THE GOLD-MINES OF MIDIAN AND THE RUINED MIDIANITE CITIES. THE INNER LIFE OF SYRIA, PALESTINE, AND THE HOLY LAND. By Mrs. Richard Burton. Jl- ith Pkotographic Portraits of Captain Burton and the Author , and with Coloured Illustrations and Map . Second Edition, 2 vols. demy 8vo. Price 24 s. *<>♦- “ Vivid pictures of the outer as well as the Inner Life of Syria ” _ Pall Mall Gazette. “ Her account of harem life is one of the best and most truthful that has yet appeared.” — Academy. “Vivid, clever, and brilliant sketches of Damascus and the Mahom- medan and Christian races of Syria.” — Edinburgh Review. C. Kegan Paul & Co., 1, Paternoster Square, London. THE GOLD-MINES OF MIDIAN AND THE RUINED MIDIANITE CITIES. A FORTNIGHT’S TOUR IN NORTH-WESTERN ARABIA. BY RICHARD F. "'BURTON, MEMBRE DE L’lNSTITUT EGYPTIEN. SECOND EDITION. LONDON : C. KEGAN PAUL & CO.? i, PATERNOSTER SQUARE. 1878. / TO HIS HIGHNESS ISMAIL I., KHEDIV OF EGYPT, A RULER WHOSE LOVE OF PROGRESS AND WHOSE PRINCELY HOSPITALITY HAVE MADE THE NILE-VALLEY, ONCE MORE, THE RESORT OF SCIENCE AND THE DELIGHT OF TRAVELLERS, GTfyese ^ages ARE RESPECTFULLY AND GRATEFULLY INSCRIBED. TO THE READER. The present publication should be considered a sequel and a continuation of my “ Pilgrimage to El-Medinah and Meccah,” from which the adven¬ ture forming its subject may be said to date. I have, » therefore, dwelt at some length upon the mighty changes, the growths, and the developments of the last quarter century, which has produced the “ Greater Egypt” of the present day: contenting myself, however, with contrasting the actual Alex¬ andria, Cairo, and Suez with my descriptions of the same places in 1853-54. The tale of the Mining-Cities of Midian reads, they say, like a leaf from the “Arabian Nights.” Yet it is sober truth. My object has been to avoid, as much as possible, all play of fancy and the exag¬ gerations of an explorer’s enthusiasm. It is hardly necessary to state that my assertions are borne out Vlll TO THE READER. by the Report of the Mineralogists officially ap¬ pointed by H.M. the Viceroy of Egypt : and the labours of H.E. Gastinel-Bey and of M. George Marie have been carefully consulted before sending this volume to print. How little is known of the country may be learned from the words of my friend Professor Aloys Sprenger,* the most scientific topographer of Arabia : “ Es (die Station in oder bei Aynuna) ist reich an Palmen, trieb einst Feldbau, und es gibt Stellen, wo man (in Rinnen f) Gold fand.” The mineral wealth of the land is equally ignored by the savant Herr Albrecht Zehme,t the most modern geographical and historical “Sketcher” of the Penin¬ sula. Finally, the heart of Ancient Midian was traversed by Dr. Edward Rtippell in 1826,! and by Dr. George Aug. Wallin in 1847 ;§ not to mention such names as Burckhardt, Wellsted, || and Lieutenant (I.N.) Carless, who also surveyed the coast under Captain Moresby (I.N.), and my old * Page 22 , Die cilte Geographic Arabiens. Bern. Huber, 1875. f Arabie?i und die Araber seit hundert Jahren. Halle, 1875. I Reisen in Nubien Kerdofan , etc. 1 vol. Wilmans, Frank¬ furt, a.m. 1829. § “Notes taken during a Journey through part of Northern Arabia:” Journal R. G.S., vol. xx. of 1850. || Lieutenant J. R., “ Travels in Arabia.” 2 vols. London : Murray, 1838. TO THE READER. ix and lamented friend Dr. Beke, whose last writings are quoted in a note to chap. xii. Yet, apparently, none of them ever fanned a pound of sand, broke a stone, or noticed an atom of metal. « It is not easy to explain how a naturalist like Riippell could overlook the structure of the rocks, and pass through the old Ophir without suspecting the existence of the masses of metal around and below him. But at that time he was a fresh arrival, and the completely novel aspects of oriental scenery and life possibly bewildered him. Those who remember their sensations during their first month in India will understand what I mean. As regards the Ruined Cities, he was evidently not allowed to visit them by his escort, the Huway tat — in those days a somewhat turbulent and dangerous tribe, fond of domineering over strange visitors. With respect to the gold in quartz and porphyry, Sprenger suggests, with much probability, that Riippell, like the men of his day, some twenty years before the discoveries in California and Australia awoke the attention of the world, never dreamt of such trea- sui es and paid no attention to the geological features which denote the presence of the precious metal. The other travellers seem to have been wholly innocent of natural history. X TO THE READER. Gold has been connected with our earliest ideas of the Arabian peninsula, since William, the bio¬ grapher of Thomas Becket, said, “ Araby sends us gold.” All have read in youth of th e. plenas Arabum domos, and led beads nunc Arabum mvides gazis. We, the members of the Khedivial Expedition, feel not a little proud of our new work in an old land ; and we may rejoice in having added a name to the long list of mines and places given by the exhaustive Professor Sprenger. The Reconnaissance, to call it by its true title, was hurriedly organized, while the advancing hot season left us little time for making collections. The choicest samples of metals were submitted, after return, to H.H. the Khediv ; and the rest of the samples were sent for analysis to the Laboratory in the Cairene Citadel. My bottle full of reptiles and insects was forwarded to Dr. Smith of the British Museum; the land-shells of Wady Aynunah to Mr. J. Gwyn Jeffreys of Ware Priory, Herts, who has so often lent me his valuable assistance ; and a few sheets of dried plants, after being inspected by my friend and fellow-traveller, Dr. Carlo de Marchesetti of Trieste, were transmitted to Professor Balfour of Edinburgh. The photographed inscription found on the march to the “ White Mountain ” was sub- TO THE READER. xi t mitted to Professor Sprenger, to Dr. Socin of Bale, and to Mr. C. Knight Watson, of Burlington House. Finally, Mr. Reginald Stuart Poole, Keeper of the Coins at the British Museum, obligingly transcribed for me the Kufic inscription upon the glass piece bought at Burj Ziba. My many other obligations have been acknowledged in the following pages ; and, if any have been neglected, I would here offer an apology. The matter of the volume may be considered virtually new. After the return of the Expedition to Egypt a few brief and scattered notices appeared in the Press of England and the Continent. The information had been gathered by “ interviewing,” and nothing appeared under my own name. For this mystery there were reasons which now no longer exist. I therefore place the whole recital before the Public, without reserve or after- thought, merely warning it that my volume begins with the begin¬ ning of a subject which will probably go far. When these pages shall be in the readers hands, I shall once more be examining the “ Land of Midian;” attempting, under the auspices of His Highness the Viceroy of Egypt, to investigate the particulars of which the generals are here described ; XU TO THE READER. to trace the streams of wealth to their hidden sources ; and to begin the scrutiny to which all such exploring feats should lead. I have therefore left the MS. in the hands of my wife, who has undertaken to see it through the Press. PREFACE. - - Dear Reader, Captain Burton is in Arabia, in the Land of Midian, once more, and I am left behind — much against the grain — in order to bring this book through the Press, that you may know what was done last year ; and besides the hopes of pleasing you, the thought that I am contributing the only service in my power towards his great undertaking makes me bear my disappointment quietly. My task will be finished in a few days, and I shall then take the first steamer from Trieste to Suez, where I hope to be allowed to join the Expedition. The volume you are about to read requires but little explanation. Captain Burton, in his old Arab days, wandering about with his Koran, came upon this “Gold Land,” though I remark that in his recital he modestly gives the credit to others. XIV PREFA CE. He was a romantic youth, with a chivalrous con¬ tempt for “ filthy lucre,” and only thought of “ winning his spurs.” So, setting a mark upon the spot, he turned away and passed on. A foreigner will exclaim, “How English!” when he reads that he kept his secret for twenty-five years, and that when he saw Egypt in distress for gold, the same chivalry which made him disdain it before, made him ask leave to go to Egypt, seek H.H. the Khediv, and impart the secret to him, and thus act like a second Joseph to the land of Pharaoh. His Highness equipped an Expedition forthwith to send him in search of the spot ; and this year he has again obtained leave, and has gone to finish what he began last year. I pray you now to read the account of his labours in 1877; and you may pro¬ bably hear more of them, as he tells me that the discoveries of metals have thoroughly satisfied him. ISABEL BURTON. Trieste , January , 1878. CONTENTS. ►o*- At Alexandria CHAPTER I. CHAPTER II. The Changes at Cairo CHAPTER III. To Suez and her Sanitarium ... CHAPTER IV. Departure from Suez, and Arrival at El-Muwaylah CHAPTER V. From El-Muwaylah to Wady AynIjnah CHAPTER VI. From Wady Ayn^nah to the Wady Morak in the Jebel El-Zahd CHAPTER VII. Midian and the Midianites CHAPTER VIII. From Ayn El-Morak to the White Mountain ; the Inscription and the Nabath^eans ... CHAPTER IX. How the Gold was found in Midian : the Gold-Mines of Arabia ... PAGE I 28 63 94 1 22 148 174 206 242 XVI CONTENTS. CHAPTER X. PAGE The Return from the White Mountain to El-Muway- lah via Wady Sharma and Wady Tiryam : Notes on Botany ... ••• ••• ••• ••• z 5 CHAPTER XI. The Cruise down South: Sulphur and Turquoises: Notes on Fishes and Shells ... ••• ••• 299 CHAPTER XII. The Cruise Northwards to Makna, Capital of Madyan 317 CHAPTER XIII. Return to Cairo, etc. : the u Prociss- Verbal ” addressed to His Highness ... ... ... ••• ••• 37° CHAPTER XIV. Departure from Egypt Conclusion ... ... ^ APPENDIX I. A. — List of Supplies for a Desert Excursion, of Six to Ten Persons, lasting Sixteen Days, and a Cruise of Five (total, Twenty-one Days)... ... 393 B. — List of Expenditures made during the Expedition 395 APPENDIX II. List of Captain Burton’s “Land of Midian” Plants... 396 APPENDIX III. List of Insects... ... ... ... ••• ••• 397 380 39o APPENDIX IV. Specimens of Reptiles presented by Captain Burton to the British Museum • • • • • # • • • 398 THE GOLD-MINES OF MIDIAN. - CHAPTER I. AT ALEXANDRIA. # l At last ! Once more it is my fate to escape the prison-life of civilised Europe, and to refresh body and mind by studying Nature in her noblest and most admirable form — the Nude. Again I am to enjoy a glimpse of the “glorious Desert;” to inhale the sweet pure breath of translucent skies that show the red stars burning upon the very edge and verge of the horizon ; and to strengthen myself by a short visit to the Wild Man and his old home. And this visit was brought about as follows : His Highness the Viceroy of Egypt having heard, from a common friend, that many and many a year ago the site of a gold-field had come to my know¬ ledge, honoured me with an invitation to report this matter in person. I applied for a months leave of t B 2 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN absence, which was obligingly granted to me by H.B.M.’s Foreign Office, in consideration of a ferocious winter, all Bora and Scirocco, spent in the “trail of the slow-worm,” at Trieste. On March 3, 1877, I found myself, despite the awful predictions of the late Mathieu de la Drome, and the words of wisdom poured by wifely lips into the obedient marital ear, boarding the Austro-Hungarian Lloyds Aurora , Captain Markovich. The trip of twelve hundred miles was more than usually pleasant, along those picturesque coasts of I stria and those Highlands and Islands of Dalmatia, which War, the Regius Professor of Geography, has now introduced to the Wandering World. Beyond the romantic Bocche di Cattaro, Bosphorus of the West, we had nothing to fear from foul weather; and we could gaze without apprehension at the ice- revetted peaks, and the snow-powdered slopes of the errand Cunariot range : the far-famed Acroceraunians, of late years known only for flint-knapping. It was, as usual, black night when we anchored off the citadel and forts of Corfu; once the most charming of soldier stations, and ruined, since the sad year 1864, in the cause of Independence — unwillingly, too, as was shown by the rising in 1873, the object of which was to hoist once more the British flag. Past the breakers that swarm up Leucas or Sapphos Leap, still purple with her blood ; through AT ALEXANDRIA. 3 the far-famed Canale with rugged Theaki (Ithaca) to port, and lofty Gephalonia to starboard ; hard by Zante, whose lovely slopes and castled white town have made her the flower of the Levant ; across the gulf of Patras, and the town of Kata- kolo, with old Poudiko Kastro, the Venetian fort, towering high over the currant-grown lowlands ; past the German-haunted Alpheus of Jupiter Olympius ; along that rude and rocky and wind- wrung Arkadfa, which so strangely gave birth to soft Arcadian tale and song ; under the savage walls of strong P eloponnesus, a fair specimen of the land in which Europe has imprisoned the Greek, expecting him, withal, to beget Homers and Hero- dotuses, Aristides, and Themistocles ; across historic Navarino Bay and its ruin-crowned breakwater, to Sphagia Island ; past all these memorious sites we steamed, and we awoke, on the morning of the fourth day, when coasting along the southern shores of Crete, which men need no loncrer call Candia. The long thin island, whose lines and blocks of silver-tipped peak and pinnacle, some rising upwards of 8000 feet, and acting as condensers to the rain-winds that rush through the frequent gaps, was the last land visible upon our course ; and, although Candia mostly exposes her beauties to the North Pole, still nothing can exceed her Alpine 4 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID I AN. charms of bright sun and sparkling snow, gold-dust rained upon the purest ermine, and the whole set off by the true Mediterranean blue, the sea dancing to the music of the winds. With a heartfelt wish that Crete — annexed in a.d. 1680, by Mohammed IV., the last Sultan who took the field in person — may find herself, in the evening of her days, made happy by re-union with Christendom and the flag of St. George, we bade her a fond farewell, and marvelling to see the way of sea so desert of ships, we cast anchor on March 8th, in old Eunostos, the new harbour of Alexandria,*'' — a noble work, worthy of Egypt’s greatest days. We travellers now look forward only to a baggage-landing company, which * The harbour improvements are estimated to cost ^2,000,000 ; and blasting the Bugzaz, or pass between the shoals into the harbour, will add 70,000. It is now proposed to fill up the Eastern, or Back Bay — called the “ New Port,” probably because utterly unfit to harbour a ship — between Forts Farrilon and Caffarelli. The latter is undoubtedly built upon the site, and partly with the materials, variegated marbles, of ancient Pharos. The engineering operation would be made easy by running a tramway from the old Necro¬ polis and quarries of Maks (Mex) beyond the obsolete Tabias, or batteries, and the bulbous ruin-Palace of Said-Pasha ; but the financial part, which also demands ^70,000, is a very different matter. The forts have sensibly been allowed to fall to pieces. What is the use of attempting to defend one end of a city ? The works on the land side are now riddled and levelled for railway lines and stations. In fact, the days when Alexandria wanted such defences are gone by : she can renew them when these times return. In my “ Pilgrimage” I mistranslated Ras-el-Tin “ Headland of Figs ” instead of “ Headland of Clay,” the latter being still used to make “ gullehs,” or gargoulettes. A T ALEXANDRIA. 5 shall save us from the mortification of the jarring boatman and the rapacious dragoman. The “ Lybian suburb,” the city of Prophet Daniel, of Alexander the Great, and of Mark the Apostle, is no longer, as in 1853, “ a city of misnomers, whose dry docks are ever wet, and whose marble fountain is eternally dry whose ‘Cleopatra’s Needle’ (why not call it the Obelisk of Thothmes ?) is neither connected with Cleopatra, nor is it a needle ; whose ‘ Pompey’s Pillar ’ (why not boldly say the Column of Diocletian ?) never had any earthly connection with Pompey ; and whose Cleopatra’s ‘ Baths ’ are, according to veracious travellers, no baths at all.” Yet it is her unlucky fate to be abused by every traveller. Never a tourist of a few hours spent at Abbat’s or at the Hotel de 1’ Europe, but throws his little stone, his critique malveillante at her. I have even heard her charged with the “ vulgarity of the West.” Viewed from the sea, the great emporium commands a respect which we indignantly refuse to Karachi ; and yet the essen¬ tials and even the accidents of Old Egypt and Young Egypt bear a family, nay a sisterly, likeness.* The failures, called “ improvements ” in other Me¬ diterranean ports, notably at Trieste, turn to the benefit of Alexandria. The difficult and dangerous * The curious reader will consult “ Sind Revisited ” — passi?n . 6 THE GOLD-MINES OF MIDI A N. entrance of yore is safely buoyed ; the anchorage- ground, formerly exposed, is now land-locked ; the noble breakwater, guarding the sea-front, wants only a better lighthouse at the Point : the interior of the old Port is provided with moles and docks ; the landing-place is being deepened by filling up, per¬ haps too much, the inshore shallows ; and, finally, broad, slab-paved quays along the Marina will pre¬ sently facilitate transit and traffic. “ Semper Libya novi aliquid parit,” said the historian ; and Libya has never brought forth anything better than the new Harbour. The “improvements” which, at Alexandria, really deserve that much-abused term, culminate about the Place de Consuls, now named Place Mehemet Aali. In 1853 this big oblong square or Place, the base of the T stem representing the shape of the modern city, was a bald, wind-wrung, and barren wilderness, alternately light dust and dark mud. Since Europe took the matter in hand, it has become a highly re¬ spectable square, surrounded by pavements and trot- toirs of stone. The inner space reserved for promena- ders, where the turbaned Napoleon * sits his Arab steed, in the presence of growing trees and flowing waters, is girt by posts and by chains which sin only in profusion of metal : they are massive enough for * The Saturday Review erroneously places Mehemet Aali’s statue, instead of Ibrahim Pasha’s, at Cairo (April 20, 1877). AT ALEXANDRIA . / the sheet-anchor of an iron-clad, and the tall spikes remind you creepingly of the Mamliik Beys, and of their pet punishment which, pace Musurus Pasha, is not wholly obsolete.* The round white basins no longer lack water : there are Kiosk band-stands whence music enlivens the lovely summer nights : the English Church is less homely-hideous than she is wont to be ; and the light-blue Palazzo Tositza, at the east end, makes a satisfactory Municipality and Court-house. Though it is the British fashion to live out of town, the old north-fronting palcizzi are large and comfortable, catching the sea-breeze and escaping the sun. But Alexandria, like Damascus and all such places, is more appreciated by the land-traveller coming the other way ; by the homeward-bound who enter it from the south. The Cairo railway¬ line is far superior to all others : even the omnibus trains are punctual ; and the mail-trains cover their 1 31 miles in four hours and a half. In the warm season the first whiff of the sea-breeze is enjoyable as the first glass of Nile water. The aspect of * On this vexed subject of “man versus bean-log,” seep. 259, “ Through Syria and Herzegovina on Foot,” — an excellently written account of a bold adventure by Mr. Arthur T. Evans, etc. — 2nd edit. London : Longmans, 1877. The argument of the Greco-Turkish diplomatist, opposed to eye-witnesses, was con¬ vincing : “ Turkey has abolished the stake by law, consequently men are never impaled.” Yemen, in Southern Arabia, could tell another tale. 8 THE GOLD-MINES OF MIDI AN. Mareotis, Eastern and Western, cools the eye that has suffered from the glare of Cairo and the Desert. The gare , with its shed of corrugated metal, is more roomy and less “ ramshackle ” than anything of the kind in Egypt. The main streets are also paved, after the fashion of the Italian towns, with the large slabs of that eocene sandstone in which Trieste still drives a roaring trade. The houses are numbered, although the thoroughfares are not named. The European shops are something like shops, not the miserable Frankish booths of the capital, where for third-rate articles you are charged first-rate Parisian prices. “ Shopping,” indeed, is throughout Egypt an expensive and unsatisfactory pastime : at Ebner’s Library, Cairo, I was relieved of ten francs for Brugsch Bey’s last pamphlet, which Leipzig sells for one thaler and a half (5 fr. 50') ; while the Pharmacie Centrale charged me four francs for an eye-wash, half a pinch of borax in a wine-glass of rose-water. The “ Canal of the Two Seas ” was the first blow to Alexandria, once so confident in her pride of place as the port-capital of the Levant, the success¬ ful rival of Algiers and Smyrna, and the last and best of the new births which Africa ever bears. This was succeeded by another shock on April 19th, when the sweet-water line, “ El Ismaelfyyeh,” that AT ALEXANDRIA. 9 connects the Nile at Cairo with Lake Timsah, reduced the area of her imports and exports to the very smallest radius. She is poor, and her poverty is of the ever-increasing order. Nothing remains for her but to make feverish Lake Maryiit (Mareotis) exchange the fish for corn, wine, and oil ; as more than one English company has proposed to do. But the injury to the passenger-traffic renders the hotels far more plea¬ sant and comfortable than of yore. Yeck’s old “ Orient ” has gone down in the struggle of life, and Abbat’s, in the triangular Place de TEglise, dating from 1868, is mostly preferred by summer visitors. The Hotel de 1’ Europe, to which the Khediv * sends his guests, has now taken the lead ; and the terms are moderate, fourteen francs per day, when you pay sixteen shillings at the Suez Caravanserai. This prospect of bankruptcy has not tended, I need hardly say, to keep up the spirits of the Alex¬ andrians. The “ Arabs,” as the Egyptians are * I cannot understand why we have naturalized the debased corruption Khedive, or Khedive of the French, who ever love to pepper the last syllables of Oriental words with their barbarous accents ; and worse still, Kedive, as an English author further degrades the title. The good old Persian word, Khadi'v (Khediv), Khudiv, or Khidfv, means a prince, a king, a great sovereign, as Khedfv-i-Hind, the Monarch of India. It is etymologically con¬ nected with Khud (self), and with Khuda (the Self-existent, /.ooo souls (in 1858, 12,000), and thirteen ginning factories, of which nine are worked in the season between September and March ; there are also four steam flour-mills which never rest. The approach on all sides is made pleasant and picturesque by the unusual quantity of wood and water ; and the view of the town from raised ground is admirable — always considering that we are on the verge where the Delta and the Desert meet. * At Zagazig I heard much concerning the want of an English Consular Agent, to protect the British community from the local avanie which in numbers rank after the Greek and before the French. Of course all European nations are here represented but ourselves. Whilst the Spanish Vice-Consul has one individual to protect, and whilst the Prussian and Brazilian Agents have none, we allow our subjects, Maltese and others, to look after them¬ selves when alive, whilst there is no one to look after them when they cease to live. The last who died at the Naffisheh Station was a Miss B _ . The body was sent by a cattle-truck to the nearest Zabtfyyah (police-court), and it was on the point of being hid by the native constables in a hole, with the shift worn during life. Thereupon M. Rempler, a German, cried shame, and generously paid the bill for a coffin and other decencies of death. Tie has, however, been repaid for his outlay. 68 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN The Zagazigites are rapidly becoming civilised as far as the ripest trickery goes. Soldiers being stationed on the several roads to levy the octroi , the innocent Fellahs have organized smuggling- funerals. The biers, instead of containing human matter for Paradise, are stuffed with taxable cheese, butter, and other creature comforts for the living. The women dress up skins like two-year-old children, fill them with forbidden goods, and carry them upon the shoulder, patting and prattling with them till the guard is safely passed. Nothing ’cuter could occur to the Parisian mind ; evidently a high future awaits this very ingenious race. Moreover the “ Bamiyah Cotton ” has caused a vast development of unfair play. The Copt who first grew the plant gave the bolls for ginning to certain Greeks, who at once sowed the seeds for themselves, returning the ordinary produce to the Copt : the latter, however, found out the trick, and now lays claim to half the yield. The same sons of Hellas also, noting that prices ran high last year, mixed the Bamiyah with any common seed they could find ; conse¬ quently there will be immense trouble in “ picking.” Next morning, whilst awaiting the Suez train due at 1.30 p.m., we walked to the famous Tells, which begin at the Railway Station, and which show their largest masses to the south of the modern town. 'Fhe ruins called Tell-Bastah have been generally TO SUEZ AND HER SANITARIUM. 69 identified with Pe-Bast, or Bubastis ; * although the eminent Egyptologist, M. Chabas de Chalons, prefers to place the great Diana at Pe-bailes. His in¬ sufficient reason for disturbing the tradition of cen¬ turies is, that the stranger goddess Bailes, or Baalis, was a form of Sekhet or Sokhet, and was probably the same as Bast. A dozen years ago the remains were looked upon as haunted, and no Fellah would have dared to cross them by night. Now, however, familiarity has done its usual work. The people have ob¬ tained permission to dig, and to use as compost for their vegetables the dark-brown dtbris dust, which is impregnated with animal and vegetable matter, and with a little lime. It is invariably sifted, and thus a quantity of small antiques, espe¬ cially scarabei, statuettes, and amulets for necklaces, are found almost every day. At times there are more valuable discoveries, especially life-sized bronze cats, the very sacred animals which the Egyptians copied with most art, bearing the collar and symbol of Bast. % Of the famous temple nothing now remains but two heaps of the finest pink-red syenite. They * Pi-Bast (City of Bast) or Bubastis, where Bast (Pashr or Diana), that is, Isis with the head of the tabby-cat (Bast = Vissat in Modern Arabic), had her head-quarters ; whilst Osiris, her husband, assumed the form of Bas or Bes (Arab. Biss), the tom-cat. (Brugsch, Geschichte, p. 200.) 7o THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. occupy the midst of a kind of amphitheatre, whose ruin is composed of the normal adobe (unbaked brick) now weathered back into the original clay. The Tells, distinguished by their bald bare polls, swelling, rounded out of the rich velvet green of the fields, extend for at least ten miles southwards to Abu Hamad, along the Suez Railway. I can only hope that a careful plan of the ground will be made before these mounds are bodily removed. We saw Haji Wali comfortably seated in the train, and after the normal five hours and a half arrived at Suez. The country traversed is highly interesting. The old land of Goshen,* pastoral, whereas Tanis (Sau) was agricultural, appears to be reviving under the influence of the sweet-water canals. A few years ago it was a howling waste ; now it is patched with tracts of emerald verdure. A little farther south are the gardens of Abu Bulah, the fine estate belonging to His Highness’s mother, which have seen only three floods. The well-grown trees, mulberries and vines, admirably illustrate the all-might of water in these regions. It was visited and surveyed in 187 2 by Colonel now General Purdy, the American Staff-officer who has lately been doing such good work in Dar-For. * The Arabs call it Bilad-el-Gesh, or El-Rabfa (the pasture) ; the popular term is now El-Wady : it is the Gesem of the old Egyptians, and the Kesemet of the Copts. TO SUEZ AND HER SANITARIUM. U At the Naffisheh Station we inspected the col¬ lection of M. Vannini, of the refreshment rooms, whose sign-board is the Manx coat of arms supplied with a central eye, and whose wife, a Bolognese, was delighted to chat with one so lately from her grand old home. From Maffi'sheh a small branch line leads to Ismailfyyeh upon the Timsah or Crocodile Lake. I have assisted at its birth, and predict for it the highest destinies. The situation is charming ; the climate excellent, fanned by the sweetest of Desert airs ; the soil extra fertile, the bathing first-rate. Viewed from the lake southwards, it shows a huge pile of building with fine gardens, the Vice-regal Palace extending left to the P ompe-a-feu works, while a number of flat roofs rise from the dense clumps of verdure, and crown the surface of a tawny land. Already, in 1876, it contained 2000 souls, and it hoisted nine several flags. The land-approach, with its mean mosque and small huts, its big-tiled houses, its three caJIs (biere en chope ), and its suburbs of * stone, mud, and thatch, is by no means so pleasant. But presently esplanades, quays, and moles will be built; and tall ships will load direct for Europe. Besides the Canal des Deux Mers, that Egyptian Bosphorus connecting the far West with the outer East, the sweet-water Ismailfyyeh, will transport the produce of the Upper Nile. Thus the babe 72 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN which bears the name of its founder, the present Viceroy, is apparently fated to become a giant in the land, to take the place of Alexandria, and to repre¬ sent the one great Emporium of Egypt. Were I settled in the Nile- Valley, my first speculation would be to buy up every purchasable acre in and around Ismailfyyeh. Perhaps I might be too late. Unfortunate Suez! When I last saw her, in 1869, she had taken a fresh lease of life; but her career was fated to be short as it was fast and bril¬ liant. The Khedivfyyeh, or rigole of sweet-water, had brought with it Hammams and coffee-houses, where the decoction of Mocha did not taste as if flavoured with Karlsbad salts. The tumble-down walls and gates had been swept away like cob¬ webs ; a lusty young growth of houses and villas had sprung up outside the enceinte and along the creek; the Pasha had built a kiosk upon the ruins of the old town ; a casino-cum-gambling-house, where the ill-fated Captain A - of the 16th Lancers lost his life by a treacherous stab,* had been opened to the “ gay world ” by two Italian ruffians; business throve as well as pleasure, and, briefly, everything was jollity and prosperity. The completion of the Lesseps Canal (Jan. 1, 1870) changed all that. As if by magic, the traffic and transit which had passed through Suez old road * The murderer was sent to Italy, tried, and duly acquitted. TO SUEZ AND HER SANITARIUM. 73 made for themselves wings, and flew to the new cut ; and, behold ! after a short seven years she finds her¬ self temporarily ruined. No wonder that the passing traveller calls her a “ dreary town/' I use the quali¬ fying adjective with intention. The Gulf-port has suffered from the Canal, like Trieste from her rail¬ way, the Siid-bahu ; but these accidents are tem¬ porary and transitory, whereas the power of position is essential and permanent. The causes assigned to the Canalists for building a Port distant three miles to the south, instead of passing close by the town, are various. Some declare that the waters south and south-west of Suez are shallow, and that the borings come upon rocks, as was the case at “ Petit Chalouf ; ” others that the Suezians, resolved to make sudden fortunes by exorbitant demands, so offended the son of the biographer of La Perouse * that the proposed Due de Suez swore they should never see a centime of his money. The truth is that the “ Universal Company” built large expectations upon their three miles of ground on either side of the waterway, and this tract would not have included * Journal Historique du Voyage de la Perouse (1790), and Voyage de la Perouse (1831), by Baron Jean-Baptiste Barthelemy de Lesseps ; born 1765. He had been sent home to report the details of the expedition to Louis XVI. He was, I believe, the only officer who escaped with life, and he died Consul de France at Lisbon in 1834. His more famous son was born November 19, 1805. 74 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN the town. But the grant has long ago been given up for a consideration ; and the fact remains that, by the selfish tactics, much money has been spent, and poor Suez wears the appearance of a Red Sea settle¬ ment lately bombarded and not yet repaired. But Suez, the latest representative of so many historical towns, will presently have her revenge. Already the engineers are speaking of a double canal, one line for the northwards, the other for the 4 southwards bound, and both communicating by locks. This supplement would not cost half the sum (say ^20,000,000 sterling) swallowed up by the original, and, all things considered, making it would probably be found cheaper than widening the actual channel. It is expected that the successor will re¬ verse the proceedings of its predecessor, and run as it easily can, down the town-creek. Apparently, it has been the fate of the Vermiculus, the “ worm- let,” * ever to keep moving, to creep down from north to south. * In vulgar Arabic Suways (Suez) is the diminutive of Shs, a worm, a weevil, not a “ moth ” as Wellsted supposed. This can hardly be accepted, as the name is found in the Abyssinian “Sos,” a shepherd, a pastor, which also survives in the hated and historic Aramaean Arabs, called Hyk-Sos. It may be u little Sus,” as towns of the latter name are found in “ Susa ” of Khuzistan, in Morocco, in Tunis, and in other places. Stephanus (sub voc. ^ovcra cccclvi., vol. 11.) associates Susa with the Grecised Persian word crovcrovy a lily, which he states to be of Phoenician or Phrygian origin, and the Arabs still term it Susan, whence Susannah. Others derive it from the old Persian Shus, pleasant (Col. Kinneir’s “ Geographical TO SUEZ AND HER SANITARIUM. 75 The tradition of the people is that in the early Christian ages the site was occupied by fishermen and smugglers. Some six centuries ago, a Shaykh from Sus in Morocco, returning from his pilgrimage, • took up his abode on the sea-shore about a hundred yards west of the English hotel ; his sanctity caused him to become famous as El-Susf, and the place was called after him El-Siis, and afterwards El-Suways. His tomb is still shown and venerated as the founder of the port-town. The Heroopolis which named the Heroopolitan Gulf, and which Ptolemy (iv. 5) places in N. lat. 290 45', can hardly have been far from Suez, and is generally supposed to be the Ajrud Fort (Shaw, ii. 2). Arsinoe or Cleopatris,* built by Ptolemy Philadel- phus, and named after his sister in the third century B.c.vand existing as a town in the second century a.d. — a life of more than 400 years — has been identi¬ fied by H.M/s Consul Mr. George Westf with the Memoir of the Persian Empire,” p. 100, el seq.). Finally, in 1412, the geographer, Abu’l Rashfd-el-Bakuy (vol. ii. p. 243), calls it Suways el-hajar (Suez of the stony-ground), as if to distinguish it from others of the name. See Ayrton’s note upon Wallin, p. 340, Jo urn. of R. Geog. Soc vol. xx. of 1850. * Strabo (xvi. 4, § 24, and xvii. 1, § 26), Pliny (vi. 29), and Ptolemy (Joe. oil.), who places it in 290 10'. f Consular Reports “on the Trade and Commerce of the Port of Suez for 1872.” Mr. West well explains the reason of the several migrations of the town by the successive siltings-up of the several anchorages ; and he believes that “ the existing site of Suez, including the land recovered from the sea, south of the 76 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN Tell el-Klismeh (Clysma), a mound about seventy feet high, at the head of the creek, where the late Said Pasha built his Kiosk. In Ptolemy it lies twenty miles north of the Clysma Presidium * (N. lat. 28° 50'), whence it is supposed the Arabs derived their “ Kulzum.” Of the latter town Yakrut el-Ha- mawi, in his “ Mu’ajam el-Bildan ” (“What is known of Countries ”), written at the beginning of the thir¬ teenth century, states (sub voc . Kulzum), “it was then a ruin, with a gate ; and a place near it, called Suways, had become the port, and it also was like a ruin, and had not many inhabitants.” Suez, at present only a “ patch ” upon Port Said, settlement as far as the new port, will, for any period of time we can practically contemplate, be that of the Egyptian Red Sea entrepot best suited for the trade between Egypt and the countries about the Red Sea and beyond it.” M. Linant de Bellefonds (“Memoires sur les Principaux Travaux d’Utilite' Publique,” etc. Paris: Bertrand, 1872-73) would place Arsinoe or Cleopatris at the so-called Serapium Plateau or Lake Timsah, then the terminus of ship-navigation. * Bochart (Phareg sub voc. Clysma) supposes the port to have sent a bishop to the Council of Chalcedon in a.d. 451. Vincent (“ Commerce, etc., of the Ancients,” i. 522) considers Kulzum an Arabic corruption of KAAr/xa, which seems to imply a place by the sea-shore ; although Bochart {foe. cit .) had suggested that it ought to be written Kkccr/xa or KA eccr/xa, from kXAw, to shut, in reference to its assumed position as a port at the entrance of the famous old Isthmic Canal (Strabo, xvi. 4, § 24). Mohammed ibn Ya’akub el-Firozabadi (died a.d. 1414), author of the “Kamils (or Ocean) Directory,” and other worthies, derive the name of the town and its adjacent sea from its Arabic sense to “swallow up,” alluding to the destruction of “ Pharaoh and his host ” near the spot. TO SUEZ AND HER SANITARIUM. 77 may be described in 1877 as exactly the reverse of what I described her in 1853. True the old hotel remains, with its bad dinners and its unclean and sulky Hindi-Moslems, who never forget their creak¬ ing- shoes, nor remember their turbans and waist- belts. To the experienced eye these latest develop¬ ments of the oran-utan, or man of the woods, are pleasant as would be an English waiter in waistcoat and turned-up shirt-sleeves. But behind the Caravanserai there is a Roman Catholic Church, with tall steeple and jangling bells; whilst priests, nuns, and pigs promenade the streets. What would that large old Turk, Giaffar Bey, have said to these abominations ? The original English cemetery upon the Creek-islet shows rents and tears in all its buildings; and the Wakalet Jirjis, the “ George Inn,” survives in the last state but one of dilapidation and decomposition. The Farzeh Daur, or rotation system,* so ably denounced by Mr. Henry Levick, formerly Vice-Consul, and still British Postmaster for Suez, has completely died out ; and the shipping has changed from sail to steam. I found quarters at the Hotel de FOrient, in the Boulevard Colmar, formerly Suk el-Nimsa, the Austrian Bazar. Early on the following morning * “ Pilgrimage,” vol. i. pp. 250-52. By a curious misprint the word generally appears as “ Fazzeh.” 78 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN (Friday, March 30th), M. George Marie, C.E., called, and gave me the following letter, bearing the signa¬ ture of H.H. Prince Husayn Kamil, Minister of Finance. Le Caire, 29 Mars, 1877. “ Monsieur, “ J’ai le plaisir de vous annoncer par la pre'sente les dispositions que j’ai prises relativement a l’excursion que vous vous proposez de faire. “ Les officiers de l’Etat Major Egyptien— Amin Effendi Ruchdi, Hansan Haris, Abd-el-Kerim Izzet ; ainsi que l’Ingenieurs des Mines, M. George Marie, ont ete designes pour vous accom- pagner ; en dehors de ces Messieurs il y’aura encore environ une dizaine* de soldats du Ge'nie qui iront avec vous. “ Les susdits officiers ont des tentes, ainsi que tous les instru¬ ments necessaires pour faire les cartes geographiques ; M. Marie aura a faire le rapport sur les mines. “ Tous seront a Suez apres demain (Samedi) matin. “J’ai donne l’ordre par ecrit au Gouverneur de Suez, pour qu’il soit h votre disposition pour le cas, ou vous auriez besoin de lui ; si par exemple vous voudriez quelques guides pour vous accompagner, vous n’avez qu’a les lui demander. “ La Fregate Egyptienne Sinnar partira de Suez Samedi ; et j’ai deja donne les ordres necessaires au Commandant des bateaux stationnant a Suez pour que le Capitaine de la Fregate vous porte dans le port ou vous voudrez aller, et qu’il reste autant que votre excursion l’exigera. “ Enfin j’ai donne aussi l’ordre au Gouverneur de Moelh (El- Muwaylah) pour qu’il vous donne des chameaux, guides et toutes autres choses, que vous voudriez, pour pouvoir faire votre ex¬ cursion. “ Agreez, Monsieur, l’expression de ma plus haute considera¬ tion. (Signed) “ Hussein Kamil. “ Monsieur Le Capitaine Burton.” Nothing could be more satisfactory. The three ♦ There were twenty with the Shawfsh (chaush or corporal) Ali. TO SUEZ AND HER SANITARIUM. 79 Egyptian officers were introduced to me, and I formally took command. We then called upon the Muhdfiz (Governor) of Suez, H.E. Sa’id Bey, to meet the Captain commanding the corvette, and to settle the time and way of embarkation. Said Bey is an old captain in the Egyptian navy, a fervent Moslem, born in Candia (Crete) — a man of energy, activity, and full of friendly feeling towards Euro¬ peans. M. Marie kindly undertook to become caterer, and Mr. Clarke, who was on “sick leave,” to act as my secretary. All was ready ; the officers had their surveying-gear, but the engineer had brought only a few bottles of acids for testing metals ; and he afterwards assured me that he looked upon the whole affair as one of those Carottes which periodically sprout up with peculiar luxuriance in Egypt. Incessant work was required, during the short space of twenty-four hours, to collect the provisions and furniture ; camel saddles, water-bags, large and small ; batterie de cuisine , eating-gear, and the manifold other requisites for a three-weeks’ cruise and desert-trip. However, by the good aid of Mesdames Chiara- mouti, a ship-chandler and general dealer established at Suez, and Isnard, proprietors of the Hotel de l’Orient, we did pretty well.* The latter also en¬ trusted to us her son, Marius Isnard, a youth of * See Appendix I. 8o THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN twenty, who was to act as chef, together with an assistant, whom I shall call Antonin Rosse. He was a Southern Frenchman, and not very strong. He died at Suez December 9, 1877. Had I known what was before me, the least expensive and the best plan would have been to engage a dragoman, with a cook accustomed to the Desert, under con¬ tract to supply us with bed and board, with riding donkeys, and, in fact, with the wants of a common tourist-party. On such journeys the dromedary is a nuisance, because of the loss of time in mounting and dismounting to collect specimens. I saw as much as possible of my old friends, Mr. and Mrs. West, and the Levick family, who had been stationed at Suez long before the days of my Pilgrimage. Our mission was, of course, kept a profound secret. The excellent correspondent of the Times at Alexandria (May 14), says that “ there never was any real necessity for the mys¬ tery : ” let me advise him, should it be his fate to have anything to do with gold in Arabia, to be quite as reticent as I was. Lastly, the good Haji Wali gave me endless trouble. He would not go to bed ; he would eat only a bit of meat and drink a drop of soup ; he had told me everything, and now he wanted to go home ; he was an old man who could not stand the fatigues of a march ; he had pains in his head, in his side, in his knees, and so forth. A TO SUEZ AND HER SANITARIUM. Sr doctor was sent for, and requested to supply him with a flask of the most nauseous gout-mixture. Mr. Clark was told off to keep him well in hand : I really feared that he would break loose and disappear. He afterwards owned that it was all “ funk,” and two bottles of bitter ale a day proved even more efficacious than the gout-mixture. Yet it was a serious step ; to take, as it were, a man of eighty-two, by the neck, as he said, and to carry him off into Arabia. I felt relieved of considerable responsibility when he returned to his family in better condition than when he left it. This chapter may end with a sketch of the Sanitarium proposed for Suez, and, indeed, for all Egypt. Much has been written about the change of climate in the Isthmus, caused by the Canal Maritime ; and pilots agree that not only fogs and clouds now appear in a sky that was once of brass, but that the water also draws with it a wind from the north, in fact the sea-breeze of the Mediter¬ ranean, the Etesian gale of Herodotus, which regularly assisted those sailing up the Nile. At Suez, formerly so stagnant, this cool indraught is perennial, even during the season when the Canicule rises ; and three winters ago Jebel Atabeh and its fronting range of Asiatic mountains were, during forty-eight hours, powdered with snow — a portent which not a little astonished the oldest inhabitant. 82 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID I AN. / In early January, 1876, two violent showers fell over the northern part of the Red Sea ; and I found that the notable change for the better at Jeddah was popularly attributed to “ the Ditch.” It certainly has some effect. The evaporation from the Bitter and the Croco¬ dile Lakes is enormous. A gallon of water in the hot season gives thirteen grains of salt, the Dead Sea yielding eighteen. There are many species of fish which cannot exist in such a medium, and at times the shores are strewed with their dead. But Mr. Andrews, of the P. and O. Office, who since 1869 has taken meteorological observations at Suez, distinctly denies that the Canal has exercised any effect upon the rainfall of the Isthmus. He holds the snow and the showers to be accidents, and his objections are borne out by the winter of 1876-77, when there was literally no rain. However, one must modify all extreme statements upon this sub¬ ject, as some declare that it has not, and many that it has totally changed the climate. It would there¬ fore appear that there is a change, which affects persons differently according to their respective temperaments. Ramleh and Helwan (les Bains, are, I have shown, the only spots in the whole land of Egypt which offer anything like a change of air to the burnt-out denizens of her cities, while neither of TO SUEZ AND HER SANITARIUM. 8’ o them can claim the title of Sanitarium. The main climatic disadvantage of the Nile-Valley in Northern eyes is its distance from the Sommerfrisch, the cool villegiatura . Libanus, the nearest, wants every comfort of civilised life ; and that next removed would be cocknified Bagni di Lucca. There is, therefore, permanent local interest in the vccouuciis- sance south of Cairo, made during early 1876 by Doctors Schweinftirth and Gussfeldt, both African travellers of credit and renown. The papers con¬ tained passing and very superficial notions of their “ attempt to unravel the mysteries of that region of mountains and depressions, which extends from the Arabian chain to the Red Sea ; ” and even the explorers seem by no means to have realised what may be the results of their exploration. A few details concerning these mountains of the Lower Thebais, as Shaw calls them,*j* a block which promises so much. The Jebel-Galalah (Khelal), now proposed as a Sanitarium, was visited in search of coal, and to cure an obstinate ophthalmia, some thirty years ago, by the well-known engineer, Hekekyan Bey, uncle to my friend Yacoul Artin * The Academy (p. 511) of May 27th and of June 3rd (p. 534). Dr. Paul Gussfeldt began in July 7, 1877, a formal description of his trip in Herr Petermann’s “ Mittheitungen.” t I have consulted only the “ Voyages de M. Shaw;” the noble French translation is two vols., folio. La Haye ; Jean Neaulme, 1743. 84 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID LAN Bey : he spent nearly twenty-four months there, and he left his name cut on a rock, which the travellers have called Hekekyan-fels. The plateau lately surveyed by Col. Purdy and other Anglo-American officers, under orders from their energetic Chief of Staff, General Stone (Pasha), averages three thousand feet high, and measures in round numbers fourteen geographical miles from east to west, by forty north and south. Composed of white and yellow limestones and sandstones overlying granite, it seems to prolong in Africa the Sinaitic foundations split by the Red Sea ; and a broad band of primary formation, along which we shall steam, offsets from the south-eastern extremity, and subtends for a considerable distance the African shore of the Suez Gulf. The great (African) Wady el-Arabah, trending from north-east, on a parallel with the Zaaferaneh Light, to south¬ west, and averaging in breadth six hours of march, separates our block from the barren Jibal el-Humr (Red Mountains) which buttress the right bank of the Nile opposite the railroad station, Benir-Suef (Suwayf.) This African Wady, which must not be confounded with the Asiatic Wady el-Arabah * (of * “ Arabah” (Heb.) means a desert, from “Arab ” (to be dry), and relates to its physical qualities ; while Midbar describes the waste in relation to its use by man. Wady el-Arabah is not an •uncommon term in Arabia ; all, however, are features of inferior importance to the north-western, which Deuteronomy (i. i, and TO SUEZ AND HER SANITARIUM. 85 the Arabs), the southern prolongation of the Dead Sea depression, has been incorrectly rendered “ watercourse of the chariots,” Pharaoh’s heavy¬ driving wheels probably haunting the interpreter’s brain. The vegetation of the block is mostly gra¬ mineous ; sun-burnt and wind-dried in August and September. Trees, especially the short and thick- trunked acacia, grow only in the valleys, and Dr. Schweinftirth found to his surprise not only Asiatic plants, but one held peculiar to Siberia. No an¬ telopes were seen ; the game is principally steinbok (ibex) in the high lands, and hares in the low levels. The scanty population is partly settled — partly nomad. The former comprises the reverend in¬ mates of the two convents. Dayr Mar Antonios (of St. Anthony), one of the most ancient, if not the oldest, in the Christian world, stands upon the southern lip of the Wady el-Arabah, about 4750 feet high, and not visible from the sea, whence it is distant thirty-five miles. It is reached by Sam- biik (boat) from Suez to Za’aferaneh Lighthouse, a run of fifty miles, easily covered in a day, or even ii. 8) calls the “plain over the Red Sea” (read “at Arabah in Yamm Suf, or the Weedy Sea”) ; and “ the way of the plain from Elath ” (for “the road of Arabah from Elath ”). In the former place the LXX. has TvArjdiov tt)s epvOpas OaAadcrrjS ", and the Vulgate “ in solitudine campestri contra mare rubrum.” The second is rendered respectively Trapa rrjv 68b v rrjv ’'Apafia and “ per viam campestrem de Elath.” 86 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN in eight hours of northerly wind. The thirty-five miles of land-route must be done on horse, ass, or camel-back. \ At a distance it appears a long wall of masonry, the well-built enceinte of a quadrangle, contain¬ ing lodgings for fifty monks, and huts for the people attached to them, with gardens and other conveniences. In the middle rises a tower with converging sides, the blunt section of a cone. There is no open gateway, and the visitor, as at Sinai, is hauled up by a rope. Mar Bulos (St. Pauls), separated from its neighbour by the main ridge of the Galalah massif, lies some fifteen miles south¬ east by east : it is visible from parts of the Gulf, and its shape resembles that of its brother. The nomads of the mountain, the Beni Maazeh, of whom we shall presently hear more, are said to number 3000 souls, although not more than thirty are visible. They are a fine race, and treat their strangers with courtesy. The chief camp lies to the west and south-west of the Hekekydn-fels : else¬ where the necessary water must be carried on donkey-back. There are two lines from Cairo to the Jebel- Galalah. The first, by Suez and Za aferaneh Point, has already been mentioned : the second, by the Upper Egypt Line (Rodeh Station), places you in four hours thirteen minutes at the gare of Beni-Suwayf, TO SUEZ AND HER SANITARIUM. 87 distant from the capital fifty-five direct geographical miles. You engage camels at the village, and you cross by ferry to the right bank. Here several small settlements are scattered around Bayazel-Nasara, a Coptic church now being rebuilt. This stage will take about two hours and a half, and the same must be allowed for the ride over the river-valley to the nearest spurs of the Red Mountains. When the “ Champagne air ” of the uplands, perpetually poured on by the pure dry winds ol the Desert to the north and south, and by the salt breezes of the Ivulzum Sea to the east, with the Nile-draught to the west, shall be duly appreci¬ ated, a tramway will shorten the transit of the plain \ even now the short space of ten hours re¬ moves you from the rank reek of Cairo to the future Hill-Station. I will borrow the travellers’ viva voce version ol their trip, assisted by lithographed sheets issued at Cairo (May 20th, 1876). Doctors Schweinfurth and Gussfeldt went with a multiplicity of objects to collect botanical specimens, and to rectify previous flying-surveys by an exact topography. They also proposed to fix the age of the sedimentary rocks by studying the palaeontology ; and to determine the astronomical positions, the altitudes and the mag¬ netic intensity, inclination and declination.* On * Their instruments were a pocket-chronometer (makers, Har- 88 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN March 19th they made the church village “ Bayaz el- Nasara: ” hence skirting the northern slopes of the Jibal el-Humr, where nine several valley-systems were laid down, they reached the spring El-Aray- yideh, on the nearer bank of the Wady el-Arabah before mentioned. The greater part of the surface, especially the nummulitic plateaux between N. lat. 28° and 290 30', was bare of vegetation, or dotted with the white- blossomed broom ( Retcima Raetano , F.) ; some of the valleys bore a rather abundant growth, whose characteristic was the absinthium (. Artemisia Ju- daica , L.). Immense quantities of silex, like those that cover whole tracts in the Libyan and Arabian Deserts, strewed the Wady Seniir (No 4) : the cores had been split to prisms by the abnormal variations of temperature, and though none were burg and Weill) whose maximum variation was + 0*9, and two watches, a six-inch sextant, the magnetic apparatus already used by Dr. Giissfeldt in Western Africa, a travelling barometer (Fortin), and two aneroids (Beck) for simultaneous observations at Cairo. The longitude was determined by careful chronometric work at Beni-Suwayf; and a meridional difference of 4' 52". 