Free Ebooks - ORIENTAL ENCOUNTERS

ORIENTAL ENCOUNTERS

Palestine And Syria (1894-5-6)

by

MARMADUKE PICKTHALL

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| Inconsistent hyphenation in the original document has been |
| preserved. Inconsistent spellings of Arabic terms have been |
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| Obvious typographical errors have been corrected in this |
| text. For a complete list, please see the end of this |
| document. |
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London: 48 Pall Mall
W. Collins Sons & Co. Ltd.
Glasgow Melbourne Auckland
Copyright 1918

CONTENTS

CHAP. PAGE.

INTRODUCTION 1

I. RASHID THE FAIR 11

II. A MOUNTAIN GARRISON 20

III. THE RHINOCEROS WHIP 28

IV. THE COURTEOUS JUDGE 36

V. NAWADIR 45

VI. NAWADIR (_continued_) 54

VII. THE SACK WHICH CLANKED 68

VIII. POLICE WORK 77

IX. MY COUNTRYMAN 87

X. THE PARTING OF THE WAYS 96

XI. THE KNIGHT ERRANT 106

XII. THE FANATIC 117

XIII. RASHID'S REVENGE 125

XIV. THE HANGING DOG 134

XV. TIGERS 142

XVI. PRIDE AND A FALL 151

XVII. TRAGEDY 161

XVIII. BASTIRMA 171

XIX. THE ARTIST-DRAGOMAN 181

XX. LOVE AND THE PATRIARCH 188

XXI. THE UNPOPULAR LANDOWNER 198

XXII. THE CAIMMACAM 209

XXIII. CONCERNING BRIBES 218

XXIV. THE BATTLEFIELD 226

XXV. MURDERERS 237

XXVI. THE TREES ON THE LAND 245

XXVII. BUYING A HOUSE 255

XXVIII. A DISAPPOINTMENT 264

XXIX. CONCERNING CRIME AND PUNISHMENT 273

XXX. THE UNWALLED VINEYARD 282

XXXI. THE ATHEIST 291

XXXII. THE SELLING OF OUR GUN 302

XXXIII. MY BENEFACTOR 311

INTRODUCTION

Early in the year 1894 I was a candidate for one of two vacancies in
the Consular Service for Turkey, Persia, and the Levant, but failed to
gain the necessary place in the competitive examination. I was in
despair. All my hopes for months had been turned towards sunny
countries and old civilisations, away from the drab monotone of London
fog, which seemed a nightmare when the prospect of escape eluded me. I
was eighteen years old, and, having failed in one or two adventures, I
thought myself an all-round failure, and was much depressed. I dreamed
of Eastern sunshine, palm trees, camels, desert sand, as of a Paradise
which I had lost by my shortcomings. What was my rapture when my
mother one fine day suggested that it might be good for me to travel
in the East, because my longing for it seemed to indicate a natural
instinct, with which she herself, possessing Eastern memories, was in
full sympathy!

I fancy there was some idea at the time that if I learnt the languages
and studied life upon the spot I might eventually find some
backstairs way into the service of the Foreign Office; but that idea,
though cherished by my elders as some excuse for the expenses of my
expedition, had never, from the first, appealed to me; and from the
moment when I got to Egypt, my first destination, it lost whatever
lustre it had had at home. For then the European ceased to interest
me, appearing somehow inappropriate and false in those surroundings.
At first I tried to overcome this feeling or perception which, while I
lived with English people, seemed unlawful. All my education until
then had tended to impose on me the cult of the thing done habitually
upon a certain plane of our society. To seek to mix on an equality
with Orientals, of whatever breeding, was one of those things which
were never done, nor even contemplated, by the kind of person who had
always been my model.

My sneaking wish to know the natives of the country intimately, like
other unconventional desires I had at times experienced, might have
remained a sneaking wish until this day, but for an accident which
freed me for a time from English supervision. My people had provided
me with introductions to several influential English residents in
Syria, among others to a family of good position in Jerusalem; and it
was understood that, on arrival in that country, I should go directly
to that family for information and advice. But, as it chanced, on
board the ship which took me to Port Said from Naples I met a man who
knew those people intimately--had been, indeed, for years an inmate of
their house--and he assumed the office of my mentor. I stayed in
Cairo, merely because he did, for some weeks, and went with him on the
same boat to Jaffa. He, for some unknown reason--I suspect
insanity--did not want me in Jerusalem just then; and, when we landed,
spun me a strange yarn of how the people I had thought to visit were
exceedingly eccentric and uncertain in their moods; and how it would
be best for me to stop in Jaffa until he sent me word that I was sure
of welcome. His story was entirely false, I found out later, a libel
on a very hospitable house. But I believed it at the time, as I did
all his statements, having no other means of information on the
subject.

So I remained at Jaffa, in a little _gasthaus_ in the German colony,
which had the charms of cleanliness and cheapness, and there I might
have stayed till now had I awaited the tidings promised by my
counsellor. There for the first two weeks I found life very dull. Then
Mr. Hanauer, the English chaplain, and a famous antiquarian, took pity
on my solitary state, walked me about, and taught me words of Arabic.
He was a native of Jerusalem, and loved the country. My sneaking wish
to fraternise with Orientals, when I avowed it after hesitations,
appeared good to him. And then I made acquaintance with a clever
dragoman and one of the most famous jokers in all Syria, who happened
to be lodging at my little hostelry, with nothing in the world to do
but stare about him. He helped me to throw off the European and plunge
into the native way of living. With him I rode about the plain of
Sharon, sojourning among the fellahin, and sitting in the coffee-shops
of Ramleh, Lydda, Gaza, meeting all sorts of people, and acquiring the
vernacular without an effort, in the manner of amusement. From dawn to
sunset we were in the saddle. We went on pilgrimage to Nebi Rubin, the
mosque upon the edge of marshes by the sea, half-way to Gaza; we rode
up northward to the foot of Carmel; explored the gorges of the
mountains of Judaea; frequented Turkish baths; ate native meals and
slept in native houses--following the customs of the people of the
land in all respects. And I was amazed at the immense relief I found
in such a life. In all my previous years I had not seen happy people.
These were happy. Poor they might be, but they had no dream of wealth;
the very thought of competition was unknown to them, and rivalry was
still a matter of the horse and spear. Wages and rent were troubles
they had never heard of. Class distinctions, as we understand them,
were not. Everybody talked to everybody. With inequality they had a
true fraternity. People complained that they were badly governed,
which merely meant that they were left to their devices save on great
occasions. A Government which touches every individual and interferes
with him to some extent in daily life, though much esteemed by
Europeans, seems intolerable to the Oriental. I had a vision of the
tortured peoples of the earth impelled by their own misery to desolate
the happy peoples, a vision which grew clearer in the after years.
But in that easy-going Eastern life there is a power of resistance,
as everybody knows who tries to change it, which may yet defeat the
hosts of joyless drudgery.

My Syrian friend--the Suleyman of the following sketches--introduced
me to the only Europeans who espoused that life--a French Alsatian
family, the Baldenspergers, renowned as pioneers of scientific
bee-keeping in Palestine, who hospitably took a share in my
initiation. They had innumerable hives in different parts of the
country--I have seen them near the Jaffa gardens and among the
mountains south of Hebron--which they transported in due season, on
the backs of camels, seeking a new growth of flowers. For a long while
the Government ignored their industry, until the rumour grew that it
was very profitable. Then a high tax was imposed. The Baldenspergers
would not pay it. They said the Government might take the hives if it
desired to do so. Soldiers were sent to carry out the seizure. But the
bee-keepers had taken out the bottom of each hive, and when the
soldiers lifted them, out swarmed the angry bees. The soldiers fled;
and after that experience the Government agreed to compromise. I
remember well a long day's ride with Emile and Samuel Baldensperger,
round by Askelon and Ekron, and the luncheon which a village headman
had prepared for us, consisting of a whole sheep, roast and stuffed
with nuts and vegetables; and a day with Henri Baldensperger in the
Hebron region. The friendships of those days were made for life.
Hanauer, the Baldenspergers, Suleyman, and other natives of the
country--those of them who are alive--remain my friends to-day.

In short, I ran completely wild for months, in a manner unbecoming to
an Englishman; and when at length, upon a pressing invitation, I
turned up in Jerusalem and used my introductions, it was in
semi-native garb and with a love for Arabs which, I was made to
understand, was hardly decent. My native friends were objects of
suspicion. I was told that they were undesirable, and, when I stood up
for them, was soon put down by the retort that I was very young. I
could not obviously claim as much experience as my mature advisers,
whose frequent warnings to me to distrust the people of the country
thus acquired the force of moral precepts, which it is the secret joy
of youth to disobey.

That is the reason why the respectable English residents in Syria
figure in these pages as censorious and hostile, with but few
exceptions. They were hostile to my point of view, which was not then
avowed, but not to me. Indeed, so many of them showed me
kindness--particularly in my times of illness--that I cannot think of
them without a glow of friendliness. But the attitude of most of them
was never mine, and the fact that at the time I still admired that
attitude as the correct one, and thought myself at intervals a sad
backslider, made it seem forbidding. In my Oriental life they really
were, as here depicted, a disapproving shadow in the background. With
one--referred to often in these tales--I was in full agreement. We
lived together for some months in a small mountain village, and our
friendship then established has remained unbroken. But he, though not
alone, was an exception.

Owing to the general verdict on my Arab friends, I led what might be
called a double life during the months of my first sojourn in
Jerusalem; until Suleyman, the tourist season being ended, came with
promise of adventure, when I flung discretion to the winds. We hired
two horses and a muleteer, and rode away into the north together. A
fortnight later, at the foot of the Ladder of Tyre, Suleyman was
forced to leave me, being summoned to his village. I still rode on
towards the north, alone with one hired muleteer, a simple soul. A
notion of my subsequent adventures may, perhaps, be gathered from the
following pages, in which I have embodied fictionally some impressions
still remaining clear after the lapse of more than twenty years. A
record of small things, no doubt; yet it seems possible that something
human may be learnt from such a comic sketch-book of experience which
would never be derived from more imposing works.

CHAPTER I

RASHID THE FAIR

The brown plain, swimming in a haze of heat, stretched far away into
the distance, where a chain of mountains trenched upon the cloudless
sky. Six months of drought had withered all the herbage. Only
thistles, blue and yellow, and some thorny bushes had survived; but
after the torrential winter rains the whole expanse would blossom like
the rose. I traversed the plain afterwards in spring, when cornfields
waved for miles around its three mud villages, wild flowers in mad
profusion covered its waste places, and scarlet tulips flamed amid its
wheat.

Now all was desert. After riding for four days in such a landscape, it
was sweet to think upon the journey's end, the city of perennial
waters, shady gardens, and the song of birds. I was picturing the
scene of our arrival--the shade and the repose, the long, cool drinks,
the friendly hum of the bazaars--and wondering what letters I should
find awaiting me, all to the tune of 'Onward, Christian soldiers'--for
the clip-clap of a horse's hoofs invariably beats out in my brain some
tune, the most incongruous, against my will--when a sudden outcry
roused me. It came from my companion, a hired muleteer, and sounded
angry. The fellow had been riding on ahead. I now saw that he had
overtaken other travellers--two men astride of one donkey--and had
entered into conversation with them. One of the two, the hindmost, was
a Turkish soldier. Except the little group they made together, and a
vulture, a mere speck above them in the blue, no other living creature
was in sight. Something had happened, for the soldier seemed amused,
while my poor man was making gestures of despairing protest. He
repeated the loud cry which had disturbed my reverie, then turned his
mule and hurried back to meet me.

