volume 2 - Robert Bedrosian's Armenian History Workshop

178 'Utnt
travel the whole of the following night. The cold was
so intense and searching that I felt anything was preferable
to trying to sleep in a tent.
We left Kutayyifah at 6.50 a.m., November 2nd, passed
Mu'addamiyah at 8.30, and Muhammad sending the
beasts on took me off to the right to show me a part
of the old conduit which ran underground to Palmyra.
It was lined throughout with slabs of a yellowishcoloured
stone, and was nearly six feet deep and four
feet wide. We soon overtook our little caravan and
came to the village of Jarud about 10.30. The villagers
knew Muhammad and pressed us to stay there for the
day, but we moved on and arrived at 'Utni about one
o'clock. A little before we reached the village we saw
on the left some ruins which were called Kal'at Barbar,
but they looked uninteresting, and as the heat was great
we did not stop. Though but a small place 'Utni was
of importance, for it Was a junction where the roads
frorn Horns and Tudmur joined to run on to Damascus.
The people were friendly and sold us two chickens, but
though they lived in huts made of stone and mud they
were to all intents and purposes as the Arabs of the
desert. They had nothing in their huts and very little
clothing of any kind, indeed, they were less well clothed
than the gazelle which we saw running in small herds
from time to time. I paid for the service they rendered
to us with coloured handkerchiefs, and they were very
pleased to have them ; in the bright sunshine the crude
colours lost their startling appearance. The afternoon
hours were very trying on account of the heat, for the
huts were like ovens, and the only thing to be done was
to lie down by one of the camels on the shady side.
At length Muhammad told me that certain stars would
rise about five o'clock at night, and that there would
be a little moonlight soon after, and that he wanted to
start then for Karyaten. In the early evening a party
of three Turkish of&cers arrived, one had his wife with
him, and as their camel-men knew Muhammad they
fell on his neck and kissed him, one after the other, and
then we all agreed to travel together. They came from