The following was scanned entire from The Desert Route to India, Hakluyt second series No. LXIII; all original editing, footnotes and preface by Douglas Carruthers.

ACCOUNT OF A JOURNEY

FROM BASRA TO ALEPPO

IN 1748

by

GAYLARD ROBERTS

PREFATORY NOTE

THE letter here printed for the first time is taken from a transcript in the Orme MSS. (India Office Library). It is found in the same volume as the narrative of Beawes, and the remarks made in the prefatory note to that section apply generally to this also.

Of Roberts himself little is known. His name occurs in some lists preserved at the India Office of the European inhabitants of Madras (1744-6). He was not in the East India Company's service. but was included among 'supercargoes and pursers' carrying on private trade. On 21 November 1744 the Court of Directors gave permission to Gaylard Roberts to go to his father, Captain Gaylard Roberts, at Madras, in order to be brought up in the seafaring way. Apparently both father and son were returning to England together when the journey now described was made; and it is evident from the account that the author was the father. It appears that Roberts had other companions on the journey, to whom he does not allude (he barely mentions his own son). Amongst them was a Mr Monro (see Plaisted, infra, p. 98). Now Munro (as it should be spelt) we know of from Alexander Drummond, who was travelling in Northern Syria at that date. When at Aleppo, he records that 'I had the pleasure of seeing Mr. Munro of Culcairn', who came from India'; and again 'Mr. Munro and some other gentlemen from India, coming through the Desart of Arabia' (Travels through different Cities ... and several parts of Asia, etc., P. 239).

1 'John Munro, Esquire, of Cullcarn, late of Bombay' was one of the executors of the will (11 August 1757) of Andrew Munro, surgeon at Madras (Love's Vestiges of Old Madras, vol. 11, P. 459). He had been on the Company's civil establishment at Bombay, commencing as a writer in January 1731 and ending as Third Member of Council in 1748.

MR. ROBERTS LETTER GIVING AN ACCOUNT

OF HIS JOURNEY OVER THE DESART OF ARABIA

IN HIS WAY TO ENGLAND

Aleppo, 1st August I748. Dear Sir,

The enclosed is a copy of the last I sent you. Since which I set out with the caravan from Bassora June 11th, arrived here the 16th ult., where I have received my principal and respondentia for the goods I advised you I had sold. I intended to have kept a journal of our passage hither, but was so excessive hot for the first four or five days that I expected to be transported to the other world, but they shaped their course another way (more northerly); we found the weather mend every day very sensibly. Near all that has been wrote by those who have journalized this way, has been that they set out such an hour in the morning, pitched their tents such an hour in the evening, that the ground was stony, or uneven, in some places gravel, sand, or level in others, that they met with pretty good water in some places, bad in others, and often get hares or antelopes, which the Arabs knock down with their sticks. This indeed is the greatest part of what a man can write of with any certainty who keeps a journal. A few have attempted to describe some exceeding grand buildings which we pass on the desart. But as it would require at least a month's time to take a survey of them to describe them truly, and as the caravan moving forward will not allow a man to do more than take a cursory view of them, all the attempts I have yet seen of those descriptions have been very imperfect. A palace 1 about midway between Bussora and Aleppo is the most solid and grand I believe of any in the world; but there is no taste or eloquence in it, nor

1 This probably refers to Ukhaidir. He would see nothing else so 'solid and grand' as this structure anywhere on his route. It is actually 300 miles from Basra and 450 from Aleppo.

can the Arabs give the least account who built it or by whom it was inhabited, for as our companions were mostly of the wild sort, who live not in houses, the grandest structure they meet with seems to have no more effect on their curiosity than on the creatures they drive.

Palmera, a palace situated in a most delightful and spacious plain about four days from this place, has its walls of the finest free stone, and the best wrought I ever saw 1, and has been decorated with columns and cut capitals of the Corinthian order, with the entablature compleat, and many well turned arches; but as the former edifice was one fourth ruined, so was the latter three fourths ruined.

We past over a vast variety of country, some of it exceeding good soil, with some of the noblest and pleasantest valleys I ever saw, terminated with hills of easy ascents and not high; all which have been formerly well inhabited, but have been laid waste by the tyranny of their governments and the pilfering disposition of the worst of people (I believe) on earth, who have been rambling about in large herds for ages past, and still continue to plunder and destroy each other.