'My knife!' he bellowed 'My knife!--that grand steel blade which was
my honour!--so finely tempered and inlaid!--an heirloom in the family!
That miscreant, may Allah cut his life!--I mean the soldier--stole it.
He asked to look at it a minute, seeming to admire. I gave it, like
the innocent I am. He stuck it in his belt, and asked to see the
passport which permitted me to carry weapons. Who ever heard of such a
thing in this wild region? He will not give it back, though I
entreated. I am your Honour's servant, speak for me and make him give
it back! It is an heirloom!' That grey-haired man was crying like a
baby.

Now, I was very young, and his implicit trust in my authority
enthralled me. I valued his dependence on my manhood more than gold
and precious stones. Summoning all the courage I possessed, I clapped
spurs to my horse and galloped after the marauder.

'Give back that knife!' I roared. 'O soldier! it is thou to whom I
speak.'

The soldier turned a studiously guileless face--a handsome face, with
fair moustache and a week's beard. He had a roguish eye.

'What knife? I do not understand,' he said indulgently.

'The knife thou stolest from the muleteer here present.'

'Oh, that!' replied the soldier, with a deprecating laugh: 'That is a
thing unworthy of your Honour's notice. The rogue in question is a
well-known malefactor. He and I are old acquaintance.'

'By the beard of the Prophet, by the August Coran, I never saw his
devil's face until this minute!' bawled the muleteer, who had come up
behind me.

'Give back the knife,' I ordered for the second time.

'By Allah, never!' was the cool reply.

'Give it back, I say!'

'No, it cannot be--not even to oblige your Honour, for whose pleasure,
Allah knows, I would do almost anything,' murmured the soldier, with a
charming smile. 'Demand it not. Be pleased to understand that if it
were your Honour's knife I would return it instantly. But that man, as
I tell thee, is a wretch. It grieves me to behold a person of
consideration in such an unbecoming temper upon his account--a dog, no
more.'

'If he is a dog, he is my dog for the present; so give back the
knife!'

'Alas, beloved, that is quite impossible.'

With a wave of the hand dismissing the whole subject the soldier
turned away. He plucked a cigarette out of his girdle and prepared to
light it. His companion on the donkey had not turned his head nor
shown the slightest interest in the discussion. This had lasted long
enough. I knew that in another minute I should have to laugh. If
anything remained for me to do it must be done immediately. Whipping
my revolver from the holster, I held it close against the rascal's
head, yelling: 'Give back the knife this minute, or I kill thee!'

The man went limp. The knife came back as quick as lightning. I gave
it to the muleteer, who blubbered praise to Allah and made off with
it. Equally relieved, I was about to follow when the utterly forlorn
appearance of the soldier moved me to open the revolver, showing that
it was not loaded. Then my adversary was transfigured. His back
straightened, his mouth closed, his eyes regained their old
intelligence. He stared at me a moment, half incredulous, and then he
laughed. Ah, how that soldier laughed! The owner of the donkey turned
and shared his glee. They literally hugged each other, roaring with
delight, while the donkey underneath them both jogged dutifully on.

Before a caravanserai in a small valley green with fruit-trees, beside
a slender stream whose banks were fringed with oleander, I was sitting
waiting for some luncheon when the donkey and its riders came again in
sight. The soldier tumbled off on spying me and ran into the inn like
one possessed. A minute later he brought out the food which I had
ordered and set the table for me in the shade of trees.

'I would not let another serve thee,' he informed me, 'for the love of
that vile joke that thou didst put upon me. It was not loaded. After
all my fright!... It is a nice revolver. Let me look at it.'

'Aye, look thy fill, thou shalt not touch it,' was my answer; at which
he laughed anew, pronouncing me the merriest of Adam's race.

'But tell me, what wouldst thou have done had I refused? It was not
loaded. What wouldst thou have done?'

His hand was resting at that moment on a stool. I rapped his knuckles
gently with the butt of the revolver to let him know its weight.

'Wallahi!' he cried out in admiration. 'I believe thou wouldst have
smashed my head with it. All for the sake of a poor man of no account,
whom thou employest for a week, and after that wilt see no more.
Efendim, take me as thy servant always!' Of a sudden he spoke very
earnestly. 'Pay the money to release me from the army. It is a
largeish sum--five Turkish pounds. And Allah knows I will repay it to
thee by my service. For the love of righteousness accept me, for my
soul is thine.'

I ridiculed the notion. He persisted. When the muleteer and I set
forth again, he rode beside us, mounted on another donkey this
time--'borrowed,' as he put it--which showed he was a person of
resource. 'By Allah, I can shoe a horse and cook a fowl; I can mend
garments with a thread and shoot a bird upon the wing,' he told me. 'I
would take care of the stable and the house. I would do everything
your Honour wanted. My nickname is Rashid the Fair; my garrison is
Karameyn, just two days' journey from the city. Come in a day or two
and buy me out. No matter for the wages. Only try me!'

At the khan, a pretty rough one, where we spent the night, he waited
on me deftly and enforced respect, making me really wish for such a
servant. On the morrow, after an hour's riding, our ways parted.

'In sh'Allah, I shall see thee before many days,' he murmured. 'My
nickname is Rashid the Fair, forget not. I shall tell our captain thou
art coming with the money.'

I said that I might think about it possibly.

'Come,' he entreated. 'Thou wouldst never shame a man who puts his
trust in thee. I say that I shall tell our captain thou art coming.
Ah, shame me not before the Commandant and all my comrades! Thou
thinkest me a thief, a lawbreaker, because I took that fellow's
knife?' he asked, with an indulgent smile. 'Let me tell thee, O my
lord, that I was in my right and duty as a soldier of the Sultan in
this province. It is that muleteer who, truly speaking, breaks the law
by carrying the knife without a permit. And thou, hast thou a passport
for that fine revolver? At the place where we had luncheon yesterday
were other soldiers. By merely calling on them to support me I could
have had his knife and thy revolver with ease and honesty in strict
accordance with the law. Why did I not do so? Because I love thee! Say
thou wilt come to Karameyn and buy me out.'

I watched him jogging on his donkey towards a gulley of the hills
along which lay the bridle-path to Karameyn. On all the evidence he
was a rogue, and yet my intimate conviction was that he was honest.
All the Europeans in the land would lift up hands of horror and
exclaim: 'Beware!' on hearing such a story. Yet, as I rode across the
parched brown land towards the city of green trees and rushing waters,
I knew that I should go to Karameyn.

CHAPTER II

A MOUNTAIN GARRISON

The long day's ride was uneventful, but not so the night. I spent it
in a village of the mountains at a very curious hostelry, kept by a
fat native Christian, named Elias, who laid claim, upon the signboard,
to furnish food and lodging 'alafranga'--that is, in the modern
European manner. There was one large guest-room, and an adjoining
bedroom of the same dimensions, for some thirty travellers. I had to
find a stable for my horse elsewhere. A dining-table was provided, and
we sat on chairs around it; but the food was no wise European, and the
cooking was degraded Greek. A knife, fork, and spoon were laid for
every guest but several cast these on the floor and used their
fingers. In the long bedroom were a dozen beds on bedsteads. By
offering a trifle extra I secured one to myself. In others there were
two, three, even four together. An elderly Armenian gentleman who had
a wife with him, stood guard with pistols over her all night. He was
so foolish as to threaten loudly anyone who dared approach her. After
he had done so several times a man arose from the bed next to mine and
strolling to him seized him by the throat.

'O man,' he chided. 'Art thou mad or what, thus to arouse our passions
by thy talk of women? Be silent, or we honest men here present will
wring thy neck and take thy woman from thee. Dost thou understand?' He
shook that jealous husband as a terrier would shake a rat. 'Be silent,
hearest thou? Men wish to sleep.'

'Said I not well, O brother?' said the monitor to me, as he got back
to bed.

'By Allah, well,' was my reply. The jealous one was silent after that.
But there were other noises. Some men still lingered in the guest-room
playing cards. The host, devoted to things European, had a
musical-box--it was happily before the day of gramophones--which the
card-players kept going all night long. I had a touch of fever. There
were insects. Sleep was hopeless. I rose while it was yet night, went
out without paying, since the host was nowhere to be seen, and, in
some danger from the fierce attacks of pariah dogs, found out the
vault in which my horse was stabled. Ten minutes later I was clear of
the village, riding along a mountain side but dimly visible beneath
the stars. The path descended to a deep ravine, and rose again, up,
up, interminably. At length, upon the summit of a ridge, I felt the
dawn. The mountain tops were whitened like the crests of waves, while
all the clefts and hollows remained full of night. Behind me, in the
east, there was a long white streak making the mountain outlines bleak
and keen. The stars looked strange; a fresh breeze fanned my cheek and
rustled in the grass and shrubs. Before me, on an isolated bluff,
appeared my destination, a large village, square-built like a
fortress. Its buildings presently took on a wild-rose blush, which
deepened to the red of fire--a splendid sight against a dark blue sky,
still full of stars. A window flashed up there. The sun had risen.

Some English people, when informed of my intention to buy a man out of
the Turkish Army had pronounced it madness. I did not know the people
of the land as they did. I should be pillaged, brought to destitution,
perhaps murdered. They, who had lived in the country twenty, thirty
years, were better qualified to judge than I was. For peace and quiet
I pretended acquiescence, and my purpose thus acquired a taste of
stealth. It was with the feelings of a kind of truant that I had set
out at length without a word to anyone, and with the same adventurous
feelings that I now drew near to Karameyn. Two soldiers, basking in
the sunshine on a dust-heap, sprang up at my approach. One was the man
I sought, the rogue Rashid. They led me to their captain's house--a
modest dwelling, consisting of a single room, with hardly any
furniture. A score of soldiers followed after us.

The Captain--Hasan Agha--an old man, with face scarred and heavy white
moustache, was in full uniform, and, as I entered, was engaged in
putting on a pair of cotton gloves. He was one of the old 'alaili,'
Turkish officers--those whose whole knowledge of their business was
derived from service in a regiment or 'alai,' instead of from
instruction at a military school; and his manner towards the men had
nothing of the martinet. He addressed them as 'my children,' with
affection; and they, though quite respectful, conversed freely in his
presence. Hasan Agha paid me many compliments, and repeatedly inquired
after my health. He would not hear about my business till I had had
breakfast. Luncheon had been arranged for me, he said, but that could
not be ready for some hours. Would I be so kind as to excuse a
makeshift? Even as he spoke, a soldier entered with a tray on which
were slabs of Arab bread, a pitcher of sour milk, and heaps of grapes.
Another soldier began pounding coffee, while yet another blew upon the
charcoal in a brazier. I refused to eat unless my host ate with me,
which he did only after much polite resistance. After the meal, we sat
and talked, the soldiers joining in the conversation. They told me of
old wars and deeds of valour. Hasan Agha was, it seemed, a famous
fighter; and the men did all they could to make him tell me of his
battles. They brought an old man in out of the town to see me because
he had fought in the Crimean war, and knew the English. Before it grew
too hot, they took me out to see the barracks and a ramshackle old
fieldpiece which they seemed to idolise. Then followed luncheon with
its long array of Arab dishes, of which the soldiers had their share
eventually. Rashid assured me afterwards that all the food on this
occasion had been 'borrowed.' That was in Abdul Hamid's golden days.
After luncheon, there was coffee with more compliments; and then at
last we got to business.

A public writer was brought in. He wrote out a receipt for me, and
also the discharge Rashid required. Hasan Agha stamped both documents
with an official seal, and handed them to me, who gave him in exchange
the money.

'Bismillah!' he exclaimed. 'I call all here to witness that Rashid,
the son of Ali, called the Fair, is free henceforth to go what way he
chooses.'

