he singing or
chattering of women and children.

As the day advanced I was happily employed at my tent door reading the
Arabic New Testament; it should have been in Hebrew at Yamnia, as being
more profitable than all the Pirke Avoth of the Talmud. At sunset our
party walked out in the fields to shoot the pretty bee-eaters.

Of this village there is a tale current among the peasantry over the
country, which conveys an important lesson for the conduct of human life.

An old Shaikh of Yabneh had five sons. When very old, a complaint was
brought to him that some one had stolen a cock; so he called together his
sons and ordered them all to search for the cock; but it was not found.
Some time afterwards it was represented to him that a sheep was stolen;
he then commanded his sons to go and search for the cock. They replied,
"O our father, it is not a cock but a sheep that is stolen;" but he
persisted in his command, and they did what they well could, but without
success. After that he was told that a cow was missing; he again
commanded his sons to look after the cock. They thinking he had lost his
senses, cried, "_Sallem 'akalak ya Abuna_, (May God perfect thy
understanding, O our father,) it is not a cock but a cow that is
missing." "Go look for the cock," persevered the old man; they obeyed,
but this time again without success. People wondered and thought him in
a state of mere dotage. Next came the news that a man was killed. The
father pertinaciously adhered to his first injunctions, and ordered his
sons to look for the cock. Again they returned without finding it, and
in the end it came to pass that the killing of the man brought on a blood
feud with his relations--the factions of several villages took up the
case for revenge, and the whole town was destroyed, and lay long in a
state of desolation, for want of sufficient zeal in discovering and
punishing the first offence, the stealing of the cock, which thus became
a root of all the rest. There is a good deal of wisdom contained in this
narrative or allegory, whichever it may be considered. Offenders become
emboldened by impunity, and the first beginnings should be checked.

_Thursday_ 3_d_.--Early dew around the tents upon the green. We mounted
at half-past six. I rode up to the village and got to the top of the
tower in the village.

After an hour and a half of level riding southwards, we arrived at a
broad old sycamore in the middle of the road.