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Indeed, so much was said that I set out with more than a suspicion that we were marching to our deaths. But Richard wished it, and that was enough for me. He never permitted any obstacle to hinder his progress. He made up his mind to travel without the tribe of El Mezrab, and he gave me the option of going with him, and I said, as I always said, "I will follow you to the death."
Richard wanted to patch up a peace between the Wuld Ali and the Mezrab tribe, but in this he did not succeed. We had a delightful ride when leaving one encampment for another, and several of the Bedawin accompanied us. As we mounted Richard whispered to me, "Let's show those fellows that the English can ride. They think that nobody can ride but themselves, and that nothing can beat their mares."
For Ra'shid Pasha, the Wali or Governor-General of Syria, both Burton and his wife conceived from the first a pronounced antipathy. He was fat and indolent, with pin-point eyes, wore furs, walked on his toes, purred and looked like "a well-fed cat." It did not, however, occur to them just then that he was to be their evil genius. Jane Digby el Mezrab.
She arrived at Beyrout, and went to Damascus, where she arranged to go to Baghdad, across the desert. For this journey a Bedawin escort was necessary; and as the Mezrab tribe occupied the ground, the duty of commanding the escort devolved upon Shaykh Mijwal, a younger brother of the chief of this tribe.
At an early date Burton formed a friendship with the Algerine hero and exile Abd el Kadir, a dark, kingly-looking man who always appeared in snow white and carried superbly-jewelled arms; while Mrs. Burton, who had a genius for associating herself with undesirable persons, took to her bosom the notorious and polyandrous Jane Digby el Mezrab.
Several Englishmen had been to Palmyra, but always with a large escort of the tribe of El Mezrab, and Richard wanted to break through the system which this tribe had of practically levying blackmail upon travellers, which often meant as much as six thousand francs, as each man in the escort costs about 2 pounds sterling a head.
Another, and the most interesting of all the personages who attended my receptions, was Lady Ellenborough, known at Damascus as the Honourable Jane Digby El Mezrab. She was the most romantic and picturesque personality: one might say she was Lady Hester Stanhope's successor.
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