To me he said: 'Rashid is a good lad, and you will find him useful.
The chief fault I have found in him is this: that, when obeying
orders, he is apt to think, and so invent a method of his own, not
always good. Also, he is too susceptible to female charms, a failing
which has placed him in some strange positions.'

The last remark evoked much laughter, relating, evidently to some
standing joke unknown to me. Rashid looked rather sheepish. Hasan Agha
turned to him, and said:

'My son, praise Allah for thy great good fortune in finding favour in
the sight of one so noble and benevolent as our beloved guest, who is
henceforth thy master. Remember, he is not as I am--one who has been
what thou art, and so knows the tricks. Serve him freely with thy mind
and soul and conscience, not waiting for commands as in the Army. Come
hither, O my son, grasp hands with me. I say, may God be with thee now
and always! Forget not all the good instruction of thy soldier days.
Be sure that we shall pray for thy good master and for thee.'

The old man's eyes were wet, so were Rashid's, so were the eyes of all
the soldiers squatting round.

Rashid, dismissed, went off to change his uniform for an old suit of
mine which I had brought for him, while Hasan Agha, talking of him as
a father might, explained to me his character and little failings.

At last I took my leave. Rashid was waiting in my cast-off clothes, a
new fez of civilian shape upon his head. He held my stirrup, and then
jumped on to a raw-boned beast which had been 'borrowed' for him by
his friends, so he informed me. It might be worth my while to buy it
for him, he suggested later--the price was only eight pounds Turk, the
merest trifle. The whole garrison escorted us to the last houses,
where they stood a long while, waving their farewells. Two hours
later, on the mountain-ridge, beyond the wady, we turned to look our
last on Karameyn. It stood amid the flames of sunset like a castle of
the clouds.

We returned, then, to the 'alafranga' hostelry; but Rashid, having
heard the story of my sleepless night, would not allow me to put up
there. I paid my debt to the proprietor, and then he found for me an
empty house to which he brought a mattress and a coverlet, a lot of
cushions, a brazier, and the things required for making coffee, also a
tray of supper--all of them borrowed from the neighbouring houses. I
might be pillaged, brought to destitution, and eventually murdered by
him, as my friends had warned me. At least, the operation promised to
be comfortable.

CHAPTER III

THE RHINOCEROS WHIP

'Where is the whip?' Rashid cried, suddenly, turning upon me in the
gateway of the khan where we had just arrived.

'Merciful Allah! It is not with me. I must have left it in the
carriage.'

Rashid threw down the saddlebags, our customary luggage, which he had
been carrying, and started running for his life. The carriage had got
half-way down the narrow street half-roofed with awnings. At Rashid's
fierce shout of 'Wait, O my uncle! We have left our whip!' the driver
turned and glanced behind him, but, instead of stopping, lashed his
horses to a gallop. Rashid ran even faster than before. The chase,
receding rapidly, soon vanished from my sight. Twilight was coming on.
Above the low, flat roofs to westward, the crescent moon hung in the
green of sunset behind the minarets of the great mosque. I then took
up the saddle-bags and delicately picked my way through couchant
camels, tethered mules and horses in the courtyard to the khan itself,
which was a kind of cloister. I was making my arrangements with the
landlord, when Rashid returned, the picture of despair. He flung up
both his hands, announcing failure, and then sank down upon the ground
and moaned. The host, a burly man, inquired what ailed him. I told
him, when he uttered just reflections upon cabmen and the vanity of
worldly wealth. Rashid, as I could see, was 'zi'lan'--a prey to that
strange mixture of mad rage and sorrow and despair, which is a real
disease for children of the Arabs. An English servant would not thus
have cared about the loss of a small item of his master's property,
not by his fault but through that master's oversight. But my
possessions were Rashid's delight, his claim to honour. He boasted of
them to all comers. In particular did he revere my gun, my Service
revolver, and this whip--a tough thong of rhinoceros hide, rather
nicely mounted with silver, which had been presented to me by an aged
Arab in return for some imagined favour. I had found it useful
against pariah dogs when these rushed out in packs to bite one's
horse's legs, but had never viewed it as a badge of honour till Rashid
came to me. To him it was the best of our possessions, marking us as
of rank above the common. He thrust it on me even when I went out
walking; and he it was who, when we started from our mountain home at
noon that day, had laid it reverently down upon the seat beside me
before he climbed upon the box beside the driver. And now the whip was
lost through my neglectfulness. Rashid's dejection made me feel a
worm.

'Allah! Allah!' he made moan, 'What can I do? The driver was a chance
encounter. I do not know his dwelling, which may God destroy!'

The host remarked in comfortable tones that flesh is grass, all
treasure perishable, and that it behoves a man to fix desire on higher
things. Whereat Rashid sprang up, as one past patience, and departed,
darting through the cattle in the yard with almost supernatural
agility. 'Let him eat his rage alone!' the host advised me, with a
shrug.

Having ordered supper for the third hour of the night, I, too, went
out to stretch my limbs, which were stiff and bruised from four
hours' jolting in a springless carriage, always on the point of
overturning. We should have done better to have come on horseback in
the usual way; but Rashid, having chanced upon the carriage, a great
rarity, had decided on that way of going as more fashionable,
forgetful of the fact that there was not a road.

The stars were out. In the few shops which still kept open lanterns
hung, throwing streaks of yellow light on the uneven causeway, a gleam
into the eyes of wayfarers and prowling dogs. Many of the people in
the streets, too, carried lanterns whose swing made objects in their
circle seem to leap and fall. I came at length into an open place
where there was concourse--a kind of square which might be called the
centre of the city.

The crowd there, as I noticed with surprise, was stationary, with all
its faces turned in one direction. I heard a man's voice weeping and
declaiming wildly.

'What is it?' I inquired, among the outskirts.

'A great misfortune!' someone answered. 'A poor servant has lost a
whip worth fifty Turkish pounds, his master's property. It was stolen
from him by a miscreant--a wicked cabman. His lord will kill him if
he fails to find it.'

Seized with interest, I shouldered my way forward. There was Rashid
against the wall of a large mosque, beating himself against that wall
with a most fearful outcry. A group of high-fezzed soldiers, the
policemen of the city, hung round him in compassion, questioning.
Happily, I wore a fez, and so was inconspicuous.

'Fifty Turkish pounds!' he yelled. 'A hundred would not buy its
brother! My master, the tremendous Count of all the English--their
chief prince, by Allah!--loves it as his soul. He will pluck out and
devour my heart and liver. O High Protector! O Almighty Lord!'

'What like was this said cabman?' asked a sergeant of the watch.

Rashid, with sobs and many pious interjections, described the cabman
rather neatly as 'a one-eyed man, full-bearded, of a form as if
inflated in the lower half. His name, he told me, was Habib; but Allah
knows!'

'The man is known!' exclaimed the sergeant, eagerly. 'His dwelling is
close by. Come, O thou poor, ill-used one. We will take the whip from
him.'

At that Rashid's grief ceased as if by magic. He took the sergeant's
hand and fondled it, as they went off together. I followed with the
crowd as far as to the cabman's door, a filthy entry in a narrow lane,
where, wishing to avoid discovery, I broke away and walked back
quickly to the khan.

I had been there in my private alcove some few minutes, when Rashid
arrived with a triumphant air, holding on high the famous whip. The
sergeant came across the court with him. A score of soldiers waited in
the gateway as I could see by the light of the great lantern hanging
from the arch.

'Praise be to Allah, I have found it!' cried Rashid.

'Praise be to Allah, we have been enabled to do a little service for
your Highness,' cried the sergeant. Therewith he pounced upon my hand
and kissed it. I made them both sit down and called for coffee.
Between the two of them, I heard the story. The sergeant praised
Rashid's intelligence in going out and crying in a public place until
the city and its whole police force had a share in his distress.
Rashid, on his side, said that all that would have been in vain but
for the sergeant's knowledge of the cabman's house. The sergeant, with
a chuckle, owned that that same knowledge would have been of no effect
had not Rashid once more displayed his keen intelligence. They had
poured into the house--a single room, illumined only by a saucer lamp
upon the ground--and searched it thoroughly, the cabman all the while
protesting his great innocence, and swearing he had never in this
world beheld a whip like that described. The soldiers, finding no
whip, were beginning to believe his word when Rashid, who had remained
aloof, observing that the cabman's wife stood very still beneath her
veils, assailed her with a mighty push, which sent her staggering
across the room. The whip was then discovered. It had been hidden
underneath her petticoats. They had given the delinquent a good
beating then and there. Would that be punishment enough in my opinion?
asked the sergeant.

We decided that the beating was enough. I gave the sergeant a small
present when he left. Rashid went with him, after carefully
concealing the now famous whip. I suppose they went off to some tavern
to discuss the wonderful adventure more at length; for I supped alone,
and had been some time stretched upon my mattress on the floor before
Rashid came in and spread his bed beside me.

'Art thou awake, O my dear lord?' he whispered. 'By Allah, thou didst
wrong to give that sergeant any money. I had made thy name so great
that but to look on thee was fee sufficient for a poor, lean dog like
him.'

He then was silent for so long a while that I imagined he had gone to
sleep. But, suddenly, he whispered once again:

'O my dear lord, forgive me the disturbance, but hast thou our
revolver safe?'

'By Allah, yes! Here, ready to my hand.'

'Good. But it would be better for the future that I should bear our
whip and our revolver. I have made thy name so great that thou
shouldst carry nothing.'

CHAPTER IV

THE COURTEOUS JUDGE

We were giving a dinner-party on that day to half a dozen Turkish
officers, and, when he brought me in my cup of tea at seven-thirty
a.m., Rashid informed me that our cook had been arrested. The said
cook was a decent Muslim, but hot-tempered, and something of a blood
in private life. At six a.m., as he stood basking in the sunlight in
our doorway, his eyes had fallen on some Christian youths upon their
way to college, in European clothes, with new kid gloves and
silver-headed canes. Maddened with a sense of outrage by that horrid
sight, he had attacked the said youths furiously with a wooden ladle,
putting them to flight, and chasing them all down the long acacia
avenue, through two suburbs into the heart of the city, where their
miserable cries for help brought the police upon him. Rashid, pursuing
in vain attempts to calm the holy warrior, had seen him taken into
custody still flourishing the ladle; but could tell me nothing of his
after fate, having at that point deemed it prudent to retire, lest he,
too, might be put in prison by mistake.

It was sad. As soon as I was up and dressed, I wrote to Hamdi Bey, the
chief of our intended visitors, informing him of the mishap which
would prevent our giving him and his comrades a dinner at all worthy
of their merit. By the time that I had finished dressing, Rashid had
found a messenger to whom the note was given with an order to make
haste. He must have run the whole way there and back, for, after
little more than half an hour, he stood before me, breathless and with
streaming brow, his bare legs dusty to the knee. Rashid had then gone
out to do some marketing. The runner handed me a note. It said:

'Why mention such a trifling detail? We shall, of course, be charmed
with anything you set before us. It is for friendship, not for food,
we come!'

There was a postscript:--

'Why not go and see the judge?'

Suleyman was in the room. He was an old acquaintance, a man of decent
birth, but poor, by trade a dragoman, who had acquired a reputation
for unusual wisdom. When he had nothing else to do, he came to me
unfailingly, wherever I might chance to be established or encamped. He
was sitting cross-legged in a corner, smoking his narghileh,
capriciously illumined by thin slants of light, alive with motes, from
the Venetian blinds. He seized upon the postscript, crying:--

'It is good advice. Why not, indeed? Let us approach the judge.'

Therewith he coiled the tube of his narghileh carefully around the
bowl thereof, and, rising with the same deliberation, threw upon his
shoulders a white dust-cloak, then looked at me, and questioned: 'Are
you ready?'

'But I do not know the judge.'

