To-night we have had a long and serious talk with Muttlak about the Ketherin tribe, in which we now consider we have an interest. He promises that he will really come north as soon as he can make arrangements with the Sebaa, and we have in return promised him that we will set up a “house of hair” with them, and keep a few nagas and a mare or two, and a small flock of sheep. This would be very agreeable, and serve as a pied à terre in the desert, quite independent of all the world.
February 24.—Another akabah had to be climbed to-day—another long winding road followed across another open plain. The wonder is why the road should wind where there is no obstacle to avoid and no object to reach by a circuit. But such is always the case. Everybody seemed cross with the hard work, enlivened only by an occasional course, in which the hare sometimes ran right in among the pilgrims, when there was a scrimmage with the dervishes for possession of the quarry. The dervishes, who are mostly from Bagdad, are ready to eat hare or anything else they can get, indeed everybody is at starvation point. The only cheerful one of our party is the stalwart Ibrahim, who has come out again now as a wag. To-day, as we were marching along, we passed a fat Persian on a very little donkey, whom Ibrahim began chaffing, but finding the Persian did not understand him, he ran up, and seizing hold, lifted donkey and man in his arms. I could not have believed it possible, had I not seen that the donkey’s four legs were off the ground. The Persian did not seem to understand this joke better than the rest, but they are stolid people, and have had a long breaking in and experience in patience during the last four months.
We have found a peaceful spot for the night, with plenty of pasture and plenty of “jelleh” for fuel. The sun has set, but in the clear cold sky there is a nearly new moon, which gives a certain amount of light.
Wilfrid is making plans for spending the spring in Persia, and the summer in India, regardless of such news as may meet us at Bagdad from England or elsewhere. Such plans, however pleasant as they are in the planning, cannot be counted on. Much may have happened in the three months since we have been cut off from all communication with Europe, or indeed any part of the world out of Arabia, and even the traveller most detached from all affections or thoughts of his distant home is liable to be seized by a sudden longing for green fields with buttercups and daisies. The passing note of a bird or the scent of a flower may be enough to upset a most admirably contrived plan.
February 25.—Twenty-seven miles of march yesterday, and thirty to-day.
The camels cannot last at this pace, but the Haj is pushing on now because the men are starving. It is said that to-morrow we may reach Kasr Ruheym, the first outpost of the Euphrates district, and there they may find supplies, but it must still be a long distance off, if our reckoning is not altogether incorrect. Wilfrid has kept a dead reckoning now ever since we left Damascus, calculating the direction by the compass, and the distance of each day’s march by the pace of the camels, and in the thousand miles we have travelled, it may well be a little out—but according to it we should now be forty-seven miles from Meshhed Ali, which should be to the north-west, not to the north of our present position.
The weather has become cold, and all day long a bitter wind blew in our faces. The vegetation has changed. In one place we saw some acacias, the first trees since we left Haïl, and some of those broom bushes which bear a flower smelling sweet like the flower of the bean, and called here by the Arabs, “gurrtheh.” The acacias have given their name to the wady, Wady Hasheb (the Valley of timber).
We had a good view of the berak unfurled to-day, and a respectable-looking pilgrim, who lives, he tells us, in the mosque of Abd-el-Kader at Bagdad, pointed out to us the motto and device in the centre of it; the sword, he says, is the sword of God, and under it is written “La ilaha ila’llahi, wa Mohammed rasuluhu” (There is no God but God and Mohammed is his prophet). On the other side of the flag is written “Nasron min Allahi wa fathon karîbon” (Victory is from God and success is near).
February 26.—This has been a long and hard day, over ten hours, and the whole time beating against a wind which cut through everything, the sky darkened with sand, driving right in our faces. We have however reached Kasr Ruheym, and all our camels are still alive. Many of the pilgrims’ camels, sixty or some say seventy, lay down and died on the road. The beautiful thoroughbred delúls cannot stand the cold, which is very unusual at this latitude so late in the season, and their owners are in despair. All the Haj is furious with Ambar, not the Persians only, but the Bedouin escort and the camel owners, for his dawdling marches at first, and his forced ones afterwards. In the last six days we have marched a hundred and seventy miles, the greater part of the Haj on foot, and almost fasting. What would an English army say to that? Yet not one of the men—nor even of the poor women—who have had to trudge along thus, has been left behind. For ourselves we have had no extra fatigue, for the change from camel-back to horse-back and back again is of itself a rest. Khrer, my delúl, has very even paces, so that one is not soon tired riding him.
We are here in clover, not actually at the Kasr, but in sight of it, encamped at the edge of a running stream! The stream rises here and is said to be perennial. There is a quantity of coarse sword grass growing beside it, and everything looks green and pretty to eyes wearied of desert scenes. A pair of francolins, disturbed by the sudden invasion of their resting-place, which they doubtless thought safely secluded from the world, are flying backwards and forwards, put up continually by the grazing camels, and are calling to each other from the bushes. This shows that we are approaching the Euphrates.