Kirriemuir. Upon this judgment the united presbyteries of Dundee, Forfar, and Meigle, dissolved it from Kirremuir, and annexed it quoad sacra, to the parish of Monifieth. Previous to this, however, it would appear that it had belonged to it quoad civilia; for the proprietor of the castle was assessed, along with the other comardir of Monifieth, for repairs to the parish church. The last public act recorded, in connection with the parishchurch of North Ferry, is that of the induction by archbishop Sharp of Mr. Robert Lundin, a younger son of Mr. Lundin of Straaverley, to the second charge in the collegiate church of Dysart. The ceremony of induction, by the archbishop in person, took place within the walls of this church, of which not a stone now remains, in the month of September, 1669. Soon after this date the parish was suppressed, the eastern part being annexed to Monifieth, and the western to Dundee. A Roman camp is said to have covered the hill of Balgillo, at which the English garrison of Broughty erected their new fort. The station is supposed to be the Ad Tavum of the itineraries, and to have been filled by that division of Agricola's army, consisting of four thousand men, which previously occupied the camp at Cattermillie. (See Cumming's "Forfarshire Illustrated.")

THE MOUNTAINS OF THE BIBLE.
No. VI.

BY DR. WILKINSON.
ZION, MORIAH, ACRA, &c.

THE ancient city of Jerusalem covered four or five distinct eminences-Zion on the south-west, 'Moriah and Ophel on the east, Acra and Be zetha on the north-occupying altogether a much larger space than the modern city. On three sides, at least, a deep valley separates them from the circumjacent heights-the celebrated mount of Olives, and the other mountains which stand round about Jerusalem. The height of these eminences from their immediate base is not great; but they are themselves elevated upon a broad mountain ridge, running on, without interruption, from the plain of Esdraelon until, in the vicinity of Hebron, about thirty miles south of Jerusaleni, it attains an elevation of nearly 3,000 feet above the level of the Mediterranean sea. How intense an interest is attached to all these mountains, it is needless to remark. Here was "the city of the great King" here did he manifest his presence for many ages in a very especial manner. Here was our Lord crucified: from hence did he arise, and go forth as a mighty conqueror over death and the grave. We will notice them in

order.

1. Mount Zion. On this was built the city of David. The tribes of Judah and Benjamin had long before taken possession of the northern and lower parts of Jerusalem, then called Jebus; but it was reserved for the victorious arms of the son of Jesse, at the commencement of his reign, as is well known to those who are conversant with sacred history, to capture the stronghold of Zion, and to expel the Jebusites altogether. He then enlarged, and fortified it, and finally placed upon

it, in a tent, or tabernacle prepared for the purpose, the symbol of the divine presence-the ark of God. Hence it was called the " holy hill of Zion;" whither "the tribes went up-the tribes of the Lord unto the testimony of Israel-to give thanks unto the name of the Lord;" and "God's hill, in which it delighted him to dwell." Hence the frequent allusions to it, in the devotional poetry of David. Hence, too, the metaphorical use of the name of this mountain, to denote not only Israel after the flesh, but the church of God in all future ages, whether in earth or heaven; for "we are come," says the apostle," to Mount Zion, the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem."