'No more do I. But that, my dear, is a disease which can be remedied.'

Without much trouble we found out the judge's house. A servant told us
that his Honour had already started for the court. We took a carriage
and pursued his Honour. At the court we made inquiry of the crowd of
witnesses--false witnesses for hire--who thronged the entrance. The
judge, we heard, had not yet taken his seat. We should be sure to find
his Honour in the coffee-shop across the road. One of the false
witnesses conducted us to the said coffee-shop and pointed out our
man. Together with his clerk and certain advocates, one of whom read
aloud the morning news, the judge sat underneath a vine arbour in
pleasant shade. He smiled. His hands were clasped upon a fair round
belly.

Suleyman, his dust-cloak billowing, strolled forward coolly, and
presented me as 'one of the chief people of the Franks.' The company
arose and made us welcome, placing stools for our convenience.

'His Highness comes to thee for justice, O most righteous judge. He
has been wronged,' observed Suleyman, dispassionately.

The judge looked much concerned. 'What is the case?' he asked.

'Our cook is snatched from us,' was the reply, 'and to-night we have
invited friends to dinner.'

'Is he a good cook?' asked the judge, with feeling.

'If your Excellency will restore him to us, and then join us at the
meal----'

'How can I be of service in this matter?'

I motioned to Suleyman to tell the story, which he did so well that
all the company were soon in fits of laughter.

The judge looked through the cause list till he found the case,
putting a mark against it on the paper.

'How can we dine to-night without a cook?' I sighed, despairingly.

'Fear nothing,' said the judge. 'He shall be with you in an hour.
Come, O my friends, we must to business! It grows late.'

The judge took leave of me with much politeness.

'Now,' said Suleyman, when they were gone, 'let us go into the court
and watch the course of justice.'

We crossed the narrow street to an imposing portal. Suleyman whispered
to a soldier there on guard, who smiled and bade us enter, with a
gracious gesture.

The hall inside was crowded. Only after much exertion could we see the
dais. There sat the judge, and there stood our lamented cook, the
picture of dejection. A soldier at his side displayed the wooden
ladle. The Christian dandies whom he had assaulted were giving their
account of the adventure volubly, until his Honour, with a heavy
frown, bade them be silent. Then they cowered.

'Be careful what you say,' the judge enjoined. 'You have not hesitated
to impute the anger of this cook to religious fanaticism. The
Nazarenes are much too ready to bring such a charge against the
Muslims, forgetful that there may be other causes of annoyance. Nay,
many of the charges brought have proved upon investigation to be
altogether groundless. You Nazarenes are often insolent in your
demeanour. Confiding in the favour of the foreign consuls, foreign
missionaries, you occasionally taunt and irritate, even revile, the
Muslims. Now, even supposing your account of this affair to be
correct--which I much doubt, for, on the one hand, I behold a wooden
ladle of no weight; while, on the other, there are two fine
walking-sticks with silver heads'--one of the Christian youths let
fall his stick in trepidation--'and you are two, while this poor cook
is one. Even supposing what you say is true, are you certain that
nothing in your appearance, conversation, or behaviour gave him cause
for anger? I incline to conjecture that you must have flouted him, or
uttered, it may be, some insult to his creed.'

'He beat us for no reason, and most grievously,' moaned one of the
assailed. Such language from a Muslim judge in a court filled with
Muslims made the two Christians tremble in their shoes.

'We did not even see him till he started beating us. By Allah, my poor
head is sore, my back is broken with that awful beating. He was like a
madman!' The speaker and his fellow-plaintiff wept aloud.

'Didst thou beat these youths, as he describes?' inquired the judge,
turning towards the cook with like severity.

'No, O Excellency!' came the bitter cry. 'I am an ill-used man, much
slandered. I never set eyes upon those men until this minute.' He also
began weeping bitterly.

'Both parties tell me lies!' exclaimed the judge, with anger. 'For
thou, O cook, didst beat these youths. The fact is known, for thou
wast taken in the act of beating them. And you, O Nazarenes, are not
much injured, for everyone beholds you in most perfect health, with
clothes unspoilt. The more shame to you, for it is evident that you
bring the charge against this Muslim from religious hatred.'

'By Allah, no, O Excellency. We wish that man no harm. We did but
state what happened.'

'You are a pack of rogues together,' roared the judge. 'Let each side
pay one whole mejidi[1] to the court; let the parties now, this
minute, here before me, swear peace and lifelong friendship for the
future, and never let me hear of them again!'

The Christian youths embraced the cook, the cook embraced the
Christian youths repeatedly, all weeping in a transport of delight at
their escape from punishment. I paid the money for our man, who then
went home with us; Suleyman, upon the way, delivering a lecture of
such high morality, such heavenly language, that the poor, simple
fellow wept anew, and called on Allah for forgiveness.

'Repentance is thy duty,' said Suleyman approvingly. 'But towards this
world also thou canst make amends. Put forth thy utmost skill in
cookery this evening, for the judge is coming.'

FOOTNOTES:

[1] About four shillings.

CHAPTER V

NAWADIR[2]

We had arrived in a village of the mountains late one afternoon, and
were sauntering about the place, when some rude children shouted: 'Hi,
O my uncle, you have come in two!'

It was the common joke at sight of European trousers, which were rare
in those days. But Suleyman was much offended upon my account. He
turned about and read those children a tremendous lecture, rebuking
them severely for thus presuming to insult a stranger and a guest. His
condemnation was supported on such lofty principles as no man who
possessed a particle of religion or good feeling could withstand; and
his eloquence was so commanding yet persuasive that, when at length he
moved away, not children only but many also of the grown-up people
followed him.

The village was high up beneath the summit of a ridge, and from a
group of rocks within a stone's throw of it could be seen the sea, a
great blue wall extending north and south. We perched among those
rocks to watch the sunset. The village people settled within earshot,
some below and some above us. Presently an old man said:

'Thou speakest well, O sage! It is a sin for them to cry such things
behind a guest of quality. Their misbehaviour calls for strong
correction. But I truly think that no child who has heard your
Honour's sayings will ever be so impudent again.'

'Aman!'[3] cried one of the delinquents. 'Allah knows that our
intention was not very evil.'

I hastened to declare that the offence was nothing. But Suleyman would
not allow me to decry it.

'Your Honour is as yet too young,' he said severely, 'to understand
the mystic value of men's acts and words. A word may be well meant and
innocent, and yet the cause of much disaster, possessing in itself
some special virtue of malignity. You all know how the jann[4] attend
on careless words; how if I call a goat, a dog, or cat by its generic
name without pointing to the very animal intended, a jinni will as
like as not attach himself to me, since many of the jann are called by
names of animals. You all know also that to praise the beauty of a
child, without the offer of that child to Allah as a sacrifice, is
fatal; because there is unseen a jealous listener who hates and would
deform the progeny of Eve. Such facts as those are known to every
ignoramus, and their cause is plain. But there exists another and more
subtle danger in the careless use of words, particularly with regard
to personal remarks, like that of these same children when they cried
to our good master: 'Thou hast come in two,' directing the attention
to a living body. I have a rare thing in my memory which perhaps may
lead you to perceive my meaning darkly.

'A certain husbandman (fellah) was troubled with a foolish wife.
Having to go out one day, he gave her full instructions what to do
about the place, and particularly bade her fix her mind upon their
cow, because he was afraid the cow might stray, as she had done
before, and cause ill-feeling with the neighbours. He never thought
that such a charge to such a person, tending to concentrate the
woman's mind upon a certain object, was disastrous. The man meant
well; the woman, too, meant well. She gave her whole mind to obey his
parting words. Having completed every task within the house, she sat
down under an olive tree which grew before the door, and fixed her
whole intelligence in all its force upon the black-and-white cow, the
only living thing in sight, which was browsing in the space allowed by
a short tether. So great did the responsibility appear to her that she
grew anxious, and by dint of earnest gazing at the cow came to believe
that there was something wrong with it. In truth the poor beast had
exhausted all the grass within its reach, and it had not entered her
ideas to move the picket.

'At length a neighbour passed that way. She begged him, of his
well-known kindness, to inspect the cow and tell her what the matter
really was. This neighbour was a wag, and knew the woman's species; he
also knew the cow as an annoyance, for ever dragging out its peg and
straying into planted fields. After long and serious examination he
declared: "The tail is hurting her and ought to be removed. See how
she swishes it from side to side. If the tail is not cut off
immediately, the cow will die one day."

'"Merciful Allah!" cried the woman. "Please remove it for me. I am all
alone, and helpless."

'The man lifted up an axe which he was carrying and cut off the cow's
tail near the rump. He gave it to the woman and she thanked him
heartily. He went his way, while she resumed her watch upon the cow.
And still she fancied that its health was not as usual.

'Another neighbour came along. She told him of her fears, and how the
Sheykh Mukarram, of his well-known kindness, had befriended her by
cutting off the damaged tail.

'"Of course," cried the newcomer, "that accounts for it! The animal is
now ill-balanced. It is always a mistake to take from one end without
removing something also from the other. If thou wouldst see that cow
in health again, the horns must go."

'"Oh, help me; I am all alone! Perform the operation for me," said the
woman.

'Her friend sawed off the horns and gave them to her. She exhausted
thanks. But still, when he was gone, the cow appeared no better. She
grew desperate.

'By then the news of her anxiety about the cow had spread through all
the village, and every able body came to help her or look on. They cut
the udder and the ears, and then the legs, and gave them to her, and
she thanked them all with tears of gratitude. At last there was no cow
at all to worry over. Seeing the diminished carcase lying motionless,
the woman smiled and murmured: "Praise to Allah, she is cured at last;
she is at rest! Now I am free to go into the house and get things
ready for my lord's return."

'Her lord returned at dusk. She told him: "I have been obedient. I
watched the cow and tended her for hours. She was extremely ill, but
all the neighbours helped to doctor her, performing many operations,
and we were able to relieve her of all pain, the praise to Allah! Here
are the various parts which they removed. They gave them to me, very
kindly, since the cow is ours."

'Without a word the man went out to view the remnant of the cow. When
he returned he seized the woman by the shoulders, and, gazing
straight into her eyes, said grimly: "Allah keep thee! I am going to
walk this world until I find one filthier than thou art. And if I fail
to find one filthier than thou art, I shall go on walking--I have
sworn it--to the end."'

Suleyman broke off there suddenly, to the surprise of all.

'I fail to see how that rare thing applies to my case,' I observed, as
soon as I felt sure that he had finished speaking.

'It does not apply to your case, but it does to others,' he replied on
brief reflection. 'It is dangerous to put ideas in people's heads or
rouse self-consciousness, for who can tell what demons lurk in
people's brains.... But wait and I will find a rare thing suited to
the present instance.'

'Say, O Sea of Wisdom, did he find one filthier than she was?'

'Of course he did.'

'Relate the sequel, I beseech thee.'

But Suleyman was searching in his memory for some event more clearly
illustrating the grave risks of chance suggestion. At length he gave
a sigh of satisfaction, and then spoke as follows:

'There was once a Turkish pasha of the greatest, a benevolent old man,
whom I have often seen. He had a long white beard, of which he was
extremely proud, until one day a man, who was a wag, came up to him
and said:

'"Excellency, we have been wondering: When you go to bed, do you put
your beard inside the coverings or out?"

'The Pasha thought a moment, but he could not tell, for it had never
come into his head to notice such a matter. He promised to inform his
questioner upon the morrow. But when he went to bed that night he
tried the beard beneath the bedclothes and above without success.
Neither way could he get comfort, nor could he, for the life of him,
remember how the beard was wont to go. He got no sleep on that night
or the next night either, for thinking on the problem thus presented
to his mind. On the third day, in a rage, he called a barber and had
the beard cut off. Accustomed as he was to such a mass of hair upon
his neck, for lack of it he caught a cold and died.

