CHAPTER V.
DOMESTIC LIFE IN HÂIFA.
Although the tents were very near to the town, Mr. Finn laughingly insisted that I should not make my first entry into Hâifa on foot; so I mounted, and, with my brother and a few of his Arab friends walking by my side, traversed the bridle-path by the gardens, and approached the embattled stone gateway. Its heavy wooden doors, covered with hides and plates of iron, were thrown open for us, on their creaking hinges, by the sleepy wardens; whose mattresses were spread on stone platforms in the square vaulted chamber of the gate.
They welcomed us with the words, "Enter in, in peace." We said, "May God preserve you! good-night." And they answered, "A thousand good nights to you!" but their greetings were almost drowned by the angry barking of a troop of dogs, roused by the clanging of the great doors behind us.
Within the town, wherever there was space, flocks and herds were lying down, crowded together in the moonlight; and in the narrow, tortuous, dirty, channeled streets we met now and then a moaning, miserable-looking, sleepless cow or stray donkey.
We passed a little belfried Latin chapel, shaded by a pepper-tree-just like a willow-and a simple mosque and minaret, with a palm-tree near it, and then came to a pleasant opening close to the sea-shore, where a number of camels, camel-drivers, and peasants were sleeping round the red embers of a wood fire.
I dismounted at the entrance of a house overlooking this scene, and passed under a low, arched gateway, into a roughly-paved, open court, brightened by the lamps and
