honest rest. I had nothing to do but listen to the pattering of the
fountains and take medicine and throw it up again. It was dangerous
recreation, but it was pleasanter than traveling in Syria. I had plenty
of snow from Mount Hermon, and as it would not stay on my stomach, there
was nothing to interfere with my eating it--there was always room for
more. I enjoyed myself very well. Syrian travel has its interesting
features, like travel in any other part of the world, and yet to break
your leg or have the cholera adds a welcome variety to it.

We left Damascus at noon and rode across the plain a couple of hours, and
then the party stopped a while in the shade of some fig-trees to give me
a chance to rest. It was the hottest day we had seen yet--the sun-flames
shot down like the shafts of fire that stream out before a blow-pipe--the
rays seemed to fall in a steady deluge on the head and pass downward like
rain from a roof. I imagined I could distinguish between the floods of
rays--I thought I could tell when each flood struck my head, when it
reached my shoulders, and when the next one came. It was terrible. All
the desert glared so fiercely that my eyes were swimming in tears all the
time. The boys had white umbrellas heavily lined with dark green. They
were a priceless blessing. I thanked fortune that I had one, too,
notwithstanding it was packed up with the baggage and was ten miles
ahead. It is madness to travel in Syria without an umbrella. They told
me in Beirout (these people who always gorge you with advice) that it was
madness to travel in Syria without an umbrella. It was on this account
that I got one.

But, honestly, I think an umbrella is a nuisance any where when its
business is to keep the sun off. No Arab wears a brim to his fez, or
uses an umbrella, or any thing to shade his eyes or his face, and he
always looks comfortable and proper in the sun. But of all the