7 was found between that station and Alexandria, or rather the observatory of M. A. Pirona, a scientific merchant long settled on the sea-board. The following table was brought home by Dr. Giissfeldt, who had not finished his calculations of magnetic intensity — Declination W. Inclination N. March 12. Beni-Suwayf April 1. Dayr Mar Antonios 8. Dayr Mar Bulos 21. Beni-Suwayf TO SUEZ AND HER SANITARIUM. 89 worked, the cleavage was clean as in our museum specimens of stone-age weapons. The travellers crossed the Wady el-Arabah, well known in the days of Mohammed Ali, from west- south to east-north-east. This valley, and its secondary or branch, Wady Herkes, supplied the Great Pasha with alabaster for his mosque in the Citadel. The material also forms the mosaic pave¬ ments in the older places of prayer ; and it yields red, yellow, and flesh-coloured marbles, with blue veins ; orange-tinted, like that of the Mosque El- Ghori ; and black from the rocks about Saint Anthony. The general aspect resembles the vast oasis- depression of Khargeh, both being bounded by similar steeps of eocenic chalk, evidently an old sea-coast. The southern bank is formed by the northern steeps of Galalah (1000— 1100 metres). Seven branch- valleys mouth into and traverse the main stem. Two of these, Wadys Natfeh and Askar, were carefully examined, and gave a comprehensive view of the whole formation. The head of the former is dis¬ tinguished by a cavern, rich in the maiden-hair fern ( Adiantum Capillus Veneris ), wholly absent from the Egyptian Desert ; and the roof stalactites, twenty feet long, are clothed with mosses. A stream, gushing from the cliff-sides, here about 1,200 feet high, forms two kieves, or basins, about 125 feet in diameter ; and the rocky steps and mossy ledges, 9o THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN over which the water rushes, are fringed with figs (F. Palmota , F.) fifteen feet tall, wild palms, and the richest verdure. The large Wady Askar is also rich in camel-pastures, and even more so in the variety of its flora. After winding through the picturesque precipices forming the bed, our explorers came upon the only path practicable to camels ; and thus reached the Galalah-crest, where the Bedawin camp with their flocks and herds. Here the vegetation was of a type totally differing from that of the Wady. The rolling surface was clad with dense herbage, and at the altitude of 1000 metres, unexpectedly appeared several plants, hitherto found only on Mount Sinai and in Inner Palestine ; whilst not a few belonged to Persia and Afghanistan. The prevailing type was that of the Sinaitic Peninsula, mingled with the Mediterranean coast-growth about Alexandria. There was an abundance of the edible root Scorzo- nera * (mollis), and of Malabafla Sekakul (R.) : the Artimisia bore a parasite, the characteristic Cyno- morium Coccineum . The travellers, having rounded the north-eastern flank of the Galalah, reached the Convent of Saint Anthony, where they were hospitably received by the Coptic monks. Organic remains on the southern, were as rich and various as the vegetation of the * It is also common on the Midianitic coast. TO SUEZ AND HER SANITARIUM. 91 northern region : a fine booty of petrifactions was sent to the Palaeontological Museum of Munich. Near St. Pauls, where they were treated with equal kindness, appeared three strata of middle chalk, which, on the northern flanks, is disclosed only by the deepest valley-cuttings. They ascertained that the Upper Galalah consists of nummulites, whilst the lower levels and the foot hills are composed of exogyra ( Mermeti Glabellatci). The marly strata intersecting the latter abound in echinites, spharo- lites, and especially in ammonites of three several species, which sometimes measure a foot and a half in diameter. The fossil beds, 500 feet thick, underlie the sandstones which, about St. Paul’s, appear in the lowest valley-sections : the latter, wholly destitute of fossil-remains, seem to be con¬ nected with the Sinaitic Peninsula and Palestine. Some hours’ journey south of St. Paul’s, in N. lat. 28° 40', the sandstones are seen, for the first time, to rest upon a confused primary formation of hornblende, granite, diorite and porphyrite, thus suggesting that it is a westerly prolongation of Mount Sinai ; and that both were once a single % range. We shall presently see the same on the eastern shores of the Akabah Gulf, and in the regions immediately to its south. The travellers noted that the upper chalk of the Ananchytes, so highly developed in the Great Oasis, is here wanting ; and, 92 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. as they found no sedimentary beds older than the middle chalk, it was in vain that Dr. Cav. Antonio Figari Bey,^ some years ago, sank a shaft to strike coal. Passing the southernmost offsets of the Galdlah, the primary region, of which Umm el-Temasib is the northern block, the Wady el-Ghazaleh, and the Wady Murr, where the chalk is extraordinarily rich in ammonites, the explorers reached the great natural basin, or cistern, Mghata. This place was visited by Raffenan-Delile, the celebrated botanist of the French expedition, in the early part of the present century. Its formation is here unique. The eocenic chalk is so full of silex-masses, rounded and melon-shaped, that water cannot find a free passage. Similar and equally regular forms clothe parts of the Libyan Desert-plateau. From Mghata the return route to the Nile, with a general west-north-west rhumb, ran first over waste tracts of sand-heaps, and then struck the Wady el-Gos, unknown to our maps. After watering at the abundant spring of the Fiumara el-Kamr, the travellers crossed the naked upper eocene, and, forty kilometres from the river, they found the snail * This chemist, who amused his leisure hours with geology- published a geological map of Egypt, full of errors, according to Schweinfiirth and Giissfeldt, but called belle carte geologique , by Issel (part i. p. 24). For a notice of the latter, see chap. xi. TO SUEZ AND HER SANITARIUM. 93 [Helix Desertorum *) of the Mukattam mountain, the block lying south and south-east of Cairo. These molluscs extended as far as the stream. On April 22nd, after thirty-five days in the “Jebel,” our wanderers returned to civilisation. Dr. Schweinfurth was so pleased with his fossils and botanical specimens, that in March, 1877, he made a second excursion.^ He was still absent when I passed through Cairo homewards ; he did not return to Cairo before early June, and we failed to meet on his way home. Dr. Gtissfeldt, who had accurately determined twenty stations for the benefit of future travellers, was kind enough to call upon us and “ talk Africa ” at Trieste. Neither of them appeared to appreciate the importance of their undertaking. This reconnaissance of the Jibal el-Humr and the Galalah may lead to the establishment of a Hill- Station, a vital want, like those of India, for the country of the Khedivs. In thirty years, as has been shown, the European population of Egypt grew from about 6000 to 80,000. It will presently number hundreds of thousands ; and many of them will be grateful to find this healthy range of moun¬ tains so near at hand. * Mr. R. M. Redhead ( On the Flora of Sanai : read before the Linnsean Soc., April 6, 1865) found the dead shells of the same Helix, indicating an approach to vegetable life, near No. VI. Station on the Cairo-Suez van-road. t Dr. Schweinfurth has just published an illustrated paper, Die dlteste Kloster der Christenkeit , etc., enlarging upon the results of his two trips. CHAPTER IV. DEPARTURE FROM SUEZ, AND ARRIVAL AT EL-MUWAYLAH. Some twenty-four hours of incessant work enabled us to pronounce the arrangements complete, after a “ scratch ” fashion ; and at six p.m. on Saturday (March 31st), just as a hasty telegram from Cairo asked if it had started, the party embarked on board Steam-tender No. II. We were accompanied by H.E. the Governor, Said Bey, and by the two Messrs. Levick, after receiving the God-speed of my old friend West, and of my brother “ wanderer,” Major R. Adeane Barlow. Suez saw us depart with the settled conviction that we were in search of — absit omen ! — “ gas,” that is, petroleum ; of salt, of sulphur, and of ruins. To the latter conjecture, however, a pair of fellow-countrymen offered, within my hearing, the liveliest objections in the purest vernacular. The usual hour of steaming placed us at the New Port, when we were received on board His FROM SUEZ TO EL-MUWA YLAH. 95 Highness’s steam-corvette, Sinn&r, Capt. Ali Bey Shukrf, and by the Acting Harbour- Master Ra’ff Waldl el-Komandamiyyeh, or Assistant-Commodore of the station. Having reported to head-quarters the kindness and courtesy of all these officials, and having managed in the gun-room, tant mal que bien , a hasty dinner for twelve mouths, I requested that no delay might be made. “ Allah yahfazkums ! ” (Allah preserve you !) were exchanged, and at ten p.m., as soon as the moon served, Sinn&r steamed out of dock, and slowly passed the large floating light-ship of Suez. The Sinn&r is an English-built ship, a sister of the Khartum , solid as the wooden walls of the olden day, armed with Armstrongs, and carrying a crew of 120 men. Her horse-power is ninety; and she makes from seven to eight and a half knots per hour, with a daily expenditure of sixteen tons of coal. Her captain is one of the best sailors in the Egyptian navy ; and we had reason to admire the style in which he and his officers threaded the dangerous shoals fringing the eastern shores of the Red Sea, which the Egyptians called Ket (circle) ; Sekot (to encircle) ; or Sharr (a barbarous insig¬ nificant word) ; headed in Moses’ day probably at Lake Timsdh, possibly at El-Kantarah, where the meeting of the Northern and Southern Mediterra¬ neans caused dead water, depositing the silt, and 96 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. built the first natural bridge that led to Phoenicia and Syria. Nothing can be stranger than the language in which the words of nautical command are given. Whilst the Egyptian soldier uses the high-sounding Turkish, his sailor brother talks Babel, borrowing from every dialect of the Mediter¬ ranean, not neglecting, withal, duly to acknowledge the merits of our English vocabulary. During the night we passed Moses’ Wells (’Uyun Mils A),* the scene of our pleasant picnic in 1876 ; and dawn saw us a little south of Point Za’aferaneh and its lighthouse, with the brother blocks Abu Deraj (the Father of Steps) and Jebel ’Atdkeh (the Mountain of Deliverance), f forming northern back¬ grounds on the bare and barren African shore. Between the first and the second chain lies the Wady Musa, whose mouth opens within sight of Suez. It is evidently so named by Christian pilgrims, because the great Deliverer thence marched upon the Red Sea,J whereas the latter in Moses’ day * In a popular book I find the “ Wells of Moses ” included amongst “hot springs;” and described as boiling up three or four inches above the surface. If this was ever true, and it is vouched for by Shaw, the waters are cooling like the “ Great Geyser.” This Jebel ’Atakah must not be confused with the “Sit Atfikah ” (Land of ’Atakah) in Midian (p. 594 et seq. “ Geschichte ^Egyptens,” Dr. Heinrich Brugsch Bey. Leipzig, 1877). t The reign of Menephtah (Menephthes I.), the Pharaoh of the Second Book of Moses, was not happy. Besides the com¬ paratively small and unimportant movement of the Jews, his reign FROM SUEZ TO EL- AT U WA Y LA FT. 97 certainly extended to the Bitter Lakes, and probably headed at Lake Timsah. Authors like Keith (on I rophecy) used to quote the names as evidence that the Arab tradition is “ fossilized ” in Arab nomen¬ clature, and that the people have preserved the memory of the Mosaic Exodus. But the slightest acquaintance with pre-Islamitic history would have taught them that in the “ Days of Ignorance” Moses was a name known to the Arabs only through the uncritical Jews and the Coptic Christians, from whose pilgrimage to Mount Sinai, in the third and fourth centuries, the modern Bedawin and Egyptians have picked up these monkish legends, and still deceive themselves and others by a conviction that the Arab tradition descends from historical times. saw the great league of Libyans and Mediterranean peoples; Siluli from the Peloponnesus; Sardunas from Sardinia (and Sardia ? ) ; Etruscans from Lydia ; Acheans, Pelasgi, and other Middle-Sea peoples, who, making an Exodus which possibly was national, fell upon Egypt and laid it waste. Many Egyptologists declare positively that the Hebrews are nowhere mentioned in the hieroglyphs. Vulgarly they are identified with the Apuri, or Aburi ; but Brugsch Bey would make this word (. Apur , plural Apurin) signify the Red Man of the Desert lying to the west and north¬ west of Suez ; and from it he would derive the “ Erythraean Sea.” Thus Apur would bear the signification of “ Ophir.” Manetho, to the disgust of Josephus, narrates that the Hebrews, an impure tribe of strangers, were expelled the pure country because they spread leprosy among the people. Strabo (xvi. 5, § 25-26) does not allude to this fact in his excellent sketch of Jewish history, where Jeiusalem is described with realistic force “a spot not such as to excite jealousy ; for it is rocky, and although well supplied with wrater, it is surrounded by a bare and droughty land.” \ 98 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID I AN. Here we see a fair illustration of my doctrine concerning the secular migration of Biblical sites and Holy Places. The Arabs who, like the Chris¬ tians, suppose the children of Israel to have set out from Memphis * at the head of the Delta, instead of from Goshen on its extreme east, and to have marched down the Wady El-Tih, which, like its brother north of Sinai, is translated, “ Valley of the Wandering,” instead of “Valley where man may wander,” send the fugitives down the Gulf as far as Tor.f During the ages between early Christianity and the first half of the present century, universal Europe, with the exception of Lord Valentia,J placed the passage of the Red Sea somewhere about Suez. When the Canal began, the ford migrated north, via the Bitter Lakes to Timsah; whilst in the last few years the learned Brugsch has transferred the same bodily from the Suez Gulf to the swamp bordering upon the Mediterranean — in fact to “that Sirbonian bog, Betwixt Damiata and Mount Casius old, Where armies whole have sunk.” The venerable legend, however, explains the * Strange to say, this departure from Memphis or its neigh¬ bourhood is still urged by so well-read a scholar as Professor Palmer (p. 270, “The Desert of the Exodus”). f See my “Pilgrimage,” vol. 1. chap. x. To “Till” is some¬ times added, “ Beni Isra’el,” but what is the date of the addition ? J “Travels,” 111. p. 356. London, 1809. FROM SUEZ TO EL-MU WAYLAH, \ 99 frequent ruins of Coptic convents and hermitages which stud the lowlands about Wady Musa. I visited them all in 1853, after returning from my Pilgrimage, and found nothing of importance. In 1876 it was said that the traveller must not trust himself amongst the Bedawin without a pass from their Shaykh Abu Shadid, who is gently compelled to make Suez his head-quarters. Zaaferaneh Lighthouse, a stone-built tower, marks the site of the two convents mentioned in the last chapter. We remark the notable contrast between the African and Asiatic shores along the length of the Suez Gulf. To the west rise sharply out of the desert-sand detached and primary ranges prolonging the Gelalah (Khelal) block southwards.^ Their wild glim nature is well explained by their hydrographic names, Sharp Peaks, Jagged Razor Hill, the Sugar loaf, and the Saddlebacks. They 6 Ghanb li^ht, an open frame-work, and the bird-cage of Ashrafi ; f and they extend to the Jebel el-Zayt, in the map called “Zeiti Hills,” that comb-like wall, behind which petroleum, sup¬ posed to be derived from buried molluscs, oozes from the ground. The rock-oil has supplied forages the two convents with light, and its overflow still * See chap. iii. t hor an excellent description of these lighthouses, 3ee Mr. Consul (George) West’s “Report on Suez, for 1872.” IOO THE GOLD-MINES OF MIDI AN. iridizes with opalescent colours, like mother of pearl, the sky-blue surface of the calm sea. Despite adverse intrigues and evil predictions, which are never wanting in Egypt, the Viceroy has determined to strike the oil by deep borings ; and at the date of my visit he had proposed to place them under charge of Colonel Middleton, an officer whose mining experience extended from Philadelphia to California. The Zayti Point, now nameless in the Admiralty Chart, is the old Drepanum Promontorium. Further south lies the Ghabbat, or Bay of Gimsah, and the Sulphur-diggings made celebrated in local legends on account of the indemnity claims, said to reach 19,000,000 of francs, put forward by the Marquis de Bassano. It directly fronts Jobal Island, naming the Suez “ Bughaz,” or Strait, “Jubal” of the Chart is one of the many reefs and rock-lumps projecting above the shoals, which threaten to “ dry up the tongue of the Egyptian main.” The slow growth of corallines is gradually blocking the entrance and converting this north-western fork of the Red into a second Dead Sea. On our return we passed the night in a snug bay, east of Tawilah or Long Island, forty miles from Tor, and sixty from Suez. A party set out to search for guano ; and they found a small quantity of brown matter, much weathered, and rain-washed till it is hardly worth the expense of transport. The Arabs, FROM SUEZ TO EL-MUWA YLAH. IOI who decline to use the impure substance, declare that it is deposited only in the smaller isles and islets of the Gulf; while certainly all the larger features which we examined did not justify the Peruvian reports spread throughout Egypt. Our fishermen, amongst whom Captain Ali Bey was ever the keenest, again supplied us and the whole crew with excellent rock-cod. The clear waters appeared full of life, the reason being doubtless the weedy bottom, which I saw here for the first time ; but the fish would bite only for a couple of hours after sundown, when the moonlight did not suffice to show the line. The opposite or Sinaitic shore, so dull and un¬ interesting when viewed from the east, is here one grand massif, and very properly called the Shur or Wall, an offset from the great chain which begins north with the Libanus, and which extends south¬ wards to Aden Point. This mountain-rampart, grandly swelling from the low and sandy plain, El- Ka a, an uncompromising bit of Arabia Sterilis, runs almost parallel with the Gulf till it breaks and sinks to mere papillae at the bold tongue-tip Ras Mohammed, which some have identified with the Poseidium or Poseidon Promontory ^ of the * Strabo (xvi. 4. 18), however, places his Posefdeion within the Alanatic Bay, which is- here supposed to be a clerical error for the Heroopolitan or Suez Gulf. It derives its name from an altar (Diod. Sic. in. 42) erected in honour of Neptune, by Aristo- 102 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID I AN. Ancients. Its splendid monotony is relieved by the lone and castellated domes and peaks of Jebel Serbal (Mountain of the Skirt), and by the com¬ paratively rounded outlines of Jebel Katerina and Jebel Musa, the true Sinai. Behind a dark projecting point nearly opposite the Gharib light, and 120 miles from Suez, lies the little horseshoe-shaped port of Tor, whence pilgrims make the convent in two or three days. The Greek Phcenicon * still shows detached clumps of dates clustering, as at Ayn Musa, wherever brackish springs ooze from the sandy shore. Since El-Wijh (Wedge) f was given up as a quarantine station — the •s harbour being bad and the water worse — unhealthy, miasmatic, marshy Tor has taken its place; an un¬ fortunate Italian — Dr. Bianchi, the Deputato di creon the Greek, whom Ptolemy Philadelphia or Lagi sent to survey the Red Sea. In Agatharkides (Diod. Sic. hi. 42) Neptune’s altar appears to be upon the Sinaitic coast near Pharan (Wady Firan) and north of Tor. Ras Mohammed is probably Strabo’s unnamed “ promontory which extends towards Petra.” * It must not be confounded with the Phxnicum Vicus or oppidum , south of El-Muwaylah, which Sprenger places at the modern Salina or Kufafal, and others a little south of El Wijh. Of course poivi/xwv (. palmetum ) would be a common term in these regions where every strip of watered ground bears its palms. The genuine Greek name for the palm is supposed to be derived from a district called Phcenicus ; and Sir Charles Fellows (“ Discoveries in Lycia.” London: Murray, 1841) thinks that he discovered the latter in “ Phineka.” f Described in my “ Pilgrimage,” vol. 1. chap. ii. FROM SUEZ TO EL-MU WA YLAH 103 Sanita — being compelled to live under canvas, and to endure all manner of discomforts, when he might easily be allowed to pass the greater part of the year with his family at Suez. In memory of my first visit, I walked across the plain of dried mud, the Jabkhah (salt-plain), and the sand-heaps, to the “ Nakhl el-Hammam” - — “ date-grove of the Hum mums ” — north of the squalid Christian village and the ruined (Venetian ?) forts. The palms, plentifully irrigated, are luxuriant, and the small yellow fruit is delicious, as of yore ; but the Convent, to which belongs the property, annually worth some five thousand dollars, has allowed the enceinte wall to become a system of gaps, whilst the house of the white-bearded old guardian is in ruins. Worse still, the “ prim little bungalow ” built by Abbas Pasha, who, by the advice of his physicians, seems to have delighted in Desert air, had been gutted by the plunderer. Here the Torites camp out during the hot season. Two mangy lads crept from the impure cistern ; the guardian had disappeared, and with him the Kahwahji, who used to supply pipes and coffee. The village- port has risen to the dignity of a station, with a Muhafiz, or governor, and a garrison of some twenty men. The hovels of mud-cemented stone are still occupied by a hundred souls or so, the 104 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. descendants of the old Jebelfyyeh Nazarenes, Wal- lachian and Egyptian slaves, stationed by Justinian in the sixth century to guard the Holy House.* They send wood and charcoal to Egypt*; they fish ; they convoy pilgrims, and they seem to have a tidy idea of trade. They are headed by Khwajah Kos- tantin, the Wakil, or Agent, of the Monastery, and they charged us a franc for a small tumbler of Raid (raisin-brandy). Moreover, it was poor stuff, whereas that made by the jolly and dirty old men of the mountain is so good that it has fuddled and floored many a thirsty traveller. The “ Bughaz (throat) of Jobal ends at in¬ famous Shadwan.f where many a good ship, in¬ cluding the P. and O.’s Carnatic, in 1869, has come to notable grief. Thus far the Gulf is well supplied with lights ; there are four between Suez and the Ashrafi Islands, both included. Beyond this, with the sole exception of the Brothers (north and south), and the Abu’l Khfsan, or Daedalus Light, the Red Sea, as far as P erim, is one succession of dangers ; Shadwdn Island and Ras Mohammed on the opposite side, taking high rank amongst famosce * I cannot explain the popular Moslem belief that a colony of Jews is still settled near Tor. f 1 he Island of Seals (^kokw v vrja-os) in Strabo (?), the Ptole- meian “ Saspeirene,” or “ Sappeirene,” insula in the “Kolpos Arabios (iv. 5, § 77). Others make “ Jobal,” Saspeirene ; and Shadwin Scytale of Nessa, the Seals Island of Agatharkides. Notice will be taken in chap. vii. FROM SUEZ TO EL-MUWA YLAH. io5 rupes. What has been done has been well done, and under McKillop Pasha, Controller-General cf Ports and Lighthouses, everything works like clock¬ work. But it is hardly fair to expect that Egypt should make any further outlay ; and presently an International Committee will fix upon the points and raise the money required.* The same should be the case with the campaign against the slave-trade in the Red Sea. If we are determined to cut off the exportation, we should provide these shores with a “ Coffin-Squadron,” at least equal in number to that which for years blocked the Guinea coast and the two bights of Western Africa. Even then I should hardly pre¬ dict success, where every baylet is a port, where every native craft is a slaver, and where every man’s religion, as well as his interests, points to the capture and to the sale or barter of Pagan flesh, f * It is the more necessary to make this observation, because on the occasion of an English ship being lately wrecked off Cape Guardafui, H.H. the Khediv was waited upon by a zealous official, with the modest request for a lighthouse, to be built at the expense, not of the British, but of the Egyptian, Government. f I take the following extract from one of the interesting “ Letters from Pantellaria,” published by the Tunes of India , overland, March 12, 1877. “ Even the Press of England begins to suspect Mahomedans of a vague impression that England owes allegiance to the Sultan. The home public will not believe, the Anglo-Indian will, that according to Turkish idea, fixed and in¬ eradicable, every European Power is simply tributary to the Porte ; and that the recusants are all Yaghi, or mere rebels. Islamism io6 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN At night steaming past Ras Mohammed, the ultimum Continentis promontorium , a bluff and a long, low point, as usual outlined by dark reef and leek-green shoal, we awoke on Easter Monday with cliffy Y ubu a * islet, bare and yellow, on the port- bow, while fronting us, clad in gold, blue and gorgeous purple, towered the kingly Mountains of Midian, a surprise and a delight to the travellers eye after the flatness and meanness of the Suez coast. classes mankind in three : the Moslems ; the Kafirs, or Unbe¬ lievers, who are Peoples of the Books (Ahl-el-Kutub), such as Jews and Christians; and finally, the Pagan-heathenry, like the Hindus and the Chinese, whose Scriptures are thus ignorantly ignored. The Moslem, who inherits the earth, is enjoined to bear with the first order of infidels, provided that these become his subjects; paying their taxes as unbelievers; and that the non- Mahomedans, who form their own States, supply tribute and add to the arriere-ban. Thus all the wars with infidels are merely caused by the revolt of these headstrong vassals, who dare to oppose the ‘ Grand Signior.’ As regards the third category , the pure heathen , the Moslem is bound to eternal war with them : he?ice the slave raids in Africa are sanctioned by the Faith. To the doctrine that the Khan and Sultan of the Osmanli is Lord of the Earth, a single exception may be found in Morocco, ruled by a direct successor of the Western Khalifat of Toledo; but this is a very disputed point. Algeria and the French are directly tributary.” The doctrine which makes the hereditary Osmanli Sultans represent the elective Caliphs, is, I may observe, a legal fiction at least as violent, pace the Rev. Mr. Badger, as that which derives the Czars from Caesar Augustus, through Rurik, and which attributes to the Romanoffs all the rights of the Byzan¬ tine Emperors, their forefathers. * The older charts call it Jeboa, Jobah and Juba, the northern “ Yuba : ” so Waleh, the flat shoal to north, still rejoices in the name of “Wyler” in Berghan’s “Wales.” FROM SUEZ TO EL-MUWA YLAH. 107 I shall describe these noble forms more particu¬ larly during our cruise along the coast to Aynunah,* when, however, they had lost to us all the charm of novelty. The first aspect of Midian is majestic, and right well suited to the heroic Bedawi race that once owned the land. Beyond the golden cushions which, embroidered with ' emerald green, line the shore, rise fiat-topped sand-banks and peaky hillocks of arenaceous stone, both form¬ ations sprinkled and revetted with dark primaries and, especially, with weathered fragments of ruddy porphyry. Inland they become fort-hills similarly metalled, but painted purple-brown by the inter¬ vening atmosphere. The picture’s towering back¬ ground, amethystine with blue aerial distances, here lit up with golden glow, there shaded with violet stripes ; naked and barren, still gorgeous and beautiful as each feature stands clear, distinct, and fantastically cloven against the bright plain of the cloudless sky, is a wall, apparently continuous, ranging between 6000 and 9000 feet above the sea- level. f * See chap. v. f So the hydrograph ers, and we had no time to control them by measuring a base. Wellsted (ii. 176) who describes them briefly but well, assigns 6500 to “ Mowilahh High Peak,” the most elevated. , The maps which accompanied us were — 1. The Stasimetric Chart of the Red Sea, by R. Moresby and Carless in the Palinurus , 1830-34; 2. Sheet I, the Red Sea, by Captain (now Sir) George S. Nares, 1871-2; and 3. Keith 10S THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. Nothing can be more picturesque than the shapes of these “Alps unclothed,” these giants, which the Hebrews of old provided with ears and teeth, ribs and loins. Their Titan shoulders, bared to sun and wind, support domes and towers, “ organ-pipes,” peaks and pinnacles ; and, fresh from the dolomites of the Tyrol and Dalmatia, I gazed upon them with dismay. What could be expected from fire-bleached limestone ? M. Marie was not so easily imposed upon, and, like a true Parisian, he backed his opinion, that the mass was schistose, with un ddjeuner at the Cafe Anglais by way of wager. At ii .30 a.m., Sinnar , which had threaded her way cautiously between the outlines of Yubua, to the north, and the low coral-reefs of Silah,* south¬ wards, ended her 220 miles, measured along the course, and cast her anchor in the open and dangerous roadstead of El-Muwaylah,*j* which has Johnston; the latter preserving Moresby’s spelling, which is truly terrible. * The Sela of the Classics (see chap, xii.), not to be con¬ founded with the Silah Station on the mainland (Wady Tiryam ?). This place may derive its name from a glaucous and prickly plant (Zilla My agr tides). f In charts and travels Mowilah, Mowilahh (Wellsted), Moilah, Moi'leh, Mohila (Riippell), Mueileh, Mueilih (Zehme), Muweilih, Moelh, and other corruptions, lying in N. lat. 270 39 and E. long. (G.) 350 34'. Sprenger (p. 23) is certainly not right in preferring “ al-Mowayliha.” The word is the diminutive of Malih, salt. In the Sinaitic Peninsula there is an Ayn and a Wady El-Muwaylah, famed for cairns; the traditional Hagar’s FROM SUEZ TO EL-MUWA YLa'h 109 an inner cove for the accommodation of native craft. The first ship of war ever seen in these waters, she fired a gun, which sent the few idlers flying in terror from the shore, and despatched her gig to bring off the Governor and the Civilian Accountant of the port. The former, poor man, was in agonies of terror, frantically inquiring, whilst he returned the salute with a pop-gun and flew his red flag, what could have happened. Presently, when he found that all we wanted was his assistance in pro¬ curing camels, the revulsion of joy brought on a short malady. El-Muwaylah means the “little salt,” alluding to its walls and water-pits ; hence the Arab say- ing, “ Ant fi Muwayldhd i.e.y “ Thou art athirst.” Evidently an old site, it is now one of the fortified Manzil, or stations, of the Cairo Hajj * (Pilgrim Well, transferred by the Moslems to Meccah ; and probably in after years one of the “ Cities of the South ” destroyed by the Israelites. Vance and D’Anville identify it with the Phoenician oppidum of Ptolemy (El-Wijh?) : Niebuhr (“ Description de l’Arabie,” P- 325)> Miiller (“ Geog. Gr. Minoris ”), and Sprenger, who evidently assume Ptolemy’s latitude, with the Modiana of the same geo¬ grapher. Popular writers confound it with Lenke-Korne, El- Ha111^ or Hawara, far south in N. lat. 250; while Wallin holds it to be a modern place. In Heb. jn, primarily denoting circular form or motion, a circuit, a circle ; secondarily, a pair of compasses to mark out circles ; and, thirdly, the celebration of religious ceremonies, of circular or rotatory dances : for instance, Exod. x. 9, to “ hold a Hagg (festival) unto the Lord.” It is well applied to the Moslem Pilgrimage, one of whose principal rites consist in circumam¬ bulating the Ka’abah or Cube-House. I IO THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN Caravan), distant five days’ march from El-Akabah. These two points define the north and south of the Tihamat Madyan, the Low-lands of MidianT The fort was originally built, as an inscription in the Sulsi character, set over the large and complicated main entrance, tells us, by Sultan Selim, the loser of Lepanto in a.h. 968 ( = a.d. 1553-54); when he conferred the right of way, and the government of the country, upon Egypt. It was allowed to fall in ruins by Abbas Pasha, destroyed by Said Pasha, and, finally, it was restored and strengthened by the present Viceroy shortly after his accession in a.h. 1281 ( = a.d. 1863-64). Looking small from afar, a simple parallelo¬ gram of masonry, with plain curtains connecting round towers at the angles, where the old guns have been remounted, it is a spacious enceinte, * Arab geographers generally divide the peninsula, says Golius (Notce in Alfragano ), into five districts : 1. The Tihamah, or lowlands, on the Red Sea, especially the southern part of El-Hejaz. 2. Nejd, the northern plateau. 3. El-Hejaz (the colligated by mountains, the Mittelland , or the Separator, i.e., between Nejd and Yemen). 4. El-Yemamah or El-Aruz, the “ oblique,” because so situated with respect to Yemen, the Land on the right hand (facing the east), and Sham (Syria) the Land on the left hand ; and 5. Yemen or Southern Arabia. The Jezirat-el-Arab proper (Arabian island, that is, peninsula) originally extended from the town of Ayla (Allabat Ayla, the Elana of Ptolemy) in N. lat. 290 to where the confines of El-Yemen meet those of El-Hejaz. The mediaeval and modern geographers confined it to the south of an imaginary line drawn from Ras Mohammed to the mouths of the Euphrates. FROM SUEZ TO EL- MU WA Y LA If. 1 1 1 containing, besides quarters for the men, a well of brackish water ; a mosque, and the tomb of a holy man, Shayhk Abu el-Umrah. The garrison consists of twenty-four infantry, with Bulukbashi (captain of irregulars), and of six gunners, with an Oubashi (corporal), all under the Yuzbashi (captain) Abd el-Wahid, who has been Governor for two years, living en gargon , and leaving his family at Suez. The rest of the settlement, which occupies the regularly terraced left bank of the Wady Surr, the great Fiumara dividing the Monarch of Mountains behind El-Muwaylah from its northern neighbour, Umm Jedayh, consists mostly of ruined houses, and a few inhabited square boxes of rough stone and mortar, with wooden shutters — in fact, the regular coast-settlement. The tenements may lodge some thirty souls at the dead season, that is when the pilgrims are not passing ; and the only tolerable house is that of the Katib, or civilian who acts as steward or accountant. The latter is the Sayyfd (Hasani) Abd el- Rahim, a native of El-Muwaylah, cousin to Abd el-Salam Bey el-Muwaylahi, a well-known member of the Majlis at Cairo. He is highly respected by the Bedawin, and he proved exceedingly useful to the expedition, which, as will be seen, he ac¬ companied to the last. The large clump of palms I I 2 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN is fed by shallow holes and pits of tepid brackish water, including four masonry-revetted wells to the north-east and the south-east, these being Govern¬ ment property. There are dwarf fields of garden stuff and durrah ( Holcus vulgar e), while limes and pomegranates are not wholly wanting. The growth must depend upon irrigation, as only a few showers fall between October and April. The tomb of another holy man, Shaykh Abdul¬ lah, in the shape of a dwarf tower, lies to the north of the settlement, where a parallel reef of coralline, subtending the shore-line, keeps out the “ sea-dog * (Kalb el-bahr, or the shark), and forms a charming bath. I have been minute in describing El-Mu- waylah. As I have before remarked, it is 229 geo¬ graphical miles from Suez ; it has been a place of considerable trade, and it will be one of the head¬ quarters of commerce, when the mining-industry shall have been resuscitated. The cove under the Fort is much affected by the Sambuks of the Juhayni fishermen,! broad-beamed craft, descended from the “ light ships ” of the old pirates, carrying from ten to twenty tons, built of Indian planks bearing the brand of the Gujrari merchant, with knees of native woods, especially * Strabo (xvi, 4, § 7), speaking of the opposite African seas, says, “ Even trees (corallines) here grow from under the water, and the sea abounds with sea-dogs.” | See chap. v. FROM SUEZ TO EL-MUWA YLAH. n3 tamarisk. Half covered with a small deck, they carry a large lateen sail. Of these boats some sixty to one hundred anchor at El-Muwaylah when returning from their cruises. Besides fishing, they search the shoals for “ Sadaf,” or mother-of-pearl, in most primi¬ tive style, the diver bringing up one at a time, and not unfrequently falling a victim to the sharks. The produce is sold by the hundred to the trader, who takes them on spec., as it were, sometimes finding a seed-pearl, and regularly selling them for the inlaid work of the Egyptian and Syrian cities, and for the rude devotional and other ornaments of which Beth¬ lehem is the Birmingham. The two officials, military and civil, came on board, and after reading the letter conveying the viceregal orders, undertook to supply us with fifty camels within three days. This delay, which we could ill afford, was caused by the Bedawin being at this season “ Fauk,” that is, in the interior. During the short chat after coffee, we heard for the first time of “Buyut el-Nasara” (Christians houses) at Ayniinah* and at other places. The good tidings filled me with new hopes. The Arabs, both Bedawin and Keith Johnston has Ain Ooneh, classically correct, but not used ; and the Hyd. charts here place, “ Ruins of a town and aqueduct, called by the Arabs Eynounah.” But the Wady is \\ rongly laid down ; the aqueduct is run in a straight line from north to south, and the “ fertile valley, with stream or water,” is placed some four miles from the coast, and distant from the Wady, instead of being at the head of the conduit. i H4 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID I AN. settled, apply the term Nazarene to all the former inhabitants of all the lands which they now occupy, holding themselves immigrant conquerors from Arabia Proper. I at once ordered a Sambuk for a reconnaisance northwards ; and the first craft which came in, coursing gallantly before the stiff south wind, was duly impressed and made fast with a cable to the corvette’s stern. But the Juhaynah, like other tribes of the coast, have an utter inbred contempt for discipline. As soon as the head of the sentinel was turned, one of the crew quietly whipped out his whittle, and silently sawed through rke rope \ whilst the other three as leisurely shook out the broad sail, and hoisted it in the gay breeze. It was amusing to see the contrast of this sedate coolness with the scene of turmoil and wild abuse and outcry on board. At length, after ten minutes, a boat full of armed sailors started in vain pursuit ; and when the chase had lasted over a mile or so, the Arab winning easy, a cartridge was found, and a shot was fired in the air. The last we saw of the Sambuk was a patch of white, hovering like a gull’s wino- over the horizon, where, rejoining her fellows, she had probably reported, “ They are seizing the boats.” “ Once a philosopher, twice a fool,” says the Eastern proverb, equivalent to our “ Once bitten, FROM SUEZ TO EL- MU W A Y LA FT. n5 twice shy ; ” and we took care to place strong guards upon the next two boats which we towed. As the shoal-fringed roadstead of El-Muwaylah is dangerous in rough weather, our captain prudently determined to anchor in Sherm (bight) Yahar, between four and five miles down south, a run easily made in an hour. These refuges are common upon the Arabian coast of the Red Sea ; they are wanting on the African shore, where Masawwah is the nearest harbour to Suez ; and, as will be seen, they are not to be trusted in the Gulf of Akabah. Mostly they run deep into the land, extending either from west to east, or to north-east, heading in two arms, which form either a straight or a crooked T. The depth of water at the entrance varies from nineteen to twenty-three fathoms; and the anchor¬ age ground shows on the charts seven or eio-ht b * The port is completely land-locked, like a dock, and the heaviest storms hardly disturb the sleepy water. At the head are' the Wadys, or winter-torrents, the Nachals of the Jews; the Cheimarrhoi of the Greeks ; the Poteks of the Slavenes, and the Fiumare of Southern Italy. The shallows near the shore allow bathing without fear of sharks. In these places one generally finds a native boat laden with charcoal, and the crew enjoys cooking and sleeping upon the hard clean sand. E 1 6 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN \ During the rest of the afternoon we made pre¬ parations for the next days work, and indented upon our good captain for the articles most needed ; an Egyptian flag, three mattresses, two Colt’s revolvers, and other odds and ends. I summoned to the quarter-deck the Rais, or masters, of the two captive boats, who were crouching in despair amidships, and explained to them that His Highness, far from intending a corvde , had ordered that their services should be amply and even generously rewarded. We then proceeded to settle the hire. For the work of a single day they began by asking fifty dollars, which presently fell to three, the latter being the sum actually paid for boats to Suez, a voyage seldom finished under a week. Then they pleaded empty bellies, and were fed with ship’s biscuit. Lastly, they begged that one of their number might be disem¬ barked in order to inform their friends that they had not been subjected to imprisonment or ill-usage. This was, of course, allowed, and the messenger duly returned as he had promised. In the evening some of the party who had landed were accosted by certain chiefs, including Shaykh Alayan, of the large and important Huway- tat tribe. They promised to bring as many hundreds of camels as we pleased, but required a delay of five days — more than our flying visit could afford. The authorities of the Fort had resolved upon FROM SUEZ TO EL-MU IV A YLAH. i x 7 applying to the Beni ’Rekbah, a small tribe numbering about fifty Nafar, or males, which claims the land upon which the Fort of El-Muwayldh is built, and which is usually encamped in the neighbourhood. These men, who have long been settled upon the coast,* own the land between Maknd and El-Mu- waylah ; at least, they were owners of it before the more powerful tribes immigrated from Egypt and dispossessed them. Being salaried to act as Ghufara, or Pilgrim- protectors, between El-Akabah and Dhobba, their “ Mad-rak,” or beat, and to supply the Hajj with camels and provisions, they are considered servants of the Mfri (Government), and, consequently, safer than their less dependent Bedawin neighbours. * They are noticed by Abu el-Abbas Ahmed ibn Abdillahi El- ’Kalkashandi (ob. a.d. 1418) in his book, Nihdyat el Adab (not Arab) fi Mdarifat A?isdb (not Kabail) eE Arab, “ The End of Learning in Knowledge of the Genealogies of the Arabs ; ” by the author of El-Masalik el-Absar ji Mamalik el-Amsar, “ The Ways of Sight in Territorial Dominions,” the work of Shihal el-Dfn Ahmed ibn Yahya (ob. 1348) ; and finally, by Ibn Khaldun, the author of the Ritab el-Ibur wa Diwan El-mubtada w’al Khabar, “The Book of Examples, and the Receuil of Subject and Predicate,” printed at Cairo some years ago : he makes them extend through Northern Africa to Tripoli. The learned Arabist, Rev. G. Percy Badger, whose Anglo-Arabic Dictionary will be a blessing to students, says that Beni ;Ukbah or Ukba has so many mean¬ ings that we find difficulty in the choice. “ People of the Rem¬ nant would be one of them. The tribes of Madyan were ranked among the oi by the early Moslems, and ever treated accordingly. 1 18 THE GOLD-MINES OF MIDI AN. ^ In their appearance there is nothing remarkable ; like the Huwaytat they tattoo with gunpowder a spot under the right eye. The Beni ’Ukbah own as Chief Hasan ibn Salim, a Shaykh upon a small scale. They are not pleasant companions, the pilgrims having taught them contempt for travellers ; and their camels, as is mostly the case upon this coast, are miserably fed, light, weak, and stunted, besides being half broken to burdens. The brutes are startled by every new sight or sound ; their accoutrements, saddles, bags and ropes are wretched ; they are ridden without nose-rings, the halter being the only curb ; and the facility with which they throw their loads, and start off at a giraffe-like gallop, breaking boxes and damaging bales, is prodigious. Fortu¬ nately for us, we had brought decent riding-gear from Suez, mine having been lent to me by Mr. Alfred G. R. Levick. I have already expressed my opinion of the “ Ship of the Desert ; ” and the experience of my last expedition has not tended to improve it. The so-called “ generous animal/’ the “ patient camel,” whose endurance has been grandly exaggerated, is a peevish, ill-conditioned beast — one of the most cross-grained, vile-tempered, and antipathetic that domestication knows. When very young it is cold, FROM SUEZ TO EL-MUWA YLAH. 1 19 grave, and awkward ; when adult, vicious and un¬ governable, in some cases even dangerous ; when old it is fractious and grumbling, sullen, vindictive, and cold-blooded. It utters its snorting moan and its half- plaintive, half-surly bleat even when you approach it. It suspects everything unknown; it roars aloud, like a teeth-cutting child, as each pound weight is added to the burden': and it is timid * and sensitive to the footfall, to the voice, or even to the presence of a stranger. This unsavoury beast, which eats perfume and breathes fetor, works well upon hard clay. Rock cuts its soles ; it labours and suffers when trudg¬ ing through sand, and mud throws it heavily, at times splitting up the arm-pits. Its vaunted docility is the result of sheer stupidity. It lacks even the intelligence to distinguish poisonous herbs. It wants the nobility and generous disposition of the horse ; the sure-footedness and sagacity of the mule ; the ponderous safety of the riding-ox ; and the frugality, the intelligence, and the docility of the ass, so ably “ rehabilitated ” by Buffon. Finally, I have mounted the peevish dromedary for years, and, except in one case, a pony-camel from * “ Camels, animals not easily frightened,” says Wellsted (ii. 25). I have ever found them more liable to panic than even horses and mules. 120 THE GOLD-MINES OF MIDI AN. Maskat, I could never conjure a shade of affec¬ tion for the modern representative of the Ano- plotherium. Let me end this chapter with the Arab explana¬ tion of why the horse hates the camel, an antipathy noticed by the Greeks as early as the days of Herodotus. It is well known to all the world that Allah, determining to create this noble animal, called the South Wind and said, “ I desire to draw from thee a new being : condense thyself by parting with thy fluidity.” The Creator then took a handful of this element, now become gross and tangible, and blew upon it the breath of life : the horse appeared and was addressed, “ Thou shalt be for man a source of happiness and wealth : he shall render himself illustrious by mounting thee.” * But the stiff-necked stranger presently complained that much more might have been done for him ; that his throat was too short for browsing on the line of march ; that his back had no hump to steady the saddle ; and that his small hoofs sank deep into the sand, with many other grievances of a similar nature, somewhat reminding us of a certain King of Castile. Where - * The Bedawi believes the horse, first tamed and ridden by Ishmael, to have been produced by the sneeze of Adam when awaking to life. So the cat is the sneeze of the lion, produced when Noah, offended by the number of mice in the Ark, tickled the nose of the King of Beasts. FROM SUEZ TO EL-MUWA YLAH. I 2 I upon Allah, like Jupiter who once threatened the dreadful threat of granting the silly prayers of mankind, created the camel. The horse shuddered at the sight of what he wanted to become, and from that hour to this he has ever started when meeting' his caricature. CHAPTER V. FROM EL-MU WAYL AH TO WADY AYNUNAH. At 6.30 a.m. on April 3rd, M. Marie and I set out in the Sambuk El Mabrzikeh , Rais Atiyyeh. We were accompanied by Lieutenants Hasan and Abd el-Kerim: the escort, ten soldiers, with the Chawush Ali and Marius, the chef, followed in the other boat. The remaining force, under Lieutenant Amir, with Mr. Clarke and old Haji Wali, remained on board Sinndr to hasten the levy of the promised camels. I felt thoroughly at home on board the Sambuk, where the sailors at once rigged up an awning to defend us from the sun. The distance, thirty-five miles by sea, twenty-seven to twenty-eight direct geographical miles by land, or twelve to thirteen Sa’at (hours) * of caravan-marching and halting, is * The “hour” is here reckoned at five kilometres (5468 yards) or three statute miles and a bittock (5280 yards). The Arab mile is = to the English and Italian geographical = ten stadia = if Roman = J- German. The Sa’at thus corresponds FROM EL-MUWAYLAH TO WADY AYNUNAH. 12- ** v) \ usually a day’s boating before a stiff southerly breeze ; this boon, however, Fortune denied us. The crew were Juhaynah Bedawin, descended from the Kah- tamyyeh or Joctanite Arabs.* The race has learned navigation, and supplies pilots to all our part of the coast. They are known by the Mashali, or gashes, numbering one to three, athwart the right cheek. Their habitat is south of El-Muwayldh, especially about the Jebel, or rather Istabl ’Antar. I had before met them at Marsa Damghah and at El- Wijh, where they are mixed with the scattered Orban Baliy.f They extend as far south as Yambu’, and eastward to El-Tabuk : they are neighbours to and friendly with the Beni Ma’dzeh ; and, like the latter, they may number 5000 Nafar(men and boys). verbally with the Teutonic stunde, or hour’s march, half a meite (lour geog. miles), that is two direct geographical miles. The actual marching of a caravan would seldom exceed this distance. For further information, see chap. xii. The tribal, which is the same as the patriarchal name, is “Juhaym,” in the plural “ Juhaynah,” but never Jahaynah , as I miswrote it in my “Pilgrimage” (i. 315). Wallin follows the Egyp¬ tian fashion “ Guheinf ; Sprenger (p. 29) prefers “ Gohayna,” and makes the tribe, like the “ Balyy,” a branch of the “ Jodha’ites,” the great family El-Kuda’a. He borrows from El-Humdani and Maltzan ; and he gives an exhaustive list of their settlements which need not be repeated here. f The Balfy are mentioned by Wallin in pp. 320 to 326. This Him) aritic tribe, claiming the whole of the Harrah country with the port-town of Wijh, is divided into a multitude of clans, as — i* Muwahil, to whom the Shaykh’s family belongs ; 2. the Mu akilah ; 3. the Aradat; and, 4. the Beni Lut. (See Sprenger on the “ Balyy,” pp. 30-1.) 124 THE GOLD MINES OF MIDIAN Their land, as we could see by the ballast, sup¬ plies “harrah,” or porous basalt, and some of their Kaliuns (pipes, dudheens) were of steatite, said to be worked at Makud. As usual, there was a black slave on board to do servile work. “ Marjan” owned the usual broad grin, mother-of-pearl teeth, and yep-yep laugh, but he had quite forgotten Kisawahfli, with the exception, however, of the grossly abusive part which distinguishes that very free and easy African tongue. The Governor of El-Muwaylah Fort had given, as a pilot and guide, a Muwallid,* or son of an emancipated slave, who called himself Salih bin Mohammed, a Topji, or artilleryman, in the service of the Viceroy. He afterwards proved true to the instincts of his African blood, and his intrigues with * Wallin writes the name “ Mutawallid.” He justly observes that these negroes not only fill whole villages, as El-Rfheh (Jericho), many parts of El-Jauf (the western hollow lying parallel with the Dead Sea), and the Suk-el-Shaykh ; they also form large clans among the nomadic Arabs, leading the same pastoral and pre¬ datory life as their former masters, to whom, although freed, they generally remain attached from the true African feeling that once a slave always a slave. Genuine Arabs will seldom, if ever, con¬ descend to take to wife a negress or even a brown-skinned Haba- shiyyeh (Abyssinian woman) ; so these blacks, intermarrying with their own race, remain in the nomad tents unaltered through long generations. With the settled tribes, however, the prejudice in favour of pure blood is not so strong ; and the Muwallidfn of the towns and villages mix and intermarry with the Arabs, “ producing children in whose features it is quite impossible to recognize the African type ” (?) . FROM EL-MU WAYLAH TO WAD Y A YNUNAH. “5 the Bedawin made him narrowly escape being- sent in irons aboard the corvette. On the return-march to the Fort, he attempted to hurry us unpleasantly, because he had lately led home a second wife : in fact, his conduct was to be expected from the ignoble African strain. However, Salih knew the land and sea by heart ; and he aided us to name and catalogue the several items of the huge mountain-wall which subtends the Tihamah.* These highlands are generically known as El- Shifah,f the lip, corresponding with the Hebrew Saphah J — a lip, a language, an edge, a brink. Some are sharp and isolated cones, whilst others are re¬ presented to be the sea faces of extensive plateaux, and each feature has a character and a physio- * We found this word, which, derived from Taham (astus vehementici), means a low unhealthy maritime region, as opposed to “ El-Nejd,” the salubrious uplands, generally used. Wallin calls the seaboard “Sahil,” or shore, allowing it an average breadth of twenty-four miles; and the maps write El-Ghaur, the hollow. The Tihamah would correspond with the Hebrew Ha-Sharun (Sharon). f The classical form is El-Shafah. Keith Johnston has “Jebel- esh-Shefa,” the first word being unnecessary. Wallin, who wrongly writes “ Shefaa,” calls its northern continuation El-Shera’, and considers our two longitudinal ranges as the western boundaries of El-Nejd. This Jebel el-Shera’a must not be confounded with the range of the same name, the Mount Seir of the Hebrews, which forms the “rugged” eastern boundary of the great Wady el- Arabah, and in one of whose valleys Petra lies. + Not to be confounded with Shephelah (whence Hispalis, Seville ?), the term applied by the Hebrews to the hills between the Hor (mountain) and the ’Emeh (plain). 126 THE GOLD-MINES OF MIDIAN gnomy of its own. All the Bedawin agree in de¬ claring that a second chain, the Harrah (volcanic ?) range, runs parallel with the maritime mountains and slopes eastward into El-Hisma.