Perceiving themselves thus as it were waylaid, they sent a messenger to the chief, requesting permission to pass; but he returned for answer, that they should neither cross his lands, nor taste his water. They were in fact in the land of Edom, to the king of which Moses sent messengers from Kadish. “Let us pass,” said he, “I pray thee, through thy country: we will not pass through the fields, or through the vineyards; neither will we drink of the waters of the well: we will go by the king’s highway; we will not turn to the right hand nor to the left, until we have passed thy borders.” But Edom said unto him, “Thou shalt not pass by me, lest I come out against thee with the sword.”—Numbers xx. 17, 18.
The travellers, after some captious negotiation, at last obtained permission to pass; but not to drink the waters. They did not, however, very faithfully observe this stipulation; for on reaching the borders of a clear bright sparkling rivulet, their horse would taste the cooling freshness of its waters; and Eben Raschib, their protector, insisted also that the horses should be gratified. On crossing this stream they entered on the wonders of Wady Mousa.
The first object that attracted their attention was a mausoleum, at the entrance of which stood two colossal animals; but whether lions or sphinxes they could not ascertain, as they were much defaced and mutilated. They then, advancing towards the principal ruins, entered a narrow pass, varying from fifteen to twenty feet in width, overhung by precipices, which rose to the general height of two hundred, sometimes reaching five hundred feet, and darkening the path by their projecting ledges. In some places niches were sculptured in the sides of this stupendous gallery, and here and there rude masses stood forward, that bore a remote and mysterious resemblance to the figures of living things, but over which, time and oblivion had drawn an inscrutable and everlasting veil. About a mile within this pass, they rode under an arch, which connected the two sides together; and they noticed several earthen pipes, which had formerly distributed water.
Having continued to explore the gloomy windings of this awful corridor for about two miles, the front of a superb temple burst on their view. A statue of Victory, with wings, filled the centre of an aperture in the upper part, and groups of colossal figures, representing a centaur, and a young man, stood on each side of the lofty portico. This magnificent structure is entirely excavated from the solid rock, and preserved from the ravages of the weather by the projections of the overhanging precipices. About three hundred yards beyond this temple, they met with other astonishing excavations; and, on reaching the termination of the rock on their left, they found an amphitheatre, which had also been excavated, with the exception of the proscenium; and this had fallen into ruins. On all sides the rocks were hollowed into innumerable chambers and sepulchres; and a silent waste of desolated palaces, and the remains of constructed edifices, filled the area to which the pass led.
Since this, Captains Irby and Mangles, who accompanied Mr. Banks, have published an account of their journey:—“Our defile brought us directly down into the valley of Wady Mousa, whose name had become so familiar to us. It is, at the point where we entered it, a stony but cultivated valley, of moderate size, without much character or beauty, running in a direction from east to west. A lesser hollow, sloping down to it from the southward, meets it at an angle. At the upper end of the latter valley is the village seen over stages of hanging fruit-grounds, which are watered by a spring. * * Some hundred yards below this spring begin the outskirts of the vast necropolis of Petra. * * As we advanced, the natural features of the defile grew more and more imposing at every step, and the excavations and sculpture more frequent on both sides, till it presented at last a continued street of tombs, beyond which the rocks, gradually approaching each other, seemed all at once to close without any outlet. There is, however, one frightful chasm for the passage of the stream, which furnishes, as it did anciently, the only avenue to Petra on this side (the eastern).
“It is impossible,” continues Captain Irby, “to conceive any thing more awful and sublime than the eastern approach to Petra. The width is not more than just sufficient for the passage of two horsemen abreast; the sides are in all parts perpendicular, varying from four hundred to seven hundred feet in height; and they often overhang to such a degree, that, without their absolutely meeting, the sky is intercepted, and completely shut out for one hundred yards together, and there is little more light than in a cavern.” This half subterranean passage is more than two miles in length, and retains throughout the same extraordinary character.
“After passing the Khasne, the defile becomes contracted again for three hundred yards, when suddenly the ruins of the city burst on the view in their full grandeur, shut in on the opposite side by barren craggy precipices, from which numerous ravines and valleys, like those we had passed, branch out in all directions. (All of these ravines, however, that were explored, were found to terminate in a wall of rock, admitting of no passage outwards or inwards.) The sides of the mountains, covered with an endless variety of excavated tombs and private dwellings, presented altogether the most singular scene we ever beheld. We must despair to give the reader an idea of the peculiar effect of the rocks, tinted with most extraordinary hues, whose summits present us with Nature in her most savage and romantic form; whilst their bases are worked out in all the symmetry and regularity of art, with colonnades and pediments, and ranges of corridors adhering to the perpendicular surface.”
The next party that visited Petra were Messrs. Laborde and Linant. After traversing Wada Araba, they entered the Wady Mousa, the “mysterious valley of Petra.” Laborde confesses that, notwithstanding the perfect good feeling which existed between the travellers and their conductors, he felt an indefinable kind of fear that the grand object of their journey—the minute investigation of Petra—might, after all, be defeated. The “Fellahs of Wady Mousa” were yet to be reconciled to their plan of operations.
It is a common belief amongst the Arabs, that immense treasures are buried beneath the ruins that strew the rocky desert of Idumea; and it is, of course, a natural inference, that the object of Europeans in visiting the country is, by magic or superior craft, to obtain access to those treasures, the possession of which belongs to the lords of the soil. But in drawing near to the city, a danger, says M. Laborde, on which the travellers had not reckoned, proved a cause of their security. The plague had been brought from the shores of the Mediterranean into the secluded Wady Mousa, and the Fellahs had fled from its violence. The travellers, during their inspection of the city, were comparatively free from annoyance: but they would have staid longer if their Arab conductors, who were afraid of the plague, had not teased them to return; and the fact of their residence in Petra was beginning to spread.
Messrs. Laborde and Linant arrived in Petra from the south; and on reaching a point from which they could see the extent of the town, they were struck with amazement at the immense mass of ruins strewed around, and the extensive circle of rocks inclosing the place, pierced with an innumerable quantity of excavations. In fact, words are inadequate to convey a clear idea of the ruins of Petra.