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

l66 TRAVELS IN ASIATIC TURKEY,
endeavours to estimate his means. If there is no plausible colour
or pretext for the entire confiscation of the property of an indivi-
dual on whom the suspicion of riches has fallen, he is callGil on to
contribute a sum, perhaps very disproportionate to his means, on
the default of producing which, not only his property, but his own
life, and those of his relatives, arc brought into danger. Industry
is thus discouraged; and to the tyranny exercised over the wretched
cultivators may be attributed the neglected state of many large
tracts of land, which, under a better form of government, would
be abundantly productive.
The wooden plough employed here for agricultural purposes, is
drawn by a pair of small oxen. The barley and wheat are sown
in January, and reaped in May. In difFerent parts of Syria the
inhabitants pursue difFerent modes in the treatment of their vines,
which in some places they prune nearly
to the surface of the earth,
depending on the spring shoots for the autumnal produce; while in
others thev allow them to attain their full growth, supporting
their
branches with props. The grapes, when ripe, are in general held
in too great an esteem, as a part of the nourishment of the inha-
bitants, to be converted into wine; but this is not invariably the
case. At Jerusalem and Bethlehem we drank some excellent wine,
the produce of the neighbouring vineyards, which were cultivated
with much labour and industry.
I shall add a few words of general observation on the diseases of
and then
Syria, with which I shall close the present digression,
proceed to the more immediate objects of this narrative.
The Syrians are
subject
to few endemic diseases, of which the
psorophthalmy, an inveterate complaint of the eyes, is the pincipal
and most common. It prevails so generally, that in the town of
Jaffa nearly two thirds of the inhabitants had, from its effects,
lost the sight either of one, or of both the eyes; insomuch that
the numbers of blind people led about were truly astonishing.
It
appears to me that the remote causes of this obstinate disease, the
effects of which are so calamitous, may be traced to a bad diet;
an exposure to a hot air from the white and burning sands, the fine
particles of which float almost perpetually in the atmosphere; and,
lastly, the confined huts or dwellings
in which the inhabitants re-
side. In support of the probability of the second of these causes,
it has been remarked, that during the season when the figs and
grapes ripen, that is, in the months of May, June, and July,
when the most intense heat prevails, this disease is most common,