ACROSS THE DESERT WITH SHE-IB
All that day we sat inside the tent amidst blinding sand. It was in vain
that we shut every curtain and flap. The whirling dust penetrated as if
by magic. We abstained from lunch in order to save food, and the only
break in the monotony of removing continual layers of sand from faces
and note-books was when a peg cracked under the strain and one side of
the tent flew up with a scream of flapping canvas, tearing up half a
dozen pegs with it. We used to go out half blinded by the force of the
gibli and knock them in again and take the opportunity of scanning the
distant rise for the prayed-for caravan. Once we counted eighteen camels
coming over the brow, and hope rose high; but, alas! they were only
grazing.
[Illustration: NOMAD TENTS NEAR JEDABIA]
[Illustration: OUR SOLDIER SLAVES AND THE GUIDE ABDULLAH]
“Allah will send the solution to the problem,” said Mohammed simply, and
he was right, for, towards evening, when the wind had dropped
considerably and we had gone down to the wadi to buy camel’s milk, which
I loved, but which Hassanein found too bitter, a small caravan of eight
camels laden with luggage for Jalo, accompanied by half a dozen Mojabras
returning to their homes after a shopping expedition in Jedabia, came
down the rise. The situation changed at once. These men brought much
news from the “belad” (village) we had left four days before. They knew
all about our caravan. “Inshallah! It will arrive in a day or two. When
we left, the men were buying their sugar and their jerds. But how is it
you have come so far? Your people expect you to be waiting just outside
Jedabia. They said to us, ‘If you meet them, treat them well for our
sakes, and the honour that you do them will be as if you had done it to
us.’” We told them about the spy. “He is one of our tribe,” they said
sadly. “It is a shame that he has set one foot outside the belad on this
errand. When we return to Jedabia we will surely spit upon him. Send him
to us now that we may take him on to Jalo with us!” We thought, however,
that the man would probably be safer with us!
[Illustration: WELL AT JEDABIA]
[Illustration: NOMAD ENCAMPMENTS ROUND JEDABIA]
It is a desert custom that when a caravan arrives at nightfall to find
another encamped before it, the first arrivals give dinner to the late-
comers. We were unable to do this because we had no food, so we could
send only apologies and greetings. Just as we had finished our meagre
supper of corned beef and rice, a messenger arrived from the hospitable
Mojabras bearing two immense basins of barley grain cooked with native
butter and pepper, with great cakes of hard sugar and actually a teapot.
The joy with which we ate the savoury mess can hardly be described, and
our retinue made relays of strong, bitter tea half-way into the night.
There was much visiting between the encampment and a chorus of “Keif
halak?” (How are you?) and “Taiyib” (Well) sounded constantly.
If two caravans meet coming from Jalo and Jedabia respectively, the
former exchanges dates for the latter’s tea and sugar. If any traveller
reaches a camp at night he is freely given food and tea and a rug by the
brushwood fire. Desert hospitality is amazing. Food and drink are always
offered. We were never allowed to buy camel’s milk. It was always given,
for were we not nomads like the desert men themselves? One never passes
a fire with two or three white-robed figures clustered round it without
being asked to sit down with them by the one expressive word “Fadhl!” It
is customary to say “Keif halak?” at least half a dozen times to each
individual, though the reply is always the same, “Taiyib.”
That night, as we all sat round a fire with a cold wind freezing our
backs, yet feeling happily satiated after our barley meal, the retinue
became rhetorical in its expressions of fidelity. The caravan had told
them that a motor had arrived from Zuetina the day after our flight, and
the town had instantly jumped to the conclusion that it was to take us
back forcibly. We were assured that the whole sympathy of Jedabia was
with us, that our opponents were very angry at our escape, but could do
nothing because they themselves had recommended us to the Sayed. I very
much doubted this latter statement and we determined to move on the
following afternoon if the caravan did not arrive in the morning. We
thought that we could get sufficient food for our men from the Mojabras
and repay them at Jalo if they would not take money. I felt sorry for
the spy. He evidently wished he had not meddled in the affair at all.
Farraj astonished us by suddenly rising to his feet and, with hands held
to heaven, calling Allah to witness that he would protect us to the last
drop of his blood. “Not even a thorn shall enter your sides,” he chanted
solemnly, and there was an awed hush after so mighty an oath.
Naturally our spy escaped in the night. Our retinue were as unpractical
as they were lazy. Therefore, when December 12 dawned, they were
extremely averse to any talk of starting. We explained to them with
infinite patience that in twenty-four hours our whereabouts, our plans,
our intentions, our very thoughts would be known in Jedabia. With the
faith of children they said, “The caravan will come to-day.” The ever-
kindly Mojabras had sent over two more vast bowls of a floury paste,
somewhat like macaroni, cooked in the same rancid butter, so, thoroughly
gorged, the retinue were prepared to await placidly the will of Allah!
