TOMB OF SALEH.

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CHAPTER XVI.

SINAI TO AKABAH.

Encampment in Wady S'Al.-Tomb of Saleh.-Sprinkling of Blood upon the Door-posts.-Geological Features of the Country.-El-Ghor.-Wild Gorge.-Grove of Palms.-The Beach.-The Gulf.-Solitude of the Desert.-Arrival at Akabah.-Reception by the Governor.-Paying our Escort. -Parting with our Arabs.-The Fortress of Akabah.-Its Inhabitants.-The Vicinity.-Eloth.-Mussulmen at their Devotions.-Amusements at Akabah.

PASSING through the Wady Sheikh, we encamped at four P.M. in the narrow Wady S'Al. The day was quite cold-the 7th of February. There was much snow in the clefts and gorges of the mountains: more had fallen during the winter, we were told, than for many years before.

We had given our Arabs a goat for dinner on the day before our departure from the convent. Just after leaving it, I perceived that they had the goat along with them, and could not imagine why they had deferred their feast, until we came to the Tomb of Saleh, a spot much venerated by the Arabs, in Wady esh-Sheikh. It is a stone hut, rudely finished, and surmounted with a cone, plastered and whitewashed. Here Tualeb and his companions dismounted, and I followed them. A young Arab then seized the goat by the horns, and dragged him to the door of the hut, when Tualeb cut off his right ear, and sprinkled the door-posts with the blood of the victim. They then entered, and, putting their hands under the coarse, tattered curtain, which was intended to conceal the coffin of the Prophet, performed their devotions, and then retired. An hour after

we had encamped at night, the goat was roasting over the fire. Next morning we observed the sign of the cross made with its blood on the necks of our camels. It is probable the Bedouins of Horeb have conceived, from their intercourse with the convent, that the cross acts as a charm to defend them from danger. Towards evening we met two or three women, closely veiled in coarse blue shawls, accompanied by a man, a child, and two dogs, to guard their small flock of little black goats which browsed before them. The bark of their dogs was the only thing that reminded us of home.

The lofty and desolate granite group in the centre of which Horeb is enclosed does not extend far to the northeast. We passed its outer barriers in less than three hours from Sinai, and entered a district of basalt, trap, and grünstone, as steril and forbidding as the one we had just left. In a few hours we passed from this trap and basalt region into a sandstone district, in which the hills were lofty, but detached, and so soft that they were rapidly disintegrating into a white fine sand, which retains no trace of the traveller an hour after he passWe encamped in this district in a deep chasm, called by the Arabs El-Ghor, or the Caldron. An hour distant to the left of our path was the Fountain of Hudherah, which Burckhardt had suggested was the Hazeroth of Scripture, the third station of Israel after leaving Horeb. With this suggestion Dr. Robinson agrees.

es.

Striking our tents in the Ghor early on the second morning after our departure from Sinai, at noon we entered the lofty range of dark granite mountains which border the western side of the Gulf of Akabah, to which we descended through one of the wildest and most ro

WILD GORGE. -THE GULF.

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*

mantic chasms I have ever seen. It seems to be a transverse zigzag rent in the range, made expressly to afford a passage to the sea. The walls are perpendicular, from 300 to 500 feet high, often not twenty feet apart, and in one or two places not more than twelve or fifteen. The Bedouins have well named this pass the Little Door. We emerged from it upon a gravelly beach sloping down to the sea a mile distant. The long, narrow strip of blue water, resplendent with the sun, lay deeply imbosomed in the gloomy precipitous mountains on the east and west. Our course was now up the gulf, nearing the water as we advanced, and in two hours our tents were pitched in the edge of a small grove of flourishing palms at the mouth of a wady. A nearly naked black Arab, the lord of the palm grove, appeared with a basket of good fish, which contributed to the luxury of our supper. While it was preparing, we laved our feet and legs in the waves which broke gently on the beach at our tent door.

We were yet two days' journey from Akabah, and the route lay along the beach, oftentimes in the edge of the water. It was interrupted but once by a high tide washing a bold precipitous promontory, which compelled us to make a detour through the mountains by passes impracticable to horses, but which our camels accomplished without a stumble. Thousands of little crabs were running over the sand, and hastening to the water at our approach. Large heaps of pearly shells lay upon the shore near the remains of fires upon which the Bedouins had roasted their contents for food.

We began to grow weary of the monotony and stillness of the Desert, as we had not, since we left the neighbourhood of the convent, either seen or heard any sign

* Dr. Robinson.

154

ARRIVAL AT AKABAH.-RECEPTION.

of life except the Bedouin fish-vender, two quails, and the notes of one lone warbler, that seemed to mourn as an exile in the unbroken solitudes. Near noon on the fifth day from Sinai, we were delighted to hear Tualeb exclaim Akabah, as he pointed towards the northeast corner of the gulf, where appeared the magnificent palm-grove, like a fringe depending from the black overhanging mountains, and dipping into the water. As we doubled the head of the gulf, we crossed the mouth of the Arabah, which was full of shrubs, upon which camels were browsing. We entered the grove of palms at three o'clock, and at four our camels knelt amid the trees under the walls of the castle. Taking Said, who was acquainted with the governor, I entered the castle with Tualeb and Materh, and found a group of some dozen men seated on a divan of rough masonry, built around the door of a dwelling, enclosing a small court. Mats were spread for us, and I took my seat by the side of a dark, keen-eyed, long-mustached Turk, who was seated on an old chair with three legs. I little dreamed that I was beside his excellency. Upon discovering my mistake, I presented a letter, which he read, and said, "There are four gentlemen." I explained the case of our French pilgrim, and in a few minutes the caravan entered the great court, and the camels were relieved of their burdens. The luggage was stowed in the strangers' room, which became our kitchen; but, taking warning from the complaints of former travellers respecting vermin in these apartments, we pitched our tents, by permission, in the open court. Hussein, the chief of the Alouins, was away in the mountains. A messenger was despatched for him, who was expected to return with him in four days.

PAYING OUR ESCORT. DEPARTURE.

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In the evening, Tualeb and Materh, accompanied by the governor, came into the tent to receive their pay. Their men were anxious to be present, but the sheikhs refused. The money was counted in parcels and then passed to them, and when they had counted each parcel and pronounced it right, I wrote it down, and adding up the sums, found they were overpaid one and a half piastres. The sheikhs then declared before the governor that the payment was made according to the contract. I instructed Said to tell them to be sure, as when we once settled a matter we never unsettled it. They recounted their money, and expressed themselves fully satisfied, yet next morning they declared that they were forty-one and a half piastres short; but no entreaties could move us to concede the point. Perhaps this circumstance increased our buksheesh somewhat, the division of which among them created some contention, and we became arbiters, divided it, and declared that so it should stand. The sheikhs, particularly Materh, were disappointed, but the men were pleased. From this circumstance, and the unwillingness to allow the men to be present at any settlement, it might be inferred that the chiefs did not always make the apportionment with even-handed justice.

About nine o'clock next morning our trusty and obliging Tawaras were ready to depart. They came around us affectionately: the common men approached respectfully and shook hands with us; Tualeb and Materh embraced us, and the first kissed my cheek. As he took leave of my young companions, he pointed silently to heaven, and their young, responsive hearts felt the powerful suggestion. As their swarthy forms, loosely shrouded in coarse, scanty garments, emerged from the gate and disappeared in the palm-grove, we felt