“Leaving this throne of modern mythology, I cross many wadis, descend and ascend many hills, pass through many villages, until I reach, at Ghina and Masshnaka, the tomb of the mythology of the ancients. At Ghina are ruins and monuments, of which Time has spared enough to engage the interest of archaeologists. Let the Pères Jesuit, Bourquenoud and Roz, make boast of their discoveries and scholarship; I can only boast of the fact that the ceremonialisms of worship are the same today as they were in the days of my Phoenician ancestors. Which, indeed, speaks well for them. This tablet, representing an armed figure and a bear, commemorates, it is said, the death of Tammuz. And the figure of the weeping woman near it is probably that of Ashtaroth. Other figures there are; but nothing short of the scholarship of Bourquenoud and Roz can unveil their marble mystery.
“At Masshnaka, overlooking the River Adonis, are ruins of an ancient temple in which can still be seen a few Corinthian columns. This, too, we are told, was consecrated to Tammuz; and in this valley the women of Byblus bemoaned every year the fate of their god. Isis and Osiris, Tammuz and Ashtaroth, Venus and Adonis—these, I believe, are one and the same. Their myth borrowed from the Phoenicians, the Egyptians, and the Romans, from either of the two. But the Venus of Rome is cheerful, joyous, that of the Phoenicians is sad and sorrowful. Even mythology triumphs in its evolution.
“Here, where my forebears deliquesced in sensuality, devotion, and grief, where the ardency of the women of Byblus flamed on the altar of Tammuz, on this knoll, whose trees and herbiage are fed perchance with their dust, I build my athafa (little kitchen), Arab-like, and cook my noonday meal. On the three stones, forming two right angles, I place my skillet, kindle under it a fire, pour into it a little sweet oil, and fry the few eggs I purchased in the village. I abominate the idea of frying eggs in water as the Americans do.4 I had as lief fry them in vinegar or syrup, where neither olive oil nor goat-butter is obtainable. But to fry eggs in water? O the barbarity of it! Why not, my friend, take them boiled and drink a little hot water after them? This savours of originality, at least, and is just as insipid, if not more. Withal, they who boil cabbage, and heap it in a plate over a slice of corn-beef, and call it a dish, can break a few boiled eggs in a cup of hot water and call them fried. Be this as it may. The Americans will be solesistically simple even in their kitchen.
“Now, my skillet of eggs being ready, I draw out of my basket a cake of cheese, a few olives, an onion, and three paper-like loaves, rather leaves, of bread, and fall to. With what relish, I need not say. But let it be recorded here, that under the carob tree, on the bank of the River Adonis, in the shadow of the great wall surrounding the ruins of the temple of Tammuz, I Khalid, in the thirty-fourth year of the reign of Abdul Hamid, gave a banquet to the gods—who, however, were content in being present and applauding the devouring skill of the peptic host and toastmaster. Even serene Majesty at Yieldiz would give away, I think, an hundred of its sealed dishes for such a skillet of eggs in such an enchanted scene. But for it, alas! such wild and simple joy is a sealed book. Poor Serene Majesty! Now, having gone through the fruit course—and is not the olive a fruit?—I fill my jug at the River to make my coffee. And here I ask, In what Hotel Cecil or Waldorf or Savoy, or in what Arab tent in the desert, can one get a better cup of coffee than this, which Khalid makes for himself? The gods be praised, before and after. Ay, even in washing my pots and dishes I praise the good gods.
“And having done this, I light my cigarette, lug my basket on my back, and again set forth. In three hours, on my way to Byblus, I reach a hamlet situated in a deep narrow wadi, closed on all sides by huge mountain walls. The most sequestered, the most dreary place, I have yet seen. Here, though unwilling, the dusk of the December day having set in, I lay down the staff of wayfare. And as I enter the little village, I am greeted by the bleat of sheep and the low of the kine. The first villager I meet is an aged woman, who stands in her door before which is a pomegranate tree, telling her beads. She returns my salaam graciously, and invites me, saying, ‘Be kind to tarry overnight.’ But can one be kinder than such an hostess? Seeing that I laid down my burden, she calls to her daughter to light the seraj (naphtha lamp) and bring some water for the stranger. ‘Methinks thou wouldst wash thy feet,’ quoth she. Indeed, that is as essential and refreshing, after a day’s walk, as washing one’s face. I sit me down, therefore, under the pomegranate, take off my shoes and stockings, and the little girl, a winsome, dark-eyed, quick-witted lass, pours to me from the pitcher. I try to take it from her; but she would not, she said, be deprived of the pleasure of serving the stranger. Having done, I
