A Beautiful Valley—Flowing Rivers—Mohammed at Damascus—Garden of God—Paul at Damascus—Mohammedan at Prayer—Valley More Beautiful—Damascus Exclusively Oriental—Quaint Architecture—”Often in Wooden Houses Golden Rooms we Find”—Narrow Streets—Industrious People—Shoe Bazaars—Manufacturing Silk by hand—Fanatical Merchants—“Christian Dogs”—Cabinet-Making—Furniture Inlaid with Pearl—Camel Markets—A Progenitor of the Mule—Machinery Unknown—Ignorance Stalks Abroad—Fanatical Arabs—A Massacre—The Governor Gives the Signal—Christians Killed—French Army—Abraham Our Guide—Brained before Reaching the Post-Office—Warned not to Look at the Women—Johnson’s Regret—Vailed Women—Johnson’s Explanation.
AT four o’clock, on the second day after leaving Baalbek, I spy one of the prettiest objects that ever greeted human vision. It is Damascus, the oldest city in the world—Damascus, laid out by Uz, the great-grandson of Noah. For days I have been riding over a ruined and desolate country, and now my eyes fall and feast on a broad, rich valley, through which flow Abana and Pharpar, two rivers of pure water. The whole valley is one great garden, or orchard, in which flourishes almost every tropical plant. Here are the orange, olive and oleander, the peach, pear, palm and pome-granate, the banana, the apple, apricot and myrtle. Amid the rich green foliage of these trees, their golden fruit is seen. Autumn, which is only summer meeting death with a smile, has seared the leaves of some of the more delicate plants of the valley. Red leaves are beautifully interwoven with the green, and they gleam in the rays of the setting sun like sheets of purest gold. Here and there tall and slender silver poplars rise high, and are gracefully swaying to and fro in the evening breezes.
Damascus is situated in the midst of this luxuriant garden. Looking down from the hilltop I see the taller houses, the mosques and minarets, rising from amidst the luxuriant foliage of the trees. Ah, what a picture! According to tradition, when Mohammed reached this point and looked down upon Damascus for the first time, he said: “Man can enter only one paradise, and I prefer to enter the one above.” So he sat down here and feasted his eyes upon the earthly paradise of Damascus and went away without entering its gates, that hereafter he might be permitted to enter the portals of the paradise of God. A stone tower marks the spot where the prophet stood. From that early period Damascus has been regarded by all Arabs as an earthly reflection of paradise, where a foretaste of all the joys of heaven are obtainable. In accordance with the description given in the Koran, the Mohammedan Bible, Arabs picture to themselves paradise as a limitless orchard, traversed by streams of water, where the most delicious fruits are ever ready to drop into the mouth.
DAMASCUS.
When we remember that Damascus is situated on the edge of the great Syrian desert, that it is surrounded on three sides by hills, high and lifted up, and that the whole country for miles and scores of miles around is bleak, parched and desolate, we can not for a moment be surprised at the pleasing effect the sight of this smiling garden produces in the heart of the Arab. Probably these swarthy sons of the desert have been traveling for ten days or a fortnight, coming from Palmyra or Bagdad, coming from central Arabia or Persia, coming across the arid plain where naught but broad oceans of sand stretch out before them, with not a blade of green grass to enliven the scene or to “rest the dazzled sight.” Finally the fortnight has past; the journey has ended; and the Arabs stand at last upon this hilltop and look down upon yonder green garden of God. In contemplating such a scene, after such a journey, these sons of Ishmael are moved by emotions strong and deep. They have found trees in the wilderness, springs in the desert; and they can but say: “Though old as history itself, thou art fresh as the breath of spring, blooming as thine own rosebud, and fragrant as thine own orange-blossom, O Damascus, pearl of the East.”
This is the scene that Paul was looking upon when suddenly a great light shone round about him from heaven, and he fell to the earth as dead. Only a few feet from where I stand, tradition points out the place where he fell. Paul, you remember, was taken up and carried into the city. Desiring to follow him, I leave the mountain top and approach the valley. Damascus is surrounded now, as in Paul’s day, by a stone wall twenty-five or thirty feet high. Entering the city through the Jerusalem gate, I am at once attracted by a man prostrate on the river bank. Placing his palms on the ground, and lifting himself the length of his long arms, he looks down upon the glassy surface of the river as though he were gazing at his image reflected in the water. Then, bending his elbows, he once more lets his breast to the earth. This is repeated over and over again. While going through this strange performance, the man is constantly mumbling and muttering in some unknown Eastern tongue. Rising to his feet, and lifting his face to the sky, the Arab repeatedly smites himself upon the brow, breast and mouth. Then waving his hand towards Heaven, he cries aloud: “Suah baha, yalla Mohammed, Mohammed, Mohammed!” I ask, “Tolhammy, what means this?” “Why, sir, that is a sacred river. The man was worshipping the river, and then, rising, he called upon Mahomet, his god, to accept his worship. He says ‘O Mahomet, accept my worship, and (placing his hand on his brow) I will think of thee with this mind; (on his breast) I will love thee with this heart; (with hand upon his mouth) and with these lips I will speak thy praises abroad. Hear me, O Mohammed, Mohammed, Mohammed!’” Who could see a sight like this without thinking of Him who said: “Pray not upon the street corners, to be seen of men; but pray secretly, and your Father who seeth in secret, will reward you openly.”