Inside there is a bazár well supplied with meat, principally mutton, by the Bedouins of the neighbourhood, and dates, wheat, and barley are grown near the town. There is little to describe in the narrow streets or the mud houses, which are essentially Arabian. Outside, the country bears traces of cultivation, the fields are divided by ridges and stone walls, there are some fine palmplantations, and the wells are numerous. The water is not deep below the surface, but it has a brackish taste, sensible enough after a day's use, and the effects are emphatically the reverse of chalybeate. The town is inhabited by the Beni Husayn Sayyids, a race of schismatics, noticed by Burckhardt.* They claim the allegiance of all the Bedouin tribes around, and pay fealty, in name only I was told, to the Meccan sherif. We made a half-halt at El-Suwayrkiyah, and, determining to have a small feast, I bought some fresh dates and a sheep for a dollar and a half. Arab travellers consider liver and fry a dish to set before a shaykh; on this occasion, however, our enjoyment was marred by the brackishness of the water-a civic feast would lose by being washed down with a thin solution of Epsom salts. At 10 A.M. we started in a south-easterly direction, and travelled over a plain thinly dotted with desert vegetation. At 1 P.M. we came to a basaltic ridge, and then entering a long depressed line of country, which could scarcely be called a valley, paced down it 5 tedious hours. The simum, as usual, was blowing, and it seemed to affect every one's temper. At 6 P.M., before the light of day had faded, we traversed a rough and troublesome ridge. Descending it, our course lay in a southerly direction; the road was flanked on the left by low hills of red sandstone and bright porphyry. About an hour afterwards we came to a long basaltfield, through whose blocks we threaded our way slowly and painfully, for it was now dark. At 8 P.M. the camels began to stumble over the little divisions of the wheat and barley fields, and presently we came to our halting-place-a large village called ElSufayna. The plain was already dotted with tents and lights. These belonged to the Baghdad caravan, whose route here falls into the Darb el Sharki. It consists of a few Persians, Kurds, and tribes contiguous to the capital of the Caliphs, collects en route the people of north-eastern Arabia, Wahhabis, and others, and is escorted by the Agayl tribe of Bedouins and the fierce mountaineers of Jebel Shamar. Scarcely was our tent pitched * Travels in Arabia, vol. ii. p. 239. "In the Eastern Desert, at 3 or 4 days'. journey from Mediná, lives a whole Bedouin tribe called Beni Aly, who are all of the Persian creed." The traveller, however, confounds the Beni Husayn Sayyids of El-Suwayrkiyah with the Beni Ali Bedouins who live about Kuba, near ElMediná. when the distant spitting of musketry and an ominous beating of the kettle-drums announced a disturbance. The Baghdad caravan, it afterwards appeared, though not more than 2000 in number, men, women, and children, had been proving to the Damascus caravan that, being perfectly ready to fight, they were not going to yield in any point of precedence. From that time the two bodies encamped at a distance about a mile one from the other. We had travelled 17 miles. The direction of El-Sufayna from our last halting-place was S.E. 5°. Though it was dark when we encamped, the Shaykh Masud set out to water his moaning camels, who had not quenched their thirst for 3 days. He returned in a melancholy mood, having been charged by the soldiers at the well 40 piastres (8s.) for the luxury. Monday, Sept. 5.—After a delightfully cool night we arose at 5 30 A.M. and prepared to start. There is nothing to see in the village of El-Sufayna: it consists of 50 or 60 mud-built, flat-roofed houses, surrounded by the usual mud rampart and turrets; the bazár at this season is well supplied, even fowls being procurable, and the country around produces dates, wheat, barley, and maize. 