The summer passed away. By the month of October the tribe was in the vicinity of Aleppo. My heart beat on finding myself so near my home; but, according to our agreement, I could not even send news of myself to my friends. Sheik Ibrahim desired to pass the winter at Damascus—no Bedouin durst conduct us. We obtained with great difficulty an escort as far as a village, two days from Aleppo, called Soghene (the hot.) The hospitable inhabitants contended for the pleasure of receiving us. A natural warm bath accounts for the name of the village; and the beauty of its inhabitants may probably be attributable to its warm springs. From thence we reached Palmyra, but with a difficulty for which we were indemnified by the pleasure of seeing Sheik Ragial again. After passing a fortnight with our friends, we went back to Corietain, where Sheik Selim and the curate Moussi welcomed us with genuine kindness;—they were never tired of hearing our accounts of the Bedouins.—Sheik Ibrahim satisfied their friendly concern about our affairs, by saying that our speculation was wonderfully advantageous; that we had gained more than we had expected; whilst in reality, between presents and losses, we only had remaining the goods deposited with Moussi.—We lost thirty days at Corietain in preparing for our departure. Winter was rapidly coming on, and no one durst furnish us with cattle, being convinced we should be plundered on the road. At last, Sheik Ibrahim bought a bad horse, I hired an ass, and in miserable weather, with a freezing wind, we set off, accompanied by four men on foot, for the village of Dair Antié. After some hours we arrived at a defile between two mountains, named Beni el Gebelain. At this spot, twenty Bedouin horsemen came upon us. Our guides, far from defending us, hid their guns and remained spectators of our disaster. The Bedouins stripped us, and left us nothing but our shirts. We implored them to kill us rather than expose us to the cold. At last, touched at our condition, they had the generosity to leave each of us a gombaz. As for our beasts, they were too sorry to tempt them. Being hardly able to walk, they would have only uselessly detained them. Night came on, and the cold was excessive, and deprived us of the use of speech. Our eyes were red, our skin blue; at the end of some time I fell to the ground, fainting and frozen. Sheik Ibrahim in despair made gesticulations to the guides, but was unable to speak. One of them, a Syrian Christian, took pity upon me and the grief of Sheik Ibrahim; he threw down his horse, which was also half dead with cold and fatigue, killed it, opened the belly, and placed me without consciousness in the skin, with only my head out. At the end of half an hour, I regained my senses, quite astonished at finding myself alive again, and in so strange a position. Warmth restored my speech; and I earnestly thanked Sheik Ibrahim and the good Arab. I took courage, and found strength to proceed. A little after, our guides cried out, “Here’s the village!” and we entered the first house. It belonged to a farrier, named Hanna el Bitar. He showed a lively sympathy in our situation, set about covering us both with camel-dung, and gave us a little wine—a few drops at a time: having thus restored our strength and warmth, he withdrew us from our dunghill, put us to bed, and made us take some good soup. After a sleep, which was indispensable, we borrowed two hundred piastres to pay our guides and carry us to Damascus, which we reached the 23d December, 1810.
M. Chabassan, a French physician, the only Frank at Damascus, received us; but as we were to pass the winter here, we afterwards took up our quarters in the Lazarist Convent, which was abandoned.
I will not describe the celebrated city of Sham (Damascus), the Gate of Glory (Bab el Cahbé), as the Turks style it. Our long residence has enabled us to know it minutely; but it has been too often visited by travellers to offer any new interest. I return to my narrative.
One day, being at the bazaar to pass away the time in the Turkish fashion, we saw running towards us a Bedouin, who embraced us, saying, “Do you not recollect your brother Hettall, who ate your bread at Nuarat el Nahaman?” Delighted with meeting him, we took him home, and having regaled him, and asked him many questions, we learned that the affairs of the tribe Hassnnée were in a bad condition, and that the league against them was extending daily. Hettall told us that he was of the tribe of Would Ali, whose chief, Douhi, was known to us. This tribe winters in the territory of Sarka and Balka; it reaches from the country of Ismael to the Dead Sea, and returns to Horan in the spring. He proposed to us to visit it, promising a good sale for our merchandise. Having consented, it was agreed that he should come for us in the month of March.
