We soon struck a herd of about 8,000 camels feeding on the grass and briars along the Shat-El-Chebar. It was a sight to see them, with their two or three hundred Arabian family tents, surrounded by horses, dogs, goats, sheep, chickens and children, leading the sleepy life of our wayside gypsies, seeming to have no inspiration for a change in their condition, as one generation follows another. On each voyage, or tour, said to occupy about five years, they go collecting camels at the round-up on the wilds of the great desert and driving them to Persia, of course selling and trading all the way along the creatures, both human and dumb, reproducing on the way. The pasturage is free but the government taxes are heavy, being nearly fifty per cent of the value of the animal, which is paid in such stock as they own. Arabian herdsmen are generous and hospitable, but, when aroused by what they consider wrong, they are exceedingly ferocious. We camped with them several days, and if I had a better grip on their language I would like to travel a year or two in one of those herdsmen's caravans and write them up as the family from which Abraham was called, for from the time of the historical events of Abraham to now there has probably been little or no change in their daily life. Their helpfulness and hospitality, without expecting recompense, often reminded me of the story of Moses helping the Midian girls to water their flocks.
SUSPICION AROUSED
Upon my return to Bagdad the Consul took me home to dinner, where he related a long, amusing story, of which I will make a short one. He said that the morning after I left Bagdad the Turkish Emissary from Constantinople sent his deputy to him to inquire who the stranger from America was and what he wanted, to which the Consul referred to my passport, which had been presented to them, and then told them all he knew about me. Again, in the evening, they sent to him to learn where I had gone, whereupon Hurner, thinking I would be more likely to go to Niffer than the interior, told them I had gone to visit my United States friend who was exploring the ruins at that place.
Again they sent, to inquire if any treasure had been found at Niffer, to which the Consul jokingly replied, "Why, haven't you heard that they have found a subterranean pocket of valuables? And I suppose Richardson is here to take them out of the country by way of the Persian Gulf. I hear he has several camels on the spot; but this is all hearsay, through the Bedouins, and may not be true."
In less than an hour, said Hurner, two hundred cavalry, with shining sabres, were on the dash over the sixty miles of straight across desert sand to intercept the American thief. Their approach was a surprise to the old Bostonian, who was simply examining each brick as they came out of the debris, and innocently declared he had seen no treasure or anything of the American.
JONA AND HIS WIVES
The next morning I received a caller whom I recognized at once as the stranger I had met in Nazzip. After I inquired how he got to Bagdad so soon, he told me he had joined the horsemen from Nazzip who protected me. I asked him what he meant by saying he knew me.
"Were you at Jask, Persia?" he began.