trouble at night to fire his gun and they would come over from Halba at
once.

I love this good man Ishoc. His pure life, his patience and gentleness
have preached to these wild people in Akkar, more than all the sermons
of the missionaries.

Would you like to see Im Hanna make bread for our supper? That hole in
the ground, lined with plaster, is the oven, and the flames are pouring
out. They heat it with thorns and thistles. She sits by the oven with a
flat stone at her side, patting the lumps of dough into thin cakes like
wafers as large as the brim of your straw hat. Now the fire is burning
out and the coals are left at the bottom of the oven, as if they were in
the bottom of a barrel. She takes one thin wafer on her hand and sticks
it on the smooth side of the oven, and as it bakes it curls up, but
before it drops off into the coals, she pulls it out quickly and puts
another in its place. How sweet and fresh the bread is! It is made of
Indian corn. She calls it "khubs dura." Abu Hanna says that we must eat
supper with them to-night. They are plain fellaheen, and have neither
tables, chairs, knives nor forks. They have a few wooden spoons, and a
few plates. But hungry travellers and warm-hearted friendship will make
the plainest food sweet and pleasant.

Supper is ready now, and we will go around to Abu Hanna's house for he
has come to tell us that "all things are ready." The house is one low
room, about sixteen by twenty feet. The ceiling you see is of logs
smoked black and shining as if they had been varnished. Above the logs
are flat stones and thorns, on which earth is piled a foot deep. In the
winter this earth is rolled down with a heavy stone roller to keep out
the rain. In many of the houses the family, cattle, sheep, calves and
horses sleep in the same room. The family sleep in the elevated part of
the room along the edge of which is a trough into which they put the
barley for the animals. This is the "medhwad" or manger, such as the
infant Jesus was laid in. We will now accept Im Hanna's kind invitation
to supper. The plates are all on a small tray on a mat in the middle of
the floor, and there are four piles of bread around the edge. There is
one cup of water for us all to drink from, and each one has a wooden
spoon. But Abu Hanna, you will see, prefers to eat without a spoon.
After the blessing is asked in Arabic, Abu Hanna says, "tefudduloo,"
which means help yourselves. Here is kibby, and camel stew