EXPEDITION AROUND THE SOUTHERN SEA.
Tuesday, April 25. Completed a set of observations, bundled up the mess things, and started, at 9.40, for a reconnoissance of the southern part of the sea; leaving Sherif in charge of the camp, with Read and the four Turkish soldiers. Steered about south, from point to point, keeping near the Arabs along the shore, for their protection; for they dreaded an attack from marauding parties. Threw the patent log overboard; the weather fair but exceedingly hot; thermometer, 89°; little air stirring; no clouds visible; the mountains, as we passed, seemed terraced, but the culture was that of desolation.
At 11.05, the patent log had marked 21 knots; depth, six feet; bottom, sof brown mud; made for a current ripple, a little farther out, coloured with decomposed wood, membranes of leaves, chaff, &c.; depth, thirteen fathoms; hard bottom; resumed the course along the shore. At 12.30, abreast of a ravine, or wady, not down on the maps, with a broad, flat delta before it. These ravines all have names, among the Arabs; but the deltas, or projecting plains, are undesignated. The limestone strata of the mountain above it were horizontal. There was a line of verdure up the ravine, indicating the presence of water. The log had measured 6¼ nautical miles from Ain Jidy soundings, a musket-shot distance from the shore, one fathom; bottom, white sand and very fine gravel. At 12.40, soundings one fathom; north end of the penin-
302 ANCIENT FORTIFICATION.
sula bearing east; steered towards it, to try for ford; water deepening to 2½ fathoms (fifteen feet), pulled into the shore-line again. A small, beautiful bird, with yellow breast, flew along the shore. Occasionally sounded out to 2½ fathoms, one mile from shore, to look for ford. At 1.58, abreast of Wady Seyal Sebbeh (ravine of Acacias), supposed to have water in it, very high up, the log having marked 8½ nautical miles. The cliff above the ravine was that of Sebbeh, or Masada. It was a perpendicular cliff, 1200 to 1500 feet high, with a deep ravine breaking down on each side, so as to leave it isolated. On the level summit was a line of broken walls, pierced in one place with an arch. This fortalice, constructed by Herod, and successfully beleaguered by Silva, had a commanding but dreary prospect, overlooking the deep chasm of this mysterious sea. Our Arabs could give no other account of it than that there were ruins of large buildings on the cliff.
The cliff of Sebbeh is removed some distance from the margin of the sea by an intervening delta of sand and detritus, of more than two miles in width. A mass of scorched and calcined rock, regularly laminated at its summit, and isolated from the rugged strip, which skirts the western shore, by deep and darkly-shadowed defiles and lateral ravines, its aspect from the sea is one of stern and solemn grandeur, and seems in harmony with the fearful records of the past.
There was that peculiar purple hue of its weather-worn rock, a tint so like that of coagulated blood that it forced the mind back upon its early history, and summoned images of the fearful immolation of Eleazar and the nine hundred and sixty-seven Sicarii, the blood of whose self-slaughter seemed to have tinged the indestructible cliff for ever.
At 3.05 P. M. a fine northerly wind blowing; stopped
GEOLOGY OF THE WESTERN SHORE. 303
to take in our Arabs. They brought a piece of bitumen, found on the shore, near Sebbeh, where we had intended to camp; but the wind was fair, and there was an uncertainty about water. We ascertained that there is no ford as laid down in the map of Messrs. Robinson and Smith. One of the Arabs said that there was once a ford there, but all the others denied it. Passed two ravines and the bluff of Rubtat el Jamus (Tying of the Buffalo), and at 4.45, stopped for the night in a little cove, immediately north of Wady Mubughghik, five or six miles north of the salt-mountain of Usdum, which looms up, isolated, to the south. From Ain Jidy to this place, the patent log has measured 13⅛ nautical miles, which is less than the actual distance, the log sometimes not working, from the shoalness of the water.
We this day paid particular attention to the geological construction of the western shore, with a special regard to the disposition of the ancient terraces and abutments of the tertiary limestone and marls. There may be rich ores in these barren rocks. Nature is ever provident in her liberality, and when she denies fertility of surface, often repays man with her embowelled treasures. There is scarce a variety of rock that has not been found to contain metals; and it is said that the richness of the veins is for the most part independent of the nature of the beds they intersect.
There has been no great variety in the scenery, to-day; the same bold and savage cliffs; the same broad peninsulas, or deltas, at the mouths of the ravines, some of them sprinkled here and there with vegetation, -all evincing the recent or immediate presence of water. This part of the coast is claimed by no particular tribe; but is common to roaming bands of marauders.
The beach was bordered with innumerable dead locusts. There was also bitumen in occasional lumps, and incrus-.
304 RAVINE, WITH RUINS.
tations of lime and salt. The bitumen presented a bright, smooth surface when fractured, and looked like a consolidated fluid. The Arabs called it hajar Mousa (Moses' stone).
Our Arabs insisted upon it that the only ford was at the southern extremity of the sea. There were seven of them with us, and they were of three tribes, the Rashayideh, Ta'amirah and Kabeneh. Being beyond the limits of their own territories, they were very apprehensive of an attack from hostile tribes. . When, this afternoon, under the impression, which proved to be correct, that there was water in the ravine, we called to them, they came down in all haste, unslinging their guns as they ran, in the supposition that we were attacked, -evincing, thereby, more spirit than we had anticipated. They were very uneasy; and, immediately after our arrival, one of them was perched, like a goat, upon a high cliff; and the others had bivouacked where they commanded a full view into the mouth of the ravine.
Our camp was in a little cove, on the north side of the delta, which had been formed by the deposition of the winter torrents, and extends half a mile out, with a rounding point to the eastward. The ravine comes down between two high, round-topped mountains, of a dark, burnt-brown colour, and a horizontal, terrace-like stratum, halfway up. In the plain were several nubk and tamarisk trees, and three kinds of shrubs, and some flowers which we gathered for preservation. Near the ravine, on a slight eminence, we discovered the ruins of. a building, with square-cut stones,-the foundation-walls alone remaining, and a line of low wall running down to the ravine; near it was a rude canal. There were many remains of terraces. The low wall was, perhaps, an aqueduct for the irrigation of the plain. Here Costigan thought that he had found the ruins of Gomorrah. About
A SIROCCO. 305
half a mile up, the faces of the ravine cut down perpendicularly through limestone rock, and turned, at right angles, a short distance above, with here and there a few bushes in the bottom. We found a little brook purling down the ravine, and soon losing itself in the dry plain. We were now almost at the southern extremity of the sea. The boats having been drawn up on the beach, their awnings were made to supply the places of tents, the open side facing the ravine; the blunderbuss at our head, and the sentries walking beside it. At 8 P. M., there were a few light cumuli in the sky, but no wind. At 8.30, a hot fresh wind from north-west; thermometer, 82°; at 9, 86°. Finding it too oppressive under the awning, we crawled out upon the open beach, and, with our feet nearly at the water's edge, slept "à la belle etoile." After the manner of the poor highwayman, we slept in our clothes, under arms, and upon the ground. It continued very hot during the night, and we could not endure even a kerchief over our faces, to screen them from the hot and blistering wind.
This was doubtless a sirocco, but it came from an unusual quarter. At midnight, the thermometer stood at 88°; and at 4, the temperature of the air, 86°; of the water, 80°. Towards daylight, the wind went down, and the thermometer fell to 79°. There were several light meteors, from the zenith towards the north, seen during the night. While the wind lasted, the atmosphere was hazy. Notwithstanding the oppressive heat, there was a pleasure in our strange sensations, lying in the open air, upon the pebbly beach of this desolate and unknown sea, perhaps near the sites of Sodom and Gomorrah; the salt mountains of Usdum in close proximity, and nothing but bright, familiar stars above us.
Wednesday, April 26. When I awoke this morning there was a young quail at my side, where, in the night,
306 LANDING AT USDUM.
it had most probably crept for shelter from the strong, hot wind.
We were up before sunrise; light variable airs and warm weather. At 5.30, started and steered S. ½ E. in a direct line for Ras Hish (cape Thicket), the north point of Usdum. At 6.42, fifty yards from the shore, sounded, the depth one fathom. Wady Mubughghik bearing west. 6.51, soundings one and three-quarter fathoms, grey mud. At 7, two fathoms, black, slimy mud. A light wind sprang up from S. S. E., a few light cirrus clouds in the N. E. The cliffs gradually slope away and terminate in Usdum. Sounding every few minutes for the ford; stretching out occasionally from the shore line, and returning to it again, when the water deepened to two fathoms. The Fanny Skinner coasted along the shore to sketch the topography, and we kept further out to sound for the ford. At 8, abreast of a short, steep, shrubby ravine, Muhariwat (the Surrounded); a very extensive excavation at its mouth. In front of the ravine was a beautiful patch of vegetation, extending towards Usdum, with intervals of gravel and sand. Many of these ravines derive their names from incidents in Arab history.
At 8.07, stopped to take bearings. Wady Ez Zuweirah, S. W. by W.; the west end of Usdum, S. by W.; marshy spit, north end of do., S. E. ½ E. Usdum is perfectly isolated, but has no appearance of being a mass of salt. Perhaps, like the peninsula, it is incrusted with carbonate of lime, which gives it the tinge of the eastern and western mountains.
At 8.08, water shoaling to two and a half feet, hauled off; 8.12, stood in and landed on the extreme point of Usdum. Many dead bushes along the shore, which are incrusted with salt as at the peninsula. Found it a broad, flat, marshy delta, the soil coated with salt and bitumen, and yielding to the foot.
PILLAR OF SALT. 307
At 8.30, started again and steered E. S. E., sounding every five minutes, the depth from one to one and three-quarter fathoms; white and black slime and mud. A swallow flew by us. At 8.52, stopped to take compass bearings. Seetzen saw this salt mountain in 1806, and says that he never before beheld one so torn and riven; but neither Costigan nor Molyneaux, who were in boats, came farther south on the sea than the peninsula. With regard to this part, therefore, which most probably covers the guilty cities, -
“We are the first
That ever burst
Into this silent sea."
At 9, the water shoaling, hauled more off shore. Soon after, to our astonishment, we saw on the eastern side of Usdum, one third the distance from its north extreme, a lofty, round pillar, standing apparently detached from the general mass, at the head of a deep, narrow, and abrupt chasm. We immediately pulled in for the shore, and Dr. Anderson and I went up and examined it. The beach was a soft, slimy mud encrusted with salt, and a short distance from the water, covered with saline fragments and flakes of bitumen. We found the pillar to be of solid salt, capped with carbonate of lime, cylindrical in front and pyramidal behind. The upper or rounded part is about forty feet high, resting on a kind of oval pedestal, from forty to sixty feet above the level of the sea. It slightly decreases in size upwards, crumbles at the top, and is one entire mass of crystallization. A prop, or buttress, connects it with the mountain behind, and the whole is covered with debris of a light stone colour. Its peculiar shape is doubtless attributable to the action of the winter rains. The Arabs had told us in vague terms that there was to be found a pillar somewhere upon the shores of the sea; but their statements in all other
308 A BITTER MELON.
respects had proved so unsatisfactory, that we could place no reliance upon them.*
At 10.10, returned to the boat with large specimens. The shore was soft and very yielding for a great distance; the boats could not get within 200 yards of the beach, and our foot-prints made on landing, were, when we returned, incrusted with salt.
