DR. LIDDON IN THE EAST.*
Kn-To is careful to avoid raising any unnecessary expectations, by distinctly stating that this volume con- sists of simple family correspondence never intended for publication. "Since my brother's death," Mrs. King says, "trifles that were mere trifles before have assumed an amount of interest in the eyes of his friends that has made me yield to their wishes and publish these letters, which are homely and have no literary merit, but give a fair daily report of how he passed his time in the one long holiday he allowed himself in his life of serious work." This is a true statement of the case, at all events as regards the feelings of Dr. Liddon's friends. They were anxious to hear anything there was to hear about him. We are glad that Mrs. King was moved to publish these letters ; they do undoubtedly give "a fair daily report "of • Dr. Liddon's Tour in Egypt and Palestine in 1886. Being Letters descriptive of the Tour, written by his Easter, Mrs. King. London : Longmans. 1891.
how Dr. Liddon passed his time; but being given so much, we naturally desire more. It is pleasant enough to follow the party up the Nile, and hear of their excursions and discoveries; but we should like to know a little more about them, especially from Dr. Liddon's point of view. It is tantalising to be told that Dr. Liddon "is just returned, delighted with his morning's work, having found an interesting Coptic church inside a large tomb," and to be able to learn no more about it ; or to hear that "H. has availed himself of all the enforced stoppages we have had, to take a walk and look up everything of interest within his reach, and there are few miles along the river that do not pay investigation," and to remain in utter ignorance of the results of his explorations. "H. is writing a detailed diary," we are told in another place, "with number- less illustrations, which makes it very interesting ; he is also sketching, and though it is his first attempt, his drawings are very graphic." This makes the outsider feel that he is poorer than he knew he was, by the loss of some delightful reading.
Not that we have any right to resent the deficiency, or to gnash our teeth when Mrs. King makes the reflection which anybody was certain to make under the circumstances :—
"Of course it is his being with us that has put the finishing touch of interest on all we see, and made it an experience quite apart from that of the ordinary traveller. His Biblical and historical knowledge, his accurate and critical mind, and his cognisance of the roots and history of language, enable him to sift evidence, and often to explain puzzling and apparently opposing theories."
But we should have liked to have been admitted to some share of such an expert's knowledge. Deluged as we are with the books of unscientific tourists, who think that a visit to Pales-
tine is an excuse for adding to the load of printed matter which must make even Atlas think that the world has grown singularly heavy of late, we should have welcomed with the greatest cordiality any opinions or impressions from such a man as Liddon. Even in matters of immediate political in-
terest, there might have been some weighty thoughts and words that would have told in these days ; for, if we are not greatly deceived, Canon Liddon held that we had a work of duty to do in Egypt, and that we must not shrink from it till it was done. We should have been glad of the opportunity of putting upon record some expression of this feeling at a time when some persons are suggesting that the British Government
might have the criminal cowardice to escape their obligations to that country by an ignominious flight.
There is, however, a sufficient quantity of good reading to be found when one looks for it, about Dr. Liddon's view of his surroundings, though we eagerly wish to bear more. His sincere desire to make himself acquainted with all forms
of Christianity, shows itself in many allusions. In Egypt he was particularly anxious to find out all about the Coptic Church, an ancient form of Christianity which has a special interest to almost every traveller. Sometimes his inquiries into the economy of this venerable hierarchy did not increase his respect for it, as when he heard of the priest near Luxor who had for many years repeated an old will he had picked up somewhere instead of the Liturgy, the congregation being quite unconscious of the difference. In other cases, however, he was more fortunate. We have a pleasant account of his interview with the Coptic Bishop of Khartoum, to whom he was presented at Cairo :—
"The Bishop is a venerable old man, who has led a very active and hardworking life, having bad a large body of Copt Christians in Khartoum. He spoke of Gordon as his dearest friend and a constant attendant at their services; indeed, he was most en- thusiastic in his admiration, saying Gordon was the hest and holiest of men, alike beloved and revered by Christians and Arabs, so much so that an order had gone forth from the Mahdi that not a hair of his head was to be injured. The Bishop said the taking of Khartoum was the greatest surprise to him and to all persons who knew its strength, for it was practically impregnable to native forces, and nothing short of treachery could have com- passed its downfall. Happily, many Christians had left it, and the Bishop was in another part of his diocese at the time of the massacre, but every Christian remaining in Khartoum was murdered."