We had packed up and hauled everything out of the tent by 7 A.M. At 11
there were still incessant councils round one or other of the fires. The
Mojabras were determined to come with us. “You are the guests of Sidi
Idris,” they said. Once more the holy letter was produced and kissed. We
had become used now to its magical effect. Apparently it would produce
anything but haste! The strangers acknowledged, however, that they had
not enough food for all our men, meaning, of course, that they could not
hope to supply large quantities three times a day. We could not hope to
make them ration it out in small portions, so we wanted to leave at
least one of the blacks to await the caravan and either hurry its
progress or send on a swift camel with provisions. There was instant
mutiny at the suggestion. The two Farraj refused to leave us. “We have
no authority over them,” said Mohammed without surprise. “Their
commandant would whip them, but what can we do?”
Further discussion seemed useless, so we went down to the wadi to buy
dates from a caravan that had come from Kufara. It was an amusing
instance of how news is carried in the Sahara. Before the question of
dates was raised at all we squatted solemnly in the sand opposite the
merchants from the far-off oasis, and Mohammed submitted to a perfect
inquisition on the state of affairs in Jedabia. Afterwards he propounded
his list of questions—what was the price of silk, of wool, of grain,
etc., in Kufara? What was the price of dates? “So much per ruba or so
much per oka?” they quoted, and for dates, “There is no price. They are
plentiful.” “Who did you meet on the way?” “What news of such and such a
family?” “One of their slaves has run away,” or “he has married another
wife,” and so on until all information was exhausted.
We actually left our low ridge above the wadi at 1.30, but we had ceased
to worry. The fatalism of the East had begun to grip us. We decided to
put our trust in Allah and join the caravan of She-ib and his kinsman,
Musa She-ib, merchants from Jalo who had sometimes travelled to Wadai, a
route that takes anything from forty-five to sixty days, with bales of
cotton stuffs, to return with ostrich feathers, ivory, camels and hides
for the markets of Kufara. We asked them how long it would take to reach
Jalo, and they replied, “There is no time. If you walk quickly you may
arrive the fifth day,” but evidently they had no intention of hurrying
themselves. They were a delightful party of six men, with eight heavily
laden camels and one or two foals clumsily trotting alongside.
We made quite an imposing caravan as we struck the track a little to the
east and the camels began to march together. It was headed by old She-
ib, sitting upright on the top of great green boxes of merchandise, a
rifle on his back, a huge revolver slung beside him in a scarlet
holster, his ebony face half-covered, against the dust, in the folds of
his white kufiya. Hassanein’s brilliant kufiya—orange, yellow and
emerald—made a gorgeous flash of colour on another camel and I followed,
huddled under the shrouding barracan, for I must not show my face to the
strange caravan. Thus fate played a new card and decided that we should
wander slowly south with the Mojabra merchants and learn yet another
phase of Beduin life.
Time forgetting and by time forgot, indifferent to the caravan of stores
that might or might not be following, we drifted incredibly slowly along
the vague track marked by occasional cairns of stones. The aspect of the
country had slightly changed since we left the wadi. It became
undulating, with a series of slight waves running from east to west,
while the vegetation grew scantier and scantier, till finally only a few
tufts of coarse grey bush a few inches high broke the wilderness of
sand. At 3 P.M. the undulating country lay behind us, and we were on an
absolutely flat plain. Two specks appeared in the distance to
materialise into a couple of travellers on camels. They paused to ask
our news and on hearing we were bound for Kufara they entrusted Yusuf
with a few mejidies to be paid to somebody at our destination. If he did
not get there himself, he was to hand the money on to another traveller.
This transaction was evidently a usual one and roused no comment.
She-ib decided to camp shortly after 3, for he observed a patch of
slightly thicker grazing away to the right of the track. Ten minutes
after the last camel had been barraked his men had made a wonderful
semicircular zariba of the boxes and sacks, with its back to the wind,
had spread rugs and blankets to form a most comfortable shelter, and
were busy making strong Arab tea. It was done with infinite swiftness
and deftness, while we were still struggling with the tent in a violent
north wind. The previous day the gibli had blown with a fairly high
temperature at midday. This morning the wind had been in the east,
swinging round to the north in the afternoon, yet the temperature at
noon had been nearly as high as on the previous day. Desert weather
seems to be quite illogical. The ground was so hard that we could not
drive in our tent pegs, so we half buried the camel saddles in stones
and tied the ropes to them. Then we were called to try our skill at a
shooting match with the Mojabras, who had set up a piece of wood at
fifty yards. My neat revolvers caused interest and amusement when
produced from under my huge hezaam, but they were scarcely appropriate.
