“Be it, then, the 10th of August, whose jotted notes I will put together and fill up the blanks. I might equally have taken the 9th or the 11th, they are all much the same; but the day I have chosen looks a little the closer written of the two, and for that sole reason I prefer giving it.
“On that day, then, in 1862, about a fortnight after our establishment at Ha’yel, and when we were, in consequence, fully inured to our town existence, Seleem Abou Mahmood-el-’Eys and Barakat-esh-Shamee, that is, my companion and myself, rose, not from our beds, for we had none, but from our roof-spread carpets, and took advantage of the silent hour of the first faint dawn, while the stars yet kept watch in the sky over the slumbering inhabitants of Shomer, to leave the house for a cool and undisturbed walk ere the sun should arise and man go forth unto his work and to his labor. We locked the outer door, and then passed into the still twilight gloom down the cross-street leading to the market-place, which we next followed up to its farther or southwestern end, where large folding-gates separate it from the rest of the town. The wolfish city-dogs, whose bark and bite, too, render walking the streets at night a rather precarious business, now tamely stalked away in the gloaming, while here and there a crouching camel, the packages yet on his back, and his sleeping driver close by, awaited the opening of the warehouse at whose door they had passed the night. Early though it was, the market gates were already unclosed, and the guardian sat wakeful in his niche. On leaving the market we had yet to go down a broad street of houses and gardens cheerfully intermixed, till at last we reached the western wall of the town, or, rather, of the new quarter added by ’Abdallah, where the high portal between round flanking towers gave us issue on the open plain, blown over at this hour by a light gale of life and coolness. To the west, but some four or five miles distant, rose the serrated mass of Djebel Shomer, throwing up its black fantastic peaks, now reddened by the reflected dawn, against the lead-blue sky. Northward the same chain bends round till it meets the town, and then stretches away for a length of ten or twelve days’ journey, gradually losing in height on its approach to Meshid ’Alee and the valley of the Euphrates. On our south we have a little isolated knot of rocks, and far off the extreme ranges of Djebel Shomer, or ’Aja, to give it its historical name, intersected by the broad passes that lead on in the same direction to Djebel Solma. Behind us lies the capital. Telal’s palace, with its high oval keep, houses, gardens, walls, and towers, all coming out black against the ruddy bars of eastern light, and behind, a huge pyramidal peak almost overhanging the town, and connected by lower rocks with the main mountain range to north and south, those stony ribs that protect the central heart of the kingdom. In the plain itself we can just distinguish by the doubtful twilight several blackish patches irregularly scattered over its face, or seen as though leaning upward against its craggy verge; these are the gardens and country houses of ’Obeyd and other chiefs, besides hamlets and villages, such as Kefar and ’Adwah, with their groves of palm and ‘ithel’ (the Arab larch), now blended in the dusk. One solitary traveller on his camel, a troop of jackals sneaking off to their rocky cavern, a few dingy tents of Shomer Bedouins, such are the last details of the landscape. Far away over the southern hills beams the glory of Canopus, and announces a new Arab year; the pole-star to the north lies low over the mountain tops.
“We pace the pebble-strown flat to the south till we leave behind us the length of the town wall, and reach the little cluster of rocks already mentioned. We scramble up to a sort of niche near its summit, whence, at a height of a hundred feet or more, we can overlook the whole extent of the plain and wait the sunrise. Yet before the highest crags of Shomer are gilt with its first rays, or the long giant shadows of the easterly chain have crossed the level, we see groups of peasants, who, driving their fruit and vegetable-laden asses before them, issue like little bands of ants from the mountain gorges around, and slowly approach on the tracks converging to the capital. Horsemen from the town ride out to the gardens, and a long line of camels on the westerly Medina road winds up toward Ha’yel. We wait ensconced in our rocky lookout and enjoy the view till the sun has risen, and the coolness of the night air warms rapidly into the sultry day; it is time to return. So we quit our solitary perch and descend to the plain, where, keeping in the shadow of the western fortifications, we regain the town gate and thence the market.
“There all is now life and movement; some of the warehouses, filled with rice, flour, spices, or coffee, and often concealing in their inner recesses stores of the prohibited American weed, are already open; we salute the owners while we pass, and they return a polite and friendly greeting. Camels are unloading in the streets, and Bedouins standing by, looking anything but at home in the town. The shoemaker and the blacksmith, those two main props of Arab handicraft, are already at their work, and some gossiping bystanders are collected around them. At the corner where our cross-street falls into the market-place, three or four country women are seated, with piles of melons, gourds, egg-plant fruits, and the other garden produce before them for sale. My companion falls a haggling with one of these village nymphs, and ends by obtaining a dozen ‘badinjans’ and a couple of water-melons, each bigger than a man’s head, for the equivalent of an English twopence. With this purchase we return home, where we shut and bolt the outer door, then take out of a flat basket what has remained from over night of our wafer-like Ha’yel bread, and with this and a melon make a hasty breakfast. I say a hasty one, for although it is only half an hour after sunrise, repeated knocks at our portal show the arrival of patients and visitors: early rising being here the fashion, and in reason must be wherever artificial lighting is scanty. However, we do not at once open to our friends, nor will they take offence at the delay, but remain where they are, chatting together before our door till we admit them; of so little value is time here.
