The interior of the tower seemed spacious enough.  A wooden staircase led us farther upwards to two tiny rooms, situated about the centre of the tower.  One of these apartments, dimly lighted by the rays of a lamp, contained a small altar, and served as a chapel, while the second was used as a sleeping-room for female pilgrims.  A wooden divan was the only piece of furniture this room contained.  My conductor now took his leave, promising to return in a short time with some provisions, a bolster, and a coverlet for me.

So now I was at least sheltered for the night, and guarded like a captive princess by bolt and bar.  I could not even have fled had I wished to do so, for my leader had locked the creaking door behind him, and taken away the ladder.  After carefully examining the chapel and my neatly-furnished apartment in this dreary prison-house, I mounted the staircase, and gained the summit of the tower.  Here I had a splendid view of the country round about, my elevated position enabling me distinctly to trace the greater part of the desert, with its several rows of hills and mountains skirting the horizon.  All these hills were alike barren and naked; not a tree nor a shrub, not a human habitation, could I discover.  Silence lay heavily on every thing around, and it seemed to me almost as though no earth might here nourish a green tree, but that the place was ordained to remain a desert, as a lasting memorial of our Saviour’s fasting.  Unheeded by human eye, the sun sank beneath the mountains; I was, perhaps, the only mortal here who was watching its beautiful declining tints.  Deeply moved by the scene around me, I fell on my knees, to offer up my prayers and praise to the Almighty, here in the rugged grandeur of the desert.

But I had only to turn away from the death-like silence, and to cast my eye towards the convent as it lay spread out before me, to view once more the bustle and turmoil of life.  In the courtyard the Bedouins and Arabs were employed in ministering to the wants of their horses, bringing them water and food; beyond these a group of men was seen spreading mats on the ground, while others, with their faces bowed to the earth, were adoring, with other forms of prayer, the Omnipotent Spirit whose protection I had so lately invoked; others, again, were washing their hands and feet as a preparation for offering up their worship; priests and lay brethren passed hastily across the courtyard, busied in preparations for entertaining and lodging the numerous guests; while some of my fellow-travellers stood apart, in earnest conversation, and Mr. B. and Count Salm Reifferscheit reclined in a quiet spot and made sketches of the convent.  Had a painter been standing on my tower, what a picture of the building might he not have drawn as the wild Arab and the thievish Bedouin leant quietly beside the peaceful priest and the curious European!  Many a pleasant recollection of this evening have I borne away with me.