However, her ladyship requested me immediately to efface the whole; and she declared she never had consented, when living with her uncle, to be praised in verse, or portrayed in painting.
[9] In the Syrian monasteries, the customary salutation between the friars who meet each other is that above mentioned, and the answer likewise.
[10] I have since read in some author that this column was of the Corinthian order, fifty-seven feet high and five feet in diameter, having a tablet for an inscription, now erased. I cannot recollect whether it was before or after we arrived at the column, that there stood a village (called Yyd or Nyd) not far out of the road, which we were desirous of entering: but the inhabitants hailed us from the roofs of the houses, and with muskets in their hands threatened to shoot any one who should approach them; for they were determined, they said, to let nobody, coming from Bâlbec, where the plague was, have intercourse with them.
[11] For the properties of this lake, see Eusebius de vitâ Constantini, iii. 55.
[12] Ayn Aty is called by Burckhardt Ainnete, one word, but I venture to think that he is incorrect.
[13] For Aphaca, a temple dedicated to Venus, on the top of Mount Lebanon, see Zosimus, i., 58.
[14] It must be observed that, in the East, a usual way of doing honour to distinguished guests is to spread something costly for them to tread or sit on. Thus, when it was thought that her Royal Highness the Princess of Wales would have visited Damietta, the English agent there, a rich merchant, had arranged that the path from the side of the Nile to his house door should be covered with Cashmere shawls. Carpets are seldom left spread out in a room, but are rolled up and moved from room to room as wanted, being generally small, and never made singly to cover a whole room.
[15] I dined with these gentlemen at different periods, and was generally expected to give about a crown as vails to the servants on coming away.
[16] We heard here, with pleasure, a eulogium passed on two of our countrymen, by the grateful widow and daughters of a M. Cuzi, who, in the prosecution of a journey, as intrepreter, with two English gentlemen, Major C. and Mr. F., fell a victim to a fever, and left a family who would have seen want staring them in the face, but for the liberal relief afforded them by these gentlemen.
[17] These hoods are made of cloth, and men use them in travelling as women use hoods in England: they being, in the like manner, not attached to a cloak, but worn separately.