A COUNTRY BELLE.
I had two pistols; one of them had a barrel about the size of a quill tooth-pick. But I knew from what experience I had had with that weapon that all that was necessary would be to find the right man and somebody to hold him and it would then be only a question of time—I should certainly kill him. But my other pistol was altogether a different affair. It was as much too large as the other was too small. It was somewhere from one to three feet long and extended from my third rib down to my knee-pan, like a lightning rod down the side of a chimney, and kept me bolt upright and stiff in my saddle. It was so formidable that I would not have liked to fire it off without getting behind something. And I thought that if worse come to worst and we met a Circassian coming to rob us, I would just hand it over to him and let him discharge it, and watch and see what became of him.
But there was one member of our party whom I must not forget to mention, and that was the soldier or military police—the “zabtieh” as he is called. For the sake of convenience we will call him the “Government,” because he represents the Government. The advantage of having him with you is, not so much that he is a kind of traveling masked battery, concealed mostly by earthworks, nor that he always provides himself with a fast horse so that in case anything happens he can turn tail and make off so speedily that the next party going over the road will not be left without a guide and protector—not so much either that his gun is likely to be a flint-lock without any flint in it, as that when you have one of these ornamental gentlemen traveling in your company, and are attacked and plundered, the Turkish Government is bound to make good your losses in such a way that your great grandchildren, if they are healthy and long-lived, will have the benefit of them. It was this last consideration which determined us to take a zabtieh. One of the most interesting relics of antiquity, and almost the only voice out of the past, from this historic plain, is a simple monument of a single stone with the Latin inscription to the effect that a certain Roman captain—giving his name—“erects this pillar to the gods of his native land.” It was the Roman way of giving vent to homesickness, and this true patriot, stationed on these inhospitable shores so far from home, has left this pathetic monument of his longing to return. It is a beautiful tribute to that tender touch of nature which makes the whole world kin. A good, true heart he must have buckled under that Roman cuirass. Let us hope that he got his furlough with full pay.
HADJAM—OR NATIVE BARBER.
The sun had dropped behind the mountain wall and the moon had taken his place with scarce diminished radiance when we approached the long-forgotten town of Mopsuestia. The atmosphere was so clear that we had seen the town for at least three hours, apparently only just ahead of us, but it never seemed to come any nearer. In fact, it seemed to be moving ahead on the road somewhat faster than our party. I tried to remember whether I had not somewhere read that at a certain season of the year corresponding with our first of May, the inhabitants of this country take up their houses on their backs and go off with them to a new place. But I could not make myself remember anything like that.
ON THE MARCH.
At last it became dark, and I was glad of it, because I thought that if those people were really going off with that city, they would probably want to set it down and rest when night came on, and then we should have a chance to overtake them.