Mohammed won the match and was loudly cheered. We had begun to feel some
affection for this tall, lean, hard-featured Beduin with his falcon’s
eyes and rare smile. We felt that he might prove a loyal ally, whereas
the plump Yusuf, with his round face and sleepy, narrow eyes, loose lips
and glib tongue, only thought of getting home as soon as possible.
Luckily for us the flight from Jedabia had been interpreted to mean a
political mission, and almost before we were out of sight of the town
the desert wireless proclaimed that we travelled on the business of Sidi
Idris. After the first day it was painfully obvious to us that only some
extraordinary intervention of fate would induce any one of our escort to
brave the dangers of the route from Jedabia to Kufara, so we encouraged
the belief in our mission by all means in our power. The Arab dearly
loves a secret. Mystery is the breath of his nostrils. Our escape at
midnight, the orders given to Yusuf and Mohammed at the last moment, our
frantic desire for speed, the spy who brought a letter from Jedabia in
twenty-four hours, the large caravan munificently fitted out by the
lavish generosity of Sayed Rida, all spoke to him of an important
secret, to be guarded with their lives and ours. We had ceased to be the
Sayed’s travelling guests whose mad whim to visit the sacred city should
be discouraged at all costs. We were rapidly becoming mysterious
messengers bearing sacred orders from their lord! Soon we should all
grumble together at the task that drove us forth in winter on such a
journey, but we should be suffering for the work of Sidi Idris es-
Senussi, and therefore for the will of Allah!
December 13 we rose at 7.30 under the impression that She-ib’s caravan
would take advantage of the cool morning to travel, but three hours
later we were still drinking tea inside the comfortable semicircle of
the merchant’s zariba. Beduin hospitality is always generous, but these
people overwhelmed us with kindness. That morning they sent us a basket
of nuts, followed by glasses of bitter tea. Hassanein went across to
their encampment to thank them and they insisted on his staying. I
joined them later, and the best red blanket was spread for me beside
She-ib. It is an erroneous impression in Europe that the veiled women of
the East are ill-treated and overworked. The Koran devotes half the
third sura to man’s behaviour towards women. Ask the Syrian woman if she
would lose her veil, and she will reply, “Not till the men are better
educated,” but the Beduin woman only hides her face before strange men.
With her own tribe she mingles freely, and the work is evenly shared.
Often with the caravan I tried to hold a tent pole or knock in a peg and
I was promptly told, “This is man’s work. Do not tire yourself, Sitt
Khadija.” Many times when old She-ib saw me resting at midday he would
say, “The Sitt Khadija is weary. Let us wait a little longer.” On the
other hand, the Moslem woman is expected to do all the work within the
tent. She should cook her menfolk’s meal and wash the dishes afterwards.
Luckily, by this time our food was so reduced that I lost no prestige by
my inability to cook more than damper bread, heavy and unleavened.
Tea-drinking is a ceremony which may last anything from one hour to
three. If one wishes to travel fast it can only be allowed at night, but
the Mojabras had no desire to hurry, so we lingered over the glasses
while their two servants and our blacks cooked relays of tea on hot
ashes. They fill half the teapot with sugar, another quarter with tea,
and then pour the water on top. They taste the sweet, strong beverage
half a dozen times, pouring it from one teapot to another, adding water
or re-boiling it till it suits them. Then it is drunk with as much noise
as possible to show appreciation. When the host thinks it is time to
finish the party, he adds mint to the teapot, and the guests take the
last sweet-scented cup as a sign of departure. Meanwhile they have
exchanged every form of gossip and told long, rambling tales with a
flavour of the Arabian Nights. Their courtesy to one another is amazing,
and it is an honest courtesy that expresses itself in deeds as well as
words. While Yusuf and Mohammed rarely addressed each other without the
respectful prefix of “Sidi” (my lord), they also warmly urged each other
to ride the only available camel at midday heat. Once Mohammed was
riding it, and he noticed Musa She-ib looked tired. “We share alike,” he
said. “What is ours is yours,” and scrambling down he insisted on the
Mojabra mounting.
It was a very friendly caravan that crawled south by short stages. Our
only troubles really were Yusuf’s laziness and the grumblings of the
blacks, who shirked even the lightest work. On the 13th we started at
9.30 and camped at 3.30, while the sun was yet hot, for we happened to
have arrived at a patch of coarse, odourless grass for the camels. At
noon the men had slipped away from the caravan one by one to prostrate
themselves with a murmured, “Bismillah arahman arahim.” Generally two of
them marched a couple of hundred yards ahead with their rifles ready,
but we saw nothing more exciting than a few distant gazelle. As soon as
we had unloaded the camels we all said our evening prayers, the “Fagr”
or fourth of the series. It still gave me much pain getting in and out
of my yellow shoe, but the fanaticism of the Senussi was a very strong
spur to the observance of every Moslem duty.
