We pass out of the town to the Mersina road under an interesting arch, called St. Paul's gate. It is one of the gates of the old walled city, but whether it is of Roman, Byzantine or Arabic origin it is impossible to tell. In Tarsus and all around Tarsus there are numerous archeological remains. But they have been so defaced and mutilated and built over that it is hard to get any idea at all of the original construction. The natives declare that the Mersina gate was built by Harun-al-Rashid, hero of the _Arabian Nights_. Harun's walls did pass at this point, and the city has never gone beyond. A few yards outside the gate, we are in a Fellahin village. Between two of the reed huts is a mud oven, patted into oval form, baked outside by the sun and inside by a fire of grass. When we pass, the women are always making bread. The whole operation is before your eyes. The wheat is threshed out of its stalks and winnowed, and ground in a stone basin with a huge pestle of iron or copper. The coarse flour is mixed with water, and kneaded in pats about as big as my hand. These are passed to an old hag, who quickly flattens them out on a board, using her forearm as rolling-pin. They are put in the oven with sticks. Two or three minutes--and you have your bread. It is not in loaves. Think of a griddle-cake nine inches in diameter, or something even thinner than a griddle-cake, and you have the Fellahin bread. It is splendid wrapping paper. When there are no fig-leaves at hand, the peasants give you butter and cheese done up in bread.