The Palestine peasant can do hard work. When half starved, anemic, hounded and terror-stricken he naturally enough fails to be as brisk and as inventive as he might otherwise be, but with half a chance he is industrious and thrifty. There are the lazy and the active as in other countries. As a general rule it might be said that the Palestinian is accustomed to work hard, but not steadily; liking to rest occasionally, not understanding, nor benefiting by, a system of sharp espionage or, more properly, “nagging.” This latter frets him and destroys his efficiency, and ought not to be practised on him. A good-natured firmness that holds him to the letter of agreements in simple, plainly understood terms is much better.

The country life of Western Palestine to-day is organized on the basis of farming. The original estate of the Arab is to own flocks and tents, with the auxiliary pastimes of raiding and hunting. This life is represented to-day by the nomad tribes of the Syrian desert and of Arabia. They still roam over Eastern Palestine and penetrate into Western Palestine, but their range is being narrowed in these regions by the pressure of the Turkish government, which is organizing the country more closely in favor of its own authority. The transition stage between herding and agriculture may be seen in the Jordan Valley and eastward, where the nomads and the village peasants go into partnership together to raise grain. Ordinarily a desert nomad scorns the farmer and villager, but there are BedawÎn farmers who are a sort of industrial bridge between the civilization of the villagers and the primitive freedom of the dwellers in tents farther east and south.^[126] The breeding of horses and camels falls to the nomad, while the rearing of sheep, goats and cattle is the vocation of the villager. It is hardly necessary to say that a scattered farm life, with dwellings far apart, as in Europe and America, is not known in Palestine, since the country is not yet secure enough to encourage it.

The farmers (fella?În) are the foundation of the village population. Their lands lie out around the village and may extend a considerable distance from it.^[127] It will be well to understand the system of landholdings in Palestine. There are three kinds of landholdings to be distinguished, wakf, mulk and mÎreh. Wakf land is land that is held in perpetual and inalienable right by some ecclesiastical establishment, as, for instance, the properties of the Jerusalem Mosk, “The Dome of the Rock,” or the landed properties of the Hebron Mosk, which is a very wealthy foundation. Or wakf land may belong to a school or other institution, or to a family. Wakf land is supposed never to change its character. If it belongs to a family there is an elder of the family or some representative who is the wakf administrator.

Mulk land is absolutely free and transferable land. It is usually in a city or a village, or it may be in a certain border around such a place of, say, forty yards in width. This is house and garden property for the actual needs of city or village life. It can be sold or otherwise transferred at the pleasure of its owners. Such a piece of property pays an extra tax where a house is built on it, as the occupancy of the land by a building prevents that land from yielding taxable produce.

MÎreh land is domanial or state land. The ultimate title is with the state, to whom it reverts in the event of the failure of proper heirs. There are nine degrees of heirs eligible as owners of such land, children, grandchildren, brothers’ children and grandchildren and so on; lastly the wife of the owner, if all the other degrees fail. If the land is sold, then the degrees count from the new owner and go right through the nine degrees from him. So it is very possible that mÎreh land may be in continuous ownership other than the state’s.

Village cultivable lands are mÎreh lands. In cases where they are village lands they are held as communal lands. In villages like RÂm AllÂh and el-BÎreh the land that is held thus in common as cultivable land is divided into three grades according to quality. Then each grade is divided into feddÂns. A feddÂn is, in the first instance, a team or yoke; in RÂm AllÂh, four yoked cattle. FeddÂn then comes to mean the amount of land apportioned to the owner of such an equipment, which amount is presumably as much as the feddÂn of cattle could plow in a day. Finally the term feddÂn is used by the peasants to indicate the acknowledged right of a village farmer to own and work his plow and team and participate in the annual divisions of the arable land of the farming community. The feddÂn is the unit, but one feddÂn may be shared by several owners, each partner contributing his share to the outfit and being recorded as entitled to privileges in the feddÂn. These legal fella?În, then, receive by lot as their assignment for the year some of each quality of land. Hence the man, or family, or company interested in one feddÂn may have land here, there and in a third place. A deep furrow, the width of a plow, marks the boundary between the different strips. Or a succession of small heaps of stones may mark the line.^[128] The workers on such a strip or strips pay the government taxes or tithes on the produce of their land.