“In comes a young man of good appearance, clad in the black cloak common to all of the middle or upper classes in Central Arabia; in his hand he bears a wand of the Sidr or lotos-wood. A silver-hilted sword and a glistening Kafee’yah announce him to be a person of some importance, while his long, black ringlets, handsome features, and slightly olive complexion, with a tall stature and easy gait, declare him a native of Djebel Shomer, and townsman of Ha’yel; it is ’Ojeyl, the eldest-born of a large family, and successor to the comfortable house and garden of his father, not long since deceased, in a quarter of the town some twenty minutes’ walk distant. He leads by the hand his younger brother, a modest-looking lad of fair complexion and slim make, but almost blind, and evidently out of health also. After passing through the preliminary ceremonies of introduction to Barakat, he approaches my recess, and standing without, salutes me with the greatest deference. Thinking him a desirable acquaintance I receive him very graciously, and he begs me to see what is the matter with his brother. I examine the case, finding it to be within the limits of my skill, and not likely to require more than a very simple course of treatment. Accordingly I make my bargain for the chances of recovery, and find ’Ojeyl docile to the terms proposed, and with little disposition, all things considered, to backwardness in payment. Arabs, indeed, are in general close in driving a bargain and open in downright giving; they will chaffer half a day about a penny, while they will throw away the worth of pounds on the first asker. But ’Ojeyl was one of the best specimens of the Ha’yel character, and of the clan Ta’i, renowned in all times for their liberal ways and high sense of honor. I next proceed to administer to my patient such drugs as his state requires, and he receives them with that air of absolute and half-religious confidence which well-educated Arabs show to their physician, whom they regard as possessed of an almost sacred and supernatural power—a feeling, by the way, hardly less advantageous to the patient than to the practitioner, and which may often contribute much to the success of the treatment.
“During the rest of my stay at Ha’yel, ’Ojeyl continued to be one of my best friends, I had almost said disciples; our mutual visits were frequent, and always pleasing and hearty. His brother’s cure, which followed in less than a fortnight, confirmed his attachment, nor had I reason to complain of scantiness in his retribution.
“Meanwhile the court-yard has become full of visitors. Close by my door I see the intelligent and demurely smiling face of ’Abd-el-Mahsin, where he sits between two pretty and well-dressed boys; they are the two elder children of Telal—Bedr and Bander. Their guardsman, a negro slave with a handsome cloak and sword, is seated a little lower down; farther on are two townsmen, one armed, the other with a wand at his side. A rough, good-natured youth, of a bronzed complexion, and whose dingy clothes bespeak his mechanical profession, is talking with another of a dress somewhat different in form and coarser in material than that usually worn in Ha’yel; this latter must be a peasant from some one of the mountain villages. Two Bedouins, ragged and uncouth, have straggled in with the rest; while a tall, dark-featured youth, with a gilded hilt to his sword, and more silk about him than a Wahabee would approve, has taken his place opposite to ’Abd-el-Mahsin, and is trying to draw him into conversation. But this last has asked Barakat to lend him one of my Arabic books to read, and is deeply engaged in its perusal.
“’Ojeyl has taken leave, and I give the next turn of course to ’Abd-el-Mahsin. He informs me that Telal has sent me his two sons, Bedr and Bander, that I may examine their state of health, and see if they require doctoring. This is in truth a little stroke of policy on Telal’s part, who knows equally with myself that the boys are perfectly well and want nothing at all. But he wishes to give us a mark of his confidence, and at the same time to help us in establishing our medical reputation in the town; for though by no means himself persuaded of the reality of our doctoral title, he understands the expediency of saving appearances before the public.
“Well, the children are passed in review with all the seriousness due to a case of heart complaint or brain fever, while at a wink from me Barakat prepares in the kitchen a draught of cinnamon water, which, with sugar, named medicine for the occasion, pleases the young heirs of royalty and keeps up the farce; ’Abd-el-Mahsin expatiating all the time to the bystanders on the wonderful skill with which I have at once discovered the ailments and their cure, and the small boys thinking that if this be medicine they will do their best to be ill for it every day.
“’Abd-el-Mahsin now commits them to the negro, who, however, before taking them back to the palace, has his own story to tell of some personal ache, for which I prescribe without stipulating for payment, since he belongs to the palace, where it is important to have the greatest number of friends possible, even on the back stairs. But ’Abd-el-Mahsin remains, reading, chatting, quoting poetry, and talking history, recent events, natural philosophy, or medicine, as the case may be.