“For all is rocks at random thrown,
Black walls of crag, black banks of stone.”
SCOTT.
We start in earnest—The Harra—A Theory of Mirage—Camp of the Beni
Sokkhr—Wady er Rajel—A Christmas Dinner in the Desert—Sand storm—We reach
Kâf.
_December_ 22.—A white frost, and off at half-past seven. Huseyn has
sent two men with us, Assad, his head man, and another. We have also
letters from him for Ali el-Kreysheh, and the Sheykh of Kâf.
Mohammed as we rode away was much elated at the success of this visit,
and related to me the pretty things Huseyn had said about us. Huseyn had
seen other franjis but none who understood the _shoghl Arab_, Arab ways,
as we did. They had come with an escort to see the ruins, but we had
come to see him. “Ah,” said Mohammed, “now they are sitting drinking
coffee and talking about us. They are saying to each other that the Beg
and I are brothers, and we are travelling together, as is right, in
search of relations, and to make friends all over the world. There is
nothing so _asil_ (noble) as to travel and make friends. Once upon a
time there was an old man who had a son, but very little other property,
and when he came to die he called his son and said to him, “O my son, I
am about to die, and I have nothing to leave behind me for your good but
advice, and my advice is this: ‘Build to yourself houses in every part of
the world.’” And the son, who was a child without understanding,
wondered how he was to do this, seeing he had no money to build houses
with, and so set out on a journey in search of a wise man who could
explain to him his father’s last words. And he travelled for many years
and visited every part of the world, and made friends in each town, and
at last he found the wise man who told him that he had already done as
his father had bidden him, “for,” he said, “you have friends everywhere,
and is not your friend’s house your own?”
We too were in high spirits, as everything now seemed to be going right.
Our course lay nearly south on the road to Ezrak, and we passed several
ruined villages and some cultivated land. Every now and then we put up
immense packs of sand-grouse, which were busy feeding on the seeds of the
_zueyti_, a kind of thistle which grows abundantly on the fallows.
Wilfrid got eight of them at a shot, and at one of the villages we bought
ten partridges of a man who had been out with a matchlock, so that we are
well supplied with meat for a couple of days. Assad has got a very
handsome greyhound with him, of the long-haired breed, which has a
wonderful nose for game. His master declares he _sees_ the birds, for
the Arabs do not seem to understand the theory of scent.
After two hours’ fair travelling, we stopped at a village called Metém,
where Assad had friends, and where we were obliged to go through the
ceremony of drinking coffee, losing much time thereby. Then a new
discussion arose as to our road, somebody having just come in from Ezrak,
who announced that the Sirhán were camped there, and the Sirhán we knew
were friendly with Huseyn el-Atrash. Assad, and Salman his companion,
refused in consequence to go that way, and were for stopping the night at
Metém to think over it; but this we would not listen to. We were
determined to go somewhere, and if not to Ezrak then by some other route
to Kâf. Somebody suggested El Kreysheh, who was said to be in the Wady
er-Rajel, and others the Sirdíeh, who were camped a day’s journey towards
the east. It was difficult to decide; but at the well of the village
while we were watering our animals, we met a man and his wife, who told
us they knew where to find the Sirdíeh, and were themselves on their way
to join them. So this decided us, and we determined on the Sirdíeh. The
Sirdíeh are friends of Huseyn’s, and our Druse guides made no objection
to going that way; Awwad the Shammari declared also that it was all
right. Accordingly we left the Ezrak road, and striking off to the east,
soon found ourselves out of the range of cultivation. Metém is to be the
last village we shall see, and the desert is now before us all the way to
Nejd.