To obtain a place in the list of such fella?În and share in the use of the communal lands is a matter of some complexity and difficulty and, perhaps, of serious discussion amounting to a quarrel. A stranger coming to the village to live cannot ordinarily enter into the land privileges. A newcomer may occasionally be worked into a privileged family by marriage. The old families of the villages, having had these land rights for years, hold them tenaciously. Newcomers are ordinarily compelled to turn to some other business, to open a shop or go into some kind of manufacture. By a difficult procedure, eased with money, communal land may become the private property of one person and be made into a vineyard or an orchard.

It is customary, under intelligent management, to let the village grain lands rest every other year.^[129] Dressing the land is not resorted to. The limestone in the soil supplies to some extent this lack. Distinctively farm-buildings, such as barns, etc., are scarcely to be seen unless it be at some farm-school or foreign colony.

Wheat and barley are the common grains. The peasant knows nothing of oats. Of hay, as the Western farmer raises it, he is likewise ignorant. Large quantities of dhurah are raised. This is a kind of millet. The early part of the winter is the time for sowing wheat, or, as the natives say, “When the thirst of the land is quenched.”^[130] Barley, which matures quicker, is sown a little later than wheat. In broadcast sowing of grain the farmer sows first and plows afterward.^[131] He starts early with his companions for the field, a little donkey carrying the plow and the seed-bags. The plow animals are usually unencumbered while going to and from the fields. Arrived at the field the donkey is turned loose to browse,^[132] the men throw aside their upper garments and tuck the corners of their skirts into their belts. The sower^[133] goes ahead, tossing the grain as evenly as possible over the ground, while the plowman follows and turns it under. There is generally a good deal of shouting on the part of the plowman in directing or stimulating his animals.

This talk to the domestic creatures is interesting. Here are some samples: To start a mule the expression used is dÎh; to stop it, hÛs. To start a donkey, ?e, and to stop, hÎsh. An ox is encouraged to go by imshi or i?la, and commanded to stand by huwwa. So there are appropriate words or sounds for the different creatures. To make a camel kneel the driver says ikh; to make him rise, ?awwil, and to walk, ?ay. A horse is stopped by hÛs and started with a sucking sound of the tip of the tongue back of the front upper teeth. Dogs are called with kity and sent away with wisht. Cats are called by bis, bis, as one rubs thumb and finger, and scared away with a rough biss. Hens are gathered with tÎ'ah, chickens with sÎs; both are driven off with kish.

If the rains be fairly good the wheat springs up soon, varying as to luxuriance with the richness and depth of the soil. Sometimes one will see a donkey nibbling at the tender tops of new grain or animals walking through it without rebuke from the owners. They seem to think that such things will not materially hurt the crop if done during the early weeks of newly springing growth, but that more rain and the later growth will make up for the slight setback. But when the grain is fairly up more care is exercised. The peasants are fairly respectful of the rights of the owners of the grain that grows near the paths and roads.^[134] One seldom sees a passing native allowing animals to disturb the green grain, though sometimes an insolent soldier will ride his horse right into an unreaped field. For wheat, especially, the peasant has great regard, considering it a sin to damage the growing wheat or to waste the kernels and flour. His respect for this breadstuff is almost awe. A donkey-boy in attendance on a party of tourists who were going to the Valley at MukhmÂs (Michmash) was greatly perturbed because one of the forward animals in the cavalcade began to nibble some green wheat by the wayside. The boy shouted out ?arÂm AllÂh, ?arÂm AllÂh (forbidden of God) and stopped the creature as quickly as possible. Many peasants are so poor that they have to substitute barley bread for wheat, but ordinarily wheat is the food of the properly fed peasant and barley the choicest food for horses, donkeys and mules. Chopped straw is also fed to these animals.^[135] For other animals, kursenneh, a grain resembling lentils in appearance, is a common food. Tares^[136] (zawÂn) often make their appearance in the grain, especially if the seed is not carefully separated before sowing. If the tare seeds are not taken out of the wheat before it is ground, any considerable proportion of it in the flour is apt to cause dizziness and nausea. The tares are of some use, being sought as food for young chickens.