Some of the Arabs, when they came up, brought a species of melon they had gathered near the north spit of Usdum. It was oblong, ribbed, of a dark green colour, much resembling a cantelope. When cut, the meat and seeds bore the same resemblance to that fruit, but were excessively bitter to the taste. A mouthful of quinine could not have been more distasteful, or adhered longer and more tenaciously to the reluctant palate.
Intending to examine the south end of the sea, and then proceed over to the eastern shore in the hope of finding water, we discharged all our Arabs but one, and sharing our small store of water with them, and giving them provisions, we started again at 10.30, and steered south.
At 10.42, a large black and white bird flew up, and lighted again upon the shore. The salt on the face of
________
* A similar pillar is mentioned by Josephus, who expresses the belief of its being the identical one into which Lot's wife was transformed. His words are, “But Lot's wife continually turning back to view the city as she went from it, and being too nicely inquisitive what would become of it, although God had forbidden her so to do, was changed into a pillar of salt, for I have seen it, and it remains at this day?” -1 Josephus' Antiq., book 1, chap. 12.
Clement of Rome, a contemporary of Josephus, also mentions this pillar, and likewise Irenaeus, a writer of the second century, who, yet more superstitious than the other two, adds the hypothesis, how it came to last so long with all its members entire. Reland relates an old tradition that as fast as any part of this pillar was washed away, it was supernaturally renewed.
A MUDDY SHORE. 309
Usdum appeared in the form of spiculae. At 11.07, came to the cave in Usdum described by Dr. Robinson; kept on, to take meridian observation at the extreme south end of the sea. 11.28, unable to proceed any further south from shallowness of the water, having run into six inches, and the boats' keels stirring up the mud. The Fanny Skinner having less draught, was able to get a little nearer to the shore, but grounded 300 yards off. Mr. Dale landed to observe for the latitude. His feet sank first through a layer of slimy mud a foot deep, then through a crust of salt, and then another foot of mud, before reaching a firm bottom. The beach was so hot as to blister the feet. From the water's edge, he made his way with difficulty for more than a hundred yards over black mud, coated with salt and bitumen.
Unfortunately, from the great depth of this chasm, and the approach of the sun towards the tropic of Cancer, the sextant (one of Gambey's best) would not measure the altitude with an artificial horizon, and there was not sufficient natural horizon for the measurement. We therefore took magnetic bearings in every direction, which, with observations of Polaris, would be equally correct, but more laborious. We particularly noted the geographical position of the south end of Usdum, which was now a little south of the southern end of the sea. The latter is ever-varying, extending south from the increased flow of the Jordan and the efflux of the torrents in winter, and receding with the rapid evaporation, consequent upon the heat of summer.
In returning to the boat, one of the men attempted to carry Mr. Dale to the water, but sunk down, and they were obliged separately to flounder through. When they could, they ran for it. They describe it as like running over burning ashes, -the perspiration starting from every pore with the heat. It was a delightful sensation when
310 A MUDDY BOTTOM.
their feet touched the water, even the salt, slimy water of the sea, then at the temperature of 88°.
The southern shore presented a mud-flat, which is terminated by the high hills bounding the Ghor to the southward. A very extensive plain or delta, low and marshy towards the sea, but rising gently, and, farther back, covered with luxuriant green, is the outlet of Wady es Safieh (clear ravine), bearing S. E. by S. Anxious to examine it, we coasted along, just keeping the boat afloat, the in-shore oars stirring up the mud. The shore was full three-fourths of a mile distant, the line of demarcation scarce perceptible, from the stillness of the water, and the smooth, shining surface of the marsh. On the flat beyond, were lines of drift-wood, and here and there, in the shallow water, branches of dead trees, which, like those at the peninsula, were coated with saline encrustation. The bottom was so very soft, that it yielded to everything, and at each cast the sounding-lead sank deep into the mud. Thermometer, 95°. Threw the drag over, but it brought up nothing but soft, marshy, light coloured mud.
It was indeed a scene of unmitigated desolation. On one side, rugged and worn, was the salt mountain of Usdum, with its conspicuous pillar, which reminded us at least of the catastrophe of the plain; on the other were the lofty and barren cliffs of Moab, in one of the caves of which the fugitive Lot found shelter. To the south was an extensive flat intersected by sluggish drains, with the high hills of Edom semi-girdling the salt plain where the Israelites repeatedly overthrew their enemies; and to the north was the calm and motionless sea, curtained with a purple mist, while many fathoms deep in the slimy mud beneath it lay embedded the ruins of the ill-fated cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. The glare of light was blinding to the eye, and the atmosphere difficult of respiration.
LOFTY HILLS. 311
No bird fanned with its wing the attenuated air through which the sun poured his scorching rays upon the mysterious element on which we floated, and which, alone, of all the works of its Maker, contains no living thing within it.
While in full view of the peninsula, I named its northern extremity “Point Costigan," and its southern one "Point Molyneaux," as a tribute to the memories of the two gallant Englishmen who lost their lives in attempting to explore this sea.
At 11.42, much frothy scum; picked up a dead bird resembling a quail; sounding every five minutes, depth increasing to four feet, bottom a little firmer; the only ford must be about here.
At 12.21, there was a very loud, reverberating report, as of startling thunder, and a cloud of smoke amid dust on the western shore; most probably a huge rock falling from a high cliff.
At 2.35 P. M., close in with the eastern shore, but unable to land from the soft bottom and shoalness of the water. At 2.50, a light breeze from W. N. W.; hauled to the north towards the base of the peninsula. A long, narrow, dry marsh, with a few scrubby bushes, separated the water from a range of stupendous hills, 2000 feet high. The cliff of En Nuweireh (Little Tiger), lofty and grand, towered above us in horizontal strata of brown limestone, and beautiful rose-coloured sandstone beneath. Clouds in the east, nimbus, seemed to be threatening a gust. At 3.30, steered N. N. E. along a low marshy flat, in shallow water. The light wind had subsided, and it was oppressively hot; air 97°; water twelve inches below the surface 90°. A thin purple haze over the mountains, increasing every moment, and presenting a most singular and awful appearance; the haze so thin that it was transparent, and rather a blush than a distinct colour. I
312 ANOTHER SIROCCO.
apprehended a thunder-gust or an earthquake, and took in the sail. At 3.50, a hot, blistering hurricane struck us from the south-east, and for some moments we feared being driven out to sea. The thermometer rose immediately to 102°. The men, closing their eyes to shield them from the fiery blast, were obliged to pull with all their might to stem the rising waves, and at 4.30, physically exhausted, but with grateful hearts, we gained the shore. My own eye-lids were blistered by the hot wind, being unable to protect them, from the necessity of steering the boat.
We landed on the south side of the peninsula, near Wady Humeir, the most desolate spot upon which we had yet encamped. Some went up the ravine to escape from the stifling wind; others, driven back by the glare, returned to the boats and crouched under the awnings. One mounted spectacles to protect his eyes, but the metal became so heated that he was obliged to remove them. Our arms and the buttons on our coats became almost burning to the touch; and the inner folds of our garments were cooler than those exposed to the immediate contact of the wind. We bivouacked without tents, on a dry marsh, a few dead bushes around us, and some of the thorny nubk, and a tree bearing a red berry a short distance inland, with low canes on the margin of the sea. A short distance to the N. E., on the peninsula, we found fragments of an immense and very old mill-stone. The mill had, doubtless, been turned by a canal from the ravine, down which the water must flow copiously in the rainy season.
At 5, finding the heat intolerable, we walked up the dry torrent bed in search of water. Found two successive pools rather than a stream, with some minnows in them; the water, not yet stagnant, flowing from the upper to the lower pool. There were some succulent plants on
EFFECTS OF THE HOT WIND. 313
their margins, and fern roots, and a few bushes around them. There were huge boulders of sandstone in the bed of the ravine; a dead palm-tree near the largest pool, a living one in a cleft of the rock at the head of the gorge; and high up, to the summits of the beetling cliffs, the sandstone lay in horizontal strata, with perpendicular cleavage, and limestone above, its light brown colour richly contrasting with the deep red below.
The sandstone below limestone here, and limestone without sandstone on the opposite shore, would seem to indicate a geological fault.
Washed and bathed in one of the pools, but the relief was only momentary. In one instant after leaving the water, the moisture on the surface evaporated, and left the skin dry, parched, and stiff. Except the minnows in the pool, there was not a living thing stirring; but the hot wind swept moaning through the branches of the 'withered palm-tree,* and every bird and insect, if any there were, had sought shelter under the rocks.
Coming out from the ravine, the sight was a singular one. The wind had increased to a tempest; the two extremities and the western shore of the sea were curtained by a mist, on this side of a purple hue, on the other a yellow tinge; and the red and rayless sun, in the bronzed clouds, had the appearance it presents when looked upon through smoked glass. Thus may the heavens have appeared just before the Almighty in his wrath rained down fire upon the cities of the plain. Behind were the rugged crags of the mountains of Moab, the land of incest, enveloped in a cloud of dust, swept by the simoom from the great desert of Arabia.
There was a smoke on the peninsula, a little to the north of us. We knew not whether those who made it
_________
314 WELL-FORMED ARABS.
might prove friends or foes; and therefore that little smoke was not to be disregarded. We had brought one of the Ta'amirah with us, for the express purpose of communicating with the natives, but he was so fearful of their hostility that I could not prevail on him to bear a message to them. With his back to the wind, and his eyes fixed on the streaming smoke, he had squatted himself down a short distance from us. He thought that we would be attacked in the night; I felt sure that we would not, if we were vigilant. These people never attack each other but at advantage, and fifteen well-armed Franks can, in that region, bid defiance to anything but surprise.
We have not seen an instance of deformity among the Arab tribes. This man was magnificently formed, and when he walked it was with the port and presence of a king. It has been remarked that races with highly coloured skins are rarely deformed; and the exemption is attributed, perhaps erroneously, not to a mode of life differing from that of a civilized one, but to hereditary organization.
The sky grew more angry as the day declined; -
“The setting orb in crimson seems to mourn,
Denouncing greater woes at his return,
And adds new horrors to the present doom
By certain fear of evils yet to come."
