530 THE JOUKNEY TO PALESTINE 
After the sterile desolation of Lebanon, the beauty of 
Damascus (October 4), set in its velvet green, was doubly 
striking. Owing to the illness of Captain Washington, they 
had to stay four days in their hotel in ' the street called straight ' 
— * which is crooked and not 15 feet broad in parts ' — and to 
give up the ascent of Mt. Hermon. Indeed there was much 
sickness in the city, especially among the Turkish troops, 
no doubt aggravated by the appalHng conditions after the 
massacre, which took place the day before our travellers 
arrived, with a destruction estimated at five milhons sterHng 
and a slaughter of some 5000 persons. ' Kuins piled 4 feet 
deep in every lane, heaps of mutilated corpses, bones — stench ! 
burnt books, pictures ' — such is the impression of a visit to the 
Christian quarter under official escort. 
On the return to Beyrout through the Anti-Lebanon country 
comes a note for the benefit of Darwin, who had asked him 
to keep a look out for special markings to compare with those 
of the zebra and other of the horse tribe : ' Saw two asses with 
forked end to shoulder stripe,' matching an earher note at 
Syra : ' Saw 4 asses with banded legs both fore and hind down 
nearly to hoof.' 
After three days' rest at Beyrout they left on October 14 
for Jaffa. At Sidon Hooker paid a flying visit to M. Gaillardot, 
chief medical officer of the Turkish Government, and collated 
his botanical knowledge, which, not having been rubbed up 
for many years, was not very serviceable. At Haifa also a 
short excursion was made to the famous convent of Mar Ehas. 
Leaving Jaffa on the 16th, they visited Jerusalem, the 
Dead Sea, Bethlehem, Samaria, and Nazareth, the Lake of 
Galilee, Mt. Carmel, and so again to Beyrout. 
The rounded steppe-like hills of the great hmestone plateau 
between Ramleh and Jerusalem appeared ' very bare, except 
of cultivated terraces scarcely distinguishable at this season ' 
of entire drought. Considering the ' good hght red soil, 
admirable for Vine and Mulberry ' into which the rock de- 
composed, ' in Lebanon every inch of this ground (except 
rock) would have been cultivated and most productive.' The 
only superiority appeared in the building of the houses. 
