Khan el Haswa where we arrived the second day is the centre of a small village of perhaps 300 people. At three in the morning we left Haswa but it was nearly noon when we reached the river, because of a delay on the road. The bazaar and business of Hillah were formerly on the Babylonian side of the stream, but are now principally on the further side of the rickety bridge of boats four miles below the ruins of Babylon. After paying toll we crossed over and found a room in the Khan Pasha—a close, dirty place, but in the midst of the town and near the river. Hillah is the largest town on the Euphrates north of Busrah. Splendid groves of date-trees surround it and stretch along the river as far as the eye can reach. The principal merchandise of the town is wheat, barley and dates. Of the Moslem population two-thirds are Shiah, and the remaining Sunni are mostly Turks. There are one or two native Christians and many Jews, but it is difficult to estimate correctly the population of Hillah or of any of the towns on the Euphrates. At Hillah the river is less than 200 yards wide and has a much more gentle flow than the Tigris at Bagdad. A short distance northwest of the town is Kerbela. It is only a village but the spot is visited by thousands of faithful Moslems every year who venerate the twelve Imams of the Shiah sect. Here is the tomb of Hosein the grandson of the prophet and the son of Ali whom they believe the true successor in the Caliphate. By living or dying here the Shiah devotee has nought to fear for the next world. So strong is this belief that many leave directions in their wills to be buried in this hallowed spot. Thousands of corpses are imported some even from India—after proper drying and salting—and are laid to rest in the sacred ground. Nejf, south of Hillah, is the place of Ali’s martyrdom and is no less sacred for the living and the dead. At Kerbela the manufacture of _torbat_ is about the only industry. A _torbat_ is a small piece of baked clay about two inches in length, generally round or oblong, with the names of Ali and Fatima rudely engraved on it. Made out of holy-ground, these are carried home by all pilgrims and are used by nearly every Shiah as a resting-place for the forehead in their prayer prostrations. According to all reports Kerbela is similar to Mecca in its loose morals and the character of its permanent population. On July 31st we left Hillah and sailed down the river in a native boat similar to the “bellum” of Busrah, but without awning. The Euphrates is more muddy than the Tigris, and its course, though less sinuous, is broken here and there by shallow rapids.[41] We sailed all night and did not stop until we arrived at Diwaniyeh the following afternoon. Many of the villages on the way appeared to have a considerable population; date-groves were plentiful, and we passed two or three Mathhab or tombs of Arab Sheikhs, including that reputed to be Job’s, “the greatest of all the sons of the East.”