of life, from the desert which they inhabit, and from the form of government which exists among them. I do not consider them brave in fight, except when the advantage of position and numbers is on their side, or when they are driven to desperation. Their courage is in fact nearly allied to cowardice, for they will fearlessly attack a caravan tended by muleteers, or protected by a few inexperienced guards, but they will seldom dare to approach an escort of regular soldiery, however small it may happen to be. In this respect, indeed, they may be regarded as common robbers, who will filch and steal from such as can offer them little or no resistance. Their hospitality, which has been so highly extolled, is certainly not greater or more genuine than that of most orientals; and I doubt whether a Bedooeen ever gives any thing away without expecting a fourfold return. Travellers in general write in very pretty strains of their reception by the Arabs of the desert; but they seldom tell us how much they paid for the compliment. They are bountiful to their entertainers because they are delighted to find themselves secure among a band of marauders, for the novelty of the thing, or because they wish to conciliate them; and the Arabs, as a matter of course, treat them with respect and consideration. But not feeling the same interest in their situation when they happen to be in a common town or village, they are less liberally and graciously disposed, and then they wonder that the natives do not appear so well satisfied as the Arabs did. The Arabs, moreover, they generally affect to treat as equals, perhaps as superiors for the nonce, and their servants and interpreters, if they have any such with them, adopt a similar line of conduct, well knowing that their accustomed insolence would not be brooked by the proud sons of Ishmael. But how do European travellers usually conduct themselves in the towns and villages of Turkey? Why, for the most part, they assume the haughty swagger of the Turk, and look down upon the natives as slaves, in which they are exceeded by their domestics who, because they know that they can do so with impunity, act in the most overbearing manner towards their fellow subjects. I am not now imagining a case; I have seen many such instances, and from my intimate knowledge of the easterns generally, I feel assured, that if travellers would treat the town and village-dwelling people as they find