She-ib and his relations always insisted on helping us to put up the
tent. There used to be a regular little fight as to who should hammer in
the pegs, much to the delight of the lazy blacks. I remember that night
was the most perfect we had yet spent in the desert, windless and calm,
with a crescent moon and the strange translucent blue that you sometimes
get in the Sahara. Mournful, monotonous chants came from the friendly
encampment beside us and the wide, white desert, unbroken by ridge or
dune, spread all round us.
We had mounted slowly and imperceptibly from the Wadi Farig (empty
valley) to a low tableland with occasional ripples running east and west
and a few scattered sandhills with square tops. Just before we reached
Bir Rassam, the following day, the ripples became accentuated into
ridges and the country looked almost volcanic, for a series of high,
square hillocks appeared on our right with some sort of rock formation
on top.
We could easily have reached the wells on the evening of the 13th, but
our friends had their own settled ideas about camping and nothing would
change them. They wanted to spend the heat of the day at Rassam and
water at their leisure, so we were wakened at 5 A.M. on the 14th, and
were actually away by 6.15. It was a glorious morning, but, as usual,
chilly. Hassanein walked with old She-ib, who promptly quoted the Arab
proverb, “A man should not sleep on silk till he has walked on sand,”
but I rolled myself in every available blanket on the back of my jealous
camel, who divided his time between biting the rival males and amorous
assaults on the females!
Besides being cold, one had begun to feel extremely hungry! The
preceding day the ration had been two sardines and a cup of coffee for
breakfast, a handful of dates at noon and half a one-ration tin of meat
at night. That morning there had been no time for food, but the kindly
She-ib had brought me a delicious bowl of camel’s milk, still warm. I
would not have exchanged it for the cellar of the Ritz!
We had left the last vestige of fawny-yellow earth and grey scrub behind
us and as the strange square hillocks came in sight we trod the white
limestone that we had known in Jedabia. We looked right over the farther
edge of the low tableland and dropped gently to a plain with the deep
white sand of the southern deserts, tufted with great shrubs and bushes
of sweet-scented feathery vegetation and clumps of low palm foliage,
with here and there a solitary upright palm. There are three wells in
the neighbourhood of Bir Rassam, perennial springs, two of which have
brackish yet drinkable water, while the third, several kilometres
farther south, has terribly salt water.
As we approached the wells, about 9.15 A.M., streams of camels appeared
from all directions. Mohammed gazed at them with loving eyes. “The Zouia
are rich,” he said appreciatively; “look at the hundreds of their
beasts!” All that morning a crowd of camels, numbering several hundreds,
pressed round the well, together with some sheep and goats, but we
encamped under a mound of sand topped by a mass of palm scrub and in
rare shelter I prepared our frugal meal. The previous night and that
morning we had had no fuel for fire, so now it was a joy to make hot tea
and I was about to knead my heavy damper when Mighrib, the most
delightful of all the Mojabras, young and smiling, in his torn white
shirt which showed muscular brown arms and chest, assured me that he
could make a much better one. He took the dough from me and, after much
pommelling and baking, produced a charred and blackened plate-like
substance; but it was thinner than mine and crisper, so we ate it
thankfully with dates and nuts. Then we rolled ourselves in jerds and
slept till wakened by the postman from Kufara, who had heard at the well
of our connexion with Sayed Rida. He was an old, old man with beard as
white as his jerd, but he could accomplish the astounding feat _of going
several days_ without water, so about twice a year he travels on the
Senussi’s government business across the Libyan desert with one fast
camel and a couple of sacks of dates and grain!
Hassanein and Mohammed went back to the wells, after the camels had been
watered and the fanatis filled, to see if they could get milk and while
there they were severely cross-questioned by two stern-faced Beduins as
to whether we were going on Sayed Idris’s business. Was it in his
interests? Was it by his actual orders? Had we letters? And so on.
Hassanein asked them if they were sheikhs of tribes and when they
replied in the negative he said he could not show them the sacred
documents. Meanwhile, the Mojabra chief was being solemnly shaved by
Ahmed under the shadow of a palm. Half-way through the proceeding he
asked me for my small mirror and, evidently dissatisfied with his
enthusiastic but inexperienced barber, finished his toilet himself with
a pair of scissors as large as shears. After that they all came and
talked to me, and I unconsciously did good work by teasing Yusuf about
his laziness and saying he was only fit for a town life. “I have left
everything with the caravan,” he said. “So have we—seven big sacks full!
