till these incursions are put a stop to. The Bedouins come from beyond Jordan, every year, just after the Winter rains are over, when the grain is springing up, so that people do not venture to cultivate more land than they hope to be able to protect. That is one reason why there are so many waste places in the country, and why some portions of the most fertile plains are abandoned by the peasants of Palestine, and only cultivated by wandering tribes, who pitch their tents in a favorable spot, plow, sow, and reap, and then perhaps recross the Jordan, and return no more till the following Spring." According to the third and sixth verses of the sixth chapter of Judges, these wanderers used to commit just such depredations in Palestine three thousand years ago, and at the very same season. "When Israel had sown, then the Amalekites, the Midianites, and the children of the East (that is, from beyond Jordan) came up against them; they destroyed the increase of the earth and left no sustenance for Israel; they came with their cattle and their tents, and they and their camels were without number, and Israel was greatly impoverished." This is one of the chief causes of the present poverty of the country.
When the sun went down we entered the guest-chamber. Large lanterns were lighted and placed on two small stools in the middle of the room. The Governor, Abu Daoud, and his little son, arrived to greet me. Soon afterward Salihh Agha came, in his large scarlet cloak, edged with gold-lace and embroidery. His dark face was deeply shaded by his lilac and silver shawl, worn like a hood, bound round his head by a thick white cord of camel's hair. His eyelids were kohl-tinged, and he looked rather fierce, on the whole. He and his brother, the celebrated Akîel Agha, are the most powerful and formidable people in the Pashalic of ’Akka. They came originally from Morocco, and are now in the service of the Turkish Government. They have three or four hundred armed horsemen under their command. They may be regarded
