DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.5073#0182
TRAVELLING IN STRIA.
171
to be ready, we determined to initiate ourselves into
the mysteries of tent life in an excursion to Deir-el-
Kamar*, the capital of the Druze country, which
generally takes two long days' riding; but as we were
new at mountain riding we determined to devote four
to it. The starting day of any excursion in Syria is
one that calls for extraordinary patience and good tem-
per ; even with these it is immensely wearying and pro-
voking. We were ourselves dressed at 5 a. m., and our
mules arrived soon after, but they were not finally
Wded and despatched till near 11a. jr., and we followed
at mid-day; we had eight mules, and a donkey to carry
their master, and we took a cook, canteen, and three
tents. This was our kit throughout Syria: — a large
tent for ourselves with double carpets, beds, dinner-table,
and two folding arm-chairs, with another tent for our
maid, and the kitchen tent; our personal luggage, which
was packed in two tin travelling-baths in stout wicker
eoverings (a luxury with which I recommend every lady-
traveller in this climate to provide herself), and a couple
°f portmanteaus, went on two mules, one of them sur-
mounted by a little wooden cage or carriage, in which
the Maltese dog, our inseparable companion and faithful
little night-guard, was carried; he used to distinguish us
a* an almost incredible distance, and his bark of recog-
nition, his voice of welcome in answer to our footsteps,
was always the glad sound which announced that the tents
Were nigb and the dinner ready, at the end of a long
weary day's ride; every one, even Mooslims, petted the
pretty Uttle thing wherever we went. His ancestors, of
tne noble Lion family of Malta, had some time ago
settled at Smyrna, where this small scion of the house
* Alus, thirteen months after, the scene of horrible and sanguinary
171
to be ready, we determined to initiate ourselves into
the mysteries of tent life in an excursion to Deir-el-
Kamar*, the capital of the Druze country, which
generally takes two long days' riding; but as we were
new at mountain riding we determined to devote four
to it. The starting day of any excursion in Syria is
one that calls for extraordinary patience and good tem-
per ; even with these it is immensely wearying and pro-
voking. We were ourselves dressed at 5 a. m., and our
mules arrived soon after, but they were not finally
Wded and despatched till near 11a. jr., and we followed
at mid-day; we had eight mules, and a donkey to carry
their master, and we took a cook, canteen, and three
tents. This was our kit throughout Syria: — a large
tent for ourselves with double carpets, beds, dinner-table,
and two folding arm-chairs, with another tent for our
maid, and the kitchen tent; our personal luggage, which
was packed in two tin travelling-baths in stout wicker
eoverings (a luxury with which I recommend every lady-
traveller in this climate to provide herself), and a couple
°f portmanteaus, went on two mules, one of them sur-
mounted by a little wooden cage or carriage, in which
the Maltese dog, our inseparable companion and faithful
little night-guard, was carried; he used to distinguish us
a* an almost incredible distance, and his bark of recog-
nition, his voice of welcome in answer to our footsteps,
was always the glad sound which announced that the tents
Were nigb and the dinner ready, at the end of a long
weary day's ride; every one, even Mooslims, petted the
pretty Uttle thing wherever we went. His ancestors, of
tne noble Lion family of Malta, had some time ago
settled at Smyrna, where this small scion of the house
* Alus, thirteen months after, the scene of horrible and sanguinary