We now bent to the south-west. Here the surface is much cut and broken by sandy Wadys, dotted with a few straggling plants: to our right was a Goz or inclined arenaceous bank, where the south wind had sifted the sand from the gravel, disposing the former in the hollows, and the latter on the crest of the ripples. Presently we reached a strange formation which, seen from the east, appears a huge vein, red and rusty, beginning close to the sea, and crossing the body of the island from south to north, while a black cone is so disposed that its southern front simulates a crater. A narrow gorge opens upon a semicircular hollow lined with ochraceous or ferruginous matter; in fact, part of the filon, which sends off fibrils in all directions. The confusion of formations was startling. The floor was here of white petrosilex, there of grey granite, variegated with squares and lozenges, drops and pineapples, red, green, neutral tinted, and disposed by oxides of iron and copper in natural designs that looked artificial. Scattered over the bed of the upper ravine beyond the hollow, were carbonates of lime, ruddy brown and chocolate-hued, here a pudding-stone, there porous like basalt: the calcareous sulphates were both amorphous and crystalline, the latter affected by contact with plutonic matter. The walls of the gash showed a medley of clay breccias, disposed in every imaginable way; and divided by horizontal veins of heat-altered quartz. A few paces further led to the head of the ravine, where a tumble of huge rocks, choking the bed, showed that the rain-torrents must at times be violent.
Meanwhile, Mr. Clarke and Lieutenant Amir had walked to the large central harbour, hoping there to hit upon sweet water and some stray Hutaym fishermen, who would show us what we wanted. They did not find even the vestige of a hut. The two exploring parties saw only three birds in the "Isle of Birds," and not one of the venomous snakes mentioned at "Tehran" by Wellsted (II. ix.), and described as "measuring about thirty inches, of a slender form, with black and white spots." We also utterly failed to discover the sulphur which was once abundant and the naphtha which, according to the same authority, was produced here in considerable quantities, and was used "by the Arab mariners to pay their boats."
The evening was exceptionally fine and calm; and we expected on the morrow (February 11th) a quiet return to El-Muwaylah. Yet a manner of presentiment induced me to summon the engineer and his native assistants, and to promise the latter a liberal "bakhshísh," if by hard work at the boiler all night, and by rigging up the ship's pump instead of a donkey-engine, they could steam off at dawn.
Unexpectedly, about four a.m., a violent sandy and misty wester began to blow; and all fancied that we had set sail to the south. Quite the contrary! The engine was still under repair. The Mukhbir was being tossed and rolled by the inshore set, and the sequel is quickest told by an extract from my "Penny":—
"Written in sight of Death. Wind roaring furiously for victims: waves worse. No chain can stand these sledge-hammer shocks. Chain parts,[140] and best sheet-anchor with it. Bower and kedge anchors thrown out and drag. Fast stranding broadside on: sharp coralline reef to leeward, distant 150 yards. Sharks! Packed up necessaries. Sambúk has bolted, and quite right too! Engine starts some ten minutes before the bump. Engineer admirably cool; never left his post for a moment, even to look at the sea. Giorgi (cook) skinning a sheep: he has been wrecked four times, and don't care. Deck-pump acting poorly. Off in very nick of time, 9.15 a.m. General joy, damped by broadside turned to huge billows. Lashed down boxes of specimens on deck, and wore round safely. Made for Sináfir, followed by waves threatening to poop us. Howling wind tears mist to shreds. Second danger worse than first. Run into green water: fangs of naked rock on both sides within biscuit-throw; stumps show when the waves yawn. Nice position for a band-box of old iron! With much difficulty slipped into blue water. Rounded south end of spit, and turned north into glorious Sináfir Bay. Safe anchorage in eight fathoms. Anchor down at 10:15 a.m., after one hour of cold sweat. Distance seven miles on chart, nine by course: Mukhbir never went so fast; blown like chaff before wind. Faces cleared up. All-round shaking of hands; El-Hamdu li'lláhi,' followed by a drink. Some wept for joy."
