light in the open air. Among other performances, they call a boy out of the midst of the crowd. Then, to all appearance, they cut him into six pieces! After a few minutes of intense excitement and suspense of the lookers-on, the separated portions of the body are reunited, and the restored boy jumps up and runs away. The Arabs generally, and especially of the lower classes, firmly believe in the occult power of the gipsies. They are hated and feared, yet patronized and encouraged to a remarkable degree. These people speak Arabic, but they also have a language peculiar to themselves. The late learned Dr. Duff told us that the language of the gipsies in India, of which he had made a vocabulary, was somewhat similar to it, and many words were identical. These people are very mischievous, and when they are in the neighborhood, it is necessary to look well after the fowls, lambs, and kids, and to set a double watch in the orchards and vineyards, and the gardens of cucumbers.
The village sheikh provided us with a guide to conduct us to Arrabeh, and we remounted. The gipsy women could not understand how I could ride with both my feet on the same side of the horse. They said, "The hills round about Arrabeh are very steep, my lady; you will fall from your horse if you sit like that."
We rode for a short distance southward, with the Great Sea now and then visible on our right hand. Then we turned abruptly eastward, and pursued our way for about two miles in single file, in a narrow path, under the shade of trees. The glossy-leaved evergreen oak and the hawthorn were the most conspicuous. Cyclamen, ferns, mazereons, mosses, and lichens grew on and round the rocks in the deep shade; while here and there in sunny glades wide-open ranunculi, anemones, dandelions, and daisies appeared. Some of the tree branches were covered with gall-berries. We lingered to examine the ruins of an ancient town, of which no tradition even is left. There were large beveled blocks of stone foundations of walls, small tesseræ,