The heat rather increased than lessened after the sun went down. At 8 P. M., the thermometer was 106° five feet from the ground. At one foot from the latter it was 104°. We threw ourselves upon the parched, cracked earth, among dry stalks and canes, which would before have seemed insupportable from the heat. Some endeavoured to make a screen of one of the boats' awnings, but the fierce wind swept it over in an instant. It was more like the blast of a furnace than living air. At our feet was the sea, and on our right, through the thicket, we
HEAT AND THIRST. 315
could distinguish the gleaming of the fires and hear the shouts from an Arab encampment.
In the early part of the night, there was scarce a moment that some one was not at the water-breakers; but the parching thirst could not be allayed, for, although there was no perceptible perspiration, the fluid was carried off as fast as it was received into the system. At 9, the breakers were exhausted, and our last waking thought was water. In our disturbed and feverish slumbers, we fancied the cool beverage purling down our parched and burning throats. The mosquitoes, as if their stings were envenomed by the heat, tormented us almost to madness, and we spent a miserable night, throughout which we were compelled to lie encumbered with our arms, while, by turns, we kept vigilant watch.
We had spent the day in the glare of a Syrian sun, by the salt mountain of Usdum, in the hot blast of the sirocco, and were now bivouacked under the calcined cliffs of Moab. When the water was exhausted, all too weary to go for more, even if there were no danger of a surprise, we threw ourselves upon the ground, -eyes smarting, skin burning, lips, and tongue, and throat parched and dry; and wrapped the first garment we could find around our heads to keep off the stifling blast; and, in our brief and broken slumbers, drank from ideal fountains.
Those who have never felt thirst, never suffered in a simoom in the wilderness, or been far off at sea, with
“Water, water everywhere,
Nor any drop to drink,"
can form no idea of our sensations. They are best illustrated by the exclamation of the victim in Dante's Inferno.
“The little rills which down the grassy side
Of Casentino flow to Arno's stream,
Filling their banks with verdure as they glide,
Are ever in my view;-no idle dream-
316 THE HEAT ABATES.
For more that vision parches, makes me weak,
Than that disease, which wastes my pallid cheek? “
Our thoughts could not revert to home save in connexion with the precious element; and many were the imaginary speeches we made to visionary common councils against ideal water-carts, which went about unsubstantial city streets, spouting the glorious liquid in the very wastefulness of abundance, every drop of which seemed priceless pearls, as we lay on the shore of the Dead Sea, in the feverish sleep of thirst.
The poor, affrighted Arab slept not a wink; -for, repeatedly, when I went out, as was my custom, to see that all was quiet and the sentries on the alert, he was ever in the same place, looking in the same direction.
At midnight the thermometer stood at 98°; shortly after which the wind shifted and blew lightly from the north. At 4 A. M., thermometer, 82°; comparatively cool.
Thursday, April 27. The first thing on waking, at daybreak, I saw a large, black bird, high overhead, floating between us and the mottled sky. Shortly after, a large flock of birds flew along the shore, and a number of storks were noiselessly winging their way in the gray and indistinct light of the early morning. Calm and warm; -went up and bathed in the ravine. There were voices in the cliffs overhead, and shortly after there was the report of a gun, the reverberating echoes of which were distinctly heard at the camp. As I had come unattended, the officers were alarmed, and some came to look for me. Our Arab was exceedingly nervous. The gun was doubtless a signal from a look-out on the cliff to his friends inland, for these people live in a constant state of civil warfare, and station sentinels on elevated points to give notice of a hostile approach. I thought that we inspired them with more
fear than they did us. Heard a partridge up in the cliffs,
A MENACED ATTACK. 317
and saw a dove and a beautiful humming-bird in the ravine.
There were some fellahas (female fellahin) on a plain to the northward of us. They allowed Mustafa to approach within speaking distance, but no nearer. They asked who we were, how and why we came, and why we did not go away. About an hour after, some thirty or forty fellahin, the sheikh armed with a sword, the rest with indifferent guns, lances, clubs, and branches of trees, came towards us, singing the song of their tribe. I drew our party up, the blunderbuss in front, and, with the interpreter, advanced to meet them. When they came near, I drew a line upon the ground, and told them that if they passed it they would be fired upon. Thereupon, they squatted down, to hold a palaver. They belonged to the Ghaurariyeh, and were as ragged, filthy, and physically weak, as the tribe of Rashayideh, on the western shore. Finding us too strong for a demand, they began to beg for backshish. We gave them some food to eat, for they looked famished; also a little tobacco and a small gratuity, to bear a letter to 'Akil, (who must soon be in Kerak,) appointing when and where to have a look-out for us.
Before starting, we took observations, and angled in every direction. Not far from us must be the site of Zoar; and on some of these mountains Lot dwelt with his two daughters. This country is called Moab, after the son of the eldest daughter. Moab means one begotten by a father.
At 8.45, started; sky cloudless, a light air from the west; thermometer, 94°. The Arabs gathered on the shore to see us depart, earnestly asking Mustafa how the boats could move without legs; he bade them wait awhile, and they would see very long legs. The Fanny Mason sounded directly across to the western shore; the
casts, taken at short intervals, varying from one and three-quarters to two and a quarter fathoms; bottom, light and dark mud. Threw the patent log over; temperature of the air, 95°; of the water, 85°.
This shallow bay is mentioned in Joshua, xv. 2. Everything said in the Bible about the sea and the Jordan, we believe to be fully verified by our observations.
At 11.20, picked up a dead quail, which had probably perished in attempting to fly over the sea; perhaps caught in last night's sirocco. At 11.28, there were appearances of sand-spits on the surface of the sea, doubtless the optical delusion which has so often led travellers to mistake them for islands. 11.30, sent the Fanny Skinner to Point Molyneaux, the south end of the peninsula, to take meridian observation. 12.30, much frothy scum upon the water. At 12.52, landed at Wady Muhariwat (Surrounded ravine), on the western shore, where a shallow salt stream, formed by a number of springs oozing from a bank covered with shrubs, spread itself over a considerable space, and trickled down over the pebbles into the sea. There were some very small fish in the stream. Thermometer, 96°.
At 1.15 P. M., started again, and steered parallel with the western shore. Keeping about one-third the distance between the western shore and the peninsula, the soundings ranged steadily at two and a quarter fathoms; first part light, the second part dark mud. At 3.05, a very singular swell from north-west, -an undulation, rather; for the waves were glassy, with an unbroken surface, and there was not air enough stirring to move the gossamer curls of a sleeping infant. We knew well of what it was the precursor, and immediately steered for the land. We had scarcely rowed a quarter of an hour, the men pulling vigorously to reach the shelter of the cliffs, when we were struck by a violent gust of hot wind, -another sirocco.
SCANTY PROVISIONS. 319
The surface of the water became instantly ruffled; changing in five minutes from a slow, sluggish, unbroken swell, to an angry and foaming sea.
With eyes smarting from the spray, we buffeted against it for upwards of an hour, when the wind abruptly subsided, and the sea as rapidly became smooth and rippling. The gust was from the north-west. The wind afterwards became light and baffling, -at one moment fair, the next directly ahead; the smooth surface of the water unbroken, except a light ruffle here and there, as swept by the flickering airs.
At 4.15 P. M., stopped for the night in a spacious bay, on a fine pebbly beach, at the foot of Rubtat el Jamus (Tying of the Buffalo). It was a desolate-looking, verdureless range above us. There was no water to be found, and our provisions were becoming scarce; we made a scanty supper, but had the luxury of a bed of pebbles, which, although hard and coarse, was far preferable to the mud and dust of our last sleeping-place. We hoped, too, to have but a reasonable number of insect-bedfellows.
Mr. Dale described the extreme point of the peninsula upon which he landed as a low flat, covered with incrustations of salt and carbonate of lime. It was the point of the margin: there was a corresponding point to the high land, which is thinly laminated with salt. They picked up some small pieces of pure sulphur. In a cave, he saw tracks of a panther. After leaving the point, he saw a small flock of ducks and a heron, which were too shy to permit a near approach.
Before retiring, our Arabs, who had gone for hours in a fruitless search for water, returned with some dhom apples (fruit of the nubk), which amazingly helped out the supper.
I do not know what we should have done without these Arabs; they brought us food when we were nearly fam-
320 REFRACTION.
ished, and water when parched with thirst. They acted as guides and messengers, and in our absence faithfully guarded the camp. A decided course tempered with courtesy, wins at once their respect and good will. Although they are an impetuous race, not an angry word had thus far passed between us. With the blessing of God, I hoped to preserve the existing harmony to the last. Took observations of Polaris. The north-west wind, hot and unrefreshing, sprang up at 8 P. M., and blew through the night. At 10, thermometer 84°; at midnight, 82°.
Friday, April 28. Called all hands at 5.30 A.M.; light airs from N. E., sky clouded, cirro-cumulus. Breakfasted à la hate on a small cup of coffee each, and started at 5.58. If the wind should spring up fair, we purposed sailing over to the Arnon; in the mean time we coasted along the shore towards Ain Jidy, for the water was exhausted, and we must make for the camp if a calm or a head wind should prevail. At 7.30, the wind freshened up from N. E. A little north of Sebbeh we passed a long, low, gravelly island, left uncovered by the retrocession of the water. A great refraction of the atmosphere. The Fanny Skinner, round the point, seemed elevated above it. Her whole frame, from the surface of the water, was distinctly visible, although the land intervened. At 12, wind fresh, air 87°, water 82°. Our compass glass was incrusted with salt.
Notwithstanding the high wind, the tendency to drowsiness was almost irresistible. The men pulled mechanically, with half-closed lids, and, except them and myself, every one in the copper boat was fast asleep. The necessity of steering and observing all that transpired, alone kept me awake. The drowsy sensation, amounting almost to stupor, was greatest in the heat of the day, but did not disappear at night. In the experience of all, two hours'
INTELLIGENCE FROM HOME. 321
watch here seemed longer than double the period, elsewhere. At 1.30 P. M., nearly up with Ain Jidy; the white tents of the camp, the line of green, and the far-off fountain, speaking of shade, refreshment, and repose. A camel was lying on the shore, and two Arabs a little beyond. Discerning us, the latter rose quickly and came towards the landing, shouting, singing, and making wild gesticulations, and one of them stooped and picked up a handful of earth and put it upon his head. Here the Sherif met us with a delight too simple-hearted in its expression to be insincere. The old man had been exceedingly anxious for our safety, and seemed truly overjoyed at our return. We were also much gratified to find that he had been unmolested.
One of the Arabs whom we sent back from Usdum fell fainting on his return, and nearly famished for want of water. His companions, suffering from the same cause, were compelled to leave him on the parched and arid shore and hasten forward to save themselves. Fortunately there was a messenger in the camp, who had come on horseback from Jerusalem, and Sherif was enabled to send water forthwith, and have the poor man brought to the tents.
