over it. Here is a shepherd-boy playing on his "zimmara" or pipe, made
of two reeds tied together and perforated. He plays on it hour after
hour and day after day, as he leads his sheep and goats or cattle along
the plain or over the mountains. You do not like it much, any more than
he would like a melodeon or a piano. When King David was a shepherd-boy
he played on such a pipe as this as he wandered over the mountains of
Judea.

Now we turn away from the sea and go eastward to Halba. Before long we
cross the river Arka on a narrow stone bridge, and pass a high hill
called "Tel Arka." Here the Arkites lived, who are mentioned in Genesis
x:17. That was four thousand two hundred years ago. What a chain of
villages skirt this plain! The people build their villages on the hills
for protection and health, but go down to plough and sow and feed their
flocks to the rich level plain. Now we cross a little stream of water,
and look up the ravine, and there is Ishoc's house perched on the side
of the hill opposite Halba. Ishoc and his wife Im Hanna, come out to
meet us, and he helps us pitch the tent by the great fig tree near his
house. We unroll the tent, splice the tent pole, open the bag of tent
pins, get the mallet, and although the wind is blowing hard, we will
drive the pegs so deep that there will be no danger of its blowing over.

Abu Hanna, or Ishoc, is a noble Christian man, one of the best men in
Syria. He has suffered very much for Christ's sake. The Greeks in the
village on the hill have tried to poison him. They hired Nusairy
Mughlajees to shoot him. They cut down his trees at night, and pulled up
his plantations of vegetables. They came at night and tore up the roof
of his house, and shot through at him but did not hit him. But the
Mohammedan Begs over there always help him, because he is an honest man,
and aids them in their business and accounts. When the Greeks began to
persecute him, they told him to fire a gun whenever they came about his
house, and they would come over and fight for him. They even offered to
go up and burn the Greek village and put an end to these persecutions.
But Ishoc would not let them. He said, "Mohammed Beg, you know I am a
Christian, not like these Greeks who lie and steal and kill, but I
follow the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, who said, 'Love your
enemies,' and I do not wish to injure one of them." The Begs were
astonished at this, and went away, urging him if there were any more