See, I have but one tobh and one barracan, and both are dirty.” This
seemed to be a new point of view for Yusuf, especially as the Mojabras
backed me up. “We have seen that they share everything they have with
you. What more do you want?” said She-ib. “Even now you are wearing the
Sitt’s coat.” Our retinue had complained bitterly of cold one night at
Wadi Farig, so we had lent them two fleece-lined waterproofs which we
had hidden in our bedding and they wore them day and night, even in the
fierce noon sun!
We departed leisurely at 3.30 P.M. and trekked through blinding, white
sand, soft and deep, till 8.30 P.M., but the last hour we went very
slow, as the grey brush appeared again and the camels grazed as they
walked. We passed a herd grazing and She-ib went to greet the owners,
encamped in a zariba of piled luggage, and to drink strong tea. We
camped under some huge grey bushes with a wonderfully sweet scent and
ate the rest of Mighrib’s black damper, with camel’s milk and a half-
ration of meat, while another marvellous sunset painted feathers of
flame and rose below the silver sickle moon.
We used to shut the tent flaps after our evening meal to write our
diaries and make our simple route maps, for if we pulled out note-books
and pencil in the daytime it caused great suspicion. We had made plans
in England, while lunching in the oriental splendour of Claridge’s, to
do a little survey work in Libya, but we had not counted with the
fanaticism of the Senussi. It seems to me now that we were mad to
imagine that a Christian could show his or her face beyond Jedabia, in a
land where it is every man’s sacred duty to kill the Nasrani. True, the
mental atmosphere had changed since the first day out, when, if we
carelessly asked the name of any tribe or district, we were looked upon
as spies. At our first camp I told one of the blacks to fetch me a
camel, whereupon he turned to his fellow-soldier exclaiming, “Are we to
be ordered about by a cursed Christian woman? One bullet and we will
send her back to her Christian country!”
After that their attitude had changed. “The ways of Allah are strange,”
they said, “for she is in truth a Moslem.” Still, the general
friendliness did not extend to instruments or diaries. “Why do you need
a compass?” asked Yusuf. “We know the road as we know our own hearts.”
We took the hint and hid our compasses under the voluminous folds of our
native dress, studying them only in secret. The barometer amused them
because it showed what the weather was like, so the actual retinue did
not mind its occasional presence outside our tent, but it had to be
concealed from all visitors. A theodolite would have been an absolute
impossibility. Anything that suggested map-making was abhorrent to our
guides. “We carry the road in our heads,” they said. I dared not even
write an ordinary diary in public unless I could pretend it was a
letter!
Gradually we drew them on to talk about routes and places with rather
less suspicion, but for a long time it was a dangerous subject and, even
when we had more or less won their confidence, we had to treat their
replies concerning names and positions exceedingly casually. To have
made an instant note of a name would have roused sharp suspicion. Before
we could get real information from them we had to destroy their original
idea that we were travelling for our own pleasure and laboriously build
up, word by word, deed by deed, a wholly new situation—that we had been
sent, much against our will, by Sayed Idris on a mission so secret and
important that it justified our midnight flight and the hardships of an
almost intolerable journey.
December 15 saw us on our way by 7.30 A.M. after a troubled packing in
the teeth of a sharp gale. The camels ran round in circles and upset
their loads and a little of our precious water dribbled out of the
fanatis. Bir Rassam is the last good well on the way to Aujela. Three
long waterless days lay before us and the blacks were horribly careless.
We ourselves used only a quart of water each per day. Since we left Wadi
Farig our daily ablution consisted merely of washing hands and face
every evening in an inch of muddy water! After a week one got used to
never washing, and by the time we reached Aujela we had forgotten even
to feel dirty! It became a competition who could use least water and so
prepare for the deadly Kufara route with its one well in twelve hard
days.
December 15 provided us with few incidents. We did a dreary seven hours’
riding with a cold south wind blowing straight in our faces. We wrapped
our jerds and blankets round us and tried to pretend we were not hungry
after a lunch of five malted milk tablets. We passed a camp of Mojabras
who were resting for an hour at midday while their camels grazed and, as
I hid my face in my barracan and urged on my camel, Hassanein went with
She-ib and Mohammed to greet them. When he rejoined me twenty minutes
later I asked him with primitive fierceness, “Did they give you tea?”
before I realised to what ridiculous depths hunger drives one! He looked
at me with wan blankness. “No luck,” he said grimly; “but they asked us
to wait for them at sunset.”
The one cheerful moment was when, about 2 P.M., I produced a thermos
flask and offered each of She-ib’s caravan a mouthful of hot tea. “There
is no fire,” said the old man. “We cannot stop to make one.” It was
Hassanein’s greatest triumph. I had fought against bringing that huge
flask. It was bulky, heavy and, of course, it had no case or strap. It
was his pet possession, however, and though I firmly discarded it half a
dozen times, it always reappeared. Now Musa She-ib drank from it,
amazed. “But where is the fire?” he asked; and, lest we should be shot
as magicians, we instantly entered into intricate explanations as to the
making of a thermos.
