hands of the host; and others gave him smaller garments as well as money, all of which he readily accepted. It seemed, from all that I could gather by indirect enquiry, that this man being the physician of the Christian community at Hhoms, the feast had been given expressly on his account, as an annual occasion for him to try the liberality of such of his patients as had not yet fallen victims to his prescriptions.

THE ANCIENT ORTHOSIA.

HHOMS, May 1. I was desirous of proceeding directly from hence through Hamah to Aleppo; but the wars of the Arabs, and their encroachment on the road, rendered that route impossible to be traversed without a large escort, or the protection of a caravan; the first I was not in a condition to pay for out of my own purse: nor did the urgency of the case require it; the last was not expected to depart for a period of ten days at least. It was, therefore, recommended to us to go down by Hhussan to the sea coast, which road, although by no means safe, was still more so than that of Hamah, and could be passed with an escort of two persons besides ourselves; while this, upon the whole, would be also the most expeditious. These two men were accordingly procured

for us from the Governor, by Mallim Scander, and we set out together about nine o'clock.

Going out by the ruined monument called the Soura, we saw a number of females sitting among the tombs there, after the manner of the country, and these were all habited with the blue checked cloths worn by the women in Egypt, but whether used here as a dress of mourning only I could not learn.

After leaving Hhoms by the Bab-el-Turcoman in the southern wall of the town, we continued to go west for about an hour over a level plain, the latter portion of which was laid out in a broad and excellent road, lined with gardens on each side. This brought us to the Nahr-el-Ahssy, which we crossed by a poor bridge having a mill on it. The stream was here contracted into a narrow space, but was deep and rapid, its course being scarcely less than four miles per hour, its waters a dull yellowish white, from the clayey and chalky soil of its banks in the lake above.

We entered now on a barren ground of gentle ascent, being the southern point of the first range of hills west of the Orontes. The whole extent of it was covered with the black porous stone seen almost all the way from hence to the Dead Sea; and the only productions of the soil were a dry and straight plant, rising to the height of a foot, and covered with olive brown berries about the size of peas, and a large branching thistle, whose head was of the colour of the finest port wine.

After going about three hours over this ground, meeting only a few cattle near ponds formed by rain, we passed under the small village of Tenoon, leaving it a few yards only on our right. It is seated on an eminence, and has some few cultivated spots of ground near it; but, on the whole, it presents an aspect of great poverty.

We continued a westerly course for about two hours more, gradually but gently ascending, until we came in sight of the castle of Hhussan, bearing from us nearly N.W. From hence, therefore, we kept in that direction, and our road became much

more interesting, as we went down over successive beds of rounding hills into an extensive and beautiful plain. We still saw the black porous stone throughout our track, and passed over several beds of sulphureous streams, in which these black stones were coated over with a crust of white deposit from the water.

This plain, of which we could learn no other name than that of Wadi-el-Hhussan, went up until it terminated in a narrow valley to the north, but extended itself widely until it met the northern feet or points of the range of Lebanon on the south, when it stretched away S.E. into the great plain of the Orontes, towards the lake already described. It was bounded on the west by the hills of Hhussan, on the north by higher mountains, and on the east by the hills which we had traversed, all of them cultivated to their very summits with corn and olives, which, added to the fertility of the plain itself, its light green fields and darker lines of trees, presented as rich and beautiful a picture as I had yet seen in the country. The lofty range of Lebanon terminates in several sloping points to the northward, and in the interval of plain between these points and the beginning of the hills of Hhussan, perhaps some of the rivers between Tartoose and Tripoly flow down. There are seen indeed from hence several streams in the plain below, some of which may also go to the lake of the Orontes, it being difficult else to conceive how that river so suddenly increases and expands itself there.

Crossing this plain for nearly two hours, we passed, at the end of it, some few mills near the stream, and ascended up a rising valley to the north of Hhussan, leaving it on our left. The castle there is seated on the peak of a round hill, and enjoys a commanding situation. As we went close under it, the style of its architecture appeared to be purely Saracen, as its masonry was smooth, and its outer wall filled with round towers at equal distances. Within, rose a square building of greater height than the outer wall, and the whole of the interior is filled with dwellings inhabited by Moslem families, with a chief, and a few Mohammedan soldiers. The sight of this building again altered my

opinion with respect to the castles in Belkah, Adjeloon, and the Haurān, and induced me to think that they were all Roman, since this Saracen one was so different from them in style and construction.

On the north of the castle, at a short distance only, is the town of Hhussan, seated on the point of a lower and smaller hill. It is peopled by Nessearys and Christians, and has in it a square tower, like those which form the minārehs of the mosques at Hhoms.

As there was a convent a little farther on, we did not halt here, but descended over a gentle slope towards a narrow valley, and at sunset reached the station of our repose. This convent, inhabited by Arab priests of the Greek church, and dedicated to St. George, looks also like a small castle at a distance, and is romantically situated on the southern brow of a hill, amid a wood of olives, with a deep valley and other steep hills immediately in front of it. We found crowds of people assembled here for the approaching festival of St. George, which would be on Sunday next; and on our expressing surprise at the number, we were told that there would be at least ten thousand persons here from all the country between Aleppo and Damascus. Devotion is not the sole object which attracts so many persons from their homes; for as this is an annual feast, a large fair is held at the same time, and every sort of commodity bought and sold under the protecting auspices of the patron saint. Under the supposition of my being a Turk, we were at first refused admittance; but on declaring myself to be an Englishman, every civility and attention was shown to the whole of our party, and we were furnished with a room on the inside, while the mass of devotees slept in the open air without. We entered the convent by a small aperture, scarcely more than three feet square, and closed by a stone door, as the ancient buildings in the Haurān. A confused fable was recounted to us of St. George having passed through this hole on horseback, and of his having the power still to cause horsemen who had faith therein to enter also. As neither of us were, however, of that