We are encamped at the edge of a plateau, from which there is an immense
prospect of hill and plain, and Wilfrid has been very busy making out a
rough chart of the different landmarks, as they may be useful to-morrow
if we should happen to miss our way. The man and woman we met at the
well are with us, and know the different points by name. Awwad too,
declares he knows every part of the desert between this and Kâf and he
has pointed out a tell, south-east by south, beyond which it lies. The
Druses, like townsmen, are already nervous at the sight of the desert,
and angry with us for camping away from villages and tents. Our camp is
well concealed in an old volcanic crater, where also we are sheltered
from the wind, which is very cold. There is a spring just below called
Ain el-Ghiaour (the infidel’s spring); according to the Druses, the scene
of a great battle fought by the Arabs of the first invasion, in which
they routed the Christians. At that time all the country we have been
passing through, and perhaps the broken ground in front of us, was well
inhabited; and there is a tell with a ruined convent on it not far off to
the north-west, still known as Ed Deyr. There is capital pasture here,
_rotha_, which the camels have been making the most of. We too have
dined, and now all is quiet, and the sky is full of stars. We have been
sitting on the edge of the crater talking over plans for to-morrow. The
Sirdíeh, it now appears, are at a _khabra_ or pool, called Shubboitia,
which we could see before the sun set like a yellow line far away to the
northeast, too far out of our road for us to go there. Awwad is in
favour of going straight to Kâf and taking our chance of what Arabs we
may meet. El Kreysheh is somewhere in front of us, and so they say is
Ibn Majil, the Akid of the Roala, whom we met last year. At any rate, we
must take a good supply of water with us, and go forward at the first
streak of dawn.
_December_ 23.—As soon as it was light we climbed up to the top of the
crater and looked over the plain. It was a wonderful sight with its
broken tells and strange chaotic wadys, all black with volcanic boulders,
looking blacker still against the yellow morning sky. There is always
something mysterious about a great plain, and especially such a plain as
this, where Europeans, one may say, have never been, and which even the
people of the Hauran know little of. Besides, it seems to have had a
history if only in the days of Og, king of Basan. But it was not to look
at the view or for any romantic reason that we had come there; only to
examine the country before us and see if we could discover traces of Arab
encampments. After looking carefully all round we at last made out a
thin column of smoke to the northeast, ten or twelve miles away, and
another nearly due east. The first must be the Sirdíeh, the second
perhaps the Kreysheh. Satisfied with this we returned to our party, who
were just setting the camels in motion, and as the sun rose we began our
march.
We have been stumbling about all day among the boulders of the Harra,
following little tracks just wide enough for the camels to get along, and
making a great circuit in order to find ourselves at last barely twelve
miles from where we began. At first we kept company with our new
acquaintances, the people going to the Sirdíeh, but when we had arrived
at the foot of the hills we found them turning away to the north, and so
wished them good-bye, much to the Druses’ disgust, who did not at all
relish our wild-goose chase of the Kreysheh, and still less the idea of
going straight to Kâf. They followed, however, when they found that we
would listen to no reason, and I must say good-humouredly. One great
charm of the Arab character is that it bears no malice, even about
trifles. Sulkiness is very rare with them. They did not pretend to know
much of the country, so we made Awwad lead the way. Going straight was
out of the question, for the Harra is an impracticable country, not only
for camels but for horses, on account of the boulders, except just where
the paths lead. We had a bleak desolate ride, for a cold wind had sprung
up in our faces with a decided touch of winter. This country must be a
furnace, however, in summer with its polished black stones. I noticed
that these were very regularly weathered; one side, that towards the
north, being grey with a sort of lichen, so that as we rode past they
seemed to change colour continually. There was very little sign of life
in this region, only a few small birds, and no trace of inhabitants or of
any recent passers by. The tracks followed generally the beds of wadys,
and wandered on without any particular aim or direction. They looked
like the paths made by sheep or camels, only that the stones were so big
it seemed impossible that the mere passage of animals could have ever
made them. On the whole I think they must be artificial, made by
shepherds in very ancient times for their flocks. In the spring, we are
told, the whole of this Harra is excellent grazing ground. It is a
curious thing that every here and there in the hollows there is a space
free from stones where water lies after rain, forming a pool. Why are
there no stones there? The soil is a dry clay with a highly glazed
surface cracked into very regular squares, so glazed indeed that even
close by it has the appearance of water, reflecting the light of the sky.