'That story fits the case before us to a nicety,' said Suleyman in
conclusion, with an air of triumph.

'What is the moral of it, deign to tell us, master!' the cry arose
from all sides in the growing twilight.

'I suppose,' I hazarded, 'that, having had attention called to the
peculiar clothing of my legs, I shall eventually have them amputated
or wear Turkish trousers?'

'I say not what will happen; God alone knows that. But the mere chance
that such catastrophes, as I have shown, may happen is enough to make
wise people shun that kind of speech.'

I cannot to this day distinguish how much of his long harangue was
jest and how much earnest. But the fellahin devoured it as pure
wisdom.

FOOTNOTES:

[2] Rare things.

[3] Equivalent to 'Pax.'

[4] Genii.

CHAPTER VI

NAWADIR (_continued_)

'What happened to the man who went to seek one filthier than she was?
How could he ever find one filthier?' inquired Rashid, reverting to
Suleyman's unfinished story of the foolish woman and her husband and
the hapless cow, when we lay down to sleep that evening in the village
guest-room. I also asked to hear the rest of that instructive tale.
Suleyman, sufficiently besought, raised himself upon an elbow and
resumed the narrative. Rashid and I lay quiet in our wrappings.

'We had reached that point, my masters, where the injured husband,
having seen the remnant of the cow, said to his wife: "Now, I am going
to walk this world until I find one filthier than thou art; and if I
fail to find one filthier than thou art I shall go on walking till I
die." Well, he walked and he walked--for months, some people say, and
others years--until he reached a village in Mount Lebanon--a village
of the Maronites renowned for foolishness. It was the reputation of
their imbecility which made him go there.'

'What was his name?' inquired Rashid, who liked to have things clear.

'His name?' said Suleyman reflectively, 'was Salih.'

'He was a Muslim?'

'Aye, a Muslim, I suppose--though, Allah knows, he may perhaps have
been an Ismaili or a Druze. Any more questions? Then I will proceed.

'He came into this village of the Maronites, and, being thirsty,
looked in at a doorway. He saw the village priest and all his family
engaged in stuffing a fat sheep with mulberry leaves. The sheep was
tethered half-way up the steps which led on to the housetop. The
priest and his wife, together with their eldest girl, sat on the
ground below, amid a heap of mulberry boughs; and all the other
children sat, one on every step, passing up the leaves, when ready, to
the second daughter, whose business was to force the sheep to go on
eating. This they would do until the sheep, too full to stand, fell
over on its side, when they would slaughter it for their supply of
fat throughout the coming year.

'So busy were they in this occupation that they did not see the
stranger in the doorway until he shouted: "Peace upon this house," and
asked them for a drink of water kindly. Even then the priest did not
disturb himself, but, saying "Itfaddal!" pointed to a pitcher standing
by the wall. The guest looked into it and found it dry.

'"No water here," he said.

'"Oh," sighed the priest, "to-day we are so thirsty with this work
that we have emptied it, and so busy that the children have forgotten
to refill it. Rise, O Nesibeh, take the pitcher on thy head, and
hasten to the spring and bring back water for our guest."

'The girl Nesibeh, who was fourteen years of age, rose up obediently,
shaking off the mulberry leaves and caterpillars from her clothing.
Taking up the pitcher, she went out through the village to the spring,
which gushed out of the rock beneath a spreading pear tree.

'There were so many people getting water at the moment that she could
not push her way among them, so sat down to wait her turn, choosing a
shady spot. She was a thoughtful girl, and, as she sat there waiting,
she was saying in her soul:

'"O soul, I am a big girl now. A year or two and mother will unite me
to a proper husband. The next year I shall have a little son. Again a
year or two, he will be big enough to run about; and his father will
make for him a pair of small red shoes, and he will come down to this
pleasant spring, as children do, to splash the water. Being a bold
lad, he will climb that tree."

'And then, as she beheld one great bough overhanging like a
stretched-out arm, and realised how dangerous it was for climbing
children, she thought:

'"He will fall down and break his neck."

'At once she burst out weeping inconsolably, making so great a din
that all the people who had come for water flocked around her, asking:
"O Nesibeh, what has hurt thee?" And between her sobs, she told them:

'"I'm a big girl, now."

'"That is so, O beloved!"

'"A year or two, and mother will provide me with a husband."

'"It is likely."

'"Another year, and I shall have a little son."

'"If God wills!" sighed the multitude, with pious fervour.

'"Again a year or two, he will be big enough to run about, and his
father will make for him a pair of small red shoes. And he will come
down to the spring with other children, and will climb the tree.
And--oh!--you see that big bough overhanging. There he will slip and
fall and break his neck! Ah, woe!"

'At that the people cried: "O cruel fate!" and many of them rent their
clothes. They all sank down upon the ground around Nesibeh, rocking
themselves to and fro and wailing:

'"Ah, my little neighbour. My poor, dear little neighbour! Ah, would
that thou had lived to bury me, my little neighbour!"[5]

'Meanwhile the stranger waiting for the water grew impatient, and he
once more ventured to interrupt the work of sheep-stuffing with a
remark that the young girl was long returning with her pitcher. The
priest said: "That is true," and sent his second daughter to expedite
the first. This girl went running to the spring, and found the
population of the village sitting weeping on the ground around her
sister. She asked the matter. They replied: "A great calamity! Thy
sister--poor distracted mother!--will inform thee of its nature." She
ran up to Nesibeh, who moaned out: "I am a big girl now. A year or
two, our mother will provide me with a husband. The next year I shall
have a little son. Again a year or two he will be old enough to run
about. His father will make for him a pair of small red shoes. He
comes down to the spring to play in childish wise. He climbs that
tree, and from that overhanging branch he falls and breaks his neck."

'At this sad news the second girl forgot her errand. She threw her
skirt over her head and started shrieking: "Alas, my little nephew! My
poor, dear little nephew! Would God that thou had lived to bury me, my
little nephew!" And she too sat down upon the ground to hug her sorrow
with the rest.

'The priest said: "That one too is long in coming; I will send another
child; but thou must take her place upon the steps, O stranger, or
else the work of stuffing will be much delayed."

'The stranger did as he was asked, while child after child was sent,
till he alone was left to do the work of carrying the fresh leaves up
from the ground and stuffing them into the sheep. Still none returned.

'The priest's wife went herself, remarking that her husband and the
stranger were able by themselves to carry on the work. They did so a
long while, yet no one came.

'At last the priest rose, saying: "I myself will go and beat them for
this long delay. Do thou, O stranger, feed the sheep meanwhile. Cease
not to carry up the leaves and stuff him with them, lest all the good
work done be lost through negligence."

'In anger the priest strode out through the village to the spring. But
all his wrath was changed into amazement when he saw the crowd of
people sitting on the ground, convulsed with grief, around the members
of his family.

'He went up to his wife and asked the matter.

'She moaned: "I cannot speak of it. Ask poor Nesibeh!"

'He then turned to his eldest daughter, who, half-choked by sobs,
explained:

'"I am a big girl now."

'"That is so, O my daughter."

'"A year or two, and you and mother will provide me with a husband."

'"That is possible."

'"Another year, and I shall have a little son!"

'"In sh' Allah!" said her father piously.

'"Again a year or two, and my son runs about. His father makes for him
a pair of small red shoes. He came down to the spring to play with
other children, and from that overhanging bough--how shall I tell
it?--he fell and broke his darling little neck!" Nesibeh hid her face
again and wailed aloud.

'The priest, cut to the heart by the appalling news, tore his cassock
up from foot to waist, and threw the ends over his face, vociferating:

'"Woe, my little grandson! My darling little grandson! Oh, would that
thou had lived to bury me, my little grandson!" And he too sank upon
the ground, immersed in grief.

'At last the stranger wearied of the work of stripping off the
mulberry leaves and carrying them up the staircase to the tethered
sheep. He found his thirst increased by such exertions.'

'Did he in truth do that, with no one looking?' said Rashid. 'He must
have been as big a fool as all the others.'

'He was, but in a different way,' said Suleyman.

'He walked down to the spring, and saw the congregation seated
underneath the pear tree, shrieking like sinners at the Judgment Day.
Among them sat the priest, with features hidden in his torn black
petticoat. He ventured to approach the man and put a question. The
priest unveiled his face a moment and was going to speak, but
recollection of his sorrow overcame him. Hiding his face again, he
wailed:

'"Alas, my little grandson! My pretty little grandson! Ah, would that
thou hadst lived to bury me, my little grandson!"

'A woman sitting near plucked at the stranger's sleeve and said:

'"You see that girl. She will be soon full-grown. A year or two, and
she will certainly be married. Another year, and she will have a
little son. Her little son grows big enough to run about. His father
made for him a pair of small red shoes. He came down to the spring to
play with other children. You see that pear tree? On a day like
this--a pleasant afternoon--he clambered up it, and from that bough,
which overhangs the fountain, he fell and broke his little neck upon
those stones. Alas, our little neighbour! Oh, would that thou had
lived to bury us, our little neighbour!" And everyone began to rock
and wail anew.

'The stranger stood and looked upon them for a moment, then he
shouted: "Tfu 'aleykum!"[6] and spat upon the ground. No other word
did he vouchsafe to them, but walked away; and he continued walking
till he reached his native home. There, sitting in his ancient seat,
he told his wife:

'"Take comfort, O beloved! I have found one filthier."'

Suleyman declared the story finished.

'Is there a moral to it?' asked Rashid.

'The moral is self-evident,' replied the story-teller. 'It is this:
however bad the woman whom one happens to possess may be, be certain
it is always possible to find a worse.'

'It is also possible to find a better,' I suggested.

'Be not so sure of that!' said Suleyman. 'There are three several
kinds of women in the world, who all make claim to be descended from
our father Noah. But the truth is this: Our father Noah had one
daughter only, and three men desired her; so not to disappoint the
other two, he turned his donkey and his dog into two girls, whom he
presented to them, and that accounts for the three kinds of women now
to be observed. The true descendants of our father Noah are very
rare.'

'How may one know them from the others?' I inquired.

'By one thing only. They will keep your secret. The second sort of
woman will reveal your secret to a friend; the third will make of it a
tale against you. And this they do instinctively, as dogs will bark or
asses bray, without malevolence or any kind of forethought.

'That same priest of the Maronites of whom I told just now, in the
first days of his married life was plagued by his companion to reveal
to her the secrets people told him in confession. He refused,
declaring that she would divulge them.

'"Nay, I can keep a secret if I swear to do so. Only try me!" she
replied.

'"Well, we shall see," the priest made answer, in a teasing manner.

'One day, as he reclined upon the sofa in their house, that priest
began to moan and writhe as if in agony. His wife, in great alarm,
inquired what ailed him.

'"It is a secret," he replied, "which I dare not confide to thee, for
with it is bound up my earthly welfare and my soul's salvation."

'"I swear by Allah I will hide it. Tell me!" she implored.

'"Well," he replied, as if in torment, "I will risk my life and trust
thee. Know thou art in the presence of the greatest miracle. I, though
not a woman, am far gone with child--a thing which never happened on
the earth till now--and in this hour it is decreed that I produce my
first-born."

'Then, with a terrific cry, he thrust his hand beneath his petticoat,
and showed his wife a little bird which he had kept there hidden. He
let it fly away out through the window. Having watched it disappear,
he said devoutly:

'"Praise be to Allah! That is over! Thou hast seen my child. This is a
sacred and an awful mystery. Preserve the secret, or we all are dead!"

'"I swear I will preserve it," she replied, with fervour.

