Our Route Now Lay N.E. By E.; To The Right
Was The Open Country Adjoining The Haouran, To The Left The Chain Of The
Heish, At The Foot Of Which We Continued To Travel For The Remainder Of
The Day.
The villages on the eastern declivity of the Heish, between
Beit el Djanne and Kferhauar are, Hyna, Um Esshara, Dourboul, Oerna, and
Kalaat el Djendel.
At three hours and a half from the point where the Wady Beit el Djanne
terminates in the plain is the village Kferhauar. Before we entered it I
saw to the left of the road a tomb which attracted my attention by its
size. I was told that it was the Kaber Nimroud (the tomb of Nimrod); it
consists of a heap of stones about twenty feet in length, two feet high,
and three feet broad, with a large stone at both extremities, similar to
the tombs in Turkish cemeteries. This is probably the Kalat Nimroud laid
down in maps, to the south of Damascus; at least I never heard of any
Kalaat Nimroud in that direction.
To the right of our road, one hour and a half from Kferhauar, lay Sasa,
and near it Ghaptata. Half an hour farther from Kferhauar we alighted at
the village Beitima. On a slight eminence near Kferhauar stands a small
tower, and there is another of the same size behind Beitima. The
principal article of culture here is cotton: the crop was just ripe, and
the inhabitants were occupied in collecting it. There are Druses at
Kferhauar as well as at Beitima; at the latter village I passed an
uncomfortable rainy night, in the court-yard of a Felah's house.
October 17th.--We continued to follow the Djebel Heish (which
DJOUN.
[p.47]however takes a more northern direction than the Damascus road
for four hours, when we came to Katana, a considerable village, with
good houses, and spacious gardens; the river, whose source is close to
the village, empties itself into the Merj of Damascus.
Three hours from Katana, passing over the district called Ard el Lauan,
we came to Kfersousa. Beyond Katana begins the Djebel el Djoushe, which
continues as far as the Djebel Salehie, near Damascus, uniting, on its
western side, the lower ridge of mountains of the Djebel Essheikh.
Kfersousa lies just within the limits of the gardens of the Merdj of
Damascus. In one hour beyond it I re-entered Damascus, greatly fatigued,
having suffered great pain.
After returning to Damascus from my tour in the Haouran, I was desirous
to see the ruins of Rahle and Bourkoush, in the Djebel Essheikh, which I
had heard mentioned by several people of Rasheya during my stay at
Shohba. On the 12th of December, I took a man with me, and rode to
Katana, by a route different from that through the Ard el Lauan, by
which I travelled from Katana to Damascus in October. It passes in a
more southerly direction through the villages of Deir raye [Arabic], one
hour beyond Bonabet Ullah; and another hour Djedeide; one hour and a
quarter from Djedeide is Artous [Arabic], in which are many Druse
families; in an hour from Artous we reached Katana. This is a very
pleasant road, through well cultivated fields and groves. I here saw
nurseries of apricot trees, which are transplanted into the gardens at
Damascus. To the south of Artous three quarters of an hour, is the
village of Kankab, situated upon a hill; below it is the village of
Djoun, opposite to which,
RAHLE
[p.48]and near the village Sahnaya, lies the Megarat Mar Polous, or St.
Paul's cavern, where the Apostle is related to have hidden himself from
the pursuit of his enemies at Damascus. The monks of Terra Santa, who
have a convent at Damascus, had formerly a chapel at Sahnaya, where one
of their fraternity resided; but the Roman Catholic Christians of the
village having become followers of the Greek church, the former
abandoned their establishment. To the N.E. of Djedeide, and half an hour
from it, is the village Maddharnie.
Katana is one of the chief villages in the neighbourhood of Damascus; it
contains about one hundred and eighty Turkish families, and four or five
of Christians. The Sheikh, to whom the village belongs, is of a very
rich Damascus family, a descendant of a Santon, whose tomb is shewn in
the mosque of the village. Adjoining to the tomb is a hole in the rocky
ground, over which an apartment has been built for the reception of
maniacs; they are put down into the hole, and a stone is placed over its
mouth; here they remain for three or four days, after which, as the
Turks pretend, they regain their senses. The Christians say that the
Santon was a Patriarch of Damascus, who left his flock, and turned
hermit, and that he gained great reputation amongst the Turks, because
whenever he prostrated himself before the Deity, his sheep imitated his
example. Katana has a bath, and near it the Sheikh has a good house. The
villagers cultivate mulberry trees to feed their silk worms, and some
cotton, besides corn. The day after my arrival I engaged two men to shew
me the way to the ruins. We began to cross the lower branches of the
Djebel Essheikh, at the foot of which Katana is situated, and after an
hour and a quarter came to Bir Karme, likewise called El Redhouan, a
spring in a narrow valley. We rode over mountainous ground in the road
to Rasheya, passed another well of
CASTLE OF BOURKUSH.
[p.49]spring water, and at the end of four hours reached Rahle, a
miserable Druse village, half an hour to the right of the road from
Katana to Rasheia. The ruins are to the north of the village, in the
narrow valley of Rahle, and consist principally of a ruined temple,
built of large square stones, of the same calcareous rock used in the
buildings of Baalbec:
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