104 MEMORIES OF MY LIFE 



perhaps entangled interminably. Fortunately, this 

 circumstance occurred about the time when I should 

 have been returning to England on my own account, 

 so I "re-levanted," if it may be so expressed. 

 Defaulters ordinarily "levant," or run from Europe 

 to the Levant ; I ran in the opposite direction. 



At Damascus in the hot time of the year there 

 was more than one delicious retreat in public coffee- 

 places with gardens, through which one of the in- 

 numerable runnels of clear river water was conducted. 

 I also took an interesting ride through the outskirts 

 of the town, where a vast amount of dried apricot is 

 prepared. It looks like greasy brown paper, is 

 wrapped in rolls, and is largely consumed. Each 

 orchard has a smoothed place like a small threshing- 

 floor, as well as a big cauldron over an oven into 

 which the apricots are put. The resulting slush is 

 ladled out and spread over the floor ; when it is 

 sufficiently hardened, it is rolled off it as if it were 

 a sheet of oilcloth. The cost of preparation is so 

 small and the results so good that this manufacture 

 mieht be found remunerative in other countries 

 where apricots grow in abundance. 



I spent some happy days at Aden on the 

 Lebanon, a little below the famous cedars. The 

 Sheikh was only too glad to entertain me, because 

 one of the miserable tribal fights was expected, and 

 he was glad of the presence of armed persons in his 

 house, to protect it. Nothing, however, happened, 

 beyond a few harmless shots. I afterwards revelled 

 in the glorious beauty of the gorges leading down 

 to the Mediterranean, and rank the view down one 

 of them as the very finest my eyes have ever rested 