Found letters awaiting us from Beirut, forwarded express from Jerusalem. Our consul at the former place announced the death of John Quincy Adams, Ex-President of the U. States, and sent an extract from a Malta paper containing the annunciation. These were the first tidings we had received from the outer world, and their burthen was a sad one. But on that sea the thought of death harmonized with the atmosphere and the scenery, and when echo spoke of it, where all else was desolation and decay, it was hard to divest ourselves of the idea that there was nothing but death in the world, and we the only living: -
322 TIDINGS FROM EUROPE.
“Death is here, and death is there,
Death is busy everywhere.”
We lowered the flag half-mast, and there was a gloom throughout the camp.
Among the letters, I received one from the Mushir of Saida. After many compliments, he promised to reprimand Sa’id Bey for the grasping spirit he had evinced, and authorized our ally, 'Akil, to remain with us as long as we might desire.
The very friendly letter of Mr. Chasseaud contained startling news from Europe. The great Being who wisely rules over all, is doubtless punishing the nations for their sins; but, as His justice is ever tempered with mercy, I have not the smallest doubt that when the ordeal is passed, the result will be beneficial to the human race. The time is coming -the beginning is even now -when the whole worthless tribe of kings, with all their myrmidons, will be swept from their places and made to bear a part in the toils and sufferings of the great human family; -when, not in theory only, but in fact, every man will be free and all men politically equal; -then, this world will be a happy one, for liberty, rightly enjoyed, brings every blessing with it.
In the evening we walked up the ravine to bathe. It was a toilsome walk over the rough debris brought down by the winter rains. A short distance up, we were surprised to see evidences of former habitations in the rocks. Roughly hewn caverns and natural excavations we had frequently observed, but none before evincing so much art. Some of the apertures were arched and cased with sills of limestone resembling an inferior kind of marble., We were at a loss how to obtain an entrance, for they were cut in the perpendicular face of the rock, and the lowest more than fifty feet from the bed of the ravine. We stopped to plan some mode of gaining an entrance to one
AN EGERIAN FOUNTAIN. 323
of them; but the sound of the running stream, and the cool shadow of the gorge were too inviting, and advancing through tamarisk, oleander, and cane, we came upon the very Egeria of fountains. Far in among the cane, embowered, imbedded, hidden deep in the shadow of the purple rocks and the soft green gloom of luxuriant vegetation, lapsing with a gentle murmur from basin to basin, over the rocks, under the rocks, by the rocks, and clasping the rocks with its crystal arms, was this little fountain-wonder. The thorny nubk and the pliant osher were on the bank above; yet lower, the oleander and the tamarisk; while upon its brink the lofty cane, bent by the weight of its fringe-like tassels, formed bowers over the stream fit for the haunts of Naiads. Diana herself could not have desired a more secluded bath than each of us took in a separate basin.
This, more probably than the fountain of Ain Jiddy (Engaddi), high up the mountain, may be regarded as the realization of the poet's dream-the genuine "diamond of the desert"-and in one of the vaulted caves above, the imagination can dwell upon the night procession, Edith Plantagenet, and the flower dropped in hesitation and picked up with avidity; the pure, disinterested aspirations of the Crusader, the licentious thoughts of the Saracen, and the wild, impracticable visions of the saintly enthusiast. One of those caverns too, since fashioned by the hand of man, may have been the veritable cave of "Adullam," for this is the wilderness of Engaddi.* Here too may have been the dwellings of the Essenes, in the early days of Christianity, and subsequently of hermits, when Palestine was under Christian sway. Our Arabs say that these caves have been here from time immemo-
_________
And David went up from thence, and dwelt in strong holds at Engaddi."-1 Samuel, xxiii. 29.
324 UNWONTED ENJOYMENT.
rial, and that many years ago some of the tribe succeeded in entering one of them, and found vast chambers excavated in the rock. They may have been the cells where " gibbered and moaned" the hermit of Engaddi.
Having bathed, we returned much refreshed to the camp. The messenger had brought sugar and lemons, and, with abundance of water, we had lemonade and coffee; and, sheltered from the sun, with the wind blowing through the tent, we revelled in enjoyment. This place, which at first seemed so dreary, had now become almost a paradise by contrast. The breeze blew freshly, but it was so welcome a guest, after the torrid atmosphere of noon, that we even let it tear up the tent stakes, and knock the whole apparatus about our ears, with a kind of indulgent fondness, rather disposed to see something amusing in the flutter among the half-dried linen on the thorn-bushes. This reckless disregard of our personal property bore ample testimony to our welcome greeting of the wind.
At one time, to-day, the sea assumed an aspect peculiarly sombre. Unstirred by the wind, it lay smooth and unruffled as an inland lake. The great evaporation enveloped it in a thin, transparent vapour, its purple tinge contrasting strangely with the extraordinary colour of the sea beneath, and, where they blended in the distance, gave it the appearance of smoke from burning sulphur. It seemed a vast cauldron of metal, fused but motionless.
About sunset, we tried whether a horse and a donkey could swim in the sea without turning over. The result was that, although the animals turned a little on one side, they did not lose their balance. As Mr. Stephens tried his experiment earlier in the season, and nearer the north end of the sea, his horse could not have turned over from the greater density of the water there than here. His animal may have been weaker, or, at the time, more
THE APPLE OF SODOM. 325
exhausted than ours. A muscular man floated nearly breast~high, without the least exertion.
Pliny says that some foolish, rich men of Rome had water from this sea conveyed to them to bathe in, under the impression that it possessed medicinal qualities. Galen remarked on this that they might have saved themselves the trouble, by dissolving, in fresh water, as much salt as it could hold in solution; to which Reyland adds, that Galen was not aware that the water of the Dead Sea held other things besides salt in solution.
We picked up a large piece of bitumen on the sea-shore to-day. It was excessively hot to the touch. This combustible mineral is so great a recipient of the solar rays, that it must soften in the intense heat of summer. We gathered also some of the blossoms and the green and dried fruits of the ocher* for preservation with the flowers
___________
* This fruit is doubtless the genuine apple of Sodom, for it is fair to the eye and bitter to the taste, and when ripe is filled with fibre and dust. Four jars, containing specimens, together with a drawing of the leaf and blossom, are placed in the patent-office, at Washington.
We have succeeded in bringing safely home some of the green and the dried fruit, and also the leaves and blossoms of the ocher, put up in spirits of wine.
“The first notice taken of the apple of Sodom is by Josephus: -'Which fruits have a colour as if they were fit to be eaten; but if you pluck them with your hands, they dissolve into smoke and ashes.’ They are also spoken of by Tacitus: -‘The herbage may spring up, and the trees may put forth their blossoms, they may even attain the usual appearance of maturity, but with this florid outside, all within turns black and moulders into dust.’
De Chartres, who visited Palestine in 1100, speaks of this fruit, and compares its deceitful appearance to the pleasures of the world; and they are also noticed by Baumgarten, De la Valle, Maundrell, and others, as having a real existence; but Pococke and Shaw deride these accounts as fabulous. In the last century, Amman describes them as resembling a small apple, of a beautiful colour, and growing on a shrub resembling the hawthorn. Hasselquist, on the contrary, is of opinion that it is the fruit of the solanum melongena, or egg-plant. He says that hit is found in great abun-
collected in the descent of the Jordan, and the various places we have visited on this sea.
The dried fruit, the product of last year, was extremely brittle, and crushed with the slightest pressure. The green, half-formed fruit of this year was soft and elastic as a puff ball, and, like the leaves and stem, yields a viscous, white, milky fluid when cut. Dr. Robinson very aptly compared it to the milk-weed. This viscous fluid the Arabs call leben-usher (osher-milk), and they consider it a cure for barrenness. Dr. Anderson was enthusiastic in his researches, and although he kept his regular
__________
dance round Jericho, in the valleys near the Jordan, and in the neighbourhood of the Dead Sea. It is true that these apples are sometimes full of dust, but this appears only when the fruit is attacked by an insect, which converts the whole of the inside into dust, leaving nothing but the rind entire, without causing it to lose any of its colour.' Linnaeus thought, also, that they were the fruit of a solanum, and named a species having large yellow berries, with black seeds, surrounded by a greenish pulp, which dries into a bitter, nauseous powder, solanum Sodomeum; but it has been found that this plant is a native of Southern Africa, and not of Palestine.
Some writers, again, have supposed this fruit to be the gall of the terebinth, or turpentine-tree. Chateaubriand speaks of it as about the size and colour of a small lemon, which, before it is ripe, is filled with a corrosive and saline juice, and when dried, contains only numerous blackish seeds, which may be compared to ashes, and in taste resemble bitter pepper. He states that they are the product of a thorny shrub, having taper leaves. In the travels of the Duke of Ragusa (Marmont), it is spoken of much in the same terms. These descriptions apply to a species of solanum, and especially to the s. sanctum, a prickly, shrub-like plant, very common in Palestine.
Seetzen, who does not appear to have seen the plant, says, 'I saw, during my stay at Kerak, in the house of the Greek clergyman of that town, a species of cotton, resembling silk. This cotton, as he told me, grows in the plain of El Ghor, near the southern extremity of the Dead Sea, on a tree like the fig-tree, called Abesche-iz; it is found in a fruit resembling the pomegranate. It struck me that this fruit, which has no pulp or flesh in the inside, and is unknown in the rest of Palestine, might be the celebrated apple of Sodom.'
A NORTHERN BREEZE. 327
watch, was ever, when not on post, hammering at the rocks. He had already collected many valuable specimens.
Through the night, a pleasant breeze from the west. Blowing over the wilderness of Judea, it was unaccompanied with a nauseous smell. Towards morning, the wind hauled to the north and freshened-strange that the weather should become warmer as the wind veered to the northern quarter: but so it was. Sweeping along the western shore, it brought the foetid odour of the sulphureous marshes with it. The Arabs call this sea Bahr Lut (Sea of Lot), or Birket Lut (Pool of Lot).
___________
This description of Seetzen's agrees very well with the fruit described as the apple of Sodom, which occurred in the same place, and has the same silky or cotton-like interior: but the plant which produces it is not like the fig-tree, nor is it called Abesche-iz. Those we saw, in various places along the shores of the Dead Sea, resembled very closely the milkweed, which is so common in the United States; it is, in fact, a closely allied plant, being the asclepias procera of the earlier writers, now, however, forming part of the genus calotropis. This plant occurs in many parts of the east, and was known as early as the time of Theophrastus. It is figured and described by Prosper Alpinus under the name, birdet el ossar; but it is now called, by the Arabs, oscher, or osher.
