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Updated: May 12, 2025
During this summer we made many excursions to pleasant spots around Bludan, and we used to invite the Shaykhs and principal people to meet us. We would choose a spot near water, or near Bedawin tents, or a melon plantation; and arriving at the appointed place, we would eat and drink, make a fire, roast and prepare our coffee, and have a siesta.
I then rode down the hill to the American Mission and begged them to come up and take shelter with me, and then into the village of Bludan to tell the Christians to come up to me on the slightest sign of danger. I gave the same message to the handful of Christians at Zebedani. I rode on to the Shaykhs, and asked them how it would be if the news proved true.
One of my earliest experiences there was a deputation from the shaykhs and chiefs of the villages round, who brought me a present of a sheep, a most acceptable present. Often when alone at Bludan provisions ran short. I remember once sending my servants to forage for food, and they returned with an oath, saying there was nothing but "Arab's head and onions."
There are five hundred and fifty-five trees, and they exude the sweetest odours. We spent a very pleasant time camping under their grateful shade. At last the day came for our party to break up, Mr. Palmer and Mr. Tyrwhitt-Drake en route for England and Richard and I to return to Bludan. So we parted. It took Richard and myself many days to get back to our home.
I, however, received them coldly, and merely said the affair had passed out of my hands. But I begged them off all the same. There was a sequel to this story, which I may as well mention here. The following summer, when we were at Bludan, Hasan and I became great friends. One day, after doctoring him for weak eyes, I said, "What made you want to hurt me, O Hasan, last summer?"
When I had parted from Richard in the plain, I climbed up to my eagle's nest at Bludan, the view from which commanded the country, and I felt that as long as our ammunition lasted we could defend ourselves, unless overpowered by numbers.
The bungalow was rural, solitary, and refreshing, something after the fashion of the Eagle's Nest we had made for ourselves at Bludan in the old days in Syria. It was the eve of a great feast, and young boys dressed like tigers came and performed some native dancing, with gestures of fighting and clawing one another, which was exceedingly graceful.
At last at midnight on the third day a mounted messenger rode up with a letter from Richard, saying that all was well at Damascus, but that he would not be back for a week. After this excitement life fell back into its normal course at Bludan, and the only variations were small excursions and my doctoring. A propos of the latter, I can tell some amusing anecdotes.
Charles Tyrwhitt- Drake, who had done much good work in connexion with the Palestine Exploration, came to us about this time on a visit, and we made many excursions from Bludan with them, some short and some long. We used to saunter or gypsy about the country round, pitching our tents at night. I kept little reckoning of time during these excursions. We generally counted by the sun.
I paid all the bills, packed Richard's boxes and sent them to England, broke up our establishment at Bludan, and had all that was to accompany me transferred to Damascus. Two nights before I left Bludan I had another dream.
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