* The latter they represent to be a tract of red sandy soil, a plateau broken by rounded hillocks, not mountains, and wanting water in the hot season. The Shifahis the salvation of the Tihamah. The cold, bare, and stony heights, which act as barriers to the land winds, condense the warm and moisture¬ laden breezes from the Red Sea, and the heavy showers, sinking into the loose and sandy soil at the base, percolate underground, and presently re¬ appear perennial in the mouths of the Wadies near the sea. During our visit the mountains tempered the nights, rendering blankets necessary ; and about 7 a.m., when the suns rays, with their beautiful vaporous effects, began to heat the plains, they sent forth a high cool gale, a local land-breeze, which does not appear even to reach the gulf. This Barri The word literally means a desert-flat with dusty hillocks. The region is described by Wallin as a vast level of the soft and comparatively fertile sand, of which the Nufood (Nufiiz, z.e., pure yellow arenaceous matter) “desert of Negd (El-Nejd) for the most part consists.” He also speaks of the Hisma “gradually opening out into an extensive plain, over which a few isolated hills are scattered, having among themselves a north-westerly course.” Finally, he corrects the author of the celebrated lexicon “ El- Kamus,” who explains the word as “a land in the Badiyeh (Desert of Syria), with high mountains, whose elevated crests are generally enveloped in mist.” J FROM EL-MUIVAYLAH TO WADY A YNUNAH. 127 (land-wind) lasted through the morning until the Bahri, or sea-wind, * set in. During the winter the mountains are reservoirs of the “ frigoric.” Water freezes on the upper levels traversed by the raw and searching south-easter; the peaks must have icy fangs, and the churlish, chiding wintry winds become “ Sarsars ” — cold and shuddering blasts. I must describe these blocks of porphyry, granite, and syenite with some detail. They have been care¬ lessly laid down in the Hydrographic Charts, which, contented with determining the coast-line, often ignore correctness in the inner features, upon which the sailor sighting the shore is often forced to depend. The apparent wall is cut by broad Wadies, all of which, like the same features in Mount Sinai, are “ Elath ” or “ Eloth,” bearers of terebinths and palms (Elim) wherever water is superficial or lies near the surface ; and we presently discovered that every greater Fiumara has its ruined settlement or settlements, each possibly, in days of yore, ruled by its own chiefs. Beginning from the south is Mount Mowilah high peak, 9000. This splendid block, rising sudden and sharp from the flat sea-board, and in¬ vading the sky with its four giant arms, looks from * The Huwaytat tribe has preserved the Egyptian names of the cardinal winds : 1. Bahri, the sea-wind, Etesian gale or norther ; 2. Kibli, the south wind; 3. Sharki, the easter; and, 4. Gharbi, the Zephyr, or west wind. I 128 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN afar more like a magnified iceberg than a thing of earth : the people call it Jebel el-Sharr, the director or land-mark, because it is first seen by the seaman. It must be the “ Hippus Mons ” of Ptolemy: no topographer or cartographer * could leave so remark¬ able a feature unnamed. f The mid-heights and passes are traversed in places by sheep-tracks ; and the lower levels, as is the case with its neighbours, are furnished, they say, with fountains and palm- groves. The Sharr is separated by the Wady el- Surr, upon which El-Muwaylah is built, from its northern adjoiner Umm el-Jedayl,J a transverse lump which changes the north-south rhumb for north¬ west to south-east. The Wady el-Jimm, or Zojeh, parts this comparatively low mountain from the Jebel Dubbagh, one of whose items is a remarkable fiat-topped tower, the Jebel el-Jimm, canted slightly southwards, and apparently inaccessible. The mass known as Fara el-Samghi ends northwards in Abu- * As Sprenger well remarks, Ptolemy is not a geographer, but a cartographer, or rather, as he would himself say, a geographer, not a chorographer. f Muller (Map vi., Geog. Gr. Min.) offers a kind of hydro- graphic sketch of this splendid block, which the homely old English “Master-Mariner” Irwin, in 1780, called the “ Bullock’s Horns.” J Wallin gives “Umm Gudeile” (Judayleh), and calls the mountains north of “Gimm” (El-Jimm), Sadr and Harb, words which we never heard applied to them. Sadr appears to be the name of a plain, and Jebel Harb lies far beyond and behind the coast-line. FROM EL-MUWA YLAH TO WAD Y A YNUNAIL 129 Zayn, which probably appears upon the map as “ Sharp Peak 6330.” Viewed from the west-north¬ west it appears weathered to a regular cupola, a Puy de Dome , a Funnel Hill like that of Bombay, an Old Man of Hoy, a rounded cone resting upon the two flat shoulders that form the base. Viewed from the north the face separates into three distinct features ; and from the south it appears as if two mighty slices of rock had been pressed together. Indeed, the first objects which strike the traveller’s eye, and the last upon which it dwells, are the four huge shoulders of the Horse-Mountain (El-Sharr), the Jimm, the Tower-hill, and the Puy de Dome. Continuing northwards we find the wide, open, and well-defined Wady Kuhlah, Wallin’s “ al Kahale” (Kahaleh), called, nearer the coast, “Wady Tiryam,” and separating Abu Zayn from its neigh¬ bour Jebel-Urnub. The latter, whose sky-line is fretted with “ organ-pipes,” after bearing upon their heads logan-like cap-stones of weathered rock, is said also to have its sheep and goat paths, water and inhabitants. We follow the Wady Kharis and the Jebel el-Sfg (Sfk),'r? whose upper slopes, white and glistening, demand exploration. The next block, Arawah, is reported to be the sea-face of a plateau, * This word, the same as the “Sfk,” the narrow ravine or rocky defile, some two miles long, which forms the approach of Petra, means in Arabic “ dust driven by the wind.” 1 30 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. which suggests the table-land of Abyssinia — accord¬ ing to “ Tommy Atkins,” a table with the legs uppermost. A line of high land apparently connects it with “Jebel Eynounah, 6,090,” more generally known as Jebel el-Zahd ; the latter is easily recog¬ nized by its comparatively rounded forms and, seen from the south, by a deep nick or Breche de Roland. The chart then shows a wide interval of lowland between the Zahd and the Jebel-“ Tayyibat Ism, 6000 ; ” it places, however, this “ Mountain of the Good Name” some ten leagues inland, whereas the ridge extends, we shall see, to the eastern shore of the Gulf of Akabah, a few miles north of the old Midianitic capital, Makna. Such was the range which came under our view, and which time forbade us to inspect carefully. It is not yet possible to lay down the upper and lower limits of this primary tract It is said to reach El- Akabah (N. lat. 290 29'), where sulphur and lead have long been known to "exist; and it may even prolong itself inland, along the eastern flank of the Wady el-Arabah, the Desert Valley of the Dead Sea, as far as Syria. Southwards it will probably extend to the northern frontier of El-Hejaz, in N. lat. 2 5°, thus giving a total length of 269 direct geographical miles. The general lie of the coast is much like that of California, and, as far as we have seen, it wholly wants the latitudinal lines of FROM EL-MUWA YLAH TO WAD Y A YNVNAH. 1 1 1 mountain which characterize Australia. Professor V. Vidal, Directeur de VEcole de Droit , and Fellow of the Khedivial Society at Cairo, would attach it to the Etna-Sinai circle of the learned Elie de Beau¬ mont, and thus he would account for the east-west strike of the porphyritic dykes and the veins of metal. The coast view, also, was by no means uninterest- ing-. Passing the palm-orchards of El-Muwaylah, we saw the three valley-mouths all known as Wady Marer, and at 11.45 we doubled the yellow sandpit, backed by arenaceous hillocks and by hills of red porphyry, known as Ras Wady Tiryam,* with its green-mouthed water-course a little further north. Careful tacking through the verdigris-coloured reefs showed us the gap of Wady Sharma, fronted by a long sandy island, unnamed in the maps, but called by the people Umm Maksur.'j' During the dry season this island is connected by a ford with the mainland ; and the damp surface produces a thin grove of Samur or Samgh ( Inga Unguis ) and Siyal ( Acacia Seyal). Leaving to port Barahkan Island, a rugged heap of sandstone, and threading our way * Riippell has Deriam-Teriam \ Wallin correctly writes Wady Teriam (Tiryam) ; Sprenger (p. 23) would change it to Taryam ; others prefer Turiam (Adm. Chart). The two latter certainly do not represent the popular pronunciation. t I would identify it with the ^Eni Insula of Ptolemy, whose latitudes are here too high ; eg, Ayniinah, in N. lat. 28° 6', is placed in 28° 50'. T32 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN amongst rock-fangs, each occupied by its own cor¬ morant, we turned eastward at 4 p.m. The Juhayni Rais, or captain, with the silly fears which imposed upon the travellers of old, here wished to anchor for the night, as the sun was low, and he could no longer sight the reefs and shoals. To this move we offered the liveliest objection. Salih declared that there was a free passage for a frigate, with eight to twelve fathoms of clear water, bounded north and south by the beds of coralline and meandrine ; moreover, we could already see the “ tabernacles/’ or reed huts, on the shore, and inland the shadowy gap of Wady Aynunah. At last, about 10 p.m., we came to anchor in the safe bight, defended on all sides by land and reef, with a long sandy point separating it from the mouth of the Wady ; and we slept on deck through the cool and dewy night, preparing to camp next morning. This is probably the “ Kolpos,” of which Diodorus (iii. 44) gives the following account : “ The navigator passing these (grassy) plains is received by a bay, a paradox of Nature, which, bending to the deepest recess inland, extends to a depth of 500 stadia (600 st. = i° = 6o miles), enclosed everywhere by rocks of marvellous size. The mouth is crooked and hard of passage, for a low reef hems in the way, allowing neither ingress nor egress. Amidst the onslaught of the current, and FROM EL-MU WAY La'h TO WADY AYNUNAH. 133 the changes of the wind, the billows boil tremen¬ dously, and are ever breaking upon the opposing stony shores. The people, called Banizomenes, live upon the flesh of wild beasts hunted with dogs. At that place is a most holy fane, held in highest honour by all the Arabs.”* It is impossible not to believe that these fantastic, sensational, imaginary horrors, combined with the abundance of gold, were not fabled by the people in order to deter strangers from interfering with their monopoly. Yet Rtippell, the landsman, says Aynunah Bay is full of shallows and quite useless for shipping ; whilst Wellsted (ii. 162), the sailor, describes it as well sheltered from all winds, and assures us that under a good pilot a vessel might enter with every facility and safety. Our first greeting was Yd Pirdn Pir ! Yd Add el-Kddir Ghilani ! (“ O Saint of Saints ! O Abd el- Kadir of Ghilan ! ”)f pronounced with the true Hindi twang ; and in the deepening shades we could dimly distinguish a dusky line of human phantoms ranged upon the Stygian shore. In reply to my question, they declared themselves to be Indian Hajis who, as usual, had been plundered by the Bedawin, and who were returning home by way of Jerusalem and Bagh- Possibly the Magharat Shu’ayb, which will be alluded to in chap, xii., has succeeded to the honours of this pagan sanctuary. But the text evidently means that Aynunah was the holy place, f See “ Pilgrimage,” vol. i. chap. x. 134 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN dad. The party, six men and one woman, travelled on foot, lodging in the reed-huts, and often sleeping in the wilderness ; yet, strange to say, none were in bad condition, and one fellow was positively fat. As they complained of hunger, I sent them some ship-biscuit, and afterwards gave them what alms we could afford. They blessed me with a Fatihah, the opening chapter of the Koran, asked for more, and finally declared that I ought to spare them the twenty days’ march, via Akabah, by sending them in a boat to Suez. No sooner had these paupers cleared out, than they were succeeded by others in a similar condition. Apparently a string of stragglers passes along the coast during several months after the Hajj -season. For long years * I have been vainly urging the Anglo-Indian Government to abate this scandal by binding the Moslems to abide by their own humane law. The Apostle of Allah, whilst making a single Pilgrimage to Meccah one of the ordinances of El-Islam, expressly forbade it to those who could not afford to leave money with their families, and to travel in a style befitting their rank. Nothing would be easier than to enforce the regulation by com¬ pelling every would-be pilgrim to show Rs. 500 before being allowed to sail. But that fatal Anerlo- Indian apathy is the one sufficient obstacle. Meccah, * See my “Pilgrimage,” iii. 255-56. FROM EL-MUWA YLAH TO WADY A YN UN. AH. 135 the focus of Moslem intrigue, still points to living examples of what evils Kafir rule can work, and wretches are still allowed to starve in the streets of Arab towns, and to display the poverty and the nakedness of once wealthy Hind. We landed early on April 4th, and passed five days in and about the Wady Aynunah, awaiting the camels and inspecting the ruins. As this is the typical, and evidently the oldest, mining station seen by us in Midian, I shall notice it at some length, and thereby save the reader from crambe repetita by remarking only differences in the other ruins. The reason why this and other mining-cities were not better explored by travellers, and why the Pilgrim- caravans yearly pass by them without a visit, is easily explained. Even in Rtippell’s day the Hu- waytat rendered the land unsafe ; many a straggler was murdered, and the Pasha of Egypt was com¬ pelled to pay each district chief a large sum in “ blackmail ” for permission of transit. Aynunah harbour lies in N. lat. 28° 2' 30". Directly upon its clean and sandy foreshore, a mile or so south of the Fiumara-mouth, and crowning the sand-heaps that overlie sandstones, stand the remains called El-Khuraybah, “ the little ruin.” The tene¬ ments, large and well-built, still show their bases ; and on the ground are scattered fragments of sea- coloured glass varying in tint, like the Roman, from 136 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. blue to green according to its thickness.* These fragments are found only upon the coast, where the wealthy enjoyed bathing ; and never, as far as our researches extended, in the inland settlements. There are also rare sherds of a pottery finer than that picked up in the interior ; the whitest are composed of almost pure kaolin. The ruins, like all others which we inspected, are reduced to mere foundations of unhewn stone, mostly coralline, bedded in excellent mortar, and nowhere are signs of architectural ornament. These maritime villas at Aynunah are confined to the spot south-east of the sand-pit, and do not extend to the part of the bight where sharp rocks line the shore. Here they are succeeded by the ’Ushash/j* or roofless huts of palm-fronds, the “ tabernacles ” of the Hebrews, mere temporary affairs, taking the place of tents ; deserted and allowed to go to ruin in the cold season, and repaired in early summer. Such is the custom of the tribes extending far down the western coast of Arabia. The booths are usually divided into two compartments, for the separation * The most solid fragment measures more than three lines : some bits are light, thin, and apparently modern, a fact easily accounted for where the Pilgrim-caravans pass. f ’Ushsh, in classical Arabic, is applied to the nest of a bird building in trees. When more substantially made, and roofed with date-thatch, the huts are called Bakkar,. in the plural Bakakir., FROM EL-MUWA YLAH TO WADY AYNUNAH. 137 of the sexes, and many are fronted by rude porches with pillars of palm-trunk. Water, made hardly potable by sulphur and Epsom, is found at Aynunah, in a pit sunk in the sand ; and near it is a draw-well partly coralline- revetted. On the highest level appears a small Hauz, a cistern regularly built with uncut stone bedded in cement, part of whose fine outer coating still remains. These plastered reservoirs, called Birket and Fiskfyyeh, are common in the Sinaitic Peninsula and in the Nejeb, or South Country. Here begins the aqueduct which, with a general direction from north to south, and skilfully conducted round the hill-sides, once supplied the thriving com¬ munity. It is between four and five kilometres, not a mile and a half, long (Wellsted), based upon the ground and supplied with a central and much larger cistern about mid-course. The material is again t rough stone, compacted with the finest mortar, pro¬ bably of burnt shells : it contains a quantity of pounded brick, an addition common to Roman cement and to that which, invented by the ancient Egyptians, has descended under the name of Humra* to the moderns. The work is well and strongly made. In one place where the earth has been * Powdered brick mixed with gypsum to make impermeable cement. “ Kosromil ” is earth and organic ashes calcined and united with lime to form the local pozzolana. 133 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN washed from under it, the unsupported masonry stands firm and solid as an arch. The channel has everywhere been lined with fine tegulae, about eighteen inches broad, and turned up at the edges ; of these, specimens were carried to Cairo. The fine ruin disappears at last along the left flank of the rocky gap through which the stream still flows. The low undulating ground over which you pass is a comparatively modern conformation, backed, at a distance varying from two to five direct miles, by an ancient sea-cliff. This falaise , here about 200 feet of extreme height, is composed of argillaceous marl, of limestones, and of corallines, from which I secured the mould of a Venus and impressions of a PectenT Veins of carbonate of iron, apparently worked, appear in the lower parts ; and the base is either upthrust granite and porphyry, or a deposit of hard conglome¬ rate, the latter being the more general. At irregular intervals of some miles, this true coast is broken by “ Babs,” or gates, which give issue to the waters of the Wadies, and these were the favourite sites of settlements, either single or in pairs ; crowning the heights, lying upon the thresholds, and sometimes occupying patches of ground where the streams formed Deltas. * Arturo Issel (“Malacologia del Mar Rosso. Pisa, 1869 ”) treats of the Pectens of the Red Sea (pp. 102-3) and °f f°ss^ Pectens (Australis Vexillum, Concinnus and Medius) in pp. 259-60. EE OM EL-MU WA YLALf TO WAD Y A YNUNAH. 1 3 9 The old sea-cliff is a highly interesting formation. It probably dates from the days when the Isthmus of Suez, that great bank of sand, lime, gypsum, sea- salt, and various testaceae, still showing only eighteen metres of maximum height at El-Jisr (El-Guisr), emerged from the waves ; when the quaternary sea broke upon the Jebel Mukkattam near Terah ; and when the African Sahara, a vast in¬ land sea during the pleiocenic and post-pleiocenic periods, became dry land. So D’Abbadie ( Lettre , etc., p. 1 2 1, “Bull, de la Soc. Geol. de France,” 1839) observed that the whole Tihamah of Eastern Arabia is occupied by comparatively modern marine formations, the latter abounding in shells tolerably well preserved and gleaming white upon the sur¬ face of the soil. Finally, Rtippell found similar examples as far as N. lat. 26°, besides conchili- ferous banks raised from four to five metres above sea-level. The “ Gate ” of Aynunah, about 200 metres wide, has evidently been closed by a barrage, in order to form an upper lake for sand washing, and to supply the aqueduct. This flooded ground is now overgrown with a “ Palmetum ” and humbler vegeta¬ tion. Two large blocks of masonry, the normal rough stone and mortar, still lie further down the bed. The builders had taken care to secure the best material for their dam. Their Makta’ el-Hajar 140 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. (quarry) is still open about four miles to the north, on the right bank of the Wady el-Makhsab. A low hill of argillaceous calcaire, fine and com¬ pact, runs from north-east to south-west. A regular incline can be traced up it. The crest which fronts the Wady has been all worked, and in two places the squared stones, tooled with a small pick, resembling that used in the great underground quarry called at Jerusalem “Tombs of the Kings,” lie upon the ground. One slab puzzled us ; it was shaped like the gravestones of a country churchyard, with a shallow circle in the upper third, measuring about a span in diameter by two inches deep, which seemed to want nothing but a cross to make it intelligible. It is impossible to forget that the Romans, when seeking the finest building material, had scanty regard for distance and labour. Below the “barrage,” and on the right side of the Wady, which is here lined with the normal con¬ glomerate, lies the second or inland settlement, now called Dao el-Hamra, the “red house” or abode, and universally attributed to the Franks. It consists of two parts. The basseville , based on a hard conglome¬ rate of the bed, the modern ground, shows a suc¬ cession of small chambers, and a large heap or pile of rough rounded stones, which the Bedawin have named the Burj, or tower. A made zigzag, still % traceable, leads up the stiff sea-face of the falaise to I FROM EL-MUWAYLAH TO WADY AYNUNAH. 14 1 the hauteville. On the left of the path is a deep artificial hollow, striking from north-west to south¬ east, and the specimens of carbonate and silicate of copper which we carried off made us suspect that the people were right in describing it as a mine of Fayriiz (turquoises). The hauteville was the usual congeries of stone- huts, measuring some seven feet by four. I All were razed to the foundation, and they remarkably re¬ sembled the quarters in the Sinaitic Peninsula (Wady Mukattab) once occupied by the captive miners and by their military guardians. The walls are placed close together, and in one part we detected a line of street through the cells like a * The Bedawin use this term, which is Persian. The old Egyptians called the stone “ Mafka,” and apparently were well acquainted with extracting it (Brugsch Bey, “Wanderungen Zu den Tiirkisminen ”). We do not know if the ancients held the modern, or rather the Russian superstition, that the turquoise is a sovereign defence against mortal wounds. The tablet at Sarabit el-Khadim (the “ Servant’s Heights ”) says, “ I (Har-ur-Ra, Superin¬ tendent of the ruins) ordered the workmen daily working, and said unto them, ‘ There is still Mafka (turquoise) in the mine, and the vein will be found in time,’ and it was so ; the vein was found at last, and the mine yielded well.” f The size and the disposition of these “ cribs ” reminded me of the Casupoli at Marzabotte, which Count Gozzadini deter¬ mined, from their scanty size, to be tombs (“ Etruscan Bologna,” p. 129). So amongst the Ivolarian Juangs, a leaf-wearing race in Western India, Colonel Dalton found the huts to measure about six feet by eight ; and even this short allowance was divided into two compartments, room and store-room. (Page 100, Journ. Anthrop. Inst ., August, 1877). 142 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID I AN. “ Laura.” I picked up a quantity of rude pottery, and the half of an eared mortar cut in fine aragonite;'* the guides spoke of a masonry-revetted well or cistern, but none could show us the way to it. A single tomb, or rather grave, amongst the huts appeared modern, and facing Meccah. All, however, denied that it was a grave, and they presently showed us the “ Cemetery of the Nazarenes,” a couple of hundred yards from the left bank of the Wady. The graves, ovals of rough stones, resembling those of the Bedawin, but considerably larger, are ranged in two ranks along the modern Hajj-road, which probably dates from the most ancient times, and they form a barbarous Via Appia — the fashion of the olden world — for those approaching the settlement from the south. I dug six feet deep into the largest, known as the “King of the Franks’ tomb,” and utterly failed to find any remnants of humanity. We came to the conclusion that the “ Red Abode ” was a settlement of workmen, most pro¬ bably servile. Still continuing our investigations, we found in the conglomerate spine at the left side of the gate-threshold, and just below where the aqueduct heads, a line of some fifteen pits, varying in depth from a few inches to half a yard, and one * Possibly the va\os, calcareous or oriental alabaster, used, Herodotus says (Thalia xxiv.), by the Ethiopians as cases to preserve their dead. A fine specimen, the sarcophagus of Psam- muthis, is found in the Sloane Museum. FROM EL-MU IV. A YLAH TO WAD Y AY NUN AH. 143 of them still contained bark, pounded by the wild man to extract tannin. These were evidently mortars for stone-crushing, and as such we used them to treat our specimens. Following up the left bank, and passing the upper end of the date-grove, where the Wady makes a great sweep from north to east, we were shown a road hewn in the rock, possibly intended for wheeled vehicles, and certainly a short cut for the workmen. It abuts upon the Wady, which here stretches from east to west, and shows in the latter direction a broad band of dark porphyry, looking as if a black sheet had been hung from top to bottom. A few yards beyond it on the right bank there is a valley which leads to Magharat Shu’ayb, the next Hajj -station, by a more direct line than that which the caravan prefers. It apparently heads in quartz, as we found at the mouth two massive boulders, very little weathered. On its proper right is another rock-hewn road, probably in¬ tended for wheels to fetch the metalliferous granite and porphyry from the adjoining mountains. Presently the main valley splits, forming an islet of rock, upon whose southern slopes lies the third settlement, known as El-Kharabah (the ruin), or El-Bandar (the place of trade). Here the wall-girt Wady Aynunah broadens and forms white spoil- banks of felspathic earth, a kaolin-like decom- 144 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN position of granite. Hence the choice of the site for the “ Afran,” as the people still call the smelting- furnaces. The fine large tiles lining the aqueduct were also made of this material. To the north, on the higher levels, are the ovens, double rows of some eight receptacles, the four to the west being almost unbroken : they are parallelograms of burnt tile, measuring a yard and a half by a yard. Evidently from the shape they were intended to smelt all the metals together ; but whether the miners could after¬ wards separate the gold and silver from the tin and lead, can be determined only by careful examination of the scoriae * brought back to Cairo. To the south of the furnaces, separated by a sandy watercourse, a gentle rise had been chosen for the houses which subtended the work-places ; and, from the absence of scoriae and vitrified clay, we judged that they had belonged to the slave- overseers. The Egyptian officers made a plan of the place, whilst we dug into the Afran. They yielded no results, but the ground all about was scattered with bricks, in shape resembling the * The celebrated chapter of Pliny (xxxiii. 21) shows the technological skill of the ancients, and notices the disengage¬ ment in the furnace of silver, which, volatilized by heat, takes the name of Sudor . In chap, xxiii. the historian treats of natural and artificial “ electrum ” — the alloy of silver with gold. The baser metals are easily separated by oxidation from gold and silver, a process extensively used at Kremnitz, the premier mint of Hungary. r45 FROM EL-MU WA Y LA H TO WADY AY NUN AH. European, and with fire-bricks partially fused and vitrified. We collected slag for laboratory analy¬ sis, some of it well-worked, and light as pumice, whilst other bits contained fibrous charcoal, evi¬ dently palm-wood. The plan also showed a broken cowrie,* and a quantity of pottery, but none of the glass which was collected in such quantities at the maritime settlement. Such is Ayniinah, a word evidently composed of ✓ / Ayn-Unah, the “fountain of Unah,” the latter being the Ptolemean name.f Its water, the “ Ayn el- * For the twenty-two species and varieties of Cyprsese, see Issel (loc. cit. pp. 1 09-1 14). He makes the Cyprcea Moneta, one of the most widely diffused of shells, common to the Mediter¬ ranean and the Red Seas (part 1, p. 32). f In Lib. 1. chap. ii. “ On the site of Arabia Felix,” which is defined as being bounded on the north by the exposed southern flanks of Petra and Arabia Deserta, extending to the Persian Gulf ; on the south by the Red Sea, eastward by part of the Persian Gulf and the sea washing the Syagros promontory (Ras el-Hadd) ; and west by the Arabian Gulf (Red Sea). We find the following names and positions on the sea-board going southwards from the Elaniticus Sinus. E. Long. N. Lat. Ofn/77 (Oune) ... ... ... 66° 20' 28° 40' (properly 28° 2' 30"). MoStW or MoSoGra (Modiana) ... 66° 40' 270 45' (El-Muwaylah ?). Thus Modfana lies twenty miles west and fifty-five miles south of Aynunah. "1^05 opos (Hippos Mons) ... 66° 40' 270 20' (Jebel el-Sharr ?). "l7T7ros (Hippos vicus) ... 67° 00' 26° 40' (Sherm Ziba ?). Qolv'lvuv Kw/jL-n (Phoenicum oppidum) 67° 20' 26° 20' (El Wijh?). 'Pavvadov km/at} (Rhaunathi pagus) ... 67° 15' 250 40' (Wady Aunid ?). Xzp(r6vt](Tos &Kpa (Chersonesi extrema) 67° oo' 250 40' (mouth of ditto ?). 'la/xfiid Kupat] (Iambia vicus) ... 63° oo' 240 oo' (properly 240 5' 30"). We are thus certain of two points in this valuable list, of Oune and of Iambia (Yambii-’a el-Nakhfl), the northern and the southern. L I4<5 THE GOLD MINES OF MIDI AN. Gasab” (. Kasab ), is mentioned, together with that of El-Akra,* by Abu Abdillah ibn Ayas in his book (a.d. 1516), Nashh el-Azhdr fi Ajdib El- Attar (Smelling of Flowers in the Wonders of Lands), as “ pilgrim-stations ” (. Mandzil el-Hajj ) “ on the shore * of the Red Sea.” He continues : “ In the Uyun el- Kasab there are springs of running water, around which grows the Persian reed (. Arundo do'nax). It is a resting-place for the pilgrims, who pitch their tents on the bank, and bathe themselves, and wash their clothes in the springs. This is the spot of which the poet sings : — “ O my friends ! forget not your vows to the nameless youth, Whose companion is sorrow, and whose eyes are wet with tears : He remembered his vow to you on the road to El-Hejaz, And neither in El-’Uyun nor in Akra did he taste of sleep.” This valley and El-Akra are the limits assigned to the Wady Damah between Dhoba and I stab! ’Antar, and to the possessions of the Orban Balfy in the olden time.f Finally, the first glance at Aynunah told me that it was hopeless to expect, in this once civilised region, the wealth of nuggets which the old Greek describes as ranging between the size of an olive- * El-Akra is the first pilgrim-station south of El-Wijh. El- ’Uyun, also, in the last verse quoted below, is the abbreviated lorm. f Hafiz Ahmad, in his “ Historical Compendium of Egypt,” also gives a list of the Pilgrim-stations on the Egyptian road. Wallin refers to No. 9972 of the Brit. Mus. MSS. FROM EL-MUWA YLAH 70 WADY A YNUNAH. 147 stone and a walnut.* Gold, the metal which appears to have been produced last, and to have first been used by man, is easily removed from the superficial strata, and can scarcely be exhausted in sand and stone. The Land of Midian is at present, in fact, much like California, when the pick and fan men had done their work : she is still wealthy, but her stage is that when machinery must take the place of the human arm. I by no means despair of finding virgin regions where the gold grain, or granulated gold, still lingers ; but they evidently will not lie within hail of the coast. * See chap. ix. CHAPTER VI. FROM WADY AYNUNAH TO THE WADY MORAK IN THE JEBEL EL-ZAHD. On April 4th, when examining the site of Aynunah, we came upon a flock of goats attended by women and children. The former wore the nose-bags of Egypt, and the latter screamed when we offered them small silver coins. Nevertheless, they recognised Salih the mulatto guide, and readily bore a message from him to certain petty chiefs of the Tugaygat clan, who were encamped in the neighbouring northern valley, Wady el-Makhsab. The result was a visit from four of the head men, Shaykhs Rafi’a, ’Ayd Alayan, Munakid, and Abd el-Nabi, who, recognising the viceregal authority, at once agreed, for a consideration, to transport the tents and bag¬ gage from the sea-shore to the palm-grove of Aynu¬ nah. Their half-wild camels made sad havoc with the boxes and bottles. In conversation they told me that some twenty years ago a Frank had visited them from Tur Si'na FROM WADY AYNUNAH TO WADY MORAK. 149 (Sinai) to collect plants. I afterwards heard from Colonel Middleton, of Cairo, that he had met an old Englishman, named Wells, in New York, who had travelled east of the Akabah Gulf on camels, and who described the country as full of ruins and minerals. Yet, curious to say, they had not the least knowledge of Dr. Beke’s visit in January, 1874 — the last excursion before his lamented death. These men belonged to the Huway tat,* a large and growing tribe, which holds the greater part of the sea-board, including El-Akabah, to the mountain called Istabl ’Antar (Antar’s Stable), f extending for seven or eight hours journey eastward into the interior, till they are met by their hereditary enemies, the Beni Maazeh. They are originally Egyptian Fellahs, natives of the Nile- Valley and subjects of the Khediv, who have become Bedawinised, aban¬ doning their ancient homes, Turah (Ta-Roau, the Greek Troja), Rasatfn, and Hahsdn (les Bains), the Cairene Sanitarium. The emigration is said to date * In the singular, Huwaytl. Ha’it is a wall or an inclosure, generally round a palm-orchard ; and its diminutive would be Huwayt. Thus Huwayti would mean a man of the small walls, and must not be used to explain classical names of tribes. My learned friend, Prof. Palmer, following Robinson, habitually calls them “ Harweitat,” which is, I think, a mistake for Huwaytat. f Wellsted (ii. 183) makes their southern limit the ruined castle near Marsa Ezlam (Wady Azlam), where the Bally tribe begins, and stretches to the Juhaynah lands. r5° THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. from about 150 years ago. Thus these partim nomodes , partim agricolce , as the ancients described the coast-people,* are unmentioned by the Arab genealogists, and they have not a single tale nor tradition connected with the old mining cities of Midian. Their chief ’Brahfm (ibn) Shadfd, domi¬ ciled in the Husaynfyyah quarter of the capital, is well known to the Viceroy. His second in command, Mohammed ibn Rufayyah of the Tugaygat clan, whose brother Alaydn came to us in Sherm Yahar, pitches his black tents near the mountains of Libu and Antar, some six or seven hours of dromedary¬ riding from our farthest southern port, Sherm Ziba. The tribe still shows its origin by the tattooed beauty spot and by the indigo-dyed dress and veiled faces of their women ; moreover, instead of horses, they have asses which are small, weak, and valueless. From the Bedawin 'they have bor¬ rowed the practice of plaiting their hair in the small pig-tails called Kurun (horns), and of never appear¬ ing without arms. Matchlocks are common : guns are used by the chiefs, and double-barrels are not wholly unknown. Even the boys are armed with swords, often longer than themselves ; and on a good old blade I read the legend Pro Deo et Patria . Numbering, like the Jehaynah and the Beni Maa- zeh, about 5000 males, they are considered a strong, * See chap. ix. FROM WADY AY NUN AH TO WADY MORAK 15 1 and by no means a quiet tribe. They are quarrel¬ some and on bad terms with all their neighbours. Md yahibbu el-nds — they do not love mankind — is the verdict of the settled Arabs concerning the H uway tat. Riippell, who judges their morals harshly, men¬ tions (p. 223) that, shortly before his visit to El-Muwaylah, the Huwaytat had driven off all the cattle belonging to the Fort-garrison, and when hotly pursued had cut the throats of the sheep and goats. They talk of Fakihs (clerks) who have been educated in Egypt ; but they are extremely ignorant of their religion, and I never yet saw one of them at his devotions. Like all the nomads, they act upon the old saying, “We do not fast the Ramazan, because we are half starved all the year round ; we never perform the Ghusl or the Wuzu (ceremonial ablutions), because we want the water to drink ; and we never make the Hajj (pilgrimage), because Allah is everywhere.” I never saw the faces of their women unveiled ; / but the men are not an uncomely race, with olive- coloured skins, lamp-black hair, features tolerably straight, and lithe, supple, active figures. Some of the fisher-lads show Shushehs (top-knots) discoloured ruddy-brown by sea water, the practice well known to the Venetian beauties of Titian’s day. Of course • we can hardly expect in these regions the highest 152 TILE GOLD MINES OF MID I AN charms of hair, especially of young hair, those lights and shades which shift with every angle. Their eyes are piercing and strong. Our Bedawin escort saw better with the naked organ than the Egyptian officers, natives of a valley plain, with their bino¬ cular glasses. Though healthy in body and mind, they are by no means a clean people, reserving fresh water for drinking, and bathing in the sea, like the lower animals, only in the warm weather. The hatred of cold water, combined with old ra^s, results in what may readily be imagined, but must not be described. The pure uncontaminated air makes them cheerful and even merry : they endure all their hardships without dreaming of “ a grumble.” Their principal occupations are pasturing, trading,, and fighting. They buy or barter grain at the several ports for sheep and clarified butter, for matting- reeds, for grass and forage, and for charcoal and other minor matters. The Huwaytat are divided as usual into a score of dans,* including those affiliated. I formed a hioh * The names given to me were — Orban Amirat (not Umrat), who occupy the Shifah + 2. „ Masahd : they dwell about Magharat Shu’ayb, and were probably a separate tribe incorpo- rated with the Huwaytat. + 3- » Sulaymi'yyin in the interior, east of Jebel ’Antar. + 4. „ Jerafin, in the Jebel el-Sharr (mountain of El- Muwaylah). „ Ghanamiyyfn, south of the Sharr. 5- FROM WAD Y A YNUNAH TO WAD Y MORAK. 153 opinion of the young Abd el-Nabi (Slave of the Prophet), whom M. Marie very naturally named Abd el-Nabfd (Slave of Strong Liquor). H is at¬ tractive features, his soft voice and deferent address would be admired in any salon of Europe. He is illiterate ; he can neither read nor write, yet he observes everything ; he would pick up all points of ceremony at the first sight. Moreover, he knows 6. Orban Mawasah, the tribe of ’Brahim ibn Shadfd; behind Sherm Ziba. Tagatkah, in the Wady Damah, south of Ziba. Tugaygat, before mentioned : owners of Wadys Aynunah and Makhsab : Wallin misnames them Dakikat. Aramleh (not Umran), in Wady Abu Salam. El-Kur’an, (in Wady Azlam and Suwayyah ?) ex¬ tending to El-Wijh. El-Mashahfr, in Wady Shagaf. El-Ulayyat, who frequent the Wady Tiryam together with — El-’Adasfn, goat-keepers affiliated with the Huwaytat. El-Jawahirah, also in Wady Tiryam. El-Zamahrah, in Jebel el-Kharis, near the Jebel el-Abyaz, which we shall visit. El-Buraysat, in Wady Abu Salam. Ziyabin, in the Wady Tiryam. El-Rakabiyyeh, near Wady Sharma. El-Salalimah (not Musalimeh), about the Jebel el-Jimm : this clan has two minor divisions — a. Hayayineh. b. Surhaylat. The names marked with a cross are given with more or less correctness by Wallin : he adds 20. ’Ureinat (Uraynat), 21. Sug- hayin, and 22. Sharman, “who frequent the districts south of Muweilah, and towards Istabl ’Antar.” / • + 8. 9- + 10. + 11. + 12. 13- 14- x5* 16. i7- 18. + 19. *54 THE GOLD MINES OF MIDI AN. what he wants to know ; he rides and shoots well, and is a judge of dromedaries and camels, sheep and goats. He can tell you the name and nature of every plant that blooms on his native hills, especially the simples useful for man and beast, holding the while to the Bedawi axiom, Akhar el-Dawd el- Kay “ The end of medicine is (the actual) cautery.” Lastly, he is ever ready to risk his life for his tribe : and no Hidalgo of the bluest blood was ever more ticklish on the “ Pun d’onor.” The Bedawi, who becomes fawning and abject when corrupted by contact with the town-Arab, is still a gentleman in his native wilds. Easy and quiet, courteous and mild-mannered, he expects you to respect him, and upon that condition he respects you — still without a shade of obsequiousness or servility. P^ence the difficulties found by the official class, Egyptian as well as Turkish. Disdaining to observe any of the little punctilios of the race, these begin with the loud authoritative address, Ya Shaykh el-Orb&n ! ending, perhaps, with some rough order. The Bedawi turns his back, and simply replies, (‘We are not Shaykhs of the Orban ! ” The man of the wilds has a dignity of his own, a perfect contrast with the unfortunate Fellah who, a slave for the last 2000 years, cannot be treated well without waxing fierce and kicking — in his own phrase, “ becoming a Pharaoh. Moreover, the Bedawi never tells a lie, FROM WAD Y A YNUNAH TO WAD Y MORAK. 155 and, when told one, never forgets it. His confidence is gone for ever, and all the suspiciousness of his nature is aroused. Should we find it necessary to raise regiments of these men, nothing would be easier. Pay them regularly, arm them well, work them hard, and treat them with even-handed justice — there is nothing else to do. I presume that this was the Roman system of garrisoning the forts and outposts to the east and the south of Syria. The wild men will also work well, as was proved when digging the Suez Canal. But the Bedawi is ever on the alert, like the cold northern sea, to use the smallest flaw in the artificial dyke of civilisation. Hence the ruin of the strong places further north, of the basalt burghs of Bashan and the ’Ulah (Hamath), of the limestone strongholds of Moab, and probably of the mining cities of Midian. Professor Vidal seems to think that the latter may have been destroyed by the incursions of the nomads under the reign of Valens, Emperor of the East (a.d. 364-378), when the power of Rome began to decline ; or during the life of his successor, Theo¬ dosius, when the riots took place at Antioch. The date is hardly likely to be so early. In the days of Mohammed, Akabat-Ayla was still ruled by a Chris¬ tian prince, John, who accepted El Islam (Robinson, i- 243)- THE GOLD-MINES OF MID I AN. Abd el-Nabi is young and ambitious, and, despite his gentle manners, I suspect that he can deal a smashing blow. Like a man of honour he is ever ready to fight, as we saw on an occasion which will be noticed. He is honest too : I engaged camels from him when suspecting that our party was being delayed at El-Muwaylah, and advanced him $15. When it came up* he returned the ’Arbiin (earnest- money), although I should have hesitated to demand it after the trouble he had taken to collect the beasts. When prompted by his tribesmen to make an exorbitant demand, he exchanges a smile of warning. The lithe agile figure climbs up the trotting dromedary, and glides from saddle to ground like an acrobat. One of our officers, who had been in the Sudan, attempted to give him the go-by in a camel race, and was passed as if he was standing still by the little “Nagah” (dromedary), which at once entered into the spirit of the sport. Like all Bedawi, he is a keen sportsman, perfect at stalking his game. He accompanied us to the last, till he saw us safe on board the corvette at Makna. Briefly, Abd el-Nabi and I became friends — in the Desert man meets man as an equal, — and on parting I gave him my bowie-knife, with many hopes that it will serve him well. I agree with Professor Palmer that the Bedawi, FROM WAD Y A YNUNAH ID WAD Y MORAK. 1 5 7 the “father,” not the “son, of the Desert,” is, like the noble savage generally, a nuisance to be abated by civilisation. Yet the race has high and noble quali¬ ties which, as the old phrase is, the world would not willingly see die ; and perhaps the pure blood of the wilderness may be infused to good purpose into burgher-men, as into their horses. Guided by Abd el-Nabi we minutely inspected the Wady Ayminah. Like Sinaitic Wady Gharandal, it is a typical valley ,palmetis consita, f ontibus irrigua , even as its settlement is a typical mining town. M. Marie, to whom I explained the difference between the popular idea of emerald islands in the sand-sea and the true oasis, a perennial spring bordered with tall palms, so common throughout Maritime Arabia, called it un oasis* serieux. This Nullah is said to come from a distance of three days’ march, and, as we afterwards learned, it absorbs a multitude of minor streams extending south to the water-shed of Wady Sharma. The spring which feeds the basin wells from the ground close within the gate. It is distinctly Arabian — that is, warm and medicinal with * The hellenised form of the Egyptian “Wahe:” hence the Arabic “Wall,” still used by the Copts, meaning an inhabited station or place in the Desert ; almost always a Wady. The ancients of the Nile valley expressed Oasis by Otou, a place of embalming before burial. Strabo, xvii. 1, says, “The Egyptians give the name of Auases (Oases) to certain inhabited tracts, which are surrounded by extensive deserts, and appear like islands in the sea.” 158 THE GOLD-MINES OF MIDI AN the pleasant taste of alum, and the picturesque hue of sulphur. It reminded me strongly of the “ mawkish ” and mephitic Palmyra-pits. Like these, it tarnishes silver, and deposits a coating of carbonate of lime upon the fetid mud which lines the channels.* The Bedawin declare that, after the Nile, it is the best in the world — a favourite popular boast. j* The soldiers said of Aynunah, “ Her air is the air of Paradise : her water is the water of Je- hannum!” They were right about the climate. The atmosphere was delightfully sweet and cool, even when the mercury was showing a hundred degrees (F.) in the houses of Cairo.J The water of Aynunah, I have said, is called the Ayn el-Kasab,§ or Fount of the Canes, from the A bottle was filled for analysis and emptied by some thirsty soul. f So in the Ti'h Wilderness, the Wells of Ma’yin are said to yield “water sweet as the waters of the Nile.” Wellsted (ii. 162) notes that the valley of “’Ainunah” is celebrated among the “ Bedowins” for fine and abundant water. + In the Aynunah gorge, on April 5th, the observations were — At 6 a.m. Therm. (F.) 69° Hyg. (Sauss.) 30° Aner. 2 9 ’9 8° At 10 a. in. 83° 2 9° 29-90° § The word is pronounced “Gasab,” with the peculiar Bedawi perversion of the Ivaf \ and hence, I presume, our word 11 Gossy- pium” properly applied to the Mawacete. Sprenger (/oc. cit. 22) says, “ Spater hiessen die Pilger die Station in oder bei ’Aynuna ‘’Oyfin alqugab.’” FROM WADY AYNUNAH TO WADY MORAN. 159 quantity of sedge ( Cyperus and Scirpus ) ; rushes (J uncus Spinosus , Fersk.), the Arabian Simar, which are cut and sent in bundles to Suez for making hasir (mats), and Arundo donax, which form a dense thicket, preventing all access to the spring or springs. A little way above the fountain, water is found by digging the usual Themail (pits) some eighteen inches deep. Below the gate it sinks and flows irregularly, depending, the people say, upon the tides. After heavy rains the whole line must roll a furious torrent ; but in the hot season, though never dry, it cannot reach the Wady-mouth, distant some three miles. Hence Aynunah is a station for the Hajj, which from El-Muwaylah marches along shore, crossing the mouths of the Wadies, but not visiting their Nakhil,* or date-orchards. The larger vegetation * Between El-Muwaylah and El-Akabah, the stations de¬ scribed to me by the Bedawin were as follows ; Riippell’s marches (pp. 216-19) are also subjoined in the list : — 1. El-Muwaylah to Aynunah, 12 to 13 hours (=i2f hours via Wady Tiryam and 12 direct, Riippell) = 28 direct miles. 2. Aynunah to Magharat Shu’ayb, 14 hours (=13 hours, R.) = 28 direct miles. Half-way there is a Mahattah, or halting-place, called Umm Rujaym, where water flows only after rain from the Jebel el-Muk. 3. Magharat Shu’ayb to El-Sheraf, 12 hours, a desert station without water: beyond it the people speak of the Mahattah Sharafah. 4. El-Sheraf to Hagul (Hakl, Agh’ale of Ptolemy), 14 hours : on the Gulf of Akabah with palm-groves and water. 5. Hagul to El-Akabah, with fort and garrison, palms and water. 160 THE GOLD-MINES OF MIDI AN. is the palm, which thrives best where its feet are in water, and its head in the fire of heaven : it is of the two species, the date and the dorn, or Theban palm (. Hyphene Thebaica f), peculiar on account of its numerous branches. The former is barbarously neglected, being never pruned nor masculated, although here and there a reed fence is run round some choicer specimen. The grounds, which might be made a Garden of Irem, are strewed with the mummied corpses of trunks and fronds ; whilst, worse still, many of the stumps still standing are mere “ black-jacks/’ The swamps are peopled with tadpoles and frog- lets, with snakes, and with little fresh-water land shells, the Melanopsis acicularis of Ferussac, com¬ mon in Arabia. In the cool shade, and during the dark hours, flies and gnats are so troublesome that travellers always camp in the sunny open below the trees. Moreover, here, as in the drier parts of the country, there is a small black beetle like a coccinella, by the Arabs called “ Ba uzah,” * which amuses itself by a sharp bite, apparently without object, and running away. We explored the upper valley of Aynunah above the furnaces, which are easily reached in twenty minutes. There we found various metals, especially * In classical Arabic meaning a gnat, a mosquito : viukh bduzah (gnats’ brains or marrow) is equivalent to our “ mare’s nest.” FR OM WAD Y A YNUNAH TO WAD Y MO RAX. 1 6 r argentiferous galena in the quartz. The banks in many places are seamed and striped by eruptive dykes, veins and filons of dark-green porphyry cutting and altering the lower and earlier plutonic formation of a red syenitic granite. We also pushed across the broken plain on the right bank of the Wady, a succession of yawning gorges and rough divides, which Salih, the guide, called “ El-Jebel” (the mountain),* and which explained why the ancients had cut a rock-road to strike smoother ground. In the hollows we found the Kabah (. Arts - tida, , or Wiisten-grcis) with feathery top, equally prized by horse and camel, and collected near the sea-shore in bundles for exportation. The Bedawin greedily ate the small green warty pod of a milky plant which they called Jura, and which the soldiers named Khi'yar el- Barr — desert-cucumber. Wild sorrel ( Rumex Vesicarius f), of surprising size and surpassing acid flavour, springs from the fissures of the rocks, and more than once supplied us with an anti-scorbutic dish. % The surface of the smoother lands was granite gravel, overlying minute dust of the same formation ; and the stone-scatters were composed of petrosilex, porphyry, diorite, peridot, and felspathic matter * As opposed to the seats and road-lines of civilisation which affect the plain. M 162 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID I AN. generally. We saw nothing of the basalts and chlorites which were conspicuous further north. Quartz appeared in various shapes : the hyaline yielded nothing ; the common and the waxy varie¬ ties showed at the fractures small dots of pyrites, with a suspicion of gold ranged in lines. We had only time to break the pebbles as we met them, not to trace the veins to their source ; but the dis¬ covery explained to us the use of the mortars sunk in the rock at Aynunah. Our walk ended at a range of remarkable but¬ tresses on the right bank, about a quarter of the distance between the water and the nearest moun¬ tain. The material is of argillaceous marl like the falaises of the true coast, capped, on a regular and horizontal base-line, by brown grit, the sand of the Desert, a modern formation, still growing as the grains are gradually compacted by dew and rain. These buttresses, rising sharply from the hollow plain, measure the extent of denudation which has taken place around them. We also fol¬ lowed the Hajj-road to the north, where, winding seawards of the falaise , it bends round inland to north-east between the mountain Zahd (Aynunah) and the “ Tayyibat Ism” block. On April 7th the caravan, preceded by the Sayyid Abd el- Rahim, straggled in, under Shaykh Hasan ibn Salim of the Beni Ukbah. Mr. Clarke FROM WAD Y A YNUNAH TO WADY MORAK. 163 had met with a “ cropper,” his beast having started off at an unexpected gallop : a mule would have broken his neck, whereas his hand and arm were only barked — another instance of the Arab saying.* The old Haji, as he waddled to the tents, exclaimed, Bid' dak taktul-ni ! — “ Thou art resolved to be the death of me ! ” and he was not restored to life with¬ out an abundance of beer. They had engaged fifty camels, for which they were to pay twelve piastres per diem, at the rate of only eighteen to twenty piastres to the dollar. Finding that the Huwaytat would not travel in the company of the Beni ’Ukbah, I dismissed the latter with bakhshish ($5), and a present of cavendish, giving them at the same time a letter of satisfaction to the Commandant of Fort El-Muwaylah. The over-zealous official at once placed several of them under arrest, and dismissed them only when a dromedary-messenger carried to him a peremptory order to do so. I had no wish, in view of future contingencies, to give these men a grievance ; they are the only tribe which, having no blood-feuds with their neighbours, can carry travellers into the far interior. Shaykh Abd el-Nabi at once set out to collect the required carriage, forty-one camels and ten Hijn, or dromedaries, the latter costing, in this region, a maximum of fifteen Napoleons. We spent April * “ Sind Revisited,” chap. vi. 164 THE GOLD-MINES OF MIDIAN 8th in resting our weary travellers, who had been two days on the march ; in pounding the stones and washing the sands, and in taking counsel concerning the line of country. I at first thought of marching straight upon the next caravan station, Magharat Shu’ayb, where, in all probability, Haji Wali first found the auriferous sand. M. Marie, however, offered cogent arguments in favour of following up the Wady, at least as far as the Zahd Mountain ; and of ascertaining the site whence the quartz comes. I therefore determined to divide the caravan, and leave at Aynunah my old friend, whose presence was not now wanted ; ten soldiers under charge of Lieutenant Abd el-Karfm ; and Marius the cook, a willing lad, but quite unbroken to desert travel. On April 9th we set out with the normal diffi¬ culties of a first march. It was 6 a.m. before I could take in hand the Mash’ab, or hook-stick, the sceptre of the Egyptian and Assyrian kings, of the hieroglyphs and the cuneiforms, a type which has survived the lapse of years numbered by the thou¬ sand, and which in Midian still keeps its old station, distinguishing from the many-headed, the despotic Bash-Kafilah, or tete de caravane. The weather had changed, and a Khamsin wind (scirocco) which lasted through the week had set in. We were, however, approaching the mountains; and we had no suffering from heat. The sun was strong be- FROM WAD Y A YNUNAH TO WAD Y MORAK 165 tween 10 a.m. and 4 p.m.,* but the mornings, the evenings, and the nights were glorious. The largest of the dromedaries, a good stepper, but a rough old beast, was set apart for me. It appeared to be of Syrian blood, quite different from the lean and light breed ridden by the rest of the party, and on the third day I learnt that it had been “ lifted ” from the Beni Ma azeh. We ascended the left bank of the Wady Aynunah, whose gate, choked by vegetation, and cut by streamlets, allows only a footman to pass. After a short divide, the path fell into one of its in¬ fluents, the Wady Umm el Niran (Mother of Fires), thus leading us round the obstacle. The upper part of Aynunah shows, by scattered vegetation, that water is near the surface. Many of the larger trees had been hewn and burnt for char¬ coal ; and the survivors were chiefly dorn palms, capparideae and samur (. Inga unguis ), whose thorns, disposed in pairs, like the African Acacia fistula , pierce all but the strongest boots or the leathery sole of a veteran Bedawi. The sandy tract grew the Cucumis prophetarum (Jonah’s gourd), with the warty yellow apple, and the smooth balls of the true colocynth (C. Coloquintida) . The Bedawin * At the end of the march, about noon, the aneroid showed 290 2', and the mercury 120° (F.) in the sun, and 90° under the thin shade of a gum-tree. j66 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. hollow out this bitter apple and fill it overnight with laban, or soured milk, which they drink in the morning. I have never tried the draught, but can easily imagine it potent as the croton-nut of the Gold Coast.