vicinity of

very

(4) See the observations which occur in p. 667, of the First Part of these Travels, vol. I. second edition. It was in consequence of a journey upon the Rhine, in the year 1793, that the Author first applied the theory of crystallization towards explaining the

formation

CHAP. XIV.

very

antient lakes, in the bed of considerable rivers, or by the borders of the ocean. Such an appearance therefore, in the approach to the Lake of Tiberias, is only a parallel to similar phænomena exhibited by rocks near the lakes of Locarno and Bolsenna in Italy; by those of the Wenner Lake in Sweden; by the bed of the Rhine, near Cologne in Germany'; by the Valley of Ronca, in the territory of Verona; the Giant's Causeway of the Pont du Bridon, in the State of Venice', and numerous other examples in the same country; not to enumerate instances which occur over all the islands between the north coast of Ireland and Iceland,

as

formation of what are vulgarly called basaltic pillars; an appearance common to a variety of different mineral substances, imbedded in which are found Ammonites, vegetable impressions, fossil wood, crystals of feldspar, masses of chalcedony, zeolite, and sparry carbonate of lime. The Author has seen the prismatic configuration, to which the term basaltic is usually applied, in common compact limestone. Werner, according to Mr. Jameson, (Syst. of Min. vol. I. p. 372.) confines basalt to "the floetz Trap formation," and (p. 369, ibid.) to the concretionary structure; alluding to a particular substance, under that appellation. Count Bournon (see Note 3. p. 667. Part I.) considers the basaltic form as the result of a retreat. This is coming very near to the theory maintained by the Author; in furtherance of which, he will only urge as a more general remark, that "all crystals are concretionary, and all columnar minerals crystals, more or less regular, the consequences of a retreat."

(1) The town gates of Cologne are constructed of stones having the form commonly called basaltic; and similar substances may be observed in the walls.

(2) See the account published by the Abate Fortis, "Della Valle Di Roncà nel territorio Veronese," printed at Venice in 1778.

(3) See "Memoria de' Monti Colonnari di S. E. il Signor Cavaliere Giovanni Strange," printed at Milan in 1778, for a beautiful representation of this Causeway; engraved by Fessard, from a drawing by De Veyrenc. Also the representations given in the LXIst volume of the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, Tab. 19. p. 583, &c.