It is especially favorable for the farmers if mists prevail at night during the time just preceding the harvest. The moisture keeps the heads of the grain from becoming brittle and so allowing the kernels to rattle out too easily. Then, too, the work of reaping, hard at best, is much pleasanter if the cooler weather is on for a few days. It is commonly ordered that the farmers shall proceed to reap simultaneously, and it is often forbidden to go out to the fields to reap until all are ready. By this arrangement the assessment of the tax on the crop may be made with more uniformity and thieving is rendered difficult. In all these matters, requiring the regulating authority of recognized overseers, it is the so-called ukhtiyarÎyeh, or as we should say, selectmen, the chiefs of the tribes, who decide questions from the day that the land was parcelled out to the feddÂns until the crop is gathered. The beginning of the harvest is a time of merry singing and industrious work.^[137] Women as well as men go to the fields^[138] and often the babies are taken along in cradles. Some of the reapers sleep in the field. The barley harvest always precedes the wheat harvest by a few weeks.^[139] In reaping, the stalks are grasped and cut low down with a sickle.^[140] A bunch is tied with a straw and thrown into a heap to make a shock. The grain is carried to the threshing-floor by donkeys, mules or camels.^[141] The animals have much hard work during this season. The threshing-floor is usually a smooth plot of ground near the edge of the village, beaten hard. Very often a natural rock floor may be utilized. At BaytÎn (Bethel) the immense ancient pool, now dry, at the southwest of the village, makes an excellent threshing-floor. On the floor the grain is piled up in what look like huge walls, each family’s crop by itself.^[142] Watchers sleep on the floor at night to prevent theft^[143] and fire. When all is ready the families owning grain on the threshing-floor throw down circular beds of the shocks and drive the animals around upon it. In the middle highland country the hoofs of the animals are depended on alone as threshing instruments.^[144] But in the north, and in some other sections, a sledge is drawn about by the animals. In the bottom of the sledge teeth of iron or stone are inserted, which tear the straw.^[145] At Samaria we saw threshing being done with the sledge and animals on the third of May. In RÂm AllÂh, where they use animals only, and where the season is later, it may be observed in June and possibly in July. Even down on the plain between the Shephelah and Jaffa we saw the peasants at work on the thirtieth of June, sometimes with a camel and a donkey hitched together. The animals generally used are the plow cattle, but all animals available are liable to be drafted into the service. Horses, donkeys, cattle and mules are to be seen hitched together promiscuously.^[146] The mouths of the animals are often muzzled with sacking.^[147] Their drivers follow them up with a kind of basket on the end of a pole to catch the manure and prevent its falling into the grain. When threshing begins the heap of stalks and heads may be four feet high and fifteen or more feet across. Midday is the best time for threshing, as the stalks are then brittle. When thoroughly ground and beaten by the hoofs of the threshing animals the heap may be but a foot deep. When the process of threshing is completed the resulting mixture of chaff and grain is tossed into the air so that the wind may carry off the chaff,^[148] while the heavy grain falls directly under the fan or wooden fork which the laborer is using. The women then sift and clean the grain with different grades of sieves^[149] and the men put it into sacks. Another more thorough sifting and cleaning is necessary before it is ground. The chopped straw, called tibn, is used as a fodder for animals. Some of the worst of the refuse is burned in the ovens. The fine dust-like chaff, called mÛ?, is also swept up and used in a mixture with clay with which the roofs are covered. A camel-load of wheat-tibn, two huge sacks, may cost from fifteen piasters to twenty-three according to cleanness and the size of the sacks. The lowest price that we ever paid was thirteen and one-half piasters. This is the Jerusalem market piaster, which equals about three and four-sevenths cents. The great wheat-field of the country continues to be the HaurÂn, east of the Sea of Galilee. From that region caravans of camels bring the sacked wheat into Western Palestine as far south as Jerusalem. The local wheat supply is entirely inadequate for the needs of the large villages, to say nothing of the cities, and must be supplemented from the fields of Esdraelon, the Maritime Plain, the GhÔr and the HaurÂn. When quarantine cuts off district from district, as in cholera times, the suffering is considerable. The ordinary country store-place for grain is a cemented cistern underground. Lentils, kursenneh and chick-peas, ?ummu?, are subjected to threshing in a way similar to that in which wheat and barley are treated.

