correct pictures of Oriental life and scenery, leaving antiquarian
research and speculation to abler hands. The scholar, or the man of
science, may complain with reason that I have neglected valuable
opportunities for adding something to the stock of human knowledge: but if
a few of the many thousands, who can only travel by their firesides,
should find my pages answer the purpose of a series of cosmoramic
views--should in them behold with a clearer inward eye the hills of
Palestine, the sun-gilded minarets of Damascus, or the lonely pine-forests
of Phrygia--should feel, by turns, something of the inspiration and the
indolence of the Orient--I shall have achieved all I designed, and more
than I can justly hope.

New York, _October_, 1854.




Contents



Chapter I.

Life in a Syrian Quarantine.

Voyage from Alexandria to Beyrout--Landing at Quarantine--The
Guardians--Our Quarters--Our Companions--Famine and Feasting--The
Morning--The Holy Man of Timbuctoo--Sunday in Quarantine--Islamism--We
are Registered--Love through a Grating--Trumpets--The Mystery
Explained--Delights of Quarantine--Oriental _vs._ American