Presently the great Fiumara opened upon a large basin denoting the Ras ("head") Wady Sadr: native travellers consider this their second stage from El-Muwaylah. In front the Jibál Sadr extended far to the right and left, a slight depression showing the Khuraytah, or "Pass," which we were to ascend on the morrow. Buttressing the left bank of the broad watercourse was the dwarf hill of which we had been told so many tales. By day its red sands gleam and glisten like burnished copper; during the night fire flashes from the summit: in truth, its sole peculiarity is that of being yellow amongst the gloomy heights around it; whilst the Wady el-Safrá, higher up to the left, discharges from its Jebel a torrent of quartz and syenite, gravel and sand. Abú Khartám, the author of the romance, was among the party: he only smiled when complimented upon the power of his imagination.

This was a day of excitement: even the mules kept their ears pricked up. After a short nine miles we had camped below the Jebel Kibár, and we had remounted our animals to ascend a neighbouring hill commanding a bird's-eye view of the Hismá plain. There was evidently much excitement amongst the Bedawi shepherds around us; and presently Ahmed el-‘Ukbí, our messenger, appeared in sight, officially heading the five chiefs of the Ma'ázah, who were followed by a tail of some thirty clansmen. Only two rode horses, wretched garrons stolen from the Ruwalá, the great branch of the Anezah, which holds the eastern regions; the rest rode fine sturdy and long-coated camels, which looked Syrian rather than Midianite.[154] We returned hurriedly to make arrangements for the reception: our Shaykhs could not, without derogating, go forth to meet the strangers; but the latter were saluted with due ceremony by the bugler and the escort, drawn up in line before the mess-tent.

After the usual half-hour's delay, the "palaver," to speak Africanicè, "came up," and M. Lacaze had a good opportunity of privily sketching the scene. The Shaykh, Mohammed bin ‘Atíyyah, who boasts (falsely) that he commands more than half the two thousand males composing the tribe, is a tall, sinewy man of about fifty, straight-featured, full-bearded, and gruff-voiced: his official style of speaking from the throat, a kind of vaccine low, imitated in camp for many a day, never failed to cause merriment. His costume rose to the height of Desert-fashion, described when pourtraying Shaykh Khizr the ‘Imráni; his manners were those of a gentleman below the Pass, and above it he became an unmitigated ruffian, who merited his soubriquet El-Kalb ("the Hound"). On one side sat his son Sálim, a large, beardless lad, who had begun work by presenting us with a sheep—Giorgi (cook) said it cost us £40. On the other was his eldest brother and alter ego: the wrinkled Sagr (Sakr) has been a resident at Cairo, and still boasts that he received the "tribute" of a horse from the Viceroy, whom he affects to treat as an equal or rather an inferior. The others were old Sagr's ill-visaged son Ali, and, lastly, a cunning-eyed villain, ‘Abayd bin Sálim, the rightful heir to the chieftainship, which, however, he had been unable to keep. All the Shaykhs were dressed in brand-new garments and glaring glossy Kúfíyahs ("head-kerchiefs"); they trade chiefly with Mezáríb in the Haurán; and, during the annual passage to and fro of the Damascus caravan, they await it at Tabúk, and threaten to cut off the road unless liberally propitiated with presents of raiment and rations. The Murátibah (honorarium) contributed by El-Shám would be about one hundred dollars in ready money to the headman, diminishing with degree to one dollar per annum: this would not include "free gifts" by pilgrims. The Ma'ázah are under Syria, that is, under no rule at all; and they are supposed to be tributary to, when in reality they demand tribute from, the Porte. In fact, nothing can be more pronounced than the contrast of the Bedawin who are subject to Egypt, and those supposed to be governed by the wretched Ottoman.

During the palaver all outside was sweet as honey, to use the Arab phrase, and bitter as gall inside. The Ma'ázah, many of whom now saw Europeans for the first time, eyed the barnetá (hat) curiously, with a certain facial movement which meant, "This is the first time we have let Christian dogs into our land!" They were minute in observing the escort, and not a little astonished to find that all were negroes—in the old day Egyptian soldiers, under the great Mohammed Ali Pasha and his stepson, Ibrahim Pasha, had made themselves a terror to the Wild Man. "What had now become of them?" was the mental question. When asked whence they had procured the two horses, they answered curtly, Min Rabbiná—"From our Lord," thus signifying stolen goods; and, like mediaeval knights, they took a pride in avowing that not one of their number could read or write. Finally a tent was assigned to them; food was ordered, and they promised us escort to their dens on the morrow.