The grape season is the happiest of the year. It begins late in July and reaches well on towards the rainy season, the first of November, or possibly even to the first of December. It includes the time for ripe figs, pomegranates, quinces and almonds. Comparatively few of the grapes are turned into wine except on foreign initiative. The Jewish colonies that have come into the country make considerable wine. A native spirit called 'ara? is made from refuse grapes. A grape molasses, dibs, is made. The fresh fruit is consumed in large quantities. Donkeys loaded with box panniers of grapes go as far as Jaffa, thirty-five miles from the grape regions. Hebron and RÂm AllÂh are famous for their grapes. RÂm AllÂh is ten miles north of Jerusalem, and Hebron (el-KhalÎl) nearly twice as far south of the city. The Jerusalem market is kept abundantly supplied with fresh grapes from these two places. Whole families go to live in the vineyards during the season of ripening grapes.

A very important manufacture from grapes is the raisin. The business is growing and the raisins are exported from the country through Jaffa. The grapes, when picked from the vines, are washed, given a bath in a mixture of lye-water and olive-oil, and then spread out on a cleanly swept space of ground. The lye makes the skins tender and the oil tends to keep off insects. The siroccos of September are of great assistance in raisin making, though not at all good for the unpicked grapes, as they are apt to turn them into raisins on the vines. The favorite raisin of the country is that made from the little seedless variety of grapes from es-Sal?, east of the Jordan. These grapes go by the name banÂt eshshams, that is, daughters of the sun. The next in favor are those of Hebron, where the larger varieties of grapes, reddish and white, are raised, and where the raisin making has been carried on for some time. Third in quality, perhaps, come the raisins of the RÂm AllÂh district, including JifnÂ, BÎr ez-Zayt, SilwÂd, etc., where the industry has but made a beginning. In this district the grapes are usually greenish white or white, that is, somewhat similar to the Malaga variety. Native business men of RÂm AllÂh go about the district paying from two cents to three cents a pound for the raisins, subject to a discount of ten per cent for waste. The German contractors provide wooden boxes for packing the raisins. Women and girls are engaged to sort them, as they are brought into RÂm AllÂh from the country around, at a daily wage of from seven to twelve cents. Something less than a third of a cent a pound is paid for camel transport to Jaffa, to which must be added the charges at that port. On board ship the German contractors pay for the completed consignment about three cents a pound, possibly a little more. The native vine owners think that they are discovering that the early picking of the grapes for raisin making prevents waste and saves the strength of the vines.

After the season the vines should be pruned and the vineyards plowed and dug over, once in early and once in late winter.^[150]

In vineyards and fig-orchards one will notice the stone huts called ?a?r,^[151] plural ?u?Ûr. Between seasons, when they are not in use, they swarm with hungry fleas. Near each of them is a tiny sunken pit, walled on three sides, which makes a little fireplace. A similar pocket makes a hiding-place for dry figs which are left here under slight pressure beneath a flat stone. The latter place is made to look like the ground about by covering with small stones so as to mislead thieves. Such a hiding-place is called a mikhba. Most of the fig crop is dried for later use. The smaller varieties are most suitable for this purpose. The fruit is picked into small baskets and spread out on the ground. Sometimes the fruit is crushed by the hand to hasten the drying.

The olive crop is ready late in the autumn. The trees are beaten^[152] with long poles by the men, while women and children gather up the berries from the ground. Seldom is care exercised to select and sort the best of the berries. They are piled in heaps inside the house, where they often become heated through, thus producing an inferior quality of oil. The berries are first put into a circular stone bed, where they are crushed, seed and all, by a sort of millstone set on edge and run like a wheel around a central pivot by a shaft. The crushed mass is then put into gunny sacking or coarse baskets and carried to the press. The oil-presses have always been very primitive, bungling affairs, but of late iron screws are being introduced.

