There was a place in Damietta, which had been used as a French chapel; and, after the evacuation of the French, some few persons, Greek Catholics, were accustomed to resort to it, to worship. It had beneath it a dwelling or magazine, used by some Mahometans. One day an officer of justice seized on Mâlem Dubány, and hurried him to prison, where he found himself in company with seven others, his acquaintances, and respectable merchants like himself. They were accused of having said prayers over the Turks’ heads, which was construed into an arrogation of superiority; and of having heard mass in the French chapel, without a firman from the Porte, authorising them so to do; for which offences they were ordered to pay eighty thousand piasters among them, or about £500 each.
They naturally protested their innocence of the charge, and that they had not such a sum at their command; and, persisting in their assertions, they were taken out and bastinadoed, ten pair each[95]. They were then remanded to prison, and given to understand that this was only a prelude to what would follow, if they did not produce the money. During this time, although in confinement, they were treated with much attention. Their meals were as good as if at home. Coffee and pipes were regularly served to them, and the domestics stood before them, with crossed hands in the attitude of respect. At last, being threatened with a second bastinadoing more severe than the first, they raised the fine, and, having paid it, were liberated with a polite message from Mûrad Bey, that they might now go and hear mass if they pleased, and not fear any molestation from him. But they did not think it advisable to expose themselves to be beaten and avanized a second time.
In the middle of March of this year, Lady Hester received information that Miss Williams, a young person strongly attached to her, had ventured from Malta to Cyprus, in a vessel alone, on purpose to join her. Miss W. owed her education and the care of her younger years to the protection of Mr. Pitt. Lady Hester afterwards took her near her person, and she left England with her ladyship in 1810.
At Malta she found her sister married to an officer of the commissariat, with whom, at Lady Hester’s departure from that island, she remained; but her attachment was so great to her protectress, that, after residing at Malta four years, she determined to follow her into the East. She accordingly embarked on board an Italian merchant-vessel, and alone braved the hazards of a voyage which proved particularly distressing; for the autumnal gales were so violent that the ship sprung a dangerous leak, and the captain was obliged to put into Rhodes to refit. Here Miss Williams remained two or three months, whilst the ship, which was found to be much damaged, underwent a thorough repair.
They sailed from Rhodes at the commencement of the new year. The captain, named Fanuggia, was a man of violent language and conduct; so that his crew, which was composed of very bad subjects, mutinied. The two parties came to blows more than once; and Miss Williams, oppressed with sea-sickness, and lying in her cot, from which she was unable to move, often heard upon deck the clashing of swords, and thought every moment that murder was perpetrating. At length they reached Cyprus, where some of the crew were put into prison; and, other men being shipped, they crossed to Beyrout, in the middle of March. Here Miss Williams landed, after a voyage of three months and a half, and was entertained by Mr. Laurella, the British agent, until recovered from her fatigue. Mrs. Fry was sent immediately to her, to instruct her how she was to dress herself—how wear her veil in travelling—and how conduct herself in this new world. About the 10th of March, she left Beyrout, escorted by Mr. Laurella, and I went to meet them on the road.
The day was exceedingly fine and warm. I was riding along in the wash of the sea; and, the sands being broad hereabout, there was a mirage playing along them, which seemed somewhat to lift objects above the ground and to confuse them. I had passed several small parties of travellers; and, tired of looking at what was coming, I let the bridle fall on my mare’s neck, and began to muse on the effects of my long residence in Syria. When first I entered the country, had I undertaken a day’s journey in any direction, it would have been thought necessary to have with me an interpreter, a janissary, and a mule or two for my baggage. My bed would have been indispensable, and my portmanteau loaded with the numerous articles which a European carries along with him. Now I was alone, a fowling-piece, lying across my saddle-bows, was my only protection; I, my own interpreter; I had no bed but my cloak; and all the articles of my dressing-box were reduced to a comb for my beard, and my tooth-brushes, which generally I concealed from the view of Mahometan natives, lest the materials, being of hog’s bristles, should render me unclean in their eyes. And this is the unencumbered way in which everybody travels in Turkey.
A mile or two beyond the river Damûr I met them. Mutual salutations having been exchanged, I turned back with the party. We stopped to sleep at Nebby Yunez. Whilst at supper, a circumstance occurred, which must have seemed somewhat extraordinary to a new comer. Mr. Laurella’s servant had furnished the provision basket, but had neglected to put up a candlestick; and such things are not to be met with in Turkish caravanseries, where oil is generally burnt. He therefore invented a substitute: cutting off the crown of a loaf of bread, part of our meal, and, making a hole in the crumb with his finger, he stuck the candle in it. Miss Williams stared in astonishment.
The next day we resumed our journey, and about noon reached Mar Elias. Lady Hester was very sensible to this mark of attachment on the part of Miss Williams. It was shortly afterwards, although I neglected to note down the day, that Mr. W. J. Bankes[96] came to Mar Elias. Lady Hester had been long in expectation of him. Of all the travellers who had passed that way previously for many months, he was the only one who could give her any news of her friends and acquaintance. When he arrived, he was lodged at Mar Elias. A day or two afterwards, I took him on a two days’ tour round by Meshmûshy, Gezýr, and Gebâ, three villages on the heights of Mount Lebanon, situated so romantically that Mr. Bankes professed not to have seen any thing like them elsewhere.
On another occasion, I accompanied him to Dayr Mkhallas, to see the monastery, and to make the acquaintance of Abûna Sâba, the superior or räis. In going, Mr. Bankes’s horse, probably unused to our mountain tracks, slipped up on his side on a rock, and it was a fortunate escape for that gentleman that he received no hurt.
When Mr. Bankes had favoured me with a sight of the drawings which he had made in his progress through Egypt and Syria, I conceived him to be a fit person to lead to the sepulchre discovered at Abu Ghyás, as has been related, since he could copy the paintings, and thus preserve a memorial of a valuable monument of antiquity. I accordingly provided a couple of peasants and some tapers, and took him to the spot.