We met but one traveller on that cold, dusty day. “Now for our
newspaper,” said Hassanein. “It is rather a late edition.” But the man
was devoid of news save that a caravan might possibly be starting from
Jalo for Wadai within a week or two. As for our own caravan, the
Mojabras, who proposed to join us that night, had made a quick journey
from Jedabia, leaving on the morning of the 12th, three days after She-
ib. They told us our men were still buying “necessities,” but proposed
to start next day. From that moment I think we mutually decided against
putting any faith in their arrival. The behaviour of the two blacks had
made us realise the danger of being at the mercy of a dozen such
creatures for thirteen days, beyond reach of any human aid. If the water
ran short they would certainly steal ours. In order to be able to over-
eat they would probably overload the camels. They would refuse to start
early or ride hard. Consequently the perils of the waterless seven days,
after which time the camels begin to get tired, would become
insuperable. We began planning to leave Jalo before them, taking only
Mohammed and Yusuf and a couple of reliable guides.
The last hour of the day’s march is generally the most cheerful, for
everybody is in a hurry to reach camp, and it is a curious fact that
camels walk more quickly and straighter to the sound of singing.
Therefore the blacks and She-ib’s drivers used to chant wild melodies of
love and prowess till even my great blond beast forgot his amorous
gurglings and kept his nose in a bee-line for the horizon. That
particular day we had ridden due south across rolling sandy country
without much vegetation except where the sudden square hills and mounds
appeared on our left at Bir Mareg, some 18 kilometres from Rassam. The
well holds only salt, undrinkable water, but around it there is about a
mile of rough scrub with large bushes of the scented furze which had
perfumed our sleep the preceding night. On the only maps I have seen a
green wadi is marked running the whole way from Rassam to Aujela, but it
exists only in the imagination of the chart-maker. In reality there is
no trace of valley or of verdure.
Across rolling white sand we rode till 3 P.M., under a sandy rock a few
hundred yards from a square hill called Arida. We camped by the last
patch of rare fuel. The south wind rose in the night and added more sand
to ourselves and our surroundings. The tent pegs on one side blew up and
we crawled out in murky darkness to knock them in again.
December 16 saw us started by 7.30, for the Farraj had succeeded in
upsetting one of the fanatis and old She-ib was wisely frightened about
our water supply. Feeling that a certain amount of sympathy now existed
between ourselves and our retinue, we tried the passometer for the first
time that day. The nervous “naga” ridden by Hassanein objected strongly
and, as she always progressed in circles, she was not of much use. My
stately beast never altered his step except to bite one of the other
animals and after a few furious stamps he submitted to the strap across
his knee, but the labour of keeping him absolutely straight for eight
hours on end was very trying. However, the instrument measured fairly
accurately, and after an eight hours’ march it gave us 36 kilometres.
[Illustration: SAYED RIDA ES SENUSSI]
There is no one track from Jedabia to Aujela. The distance as the crow
flies is about 220 kilometres. There is a main route as far as Wadi
Farig. Thereafter one may wander south anywhere on a stretch some ten
miles broad. We travelled on the route which our friends considered
provided the best fuel and grass, but it was the least frequented and,
therefore, the most dangerous. “No one comes by this track without fear
of a battle,” said the delightful Mighrib, and hardly half an hour later
a party of eight men, without camels, six blacks and two Arabs, appeared
from the sand mounds. “Dersalaam! We are going to be attacked,” said
She-ib with calm interest. Any party of men without camels is looked
upon with suspicion in the desert. Thus travel the robber bands in order
to be able to scatter quickly. “Some of them will come up and talk to
us. Their friends will be hidden behind those mounds. They will fire
into the air to attract our attention and then the people who are
talking to us will attack us. If they kill us they will take the
caravan.” The blacks cheered up at once. The prospect of a fight always
stimulated them. Everybody pulled out a rifle, but evidently the display
of force or the Sudanese intimidated the mysterious party, for they
suddenly sheered off without any salutation and vanished as suddenly as
they had appeared.
[Illustration: THE AUTHOR IN BEDUIN DRESS]
It is curious the fear with which the Beduins regard the black slaves
who are sent from the Sudan as boys of eight or ten and who are trained
as soldiers by the Senussi family. They are more brutes than men. I have
seen sheer murder in the eyes of the toothless Farraj when I refused him
extra sugar, yet they are courageous and faithful to their masters. A
good black slave like Ali, our beloved cook at Jedabia, is worth his
weight in gold. There was much difference of character between the
Farrajes. One had a square, bestial face with a few broken yellow teeth.