66 We travelled towards the S.E. and entered a country destitute of the low ranges of hill which from El-Mediná hitherto had bounded the horizon. After 2 hours' march our camels climbed up a precipitous ridge, and then descended into a broad gravel plain. From 10 to 11 A.M. our course was southerly, over high table-land, and we afterwards traversed for 5h. 30m. a plain which bore signs of standing water. This day's march was peculiarly Arabic-- a "Sahara la Siwahu," as my companions called it, a desert where is no living thing but Allah." The horizon was a sea of mirage, and fantastic streams gushed over every descent. Gigantic columns of sand whirled about the plain, and on both sides of our road were piles of bare rock standing detached upon the surface of sand and clay. Here they appear in oval lumps heaped up with a semblance of symmetry; there a single boulder stands with its sharp foundation resting upon a pedestal of low dome-shaped rocks: all are of coarse pink granite, which flakes off in large crusts under the influence of the atmosphere, and I remarked one block which could not have been less than 30 feet high. Through these scenes we continued travelling till about 4 30 P.M., when the guns suddenly roared a halt. There was not a trace of human habitations around us. Shaykh Masud guessed correctly the reason of our detention in these inhospitable wilds. "Cook your bread," said he, "and boil your coffee, for the camels are a little tired, and the gun will soon sound again." Our present station was called the "halting-place of the Mutayr," a clan of ruffians which infests these parts. We had passed over about 18 miles of ground, and our present direction was S.W. of Sufayna 20°. At 10 30 that night we heard the signal of departure, and as the moon was still young we prepared for hard work. Our course was south-westerly, through what is here called a waar— rough ground and thickety plains. The camels tripped and stumbled, tossing their litters like cock-boats in a short sea; at times the shugdufs were well nigh torn from their backs by the pitiless thorn-trees, and nothing could be wilder or more picturesque than our passage over the basaltic fields and ridges. The morning broke as we entered a wide plain. In many parts were traces of water, but no such luxury now met the eye. Lines of basalt here and there seamed the surface, and in many places wide sheets of tufaceous gypsum, called by the Arabs sabkhah, shone like mirrors set in the russet framework of the plain. After our fatiguing night, day came on with a sad sensation of oppression, and we were disappointed in our expectations of water, which usually abounds in this station, as its name "ElGhadir" denotes. At 10 A.M. we pitched our tent, after a march of about 20 miles. The direction of the night's journey was S.W. 21°. Tuesday, Sept. 6.-The Pacha gave the signal for departure at 6 P.M. We mounted and traversed the eastern plain. A heavy shower was falling among the western hills, which sent forth damp and dangerous blasts. Between 9 P.M. and the dawn of the next day we witnessed a recurrence of the last night's scenes, over a road so rugged and dangerous that I wondered how men could prefer to travel there by night. But the sturdy camels of Damascus were now worn down by fatigue; they could not endure the sun, and our time was so short that we could not afford a day's halt. My night was spent upon the front bar of my shugduf, encouraging the dromedaries; and that we had not one fall excited my extreme astonishment. At 5 A.M. we entered a wide plain thickly dotted with the common thorny trees, in whose strong grasp many a litter lost its covering, and not a few were dragged with their screaming inmates to the ground. About 5 hours afterwards we crossed a high ridge and saw below us the camp of the caravan not more than 2 miles distant; and at 11 A.M. we reached the station, which is about 24 miles from El-Ghadir, in the direction SE. 10°. It is called El-Birkat,* or the Tank, from a now ruinous receptacle for water built of hewn stone by the Caliph Harun el Rashid. The land belongs to a tribe of Bedouins called Utaybah, reputed to be the bravest and the most ferocious in El-Hejaz ; * In this country a "birkat" may be an artificial cistern or a natural basin smaller than a "ghadir." VOL. XXV. K and the citizens denote their dread of them by asserting that they drink the blood of slain foemen in order to increase their courage.* The Pacha allowed us a rest of 5 hours at El-Birkat. Wednesday, Sept. 7.