Page:Domestic Life in Palestine.pdf/46

Rh cumbers, and vegetable marrows, were flourishing. Young castor-oil trees, palms, and oleanders, were springing up between large masses of rock. In their shelter the sweet basil, pinks, roses, as well as many English seedlings, were being coaxed into existence, making a cheerful though wild-looking garden round the pretty Egyptian tent prepared for me, the ropes of which were attached to some vigorous olive-trees, of two or three years' growth. I found my luggage already there, for the muleteers had arrived an hour or two before us. The blue tent lining appliquéd with black and scarlet borders, in patterns of good design, on the white canvas, the crimson cloth carpet, and simple tent furniture, looked bright and cheerful; while the views of the Bethlehem plain, Mount Zion, and Jerusalem, from the tent door, delighted me.

We passed the evening pleasantly with Mr. and Mrs. Finn, talking over our journey, and planning future ones. Their children were eager to show me their treasures, and to take me to all the memorable spots in the neighborhood they knew so well, for they were born in, and had scarcely ever been out of sight of Jerusalem. "I will take you to Olivet, and to the top of Mount Scopus, and then you can see the River Jordan and the Dead Sea," said Skander, the eldest boy; and little Constance added, "Mamma, may I take Miss Rogers to see Judas's tree, and the Garden of Gethsemane, and may we go to Bethlehem and to Solomon's Pools?"

These children, who had grown up amid such scenes, and who had learned to speak Arabic simultaneously with English, interested me exceedingly, evincing in all they said and did the effect of the influences around them. I showed to Constance an engraving of an English sea side view, and she immediately said, pointing to a castle, "There's the tower of David;" and again, pointing to the bathing machines, exclaimed, "These are the tombs of the kings, and there is the Dead Sea," the only sea which she had ever seen. After tea, the little ones were led by their