Wilfrid in the meanwhile had been with Seyd Mustafa and Mohammed to the Haj, and had had tea with Huseyn Koli Khan. They also called on Ambar and Ali Koli Khan; but both were out. Most of the pilgrims were lying on their backs asleep in the sun. It was very hot.
Ambar’s little white mare has been brought to graze near our tents, for as usual we have chosen the best pasture for our camp. The slave with her says she is a Krushieh. She is a flea-bitten grey, very old and very small, but for her size powerful, with a good head, though not a handsome one, a very fine shoulder with high wither, the usual Nejd hindquarter and manner of carrying the tail, legs like iron. To complete the picture, I must mention one knee swelled, all four feet much out of shape with long standing in the yard at Haïl, and very hairy heels. There are with the Haj several yearling colts bought by the hemeldaria for sale at Bagdad, scraggy little things more like goats than horses.
The sun has brought out a huge tarantula from the sand close to our tent. It is the first venomous reptile I have seen on the journey.
February 21.—Ambar seems determined to make up for lost time, and he has hurried the Haj on all day so that we have done over thirty miles. Our road has been through broken ground, the Wady el-Buttn (the valley of the stomach), where we saw a fox and some hares. One of these last the dogs caught after a long course, and another was run to ground. Abd er-Rahim, the Kermanshahi, rode with us a part of the day, mounted on the most lovely delúl that was ever seen; she is of a bright chestnut colour, with a coat like satin, a light fine mane rather darker than the rest, eyes more beautiful than those of the gazelle, and a style of going which I have not seen equalled by any other camel. This delúl can canter and gallop as well as trot, and kept up with us very fairly when we were chasing the hare, though of course she could not really command a horse’s pace. Abd er-Rahim and Ali Koli Khan now both ride delúls, and have dressed themselves up in Arab fashion, all silk and gold, the mean-looking little Kurd being thus transformed into a fine gentleman. Their saddles, bridles, and trappings are also very gay, got up regardless of expense. They hired their delúls of Ibn Rashid for the journey, I forget exactly for what sum, but it was a good deal of money. The Persians will not eat hare; and Ali Koli Khan, who is travelling with a private chaplain, would not join us in our sport. Indeed he seems now to keep rather aloof from us, but Abd er-Rahim has no such scruples. We hear that a sermon was preached yesterday in camp, against the sin of holding intercourse with kaffirs.
This has been a long, tedious march, two of our camels being tired. We have come to the end of our provision of flour for them, and there is really very little they can eat on the road. Wilfrid makes it still a hundred and forty miles to Meshhed.
February 22.—We travelled yesterday through a low-lying district, bounded by cliffs a little in the style of Jôf (it is all called el buttn, the stomach), and this morning, soon after starting, we reached the end of it, and had to ascend two or three hundred feet, the last akabah or ascent being very steep.
Here there was a great confusion, as the road was narrowed to a single track, and the Haj had to go almost in single file, instead of in line, its usual way of travelling. The steepness of the cliff proved too much for more than one camel, tired as they were with yesterday’s march and want of food. Among them poor Shenuan, the ugly camel of our string, gave in. He is not old, but has long been ailing, and for the last week has carried nothing but his pack-saddle, and been nothing but a trouble to us, still it cost us a pang to abandon him. He has had mange from the very beginning of our journey; in fact, he was the only camel of those originally purchased by Mohammed for us, to which we demurred at the outset. Our objections were overruled by Mohammed’s arguments, that Shenuan’s youth and strength would enable him to get over the effects of mange, but he never prospered, and did not recover from the fatigue of the Nefûd. Poor fellow, he was very loath to be left behind, and struggled on till he came to this hill, which was too much for him. We left him, I am glad to say, in a bit of wady where there was some grass, but I fear his chance is a small one. Camels seldom recover when they get past a certain stage of exhaustion. They break their hearts, like deer, and die. Poor Shenuan! I shall not easily forget his face, looking wistfully after his companions as they disappeared over the crest of the hill. He is the first of our small party that has fallen out of the ranks, and we are depressed with the feeling that he may not be the last.
At the top of the cliff we came to a perfectly level plain, strewn with fine flints, and across this we have travelled all day. Its height above the sea is 1460 feet, and we find that ever since leaving Shaybeh, where the road turned north, we have been descending at an average rate of about ten feet per mile, but the descent is not regular, because of these cliffs which we have come to, which have all been, in a sense, contrary to the general declivity of the ground. About mid-day we came to a great pool of rain-water, at which the camels drank and the goat-skins were filled, a very welcome accident. Our march to-day was twenty-four miles.
February 23.—The flinty plain is called Mahamiyeh, and with the Buttn forms a neutral ground between the Shammar and the Ánazeh, who are here represented by the Amarrat, their Sheykh Ibn Haddal. It was somewhere about here that the battle was fought the other day, in which the Dafir got the best of it, and some of the Ibn Haddal were killed. The consequence of its being thus neutral is, that the Mahamiyeh is covered with dry grass of last year, uneaten by any flocks, a great boon to us; for there is no fresh grass yet.
Beyond the Mahamiyeh we came again to hills, amongst which we found the wells of Sherab, and beyond this again the ground sloped downwards until we came to a regular valley, which we followed in its windings all the afternoon. This is the Wady Shebekkeh, which narrows in one place almost to a ravine. There water had evidently flowed not long ago, and we found some beautiful clear pools, beside which the Haj is camped. We ourselves are some two miles further on, where there is better pasture. The Haj camels are getting terribly thin. These forced marches (we came twenty-eight miles to-day) are telling on them, and their owners are complaining loudly. The pilgrims having only hired the camels, of course care nothing for their welfare, and will not let them graze as they go, because riding a camel which eats as it goes is rather tiresome. Then in the evening the tents have to be pitched in some spot where a large camp can stand altogether, irrespective of considerations of pasture, the poor camels often having to go two or three miles to their food. We manage better, and always choose our spot for their sakes more than our own. Two of our camels nevertheless are tired, but our camels are loaded far more heavily than those of the pilgrimage.