* A large fungus, which thrusts up the sands of the Wadys, was also found in many places; but nowhere could we hear of the white truffle, which, after wet winters, grows so abundantly in the Desert of Palmyra and in the great Syrian wilder¬ ness. We were not a little surprised to see, as we advanced, the quartz diminishing in quantity till it completely disappeared, and we did not find out the reason till the next day. Our direction was northerly towards a great gash in the Zahd or Ayniinah f Mountain ; and, after a slow march of four hours, covering fourteen miles, we reached the camping-ground at the mouth of the Wady el-Morak, so called from its fine spring. The ground was level, except where a huge jorf (gravel-bank), a broken segment of unstratified sand, possibly artificial, and built up by the washings Considered a most powerful remedy ; the green nut is split into foui, and a slice, duly seasoned with spices, is administered to the patient : unfortunately, I lost the prescription. "I" Johnston calls it Jebel el-Ayoon (Mountain of Springs), a name certainly unknown to the Arabs. Muller (Map vi. “ Geog! Gr. Minores ) has Dj Ain-oune, a nearer approach to correctness, but too classical. FROM WADY AYNUNAH TO WADY MORAK. 167 of ores, projected from the right jaw of the gorge. The Bedawin declared that on the other side of the mountain-block, and distant twelve hours’ march, they had seen “ Afran ” (furnaces) and a large masonry-well. These men exaggerate, but do not invent. I showed one of them a bit of quartz, when he at once told me that whole hills of that “ white stone ” are to be found on the south-eastern line. Having thorough confidence in the Bedawi’s coup d'ceil for collecting minerals as well as plants, I sent him off with a promise of reward. He started on a violent little “ Nagah ” which, during the march, used to “ curse and swear ” at the slowness of the pace whenever the halter was drawn tight. He returned within seven hours, bringing specimens, he said, from every part of the hill. This determined our direction for the next day. In the evening we explored the gorge, whose right bank showed vestiges of a causeway and steps. Fortunately, the geologist, unlike the botanist, finds all he wants in the valley, without requiring to scale the mountain. The lower part of the Jebel el-Zahd is composed of granites and syenites ; the upper of homologous red porphyry — hence its remarkable rounded sky-lines. The same rock forms the back¬ bone of Edom, clothed with the new red sandstone — a fact eminently suggestive. Every pebble that wre broke contained more or less metal ; we added i68 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. antimony * to our list, and we found dark-coloured tourmalines. I remembered that the “ Kimberley Diamond-mine ” in South Africa is surrounded by a non-diamantiferous porphyry or greenstone ; but we had neither stores nor time for anything except what came in our way. The Pentateuch mentions the diamond (Exod. xxviii. 1 8, and xxxix. n),f alluding to its being engraved, and the Talmud pre¬ serves a tradition that Jethro’s rod was of the Queen of Stones. Sir John Maundeville, speaking of the Land of Job (chap, xiv.), tells us that the “diamonds of Arabia are not so good (as those of India) : they are browner and more tender.” One of the party at once acquired the sobriquet * The mineral used for the eyes by the ancient Egyptians was called “ Mas Mut,” and was brought by the Shasu (Bedawin) of Madi (Midian) and of Pitshu (Arabia Petraea). Brugsch, p. ioo, Hist. I Egypte, etc. Leipzig, 1875. The Arabs are also called Amu and Hirusha, or “they who (are) on the land.” f D^rr in the first as well as in the second quotation is trans¬ lated tacr7rts by the L NX.., jaspis by the Vulg., “demant” by the Germ., and “ diamond ” by the A.V. Professor Maskelyne, of the British Museum, asserted to me that the cutting of diamonds was unknown to the classics. The Adamas of Pliny was certainly a diamond, for it cuts and polishes all gems (xxxvii. 76) ; it was found in India and Arabia {ibid., 15) ; it was prized by kings (ibid.), and it was tested on the anvil (ibid). He calls it “ a nodosity of gold ; ” and, in the Brazil, I have seen a speck of gold inside the crystal. Moreover, it was sought by lapidaries, who set it in iron handles. The vulgar idea is that Louis Berquen of Bruges, in 1456, invented diamond-cutting; but how long before his day was the art known to the Hindus? Maundeville (toe. cit.) alludes to their being polished in a.d. 1322. FR OM WAD Y A YNUNAH TO WAD Y MORAK 1 6 9 “Abu Natrun ” (Fatter of Nitre).-* He had heard the Bedawin speak of saltpetre, and, after his even¬ ing ramble, he brought back some fragments of a brown and crusted clay which, when duly smelt and tasted by him, had suggested a mixture of salt and ammonia. Unfortunately, we insisted on seeing the spot; and loud were the shouts of laughter when it was discovered to be a halting-place for camels. I presume that the desert air caused our unusual exuberance of spirits : it was the merriest journey I ever made. The minutest bit of “wut ” sufficed ; and “Abu Natrun” supplied us with guffaws for many a day. This wild gorge is a fine study of “ il bello orrido,” the savage picturesque, a gloomy and rugged rent in the mountain flank, red and ruddy with black dykes and dark veins above, and striped with a ghastly white below. This water-mark shows the violent rush of a boiling, roaring sayl (torrent), which, after heavy rains, must roll fathoms deep, and must whirl and wash down the hugest boulders as though they were pebbles. The bed, here sharply sloping, there falling perpendicularly, is covered with * The word is probably Egyptian. “Nuter”has the primary signification of purifying: hence the “nitre” used by the ancients to clean the interiors of their temples and houses. It is found in the dust of ruined villages, and is scraped off the walls as well as off the interior of caves. For a description of making sal ammoniac in Egypt out of the finite de Chameau , la plus forte et la meilleure , see “Shaw’s Travels,” ii. Append, xxix. THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN 1 70 gigantic blocks and “ hard-heads/’ torn and weathered, from the towering walls. Now and then we crossed the crystal-clear streamlet, rippling from under cover ; and in the lowest level it bares its virgin charms upon a bed of the purest golden sand. The merest sketch of a sheep-path zigzags up the right side to the source, where three palms are said to grow. We found the water better flavoured, or rather less evil-flavoured, than that of Aynunah, whilst its effects were still more dolorous. A bath in a rocky basin, cleared of water plants, frogs, and tad¬ poles, consoled us for the loss of the “ Hammam ” which we had dug for ourselves at the last station. During this first march we saw no game, the only exception being a small hare with ears as long as the “jackass-hare” of the Western United States. There were, however, earths of the hyaena ( Zabd ), of the porcupine (Nis), and of the hedgehog (Kun- fud) ; whilst the jackals ( Saalab ) and the foxes [A die l husayri) had made for themselves frequent hole-homes. Every day afterwards we saw troops of gazelles ; usually three to five, animals with large startled eyes and asinine ears, evidently the growth of racial watchfulness — life in a perpetual state of guard. One pretty thing followed a lad into camp, and sat like a dog at his feet.* In an evil hour it * The same has been remarked of the wild goat of Sinai, presently noticed. FROM WADY AYNUNAH TO WADY MORAK. 17 1 was bought by one of the officers ; it travelled in a cage on camel-back, and when it was dying its throat was cut for venison. How can men be such can¬ nibals as to eat pets ? Three other young ones were embarked from Sherm Ziba : one died, and the rest were landed safely at Suez. I asked after the Beden ( Capra Sinaitica) of the neighbouring Penin¬ sula, in Syria called El-Wa’al, whose noble ringed and recurved horns are sold for knife-handles, and form favourite “ trophies of the chase.” Apparently it does not extend to these mountains, although the Bedawin spoke vaguely of a stag with large branches. Birds were so rare near the shore that we started whenever the silence was broken by a stray note. The people told us that they had all followed the tents into the interior {fault), where rain-water still abounds. A few were found about the pools, especially the yellow and the white and black wagtails ( Motacilla flava and alba), called by the Arabs ’Usfur bamyyeh, and sundry varieties of tits. All were too tame and trusting to be shot ; more¬ over, this was the nesting time — yassawwii bayt, — “ they are building their houses,” as the people said. Flights of sand-grouse ( Pterocles Alchatd) winged their way towards water before sundown. I never shoot the beautiful Kata after he saved my life in Somaliland. The pin-tailed species so common in 172 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN Egypt is seemingly rare here. We flushed quail, but no partridge ; we saw hawks, but no vultures and crows ; martins appeared, but never a sparrow. On the stony tracts were hoopoos ( hudhud ), the crested lark and bright-coloured jays ( cor arias gar- rula) ; and the blue rock-dove ( Columba livid) dwelt in the holes of the Aynunah cliffs. Our dark hours were enlivened by the cuckoo-like cry of a night-jar, but we never heard the owl, which so unpleasantly affected a fair friend at Corfu. The green merops ( EEgyptius ) hunted flies over the valleys. The swallows were already on the wing, and, in early May, when steaming north from Alexandria we were accompanied by weary flights that nestled for the night wherever they could find a shelf. The shore abounded in white gulls that skimmed the waves ; whilst cormorants, which plunged like plum¬ mets of lead, confined themselves to particular locali¬ ties. The swampy Wady-mouths housed the snow- white paddy-bird, called in Egypt “ Abu Kirdan the “ father of a (long) neck ” is never killed, because it accompanies the Fellah and destroys insects. We found the “waran,” or true chameleon (C. vulgaris , also called Lucerta Nilotica by Hasselquist and Fuskal) ; and the large Lybian lizard, known by the generic name of Zabb ( Lacerta Egyptiaf), besides many smaller species. Two snakes were killed by * “ Kirdan ” possibly derives from the Persian “ Gardan.” FROM WADY AYNUNAH TO WADY MORA'k. 173 Haji Wali at the waters of Aynunah, but the cerastes (. Hasselquistii ), so common in the desert, was not seen. In the morning the ground was covered with yellow locusts, and many species of brown grass¬ hoppers, especially the large, dark leathery species Jemal el-Yahiid (Jew’s Camel*), enjoyed the sun. I bottled a fine spider (. Lycosa ), called by the Arabs Abu Shabah (Father of a Web), and the subject of as many tales as the Tarantula, or the yellow and black Ananu of the Gold Coast. The butterflies, with the exception of a chocolate-coloured species, seen near El-Muwaylah, were all white. Large hornets ( Zabur ) were seen in the wilderness ; and the flies ( Tabarus f) at Shama were compared by the officers with those of the Shilluk and Dinka countries (Tsetse ?\ which kill horses and cattle. Specimens of the beetles, grasshoppers, ants, ticks, camel-ticks, and other creeping things which abound, were sent to the British Museum. * Some Bedawin apply “Jew’s Camel” to the chameleon, and call the grasshopper Himdr El-Banat (Ass of the Girls) or El- Shay tan (of Satan). CHAPTER VII. MIDIAN AND THE MIDIANITES. The Land of Midian is still known to its inhabitants as “Arz Madyan,” the latter form being equivalent to the Madian of the A.V. (Apocrypha and Acts vii. 29.) North it is bounded (N. lat. 29° 29') by El-Akubat el-Misriyyah, or the Egyptian steep, as opposed to the El-Akubat el-Shamiyyah, the Syrian, traversed by the Damascus Caravan, a similar pass one day’s march to the east. The former gives its name to a fort-village frequented mostly during the Pilgrimage season : it was the birthplace of Lukman the Wise (prophet), who has absurdly been named Esop. All my informants agreed that El-Muwaylah (N. lat. 2 7° 39') is the southernmost point of Madyan Proper ; and this is an argument in their favour who would identify the “ little Salt” with the Ptolemeian* Modfana or Modo’una. 7 hus the length represents * Lib. vi. 11. (See chap, v.) In chap. xii. we will notice the Alexandrian’s Makna or Maina. MID IAN AND THE MIDIANITES. i75 i 49' (=109 dir. geog. miles);'7" a figure which rises to 160, if we measure along the coast line* neglecting the minor sinuosities, but including the great eastern staple of the Akabah Gate ; the clas¬ sical Flexio Sinus FElanitici , now called Ras Fartah. Further north of Midian Proper begins the vast Wady el-Arabah, connecting, after a fashion, the Elanitic branch with the Red Sea trunk. South¬ wards, the lands of the Bally, the Juhaynah, and other Bedawin separate it from El-Hejaz, the Moslem’s Holy Land, whose frontier in N. lat. 250 is formed by Jebel Hassanl, on the parallel of an island similarly named. The eastern frontier is still un- * In the wild book written by the Abbe Guenee to confute the errors of the noble Frenchman who created religious liberty in France, we find (part iii. let. 1, § 6) that Voltaire believed Midian to be a “ Canton of Idumsea in Arabia Petraea, beginning north with the Arnon torrent, and ending south with the torrent Zared, lying amid the rocks, and on the eastern shore of Lake Asphaltitis, and thus about eight leagues long by a little less of breadth : it is held by a small horde of Arabs.” Elsewhere he owns that “ the sandy region of Midian may have contained some villages.” But, as the Abbe, or rather his Hebrew friends, per¬ tinently ask, “Who shows that the southern boundary was the Zared ? ” The “ brook Zered,” which parted Mo’ab from Edom, and which limited the thirty-eight years’ wanderings (Deut. ii. 14), is a Wady falling into the south-eastern corner of the Dead Sea. Robinson (ii. 555) identifies it with El-Ahry (El-Ahsa? ), still sepa¬ rating the districts of El-Jibal and El-Kerak. Professor Palmer says (p. 524), “ The brook (Wady) Zared may either be Seil Garahi, or Wady ’Ain Feranji, South of Kerak : Zared signifies ‘willow,’ and corresponds to the Arabic Sufsdfeh , the name given to a small Wady which unites with the last of the two valleys mentioned. ” 176 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN explored, and we heard of ruins far in the interior. The business of the next winter will be to trace the auriferous and argentiferous deposits to their sources in the north and east. Westward it abuts upon the Elanitic recess of the Red Sea ; but in modern parlance it does not extend to the opposite coast, the Sinaitic Peninsula, where the old Midianites un¬ doubtedly dwelt. As Bedawin, they would wander far and wide. * The name of their habitat would be vague, and its area would extend or shrink according to their numbers, and to the resisting power of their neighbours. Hence the general remark of modern geogra¬ phers is true, namely, that it is difficult to lay down the precise frontiers of Midian.* Hence, too, as Rabbi Joseph Schwarz remarks (p. 173), we find Midianite hordes about Gaza (Judg. vi. 4) ; in Moab (Numb. xxv. 6) ; in the Amorite land (Josh. xiii. 21), and in Edom, especially about Rekun (Petra). J But there is no reason for the various emendations introduced by the translators and mappers of Josephus, who are determined to have two Midians. He declares (Antiq. ii. 11) that “Moses, when * Munk (p. hi, Ealestina , Ital. transk \ Venice, 1853) opines that the Biblical writers do not determine the Midianite country, but that the mediaeval Arab geographers are more satisfactory. t dhe same may be said of the kinsmen of the Keni, or Kenites (Judg. iv. 11 ; 1 Chron. ii. 55 • 2 Kings, x. 9), the descend¬ ants of Jethro, also called Bene Rechob and Shalmaii (Onkelos and Jonathan in Numb. xxiv. 12). MID IAN AND THE MIDIANI TES. 177 flying, came to Madian City on the shores of the Red Sea, taking its name from Mi'dan, son of Abraham.” But he does not make the people distinct from the Madianite who occupied the country east of the Sinus Asphaltites, and south-east of the tribe of Reuben/'* Midian country and city thus had, and still have, the same name, a common practice in this part of the East ; witness “ El-Sham,” Syria and Damas¬ cus, and “El-Misr” (. Masr ), Egypt and Cairo. It is palpably derived from its own tongue, meaning in Hebrew, strife, contention, a litigious people, or a race struggling for the possession of a country equally coveted by Asiatics and Africans (Egypt). f “Midian” and “ Madyan ” are represented by “ Madf,” a word occurring in many hieroglyphic texts ; the plural would be Madf-an or Madf-nd, and the term is barbarous and unmeaning. Thus the land would adjoin Pitshu , not Pit-shu (Petraea), of the Shasu (Hyksos ; Brugsch, Geschichte ), and Aduma, Edom, Idumaea (Brugsch, Hist . d' Egypt e, p. 146). The primitive Troglodytes, whose memory is pre¬ served in Josephus (loc. cit.)} were probably ousted by the Rubu or Arab races typified by the de¬ scendants of Esau ; and the new-comers did not change the old names. * On this subject, see chap. xii. f This is the interpretation of the learned Hebraist, Professor Vita Zelman, of Trieste. N 1 78 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN Hence an inscription of Rameses III. says, “ I made destruction of the Saar of the tribes of the Shasu ; ” where Sa’ar would be correspondent with the Hebrew Mount (Seir), and the Shasu with the Bedawin inhabiting Aduma. It is not to be con¬ founded with Pun or Ta-heter ,* the region of the Gods, the “ Holy Land” which sent forth Osiris and Isis ; the country bordering upon the mouth of the Red Sea, both in Asia and Africa, which older students referred to the Sinaitic Peninsula, and which, according to Professor Leo Reinisch, “ belonged to Egypt as early as the sixth dynasty, and supplied her with the noble metals.” “ Midian ” is quite ignored by the classical authors of Greece and Rome ; although it frequently occurs in the sacred books of the Hebrews, and in the Talmud and Rabbinical writings, and finally reappears under the form “ Madyan ” in the mediaeval Arab geographers, and in the language of the present possessors. Although the classical writers never adopted the * “Ta-heter,” however, is a disputed term. Some apply it to Phoenicia; and others (Chwolson, p. 186, and De Rouge) to Babylonia. The same is the case with “ Pun.” Brugsch contends that it means (Southern) Arabia. Mariette has lately made wild work with the old definition of “Pun or Pouno, bordering upon To- houtes or the Holy Land.” According to him, it is not Yemen but Somali-land, fronted by Socotra, the “ divine ground,” be¬ cause Osiris was there born. From Pun he would derive Punici, Paeni, Phoenicians, who had nothing to do but to cross the Red Sea and, as Herodotus tells us, to march northwards into Syria. MIDIAN AND THE MIDIANITES. 179 word Midian, they have left ample notices of the Midianite region, or, as they called it, Nabathaea and Nabataea. The first, and not the least satis¬ factory, is Agatharkides of Cnidos* (b.c. 130), whose description of the Erythrean Sea has been preserved by the Sicilian of whom Pliny said, Primus apud grczcos desiit nugare Diodorus , and by Photius, the literary patriarch. Cap. 87. “ Touching this place,” says the guar¬ dian of the young Ptolemy, “ is a place which men called Nessa,f or of seals, from the abundance of those animals; and this Nessa lies near a promon¬ tory (Ras Mohammed ?) eminently well wooded. J Thence a straight line extends (northwards ?) to the (city) called Petra, and to Palaistena ; whither the Gerrhaioi and the Minaioi,§ and all the Arabs * Pp. 177-181, “Geog. Gr. Minores.” Muller, Paris, 1855. f Riippell (. Reise , p. 187) says that the Halicore, often caught in the waters of the gulf, is called by the people Nakat el-bahr , or “ She-Camel of the Sea.” As N-^cro-a means Anas, a duck, the words “ or of seals,” may be an interpretation. t Possibly in those days the bluff called by the Arabs Ras Mohammed may have been an islet. It is now bare as a bone, but I have suggested (chap, x.) that the comparatively luxuriant vegetation about Beersheba, with its Malvaceae, Chrysanthemums, Amaryllids, and Lotus Arabicus, and its rich thick carpet of various grasses, Fistula, Stipa and ^Egilops, may once have ex¬ tended as far south as the now arid and thorny regions around El-Akabah. § The Gerrhaei owned “ El-Jara’a ” (pronounced Gera’ a), mean¬ ing “ a bald place where earth grows nothing.” Their chief town was in or near the P ersian Gulf (Erythrean Sea) commanding the region now called Hasa, El-Hasa or Lahsa, and well known to i8o THE GOLD-MINES OF MIDI AN. dwelling in the neighbourhood, bring from the upper country frankincense, it is said, and bundles of fra¬ grant things.” Cap. 88. “After the Gulf Laianites (El-Akabah), around which dwell the (Nabathaean ?) Arabs, is the land of the Buthemanes,* which is spacious and level, well-watered, and deep : nothing, however, is there cultivated but medica (lucerne, clover, Pliny xvi. 43), and herb -lotus (melilotus, Plin. xxi. 63), which attain the stature of a man. By reason of these growths there are many wild camels (?) ; many troops of stags and antelopes (A. dorcas ?) ; also many flocks of sheep, and infinite herds of cattle and mules. Upon these gifts of fortune attends the nuisance that the earth breeds numbers of lions, modern travel. The Minaei were the gens magna of the classics, the great trading-race, settled to the south-west of the Gerrhaei ; and their capital, Karn el-Manazil, lay east-north-east of Meccah, which also belonged to them. For an exhaustive description of the “ Minaean Confederation,” under the Kinda dynasty, see Sprenger (Joe. cit. pp. 212-220), and his excellent note appended to the little map of my Pilgrimage-route (Tauchnitz Edit., vol. iii. 169). * The “ Thimanei ” of Pliny (vi. 32), who follow the Nabataei : they are possibly the Bene Teman of Scripture. Muller (“G. G. Min.” p. 179) appears to accept Ritter’s opinion that the modern Hutaymi preserve the name. Sprenger (p. 9) makes Teman (“ that which is on the right hand or south ”) synonymous with El-Yemen, and “Bern! Teman” to mean Southerns, because dwelling in Southern Idumaea. These sons of Eliphaz (Gen. xxxi. 11-15) are opposed in Ezekiel (xxv. 13) to “Dedan” on the Persian Gulf; and Baruch (iii. 22) notices them as merchants, MID IAN AND THE MIDIANITES. 181 wolves, and pards ; and, thus, that which makes the happiness of the land, causes unhappiness to its inhabitants.” * Cap. 89. “From the nearest shores there is a gulf which runs inland to a depth of at least 500 stadia.f Those who live about it are called the Batmizomanei's ; and they are hunters of wild beasts.” Cap. 90. “ Beyond this region are three islands forming many ports. The first is sacred to Isis, whilst the second and third are called Soukabua (Sucabya) and Saludo (Salydo). All are uninhabited, and are shaded by the olive-trees which grow in these parts, and which do not resemble ours.” J Cap. 91. “These islands being passed, stretches a long and stony shore, the land of the Thamon- d<£ni § Arabs. For 1000 stadia (i.e., from El-Mu- waylah to El-Wjih) the coast is here most trouble¬ some to navigators, for there is no safe port, nor * He is one of your moralizing travellers, rich in truisms ; and his Italian translation and annotator emulates him with the old saw — Nihil est ah omni parte beatum. f In Ptolemy 500 stadia = i° of latitude : here the degree is probably 600. Measured from the eastern jamb of the Akabah Gate, the bottom of Aynunah Bay may be recessed forty miles, but not more. The Batmizomenefs are the Banizomenes of Diodorus. (See chap, v.) t AH the islets, except Umm Maksur, are now quite bare. For a synopsis- of their names, see chap. xii. § Evidently the Tamud of Arab genealogists (see chap, x.) The eastern shore to the south is very foul with shoals and reefs. 182 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN anchorage-station, nor bay of refuge, nor artificial mole which may shelter the mariner in his need.” The author, who has now passed southwards of Midian, describes the gold sands of the Debai (Debse) * region ; and the nuggets of the country held by the Alilaioi (Abilaei), and the Nasandreis (or Gasandenses, the Beni Ghassan). Finally, he reaches the Karbai (Carbse of Upper Khaulan) and the Sabafo (Sabsei) of El- Yemen. Diodorus (iii. 42-44) preserves other details from Agatharkides ; such as the massacre of the Maranita by the Garindaneis (Garindanenses) whilst the former were offering their septennial Camel- hecatomb to the Gods of the Grove. He also mentions that the devotees carried some healing water from the fount, exactly as pilgrims now pre¬ serve the waters of Jordan, Zem-Zem and Lourdes. He warns navigators that there are few ports upon this shore of North-Western Arabia, on account of the impinging of high mountains, which, adorned with a variety of colours, afford a splendid spectacle to the voyager. f “ Passing onwards, you enter the Laianftes (Lseanatic) Gulf, bordered by many villages of the Arabs, whom they call Nabatafoi. These men not only occupy a great part of the * This tribal name is generally derived from the Arabic “ Dahab,” gold. For other particulars concerning the metal¬ working tribes, see chap. ix. f How true this is may be judged from my chap. v. MID IAN AND THE MIDIANITES. 183 littoral, they also stretch far into the interior, for the region is populous and very pecorous. Formerly they lived according to the rules of justice, satisfying themselves with their flocks and herds ; but when the Alexandrian kings had made the Gulf navigable for traders, they maltreated shipwrecked sailors, and, moreover, equipping light piratical vessels,* they pillaged navigators, emulating the ferocious and nefarious customs of the tribes dwelling in Pontic Taurus. At last, they were attacked on the high seas by the Ouadriremes ; and they received well- deserved punishment.” After describing the rich plains of medica and lotus, the abundance of game (including wild camels), and the savage beasts, Diodorus passes on to the “ bay of paradoxical nature,” — the harmless and respectable Aynunah — to which he adds peculiar horrors, f Lastly, after the tract of wild coast, he lands us among the Debae, the Alilai, and the Gasandeis, where the pure gold (xpuo-oc airvpog ) does not require fusing. Strabo (xvi. 4, § 18), who evidently borrows from * Arja-TpLKa cTKacJir), probably of the species of the Sanbuk. The latter is thus mentioned by Ibn Batutah (see p. 35), who ended his wanderings in a.d. 1353. “I then went on board a Sanbuk, which is a small boat ” (read “craft”). Hence, possibly, the harp called 5a fji(3vXr] by the Greeks, and the Sambuca , a kind of trumpet used by the Roman armies : Bochart, Vossius and others, however, find the “ Sambyke ” in ndid (Sabeca, a harp) of the Book of Daniel (iii. 5, 7, 9). f I have translated his account in chap. v. 1 84 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN \ the same sources, notices the AHanitic Gulf and Nabataea,* * * § a thickly inhabited country ; he tells us the tale of the pirates, making them use rafts, f and, further south, opposite the well-wooded plain, he places the island Dia (Tiran ?) It is followed by three desert islands, a stony beach, a rugged coast, and the “ paradoxical bay,” none of whose fancied horrors have been spared. Every reader of the Torah, and of Josephus’s “ Targum,” knows that Abraham, after Sarah’s death (cir. b.c. i860), had by Keturah the “bound one”J (Gen. xxv. 1) several sons, the fourth being Mididn (T]9) or Medan (:?!?).§ The latter, again, became the sire of five : Ephah, Hefer (’Efer) Hanoch (Haniikh), Abidah, and Eldaah, || who in Hebrew tradition represent the progenitors of the Midianites and their Pentarchy. * Strabo’s interesting details concerning the Nabathsean kings will be found in chap. viii. f Probably meaning the Delete, or inflated skins, which are supposed to have named the Arabian “Askitai” (Ascitae), and which are still used upon the Euphrates. t Sprenger (p. 295) has “Sohne der Qetura, d. h. des Rauch- erwerkes ” (of frankincense-working). § The LXX. prefers MaSaA, MaSav, and MaSia /jl, the latter re¬ sembling the MaSia/m town of Ptolemy (vi. 7, § 27) ; whilst the Hebrew “monument” suggests that the latter “a” was pro¬ nounced long = Midian. In the Palestine Targum (Jonathan), the word is written Midyan. || The variants are Eipher, Epher, Hanok, Abida and Aldaah (Pal. Targum) and Eipha, Ephir, Hanok, Abidah and Eldaah (Onkelos). MID IAN AND THE MID I A NITES. 185 The country must have been occupied much as it is now in b.c. 149 if when Moses, the meekest of men, having slain an Egyptian — a “ rash act,” says a modern traveller — fled to the Eastern Desert, pro¬ bably because all the civilised roads were closed to him. Approaching Midian city about noon, he sat down near a well where the seven virgin daughters (the Moslems say two) of the local Rabba, or priest, RaguelA whose cognomen was Yetro (Jethro), being in charge of the flocks, as was the custom of the Arab Troglodytes, came to give them drink.f They were driven away by the shepherds, who wanted the water, and they were defended from insult by the future Lawgiver. The girls told the tale to their father ; the Priest-prince sent them to bring the stranger, adopted him as a son, and, on condition of his doing service for eight to ten years, gave him to wife Zipporah, whom the Arabs call Saffurah, and believe to have been the eldest. This connection subsequently gave offence to Moses’ kinsfolk (Numb, xii. 1) because she was a “ Kushiyat.” J By her he * “Raguel,” or rather Rhagouei ('Payou^A) in LXX. ; Ruel in A.V. (Exod. ii. 18); Hobab (in Judg. iv. 11, and perhaps in Numb. x. 29) had, according to Josephus, “ Iothor for a surname.’’ The Moslems are also as abundant in nomenclature. f The tradition of the “well of Jethro’s daughters,” from which “ Moses watered the flocks of Shu’ayb,” was preserved by the mediaeval Arab geographers, but apparently it has died out amongst the Maknawi, or modern Midianites. t A Cushite (Kushite), not “an Ethiopian.” The old fashion was to translate “ Kush” by ^ Ethiopia super Egyptum , the Nubia i86 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN had two sons, Gersham, “a stranger there,” and Eliezer, or “ El (God) is my help.” Moses was placed in charge of the flocks, one of the sources of patriarchal wealth ; and the Vision of the Burning Bush (Exod. iii.) happened when he led them “ to the backside of the Desert,* and came to Horeb.” Here, then, we see that the Hebrews extended Midian over the Sinaitic Peninsula, a tradition pre¬ served during many years. In the Antonine Itine¬ rary, finished circa a.d. 180, the town of Pharan is part of Midian. Antoninus Martyr j* (Itin. cap. xl.) says of the same place ipsa terra est Midianitarum , et habitantes in ipsa civitate : dicitnr quia ex familia and the Abyssinia of the present day. In Habbakuk (iii. 7) “ Cushan,” the country, is evidently an equivalent of Midian in the same verse, possibly a more general term. * The Heb. words are qiqftn "iritf (Akhar ha-Midbar) which Dr. Beke (Orig. Bib. i. 193) would render “West of the Desert;” Calmet (s.v. East). “ The Hebrews express east, west, north, and south, by before, behind, right and left, according to the situation of a man whose face is turned to the rising sun : ” this undoubtedly favours his theory that Yamm Suph (the Sea of the Sedge) invariably applies to the Akabah, not to the Suez Gulf. The LXX. has vtto tyjv eprjfjLov ; and the Vulg. ad interior a deserti. The Tar g. Pal. says, “ He (Mosheh) led his flock to a pleasant place of pasturage, which is behind the desert ; and came to the mountain on which was revealed the glory of the Lord, even Horeb.” The Targ. Onk. : “ He led his flock to a place of the best pastures of the wilderness,” etc. f See Tuch, Antonins Martyr , Seine Zeit und Seine Pilgerfahrt nach dem Morgenlande (Leipzig, 1864, 40 p. 37); also De locis Sanctis quce perambulavit Antoninus Martyr , mit Bemerkungen ; herausgegeben Von T. T. Tobler , 1863; quoted in App. to Professor Palmer’s “ Desert of the Exodus.” MID IAN AND THE MID I A NITES. 187 Jethro soceri Moysis descendant (i.e., the eighty serfs and their households). Eusebius (ob. circ. a.d. 340) assigns “ Rephidim,” where the Amalekites were defeated (Exod. xvii. 1), and Horeb to Pharan, and the “ Har ha-Elohim,” (Mount of God, ibid, xviii. 5) to the Land of Midian.* But, as Dr. Richard Lepsius remarks,f “although Moses lived with Jethro in Midian, this fact offers no ground to place the Mount of the Law in Midian, for that is nowhere said.” Finally, Burchard or Brocardus, the Dominican, in a.d. 1232,1 speaks of the Gens Midianita rum , qui nunc Beduini et Turonioni (i.e., from Tor) dicuntur. The Talmud of Babylon, I am informed by the Vicar Rabbi Moise Tedschi, of Trieste, hints as follows at the existence of a Midianite army in * S.w. 'Pcu^iSi//, and xwPr//^- His words are To7ros t r\% eprjfxov 7rapa to ^ptprj^ opos, lv a> Ik rrjs 7ritpavpa as if it were a bridge, whilst the Authorized Version has “ the ferry-boat.” t Soc, or Succah, (plur. Succoth), a booth or covert, from Sakek, to cover as with boughs, always the habitation of man or beast made of leafy boughs. The English Bible has “ tabernacles,” the * Vulg. Tabernaculum, tentorium, umbraculum. — S. These booths are the Mod. Arabic “Ushash” (chap. v.). § They had fallen back upon Karkor (Judg. viii. 10) with their 15,000 swordsmen who survived. Kark, according to Sprenger MIDI AN AND THE MIDIANITES. 203 Gideon burst upon them. Here a third victory completed the conquest. The two chiefs were caught and slain;* the tower of Peniel was razed ; and the princes of Succoth were scourged with the thorny branches of the acacia-groves of their own valley (Judg. viii. 16). “ This success was, perhaps, the most signal ever obtained by the arms of Israel ; at least, the one that lived most in the memory of the people. The ‘ spring ’ of Gideon’s encampment, the rock and the winepress which witnessed the death of the two Midianite chiefs, were called after the names then received ; and the Psalmist and the Prophets long afterwards referred with exultation to the fall of ‘ Oreb and Zeeb, of Zebah and Zalmunna, who said, Let us take to ourselves the pastures f of God in possession, — the breaking of 1 the rod of the oppressor as in the day of Midian ’ (Isa. ix. 4). Gideon himself was by it raised to almost royal state, and the establishment of hereditary monarchy all but anticipated in him and his family.” We may add that the battle-cry, “ The Sword of the Lord, and of Gideon,” has been perpetuated by long generations, and has even added a horror of its own to the civil wars of Puritan England. After the ruthless destruction of “ an hundred and twenty thousand men that drew sword,” and (p. 150), is the Kerake of Ptolemy, in N. lat. 30° 5' : Karkar meaning a large smooth plain (plur. Karakir, often changed to Korakir, whence the Biblical Karkor) ; and Karkarah, a smaller feature. He distinguishes from the Idumsean Karak, the Karkeria of Eusebius. * How proudly and heroically they died we are not told in “ Sinai and Palestine;” we are in Judges (viii. 21), “Then (when Gideon’s son, being a youth, feared to slay them) Zebah and Zal- munna said, Rise thou and fall upon us : for as the man, so his strength. And Gideon arose and slew Zebah and Zalmunna, and took away the ornaments that were on their camels’ necks.” f Such is the more accurate translation, as well as the more vivid in the mouths of the nomad chiefs (Ps. lxxxiii. 12). — S. 204 THE GOLD-MINES OF MIDI AN. fifteen thousand more, * the Midianites lifted up .their heads no more. In fact, they fade out of Hebrew history, and serve only as references to the poets and the prophets.J To the explorers of the Mining- Cities of Midian the most interesting part of the story is the quantity and variety of metals produced by the land — gold, silver, copper, tin, and leadj (Numb. xxxi. 22). Part of the booty taken by Moses and Gideon (“jewels of gold, chains and bracelets, rings, ear-rings and tablets” {ibid. 50) ; and golden ear-rings, weighing 1,700 shekels ; to¬ gether with ornaments, collars, purple raiment, and chains for the camels’ necks) was doubtless made by trade. “ Midianites merchantmen ” (about b.c. 1729) drew Joseph out of the pit, and sold him for twenty pieces of silver to the “ Ishmaelites ” (Gen. xxxvii. 28), their kinsmen.§ But the discovery of the later * Yet the squeamish sentimentalism of the present day shudders when it hears of 20,000 Russians or Turks being put hors de combat , whilst it can read unmoved the massacre and the concomitant atrocities which destroyed 135,000 Midianites. Truly what Voltaire said of distance in space, applies equally well to distance in time. f Psa. lxxxiii. 9-12. Isa. ix. 4 ; x. 26, and lx. 6. Hab. iii. 7. See Joseph. Ant. v. 6. Even the Talmud notices them only in connection with Moses and Gideon. X All these were found by the Expedition of 1877; besides zinc, tungsten, antimony, and various forms of iron, especially titaniferous and haematite. § “ For they ” (the Midianites) “ had golden ear-rings, because they were Ishmaelites ” (Judg. viii. 24). Thus the Midianites and the Ishmaelites both belonged to the Bene-Kedem or “ people of the East” — Bedawin, and tent-dwellers. MIDI AN AND THE MIDIANITES. 205 mining-establishments and of the precious metals still unextracted, shows another and an indigenous source of wealth. Under Trajan (a.d. 98-117) the Land of Midian probably shared the destinies of Edom, or Idumaea, which, after its conquest by A. Cornelius Palma, was raised to an especial province, with the title of Palestina Tertia, sen Salutaris. To that epoch I would refer the establishment of Aynunah which was probably destroyed by the troubles and dissen¬ sions following the earliest political revolt of El- Islam. The other remains at Makna, Sharma, and Wady Tiryam show, by an inferior style, a bar¬ barous occupation, possibly of the Nabat, Christian Arabs, who held the soil till the Mohammedan conquest. Lastly came the Bedawi,* who have re¬ duced the land to what it now is ; the abomination of desolation taking the place of the “ fatness of the earth.” * For the probable date of the Bedawi incursions, see chap. vi. CHAPTER VIII. FROM AYN EL-MOrXk TO THE WHITE MOUNTAIN : THE INSCRIPTION AND THE NABATHyEANS. The caravan began on the second day to assume shape and order. Between three and four a.m. I called up Antonin, the mai'miton , to make ready tea and coffee for six, besides the Bedawi Shaykhs and the Chiefs of the native party : the latter also had their own brew, which I need hardly say was far better than ours.* We, the Europeans, setting off on foot, carefully examined the country whilst the confusion of packing and loading reigned in camp. After an hour or two the dromedaries came up, and we rode to the next station. Breakfast, prepared overnight, was spread upon a cloth under some thorn-tree, about 1 1 a.m. We had generally a long draughCof laban (soured camels milk), and we The Gishr (Kdshr), or coffee husk, is here unknown : it is universally used about Aden in Western Yemen and at Sana’a, and a modern traveller compares it with the mixture of tea and coffee formerly drunk under the name of “ twist ” in England. AYN EL-MORAK TO THE WHITE MOUNTAIN. 207 0 eked out our civilised supplies with the mutton of the Huwaytdt, which, fed upon the fragrant Shfh (absinthium), the balm-like Za’atar (Thyme, Th. Ser- pyllum), and other perfumed herbs of the desert, has a surpassing flavour, far superior to the grass-fed venison at home. We then rested during the heat of the day. Sleep, both at night and by day, is remarkably light in these highly electrical regions, despite the purity and cleanliness of the “ Nufiez,” or soft sand, which the Arab so much enjoys. In the afternoon we resumed our work, climbing, exploring, and collect¬ ing specimens, which the soldiers carried in bags and baskets, whilst the Egyptian officers made their sketches and plans. We dined at sundown, and passed the evening and part of the night in chat with the Bedawin, gathering the very scanty infor¬ mation they could afford. I am not certain that my companions did not look forward to a little more sleep and a little less work when the excursion ended. Setting out at 5 a.m. (April 10th) in the moun¬ tain-wind, cool and high, we took a line towards the White Mountain, on the south-east, and skirted the seaward base of the Jebel el-Zahd, whose tall eastern heights now justified the 6090 feet of the chart. Hence, also, we could distinguish the Wady between the two Massifs , Jebel Arawah to the north, 2o8 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN and Sfg to the south. From the sea they had appeared a single wall. Presently we came upon a newer formation, sandstone-grit ; in this strange land every Wady shows a change. Reaching, after an hours walk, the valley El-Khim (for Khiyam, tents), we found its sole striped with what seemed to be black sand. The bundle carried off for testing was remarkably heavy. I suspected emery; M. Marie said oxide of tin ; and it proved to be chloride of lead almost pure. The supply of quartz, much of it white, a little of it pink ; with a fair proportion of hyaline, which was as usual barren, increased as granite, taking the place of porphyry, became more abundant. In many parts, huge weathered and rounded blocks, like crumbs that had fallen from the tables of the Titans, cumbered the bed. We crossed the upper part of the Wady Aynunah, and ascended the broad and winding Wady Intaysh, which was marked by a large frag¬ ment of angular quartz. Here and there lay tombs that resembled those of the Bedawin on a large scale : the people, however, declared them to be Christian, and about half-way Mr. Clarke detected a “ written stone,” a block of red porphyry, the same material which bore the Himyaritic inscriptions, copied by Sutzen in Yemen. It shows two crosses ; and in this point, as well AYN EL-MO RAK TO THE WHITE MOUNTAIN. 209 as in the letter QU, it much resembles the three inscriptions in ill-formed characters copied by Dr. Wallin (loc. cit. p. 313).* The latter were engraved upon immense stones, which had been detached No. I. THE INTAYSH (MIDIAN) STONE. from the mountains overhanging a ravine where it entered the Hismah ; and he found them near a cemetery of the Beni Ma’azeh tribe, where, from * 1 he learned Orientalist, Rev. G. C. Renouard, who annotated Dr. Wallin’s paper, remarks that the characters do not resemble those of the Sinaitic Jebel el-Mukattab, or the Himyaritic alphabet, anciently used in Yemen and Hazramaut. They “ correspond, in some degree, with the ancient Phoenician character, but no satis¬ factory conclusion can be formed from such short inscriptions, copied, probably, in great haste.” p 2 10 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. No. II. DR. WALLIN’S INSCRIPTIONS. Found on large stones where the Wady Unayyid debouches upon the country called El-Nisma. 2. EDJoi AYN EL-MO RAK TO THE WHITE MOUNTAIN. 21 1 No. III. Dr. WETZSTEIN’S INSCRIPTIONS. Older Inscriptions. i. Pound on a Rijm or stone-heap about ten minutes south¬ east of Ka’akul : the slab is surrounded with a circle. 2. Found about a quarter of an hour south of Odesiyyah. i(£mC)S»< ilHiy r*:0AdoV(jl 4. At Shbikket el-Nemara. 2 12 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. 5. At the Rijm Ka’akiil. <3 6. Shbikket el-Nemara. HI 7. From a Rijm near Odesfyyah. c 51 0/ ’4. © \i/ Tt'ZO n 8. Copied from Rijm Ka’akul. r > 4, j*L AYN EL-MO RAK TO THE WHITE MOUNTAIN. 213 ancient times, their Shaykhs and other persons of consideration were buried. ‘‘Upon other stones were graven clumsy representations of various animals, such as camels, sheep, and dogs, probably the work of Bedawi shepherds.” * No. IV. INSCRIPTION FROM THE WADY EL-MOYAH, NEAR EL-WIJH (Wellsted, ii. 189.) * Similar tracings were found and figured by Dr. J. G. Wetz- stein, whose interesting book ( Reisebericht uber Hauran und die Trachonen. Berlin : Reimer, i860) I have translated and anno¬ tated. M.M. Socin and Gildemeister agree in disconnecting our find with the inscriptions of the Harra and the Hauran (Wetzstein’s). Upon this subject I have still doubts, and the tracings are there¬ fore offered to the reader, together with those of Wellsted from near El-Wijh. It will not be difficult in a few years to obtain a “ corpus inscriptionum,” Nabathsean, Himyar, Hebrew, and Arabic from maritime and inner Arabia. 2 T 4 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID LAN No. V. * From Dr. R. Dozy’s “ Die Israeliten zu Mekka,” Leipzig, Haarlem, 1864. * Mscnftic McccaJia QfsM IhAuh Cod4£S fcltfS u Vituv tfprr (jnpAL if afu Heir. lurry) ito Afo**> AfphabeLa, U ^ * X. A7ie& eA> £ it > JufJ 3 n 1 v * *1 / 1 fcr ^ 5 a t J V / n AtA art&j rf ' U Aetk i l <%eU£**f, 4 Jfisyev\ • V V Aeii &01 £sj 4^2 l ^ OTeJ c/Jam \ TLCm. *¥ CUHL) JetA. n p> / ** *T ,i« il* t) t * 1 ;.1 u * Smtm. X &L. 9 AeXL t 1 Jam. <*. CoJA &tk 'i P<~6m.y 'i&cLll*? ** L HeJr amZ cC Ann ^ Jnoxay -Dc£ U 0 » at u*.fin C?;/k5) u£ D H&y L deft. J & arouses a suspicion that it cannot be a Kdf (K). Might it not be an M ? Mr. Clarke presently remembered that, when riding out from El-Muwaylah to Aynunah, he had observed something of the kind, whilst crossing the Wady Sherma ; but not being prepared for inscrip¬ tions, he had neglected to secure it. This little business was duly confided to the care of Sayyid * “Outlines of Hebrew Grammar,” by Gustavus Bickell, D.D., Prof, of Theology at Innsbruck (1869-70). Revised by the author, and annotated by the translator, Samuel Ives Curtiss, Ph.D., Leipzig, with a lithographic table of Semitic characters by D. 1 . Euting. Leipzig: F. A. Brockhaus, 1877. 2 I 6 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. Abd el-Rahi'm. The Bedawin also spoke of a “ writing ” similar to ours in the Shifah (moun¬ tains), east of the line of march, and as big as a house — for which I would suggest a tombstone. After my return, Professor Sprenger sent me the following extract from the Jehan-Numa. “Near Midian are Alwah (tablets ? or rock-faces ?) covered with inscriptions, containing the names of ancient kings;” and he is unable to say whether Makna or the settlement El-Bad a* (the Madyama of Ptolemy, now Magharat Shuayh ?), about seven leagues to the east, is meant. Also between Madyan and El- Akabah he has had notices of a narrow valley, in whose precipitous stone-walls is a “ Kawwat ” (niche in the rock) which may contain interesting remains. The left bank of the Wady Intaysh showed reefs of dazzling white quartz, some of it recently broken. This could hardly have been done by our messenger of yesterday. Presently, on the right, appeared a small rounded mamelon of the same substance, rising abruptly from the dwarf flat, and stained yellow by wind and weather. Lastly, we sighted the Jebel el-Abyaz (White Mountain), also called Jebel Maro ; and, winding along the southern foot, we encamped on the plain, or rather the valley-head, El-Maka’adeh — the place * Riippell calls the place “ Beden ” (an ibex ?)k AYN EL-MO RAK TO THE WHITE MOUNTAIN. 217 of sitting.* Here all was dry, and we vainly sank a pit some six feet deep. The Bedawin, however, declared that water is to be found amongst the hills at the distance of an hour’s march. I lay under a siyal (acacia) enjoying the breath of the Desert, and wondering what had become of my companions, till 11 a.m., when, hearing that their guide was a “ ghashim ” (Johnny Raw), a party was started with water and provisions to lead them into camp. They had lost their way, and had done the wisest thing they could in sitting down till their absence was remarked, carefully finishing their bottle of wine in the meanwhile. During the afternoon we ascended the White Mountain, which rises about 600 feet above the adjacent plain. The base is composed chiefly of porphyry, metalled with iron in sandstone grit : this is overlaid by gray granite, seamed and stratified with thick veins of quartz, and the latter outcrops from the summit, forming a regular cap. Whilst M. Marie remained below, I climbed the head, and took note of the prospect. Some half a dozen similar pitons of quartz dotted the lower lands * Our march began at 5 a.m., and ended at 9.45 ( - 4 h. 45'). Of this total 1 h. 30' (4^ statute miles) were employed in walking, and 3 h. 15' (=13 miles) in slow riding. The time would give about 1 1\ miles; whilst the caravan, which came in at 11.30 a.m., had occupied 6 h. (=18 miles). The Aneroid (Casella, Com¬ pensated) showed an altitude of 29-98 = 1050 feet. 2l8 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID I AN between our Mamelon and the Jebel el-Arawah to the east ; and looking seawards, it was easy to lay down the position by means of the several islands.* After building what in Syria is known as a “ Kakur ” f (stone-man), I was descending when M. Marie cried out that he had made a discovery. Striking from east to west, measuring from a yard and a half to two yards in breadth, and standing well out of the quartz-mass, was a vein which we at once named Le Grand Filon. It passes clear through the hillock, and, forking in the bowels, reappears double on the eastern side : the depth and the width shot up from the earth can, of course, be ascertained only by work¬ ing. It resembled from a distance porphyry, while much of it had a pavonine lustre, like the argenti¬ ferous galena of the Silver States in North America. The great weight suggested one mass of metal, and part of it had evidently been worked. On our return to Cairo, specimens of the Grand Filoii were at once submitted to examination by Gastinel-Bey, who worked by the vote humide , whilst M. Marie preferred the dry way. The latter melted * The compass-sights which fix the site of the White Moun¬ tain and of its pale-faced neighbours, are — 1. South end of Yubu’a 2i5°-2i8°. 2. The Small Shushu’ island 240°. f This kind of landmark is called in the Koran “ Ayah ” (’Ayah, a sign) ; in Yemamah “Bath” (plur. Butul), and in North- Western Arabia “ Irani” (plur. Aram), a word sometimes con¬ founded by the inexperienced with (the garden of) “ Irem.” AYN EL-MORAK TO THE WHITE MOUNTAIN. 219 and cupelled his fragment in the usual manner.* It proved to be a highly composite formation contain¬ ing some ten metals, the base being titaniferous iron, with a certain amount of wolfram or tungsten ; the oxide of iron amounting to about 86*50 per cent. ; copper 3*40, and a trace of silver by voie seche ), the latter, according to M. Gastinel, not easily separated, except in the laboratory. On the other hand, Colonel Middleton, who has had great ex¬ perience in these matters, declares that the process is simple — spalling the ore, roasting, pulverising, and precipitating with sal ammoniac or with common salt. After my return to Cairo, I proposed to the Viceroy an immediate start, with a party of engineers and a load of gun-cotton or dynamite, to blow up the vein in masses weighing tons, to carry it bodily off to the Capital, and to show the world a specimen of Midianitic metal. But on April 24th the Russo-Turkish war broke out, with the usual exorbitant requisitions of men and money from unhappy Egypt. I felt that my proper place was at my post, and the hot weather was rapidly coming on. The project, therefore, remained in abeyance until November, when we supposed that * To 25 grammes of ore he used as flux — Litharge (100 grammes); Carbonate of Soda and Borax (each 40 gr.); and Nitrate of Potash (2 gr.). The stuff was readily melted, but the cupella- tion was imperfect. 220 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID LAN the Campaign would cease to engross public attention. Meanwhile, my facetious friend, Colonel Lockett, of Cairo, suggested a tin dollar ; and a pert young Levantine-Frenchman informed the public, not confi¬ dentially, cest de la blague . Returning to camp by another direction, where we found signs of a made-road, we enjoyed a pleasant evening talking over the prospects of the Grand Filon> and admiring the exquisite beauties of the sky, whose deep blue crystalline vault gained double distance by its purity and serenity. Never did the after-glow, the zodiacal light, though clearly visible every evening, appear so brilliant ; changing from purple and indigo to gold and pink, and finally to a pale sea-green. It was so distinctly defined that the apex of the pyramid seemed to touch the zenith. A height of upwards a thousand feet had placed us above the grosser vapours of the shore. Sea¬ wards, the stars — glowing red sparks like distant ship-lamps or lighthouses — showed themselves upon the very line where air and water meet. Inland, the misty giants in panoply of polished steel towered above the huge curtain of the bulwark, enchanted sentinels guarding the mysterious regions of the East ; till presently the shades thickened, and we saw nothing but an army of grey phantoms behind us ranged in grisly array. Before nightfall we noticed an unusual disposition AYN EL-MO RAK TO THE WHITE MOUNTAIN. 