341 
Turning to the west, with a slight inclination to the 
north, I ascended a desert country entirely composed 
of calcareous rock, and arrived at a village about half 
past eight, where the fusileers quitted me to return to 
their homes, because at a certain distance from Aleppo, 
there is no fear of being pillaged by the Bedouins, and 
^the other petty robbers who infest the neighbourhood 
of the city. 
There is at this place, by the road side, a perpendi- 
cular excavation almost elliptical in form, about one 
hundred feet in diameter, and forty in depth. There is 
a gallery all round it, about half way down, which has 
apertures leading to different caverns. The Mussulmen 
think this is part of the ruins of a city which has been 
swallowed up. The Christians at Aleppo assert that it 
is an amphitheatre for the combats of wild beasts, 
which appears probable enough. It is also possible that 
this monument has served as a prison, or catacombs; 
or perhaps it was an immense cistern. I dare not abso- 
lutely decide on this point. 
From thence the road winds more to the south-west, 
across rocks, which we were obliged to ascend and 
descend until three quarters past ten, when we stopped 
to breakfast at a hamlet called Tadil. 
We set out again at half past eleven, and about one 
o'clock arrived at another village called Tereb, where 
we halted for two hours. We afterwards entered a large 
and fine plain studded with villages. At half past three 
we inclined more to the south- wefet, and passed a village 
in ruins; traversed Hazeni, a considerable village, at sun- 
set, and at six o'clock halted for the night in a hamlet 
called Mortahoua, 
This great plain, the soil of which consists of fine 
vegetable earth in good cultivation, is thickly peopled; 
