cii. XVIII.] lie arg7ic 07ir Case at tlic Scra'i. 57 



.Tedaaii." Still the Mudir made a feeble attempt at 

 opposition, on the score of his having no soldiers to 

 send with lis as escort. But it was unanimously 

 voted that soldiers would he quite out of place on 

 an expedition of this sort. To arrive with an escort 

 would in its turn bring " shame " on Jedaan, and 

 that could not be thought of, for Jedaan is a power 

 in Tudmur. As a last resort, the good man pro- 

 posed to go himself with us, and we of course had 

 to express great delight at the idea. But Hassan, 

 who has been taken into confidence about the 

 twenty mej idles, took the ]\Iudir aside and told him 

 in a whisper, that he really thought a man in his 

 position had other business to attend to than that of 

 running about after Frank travellers among the 

 Bedouins, and Ali Bey was quite nonplussed ; so, 

 like other functionaries overpowered by popular 

 clamour, lie has washed his hands of anything that 

 may happen, and has let us have our own wa}'. 

 Indeed, I do not see exactly how he could prevent 

 us if he would, and we are to start to-morrow 

 mornino'.'" 



o 



The rest of the day we have been spending in 

 looking at the ruins, which we are now better able 

 to appreciate than we were yesterday, and in paying 

 Abdallah a farewell visit, and in making a few pur- 

 chases. Mohammed has made AVilfrid a present of 



* We have siuce heard that Ali Bey did not hold out at his post 

 more than ten days longer. He was seized with a panic and fled 

 to Deyr. 