During the raw and gusty night the mercury sank to 38° F., the aneroid (26.91) showing about three thousand feet above sea-level; and blazing fires kept up within and without the tents, hardly sufficed for comfort. On the morning of February 24th

"Over the wold the wind blew cold;"

and the Egyptian officers all donned their gloves. The early hours were spent in a last struggle with our Shaykhs, who now felt themselves and their camels hopelessly entering the lion's lair. The sole available pretext for delay was that their animals could never carry the boxes and tents up the Pass; but, though very ugly reports prevailed concerning the reception of Ahmed el-‘Ukbí, and the observations that had been made last night, not a word was suffered to reach my ears until our retreat had been resolved upon. Such concealment would have been inexcusable in a European; in the East it is the rule.

At 7.15 a.m. we struck the camp at Jebel Kibár, and moved due eastward towards the Pass. This north-eastern Khuraytah (Col) is termed the Khuraytat el-Hismá or el-Jils, after a hillock on the plateau-summit, to distinguish it from the similar feature to the south-west: the latter is known as the Khuraytat el-Zibá; or el-T h m , the local pronunciation of Tihámah. About two miles of rough and broken ground lead to the foot of the ladder. The zigzags then follow the line of a mountain torrent, the natural Pass, crossing its bed from left to right and from right again to left: the path is the rudest of corniches, worn by the feet of man and beast; and showing some ugly abrupt turns. The absolute height of the ascent is about 450 feet (aner. 26.70—26.25) and the length half a mile. The ground, composed mostly of irregular rock-steps, has little difficulty for horses and mules; but camels laden with boards (the mess-table) and long tent-poles must have had a queer time—I should almost expect after this to see an oyster walking up stairs. Of course, they took their leisure, feeling each stone before they trusted it, but they all arrived without the shadow of an accident; and the same was the case during the two subsequent descents.

We halted on the Sath el-Nakb ("the Passtop") to expect the caravan, and to prospect the surrounding novelties. Heaps and piles of dark trap dotted the summit like old graves; many of the stones were inscribed with tribal marks, and not a few were capped with snowy lumps of quartz detached from their veins in the porphyry. This custom, which appears universal throughout Midian, has many interpretations. According to some it denotes the terminus of a successful raid; others make it show where a dispute was settled without bloodshed; whilst as a rule it is an expression of gratitude: the Bedawi erects it in honour of the man who protected or who did a service to him, saying at the same time, Abyaz ‘alayk yá Fula'n—"White (or happy) be it to thee!" naming the person. Amongst these votive stones we picked up copper-stained quartz like that of ‘Aynúnah, fine specimens of iron, and the dove-coloured serpentine, with silvery threads, so plentiful in the Wady Surr. The Wasm in most cases showed some form of a cross, which is held to be a potent charm by the Sinaitic Bedawin; and on two detached water-rolled pebbles were distinctly inscribed lH and Vl, which looked exceedingly like Europe. Apparently the custom is dying out: the modern Midianites have forgotten the art and mystery of tribal signs (Wusúm). In many places the people cannot distinguish between inscriptions and "Bill Snooks his mark," and they can interpret very few of the latter.

Looking westward through the inverted arch formed by the two hill-staples of the Khuraytah, and down the long valley which had given us passage, the eye distinguishes a dozen distances whose several planes are marked by all the shades of colour that the most varied vegetation can show. There are black-browns, chocolate-browns, and light umber-browns; bright-reds and dull-reds; grass-greens and cypress-greens; neutral tints and French greys contrasting with the rosy pinks, the azures, the purples, and the golden yellows with which distance paints the horizon. From a few feet above the Col-floor appear the eastern faces of the giants of the coast-range; and our altitude, some 3800 feet, gave us to a certain extent a measure of their grand proportions.