When the grapes have all been picked from a vineyard the sheep and goats^[153] are turned in to eat the leaves from the vines. The flocks are allowed to feed in the wheat and barley-fields, also, after the harvest. Goats and sheep are very often seen together in flocks.^[154] Their keepers, who are their inseparable companions through the day, take care to secure safe folds for them at night. A party of us were at Te?Ûa on the 30th of December, 1902. After examining the ruins we turned our attention to the modern aspect of the place. The caves and recesses about the ruins were used by shepherds, who were living there and caring for large flocks. As the sheep and goats came home late in the afternoon, the little lambs and kids, whose tender days forbade their accompanying their mothers to pasture, were hungrily awaiting them. There were about sixty of these young ones skipping about. When the plaintive cries of the little ones were answered by the motherly calls of the returning elders there was considerable excitement and motion on both sides, until by some mysteriously hidden sense families were united and all was quiet again as supper progressed. A few days later, on our way in from MÂr SÂbÂ, we saw the newborn of the flocks in the desert places where animals were browsing. The shepherd usually carries the newly-born in from the fields.^[155] Very rarely is one missed. Once, in the valley called WÂdy el-'Ayn, between e?-?ayyibeh and Dayr DÎwÂn, I traced a little kid by its bleat, and seeing no flock about carried it home in my saddle-bags, hoping to rear it; but, missing the peculiar quality of the new milk of its mother, it did not survive many hours. Sometimes, in order to curb the inordinate appetite of a young kid for the milk, the shepherd puts a little bit in its mouth, made by two pencil-like sticks and secures the ends by cords crisscrossed over the sprouting horns.

The sheep of Palestine have immense tails, which often weigh fifteen pounds and more. In the Lebanon this weight is doubled on the sheep that are specially fattened for the winter supply of meat. These sheep, called ma'lÛf, are fed on the remains of the mulberry leaves not devoured by the silkworms. As the worms eat only the tender parts of the leaves, the sheep are given what is left. When the animal is so surfeited as to refuse more food, an attendant makes it her business to roll it up in leaves and force it into the unwilling creature’s mouth. The sheep attains an almost incredible size under this treatment.

The goats have very long flapping ears, which often get torn in the briers as they hold their heads down to feed. On some breeds the ears nearly, if not quite, touch the ground as the goats walk along. Goats and sheep are allowed to overrun all the wild places for pasture, so that any shoots of trees or shrubs that start are nibbled off. They browse upon some of the driest and least promising ground. They flourish best in the time of the rains. As the country’s surface is burned over with the hot summer and autumn, the flocks are driven to the few moist valleys.^[156] Most frequently a boy is in charge of a smaller flock.^[157] He whiles away some of his time on a reed flute.^[158] If his animals get too far from him, or go in the wrong direction, he heads them off with a call and by dropping a stone from his sling,^[159] or hand, just beyond them in the forbidden direction. The shepherd’s usual weapon is a heavy oaken club, called locally dibbÛsy from its resemblance in shape to a pin, the long handle being ended in a round, heavy knob. This club is under three feet in length and weighs from one to two pounds. It is a powerful weapon. Often, too, a shepherd will carry one of those long, rickety, brassbound muskets that look very dangerous,—for the manipulator. A leathern pouch, flint and steel, a knife and a sling of woolen yarn complete the outfit, except the actual clothing. The main garment is a long cotton shirt that comes to the knees, belted with a leathern belt. For sleeping and for rainy weather the homespun woolen overcoat, called an 'abÂyeh, is worn. Shoes and head-dress finish off the man, who is the loneliest of Syrians, though he sings and plays and talks to his animals. Sometimes, as you see him in silhouette against the sky-line, he seems to be transfixed on the club or musket on which he leans, so long does he stand unchanged. When he moves it is with singularly slow movements.

