every precept of Moslem faith and practice; subjects of the Ottoman Sultan, and yet living in perpetual rebellion or coaxed by heavy bribes into nominal submission; suffering untold hardships from their life of constant exposure to winter storms and summer heats; without proper food, clothing or shelter, and utterly destitute of medical aid and relief, and yet despising the refinements of civilized life, and regarding with contempt the man who will sleep under a roof; they constitute a most ancient, attractive class of men, interesting to every lover of his race, and especially to the Missionary of the Cross.

European missionaries can do little among them.  To say nothing of the rough, nomadic, unsettled and perilous life they lead, any European would find himself so much an object of curiosity and suspicion among them, and the peculiar Bedawin pronunciation of the Arabic so different from the correct pronunciation, that he would be constantly embarrassed.  Native missionaries, on the other hand, can go among them freely, and if provided with a supply of vaccine virus and simple medicines, can have the most unrestrained access to them.  During the last ten years, several native colporteurs have been sent among the Bedawin, and lately the Native Missionary Society in Beirut has sent out one of its teachers as a missionary to the Arabs.  There is little use in taking books among them, as very few can make use of them.  Mr. Arthington of Leeds, England, has been making earnest efforts to induce the Bedawin to send their children to schools in the towns, or allow schools to be opened among their own camps.  We have tried every means to induce their leading Sheikhs to send their sons and daughters to Beirut for instruction, but the Arabs all dread sending their children to any point within the jurisdiction of the Turks, lest they be suddenly seized by the Turks as hostages for the good behavior of their parents.  The latter course, i.e., sending teachers to live among them, to migrate with them and teach their children as it were “on the wing,” seems to be the one most practicable, as soon as teachers can be trained.  Until the Turkish government shall compel the Bedawin to settle down in villages and till the soil, there can be little done in the way of instructing them.  And when that step is taken, it is quite doubtful whether the Moslem government will not send its Khoteebs or religious teachers, and compel them all to embrace the religion of Islam.  If that should be done, Christian teachers will have but little opportunity of opening schools among them.

One of the leading tribes of the Bedawin is the Anazy, who are more numerous, powerful and wealthy than any other Kobileh of the Arabs.  Their principal Sheikh on the Damascus border is Mohammed ed Dukhy, the warlike and successful leader of ten thousand Arab horsemen, of the Weled Ali.  He is now an officer of the Turkish government, with a salary of ten thousand dollars a year, employed to protect the great Haj or Pilgrim Caravan, which goes annually from Damascus to Mecca.  He furnishes camels for the Haj, and a powerful escort of horsemen, and is under bonds to keep the Arabs quiet.