Mount Zion is stated by modern travellers to be about a mile in circumference. The highest part of it is on the west side. Towards the east it falls down in broad terraces on the upper part of the mountain, and narrow ones on the side as it slopes down towards the brook Kedron. Each of these terraces is divided from the one above it by a low stone wall built of the ruins of this celebrated spot. Those near the bottom of the hill are still used as gardens, and are watered from the "pool of Siloam." The numerous springs and watercourses of Jerusalem doubtless imparted much fertility to the rich alluvial soil of the valleys in which the Jews had gardens, which likewise included their burying-places, according to the custom of the east. On the opposite side of the mountain are the upper and lower pools of Gihon, provided by the early sovereigns of Judah for supplying the city with water, which was conveyed to it by an aqueduct that can still be traced. The lower pool, which must have been of very considerable size, about 600 feet by 250, and formed in a singular manner by throwing a massy wall across the lower end of the valley, is at present much dilapidated, and perfectly dry. The upper pool is in a more perfect condition; its strong walls being unbroken, and the steps into it from the corners nearly entire. It contains water. The situation of this pool is interesting, as having been the spot where the prophet Isaiah was commanded to meet Ahaz, and where he gave utterance to that memorable prediction: "Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son" (Isa. vii. 3). Here, too, it was that Rabshakeh, the Assyrian captain, stood to reproach the living God; and from this spot that he addressed "the men that sat upon the wall" (2 Kings xviii. 17). Here, too, it was, at a period much prior to these occurrences, that "Zadok the priest and Nathan the prophet anointed Solomon king" over Israel; and this valley was made to resound with the cry, "God save king Solomon" (1 Kings i. 38). Only a part of Mount Zion is included within the walls of the present city; but the ancient city, as already hinted, evidently covered the whole, and, doubtless, owed its security to the deep ravine by which it was encompassed, in addition to the strong and high towers with which it was enclosed and flanked completely around. Such was then "the stronghold of the daughter of Zion;" but what is it now? "Zion shall be ploughed as a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps" (Micah iii. 12). The present aspect of what was once the "joy of the whole earth" does, indeed, bear melancholy but

is most striking to see them in the country, of which they are the rightful masters, and, above all, in their own metropolis, is more astonishing still. Crushed, for century after century, by every species of insult and degradation, alike by infidels and professed Christians, having bowed their head time after time to persecution and rapine and massacre, there are they to be found, still as separate and distinct a people as when first introduced into it by Joshua; still unsubdued; still looking out, with a patience which no time can exhaust, for the Deliverer to come to Zion. And to be enabled to hold communication with and to assist his brethren at Jerusalem, to be permitted to visit the holy city, to obtain perchance a burying-place in the valley of Jehoshaphat, are among the first wishes of a devout Jew in every part of the world: "I will not make a full end of thee:" "There is hope in thine end, saith the Lord" (Jer. xlvi. 18; xxxi. 17).

CASTLE*.

A DIMINUTIVE of castra, denoting a small camp or fortification: hence a fortified house or resi

dence, a chateau. In the present state of the English language, "castle" is applied only to a large pile of fortified and embattled buildings. It may be doubted if the word has exactly this import in scripture; for castles, in this sense of the term, came in conjointly with the feudal ages; though fortresses, towers, strongholds, and fortified cities, are mentioned in the bible. In some instances the word "castle" seems equivalent to the classic name "acropolis," which signifies a fortified hill or eminence, the original settlement and cradle of a city (1 Chron. xi. 5, 7). The castle in the sacred writings, with which it is important that the student should be acquainted, is that into which Paul was carried by the Romans, when rescued from the fury of his excited countrymen (Acts xxi. 84, 37; xxii. 24; xxiii. 10). This was the fort Antonia, so named in honour of Mark Antony, by king Herod, who constructed it out of an earlier stronghold, erected for the protection of the temple by John Hyrcanus (135 A.C.). It stood at the north-western angle of the temple, and, from its position, must have been intended to guard against internal commotion rather than external violence. Here, accordingly, was it that the Roman guard had their head quarters, in the times of the New Testament. From the era of Hyrcanus, here had the official vestments of the high priests, the Jewish regalia, been preserved, as in a place of safety; which, however, the Jews, under the Roman sway, found could be converted into a place of detention. They therefore employed constant efforts until they regained the custody of them in the days of the president Vitellius. "The tower of Antonia," says Josephus, was situated at the corner of two cloisters of the court of the temple, of that on the west and that on the north. It was erected upon a rock fifty cubits in height, and was on a great precipice. Before you come to the tower itself, there was a wall three cubits high: within that wall all the space of the tower Antonia itself was