This, no doubt, is the way some of the curious mirage effects are
produced in the desert, for it is to be noticed that the most perfect
delusions are found just in places where one would naturally expect to
find water—that is, where water has been.
At half-past twelve, we came suddenly on a level bit of open ground,
which we took at first for one of these khabras, but found it to be part
of a long wady running north and south, with a very distinct watercourse
in the middle, with tamarisk bushes, and patches of fresh grass, showing
that water had run down it not long ago. Both Awwad and the Druses
recognised this as the Wady-er-Rajel, where the Kreysheh were reported to
be encamped, and the only question was, whether to turn up or down it.
While we were debating, however, a flock of sheep was sighted, and
presently a boy, who told us he was a Sirdíeh, but that the Kreysheh were
only a couple of hours further down the valley. This just suited, as it
was exactly in the right direction for us, and we are now at Ali
el-Kreysheh’s camp, and being hospitably entertained by a young relation
in the Sheykh’s absence. Ali is away at Mezárib with fifty horsemen, to
escort the Jerdeh on their way to Maan.
We have had some singing to-night, and playing of the rebab. Among the
songs I was pleased to recognise an old Shammar ballad about Abdul Kerim
and the man who had no mare.
_December_ 24.—The Kreysheh, at whose camp we now are, belong to the Beni
Sokkhr, a large, but not very warlike tribe, which occupies the whole of
the district from the pilgrim road eastwards to the extreme edge of the
Harra, throughout a wilderness of stones. To this they are said to owe
their name of Beni Sokkhr, children of the rocks; and they assure us that
they have lived in the Harra “from all time.” They do not come from
Nejd, they say, like the Ánazeh, but are Shimali or Northern Arabs. We
were told the names of ten divisions into which the Beni Sokkhr have
ramified, each owning a separate Sheykh, though nominally subject to
Fendi el-Faiz, or rather his son Sóttan, for Fendi is old and has given
up practical authority. These divisions are probably nothing more than
groups of the tribe, as their names are those of their Sheykhs, the
principal being Sóttan, and next to him El Kreysheh, and next again Ed
Dreybi ibn Zebbed. The Kreysheh have camels as well as sheep, and seem
pretty well off; but they have no great number of mares, and those not of
the best type. They keep hawks and greyhounds.
They have given us news of the Roala. Ibn Majil, whom we met last year
at Sotamm Ibn Shaalan’s, and who took our side in the negotiations for
peace with the Sebaa, has now separated from Sotamm, and is somewhere
down by Jôf, so perhaps we may meet him; while Sotamm has just marched
north again to attack the Welled Ali. The Kreysheh are friends with Ibn
Majil, but at war with Sotamm, another curious instance of the
inconsistencies of Bedouin politics. These are, indeed, as changing as
the clouds in the sky, and transform themselves so rapidly, that in
Desert history, if it were written, ten years would comprise as much
incident as a century in Europe.
While negotiations were going on about arrangements for our further
progress, I went to call on Ali el-Kreysheh’s wives. There are two of
them, Hazna and Fassal; but I only saw the latter, who had the women’s
tent to herself with her attendants and three children, two little boys
and a girl, remarkably dirty, and (what is rare among Bedouins) suffering
from sore eyes. Fassal was plain and uninteresting but sensible, and I
daresay has the advantage over Hazna, who, poor thing, is childless. She
told me she was from a section of the tribe further north, and took an
interest in Damascus, asking about the new Valy as well as about Mohammed
ibn Smeyr, who is the great name in these parts. She seemed much pleased
with the box of sugar-plums I gave her, and when I went away followed me
as far as the end of the tent ropes invoking blessings on my head.
I found our own tents down and everything ready for a start; for an
arrangement had been come to with the young man representing our host,
that we were to have a _zellem_ (person) to go with us as far as Kâf for
the sum of ten mejidies (forty shillings). Assad and Salman were just
saying good-bye, for they had to go back to Melakh. They were made very
happy with a Turkish pound apiece, and Assad has left us his greyhound,
the black and tan dog, who whined piteously when his master went away. I
like the dog for this.
