ISKANDER EFFENDI. 55 



" My resolution was taken at once. 



" I closed my shop, and, hastening home, inquired of 

 Edith when she expected Selim. He was to return the 

 next day. I must be at the well of Birreh, then, in the 

 morning, and watch for him to the northward on the road 

 to Galilee. I had not been living thus long in Jerusalem 

 without providing for myself the means of assistance in 

 just such cases as this. For in the East we were liable 

 at any moment to need the strongest personal defenses; 

 and among my household goods I had a store of arms, 

 while among my acquaintances were men I could depend 

 on for such emergencies. But the time was brief. 



" Near Bir Ayoub, on the Jaffa road, I once found an 

 Arab in distress, and succored him. No matter now for 

 the particulars. He was one of the men of Abu Goash, 

 the robber-chief. My man and his family were bound 

 to me by the Eastern laws of gratitude. Seven stout men 

 with horses I could count on from among them, and to 

 them I dispatched a messenger before the gates of Jeru- 

 salem were shut at sunset. They would have no diffi- 

 culty in reaching the appointed place of meeting by day- 

 break in the morning. I myself with one of my servants 

 mounted and left the city in the night, carrying about us 

 enough of the Frankish weapons to arm our expected 

 band. I had a perfect arsenal of revolvers in my belt 

 and shawl, and Mousa, my man, carried as many. We 

 rode northward by the starlight, picking our dangerous 

 way among the rocks; for there are no roads in Syria, 

 and night travel is next to impossible. You know them 

 well, Effendi. The moon rose a little before the dawn, 

 and by its deceptive light we passed the well of Birreh, 

 and the great fields of rocks that lie around the site of 

 Bethel of old. In the olive-groves near Ain Haramieh 



