ALTNEULAND

Organ of the Zionist Commission for the Exploration of Palestine

It is no easy task to give a yearly survey of the progress of our present work in Palestine: development goes forward so slowly, our activity is so slight, that particular landmarks of a forward movement, such as would stand out from everyday life and furnish points of departure for the history of the year, are scarcely noticeable. Whereas in the past year we were able to record a considerable advance over a longer preceding period — an advance traceable on the one hand to the founding of the Anglo-Palestine Cy., on the other to the extension of the older colonies of Baron v. Rothschild and the establishment of some new ones — of the year just past we can say that in its course there is to be recorded, in some cases, only a first start toward new successful activity, but in other cases unfortunately a decline in development as well, or at the least a standstill which is hardly to be distinguished from a decline.

In the foreground of interest in the old colonies — which, as is well known, are chiefly engaged in viticulture — stood, and still stands, the wine question. The manufacture of wine is concentrated, as our readers will be aware, in the two great wine-cellars of Baron von Rothschild, of which the cellars of Rishon le Zion are distinguished by their especial importance, since they lie in the midst of the wine-growing colonies of Judaea. On the Rishon cellar