As we left the Kreysheh camp a bitter wind sprang up from the
west-south-west, and continued all day long, chilling us, in spite of all
the furs and cloaks we could put on, to the bone. Our course lay nearly
across it south-south-east. We are out of the hills now in a nearly
level plain still covered with the black stones. The only variety during
the day was when we came to a large khabra (Khabra-el-Gurrthi), a dreary
flat of dried up clay and sand which we took two hours to cross, though
we went at the camels’ best pace. The wind drove great clouds of sand
across it, making it one of the dreariest places I ever saw. We were all
too cold for much talking, and sat huddled up on our delúls with our
backs to the wind, and our heads wrapped up in our cloaks. We met no one
all day long, except one string of a dozen camels driven by two very
wild-looking Arabs who told us they were Shesharât, and nothing living
except a hare which got up among the stones, and which the dogs coursed
for some hundreds of yards, over ground which would have broken every
bone of an English greyhound, apparently without hurting themselves.
About two o’clock we came, to our great delight, upon the Wady er-Rajel
again, an angle of whose course we had been cutting off. Here we found
beautiful soft ground and grass and pools of water, for this wady had
running water in it last month, and is not quite drunk up yet. The
pasture was too good to be passed, so here we remain for the night. Just
as we were unloading, a little troop of gazelles looked over the edge of
the wady, perhaps come for water, and Mohammed set off in pursuit with a
Winchester rifle. We heard him fire all the twelve shots one after the
other, but he came back empty-handed. Our tent is set under the lee of a
rough wall of loose stones, such as are set up by the shepherds as a
shelter for their flocks. The wind still blows tempestuously, and it is
cold as a Christmas Eve need be. But Hanna has made us a capital curry,
which with soup and burghul and a plum-pudding from a tin, makes not a
bad dinner, while Abdallah has distinguished himself baking bread, and
Awwad roasting coffee.
_Wednesday_, _December_ 25.—Christmas Day. We are out of the Harra at
last, and on open ground. That black wilderness had become like a
nightmare with its horrible boulders and little tortuous paths, which
prevented the camels from doing more than about two miles an hour. Now
we are able to push on at three, or three and a quarter.
After floundering down the wady for half an hour, we came to some
splendid pools in a narrow cleft of rock, where we stopped to take in
water. We have been very fortunate in such a season as this to find the
Wady er-Rajel full. The rain which filled it must have been some
isolated waterspout on the eastern slope of Jebel Hauran, for not a drop
fell anywhere else; and there is no autumn grass except just along its
edge. It is rapidly drying, or rather being drunk up, and the little
vegetation is very closely eaten down. In the smaller pools there is a
very distinct flavour of sheep and camels in the water; but at the pools
we came to this morning it is still pure. The Kreysheh have been all up
this valley, eating and drinking their way, and leaving not a blade they
could help behind them, and we have come upon numerous tracks of their
cattle. Every here and there we have passed the traces of their camps,
stones set in line on three sides of a square; one we saw had been only
just deserted, and we put up a number of vultures and ravens from the
fresh carcase of a camel lying by it. There crossed it also the
footprint of a horse, which brought on the usual talk of ghazús and
marauders, in which our people delight. They, however, have settled it
among them to their satisfaction, that such accidents as meeting robbers
or people of a hostile tribe are “min Allah” (from God), to be classed
with the rain and fine weather, and sickness and good health, all which
things the Bedouins consider fortuitous.
