DHAMI.
[p.110]Wahabi had killed four of his brothers; that he fled from home, and established himself at Dael, a village in the Haouran, which was ransacked last summer by the same enemies, when he lost the whole of his property. This man corroborated what I have repeatedly been told, that a single person may travel over the Wahabi dominions with perfect safety.
November 29th.—I here took two Druses to conduct me into the interior of the Ledja. The Arabs who inhabit that district pay some deference to the Druses, but none whatever to the Turks or Christians of the neighbouring villages. In one hour we passed the two ruined cities Zebair [Arabic] and Zebir [Arabic], close to each other. At the end of two hours and a quarter, our road lying in the direction of the Kelab Haouran, we came to the ruined village Djedel [Arabic]. Thus far the Ledja is a level country with a stony soil covered with heaps of rocks, amongst which are a number of small patches of meadow, which afford excellent pasture for the cattle of the Arabs who inhabit these parts. From Djedel the ground becomes uneven, the pasturing places less frequent, the rocks higher, and the road more difficult. I had intended to proceed to Aahere, where there is a fine spring; but evening coming on we stopped near Dhami [Arabic], three hours and three quarters from Khabeb, and two hours distant from Aahere. It appears strange that a city should have been built by any people in a spot where there is neither water nor arable ground, and nothing but a little grass amidst the stones. Dhami may contain three hundred houses, most of which are still in good preservation. There is a large building whose gate is ornamented with sculptured vine leaves and grapes, like those at Kanouat.
Every house appears to have had its cistern; there are many also in the immediate vicinity of the town: they are formed by excavations in the rock, the surface of which is supported by props
DEIR DHAMI.
[p.111]of loose stones. Some of them are arched and have narrow canals to conduct the water into them from the higher grounds. S.E. of Dhami half an hour is Deir Dhami [Arabic], another ruined place, smaller than the former, and situated in a most dreary part of the Ledja, near which we found, after a good deal of search, an encampment of Arabs Medledj, where we passed the night.
November 30th.—These Arabs being of a doubtful character, and rendered independent by the very difficult access of their rocky abode, we did not think it prudent to tell them that I had come to look at their country; they were told, therefore, that I was a manufacturer of gunpowder, in search of saltpetre, for at Dhami, and in most of the ruined villages in the Ledja, the earth which is dug up in the court- yards of the houses, as well as in the immediate vicinity of them, contains saltpetre, or as it is called in Arabic, Melh Baroud, i.e. gunpowder salt.
The Ledja, which is from two to three days journey in length, by one in breadth, is inhabited by several tribes of Arabs; viz. Selman [Arabic], Medledj [Arabic], Szolout [Arabic], Dhouhere [Arabic], and Siale [Arabic]; of these the Szolout may have about one hundred tents, the Medledj one hundred and twenty, and the others fifty or sixty. They breed a vast number of goats, which easily find pasturage amongst the rocks; a few of them also keep sheep and cows, and cultivate the soil in some parts of the Ledja, where they sow wheat and barley. They possess few horses; the Medledj have about twenty, and the Szolout and Dhouhere each a dozen. But I shall have occasion to speak of these Arabs again in describing the people of the country.
The tent in which we slept was remarkably large, although it could not easily be perceived amidst the labyrinth of rocks where it was pitched; yet our host was kept awake the whole night by
THE LEDJA.
[p.112]the fear of robbers, and the dogs barked incessantly. He told me next morning that the Szolout had lately been very successful in their nightly depredations upon the Medledj. Our host having no barley, gave my horse a part of some wheat which he had just brought from the plain, to bake into bread for his family.
December lst.—We departed at sunrise, the night having been so cold that none of us was able to sleep. We found our way with great difficulty out of the labyrinth of rocks which form the inner Ledja, and through which the Arabs alone have the clue. Some of the rocks are twenty feet high, and the country is full of hills and Wadys. In the outer Ledja trees are less frequent than here, where they grow in great numbers among the rocks; the most common are the oak, the Malloula, and the Bouttan; the latter is the bitter almond, from the fruit of which an oil is extracted used by the people of the country to anoint their temples and forehead as a cure for colds; its branches are in great demand for pipe tubes. There are no springs in any part of this stony district, but water collects, in winter time, in great quantities in the Wadys, and in the cisterns and Birkets which are every where met with; in some of these it is kept the whole summer; when they are dried up the Arabs approach the borders of the Ledja, called the Loehf, to water their cattle at the springs in that district. The camel is met with throughout the Ledja, and walks with a firm step over the rocky surface. In summer he feeds on the flowers or dry grass of the pasturing places. In the interior parts of the Ledja the rocks are in many places cleft asunder, so that the whole hill appears shivered and in the act of falling down: the layers are generally horizontal, from six to eight feet, or more, in thickness, sometimes covering the hills, and inclining to their curve, as appears from the fissures, which often traverse the rock from top to bottom. In
[p.113] many places are ruined walls; from whence it may be conjectured that a stratum of soil of sufficient depth for cultivation had in ancient times covered the rock.
We had lost our road, when we met with a travelling encampment of Medledj, who guided us into a more open place, where their companions were pitching their tents. We breakfasted with them, and I was present during an interesting conversation between one of my Druse companions and an Arab. The wife of the latter, it appeared, had been carried off by another Arab, who fearing the vengeance of the injured husband, had gone to the Druse Sheikh of Khabeb, and having secured his Dakhil [Arabic], or protection, returned to the woman in the Ledja. The Sheikh sent word to the husband, cautioning him against taking any violent measures against his enemy. The husband, whom we here met with, wished to persuade the Druses that the Dakhil of the Sheikh was unjust, and that the adulterer ought to be left to his punishment. The Druse not agreeing with him, he swore that nothing should prevent him from shedding the blood of the man who had bereft him of his own blood; but I was persuaded that he would not venture to carry his threat into effect; for should he kill his enemy, the Druses would not fail to be revenged upon the slayer or his family.
The outer Ledja is to be distinguished from the inner, on this side as well as on that by which we entered it, the former being much less rocky, and more fit for pasturage than the latter. On the borders of the inner Ledja we passed several places where the mill-stones are made, which I have mentioned in a former part of my journal. The stones are cut horizontally out of the rocks, leaving holes of four or five feet in depth, and as many in circumference; fifty or sixty of these excavations are often met with in the circumference of a mile. The stones are carried to be finished at Ezra, Mehadje, Aeib, Khabeb, and Shaara.
SHAARA.
[p.114] In one hour and a half from the borders of the Ledja, we came to Kastal Kereim, a ruined village, with a Birket; half an hour from it, Kereim, a Druse village. Between Kereim and Khabeb in the Loehf, is Aeib [Arabic], a Druse village, in which is a powder manufactory; there is another at Khabeb. Half an hour from Kereim is Kalaat Szamma [Arabic], a ruined village, with several towers. One hour and a half, Shaara, a village inhabited by about one hundred Druse and Christian families. We travelled this day about eight hours and a half. Shaara was once a considerable city; it is built on both sides of a Wady, half an hour from the cultivated plain, and is surrounded by a most dreary barren War. It has several large solidly built structures, now in ruins, and amongst others a tower that must have been about forty-five feet high. In the upper town is an ancient