228 SIR VICTOR BROOKE CHAP. 



large well of the purest water in one of the vaults, of 

 which we drank freely. 



Thursday r , i %th April. Saw the old castle well as 

 we wound our way up the steep ascent on the road to 

 Kefr Hannar. The road goes round Hermon. Saw a 

 lovely grove of oak to the east of castle, where was 

 carried on in olden times the worship of Astarte. 

 Lunched on the wild plain covered with basaltic walls 

 to the east of the snowy Hermon. We passed the 

 curious Druse town of Mejdel-esh-Shems at about the 

 highest place, probably 4000 feet above sea- level. 

 The Druses are a very fine set of people physically. 

 Their religion, which is akin to Mohammedanism, began 

 I ooo A.D., and they have kept apart ever since. They 

 say when they are in full war-paint with lance, pistols, 

 and gaily caparisoned horse leading an armed troop, 

 the sheikhs looked grand. Their headquarters are at 

 Hasbeya, west of Hermon, near the upper sources of 

 the Jordan. It was the Druses who mainly murdered 

 the Christians at Damascus in 1860, instigated by the 

 Turks. There were 14,000 Christians killed. Kefr 

 Hannar is a desolate, lonely place, and very high. 

 Hermon and Anti-Lebanon rise immediately above. 



The approach to Damascus is most striking. All 

 around is sterile and bare, when through a gorge in the 

 mountains rushes the Barada, vegetation accompanying 

 it in its narrow gorge. Emerging it spreads itself out 

 like a fan, and a garden of Paradise stretches away on 

 all sides, embracing the city with its groves of walnuts, 

 sycamores, oranges, etc. etc., through which run spark- 

 ling brooks in all directions. Damascus is surrounded 

 by very old walls in fact, the city is probably about the 

 oldest inhabited city in the world. After a bath Trench 

 and I went and strolled through its arched bazaars, 

 with their shops, khans (buildings for exposing mer- 



