However much we regretted the murder of that poor man, by whom we had been recieved only the evening before with such kindness, we could not forbear rejoicing at not having been ourselves the destined victims. We were told that the Agelis ( an Arab tribe ) had been settled for fifty years at Hit, and having paid the same taxes as the other inhabitants, had been forced by the new Agha ( regent ), the greedy Kurde ( wolf), to pay a certain sum with which they, as true subjects, should not have been charged, and they accordingly obstinately refused to pay. But the governor obtained troops from the Pasha of Bagdad,with whose assistance the Agelis were driven out of Hit, and their goods were confiscated, for which treatment they swore to take revenge on the Agha.
With the break of day, a soldier came to inform us that the two innocent sons of the Agha, and his brother-in-law, had had their throats cut while asleep, but the Agha himself was only wounded, and had escaped from the grasp of the Agelis, and desired us to visit him. We found him outside of the town, not far from the city gate,sorrounded by about fifty horsemen, with whom he had been pursuing his enemies, who had taken possession of all his moveable pro- perty ; but his pursuit had been in vain, as he could not overtake them. He was wounded in one of his legs, and he escaped death only by throwing himself from the high verandah of the palace into the neighbouring yard. He rquested us to prolong our stay with him, in order to cure his wounds,promising, as soon as he should be well, to escort us to Bagdad. We could not resist this application, partly owing to our gratitude for his kind reception, and partly because we thought by curing him, which seemed an easy matter, we should render a service to the Pasha of Bagdad, which might be of greater advantage to us than the letter we had from the Pasha of Damascus. Accordingly, we separated ourselves from our travelling companions, who on the same day went down the Euphrates on their way to Bagdad. We committed, however, a very great blunder, for which we had to suffer, by quitting the
