THE REBEL SHEIK. 
307 
to shoot them. On this account, as I supposed, he kept very 
close to us, we being altogether unarmed, so as to be on the 
spot when the attack commenced, and at the same time af¬ 
ford us protection with his courage and fire-arms. 
But it seemed as if we were doomed never to enjoy a good 
adventure in the way of an attack from the Arabs. No mat¬ 
ter how fervently we wished to be robbed (having only a 
trifle of small change about us), I verily believe had we hung 
bags of gold on our backs, and invited every prowling thief 
we met on the way to shoot at us; had we proclaimed aloud 
that it would greatly oblige us to be peppered with slugs or 
knocked on the head, so as to have a genuine adventure, to 
put down in our journals, and talk about when we got home, 
not one would have dared to undertake such a thing, so effi¬ 
ciently were we protected by our dragoman. These fellows, 
who watched us so closely, were, as we soon discovered, the 
followers of a noted refugee from the Turkish Government, 
formerly the Sheik of Baalbek, who had fortified himself in 
the ruins of Khan Jub Yusef. 
As we rode up in front of the Khan, the Sheik came out 
and received us with great civility. He was followed by a 
few armed men, who, upon seeing that there were no spies 
in the party, dropped off quietly, and sat down on the rocks, 
some distance off. A long conversation took place between 
the two heroes (our own and the hero of the Khan), the sub¬ 
stance of which appeared to be this : that the Sheik, unable 
to endure the oppressive sway of the Turks, had taken up 
arms against them, resolved to die fighting for the freedom 
of his country. All the followers that he could prevail upon 
to join his standard amounted only to nineteen; yet with this 
handful of men he had fought and slain more Turks than he 
could count. Himself and his party were sentenced to be 
hunted throughout the land, and shot down, tortured, or muti¬ 
lated, wherever they could be found. Several had been killed 
at different times in battle ; three had recently been captured 
in a foraging expedition down by Tiberias, and. after suffer¬ 
ing the cruelest tortures, were shot and hung upon poles, as 
a warning to the rest of the band. For himself (the Sheik), 