Besides meat and milk, which both goats and sheep provide, the sheep produce wool. Considerable raw wool is bought by the weavers of the village. A man in RÂm AllÂh, whose house abuts unpleasantly on more valuable property, refuses to sell it to a well-to-do neighbor^[160] because it is on the outskirts where he is in a position to get first chance at those who come into the village from that direction to sell fleeces. The wool is washed, combed, dyed and spun into thread by the villagers. We had occasion to purchase a lot of wool in fleeces for mattresses. We bought five hundred and ten pounds at eleven cents per pound, but after a thorough cleansing we found that the lot weighed four hundred and twenty-six. Having purchased ticking for mattresses, quilts and pillows, and cotton for filling the quilts, our next step was to engage the services of the mattress-maker from Jerusalem. His name was Baruch, a Spanish or Sephardim Jew, tall, wiry and dark, with stooping shoulders and remarkably successful in getting hold of one’s hand and planting on it a reverential kiss before his object was discovered. The kiss felt and sounded like the bursting of a smoke-ball. He came for a few days’ stay, bringing his tools and a boy helper with him. The most novel of the implements was one shaped like a huge bow which is used in fluffing up cotton or wool. It might be compared to an attenuated single-stringed harp. It is held in the hand by the wooden part, the string resting in the cotton. By striking the cord with a wooden mallet, a vibration is set going that twangs musically and throws the cotton into a light, billowy mass. He is very skilful with his needles. He would sew and quilt nearly twenty hours out of the twenty-four in his haste to complete the task and get back to Jerusalem. We were put to it to feed him properly, as certain things were unlawful for him to receive and eat from our hands. But eggs, olives, bread and tomatoes were acceptable. In case of a doubt concerning an article of food we simply asked him whether it was lawful or not. He was very gentle and pleasing. We had to be careful to see that he did not go to sleep among his inflammable materials and leave the lamps burning according to Oriental practise.

When otherwise unemployed a villager will spin off a ball of yarn by hand. Two sticks, like thick pencils, are laid one across the other at right angles. This makes the bobbin. The upright one is notched at the top to catch the thread when needful. A hank of clean wool is disposed over the left forearm. A little of this is started through the fingers of the two hands. It is then caught on the notched end of the bobbin, which is given a whirl and allowed to hang down, while the hands play out the twisting yarn to govern the thickness. When the bobbin carrying the spinning yarn has reached the ground, the amount of yarn already made is wound up on it and caught at the notch. The whirling, feeding out and spinning go on until a ball of yarn is produced.

The looms are primitive and heavy. They are constructed in the dark room which serves as the weaver’s house. A pit is made for him to sit in, and only the light from the door falls on his work. Cotton and wool fabrics of heavy texture are produced. The heavy woolen 'abÂyeh is the chief garment made by the peasant weavers. The light-weight cloth for the other garments is purchased from the city shops. Coarse rugs are made on a still more primitive loom, which is often seen out-of-doors, especially among the BedawÎn.

The land of Palestine bears abundant evidence of a higher state of cultivation once upon a time than that of the present day. Remains of villas, terrace walls and numerous cemented cisterns to catch rain-water are observable. The soil lacks only water to produce abundantly. For the most part the list of things grown has narrowed to those requiring the least care and capital. Where springs are plentiful, and where the people have a little ambition, a variety of vegetables and fruits are cultivated. But because of the uncertainty of the amount and incidence of the tax there is little incentive. In the neighborhood of Jaffa some of the finest oranges in the world are raised. The Sidon oranges come next in desirability. The Jordan Valley is one of the richest garden spots imaginable. The vine is perfectly at home in the lime country of the highlands, as are the fig and the olive.^[161] This same region is excellently well adapted to silk culture, and might exceed the Lebanon in this respect, though scarcely a dream of such a possibility is indulged in Palestine. The gardens of Ur?Âs, near Solomon’s Pool, of 'Ayn KÂrim, of SilwÂn (Siloam) and of JenÎn might with encouragement be matched hundreds of times. Around Haifa, and on the way to 'AthlÎt, the Germans have shown what improvements are possible. There is also the fine agricultural farm at Jaffa, called Mikweh Israel, or Natur’s, under French management. By pools and cisterns, conduits and irrigation, the peasant farmers could make garden spots where now to the eye of the stranger all looks hopeless. The peculiar powdery effect of lime rock, and the countless tons of small stones constantly breaking up and showing on the surface of the ground, look, but are not necessarily, forbidding.

