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something as important in aesthetic art [[strikethrough]] as rare and important [[/strikethrough]] as the biblical mss of last years - acquirement are in ecclesiastic lore.  Don't deem me over-sanguine when I write such dreams.  I know that certain superb things of which even museums know little, are hidden between where I now write and the Euphrates river.  They and their history as fully as it can be obtained is my present hurried quest.  This quest encourages me to face the discomfort and perhaps some physical danger of a couple of weeks in this sweltering vortex of Arabs and on to that home of [[underlined]] boils [[/underlined]] Aleppo. 

I have already learned how inaccurate much of that which has been heretofore said about the potteries of Damascus and the vast field north and east of here.  This information alone is worth more to my present collection than I had dared dream.  The stone cutting and carving of the best Greek period, as done behind these great mountains too,

Transcription Notes:
I changed "ecclesiastic love" at the end of line 4 to "ecclesiastic lore", but his r and his v are very close in the best of circumstances.--thomasc