BEREIT. 
221 
han, close to which runs the Ledja ; and the Wady Lowa descends 
the mountain on the west side of it. We proceeded in the direc 
tion of Soueida, and in an hour and a quarter from the village 
stopped, after sunset, at an encampment of the Djebel Haouran 
Arabs. My companion, and a guide whom I had engaged at 
Om Ezzeitoun, persuaded me to appear before the Arabs as a 
soldier belonging to the government, in order to get a good sup 
per, of which we were in great want, that of the preceding night, 
at the saltpetre works, having consisted of only a handful of dry 
biscuit. We were served with a dish of rice boiled in sour milk, 
and were much amused by the sports and songs of the young 
girls of the tribe, which they continued in the moonlight till near 
midnight. One of the young men had just returned to the en 
campment, who had been taken prisoner by the Aeneze during a 
nightly predatory expedition. He showed us the marks of his fet 
ters, and enlarged upon the mode of treating the Rabiat, or pri 
soner, among the Aeneze. A friend had paid thirty camels for 
his liberation. In spring the Arabs of the Djebel Haouran and the 
Ledja take advantage of the approach of the Aeneze, to plunder 
daily among their enemies ; they are better acquainted with the 
ground than the latter, a part of whose horses and cattle are every 
spring carried off by these daring mountaineers. 
April 25th.—At half an hour from the encampment is the 
hill called Tel Dobbe ( ), consisting of a heap of ruins, with 
a spring. To the N. E. of it, a quarter of an hour, is the ruined 
village of Bereit, which was inhabited in 1810, but is now aban 
doned. The Haouran peasants wander from one village to ano 
ther ; in all of them they find commodious habitations in the 
ancient houses ; a camel transports their family and baggage; 
and as they are not tied to any particular spot by private landed 
property, or plantations, and find every where large tracts to cul¬