'But the miracle which she had witnessed burned her spirit. She knew
that she must speak of it or die; and so she called upon a friend
whose prudence she could trust, and binding her by vows, told her the
story.

'This woman also had a trusted friend, to whom she told the story,
under vows of secrecy, and so on, with the consequence that that same
evening the priest received a deputation of the village elders, who
requested, in the name of the community, to be allowed to kiss the
feet of his mysterious son--that little, rainbow-coloured bird, which
had a horn upon its head and played the flute.

'The priest said nothing to his wife. He did not beat her. He gave her
but one look. And yet from that day forward, she never plagued him
any more, but was submissive.'

'The priest was wise on that occasion, yet so foolish in the other
story!' I objected.

'The way of the majority of men!' said Suleyman. 'But women are more
uniformly wise or foolish. A happy night!' said Suleyman conclusively,
settling himself to sleep.

The usual night-light of the Syrian peasants--a wick afloat upon a
saucerful of oil and water--burned upon the ground between us, making
great shadows dance upon the walls and vaulting. The last I heard
before I fell asleep was Rashid's voice, exclaiming:

'He is a famous liar, is our wise man yonder; yet he speaks the
truth!'

FOOTNOTES:

[5] 'Ya takbar jarak, ya jari!'--a very common cry of grief in Syria.

[6] Something like 'Pooh-pooh to you!' but more insulting.

CHAPTER VII

THE SACK WHICH CLANKED

The sand which had been a rich ochre turned to creamy white, the sea
from blue became a livid green, the grass upon the sand-hills
blackened and bowed down beneath a sudden gust of wind. The change was
instantaneous, as it seemed to me. I had observed that clouds were
gathering upon the mountain peaks inland, but I had been riding in hot
sunlight, only a little less intense than it had been at noon, when
suddenly the chill and shadow struck me. Then I saw the sky completely
overcast with a huge purple cloud which bellied down upon the land and
sea. The waves which had been lisping all day long gave forth an
ominous dull roar. White horses reared and plunged. A wind sang
through the grass and thistles of the dunes, driving the sand into my
face.

Rashid, who had been riding far behind, in conversation with our
muleteer, came tearing up, and I could hear the shouts of the mukari
urging his two beasts to hurry.

'There is a village on the headland over there--a village of
Circassian settlers,' cried my servant, breathless. 'It has a bad
name, and I had not thought to spend the night there. But any roof is
good in such a storm. Ride fast! We may arrive before the downpour.'

My horse had broken to a canter of his own accord. I urged him to a
gallop. We flew round the bay. The village on the headland took shape
rapidly--a few cube-shaped, whitewashed houses perched amid what
seemed at first to be great rocks, but on a close approach revealed
themselves as blocks of masonry, the ruins of some city of antiquity.
From time to time a jet of spray shot up above them, white as lilies
in the gloom. The sea was rising. I discerned an ancient gateway
opening on the beach, and set my horse towards it, while the rain came
down in sheets. I saw no more until the ruins loomed up close before
me, a blind wall.

'Your right hand!' called Rashid; and, bearing to the right, I found
the gateway. We waited underneath its vault until the muleteer, a
dripping object, shrouded in a sack, came up with his two mules; and
then we once more plunged into the deluge. The path, a very rough one,
wavered up and down and in and out among the ruins. There were,
perhaps, a dozen scattered houses without gardens or any sign of
cultivation round them. Only one of them possessed an upper storey,
and towards that, supposing it to be the guest-room, we now picked our
way. It stood alone right out upon the promontory, topped by clouds of
spray.

A little courtyard gave us partial shelter while Rashid ran up some
rough stone steps and hammered at a door, exclaiming:

'Peace be on this house! My master craves for food and shelter, and
we, his servants, ask the same boon of thy goodness. O master of the
house, God will reward thy hospitality!'

The door was opened and a man appeared, bidding us all come in, in
Allah's name. He was of middle height and thick-set, with a heavy grey
moustache. An old-fashioned, low-crowned fez, with large blue tassel,
was bound about his brow with an embroidered turban. A blue zouave
jacket, crimson vest and baggy trousers of a darker blue completed
his apparel, for his feet were bare. In his girdle were a pair of
pistols and a scimitar.

He bade us welcome in bad Arabic, showing us into a good-sized
room--the upper chamber we had seen from far. Its windows, innocent of
glass, were closed by wooden shutters, roughly bolted, which creaked
and rattled in the gale. A very fine-looking old man rose from the
divan to greet us.

'What countryman art thou? A Turk, or one of us?' he asked, as I
removed my head-shawl. 'An Englishman, sayest thou?' He seized my
hand, and pressed it. 'An Englishman--any Englishman--is good, and his
word is sure. But the English Government is very bad. Three Englishmen
in Kars behaved like warrior-angels, fought like devils. And while
they fought for us their Government betrayed our country. What? Thou
hast heard about it? Praise to Allah! At last I meet with one who can
confirm the story. My son here thinks that I invented it.'

I happened to have read of the defence of Kars under the leadership of
three heroic Englishmen--General Williams, Captain Teesdale, and
Doctor Sandwith--and of the betrayal of the Circassian rising under
Shamyl at the time of the Crimean war.

The old man was delighted. 'Listen, O my son!' he called out to the
person who had let us in. 'It is true what I have often told to thee.
This Englishman knows all about it. So does all the world, except such
blockheads as thyself and thy companions.'

His son begged to be excused a minute while he put his crops into the
barn. Therewith he dragged a sack out of the room. What crops he may
have grown I do not know; but this I know--the contents of that sack
clanked as he dragged it out.

When he returned, he brought a bowl of eggs cooked in clarified
butter, two slabs of bread, and a great jug of water, apologising for
the coarseness of the fare. We all supped together, the old man
babbling of the days of old with great excitement. His son stared at
me with unblinking eyes. At last he said:

'I like thee, O khawajah. I had once a son about thy age. Say, O my
father, is there not a strong resemblance?'

Thereafter he talked quite as much as the old man, giving me the
history of their emigration from the Caucasus to escape the yoke of
the accursed Muscovite, and enumerating all the troubles which
attended their first coming into Syria.

'We are not subjects of the Government,' he told me, 'but allies; and
we have special privileges. But the dishonoured dogs round here forget
old compacts, and want us to pay taxes like mere fellahin.'

We sat up talking far into the night, while the storm raged without,
and the rain and the sea-spray pounded on the shutters; and never have
I met with kinder treatment. It was the custom for chance comers to
have food at evening only and leave betimes next morning. But our
host, when I awoke in splendid sunlight, had breakfast ready--sour
milk and Arab bread and fragrant coffee--and when I went out to my
horse he followed me, and thrust two roasted fowls into my
saddle-bags, exclaiming 'Zad!'--which means 'food for the road.' And
much to my abashment he and the old man fell upon my neck and kissed
me on both cheeks.

'Good people! The very best of people! They would take no money. God
reward them,' chanted Rashid, as we rode out of the ruins inland
through a garden of wild flowers. The storm had passed completely. Not
a cloud remained.

After an hour we came in sight of a large khan outside a mud-built
village on the shore. Before it was a crowd, including several
soldiers. As we drew near, Rashid inquired the meaning of the throng.

'A great calamity,' he was informed. 'A man, a foreigner, is dying,
killed by highwaymen. One of his companions, a poor servant, is
already dead.'

We both dismounted, and Rashid pushed in to learn more of the matter.
Presently a soldier came to me.

'Your Honour is an Englishman?' he questioned. 'Praise be to Allah! I
am much relieved. This other also is an Englishman, they tell me. He
is severely wounded, at the gate of death.'

I went with him at once to see the sufferer, who seemed relieved to
hear me speak, but could not answer. Rashid and I did what we could
to make him comfortable, giving the soldiers orders to keep out the
crowd. We decided to ride on and send a doctor, and then report the
matter to a British consul.

'He was going down to start some kind of business in the city over
there,' the leader of the soldiers told me, nodding towards the south.
'He had a largeish company, with several camels. But near the village
of ---- he was attacked by the Circassians, and was so foolish as to
make resistance. They took everything he had of worth--his arms, his
money--and killed a camel-driver, besides wounding him. It happened
yesterday before the storm. They say I should take vengeance for him.
What am I--a corporal with six men--to strive with Huseyn Agha and his
cavalry! It needs a regiment.'

He went grumbling off. Rashid and I were staring hard at one another;
for the village named was that where we had spent the night, and
Huseyn Agha's roasted fowls were in our saddle-bags.

Rashid, as I could see, was troubled upon my account. He kept silence
a good while. At last he said:

'It is like this, my lord. Each man must see with his own eyes and not
another's. People are as one finds them, good or bad. They change with
each man's vision, yet remain the same. For us those highway robbers
are good people; we must bless them; having cause to do so. This other
man is free to curse them, if he will. Good to their friends, bad to
their enemies. What creature of the sons of Adam can condemn them
quite?'

CHAPTER VIII

POLICE WORK

Having to dress for dinner on a certain evening, I took off my
money-belt, and quite forgot to put it on again. It happened to
contain twelve English pounds. I left it lying on the table in the
hotel bedroom. When I came back in the small hours of the morning it
was gone. Rashid--who slept out at a khan in charge of our two
horses--came in at eight o'clock to rouse me. Hearing of my loss, he
gave me the worst scolding I have ever had, and then went out to blow
up the hotel proprietor.

It was, for once, a real hotel with table d'hote, hall-porter, and a
palm-lounge--everything, in fact, excepting drains. The owner was a
fat, brown individual, whom I had generally seen recumbent on a sofa
in his office, while someone of his many sons did all the work. But
that he could show energy upon occasion I now learnt. Hearing from
Rashid that I, a guest in his hotel, had suffered robbery, he sprang
on to his feet and danced with rage.

When I arrived upon the scene, which was the palm-lounge--an open
courtyard shaded by an awning--he was flourishing a monstrous whip,
with dreadful imprecations, literally foaming at the mouth. I begged
him to do nothing rash, but he seemed not to hear me. With the squeal
of a fighting stallion, he rushed off to the servants' quarters,
whence presently there came heartrending shrieks and cries for mercy.
His sons, in fear of murder, followed him, and added their
remonstrance to the general din. The women of his house appeared in
doorways, weeping and wringing their hands.

Rashid seemed gratified by this confusion, regarded as a tribute to
our greatness, his and mine.

'Be good enough to go away,' he told me. 'The scene is quite unworthy
of your dignity. I will take care that all is done to raise your
honour.'

I remained, however. Presently, the host returned, perspiring freely,
mopping his brown face with a crimson handkerchief. He smiled as one
who has had healthy exercise.

'It is no use,' he told me, with a shrug. 'I beat them well, and every
one of them confessed that he alone, and not another, was the thief.
Each, as his turn came, wished to stay my hand at any cost.'

He sank down on a sofa which was in the court. 'What further is your
Honour's will?' he asked. 'I will beat anyone. The story is so bad for
the hotel. I should be ruined if it reached the ears of Cook or
Baedeker.'

The cries of those unhappy servants having shamed me, I told him that
I was content to count the money lost rather than that harmless folk
should suffer for my carelessness. Rashid protested, saying twelve
pounds was no trifle, although I might, in youthful folly, so regard
it. He, as my servant, had to guard my wealth.

'The gold is lost. It is the will of Allah. Let it be,' I answered
irritably.

'Thou wilt not tell the English consul?' cried the host, with sudden
eagerness. 'Thou wilt refrain from saying any word to Cook or Baedeker
to bring ill-fame and ruin on the place? Our Lord augment thy wealth
and guard thee always! May thy progeny increase in honour till it
rules the world!'

'But something must be done,' Rashid remonstrated. 'A crime has been
committed. We must find the culprit.'

