Lady Hester presented him with a complete suit of clothes, which he immediately distributed among his people, telling her that a Bedouin prince was the father of his subjects, and that what he got was for his children.
The result of Nasar’s visit was that her ladyship declined the offer of troops from the pasha to protect her, dismissed all those whom she had partly engaged for the journey, and, availing herself of Mr. Barker’s illness, on whom I remained to attend, and with whom civility required Mr. B.’s stay, she departed alone, as she said, for Hamah, on the 15th of November.
The following letter, written by Lady Hester herself the day before her departure, explains her own feelings at this time:—
Lady Hester Stanhope to ——.
Damascus, November 14, 1812.
My dear ——,
B. and Mr. Barker arrived here about the first; the latter has been laid up with a fever ever since, and I have given up my journey to the desert for the present, as the Pasha insists upon sending 800 or 1,000 men with me, and the expense would be ruin; but I am going off to Homs to-morrow, and in the course of the winter shall contrive to go in some way or other.
It seems very cross to be angry at people being anxious about you; but had B. and Mr. B. made less fuss about my safety, and let me have had perfectly my own way, I should have been returned by this time from Palmyra. Yet I cannot but regret it; (for I had leave to dig and do every thing I pleased at Palmyra): chance having put such extraordinary power in my hands, it has been lost by mismanagement. It is not here as in other parts of the world; if you only go a mile to the right instead of the left, which you have not previously bargained to do, your camels leave you, your guards won’t stir out of their district, you must pay them four times their price to induce them to go on, &c. Therefore, it was very fine and very natural to write, every three days from Aleppo, “we will meet here, then there,” and to make fifty changes, and to express fifty fears:—from people who did not know the country it might be expected, but those who did ought to have been aware it would have been taken advantage of, which has been the case.
We have no plague here at present, but I suppose it will come when goods arrive from Constantinople. I, for one, have little apprehensions of the plague; all in this world rests with Providence, and over-caution ever exposes persons more to danger than remaining quiet.
I have just sent to Sayda for the things Captain Hope forwarded me from Smyrna; I trust I shall find all my packets of letters with them. I have sought in vain for some good thing to send you from hence, but can find nothing; but I have ordered some wild-boar hams to be made, which you will receive in the course of the winter. I should feel so ungrateful were I not to think of you constantly, even in little matters. B. ordered some of the famous Vino d’Oro, of Mount Lebanon; when the casks are well seasoned, and an opportunity offers, it shall be sent to Malta. B. desires to be most kindly remembered to you; he hates this place, as I thought he would, but must remain here till Mr. Barker is well enough to set off. Aleppo he also thought abominable. I knew I should dislike Aleppo if I went there, because it is full of vulgar people: but here there are chiefly great Turks, and, as I get on very well with them, I rather like the place than otherwise, but think it very unwholesome from the quantity of water and trees in and about the town; however, it is very beautiful in its way, but it is not the way I like. Brusa and the banks of the Bosphorus for me!—enchanting scenes which I think upon with delight. But I must not write on for ever, I forget all the business you have upon your hands: may your health not suffer from it is all I pray.