KEREK.
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live like Bedouins, whom they exactly resemble, in dress, food,
and language. The produce of their fields is purchased by the Bedouins, ¬
or exchanged for cattle. The only other commercial intercourse ¬
carried on by them is with Jerusalem, for which place a caravan ¬
departs every two months, travelling either by the route
round the southern extremity of the Dead sea, which takes three
days and a half, or by crossing the Jordan, a journey of three
days. At Jerusalem they sell their sheep and goats, a few mules,
of which they have an excellent breed, hides, wool, and a little
Fowa or madder (Rubia tinctorum), which they cultivate in small
quantities ; in return they take coffee, rice, tobacco, and all kinds of
articles of dress, and of household furniture. This journey, however, ¬
is undertaken by few of the natives of Kerek, the trade being
almost wholly in the hands of a few merchants of Hebron, who
keep shops at Kerek, and thus derive large profits from the indolence ¬
or ignorance of the Kerekein. I have seen the most common -
articles sold at two hundred per cent. profit. The trade is
carried on chiefly by barter : and every thing is valued in measures -
of corn, this being the readiest representative of exchange
in the possession of the town’s-people; hence the merchants,
make their returns chiefly in corn and partly in wool. The only
artizans in Kerek who keep shops are a blacksmith, a shoemaker,
and a silversmith. When the Mekka caravan passes, the Kerekein -
sell provisions of all kinds to the Hadj, which they meet at the
castle of Katrana. Many Turks, as well as Christians, in the town,
have negro slaves, whom they buy from the Bedouins, who bring
them from Djidda and Mekka: there are also several families of
blacks in Kerek, who have obtained their liberty, and have married
free black women.
The houses of Kerek have only one floor, and three or four are
generally built in the same court-yard. The roof of the apartment