'True,' said the host, 'and I will help with all my strength. The
consul would not help at all. He would but frighten the police, with
the result that they would torture--perhaps hang--a man or two, but
not the man who stole your belt of money. Our police, when not
alarmed, are clever. Go to them and give a little money. They will
find the thief.'

'I go this minute,' said Rashid.

I bade him wait. Knowing his way of magnifying me and my possessions,
I thought it better to be present at the interview, lest he should
frighten the police no less than would the intervention of a consul.

We went together through the shady markets, crossing here and there an
open space of blinding sunlight, asking our way at intervals, until at
last we entered a large whitewashed room where soldiers loitered and
a frock-coated, be-fezzed official sat writing at a desk. This
personage was very sympathetic.

'Twelve pounds!' he cried. 'It is a serious sum. The first thing to be
done is to survey the scene of crime. Wait, I will send with you a
knowing man.'

He called one of the soldiers, who stepped forward and saluted, and
gave him charge of the affair.

'You can place confidence in him. He knows his business,' he assured
me, bowing with extreme politeness, as we took our leave.

With the soldier who had been assigned to us we sauntered back to the
hotel. The man abounded in compassion for me. He said it was the worst
case he had ever heard of--to rob a man so manifestly good and amiable
of so great a sum. Alas! the badness of some people. It put out the
sun!

At the hotel he spent a long while in my room, searching, as he said,
for 'traces.' Rashid, the host and all his family, and nearly all the
servants, thronged the doorway. After looking into every drawer, and
crawling underneath the bed, which he unmade completely, he spent some
minutes in debating whether the thief had entered by the window or the
door. Having at last decided for the door, he turned to me and asked
if there was anybody I suspected. When I answered 'no,' I saw him
throw a side-glance at Rashid, as if he thought him fortunate in
having so obtuse a master. As he was departing, Rashid, at my command,
gave him a silver coin, for which he kissed my hand and, having done
so, said:

'I know a clever man, none like him for such business. I will send him
to your presence in an hour.'

Three hours passed. I had finished luncheon, and was sipping coffee in
the lounge, when a sleek personage in gorgeous robes was brought to
me. He had a trick of looking down his nose at his moustache, the
while he stroked it, with a gentle smirk.

'Your Excellency has been robbed,' he murmured in a secret tone, 'and
you would know the robber? There is nothing simpler. I have
discovered many thieves. I think it likely that I know the very man. I
will disguise myself as an old woman or a begging dervish. There are
many ways. But, first, your Honour must bestow on me an English pound.
That is my fee. It is but little for such services.'

I answered languidly that the affair had ceased to thrill me; I wished
to hear no more about the money or the thief. He stayed a long while,
wheedling and remonstrating, depicting his own subtlety in glowing
terms; but in the end departed with despairing shrugs and backward
glances, hoping that I might relent.

Rashid, who had been out to tend the horses, came presently and asked
if I had seen the great detective. When I described our interview, he
nearly wept.

'The people here think me the thief,' he told me. 'They say nothing,
but I feel it in their bearing towards me. And now you give up seeking
for the culprit! Am I to bear this shame for evermore?'

Here was a new dilemma! No way out of it appeared to me, for even if
we did employ the great detective, our chance of finding the
delinquent seemed exceeding small. I was thinking what could possibly
be done to clear Rashid, when a familiar figure came into the court
and strolled towards us. It was Suleyman! I had imagined him three
hundred miles away, at Gaza, in the south of Palestine. Loud were our
exclamations, but his calm rebuked us. I never knew him show
excitement or surprise.

He heard our story with deliberation, and shook his head at the police
and the detective.

'No use at all,' he scoffed. 'The one man for your purpose is the
Chief of the Thieves. I know him intimately.'

'Ma sh'Allah! Is there then a guild of thieves?'

'There is.'

'The Sheykh of the Thieves must be the greatest rogue. I do not care
to have to do with him.'

'You err,' remarked Suleyman, with dignity. 'Your error has its root
in the conviction that a thief is evil. He may be evil as an
individual; all men are apt to be who strive for gain; but as a
member of a corporation he has pride and honour. With Europeans, it is
just the opposite. They individually are more honourable than their
governments and corporations. The Sheykh of the Thieves, I can assure
you, is the soul of honour. I go at once to see him. He can clear
Rashid.'

'If he does that, he is the best of men!' exclaimed my servant.

An hour later one of the hotel men, much excited, came to tell me that
some soldiers were approaching, who had caught the thief. The host and
all his family ran out into the hall. Rashid and all the servants came
from kitchen purlieus. Four soldiers entered with triumphant
exclamations, dragging and pushing forward--Suleyman!

The prisoner's demeanour had its usual calm.

'I have regained the belt,' he called to me. 'These men were watching
near the house, and found it on me. They would not hear reason. The
man who stole the belt--a Greek--has left the city. He gave the Sheykh
the belt, but kept the money.'

The soldiers, disappointed, let him go.

'How dost thou know all that?' inquired their leader.

'The Headman of the Thieves informed me of it.'

'Ah, then, it is the truth,' the soldier nodded. 'He is a man of
honour. He would not deceive thee.'

I do not claim to understand these things. I but relate them.

CHAPTER IX

MY COUNTRYMAN

One summer, in the south of Syria, amid that tumbled wilderness of
cliff and chasm, shale and boulder, which surges all around the Sea of
Lot, we had been riding since the dawn without encountering a human
being, and with relief at last espied a village, having some trace of
cultivated land about it, and a tree.

Rashid was on ahead. Suleyman had been beside me, but had dropped
behind in order to perform some operation on his horse's hoof. As I
came down the last incline on to the village level I heard angry
shouts, and saw a crowd of fellahin on foot mobbing Rashid. Urging my
horse, I shouted to him to know what was happening. At once a number
of the villagers forsook him and surrounded me, waving their arms
about and talking volubly.

I had gathered, from their iteration of the one word 'moyeh,' that
water was the matter in dispute, even before Rashid succeeded in
rejoining me.

He said: 'I rode up to the spring which flows beneath that arch, and
was letting my horse drink from the stone trough of water, when these
maniacs rushed up and dragged my horse away, and made this noise. They
say the water in the spring is theirs, and no one else has any right
to touch it. I offered to make payment, but they would not hear me. I
threatened them with vengeance, but they showed no fear. Is it your
Honour's will that I should beat a few of them?'

Seeing their numbers, I considered it the wiser plan for us to let
them be till their excitement had cooled down, and till Suleyman
arrived to help us with advice. Accordingly, I smiled and nodded to
the villagers, and rode back up the path a little way, Rashid obeying
my example with reluctance, muttering curses on their faith and
ancestry. Then we dismounted and lay down in the shadow of some rocks.
It wanted still two hours before the sun would set.

Suleyman came on us, and dismounted at a call from me.

'What is the noise down there?' he questioned, looking at the village
with that coolness, like indifference, habitual to his face when
meeting problems of importance.

'They will not let us touch the water--curse their fathers!' growled
Rashid. 'Heard anyone the like of such inhospitality? It would but
serve them right if we destroyed their houses.'

Suleyman screwed up his eyes, the better to survey the crowd of
villagers below, who now sat guard around the spring, and murmured
carelessly:

'It is evident that thou hast angered them, O son of rashness. We
shall do well to wait before approaching them again with our polite
request.'

Therewith he stretched his length upon the ground, with a luxurious
sigh, and would, I think, have gone to sleep, had not Rashid,
conceiving himself blamed, thought necessary to relate in full the
whole adventure.

'What else could man have done?' he asked defiantly. 'Say in what
respect, however trifling, did I act unwisely?'

'By Allah, thou didst nothing wrong, and yet thou mightest have done
better, since thy efforts led to failure,' said the sage, benignly.
'Thou art a soldier yet in thought, and thy one method is to threaten.
If that avails not, thou art helpless. There are other ways.'

'I offered money,' cried Rashid indignantly. 'Could man do more?'

'What are those other ways? Instruct us, O beloved!' I put in, to save
Rashid from feeling lonely under blame for ignorance.

'No truly great one ever argues with a crowd. He chooses out one man,
and speaks to him, him only,' said Suleyman; and he was going to tell
us more, but just then something in the wadi down below the village
caught his eye, and he sat up, forgetting our dilemma.

'A marvel!' he exclaimed after a moment spent in gazing. 'Never, I
suppose, since first this village was created, have two Franks
approached it in a single day before. Thou art as one of us in outward
seeming,' he remarked to me; 'but yonder comes a perfect Frank with
two attendants.'

We looked in the direction which his finger pointed, and beheld a man
on horseback clad in white from head to foot, with a pith helmet and
a puggaree, followed by two native servants leading sumpter-mules.

'Our horses are in need of water,' growled Rashid, uninterested in the
sight. 'It is a sin for those low people to refuse it to us.'

'Let us first wait and see how this newcomer fares, what method he
adopts,' replied Suleyman, reclining once more at his ease.

The Frank and his attendants reached the outskirts of the village, and
headed naturally for the spring. The fellahin, already put upon their
guard by Rashid's venture, opposed them in a solid mass. The Frank
expostulated. We could hear his voice of high command.

'Aha, he knows some Arabic. He is a missionary, not a traveller,' said
Suleyman, who now sat up and showed keen interest. 'I might have known
it, for the touring season is long past.'

He rose with dignified deliberation and remounted. We followed him as
he rode slowly down towards the scene of strife. When we arrived, the
Frank, after laying about him vainly with his riding-whip, had drawn
out a revolver. He was being stoned. His muleteers had fled to a safe
distance. In another minute, as it seemed, he would have shot some
person, when nothing under Allah could have saved his life.

Suleyman cried out in English: 'Don't you be a fool, sir! Don't you
fire!'

The Frank looked round in our direction, with an angry face; but
Suleyman bestowed no further thought on him. He rode up to the nearest
group of fellahin, crying aloud:

'O true believers! O asserters of the Unity! Bless the Prophet, and
inform me straightway what has happened!'

Having captured their attention by this solemn adjuration, he
inquired:

'Who is the chief among you? Let him speak, him only!'

Although the crowd had seemed till then to be without a leader, an old
white-bearded man was thrust before him, with the cry:

'Behold our Sheykh, O lord of judgment. Question him!'

Rashid and I heard nothing of the conversation which ensued, except
the tone of the two voices, which appeared quite friendly, and some
mighty bursts of laughter from the crowd. No more stones were thrown,
although some persons still kept guard over the spring.

At length Suleyman returned to us, exclaiming:

'All is well. They grant us leave to take what water we require. The
spring has been a trouble to these people through the ages because the
wandering tribes with all their herds come here in time of drought and
drink it dry. But now they are our friends, and make us welcome.'

He called out to the Frank, who all this while had sat his horse with
an indignant air, more angry, as it seemed, to be forgotten than to be
assailed:

'It is all right. You take the water and you pay them five piastres.'

'It is extortion!' cried the Frank. 'What right have they to charge me
money for the water of this natural spring, which is the gift of God?
I will not pay.'

'No matter. I pay for you,' shrugged Suleyman.

I tried to make the missionary--for such he proved to be upon
acquaintance--understand that the conditions in that desert country
made the spring a valued property, and gave a price to every
pitcherful of water.

'What! Are you English?' was his only answer, as he scanned my
semi-native garb with pity and disgust. 'And who, pray, is that person
with you who was rude to me?'

'His name is Suleyman. He is a friend of mine.'

'A friend, I hardly think,' replied the Frank, fastidiously. He was a
big man, with a dark complexion and light eyes. 'I am going to camp
here to-night. I have a tent. Perhaps you will be good enough to come
and sup with me. Then we can talk.'

'With pleasure,' I made answer, taken by surprise.

