fellah came into Beirut driving a herd of swine to the market.  Now of all sights in the world, the sight of swine is to an orthodox Moslem the most intolerable, and especially in the holy month of Ramadan.  Even in ordinary times, when swine enter the city, the Moslems gather up their robes, turn their backs and shout, “hub hub,” “hub hub,” and if the hogs do not hasten along, the “hub hub,” is very apt to become a hubbub.  On the 28th of that holy month, a large herd entered Beirut on the Damascus road.  The Moslems saw them, and forthwith a crowd of Moslem young men and boys hastened to the fray.  A few days before, the Maronite Yusef Keram had entered the city amid the rejoicings of the Maronites.  These swine, whom the Moslems called “Christian Khanzir,” should meet a different reception.  Their wrath overcame their prejudice.  The Maronite swine-drivers were dispersed and the whole herd were driven on the run up the Assur with shouts of derision, and pelted with stones and clubs.  “You khanzir, you Maronite, you Keram, out with you!” and the air rang with shouts mingled with squeals and grunts.  I saw the crowd coming.  It gathered strength as it approached Bab Yakoob, where the white turbaned faithful rose from their shops and stables to join in the persecution of the stampeding porkers.  “May Allah cut off their days!  Curses on their grandfather’s beard!  Curses on the father of their owner!  Hub hub!  Allah deliver us from their contamination!” were the cries of the crowd as they rushed along.  The little boys were laughing and having a good time, and the men were breathing out wrath and tobacco smoke.  Alas, for the poor swine!  What became of them I could not tell, but the last I saw, was the infuriated crowd driving them into the Khan of Muhayeddin near by, where one knows not what may have happened to them.  I hope they did not steal the pork and eat it “on the sly,” as the Bedawin did at Mt.  Sinai, who threw away the hams the travellers were carrying for provisions, and declared that their camels should not be defiled with the unclean beast!  The travellers were very indignant at such a loss, but thought it was too bad to injure the feelings of the devout Moslems, and said no more.  What was their horror and wrath to hear the next night that the Bedawin were seen cooking and eating their hams at midnight, when they thought no one would see them!

Do the Syrian people all smoke?  Almost all of them.  They speak of it as “drinking a pipe, drinking a cigar,” and you would think that they look upon tobacco as being as necessary to them as water.  Old and young men, women and even children smoke, smoke while they work or rest, while at home or journeying, and measure distances by their pipes.  I was travelling, and asked a man how far it was to the next village.  He said about two pipes of tobacco distant!  I found it to be nearly an hour, or three miles.  The Orientals spend so much time in smoking, that some one has said “the Moslems came into power with the Koran in one hand, and the sword in the other, but will go out with the Koran in one hand and the pipe in the other!”