Palestine at the turn of the 19th century was a very different place than it is today. Like most of the world, it was much emptier. Nowadays, entire countries have little or no wilderness, and human settlement encroaches everywhere. Just north in Lebanon, for example, urban settlement is quickly decimating the fields and hills of the Mediterranean coastline. In the Palestine of 1900, human life existed in pockets, surrounded by the wildness of the arid lands.