The Caravan Route between Egypt and SyriaLudwig Salvator, Archduke of Austria
History
The Caravan Route between Egypt and Syria
Ludwig Salvator, Archduke of Austria
Palestine -- Description and travel
The Souk or Bazaar of Khanyunis is formed by two streets lined with
wretched Turkish shops, with mud or clay projections for seats. The
doors are made to flap upward, but they close imperfectly; the roofs
are, as usual, made of the Artemisia shrub. The goods exposed in these
shops come for the most part from Gaza and Jaffa; but the caps of
camel's hair and of cotton, as well as the white and black Syrian
mantles, are made by the villagers themselves. At the end of the
village, near the Souk, and on the road to El Harish, is the second
public well, about 18 fathoms deep, and built entirely of ancient marble
fragments. At the side is a cistern with cattle-troughs of the same
material, which evidently belongs to a more flourishing period than the
present. Somewhat further on, behind a slight hollow with stagnant water
and a few palm trees, in the Akaba and Suez road, is the burial-ground,
containing a few whitewashed tombs of step-like construction. At the
opposite end of the village, where the road is open to the surrounding
country, we came upon a hollow with embankments, and then took the road
leading to Benishaela.
In the neighbourhood of Benishaela there are many gardens, which bear
witness to the extreme fertility of the soil; though unfortunately there
is not a single well among them. Almonds and apricots are the chief
productions, and the raised ground enclosing them is often covered with
small branches of the thorny "Sidr." Near the village we saw several
"Sidr" trees, as well as tamarisks (Atel) and sycamores. The most
numerous class are the thorny Opuntias, which grow round some of the
gardens in rank luxuriance.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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