It is a tall, perennial plant, with thick, dark-green, shining, opposite leaves, on very short foot-stalks; the flowers are interminal, and have axillary umbels of a purple colour, succeeded by somewhat globose pods, about the size of a large apple, containing numerous flattened, brown seeds, each furnished with a silky plume or pappus. The bark, especially at the lower part of the stem, is cork-like and much fissured. If it be cut, or a leaf torn off, a viscous, milky juice exudes, which is exceedingly acrid, and even caustic, and is said to be used in Egypt as a depillatory. In Persia, this plant is said to exude a bitter and acrid manna, owing to the puncture of insects. Chardin says that it is poisonous. Both the plant and its juice have been used in medicine, and probably are identical with the mudar, or madar, of India, which has attracted so much notice as a remedy for dis. eases of the skin"-Griffith.
CHAPTER XV.
EXCURSION TO MASADA.
SATURDAY, April 29. Awakened at daylight by one of the Arabs calling the rest to prayer. The summons but slightly heeded. Despatched Mr. Dale, Dr. Anderson, and Mr. Bedlow, with the interpreter, a Turkish soldier, and some Arab guides, to Sebbeh (Masada); they took the camel with them to carry water. Soon after breakfast, sent the Fanny Skinner to sound in a north and south line, between the peninsula and the western shore. A clear, pleasant morning; wind fresh from the N. W. Experienced some difficulty in getting the boat through the surf.
Remained in camp to write a report of proceedings to the Hon. Secretary of the Navy, and to answer the kind letters of H. B. M. Consul at Jerusalem, and Mr. Chasseaud, U. S. Consul at Beirut. Every thing quiet; and, towards noon, as the wind subsided, the sea assumed its sombre and peculiar hue.
At noon, fired out at sea, in honour of the illustrious dead, twenty-one minute-guns from the heavy blunderbuss mounted on the bow of the Fanny Mason. The reports reverberated loudly and strangely amid the cavernous recesses of those lofty and barren mountains. This sea is wondrous, in every sense of the word; so sudden are its changes, and so different the aspects it presents, as to make it seem as if we were in a world of enchantment. We were alternately upon the brink and the surface of a
huge, and sometimes seething cauldron. Picked up a piece of scoriated lava.
At 1 P. M., Mr. Aulick returned. He reported a gradual decrease of soundings to thirteen fathoms, nearly up the slope to the shallow basin of the southern sea. Everything favours the supposition that the guilty cities stood on the southern plain, between Usdum and the mountains of Moab. The northern part must have been always water, or the plain have sunk at the time of the catastrophe.
Protected by our presence from the fear of robbers, some of the Ta'amirah came in to harvest their few scanty patches of barley. They cut the grain, with their swords for reaping-hooks, and threw it upon the threshing floor, -a circular piece of hard, trampled ground, around which were driven three donkeys, abreast. It was a slow and wasteful process. The little unmuzzled brutes were, in their rounds, permitted to nip the upturned ears. We had often noticed the humanity of this people towards the brute creation. In a moment of excitement, Sherif wounded a stork, but seemed sincerely sorry for it afterwards. The Arab who brought the wild boar pigs to sell, cut their throats rather than turn them adrift, when they would have perished for want of food, which they were too young to procure. These Arabs always express great horror at anything like wanton cruelty towards animals. And yet 'Akil looked upon the woman whose husband he had slain, without the drooping of an eyelid, or the visible relaxation of a muscle. It is for philosophers to account for this trait of humanity towards animals, in a race proverbially reckless of the lives of their fellow-creatures.
The small quantity of grain these people could spare, we purchased for distribution at home. In the afternoon, mounted on Sherif's spirited mare, I went up to the foun-
tain of Ain Jidy. It is a clear, beautiful stream, issuing from the rock, skirted by the cane and shadowed by the nubk, four hundred feet up the mountain. The view from it was magnificent, particularly towards Usdum and the southern basin of the sea.
At sunset, the party to Sebbeh returned. The following account I glean from the reports of Mr. Dale, Dr. Anderson, and Mr. Bedlow: -principally the last.
Their route, at first, led along the shore of the sea to the south, over the debris brought down by the winter torrents, -a road, over which no other but an Arab horse could have travelled a mile without breaking his limbs, or dashing his rider upon the sharp rocks, or disappearing, rider and all, down one of the gulleys which furrowed the delta from the bases of the cliffs to the margin of the sea. After passing a projecting headland, which bounded the shore-line view from the encampment, they beheld, in the distance, most singular formations, resembling a plain covered with towns and villages, marble cities, with columns, temples, domes, and palaces, which, as they advanced, faded away, and finally resolved themselves into curiously-configurated hills, so marked and channelled by the weather, that, although aware of the formation, it was difficult to destroy the first illusion. A little after eight o'clock, they came to Wady Sebbeh, and discovered a distinct road, fifteen feet wide and marked by two parallel rows of stones, which continued, with interruptions, for the space of a quarter of a mile. At nine o'clock, when the heat of the sun began to be oppressive, they reached a low cave in the southern face of the mountain, over Wady Seyal, -a deep ravine, which separates the cliff from the main ridge on the north. Here they dismounted, as it was impossible to proceed farther on horseback. Hence, sometimes upon their hands and knees, they clambered up the steep and rugged cliff, its
RUINS OF MASADA. 331
perpendicular side pierced with apertures, like the Rock of Gibraltar. They were inclined to believe, that the path by which they ascended is the one which Josephus calls the "serpent, as resembling that animal in its narrowness and perpetual windings; for it is broken off at the prominent precipices of the rock, and returns frequently into itself, and, lengthening again by little and little, hath much to do to proceed forward, and he that would walk along it, must first go on one leg and then on the other; there is also nothing but destruction, in case your feet slip, for on each side there is a vastly deep chasm and precipice."
They crossed the ravine upon a chalky ridge, which, although considerably below the highest point of the cliff, yet connects the southern steep of Seyal to the northern escarpment of Masada, and reached the top a little before 10 A. M. The whole summit was surrounded by the ruins of a wall, built on the brink of the precipice. Passing through a gateway with a pointed arch, the keystone and voissures of which were of hewn stone, curiously marked with Greek delta-shaped figures Δ, and others resembling the planetary symbol of Venus, some upright and some reversed, and others again with rude crosses and the unfinished letter T, they came upon an area of about three-fourths of a mile in length from north to south, and one-fourth of a mile from east to west.
There was very little vegetation, except in the bottoms of a few excavations, which seemed to have been used as cisterns or granaries, and which were half filled with a rank weed and a species of lichen. Elsewhere, the earth was as sterile as if sown with salt; yet Herod spoke of it as being "of a fat soil, and better mould than any valley for agriculture." Concerning these excavations, Josephus says, -" He (Herod) also had cut many and great pits, as reservoirs for water, out of the rocks, at every one of the
332 RUINS OF MASADA.
places that were inhabited, both above and around the palace and before the wall; and by this contrivance, he endeavoured to have water for several uses, as if there had been fountains there."
Towards the northern and western edge of the cliff, and near the point which is probably the "White Promontory," mentioned by Josephus, they observed, one of these excavations of considerable extent, much choked with the ruins and rubbish of its own cemented walls, together with the decomposed thistles and rank weeds of many centuries.
In the south-west corner of the rock, they found one still larger, finely stuccoed, with a gallery, a flight of forty stone steps, and lighted by two windows on the southern face of the cliff. This large room was beautifully stuccoed with pebbles, and as smooth and clean as if just finished. This excavated chamber led them to infer that there were numerous others, lighted by the apertures in the cliff they had seen outside on their ascent; but they could find no access to them.
At the distance of about 100 feet below the northern summit, on an inaccessible precipitous ledge, they saw the ruins of a round tower; and forty or fifty feet below that, on another ledge, the foundation walls of a square enclosure, with a triangular wall abutting with the angles of its base upon the walls of the circular tower, and the west side of the square enclosure. They found it impossible to descend to examine these ruins.
Besides the remains of the round tower, or donjon keep, there were, on the summit, the fragments of walls with circular recesses of tessellated brick-work, arched doorways, and mullioned windows, partly surrounding an enclosure which was perhaps the court-yard or quadrangle of the castle, now filled with rubbish, fragments of marble, mosaic and pottery.
RUINS OF MASADA. 333
The foundations and lower portions of the wall built around the entire top of the hill by Herod, are still remaining on the eastern side. The officers amused themselves by displacing some of the stones and sending them over the cliff, and watching them as they whirled and bounded to the base, upwards of 1200 feet down, with more fearful velocity than the stones from the Roman ballistae when Silva pressed the siege.
One of the windows, apparently a part of a chapel, looked out upon the sea. It was the one appearing as an arch, which we saw when passing in the boats. From thence, the sea could be seen throughout its whole extent, its northern and southern extremities clearly defined, even through the haze which overhung them. The configuration of the peninsula lay distinctly before them, and bore some resemblence to an outspread wing.
Immediately below them, along the base of the cliff, could be traced the wall of circumvallation which "Silva built on the outside, round about the whole place, and had thereby made a most accurate provision to prevent any one of the besieged running away."
Continuing their explorations towards the southern and eastern edge of the cliff, they followed a perilous track along the face of the rock, which could not have been less than 1000 feet in perpendicular height above the chasm, and came upon an extensive shelf or platform encumbered with masses of rubbish and masonry, evidently the ruins of the wall which edged the cliff above. Scrambling over the heaps, they reached an excavation which the Arab guide called a cistern, which is probably correct, for in descending they saw narrow troughs or aqueducts, the inner half scooped in the rock. It was an oblong cell, hewn in the rock, measuring thirty feet in length, fifteen in breadth, and eighteen or twenty in depth, cemented on all sides. At the entrance of the excavation
334 RUINS OF MASADA.
they saw the carcase of an animal recently killed. It resembled the rabbit, and was called by the Arabs “webr" or webeh, the coney of scripture. To the left of the entrance, and within the cell, was a small flight of steps terminating in a platform. Like the walls, the steps were coated with cement. Above this was an aperture
not accessible by the steps. By notching the wall, they contrived to reach it. It was the entrance of a low cave, roughly hewn in the rock, with a window looking out upon the steep face of Wady Senin. Around the rough and uncemented walls were rude crosses in red paint, and upon the dust of the floor were the fresh footprints of the “whal," or the bteddin.
They attempted to explore the southern face of the mountain, by following a zigzag path along the ledge projecting a few feet from the rough surface of rock, but found it impracticable from the looseness of the rocks and the fearful dizzy depth below. On their return, they observed a singular ruin about the centre of the quadrangle. The square blocks of stone, cemented together with great regularity, were cellular on both sides, so abraded by the weather as to present the appearance of a honey-comb. They supposed it to have been a store-house or barracks for soldiers. Before descending they sketched the sea, and took many bearings. On their return to the cave, the Arabs asked them if their visit had been "acceptable." These people believe that we come here to search for treasure or to visit places we consider holy. In Wady Seyal (Ravine of Acacias) were many seyal or acacia trees.*
__________
* Acacia Seyal or Alotica furnishes gum Arabic, and probably afforded the shittah or shittim wood, used in building the tabernacle. In Isaiah, the shittah is joined with the myrtle and other fragrant shrubs. The flowers have an agreeable odour. Almost all travellers speak of the acacia seyal as abounding in Palestine and the desert of Arabia It is sometimes
On their return, they noticed a foetid sulphureous smell in passing Berket el Khulil (the “tank of Khulil).
