have been bought with money fraudulently obtained; and consequently will not partake of the hospitality of any who are given to robbing; neither will they eat the food of Christians, though they eat that of the Mussulmans. Sheikh Hhabeeb once, when he partook of coffee at my house, paid my servant first for it, though he was reported at the time to have said that he only did this that people might not talk, for that he himself considered my property Halâl, or lawful. The Bagdad sheikh ate without any scruple, and laughed at other sheikhs for theirs. Sheikh Hassan il Kinanee also ate frequently at my house, though privately.

They pretend to a knowledge of future events, by means of astrology, divination, and ruml, and also to the power of exorcism, writing amulets, &c. They have some acquaintance with the names of the stars, and tell a man, "Your sign of the zodiac is such and such, and therefore such and such a line of life would suit you." My lad's name was such and such, but as he was always ill it was by the advice of a sheikh changed to another.

They pretend to reckon or divine by means of a string of beads and looking into a book.

Ruml consists in making a number of fine dots, like sand, on a piece of a paper, from which the sheikh divines what will happen to any one. When at Hamah, on one occasion, an Ansairee sheikh "reckoned" for me in this way, and presented me with the paper of which he had made use.

to

A family of sheikhs in our neighbourhood profess have the power of exorcising evil spirits. A poor man in a village immediately below my own became mad, and yet was still allowed to go at large. After a little time he severely wounded his wife, who was brought to us on a Sunday morning covered with blood. Soon afterwards he set fire to his house and took refuge in a cave near, whence he took to flight, and has

was brought to cure him. He addressed the evil spirit, and was supposed to receive answers through the man himself. The sheikh ordered the spirit to enter into me, but he refused, as he considered me too good, and was then told to go to Hamah. The spirit asked whence he was to come out, from the man's toe or mouth, and received directions; but the issue of all was that the man remained uncured.

It is a very common thing for the sheikhs to write amulets; and I have a book in which are described a variety of most potent charms, which if written and worn will be all-powerful against every variety of disease and calamity. Some of them are mere repetitions of particular letters. Most of the children have some in their headdress, or suspended round their necks by a string, in little cases of leather. Sheikh Hassan il Kinanee is also accused of writing love charms, and of other improper practices.

When a man is ill a sheikh comes and reads over him in a loud voice what is called Azai-im, for which he receives five piastres or so. Sometimes he brings a lad with him, whom he puts under what is called the Sir-ah, and then gets him to say what is the cause of the man's disease. If it be suspected to be a devil, he is exorcised; and sometimes the sheikh tells the man that his illness is in consequence of breaking a vow, or some other sin of omission or commission. I have been told that the eyes of one who has often been put under the Sir-ah become red.

A

There are numerous pretenders to second-sight. certain sheikh, called Ali Zahir, living near Ahmed Kirfâs, tells a man all that he may have done on the road, and acquaints people with the locality of stolen property. This and similar stories are told in the most circumstantial

manner.

The people fear the evil eye, which they call Nudrah, and believe in enchantment. Soon after I had established myself in the mountains there was a fight bctween the inhabitants of my own district and those of the

neighbouring one.

These last were worsted, and ascribed their defeat to a whistle with which I had been accustomed to summon my servants. They said that I had been seen riding on my white mare at the time of the fight, and that I had blown my whistle, which brought small birds upon them, and in some way or other their balls were made to fall short, while their adversaries' balls reached them. They consequently threatened the destruction of my life and property, while the story was made a subject of merriment with my own people, who, however, warned me of danger.

In some of these things When a man has killed a Christian, but spends the "I

The Ansaireeh will not eat of some things which even the Mussulmans consider clean, as the hare and eels, which they wrongly call salloor. Neither will they eat any kind of fish without scales. they follow the law of Moses. wild boar, he will sell it to a money obtained only in buying powder and shot. have found," says Niebuhr, "in my Nusairee book, that Maana had forbidden them to eat of the camel, hare, and eel; that Ism had not permitted them to partake of pork, blood, and, in general, the flesh of beasts not properly killed; and that Bab had forbidden them the zellor (a certain black fish of the Orontes), and everything burnt.”*

The Ansaireeh have a great regard for myrtle. Like the Mussulmans, they place it about the tombs. Mention is made in my Ansairee MS. of "what is lawful, and the reverse, above the myrtle;"† and it is said that he who in a religious assembly "chatters above the myrtle" will become dumb; and once, in a district near Mount Cassius, one of my Christian servants fell in with a man who was on his back, throwing up his legs, and performing most extraordinary antics round a myrtle bush. The myrtle is also mentioned in the second class given by M. Catafago.

The Ansaireeh shave the hair of the armpits, and the Kumreeh sect that under the chin likewise. The Shemseeh do not; so when, during one of the fights, an old man of this sect fell into the hands of the people of our district, they shaved him. The people of a bordering. village having become Kumreeh have shaved the same part.

In my Ansairee MS. * tobacco is spoken of as "forbidden above the myrtle"; but it is a Shemseen book, and by that sect tobacco is considered unlawful, so that their sheikhs do not smoke.

* Page 186.

193

CHAP. VIII.

PRESENT STATE OF THE ANSAIREEH.

I CANNOT better preface what I have to say on the present state of the Ansaireeh than by relating the events of the last few years in their neighbourhood. The reader will then be able, even before I descend into particulars, to guess pretty accurately what must be the social state of a people so circumstanced. I shall confine my remarks principally to my own district, and thus, by entering into a rather detailed account of particular occurrences, give a clearer picture of the general state of things.

When on my way out from England, in 1853, to commence the mission which I had determined on after my first visit to the Ansaireeh, I passed the English and French fleets on their passage up the Dardanelles to commence the Russian war. I consequently found a very different state of things in Syria, and in the Ansaireeh country, from that which I had seen the previous year. The town of Ladikeeh was in confusion from the irregular levies of the neighbourhood, who to the number of three or four hundred were assembling to start for Erzeroom, Kars, and Lake Van, to defend that portion of the Sultan's dominions. Miserably armed and clothed, they were possessed with greater enthusiasm than I should have expected from Mohammedan shopkeepers and the refuse of town populations. They marched about the streets crying out: "The gate of Paradise is open!" "God give victory to the Sultan! May Allah burn the infidels!" They were at least as dangerous to their