The ruins of Kanawat are among the most important in Bashan, and they date from the early centuries of our era. One of the earliest inscriptions in the Hauran is a fragment (of course rifled from an older structure) now in the wall of one of the churches. In this fragment Agrippa (presumably the elder) reproaches the people for having lived up to that time as if in the dens of wild beasts, and the remainder of the inscription, which is wanting, no doubt called upon them to build themselves houses and live like men. The testimony of Josephus and others corroborates Agrippa's tablets as to the habits of the people up to that period, and the ruins of private houses as well as palatial residences stand as proof that at that time at least they took to building houses. From the time of Agrippa to the time of Justinian a gleam of sunshine fell upon Bashan, for to that palmy period of Roman rule belong all her wondrous monuments. Before and after that period dark and troublous times were the portion of Bashan. But a wave of prosperity then passed over the land, leaving behind it monuments which, in the grace and grandeur of their massive ruins, have been attributed to the giants by travellers of the nineteenth century. This ruin has been hastily identified as the Kanath of the Bible; but the theory is one that must be thrown down. There is little in the Bible about Kanath, but that little goes to prove that it could not have been at Kanawât. When the Manassehites were settling into their possessions east of the Jordan, "Nobah went and took Kanath, and called it after his own name" (Num. xxxii. 42). Kanath is but once again mentioned in the Bible (1 Chron. ii. 23); but under its changed name, Nobah, we meet it again, in connection with other towns, which approximately fix its location. When Gideon pursued the flying Midianites across the Jordan, touching at Succoth and Penuel in his pursuit, "He went up by the way of them that dwelt in tents on the east of Nobah and Jogbehah, and smote the host" (Judges viii. 11). Now, Succoth and Penuel and Jogbehah belong to Gilead (Josh. xiii. 27; Num. xxxii. 35), and Jerome places Succoth east of the Jordan, opposite Scythopolis, at the place where Burckhardt found its ruins. We would thus expect to find Nobah on the east of Gilead, beyond the places mentioned in connection with it, certainly not on a remote mountain distant from them a march of three or four days. But when we read that "he went up by them that dwelt in tents on the east of Nobah," we see from the slightest knowledge of the country that Nobah could not have been Kanawât, for the country east of Kanawât is mountain, and to have gone up by the people who dwelt in tents east of Kanawat, Gideon must have taken his noble three hundred round behind the Jebel-el-Druze, into the distant and inhospitable desert, El Kra. We thus see the utter absurdity of identifying the Kanath or Nobah of the Bible with the Kanawat of the Druze mountain. Kanath must be sought for much nearer Gilead; and as two scientific expeditions are now exploring Bible lands, it is of the utmost importance, in the interests of Biblical geography, that attention

already taken up recognised positions on the maps. I shall trouble the readers of the "Leisure Hour," however, with as few as possible of these crude identifications, as I may have an opportunity of exposing them elsewhere; but I would be inexcusable did I give the approval even of silence to so manifestly incorrect identifications as those of the Pharpar, Edrei, and Kanawât.*

There is little doubt that Kanatha, or Kanawât, grew into importance as the summer residence of the Roman rulers of Bashan. It was the sanitarium of the district. Even Florentinus, whose great tomb is at Petra, is supposed to have had a summer residence at Kanawât, and his name remains over the door of a private house to this day. What Simla is to the English of India, and Bludan to the European resident at Damascus, that was Kanawat to the Romans, whose presence brought order and prosperity, for the first and last time, to the manifold districts of Bashan.

At Kanawât they had wooded hill and bracing air, and ice-cold springs and murmuring streams, and the scene of their stewardship spread out before them like an open book; and so they builded temples to their gods, which were no gods, and when Christianity became patronised by the Constantines, they pulled their temples about and made them into Christian churches; and they had their theatres, and their hippodrome, and their baths, and their promenades; and when the city was plucked from the feeble grasp of the Byzantines, the blight of Islam, whose genius is destruction, fell upon it, and from that period to the present day, time and man have united to make this lovely town once more like a burrowing place of wild beasts. Their success has been considerable; but as we gaze on the airy columns that proudly rise above the oaks, and stumble over statue, and column, and capital, and listen to the partridge and see the gazelles roaming tamely through the evergreen parks, and drink the crystal waters, and then turn to the wondrous landscape, stretching away to Joulan, and Hermon, and Lebanon, we can form still a conception of the paradise which Roman energy and taste created in this mountain dell.

I am glad the sheik is not here, for he is so great a friend of mine that he would certainly encumber us with kindness. Unimpeded by friend or foe we roam over the whole ruins, but we are not a little surprised to find that all the men have arms ready for use, and wherever we come upon any one suddenly, his first instinct is to grasp his weapon. I return from my explorations, having sold every book I took with me. The women here are just like those we spoke of at Mejdel, and they wear an additional red robe under the blue one, doubtless necessitated by the greater altitude of the village. The horn is more common here, and the size and weight of the numerous bracelets worn on the same arm are more striking. They all have a trick of drawing the veil that hangs from the horn coquettishly over the face, leaving

In Roman times there were two cities in Bashan, Kanatha and between them. I have in my cabinet coins of both cities. Kanatha is

Kanata, and writers have not been sufficiently careful to distinguish Kanawat, and Kanata is now proved by inscriptions (Waddington,

p. 549) to be Kerak, a ruin in the vicinity of Bosra. This Kanata has been pointed out with some probability as the Kanath of the Bible, but though it answers better to the Scripture account of it than Kanawat. I believe it is also too far distant from the Jordan to be the Nobah to the east of which Gideon went up with his improvised and famishing little troop.