Their report seems to confirm the supposition of Messrs. Robinson and Smith that the ruins of Sebbeh are those of Masada. At every step in our route, where these gentlemen have been, we found that accurate and learned observers had preceded us, and in these precursors, with no little satisfaction, we recognised our own countrymen.
CHAPTER XVI.
FROM CAMP TO THE CAPITAL OF MOAB.
SUNDAY, April 30. This morning, like the land we are in, we enjoyed our Sabbath, and slept until the sun and flies compelled us to get up. There were light airs from the west. At 6.30 A. M., thermometer 84°, and quite warm. The wind had been fresh in the night, and the boats were driven by the surf broadside on the beach. The atmosphere of the tent being oppressive, we breakfasted outside in its shade. Some of us spent the forenoon in the quiet recesses of the ravine, endeavouring to observe the day. Thus far, all, with one exception, had enjoyed good health, but there were symptoms which caused me uneasiness. The figure of each one had assumed a dropsical appearance. The lean had become stout, and the stout almost corpulent; the pale faces had become florid, and those which were florid, ruddy; moreover, the slightest scratch festered, and the bodies of
_________
called by the Arabs the talk, and camels graze on its leaves and tender branches.-Griffith.
336 EFFECTS UPON HEALTH.
many of us were covered with small pustules. The men complained bitterly of the irritation of their sores, whenever the acrid water of the sea touched them. Still, all had good appetites, and I hoped for the best.* There could be nothing pestilential in the atmosphere of the sea. There is little verdure upon its shores, and, by consequence, but little vegetable decomposition to render the air impure; and the foetid smell we had frequently noticed, doubtless proceeded from the sulphur-impregnated thermal springs, which were not considered deleterious. Three times, it is true, we had picked up dead birds, but they, doubtless, had perished from exhaustion, and not from any malaria of the sea, which is perfectly inodorous, and, more than any other, abounds with saline exhalations, which, I believe, are considered wholesome. Our Ta'amirah told us that, in pursuance of the plan he had adopted with regard to the settlement of the Ghor, Ibrahim Pasha sent three thousand Egyptians to the shores of this sea, about ten years since, and that every one died within two months. This is, no doubt, very much exaggerated.
There was, most probably, much mortality among the poor wretches, forced from their fertile plains to this rugged and inhospitable shore; but dejection of spirits, and scarcity of food, must have been the great destroyers.
At 12.15, started for the eastern shore, leaving Sherif again in charge, with directions to move the camp to Ain Turabeh, on Wednesday. This was the day appointed to meet 'Akil, and I felt sure that he would not fail us.
A light air from the south induced me to abandon the awning and set the sail, to spare the men from labouring
__________
"Wherever there is an evil there is usually its antidote near at hand; and, perhaps, the remedy for these cutaneous diseases is to be found in the acrid juices of the osher, which grows here and upon the southern shores of this sea.
HEAT AND DESOLATION. 337
at the oars. A light tapping of the ripples at the bow, and a faint line of foam and bubbles at her side, were the only indications that the boat was in motion. The Fanny Skinner was a mile astern, and all around partook of the stillness of death. The weather was intensely hot, and even the light air that urged us almost insensibly onward had something oppressive in its flaws of heat. The sky was unclouded, save by a few faint cirri in the north, sweeping plume-like, as if the sun had consumed the clouds, and the light wind had drifted their ashes. The glitter from the water, with its multitude of reflectors, for each ripple was a mirror, contributed much to our discomfort; yet the water was not transparent, but of the colour of diluted absinthe, or the prevailing tint of a Persian opal. The sun, we felt, was glaring upon us, but the eye dared not take cognizance, for the fierce blaze would have blighted the powers of vision, as Semele was consumed by the unveiled divinity of Jove.
The black chasms and rough peaks, embossed with grimness, were around and above us, veiled in a transparent mist, like visible air, that made them seem unreal, and, 1300 feet below, our sounding-lead had struck upon the buried plain of Siddim, shrouded in slime and salt.
While busied with such thoughts, my companions had yielded to the oppressive drowsiness, and now lay before me in every attitude of a sleep that had more of stupor in it than of repose. In the awful aspect which this sea presented, when we first beheld it, I seemed to read the inscription over the gates of Dante's Inferno -"Ye who enter here, leave hope behind." Since then, habituated to mysterious appearances in a journey so replete with them, and accustomed to scenes of deep and thrilling interest at every step of our progress, those feelings of awe had been insensibly lessened or hushed by deep interest in the investigations we had pursued. But now, as I
338 PRESENTIMENT OF DISASTER.
sat alone in my wakefulness, the feeling of awe returned; and, as I looked upon the sleepers, I felt ‘the hair of my flesh stand up," as Job's did, when “a spirit passed before his face;" for, to my disturbed imagination, there was something fearful in the expression of their inflamed and swollen visages. The fierce angel of disease seemed hovering over them, and I read the forerunner of his presence in their flushed and feverish sleep. Some, with their bodies bent and arms dangling over the abandoned oars, their hands excoriated with the acrid water, slept profoundly; -others, with heads thrown back, and lips cracked and sore, with a scarlet flush on either cheek, seemed overpowered by heat and weariness even in sleep; while some, upon whose faces shone the reflected light from the water, looked ghastly, and dozed with a nervous twitching of the limbs, and now and then starting from their sleep, drank deeply from a breaker and sank back again to lethargy. The solitude, the scene, my own thoughts, were too much; I felt, as I sat thus, steering the drowsily-moving boat, as if I were a Charon, ferrying, not the souls, but the bodies, of the departed and the damned, over some infernal lake, and could endure it no longer; but breaking from my listlessness, ordered the sails to be furled and the oars resumed-action seemed better than such unnatural stupor.
Prudence urged us to proceed no farther, but to stop, before some disaster overtook us; but the thought of leaving any part of our work undone was too painful, and I resolved to persevere, but to be as expeditious as possible without working the party too hard.
At 4.10 P. M., reached "Point Costigan," north end of the peninsula, and steered S. S. E. across the bay, to search for water and for signals from 'Akil. The heat was still intense, rendered less endurable by the bright glare from the white spiculae of the peninsula, and the
BATTLE BETWEEN ARABS. 339
dazzling reflection from the surface of the sea. At 4.45, sounded in twenty-four fathoms, hard bottom, about gunshot distance from the land. 5.05, saw an Arab on the shore among the low canes and bushes, and shortly after several others. Preparing for hostilities, yet in the hope of a friendly reception, we pulled directly in and hailed them. To our great delight, one of them proved to be Jum'ah (Friday), sent by 'Akil, who yesterday arrived at Kerak. We immediately landed, and bivouacked upon the beach, a short distance from a shallow stream descending the Wady Beni Hamed.
'Akil, on leaving us at 'Ain el Feshkah, endeavoured, according to agreement, to find his way to the eastern shore and thence to Kerak. On his way he stopped with some of his friends, a portion of the tribe of Beni Sukrs from Salt. In the night they were unexpectedly attacked by a party of Beni 'Adwans. At first, being much inferior in numbers, they retreated, 'Akil losing his camel and all his baggage. Subsequently they were strongly reinforced, and became assailants in their turn. The action lasted several hours; they had twelve wounded, including two of 'Akil's followers, and twenty-two of the Adwans were reported to be killed and wounded, among the former the son of the skeikh. 'Akil's Nubian was twice wounded in the arm, once by a gun-shot, and once by the thrust of a spear. The rifle of the hostile young sheikh was given to Sherif Musaid, nephew of Sherif Hazaa, for his gallantry in the action.
We learned from Jum'ah that there were two sheikhs or governors in Kerak, a Christian one, who could muster 250 riflemen, and a Muslim one, whose followers were mostly mounted, and far more numerous; -the former wholly subservient to the latter.
At 7.30 P. M., Sulieman, the son of Abd 'Allah, Christian sheikh o£ Kerak, with four followers, arrived with a
340 DEBILITY FROM HEAT.
welcome and an invitation from his father to visit him in his mountain fortress, seventeen miles distant, saying that he would have come himself if certain of meeting us. They had been despatched at Akil's instance at early daybreak, and from the mountains, on their way down, saw us crossing the sea. An invitation was also received from the Muslim sheikh. I accepted it with a full sense of the risk incurred; but the whole party was so much debilitated by the sirocco we had experienced on the south side of the peninsula, and by the subsequent heat, that it became absolutely necessary to reinvigorate it at all hazards. I felt sure that Jum'ah would carefully guard our boats in our absence, and therefore sent to 'Akil, through whom alone I had resolved to hold transactions with this people, for horses and mules for the party. He had sent an apology for not coming in person on account of his wounded followers, and in consequence of all their horses being foundered. Mr. Dale, like myself, found it difficult to keep awake to-day, while steering the boat across. We are on the eastern side, a little north of the
neck of the peninsula. Wady Kerak is at the S. E. extremity of the bay. Between it and us is the village of Mezra'a, and in the near vicinity of the latter are the supposed ruins of Zoar. To-morrow we will continue the exploration of this deep and interesting bay.
On our return here, in consequence of the sun having been pouring on my unsheltered back for some hours while steering the boat, I was heated excessively, and sick even to faintness; but a bath wonderfully refreshed me. On all occasions, when weary, faint, and almost exhausted, a bath has been the great restorative, and I recommended it to all. On the banks of the stream were oleanders eighteen feet high, and in full bloom. Here, too, as on the Jordan, it is quite fragrant. Between the camp and the stream, and scattered on the plain, are,
THE FELLAHIN TRIBES. 341
groves of acacia, and many osher trees as large as half-grown apple-trees, and with larger fruit than any we had seen. We gathered some of the size of the largest October peach, but green, soft, and pulpy; emitting, like the branches, a viscous milky fluid when cut, which the Arabs told us would be extremely injurious to the eyes if it touched them. There was some of the dried fruit too, as brittle as glass and flying to pieces on the slightest pressure. Within the last was a very small quantity of a thin, silky fibre, which is used by the Arabs for gun matches. The rind is thinner, but very much in colour like a dried lemon, and the dried fruit has the appearance of having spontaneously bursted.
An Arab from Mezra'a brought us some detestable sour leban and some milk, but of which few could endure the smell, caused by the filthy goat-skins which contained them, and which, it seems, are never washed. He also brought some flour made of the dhom apple, dried and pulverized, which was very palatable.