221 in the camp : the camels were all collected, tethered and pegged down, whilst the number of fires had greatly diminished. Presently Shaykh Abd el-Nabi quietly disappeared, heading many of his merry men, and without saying a word of scare, for the purpose of holding the passes of the White Mountain, whence his hereditary foes, the Beni Ma’azeh, generally issue in force upon the plain. This was communicated to us by the Governor of El-Muway- lah, who had joined the caravan last night. We at once made our preparations. Rifles and revolvers were placed upon the table ; and my carbine-pistol appeared at last to have a chance of distinguishing itself. My two companions kept guard till midnight, exhorting the patrol when it failed, to cry out, “ One, two, three, four ; ” and I undertook the morning watch. The alarm came to nothing ; nor could this be regretted. The loss of a man or two would have made me for ever repent having divided a weak party into two. But not a syllable had been whispered to us about the possibility of such an adventure ; and it seemed at the first aspect impos¬ sible that a tribe which trades with Egyptian ports should attack a party of Government troops. Sayyfd Abd el-Rahfm explained the difficulty by remarking that the Bedawin have no sense, and will assault anything and anybody, at every possible opportunity. Moreover, they' are mischievous as 222 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN children or monkeys, and, like the knight-errants and Raubritters of old, they are ever spoiling for a fight. The onset would, of course, have been upon the Huway tat, not upon us ; on such occasions, how¬ ever, the Wild Man expects those whom he protects to protect him — it is a question of “ Pun d’onor.” This turbulent tribe,* also half-Fellahm and of Egyptian origin, may muster some 5000 males. Its habitat lies east of the Haway tat, extending north to El-Arfsh and inland some four or five days of dromedary riding, at least 20 (= 120 geog. miles) into the Hisma, or Region of Red Soil.f They are * They have been mentioned in chap. iii. Wallin {loc. cit. p. 310) gives the following names of the principal clans — 1. Orban Sabt or Beni Sabut, which he finds mentioned in El-Kalkashendi, and supposes to be of Jewish extraction, de¬ riving the word from Sabt, the Sabbath, Saturday. I also heard of their custom of ringing at sunset a large bell hung to the middle pole of the Shaykh’s tent. 2. El-Ati'yyeh composed of the family and relations of the Chief Shaykh. 3. Rubaylat. 4. Duyufiyyeh. 5. Tujara. 6. Sulaymat. 7* Aliyyin. 8. Khazara. 9. Amriyym ; and 10. Sa’adaniyym. j In Keith Johnston, and other maps, the Hisma Region is, I suspect, made to extend too far North. Wallin places the Beni Ma’azeh and the Beni Atfyyeh over all the land from the Birket- el-Mu’azzam, the second pilgrim station south of Jabuk, to the Wady Musa of Petra, where they sometimes descend from the mountains and mingle with their kinsmen the Tiyaheh, or people of the Tih (desert), north of Sinai. They levy the Ukhuwweh, or protection-tax, from the people of Ma’an, a town south-east of Petra. Their other districts are El-Akhzarand Zat-el-Hajj, the first pilgrim station north of Tabuk, where a ruinous walled town, with buildings, caverns, and treasures guarded by a black dog is spoken of. Their “ Madrak,” or district of escorting pilgrims, AYN EL-MO RAK TO THE WHITE MOUNTAIN. 223 divided into as many Kabail (clans) as their western neighbours ; and they are subject to two great Shaykhs, Mohammed bin Atfyyeh in the Hisma, and Sdlim bin Khazar near the Magharat Shuayb. Their wealth consists in camels and asses, sheep and goats ; with about a dozen horses kept for the Ma’ireh, or raid — want of pasture prevents breeding the animal. Mules, mentioned by the Classics, are now quite unknown to Midian. There should be no difficulty in managing this people, as they trade with El-Arish (Rhinocolura) and with Suez via Akabah ; and they will not cease to trouble travel¬ lers until their chiefs are induced to settle at Cairo. We did not see any oEthe tribesmen; but their enemies told us that they were pure Bedawin who never tattoo their faces. 1 will conclude this chapter with a few notices of the Nabathaeans, who have, as has been seen, left their mark on the land of Midian, a mere point in their wide possessions, and whose remains justify the tradition of the people that the old cities are the “ruins of the Nazarene.” The frequent mention of this most important race by the Classics, both in verse and prose, has, despite distance of space and lies between Ma’an and Birket-el-Mu’azzam. We find them spread over Egypt, and extending into Northern Africa. From their features and character Wallin judges them to be of Syrian origin, although this is not noticed by the Arabian genealogists ; and he does not give them a bad name. 224 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN date, preserved its memory even in the vulgar modern literature of Europe. Camoens (Lusiad, i. 84) by Nabathaean — “Ja o raio Apollineo visitava Os Montes Nabatheos accendido ” * — simply means “ Eastern : ” in this he follows Ovid (Met. i. 61) — “ Eurus ad Auroram Nabathseaque regna recessit, Persidaque et radiis juga subdita matutinis.” And in Eastern Arabia, especially about El-Hasa, the people still sing “ Nabati verses.” I may here remark that as “ Midian ” and the “ Midianites ” are unknown to the so-called Profane, so are “Nabathaea” (Nabataea) and its “Nabathseans” almost ignored by the Sacred or Canonical books, f The word has been derived by St. Jerome and the Commentators from the “ primogenitus Ismaelis , Nabajoth ” or Nebajoth, their “ symbol ” (nb; NafidiwO, Gen. xxv. 13, and 1 Chron. i. 29, “ Nebaioth ”). * “ Already lit Apollo’s morning ray The Nabatean hills with burning light.” | We can hardly call Isaiah (lx. 7) an exception : “ All the flocks of Kedar shall be gathered together unto thee, the rams of Nebaioth shall minister unto thee.” Evidently, however, the “ Nabathites ” or Nabatheans (Vulgate) of 1 Macc. v. 24-25, and ix. 35, to whom Jonathan sent his brother John, and who are made “ inhabitants of Eastern Jordan,” refer to these people. As is remarked by Rabbi Joseph Schwarz (p. 171, Das heilige Land. Frankfurth am Main: Kaufmann, 1852), we cannot lay down precise limits to the possessions of nomads. AYN EL-MO RAK TO THE WHITE MOUNTAIN. 225 I hus a so-called Scriptural name has evidently been given, after the fashion of the Jews, to a race much older than Abraham, Noah, and the Hebrew “Adam” * himself. The late M. de Ouatremere, of whom more presently, found the ancient nation not in the Nabit (Nebajoth) of the Arabs, but in Nabat, Nabft (plur. Anbat) or Nabatu (Heb.), the expression corresponding with what we popularly understand by “ Semitic.” The Nabathseans are mentioned by Diodorus, who wrote in the days of the first Emperors, as living on the Ailanitic Gulf ; f whilst Agathar- kides ( De Mari Erythrceo) describes the country at the Gulf-head, and yet does not name the Nabataioi. Strabo says, categorically (xvi. 2, § 34), “ The Idu- maeans are Nabathaeans ; ” and in the same book (4, § 21), he gives the following detail : “The Naba¬ thaeans and the Sabaeans situated above Syria are the first people who occupy Arabia Felix. J They * This is not the place to enlarge upon the pre- Adamite Kings of orthodox Islam ; but any reader of Chwolson will understand me. See his p. 174. f Lib. iii. 12. 48. See chap. vii. J This passage, amongst many others, warns us not to con¬ found the Ptolemeian and classical “ Arabia Felix,” as has often been done, with the comparatively small province El-Yemen in Southern Arabia. The Greeks and Romans knew only the country between Egypt and the Persian Gulf, including Syria and the line of the Euphrates, whilst they applied the term “ Arab ” as vaguely as we do. 1. Arabia Petraea was the province about Petra, which is not more stony than either of its neighbours. Q 226 THE GOLD-MINES OF MIDI AN were in the frequent habit of overrunning this country before the Romans became its masters, but at present both they and the Syrians are subject to the Romans.” After describing Petra the Capital, in the words of his philosophic friend, Athenodorus, an eye-witness, he gives an account of the unfortu¬ nate expedition sent under poor Gallus “ to subdue the Arabians.” * The Nabathseans had promised their co-operation, and supplied one thousand men under Syllaeus. This treacherous minister of King Obodas of Petra having caused a complete failure, with corresponding loss of life, was beheaded at Rome. t. According to Strabo, “Petra, which has excellent laws, is always ? governed by a King of the royal race ; his minister being one of the Companions is therefore called Brother.f The Nabathseans are prudently fond of accumulating property : the com¬ munity fines a citizen who has wasted, and rewards him who has increased, his substance. They have 2. Deserta was the Great Syrian Desert, the north-western pro¬ longation of the central waste, but still peopled according to Ptolemy. 3. Eudsemon or Felix (Yemen or Teman), the land extending south of El-Akabah, was thus a vague term containing the remainder of the Peninsula. * It is an old remark that this march, which promised so much information, geographical and ethnological, has only tended to confuse our knowledge of Arabia. • t The good Ibn Batutah (see chap, xi-.) found a similar con¬ fraternity among the Turkomans ; the members were styled “The Youths,” their president “ The Brother.” AYN EL-MO RAK TO THE WHITE MOUNTAIN. 227 tew slaves, and are served for the most part by their relations, or by one another, or each person is his own servant. This custom extends to their mon- archs, who court popular favour so much that they sometimes minister to their subjects. These reguli * must render frequent accounts of the administration to the people, and moreover they are subject to inquiries into their private life. The citizens eat their meals in private com¬ panies consisting of thirteen persons ; but the king' gives many public entertainments in great buildings. Each dinner-party is attended by two musicians ‘ and no guest drinks more than eleven cupfuls from separate cups, each of gold. Ignoring tunics, they wear girdles f around the loins, and walk about in sandals . the royal dress is the same, but its colour is purple. “ The houses are sumptuous and of stone ; and the cities require no walls. A great part of the country is fertile ; lacking, however, olives, whose * The Periplus, chap, xix., makes the MaXtXa (Malik) of the Nabataei inhabit Petra : the latter was connected by a highway with the southermost port, Leuke Kome, where, in the days of subjection to the Romans, a centurion was stationed (Sprenger, 28). Thus the Nabathaean possessions would include Thamuditis as well as Midian. Ma’an afterwards succeeded to the honours of Petra. 1" Tvidently the waist-cloth, primitive form of the kilt ^ the Pilgrim garb and the Shukkeh of the modern Arabs, a word which has extended into the heart of Africa. 228 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID/AN place in the mill is supplied by the grain Sesamum. The sheep have white fleeces, the oxen are large, but the country produces no horses.* For the latter, camels are the substitutes, performing the same kind of labour. “ Some merchandise is altogether imported into the country ; other articles are not so, being native products , as gold and silver , and many of the aromatics. But brass (copper) and iron,f purple garments, styrax, saffron and costus (or white cinna¬ mon), pieces of sculpture, paintings, and statues are not found in the country. “ The Nabathaeans look upon the bodies of the dead as no better than manure, according to the words of Heracleitus, ‘ dead bodies are more fit to be cast out than dung : ’ whereupon they bury even their kings beside midden-heaps. They worship the Sun — the Sabaean ‘ Sonnencultus,’ — and they build his altar on a housetop, pouring out libations and burning incense upon it every day.” * * * Pliny contents himself with naming the peoples adjoining the Nabataei (v. 12, and vi. 32) : he also * This is the case still both in Nabathsea and in Midian. The horse, essentially an animal of the plains, which thrives upon the high and healthy rolling uplands of Nejd, is not fitted for hot and mountainous regions like the Tehameh cl-Hejaz, Hazramaut. and the massifs of El-Yemen. | As has been seen, iron is very common, and copper is also found abundantly in the rocks of Midian. Both metals are men¬ tioned in Num. xxxi. 22. AYN EL-MO RAK TO THE WHITE MOUNTAIN. 229 reports the most esteemed kind of Teuchites (an Andropogon ), a sweet-scented rush, and prized as a stomachic and a curative of many affections, as grow¬ ing in the country. Pomponius Mela has nothing to say about Nabathaea and the Nabathasans. Josephus (Ant. 1, 12, § 4) declares that the country extending from the Euphrates to the Red Sea was occupied by the twelve sons of Ishmael, who gave it the name of Nabatena. It would thus border upon Egypt and Petr^ea, and contain the Deserts and the Highlands extending eastward to the Persian Gulf. Moreover, he calls the inhabitants of the land Nebajoth “ Arabs.” The old classical dictionaries and guide-books * content themselves with telling us that the Naba- thseans were roving pastoral Ishmaelites, a mixed race of Arabs and Edomites, originally bounded west and north-west by the Moabites and the Edomites that they subsequently extended west¬ ward into Sinai ; and that their habitat at last became synonymous with the whole of Arabia * Amongst which we must include the last edition of “Murray’s Handbook for Syria and Palestine.” That very naive person, the author, assures us that “ the Mahommedans were the instruments by which the fearful predictions of Scripture (quoting the ‘ theo¬ cratic cursings’ of Ezekiel xxv.) were fulfilled.” He has evi¬ dently never thought of the Bedawin who destroyed his Giant Cities of Bashan — Christian towns which lasted till the sixth century of our era. And thus history is written — in Hand¬ books ! 230 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN Petraea on both sides of the ^Klanitic Gulf, and with the mountain-region of “ rugged ” Seir, where they established their capital, Petra, about the third cen¬ tury b.c ; that these shepherds developed to a nation of traders, whose head-quarters, between Egypt and Syria, upon the highway to “ Babylon/’ a centre of trade with the Sabaeans of Southern Arabia, and with the Gerrhaeans on the Persian Gulf (Strabo, xvi. 3, § 4-5) secured to them absolute pre¬ eminence in the commerce of the East before it was diverted to the Nile- Valley,^ and enabled them to establish an overland route for the Indian traffic ; that this most ancient line extended from Leuke Kome (El-Hawara, in N. lat. 250), their southermost port in the Red Sea, to Mediterranean Rhinocolura ; that Nabathaea thus became a powerful monarchy; allied itself with the Jews after the Captivity, and was able to resist the attacks of the Graeco-Syrian Kings ; that under Caligula (a.d. 37-41), though nominally subject to Rome, an Ethnarch at Damascus was called Aretas the King, i.e., of the * The first of the many overlands was from India up the Euphrates, with a branch from India to Hazramaut, and thence by caravan. The second was by way of Leuke Kome, and Ghazzeh (Gaza), and the third lay through Egypt. The valuable Indo- European trade, ever striving for the shortest line of route, will eventually take the direct diagonal across the Western Asiatic Continent; and, possibly, in the far future, Erzerum shall be¬ come the half-way station between the Persian Gulf and the Black Sea. 231 AYN EL-MORAK TO THE WHITE MOUNTAIN. N abathaeans ; * that under Augustus they sent auxiliaries with EElius Gallus ; that in the reign of Trajan their head-quarters, Arabia Petraea, were raised to the rank of a Roman province (a.d. i 05-1 07) ; and, finally, that from the fourth century until the Moslem Conquest, the province became part of Palestine, and the diocese of a Metropolitan, whose See was at the “ Rock city of Edom” (Petra). Thus the Nabathaeans were made originally a Bedawi or Ishmaelitic tribe of Arabia Petraea ; then a settled and commercial people ; and, lastly, civilised Christian Arabs. The researches of the lamented Etienne Marc de Quatremere j* consigned to oblivion the descent * He died on September 18, 1857, and a notice historique of his life and labours was printed by M. le Secretaire perpetuel , in pp. 243-49, tome 1, Nouvelle Serie ; Bulletin de Juillet et Aout, 1865 ; Academie des Inscriptions et Belles Lettres , Comptes rendus des Seances de V Annee, 1865. f These Ethnarchs were Beni Ghassan, which, however, the new school would naturally include under the Nabati family. “Aretas” (El-Haris, King of the Minaei), and “Obodas” (El-Ubayd, King of Petra), with the favourite Greek termination in “as,” for barbarous words, were possibly dynastic names like “ Abimelech ” amongst the Philistines; the “Atabeks” of Persia, the “ Fazli,” the “ Anlaki,” the “ Rezaz ” near Aden, and other ruling houses on a small scale. See d’Herbelot s.v. Gassaniah ; and Sale’s Koran (Prelim. Discourses, sec. 1). The flood of Aram, so important an event in Arab story {temp. Alexander the Great?) caused the rise of two Kingdoms : 1. Ghassan, so called from a water near Damascus, a realm founded by the Beni Azd ; and, 2. Hira in Mesopotamia, established by the descendants of Kahtan. Both these monarchies, and notably the Gassamides, became Christian. 232 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. of the Nabathaeans from Nebajoth, which was ac¬ cepted long before the days of St. Jerome (Comm, in Gen. xx. 13, and xxv. 13) ; whilst they opened to the modern world a vast and wholly novel perspec¬ tive of the origin, the racial affinities, the languages, the religion and the history of the NAB AT, as we shall now call them. He had been struck by the fact that El-Mas’iidi (Katab el-Tanbih), and other writers of repute, instead of including the fancied descendants of Nebajoth among their own people, and calling them “Arabs,” like the Greeks and Romans, formally attached them to the Aramean,* or Palaeo-Syrian family ; and even made them the primitive and indigenous possessors of the vast tract extending to, and even beyond, the Great River (Euphrates) ; and including Syria and As¬ syria, Bayn el-Nahrayn (Mesopotamia), El- Irak (Chaldsea) and Babylonia. Presently the French savant found a fragmentary Arabic MS. in the Bibliotheque Imperiale of Paris, which confirmed his previous impressions. The fragment proved to be an Arabic version of the Faldhat el-Nabatiyyah , a treatise on Nabati * “ Aram,” which the Greeks rendered Syria, Suria, and Soria, means the “Highlands,” as opposed to Canaan (Kan’an), the lowlands, the latter extending to Babylonia. A modern traveller has been pleased to call the word Syria, “the invention of a Greek Geographer,” when we find SVRVS (a Syrian) even in early Roman inscriptions. AYN EL-MORAK TO THE WHITE MOUNTAIN 233 Agriculture. Forming two books out of a total of nine, it contained about 600 pages of Arabic writing. The subjects were an Astronomical Calendar, as exact as it was extensive, and a learned and precise nomenclature of the flora, especially of cultivated plants which never flourished in the arid waters of Arabia Petraea. The translator was the well-known Abubekr bin Ahmed of Kassfn, surnamed “ Ibn- Wahshfyyah,” whose genealogy shows his Chaldean (Rasdanf) descent ; a Moslem Albertus Magnus of the third century (Hegira = circa a.d. 904); and he dictated his work to a favourite scholar, Abu Talib el-Zayyat (the oilman). De Ouatremere * admitted the assertion of Ibn- Wahshfyyah, who identified the “ Nabat” with the Assyrians in the general sense of the word. He found in them the elder race of the great Aramean family, the inhabitants of Babylon, before the Chal¬ deans, and the originators of geoponics and georgics, of magic, natural and artificial ; of astronomy, of angelology, of medicine, and generally of the sciences which the world has attributed to the latter.f According to him they were established * The Mhnoire sur les Nabateens , communicated to the Acadhnie des Inscriptions in 1823-26, was published by the author in Jan.-March, 1835, in the Nouveau Jour, de la Societe Asiatique de Paris , instituted in 1822 : and was printed in a separate form ; Paris, 1835. f This dispossession of the Chaldeans, whose learning has for 234 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN from all antiquity in Mesapotamia, submitting to the successive dynasties of Nineveh and Babylon. There they throve and waxed wealthy, assiduously cultivating, not only the ground, but the world of mind, and producing a literature, impressed in a high degree with the spirit of the race, especially philosophical and astrological, pantheistic and super¬ stitious — in fact, Chaldean. Under these circumstances a part of the popu¬ lation would inevitably addict itself to Art and Commerce ; and, for reasons now unknown, it would throw out distant establishments connected with the mother-country. One of these was Petra, whose ruins, as every traveller has remarked, contrast strongly with the architecture of the Semitic race in all its other developments. Hither the Nabat trans¬ ported their arts and sciences, their literature and their works, which their Arab successors deemed worthy of translation. The fragment on “ Nabati Agriculture ” is a singularly original remnant of a literature, bearing upon it the impress of Mighty Babylon. Internal long ages been one of the commonplaces of literature, may be compared with the fall of the Incas, who, according to my old friend and colleague, Mr. Thomas T. Hutchinson, late H.M.’s Consul, Callao (“ Two years in Peru.” London : Sampson Low, 1 ^73), only borrowed from the Chimmoo and other races which preceded them, and who, being essentially destructive, and non¬ constructive, only injured what they borrowed. AYN EL-MO RAK TO THE WHITE MOUNTAIN. 235 reasons suggested to De Ouatremere that it belongs to the most glorious epoch of the Chaldsean Empire, the reign of Nebuchadnezzar (circa b.c. 600) who, however, is not mentioned. The French savant believed that it would be possible to recover the whole manuscript ; * * * § and his broad outlines of the religion and the language are now generally ac¬ cepted. The coins of the Nabati Kings were first described by that polite and munificent scholar, the late Due de Luynes, who, in his valuable paper, f adduced facts to prove the name of “Nabat,’ J and to confirm the theory that the mysterious race was of Chaldseo-Aramean origin. Already El-Masudi had stated that “ the Nabit differs (from the Syrian) only in a small number of letters, but the basis of the language is the same.” Caussin de Perceval § believes the original tongue to have been Chaldsean, and the modern a corrupt Arabic. This sketch was amplified by the learned MM. * I have heard of a copy, and my excellent friend, M. Yacoub Artin Bey of Cairo, is kindly looking after it. Whether the manuscript be complete or not cannot yet be determined. f Revue Numismatique, Nouvelle Serie, iii. 1858. + Mr. Reginald S. Poole (see chap, xi.) tells me that in the Due de Luynes’ paper the coins are published, but the Nabati alphabet has been converted into square Hebrew. For the older form he refers me to Langlois, Numismatique des Arabes avant rislamisme (1 vol. 40, 1859 : Rollin et Feuardent, Paris and London). § Essai stir V Hist Arabes, etc. 236 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID I AN Chwolson,^ Professor of Oriental languages at St. Petersburg, who supports the claims of the Nabat to rank with the most interesting races of antiquity. According to him (page 10) the remains of its literature consist of four works, one fragmentary ; i. The Book of Nabati Agriculture f (before mentioned) ; 2. The Book of Poisons ; 3. The Genethlialogs of Teukelunha of Babylon, and 4. The Book of Decomposition, alias the Secrets of the Sun and Moon. I bn Wahshiyyah,J the A rabic translator, informs us that No* 1 was begun by El- Zaghrft (Daghrith), was continued by El-Yanbushdd, and was completed by El-Kusami (Kuthami.) M. Chwolson ( Ubersetze , p. 68, etc.), disregard¬ ing the internal dates, makes the earliest live about • • • • * Uber die Uberreste der alt Babylonischen Literatur in Ai'abische Ubersetzung, St. Petersburg, 1849. He found his materials not only in the “ Book of Agriculture,” but also in the Dictionaries, as in the Sihah and Kamus ; and in the mediaeval Arab geographers, as El-Mas’udi (“ Meadows of Gold”), etc. The latter expressly states that the Nabat founded the City of Babylon. f This may sound like “ Chinese metaphysics,” but it is not so. The Bedawin treated the Nabat like Helots-; while the settled Arabs, even to the present day, alluding to the superiority of the old “ Nabat ” in georgics, call works on farming generally, Faldhat el-Nabatiyyeh, Agriculture of the Nabat, and this is a fair testimony to the fact that such treatises did exist. The Jews of El-Medinah, in the days of the Apostle- of Allah, were also, according to Arab tradition, Nabat. t He is noticed by D’Herbelot ( s.v . Falahat) as Ebn Vahas- chiah; another author on georgics, Ebn Aovam al Cothai, is quoted by the French Orientalist. A YN EL-MO RAK TO THE WHITE MOUNTAIN. 237 2500 years b.c., the second some three or four centuries later ; and the last, whom he holds to be the chief of the trio, while Ibn Wahshiyyah con¬ siders him little more than the Editor, he would consign to the thirteenth century b.c. This date is obtained in the book by the mention of a Canaanite dynasty, which he and Bunsen (“ Egypt, iii. 432) find corresponding with the Fifth or Arabian line of Berosus ; nine Kings reigning 245 years b.c. 1521-1276. Moreover, he suspects that the latter were the mysterious Hyksos. Later commentators have remarked, “ formidable intrinsic difficulties;”* such as the mention in Nabati literature of names closely resembling those of Adam (Adami), Seth (Ishitd), Enoch (Anuha), Noah, Shem, Nimrod (Namroda), and Abraham ; and the occurrence of corrupted Hellenic words like Armisa (Hermes); Agathadfm’un (Agathodamion) and Yunan (Ionians, Greeks).f Even M. Chwolson himself confesses that the circumstances related of the patriarchs seem to have been borrowed from the Hebrew writings ; or even from the later Jews, with the important reservation, however, that much may * See Smith’s Diet, of the Bible, s.v. Nebaioth. The objectors were Ewald ( Goettingische Gelehrte Anzeigen, 1857-1859); Renan (Journ.de V Institute April-May, i860); and M. de Gut- schmid (Zeitschrift d. Deutsch, Morgenldnd , Gesells. xv. pp. 1-100). f I do not include amongst the suspected “ Tammuz ’ (Adonis), a word which may be of any antiquity. 238 THE GOLD-MINES OF MIDIAN be due to the translators hand. I may observe, moreover, that both sacred and profane writers may have taken their information from the same sources : and this, indeed, is rendered more than probable by the flood-legends of the so-called Izdubar or Nimrod (b. c. 2000 ?), and by the creation-myth, in six periods, each of a thousand years or a day, which seems to have been common to Egypt and to the whole of Western Asia.* Of the other apparent evidences of modern thought which have been detected — such as the subjects of Nabati literature, scientific and industrial, being by no means those usually chosen by the Aryan and the Semitic world, and suggesting the inquiry whether the work should not be dated several centuries after the beginning of our era — I would further remark that not only Arab translators are in the habit of taking considerable liberties with their authors, the Semitic versions of the holy books of the Hindus supplying any number of instances of paraphrase and of insertion, but also that the Nabat treatment of many subjects, notably of history, utterly un-Arab, suggests the literature of a wholly different race. If the startling results of MM. de Quatremere and Chwolson are to be accepted, the four Nabati * In pp. 91-92 of “ Etruscan Bologna” (London: Smith, Elder & Co., 1876) I have offered some notice of this Creation and Fall of Man myth, drawn from the labours of the late lamented Mr. George Smith. AYN EL-MO RAK TO THE WHITE MOUNTAIN. 239 books introduce us to a great unknown nation of the remotest antiquity, whose civilisation was to that of the Greeks as the latter is to ours, and prove that the elaborate treatment of Science is at least as old as the oldest monuments of Egypt.* Scholars naturally object to accept such radical innovations ; and they will suspend judgment at least until some of the cuneiform texts are submitted to the world. The first step has been taken. Already we hear that Nineveh has yielded the “ Observations of Bel,” a treatise in sixty books, dating from the seventeenth century b.c., and describing the stars as they stood * 2540 years before our era, when Alpha Draconis was Polaris. But for the present we content our¬ selves with accepting the theory that the Nabat of Chaldaea are the same race as the Nabathseans of Arabia Petraea. It has been suggested that Nebajoth, one of the “ sons of the concubines,” f whose early history has * See Professor Chwolson’s conclusions in pp. 170-176. I have already quoted the Nabati views on cruelty to animals, which are advanced as those of any Humane Society of the nineteenth century, including the anti-vivisectors. There are other thoughts which startle us ; for instance, the opinions of the Canaanite and the Chaldean sages that “ everything mundane is governed by eternal immutable laws, without any connection with the deeds, good or evil, of mankind.” f This term of reproach is rather Christian ignorance than Jewish outrecuidance. The Hebrew “ Faljas ” means a “second wife,” of course inferior, as amongst all polygamic peoples, to the first. 240 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID/AN been left in darkness, might have travelled to the East, whence his grandsire Abraham came, have intermarried with the Chaldeans, and become the forefather of a mixed race — the Nabat, But this is a genuine retrogression to the mediaeval theories which made Hebrew the “ venerable sire of Greek and Latin the ancestors of the Jews the progeni¬ tors of mankind ; and the Pentateuch the foundation of all literature, the origines of all authentic history, the shrine of the primaeval revelation, and so forth. * “Allahu aalam !” as the Moslems say. The following eight specimens of Nabad Alpha¬ bets were supplied to me by the kindness of an old friend, W. S. W. Vaux, Secretary to the Royal Asiatic Society: they are copied from M. Francois Lenor- mant ( Esscti sur la Propagation de V 'Alphabet Phd- nicien dans V Ancien Monde . Paris, 1872, planche xv). Of this valuable work one volume, in two parts, has been published at intervals of three years. * Nor are these days yet passed. See preface, p. viii., to “ The Targums of Onkelos and Jonathan ben Uzziel,” etc., by J. W. Etheridge, M.A. London : Longmans, 1862. AYN EL-MO RAK TO THE WHITE MOUNTAIN 241 No. VI. NABATf ALPHABETS. }V / . a 3_ 4 V < . 7 S r» - ^ 20 /• 6 6 8 j C 6 6 * - / - (4 >G 6 6 ) > ;> > 3 J > ) r 7 <1 0 \ ^ 1 A ^ D V 0 "1 > *i \ a s 1 "in t/ >1 9« n <1 dd w 1 9 A A 3 £ V 0 K V* // n *« l /f A hn it a u si n A T «• b l)b 6 b £ b> i? 0 b b $ V > J * > ✓ > / 5 5 •i i ^ X * * ?> > 3 > A <4 ? P < i 4 J / j ^ j ) / J n w 0 M 3 b nti J d 0 a n / ) J J t J / ) i ) ) t J M to Q V ^ ?> P u a U A r E 14 y/y ? w r > !• 3 }V 9 u U > A i* «( II •« 9 9 1 n 0 u /» )’ •t A n u ? ? p 3 f / P 9 71 ) Hi mi a n \ A ^ 1 y 7 ;= f 2= ft E p, > - - tv rvA A- A n A a n ft n r\ n (K No. I. B.c. 60, Inscriptions. — 2. B.C. 95-50, Coins. — 3. A. D. 1st Cent., Coins. 4* 99 99 Inscriptions. — 5. a.d. 47, Inscriptions. No. 6. a.d. 75-105, Coins. 7. A.D. 100, Inscriptions. 8. A.D. 2-5 Century, Inscriptions from Sinai. R CHAPTER IX. HOW THE GOLD WAS FOUND IN MIDIAN *. THE GOLD MINES OF ARABIA. The readers of my “ Pilgrimage ” * may, perhaps, remember certain pleasant reminiscences of a bluff and genial old friend, one Haji Wali Alioghlu Arslanoghlii, my neighbour in the Wakalah (Cara¬ vanserai) Silahdar, and the companion of my leisure hours whilst preparing for travel to El-Hejaz. A o-enuine Tartar of the Kipchak tribe of Kirghiz, which pitches its tents near Akmasjia, east of the Caspian, and which lives on mutton, milk, Kurutf and Kimmiz — the Koumiss, now a fashionable remedy in Europe, — he has wandered far and wide * Vol. i. chaps, iii. and iv. f Kurut, in Arabia “Afik,” a favourite article of diet with wandering pastoral tribes, is made as follows : A quantity of “ laban ” (artificially soured milk) is placed in the sun for two or three days ; the serum which remains after evaporation is strained off, and the remainder is made into balls and dried. I should hardly recommend this rude conserve of milk to the epicures of Europe, but in the Desert, when dissolved in water, Affk makes a cooling and thirst-quenching drink HOW THE GOLD WAS FOUND. 243 over Tashkand, the “ Stone Town,” * Bukhara, Khiva, and Samarkand. When I parted with him in 1854, he was a Persian subject trading- in Cairo. He then became a Russian Simsar (broker) at Zagazig ; and here he was living with his wives and children, as comfort¬ ably as a man numbering eighty-two summers can expect to do, when I swooped down upon him, and carried him bodily into the Arabian wilderness. It so happened that during the cold season of 1849, as Haji Wali, an item in the Cairo caravan, was returning from his second pilgrimage, he was led by the will of Allah to hit upon the gold. On the second or third of March — for his memory, though admirable, cannot retain every trifle — he and his companion, Akil Effendi of Alexandria, exchanged their camels for asses, and preceded the Kafilah. By way of rest he dismounted, and going off to the right of the road, where a single tree grew, he sat down under it. He describes the place as showing to the left (west) a rounded mountain or hill drained by two Wadies to the sea (Gulf of El-Akabah) ; whilst on the n^ht was a “ bab ” (gate), somewhat like that of W ady Aynunah, a dry watercourse run¬ ning between two tall bluff cliffs. In the rude * Sprenger (p. 4) translates Tashkand “ turns lapidea, ” /.ip) = red, certainly cannot be written with an “ Alif.” But we find signs of the same anomaly in Hebrew. The few passages in the Books of Kings and Chronicles all give TSm (’Ofir), whilst in Job (xxviii. 6) we find nm nnsy (’Ofiruth Dahab) ; in the A.V. “dust of gold,” or gold ore, written in the plural with the Oin. By assuming that “ Ophir,” the Red Land, is generic, and not applied to a single emporium, firstly, we get over the difficulty of * That is between Circa B.c. 1014, when Solomon and Hiram equipped the Ophir-fleet, and B.c. 740, when Elath was taken from the Tews bv Rezin King of Syria. See chap. xii. J 7 ’ f I shall attempt to prove that “Tarshish,” the city, was situated in the Bay of Gibraltar. * The assertion (Smith’s Diet. j.z/. Ophir), that the Alif and the Ayn are interchangeable is most objectionable : the latter in all the Semitic tongues is one of the most tenacious of letters. HOW THE GOLD WAS FOUND. 263 the three-years’ voyage, if this period be not “ writ large ” in the three versions of the episode. Secondly, although an emporium in Yemen, or even an island in the Red Sea, as Eupolemus believed, may have collected gold and silver, ivory and peacocks ; yet the word Tukkfyyim, in Kings (i. 10. 22), and Tuki'yyim, in Chronicles (ii. 9. 21), is evidently borrowed from the Tamil-Mala- yalam. * With them “Tokei,” or “Tokei,” with the first vowel now short then long, denotes the u bird with the (resplendent) tail.” In order to turn the obstacle, certain theorists have pro¬ posed to metamorphose the turkey into a parrot, thus sweeping away with a stroke of the pen, the tradition of nearly three thou¬ sand years. Why will Biblical students forget that there are such things as Talmuds and Targums? The “ peacock,” which does not exist either in Arabia or in Africa, may fairly suggest that the Ophir-voyage extended to the Western Coast of India. But if to India, what more probable than that one of the three years should have been spent upon the Mozambique Coast? The Phoenician sailor, who explored the stormy Baltic and the wild seas of the West Libyan shore, would hardly be deterred by the dangers of Zanzibar and the Koukan. In a private letter addressed to me from Wabern (May 18th), the author of the Alte Geographic says, “ The credit of having made a discovery, whose results cannot be overrated, is due to you. I think, however, that you have, as yet, taken only the first step ; and that much greater and more profitable results are awaiting you in Southern Arabia. Do not forget the old mines in Dhankan ; in Dsjabbel al-Nukkab ; in the Wady Baysch, and in Kufa ah or Fuka ah. Do not neglect Mogaddasy’s gold-digging of Marwa, only four days from Al-Higr, on the western road to Madyna : further west of Marwa, on the way to Haura, the harbour, you may, perhaps, find coal ; and, though I am not sanguine as to its quantity, still it would be worth while to make a trial. Nor do I think it impossible that the mines of Nagd (Nejd) may prove even richer than those of Southern Arabia ; the latter, however, are all near the coast, and none of them extend inland beyond forty (English) miles. It is the interest of the world to assist you in making further researches ; and I hope that # P. 91. 2nd edit. “ Comparative Grammar of the Dravidian Languages,” by the Rev. Robert Caldwell. London : Triibner, 1875. 264 THE GOLD-MINES OF M1DIAN. in a couple of years you will be able to throw full light upon the subject.” In contrast to these sober and sensible views, I cannot help quoting the following curious letter addressed by a Mr. William Gosling to the Editor of the Jewish Chronicle and Hebrew Ob¬ server (No. 9, March 25, 1855), and headed “ Gold and Silver in Palestine ” : — It is now more than three years since I had the honour of addressing the Earl of Shaftesbury on the subject of the gold and silver mines in Palestine ; and although I have not had an oppor¬ tunity of making any practical geological researches, yet by dint of close study I have been led to conclude that gold and silver are more abundant in the land of Israel than in those of Australia and California. For I find it written that ‘ The land is also full of silver and gold, neither is there any end of their treasures ’ (Is. ii. 7. Comp. Deut. viii. 9, describing the Promised Land, ‘ Whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills thou mayest dig brass ). . . . What then will be the great source of attraction to the Jews to return to the Land of Palestine ? I answer, The dis¬ covery of Gold and Silver in the hills of their own country , particu¬ larly that of Sidon and Sarepta , where I believe it will be found in such abundance that it will eclipse the discoveries made in Australia and California. I am glad, therefore, to find that the inhabitants of Sidon are bestirring themselves in the matter (?). To my mind it is like the little cloud, which the Prophet Elijah’s servant saw, about the size of a man’s hand, which was the pre¬ cursor of abundant ram. So it will lead to great discoveries.” CHAPTER X. THE RETURN FROM THE WHITE MOUNTAIN TO EL-MU- WAYLAH, vid WADY SHARMA AND WADY TIRYAM. NOTES ON BOTANY. With a last fond look at the Grand Filon, we set out next morning (April nth), westing towards the Erythraean Sea. Nothing could be more refreshing than the sense of complete freedom, of breathing boundless air, of feeling that the world lay open before one. The sunrise was of splendid wildness, the rays of light being divided by the peaked and pinnacled sky-line of the mountain-wall into distinct and several shafts which, sharply defined on the east, melted away before they reached the zenith. The gorgeously-tinted gala-robes worn by the giants of earth ; seawards the ora variis ornata colon- bus , which even the ancients, who cared little for landscape, described as a Mirificum prceternavigan- tibus Spectaculum ; and the infinite shades and shift- ings of colour, which made the features of the 266 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN ground mobile as the face of the waves — were the especial charms of the morning hours. Nor could we help admiring the perfumed vegetation of the Desert; small, tender and mignonne as that of Ice¬ land, and filling the liberal air with its lavish fragrance. After many a halt to “ prospect/’ we entered the smooth line of the Wady el-Maka’adah, which begins at the station. A carriage * and four could be driven along it, avoiding only the normal out¬ crops and islets of grey granite, here and there weathered to whiteness. Presently this rock en¬ tirely disappeared, and we saw nothing but debris of porphyry, which had slipped from the lofty red walls of the canon. The dromedaries came up with us after a walk of fifty minutes ; and now we determined to try their speed. After travelling about nine miles, we were shown on the left the head of Wady Sharma, the objective of our march : we presently learned why the guides did not take the direct road down the great southern fork, whose “ bab ” (gate) is rendered impassable to camels by a marsh. The Bedawin pointed out to us the valley-banks of ruddy-pink, and told us that the same material formed the surface of the Hisma. * I lately heard of a dignitary making the Pilgrimage from Cairo in a carriage. Presently there will be VVenham Lake ice on the Hajj road, and the days of Harun el-Rashid will be revived. RETURN FROM THE WHITE MOUNTAIN 267 Presently we reached the seaward gap of Wady el-Maka’adah, and once more felt the delicious gulf- breezes full in our faces. This breach in the falciise , as usual about 200 metres broad, is distinguished from its inhabited neighbours by being waterless ; consequently there are no ruins, and thorns usurp the place of palms. Here we stood nearly opposite the southern end of the long strip of wooded island “ Umm Maksiir.” The shore was close at hand ; and we were shown the place where the Arabs collect, when the waters are dried up, a coarse and sandy salt. The lower bed of the Fiu- mara, after issuing from the gate, hence changes its name to Wady Mellahah of Salinas. We then wound along the seaward face of the ancient cliff, and passed, on the left, a second gap, or rather crack, tortuous and rock-strewn, which splits the wall from top to bottom. This gorge also has evidently never had tenants. On the right was a small cemetery of Bedawin graves, over which no man recited a Fatihah ; and after a sharp trot of nearly three hours, ^ we sighted with pleasure the long and broad “Nakhil” ( palmetum ) that announces Wady Sharma, with its dates and dorns, reeds, * We set out at 5.10 a.m., and arrived at 8.45 ( = 3 h. 35') : of this we walked 50' (= 2 miles) and rode 2 h. 45' (=14 miles), or a total of 16 miles. At Camp Wady Sharma, the aneroid showed 29*30 and the therm. (F.) at 2 p.m., when the Khamsin was blowing, 930 in the shade. 268 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. sedges, and rushes. Water, treacherously clear and crystalline, but highly sulphureous, flowed over the sands in a prattling stream, and below camp formed a long pool, where all the birds of the neighbour¬ hood assembled to chat and drink. A bath was immediately hollowed out ; and the tents were pitched upon the raised right bank, beyond the reach of the malt culices , the gnats, the mosquitoes, and especially the flies, which here, I have said, are considered poisonous. When the air had somewhat cooled, Mr. Clarke and Shaykh Abd el-Nabi set out on their, drome¬ daries to bring up the remainder of our camp from Wady Ayniinah. I had resolved to rendezvous at the next station, and to march in one body upon El-Muwaylah. We then proceeded to inspect the “ houses of the Nazarenes,” which had been de¬ scribed to us as larger and more important than in the other cities of Midian ; whilst the local supply of iron-ore is famous amongst the Bedawin. The shelf upon which the tent stood was a mass of ddbris , pottery-sherds, scoriae, and ashes — in fact, animal and vegetable matter, capped with that saline efflorescence which the people connect with ancient ruins. A couple of men, set to dig, found nothing save a scorpion. We then walked to the place where the Wady splits and forms a long flat holm, uniting somewhat below it. This was the RETURN FROM THE WHITE MOUNTAIN 269 site of a strong fortress, with angles adapted to the ground, and with the usual complicated entrance, apparently a long couloir. It was several kilometres in circuit, and the plan-tracing occupied Lieutenants Arif and Hasan until noon the next day. They also hunted out the furnaces, whose scoriae strewed the maritime plain ; while I collected pottery, but failed to find any glass-fragments. The only other remarkable work of the old town was a deep cut in the soft rock, apparently artificial, and possibly used for metal-washing : it extended from the ruins to the northern bank of the stream’s southern branch, where the waters slept in a dark, deep, and sullen pool, which did not invite a header. Thence we walked up the Wady Sharma, a generic name made proper ; * and found the fine palm-grove in the same neglected condition as that of Wady Aynunah, while traces of Bedawi fires appeared in the shape of scorched trunks, standing as well as felled. A swamp defends the upper part of the islet, while the right bank, choked with marsh and vegetation, hardly affords a footpath. The tall and stiff falaise , now based as usual upon granite, is composed of the normal stalactite-like corallines and meandrinse. The material shows frequent moulds of Venus, oyster, and other modern * Sharm being a bight or creek : the principal port in Hadra- maut is also called Sharma. 270 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID I AN. shells, with impressions of pectens and crystallised carbonate of lime in patches, which make good cabinet specimens. Throughout the lower part appeared poor carbonate of iron in masses. This somewhat puzzled us ; the signs of working were extensive ; the white stone had been laid bare ; and yet, of what value could such metal have been ? The next march, however, explained away all our difficulties. Nothing would be easier than to dam the valley, like that of Aynunah, and to secure a good head of water for stamping the less valuable yields. The stone in which gold or argentiferous galena occurs would repay the expense of sending to Suez. The form of dykes will demand the study of an ex¬ perienced engineer. At times the momentum of the torrent must be enormous ; but as the ancients evidently succeeded in such works, there is no reason why we moderns should fail. The upper heights of the old sea-cliff were strewed with ferruginous grit and fragments of porphyry, giving a red and white colouring, both equally vivid. I asked Salih, the guide, whether any settlement was to be found above. He replied by a categorical “No,” and presently excused himself, protesting his ignorance. We swarmed up, by a rain-gash, the highly-in¬ clined flank of the falaise ; and at once, on reaching the top, came upon the workmens quarters. The site RETURN FROM THE WHITE MOUNTAIN. 271 is curious, a buttress or snout projecting from the right cliff-wall far into the Wady, running east to west, with a hollow semicircle facing south, and defended by an almost perpendicular fall northwards. The houses, made of rough stone laid in mortar, occupied the base and the tip of the tongue. As at Aynunah, the tenements were huddled together, and did not exceed the size of Hindu huts. It was night before we reached camp, and want of time prevented our visiting the sea-board to ascertain whether Sharma, like Aynunah and Tiryam, had its settlement of richards near the sea. The hot walk and climb were bad preparations for the damp raw air of the well-watered valley, where we dined a la belle Itoile. The next march, Sharma to Wady Tiryam, began with a walk of two hours and a half, over the Tihamat-Madyan— the nature-reclaimed maritime flat with the normal bulging stripes or waves of dark stone, alternating with parallel lines of deep, loose, and light-coloured sand. The direction was south¬ erly, with a little westing. We crossed, after about six miles, the large Wady Nakhbar, and we saw, at a considerable distance inland, the great gap of the W ady Kuhlah : it is the upper course of the Wady Tiryam, whose broad and broken bed debouches into the sea a little north of the Ras or promontory, the latter marked by the high sand-heaps which we had seen from the Sambiik. 272 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. After four hours of slow work, covering thirteen to fourteen miles,* we came upon an irregular en¬ ceinte of rough stone, protecting a broad shelf on the right bank of the Fiumara. It also defended a large cistern much resembling those of the Wady Aynunah, but of inferior construction ; the mortar contained very little brick, and the cement was of coarser texture. Remembering how the Hajj-road had been supplied with tanks by the piety of Zubaydah Khatun f and others in the olden day, I suggested to the Bedawin that this “ hauz,” or rather Karif (= reservoir), might be one of the number. They all declared that it was the work of the Nasara; and the Egyptian officers, when making their plans, discovered it to be the head of an aqueduct intended to feed the maritime settlement. Wady Tiryam, evidently one of the most import¬ ant positions, with the broadest and deepest torrent- bed, has no rivulet. The Bedawin assert that apparently causeless changes have taken place during the last few years ; and none of them remembered any shocks of earthquakes. J Riippell (p. 217) on * We set out at 4.20 a.m., and arrived at 9.20 (=4 h.) : of this we walked 2 h. 30' (= 7 miles) and rode 1 h. 30' ( = 7 miles), or a total of 14 miles, the caravan came in at 10.30 p.m. t See my “ Pilgrimage,” iii. 2. t The disappearance of springs is common in Arabia : Wallin heard of the phenomenon at El-Karaya, near Tabuk, and at the ancient site, El-Feriri in the Ketayfi mountain. RETURN FROM THE WHITE MOUNTAIN 27 3 July 8th, 1626, here found a flowing bach seven feet broad and four inches deep. Above the camping- place, on a kind of terrace, surrounded by palms, and showing by its large mounds and its salt earth that it was once inhabited, there are a few shallow pits in the Wady-sand which supply turbid water. 1 he “ mud-doctor,” as he is irreverently called, has long ago untaught me the old- Adam prejudice against drinking clean dirt. En revanche , the air is exceptionally light (i.e., heavy) and elastic after the heavy {i.e., light) dampness of Wady Sharma. Shortly after we had breakfasted, the remainder of the caravan came in from Aynrinah,* and Haji Wali rode up with all the air and spirit of a middle- aged man. He “ nakh’d”*j* his dromedary, which he had preferred to the weak-kneed Huwayti donkeys ; and he carried his baggy galligaskins with a jarret tendu. The old man was in excellent spirits, having heard of our good fortune : he no longer feared to return home with a “black-face.” He had drunk beer during the whole of his halt, declaring that the water disagreed with him ; and a couple of bottles a day had evidently suited his constitution — he even I he caravan set out at 5-3° a.m., and arrived at 12.45; a total of 7 h. 15 =15 miles, or three hours of moderate dromedary travelling. Mr. Clarke rode the distance in 5 h. 45', and Haji Wali in 6h. 15 . t fo nakh is to make the camel kneel by ejaculating ‘ Ikh! Ikh ! ’ and by touching the neck with the staff. See my “ Pilgrimage,” chap. viii. and xiii., vol. i. 274 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. talked of marrying a fourth wife. But, having re¬ turned to respectability and Zagazig, he touched very lightly, I am told, upon the matter of the Giaour beverage. During the afternoon we examined the right bank, which gave a view of the island-town s site ; although nothing of it remained but the earthwork fronting northwards. The high and hilly ground bounding the Wady had evidently been guarded with unusual care ; and, though the fortifications had become mere piles of large rounded pebbles, it was easy to trace their form and extent. Above the rough enceinte of dry wall through which we had approached the valley, and occupy¬ ing a small platform strewed with red porphyries, petrosilex, and ferruginous grits, were the ruins of a number of detached towers. A little higher rose a square work (Masna’a), with three round bastions facing the north. Still higher upon the eastern heights appeared two more “ burj ” (ftyrgoi), and outlying heaps crowned the summits which com¬ manded the upper course of the stream. The right bank explained the mystery of the Sharma settle¬ ment. Evidently the blood-red earth of the Hisma had here been washed. It lay in patches upon the hills, and formed part of the Fiumara-cliffs, where oxygen had converted it, like the Tana of the Brazil, into marbled masses of pink and mauve. RETURN FROM THE WHITE MOUNTAIN 275 Our evening “ Samrah ” (chat) was enlivened by a certain Haj Akil bin Muhaysin, who called himself, what he was not, Shaykh of the Masa’id clan, tenants ol Magharat Shu’ayb.* I did not much like the man, a parlous youth that boasted too much of his position. He was grasping as an Icelander and over- greedy of bakhshish, even applying for a companion whom he had brought with him. Some day, how¬ ever, he may be useful in escorting travellers inland, where the other Huwaytat cannot accompany them. He also described Tabuk and El-Hijr, both of them stations on the Caravan-road from Damascus, and both full of interest to me. Tabuk *[ is a village and a pilgrim-station for the Syrian caravan in the Hisma-land, belonging to the Beni Ma’azeh, and built on the eastern versant of the second or inland parallel chain. It is known to * See chap. vi. Riippell (p. 214) makes his “ Musaiti ” occupy the land between Beder (Bada’ or Magharat-Shu’ayb) and El-Akabah : he suspects that they were Jews early converted to El-Islam, reports their want of hospitality, and ignores their numbers. t Written labuc by Sale (Koran, p. 143, n.), who describes it as a town situate halfway between Medina and Damascus.” Belonging to the Greeks under the Emperor Heraklius, it was attacked by Mohammed with 30,000 men in a.h. 9 ; and it is the northernmost point of the Apostle’s campaigns from El-Medinah. Wallins map places it in N. lat. 28°, and in E. long. 370 10' ; while Sprenger prefers N. lat. 290, a little south of, and some 30° 30' ( = 210 dir. geo g. miles) east of El-Akabah. The Kanun has E. long. 58° 50', and N. lat. 270; and the Atwal the same longitude, but with N. lat. 30° — an error on the other side. 27 6 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN geographers by the detailed account of Wallin,* who travelled under the name of Haji Wali. He places it in the centre of a large plain, the Hemadat Tabuk, amongst the red buttes , an oasis in a dry and thirsty land, plentifully supplied with sweet water, and growing garden-stuff and a little grain, dates, pomegranates, almonds, and even vines. Abulfeda,f who died in a.d. 1331, notices that it is in the third climate, near the great Badiyat el- Sham, the desert south and east of the Holy Land (not les campagnes de Syrie ), J and lying between * Wallin, /oc.j cit. 312-320. The Swede was an excellent traveller, hardy, and temperate as a Bedawi ; but he lacked the fine ear that distinguished Burckhardt. His descriptions of desert- life are charmingly simple and natural. t Geographic d\Ahulfeda (Isma’fl ibn Ali bin El-Sultan el- Muzaffar, etc.), traduction francaise par M. Reinaud ; Iviprimerie nationale. 