Desert blossoms as a rose--Flowers of the desert--Arabs, their occupation and women--Arab dancing--Robbers of the desert--An army of ten thousand--Five hundred armed men--False alarms--Lost in the desert--Delights and disturbances of travelling. "Truth is truth: too true it was, Gold! She hoarded and hugged it first, Longed for it, leaned o'er it, loved it-- Alas! Till the humour grew to a head and burst, And she cried at the final pass. Talk not of God, my heart is stone! Nor lover nor friend--be gold for both! Gold I lack, and, my all, my own...." R. Browning. "O that the desert were my dwelling-place." Byron. It can with all truth be said that in springtime the Desert of Mesopotamia blossoms as a rose. Two years ago we travelled from Mosul to Aleppo by the northern route via Mardin, Diabekir, and Orfa. We left Mosul about the 20th June, just as the harvest had all been gathered in and the earth had once more resumed its parched-up appearance for another summer. No sooner had we left the neighbourhood of Mosul behind us than we were surrounded again on all sides by fields of waving corn, in many instances still green, and this continued the whole way to Aleppo; the harvest becoming later as we travelled north. Where the land was not cultivated the wild flowers were a perfect delight, and the desert air was filled with their sweetness. In one place the effect of these flowers was peculiarly enchanting. As far as the eye could see, the fields were covered with hollyhocks of all hues, the different shades being grouped together; thus a vast expanse of red hollyhocks would be succeeded by a field of white ones, these again changing to a delightful mauve. I have never anywhere seen such a wealth of wild flowers as we saw in that so-called desert journey from Mosul to Mardin. To try to enumerate the countless tiny flowers of the desert would be futile; they go very near to rival in number and beauty the wild flowers of Palestine. Once we were sitting in a field waiting for our caravan, and my husband said he would see how many different kinds of flowers he could pick without moving. In a minute or two he had gathered over a dozen, all within arm's reach. In that field alone there must have been at least a hundred varieties of flowers.