Page:Path of Vision; pocket essays of East and West.djvu/107

 a visit, my beloved Syria. But who are these strangers? I am asked. Why do they come so late? What is their mission to Syria, that is to say, their design upon her? Ah, dear Mother, my companions are neither missionaries, nor tourists, nor philanthropists. They come not to shed tears with you—like the paid mourners of antiquity; they come not to gaze at your ruins and rob you of the remnants of your temples and your gods; they come not to pity your poverty and trim the sacred ragged edges of the garment of your glory. My companions knew and loved you before you became the helpless victim of cormorant hierarchs and decorated obscurants and rogues. Not that they ever visited you in the flesh; but clothed in the supernal and eternal mystery of genius, they continue to live and journey in the world of the human spirit, even like your ancient cedars, even like your sacred legends.

With a little digression I shall endeavor to make my companions better known to