Explorations in Bible lands during the 19th century - H. V. Hilprecht

DURING 19 in CENTURY: ASSYRIA AND BABYLONIA 315
threw their scrapers and baskets away and commenced the
war-dance, brandishing their spears or guns in the air and
chanting some defiant sentence especially made up for the
occasion, as, e. g., " We are the slaves of Berdi," " The last
day has come," " Down with the Christians," " Matches in
his beard who contradicts us," etc. The Turkish commissioner
and the zabtiye (irregular soldiers), — whose number
had been considerably increased by the qaimmaqam of
Diwanive, much against our own will, — picked frequent
quarrels with the natives and irritated them by their overbearing
manners. The Arabs, on the other hand, were not
slow in showing their absolute independence by wandering
unmolested around the camp, entering our private tents
and examining our goods, like a crowd of naughty boys ;
or by squatting with
expressions at the Otto-
and hurling taunting and offensive
man government.
their guns and clubs near the trenches
It was also a mistake that we had pitched our tents on
the top of the ruins. For as the mounds of Nuffar had no
recognized owner and yet were claimed by the Turks, the
Bedouins, and the Ma'dan tribes at the same time, we were
practically under nobody's protection, while by our very conspicuous
position we not only suffered exceedingly from hot
winds and suffocating sand storms, but invited plundering by
every loiterer and marauder in the neighborhood. Moreover,
unacquainted as we all were then with the peculiar
customs of Central Babylonia, we had not provided a mudhif
or lodging-house, a spacious and airy sari/a, which in every
large village of the country is set apart for the reception of
travellers and guests. What wonder that the simple-minded
children of the desert and the half-naked peasants of the
marshes, who noticed our strange mode of living and saw so
many unknown things with us for which they had no need
themselves, shook their heads in amazement. On the one
hand they observed how we spent large sums of money for