The Village Has No Water But
What It Derives From Its Cisterns, Which Were At This Time Nearly Dry.
It Consists Wholly Of Ancient Habitations, Built Of Stone, Of A Kind
Which I Shall Describe In Speaking Of Ezra.
November 10th.--We quitted Tebne early in the morning, and passing the
villages Medjidel [Arabic], Mehadjer [Arabic], Shekara [Arabic], and
Keratha [Arabic], all on the left of the route, arrived, at the end of
three hours and a quarter, at Ezra [Arabic].
Here commences the plain of
the Haouran, which is interrupted by numerous insulated hills, on the
declivities, or at the foot of which, most of the villages of the
Haouran are seated. From Tebne the soil begins to be better cultivated,
yet many parts of it are overgrown with weeds. On a hill opposite
Manhadje, on the west side of the road, stands a Turkish Meziar, called
Mekdad. In approaching Ezra we met a troop of about eighty of the
Pasha's cavalry; they had, the preceding night, surprised the above-
mentioned
[p.57]party of Arabs Serdie in the village of Walgha, and had killed
Aerar, their chief, and six others, whose heads they were carrying with
them in a sack. They had also taken thirty-one mares, of which the
greater number were of the best Arabian breeds. Afraid of being pursued
by the friends of the slain they were hastening back to Damascus, where,
as I afterwards heard, the Pasha presented them with the captured mares,
and distributed eight purses, or about £200.
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