2 vols. in fol. Paris, 1848. The reigning Prince of Hamah (Hamath) wrote two great works : 1. Takwim El- Buldan (Table of Countries), disposed by Tables according to the order of the Climates, with longitudes and latitudes after the Ptolemeian pattern ; and 2. El-Mukhtasar ff Akhbari ’1 Bashar \an Epitome of the Universal History of Mankind). From the latter Pococke (edit. 1806) drew his “ Specimens.” The mediaeval Arab writers who preceded, or are associated with, this kinsman of the great Saladin, were Ibn Khordabeh, El-Mas’udi, Abu Zayd, El-Istakhri, Ibn Haukal, El-Bayruni, El-Idrisf, Yakut, Ibn Sayd, El-Kazwfni, Ibn Batutah, Sidi Ali Chelebi, and Haji Khulfah. t Golius (40, 1669 Amsterdam, Notee in Aifragano, i.e., El- Ferghani, who flourished a.d. 800) more correctly says, “ Regionem hanc ( i.e ., El-Hejaz) quoque terminat ad boream Arabia deserta, quam illi ( Badietu-l-Sham ) desertum sive campos Syr ice vocant.” This vast wilderness extends, with a few scattered oases, to the valley of the Euphrates. RETURN FROM THE WHITE MOUNTAIN 277 Syria and El-Hejaz. It has a spring and palm- trees, and it was occupied by the men of El-Ayka,* to whom Allah commissioned Shu’ayb f (Koran, surat vii. , Sale, p. ri6, and s. xi., Sale, p. 170) ; the latter, however, belonged not to therrh but to the tribe of Madyan (“ Ahl Madyan ”). As a rule Arabian geographers connect the names of Tabuk and Madyan, the city, placing the former to the east and the latter to the west. Tabuk may be so honoured in consequence of the tradition which makes Mohammed ascend a hill in the neighbour¬ hood, and turning northwards exclaim, “ All this is Sham ” (Syria), and turning southwards, “ All this is Yemen. ” Even more interesting is El-Hijr, J head-quarters of the Troglodytic Tamiid, the rocky place or Petra, the townlet also called Madyan Salih, which Sprenger (p. 146) identifies with the Egra of Ptolemy, and places in N. lat. 26°, or 3° (180 miles) * El Ayka (others write, after Egyptian and Syrian fashion, A1 Eike) is supposed to be a wood in the land of Midian, where Shu’ayb or Jethro prophesied to the Midianites. See Ayrton’s note to Dr. Wallin’s Route, p. 318. j In both places the Koran says, “ And unto Madyan we sent their brother Shu’ayb.” J Wallin (p. 237) believes the Wady el-Kora to head at El-Hijr (the ring-wall), and to debouch atEl-Wijh, the latter being Strabo’s Egra, meaning the port-town of El-Hijr. According to Sprenger, El-Hijr had three havens : 1,. El-Amid to the north ; 2. El-Wijh the central ; and 3. El-Haura the southern, where most geogra¬ phers find the Leuke-Kome, the Nabath^ean port. 278 THE GOLD MINES OF MIDIAN south of Tabuk, also upon the Damascus- Medinah line. Here a mountain still bearing the name of Jebel el-Nakeh (of the she-camel), attests the Judseo- Arabs' miracle of Nabf Salih and the men of Ta- mud.* It is related that when the Apostle of Allah passed through the demon-haunted defiles, he veiled his head, muffled his face, and hurried his pace on account of the Jinns and Ghuls which infest them, forbidding his followers to halt there either for food or drink. We rationalistic moderns have determined that El-Hijr must contain, besides inscriptions, statues or reliefs of the pagan day ; but as yet no traveller has visited it. * The Tamud (Thamoudeni of Agatharkides) are the same as the Themuditse of Pliny on the south coast of El-Muwaylah • north-western Arabia being known generally as Thamuditis. These names derive from the posterity of Tamud, the grandson of Aram, and consequently of the Arab el-Aribah, the pure or genuine Arabs. Sprenger (§ 329), quoting Uranius, says that their city was near the Nabathseans, and derives the name of the Horite-Idumgean race from Thamad, scarcity of water. They fell into idolatry, when the Prophet Salih (Bochart identifies him with Selah and D’Herbelot with Phaleg. both probably being misled by Biblical prepossessions), who lived during the interval between Hud and Abraham, was sent to bring them back to the worship of Allah. I need hardly waste time upon the tales of the pregnant she-camel issuing from the rock; the impious slaughter of the beast, and the “ visitation of Providence,” an earthquake and a terrible noise, the voice of the Archangel Gabriel crying, “ Die, all of you ! ” Salih and his few converts retired to Palestine, and died at Meccah (Sale, Prel. Disc. p. 5). The more general idea is that Salih fled to Palestine, and is buried in a cave under the “ White Mosque” of^Ramleb. There must have been later Tamud like the later Ad, for their horsemen served in the Roman army. RETURN FROM TITE WHITE MOUNTAIN. 279 Years ago Hofrath Alfred von Kremer, the learned author of the Cultursgeschichte des Orients unter den Chalifen , now Austrian Commissioner in Egypt, visited Damascus by the advice of Baron von Hammer-Purgstall, with the intention of ex¬ ploring El-Hijr. H e failed from the difficulty of finding a guide, and owing to the exorbitant sum demanded for camels and escort. I also had made arrangements with Findi El-Fa iz, Shaykh of the Beni-Sakr who convey to El-Medinah the Tayyarah or plying caravan, to transport me, when that “ un¬ speakable Turk,” the late Aali Pasha of infamous memory, caused my recall from Syria. On Friday, April 13th, we returned to El-Mu- waylah. There was some trouble in leaving Wady Tiryam : the Huwaytdt declared that they could not detach their camels for fear of the Beni-Maazeh, who infest this border-station ; and the Egyptian officers wished to measure the ruins, to survey the site, and to follow us at their leisure. We, the Europeans, set out down the Wady at 5 a.m., to inspect the maritime settlement, with a Bedawi guide and six soldiers, leaving the rest in case of a possible Kaum (raid). The walking in loose sand and over crum¬ bling Sabkheh (salt earth) was not a pleasure. After an hour and a quarter we reached the “ houses of the Nasdra,” which, like the other settlements, have been rased to the ground. It was a scatter of large 280 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID/AN. tenements, a Leuke-Kome, a white village or castle, built of snowy coral (madrepore) ; and apparently it had been walled round. We picked up many frag¬ ments of green-blue glass, more or less iridised ; and were shown the aqueduct, whose terminal tank * is now buried under the sands. The Tiryam esta¬ blishment was one of the largest, and it lies a few yards south of the Wady, and directly north of the sand-heaps and the projecting yellow point known as Ras Wady Tiryam. Somewhere hereabouts must have been the old pilgrim-station El-Silah. This Tiryam is the third large establishment which we have found between El-Muwaylah and Aynunah, a distance of only twenty-seven direct geographical miles. In fact, I may say that every Hydreuma, as Strabo calls the Wadies supplying water, was provided with its several settlements of metal-workers. How far these men extended east¬ ward into the interior we could gather only from hearsay ; but the distance may safely be laid down at fifteen hours’ march. It must be evident that what enabled such towns to live and thrive, can hardly fail to enrich the industrials of our modern day. And here we see, well displayed, the life of old Midian; the “cities” and “goodly castles” near t Riippell (p. 217) describes it as a rhomb-shaped hydraeum or piscina, with sides about forty feet long, ten feet deep, and revetted with stucco. RETURN FROM THE WHITE MOUNTAIN 281 the sea, and the hordes of tent-dwellers of the interior who meet the Bene-Kedem, the eastern Bedawin. The only difference is that now the nomad has prevailed over the citizen ; but the turn of the latter will come again. Our riding-camels found us without delay ; and we fell at once into the Hajj road, at a place where the wretched Maghribis or North-Western Africans encamp. From El-Muwaylah to Wady Ayniinah the line skirts the shore ; hence the pilgrims, who know the ready shooting of the Bedawin too well to straggle from the beaten path, see from a distance, but never visit, the “palmeta” of Wadies Tiryam and Sharma. The march to El-Muwaylah was monotonous enough, with the flat sand-banks sea¬ wards, and inland the peaky sandstone hillocks, one detached and tall ; but we were consoled by the sight of the corvette lying at anchor off the Fort. The country was a succession of divides and valleys ; the latter, as usual, all honoured with names. At last we debouched upon the reefy shore ; and, passing the tombs of Shaykh Abdul¬ lah, we entered the Fort. We were received with the effusion which our success deserved. As we drank coffee under the cool main-entrance,* speci- * We set out walking at 5 a.m., and reached the debouchure of the valley at 6.15 (=ih. 15' = 4 miles). We rode alternately fast and slow between 6.30 a.m. and 10.20 ( = 3 h. 50' = 16 miles), or a total of 20. On the chart the direct distance between the 282 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID I AN mens of the promised seed-pearls were asked for, but they had not been procured. The only “an- tikas ” were a Portuguese silver coin with the castles, and a copper piece bearing the “ seal of Solomon,” with the legend “ Zuriba fi Mishk (struck at Damascus). We carried away, however, a fine specimen of free gold in a water-rolled frag¬ ment of porphyritic greenstone. According to local accounts, it had long been lying about the Fort, and had lately been picked up there by the little daughter of the official who presented it to me. Finally it was taken by the Princesses in Cairo, who framed it and placed it in their museum. I was careful to collect botanical specimens throughout the region which we visited, the septen¬ trional Africano-Arabian zone connecting Morocco with the Persian Gulf, and including Sinai and the Libanus. But the work was a hors d? oeuvre; and, as the Persians say, time was “ narrow.” The Bedawin lent willing aid, and gave me the names and the peculiarities of every plant, rarely saying, “ I don’t Ras Wady Tiryam and the Muwaylah Fort is n miles. Our marches and stations were thus : — Miles. 1. (April 9) from Ayminah to Wady Morak 14 2. (April 10) to the Jebel el-Abyaz ... 17*50 3. (April n) to Wady Sharma 16 4. (April 12) to Wady Tiryam 14 5. (April 13) to El-Muwaylah 20 RETURN FROM THE WHITE MOUNTAIN 283 know it.” Their excellent memories enabled them to remember every item that we gathered ; and they took the kindly interest of the Eastern man in adding to my store. This unaffected and childlike display of benevolence in small things, be it genuine or affected, is, perhaps, the great charm of Oriental life and travel ; and it explains the fact that many an ancient maiden has regarded with peculiar com¬ placency her berry-brown dragoman and his very big bags. Convinced that every botanical specimen from unknown Midian would be useful to connect it with the adjacent flora, and suspecting that the High¬ lands — which we ascended to about 1,500 feet, until many plants were stunted to an inch or two — might possibly afford novelties, I gave as much time as could be spared to collection. The hortus siccus was, of course, very imperfect. We were wholly un¬ prepared ; we wanted press and even brown paper, the place of which was taken by bits of newspaper ; and many of the specimens brought by the Bedawin lacked flower or fruit, or both. Such as it is, how¬ ever, the harvest was forwarded to Professor Balfour, of Edinburgh, after being tidied by my friend and fellow traveller, Dr. Carlo de Marchesetti, of Trieste, who favoured me with a few manuscript observa¬ tions. The flora of the region which we traversed f 284 THE GOLD-MINES OF M/D/AN remarkably resembles that of Sinai and the Desert between it and the “ Holy Land,” extending down the Arabian coast as far as its southern apex. Geographically speaking, the Nile forms a distinct frontier between the two facies; Syro-Arab to the east and Lybio-African on the west ; but the vegetation does not submit to this law. Dr. Anderson * tells us that the growth of Aden closely resembles that of Arabia Petrsea, of which it is evidently the extension. The botanical characteristic of this Desert is the small proportion of species to the inordinate number of genera and natural orders ; indeed, he declares that this holds true even- when the flora is compared with those of places having similar areas and similar relations to the mainland.*^ While * “ Florida Adenensis. A Systematic Account, with Descrip¬ tions, of the Flowering Plants hitherto found at Aden.” By Thomas Anderson, Esq., M.D., F.L.S., H.M.’s Bengal Medical Service. Journ. Proceed. Linnean Soc. Supplement to vol. v. ‘‘Botany.” London: Longmans, i860. t At Aden Dr. Anderson found the total number of natural orders 41 ; of genera, 79 ; of species, 94. The following table shows the actual paucity of species at the “ Coal-Hole,” proving that the great relative preponderance of natural orders and genera does not necessarily distinguish the vegetation of similar localities, since it is entirely due to climatic causes, instead of being the result of situation or of isolation : — Natural Orders. Genera. Species. Aden affords 41 79 94 Hongkong 122 56° 965 Ischia (Bay of Naples) 86 372 794 Gibraltar 68 243 45 6 Professor Ascherson, who accompanied M. Gerhard Rohlfs RETURN FROM THE WHITE MOUNTAIN 285 the species are limited, only a few of the more arid forms preponderate. Here the sun plays the part of the Campos-fires in the Brazil, and in both places the vegetation has to contend against excessive heat and dryness, conditions tending to the extinction of life. Foliage is reduced to a minimum, and the superfluous moisture, given off by leaves in less arid climates, is stored up in fleshy stems against seasons of long-continued drought. The dryness of the atmosphere, while reducing the amount of cellular tissue, favours the production of spines ; and though, in many cases, the development has not attained actual spinosity, still the modifying influence of climate appears in rigid or distorted members, and asperities of stem and foliage. In some the leaves end with sharp recurved hooks ; in others the stipules are spinous; in a few the bracts are prickly : in an Euphorbia ( Cuneata ) the short stiff branches are terminated by dwarf thorns ; and a grass (the Aeluropus Arabicus ) bears leaves so sharply armed that specimens of it are not readily gathered. Several species exude gums or resinous matter, that encrusts their stems, probably resulting from the bark cracking under exposure to great heat at 1869 to the Libyan Sahara, found 91 species growing spon¬ taneously at Farafreh, and 183 in the oasis of Dakhel. 286 THE GOLD-MINES OF MIDJAN. Aden, alternating, in Arabia Petrsea, with dry cold. Many of the plants have glaucous stems or leaves, or are completely covered with a hoary pubes¬ cence. Not a few are viscous, adhering to the hand like glue ; and a large proportion is distinguished by more or less pungency or aromatic odour — qualities always possessed by the growth of the Desert. With Dr. Anderson, we may lay down as follows the limits of this growth, which, especially in Con¬ tinental Europe, is known by the general name of “ Flora of the Sahara.” Starting from its head¬ quarters, the rainless regions of Arabia, it extends over the whole Peninsula, except only the moun¬ tainous buttress of El- Yemen to the south and the south-west. It follows the shores of “ The Gulf/’ whence it penetrates into Southern Persia ; it over¬ spreads Beluchistan, Sind, Southern Afghanistan, and the Western Panjab, its southern limit being N. lat. 23° (Sind) and 30°-3i° (Afghanistan and Panjab): southwards it forks to the Nerbadda ; disappears and reappears in the form of an oasis at the southern point of the Dakhan (Deccan) im the Madura territory. Westward of Arabia Petraea this “Bedawi vegetation” passes into Egypt, Nubia, and partially into Abyssinia; and it stretches over the African Sahara, where, in about E. long. 50, it attains the greatest breadth. Here it covers the wilderness RETURN FROM THE WHITE MOUNTAIN 287 between N. lat. io° and 37°; whereas in Asia the upper or northern fork shrinks to a zone of 7° to 8° in depth. It passes to Senegal, and finally it reaches its western limit in the Cape de Verd Islands, retaining to the last its Desert type. The exception, as has been said, is El-Yemen ; and here we even now depend for information upon Peter Forskal,* the energetic student of Natural History, who accompanied Carsten Niebuhr in 1761, and who died at Jerim on July 11, 1763. During his hurried visit to Sana a and to the Coffee districts, he found thirty new genera and he described some 800 species, a number which he might greatly have increased, had it not been for his conscientious de¬ termination to admit nothing but what had been carefully examined. Seetzen y is still the first au- * The works edited by Niebuhr form the three well-known Flora sEgyptico-A rabica and Descriptiones Animalium, 1775 : and the leones Rerum Naturalium , 1766. t Born at Sophiengroden (Jan. 30, 1767) : studied medicine at Gottingen (1785), where he published his inaugural dissertation, Systematum de morbis plantarum brevis dijudicatio (1789); travelled about Europe and wrote many short studies till August, 1802, when he descended the Danube to Constantinople ; reached Smyrna and travelled through Asia Minor to Aleppo (Nov. 23, 1803), and made Damascus his head-quarters. From this time to the end of his life he wandered far and wide about Syria (1805-6), including the neighbourhood of Jerusalem (1806-7), and he travelled to Sinai, Suez, and Cairo (1807-9), where he halted to rest and to prepare for more extended journeys. On Oct. 10, 1809, he reached Meccah from Jeddah; performed his pilgrimage, and became Haji Musa el Hakim (the doctor) ; 288 THE GOLD-MINES OF M/D/AN thority for the Tlh Desert, which he crossed from north to south in 1807. Of all the scientific travellers of the present century, he is perhaps the least known in Eng¬ land. Though inspired by Niebuhr, his style is clumsy and heavy. His numerous and careful studies were published in a detached form, and the collected edition did not appear till 1854.* made the visitation to El-Medinah, and halted at Mocha, whence his last letters to Herr von Zach, of Gotha, were dated Nov. 14 and 17, 1810. In Sept., 1811 (set. 44), he resolved to cross Arabia, and to march upon Maskat and Basra (Bussorah) via Sana’a. He lived between June 2nd and 27th (181 1) at the capital of Yemen, whose modern name, dating only from the Abyssinian invasion, derives, according to Sprenger (181), from Sind, strong. The older term “ Uzal,” he identified, after El-Hamdani, with the Uzal of Genesis (x. 27). On Sept, n he set out with thirteen camel loads (the Life prefixed to the four-volume edition says seven¬ teen). Two days after leaving Mocha, he was found dead at Taas, supposed to have been poisoned by the Imam. The reports of his death were collected by Dr. Aykin and Mr. Forbes, agent of the H.E.I. Company at Mocha. Mr. J. Bird, recounting his coasting-journey along Southern Arabia in 1833 (R. G. Soc. iv. of 1834), heard that Seetzen had been murdered by order of the father of the then reigning Imam. The worthy successor of Niebuhr could never persuade Moslems that he was one of themselves, and Buckingham blamed him for travelling with so large a number of camels. * Ulrich Jasper Seetzen’s Reisen Lurch Syrien , Paldstina , Pho- niceen , die Transjordan- Lander, Arabia Petrcea und unter-Egyptien. Herausgeben und commentirt von Professor Dr. Fr. Kruse in verbindung mit Prof. Dr. Heinrichs, Dr. G. Fr. Hermann Muller, etc. 4 vols. 4to. Berlin, 1854 : G. Reimer. The copy in the K. K. Universitat Bibliothek (Vienna) was kindly forwarded to me at Trieste, at the instance of my friend Prof. Leo RETURN FROM THE WHITE MOUNTAIN 289 Hence we are not astonished to find a popular work on Arabia asserting that the hopes of the scientific world were disappointed by his premature death at Akaba (supposed by poison). But North-Western Arabia is more accessible to travellers than El-Hejaz or Yemen ; and modern botanists have been able to add something to Seetzen’s store. Of especial value to those who would study the flora of Arabia Petraea are two papers, which appeared in the Journal of the Pro¬ ceedings of the Linnean Society .* One is on the “Vegetation of the Western and Southern Shores of the Dead Sea,” by B. T. Lowrie, M.R.C.S. Eng., read April 6th, 1865 : it treats of the Ghor or Jordan Valley, botanically the least-known section of Palestine before the author’s visit in January, 1864. The other, which comes even nearer, is the “ Notes on the Fflora of the Desert of Sinai,” by Richard Milne Redhead, Esq., F.L.S. and R.G.S. As we have seen, all the older classical authors, who have described the Nabathaean country round the head of the Akabah Gulf, concur in making Reinisch, the Egyptologist. A short correspondence between Seetzen and his old patron M. de Zach, of Saxe-Gotha, was trans¬ lated and printed in 1810 by the Palestine Association. Mr. Keith Johnston obliged me by copying from Ritter’s Erdkunde (West Asien, p. 74, dritte Buch, zwolfte Theil) the pages con¬ taining Seetzen’s “ Reise durch Yemen in J. 1810, von 28 May bis mitte August” u 290 THE GOLD-MINES OF MIDI AN. it a land of exuberant gramineous vegetation. It is difficult to believe that here imagination did not play a great part, when we stand in presence of the bare peaks of small-grained gray granite ; of ruddy syenite and mica-schist ; of the rounded heads of hard and homogeneous red porphyry, apparently fire -baked argile ; of greenstone and greenstone- slates, often a misnomer, for much of it is coal-black ; of quartz hills, dingy outside, but of brilliant and dazzling white where fractured ; of chloride slates and sands ; and of the sterile and ghastly sub-ranges, chalk, gypsum, and selenite, which cannot bear a blade of grass. But about Bir-el-Seba (Beersheba) the fertility of the country rapidly increases, and with it the variety of the flora, whilst one march north of it opens a vast undulating plain of rich thick pas¬ tures, brilliant with the scarlet Ranunculus and Adonis (Redhead). Possibly this luxuriant tract may, two thousand years ago, have been pro¬ longed to the southwards. That great changes for the worse have taken place in the Sinaitic Peninsula, and in the Negeb, or South Country, we know from the expeditions of Messrs. Tyrwhitt- Drake and Palmer, who found undoubted traces of rich pas¬ turages of watered ground and of human habitation, where all is now a howling waste.* Moreover, the * The “ Desert of the Exodus ” (p. 25) ; also “ The Literary RETURN FROM THE WHITE MOUNTAIN 291 custom of supplying Egypt with charcoal,* as the Land of Midian has done for many generations, favours the growth of Desert : in many places we found only stumps and torn branches where the largest trees had been. The affinities of the Midianite vegetation gene¬ rally are with those of the Sahara and of Northern Africa, especially the Desert-growths of Upper Egypt and Nubia. Dr. Lowne also remarked the same of the flora of the delta-like flat extending from the mouths of the Wadies Zuwayrah and Mahawat to the shore of the Dead Sea. He found it, “by com¬ parison with the collection from Sinai deposited by Major McDonald (Macdonald) in the Kew Herba¬ rium, precisely similar to that of Arabia Petraea.” Dr. de Marchesetti observes that the “ Sahara flora” in my little collection is not pure ; the mixed type reveals the influences of the Desert-steppes on one side, and on the other of the neighbouring Mediter¬ ranean, whose immigrants would easily find their way down the Wady el-Arabah from the Dead Sea to the Gulf of El-Akabah. Remains of the late Charles F. Tyrwhitt-Drake, F.R.G.S.,” by Walter Besant, M.A. London: Bentley, 1877 (p. 239). * When the mines are to be worked, the first step will be positively to forbid this injurious form of industry. The Sinaitic diggings and the immense smelting operations under the Pharaohs, whilst proving that the Peninsula had a plentiful vegetation, and, consequently, a more copious rainfall, must have been perma¬ nently destructive to tlie country. 292 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. The peculiarity of the part of Midian visited by the Khedivial Expedition is the importance of the Wadies, true Oases which are supplied with perennial springs. Three of these, not including the dried-up Wady Tiryam, were found within a space of thirty- five direct geographical miles ; and they would exert an important effect upon the barren lands lying between them. As in the adjoining Sinai, the notable growth of the valleys is the date, which, being com¬ pletely neglected, gives a poor fruit A The groves (. Nawakhilali ) have a most picturesque appear¬ ance ; the untrimmed fronds form a regular circle around the head, quite unlike the trimmed broom¬ like deformity of civilisation. The Daum-trees showed neither flower nor fruit to determine whether they belonged to the Hyphcene Thebaica or to the H. Cristata , the latter, according to Von Wrede, found in Hadramaut. Sprenger (60-61 and 20), notices the Bdellium placed by Dioscorides about Madyan : the Daum is also called in parts of Arabia “ Nakhl el-Mukl,” Persice Darakht-i-Mukl, or palm- tree of the gum-mukl ; and the latter he identifies with the Bdellium of Genesis.j * I have read in books of (but I never saw them) date-kernels soaked in water till they became soft, and given to cattle instead of barley. t See chap. ii. 11-12 : “And the name of the first is Pison (Wady Baysh ?) : that is it which encompasseth the whole land of Havilah (El-Khaulan ?) where there is gold. And the gold RETURN FROM THE WHITE MOUNTAIN 293 These palms shelter luxuriant and impenetrable thickets of reeds ( Arundo donax) and rushes ( Scirpus holoschcznus ), with Salvolas, Senecio, S inapis, Resede, Veronica, and a bitter Nasturtium * ( Officinale ), growing near the water upon grounds encrusted with a white efflorescence, apparently salt and sulphur. The curious and grotesque Asclepias ( Calotropis procerct),\ a large shrub with oval dark- green leaves, woolly underneath, was found only in the Wady Makna, springing from the sands beyond reach of the rill. The same was the case with the Zizyphus, whose dried and shrunken flesh contains a single round hard stone. Mr. Redhead compares it of that land is good : there is bdellium (bdolach), and the onyx-stone (Eben ha-Shoham).” This resin is called by the Greeks Bolchon and Madelion (Dioscorides) ; by the Latins, Brochon, Maldachon, and Malachum (Pliny) ; and Sprenger explains the latter word by a transposition of the two last con¬ sonants, “Mk 1 ” corrupted to “Ml k.” For the various kinds of gum, Arabian and Indian, Bactrian, Scythian (Indo-Scythian from Sind?), and Jewish, the reader is referred to Sprenger’s learned work. Marvellous to relate, Dr. Beke ( Origines Biblicce , p. 53) approves of Diodati’s version, which renders Bdolach “pearls.” The onyx was supposed by the ancients to be the peculiar produce of Arabia (Pliny xxxvi. 12); and the Greeks probably translated the word from the Arabic Zofr (Plur Azfar), which also means a nail or claw. Onyxes, used for knife-handles, etc., are still found in many parts of Arabia, including Khaulan (Havilah?). A specimen of a worked carnelian was brought to me at Wady Tiryam ; the upper edge has been pierced, and it has evidently served as a talisman. * The Arabs call it El-Narrah, “ the hot (plant).” t Like the Salvadora Persica, it is supposed to be an Indian plant, yet both are equally common in Upper Egypt and Nubia. 294 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN with a Siberian crab, and he found the “ reddish orange fruit very pleasant to the taste.” From the rocks near all the Wadies we collected a fine Runex ( Vesicarius ?) “ with large membranous, shiny seeds, and foliage in appearance and flavour like the Oxyria, excellent as a salad ” (Redhead). The chief arboreal vegetation of the dry Wadies and of the adjacent plains are the acacias, some of them dwarfed to small shrubs. The common species are the Sunt or Sont (. Acacia Nilotica), Athl and Talh (A. Fortilis or Gummifera ), which Burckhardt calls the “ gum-Arabic tree,” and which produces, says Wellsted, the “gumma Terrse;” the Samgh or Samur (Inga unguis ), and especially the Siyal (A. Seyctl ), whose trunk affords the best charcoal, while its bark yields the best tannin. The latter is supposed to be the chittim-wood of the Torah (Exod. xxv.) and the traditional “ Burning Bush.” * The bole is reddish, the tender shoots are used as forage, and the long grey spines are disposed in twos. Upon our line of march we nowhere saw the * The Koran (chap, vii.) has not improved upon the Biblical accounts of this Thauma. As Moses was returning with his pregnant wife and his family to Egypt, he saw a bush on fire, and going to fetch a brand for domestic purposes, he found it green ; while a voice cried unto him, “ Blessed be he who is in the fire, and whoever is about it,” etc. The Greeks always depict the Virgin and Child in the centre of the flame, their theory being that the mystery typified by the marvel was the maidenhood of the mother. RETURN FROM THE WHITE MOUNTAIN 295 Butm, or terebinth ( Pistacia terebinthus ), nor the prickly oak ( Quercus pseudo conifer a) * so common N further north, nor the fruit-trees and the Difu (oleander) with their beautiful rosy bloom. The Athil and Tarfa ( Tamarix Orientalis), the hardy growths which extend from the tropics to Dover- court in Essex, were mostly single, rarely forming thickets. As a rule, they are cut down when young, and the hard wood is used for boat-knees, camel- saddles, and similar small articles. We remarked the straggling and spiny Bala¬ nitis Aigyptiaca, the Arab Yakkum, or “ Tree of Jehannum.” It bears a “fruit in size, form, and colour resembling a large unripe plum ; and it yields the straight yellow wands and walking-sticks of * The Elah (terebinth) and Allon (oak) of the Jews, both generically derived from El (Allah). The latter is one of the difficult roots in the Hebrew tongue : applied to trees, it seems to have arisen from their strength or their overshadowing and pro¬ tecting power. The plurals Elim (masculine) and Eloth or Elath (fem.) signify palms, dates etc. ; and the learned Vice-Rabbi Tedeschi, of Trieste, remarks that both the Scriptures and the Talmud seem to have noticed the difference of sexes in vegeta- tation. He gives the derivations as follows : El-force, power ; Elohim=the ensemble of forces : Ela’, oak, terebinth, or other large tree; with plur. Elim, Eloth and Elath (masc. and fem.), Elon and Allon, an oak grove ; plur. Allonim : Alla (plur. Alloth), the reduplication denoting increment, formerly translated an oak, now a terebinth, and supposed to be derived from some kindred dialect. Brugsch Bey denies that Elim (masc. plur.) means “palms.” He would place the Mosaitic station Elim , or Aa-lim, at Hero- opolis, near Suez, and translate the word “ Fisch-stadt.” 296 THE GOLD-MINES OF MIDI AN. 1 balsam wood/ upon which the wood-turners of Jerusalem cut the word Jordan in Hebrew” (Red¬ head). The Re tern, or broom (. Ratama , or Spartium mono-spermum ), the supposed “Juniper” of the English version, was also common. Caper-bushes [Capparis spinoso ), the x\rab’s Asaf or Lasaf, with fleshy leaves in bright green tufts, hang from the rock-clefts ; the Ardk, another Capparisdea, shows bunches of fruit like currants ; and the Salvadora ( Persica ) is common as in Sind. Amongst the families principally represented in the collection, appear the Composite e and the Crucifercz ; several species of Crepis, Erigerum, Picridium , Senecio, and Pulicaricz , with Brassica and Malcolmice both greedily devoured by camels. The Graminece are represented by the Aristida [ plumosa ) and the Pennisetum (Cenchroides), which extend from the Canaries to the Panjab ; and in the less arid places are found the grassy tufts of Andropogon and paneck-grass ( Panicum ). Then follow the Leguminosce , the Labiates , the Antiri- chince and the Borraginece , the latter flourishing high up the mountains. The Egyptian plants which have extended eastward are the thistle-like Centauria ( AEgyptiana ) ; the edible Salsola [Echinus) ; the Malcolmia [Arenaria) ; the Trigonella [hamosa) ; the Parietaria [Alsincefolia) ; the Medicago [helix) with its curious snail-like legume, the Picris [pilosa )} RETURN FROM THE WHITE MOUNTAIN. 297 the Croton (oblongifolium) , and others of lesser i m port. The following are the growths belonging to the flora Mediterranea and to the plains of Pales¬ tine, which have pushed their way south and south¬ west as far as the Nile-Valley: the blue-berried Solanum nigrum ; the Solanum coagulans with purple flowers like the potato, and yellow fruit by some identified with the “Apple of Sodom ; ”, Picridium ( tingitcenum ) ; Heliotropium ( luteum ) ; Antirrhinum ( Orontium) ; Lycium (. Europceum ) ; Trifolium ( Stella - turn ) ; Salvia ( Claudistina ) ; Asphodelus (fistulosus ) and the Geranium, the Storchschnabel of the Germans. The lower grounds with saline bottoms sup¬ port the plants which are found upon the littoral dunes of Suez and Palusium, and which form a vast band around the shores of Egypt and Cyreniaca : Suseda * ( fruticosa) ; Salsola {Sodcs) ; Saliconica {fruticosa), a drooping shrub, olive-green and reddish ; Zygophyllum (< desertorimi ), Scripus {holoschcznus). Dr. de Marchesetti was much pleased to recognise old friends which he had collected at Aden and on the mountains at the mouth of Bab el-Mandeb : Statice primrosa (rough and coarse) ; Reseda Amblyocarpa (here very common as in the Ghor and the Aden * Forskal made the Suseda a distinct genus : several species of this plant supply an alkaline salt, which serves as soap. 298 THE GOLD MINES OF MID IAN. Crater) ; Zygophyllum simplex , Fagonia Cretica ( Sinaica , Boiss.) ; Qeome ( ' droserifolia and trinervia) Aeluropus Arabicus ; the Arua ( javanica ), also frequent in Aden and India ; the Cucumis pro - phetarum , and others. Senna ( Cassia Sennet) was common as in most parts of Arabia, and some of the best is said to grow in the neighbourhood of El-Arish : another favourite medicinal plant is the Euphorbia. We missed the oleanders ( Nerium odorum ), the laurel rose, the nosegay of St. Joseph, whose lovely pink blossoms are the pride of the Syrian Valley; we did not remark the Sabr (“ patience-plant)/’ or Aloe, so common in the South ; and apparently the Balisan, or Balm of Meccah, does not now extend so far north A * “Pilgrimage,” iii. 138. This “balm of Gilead” is said to have been grown in the Jordan Valley, “where kings warred for what is now a weed.” CHAPTER XI. THE CRUISE DOWN SOUTH ; SULPHUR AND TURQUOISES : NOTES ON FISHES AND SHELLS. At El-Muwayldh we re-embarked on board the Sinndr , whose good Captain received us with a hearty welcome, and on the same day we proceeded south, to inspect a “ mountain of Sulphur,” and a turquoise mine of which we had heard from the Bedawin and from the “ wall-jumpers.”* After an hour-and-a-halfs steaming, we cast anchor in the Sharm J ibbah,*j* about eight miles beyond the Sharm Yahar. Running from west due east, with a clear channel of seventeen to fifteen fathoms, it is a close bight, hammer-headed as usual, the entrance being the handle ; and it is distinguished by a remarkable * Nuttat El-Hayt, jumpers or climbers of walls, is the offen¬ sive term applied to villagers generally, and especially to the Hutaym, the Huwaytat and other tribes not Bedawi pur sang. f So the people pronounce it. Captain Ali Bey Shukri writes the word J ubah ; and the Hydrographic Chart, which gives a plan, calls it “ Sherm Joobbah.,, 3°° THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN cavern in the cliffs of crumbling sandstone which form the southern sea-wall. The knob known to the people as “Tuwayyil el-Kibrft ” appears, when seen from the sea, a tolerably regular pyramid, with a dwarf yellow cliff, like a notch or cornice, near the western apex : its site is the northern flank of the Wady Madsus, the sister formation to the south being Wady Jibbah. The Egyptian officers landed, and after a quarter- of-an-hour’s walk, reached the foot of the hillock, whence they brought back specimens from the several altitudes. They found the prevalent forma¬ tion to be carbonate of lime. The sulphur was made evident by the colour and odour when washed, but we had neither rods to bore with nor retorts to ascertain its proportions. The Wild Men have not learned to extract it ; and they import their gunpowder from Egypt. As may be imagined, this well-adulterated stuff has, « like the home-made, little strength ; and no present is more welcome to a Bedawi than a pound or two of good English “ bariit.” Experience of brim¬ stone in Iceland has taught me to suspend opinion of the “ Long-little Sulphur (Hill) ” till drills are sunk from twenty to forty feet deep. Our return on board was feted by a sailors’ “Fantasia,” a genuine survival of the old Canopic fun, which formed a farcical contrast with the grave THE CRUISE DOWN SOUTH 3QI dry humour displayed on the deck of an English ship of war. All the dramatis persona were men from Lower Egypt. One of them .made a tolerably pretty girl, who walked with the true Trieste wriggle, and who danced mincingly Almeh-fashion : she was waited upon by the chief-buffoon, Kara-gyuz,* a short, squat fellow in an impossible costume, inclu¬ ding the tail. Ali, who thus represented the clown, had served in that capacity at Alexandria, and his low bow with the wave of the two arms that followed each tumbling-feat smacked of high civilisation. He had fallen out and fought with his brethren of the circus, the punishment being condign enlisting. It is related that the Captain once hung him by the heels for an hour without the least prejudice to his health or his good humour. Next came the Kazi, in a tremendous white beard, a huge turban, and a broom-stick by way of staff. Of course, he thrashed everybody, and he kissed the pretty girl with his mumbling jaws in every corner. The Arnaut (Albanian), with a peaked and horizontal mustachio, big as a Bologna sausage ; a weapon-stuffed waist-shawl that dwarfed the divine’s head-gear ; perpetually using his stick upon his servant after shouting “YaVeletL’f and * See my “ Pilgrimage,” 1-118 ; and Lane, 11-19. f The Ya Walad ! (O boy ! ). Walad is the origin of our “valet;” and certain French travellers in the East have coined un yavalet , by which we are to understand a little foot-page. 3°2 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID/AN calling all his Moslem brethren by most oppro¬ brious names, such as “ Karata” and “ Mu’arras,” was carried in by two men, mounted upon one of our camel-saddles. He was married by the Kazi with due ceremony to the pretty girl ; both were publicly placed upon the nuptial couch, and the mode of awaking the bridegroom next morning was, to say the least of it, peculiarly striking. Perhaps the spectator who most enjoyed the sport was the Mullah Effendi, the Aumonier or Chaplain of the corvette, a good-humoured, portly Cairene, who enjoys a cigar, sleeps upon the quarter¬ deck sofa, delivers the Azdn or prayer-call from the bridge, and acts Imam (fugleman) to the rare-pious amongst the Faithful. The next was the venerable Haji Wali, who has acquired the habit of saying, when told it is the hour for devotions, “ Kaman Shuwayy ” — “ Wait a bit ! ” I confess that the play was very “ shocking ; ” and that my sides ached with laughter. On the following day we proceeded in the cor¬ vette to examine a turquoise-mine, concerning which we had heard many details from Shaykh Ayd Alayan of the Tugaygat clan. I had also seen a bright-blue “ Fayruz” from these diggings set in the stock of a Bedawi matchlock, and notched across to resemble a screw, d hough exposed to wear and THE CRUISE DOWN SOUTH 3°3 weather for some fifty years, it had lost nothing of its colour. In fact, it was pure silicate of copper, which is not affected by oxygen and other acids ; whereas the carbonates of copper speedily change to sub-carbonatis, and break out in green spots. This is almost always the case, although there are some notable exceptions, with the yield of the Sinaitic mines, first worked by the Egyptians * and last by the unfortunate Major Macdonald. Once the handsomest man in the British Army, the hospitable “ King of Sinai ” utterly ruined himself, and died in poverty at Suez. His Egyptian servants, whom he trusted, plundered him to the last ; and, despite long inquiries, I could never discover what became of his great find, a perfect stone about the size of a hen’s egg. There are beliefs connected with turquoises ; and I know a lady who would have spent a small fortune in securing this prize. Steaming under the shadow of the tremendous Jebel el-Sharr,j which hardly altered its shape as * One of the hieroglyphic inscriptions in Sinai mentions the “ Goddess Hathor (or Athor), Mistress of the Land of the Turquoises;” and another in the Wady Mukattab names the “ Goddess of Copper.” The Arabs still fumble in the old mines, and of late some good bargains have been made at Cairo. f I have explained the word, which is an active participle from Sharr, exposing (e.g., to dry), and which Wallin is wrong to write Gabal (Jebel) Shar (Shar),. Berghaus gives, after his fashion, Djebel-Schaar, as if it were the “hair-mountain.” 3°4 THE GOLD MINES OF MID IAN. the corvette changed angle, we passed the two points known as Ras Maharrash and Abu Shanrah; " and, after covering 14*30 sea tniles from Jibbah, and 22*30 from El-Muwaylah, we cast anchor at 9,10 a.m. off the Burj Ziba, the Deba of Niebuhr, which our charts write Zibber, probably upon the principle which converts “you” into “yer.”*j* The coast is here bluff with coralline cliffs, and from their base a narrow strip of sand extends to the pointed reefs and sharp-edged ledges, upon which the sea breaks even in calm weather : this wall rises abruptly from great depths, and hence the surf so much feared by the natives. All assured us that landing was im¬ possible. We moored the corvette fore and aft. The shallow bight is an “ Acathartus,” or Foul Bay, and the least wind from the south-west makes it dangerous. Indeed the description of Wellsted (ii. 183) is almost as frightful as those of Agatharkides and his copyists, Diodorus Siculus and Photius. There is an inner harbour, with a fortified well used by pilgrims ; but the water is too shallow for any * In the chart called Ras Maharash and Ras Abusharirah ; these naval surveyors always misspell when they can. ■f And (proh pudor!) an anchorage to the south, is written Mersa Zebaider (Zubaydeh); whilst that of El-Ghalafikah becomes “ Gulafugger.” And the worst part of these errors is that they become stumbling-blocks to students, being copied into serious works. See, for instance, Muller (Geog. Gr. Min.), p. 181, note. THE CRUISE DOWN SOUTH. 3°5 but the smallest native craft. This place, possibly the Hippos Vicus of Ptolemy, * is now a dependency of El-Muwaylah, occupied by the garrison some three or four years ago. The settlers have built a fair tower which flew its flag on our approach ; and the houses, though of the same homely kind, are better than those of the mother-town, which decidedly has seen better days. Outside the settlement, numbering some 300 souls, rise the black tents of the nomads, who do a considerable trade with the citizens, selling sheep and clarified butter, charcoal and mat-rushes. The sea is rich, as we saw by the troops of gulls and cormorants ; and the lads, paddling and occa¬ sionally upsetting their crank monoxyles, brought us excellent rock-cod and another fish, succulent eating, which somewhat resembled tunny. The baskets showed the quaintest shapes, and coats bright-coloured as the Coralline “ Gardens of the Sea.” Some were monsters all head, with tremen¬ dous gapes ; others showed mere lines like worms, and others again all body ; these appeared flat * I would place it here because there is no other fitting site. Sprenger (p. 24), confused by the calography of the maps, seems inclined to find “ Hippos ” in Dabbat (Lasttheir, Pford). Ziba would be the plural of Zaby, Capra Gazella (Forsk.) ; in the feminine Zabych =labitha = Dorcas : it is rarely used in compari¬ son with the words “’Ard,” the male, and “Ghezaleh,” the female Gazelle. Wellsted (p. 11-81) writes Sherm Dhoba. 3°6 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID I AN. (. Batistes and Chcetodons ), and those owned bird- shapes rather than fish-forms. Unicorns abounded : there were Scorpcenas and Acanthi, weaponed with dreadful spines ; and the Diodons ( hystrix , etc.) and Jetrodons ( Sceleratus , etc.) represented giant bladders clad in thorny coats of mail. All the hues of the peacock and the rainbow were there : purple and orange ; lake-green, emerald- green, and blue variegated green ; dark blue and cerulean blue ; blood-red and green and coral red ; citron and pink ; crimson with yellow fins ; silver- white and lamp-black, regularly marginated, banded, zebraed, ocellated, lined, cinctured or pointed with the purest gold. We seemed to be in the region of the Arabian Nights. We should not have been surprised to hear that the fish were the transformed citizens of the Horses village; the white being Moslems ; the red, Magians ; the blue, Christians ; and the yellow, Jews. It appeared quite natural to read, “ And lo ! there came forth a damsel of tall stature, smooth¬ cheeked, of perfect form, with eyes adorned with kohl, beautiful in countenance, and with heavy swelling lips ; wearing on her head a Kufiyeh- kerchief interwoven with blue silk ; with rings in her ears, and bracelets on her wrists, and rings set with precious jewels on her fingers, and in her hand was a rod of Indian cane: and she dipped THE CRUISE DOWN SOUTH. 3° 7 the end of the rod in the frying-pan and said ‘ 0, fish, are ye faithful to your covenant ? * ” * Despite the Khamsin, which was blowing heat and glare, the energetic Egyptian officers landed, and walked over the rough plain to the north, till they reached the Jebel Shekayk,f which is seven or eight hours’ march from El-Muwaylah. But un¬ fortunately the guides failed them ; the range, which looked from afar small and low, proved long and broad ; and nothing was brought from it but speci¬ mens of chloritic sandstone. Meanwhile we landed to inspect the place and to enjoy a bath in the creek, defended from sharks, and abounding in large jelly¬ fish, Medusae ( octostyla ), etc., which swam nimbly before us in all directions, while the crabs dipped and dived into their holes. Wady Ziba is the usual “gate,” apparently waterless, growing dorn-palms and thorn-trees instead of dates ; and the coast-line is composed of the normal coralline, based on hard conglomerate, and revetted with scatters of porphyry. Outside the “ Bab ” stands a walled building sur¬ rounding a well sunk by Sultan Selim for the benefit of pilgrims : this is probably the birket or reservoir mentioned in Burckhardt’s Itinerary. W e drank coffee with Haji Mohammed, the principal merchant, who supplied us with sheep ; * Lane, vol. i. pp. 100 and no. t Apparently the diminutive of Shukak, the Merops Apiaster, 3o8 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID/AN and we bought some curiosities found in the neigh¬ bourhood, and more likely to be the work of a civilised vicus than of the Wild Man. One was a truncated cone, pierced and polished, of granite resembling that of the Channel Islands, white and black, somewhat like a plover’s egg ; the other was one of those curious objects, a coin-weight of green glass, * similar to what is still made at Hebron, but bearing a Kufic inscription. Mr. R. S. Poole finds it = 6 1 grains (= i dinar), these glass weights being generally light ; he assures me that it differs from all in the large collection of the British Museum, and he reads it thus : that is, “ By command of the Imam (prases) El- Mahdi B’illah, Amir El-Muminfn.” My corre- * The vitrine discs stamped on one side were formerly held to be tokens or equivalents of coins : they have been accepted as weights since 1873, when my learned colleague, Mr. Edward T. Rogers, published his study in the Numismatic Chronicle. He holds that they were not made at Hebron or in Syria, where very few have been found ; that the head-quarters of the manufacture would be Egypt, and that they were the usual Arab imitations of the Byzantine system. The earliest dates, it is believed, from A.H. 96 = A.D. 711. THE CRUISE DOWN SOUTH 309 spondent has no doubt that this El-Mahdi is of the Fatimah Caliphs. The style suits his time better than the Abbdsahs ; moreover, the latter is styled El-Mahdi Mohammed. After we had left Ziba, and when, as often happens, it was too late, we heard of some ruins four hours to the south. The people call them U mm Amil ; and they are said to show houses, furnaces, and other appurtenances of an industrial establishment. The Governor of El-Muwaylah had spoken to us about them ; but he was vague upon the subject, and we could hardly learn from him whether the site, distant thirty miles, lay inland from / the Fort, or along the sea-board. Umm Amil was the most southerly of the mining-cities of Midian concerning which we could collect any notices, but that is no reason why others should not exist. Rtippell (p. 222) was told by a chief of the Huwaytdt at El-Muwayldh that two long marches to the east led to the Jebel-Maktub (written mountain), where ruins with inscriptions and figures (statues ?) abound. He was unable to visit the place, but he recommends the trip to his successors.* Wellsted (ii. 187) explored a ruined town about four hours in the interior from El-Wijh ; copied an in- * I did not see his excellent volume till after returning to Trieste. The eleven pages of this able naturalist (213-233) con¬ tain an immense amount of matter, but he apparently had no idea that he was visiting large mining establishments. 3IQ THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. scription in the Wady el-Moyah (p. 189) ; and, after walking some ten miles from the Fort, found the “ Buyut el-Nasara.” I hese remains were partly built of hewn stone, the house-walls measuring full six feet thick. The length was estimated at two miles, and they lay scattered at intervals in a rocky valley with a general north-eastern direction. Two hills projected across the hollow, leaving a narrow central defile ; and on either brow were traces of small forts, probably like those which we saw at Makna and Sharma. Again, about seventy-five miles further south, in N. lat. 25°, near El-Hawara (Leuke-Kome ?), also called Daya El-Ishrfn, because it is the twen¬ tieth station on the Hajj-road, he heard (ii. 195) of buildings and columns which his short stay did not permit him to examine. Thus, we have notices of former civilisation between Jebel Tayyibat Ism (N. lat. 28 30) and Hawara, fronting Hassani Island, in N. Lat. 25 =210 direct geographical miles. As an Italian writer remarks, the squalid sterility that reigns on the rough borders of the Red Sea contrasts stiangely with the life abounding in its waters , the latter being, unlike the land, the very image of fecundity. The sun, which parches and scorches the shores, bespreads its bottoms with luxuriant and many-coloured algse 5 favours the marvellous stony vegetation of the polypes ; and THE CRUISE DOWN SOUTH. breeds an infinite variety of being — endless shoals of fish; crustaceae of a thousand shapes; strange annelids, elegant echinoderms, and molluscs whose beautiful shells form the delight of collectors. For the ichthyology of the Red Sea we are, as usual, driven to Forskal, who described 114 species with more care than he applied to his molluscs ; named 56 which were observed at Smyrna, in Con¬ stantinople, and the Arabian waters ; and published a catalogue of the fish of Malta, communicated to him by a learned physician. His most numerous genera are the Sciaenae or Maigre family (25 species); the Chaetodons (15) ; the Icarus or parrot-fish, novum genus (10) ; the Scomber (10) ; the Labrus (9), and the Perea (8). It is needless to say that many of these have been otherwise distributed by his suc¬ cessors. The most useful part to travellers is the addition of the Arabic names : unfortunately, the illustrations are few; the Chaetodon Teira (Platax Teira, Klunz) in Tab. xxii. and the Chaetodon Unicornis (Tab. xxiii). • A valuable Synopsis der Fische des rot hen Meeres * * Verhcindlungen des K. K Zoologisch-botanischen Gesellschafi in Wien . I. Theil : Percoiden-Mugiloiden (xx. Band, iv. Haft, pp. 669-834, Jahrgang 1870); II. Theil. Schluss (xxi. Band, i. und ii. Haft, pp. 441-688, Jahrgang 1871) ; und III. Theil: Systematische Uebersicht der Fische des rothen Meeres (xxi. Band, iii. und iv. Heft, pp. 1352-1368, Jahrgang 1871). Dr. Klemsinger is, I hear, em¬ ployed in sketching the natural history and geology of Upper Egypt for Messrs. Blackie & Co. 312 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN has been published by the Austrian doctor, C. B. Klemsinger, M.D., a sanitary officer, stationed four years at El-Kusayr (Cosseir), where I believe he is still serving."^ 4 His especial object was not to describe new species ( arten ), of which, before November, 1870, he had observed some fifty; but to determine by sharper lines the specific differences which, in the extensive labours of his predecessors,')’ had not satisfied him. For this purpose he had observed live, or at least fresh, specimens numbering 400 species, or three-quarters of the total number known in these seas ; and on returning to Europe he was assisted in his task by studying various collec¬ tions at Stuttgart, Frankfort-on-the-Main, and Berlin. In his preliminary observations (part i. p. 671) he carefully lays down what he considers to be the characteristic of species. The system which he adopts is that of Joh. Muller, with modifications by Gunther and Bleeker ; J and he accepts the nomen- In the Austrian Meteorological Journal ’ June 15th, 1877, Dr. Klemsinger gave a summary of one year’s observations on the climate of the Red Sea. t The faunists whom he quotes are Forskal, Bloch, Russell, Lacepede, Quoy and Gaimard, Cuvier and Valenciennes, Ehrenberg, Ruppell and Leuchkart ( Symbol* Physical , 1828), Cantor, Bennet’ Richardson, Schlegel, Bleeker, Peters, Gunther, Kner, and Playfair. t (Theil III.) The divisions are Sub-class i, Teleostei (Joh. Muller); Order I. Acanthopteri (Muller) ; II. Anacanthini (do.); Order III. Physostomi (do.) ; Order IV. Plectognathi (Cuv.) ; and Order V. Lophobranchii (Cuv.) ; Sub-class 2, Chondropterygii (Gunther) ; and Order I. Plagiostomi. THE CRUISE DOWN SOUTH 3*3 clature* proposed by the Report of the Committee (British Association, Von Strickland, Sillimans Journal ’ July, 1869), ending family names with videi, and sub-families with ini. He supplies in the Latin alphabet the Arabic names of fishes cur¬ rent at El-Kusayr; and as he gives no illustrations, it is to be hoped that when his valuable labours are brought to a close, he will reprint the papers in a de¬ tached form, with all the honours which they deserve. The Malacology of the Red Sea, and especially of the Suez Gulf,*)* has been treated by Signor Arturo Issel ( Malacologia del Mar Rosso, etc. Pisa : Biblioteca Malacologica, 1869), who visited the Isthmus of Suez in 1865, and whose interesting volume describes 100 species as new. From the Gulf of El-Akabah we have 120 species, and from Suez 21, or a total of 141 species, described by the Marquis G. M. Arconati ; J and the compari- * The terminology is truly distressing. For instance, the Percalineata of Forskal is the Perea Arabica of Linnaeus, and the Centropomus Arabicus of Lacepede. The Cheilodipterus Arabicus of Cuvier is the Cheilolineatus of Riippell, Giinther, Playfair, and Klunz. This is only a specimen taken at random, and not chosen. It is to be regretted that the popular European names, like “ rock- cod,” are not added to Klemsingers fine work. f It is curious to note with Vaillant ( Recherches , etc., Joum. de Conch., 1865, p. 97) that the shells of the Suez Gulf, instead of showing the vivid and beautiful colours which distinguish the same species in other places, rather remind one of the “ chlorotic representations of a tropical fauna.” | A list of the shells found on the shores of the Gulf of El- Akabah (March 11-13, 1864) is given by Mr. R. M. Redhead, 1 3i4 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN son is interesting-, because, of these 120, as many as 15 genera were not found in the Suez Gulf, though existing in the Southern Seas, while only 39 species are common to both. It has also caused surprise that whilst there was no solution of con¬ tinuity between the Mediterraneo- Adriatic * and the Red Sea in pleiocenic and meiocenic or post- pleiocenic days, the fauna of the two was entirely distinct, with the exception of the few species which crossed the strait. Herr Fischer, one of the two Directors of the Conchological Journal , in opposi¬ tion to the opinions of Cazalis de Fondouce, of Professor de Philippi, and of Woodward (Manuel), wrote il n exist e aucune coquille commune a la Mer Rouge et a la Mediterande. But a more careful examination enabled Signor Issel to detect seven living species common to both, namely, Cyprsea [Annulus and Moneta) ; Nassa ( Costulata ) ; Cri- theum [scabrum) ; Solecurtus [Strigilatus) ; Donax (i irunculus ) ; and Area (lactea). At the same time he notes certain differences in the typical forms, possibly the result of many ages of separation, which pro- (/oc. c/t.), with great diffidence as to the complete accuracy of the species named. P. Forskal (1775) aEo offers {Desert Animal. pp. xxx.