Evening Republican, Volume 18, Number 301, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 December 1914 — A DISAPPOINTING CITY [ARTICLE]

A DISAPPOINTING CITY

Probably no modern city is/more disappointing to the expectant/traveler than is Jerusalem. We think of it in its ancient glory; we picture to our imagination the magnificient temple with its golden roof and the -other buildings of the hill of Zion. Wfe read of its being the rendezvous in Passover times of a million pilgrims, and we naturally think of it as an enormous city, oomparable to London or New York of the present day. We think of it in its Oriental setting of two thousand years ago, but as we approach in a modern railway train, and dlmb the steep ascent which leads to the city behind ah American engine, our illusion disappears. ' At last the guard calls-out “Jerusalem!" and we disembarks mile from the city, get into a rickety modern hack, which has evidently done duty In some more civilised community, and are bounced over the rough roads and the intolerable cobblestones within the gates, until, at last, we are landed at our modern hotel, so different from the khan of ancient times. And here ow disillusion has begun. JThe city of which we read of accommodating a million guests on the feast days could hardly to-day entertain a thousand strangers within its walls, and, since a multitude of pilgrims come every year from Russia and Italy and France and Germany, these nations have erected great hostels outside the walls for the accomodation of pilgrims. But these, fine and even magnificent as they are, take us not back to the Jerusalem of two thousand years ago, but tell us only of the modern city where half a dozen great nations are bonding these hostels and hospitals tn order to gain political and commercial advantage, and patiently awaiting the time when they can oust tram Ms possession the Turk who has so long held sway within the sacred rtty. —The Christian Herald Marriage la always a failure when the woman in the case is unable to distinguish between the husband’s peace of mind and a piece of her own.