ing, however, the sailors descried the
mountains of Cyprus looming in the far distance like a misty cloud.
With my less practised eyes I could see nothing but the sunset at
sea--a phenomenon of which I had had a more exalted conception. The
rising and setting of the sun at sea is not nearly so striking a
spectacle as the same phenomenon in a rocky landscape. At sea the
sky is generally cloudless in the evening, and the sun gradually
sinks, without refraction of rays or prismatic play of colours, into
its ocean-bed, to pursue its unchanging course the next day. How
infinitely more grand is this spectacle when seen from the "Rigi
Kulm" in Switzerland! There it is really a spectacle, in
contemplating which we feel impelled to fall on our knees in
speechless adoration, and admire the wisdom of the Almighty in his
wondrous works.

May 24th.

On mounting to the deck this morning at five o'clock I could
distinguish the island of Cyprus, which looks uglier the nearer we
approach. Both the foreground and the mountain-peaks have an
uncomfortable barren air. At ten o'clock we entered the harbour of
Larnaka. The situation of this town is any thing but fine; the
country looks like an Arabian desert, and a few unfruitful date-
palms rise beside the roofless stone houses.

I should not have gone on shore at all, if Doctor Faaslanc, whose
acquaintance I had made at Constantinople, and who had been
appointed quarantine physician here four weeks before my departure,
had not come to fetch me. The streets of Larnaka are unpaved, so
that we were obliged literally to wade more than ankle-deep in sand
and dust. The houses are small, with irregular windows, sometimes
high and sometimes low, furnished with wooden grated shutters; and
the roofs are in the form of terraces. This style of building I
found to be universal throughout Syria.

Of a garden or a green place not a trace was to be seen. The sandy
expanse reaches to the foot of the mountains, which viewed from this
direction form an equally barren picture. Behind these mountains
the appearance of the landscape is said to be very fruitful; but I
did not penetrate into the interior, nor did I go to Nikosia, the
capital of the island, distant some twelve miles from Larnaka.

Doctor Faaslanc took me to his house, which had an appearance of
greater comfort than I had expected to find, for it consisted of two
spacious rooms which might almost have been termed halls. An
agree