The engine, or rather the engineer, had saved us: as the saying is, it was touch and go—the nearest thing I ever did see. Had the rotten old boiler struck work for five minutes when we were clearing out of Tírán, or steaming along Sináfir shore, nothing could have kept the ship afloat. Those who behaved best, a fireman, a boy who crept into the combustion-chamber to clear it, and helmsman who, having been at Liverpool, spoke a little English, were duly "bakhshísh'd." The same reward was given by mistake to the boilermaker, Mohammed Sa'íd Haddád, who had malingered, instead of working, through the night. At Suez he had the impudence to ask me for a Shahádah ("testimony") to his good character. On the whole the conduct of the crew was worthy of all praise.
In a decently equipped English steamer we should have laughed at this storm, and whistled for more wind; but the condition of the Mukhbir quite changed the case. The masts might have rolled out, or she might have sprung a leak at any moment. And supposing that we had escaped the crash upon the reef, the huge waves, and the schools of sharks, our situation would have been anything but pleasant. The Island of Tírán, as has been shown, is a grisly scrap of desert: it has no sweet water; and its three birds would not long have satisfied thirty hungry men. It is far from the mainland; the storm, which lasted through two days, was too violent for raft or boat to live, and at so early a season native craft are never seen on these seas. Briefly, a week might have elapsed before our friends at El-Muwaylah, who were startled by the wildness of the wind, could have learned our plight, or could have taken measures to relieve the castaways.
Sináfir Island, which we have to thank for giving us hospitality on two occasions, consists mainly of a bay. Viewed by the norma verticalis, it is shaped like an ugly duckling, with an oval (Wellsted says a circular) body of high ground disposed north-east to south-west; and with head and neck drooping westward so as to form a mighty pier or breakwater. The watery plain within is out of all proportion to the amount of terra firma. The body-profile shows straight-backed heaps of gypsum, some two hundred feet high, which become quoin-shaped about the middle of the isle: these hillocks are connected by low strips of sand growing the usual vegetation, especially the pink Statice pruinosa.
Presently our Sambúk, which had also lost chain and anchor before she could run out of the storm, appeared to the north-west of the bay; and a pilgrim-craft, bound for Suez, was our companion in good fortune. A party landed to examine Sináfir, which still shows signs of a junction with Tírán. In days when the Secondary formation was an unbroken street, the whole segment of a circle, extending from Sharm Yáhárr to northern Sinai, must have been dry land; these reefs and islands are now the only remnants. The islet itself seems lately to have been two: the neck and head are one, and the body is another; an evident sea-cliff marks the junction, and what appears like a Wady below it, is the upraised sea-bed of coralline. To the north-west, and outside this strip, lies the little port defended by a network of reefs, in which our Sambúk had first taken refuge. The bay-shore bears traces of more than one wreck; and in the graveyard used by the native sailor, an open awning of flotsam and jetsam looks from afar like a tumble-down log-hut. The number of reefs and shoals shown by stripes of vivid green water promised excellent fishing, and failed to keep its promise.
At length, after a third wasted day, we managed, despite a new hole in the old boiler, to steam out of hospitable Sináfir at 6:30 a.m. on the auspicious Wednesday, February 13. The appearance of the Mukhbir must have been originale enough: her canvas had been fished out of the hold, but in the place of a mainsail she had hoisted a topsail. We passed as close as possible to the islet-line of Secondary formation, beginning with Shu'shu', the wedge bluff-faced to south: the Palinurus anchored here in a small bight on the north-east side, between two reefs, and narrowly escaped being wrecked by a northerly gale. At 10:45 a.m. we were alongside of Baráhkán, a double feature, lumpy and cliffy, connected by a low sandy isthmus: the eastern flank gives good shelter to native crafts. Lastly came Yubá', the compound quoin, the loftiest of the group, upwards of 350 feet high, with its low-lying neighbour Wálih. These islets have classical names, as I have before mentioned,[141] and appear once to have been inhabited: even at Yubú', the least likely of all, we heard from several authorities of a deep rock-cut well, covered with a stone which the Arabs could not raise.