He was a grumbler and infinitely lazy, shirking all work, stealing
everything he could lay his hands on. The other was big, brutal and
stupid with something of the nature of a kindly bulldog. He would
occasionally return us dates or flour, saying, “We have enough. Why do
you not eat yourselves?” We thought he might be turned into a good
servant eventually, for he did not mind cooking and washing up. The
point of view of both was that they were soldiers and not servants. They
were prepared to fight, but not to work. As a matter of fact a caravan
guarded by blacks is rarely attacked, as the Beduins know it will
generally be defended to the last inch.
When first the rumour spread through Jedabia that a rich woman was
travelling into the interior and a guard of sorts became necessary,
Sayed Rida instantly offered some of his soldier slaves. Not till after
we left the little mud belad on the edge of the world did we grasp all
the threads of the situation we left behind. It had been a cunning woof
of plot and counter-plot from the moment when the aged ekhwan, Haji
Fetater, had vowed on the “Fatha” to take the Englishwoman safely to the
Holy Oasis, to the night of our desperate flight without other guard
than Mohammed and Yusuf. From the very day we first spoke tentatively of
our journey among the Ulema of Jedabia, one ekhwan, fanatical and
terrorstricken, had been strongly opposed to it. He successfully
dissuaded Haji Fetater from accompanying us. “You are too old,” he said.
“You will die on the road. Where is your dignity? Is this travelling
with a Nasrani to be your last action on earth? Heaven forbid!” As the
ancient man was over eighty we were not sorry to hear of his change of
front.
Another ekhwan was suggested, but as he asked for forty men to protect
us, among whom only ten were to be blacks, our suspicions were aroused
and we refused his company. We learned afterwards that, believing the
bazaar rumour about our wealth, he had planned to kill us in the desert,
seize our money and return sorrowfully, saying that a vast force of Tebu
spearmen had attacked us, that he had defended us gallantly, but that we
and all the blacks had been killed. This because he _knew_ that the
Sudanese would fulfil the orders given by their master the Sayed and
protect us to the last. There is always faint friction between these
black warrior slaves and the Arabs. They could never combine. For this
reason the crafty ekhwan decided that his force must be large enough to
murder the soldiers as well as us. The proportion of Beduin to Sudanese
shows his high opinion of the latter’s value. Their ruthlessness is
encouraged by every means, even by brutal punishment. If a soldier
disobeys an order he is flogged or his hand is cut off!
December 16 was enlivened by Mohammed’s marriage prospects. One Omar,
owner of two or three camels, a one-eyed creature of hideous and
ferocious aspect, was travelling with She-ib’s caravan. He was reputed
to have a very beautiful sister. Mohammed was thrilled. He made discreet
inquiries and finally offered to marry the girl on his return journey.
Mohammed was a big man in the eyes of the Beduin. He enjoyed the
confidence of the Sayed and, moreover, he was tall and straight and
clean of limb, a fine lean Arab with pride of race and tradition written
all over him. Omar accepted the suitor at once and three camels were
agreed upon as the dowry to be paid by the bridegroom to the bride’s
father. Thereafter everyone made plans for marrying, mostly for the
third and fourth time. Hassanein heard there were slaves to be bought at
Kufara and he instantly decided to add a beautiful one to his
possessions when we reached our far-off goal.
There was one member of the caravan who took no part in the plans. For
five days he had plodded along with the party, singing and talking
cheerfully, doing his share of the work, and we never guessed that he
was different from the rest till Mohammed, in his excess of matrimonial
enthusiasm, let go the camel he was leading and called out, “Ya Amma!
Imsikhu!” (Thou blind one! Catch him!) Unfalteringly the sightless boy
caught the beast. It was most extraordinary. Thereafter I watched him
carefully. I saw him driving camels in the right direction. He measured
distance much better than the others. He was more accurate in his
judgment of time. He reminded me of the famous mediæval Arabian Bashar,
the blind poet of Aleppo, who, arriving in a certain city, was told to
bend his head in one of the streets as a beam was stretched across it
from one house to another. Ten years later he rode into the same town,
and his companions were surprised because he bowed low in the middle of
an empty road. “Is the beam still here?” he asked.
The Beduins have no idea of distance. “How many hours is it to Aujela?”
one asked. “There are no hours in the desert,” they replied. “We do not
know them.” “Are there days in the desert?” “Yes, there are days. If you
walk quickly it is one thing. If you do not let yourself out, it is
another thing.” The difficulty in measuring by day is that, except on
the big caravan routes, each man’s estimate of distance varies according
to his energy. The whole life of a Beduin is reduced to the simplest
possible effect. He uses very few words. The same verb has a dozen
meanings. For instance, “Shil” means anything from “take away, pick up,
carry, put on, throw away, to pack, unpack, drop, lose,” etc. “Akkal”
should mean to eat food, but when two camels fought hideously Mohammed
said, “They are eating each other.” Desert Arabs have no names for
plants or flowers that they see each day. I asked about a huge, feathery
tree something like a coromandel which first made its appearance at
Sawami and I was told, “It has no name. It is for making houses and
firewood.”
