had previously refreshed themselves with cigarettes. The talk had been general and lively and an air of comfort and good-will had filled the place. I admired those good-hearted men and their simple and sensible way, as with the fumes of coffee and the interest of their talk they beguiled their friend and themselves for several hours. The female friends of a woman in grief assemble at the house where she lives with the object of comforting her. So with all the great events of life, birth, marriage, death, a feast, a return from a journey, the friends, who are usually related, distantly at any rate, gather together for the pleasure of conversation and discussion, to drink coffee and, as they say in the native idiom, to “drink tobacco,” for they always describe smoking as drinking. [Illustration: WOMEN AT THE SPRING] [Illustration: FOUNTAIN AT NAZARETH] Often in a conversation where there seems to be a likelihood of ill feeling, as, for instance, in business matters, the one who is leading the conversation will pronounce the opening salutations and addresses all over again. So in the middle of a conversation that does not appear to be “getting anywhere,” he may break in suddenly with “Good morning, sir; how are you?” This repeated several times during a long talk has the effect of a fresh start with the erasure of what has passed. Sometimes a man who is being pressed, as he thinks, unduly, will break out into vituperation, pass his hand over his brow in sign of weariness and the unreason of his opponents, even weep a little with vexation. Meanwhile all the other talkers about him observe him soberly and silence may rest on them for some minutes before the subject is resumed. All these things make little difference with the results of the business in hand, however. He who has the advantage holds it unmoved, though he may be as diplomatic as possible in forcing the conclusion. Any exhibition of passion or impatience usually betrays the weaker side in the discussion. Such conversations may be continued at odd times through days. When there are visitors at the guest-house who are to be fed, the people take one of the huge dishes known as the _minsaf_, fill it with food, generally rice and mutton, and several help to carry it to the guest-chamber, supporting it in a large piece of sacking, which they hold by the four corners. One of the gala times to which the neighbors look forward is what might be called a roofing-bee. When a house which is in the course of building has been finished except the roof, the master mason in charge becomes practically the head of an open-air festival, for besides his usual helpers the whole neighborhood turns out to assist. The women bring stone and mortar, the men stand in line to pass it, and amid shouting, singing and the firing of guns the work goes on merrily to completion, when the mason is supposed to receive as a present a new robe and the merrymakers are feasted on rice.