_Soom il Ratas_ 7 days.
_Soom il Rasheishie_ 7
_Soom Mar Elias_ 7
_Soom il Kebeer_, or Great Lent before Easter 48
_Soom Kirkoor Saureech_ 7
_Soom il Seida_ 7
_Soom il Raffa il Saleeb_, or Elevation of the Cross 7
_Soom il Ajeeb il Saleeb_ 7
_Soom Sarkees_ 7
_Soom Mar Jacob_ 7
----
111
_Soom Marè Hannah il Chinkaly_, which is a voluntary
fast, and all not obliged to keep it 48
Besides these Lents, all the native Christians keep fast Wednesdays and
Fridays (one or two excepted), through the whole year.
[478]
1 Day fast the 3d of the month _Tishereen il Awal_.
1 ditto the 10th of ditto.
1 ditto the 10th of the month of _Taibaat_.
1 ditto the 14th of the month _Adar_.
1 ditto the 17th of the month _Tammoose_.
1 ditto the 9th of the month _Abb_.
--
6
[479] From the Italian word _franco_, free or exempt, in allusion to the
privileges the Europeans enjoy.
[480] 1753.
[481] An officer of ceremony (in the nature of one among the Turks of the
same name), who walks before the consul with a staff tipp’d with silver.
He is also employed as a messenger, and takes care of all letters.
[482] Or interpreters.
[483] One of the _Terra Santa_, pretty large, whose church the French,
and many of the natives of the Romish faith (when not prohibited by the
bashaw) frequent.
One of _Capuchins_. } Each has only two or three friars.
One of _Carmelites_. }
The _Jesuits College_ seldom has more than two or three.
[484] This is attributed to the dews, which fall in small quantities
during the nights at that season, and which the natives who sleep abroad
have nothing to shelter them from; and as the Europeans, who usually
sleep on bedsteads, are exempted from this complaint, and, by lying
abroad without this conveniency, have been seized with the ophthalmia,
this conjecture seems to have some foundation in experience.
[485] Lowthorp’s Abridgment of the Phil. Transactions, vol. iii. p. 605.
[486] See Page 4.
[487] On the 16th of this month, the thermometer was unfortunately broke,
and it was the beginning of September before another could be procured.
[488] The thermometer now used was a small portable one.
[489] A town in the gulf of Scanderoon, the chief port in that part of
the country for landing goods from Egypt; the inhabitants of which have a
good deal of commerce with the Curds, who dwell on these mountains.
[490] See the method in the chapter on the plague.
[491] From what I have since seen of the manners of the people, I have
reason to believe that those symptoms were often concealed.
[492] A high part of the suburbs to the north-east.
[493] In a letter written, at Aleppo in the year 1719, by an English
gentleman who had then been about thirty years in that country, the
author says, that, since he had been there, the plague had never visited
them oftener than once in ten or twelve years. Those within the memory
of the people were in 1719, 1729, 1733, and the late one, which ended in
the year 1744; since which time ten years are now elapsed without any
appearance of it, either here or upon the coast of Syria.
[494] Some have told me, that the plague of 1719 came from the northward;
but none of the journals or letters I have perused make any mention of
this circumstance; though all of them confirm its raging at Tripoli,
Sidon, _&c._ some months before it appeared at Aleppo.
In the year 1728 the plague made great havock in Egypt, and in the summer
of that year it raged at Byass, and the parts adjacent; but did not break
out at Aleppo till the year 1729.
At Tripoly, Sidon, and Damascus, the plague raged in the year 1732. It
was 1733 before it raged at Aleppo.
For the progress of the last plague, see p. 191. concerning its coming to
Aleppo; from thence it went to Damascus, and the coast of Syria, where
its greatest force was exerted in the year 1744; at which time it was
greatly abated at Aleppo.
[495] In the year 1719, the plague made great havock, and advanced so
fast in the spring, that the Europeans shut up about the middle of March,
and opened about the middle of July.
In 1729 the number of the sick being few, it was the middle of May before
any shut up, and they were not above a month confined.
In 1733 the disease raged with violence, though not quite so much as in
1719. The Europeans, however, shut up, and got abroad again at the same
seasons as in the former year.
In 1742 they were confined much about the same time as in 1729.
In 1743 the distemper raged with violence, though not quite to that
degree as in 1733. The Europeans shut up the 11th of April, and opened
about the middle of July.
In 1744 the number of the sick being inconsiderable, and the terror from
the distemper much abated by being used to it, few of the Europeans shut
up. The progress of the disease was just as above mentioned.
[496] Unde fit ut in peste fallat nos sensus, fallat ratio, fallant
Hippocratis aphorismi; & ipse, ut puto, in his falleretur Hippocrates.
_De Febre Pestil. c. 5._
[497] Curds, or, as the English commonly call them, _Gourdeens_, are a
race of hardy, robust people, who inhabit most of the mountains Amanus,
and live chiefly by plunder, making excursions for this purpose into the
neighbouring plains, and retiring to the mountains again whenever any
force is sent against them.
[498] It is lawful for them to abstain from going into an infected city,
but not to fly from one infected while they are in it.
[499]
Take of Sulphur, six pounds.
Orpiment.
Crude Antimony.
Litharge.
Cummin seeds.
Euphorbium.
Black pepper.
Ginger, of each four pounds.
Assa fœtida.
Cinnabar.
Sal Ammoniac, of each three pounds.
Arsenic, one pound.
Reduce these into a powder, to which add:
Of Raspings of pine wood, six pounds.
Bran, fifty pounds.