Youthful explorers in Bible lands Author:Robert Morris Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER IV. MOUNTING THE HILLS OF DAN AND BENJAMIN. Dog of Adoption — Native Horses—Wely — ELLIOT'S DIARY. Honeysuckle Glen, Thursday, March 18,1869.... more » II A. M. WHEN we left Lydda, this morning, a young dog followed us out of town, as if wanting to make one of our party. I fed him and tied a piece of ribbon around his neck, and named him Sweet-Home. The dogs here are mangy and poor, when they get to any age. They don't belong to anybody. They have to fight for a living, and are welted with scars. Their tails and ears look miserable. Sweet-Home is not old enough yet for a warrior. If he behaves well, I will take him to America and make a.freed- man of him. The puppies here are sleek and beautiful; but the dogs, horrid. The ancient Jews used to make dogs useful in watching houses and guarding flocks, but I don't see them at it now. Hungry and half wild, they seem to be all the time yearning to eat. No wonder the Mohammedans call them unclean. They are unclean if there is anything unclean. I noticed, yesterday, in Joppa, a big, mangy dog sleeping right across the sidewalk. Every native, man and woman, walked around him, so as not to let their dresses touch him. If their clothes had touched him I suppose it would have been necessary to wash (hem. But I made the fellow hop, with my almond cane. I don't walk around a dog, if I know myself. You can't insult anybody in this country so much as to call him kelb — that is, dog. So it was in Bible times. In I Samuel xxiv: 14, and many other places, this is seen. The Mohammedans call all us Christians, dogs, when they dare do it. Some dogs go to Mecca every year with the pilgrims, and then they call them hadjis. Sweet-Home has the ears and head of a prairie wolf. He is small, sharp-nosed, red-colored, with a short tail. I will ...« less