nd ate our breakfast, consisting
of some hard-boiled eggs, a piece of bread, and a draught of
lukewarm water from the cistern. Our poor beasts fared even worse
than ourselves--they received nothing but water.

On leaving this place to resume our journey across the plain, we not
only suffered dreadfully from the heat, which had reached 30 degrees
Reaumur, but were further persecuted by a species of minute gnats,
which hovered round us in large swarms, crept into our noses and
ears, and annoyed us in such a manner that it required the utmost of
our patience and determination to prevent us from turning back at
once. Fortunately we only met with these tormentors in those parts
where the corn had been cut and was still in the fields. They are
not much larger than a pin's head, and look more like flies than
gnats. They are always met with in great swarms, and sting so
sharply that they frequently raise large boils.

The vegetation was at this season already in so forward a state that
we frequently passed stubble-fields, and found that the wheat had in
several cases been already garnered up. Throughout the whole of
Syria, and in that part of Egypt whither my journey afterwards led
me, I never once saw corn or vegetables, wood or stores, carried in
wagons; they were invariably borne by horses or asses. In Syria I
could understand the reason of this proceeding. With the exception,
perhaps, of the eight or ten miles across the valley of Sharon, the
road is too stony and uneven to admit the passage of the lightest
and smallest carts. In Egypt, however, this is not the case, and
yet wagons have not been introduced.

A most comical effect was produced when we met long processions of
small donkeys, so completely laden with corn, that neither their
heads nor their feet remained visible. The sheaves seemed to be
moving spontaneously, or to be propelled by the power of steam.
Frequently after a train of this kind has passed, lofty grey heads
appear, surrounded by a load piled up to so great a height, that one
would suppose large corn-wagons were approaching rather than the
"ship of the desert," the camel. The traveller's attention is
continually attracted to some novel and curious object totally
dissimilar to any thing he has seen at home.

Towards ten o'clock we arrived at Ramla, a place situate on a little
hill, and discernible from a great distance. Before reaching the
town, we had to pass through an olive-wood. Leav