Having filled our goat skins, we left the Wady er-Rajel for good, and are
to come across no more water now till we get to Kâf. The valley takes a
turn here to the west before it reaches the Wady Sirhán, and would
therefore be out of our road. We have been crossing some rolling downs
covered with light flinty gravel, a delightful change from the Harra, and
have had a gallop or two after the gazelles, which now and then came in
sight. We thought too of our Christmas dinner, and how glad we should be
to get some addition to the rice, which was all we had; but neither
greyhounds nor mares were in good enough condition to run down their
quarry. Once we made a rather successful stalk, and a charge in among a
small herd, but the dogs could not get hold of anything, and, though
several shots were fired, nothing came to bag. Then we had a long gallop
after Sayad, the black and tan greyhound, who went on after the gazelles
for a good two miles, so that we were afraid of losing him; and then
another long gallop to get back to our camels. This time, we had been
three quarters of an hour away from them, and we found our people all
much alarmed, Abdallah rather angry at our going so far, for Mohammed was
with us. He was perfectly in the right, and we were to blame, for we are
on a serious journey not a sporting tour; and to say nothing of danger
from enemies, there is always a certain risk of missing one another in a
country like this where camels leave no track behind them. A turn to
right or left out of the direct line and a fold in the ground, and they
are lost. So we apologised, and promised to do so again no more. We
were, however, in a most unexpected manner provided with dinner; for
while we were still talking, behold a grazing camel all alone on the
plain, not a mile away; when with a general shout of “a prize,” the whole
party on horseback and on foot rushed in pursuit. We were naturally the
first up, and drove the animal at a canter to the others. The camel was
a young one of last spring, in good condition, and at the sight tears
rushed into Hanna’s eyes—tears of hunger, not of pity. I am afraid
indeed that none of the party had much thought of pity, and the scene
caused me mixed feelings of compassion for the poor victim, and disgust
at ourselves who were waiting to prey upon it. No question was raised as
to ownership; camels found astray in desert places were by acclamation
declared the property of the first comer. We were in fact a ghazú, and
this was our lawful prize. So the poor little camel was driven on before
us.
Dinner is thus secured, and I must see what else can be arranged in
honour of the occasion.
_December_ 26.—Mohammed, Abdallah, Awwad, the two Ibrahims and Hanna, all
of them, spent the evening in feasting and ate up the whole of the camel
except the short ribs, which were set before us, and the shoulders which
were kept for to-day. They divided among them the labour of killing,
skinning and quartering, and cooking it, for all were equally ready to
lend a hand to the work. People talk sometimes of camel meat, as if it
were something not only unpalatable, but offensive. But it is in reality
very good; when young it resembles mutton, even when old it is only
tough, and never has any unpleasant taste as far as my experience goes;
indeed if served up without the bones it could hardly be distinguished
from mutton.
The servants having thus feasted were all soon sound asleep, and even
when suddenly, between two and three in the morning, the wind rose with a
deafening noise, they did not wake, not till their tent blew down upon
them as ours did upon us. We were awake and might have kept our tent
standing had we not been too lazy to get up and drive in the pegs. It
was too late when the tent had fallen on us to do anything but lie as
well as we could beneath the ruins and wait for daylight. Fortunately
the main pegs had not drawn, and the sand, for this hurricane was a sand
storm, soon covered over the edges of the fallen tent, and no further
damage was done. In the morning, the servants proposed staying where we
were; but we would not hear of this, as we had water for only two days,
and it would have been folly to dawdle, so after rubbing the sand out of
or rather into our eyes, we set to work packing and loading. The wind
continued violent and bitterly cold, and carried a great deal of sand
with it. It came from the west-south-west. We had camped under shelter
at a small tell close to the Tell Guteyfi, which proved to be the same as
one pointed out to us by Awwad from Ain el-Giaour, and once beyond it, we
found ourselves on a perfectly open bit of plain, exposed to the full
fury of the gale, now more violent than ever. Sand storms are evidently
common here, for the Tell Guteyfi, which is of black volcanic boulders
like the Harra, is half smothered in sand. We saw it looming near us in
the thick air, and soon after were almost hidden from each other in the
increasing darkness. The sun shone feebly at intervals through the
driving sand, but it was all we could do to keep the caravan together,
and not lose sight of each other. At one moment we had all to stop and
turn tail to the wind, covering our eyes and heads with our cloaks,
waiting till the burst was over. Nothing could have faced it. Still we
were far from having any idea of danger, for there really is none in
these storms, and had plenty of time to notice how very picturesque the
situation was, the camels driven along at speed, all huddled together for
protection, with their long necks stretched out, and heads low, tags and
ropes flying, and the men’s cloaks streaming in the wind, all seen
through the yellow haze of sand which made them look as though walking in
the air. The beasts looked gigantic yet helpless, like antediluvian
creatures overwhelmed in a flood. Still, as I said, there was no danger,
for the wind was steady in its direction, and our course was directly
across it—that we knew—and by patiently struggling on, we managed to get
over a deal of ground. Suddenly the sandy plain over which we were
travelling, seemed to sink away in front of us, and at the bottom of a
steep dip we could see clumps of tamarisk looming through the storm. We
knew that a refuge was at hand.