At 3.30 P.M. we were still more than a day’s march from Aujela and our
water was running out owing to the carelessness of the blacks. Grave
colloquy followed. We were relieved to see that even the lazy Yusuf
grasped the seriousness of the situation. We had two single-ration tins
left and about two pounds of flour and one pound of macaroni. It was
decided that we should camp for a couple of hours, in order to rest
after our three hours’ riding, and then push on by starlight. We gave
half the food to our retinue with the last morsels of sugar and made
ourselves coffee on a tiny fire in a hole scooped in the ground. Earlier
in the day we had collected wood from the last patch of scrub that we
passed and loaded it on one of the camels. We hated opening the last
tin, but we knew that we must keep the cereals for the men’s breakfast
next day. We had had nothing to eat all day except a few dates and a
small bowl of camel’s milk which the adorable She-ib gave me at sunrise.
I shall always remember the dear old man’s twisted smile. “When you are
happy I am happy,” he said. “For the honour of the Sayed we would carry
you on our heads!” Luckily it was a glorious night. At 5 P.M. we said
our sunset prayers and to the usual formalities I added a very
passionate supplication that we might reach Aujela on the morrow. I
should never have believed it possible for our indolent retinue to have
collected so much energy. As the evening star rose red above the horizon
the camels were loaded and at 5.30 we set off under a crescent moon in a
vivid starry sky. A caravan always marches better at night. The camels
cannot see to graze. It is cold and the men step out briskly, singing
continual wild songs and urging on their beasts by strange shouts and
yells. “Thou beautiful one, walk on!” “Let yourself out, for soon you
will have rest!” “Be patient, thou strong heart, do not stumble!” or
else a monotonous, repetitive chorus, “Shey latif! Shey latif!” (A
pleasant thing), “Ma salaam!” If one person fall silent for more than a
minute he is urged by name to let his voice be heard. So in ever-
increasing cold, to the accompaniment of chants and shouts, we marched
for three and a half hours, by which time She-ib considered it was safe
to camp, for we were within a day’s journey of Aujela.
A few sandy mounds broke the surface of the vast plain. In a white
starlight, clear and cold, with the rising south wind that is the bane
of the desert, we laid our flea-bags on the lee side of the largest
hillock and crept into them without undressing. We tried to put the
flaps over our heads, but the sand, as usual, covered everything and we
ate grit mingled with dates for breakfast. We meant to start before the
dawn, but the camels had strayed far in search of scarce grass. When
collected, they displayed a fiendish ingenuity in throwing their loads
and tangling themselves up in every possible strap. The wind was
bitterly cold and my barracan was in its most irritating mood when it
wrapped itself round everything but me! The Farrajes would not walk
because they were cold. The gibli blinded the camels and they swung
round in circles. Even Hassanein was not feeling energetic on six
tablets of malted milk. In the middle of the frozen muddle I suddenly
lost my temper, saying, “I will show you how to walk.” I dropped from my
camel and, throwing my barracan over my arm, set off with great strides
in a southern direction. The action may have stimulated the caravan into
movement, but it certainly undid nearly a week’s work. For twenty
minutes, as they followed my racing steps, Omar and Mighrib discussed
Christians and their ways. “These Feranji women walk well until they get
fat and they cannot move,” they said. Hassanein changed the conversation
two or three times, but it always came back to the difference between
the Nasrani and the Moslem.
Old She-ib had walked on and I found him waiting on the top of a slight
rise from where the beginning of the longed-for oasis showed a faint
blur of green surrounded by a mist of mirage. “There is Bir Msus,” he
said. “You will have eggs and bread and milk to-night.” “I think I want
a tailor even more,” I said ruefully, regarding my torn white trousers,
rent at ankle and knee. “These must be mended.” “I think new ones would
be better!” said She-ib diffidently. At 10 A.M. we saw the dark line of
Msus in the distance, but not till midday did we draw level with it,
trekking steadily south over a flat, sandy plain with no sign of wadi.
As there is only a well at Msus and no village, we left it to the east
and went straight on towards Aujela, which lies at the south-west end of
an S-like wadi, whose other extremity is represented by Msus. At 12.30
we breasted a slight swell, and below us lay the wide green wadi full of
coarse grey shrub with a mass of palms on the farther side.
“Hamdulillah!” exclaimed the devout Mohammed, and slipped off his camel
for the noon-day prayers.