But it is at the hour of sunset that one most completely falls under the spell of the Tigris and the historic land through which it flows. For the sunsets of the desert lands of the East exhibit a gorgeousness of color unknown in our land of fogs and mists. This is probably owing to the haze produced by impalpable dust in an exceptionally dry atmosphere. As the sun nears the horizon, the western sky glows with all the delicate hues of ruby and topaz, emerald and amethyst and, after it has set, the zodiacal light, rising from where the sun disappeared, ascends to the zenith with a display of all the delicate tints of rose and gold and lilac of the aurora borealis.
The glories of a sunset in Mesopotamia are indeed entrancing, but it is when night comes with her dewy freshness and
Her starry shade
Of dim and solitary loveliness;
when the moon silvers the river’s wavelets and its ruin-crested banks, that one loves to linger in this land of a great historic past and contemplate at leisure
Those ruined shrines and towers that seem
The relics of a splendid dream;
Amid whose fairy loneliness
Naught but the lapwing’s cry is heard.[411]
How we reveled in those glorious moonlit nights spent on our tranquilly floating kelek on the enchanting Tigris! “They say that Carl Niebuhr, the traveler, when old and blind, used to lie and dream over the old Eastern landscapes and night-skies in his darkened life,—a perpetual world of enchantment to console him.”[412] How could it have been otherwise? For how often since our return from the East where we, like Niebuhr, have spent some of the most delightful days of our life, have we not also found ourselves dreaming of the eventful days and the fascinating nights which it was our privilege to spend under the pale azure skies of the inspiring and enthralling home of our race?