"At Jbail I visited the citadel, said to be of Phoenician origin, which is occupied by the mudir of the District. Entering the gate, near which is a chapel consecrated to Our Lady of that name, where litigants, when they can not prove their claims, are made to swear to them, we pass through a court between rows of Persian lilac trees, into a dark, stivy arcade on both sides of which are dark, stivy cells used as stables. Reaching the citadel proper, we mount a high stairway to the loft occupied by the mudir. This, too, is partitioned, but with cotton sheeting, into various apartments. "The zabtie, in zouave uniform, at the door, would have me wait standing in the corridor outside; for his Excellency is at dinner. And Excellency, as affable as his zabtie, hearing the parley without, growls behind the scene and orders me gruffly to go to the court. 'This is not the place to make a complaint,' he adds. But the stranger at thy door, O gracious Excellency, complains not against any one in this world; and if he did, assure thee, he would not complain to the authorities of this world. This, or some such plainness of distemper, the zouave communicates to his superior behind the cotton sheeting, who presently comes out, his anger somewhat abated, and, taking me for a monk--my jubbah is responsible for the deception--invites me to the sitting-room in the enormous loophole of the citadel. He himself was beginning to complain of the litigants who pester him at his home, and apologise for his ill humour, when suddenly, disabused on seeing my trousers beneath my jubbah, he subjects me to the usual cross-examination. I could not refrain from thinking that, not being of the cowled gentry, he regretted having honoured me with an apology.