When I last made a memorandum, we were at Ephesus.
We are in Syria, now, encamped in the mountains of
Lebanon. The interregnum has been long, both
as to time and distance. We brought not a relic
from Ephesus! After gathering up fragments of
sculptured marbles and breaking ornaments from the
interior work of the Mosques; and after bringing them
at a cost of infinite trouble and fatigue, five miles
on muleback to the railway depot, a government officer
compelled all who had such things to disgorge!
He had an order from Constantinople to look out for
our party, and see that we carried nothing off.
It was a wise, a just, and a well-deserved rebuke,
but it created a sensation. I never resist a
temptation to plunder a stranger’s premises without
feeling insufferably vain about it. This time
I felt proud beyond expression. I was serene
in the midst of the scoldings that were heaped upon
the Ottoman government for its affront offered to
a pleasuring party of entirely respectable gentlemen
and ladies I said, “We that have free souls,
it touches us not.” The shoe not only
pinched our party, but it pinched hard; a principal
sufferer discovered that the imperial order was inclosed
in an envelop bearing the seal of the British Embassy
at Constantinople, and therefore must have been inspired
by the representative of the Queen. This was
bad—very bad. Coming solely from
the Ottomans, it might have signified only Ottoman
hatred of Christians, and a vulgar ignorance as to
genteel methods of expressing it; but coming from
the Christianized, educated, politic British legation,
it simply intimated that we were a sort of gentlemen
and ladies who would bear watching! So the party
regarded it, and were incensed accordingly.
The truth doubtless was, that the same precautions
would have been taken against any travelers, because
the English Company who have acquired the right to
excavate Ephesus, and have paid a great sum for that
right, need to be protected, and deserve to be.
They can not afford to run the risk of having their
hospitality abused by travelers, especially since
travelers are such notorious scorners of honest behavior.
We sailed from Smyrna, in the wildest spirit of expectancy,
for the chief feature, the grand goal of the expedition,
was near at hand—we were approaching the
Holy Land! Such a burrowing into the hold for
trunks that had lain buried for weeks, yes for months;
such a hurrying to and fro above decks and below;
such a riotous system of packing and unpacking; such
a littering up of the cabins with shirts and skirts,
and indescribable and unclassable odds and ends; such
a making up of bundles, and setting apart of umbrellas,
green spectacles and thick veils; such a critical
inspection of saddles and bridles that had never yet
touched horses; such a cleaning and loading of revolvers
and examining of bowie-knives; such a half-soling
of the seats of pantaloons with serviceable buckskin;
