ey are placed on beetling cliffs like the home of the eagle
above the chasm. No solitary houses are met throughout the country. The
people build together for safety, and near the water for life, and by
the village fountains and wells cluster the fairest scenes of Eastern
poetry, as well Arab and Persian as Hebrew, and around them have taken
place some of the fiercest of Oriental battles.

At the villages a little water is drawn off from the rivers, and
carefully apportioned among the different families and factions. By
means of this water, carefully conducted to the various gardens, apples
and plums, grapes and pomegranates, melons and cucumbers, corn and
onions, olives and egg plants are cultivated; and such is the bounty of
Nature, that with the least effort existence is possible wherever there
is water. A little rancid oil and a few vegetables are sufficient to
sustain life, and these can be had by a few hours labour in the cool of
the day. The rest of the time may be spent squatting cross-legged by the
water, or smoking and dozing in the shade. This is existence, but not
life; yet why should the _fellah_ labour for anything beyond what is
absolutely necessary, when the slightest sign of wealth would create
anxious solicitude on the part of the Turk?

A ride of seventy-two miles across Ph[oe]nicia, Lebanon, C[oe]lo-Syria,
and Anti-Lebanon, brings us, by French diligence, to Damascus. Abana and
Pharpar break through a sublime gorge, about 100 yards wide, down the
middle of which the French road winds its serpentine course, the rivers
on either side being fringed with silver poplar and scented walnut. As
we look eastward from the brow of the hill, the great plain of Damascus,
encircled by a framework of desert, lies before us. The river, escaped
from the rocky gorge, spreads out like a fan, and, after a run of three
miles, enters Damascus, where it flows through 15,000 houses, sparkles
in 60,000 marble fountains, and hurries on to scatter wealth and
fertility far and wide over the plain. Those who have gazed on this
scene are never likely to forget its supreme loveliness. Its beauty is
doubtless much enhanced by contrast. The eye has been wandering over a
chocolate-coloured and heated landscape throughout a weary day;
suddenly, on turning a corner, it rests on Eden.

The city is spread out before you, embowered in orchards, in the midst
of a plain of 300 square miles. Around the pearl-coloured, city--first
in the wor