A LAVA-FLOOD. 51 



stock of conversation became completely exhausted, and 

 Ave "vvere immensely relieved when they departed. 



We hired a Druse to guide us through the Lejah, as 

 Kliasim was unacquainted with the paths in its interior, 

 and set out on the morning of the 24th, which was dull 

 and showeiy. We rode out of Shuhba, by a gap near the 

 north-west corner of the walls, and skirting the north 

 base of the same cone we had passed on the previous day, 

 descended a long slope covered with the most extraordinary- 

 lava-streams, cracked in places exactly like the broken 

 portion of a glacier. Mohammed, Khasim's subordinate, 

 managed to be left behind for the second time, and did not 

 come up with us till we had been nearly an hour on the 

 road. Khasim meantime was alarmed lest the Druses 

 should have done him some mischief. When the truant 

 appeared, he told us that he had been purposely mis- 

 directed. If there was any truth in his statement, which 

 I very much doubt, it was the solitary unfriendly act 

 we met with among the Druses of the Jebel Hauran, 

 whom we found (as Mr. Porter well describes them) 'a 

 people of patriarchal manners and genuine x^^triarchal 

 hospitality.' 



The ground after a time became rather less rugfored, 

 and some traces of cultivation appeared before we passed 

 the hamlet of Selakhid, a quarter of a mile to the right. 

 Its Sheikh rode out to invite us to turn aside and rest in 

 his house. He was well-mounted, and was a most pictu- 

 resque figure, as he caracoled by our side, accoutred in 

 jackboots, and clad in loose-flowing garments, which 

 rivalled the rainbow in their varied colours. Finding we 

 were not to be persuaded, he rode with us for some 

 distance, and then, wishing us a prosperous joimiey, 

 turned back to his home. Crossing the Roman high- 

 road from Bozrah to Damascus, which ran through the 



E 2 