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In Mejdel we can once more move about without our revolvers, and without wishing we had eyes in the backs of our heads to guard against sudden surprises. However, as I wander in the suburbs of the village, I become the object of a very ridiculous demonstration. I have left my colporteur with the crowd, and while copying an inscription at the end of the village, a Bedawy woman comes up, and slips her hand into the open pocket of my coat. The action is so quick and skilful that I do not perceive it. Finding that she has only secured a central-fire cartridge, she returns it to me with a look of disgust. She then commences a jerking Bedawy dance, shouting or singing with a shrill voice, Wulla, wulla, look at the smallness of his legs!" Her screams and laughter draw a crowd of Bedawin women, and they immediately fall into a ring round me, and all clapping their hands together, join in the chorus, " 'Wulla, wulla, look at the smallness of his legs, just like pipe shanks." When they see that I rather enjoy the scene, the din becomes deafening, but a Druze comes to my rescue, and they all slink off to their lairs, withered hags as they are. These women belong to a sub-tribe of the Bedawin which is always stationary in the neighbourhood, and while the Druzes protect them they act as "hewers of wood and drawers of water" to the Druzes. They have the same gipsy appearance wherever seen. They are small and lean, have sharp, pinched features, which are all covered with blue marks, and their clothes are a bundle of grimy rags. They all have the same deep-set, small, piercing eyes, and the same uncombed buttered locks.

At Nejran we first meet the Druze women wearing the tantur, or wonderful horn, which in many places they have ceased to wear. The horn is a silver tube from twelve to twenty inches long, and three or four inches in diameter, tapering to the top. It is like a drinking-glass greatly elongated, open at the bottom and closed at the top, and is generally beautifully engraved with flowers and arabesque patterns. The horn is placed with its mouth on the tarboosh, or red felt cap, on the top of the head, slanting forward; and it is fastened by strings attached to hooks on the horn and passing under the chin and behind the head. Over the horn a white muslin veil is thrown, which falls down over the shoulders, and a hair rope, passing round the head outside the veil, keeps the horn in its place. The headdress is then the shape of the "grenadier's hats" which we used to make of rushes.

The remainder of the toilet of these horned females consists of wide calico trousers and a kind of blue calico shirt falling over all to below the knees. The feet are generally bare. In this strangest of costumes, which gives a "Mother Hubbard " appearance, they engage in all works-some of them are said to sleep with their horns on at night; and as one sees them going to the wells, with jars on their shoulders and horns on their heads, they form a very striking picture. All the women wear massive

ornaments, so that on the same arms you will see bracelets of glass, brass, gold, and silver, the one above the other. A well-dressed, fashionable woman in the Hauran will have on her person fifteen or seventeen pounds' weight of jewellery. The Christian women dress exactly like the Druze women, barring the horn. The children all wear little red caps with coins and charms suspended from the tassels.

On the 9th of April we canter out of Mejdel on a clear, bracing morning. Lebanon and Hermon appear very distinct, and very high, and the snows on their summits glow like amethyst as they are lighted up by the rising sun. To the north-east Tell Sheehan stands gazing open-mouthed at the unlovely sable flood which it has vomited forth on the plain. The morning shadow lies dark on the mouth of the crater, showing very distinctly whence came the discharges which now drape the land. We believe we can trace the wavy outline of the fiery deluge that issued from its rugged throat; and the other smaller truncated cones around show by the deep gashes in their sides that they were no idle spectators of the dismal work.

The stones are here gathered out of the fields, and the corn is growing luxuriantly around the cairns. In a few minutes we cross the Roman road which runs from Phæna to Bostra through the centre of the Lejah. On my previous visit I got a small bustard at this place. It was larger than a partridge, but the partridge was preferred at dinner. In a little over an hour we reach Suleim, and the Sheikh Abu Shahin meets us with the ever-ready Druze welcome. The sheikh is very proud of his new house, which he has built in the flimsy Damascus style. In the walls he has built inscriptions and bits of Greek ornaments, as he naively says, to save Englishmen from ranging through the town to look for them. On one stone there are the figures of two animals like lions, with wings and very long necks. They are much defaced, but they seem to have had the countenances of men. North-east of the village there is a fine temple in ruins, and hard by the large village cistern. The Druze women, as they stoop to fill their jars along the brink of this cistern, appear from a distance like huge birds with their long beaks pointing down to the water. From Suleim we strike up the hill to Kanawat. The country most pleasantly reminds us of home,-extensive cultivation and abundant vegetation, and the whole district wooded like an English park. On our left, on the curve of the hill, stands the "Kasr Mabroom," or round tower, the most conspicuous artificial object in the whole landscape. We cross a mountain stream opposite the Kasr Mabroom, and close to the ruined base of another round tower. We now ascend among the evergreen "oaks of Bashan," doubly pleasing in shade and colour, after the dismal and sterile districts which we have been traversing. Through the breaks in the trees on our left we see a curious ruin, and after vainly attempting to bring our horses up to it, we tie them in the thicket and approach it on foot. It is a huge round tower with the side fallen out of it. The stones of which it was built were dressed, and do not seem very old; but there are hard by a number of foundations of other round towers that have a very ancient look. A consider able stream flows close by these towers, and par tridges roost in the oaks that now cover them. As we reach the edge of the wady on which the city