-We left El-Birkat at 4 P.M., and travelled eastwards over rolling ground, thickly wooded. There was a network of paths through the thickets, and the moon was mostly clouded: the consequence was almost inevitable loss of way. About 2 A.M. we began ascending hills in a south-westerly direction, and presently fell into the bed of a wide rock-girt fiumara, which runs from E. to W. The sands were overgrown with saline and salsolaceous plants-Coloquintida, Senna, the Rhazya stricta, and a luxuriant variety of the Asclepias gigantea, whose broad leaves were cottoned over with mist and dew. At 6 A.M. we left the fiumara, and turning to the W., arrived about an hour afterwards at the station. "El-Zaribah," "the valley," is an undulating plain amongst high granite hills. In many parts it was faintly green; water was close to the surface, and rain stood upon the ground. During the night we had travelled about 23 miles, and our present station was S.E. 56 of our last. Thursday, Sept. 8. After eating and sleeping we prepared for the ceremony of El-Ihram,† or assuming the pilgrim garb, ElZaribah being the "mikat, or appointed place for the rite. Between the noonday and the afternoon prayers we bathed, and then the barber shaved our heads; after which we deposited our laical clothes, and invested ourselves with the two long cotton cloths, the same as those used in the Cairo baths, which compose the religious toilette. Our heads and feet were naked, a state by no means suited to the September sun in Arabia; and a leathern purse was the only article we were allowed to carry round our necks. Then came long prayers, and a drowsy exhortation to be good and faithful pilgrims, to abstain from the enormously long list of things forbidden to the faithful at this season, and diligently to cry the "Talbiyat" at the height of our voices. This is a short prayer which derives its name from the first word of the four sentences comprising it. Here I am! (labbayk) O Allah! here am I! No sharer hast thou; here am I! Verily the praise and the benefit are thine, and the kingdom! * Some believe this literally, and it is the only suspicion of cannibalism attaching to El-Hejaz. Possibly such a thing might take place after a fight when more than usual Bedouin rancour has been displayed. Who does not remember the account of the Turkish officer licking his blade after having sabred the body of a Russian spy? El-Ihram-literally meaning "the prohibition"-is applied to the ceremony of putting on the pilgrim's garb and the dress itself. It is a serious interruption to profitable conversation, for whenever you begin talking upon indifferent matters with a sensible man, he-if there be hearers-replies by asking what has become of your "Talbiyat." And this lasts till the return to Mecca from Muna. Friday, Sept. 9.-We left El-Zaribah at 3 P.M., travelling towards the S.W., and a wondrously picturesque scene met the eye. Crowds in the pilgrim dress, whose whiteness glittered upon their dark skins, Bedouins galloping their blood camels, fierce Wahhabis following their enormous kettle-drum and green flag flaunting in the wind, Turkish grandees, fair-haired Syrians, sable Africans, chocolate-coloured Indians, and a score of other nationalities, all urging their camels wildly and shouting the Talbiyat with willing lungs. Looking back at El-Zaribah soon after our departure, I saw a heavy nimbus settled upon the hill tops, and the growling of distant thunder smote our ears joyfully. We had hoped for a shower, but were disappointed by a dust storm, which ended with a few heavy drops of rain. At 5 P.M. we entered the wide bed of a fiumara, down which we were to travel all that night. It varies in breadth from 150 feet to about of a mile. Its course, I was told, is towards the S.W., and it enters the sea near Jeddah. The channel is a coarse sand, with here and there masses of sheet rock; and it bears in some places the vegetation usually found in fiumaras. It is everywhere flanked by dark and barren buttresses of rock. Half an hour's ride brought us to a suspicious-looking place. On the right was a precipice, at the base of which flows the stream when there is one; and to this half of the channel was our road limited by the stones and thorns that covered the other portion. The left almost reflected the right side; and opposite, the way seemed to be barred by piles of hills. Day still smiled upon the upper peaks, but the lower slopes and the fiumara bed were already curtained with a grey and sombre shade. A damp fell upon the pilgrims' spirits as they approached the place. The men ceased their loud prayers, and the very women became silent. While still puzzled by this phenomenon, an explanation was vouchsafed to me. A small curl of blue smoke, like a lady's ringlet, on the summit of the right-hand precipice, caught my eye; and simultaneous with the matchlock's echoing crack, a high-trotting dromedary in front of me rolled over upon the sands. A bullet had split his heart, throwing his rider a goodly somerset of 5 or 6 yards. Then came a scene of confusion and hurry which jammed the whole line into a solid mass. Shrieks, groans, curses, orders and counter-orders, with an occasional "phit" and a death-cry-the Utaybah seldom missed-lasted about half an hour. At length |