After Supper I Was Ready To Go Down To The River, Not More Than A Hundred Yards From Our Lodging-Place.

When we started, our host stepped to a corner of the room, picked up a gun, and prepared to go with us.

I told my dragoman to tell him not to go with us. The reply was, "He will go with us." "Well," I said, "if he must go make him put down that gun; it will spoil my evening of quiet thought at the sacred river." The answer was: "Make no further objection. Have you not noticed that everybody here carries a gun? He knows what he is doing. This is the most disreputable place along the river. Those Bedouins of the black tents that we passed over yonder would want no better opportunity than to find you, who are expected to have money, alone at the bridge." I accepted the situation, and said, "All right, but I shall expect you both to be obedient to the extent of giving me a period of quiet as long as I wish to remain."

But, before we go to the bridge, let me tell of that night in that miserable place of filth. At the time of retiring my host said to me through my interpreter that I could have choice of beds - that I could either sleep on the counter, which consisted of a couple of boards laid carelessly across boxes, or that I could sleep behind the counter on the floor! After looking at the boards, and thinking what would likely be the result should I attempt to sleep there, I made choice of the floor. The room then became my BEDROOM.

Oh, that night! I did not sleep a half-hour. The place seemed alive with vermin. My host slept on the counter. He did not seem to be annoyed in the least. True, he scratched, but he snored an accompaniment to his scratching throughout the night. I could only scratch and listen to him; there was no snoring for me. After that night it required frequent bathing and much searching for a week or ten days before I felt free from the awful pests of that filthy den. Thus it was that my first crossing of the Jordan did not bring me to a "land of rest," but to an experience akin to distraction.

But now to the bridge. We pass quietly among the curious gazers down to the river. Just south of the bridge I go down to the river's edge and bathe my hands, face, and feet in water that only a few hours ago was in the lake where the waves were once stilled by His quiet command of power - "Peace, be still," and where He at another time walked amidst the billows to meet his own; in water that will hurry on down the valley to the place where He was baptized; and then it will pass on into oblivion in the Salt Sea of Death.

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