St. Maximos' Hut

Christianity permits and sanctions the drinking of wine; ande of all the holy brethren in Palestine there are none who hold fast to this gladsome rite so strenuously as the monks of Damascus, not that they are more zealous Christians than the rest of their fellows in the Holy Land, but that they have better wine. Whilst I was at Damascus, I had my quarters at the Franciscan convent there; amd very soon after my arrival I asked one of the monks to let me know something of the spots that deserved to be seen. I made my inquiry in reference to the associations which the city had with St. Paul. "There is nothing in all Damascus," said the good man, "half so well worth seeing as our cellars," and forthwith he invited me to go, see, and admire the long range of liquid treasure that he and his brethren had laid up for themselves on earth. And these, I soon found, were not as the treasures of the miser that lie in unprofitable disuse; for day by day, and hour by hour, the golden juice ascended from the dark recesses of the cellar to the uppermost brains of the friars. Dear old fellows! in the midst of that solemn land, their Christian laughter rang loudly and merrily--their eyes kept flashing with joyful fire, and their heavy woolen petticoats could no more weigh down the springiness of their paces, than the filmy gauze of a danseuse can clog her bounding step.