Coffee was served, and I was mounted on my “gallant gray,” still by twilight, parting with some friends who had been rambling with me for three weeks over Phœnicia and the Lebanon. I set my face in the direction of Jerusalem.
We were guided by the Shaikh of Rumaish, a Christian village that lay upon the road before us, he being furnished with a written mandate from Hhamed el Bek, the ruler of Tibneen, to take four men of his place as our escort through the forest.
In the outskirts of the forest belonging to the
castle we found peasants already proceeding to the threshing-floors; women in lines marching to the wells with jars cleverly balanced upon their heads; and camels kneeling on the ground munching their breakfast of cut straw, with most serious and unchanging expression of countenance, only the large soft eyes were pleasant to look at.
In half-an-hour we were at Aita.
This country is famous for the quality of its tobacco, a plant that is most esteemed when grown among the ruined parts of villages, because the nitre contained in the old cement of houses not only serves to quicken the vegetation, but imparts to the article that sparkling effect which is admired when lighted in the pipe.
Vines are also extensively cultivated, and the people take pleasure in training them aloft upon the high trees, as oak, terebinth, poplar, etc., and allowing them to droop down in the graceful festoons of nature, which also gives an agreeable variety of green colour among the timber trees.
We were entering the gay woodland and reaching the top of a hill, when the sun rose at our left hand, and the glory of that moment surpassed all common power of description. Crowds of linnets and finches burst suddenly into song; the crested larks “that tira-lira chant,” [265] rose into the merry blue sky, with
the sunlight gleaming on their plump and speckled breasts; the wood-pigeons, too, were not silent; but all, in harmonious concert, did their best to praise the blessed Creator, who delights in the happiness of His creatures.
Forwards we marched with light spirits, through dense woods, varied by the occasional clearings, which are called “the rides” in old English forests, and sometimes we drew near to snug villages, or got glimpses of such, by the names of Teereh, Hhaneen, and ’Ain Nebel; the latter at two hours from Tibneen; the people there are Christian, and they cultivate silk and tobacco. In some places we observed ancient sarcophagi, hewn into solid rock without being entirely detached, they had therefore been left unfinished, though partly ornamented.