From the "People's Dictionary."

built upon, to the height of forty cubits. The inward parts had the largeness and form of a palace, it being parted into all kinds of rooms and other conveniences, such as courts and places for bathing, and broad places for camps. As the entire structure resembled a tower, it contained also four other distinct towers at its four corners. On the corner where it joined to the two cloisters of the temple, it had passages down to them both, through which the guard (for there always lay in this tower a Roman legion) went several ways among the cloisters with their arms on Jewish festivals, in order to watch the people, that they might not there attempt to make any innovations; for the temple was a fortress that guarded the city, as was the tower of Antonia a guard to the temple" (Jew. War, v. 5, 8).

The last words are a striking comment on the record in which Paul's apprehension is narrated. There we find the Roman guard making its appearance on a juncture of the very kind spoken of by the Jewish historian. Terms, too, are used in the Acts which have a peculiar propriety. The fort is spoken of simply as "the castle," its ordiknown. nary name, the name by which it was generally A description of so well known a place was not needful; but in what circumstances not needful? Josephus, in writing his history, judged a description needful, and gave one. Let the reader mark the difference between the historian of the book of Acts and the historian of the Jewish war. The latter wrote for the Romans, and when Jerusalem had been levelled to the ground. On these accounts a description was necessary. Besides, Josephus was, so to speak, a professional historian, having such models as Thucydides and Livy before his eyes. Luke was a simple chronicler, recording facts with no other aim than to say the simple truth in the fewest words. But had even so inartificial an author written when the Jewish temple and polity had come to an end, or written with a view to "strangers and foreigners,' he would scarcely have failed to add, after the manner of Josephus, some explanatory details. A writer in these days, speaking of London, and in the main to citizens of the metropolis, might with propriety talk of "the Tower," without risk of being misunderstood; but if the city and the Tower lay in ruins, and if he had in view readers who were personally unacquainted with its localities into a description of "the Tower," should he have and structures, he would then be drawn to enter occasion to mention it.

This is a corroboration of the credibility of "the Acts of the Apostles," on a minute, unobvious, and therefore important point. But the corroboration goes yet further. The account in Josephus shows that the fort lay on an eminence, and had a communication with the courts of the temple by an ascent. In the temple it was that the uproar against Paul began. His enemies dragged him from the temple into its cloisters or the immediate vicinity. Hither came the Roman guard, and bore Paul away. These particulars are congruous with themselves, and with the record in both historians. But the words, "tidings came unto the chief captain,' "conceal another point of agreement with fact. In the original it is, "a report went up." On receiving this report, the soldiers "ran down unto" (literally, upon)

"them." So also in xxi. 35, we find: "When he" (Paul) “came upon the stairs" flight of steps, or ascent, leading up into the castle. Paul's position, too (v. 40), "on" (or on the top of) "the stairs," while addressing the people, is thus explained. In equal accordance is it that, when the harangue was finished, the captain ordered Paul to be brought into the castle, the apostle being already on or near the top of "the stairs," where only could he have hoped to address the raging multitude in safety. Another instance is found (xxii. 30), where Paul is "brought down to be set before the Jewish Sanhedrim. And when a great dissension arose in this grave council, "the chief captain, fearing Paul should have been pulled in pieces of them, commanded the soldiers to go down, and bring him into the castle." To say nothing of the faithful picture here given of the explosive turbulence of priest and people, we ask whether these verbal coincidences are not very remarkable? whether it is likely they would have existed, had not the author written from a knowledge of actual facts? One, or even two such, might have been ascribed to accident. Those which we have indicated are too numerous and too marked not to prove that Luke's narrative emanated from an eye-witness: not improbably that eye-witness was the prisoner himself, who had had good reason to be minutely acquainted with the localities, and whose language, in describing the events, would undesignedly take its shape from the peculiar features of the several places.

