e wall grows a large
acacia-tree, the light-green colour and drooping foliage of which gave
somewhat of an Indian appearance to the scene.

Lamps were then lit beneath an arcade, and near the water a huge cresset
was filled with resinous pine splinters, and the light of its burning
flickered fantastically over the pool, the house, and the trees.

Next came the dinner, late for the appetites of us travellers, and
tedious in its duration--with music outside the open windows.

After the meal the Bek withdrew to the corner of his divan for
transaction of business with his people, as the Moslems do at that
season. His part of the affairs consisted in endorsing a word or two
upon the petitions or addresses that were produced by the
secretaries--these were written on small rolls of paper like tiny
cigarettes, pinched at one end. How very un-European to carry on
business in so few words, either written or spoken!

Said Bek was a man of few words in such transactions, but what he did say
seemed always to hit exactly the point intended; and the wave of his
finger was sufficient to summon a number of men to receive his commands.
He was evidently a person of a different stamp from the coarse leaders of
Lebanon factions, the Abu Neked, the Shibli el 'Arian, and such like; he
is proud of his family antiquity, refined in dress and manners, and has
always, like the rest of the Druses, courted the favour of the English
nation.

On the entrance of his son, named Nejib, probably four or five years old,
all the Akal councillors and military officers rose to receive him.

In the morning we took our departure, when Said Bek accompanied us as far
as the Meidan, and a profusion of Druse compliments filled up the
leave-taking.

We now passed for some hours along the river side, through the utmost
loveliness of Lebanon scenery. Among other trees that lined its banks,
or adorned the precipitous cliffs, or followed the rising and falling
road, were noble specimens of platanus (plane) and lofty zanzalacht, (the
peepul of India;) crystal rills tumbled down the rocks, as if sparkling
alive with enjoyment; then the usual poplar, walnut, evergreen oak, and a
large plantation of olive: the river sometimes smiled with the fringe of
oleander. We halted for a time under a wide-branching platanus at the
end of a bridge, between the masonry of which grew bunches of the caper
plant, then in blossom of white and lilac, and at the piers of which grew