Page:The Nestorians and their rituals, volume 1.djvu/397

Rh The conduct of Shlash's brother, my guide, and of two other Arabs who had joined him while I was examining the ruins, prevented me from extending ray researches into the interior of the castle, where I understood there are several ancient vaults, one containing two small and beautiful pillars each crowned with a lotus blossom. The savage-looking fellows, who were armed with clubs hid beneath their cloaks, first tried to decoy me into one of the subterraneous passages, promising to show me something very wonderful; but finding me on my guard they charged me in the most insolent manner with a desire to excavate for treasure. Being alone, and unprovided with any weapon of defence, I strolled about hither and thither hoping to meet some of our party. On reaching the summit of a mound from whence I could be seen by them, the two Arabs took their departure, and my guide accompanied me to the tent where I found Shlash himself, the sheikh of the Jès tribe, who had come to pay us a visit. He is a fine young man with a frank and open countenance, which contrasted strikingly with the villanous look of his brother,—a notoriously bad character, who was imprisoned at Urfah for nine months for having been an accomplice in the murder of two Turks, and would have been hung had not his brother ransomed him by the payment of a large sum of money. Shlash informed me that the Jès were all Igrâwy, that is village-dwelling Arabs, who cultivate the soil, but in seasons of scarcity roam about in the desert like the Bedooeen, and sometimes cross the Euphrates. They are not numerous now, having suffered much from the Aniza and Shammar, and from the exactions and tyranny of the Turkish government. They are considered a most treacherous set by the people of Urfah, and if all that is told of their secret murders may be relied on, they are not much behind the Thugs of India in dexterous atrocities. The only Englishman whom Shlash remembered to have seen at Harran previous to our visit was Captain Lynch of the Indian navy, whose name he was quite familiar with.

May 25th.—Long before day-break three or four runaway Arabs came to Harrân bringing the intelligence that the Sayeh had attacked the Shammar during the night, and that a fierce conflict had ensued in which many lives were lost on both sides. The Sheikh, whose wound we had dressed, had also died, and