“Her son, a youth of not more than two score years, returns from his day’s labour a while after I had arrived. And as he stands in the door, his pickaxe and spade on his shoulder, his sister runs to meet him, and whispers somewhat about the stranger. Sitting on the threshold, he takes off his spats of cloth and his clouted shoes, while she gets the pitcher of water. After having washed, he enters, salaams graciously, and squats on the floor. The mother then brings a wicker tray on which is set the supper, consisting of only bread and olives. ‘Thou wilt overlook our penury,’ she falters out; ‘here be all we have.’ In truth, my hostess is of the poorest of the Lebanon peasants; even her sweet-oil pipkin and her jars of lentils and beans, are empty. She lays the tray before her son and invites me to partake of the repast. I go to my basket, bring forth the few onions and the two cakes of cheese I had left, lay them with an apology on the tray—the mother, abashed, protests—and we sit down cross-legged in a circle to supper. When we rise, the little girl lights a little fire, and they enjoy the cup of coffee I make for them. And the mother, in taking hers, tells me naively, and with a sigh, that it is five years now since she had had a cup of coffee. Indeed, she had seen better days. And ’tis sorrow, forestalling Time, which furrows her cheeks and robs her black eyes of their lustre and spark.
“She had once cattle, and a beit of her own, and rugs, too, and jars full of provision. But now she is a tenant. And her husband, ever since he emigrated to America, did not send a single piaster or even write a letter. From necessity she becomes a prey of usurers; for those Lebanon Moths, of which we saw a specimen in the village of bells and potteries, fall mostly in the wardrobe of women. They are locusts rather, who visit only the wheat fields of the poor. Her home was mortgaged to one such, and failing to meet her obligation, the mortgage is closed and he takes possession. Soon after she is evicted, her son, the firstborn, a youth of much promise, dies.
“ ‘He could read and write, my son,’ quoth she, sobbing; ‘of a sharp wit he was, and very assiduous in his studies. Once he accompanied the priest of the village on a visit to the Patriarch, and read there a eulogium of his own composition, for which he received a silver medal. The Patriarch then sent him to a Seminary; he was to become a priest, my son. He wrote a beautiful hand—both Arabic and French; he was of a fine wit, sharp, quick, brilliant. Ah, me, but those who are of such minds never live!’
“She then tells me how they lost their last head of cattle. An excellent sheep it was; which one night they forgot outside; and the wolf, visiting the village, sees it tied to the mulberry, howls for joy, and carries it off. And thus Death robs the poor woman of her son; America, of her husband; the Shylock of the village, of her home; and the wolf, of her last head of cattle. And this were enough to age even a Spartan woman. Late in the evening, after she had related at length of her sorrows, three mattresses—all she had—are laid on the straw mat near each other, and the little girl had to sleep with her mother.
“Early in the morning I bid them farewell, and pass on my way to Amsheet, where Henriette Renan, the sister of Ernest, is buried. An hour’s walk, and the incarcerated wadi and its folk lie concealed behind. I breathe again the open air of the mountain expanse; I behold again the emerald stretch of water on the horizon, where the baggalas and saics, from this distance, seem like doves basking in the morning sun. I cross the last rill, mount the last hilltop on my journey, and lo, at the foot of the gently sloping heath are the orchards and palms of Amsheet. Further below is Jbail, or ancient Byblus, looking like a clutter of cliffs on the shore. Farewell to the mountain heights, and the arid wilderness! Welcome the fertile plains, and hopeful strands. In half an hour I reach the immense building—the first or the last of the village, according to your direction—which, from the top of the hill, I thought to be a fortress. A huge structure this, still a-building, and of an architecture altogether different from the conventional Lebanon type. No plain square affair, with three pointed arches in the façade, and a gable of pink tiles; but here are quoins, oriels, embrasures, segmental arches, and other luxuries of architecture. Out of place in these wilds, altogether out of place. Hard by are two primitive flat-roofed beits, standing grimly there as a rebuke to the extravagant tendencies of the age. I go there in the hope of buying some cheese and eggs, and