'Where is your camp?' he asked.

'We haven't got one. We put up in the guest-room if there is one, or
under the stars.'

'Well, there's no accounting for tastes,' he murmured, with a sneer.

Rashid, through all this conversation, had been standing by, waiting
to tell me that Suleyman had gone before into the village to the
headman's house, where it had been arranged that we should pass the
night. Thither we went, when I had finished speaking to the
missionary; and there we found Suleyman enthroned among the village
elders in a long, low room. He stood up on my entrance, as did all the
others, and explained:

'We have a room near by where we can throw our saddle-bags, but it is
verminous, and so we will not sleep inside it, but outside--on the
roof. For supper we are the invited guests of the good sheykh, and I
can tell you he is getting ready a fine feast.'

With deep regret and some degree of shame I told him of my promise to
take supper with the missionary. He looked reproach at me, and told
the villagers what I had said. They all cried out in disappointment.
Suleyman suggested that I should revoke the promise instantly, but
that I would not do, to his annoyance; and after that, till it was
time for me to go, he and Rashid were sulky and withdrew their eyes
from me. I knew that they were jealous of the Frank, whom they
regarded as an enemy, and feared lest he should turn my mind against
them.

CHAPTER X

THE PARTING OF THE WAYS

It was dusk when I set out for the missionary's tent, and starlit
night before I reached it--so fleeting is the summer twilight in that
land.

Rashid went with me, as in duty bound, and insisted on remaining with
the servants of the missionary by the cook's fire, although I told him
to go back repeatedly, knowing how his mouth must water for the
headman's feast. The dudgeon which he felt at my desertion made him
determined not to let me out of sight, and called for the martyrdom of
someone, even let that someone be himself.

The missionary called: 'Come in!' while I was still a good way off the
tent. Entering, I found him stretched on a deck-chair, with hands
behind his head. He did not rise upon my entrance, but just smiled and
pointed to another chair beyond a little folding table laid for
supper.

He spoke of the day's heat and the fatigues of travel and the flies;
and asked me how I could endure to sleep in native hovels full of
fleas and worse.

I told him that, by Suleyman's arrangement, we were to sleep upon the
roof for safety. He sniffed.

I then related a discussion I had overheard between Rashid and
Suleyman as to the best way of defeating those domestic pests,
thinking to make him laugh. Rashid had spoken of the virtues of a
certain shrub; but Suleyman declared the best specific was a new-born
baby. This, if laid within a room for a short while, attracted every
insect. The babe should then be carried out and dusted. The missionary
did not even smile.

'The brutes!' he murmured. 'How can you, an Englishman, and apparently
a man of education, bear their intimacy?'

They had their good points, I asserted--though, I fear, but lamely;
for the robustness of his attitude impressed me, he being a man,
presumably, of wide experience, and, what is more, a clergyman--the
kind of man I had been taught to treat with some respect.

He said no more till we had finished supper, which consisted of
sardines and corned beef and sliced pineapple, tomatoes and
half-liquid butter out of tins, and some very stale European bread
which he had brought with him. Confronted with such mummy food, I
thought with longing of the good, fresh meal which I had left behind
me at the headman's house. He may have guessed my thoughts, for he
observed: 'I never touch their food. It is insanitary'--which I knew
to be exactly what they said of his.

The man who waited on us seemed to move in fear, and was addressed by
his employer very curtly.

After the supper there was tea, which, I confess, was welcome, and
then the missionary put me through a kind of catechism. Finding out
who I was, and that we had some friends in common, he frowned deeply.
He had heard of my existence in the land, it seemed.

'What are you doing here at all?' he asked severely. 'At your age you
should be at college or in training for some useful work.'

'I'm learning things,' I told him rather feebly.

His point of view, the point of view of all my countrymen, imposed
itself on me as I sat there before him, deeply conscious of my youth
and inexperience.

'What things?' he asked. And then his tongue was loosed. He gave me
his opinion of the people of the country, and particularly of my two
companions. He had summed them up at sight. They were two cunning
rogues, whose only object was to fleece me. He told me stories about
Englishmen who had been ruined in that very way through making friends
with natives whom they thought devoted to them. One story ended in a
horrid murder. He wanted me to have no more to do with them, and when
he saw I was attached to them, begged me earnestly to treat them
always as inferiors, to 'keep them in their place'; and this I
promised, coward-like, to do, although I knew that, in the way he
meant, it was not in me.

It seemed that he himself was travelling in these wild places in
search of an old Greek inscription, mention of which he had discovered
in some book. He half-persuaded me to bear him company.

'You are doing no good here, alone with such companions,' he said, as
I at last departed. 'Think over my advice to you. Go back to England.
Come with me for the next few days, and share my tents. Then come and
stay with me in Jerusalem, and we can talk things over.' There was no
doubt of the kindliness of his intention.

I thanked him, and strolled back toward the village in the starlight,
Rashid, who, at my first appearance, had detached himself from a small
group which sat around the missionary's kitchen fire, stalking on
before me with a lantern.

It seemed a wonder that the village dogs, which had made so great a
noise on our arrival in the place so short a while before, now took no
notice, seeming to recognise our steps as those of lawful inmates.

At the headman's house Suleyman still sat up talking with the village
elders. He expressed a hope that I had much enjoyed myself, but with a
hint of grievance which I noticed as a thing expected. Looking round
upon those eager, friendly faces, I compared them with the cold face
of the missionary, who suddenly appeared to me as a great bird of
prey. I hated him instinctively, for he was like a schoolmaster; and
yet his words had weight, for I was young to judge, and schoolmasters,
though hateful, have a knack of being in the right.

At last we three went up on to the roof to sleep. We had lain down and
said 'good night' to one another, when Suleyman remarked, as if
soliloquising:

'Things will never be the same.'

'What do you mean?' I questioned crossly.

'That missionary has spoilt everything. He told you not to trust us,
not to be so friendly with persons who are natives of this land, and
therefore born inferior.'

I made no answer, and Suleyman went on:

'A man who journeys in the desert finds a guide among the desert
people, and he who journeys on the sea trusts seamen. What allegations
did he make? I pray you tell us!'

'He told me stories of his own experience.'

'His experience is not, never will be, yours. He is the enemy. A
tiger, if one asked him to describe mankind, would doubtless say that
they are masters of the guile which brings destruction, deserving
only to be clawed to death. Question the pigeons of some mosque, upon
the other hand, and they will swear by Allah men are lords of all
benevolence.'

Rashid broke in: 'His boys, with whom I talked, inform me that he is
devoid of all humanity. He never thanks them for their work, however
perfect, nor has a word of blessing ever passed his lips. He frowns
continually. How can he be the same as one like thee who laughs and
talks?'

We had all three sat up, unconsciously. And we continued sitting up,
debating miserably under the great stars, hearing the jackals' voices
answer one another from hill to hill both near and far, all through
that night, drawing ever closer one to another as we approached an
understanding.

'An Englishman such as that missionary,' said Suleyman, 'treats good
and bad alike as enemies if they are not of his nation. He gives bare
justice; which, in human life, is cruelty. He keeps a strict account
with every man. We, when we love a man, keep no account. We never
think of what is due to us or our position. And when we hate--may God
forgive us!--it is just the same--save with the very best and coolest
heads among us.'

'But you are cunning, and have not our code of honour,' I objected,
with satirical intention, though the statement sounded brutal.

'Your Honour says so!' cried Rashid, half weeping. 'No doubt you are
referring to that theft in the hotel, of which you thought so little
at the time that you would take no action. That was the doing of a
Greek, as was established. Say, can you of your own experience of
children of the Arabs say that one of us has ever robbed you of a
small para, or wronged you seriously?'

'I cannot,' was my answer, after brief reflection. 'But the experience
of other, older men must weigh with me.'

'Let other men judge people as they find them, and do thou likewise,'
said Suleyman.

'He urged me to give up this aimless wandering and go with him in
search of an old Greek inscription, not far off. Within four days he
hopes to see El Cuds again; and thence he urged me to return to
England.'

At that my two companions became silent and exceeding still, as if
some paralysing fear hung over them. It was the hour immediately
before the dawn, and life seemed hopeless. The missionary's voice
seemed then to me the call of duty, yet every instinct in my blood was
fierce against it.

'Your Honour will do what he pleases,' said my servant mournfully.

'The Lord preserve thee ever!' sighed Suleyman. 'Thou art the leader
of the party. Give command.'

A streak of light grew on the far horizon, enabling us to see the
outlines of the rugged landscape. A half-awakened wild-bird cried
among the rocks below us. And suddenly my mind grew clear. I cared no
longer for the missionary's warning. I was content to face the dangers
which those warnings threatened; to be contaminated, even ruined as an
Englishman. The mischief, as I thought it, was already done. I knew
that I could never truly think as did that missionary, nor hold myself
superior to Eastern folk again. If that was to be reprobate, then I
was finished.

'Saddle the horses. We will start at once,' I told Rashid. 'Before
the missionary is afoot--towards the East.'

For a moment he sat motionless, unable to believe his ears. Then
suddenly he swooped and kissed my hand, exclaiming: 'Praise be to
Allah!'

'Praise be to Allah!' echoed Suleyman, with vast relief. 'The tiger in
thee has not triumphed. We shall still know joy.'

'I resign myself to be the pigeon of the mosque,' I answered, laughing
happily.

Five minutes later we were riding towards the dawn, beginning to grow
red behind the heights of Moab.

CHAPTER XI

THE KNIGHT ERRANT

We had left Damascus after noon the day before, and had spent the
night at a great fortress-khan--the first of many on the pilgrims'
road. We had been on our way an hour before Rashid discovered that he
had left a pair of saddle-bags behind him at the khan; and as those
saddle-bags contained belongings of Suleyman, the latter went back
with him to retrieve them. I rode on slowly, looking for a patch of
shade. Except the khan, a square black object in the distance, there
was nothing in my range of vision to project a shadow larger than a
good-sized thistle. Between a faint blue wave of mountains on the one
hand and a more imposing but far distant range upon the other, the
vast plain rolled to the horizon in smooth waves.

I was ascending such an undulation at my horse's leisure when a
cavalier appeared upon its summit--a figure straight out of the pages
of some book of chivalry, with coloured mantle streaming to the
breeze, and lance held upright in the stirrup-socket. This knight was
riding at his ease till he caught sight of me, when, with a shout, he
laid his lance in rest, lowered his crest and charged. I was
exceedingly alarmed, having no skill in tournament, and yet I could
not bring myself to turn and flee. I rode on as before, though with a
beating heart, my purpose, if I had one, being, when the moment came,
to lean aside, and try to catch his spear, trusting in Allah that my
horse would stand the shock. But the prospect of success was small,
because I could see nothing clearly, till suddenly the thunder of the
hoof-beats ceased, and I beheld the knight within ten yards of me,
grinning and saluting me with lance erect, his horse flung back upon
its haunches.

'I frightened thee, O Faranji?' he asserted mockingly.

I replied that it would take more than such a wretched mountebank as
he could do to frighten me, and showed him my revolver, which, until
the fear was over, had escaped my memory. It pleased him, and he
asked for it immediately. I put it back.

'A pretty weapon,' he agreed, 'but still I frightened thee.'

I shrugged and sneered, disdaining further argument, and thought to
pass him; but he turned his horse and rode beside me, asking who I was
and where I came from, and what might be my earthly object in riding
thus towards the desert all alone. I answered all his questions very
coldly, which did not disconcert him in the least. Hearing that I had
attendants, one of whom had skill in warfare, he said that he would
wait with me till they came up. I tried to frighten him with tales of
all the men Rashid had slain in single combat: he was all the more
determined to remain with me, saying that he would gain much honour
from destroying such a man.

'But I