Sheik Ibrahim having received, through the intervention of M. Chabassan, a group of a thousand tallaris from Aleppo, desired me to make new purchases. When they were completed, I showed them to him, and asked whether any thing would remain for us at our return? “My dear son,” he replied, “the gratitude of every chief of a tribe brings me more than all my merchandise.—Be under no concern. You also shall receive your return in money and in reputation. You shall be renowned in your time; but I must know all the tribes and their chiefs. I depend upon you to get to the Drayhy, and for that purpose you must absolutely pass for a Bedouin. Let your beard grow, dress like them, and imitate their usages. Ask no explanations—remember our terms.” My only reply was, “May God give us strength!”
Twenty times was I on the point of abandoning an enterprise of which I perceived all the dangers without knowing the object. This silence, this blind obedience, became insupportable. However, my wish to come to the issue, and my attachment to M. Lascaris, gave me patience.
At the time agreed, Hettall arrived with three camels and two guides, and we set out the 15th March, 1811, one year and twenty-eight days after our first departure from Aleppo. The tribe was at a place called Misarib, three days from Damascus. Nothing remarkable happened on the road. We passed the nights under a starry sky; and on the third day, by sunset, we were in the midst of the tents of Would Ali. The coup d’œil was delightful. Every tent was surrounded by horses, camels, goats, and sheep, with the lance of the horseman planted at the entrance: that of the Emir Douhi arose in the centre. He received us with all possible consideration, and made us sup with him. He is a man of understanding, and is equally loved and feared by his people. He commands five thousand tents, and three tribes, which are joined to his; those of Benin Sakhrer, of El Serhaan, and El Sarddié. He had divided his soldiers into companies or divisions, each commanded by one of his kinsmen.
The Bedouins are fond of hearing stories after supper. This is one that the emir told us: it depicts the extreme attachment they have for their horses, and the self-love they manifest with regard to their own qualities.
One of his tribe, named Giabal, possessed a very celebrated mare. Hassad Pacha, then vizier of Damascus, made him on various occasions all sorts of offers to part with it, but in vain, for a Bedouin loves his horse as he does his wife. The pacha then employed threats, but with no better success. At length, another Bedouin, named Giafar, came to the pacha, and asked what he would give him if he brought him Giabal’s mare? “I will fill thy barley sack with gold,” replied Hassad, who felt indignant at his want of success. This took place without transpiring; and Giabal fastened his mare at night by the foot with an iron ring, the chain of which passed into his tent, being held by a picket fixed in the ground under the very felt which served him and his wife as a bed. At midnight, Giafar creeps into the tent on all-fours, and, insinuating himself between Giabal and his wife, gently pushes first the one, and then the other: the husband thought his wife was pushing, the wife thought the same of the husband; and each made more room. Giafar then, with a knife well sharpened, makes a slit in the felt, takes out the picket, unties the mare, mounts her, and, grasping Giabal’s lance, pricks him slightly with it, calling out, “It is I, Giafar, who have taken thy noble mare; I give thee early notice!” and off he goes. Giabal instantly darts from the tent, calls his friends, mounts his brother’s mare, and pursues Giafar for four hours. Giabal’s brother’s mare was of the same blood as his own, though not so good. Outstripping all the other horsemen, he was on the point of overtaking Giafar, when he cried out, “Pinch her right ear, and give her the stirrup.” Giafar did so, and flew like lightning. The pursuit was then useless: the distance between them was too great. The other Bedouins reproached Giabal with being himself the cause of the loss of his mare.[G] “I would rather,” said he, “lose her, than lower her reputation. Would you have me let it be said in the tribe of Would Ali, that any other mare has outrun mine? I have at least the satisfaction of saying that no other could overtake her.” He returned with this consolation, and Giafar received the price of his address.
Some one else related that in the tribe of Nedgde there was a mare of equal reputation with that belonging to Giabal, and that a Bedouin of another tribe, named Daher, was almost mad with longing to possess her. Having in vain offered all his camels and his riches, he determined to stain his face with the juice of an herb, to clothe himself in rags, to tie up his neck and legs like a lame beggar, and, thus equipped, to wait for Nabee, the owner of the mare, in a road by which he knew he must pass. When he drew near, he said to him in a feeble voice: “I am a poor stranger: for three days I have been unable to stir from this to get food: help me, and God will reward you.” The Bedouin offered to take him on his horse, and carry him home; but the rogue replied: “I am not able to rise, I have not strength.” The other, full of compassion, dismounted, brought the mare close, and placed him on her with great difficulty. As soon as he found himself in the saddle, Daher gave her a touch with the stirrup, and went off, saying—“It is I, Daher, who have got her and am carrying her off.”