The market of a village is usually its chief street, in which the buyers and sellers meet each other, where the laden animals from the country about come with goods, and where people bent on business are most apt to meet those who can serve them. Shops and storerooms line the market street. The Arab name for this interesting locality is sÛ?. Thither the gardener takes such of his produce as he cannot himself use, and if he be not a merchant himself, puts it into the care of one who is, on commission. Venders of fabrics, pottery, breadstuffs and meats assemble here and display their goods. The shopkeepers naturally seek localities in the market street and, when space fails there, in the adjacent streets. If there are a number of tribes in the village, each tribe, in its own section, may have stores for the supply of the simple stock of foodstuffs required. A shop or store is a little room from six to a dozen feet square, with a door, seldom a window, a counter and the necessary bins and shelves. What we should call a grocery store will keep in stock sugar, flour, oil, matches and possibly grain. Some simple candies, some spice, starch, dried fruit, coffee and rice may complete the list. The scales will be on the counter. No wrapping-paper need be used, as the purchaser brings his own dish if he be purchasing a liquid, and if not, carries his purchases in the skirt of his dress or in a handkerchief. The sugar comes in a huge loaf covered with blue paper. Salt is heavily taxed by the government. Tobacco is a government monopoly and to be sold only by a specially authorized merchant, who wears a brown coat as a sort of uniform designating him and his rights. Such a shop as has been described may add cotton cloth and thread to its stock. Shoe shops confine themselves to the making and displaying of peasant shoes. The weaver of cloth and 'abÂyehs ordinarily has no separate place of sale, but sells from the loom-room or else makes a journey to the villages about and displays the goods in their market streets. The shops have their regular customers, to whom they sell on credit, with some favor and less haggling than is customary with other purchasers. The butcher hangs his freshly-slaughtered sheep on hooks in the side wall of the market street and sells at a uniform price per ru?l or o??Îyeh any part of the creature. Perhaps he has not killed until there is a likelihood of demands enough for meat to warrant the venture. If local restrictions do not hinder, the butcher may kill and dress his animals right in the market street.

The traders are keen and allow no points of advantage to escape their notice. In fact, the conversation of the common people of the country is in terms of the currency and concerns the ins and outs of bargaining, loss and gain. Sometimes, in the heat of trading, the parties appear to rise into a frenzy of altercation. But nothing is ever settled at this high tension. After a few seconds of comparative calm the haggling and controversy begin again and an attempt is made to find a common basis of argument in which neither party may yield too much. The difference between wholesale and retail business is not very clearly recognized in the villages. Few peasant producers know what their own expense has been in the production of their commodities. Striking a bargain is a tedious process to the stranger, but an exercise of great interest to the native and full of possibilities. He declares that the business arrangement shall be as you like, utterly. He is a servant of God, he seeks not money but your happiness, your good-will. Is not that the sweetest possession, the love and favor of brothers? If it is a house that you are trying to rent at a decent price, he says, “What is such a thing as that between us? Take it for nothing.”^[162] An utter stranger once came to my door with a young gazel which he had found in the wilderness. He declared that it was a present to me. I offered him forty cents for it and he demanded sixty. I gave him the forty, however, promising the other twenty if the little creature lived.

Measures and weights vary as between villages. In the cities the French system prevails, but in the country the peasantry persist in the use of the variable weights and measures. Many things are weighed which with us are measured, as, for example, olive-oil and vegetables. The o??Îyeh approximates a half pound. Six of these o??Îyehs equal an o??a, and two o??as equal a ru?l. One hundred ru?ls equal a ?on?Âr. The linear measure of one dhrÂ' or drÂ' equals about twenty-seven inches. The grain measure, called ?Â', is the least regular of all. The RÂm AllÂh ?Â', for example, is a little larger than the Jerusalem ?Â' and more than double that of ?ayyibeh.

In theory the coinage of the country consists of the Turkish gold pound of one hundred piasters, the silver mejÎdeh of twenty piasters, the half and quarter silver mejÎdeh, the silver double piaster, piaster and half piaster. There are also coins of nickel and copper alloy, one called bishlik, which equals two and a half piasters, a double bishlik, called wazary in Jerusalem and zahrÂweh at Haifa, a half bishlik, a half piaster and a quarter piaster. There are some copper coins of small value. This list and these values are according to the government standard, which is called ?Âgh, and they hold for all payments of taxes, for the post and telegraph and for legal business. For ordinary trade in the country, though these same coins are used, different values are assigned to them. Thus Hebron, Jerusalem and other places have their own systems of reckoning. In Jerusalem the tariff sherk, or market, as it is called, makes the mejÎdeh twenty-three piasters instead of twenty as in government reckoning. The result is a diminution of the piaster and an increase in the number of them in each of the coins mentioned above. The Turkish gold pound is not seen in the country, but the gold twenty-franc pieces of the Latin Monetary Union are frequently seen and go by the name lÎreh fransaweh or nubalyÔn (Napoleon). This coin equals one hundred and nine piasters according to the Jerusalem market rate.

