ARMAGEOON MAY BE BATTLE SCENE.

Pahiatua Herald, Volume XXII, Issue 5851, 26 September 1917, Page 7

ARMAGEOON MAY BE BATTLE SCENE.

(WILLIAM T. ELLIS, in ‘ Boston Transcript.”) British troops are now marching northward through Palestine. Their objective is the overthrow of the Syrian Arnj(p , long commanded by Djemal Pasha, and now centring in the oldest living city in the world, Damascus. After the Syrian Army lias been dealt with, the British troops, which drove the enemy from t 1 Sinai Peninsula, thus making safe the Suez Canal, will seek to effect a junction with the forces from Bagdad. As the Allied soldiers converge on Aleppo, which is the great railway centre up near the head of the Mediterranean, they will meet increasing opposition, for they will he drawing nearer to the Turco-Teutonic base of Constantinople. The Syrian Army will doubtless try to intercept the foe at a convenient place. Tt is clear that the junction of he opposing forces wil be nowhere else than the plain of Megiddo, or Armaggedon. where the old Haifa Railway to Damascus is joinel by the new railway down through railway junction, on the route between Suez and Damascus, even as it was a meeting place of the great highways between Egypt and Assyria, in the days when Pharoah Nac-ho and Josiali. King of Israel. fought thereon. Because the east and west met at Armageddon, this plain won tig fame as a battleground of empire. tTwelve miles west at its greatest width, and more than forty miles long measured from the Mediterranean to T 1 -"> River, the

great plain of Megiddo. or of Esdraelon. as it is more commonly called, is a rare battlefield, which soldiers from the days of the Pharoahs iml the Ceasars to Napoleon and Kitchener have praised and utilised. It is easily located on any Bible map or other sketch of Palestine, on the border between the •hills' of Calilee and the hills of Samaria. Nazareth, the bovhood home of Jesus, loiks down on it from its northern edge. Through the plain of Armageddon and past the town of Mogiddo, from wlreh the name is derived runs the French railroad which links Haifa with pjiniascus. and over which myriads of American tourists have ridden, not all of them know im that Armageddon lay before ttheir eyes. Here it was that ‘‘the stars in their courses fought against Sisera.” and victorious Deborah sang her famous song. ’’"ip it was that the Arabs—immemorial invaders of this fertile plain—or Midianites. as the Bible ('alls them. met. defeat at the hands of flidr-'U and his 300. Here it was that King Saul fought with the Philistines, in his last battle. his son Jonathan dying with him on the field. Here his successor. David, sang his lament over his heart’s comrade. Here it was that Pharoah Xeelio slek King 'Jos'ah. and Jeremiah wrote his dirge over the dead king. Here the Romans maintained a garrison and fought many battles; and here also Cleopatra cattle with Mark Antony. Here came the Christian pilgrims to dwell, in the fourth century, and hither swept the devastating hordes of Mohammedanism, in the seventh century. Here the crusaders planted their fortresses. and here .Richard the Lion-hearted fought with Saladin the chivalrous. Here Napoleon began liis famous retreat. Cpon this spot, at the present moment. the opposing armies of the British and of the Turco-Teutons