The sheikh of Mezra'a, with some of his people, also came in. Together with the fellahin tribes at the south end of the sea, they are generally denominated Ghaurariyeh. They are much darker, and their hair more wiry and disposed to curl than any Arabs we have seen. Their features as well as their complexion are more of the African type, and they are short and spare built, with low receding foreheads, and the expression of countenance is half sinister and half idiotic. Their only garment is a tunic of brief dimensions, open at the breast and confined round the waist by a band or leathern belt. The sheikh has rude sandals, fastened by thongs; the rest are barefooted. The women are even more abject-looking than the men, and studiously conceal their faces. They all, men and women, seem to bear impressed upon their features the curse of their incestuous origin.
342 CHRISTIAN ARABS.
Their village, Mezra'a, is on the plain, about half an hour, or one mile and a half distant. Their houses are mere hovels plastered with mud. They cultivate the dhoura (millet), tobacco, and some indigo, a specimen of which we procured.
The deputation from Kerak expressed great delight at beholding fellow-Christians upon the shores of this sea, and said that if they had known of our first arrival on the western shore, they would have gone round and invited us over. It was a strange sight to see these wild Arab Christians uniting themselves to us with such heartfelt cordiality. It would be interesting to trace whether they are some of the lost tribes subsequently converted to Christianity; or the descendants of Christians, who, in the fastnesses of the mountains, escaped the Muhammedan alternative of the Koran or the sword; or a small Christian remnant of the Crusades. At all events their gratification at meeting us was unfeigned and warmly expressed. They felt that we would sympathize with them in the persecutions to which they are subjected by their lawless Muslim neighbours. They had, indeed, our warmest sympathies, and our blood boiled as we listened to a recital of their wrongs. We felt more than ever anxious to visit Kerak, and judge for ourselves of their condition. Their mode of salutation approaches nearer to our own than that of any other tribe we met; they shake hands, and then each kisses the one he had extended. They had never seen a boat, which, in the language of the country, is called "choctura," and supposing that ours must have feet, examined them with great curiosity. They could not believe that anything larger could be made to float. In the course of the evening one of the fellahin from Mezra'a, when he first beheld them, stood for some time lost in contemplation, and then burst forth in joyful shouts of recognition. He was an Egyptian by
METEORS. 343
birth, and stolen from his home when quite young, had forgotten everything connected with his native country, until the sight of our boats reminded him of having seen things resembling them; and the Nile, and the boats upon its surface, and the familiar scenes of his childhood, rushed upon his memory. It was interesting to see the dull and clouded intellect gradually lighten up as the remembrance of the past broke in upon it; yet it was sad, for the glad smile of the Egyptian died away, and left a sorrowing expression upon his features - for from the Nile his dormant affections had, perhaps, reverted to the hovel upon its banks-and he thought of his mother and young barbarian playmates.
These Christian Arabs are of the tribe Beni Khallas (Sons of the Invincible), a name inappropriate to their present condition. Their features are fuller and more placid in expression, and they seem more vigorous, manly, and intelligent than the Raschayideh and Ta'amirah of the Judean shore. After dinner, partaken by the light o£ the camp-fires, we set the watch and threw ourselves upon the shelving beach, each one wrapping up his head to screen it from the fresh wind. Our Christian Arabs kept watch and ward with us through the night, for they had reason to know that the Mezra'a people were dangerous neighbours.
Although the wind was fresh from the north-west during the night, the thermometer, which was taken hourly, ranged from 82° down to 70°. At 70° the air felt uncomfortably cold, so much had we been relaxed by the sirocco. During the day the weather became warmer, not only from the direct rays of the sun, but the reflected heat from the barren cliffs which hem in this sea. There were several meteors in the night, shooting from the zenith towards the north. One was peculiar; instead of darting along the sky, it seemed to drop directly down, with less
344 A WILD BOAR KILLED.
than the usual velocity. It was very bright, and resembled falling fire-flakes from a discharged rocket.
Monday, May 1. A calm and warm but not unpleasant morning; thermometer, 83°. At 7, sent Mr. Dale and Mr. Aulick in the Fanny Skinner to complete the topographical sketch of the shore-lines of the bay, to verify the position of the mouth of Wady Kerak, and to sound down the middle on their return. About mid-day they came back; the weather oppressively warm.
Overhauled the copper boat, which wore away rapidly in this briny sea. Such was the action of the fluid upon the metal, that the latter, as long as it was exposed to its immediate friction, was as bright as burnished gold, but whenever it came in contact with the air, it corroded immediately.
Put up specimens of the flower and fruit of the ocher tree in spirits of wine, and procured some indigo, raised in the vicinity of Zoar, the ruins of which, a short distance hence, I purposed visiting in the evening. At 9, a wild boar was brought in. A horse, taken into the bay, could, with difficulty, keep himself upright. 'Two fresh hens' eggs floated up one-third of their length. They would have sunk, in the water of the Mediterranean or the Atlantic.
When one of our party inquired if there were stores in Kerak, describing a place where articles were sold, the Christian Arab replied, -" What we have we give: do you think that we would sell you any thing? You are our friends." While waiting for the horses, we made this a feast-day; and, anticipating the usual hour, dined sumptuously, at 2 P. M., on wild boar's meat, onions, and the last of our rice.
The stones on the beach before me, as I wrote, were encrusted with salt, and looked exactly as if whitewashed. It was well that we dispatched 'Akil in advance to the
ANCIENT RUINS. 345
Arabian tribes, for the Sheikh of Mezra'a told Jum'ah that, when he first saw us coming, he hastened to collect his followers, with the determination of attacking us, and only changed his purpose when he heard him greet us as friends. It would have been a matter of regret had they fired upon us; for, although we would most certainly have defeated them, there must have been blood shed, and it was my most earnest wish to accomplish the objects of the expedition without injury to a human being.
P. M. Rode out upon the plain, with two Arabs on foot, to look for the ruins of Zoar. Pursuing a S. E. direction, up the peninsula, passed, first, some dhoura (millet) fields, the grain but a few inches above the ground - many of the fields yet wet from recent irrigation. Thence rode through many tangled thickets of cane and tamarisk, with occasional nubk and osher trees, and came, at length, upon an open space, with many large heaps of stones in regular rows, as if they had once formed houses. They were uncut, and had "never known iron;" but there were no other vestiges of a building about them so I concluded that they were the larger stones which had encumbered the soil, and were gathered by the fellahin. Proceeding a little more to the south, we came to many more such mounds or heaps, and, among them, to the foundation of a building of some size. It was in the form of a main building, with a smaller one before or behind it; the first being a quadrangular wall, and the other in detached pieces, like the pedestals of columns. The stones were large, some of them one and a half feet in diameter, uncut, but roughly hewn, and fitted on each other with exactness, but without mortar. There were many minute fragments of pottery scattered about on the soil; and among the rubbish I found an old hand-mortar, very much worn, which I brought away. The ruined
foundation bore the marks of great antiquity; and the site corresponds to the one assigned by Irby and Mangles as that of Zoar. But I could see no columns and no other vestiges of ruins than what I have mentioned.
Returning, saw the horses and mules for which we had sent, coming down the mountains, and waited for them in the plain. They were accompanied by Muhammed, the son of Abd'el Kadir, the Muslim Sheikh of the Kerakiyeh, and by Abd' Allah, the Christian sheikh of the Beni Khallas; the latter residing in the town of Kerak, the former living mostly in black tents, about half a mile distant from it.
On our way to camp, Muhammed endeavoured to display his horsemanship; but the animal, wearied by the rough mountain road he had travelled, fell to the ground, and his rider was compelled to jump off to save himself. In mounting again, not finding any thing more convenient, he arrogantly ordered one of the fellahin to stoop, and, placing his foot upon the abject creature's back, sprung upon his horse.
This Muhammed is about thirty years of age, very short but compactly built, with a glossy, very dark-mahogany skin, long, coarse black hair, and a thick, black beard and moustache. His eye, fiery, but furtive, was never fixed in its gaze, but, rolling restlessly from one object to another, seemed rather the glare of a wild beast than the expression of a human eye. Altogether, we thought that he had the most insolent and overbearing countenance and manner we had ever seen.
Abd' Allah, the Christian sheikh, about twenty years his senior, was a very different person; robust in frame, he was mild even to meekness. In the bearing of the respective parties towards each other, we could read a long series of oppression on one side and submissive endurance on the other.
AN ARAB LATTER. 347
They brought me a letter from 'Akil, of which the following is a literal translation :
DIRECTION.
"By God's favour. May it reach Haditheh, and be delivered to the hand of the Excellency of our Beloved. “May God preserve him. Beduah, 1642."
INSIDE.
"To the Excellency of the most honourable, our dear friend-may the Almighty God preserve him.
“We beg, first, to offer you our love and great desire to see the light of your happy countenance. We beg, secondly, to say that in the most happy and honourable time, we received your letter containing your beautiful discourse. We thanked, on reading it, the Almighty God that you are well, and ask him now, also (who is the most fit to ask), that we may be permitted to behold the light of your countenance in a fit and agreeable time.
"The animals which you have ordered will be brought down to you by the Excellency of our brother chief, Muhammed Nujally, and the chief Abd' Allah en Nahas; and the men necessary to guard the boats will be supplied by the said chiefs.
“The reason of our delay in coming to you was the weakness and fatigue of our horses. The time will be, God willing, short before we see you.
“This being all that is necessary, we beg you will offer our compliments (peace) to all those who inquire after us. -From this part, the Excellency of our respected brother, Sherif, sends you his best compliments. May you be kept in peace.
Seal of 'Akil Aga el Hassee.
"KERAK, 28 Jamad Awah."
The boats excited much attention; and, to gratify both the Christian and the Muslim Arabs, we launched one
348 ARAB WAR-CRY.
and pulled her a short distance out and back, some of the Arabs being on board; but Muhammed, although he had been the loudest in expressions of wonder and incredulity, declined to go with them; and I was disposed to think that he was a very coward after all. On returning from the beach, they stuck plugs of onions into their nostrils, to counteract the malaria they had imbibed from the sea. They call it “the sea accursed of God;" and, entertaining the most awful fears respecting it, looked upon us as madmen for remaining so long upon it.
During the forenoon, the thermometer ranged from 86° to 90°. At sunset, it stood at 83°, and quite pleasant. Sky filled with cumulus and stratus. A little after 8 P. M., we heard the song sung by the tribes when about to meet friends or enemies; in the first instance, a song of welcome; in the last, a war-cry of defiance. The wild coronach was borne upon the wind, long before the party singing it were in sight; but presently, fourteen mounted Arabs, headed by the brother of Muhammed, came proudly into the camp. The camp consisted of two boats' awnings, stretched over stakes, to screen us from the sun and wind. All carried a long gun and short carbine, the last slung over the shoulders, except one Arab, a kinsman of the sheikh, who bore a spear eighteen feet long, with a large, round tuft of ostrich feathers just below the spear-head. Reining up before us, they finished their song, prior to dismounting or exchanging salutations. The war-cry of the Arabs was the only true musical sound we heard among. them, although they frequently beguiled the tedious hours of a march with what they termed a song. The following notes, by Mr. Bedlow, will give some idea of their war-cry.