Change is seldom made for the large coins except in the better city shops, but must be purchased of the money-changers who sit behind their little tables at different points on the main streets. A very common rate for change is the charge of a piaster and a half for changing the Napoleon into small money. In the villages the storekeepers sell change.

The peasants refuse to accept damaged coin or any coins that arouse their suspicions as to genuineness or weight. A few coins are less acceptable in some sections than in others. The big copper coin called the ?obbu?, worth five paras in Jerusalem, is not used in Beirut, and conversely the ne?Âsy of Beirut and vicinity is not used at Jerusalem. When the new style metlik had been issued by the government and had been in use in Constantinople for some time, it was slowly gaining favor in Beirut and was being refused in Palestine except in a few places, where it was taken at a discount of one-fifth from its legal value.

A primitive method of keeping a record was seen at the village of e?-?ayyibeh. A small bow was made from a twig and on the cord was strung a lot of paper slips. Every slip contained the names of five ?ayyibeh men. The whole village was thus divided up into groups of five. Whenever soldiers coming from Jerusalem were quartered on the villagers one of these groups was responsible for feeding the soldiers. Each group took its turn. Another bow, string and bunch of written slips represented the order of turns of the citizens for feeding the soldiers’ horses.

Money lending is common among the country people and often the rates are very high. Seldom is the rate less than ten per cent, and more often it is twenty. A clever man possessed of a small capital multiplies it rapidly by judicious loans, though it must be confessed that the gambling element enters pretty largely into the business. Some possessors of ready money invest it in the form of advances to owners of future crops, taking their pay in the crop when harvested. This is often done when soldiers, representing the government, descend on a village and demand the taxes. The peasants in seeking the ready money with which to pay are compelled to dispose of barley and other produce cheap.

Often of an evening one will hear the crier publishing something of general concern to the villagers. In RÂm AllÂh this officer, called nÂ?Ûr, and chosen by the shaykhs, receives a yearly allowance of seventy mejÎdehs. The tribal elders decide upon some matter for general observance and the crier makes it known. For instance, when an especially dry season was on, the village crier was heard proclaiming that no woman should draw more than one jar of water from the springs at a time. If any woman were caught offending the extra jar would be broken and a fine of a bishlik (eleven cents) imposed. At another time it was forbidden the people to harvest the olives until a certain date. Lost articles are advertised by the criers, and those lounging about in the evening are kept in touch with business news, as the voice penetrates all quarters of the village.

The go-between, or wasÎ?, is a familiar figure in Syrian business matters. A merchant from Nazareth explained to me the popularity of this intermediary thus: “If there are two men, each wanting something of the other and neither wishing to express his whole mind before the other has done so, they can avoid the difficulty by employing a third person to whom each unbosoms freely, and this third person, possessing the secrets of both, knows how to approach either one with the business of the other.”^[163]

The village shaykhs are agents in many business matters. The shaykh is chief of his family or tribe in all matters needing a representative. The position often goes from father to son, if the ability which secured the position for the father be a characteristic of the son. Or it may go to some other near of kin to the former shaykh. The shaykhs are sometimes chosen by acclamation or by general consent and are recorded by the general government. The shaykh is in charge of the guest-room of his tribe. Here it is that out-of-town business men are taken, especially if they have come to buy commodities of the village. When the soldiers are sent by the government to a village with a levy they are entertained at the guest-house. The shaykhs of the different tribes in the village deal with the soldiers. The amount of money asked of the village is apportioned between the shaykhs representing the tribes. Each shaykh distributes his apportionment to the members of his own tribe. If any man prove obstinate in meeting his obligations he is turned over by the shaykh to the soldiers, who may beat him or carry him off to prison. If the government seeks an offender in the village it does so through the shaykh of the offender’s tribe.

VARIOUS ARTICLES MADE OF SKIN: BOTTLES, BAGS, POUCHES AND BUCKETS