Travels in Turkey, Asia Minor, Syria, and across the desert into Egypt ...

1 I 8 TRAVELS IN ASIATIC TURKEY,
influenced in the position of their towns. That of Bamla is situ-
ated on a rising ground, commanding a
very extensive view of the
level, open country, by which it is surrounded on all all sides.
As we had brought with us our own bedding, and other conve-
niencies, we were soon settled in the convent, which afforded us
nothing but the bare walls ; and having procured provisions, the cook
whom we had taken the precaution to bring with us, began his operations,
and soon supplied us with a good dinner. After having taken
this refreshment, we went into the town, and saw the female inha-
bitants busied in making a kind of cotton cloth for their garments.
We next proceeded to the bazar, or market, which was but indif-
ferently supplied with a few fruits and vegetables, such as dates,
figs, lemons, cucumbers, &c. We observed several date-trees,
with fruit on them, distributed among the buildings ; and their appearance,
thus blended as they were with the houses, was extreme-
ly picturesque. Without the town we noticed a small pottery for
the fabrication of vases to hold water. Bamla was anciently a city,
but is now an open town onlv, under the government of the Pacha
of Jerusalem and Gaza, Mahomed Pacha.
In this place the minarets of the mosques differ very essentially
from all those we had before noticed. It contains three convents
for the reception of the pilgrims on their way to the holy city.
It was painful to me to observe that the disease of the eyes, so
common in these countries, prevailed verv generally, and that with
great violence, among the poorer classes at Bamla. Both young
and old were alike afflicted by blindness. This was not surprising
since it was easy to trace in their squalid and meagre countenances
the manifest causes of disease, namely, the want of a good,
nourishing diet, and the necessary clothing
to encourage and keep
the excretions of the skin. The dress of the females- consisted
up
of a blue cotton chemise only, resemblino- the frock of an English
peasant, and reaching nearly to the ancles, with a broad belt, or
girdle,
fastened about the waist. The men were dressed in a simi-
lar manner, but with a white instead of a blue chemise, and were
for the greater part without shoes.
In the evening we paid a visit to Mahomed Pacha, a great fa-
vourite of the Vizier, and very useful to him in the country, as a
collector of the tributes* His reception was of the most friendly
kind; and he offered us every assistance on our route, promising to
,;end forward a messenger to give notice, at the places through
which we were to pass, of our approach, together with such or