Fortunately, we now know the last statement to have been an
exaggeration. In Palestine, Dr. Liddon, after the manner Anglicans, threw in his lot entirely with the Greek Ch The present writer remembers an excellent Greek etcles of whom Mrs. King speaks with deserved praise—and name she misspells with a consistency worthy of a better —telling him that if he wished to see Jerusalem proper
must do it "through Greek spectacles." Dr. Liddon's party seem to have followed this advice completely. It is, as we have said, usual for clergymen of the Church of England to cast their lot in wholly and unreservedly with the Greek Church ; but we have often ,kbildered why. To say nothing of other Protestant communions, at which the Anglican nose turns up in instinctive disdain, the Latin—or, as we call it, the Roman Catholic—Church is far more free from degrading supersti- tions than its Greek neighbour in Palestine, and certainly more tolerant. We find Mrs. King saying, for instance, that the Church of the Nativity at Bethlehem, "like the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, is divided between many nations, the Greek Church holding here, as elsewhere, all the most im- portant sites. This seems right, as it is the Orthodox Church of the East. The Latins are very jealous, and the French have, no doubt for political reasons, pushed the Latin claim, making religion a catspaw to serve worldly considerations." Now, there are undoubtedly political reasons at the bottom of the French support of the Latin Catholic Church ; but to represent this fact as in any way singular is a gross injustice. The Greek Church in Palestine is as thoroughly political a body as, say, the Liberation Society in England, and the Patriarch of Jerusalem is, next to the Russian Ambassador at Constantinople, the most directly accredited agent of the Court of St. Petersburg in the Turkish Empire. Perhaps it was some Russophil priest who suggested to Mrs. King that a Polish refugee was "probably a Nihilist, as he told us that, for political reasons, he could never return home." Many a patriotic Pole, who has come under the ban of the most suspicious Government on the face of the earth, might say the same; but a Polish Nihilist is about as common a character as a Scotch Fenian.
There are not many descriptions to be found in the book before us, but of two scenes at least which are very rarely witnessed by English travellers, we have very fall and in- teresting pictures. One of these was the Greek Easter service, followed by the banquet given by the Patriarch to distin- guished members of the congregation ; another much more out-of-the-way performance, which only a very fortunate few have ever witnessed, was the Mahommedan festival at Neby Mousa, from which all but true believers are excluded with the utmost rigour. All the ordinary traveller knows of Neby Mousa is the distant view he gets from Jericho of a little white dome on a height to the west of the Dead Sea. The Mahommedans say that Moses was buried there ; the Pales- tine Exploration Committee say that is all nonsense, but then they are old-fashioned people who believe in the Book of Deuteronomy. It is strange, by-the-way, that at a time when Wellhausen, Knenen, and Company are supposed to have de- stroyed the Old Testament as completely as Mrs. Humphry Ward has abolished Christianity, so influential a body should continue to direct their researches by the accounts contained in that tissue of asserted myths and forgeries. Perhaps it is because their secretary is a distinguished novelist, and they consequently have an expert's knowledge that the Bible stories are more firmly constructed and hang together better than the legends evolved out of the imaginative brain of M. Renan; perhaps, being learned men, they are aware that history as it actually happens is always the merest foolishness, and that no one rewriting it out of his own head would make such ludicrously impossible things happen. But the Mahommedans care as little for the Palestine Exploration Fund as for the new criticism, and they are quite decided that Moses was buried at this spot, whither it is therefore desirable to make pilgrimages. The Bedouin sheikh under whose protection Dr. Liddon and his party travelled, said to them : "The twenty-one years I have arranged for travellers to pass through this country, I have never known a Christian camp here, and I do not believe any Christian has ever been present during the pilgrimage." People of this kind always make—as is natural—a great fuss about the dangers that travellers run, and their own power of protecting them ; but we believe that in this case the sheikh did not say more than the truth. At any rate, we never before heard of any occasion when Christians were present, nor did we believe it possible. Mrs. King's account of the scene at Neby Mousa is, to our mind, undoubtedly the best thing in the book, but we will not spoil the reader's appetite by quoting from it.
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