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to wreak their malice and satisfy the spirit of revenge without the aid of Pilate, he is brought before the governor, who being assured of his innocence, and finding he was a Galilean, sent Him to Herod, the site of whose palace is still pointed out. Here he was mocked by the cruel emblems of royalty, being set at naught by Herod's men of war!

In the meantime, the traitor Judas, consciencestricken, has cast down before his employers the reward of his fearful iniquity; and driven by despair to the Mount of Olives, has there laid violent hands upon his own life. The place of this awful suicide is still pointed out at no great distance from the peaceful village which his betrayed Master loved so well.

From Herod's palace, he is sent again to Pilate, who, satisfied of his innocence, brings him out to the enraged multitude, with the memorable words, "Behold the man! I find no fault in him." But they who, a short time before, shouted "Hosanna!" now shout with greater vehemence, "Crucify him! crucify him!" Like a lamb to the slaughter he is led through the "Sorrowful Way," that Via Dolorosa which has long been venerated as the path from a court without justice to a death without mercy! The street which bears this sad descriptive name, extends by a crooked course from the palace of the Roman governor to Calvary. It has

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SUPERSTITIOUS TRADITIONS.

for centuries been annually travelled by Christian pilgrims, whose easy credulity has made them accept as truth traditions for which there is no satisfactory proof; but, at the same time, it may be conceded, that they need not all be set aside as utterly improbable. Our faith, indeed, was not sufficiently strong to arrest our steps at these separate places, while we gave way to devout thoughts and remembrances, such as filled our hearts on the Mount of Olives, at Bethany, Gethsemane, and in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. But it may not be uninteresting to you, to see what impressions are produced by them upon those whose religious discipline has caused them to be, not more devout we trust, but certainly more easy of belief. "Come along with me," says De Geramb, a Trappist monk, "to the Road of the Cross, and let thoughts of grief, repentance, gratitude, and love, accompany our steps. Nine of the fourteen stations are in the streets, forming the Via Dolorosa, so that the pilgrim is obliged to refrain from all external signs of piety, if he would avoid the insults and outrages of which Turkish fanaticism is not sparing. To satisfy their devotion in some trifling degree, most of the pilgrims seek to touch by stealth the object which marks the station, though frequently covered with spittle, and then to lay their hand upon their heart.

"The first station in the Road of the Cross begins

PILGRIM STATIONS.

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at the very spot where the last in the Way of the Captivity ends; that is, at the Lithostrotos, called in the Hebrew Gabbatha, where Jesus was condemned to die upon the cross.

"The second station is on the spot where Jesus, delivered up to his implacable enemies, was hurried away through a furious mob, loading him with imprecations, to be burdened with his cross, which he was to bear to Calvary. There is nothing to indicate the exact point of this station.

"To reach the third, you must pass under the arcade of the Ecce Homo. At the end of the street, turning to the left, near a Turkish bath, you come to a prostrate column of red marble, which, according to tradition, marks the spot where our Saviour fainted for the first time under the weight of the instrument of his execution.

"Forty paces farther, you enter a street which leads to the Via Dolorosa, in which there was formerly a church, known by the name of Notre Dame des Sept-Douleurs: this is the fourth station. On this spot it was that Mary, thrust back by the soldiers, met her Son toiling under the weight of the ignominious wood on which he was about to die. Without making explicit mention of this meeting, the evangelists infer it in their narratives, by showing us the blessed Virgin on Calvary, at the moment of the death of Jesus; and this tradition dates from high antiquity.

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HOUSE OF VERONICA,

"Sixty paces farther begins the fifth station, at the foot of the hill which leads to Golgotha. Here it was that Christ, exhausted by his long sufferings, stumbled; and that the Jews, eager for his blood, stopped a Cyrenian, and forced him to bear the cross. And, as they led him away, they laid hold upon one Simon, a Cyrenian, coming out of the country, and on him they laid the cross, that he might bear it after Jesus.'

“Proceeding about eighty paces, you come to the sixth station. It is the house of Veronica, or, more correctly speaking, the spot on which stood that house, the very ruins of which have disappeared, and on which is now seen the dwelling of a Greek family. You are shown the place where (according to an oft-confuted tradition) a heroic woman, forcing her way through the soldiers and the crowd which surrounded Jesus, and throwing herself at his feet, wiped his distorted features, the impression of which was left upon the cloth which had touched the august face of the Saviour of the world.

"About one hundred paces from the house of St. Veronica, is the Judgment Gate, through which malefactors passed who were to be executed on Calvary. This gate is walled up for half its height; behind, you can perceive the stone pillar on which the sentence of Pilate was posted. It is upright, and may be seen at a distance.

WAY TO CALVARY.

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"It is about eighty paces from the Judgment Gate to the place where Jesus fell, for the second time, under the weight of his cross.

It is marked by an incision made in a stone in the wall.

"From the Judgment Gate to the top of Calvary, the ascent begins to be steeper. The eighth station. is about thirty fathoms from the preceding. It may be known by a thick column, placed before a doorway of mean appearance, and which is walled up. It was there that Christ spoke to the women of Jerusalem, who were shedding tears over his fate, and exhorted them to weep not for him, but for themselves and their children.

"The way which formerly led to Calvary, and along which our Saviour passed, no longer exists; it is covered with houses, amidst which is the ninth station, likewise marked by a thick column, the approach to which, Turkish fanaticism has taken delight to render disagreeable, by heaping up filth against it for the purpose of keeping off the Christians.

"The tenth and the last four stations are in the immense Church of the Holy Sepulchre."

I have given this account abridged from the words of Father De Geramb, a monk of the monastery of Notre Dame de la Trappe, as well as the narration of the singular ceremonies at the other "stations" in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, to show the interest which many still have in the