When they reached their ordinary place of encampment, a new scene began; the sheep and goats laid themselves in the grass, the camels knelt down, the poultry flew from their backs. In two hours the dark brown tents were erected. Helon made Sallu assist them, while he himself looked on and enjoyed the animated confusion of the scene. With upright and cross poles a large tent of an oblong form was erected. The coverings were of a thick brown stuff made of goats’ hair, and the door of the tent was nothing but a curtain of this cloth, which could be lifted up or drawn aside. In the middle was the tent of the chief of this nomadic tribe; the rest were pitched around it, to the distance of thirty paces. Every one of the larger tents was divided into three parts by curtains; in the outermost were the young and tender cattle which required shelter, in the next the men, and in the innermost the women. The mattresses, pillows, and coverlets for sleeping were laid in one corner; the weapons were hung on the sides of the tent; carpets were spread upon the floor, a hole dug in the middle for the fire, and the few and simple articles of household furniture, wooden dishes, vessels of copper, a hand-mill, and bottles of leather, easily found their appropriate place. Helon beheld, with admiration, the rapid erection of this moveable town. The number of the tents was about thirty, that of the men and women above two hundred, and the cattle amounted to some thousands. Always reminded of the past by the present, he thought he saw the Rechabites, or Israel journeying in the wilderness, or the pastoral wanderings of Abraham and Jacob. “How much more agreeable to nature, how much more favourable to virtue,” thought he, “is this life of simplicity and freedom, than the constraint and luxury of the governor’s palace!” He laid himself down beside the well, and thought “what would be wanting to the happiness or to the purity of life, if here, with Sulamith, I could spend my days, far from the cares and the temptations of the busy world!”