[Picture: Sand Storm in the Wady Er-Rajel]
Here then we are comfortably housed under one of these bushes, where
there is a delightful lull. The soil is all deep sand, white as snow,
and the tent which we have rigged up is already half buried in it, so
that we might imagine ourselves at home snowed up on Boxing Day. We have
made a fire of tarfa sticks inside the tent, and have been enjoying
Hanna’s delicious coffee. Where is one ever so much at home as in one’s
own tent? Awwad surprised us very much to-day by objecting, when we
proposed to pitch the tent, that it would be impossible to do so in the
sand. If Mohammed or any of the townspeople had done so it would have
been natural, but Awwad is a Bedouin born, and must have pitched camp
hundreds of times in the Nefúd. Yet he had never heard of burying a tent
peg.
One misfortune has happened in the storm. The old rogue of a camel we
bought at Mezárib, who has been trying all along to get back to his
family, has given us the slip. Taking advantage of the darkness, and
knowing that the wind would obliterate his track at once, he decamped as
soon as unloaded, and is gone. Mohammed and Awwad, each on a delúl, are
scouring the country, but without a chance of finding him; for at best
they can only see things a hundred yards off, and he was not missed for
the first half hour. Mohammed has vowed to kill a lamb, but I fear that
will do no good.
_December_ 27.—We have arrived at Kâf after a long march, twenty-seven or
twenty-eight miles. Course about south-east!
In the night a little rain fell, and the wind moderated. At eight
o’clock we started, crossing a wide plain of coarse sand interspersed
with low sandstone tells. At noon we came upon a well-marked track, the
road of the salt caravans between Bozra and Kâf, which, after crossing a
rather high ridge, brought us to a very curious valley; an offshoot, we
were told, of the Wady Sirhán. The geological formation of this is
singular; the crest of the ridge on either side the valley is of black
rock with detached stones of the same—then yellow sandstone, then another
black layer, then pure sand, then sand with isolated black stones, then a
calcareous deposit, and at the bottom chalk. The actual bed of the wady
is a fine white sand sprinkled over with tamarisk and guttub bushes. As
we were crossing this our dogs started a jerboa, and, little creature
though it is, it gave them much trouble to catch it. Its hops were
prodigious, and from side to side and backwards and forwards, so that the
dogs always ran over it, and snatching, always missed it; till at last,
as if by accident, it jumped into Shiekhah’s mouth. Abdallah and the
rest were very anxious to eat it, but it was so mauled as to be beyond
cooking. At three o’clock we crested another ridge, and from it suddenly
came in sight of the great Wady Sirhán, the object of so many of our
conjectures. It seems, however, to be no wady, but the bed of an ancient
sea. A little black dot on the edge of a _subbka_ or salt lake, now dry,
and just under a tall black tell, marked the oasis of Kâf, an
infinitesimal village of sixteen houses, and a palm garden of about an
acre.
I have had the misfortune to sprain my knee, an awkward accident, and
very annoying in the middle of a journey. My delúl, always a fidgety
animal, gave a bolt just as I was leaning over to arrange something on
the off side of the _shedád_, or saddle, and pitched me off. The pain is
indescribable, and I fear I shall be helplessly lame for some time to
come. But here we are at Kâf.
[Picture: Kâf]