-xxxiv.) a catalogue of land, river, and (Red) sea-shells, including eighteen of the latter. According to Signor Issel, the Mediterranean was zoologically dependent upon the Erythraean Sea, and, consequently, upon the Indian Ocean ; in later geological periods it became, what it is now, tributary to the Atlantic. THE CRUISE DOWN SOUTH 3i5 duced at first equivalent varieties and, subsequently, equivalent species/'’' According to him, a mollusc living at Port Sa’id, and its equivalent at Suez, are the two forms derived from a single stips, alive or ex¬ tinct ; and from a type existing in a given place can proceed equivalent species and varieties, if the locality has undergone changes more or less radical ; whilst geographical species and varieties result only from the diffusion of the same type to great distances, where the new media gradually evolve new charac¬ teristics. The lovely coral-fields of the northern Red Sea are described and figured in colour and perspective .by Eugen Baron Ransonnet.f One of his drawings represents an aquarium-like coral-group in the harbour of Tor. It is an oasis containing some twenty-one objects, especially the large dome-shaped Careophyllina ; the rounded Meandrinae ; the Polypi ( Alcyonia and nephthya) ; the rosy-red Seriatopora ; a Scutella ( Raghif el-Bahr ), prickly like the urchin ; the representative Madrepora ( porites ), ochre-yellow * Of these equivalents in the Mediterranean and the Red Sea, our author gives (pp. 39-40) thirty instances. All were collected at Suez. f Reise von Kairo nach Tor, zu den Korallenbanken des rothen Meeres. Verhandlung des K. K. Zoologisch-botanischen Gesell- schaft in Wien (pp. 163-188, Jahrbuch 1863, xiii. Band. Brau- miiller). 3l6 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN and carmine, or round and rosy ; the leathery Spongia ( retifera ) ; the fan-shaped Padina ( pavonio ) ; the conus-shell which furrows the sand ; the regular globes of the Favosites, one of the cacti of the sea ; the sponge-like Madrepora ( conglomerata ) ; the purple-red “ organ-coral ” ( Tubipora musica) ; the fan-shaped Millepora ( complcinata ) which burns the skin ; and the leaf-like Monticularia. The higher life is represented by the hermit- crab ( Pagurus bernardus ), the small Blennius, the coffee-fish, and the shark. The Baron’s other illus¬ tration shows the section of a big coral-bank near the entrance of Tor, containing a large and rare Monticulari ; two Heteroporas growing like a stalk of erica ; a mushroom-shaped Alcyonium ; and the branchy Sertularia, haunted by the bird-like Platax, and by the violet-ringed Medusa ( aurita ), the latter also belonging to the seas of Europe. CHAPTER XII. THE CRUISE NORTHWARDS TO MAKNA, CAPITAL OF MADYAN. On April 15th the Sinntir steamed out of Sherm Ziba and, passing El-Muwaylah, anchored for the night in a snug Khor (natural port), a kind of Sandy Hook, on the western flank of the circular Sinafir or Senafir Island.* The lumpy, low-lying, water- lacking rock, about 1 50 feet high, and utterly bare * The following is a synopsis of the identifications, by various writers, of the six islets which, beginning from the south, outlie the Midian shore : — 1. Silah, a mere coral-reef, is Sprenger’s Salydo (Agatharkides) and Muller’s Sela I. 2. Yubu’a (not Ye’ubah) is Sprenger’s Soukabua (Agath.), and Muller’s Isura (Plin.). 3. Barahkan (not Burrahghan), identified both by Sprenger and Muller with the “ Isidis Insula” (Agath.). 4. Shu’shu’a (not Abou Choucha) ; Muller’s Soukabua. 5. Sinafir, Miiller’s Salydo. 6. Jazfrat, or Jebel Tiran (not Tehran) ; the Iotabe of Pro¬ copius and Malchus ; Muller’s Dia (Agath. and Strabo) ; and Mannert’s “ Isle of Seals” (Agath.). All were visited in 1833 by Lieut. Wellsted (ii. 1 7 3 1 7 9)» but he does not name Umm Maksur (p. 173), the peninsula-island. THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. 3i8 of the trees with which the classics forested it, is the only feature which bears an Egyptian name ; possibly from “ Senofern, Pharaoh the Ameliorator (‘ who makes good ’), the twenty-fifth (?) and last King of the Third Dynasty ; the ‘ Conqueror of Stranger Peoples ’ who overran Mafkat-land (Sinai of the turquoises), and whose memorials may still be found in Wady Magharah and this suggests that it may be the Isis Isle of Agatharkides. A party landed in search of ruins, snakes, and guano, but found neither this, that, nor the other : Tfran, also, shows none of the huge and venomous reptiles with which the Arabs stock Sinafir. They brought back specimens of madrepores and coral¬ lines based upon decomposed granite, the general intrusive formation ; and especially the brilliant red- purple Tubipora (. Musica ), called by the Arabs Dam El-Akhwan, or “ Brothers Blood.” * Burckhardt has remarked that the coral of El-Akabah is mostly red, while the white prevails in the Suez Gulf. They found fragments of petrosilex and ruddy rock-salt in bits of agglutinated sandstone similarly coloured : this material is also supplied by Sinaitic Sherm el- Shaykh, and, as we shall presently see, by Wady Makna. * “ Brother’s Blood ” is also the popular Arab name of the mediaeval drug, known to Europe as “ Dragon’s Blood.” Forskal (Descrip. Anim. xxix.) writes, by a clerical error, “ Damm el-Akha- rayn.” CRUISE NORTHWARDS TO MAKNA'. 3i9 Long-spined echini and hermit-crabs ( paguri ) were observed in numbers : every “ flower of the sea ” seemed to lodge a tenant, and the latter had ample choice of quarters in the heaps that strewed the shore. Mr. J. Gwyn Jeffreys, to whom my few specimens were submitted, declared the shells to be interesting, although common, on account of the inhabitants. The plants proved to be those of the mainland. The fishermen were unusually successful, and we all enjoyed the excel¬ lent Tawm ( Perea Tauvina, Forsk. p. xi., and Serranus Tauvina , Klemsinger, i. 683). Next morning we set out, at 5.30 a.m., in a northerly wind which frequently fell calm, with a mar vecchio , the heave and wash of gales which had broken to the south. After steaming for an hour and a half we doubled the tall and grim Bird Isle (Ti'ran), conical above and queerly triangular below. We could hear nothing of the naphtha, which Wellsted declares (ii. 160) is produced abundantly enough to serve for “ paying ” Arab-boats. Then we found ourselves in the dangerous socte of El- Akabah. This Sinus intimus , the eastern fork of the Erythraean, has been cursorily treated by the earlier classical geographers. Dr. Beke declares (Orig. Bib. p. 185) that in the days of Herodotus, the Akabah Gulf was “ unknown to the Egyptians and, 32° THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN a fortiori, to the Jews resident in Egypt.” But, granting the ignorance of the “ Father of History, how could the subjects of the Pharaohs have ignored the feature, when there were large military estab¬ lishments and gangs of slaves working the mines of Sinai within sight of its waters ? Agatharkides and Diodorus, we have seen,* mention the Laianitic Gulf and its settlements; but they do not allude to the perils of its navigation, whilst dwelling upon those of tranquil Aynunah Bay. The same is the case with Strabo and Pliny; and for realistic descrip¬ tions we must wait till the days of the later Greek historians. Strabo (xvi. 2, §30) places Ailanaf or CElana (now Akabat-Ayla) “ on the innermost mychos (recess) of the Arabian Gulf. The latter feature has two forks : one, trending towards Arabia and Gaza [hod. Ghazzah), is called after its city Aila- nites ; % the other lies in the direction of Egypt, towards Heroopolis (the old town near Suez), to which Pelusium is the shortest road (between the two seas). Travelling is performed on camels through a desert and sandy country, where snakes * See chap. vii. f The translators Hamilton and Faulconer (Bohn, 1857) ex¬ plain “ Ailah” by Hale (for Haila), or by Acaba-Ila. + He repeats (chap. iv. § 4), “Ailana is a city on the other recess of the Arabian Gulf, which is called Ailanites, opposite to Gaza, as we have described it.” CRUISE NORTHWARDS TO MAKNA. 321 are found in great numbers.” He further observes (xvii. i, § 35) that Lower Egypt, and the lands as far as the Lake Sirbonis, were once sea ; and con¬ fluent, perhaps, with the Erythraean at Heroopolis, and with the Ailanitic recess of the (Arabian) Gulf.” This remark is right worthy of the nineteenth century. We now hold that the Suez Isthmus was under water during the inferior and the middle Tertiary periods ; that it rose wholly or in part, during the succeeding Pleiocene, when it produced large arboreous monocotyledons, many of them now petrified ; that it sank again in the post- Pleiocene ; and, finally, that it became what it is during the comparatively recent age, when the emersion of the great African Sahara determined, according to Desor, the end of the Glacial Epoch. * Pliny (v. 12) merely mentions the Heroopolitic and the CElanitic Gulfs. He speaks (vi. 32) of the “ inner recess ( Sinus intimus ), where dwell the Laeanitae, who named it ; also Agra,f their royal city, and, upon the Gulf, that of Laeana or, as others say, (Elena ; for which reason some writers have called it the HHanitic, and others vElenitic : Arte- midorus (in Strabo) has Alenitic, and Juba Laeanitic.” Ptolemy (v. 17, § 1) places the Elana Rome, here * Possibly it may be proved that the Wady El-Arabah has seen the same vicissitudes. t Sprenger (p. 139) derives the word from Hajar (pronounced by the Bedawin Hagar ), a town or village. 322 THE GOLD MINES OE MIDI AN meaning castellum as well as oppidum , in E. long. 65° 40', and in N. lat. 29° 15'. St. Jerome (ob. a.d. 420) adds that the ancients called it Ailath, and the moderns Aila. The LXX. has ’AtAaS, (in which the g — th) and AlXwv ; Procopius Allas, and Eusebius Elat and Elas. The Hebrew would be Ailath (Elath) or Ailoth (Eloth), meaning the “ palms ” or the “ terebinths,” and hence their name for the fork 1 “ Yamen Ailath ” ( rb'x d*).* In the later Greek historians we find excellent sketches of the Gulf. Procopius (nat. circ. a.d. 500) when describing Palestine in his Persian W ars (i. 19? § 2), thus notices the land “ on the east of the Red Sea, which extends from the Indus to the frontier of the Roman Empire.f On its eastern shore rises the city called ‘ Ailas,’ where the sea coming to an end, as has been related to me, contracts itself to a very narrow strait. To one thence sailing forth, J the mountains of the Egyptians are (visible) on his right, trending towards the south wind ; whilst on * Robinson (i. 253) gives full historical details concerning El-Akabah, the town, a subject which does not belong to these pages. t Here again we see the Erythraean or Red Sea including, after ancient fashion, the Persian Gulf. The mythical King Erythras was buried at Ogyris, which Sprenger (pp. 100, 101, and 120) identifies with the larger island of “Magyra” (Masirah), on our maps Mosera, between Ras Madrak and Ras El H add. + ’EvfleVSe € 67° OO' 23° 45' (True, 28° 24'.) Marjra / 'AyKaXrj ON 00 O M On 28° 45' (El-Hakl or Hagul on the coast.) MaSia/xa 68° 00' 28° 15' (Magharat Shu’ayb ?) Here the latitude of Makna agrees tolerably with the modern ruins of the same name : this is also the case with Ma8ta/xa, lying further east. “ Madyan ” is placed : — E. Long. N. Lat. By the Atwal . 55° 45' 290 00' „ Kanun . 56° 20' 290 00' „ Ibn Sa’id ... . 6i° 00' 27° 52' „ Rasm . 6i° 20' 2 9° 00' Thus in latitude we find a divergence of sixty-eight miles. CRUISE NORTHWARDS TO MAKNA. 331 the site of Midian, the capital. Josephus (Ant. ii. 12), in a passage before quoted, tells us that “ to the present day there is a village south of Akabah, on the Red Sea coast, called Midian;” and that this was the place to which Moses fled. Eusebius (sub voc.) and St. Jerome transfer it north to the river Arnon (Wady Mojib), south of Areopolis or Ar-Moab, the city of Moab, and affirm that the ruins were visible in their time.* The mediaeval Arab geographers have absolutely settled the question ; and we cannot suspect that in this case, as is the custom, they transferred the name of the capital to its chief port. Abulfeda (Table iv.) has these words, “ Madyan is in the beginning of the Third Climate, f and belongs to El-Hejaz. It is a ruined town on the shore of the Red Sea, and it contains the well where Moses watered the flocks of Shuayb.J Madyan primarily * Hence the “ Encyclopaedia Britannica ” (s.v. Madian) makes it a town of Arabia Petraea, near the Arnon, and remarks that St. Jerome speaks of another Midian or Madian, whose people were called Madianaei and Madianitaei, whilst the land was known as the Madianaea Regio. t The First Climate (nearest the Equator) would be distin¬ guished by Aden, the Second by Meccah, and the Third by Damascus. (See Muhammedi’s Alfragani Chron. et Astronom. Ele¬ ments M. Jacobus Christmannus, Frankfurti, 1590.) + Shu ayb, ’ corrupted by the Bedawin and the citizens of Madyan to Shaib, is synonymous with Jethro (Yetro, Arabic^ Gathar or Ghathar). The Rev. Mr. Badger boldly suggests that as Yahab’ Altaha is pronounced in Syria “ Yau Alaha ; ” so “Yetro ” 332 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN designated the tribe to which Shu’ayb belonged, and the word was presently extended to its habitat. We find the following reference in the Koran (surats vii. 83, might originally have been Yathrib (Jatrippa), the old name of El-Medinah. Jethro’s Moslem title is “ Khatib el-Anbiya,” or Preacher to the Prophets, on account of the words of wisdom which he bestowed upon his son-in-law (Exod. ii. 18), and which would be useful to many an unwise head of department in this our day. Some writers have made him the son of Mikhail, ibn Yashjar, ibn Madyan ; but they are charged with ignorance by Ahmed ibn Abd el-Halim. El-Kesai states that his original name was Boyun; that he was comely of person, but spare and lean; very thoughtful, and of few words (Sale’s Koran, p. 117)- Other commentators add that he was old and blind. In the “ Berakhoth,” Jetro and Rahab are Gentiles, or strangers, affiliated to Israel on account of their good deeds (p. 48, M. Schwab’s version. Paris : Imprimerie Nationale, 1871). As regards the wonder-working rod, Josephus (Ant. ii. 12) makes it a shepherd’s staff, which, thrown upon the ground, became a serpent, with head raised high as if in wrath : when taken up it recovered its original form. According to the Talmud (. Pirke Rabbi Eliezer Agadol ?), it was a wand set with jewels, which lay in the gardens of Jethro : the latter had often vainly attempted to uproot it with all his oxen; but Moses, pronouncing the sacred name, raised it at once. To my friend James Pincherle, of Trieste, I owe this quaint legend, which finds so many a parallel in Christian and Moslem thaumaturgy. The commentator Rushi (Exod. xvii. 6) makes the substance adamas or diamond (Sampirin or Sampirinon ) : his argument is that when the Lord ordered Moses to smite the rock in Horeb (Exod. xvii. 6), the words are not “ on the rock,” but “ in the rock ” (ba-tsur) ; thus showing that the rod was hard enough to break stones. Sampir may be the sappir or sapphire of which the Medrash says the Tables of the Law were made. Moslems declare the “ Asa” (rod) to have been the branch of a Paradisial myrtle-tree, bequeathed by Adam to Shu’ayb, and used by the latter to defend his cattle from wild beasts. CRUISE NORTHWARDS TO MAKNA . 333 and xi. 85), “And he sent unto Madyan their brother Shu’ayb.” The commentators add that Shu’ayb, though blind, was divinely commissioned to convert his fellows by preaching the True Faith revealed to Abraham. The Midianites, however, mocked him, and were destroyed by fire from heaven, whilst the land was wasted by an earthquake. Jethro alone escaped, fled to Palestine, and was buried near Safet.^ Abulfeda (chap, i.) again mentions Madyan town, and places it before Yambu’a, as the first passed by the traveller going south along the sea. His Solinus, or ape, El-Sipahi f ( ob . a.d. 1572), adds: “ El-Kanun says Tabuk is in the Barr (interior) oppo¬ site Madyan : I say that Tabuk is in the east and Madyan to the west/’ He also states, “Madyan is a ruined town on the Hejazi shore of the Red Sea, where the Gulf of Akabah has the breadth of only one mijra (= day’s run) ; opposite Tabuk, and distant about six days’ marching. It contains, in addition to a spring of water, that same well from which, in * His tomb is one of the objects of the grand tour in Syria. There is a Wady called after Shu’ayb in Mount Sinai; and a “ Sikkat Shu’ayb ” {Jethro’s road) near the mouth of the Wady El-Dayr. | In full El- AM cl- Fakir, Mohammed el-Shahir hi Ihn el-Sipahi (the slave, the pauper Mohammed, known as the “ Son of the soldier”). His geographical compendium, which is Abulfeda alphabetically ordered with a few additions and corrections,^ is named Amah el-Mesdlik ild Malar if at el-Bulddni w’ el-Mamdlik (Light for the road to a knowledge of cities and countries). 334 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID I AN former days, our Lord Musa gave drink to the flocks of Shu’ayb.” Ibn Said remarks that “ Front¬ ing the sea near Madyan, with a little northing, lies the town El-Kusayr (Cosseir) on the western (or African) shore.” In the Mardsid el-Ittilaa we find ( sub voc.) — “ The city of Madyan, say the Arabs, is the city of Shu’ayb ; and it lies opposite Tabiik, on the coast of the Bahr El-Kulzum (here, the Akabah Gulf) ; between them is a six days’ journey. It is larger than Tabuk, and in it is the well from which Moses watered the flocks of Shu’ayb.” All the Arabs of the present day, the settled as well as the nomad 'tribes, call the ruins indifferently Madyan and Makna. Ruppell (p. 221) supposes that the monks, for whom he finds a “ kloster,” taught the people that Makna was the old site of Midian city ; a tradition which he found still in vogue. Many modern geographers have grossly erred by confounding the M adm/ua of Ptolemy,* in N. lat. 28° 15', with his MocWa in N. lat. 270 45'. D’Anville (‘‘Compendium,” etc. London, 1810) says, “The position of Madian, called by Ptolemy (iv. 5) Modiana, not far from the sea, is known to the Arabs as Migar-el-Shuaib, or the grotto of Shuaib.” My late friend, F. Ayrton, caused further confusion * Chap. v. gives the Ptolemeian “ sites in Arabia Felix,” along shore from ’Oune (Aynunah) to Iambia (Yambu’a el-Nakhil). CRUISE NORTHWARDS TO MANNA ' 335 by writing and translating “ Mugheir-al-Sho’aeib, the Garden of Sho’aeib.” * Lastly, Mr. Forster, of the One Primeval Language, in an incorrect and uncalled-for book on the Geography of Arabia, declares (ii. 116) that “the Modfana of Ptolemy identifies itself with the Madian of Abu-l-Feda, and the Midian of Scripture, at the mid- coast (read southern fourth) of the Gulf of ’Akaba’.” The Magharat-Sha’fb (Shu’ayb) is, I have said,f the second return pilgrim-station on the section between El-Muwaylah and El-Akabah. From Aynunah the caravan -road winds a few miles along shore, and then, bending abruptly to the north-north¬ east, skirts the southern flanks of the great buttress called in the chart Jebel d ayyibat Ism. Travelling up the Wady Makna, the distance is seven hours by dromedary or ten by camel, about = twenty-five miles.J Deriving its name from a small cave, * “ Magharah ” is the Arab form of the Heb. “ Me’arah,” a cave or grot. I cannot see, when we denote the letter “ Ayn ” by a comma, why the hapless “ Oin ” should be perverted a discretion into an “ h,” an “ r,” and an “ ng”. t Chap. vi. gives a tabular list of the stations and their distances. + Wallin estimates the walk of a “ fast camel ” at five miles an hour, and he covered 260 miles in fifty-two hours ; this, however, is a pace that kills. Robinson (i. 545) gives 2\ stat. miles per hour for short distances, and for long 2\ ( = 2 geo g. miles). Sprenger makes the caravan march in three days, or thirty-three to thirty-six hours, twenty (direct?) geograph, leagues ( =i°) : he sensibly cautions travellers (p. 142) not to confound the Zeitstunde , 336 THE GOLD MINES OF MIDI AN originally a catacomb, where the Prophet, like the Apostle of Allah on Jebel el-Nur, used to retire for prayer and meditation, it is still visited by the pious ; and I have suggested (chap, v.) that its honours may derive from an older date. Rtippell, who gives an illustration (No. 8) of what he calls Maghayir Shu’ayb (Caverns of Jethro),'"' visited it on July nth, and found, to his surprise, water in places one foot deep by fifty paces broad. He calls the site Thai von Beden (of the ibex), possibly a corruption of the Bedawi name El-Bada’ ; while Wellsted (ii. 123) places Beden two and a half hours’ march from his “ Maharehi Sho’a'ib.” On the southern side of the valley the German traveller remarked ruin-heaps and a few column-shafts : the Catacombs, locally called “ Biban ” (doors) from their pylores and facades of smoothed rock, lay to the westward of these rem¬ nants, and consisted of square mortuary chambers cut in the sandstone. The resemblance to the Petra style of building suggests an old Nabati mining- town : what remained of it in Mohammed’s time was probably demolished during the succeeding wars.f Our nomad informants, who dwelt lovingly upon or hour of time, with the Wegstunde, or hour of road (the Schsenus, Farsakh or Parasang, numbering thirty-two to forty stadia or furlongs) ; the latter being about double the former. See chap. v. * The plural is an error. For the Maghayir Shu’ayb, another place, see Sprenger, p. 147. f Golius in Alfrag. p. 143. CRUISE NORTHWARDS TO MAKNA. 337 the, manifold beauties of the site, the palm-groves, and the purling spring, spoke of a mosque, and of ten to thirteen “houses of the Nasara,” ruined but still standing. Here, then, we have, evidently, the Ma^ia/ua of Ptolemy, probably a summer retreat for the wealthy citizens. It is hardly likely that a nation of traders, like the settled Midianites, would have placed their capital in an inland valley, when they had such a fine naval position as Makna. We landed (12.45 P-m.) at the old port of Midian, where the water was deep enough to carry a frigate within biscuit-throw of shore. The corvette, not liking the look of the place, stood over to the west of the Gulf, where, fifteen miles away from us, she obtained partial protection and unsafe quarters at the Sherm el-Dahab.* The “ Creek of Gold,” whence, by-the-by, fine specimens of pure haematite were brought, derives its name, according to local legend, from the gold of Ophir being there landed. Sulayman bin Daud was evidently a better botanist than a mineralogist, or he would not have sent ships on a three years’ voyage for a metal which lay at his threshold : but — “They didn’t know everything down in Judee.” * Such was our captain’s report, and he found fault with the chart for stating “good anchorage, safe from all winds,” when the cove is open to the dangerous Azyab, or south-easter. According to him, Abu Zatat, the creek to the south, is slightly better, and El-Nebiki, the southernmost on the western shore, is a little worse. z I 338 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN Sherm el-Dahab * is a hook at the mouth of the great Sinaitic valley, where Wady Tahmeh from the north anastomoses with Wady Nasb from the opposite direction. Thus it is easily connected with “ Hazeroth, whose gold is abundant.” f Wellsted (ii. 153), who lay at anchor here for several days, describes this “ only well-sheltered harbour in the (Akabat) Sea,” as “ nearly surrounded by a semi¬ circular belt of coal, on which the lapse of ages has deposited a thin layer of sand.” The rock-ridge, which, rising but a few inches above the wasser- spiegel , is covered by high water, shows at ebb-tide a broken line of vertebrae, “ which gave the name of Esiongeber or (giants) backbone.” J Hence he suspects the ledge of having broken the joint fleet, ten sail, of Jehoshaphat and Ahaziah, about b.c. 896 (2 Chron. xx. 37). But Asiun-geber (-Q3 rm Numb. 33-35), or “the giant’s shoulder- * The Sacra Bibbia di Vence calls the place Minat el-Dahab , or harbour of gold (vol. ii. p. 477, 5th edit., by Sig. Drach, illus¬ trated and annotated by Prof. Bartolomeo Catena, Milano, Stella, 1831). The “Gold-creek” was visited by Dr. Laborde and Linant in 1828. Beoche assures us that the epithet “golden” does not take its origin from a tradition that gold was formerly brought there, but from the mica glittering in its sand. Mica, however, appears everywhere in these regions. Wellsted also noted that “the teeth of two Ibices received on board were covered with a substance resembling gold ; ” and remembered that the same is the case with sheep in the Libanus (?). | See chap. ix. I There is still work to do at Sherm el-Dahab, where mounds stud the western side of the Scorpion’s tail-point. CRUISE NORTHWARDS TO MAKNA. 339 blade,” the old ship-building port, must be sought to the north,* “beside Eloth (El-Akabah) on the shore of the Red Sea, in the land of Edom.” Schu¬ bert would place it on the islet Kurayyah, a rock some 300 yards long. Dean Stanley (“ Sinai,” etc., p. 85), who identifies “ Elath ” with El-Akabah, opines that we have no means of fixing the posi¬ tion of Ezion-geber. The latter may be Robinson s Ayn el-Ghadyan , lying some ten miles up the Wady el-Arabah, where possibly the Gulf-head once extended. And now to describe the actualities of the ancient Midianitish capital, which once ruled the seaboard between El-Akabah and the frontier of El-El ejaz. Makna baylet opens westward; and is provided by nature with two coralline reefs, a northern and a southern, converging and forming rude moles. These breakwaters are covered by the * Hence we find in the Peutinger Tables : — 1. From Haila (Ela, El-Akabah) to Diana (Ghadyan, Ezion- geber, the letters in Arabic and Hebrew being the same), sixteen Roman miles (=14^ English). 2. From thence to Rasa (? to the north), sixteen Roman miles. 3. From thence to Gypsaria (Kontellet Garaiyeh, Palmer), six¬ teen Roman miles. Dr. Laborde and Linant ( Voyages de VArabie Petree , etc. Paris, 1830 ; and Commentaire Geog. sur VExode , etc.) place “Elath” on the north-west of the Gulf-head, near the mouth of the Wady El-Arabah ; and Ezion-Geber facing it, while they assign to “ Madian ” its present traditional site. 340 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN high tides, which here rise about six feet ; and at low water they show signs of a brilliant leek-green vegetation. Both bear signs of work ; and we agreed that nothing would be easier than to build upon these foundations a secure dock. Beyond the two piers are the “ gardens of the sea,” reefs of the strangest appearance. In misty weather such as the Azyab brings, they look like sheets of verdigrised copper, and long lines of the loveliest emerald-green alternate with stripes and patches of the deepest blue. The “ sands ” are mostly gravel-fragments of ruddy syenite, washed down by the Wady whose mouth is waterless at this season. Here stand two groups of Ushshash or date- frond huts, which may number 150, some uncovered, many of them roofed, and supplied with the usual verandahs of the same material. All are now empty and ragged because the tribes are in the interior; but, as the hot season advances, each will be “ tidied ” and occupied by its own family of Ichthyophagi. The “ tabernacles ” of “ cadjan,” mat, sometimes divided by screens in a poor attempt at a harem, contain only old hand-mills, grinding stones, rude hearths, the carapaces of fine turtle,* heaps of * Hereabouts, in a.d. 1615, Pietro della Valle saw “tortoises as large as the body of a carriage.” During two centuries and a half they have had time, like other things, to assume reasonable dimensions. CRUISE NORTHWARDS TO MAKNA. 34i cockle-shells, and the remnants of lobsters which are said to be excellent. The clump to the north of the Fiumara belongs to the Beni Ukbeh ; southwards are the Maknawi',* some forty or fifty families, the pauper descendants of the wealthy Midianites who hung their camefs neck with gold-chains, and who strewed their line of flight from the Three Hundred with earrings, collars, and purple raiment. We saw from the corvette the few then occupying the huts, and all ran away when we landed. Presently one family returned and, after a long pourparler , supplied us with a kid, the only one in the village — our bibulous marmiton had left all the mutton on board. Nothing could be more wretched than their booths ; and these “ Midianitish women ” would not even unveil. Along the beach lie rude towers of dry untrimmed stone, evidently the modern repre- * Wallin (p. 303) calls them “ El-Fawaideh ; ” and says they are nomadic Fellahs who, like the Jabalfyyeh in Sinai, associate themselves with the Bedawi owners of plantations, and receive by way of payment for cultivation a certain proportion of the date crops. When the fruit is ripe, the proprietors assemble to gather it, and hold a kind of fair : the prospect of trading and bargaining attracts from remote districts many Arabs who have no interest in the palm-groves. The Rev. G. Percy Badger proposes to explain Makna and Maknawi by Maknat or Maknuwat (plur. Makanf), a space upon which the sun does not shine ; and he quotes Freytag, who considers the term as opposed to Madh’hat, the outside or suburbs of a settlement. This would readily explain the Ma/cva of Ptolemy ; for the gorge is the deepest we have yet seen. 342 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. sentatives of the old maritime settlement; and on the borders of the Wady-mouth clumps of dates extend almost to the shore, where the spray breaks over them, and where the percolating tide forms a pool and a fine bath. The Bab, or Gate, opening a few hundred yards from the sea, has jambs of grey granite, capped and overspread, as by a table-cloth, with the hardest breccias and conglomerates ; the latter here and there revet sandstones of new formation and chloritic aspect. The falaise is composed of the normal stalactite-like calcareous carbonates passing, here and there, into crystallised lime like arragonite ; and the lower corallines blackened, like the granites, by the action of the sea-salts, are mixed with oxides of iron agglutinated by the dews and rains. The scatters of slag and scoriae are rare, as might be expected, in a place still inhabited ; and none could tell us where the furnaces had been. The Makndwi are the meanest tribe we have yet seen ; they pre¬ serve no traditions of the Bene Ganba-Ganba Jews, who here numbered some 600 in the days of Mohammed, and who lived chiefly by fishing. The sea-cliff ends to the north with a huge, bald white buttress, which Icelanders would call a “horse.” From its pale shoulders rise, beautifully blue, the heights of Tayyibat Ism ; and southward lies El- Muzayndi — a range of red syenitoid granite, whose CRUISE NORTHWARDS TO MAKNA. 343 rapidly decomposing slopes are pimply and warty, like the earth-pillars and stone-capped pyramids of Tyrolese Botzen. The whole breadth of the Wady is traversed and streaked by broad bands of green porphyry, which play hide-and-seek in the most fantastic way. The gate leads to a dense “ Nakhil ” of neglected dates which must number more than one thousand ; in fact, it is a long thick grove, tree rising above tree, and, viewed from the sea, giving the idea of a torrent of verdure. The dead and the -dying mingle with the live trees. As usual, all are untrimmed, and the modern Midianites ignore even palm-wine. After pitching the tents and establishing the kitchen-buttery, as usual, under the palms, we en¬ gaged Sa’ad, an old Maknawi, to show us the ruins. Professing complete ignorance concerning Moses’ Well, he led us up the left side of the deep and shady Wady, south of the gate, by a road whose regular zigzags marked the maker’s hand, to a saddleback about 250 feet high. Capped with the usual conglomerate, whose face had been washed and weathered into broad and overhanging eaves, the commanding height was corniced and bluff inland or facing towards the valley that lay at its feet. This place is called by the Beclawin the Burj or Citadel. The hiodi town was built in the normal o 344 THE GOLD-MINES OE MID IAN style, rough stones bedded in mortar ; but the fine Roman cement had made way, in this region of pure gypsum, for a barbarous material more than half mud. In fact, the general appearance was modern, making Rtippell suspect that it was a convent of early Christians. Possibly the strong site had been preserved and restored when the remainder of the settlement was destroyed, and probably its survival had extended deep into Islamitic days. It seemed, in fact, to belong to the class of ruins which Wellsted and Miles found at Husn Ghurab or Ravens fort.* “ Cernimus antiquas nullo custode ruinas.” From the crest we could distinctly trace the foundations, though half-buried by the hand of Time, of the basseville which occupied a waterless sandy slope gently falling, like a Wady, towards the main valley. We dug into a grave in the fort, and found bones but no skulls ; and we carried off a fragmentary hand-mill of the hardest basalt, a stone which now began to puzzle me. Descending to the Wady Makna by an abrupt path, round the corniced front, we crossed its breadth from south to north. It is by far the finest we have seen. The sands are grown with the apple of * See Captain Miles’s valuable paper, “Account of an Excur¬ sion into the interior of Southern Arabia, with M. Werner Mun- zinger” (Pasha), C.B., Hon. Corr. Mem. R.G.S. CRUISE NORTHWARDS TO MAKNA. 345 Sodom, the gigantic ’Ushr (Calotropis procera) : but the medicinal uses of “ the silk-tree” are here un¬ known. Much less has the silk-plant been utilised for its strong white fibre, one of the best known,* and now become such a favourite in Europe. On both banks of the water, enclosures, like gardens, hedged with reeds, protect the small fragrant green limes prized throughout Arabia; the thorny Jujube (Zizy- phos vulgaris) p a few figs, almonds, pomegranate, and, they say, grapes, the “ Weinreben ” having been seen by Riippell in fruit (July 12th). Here and there was a patch of Durrah {S erg hum vulgare ), which grew lush and luxuriant. The place might be converted, by damming the stream and retaining the water, into a “ paradeisos.” Upon the high-raised right bank, a second and parallel feature, bubbling up from under the driest of sands, forms a small rivulet and a series of cascades, in one place actually four feet high. Its tinkling song really startled us — who ever expected such music in arid Arabia ? This Ayn el-Tab- bakhah (Spring of the She-Cork), which is lost in * See my “ Pilgrimage,” iii. 122. f Wallin, who evidently had not the slightest tincture of natural history, describes (p. 339) the rhamnaceous “lote-bush” as “ small acacias, called in Arabic Sidr.” The berries, distinguished by the name of Nabk, have, when dry, a sickly sweet flavour, which is much relished by the Bedawin, and the reason is probably the usual crave for saccharine matter where sugar is unknown. 346 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN the palm-thicket, must have been the principal charm of ancient Midian, the northern half of whose basseville lay immediately above and beyond the palm-grove. Here again we found stone basements, glass and fictile fragments. Further up the valley the people show the Masjid or praying-place of Sayyidna Musa, over which, they say, a mosque formerly stood. The stones, of fine white marmorine texture, bear signs of tooling, somewhat remarkable in these regions; others are of red and weathered syenite. They form several inform heaps, but the plan might, perhaps, be discovered by removing the sand.* In Midian-land, I have said, the rock-formations are ever changing. Here the characteristics are carbonate of lime, so fine that it becomes at times white marble ; and the abundance of chlorite, which stains the sands, and covers the stones with a coat¬ ing, like enamel, of pale green-yellow. We were * In Note (p. 358) will be found the only two letters addressed by Dr. Beke to the Times , and reprinted here with the express permission of Mrs. Emily Beke. I am told that some sketches appeared in the Illustrated London News of April 18, 1874. Mr. John Milne, F.G.S., who accompanied the ex¬ plorer, published his notes in the Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society for February, 1875. I have not yet seen them, but I am assured that never a word about metals occurs in them. Finally, a paper with two views of Midian, and headed “ Land of Midian,” appeared in the Illustrated London News of June 9, 1877. Still never a word about the mineralogical wealth of the land. 347 CRUISE NORTHWARDS TO MAKNA. shown a coarse and impure rock-salt, which is said to be produced by the cliffs bordering the upper valley. Hearing of a Jebel el-Abyaz, or sulphur- mountain, rising to the south-east, about four hours’ march from the sea, we sent two Huwayti lads to fetch specimens : they failed to find the hill, and none of our Bedawin, including Haji Agib of the Mesa’id, knew the way. There is a comparative deficiency of quartz, and a remarkable abundance of lava and basalt occurring in scattered blocks. These plutonic formations, so common in El-Hejaz, are said here to be washed down from the heights v about Magharat Shu’ayb. We heard, further, of a Jebel el-Harrah, in the eastern interior beyond the Shifah ; and wherever this name meets the ear, an experienced Arabian traveller, I have said, ex¬ pects to find Vulcanism.* * Wallin (p. 327) quotes a statement by Ahmed ibn Yahya El-Sha’ir (the poet), author of the Kitdb el-Bulddn (“ Book of Countries ”), that the lands known by the name of El-Harrah in Arabia are eight. There must be hundreds of the minor out¬ breaks, so old that, like the traps about Bombay, they show no signs of crater or place of issue : upwards of a score were found by my late friend, Charles F. Tyrwhitt Drake, scattered amongst the nummulites, hippurites, and calcareous formations of Palestine. Wallin (p. 321) often mentions black fragments; black porous stones of peculiar lightness (ibid.) ; layers of black fragments, by which the natural red colour of the sandstone is hid in parts of the Harrah-Mountain (p. 329); and finally (p. 327) black-looking peaks of volcanic appearance. These words in italics are omitted by his annotator, Mr. F. Ayrton, who wrong-headedly remarks (p. 321), 34§ THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. During the night of April 16th, the wind blew great guns, threatening to level the tent. The next morning showed an “ Azyab ” day, cool and calm till the hot ozone-laden wind of noon arose, murky, like an English November, and promising rain, which never came. According to the Bedawin, this state of the atmosphere accompanies the heliacal setting of the Surayya (Pleiades). At the same time a violent Khamsin, more westerly than the Azyab, did much damage at Cairo and Suez, raising the mercury to (F.) ioo°, in the cool hall of Shep- heard’s Hotel. The most curious action of the Khamsin is the active part which it plays in the deposition of nitre, but it is readily explained by the Kinetic theory of gases. The intensely dry and electrical wind, a non-conductor, causes violent molecular agitation in the upper atmosphere, with a pro¬ portional development of ozone ; the latter is pre- “ It is possible that the rock of these hills is ferruginous sand¬ stone ; the red colour being due to the presence of oxide of iron, which becomes a black peroxide after having imbibed more oxygen from the atmosphere ; and thus small fragments become externally quite black, and from the action upon their surfaces, have very much the appearance of cinders. The same thing may be observed in the Valley of Koseir, about twelve miles west of the town of Koseir, on the route to Keune, in Egypt.” Nothing of the kind ! the light-weighing stones were simply lava and black basalt. For a notice of the “ Harrahs ” near El-Medinah, see my “ Pilgrimage,” ii. 230, 235. CRUISE NORTHWARDS TO MAKNA. 349 cipitated by the cold, still night, and it finds affinities on the ground. Next morning, whilst Lieutenants ’Amir and Hasan were making their plans of the harbour, fort, and ruins, we set out to examine the Jebel el-Hamra, the Red Mountain, which closes the horizon to the east. Its jagged crest of ruddy peaks, cut by dark dykes of porphyry, and fronted by two pale, leprous patches, had excited our curiosity last evening. We could not understand the white, and the red was so vivid that, despite the syenitic gravel on the shore and in the Wady, we suspected ferruginous grit, or the New Red of Petra. One line lay up the “Water of Makna” proper, or the southern rivulet called the Ayn el-Hafayir (Spring of Pits). Like its fellow of the She-Cork, it wells from the sands ; the taste and hue are sulphureous and medicinal ; and, as usual, it tarnishes silver. The growth of sorrel was remarkable in the fertile nooks ; but the Wady was mostly choked with loose boulders and with projecting spines of bare and worn granite, into which the waters had cut and bored deep channels. One projection showed a number of shallow “ cup-marks,” forming holes, like those with which Egyptians play their favourite game, El-Mankalah.* Beyond the springs * Lane (Mod. Egypt, ii. chap, xvii.) gives an illustration of the board, and describes the game at full length. Some years 35° THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN the valley is nude and bare of vegetation, except a thorn-tree or two in the re-entering angles, which have been most watered. We collected the plants, which gradually became more stunted as the land rose, and we added a variety of beetles, especially the “Umm Amir,” to our bottles. The birds were Katas, and a small black species, with a snow-white tail, in shape not unlike the wheat-ear. The hornet was unusually large and lively. Here and there little mounds of stone denoted, according to the people, the deeply-sunk Bayt, or home of the Su’uban ( Coluber Guttatus , Forsk.), the large male serpent, cockatrice or dragon, so famous in the history of Nabi Musa.* Skinks, or sand- lizards (Sikankin), abounded ; and after a sharp chase, we captured the young of a Zabb,f a lizard, ago it was introduced into England by some ardent Anglo-Egyp- tians, but it lived the short life of an exotic. * Surat vii. sab. 1 1 8 : “ Wherefore he cast down his rod and behold it became a visible serpent ( fd-iza hiya Su'ubanun). A1 Bayzawi and the commentators say that this dragon was hairy : when it opened its mouth, the jaws were eighty cubits asunder, and when its lower mandible was on the ground, the upper reached the palace top. Pharaoh and the whole assembly were so terrified, that 25,000 men lost their lives in the press of the flying crowd. Moses took the serpent by the mouth, at the com¬ mand of Allah (Surat xxx. Sale, 236), although it was swallowing stones and trees, and this earthly kin of the Great Sea Serpent once more became a rod. The word Su’uban is also applied to the Constellation Draco ; especially to the Draconis, which was the Polaris circa b.c. 2790. f The Lacerta El-Dsobb of Seetzen, who gives the measure¬ ments (p. 437, iii. Reisen, etc. Berlin, 1855). CRUISE NORTHWARDS TO MAKNA. 35 1 some four feet long, which burrows far into the ground : it changes colour, but not so remarkably as the “ Waran,” or true chameleon. The Makna fiumara drains, according to the Bedawin, the waters of Magharat Shu’ayb, which Ruppell places further south. * Here it has a lovely rose-pink hue, the effect of sunlight playing upon syenitic sand and gravel. Its principal branches, the Wady El-Kharag and El-Mab’ug, are on the left bank : the latter contains, they say, bitter water near the head. We quitted the Makna where it winds between the dark Jebel el- Abidin to the north and the ruddy Jebel el-Hamra southwards; and, with the conviction that my old friend had hit upon the gold in its upper course, we reformed its name to “WADY HAJI WALL” After two good hours, ascending some 1500 feet, we stood at mid-height on the chain, which is broken, and everywhere threaded, not by the usual chasms, but by sandy water-courses, easy even to a camel. The syenite, containing very little silvery mica, was traversed, as usual, by broad dykes of bottle- * P. 221. On his return from Magna (Makna) to Mohila (El-Mu waylah), after five hours and a half in a south-easterly direc¬ tion, he noted a valley which carries off the surplus supply of “ Wadi Beden.” Thence four hours to the south-south-east placed him at the sandy plain and spring “ El-Gear,” where stood the huts of the Musaiti (Masa’id) Arabs. The site is four hours from Aynunah. 352 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. green porphyry ; and the discovery of the day — for almost each day had its own — was the chlo¬ ride slate, the matrix of the Brazilian gold mines, especially that of Sao Joao del-Rei. To this we did due honour in an evening bowl of punch, which sent the weak heads reeling to bed. April 1 8th — our last day in Arabia — broke with a fine ’Illi, or north-wester, which tossed the water about like a mid-wintry easter in our Channel. Luckily for us the corvette did not like the weather. She had promised to pick us up in the morning ; and she gave us nearly the whole day. We sketched the booths which have supplanted the tents of Shem, and we wandered about the sea-shore attempting, but failing, to catch the sea-snakes. M. Marie con¬ siderably scandalised the half-starving Maknawi by eating raw sea-eggs, owning the while that he would have preferred his oitrsins cooked in the shell, or made into omelets. There are two kinds of these Echinidae, which the Arabs call Gunfud el-Bahr (sea-hedgehog) ; one small, the other with stony spines three inches and a quarter long,* and not unlike the imitation cigars made of chocolate : the latter is also * I find the Grand Her is son de Mer figured by Shaw (ii. 74), and described (ii. 89) as having points larger than a swan’s quill. (See the fine French translation, two vols. quarto. La Haye, Jean Neaulure, 1743-) CRUISE NORTHWARDS TO MAKNA . 353 found on Bourbon Island. The beach was rich in the large scalopped shells which the French term Benitiers ( Concha imbriccitci, Shaw) ; and another production of Makna is the whorled operculum of a large species of Turbo,* known as the •. Hajar el- Akrab, or scorpion’s stone: I collected some hundreds for making buttons. Tired of the shore, we “ took,” as the Bedawin say, “ the pole-star between our eyebrows,” and « walked, studying the accidents of ground, to the great white horse-buttress north of camp. Composed of pure gypsum and salenite, it is based upon granite decomposed almost to schist. Some of these formations assume the quaintest shapes ; one in particular was an enlarged copy of an Indian “ Shola topi;” and the harder veins of rock, quaintly weathered, stood up like smoke¬ stacks. Diorite and porphyry were scattered over the plain, and there was the usual medley of metals. We picked up a fragment containing Icipis calcimmaris (oxide of zinc), and almost every stone we broke contained spots or lines of mineral, even the hard black and porous basalt showing silvery streaks, which, upon analysis, proved to be free * The operculum much resembles that of the T. Argyrostomus of Java, but never reaches the size of T. Aleurius . 354 THE GOLD-MINES OF MIDI AN. gold.* We only regretted not being able, on account of the dangerous wind, to visit the Land of Ad, and the mining-ruins reported in Jebel Tayyibat Ism. Sprenger (pp. 199-200) places to the north-east of Madyan City and ‘north of the Sarakeni the “ Oaditae ” of Agatharkides ; and he identifies them with the Beni Ad (Adites), holding, like certain Arab geographers,')' that this race dwelt between Syria and Yemen. Their first king, Sheddad bin Ad, fourth in descent from Nuh (Noah), built the garden of Irem, so useful to Eastern poets. The fate of the Adites was similar to that of the Beni Tamud : the Himyarite prophet, Hud, was sent to convert them from idolatry ; and, when they refused to hear the words of wisdom, a Simiim entered into their nostrils, and, passing through their bodies, mummi¬ fied them. The Koran (xlvi. 20) transferred them to the Ahkaf, or the Sandheaps near Hazramaut — the Home of Death — where their paradise is now buried ; perhaps a confusion with the Nufiid or arenaceous tracts of the Hisma. Also the Oaditse, * The report of the official analysers confirms this statement. What I call “porous basalt,” however, appears to M. Marie to be “ porphyres-pyritique,” or “ porphyre basaltique” (chap. xiii.). The free gold thus appeared in two formations ; the other being the lump of porphyritic greenstone before referred to. j He quotes Beladzori’s A?isab (Genealogies), fol. 3. “ Adite,” in Arabic, means anything very old : the term, for instance, would be applied to Cyclopean walls. CRUISE NORTHWARDS TO MAKNA 355 east of Madyan, might have been the later or junior Ad, afterwards changed into monkeys, and this seems to be denoted by their connection with the prophet Lukman, the Wise, a native of Akabat- Ayla. At 4 p.m. the corvette ran in from the “ Creek of Gold,” and we lost no time in embarking. Indeed the agility of our escort, when homeward-bound, formed a truly remarkable comparison with their slow and measured movements the other way. Besides fancy specimens intended for H.H. the Viceroy, we carried away for analysis eight boxes full of metalliferous quartz, greenstone, porphyry, basalt, syenite and chloritic slate ; fourteen water- bags of granite, and other gravels ; and twelve baskets of sand for laboratory work. We were accompanied on board by the Sayyid Abd el-Rahfm and the Shaykh Abd el-Nabi, who faithfully promised to forward to the Governor of Suez, within a reasonable time, specimens of the turquoises from Jebel Shekayk, red earth from the Hisma, the “written stone” in Wady Sharma, and sulphur from the Jebel el-Abyaz of Makna. Our companions had their dromedaries all ready for the long march homewards, and, after the usual acknow¬ ledgment of their services, we bade them adieu and saw them overboard. Decidedly the most enjoyable part of a delightful 356 THE GOLD-MINES OE MID IAN and eventful visit to old Midian was the short stay at Makna, and the glimpse of the Dahi,* or true Desert, which it offered us. What a contrast with the horrors of the civilised city — “ the clouds of dust by day, and glare of gas by night, and the noise of the streets roaring like an angry beast ! ” How easy to understand the full force of the Bedawi expression, “ Praise be to Allah that once more we see the Nufud ! ” the soft clean sand of the wilder¬ ness, with its sweet fresh breezes and its perfumed flora, “ the Deserts spicy stores ; ” its glorious colouring and its grand simplicity that engender male and noble breeds of man and beast! Its atmosphere is the reverse of that Hesperidian air, concerning which Homer sang — “ There the human kind Enjoy the easiest life : no snow is there, No biting winter and no drenching shower, But Zephyr always gently from the sea Breathes on them, to refresh the happy race.” (Od. iv. 563). * “ Delhi” says Ayrton, “ is applied to the Desert in the sense of its being a place open and exposed to the sun and, /car i)v, to its wide central expanse. Ghayit is a land without water ; Badiyeh is a barren steppe ; Himddih is gravelly, flinty ground ; and Kda is a sandy plain : Nufud seems to be used with refer¬ ence to the comparative fertility of the part so called.” Dahua is the Desert (_ falah ) in general; but it is especially applied, like Bcifha , to a gravelly, sand surface, somewhat depressed. Lastly, Makhraj is the issue from the waste upon fertile, watered ground. CRUISE NORTHWARDS TO MAKNA. 357 The climate of Midian, and perhaps I may say, of the Desert generally, is harsh — hot by day as it is cold by night. Yet no one, who has ever enjoyed its charms, fails to look back upon his journey with the fondest of memories. The Desert, with its sudden and startling changes from utter desolation to exuberant vegetation, is pre-eminently the Land of Fancy, of Reverie ; never ending, ever renewing itself in presence of the Indefinite and the Solitude, which are the characteristics of this open world. The least accident, the smallest shift of scenery, gives rise to be longest trains of thought, in which the past, the present, and the future seem to blend. In the forested land of the tropics Nature masters man ; his brain is confused with the multiplicity of objects ; he feels himself as prisoner in a gorgeous jail. Moreover some of us suffer from lasting sadness in the regions of evergreens, such as Central Africa, Brazil, and Western India. Much as I enjoyed my last visit to Bombay when able to leave it by the first steamer, hardly a week had passed before the old melancholy made itself felt. But in the Desert man masters Nature. It is the type of Liberty, which is Life, whilst the idea of Immensity, of Sublimity, of Infinity, is always present, always the first thought. Whilst prosaic and prosy Robinson asked, “ How can a 358 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. Desert be beautiful ? ” right well sang the F rench poet * — - “ A l’aspect du desert, l’infini se revele, Et 1’ esprit exalte devant tant de grandeur, Comme l’aigle fixant la lumiere nouvelle, De l’infini sonde la profondeur.” Adieu, Midian ! NOTE. Mrs. Beke, the widow of my old and regretted friend, has kindly allowed me to republish the two letters addressed by her late husband to the Times (Feb. 27, and March 5, 1874). These are, as far as I can ascertain, the only printed records of the adven¬ turous excursion to the Gulf of Akabah which ended an active and energetic life. It is evident from them that no idea either of mineral wealth, or of industrial establishments, had struck the traveller when he was examining the shores of Midian in search of the “ True Sinai.” Letter I. MOUNT SINAI. TO THE EDITOR OF THE “ TIMES.” Sir, — On the 28th of January I wrote from Akaba, announ¬ cing the discovery of “ Moses’ Place of Prayer” at Madian, on the East Coast of the Gulf of Akaba, which I identify with the “ Encampment by the Red Sea” of Numbers xxxiii. 