CHAPTER XI.

SIDON AND TYRE.

Sidon and Tyre- The landing-place of Sidon - Ideas respecting English travellers-The French ConsulWalk through Sidon.

WITH Sidon commences the beauty of scenery and the richness of cultivation, which goes on increasing as you approach the northernmost ports and towns of the fertile region of Syria; but in Sidon we are yet in Palestine, though the desolation and ruins of that holy land are no longer visible. We have left behind sterile and stony soil, in which vegetation seldom attains any perfection, and which, in many parts, refuses even to nurture the tender blade of grass that springs

up with every successive summer shower, and is as regularly withered by the following day's scorching heat.

Sidon is a perfect orchard. The dark foliage of orange and lemon trees is softened into livelier and lighter tinges of green, till boldly standing forward amongst the rest, are clearly discernible the gracefully bending leaves of the banana—a fruit unknown in other parts of Syria and Palestine, yet which, from some great suitableness of soil or climate, or both, arrives at its highest perfection in Sidon. Behind the town are the thickly-wooded hills; in the immediate vicinity fir trees and wild oaks and olives blend their variegated hues, and far to the rear, in crevices and clefts, towering aloft, rises the noble range of Lebanon, with snow-topped peaks, defining boldly the outline of the picture on the clear, bright azure of the sky. Then the town itself is prettily built. The fine old ruined tower, projecting far into the sea, with the bridge of many arches, that was built to reach it; the gay-looking white-washed houses, peeping over the tops of fine fruit gardens, and rising gradually till they reach the castle-topped summit of the hill; the busy throng of pigmv.

looking people, in bright coloured dresses, running about the beach, all combine to make the landscape inviting and strange to the eye of the wayfarer, rocked about in a wretched boat full a mile from the shore. Yet there is no remedy but patience. Wait you must till the Reis, who has gone on shore in a kind of sieve that no humane person would trust a cat's life in, returns, and then the boat obtains pratique, and you may land as you best can.

There is a great rise and fall of tide at Sidon, owing, I imagine, to the many under-currents and different inlets that exist amongst the sunken rocks, and those that are above the level of the sea, two miles away from land, where the current sets in a southern direction with immense rapidity. A mile further off, it sets equally strong to the northward. Vessels bound to Beyrout, coming from Malta, and steering direct for the latter port by observation and compass, are surprised to find that they invariably make the high land of Sidon, because this is in direct contradiction to the observations contained in their sailing directions, which are compiled from the surveys of eminent nautical men. This error, I think, may be traced

to the possibility of the surveys having been made from the anchorage-ground, in which case the computations regarding currents would be strictly correct, otherwise an extraordinary change must have taken place since the date of these surveys, for it is a notorious fact that the current sweeps rapidly round Sidon, and even Ras Beriout in a northern direction, and continues this course within a mile and a half or so of the land, till it reaches the extreme northern bay in the Gulf of Ickanderoon, whereas vessels further out at sea (but always in sight of land) are experiencing a southerly set.

Owing to this rise and fall, landing at Sidon is sometimes no easy matter, and so it chanced unluckily at the hour that we got pratique. I had, therefore, no alternative, but to be broiled in the sun till nigh upon mid-day, when there would be a sufficiency of water to permit of our passing the bar, and getting into the Fisherman's Harbour, or to risk my life in the afore-mentioned sieve, in which the Captain had successfully brought off permission to land. I preferred the latter evil, being pretty confident in my skill as a swimmer; and paddled by a little boy, and care

fully balancing myself, I at length had the extreme gratification of finding myself safe, and even dry, on shore, though without my servant, whom I left to follow with my boxes at noon tide.

There is a good deal of scrambling and hopping, and rather break-neck work, to get through, even after one is once landed; and this is occasioned by slippery sea-weed, and smooth rocks, which show themselves when the tide is low. But having once got safe to the Turkish coffeehouse on the other side, all trouble is over. This is approached through crowds of indigent watermen and ragged boys, assembled to criticise your appearance, and conjecture what on earth can have made a man, who must be worth boxes of money, leave his harem, to risk life and health, and suffer every discomfort, in a miserable Arab felucca. Their general opinion of an English traveller is, that he is either a lunatic or a magician: a lunatic, if on closely watching his movements, they discover that he pays little attention to anything around him; a confirmed lunatic, if he goes out sketching, and spends his time in spoiling good paper with scratches and hieroglyphics; and a magician when inquisitive about ruins, and