[172] The Temple of the Sun at Balbec.
[173] "You behold there a considerable number of a remarkable species of beautiful insects, the elegance of whose appearance and their attire procured for them the name of Damsels.—Sonnini.
[174] "Such Turks as at the common hours of prayer are on the road, or so employed as not to find convenience to attend the mosques, are still obliged to execute that duty; nor are they ever known to fail, whatever business they are then about, but pray immediately when the hour alarms them, whatever they are about, in that very place they chance to stand on; insomuch that when a janissary, whom you have to guard you up and down the city, hears the notice which is given him from the steeples, he will turn about, stand still, and beckon with his hand, to tell his charge he must have patience for awhile; when, taking out his handkerchief, he spreads it on the ground, sits cross-legged thereupon, and says his prayers, though in the open market, which, having ended he leaps briskly up, salutes the person whom he undertook to convey, and renews his journey with the mild expression of Ghell yelinnum ghell, or Come, dear, follow me."—Aaron Hill's Travels.
[175] The Nucta, Or Miraculous Drop, which falls in Egypt precisely on St. John's day in June and is supposed to have the effect of stopping the plague.
[176] The Country of Delight—the name of a province in the kingdom of Jinnistan, or Fairy Land, the capital of which is called the City of Jewels. Amberabad is another of the cities of Jinnistan.
[177] The tree Tooba, that stands in Paradise, in the palace of Mahomet. See Sale's Prelim. Disc.—Tooba, says D'Herbelot, signifies beatitude, or eternal happiness.
[178] Mahomet is described, in the 53d chapter of the Koran, as having seen the Angel Gabriel "by the lote-tree, beyond which there is no passing: near it is the Garden of Eternal Abode." This tree, say the commentators, stands in the seventh Heaven, on the right hand of the Throne of God.
[179] "It is said that the rivers or streams of Basra were reckoned in the time of Peisl ben Abi Bordeh, and amounted to the number of one hundred and twenty thousand streams."—Ebn Haukal.
[180] The name of the javelin with which the Easterns exercise. See Castellan, "Moeurs des Ottomans," tom. iii. p. 161.
[181] "This account excited a desire of visiting the Banyan Hospital, as I had heard much of their benevolence to all kinds of animals that were either sick, lame, or infirm, through age or accident. On my arrival, there were presented to my view many horses, cows, and oxen, in one apartment; in another, dogs, sheep, goats, and monkeys, with clean straw for them to repose on. Above stairs were depositories for seeds of many sorts, and flat, broad dishes for water, for the use of birds and insects."—Parson's Travels. It is said that all animals know the Banyans, that the most timid approach them, and that birds will fly nearer to them than to other people.—See Grandpré.