Travels in the countries between Alexandria and Paraetonium : the Lybian desert, Siwa, Egypt, Palestine, and Syria, in 1821 / by John Martin Augustus Scholz.

  • Scholz, J. Martin Augustin (Johann Martin Augustin), 1794-1852.
Date:
1822
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Travels in the countries between Alexandria and Paraetonium : the Lybian desert, Siwa, Egypt, Palestine, and Syria, in 1821 / by John Martin Augustus Scholz. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    the Holy Land are accused, but wrongfully, of favouring these extortions: but the servants in the convents are uncommonly insolfent. Thus I have seen them wait whole days at the door of a traveller, for a large douceur, (Bakschisch,) because they have put him in mind of a festival in the church. This selfish charac- ter, this intolerable importunity, is become contagious. The Armenian and Greek monks have a genteel mode of indemnify- ing themselves for services performed. They do not fail to give the stranger somebody as a guide, who soon gains his confidence, and knows the tax to be paid, for benefits received, to the church ; for, according to the customary polite way of speaking, the church, and not the clergy receives it. If he is rich, this tax often amounts with the Armenians to one thousand piastres for a few dinners and nights’ lodging. The Greeks ask less, but the oftener. The poor pilgrims on the other hand receive kind treat- ment from them. They give them little, but that little as long as they need it. The Latins maintain them very well for a month; but when that is expired they must go away. In the observance of this, otherwise good rule, they have often laid aside all Christian charity, and committed cruelties which will be an eternal disgrace to the intercessors of the Catholics at the tomb of Christ, and may serve as an illustration of the history of the degenerate monastic spirit, for this was not the intention of St. Francis. They have cast poor half naked pilgrims into the street, given them nothing on which to lay their heads, and haughtily rejected their entreaties for a bit of bread. On such acts the blessing of God will never come.—In places where there is no monastery or hospital, strangers lodge in the house of a consul, or in a khan. These are inconvenient and dirty, and men and animals are often lodged together in one stable. Those who travel with Greeks generally lodge with the Kuris, (or Greek priests), whose dwellings are in general very wretched. In sum- mer travellers are exposed to the burning heat of the sun, in win- ter to torrents of rain. From the want of regular roads they are often in danger of losing their way, or in bad weather of sinking in the mud. Thus on my first journey in Galilee, my horse sunk so deep into the mud, half a league from the lake of Tiberias, that I fell off several times, and had to wade in it up to my knees. In Samaria, in the valley before the village of Taniun, several camels sunk in the mud, and the drivers had to wade up to their hips to carry their heavy burdens on to the high dry ground, and help the animals out. My mule also sunk, and we had great difficulty in getting it out. No bridges are ever built over the rivers, and wading through them is often dangerous when the waters are high. In the cultivated parts of Syria the best mode of travelling is