LITTLE GIRLS OF THE VILLAGE
Our first visual impressions of Râm Allâh were received on an afternoon early in April, 1901, before the completion of the carriage road, as we approached it by the old bridle-path already mentioned. By this path Râm Allâh is hidden from sight until one rises to the summit just to the south of the village, where many of the villagers have vineyards planted. Between this hill and the village lies a soft depression which, beginning at the watershed to the east of the village, dips away to the southwest towards the little village of Râfât and beyond, disclosing a beautiful view of ancient Gibeon (el-Jîb) and Mizpeh of Samuel (Neby Samwîl). There the village of Râm Allâh rested partly in the edge of the valley, but mostly spread along the opposite ridge. The gentler rays of the afternoon sun brought out the creamy tints of the stone houses standing in their cubical solidity. Here and there rose a taller building; at the left was the red-tiled roof of the Greek Orthodox Church. But by far the choicest bit of the panorama was the house and grounds of the Friends’ Mission property. The house had one of the rare, tiled roofs evidencing Western influence among the flat and domed structures of the truly Oriental style. The well-constructed stone building was the home of the Girls’ Training Home, a boarding-school for young Syrian women, supported by the New England Yearly Meeting of Friends, and named after two of their honored members, “The Eli and Sybil Jones Mission.” I had seen pictures of the place and so knew it at once, though there was now added the charm of colors. The building sat in sweet Quakerly composure among numerous trees and vines. Tall, pointed cypresses, pines and various fruit trees abounded, which once so delighted the gaze of a little girl in the village that she boldly declared that she knew where heaven was. She thought she had seen it when she looked through the Mission Gate on the well-kept grounds filled with beautiful green. Such gardens could be duplicated all over the country at a small price beyond patience.
Just above the Friends’ grounds is the house owned by the English Church Missionary Society, who make Râm Allâh headquarters for their work in different villages of this region. For more than a quarter of a century the agents of the society had been Mr. and Mrs. George Nyland, who, in their early years, went out from Holland to Egypt as missionaries, but after a few years entered the Church Missionary Society work in Palestine.
The nearest neighbor at the front was the so-called “Old Man at the Gate.” He had earned this title, suggestive of unpleasant nearness, by a certain ability to introduce himself when no one else did so. It was a practise of his to come up through the grounds into the house once or twice each year to ask for an envelope and paper. The sensation was like the imposition of a tax. He assured us of his great friendliness and his usefulness to the Mission. He often spoke of the piece of land near the south gate where the small cistern was as an evidence of his goodness to us, in that he had sold it to us for a very small price, though the traditions of the mission were that he had received a very good price for it. I recollect the way in which one of his sons disappointed us. We had as guests over night some missionaries who depended for their start the next morning at five o’clock on our promise to secure the animals to take them on to Nâblus. We bargained with one of the old man’s sons to provide us a saddled animal and considered our business done, but about nine o’clock that night he came around and calmly repudiated the bargain, demanding better terms. We ought to have been thankful that his impatience to get the better of us had prevented his saving this bit of annoyance until the last moment before starting. As it was, we still had some hours of night to provide ourselves.
Across the street from the schoolyard was a family which some of our people had dubbed “The Clean Family.” Our butcher lived directly in front of us. He was an honest, burly fellow who usually wore a sheepskin coat, wool side in. He had been a friend of the mission inmates for many years and an attendant and helper in the mission congregation. To the north of us were some Protestant natives who were pleasant neighbors, and across the street from them dwelt some English women, mission workers, who gave their time to works of mercy among the women of near-by Moslem villages. We were to become much indebted to them for comfort and society.
Just south of the Friends’ property is the little chapel of the Greek Catholic body which claims a few people of Râm Allâh, and just south of that runs a little path, through the vineyards, called the Ṭarîḳ el-Majnûny, The Road of the Crazy One. One of the old men told how in former years along that road the oak woods were so thick that a cat could not pass, and that if a piece of bread were dropped from above, the thickness of the foliage would prevent it from reaching the ground. This is interesting as pointing to traditions and to the kind of figures used by the natives in descriptions.
And so our neighborly resources continued. We gratefully acknowledge that the best lesson that we learned during our intimate acquaintance with the village community was that, joined with varying accidents of speech, dress and advantages, human beings are much alike everywhere and possess many admirable traits.
To the westward of Râm Allâh there begins with an abrupt head the Wâdy Ṭarafîdya, which runs nearly north and south and leads to Wâdy el-Kelb. One of the paths to ‛Ayn ‛Arîk bends around it. Just under this path to the eastward, between it and the wâdy, is a little spring, ‛Ayn Ṭarafîdya. Most of the land hereabouts has been purchased by Râm Allâh people of Baytûnyeh, the latter reserving the spring and some olive land. The taxes are paid through Baytûnyeh. Forty-two feet down from ‛Ayn Ṭarafîdya is a reservoir with thick, heavy stone walls, the corners being at the four main points of the compass. The northeast wall is ninety-seven inches thick and the northwest wall sixty-six inches thick. The reservoir is nearly forty feet square. The southeast wall inside is forty feet long and the northeast wall lacks three inches of the same measurement. There is a broken descent into the old dry pool at the west corner. I was here on a soft, gray December morning when the sky was hung with ready clouds. There was a sweet quiet under the olive-trees. The earth was red beneath. The black wet trunks and moss-covered branches showed through the gray-green mantle of the trees like a core through filigree. On one side of the valley the steep wet cliffs were decked with Christmas green. On the other side were terraces holding leafless fig-trees that stretched up their many fingers like candelabra to the mist. Down through the valley were seen round, stone watch-towers with brush tops. Pink daisies, narcissus, the little white and lavender crocuses and creepers were already showing. In the tiny scrub-oaks were twining green leaves.
Wâdy el-Kelb has two heads, the one to the north being called Shayb ed-Dars, the one to the east going by the name Baṭn el-Hawâ. Wâdy el-Kelb and Khullet el-‛Adas are favorite grounds for anemones of various colors. Every little cut or crest of the surface hereabouts has its local name given or continued by the peasants, who spend many hours in these orchards, vineyards and pasture-grounds. The next depression beyond Baṭn el-Hawâ[el-Hawâ] is Wâd[Wâd] Karom Shutâ, which rises in Karom Shutâ and between the two wâdys thrusts out the little headland known as Ḳurnet Mûsâ. Above the Karom Shutâ are the Karûm Senâsil, named from the terraces that characterize the piece of vineyard there.