“It is my hope that you are going to stay with me this time Rabbi.”
As the answer was not given immediately, the gentleman proceeded to explain the necessity of the case.
“You see, you stayed with Giwergis when you were here before; and that was all right, as you came down with him. This time though, you ought to come to me. If you do I shall be very glad to see you; but if you don’t—well I fear that the only thing for me is to shoot you!”
The invitation was accepted, and no more pleasant host could any man have had.
A sad scandal is related of a certain apostle of teetotalism who found himself in a mountain village on the day of a wedding feast. He was cordially invited to stop and share in the feasting and dancing; and did so—to reprove excesses and see that decorum was preserved. In due course the governor of the feast invited him to take wine with[{299}] him, and this the total abstainer a little too curtly declined. The mountaineer bristled up immediately. Such a refusal was a downright insult. And literally at the pistol’s mouth the poor guest had to gulp the draught down. Nor was that the end of his woes. The other guests were all ripe for frolic; and all that afternoon the unhappy man was haunted by a procession of rollicking caterans, each equipped with a practicable rifle and a large goblet of wine. Of course there was no refusing such very insistent hospitality; and over the inevitable dénouement we feel ourselves constrained to draw a veil.
The fact is though, that boys with guns in their hands can be dangerous, when their feelings are hurt, or when for any reason they are frightened; and then they may turn against their best friends. Only once in his twenty-five years of residence did Dr. Browne find these mountaineers turn really nasty with him, and on that occasion, the men concerned were our good friends of Tkhuma; though the blame did not really rest on them.
A certain Roman Catholic intriguer in the nation desired to dispose of Dr. Browne’s influence, and was not particular either as to the methods he employed or as to the result of them, whether for the foreigner or for his own people. Having ascertained that Dr. Browne was proposing a journey into Tkhuma, and having discovered some details of his plans, he sent a message down into the district. “See here, that Englishman is coming down your way with a companion; and his real intent is to destroy your religion. You will see that when he comes he will do this and that—things that look quite innocent, but which will be a sign to you that I speak truth. Then do you deal with him according to your zeal.”
Down came the Englishman with his companion, and did the acts named, to find that he had roused a storm. For some days both were kept as prisoners in the house of one of the village chiefs; and matters got so far that the leading men were actually debating, in the presence of their captives, whether they should kill them or not. This question occasioned a quarrel, and knives were drawn in[{300}] the dispute. Then Dr. Browne stepped forward, knowing of course what the trouble was about (for he spoke the Syriac tongue like a native), but (we are convinced) only stirred by the scandal of Christians quarrelling and fighting with one another. He, the prisoner in their hands, rebuked them paternally for that sin; talked to them generally for their good; and finally issued his orders that before proceeding with the discussion the two that had drawn knives on one another should exchange the kiss of peace! Well, they did. Being slightly ashamed of themselves, they kissed and made friends like the children that they are. But after they had done that, at the order of the Englishman, it was really impossible to go on discussing whether they should kill him; and so the whole incident closed!
Courage, coolness and humour are a necessity for the European who would wander here; but with them he is practically as safe as in London. Men deficient in those qualities may at any time find themselves in an awkward position; as befell a certain unfortunate “Frank” who came into the land to study Kurdish folk-lore, “without a pass from Roderick Dhu.” He had disregarded the advice given him, to take some “Nestorian” from the house of the Patriarch, who could guarantee his character and explain his naturally puzzling proceedings to both Kurd and Christian; and took instead an Armenian who knew nothing of the land.
Accompanied by this man, he went down into the land of Tkhuma, which is as wild a district of Christian ashirets as any in Hakkiari. It was just after harvest, and folk had nothing to do; so a little friendly fight was in progress between two Christian villages. Of course the foreign traveller was stopped and questioned by armed men, who demanded who he was and what he had come for. Had he told the truth, and said that he was neutral in the dispute, he might have been as safe as the Kenites were, when Sisera was fighting out his quarrel with certain Israelitish ashirets: but his wretched Armenian was panic-struck, and was at some pains to explain that his master had come down in the interests of one particular faction, and was the[{301}] intimate friend of its leader. As a matter of fact (though he did not realize it till too late), the gentlemen who had stopped him were prominent leaders on the other side. Hence, taking the man’s own account of himself as true, they were much disposed to deal with him as an enemy and a spy.