iS 11 .] Sketch of the preserd State of Greece and Palestine, 433 
saw f5.ve difTcrent bauds of robbers con- 
eondiiig ill arms- for die possession of de¬ 
serts and n,ii!)s. We saw there the Al- 
batiiaa levelling liis piece at grou[)s of 
f-iaushed children, wlio, as if familialised 
to this terrible sport, ran to bide them¬ 
selves behind the ruins of their cabins. 
Of one hundred and lifty villages, which 
we counted on tlie banks of the Nile iii 
ascending from Rosetta to Cairo, but one 
remains entire. A part of the Delta is 
• 
suffered to lie fallow ; a circumstance 
which lias not perhaps before occurred 
since the period when Pharaoh gave this 
fertile land to the posterity of Jacob. 
Most of the Fellahs have been massa¬ 
cred and the survivors have gone into 
Upper Egypt. The natives, who could 
not prevail upon themselves to abandon 
their fields, liaye desisted from the at¬ 
tempt of raising families. A man born 
in the decline of empires, and who sees 
in futurity no other prospect but that of 
disastrous revolutions, has, indeed, little 
reason to rejoice at the growth of chil¬ 
dren whose inheritance is to be misery. 
There are times when he may say with 
the propdiet—“ Happy are the dead 
We shall always recollect the relief. 
which we derived amid these scenes of 
wretchedness from a miniature France 
which we found in the island of Rhodes— 
Procedo et parvarn Trojani simulataque mag- 
nis 
Pergama, &c. 
\Ve traversed vviih lively emotion a long 
street called the Street of the Knights, 
and which is lined with Gothic edifices, 
whose wails are hung vvith the anus of 
the great families of France, and with 
deviices in our old language. Soinevvhiit 
farther on we discovered a small chapel, 
in which two poor monks ofilciated. . It 
is dedicated to Saint Louis, of whom we 
found mementirs in every part of the 
East, and whose death bed wm saw at 
Carthage. 'The Turks, who have every 
where mutilated and defaced the monu¬ 
ments of Grecian m t, fiave, nevertheless, 
spared those of chivalry. 
We must here narrate a little occur¬ 
rence which served to recal to us at this 
time the recollection of onr country ; and 
who can be indilTerent to this recollection 
whose lot it is to have first seen the light 
where the Payards and the Tuicnnes 
were born?—We found ourselves at 
Bethlehem, on the point of setting out 
for the Dead Sea, when we w'ere inform¬ 
ed that a French priest resided in a con- 
veiit of that place. We requested to see 
him, A person was presetited to us 
about forty-.five years old, and of a placid 
but grave aspect. His first words made 
ns start; for we have never heard abroad 
tlie accents of a French voice without 
the most lively emoiidii. We have al¬ 
ways been ready to exclaim with Phi- 
loctetes, 
q-nXraTCJV <p£v ro ^ 7\a.eo)'/ 
We asked him a few questions. He 
told «s that his name was Fallier Cle¬ 
ment; that he was from the neighbour¬ 
hood of Mayenne; that be once be¬ 
longed to a monastery of Britanny; 
tliat he had been deported to Spain with 
an hundred others like himself; and 
there hospitably received into a convene 
of his O'vn order; and that his superiors 
had sent him on the mission to the Hotp 
Land .—We asked whether he had no in¬ 
clination to return to fiis country, and if 
he wished to w'rite to his family.—lie 
replied to us with a smile of bitterness; 
—Who is it in France who recollects a 
poor capuchin ? Do 1 know whether f 
have as yet a relative in being? Gentle¬ 
men, here is my country. I hope to ob¬ 
tain, through the merits of the cross, 
courage to face death here, without de¬ 
pendence upon any one, and without 
thinking of a country where I must be 
totally forgotten.” 
When he had pronounced tliese words, 
bis emotion become so strong and visi¬ 
ble, that he was compelled to withdraw. 
He retired precipitately to his cell, and 
could not be prevailed upon to reappear. 
Our presence had awakened in his heart, 
recollections and feelings which it was 
bis interest aitd Ills wish to extinguish for 
ever. There is no part of the world 
w here our political storms have not cast 
the children of St. Louis; there is no 
desert in wliich they have not sighed 
alter their native land. Sucli is human 
destiny !—A Frenchman now mourns for 
the loss of his birth-place on the same 
banks, of which the recollection inspired 
many centuries ago t.he fine»t of all can¬ 
ticles on the love (;f country. 
Super fi jnilna Rabylonis ! See. 
The sons of Aaron, who suspended 
tlieir cinnor on ttie willows of Babylon, 
did not all return to the city of David, 
F.mmaus and Bethel were not revisited 
by all the daughters of Judea ;—by those 
companions of Esther, who sang upon 
(he borders of the Euphrates, 
* After so long a privation, how grateful 
is llut sound to my 
O rives 
