Page:Memoirs of the Lady Hester Stanhope.djvu/150

 the village about four in the afternoon, on ascending the side of the hill on which Lady Hester’s house stands, I met four persons mounted on mules, and conjectured them, by their boots, which were black, and reached up to the calf of the leg, not to be of the country; for in Syria either red or yellow boots are always worn. They had on Morea capotes, and their dress was that of the more northern provinces of Turkey. In passing them, I said, "Good evening!" in Arabic, but, on receiving no answer from the two nearest to me, I looked hard at them, and immediately saw they were Europeans.

On alighting at my own door, I asked the servant if he had seen anybody go by, and his reply was, that three or four Turkish soldiers had passed. I then inquired of one of Lady Hester’s muleteers, who was unloading some provisions he had brought from Sayda, if he knew who the four men were whom I had seen; and he answered that, at the foot of the hill, they had inquired of him the road to Jôon, and that they were Milordi travelling: Milordo being the term applied to every European who travels in the Levant with a man-servant, and has money to spend.

I went in to Lady Hester a few minutes afterwards, and told her that some travellers, as I thought, to get a nearer view of her house than could be had from the high road, had made a round, and had just ridden past