At length we had climbed the last hill, and Damascus, "the vaunted city of the East," lay before us.
It is certainly a striking sight when, escaping from the inhospitable domains of the mountain and the sandhill, we see stretched at our feet a great and luxuriant valley, forming in the freshness of its vegetation a singular contrast to the desert region around.

In this valley, amid gardens and trees innumerable, extends the town, with its pretty mosques and slender lofty minarets; but I was far from finding the scene so charming that I could have exclaimed with other travellers, "This is the most beauteous spot on earth!" The plain in which Damascus lies runs on at the foot of the Anti- Libanus as far as the mountain of Scheik, and is shut in on three sides by sandhills of an incomparably dreary appearance.

On the fourth side the plain loses itself in the sandy desert.

This valley is exceedingly well watered by springs descending from all the mountains, which we could not, however, see on our approach; but no river exists here.

The water rushes forth but to disappear beneath the sand, and displays its richness only in the town and its immediate neighbourhood.
From the hill whence we had obtained the first view of Damascus, we have still a good two miles to ride before we reach the plantations.
These are large gardens of mish-mish, walnut, pomegranate, orange, and lemon trees, fenced in with clay walls, traversed by long broad streets, and watered by bubbling brooks.