A short distance up the hill from Kanawât we come upon the interesting ruins of Sia. The temple was dedicated "to our lord King Herod the Great,' and was adorned with groups of sculptured birds and animals, and festooned fruits and flowers. Herod's statue, of which one foot remains, was destroyed probably by the early Christians, who bore no good will to the murderer of the infants. This monument to Herod the Great is exceedingly interesting when taken in connection with a statement by Josephus. Herod commenced the work of civilisation in Bashan, and Josephus (Ant. Jud. xvi. 9, 2.) tells us that "he placed three thousand Idumeans in Trachonitis, and thereby restrained the robbers that were there." On the stones about there are Idumean inscriptions, and it has been plausibly conjectured that Herod placed the three thousand in Kanawât, and that they erected the monument of Sia. And this conjecture seems almost certain when we remember how badly the great king's efforts at civilising these wild regions were appreciated; and indeed so unpopular was he with the people, that a monument could only have been erected in his honour in a place protected by his garrison.

Descending from Kanawât we pass one of the loveliest ruins in the Hauran. On a knoll to the right a number of beautiful Corinthian columns stand on a raised platform, towering over the wooded landscape. Time has made gaps among them, so that they stand charmingly irregular, like the trees of the field around them.

We shoot down to Atil through a lovely wooded country, in which every piece of open ground waves with luxurious wheat. Streams murmur between grassy margins, and the air is heavy with the scent of hawthorn and other blossoms, and on the grassy slope our horses crush with iron heel

"The little speedwell's darling blue,
Deep tulips dashed with fiery dew,
Laburnums, dropping wells of fire."

When our minds wander, led by the association of ideas, to the "days that are no more," we are generally abruptly called back to the reality of our position by the appearance of some ruffian among the trees, braced in the antique armour of his hereditary robber race. In Atil, the ancient Athila, there are two temples and many inscriptions, one of which was addressed to the Idumean god Theandrias, who was worshipped elsewhere in Bashan, especially in Bosra. Several broken statues, some of them equestrian, are lying about, and there is one fine bust built into a garden wall. Here first we meet the Druzes armed and excited, but as yet we do not know the cause. A young Druze, who was once in a Protestant school, recognises me, and we have a good sale of books. The whole village press upon us more familiarly than is pleasant, and I find one man whose hand has strayed into my pocket. He seems greatly amused when I ask him if that is an ordinary custom among them. We discover in Atil a wonder such as no traveller has seen in the Hauran since nor before. It is nothing less than a Druze woman reading a

From Atil to Suweideh our path lies for the most part along the Roman road. Nothing in this land gives one such an idea of the earnest, stern purpose and iron will of those old Roman teachers of order as this road, striking straight as an arrow over rock and hollow, through the whole length of this dismal land. We pass what seem to have been roadside inns at regular intervals on the road.

CATERPILLAR MARCHES.

EVERYONE has heard or read of the marches of the land crabs in Jamaica, when countless hosts move across the country in crowded array, turning neither to right hand nor left. Some people have made very merry over Reaumur's description and figures of the "processions," as they are called, of a species of caterpillar too well known in some parts of the continent. The regularity of the order of march might entitle them to take rank with volunteers at least, if not with actual soldiers, though they are not shown in our illustration as marching "by fours" or in sections; but in an order gradually increasing. First of all, there are some five or six individuals in single file, then follow about the same number of pairs, next we have an increase to three, then to fours, until it reaches six or seven abreast; and what is as surprising, they keep head to head and tail to tail in an admirable manner. Perhaps the circumstance that they have, each individual of them all, sixteen legs to march upon instead of two, is rather helpful to them than otherwise. No doubt the worthy entomologist may have given some scope to fancy in the delineation, still, as far as the general fact goes, he was doubtless right, and these caterpillars do move along with a degree of regularity from their nests to the spot where they are going to feed; for they are moved to these excursions, not so much by the desire for a promenade, as by the keen demands of appetite.

There are two species, indeed, of the moths known as the Processionaries; one of these, designated Cnethocampa processionea, being a feeder upon the leaves of the oak principally; the other, resorting to the pine and fir, bears the Latin name of C. pityocampa. Some interest has been awakened in the latter species amongst British entomologists, through its sudden appearance in some numbers in the vicinity of Sevenoaks and Southborough, in Kent. The facilities, however, afforded by the steam communication of modern times for the quick transit of living insects from one land to another, excites in the mind many naturalists a large amount of suspicion with

of