EARLY RECOLLECTIONS.

SOME recollections haunt us through all the chances and changes of our existence. Some early memory walks with us, step by step, through the paths of the green earth: it clings to us in sickness and in sorrow it dwells with us in sunshine and in shade, perhaps giving tone and colour to the circumstances by which we are surrounded, and often, very often thus influencing our actions in every stage of life. It may be the noise of the foaming wave, or the glimpse we catch of the sweet violet underneath the hedge, which brings back our first remembered grief, or our earliest joy-but there it is; and, in an instant, to each one of us is the page of the past opened; and clearly does the scene stand forth from among those never-fading pictures, drawn by the keen observation and the simple truthfulness of childhood. Would not parents do well to make these first pictures in life, these recollections which go with us even to the grave, as pleasant and profitable as possible to those whom they so fondly love? Happy are the children who by such remembrances do not weaken their affection for the absent, or, worse than this, cannot wound the memory of the dead.

I seldom open my bible but I feel grateful for the early care which allows me now to associate my first thoughts of that holy book with pleasant remembrances. No weary task rises up before me; no toilsome repetition ill understood; no soiled page, blotted with my tears; no sad, sad punishmentlesson; but, instead of these, memory on which I love to dwell, and, among them, the kind look and the gentle tone of commendation that rewarded any voluntary exertion of reading or re

petition. A privilege and a pleasure I felt it was, in those first days of life, to pore upon the large print of our old family-bible, and to spend hours, happy hours too, in, most literally, spelling over those simple and beautiful histories of scripture, while the sunbeams, I well remember, when in my favourite nook in a western window, not unfrequently illuminated the page. How suitable the gilding for the book!

Nor do I ever read the 23rd Psalm, but early recollections steal over me; and I am in an instant, by the magic of memory, transported to the home of my childhood; and the hour, brief and bright, when I first heard those sacred words, shines out vividly from the midst of the surrounding obscurity. I do not think I have an earlier recollection than this; for after it there comes a blank, a dimness; and then life begins to tell its continuous story.

Let me look back through these long, long years, and recall that hour. The sketch, though slight, will be truthful, for I have treasured up the memory of it, day after day, and year after year.

It must have been a winter's evening I suppose, for a large bright fire burned before us; and it seems to me I have never seen so bright a fire since our table was drawn close to it. The night may have been cold; but it was not stormy, for I well remember the stillness without and within. The day was not an ordinary one: probably it was a sabbath evening, for there seemed to be a calmness in the very atmosphere, a hush upon my young spirit. The room is indistinct to me-dream-like. I have no recollection even of familiar furniture: all else is in the back-ground, save that brightly polished table, the glowing fire, and the group beside it. I could at this moment, were I there, point out the very spot where my mother sat: my father was opposite to her; and before him lay open, upon the table, what seemed to my inexperienced comprehension of size, a large, very large book; while I, a little child, stood by his side. And young indeed I must have been, when I recollect I was alone by that hearth which has since been gladdened by many a childish tone. Yet, such as I was, I well remember there was a strong sense of comfort, of happiness, of "fire-side enjoyment," at my young heart at that moment. In the very fulness of this feeling, I recollect looking gladly on all things around; and all things, too, seemed to look smilingly back upon me.

My father was reading "The Lord is my shepherd: I shall not want." And beautiful, inexpres sibly beautiful, did these words, and each succeeding one, seem to me. The imagery-thus far a child of the country-was within my comprehension, and it was at once understood. "The green pastures, the still waters,' were they not my daily companions? Even "the valley of the shadow of death" thus presented, brought no terror to my young imagination. While, with a loved mother near, where is the child who would not in a moment feel the force and fondness of that home simile, the prepared table, the cup that runneth over"?

And I first heard and felt these sublime words, surrounded by the halo of affection; and O this is a glorious light to shine upon early impressions! the domestic affections beautifully interpret the