It would be worth no man's while to attempt this passage from Bengall unless he has a prospect of getting to Bassora the beginning [blank], as the caravan generally sets out from. that time to the beginning of June 2, and if you get there after the caravan is gone, you lose the advantage of letting out your money on respondentia, for which they often give

1 One would conclude from this that Roberts, at any rate, viewed Palmyra from a distance. But Plaisted, who chanced to have the same Arab servant as Roberts, was assured by him that Roberts had gone no further than Taiyibe (see Plaisted's narrative, 18 July; Taylor repeats this, pp. 229-30). Alexander Drummond, who was travelling in Northern Syria at that time, and was afterwards (1754~6) Consul at Aleppo, confirms this point. He says that 'Mr Munro, and some other gentlemen from India [Roberts was one of them; see p. 98] coming through the Desart of Arabia, passed by the ruins of Teybeh, or Tiera, as named by the Romans, mistaking it for Palmyra, which is but a little way distant from it.' It is interesting, but no proof of identity, that a 'William Robt' cut his name on the stones of Taiyibe (see Rousseau, op. cit. p. 155).

2 Plaisted, on the other hand, says the 'Camel' caravans leave from mid-April to mid-June, but the'Merchants' caravans await the arrival of ships from India, usually early in June, and the caravans leave accordingly about mid-July.

18 to 20 per cent, tho' you lose 10 per cent in remitting your money home by the lowness of the exchange here. But should the caravan be departed before your arrival at Bassora, you must proceed by way of Bagdat, where you will be plundered by the men in power at most places you come to, and is much more expensive than with the caravan, tho' it cost me for bare necessaries for myself and son from Bassora to Aleppo 16oo rupees; and amounts to full 21 rupees per mile: a rate of travelling by far I believe the most extravagantly dear of any in the world. So that unless one has a fair appearance of getting well by goods he may bring to Bassora, which is hard to be depended upon, it seems by no ways adviseable to come this way. There is no other advice I can think of necessary to a person who attempts this passage, but that he ought to allow himself a bottle of sour shrub for punch and one bottle of wine a day, and to bring with him ten bottles of orange juice, very strong iron bound chests big enough to stow four dozen bottles in each, two of which make a camels load, 20 or 30 fowls in a strong coop well covered to screen them from the sun, to see they have meat and water given them at 11 every morning, and to recruit at Mushadali 1 what more you may want for the rest of the journey, as nothing is to be had beyond that place till you get hither. A few sheep may also be bought, each be put in a bag and stowed upon the chests. Hares (and mostly very good) you will meet with in great plenty. A good quantity of ghee 2 must be laid in; a few Bassora tongues; but pigeons and mutton we potted a good quantity, which the excessive heat spoiled in four or five days, and with them we lost a good part of our ghee. Cooks, bottles, rack, wine, and chests are not to be procured in Bassora, so that those you must bring with you. We rode on horses or mules from the time of setting out in the morning till ten and then going into the Kedgwa 3 (which are boxes to sit in on the camel with an awning over them) for the rest of the day, it afforded an agreeable variety of motion. I should advise

1 Meshed Ali.

2 Indian butter.

3 Kajawa (Persian), same as Beawes' mihaffa (Arabic).

the getting of good large Bassora asses to ride on in the mornings; which have an easy motion and cost but little, whereas they will not give here above one half what a horse or a mule cost at Bassora. The heat begins every day at eleven in the morning and continues till five in the afternoon; the rest of the time the air is delightful. Should you bring any bale goods with you, let them weigh 260 to 270 pounds each bale; which may save you the trouble and charge of repacking them, if you should find it advisable to bring them hither, for want of a good sale at Bassora, two such making a camel load. This is all I can think of concerning this affair that can deserve your attention, only that you ought always to have a servant by when they unload your liquor chests, to prevent their letting them go at once from the camels back like a bale, which will soon put an end to your store of liquor. Your packet for your uncle left Constantinople six weeks since, and I doubt not but is in [his?] hands before this. If any of our friends desire a sight or copy of this, please to let them have it. We are going to Cyprus to meet some French ship to carry us to Marseilles, from whence we may hope soon to get home.

Since writing the above we have taken our passage on a Dutch ship directly for England, who sails in a few days.

And am, Dear Sir, Your faithful

and most humble servant,

GAYLARD ROBERTS.

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