DOUBTFUL APPEARANCES 349
These few notes are uttered in a high, shrill voice,, and with a modulation or peculiarity bearing some affinity to the characteristic Yoddle of Tyrolean music. The distance at which this strange, wild war-cry can be heard, is almost incredible.
After nightfall the wind sprang up fresh from the northward. We made a lee by stretching one of the boat's awnings across, and lying upon the beach with our heads towards it. For myself I could not sleep. The conduct of Muhammed, amounting almost to impudence, filled me with distrust. He had come down with about eight men, his brother with fourteen more, and by two and three at a time they had been dropping in ever since, until, at 9 P. M., there were upwards of forty around us; and, if disposed to treachery, there might be many more concealed within the thicket. It seemed as if Muhammed considered us as already in his power, and it occurred to me at times, that it was my duty, in order to save the lives for which I was responsible, to depart at once; but two considerations determined me not only to remain, but, at all hazards, go to Kerak. The second day after our arrival upon this sea, I had sent 'Akil to the Arabian tribes to announce our coming and to make arrangements with them to supply us with provisions. He had, through great peril, and at considerable loss, made his way along the whole eastern coast, and as directed, announced the coming of a party of Americans, people from another world, of whom they had never heard before. I therefore felt that to retire now would be construed into flight, and the American name be ever after held in contempt by this people, and all who might hereafter sojourn among them. Moreover, to decline an invitation for which we had made overtures through 'Akil, might hazard his safety. In addition to these considerations, I felt satisfied that if not invigorated by bracing air, even for one day,
350 HEAVY DEW.
many of the party would inevitably succumb; and I preferred the risk of an encounter with the Arabs to certain sickness upon the sea, with its result, unaccomplished work.*
Although the wind was high, too high to take observations of Polaris, the night was sultry; thermometer 81°, the dew so heavy as to filter through the awning and drop upon our faces. This is the second time we have experienced dew upon this sea, each time with a hot wind from the north. It probably betokens some atmospheric change. Then it was succeeded by a sirocco. We shall see what to-morrow will bring forth. This is our fifteenth night upon this sea. Towards morning the wind lulled and the sky became clouded and the weather cool. Tuesday, May 2. Cloudy. Called all hands at 4 A. M., and set off at 5.30, after a hurried and meagre breakfast. The sailors were mounted on most unpromising looking cradles, running lengthwise along the backs of their mules, while our horses were but little better caparisoned. At his earnest solicitation, I left behind Henry Loveland, seaman, who was apparently one of the least affected by
_________
My misgivings were not unfounded. Just before our final departure from this place, the son of the Christian sheikh told us that the Muslims, with a concealed party amounting in all to sixty, had determined to attack us (of which the Christians dared not give us notice at the time), but as there was always an officer and two men on guard, one of them posted beside the blunderbuss, and I so often came out to look around, they fancied that we suspected their design, and therefore kept quiet. Armed as we were, the odds would have been against them. Each sailor had a carbine which loaded at the breech, and could be fired with great rapidity, and there was attached to it a steel bayonet, three feet long, that could be drawn out at will; and each one carried in his belt a pistol with a deadly bowie-knife attached. The officers had severally a carbine, a revolver pistol, and a sword, three of the last having pistol-barrels attached to the blade near the handle. I rejoice that we had no serious occasion to use them.
EXCURSION INLAND. 351
the previous heat.* To him and our Bedawin friend Jum'ah, who had several Arabs with him, I gave strict charge of the boats and all our effects.
We were fourteen in number, besides the interpreter and cook. The first I believed courageous; the latter I knew to be an arrant coward. Our escort consisted of twelve mounted Arabs and eight footmen, the rest having gone in advance.
We struck directly across the plain forming the base or root of the peninsula, towards the lofty ragged cliffs which overlook it from the east, and passed many nubk and osher trees, and fields of dried stalks, some resembling those of the maize and others the sugar-cane. The Arabs said that sugar was not cultivated upon this plain; but these stalks were the product of cultivation, were unlike the dhoura stalks, and very much resembled the sugar-cane. Crossing the stream which flows down the Wady Beni Hamad, and a number of patches of dhoura (millet), artificially irrigated, we passed close under a ruin on an elevated cliff, which overlooks the plain of Zoar. It seemed to be the remains of a fortalice not more ancient than the times of the Crusades. We would have given much to explore the plain and visit the ruin above, but circumstances forbade it. It was essential to inhale the mountain air as soon as possible, and equally important that we should keep together to guard against treachery. We resolved to make an exploration on our return, if satisfied that we could do so with safety.
We thus far passed in succession the loose tertiaries of the peninsula; some ferruginous and friable sandstone, a yellow and shaly limestone, clay-slate, and argillaceous marls.
From Wady Beni Hamad we skirted along the base of
__________
" This man eventually suffered more from sickness, and his life was longer in jeopardy, than any of the rest.
352 A THUNDER STORM.
the cliffs for about two miles in a south direction, across the neck of the peninsula towards the S. E. inlet of the sea, and. crossing the bed, turned up Wady Kerak, the steepest and most difficult path, with the wildest and grandest scenery we had ever beheld. On one side was a deep and yawning chasm, which made the head dizzy to look into; on the other beetling crags, blackened by the tempests of ages, in shape exactly resembling the waves of a mighty ocean, which, at the moment of overleaping some lofty barrier, were suddenly changed to stone, retwining, even in transformation, their dark and angry hue. In most places the naked rock dipped down abruptly into the deep and gloomy chasm, and it only required a torrent to come tumbling headlong over the rude fragments fallen from the cliffs above to complete the sublimity of the scene. Nor was it wanting.
When we first started, it was so cloudy that we congratulated ourselves upon the prospect of a cool and pleasant instead of a sultry ride. While passing under the ruin, it began to rain lightly but steadily. Before we had half ascended the pass, however, there came a shout of thunder from the dense cloud which had gathered at the summit of the gorge, followed by a rain, compared to which, the gentle showers of our more favoured clime are as dewdrops to the overflowing cistern. Except the slight shower at the Pilgrim's Ford, this was the first since we landed in Syria. The black and threatening cloud soon enveloped the mountain-tops, the lightning playing across it in incessant flashes, while the loud thunder reverberated from side to side of the appalling chasm. Between the peals we soon heard a roaring and continuous sound. It was the torrent from the rain cloud, sweeping in a long line of foam down the steep declivity, bearing along huge fragments of rocks, which, striking against each other, sounded like mimic thunder. In one spot, where the
SUBLIMITY OF THE SCENE. 353
torrent made its maddest leap, a single palm-tree, bent by the blast, waved its branches wildly above the gorge, seeming to the imagination like the genius of the place bewailing the devastation of its favoured haunt. During the whole of this storm, our rugged path led along the face of a steep precipice looking into the dark grandeur of the chasm beneath. It was a wild, a terrific, but a glorious sight!
“It more stirs the blood
To rouse a lion than to start a hare;"
and I rejoiced to witness this elemental strife amid these lofty mountains. How much more exciting and sublime than anything a monotonous plain presents! I have skirted the base of Etna, clothed in the luxuriant verdure of a favoured clime, and looked upon its summit, wreathed in a mantle of perpetual snow, while the smoke from its crater gracefully curled above it. I have clambered the cone of Vesuvius by nightfall, and looked over its brink into the fiery caldron beneath; and in a thunder-storm, I once launched a boat at the foot of Niagara, and rocking in the foam of its cataract, marked with delight the myriads of gems, of every hue and radiance, reflected in the misty vapour at each successive flash; but I never beheld a scene in sublimity equal to the present one.
A meandering river and a fertile plain, with their accompaniments, luxuriant foliage and fragrant odours, interspersed with scenes of domestic peace, captivate the eye and delight the senses. But the boundless ocean or sky-piercing mountains are necessary to the grandeur of sublimity; to embody, as it were, to the mind, and enable it to realize the presence of a great Being - great in all things, -but seeming to us most potent when either the "live thunder" leaps from cliff to cliff, or "He rides upon the wings of the mighty wind" across the illimitable waste.
354 RUGGED SCENERY.
The storm gradually subsided; the cloud which had enveloped the mountain-tops and spread itself far down the chasm, gathered its misty folds and was swept by degrees over the crest towards the desert of Arabia; -to refresh, perchance, the arid plains from its yet copious store.
At 9.15, bending a little from the ridge to the south, we passed a small stream, trickling down in a N. E. course towards the wady. Like the torrent, the stream was doubtless the creation of the shower. The general impression that there is a perpetual stream down the Wady Kerak, is an erroneous one. The Kerakiyeh tell us that it has only water in the rainy season, and for a short period, at other times, after storms like the one which had just passed over. When we crossed the foot of the ravine, there was no water in it; but quite a considerable stream in the Wady Beni Hamad, whence the plain around Mezra'a is irrigated. Except the lone palm, we had not seen a tree or shrub since we turned up the side of the ravine; but all along our zigzag path, the wildest rocks, bare, black, and contorted, presented themselves in detached fragments, and in wondrous strata, -mountainsides tumbled down, perpendicular crags, and deep chasms.
At 9.25, while passing along the edge of a sheer precipice, the weather partly cleared up, and gave us a terrific view down the ravine; it pained the eye to look into its dizzy depths.
At 9.45, stopped to rest at a small spring of pure water, which gushed out of a hill-side. The elements were not yet entirely hushed, the wind sweeping down the ravine in occasional gusts. Here the Kerakiyeh amused themselves by firing at a mark. Approaching to pistol shot distance, and taking rest with their long guns, they rarely hit the mark. Their powder was so indifferent, that one of our sailors contemptuously remarked that a gazelle
PARTIAL CULTIVATION. 355
could run a mile between the flash and the report. They were perfectly astonished at the execution of our rifle. At 10.30, started again, the road leading upon a wide terrace over the valley; the terrace here and there was almost blocked up by huge fragments, severed from the cliffs above, many of them, also, lying in every possible position in the valley beneath. Several of these blocks, and many places in the mountain-side, were hollowed out, sufficient in some places to shelter many persons. These old limestone-rocks are worn into caverns, arches, and the resemblance of houses; an isolated block was exactly like a thatched, moss-grown cottage. One of these may be the cave where Lot and his two daughters dwelt. About two-thirds up, we saw some of the retem, or broom plant,* many purpl