February 14th.--I LEFT Aleppo at mid-day; and in half an hour came to
the miserable village Sheikh Anszary [Arabic], where I took leave of my
Worthy friends Messieurs Barker and Van Masseyk, the English and Dutch
Consuls, two men who do honour to their respective countries. I passed
the two large cisterns called Djob Mehawad [Arabic], and Djob Emballat
[Arabic], and reached, at the end of two hours and a half, the Khan
called Touman [Arabic], near a village of the same name, situated on the
Koeyk, or river of Aleppo. The Khan is in a bad state; Pashas no longer
think of repairing public edifices.
February 15th--After a march of ten hours and a half, I arrived at
Sermein, having had some difficulty in crossing the muddy plain. The
neighbourhood of Sermein is remarkable for great numbers of cisterns and
wells hewn in the rock: in the town every house has a similar cistern;
those in the plain serve to water the peasants' cattle in the summer,
for there are no springs in these parts. On the S.E. side of Sermein is
a large subterraneous vault, cut in the solid rock, divided into several
apartments, and