poor and sick who came in my way. I often also had a gallop over the
mountains and plains; or I went shooting, either on foot or on horseback.
The game was very wild round Damascus, but I got a shot at redlegged
partridges, wild duck, quail, snipe, and woodcock, and I seldom came
home with an empty bag. The only time I ever felt lonely was during
the long winter nights when Richard was away. In the summer I did not
feel lonely, because I could always go and smoke a narghileh with the
women at the water-side in a neighbour's garden. But in the winter it
was not possible to do this. So I used to occupy myself with music or
literature, or with writing these rough notes, which I or some one else
will put together some day. But more often than not I sat and listened
to the stillness, broken ever and anon by weird sounds outside.

So passed our life at Damascus.


NOTES:

1. Miss Stisted speaks of her as "Jane Digby, who capped her wild
career by marrying a camel-driver," and animadverts on Lady Burton
for befriending her. The Shaykh was never a camel-driver in his
life, and few, I think, will blame Lady Burton for her kindness
to this poor lady, her countrywoman, in a strange land.




CHAPTER XIII. THROUGH THE DESERT TO PALMYRA. (1870).