1848.] OVERLAND MARCH. 475 



ing powers of physical endurance rarely equalled; prompt in 

 danger; terrible in battle, — yet kind and affectionate in his 

 intercourse with his family; ever ready to face any peril in 

 defence of his creed, to acaomplish revenge, or gratify his 

 propensity for plunder ; never-tiring and relentless in the 

 pursuit of an enemy, but adhering to a friend with the devo- 

 tion of a brother: murdering and robbing with impunity those 

 not under his protection, but, where his word and faith have 

 been plighted, faithful and reliable to the last — such, in brief, 

 is the, character of the Bedawi warrior, who roams at will 

 through the desert wilderness of Judea, and along the sandy 

 terraces overlooking the valley of El-Ghor. 



(5.) It having been satisfactorily proved that the horses 

 of Araby, however useful in their appropriate sphere, were 

 wholly unfitted for hauling the boats over the mountain 

 ridsfes between Acre and the Lake of Tiberias, 'though the 

 distance barely exceeded thirty miles, Lieutenant Lynch had 

 recourse to the never-failing "ship of the desert"* — thejemel 

 of the Arab. A pair of camels were harnessed to each truck, 

 and one attached in front as a leader; a number of the same 

 animals were also provided to relieve the former, and to carry 

 the bas^a^e of the party, while each one of the officers and 

 men was mounted on a tine Arabian destrier. 



On the morning of the 4th of April, they commenced the 

 overland march. Crossing the beautiful plain of Acre, em- 

 purpled with the glorious dyes of the anemone, and sprinkled 

 all over with the beautiful blossoms of the daisy, the white 

 and crimson and golden flowers of the aster, the pale asphodel, 

 the scarlet pink, the variegated convolvulus, and the bright- 

 tinted cyclamen, — they soon commenced the ascent of the hills 



* According to Sir William Jones, the ancient Arabian poets were fond of 

 comparing their favorite animal to a ship; and among the extracts which he 

 gives, illustrative of this fact, are the following: — 



" Long is her neck [the camel's] : and when she raises it with celerity, it re- 

 sembles the stern of a ship floating aloft on the billowy Tigris." 



'Ah! the vehicles which bore away my fair one, on the morning when the 

 tribe of Malee departed, and their camels were travelling the. banks of Dcda, 

 resembled large ships." 



