ring. Here, the
ploughman comes, carrying his long plough and goad on his shoulder,
and with him his wife lugging the yoke and his boy leading the oxen.
Alas, the sun shall not set on these bright, glowing, green terraces,
whose walls are very ramparts of flowers. There, the boy with his
scythe is paving the way for his father's plough; the grass is mowed
and given to the oxen as a bribe to do the ugly business. And all for
the sake of the ugly mulberries, which are cultivated for the ugly
silk-worms. Come, let us to the heath, where the hiss of the scythe
and the 'ho-back' and 'oho' of the ploughman are not heard.

"But let us swing from the road. Come, the hedges of Nature are not as
impassable as the hedges of man. Through these scrub oaks and wild
pears, between this tangle of thickets, over the clematis and
blackberry bush,--and here we are under the pines, the lofty and
majestic pines. How different are these natural hedges, growing in
wild disorder, from the ugly cactus fences with which my neighbours
choose to shut in their homes, and even their souls. But my business
now is not with them. There are my friends the children again
gathering the pine-needles of last summer for lighting the fire of the
silk-worm nursery. And down that narrow foot-path, meandering around
the boulders and disappearing among the thickets, see what big loads
of brushwood are moving towards us. Beneath them my swarthy and hardy
peasants are plodding up the hill asweat and athirst. When I first
descended to the wadi, one such load of brushwood emerging suddenly
from behind a cliff surprised and frightened me. But soon I was
reminded of the moving forest in Macbeth. The man bowed beneath the
load was hidden from view, and the boy directly behind was sweating
under a load as big as that of his father. '_Awafy!_' (Allah give you
strength), I said, greeting them. 'And increase of health to you,'
they replied. I then asked the boy how far down do they have to go for
their brushwood, and laying down his load on a stone to rest, he
points below, saying, 'Here, near the river.' But this 'Here, near the
river' is more than four hours' walk from the village.--Allah preserve
you in your strength, my Brothers. And they pass along, plodding
slowly under their overshadowing burdens. A hard-hearted Naturalist,
who goes so deep into Nature as to be far from the vital core even as
the dilettante, might not have any sympathy to throw away on such
occasion