APPENDIX B. JACOB'S WELL. JACOB'S Well, as may be seen from the diagram giving a section of it on p. 153, at present stands below a ruined chamber or vault, which, in its turn, appears to have been beneath the pavement of a cruciform church built over it in early times. This church is mentioned by Jerome as built by the Lady Paula, and Arculphus describes it in A.D. 700. All that is now seen on the surface of the ground, as shown in our engraving on p. 149, is an aperture leading into the small ruined chamber built above the mouth of the well. Although in this picture, in order to give the reader a graphic and realistic idea of the meeting of our Saviour and the woman of Samaria, a weary Fellahh is shown sitting beside the opening into the chamber, and a Fellahhah approaching with her heavy waterpot poised on her head and her leather bucket and rope in her hand, the well is not now used. For the greater part of the year it is quite dry, though during the spring rains it holds at times some water, and at others wet mud, which accounts for travellers having heard a splash when, at this season of the year, they have dropped stones into it. The diameter is 7 feet 6 inches. The upper portion is "built in with neatly dressed and squared stones like the masonry of the wells of Beersheba," but the lower portion is "hewn, to all appearance, out of the solid rock." All this may be seen, as Dr. Tristram saw it, by descending through the hole in the roof of the chamber to the mouth of the well and letting down in succession lighted twists of paper. When, in 1866, Captain Anderson descended to the T bottom, it was 75 feet deep, and Major Conder found it the same in 1872, and both observed that it was choked up below with stones. When, on the occasion of Bishop Barclay's visit in 1881, a boy was let down into it, the depth was reported to be only 67 feet, so largely—if this last measure is to be trusted, about which I feel some doubt had the zeal or folly of pilgrims increased the pile of stones at the bottom. Dean Stanley speaks of the site as "absolutely undisputed," and it is a remarkable unanimity to find Jews, Samaritans, Mohammedans, and all the numerous and discordant sects of Christians agreeing in this identification. Still all that such a consensus of opinion goes to prove is that the original well was somewhere in this immediate neighbourhood. It is much to be desired that the immense mass of stones which have accumulated during ages should be taken out, and the whole structure cleaned and repaired, and the source whence the water is derived discovered. At present this last is unknown, and everything as to the genuineness of the well depends upon it. Strangely enough, the question of the water supply seems to have been overlooked by all who have explored or written about this interesting ruin, whilst most of them have too hastily accepted it as undoubtedly genuine. Major Conder says it is dry in summer, and accounts for its "occasionally" having "as much as two fathoms of water" in the rainy season, by the "whole depth" being "cut through alluvial soil and soft rock receiving water by infiltration through the sides." But such a source of water is comparatively valueless in the Holy Land, because the amount received by infiltration is in almost all instances very small, and entirely fails just when it is wanted, in the hot season. 1 Palestine Exploration Fund Quarterly Statement. July 1881, p. 212. There are but few deep wells of this kind in Palestine, especially in the mountains, most "wells" here being huge but comparatively shallow underground water cisterns, consisting of square chambers hewn in the rock, and lined with a strong coat of cement, in which the surface rain-water is collected in the winter and stored up for use during the rest of the year. The name of such a water cistern in Arabic is beer, evidently the beair of the Hebrew Old Testament, the word most frequently translated "well" in our Version. On the low maritime plains, as at Joppa and in the wadies south of Gaza, the few wells sunk like ours to find spring water are comparatively shallow. "A well of living waters (Cant. iv. 15), that is, "a well of spring water," must ever have been uncommon in Palestine, and it is rare indeed in the central limestone range that water can be tapped at 80 or 90 feet, or even at a much greater depth. The well-watered valley of Shechem may prove an exception; but unless a spring can be found when this well is thoroughly cleaned and repaired, it surely cannot be the one dug by that shrewd and prosperous Jewish sheep-master and herdsman of whom the woman of Samaria said, "Our father Jacob gave us the well, and drank thereof himself, and his sons, and his cattle" (John iv. 12). 3 7 II Barber shaving a customer's head. By JAMES CLARK BY JAMES CLARK Fellahhat, or peasant women, showing dark blue robe. By Bedaween Arab Sheikh mounted. Fellahh and wife going to market. By JAMES CLARK Palestine village. By JAMES CLARK. By FREDERIC SHIELDS Bedaween seated on the ground. By JAMES CLARK Sitting, ancient modes of. By JAMES CLARK 75 79 93 95 Public crier on the housetop. By JAMES CLARK 107 |