BSY_FB_28-014

January 14, 1905

is-Summāḳiyât 9:00 A.M. Temp. 43 ° Baro. S 26.88 Baro. L. 27.13

Nimbus clouds going E. Breeze varying from #1 to #4 and from
S. by E. to W. - through S. Light drizzle for 4 hours in afternoon
What would be called a cold, damp, chilly rainy day. Moon & stars
shining brightly in clear sky from 8 P.M. to 10 P.M. & then it clouded
up again, clouds coming from W. Rainbow, partly double for 1/2 hr.
from 4:00 P.M. Sunset cloudy.

is-Summāḳiyât, a town divided into 2 parts by a branch of Wadi Butm, one part N.W. of the other. There are ruins, and numerous
inscriptions, mostly funereal, many in situ in old burying places to the E.
of both parts of town. 10 Moslem, 15 Christian families.

B. & L worked most of day.

B. left camp about 11:15 A.M. with 2 servants & Haurânī guide
returning to Umm is-Surab for the purpose of getting more measurements
of ruins & to make a squeeze of a Nabataean inscription. It took him 1 hour
trotting & cantering most of way. He left there at 3:10 for camp.

The guide was afraid of robbers, and while at Umm is-Surab, seeing four
horsemen at a distance, climbed to the top of the church tower, and
watched them anxiously for some time, crouched low & out of their sight
behind some stones. At last he descend & said that thank God they
were going in a different direction than toward us. Poor fellow, he had
lived all his life in fear, in this border land without law, Druse to the E.
and wild Arab tribes to the S., both at his very door. What a way to go
through life!