Because the light air breathed sharply off the snows, and because the vista of mountains was a feast to the eye, we lay for several hours in the sanctuary of the Prophet Noah. There can be no manner of doubt that I ought to have completed the pilgrimage by visiting his grave, but it lay far down upon the southern slopes of Jûdî Dâgh, and I was making holiday upon the hill-tops; therefore when we turned homewards, we bade Shim’ûn conduct the donkey and ’Abdu’l Mejîd to Ḥasanah and ourselves kept to the crest of the ridge. Half-an-hour from the summit we met some Kurdish shepherds near a small heap of ruins, concerning which they related the following history: Once upon a time there was a holy man who took a vow of pilgrimage to the ship of Noah, and for a month he journeyed over hill and vale until he reached the spot on which we stood. And there he met the Evil One, who asked him whence he came and whither he was going. The holy man explained that he was bent on a pilgrimage to the ship of Noah. “You have still,” said the Devil, “a month’s journey before you.” Thereat the pilgrim, being old and weary, lost heart, and since he could not return with his vow unfulfilled, he built himself a hut and ended his days within sight of the goal, if his eyes had not been too worn to see. The presence of the shepherds upon Mount Jûdî was not to be attributed to any pious purpose. They had come up from the villages below to escape from the sheep tax which was about to be levied for the second time within a twelvemonth, once for last year’s arrears, and once for this year’s dues. Their lawless flocks skipped among the boulders and the snow-wreaths as light-heartedly as the wild goat, which no government can assess, but the owners lived in anxiety, and when, half-an-hour further, we encountered a second company, they took us for soldiers and greeted us with rifle shots. Kas Mattai grasped the situation and shouted a justification of our existence, which was not received without hesitation. I was standing, when the shots began, in the middle of a _névé_, and thinking that I must offer a fine mark, I stepped off the snow and sat down upon a grey rock to await developments. But as soon as we had made it clear that we were simple people with no official position, we were allowed to pass. “It was well,” observed Kas Mattai, as we clambered down the crags, “that ’Abdu’l Mejîd was not with us. They would have killed him.” At the foot of the rocks we sat down to rest beside a bubbling spring. “Have you suffered at the hand of the government?” I asked my guide. “We suffer from the Kurds,” he replied, “and there is no one to protect us but God. Effendim, the âghâwât from Shandokh come over the pass and claim hospitality from us. We are poor men--in all Ḥasanah there is not one who is ignorant of hunger; how shall we feed the âghâwât, and their mares, and the followers they bring with them? And how shall we refuse when they are armed with rifles?”