I had dreadful difficulty with a photograph which I took of these columns. I developed it at night, tormented by mosquitoes, and in the morning it was all cracked and dried off its celluloid foundation. I put it in alum, and it floated off half an inch too large in both directions. If I had had a larger plate on which to mount it, it would have been an easy enough job, but I had not, so I was obliged to work it down on to the original plate with my thumbs. It took me seven solid hours, and I had to be fed with two meals, for I could never move my thumbs nor eyes off my work. I felt very proud that the cracks did not show when a magic-lantern slide was made from it.
There was a great deal of vegetation among the ruins. Specially beautiful was a very luxuriant creeper called by the inhabitants asaleb. It has a luscious, large, pear-shaped red fruit with seeds which, when bitten, are like pepper. It has large flowers, which are white at first, and then turn pink.
On our way home from Al Balad we stopped to rest under some cocoa-palms, and stones and other missiles were flung up by our guides, so the cocoanuts came showering down in rather a terrifying way. The men then stuck their ghatrifs in the ground and banged the nuts on them, and thus skinned them. Then they hacked at them with their swords till they cut off the tops like eggs, and we enjoyed a good drink of the water.
CHAPTER XIX
THE GARA TRIBE
We left Al Hafa on December 29, after waiting six days for camels. There was much difficulty in getting a sufficient quantity, and never before had camels been hired in this manner. It was hard to make the people understand what we meant or wished to do.
When at length the camels were assembled, they arrived naked and bare. There were no ropes of any kind, or sticks to tie the baggage to, no vestige of any sort of pack saddle, and we had to wait till the following day before a few ropes could be procured. A good many of our spare blankets had to be used as saddle-cloths, that is to say under the baggage; ropes off our boxes, straps, raw-hide riems that we had used in South Africa, and in fact every available string had to be used to tie it on, and the Bedouin even took the strings which they wear as fillets round their hair, to tie round the camels' necks and noses to lead them.
There was great confusion over the loading, as all that ever yet had been done to camels in that country was to tie a couple of sacks of frankincense together and hang them on. The camels roared incessantly, got up before they were ready, shook off their loads, would not kneel down or ran away loaded, shedding everything or dragging things at their heels. Sometimes their masters quite left off their work to quarrel amongst themselves, bawling and shouting. Though we were ready at seven, it was after midday before we were off, though Wali Suleiman himself superintended the loading.