10. This letter was forwarded by the Erin on her return voyage from Akaba; but, in consequence of the severe weather she was exposed to, she had to put in at Tor, whence she may be expected to arrive here in a day or two. I am now thankful to be able to report that the object of my expedition to discover the true Mount Sinai has happily been attained, very much sooner than I could have anticipated, although not altogether in the manner I had expected. * Felicien David. 359 CRUISE NORTHWARDS TO MANNA. As stated in my former letter, we reached Akaba in the steamer Erin on the 27th of January. We left Akaba under the personal escort of Sheikh Mahom- med ibn I j at, the chief of the Alauwin tribe of Bedouins, to whom I was the bearer of a firman from His Highness the Khedive of Egypt, and proceeded north-eastward up the Wady-el-Ithem (the “ Etham ” of the Exodus), and encamped in the evening at the foot of Mount Barghir, one of the principal masses of the chain of mountains bounding the valley of the Arabah on the East, which are marked on our maps as the Mountains of Shera, but of which the correct designation is the Mountains of Shafeh; those of Shera, as I have myself seen, being a chain extending from that of Shafeh in a direction from north-west to south-east. My astonishment and gratification may be better imagined than described when I learnt that this Mount Barghir is the same as a mysterious JebelT-Nur , or “ Mountain of Light,” of which I had heard vaguely in Egypt as being that whereon the Almighty spoke with Moses, and which, from its position and other circum¬ stances, is without doubt the Sinai of Scripture ; although, from its manifest physical character, it appears that my favourite hypo¬ thesis that Mount Sinai was a volcano must be abandoned as untenable. We encamped at the foot of “the Mountain of Light,” and during the ensuing night we experienced a most tremendous storm, the thunder and lightning being truly terrific, some of the claps being directly over our heads. The rain fell in torrents during several hours, threatening to wash us away altogether. I do not remember to have ever witnessed a more violent tempest either in Abyssinia or elsewhere ; and its effect on my mind was this — that if the words of Scripture that at the time of the Delivery of the Law on Sinai “ the Mountain burned with fire into the midst of Heaven, with darkness, clouds, and thick darkness ” (Duet. iv. n), with other texts which I need not here refer to, are not, as would now appear, to be understood as descriptive of a volcanic eruption, still less can they be held to describe a mere thunderstorm, however violent, as is generally, but somewhat incon¬ siderately imagined. As the climbing part of my expedition necessarily devolves on my young companion, Mr. Milne, he, on the following morning, ascended the mountain on Sheikh Mahommed’s horse, and accom- 36° THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN panied by the Sheikh’s son and an attendant, also mounted, and by three Bedouins on foot. On his return, shortly after four o’clock in the afternoon, he made me a most valuable and interesting report, of which I now gladly publish a few heads. The way was at first up a narrow wady, which grows more and more narrow till it becomes a gorge. On the road they passed a stone on which some inscriptions appear to have been cut, but which are now all defaced with the exception of the words “Ya Allah ” (“Oh, God”), in Cufic, or old Arabic, characters. Within the gorge itself they stopped to inspect another large stone, about four feet long and two feet square, made of granite. It originally stood upright, about two or three feet away from the side of the gorge, on another stone, which served as a pedestal ; but it has now fallen over, and rests between its pedestal and the side of the gorge. Near the stone the Bedouins come to pray; and, according to the statement of Sheikh Mahommed, who had heard it from his father, and he from his father, and so on, Sidi Ali ibn ’Elim, a noted Mahommedan saint, whose tomb and mosque are between Jaffa and Haifa, came here also to perform his devotions. What led him to do so my informant could not say, unless he was commanded by Allah. On reaching the gorge the riders had to leave their horses with two of the Arabs, and perform the rest of the ascent on foot. A short way up they came to a low wall across the gorge, which latter is filled with large boulders, and close above the wall, on the right hand, is a well about three feet in diameter and about the same to the surface of the water, which may be two feet deep. From this point the ascent was a “ climb,” the face of the rock being almost perpendicular. On the ridge on the left side of the gorge, about 150 yards distant from the well, is a pile of large rounded boulders of granite, consisting of four stones of the material of the mountain, three standing up facing the north and one at the back to the south, and on all of them are cut inscriptions, which Mr. Milne copied as well as his cold fingers would allow him to do so. The stones, which are much weather-worn, are externally of a dark-brown colour, against which the inscriptions make themselves visible from their being of a somewhat lighter colour. The lines of these “ Sinaitic inscriptions ” are about three-quarters of an inch broad and very shallow, being not more than an eighth of an inch deep. CRUISE NORTHWARDS TO MAKNa. 361 The figures on the stones are very rude, and can hardly be phonetic; neither is it easy to say what they are intended to represent. On the very summit of the mountain they found numerous sheep skulls and horns, with a few bones, it being the custom of the Bedouins to come up here to pray and to sacrifice a lamb, which is eaten on the spot. But none of the remains appear to be very recent. It is here, as I was told, that the Almighty is said to have spoken with Moses. Before reaching the summit snow was found in the crevices of the mountain, and while Mr. Milne was at the top it hailed and snowed, and was so bitterly cold that it was as much as he could do to take a few angles with the Azimuth compass, and even this he could not have done had not his attendants kindled a fire by which he might warm his fingers. The elevation of the spot is estimated at 5000 feet, but it will be known more accurately when our observations on the journey come to be calculated. Though so far distant, Akaba seemed just under his feet, but on so diminu¬ tive a scale that he failed to detect the castle among the date- palm trees the general outline of which alone was visible. In other directions the landscape was blocked out by banks of cloud, fog, and rain. Mount Barghir, “ The Mountain of Light,” is one of the loftiest peaks of the range of mountains on the east side of the Wady-el-Arabah and the west side of the Wady-el-Ithem, over¬ hanging the latter. Without dwelling on the geological features of the mountain, of which Mr. John Milne’s report will treat very fully in my book, it will be sufficient to say here that it consists of a mass of pink or reddish granite, which, in places, where it is weathered, assumes a dark-brown hue, and that the granite is traversed by numerous dykes, generally of a dark-green colour, and apparently dioritic. On the side of the mountain are many large boulders, several of which are so much decomposed on their under sides as to form small caverns. One of these was as much as twenty feet, or thereabouts, each way across, with a height of ten feet or twelve feet at the entrance, sloping down towards the back. As the existence of a cave or caves on Mount Sinai is essential in order to meet the requirements of the texts (Exodus xxxiii. 22, and 1 Kings xix. 9), the fact that such caves do actually exist on the “ Mountain of Light ” is most pertinent and important. 362 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN Not less significant is the fact that this majestic mountain is visible in all directions, and that round its base towards the east and south there is camping ground for hundreds of thousands of persons. It would be out of place to dwell here on the importance of this discovery of the “ Mountain of Light,” as regards the elucida¬ tion of the Sacred History. Its identification- with the mountain on which the Law was delivered is scarcely open to a doubt I had imagined that mountain to be a volcano. I have publicly declared my conviction that such must be the fact, and the journey from which I am now returning was undertaken with the express object of establishing this assumed fact. I am now bound to admit that this discovery, though in strict accordance with the principles enunciated in my Origines Bibliccz forty years ago, proves me to have been egregiously mistaken with respect to the volcanic character of Mount Sinai. I make this admission without any reservation, because my desire is, as it always has been, to adduce evidence of the historical truth of the Scripture narrative of the Exodus, in contradiction to the erroneous interpretation put upon that narrative, which has caused its truth to be called in question ; and I should be a traitor to the cause I have so much at heart were I to attempt to bolster up my own opinions when found to be unsupported by facts. “ Great is truth, and mighty above all things.” I am, Sir, your very obedient servant, (Signed) Charles Beke. Suez, Feb. 1 6, 1874. DR. BEKE’S SINAI EXPEDITION. TO THE EDITOR OF THE “ TIMES.” Sir, — In Dr. Beke’s letter from Suez of the 16th ult., which you kindly published in the Times of the 27th ult., by which he announced his discovery of the “ true Mount Sinai,” he mentioned that he had written to you on the 28th January from Akaba, describing “ Moses’ Place of Prayer ” at Madian, on the east coast of the Gulf of Akaba, which also he has been so far fortunate as to discover. On his return to Egypt, Dr. Beke found that the little steamer Erin had not returned to Suez, she having been delayed by stress of weather and want of coals, so that his letter to CRUISE NORTHWARDS TO MAKNA. 363 you of the 28th of January, which he intrusted to the captain, has only now reached me, and I hasten to forward it to you for publication : — - “ His Highness the Khedive having been pleased to place the Egyptian steamer Erin at my disposal for the conveyance of myself and party to the head of the Gulf of Akaba, we left Suez in that vessel on the morning of January 18th, and arrived here in safety in the afternoon of yesterday, the 27 th, after a pleasant, and, from my point of view, most interesting and successful voyage of ten days. “ The run down the Gulf of Suez was without the occurrence of anything of moment, but on our passing Ras Mohammed — the southern extremity of the Peninsula of Tor, the traditional ‘ Mount Sinai ’ — we encountered the northerly winds almost constantly blowing down the Gulf of Akaba, which during three days and more raged with great violence. Fortunately I was desirous of visiting Aiyunah (Aynunah ?), Burckhardt’s Ayoun el Kassab, the Hadj station on the sea shore, a little way east of the entrance of the Gulf, which I imagined to be the ‘ Encampment by the Red Sea’ of the Israelites, mentioned in Numbers xxxiii., 10, and by going thither we escaped the violence of the storm; otherwise I fear it might have fared badly with our frail bark of only sixty-four tons. “ On our return into the Gulf, as the tempest had not entirely abated, we anchored on the 24th close to the shore at Magna or Madian, in 28° 23' N. lat., behind a point of land and a reef, which, though not a fit anchorage for a large vessel, afforded shelter to the little Erin , though we lost here one of our anchors. A Madian we had to remain a day, which afforded us an opportunity of going on shore and inspecting the place, a camping ground of the Benu Ughba Arabs, numbering about 400 souls. The Sheikh, with the main body of the tribe, was away in the interior, a few persons only remaining here to attend to the fructification of their numerous date palms — it is no exaggeration to estimate them at 1000 or more— growing near the beach and along a valley coming from the east, in which there is a perennial stream of water. With the date trees we also saw several dom palms, lime, nebbuk, and fig trees ; and there were even a few patches of barley carefully protected by hedges of palm leaves. “ We were on the point of returning to the ship, when we 3^4 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN were informed of the existence in the vicinity of a holy spot, where it is said the prophet Moses prayed, and over which a ‘mosque’ had been erected. This was stated to be at an hour’s distance from the shore ; and as with these people’s vague estimate of distances it might possibly be much more, and I did not feel myself competent to go so far on foot, we went on board to lunch, after which Mr. Milne returned on shore and walked inland with a servant and a native guide. “ He proceeded eastward up the valley, along the side of the palm grove, gradually ascending over a sandstone slope in places worn into hummocks by the water, which during the rainy season finds its way down to the sea, and when about half a mile from the coast he came to a small stream some three feet wide, running in a channel which it has cut in the solid rock. At the point where he struck the stream the water runs prettily over the in¬ clined but irregular surface of the rock, with a fall, or succession of falls, of about twelve feet in all, winding and losing itself among the palm-trees. The surface of the rock, which is sandstone, in places merging into a conglomerate of granite, diorite, and quartz, in stones, some as large as cocoa-nuts, cemented by coarse sand, is here quite clear, so that one walks upon the bare rock ; but at a couple of hundred yards further up the valley the rock is covered with sand, which appears to be making rapid inroads. So great, indeed, is its encroachment on the date plantations, that the Arabs have made hedges round these to protect them from the sand, which hedges, however, are being overwhelmed, and others have, consequently, to be erected further in. “ On reaching the end of the palm groves, a mound is seen half as high as the tops of the trees, with numerous blocks of white stone lying among the sand, and beyond this there is a good view further up the valley, along which date palms are seen growing in patches. There are also a few dom palms, one noticeable one overhanging the white stones. “These remains, which instead of being an hour’s journey or more from the sea, are at the utmost one mile from the beach, were found on examination to consist of blocks of alabaster, so white and pure as at first sight to be mistaken for marble, and only proved to be sulphate of lime, by its scratching with a knife and by its non-effervescence with muriatic acid. The blocks are each about three feet long and one foot six inches square, and CRUISE NORTHWARDS TO MAKNA. 365 appear to have been worked with the tool, though the edges are now much rounded by the weather. One of them seems to form a portion of a column. Together with the blocks of alabaster are some of granite, likewise much weathered. As far as a brief and hasty inspection would allow an opinion to be formed, these stones appear to lie in two parallelograms, ranging from north to south, the one within the other, the south end of the inner one being semi-circular, and there even seem to be indications of a third range of stones further to the north. But it is difficult to speak with certainty on account of the sand which covers these stones in part and threatens soon to hide them entirely. There are several mounds of sand round about, which may probably contain other remains. “This most interesting spot, which requires to be more closely examined, is especially important to me, because I now see that here, at Madian, and not at Ayunah (Aynunah), must have been the 4 Encampment by the Red Sea,’ of the Israelites. Its proximity (half a day’s journey) to Maghara Sho’eib, or Jethro’s Cave, which I identify with the Elim of the Exodus, and the fact that the stream of running water must have some of its sources at or near that spot, explain why it should not have been mentioned in Exodus, xv. 27, xvi. 1, as a separate station, much more satisfactorily than I attempted, in page 38 of my pamphlet, Mount Sinai a Volcano , to explain the apparent discrepancy in the two statements of Scripture. The 4 Encampment by the Red Sea,’ was simply a continuation of that at Elim, with its 4 twelve wells of water and three score and ten palm trees,’ the two together stretching down the valley, with its living water, from Maghara Sho’eib, or 4 Jethro’s Cave’ to this 4 Praying-place of Moses,’ at Madian. 44 As one of my main arguments against the correctness of the vulgar identification of Mount Sinai and other places con¬ nected with the Exodus of the Israelites is based on the insuffi¬ ciency of local traditions to establish the authenticity of any such identifications, it would be inconsistent on my part were I to insist on the intrinsic and absolute value of the traditions attached 1 \ to ‘Jethro’s Cave,’ 4 Moses’ Praying-place,’ etc. Nevertheless these traditions are, at the least, as valuable as any of the others, and their existence here on the distant and almost unknown shores of the Gulf of Akaba, as well as that of 4 Pharaoh’s Island,’ within sight from where I am now writing, and 4 Wady Itum,’ the 366 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN entrance to the desert of Nedjd, which I identify with ‘ Etham in the edge of the wilderness ’ of Exodus xiii. 20, within a two hours’ journey from this spot, all serve to show that there is sufficient reason for my hypothesis that this, the Gulf of Akaba, and not the Gulf of Suez, is the Red Sea through which the Israelites passed in the flight from Pharoah King of Mizraim. A few days more will, I trust, suffice to demonstrate the absolute truth of this hypothesis. “ I am, sir, “ Your very obedient servant, (Signed) “ Charles Beke. “Akaba, Jan. 28th, 1874.” In your impression of to-day I see a letter from Mr. F. W. Holland, and one from our friend Major Wilson. The former gentleman, although he says he . is quite ready to bring forth arguments to disprove Dr. Beke’s theory, -very rightly and kindly adds that it would be neither fair nor wise to attempt to do so until he knows further particulars of Dr. Beke’s discoveries. Major Wilson also says, “ I had not intended raising a discussion on the result of Dr. Beke’s journey until his return to this country, nor do I wish to do so now.” I trust I may be pardoned for remarking that the contents of the Major’s letter can scarcely be said to be in accordance with the intention thus expressed. Dr. Beke will, I trust, be home in the course of a fortnight, and in the mean time I venture to ask the public to withhold their judgment until he arrives with the proofs, which I am persuaded he will bring with him of his discovery of the true Mount Sinai. I ask this because I am, like Major Wilson, delighted to see that my husband does not intend his discovery of the true Mount Sinai to end in smoke, but in truth. In Dr. Beke’s letters to me from Akaba, he tells me he is deeply indebted to the “ patriotic and obliging ” spirit of the Peninsular and Oriental Company for their kindness in supplying his little steamer Erin with the British flag and for every assist¬ ance in his preparations for his journey from Suez. I have the honour to be, with thanks for kindly inserting this, Sir, Yours very faithfully, (Signed) Emily Beke. March 3rd, 1874. CRUISE NORTHWARDS TO MANNA. 367 OPHIR AND THE LAND OF MIDIAN. TO THE EDITOR OF THE “ DAILY NEWS.” Sir, — With reference to your leading article in the Daily News of yesterday, May 15th, permit me to ask you kindly to give publicity to what Dr. Beke said in 1872, by which it will be seen that my husband predicted the discoveries now made by our distinguished friend, Captain Richard Burton. I rejoice to learn that Captain Burton’s explorations on the shores of the Gulf of Akaba are likely once more to reawaken public interest in, and must confirm Dr. Beke’s and Mr. John Milne’s important dis¬ coveries in the Gulf of Akaba in January, 1874, of Aynunah, Magna, or Midian, and other places of interest connected with the “ Encampment by the Red Sea of the Israelites,” and finally of the “True Mount Sinai.” Dr. Beke said in March, 1872 : — “ Through the kindness of Dr. Petermann, I have received fac-similes of the drawings made by Herr Carl Manch, of some of the ornaments on the ruins of Zimbabye, in South-Eastern Africa, discovered by him, as is mentioned in the Athenceum of the 10th ult. ; which he identifies with Ophir, and supposes to be of the Tyro-Israelitish construction. As, however, whatever knowledge we possess of Ophir is derived from the Hebrew Scriptures alone, we are not warranted in seeking for it anywhere except where, from a comparison of the various passages in those Scriptures, we find it to be placed by them. And the mention of Ophir in conjunction with the Arabian countries of Havilah and Sheba, ought to be conclusive that Ophir itself was in Arabia likewise. Taking this for granted, it should now be shown how intelligible the whole history of the Tyro-Israelitish trade with the land of Ophir becomes. From 1 Kings, chap. ix. verse 26-28, we learn that King Solomon, having obtained a footing on the shores of the Yam-Suph (Red Sea), in the land of Edom — that is to say, the Gulf of Akaba — opened a trade by sea with Ophir, at the instiga¬ tion of, and in conjunction with Hiram, King of Tyre. The practical effect of this joint maritime enterprise was similar to that of the Portuguese in the fifteenth and following centuries. As this modern nation found a way to India by sea, round the Cape of Good Hope, and so diverted the commerce of the further East from the overland route through the Levant, so did the 368 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID/AN Tyro-Israelites open a maritime trade by way of the Straits of Bab el-Mandeb with the countries in Eastern and Southern Arabia, with which they had previously traded overland. As soon, however, as the fleet reached Ophir, the Queen of the adjoining country of Sheba, having become acquainted with the fame of Solomon (i Kings x. i), undertook in person an overland journey to his court, taking with her no less than 120 talents of gold — nearly equal to one-third of the total quantity (420 talents) brought home by the joint fleet — 6 and of spices very great store, and precious stones ; there came no more such abundance of spices as those which the Queen of Sheba gave to King Solomon’ (1 Kings x. 10). The avowed object of this lady’s visit to the wise King of Israel was ‘to prove him with hard questions’ (1 Kings x. 1), but it is not impossible that, like the Chinese of modern times, when the Russians first visited them by sea, the Sovereign of Sheba and her people were averse to this opening of a new trade in that direction, preferring the continuance of the ancient overland route, which could be more easily kept under native control; and that she brought with her such an abundance of the rich produce of India and Africa by the old road, in order to show how unnecessary the new one was. Be this as it may, this maritime route to Ophir and Sheba did not last long. Passing over the allusions to it in 1 Kings xxii. 48, and 2 Kings xix. 22, which show that it must have been often interrupted, we read (2 Kings xvi. 6) that in the reign of Ahaz, King of Judah (c. 740 b.c.), ‘ Rezin, King of Syria, recovered Elath ; and the Syrians came to Elath, and dwelt there to this day ; ’ so that, under any circumstances, the whole duration of this Red Sea commerce did not exceed two centuries and a half. During that brief interval it is not likely that the Tyro-Israelitish fleets continued their voyages to the East Coast of Africa, even if the Arabians had allowed them to interfere with their monopoly, and still less that they should have penetrated as far inland as Zimbabye. The ruins discovered there are therefore certainly not Tyro-Israelitish. They may, however, have been constructed by the Southern Arabians, who, as the representatives of the Biblical nations of Sheba and Ophir, have traded with the East Coast of Africa, and had settlements there down to the present day. Still this does not afford any reason for attributing to these build¬ ings a remote antiquity. The prevailing notion that all ‘ Cyclo- CRUISE NORTHWARDS TO MAKNA. 369 pean ’ or megalithic remains must necessarily date from the earliest ages, has sustained a severe blow from Mr. James Ferguson, who, in his recent work, ‘ Rude Monuments in all Countries : their Age and Uses,’ contends that the monuments in England, Brit¬ tany,’ and elsewhere, which during centuries have evoked the wonder of antiquaries, belong to a period far more recent than the Roman age, just as he showed in the Aihenceum of July 30th, 1870 (No. 2231) that ‘ the Giant Cities of Bashan,’ which Dr. Porter would have us believe were inhabited by King Og in the time of Moses, were, without a single exception, ‘erected during the six centuries which elapsed from the time of Christ till the age of Mahomet.’ * The buildings at Zimbabye are not improbably of the same age.’ ” Hoping this may prove of interest to your numerous readers and thanking you, I am, Sir, Your obedient servant, (Signed) Emily Beke. Ferndale View, Tunbridge Wells, May 17th, 1877. CHAPTER XIII. RETURN TO CAIRO, ETC. THE “ PROCfcS-VERBAL ” ADDRESSED TO HIS HIGHNESS. The violent “ Tlli ’’-wind of April 18th, which made us pass the night zigzagging under easy steam, and the broken tumbling sea, fell calm and smooth shortly after we had threaded the dangerous part of El- Akabah. Sailing under a cloudless sky, with a flowing sheet and a following breeze, we spent the time on board in writing our reports, in pounding our specimens, and in treating the powder with mercury which was borrowed from our obliging Captain’s artificial horizon. On Saturday, April 21st, exactly three weeks after our departure, we took leave of all our friends of the S.S. Sinndr , in¬ cluding the Mulla Effendi (chaplain), and the good old Hakimbashi (surgeon) who had been most atten¬ tive to the small maladies of our men. I may truly say that we shall be rejoiced to see them again. We landed at Suez in the best of health and spirits, and we were received by the port-officials RETURN TO CAIRO. 37i with all their former courtesy, and by our friends with their natural hospitality. A telegram was at once despatched to the Viceroy announcing succes comp let, and applying for a special train, which was supplied to us by the kindness of H.E. Barrot Bey. Nothing now remained but to pay the wages and the bakhshish of the two Europeans, Marius Isnard, the cook, and the mcirmiton , Antonin. We set out without delay. At Zagazig, Haji Wali, despite a drenching shower of rain, rushed off to his home, after taking the shortest of leaves. Having arrived there he was so bullied and badgered by his friends for having confided such a secret to Fianks, and so laughed at for allowing us to monopolise all the profits (!), that he presently rushed up to Cairo, more mad than sane, and caused an infinity of trouble. At Zagazig he also distributed amongst his cronies, as presents of price, valueless bits of quartz. The train was slow, and we did not reach our destination before a dozen or so of hours. The tidings, too, were none of the best. War was expected, troops were getting ready for the voyage, and there was a general confusion of excitement. Mr. F. Smart, unable to wait any longer, had left for Alexandria, en route for Naples. I waited, however, upon H.H. Prince Husayn Kamil Pasha, the young Minister of Finance, who asked me the 372 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. most sensible and pertinent of questions ; showing himself a master of detail like his father, and by no means satisfied without a corresponding reply. Through the kindness of H.E. Ibrahim Bey Tauffk, I had a short audience with His Highness, despite the general turmoil and the urgency of Consuls- General. Next morning the Khediv, after receiving my hearty acknowledgments of the princely way in which he had ordered the excursion, thanked me for the service which I had rendered to Egypt, and accepted my assurance that the N ile- V alley has ever been the land of my predilection. His Highness inspected with curiosity the charts, maps, and plans of his staff-officers ; and at once understood the advantage of working, with modern appliances, the ancient Mines of Midian. He also took no little interest in the measures which I briefly outlined. The first step would be to regiment the convicts, who now do little beyond dying at the local Botany Bay, Fayzoghlu. These men could be divided into com¬ panies, officered from the Engineer-branch of the service, and form a body like that which, in the more economical and less sentimental days of English colonial history, distinguished themselves on the Gold Coast and in West Africa. In Midian they would' find a healthy climate ; the sea would prevent their escape on one side, RETURN TO CAIRO. 373 the Desert on the other ; and, lastly, they might look forward to pardon and freedom, the convicts best incentive to good conduct. Indeed, hands would never be wanting; the Bedawin are always ready, as they showed themselves upon the Suez Canal, to work for regular pay. I also suggested that the richer ores should be treated at a great central usme established at Suez, whither transport would be cheap, and where fuel, so rare and ex¬ pensive in Arabia, would cost comparatively little. My ideas were approved, but political matters delayed their development — I hope only for a time. I also took the opportunity of presenting to His Highness the following appeal on behalf of those who had served in the “ Khedivial Expedition.” Monseigneur, J’ai rhonneur de vous annoncer que le Jeudi, 29 Mars, 1877, je suis arrive k Suez, accompagne de M. Charles Clarke, Directeur des Te'legraphes a Zagazig, et par mon ancien ami, le Haji Wali Effendi. Le matin suivant, je regus la visite de Monsieur George Marie, Ingenieur des Mines attach d k l’Etat-Major, qui me remit une lettre de S. A. le Prince Husayn Kamil Pasha, Ministre des Finances, et me presenta les officiers suivants de l’Etat-Major Egyptien : Amir Effendi Rushdi, Hassan Effendi Haris, Abd el-Karim Effendi Izzat. Ces officiers emmenaient avec eux le Sergent Ali et vingt homines du genie. J e fis ensuite visite au Gouverneur de Suez, S. E. Said-Bey, pour prendre, avec lui les mesures ndcessaires k notre embarquement. Le jour suivant (Samedi, 21 Mars), k six heures du soir, 374 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID I AN nous fumes a bord de la corvette Sinnar, Capitaine Ali-Bey Shukri, oil nous trouvames le capitaine du port Ra’iif-Bey qui se met entierement a notre disposition. A io heures du soir la corvette se mettait en marche, et nous etions partis. Le Lundi (2 Avril), k n heures 30', nous arrivions a El- Muwaylah dans le Tihamat de Madyan, ou nous re5umes la visite de l’officier commandant la garnison, Yuzbashi Abd el-Wahid, et de becrivain du fort, Sayyid Abd el-Rahfm. Ces messieurs s empresserent de requerir les 50 chameaux necessaires a bexcur- sion projetee, et en attendant, la corvette Sinndr se retira dans le Sherm Yahar, ou 1 ancrage offre beaucoup de securite. Le 3 Avril, accompagne de M. Marie et des Lieutenants Hassan et Abd el-Kanm, et de 10 soldats je partis pour le port appelle La Khurabeh, a la bouche du Ouadi Eynuneh. En attendant, M. Clarke, avec le Lieutenant Amir resta sur la corvette pour activer nos preparatifs. Le 4 Avril, nous fimes une reconnaissance du pays, ou nous decouvrimes un ancien etablissement metallurgique ; un aqueduc d une lieue et demie avec deux reservoirs, en apparence de con¬ struction romaine, et enfin une ancienne ville appelle'e Dar el- Hanna, ou devaient habiter les travailleurs sur la rive gauche du Ouadi. Nous fumes nous convaincre en meme temps qu’ii la porte la plus etroite du Ouadi il avait existe autrefois un barrage en pierre et toutes les constructions ne'cessaires h une exploitation. Le 5 Avril, conduits par le Scheik Abd el-Nebi de la tribu des Houetat, nous visitames les fours, oil nous trouvames des bnques^ vetrifiees et d’anciennes scories, toutes choses qui nous confirmerent dans la conviction oil nous e'tions qu’il y avait en la autrefois un etablissement tres important. Une route pratique'e dans le rocher menait evidemment de la ville a Tusine. Le 6 Avril, pendant que les officiers s’occupaient de relever les environs, nous visitames la partie droite du Ouadi Eynuneh, oil nous trouvames que le terrain etait primitif, et traverse par d’enormes filons de porphyre, coupant des masses de granit rouge, contenant beaucoup de feldspath. Nous y trouvames egalement des quartz, qui avaient ete evidemment emmenes par les eaux et en cassant quelques uns nous fumes nous convaincre qu’ils e'taient aurifhres et argentneres, ce que exphquait immediatement la presence dans le pays de Tedablissement metallurgique. RETURN TO CAIRO. 375 Le 7 Avril, nous visitames au nord d’Eynuneh, dans le Ouadi Makhsab, une carriere de pierre, qui avait du etre exploitee par les anciens. Dans l’apres midi les autres membres de l’expedition arriverent avec la caravane : le soir nous trouvames qu’a droite du Ouadi pres du village on avait autrefois exploite des turquoises. Le 8 Avril, fut passe en essais des sables auriferes, et en pre- paratifs de depart pour le lendemain. Le 9 Avril, nous marchames sur le Djebel Sahd, autrement dit Djebel Eynuneh, et apres quatre heures de marche, nous arri- vames a la bouche d’une grande gorge appellee Ouadi El-Morak. La nous trouvames des traces de travaux importants, c’est-a-dire des rdsidus de lavage des debris de route, etc. Un Bedouin nous assura qu’il y avait, a 12 heures de l’autre cote de la montagne, des fours nombreux. Le gorge tres escarpee et tres difficile etait formee de granit tournant a la syenite un torrent assez important passait a travers d’immenses blocs de rocher quio parfois barraient compffitement la route. Nous recuellimes des echantillons de sable, et trou¬ vames des tourmalines et de Tantimoine. Le 10 Avril, nous transportames notre camp de Morak au Djebel el- Abiad situe plus au sud-est a quatre heures de marche. En traversant le Ouadi El-Khiyam nous de'couvrimes du sable noir tres pesant contenant de l’oxide d’etain presque pur ; c’est la M. Clarke decouvrit une pierre portant une ancienne inscription, que j’ai en l’honneur de remettre a Votre Altesse, et qui eclairera sans doute la question de savoir quelle race occupait alors le pays. Dans Tapres-midi nous visitames la Montagne Blanche, autrement dite Maro, haute d’environs 200 m. au dessus du niveau de la plaine, et dont le sommet est presque entierement forme de quartz ; a droite et a gauche se trouvaient plusieurs autres pitons de la meme formation. Dans la masse quartzeuse et la coupant perpendiculairement, sur toute la profondeur de la montagne, M. Marie remarqua un enorme filon contenant du fer titanifere et du sulfure d’argent, et qui lui sembla avoir ete exploite autrefois. L’epaisseur de ce filon etait d’environ 1*50 m. h 2-oo m. Vers le soir notre guide nous prevint que nous pouvions etre attaques dans la nuit par une tribu tres turbulente que se nomment les Beni Ma’azeh, habitant de Tautre cote de la montagne, et sVtendant jusqu’au Hisma ou region de terre rouge : les Bedouins sont presque toujours en lutte avec leurs voisins. Nous primes les 376 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. dispositions n^cessaires pour repousser cette attaque qui heureuse- ment n’eut pas lieu. Le n Avril, nous portames notre camp du Djebel el-Abiad, h. la bouche du Ouadi Scherma, situe a quatre heures de marche plus au sud. Comme a Eyniineh, nous trouvames qu’il y avait en la une nombreuse population d’ouvriers et de mineurs. Une immense forteresse, dont le plan fut releve par les officiers, une ancienne ville dans un llot forme par les aux branches du Ouadi, des carrieres de sable rouge, mele de carbonate de fer, exploitees sur une longeur considerable, indiquaient suffisamment qu’autre- fois cet endroit etait le siege d’une industrie florissante. Le 12 Avril, notre Camp fut transfere sur le Ouadi Tiryam h cinq heures de marche au sud. La, comme a Eyiiuneh et h Scherma, nous trouvames les restes d’une ville sur la rive gauche du torrent, et sur la rive droite des fortifications tres considerables. Aux environs et en de nombreux endroits des carrieres de sable rouge qui, d’apres les Bedouins, est analogue a celui du Hisma, indiquaient une exploitation tres active. Le 13 Avril, nous visitames a pied la bouche du Ouadi coralline. A midi nous arrivions a El-Muwaylah, et sans perdre Tiryam, oil nous trouvames les restes d’une ancienne ville batie en de temps nous partimes pour le Scherm Djibbah, oil se trouvd une montagne a la bouche du Ouadi Madsus, contenant du soufre dont nous primes des echantillons. Le 14 Avril, la corvette partit pour le Scherm Ziba, ou on nous avait assure qu’il existait une mine des turquoises, que nous ne pumes pas trouver par suite du mauvais vouloir des habitants. Le 15 Avril, accompagnes par le Said Abd el-Rahfin et le Scheik Abd el-Nebi, nous partimes avec la corvette pour visiter le Ouadi Makna, dans le golfe d’Akabah, oil nous arrivames le lendemain (16 Avril) an heures du matin. En cet endroit se trouvait autrefois une ville d’une grande importance, capitale de tous le pays de Midian, s’etendant depuis Akabah jusqu’au Djebel Hassani. Les restes d’un port se voient encore dans la mer ; une forteresse, aujourd’hui detruite, dominait sur la rive gauche du Ouadi et commandait toute la vallee et la basse ville, que s’dtendait des deux cote's du courant d’eau. Des scories indiquaient que lh aussi il y avait eu autrefois une exploitation ; mais les habitants ne purent pas nous indiquer Fendroit oil se trouvaient les fours. Dans ces regions la formation primitive, k RETURN TO CAIRO. 377 nu en bien des endroits, est au contraire recouverte en d’autres par des masses de sables chlorites, surmontees de couches puissantes de gyps contenant egalement du sel gemme. Le 1 7, pendant que la corvette se refugiait au Scherm Dahab, nous poussames a pied une reconnaissance jusqu’a la montagne appellee Djebel el-Hamra. Nous trouvames toujours la memes formation primitive, formee de filons de porphyre encastres dans le granit rouge, et nous decouvrimes des quartz chlorites et des chlorites absolument analogues a celles qui au Bresil con- tiennent Tor. Enfin le 18 Avril, en entendant Farrivee de la corvette, M. Marie, M. Clarke, et moi nous eumes Fheureuse idee de pousser une reconnaissance vers le nord, et la nous nous trouvames en face d’une formation aurifere complete. A la simple vue For apparait en petites veines et en pointes nombreuses dans des galets roules par les eaux transposes du haut du Ouadi, et formes par du porphyre basaltique. II est evident que cette formation doit exister dans les montagnes environnantes. Les Bedouins m’assu- rent d’ailleurs qu’a la tete du Ouadi dans une des stations du pelerinage, appellee Magharat-Sha’ib, se trouvent encore des restes d’anciennes maisons, des dattiers et de Feau : evidemment a cet endroit Haji Wali Effendi a trouve For il y a 26 ans. Malheu- reusement le peu de temps que je pouvais accorder a mon ex¬ cursion, la difficult^ de nous procurer des chameaux, les dangers que pouvait craindre la corvette dans ces parages peu frequente's et difficiles, ne nous permirent pas de visiter cet endroit : d’ail¬ leurs la decouverte pour nous etait assuree et nous etions presse d’informer Votre Altesse de la reussite complete de Fexpedition. En consequence aussitot la corvette arrivee, nous nous embar- quames, et nous arrivames a Suez le 2 1 courant. En finissant ce rapide apergu de notre voyage, permettez moi, Monseigneur, de vous remercier de la fa5on vraiment prin- ciere dont par vos ordres S. A. le Prince Husayn Pasha a su organiser notre expedition. Nous avons trouve chez les employes du Gouvernment Egyptien, leurs Excellences Said Bey, Gouverneur de Suez; Ra’iif Bey, capitaine du port; Ali Bey Shukri, com¬ mandant la corvette ; le Gouverneur de El-Muwaylah et l’ecrivain du fort, le Said Abd el-Rahim, une courtoisie parfaite, et un zMe extreme h accomplir les desirs de Votre Altesse. Je ne crois pas trop m’avancer en declarant ici que notre 378 THE GOLD-MINES OE MID IAN expedition a completement reussi ; et je me permettrai de prier Votre Altesse de vouloir bien lui donner l’importance qu’elle merite. En 1 6 jours nous avons constate Fexistence de six grands etablissements miniers : — Nakhil Tayyibat Ism, Umm Amil. Makna, Wady Eyniinah, Wady Scherma, Wady Tiryam, Umm Amil. Nous n’avons malheureusement pas pu visiter le premier et le dernier. Nous avons trouve For, l’argent, le zinc, la galene argen¬ tine, l’antimonie et le soufre dans le porphyre et le granit qui composent la plus grande partie de ces montagnes ; dans le quartz qui forme des pitons entiers ; dans les chlorites et dans la terre rouge. Personnellement nous avons constate Fexistence de metaux precieux depuis Makna jusqu’a El-Muwaylah ; nous ne doutons pas que cette formation ne s’etend au nord jusqu’a Akabah et peut-etre au Syrie, et au sud jusqu’a Djebel Hassani. Quant a la largeur de l’ouest a l’est elle reste a determiner ; mais tous les renseignements que nous avons recueilles sur les lieux nous portent a croire que le Hisma, ou terre rouge, commence a deux degres, c’est-a-dire 120 milles geographiques de la cote, et s’etend jusqu’au cceur de l’Arabie. C’est done, Monseigneur, une ancienne Californie que, grace a votre bienveillance, nous avons fait revivre ; et en consequence j’oserai demander a Votre Altesse de vouloir bien recompenser les membres de l’expedition que j’ai eu l’honneur de diriger. Je demande a Votre Altesse — 1. Pour le Sergent Ali et les 20 hommes de l’escorte une gratification. 2. Pour les officiers qui ont parfaitement fait leur devoir, et specialement pour le B.-Lt. Hasan Effendi, un grade. 3. Pour M. Charles Clarke, Ingenieur Telegraphique, depuis 13 ans au service de Votre Altesse, et qui m’ a tres-bien seconde, le titre de Bey. 4. Pour mon vieil ami, Haji Wali, de Zagazig, qui fut le premier h decouvrir l or en 1849, et B^i? malgre ses 82 ans, RETURN TO CAIRO . 379 a bravement support e les fatigues du voyage, une rente viagere, sur laquelle la generosite bien connue de Votre Altesse me dispense d’insister. 5. Quant a M. Marie, qui a deja Fexperience de ce voyage, et qui a eu le premier l’occasion d’observer les mineraux de cet Ophir Arabe, je propose a Votre Altesse de l’envoyer en Angle- terre et au France pour qu’il puisse y recruter le materiel et le personnel ; et pouvoir faire ainsi une expedition serieuse dans la saison froide, et meme un commencement Sexploitation. Je me felicite d’avoir ete accompagne dans mon voyage par M. Marie, qui s’est montre a la hauteur de la mission delicate que S. A. le Prince Husayn Pasha a bien voulu lui confier, et dont le qualite de frangais donne, suivant mon desir, un caractere inter¬ national a notre voyage. Votre Altesse voudra bien excuser la liberte que je prends en allant au devant de ses desirs, et Fattribuer a sa veritable cause, Finteret que je prendrai toujours au Gouvernement progressif de 1’Egypte, et au bonheur du pays dont la Providence vous a confie les destinees. Je suis, De Votre Altesse, Le plus devoue Serviteur, Richard F. Burton. V A bord du Sinndr le 20 April, 1877. At Cairo our friendly party presently broke up. ✓ Lieutenant Amir was ordered to Dar-For, in the very heart of Africa, vulgarly called Darfur. Lieu¬ tenant Hasan, greatly to my regret, joined the Egyptian auxiliary force proceeding to the seat of war. Mr. Clarke, my energetic and able wakil y returned to Zagazig, whence he was careful to supply me with all the news ; and M. Marie was allowed by the Khediv leave of absence to France, in order to prepare his liver for the pains and penal¬ ties of the next autumn’s campaign. CHAPTER XIV. DEPARTURE FROM EGYPT. I had still work to do before leaving Egypt. The literary City of the Arabs, par excellence , appeared to me the best place for investigating the origin of that mysterious alphabet known in Syria as El- Mush aj jar, the tree-shaped, the branchy, in fact, the “ palm-runes” of the Icelandic Edda. Of late it has gained great interest by its evident connection with the Ogham, Ogam, or Ogmic, and with even older characters. Despite the novelty of the subject, however, 1 must defer publication, as the researches are not yet in a fit state to appear before the world. After paying my last respects to His Highness, I left Cairo on April 27th, and greatly enjoyed the cool Etesian gales of Alexandria, after the khamsin of the capital, whose glare and reflected heat were rapidly converting the lively perron of Shepheard’s Hotel into an Arabia Deserta. On May 2nd, the Institut Egyptien was pleased to confer upon me its honorary membership ; and on the same day I de- DEPARTURE FROM EGYPT 381 livered a short lecture, which was duly reported in the Phase d' A lexandrie (May 4th). * * “ Mercredi dernier avait lieu a l’lnstitut Egyptien une stance d’un haut interet. “ Monsieur le Capitaine Burton, l’intrepide et savant voyageur, dont les travaux ont eu un si grand retentissement, devait y rendre compte de ses dernieres decouvertes. “ La stance a 6t6 ouverte par S. E. Colucci Pacha, President de l’lnstitut, qui a rappele les services eminents rendus a la science par M. le. Capitaine Burton, ses voyages h la Mecque et dans 1’Afrique Centrale 011 il a, un des premiers, fait connaitre l’existence des grands lacs equatoriaux. “ M. le Capitaine Burton a ensuite pris la parole, pour exposer les resultats de son dernier voyage ; l’importante decouverte des anciennes mines d’or, situees sur la cote arabique, en face de Suez, et Fexploration du pays biblique de Midian. “ M. Burton a raconte, comment un de ses amis, un brave Turc, nomine Hadj Valy, Favait inform^ de l’existence de sables aurifkres du cote de FAkaba, lui offrant de le faire conduire sur les lieux, habilld en Bedouin. “ S. A. le Khedive, h qui M. Burton fit part de ces indications, mit a la disposition du Capitaine une fregate a vapeur, avec le nombre d’hommes necessaires, et lui adjoignit trois officiers du g£nie, et le mine'ralogiste M. George Marie. “ M. Burton, ainsi accompagne, se rendit de Suez k Moila, et parcourut les diverses localites qui lui avaient 6t6 signalees. “ II retrouva en quatre endroits difierents, les traces des mines exploitees par les anciens \ les anciennes carri^res \ les ouvrages executes, tels qu’aqueducs et barrages, des scories et des instru¬ ments de travail. u Les mines fournissaient des turquoises, du quartz ou des sables auriferes, et de Fargent combine avec une forte proportion de plomb ou detain. “ L expedition a rapport^ plusieurs specimens de ces mati^res que MM. Gastinel Bey et Marie s’occupent d’analyser. “ Les lieux oil se trouvent ces anciennes mines sont Gebel- Abiad par 28 degrds de latitude, Beit-el-Nessara, et les Ouadis Einuneh, Sherma et Tiriam. 382 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID I AN. At the Anglo- Egyptian Colony of Ramleh, which will some day become a suburb of the New City, I passed a week with my friend Mr. Charles ( alias Charley) Grace, whose familiar petit nom shows the full measure of his well-merited popularity. If, during that pleasant time, I attempted any evil pleasantries concerning the sand-heaps of “ Rum- lay,” and the ice-plants, and the broken bottles, and the crushed provision-tins which seem to represent its normal growth, I take this opportunity of ex¬ pressing my repentance, and of promising more reverence for the future. H.M.’s Foreign Office had kindly granted me leave of absence till the end of May; but the Russo-Turkish war was declared on April 24th ; and, “ Consuls, to your posts ! ” was the order of the day. So, resisting the temptation to make the grand tour, via Jaffa, Bayrut and Constantinople, I em- “ Le voyage au pays de Midian, sous un autre point de vue offre egalement un grand interet. “ Le Capitaine Burton a pu retrouverles vestiges de la capitale de Midianites, Makna, que les Arabes appellent encore aujourd’hui Madian. II a rapporte une inscription Midianite dont il offre une photographie a l’lnstitut. “ Nous ne pouvons suivre M. le Capitaine Burton dans les details geographiques et geologiques oil il est entrd, mais nous annoncerons qu’il se propose de reprendre bientot ses e'tudes dont les fruits ont dejk et£ si heureux et qu’il s’appliquera it resoudre les iniportantes questions soulevees par son voyage sur 1 archeologie et la topographie biblique et a dtudier tout ce qui concerne Sexploitation des mines de'couvertes par lui.” DEPARTURE FROM EGYPT 383 barked (May 6th) on board the Austrian Lloyd’s S.S. Flora, Captain Pietro Radaglia. The ship was not Ai. She was small and slow, her engines not having been cleaned ; her first-class passengers numbered thirty bodies to twenty-four berths ; and her second, and even her third class, were allowed to encumber her quarter-deck, which was always washed too late ; and furtively to kiss unclean hands to the ladies. It is incredible how little good is done to the public by large postal subventions. The last steamer, despatched at a comparatively dead season, was large and roomy enough to accommodate sixty passengers : the Flora , and the S.S. Vesta , which followed her, were un¬ comfortably crowded, besides having to refuse about a dozen passengers. Indeed, but for the extreme civility and courtesy of the Austrian Lloyd’s cap¬ tains, officers, and men, complaints would be as many as travellers would be few. Among the little knot going north was H.E. Sefer Pasha (Count Kossielsky), returning for the summer to his Chateau of Bertholdsstein, near Styrian Graz ; and he brought with him a little fright who had been captured by the Deuka tribe, and released by the soldiers under Colonel Gordon (Pasha), lately made Governor-General of the Provinces of the Equator — Sudan and its depend¬ encies. About the nationality of this specimen 3^4 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID I AN. there are many doubts. M. Gessi declares that the individual is a dwarf, belonging to the Shilluk tribe, on the Sobut River ; that he has known him, to¬ gether with his father and family, for two years ; and that he passed into the hands of an Austrian sea-captain, who forthwith declared him to be an “ Aka.” The first “ Pygmies ” brought to Europe were, it will be remembered, the two lads from the Country of Munza, King of the Monbuttoo (Mon- botu), who reached Khartum in the boats belonging to the late M. Miani. It was the only success that ever befell the poor old Venetian traveller; and he did not live to enjoy its fruits. He died, like Dr. Livingstone, of hardship and fatigue, attended by his two dwarf negroes, and by a negroid sergeant, who afterwards escorted the dwarfs to Italy. I could not repress a laugh when the Pygmy, Monsieur Rustam, so called after the giant-hero of Persia, came on board the Flora. His huge little head was clad in a new and long tasselled Tarbush, whilst a small great-coat, a European paletot made in Alexandria, invested his squat, square fat body, falling like a sack upon his heels. A pair of bag- breeches, whose tail almost touched the ground, and Parisian bottines with elastic bands, completed the couthless, fitless attire. He sat the image of pompous dignity a yard and a bittock high, monopo¬ lising the place of honour before the cockswain, in DEPARTURE FROM EGYPT. 3S5 the P01 t-Captain s own barge; and his tiny legs, like a duck’s, far too short for the trunk, failed to reach the ground. It was, in fact, Cowper’s picture — - “ The slippery seat betray’d the sliding part That prest it, and the feet hung dangling down.” Coming alongside, he climbed the companion-ladder with the assistance of a tasselled and silver-mounted cane ; strutted straight to the quarter-deck ; de¬ liberately chose the most comfortable travelling- arm-chair, utterly reckless of its owner ; settled down with an air, and looked around him as though he had been the monarch of all he surveyed. And yet this thing had been captured in the wilds of Africa only seven months before we had the honour of meeting it. A superficial glance at M. Rustam sug¬ gested that he was a dwarf eunuch-mute, attached to some powerful Harlm, and much prized, as are Skyes and Dachshunds, for extreme ugliness. We had on board the Baronne de Z - , a glorious blonde, an angel in an “ idiot-fringe,” a “ Daughter of the gods, Divinely tall, and most divinely fair. ” She was talking to me when she caught sight of the creature, and it so charmed her that she ex¬ claimed, “Mat's je V embrasserais volontiers !” Presently, Sefer Pasha told me that this citizen of Lilliput-land was being sent to Vienna for the 2 c 386 THE GOLD-MINES OEM/D/AN. t inspection of H.I.M. the Empress of Austria. I then began my study of Monsieur Rustam, or, as he called himself in his own tongue, “ Borch.”* He had learnt sufficient Arabic to make himself under¬ stood ; and, in little more than half a year, he had picked up some Italian and a few words of German. Unfortunately he was as stiff and proud as he was quick, observant, and intelligent ; and he absolutely declined to be measured, or even to show his teeth. Yet he condescended to play with the monkeys on board ; and the first thing he deigned to do at Trieste was to walk out and inspect the town. The photograph given to me by his temporary owner is good, showing a certain resemblance to “ Khayrullah,” the younger of the Miani Pygmies. Unfortunately it presents the full face instead of the very remarkable profile. The Lilliputian measures in height forty inches and two lines, very little more than the famous Polish dwarf, Count Borowlacki, f who is described as having “ perfect symmetry of form, great accomplishments, and elegant manners.” M. Rustam’s age appears (1877) to be about twelve or thirteen. There is little trace of deformity about the manikin, although his stunted legs, large head, and burly trunk suggest the idea of a man cut down, * M. Gessi pronounces and writes the word “ Botch.” t He was thirty-nine inches high, and died at ninety-eight on ' September 5, 1837. 1 DEPARTURE FROM EGYPT 387 and his great breadth of beam reminds us of the term “ pocket- Hercules.” The skin is a dark and shiny chocolate, or coffee thoroughly roasted, very unlike the dirty yellow of Du Chaillffs Obongos, who dwell in the virgin forest : it seems to belong to the people of sunny plains. His head, rather rounded at the parietes, is backed by an unusually pro¬ jecting occiput — apparently a racial characteristic;* and its high* bombd brow gives him a peculiarly thoughtful look. The hair, short and curling stiff, rises like pepper-corns from the scalp ; and its colour is reddish-brown as if sun-stained. There are as yet no signs of beard or mustachio : this, again, apparently distinguishes the Aka race. The nose has literally no bridge ; the root is flush with the cheeks ; and the tip, with petalous nostrils, rises suddenly from a dead flat : the feature irresistibly suggests a broken-nosed pug-dog. The lower face is oval, and the malar bones, though somewhat prominent, are not so highly developed as in the African race generally. The eyes are partially closed by the fat eyelids, and the “whites” are, as usual, a dull brown. The glance is acute and intelligent, wholly lacking the “ untamable wildness ” of the Obongo. The ears have very little lobule, and the latter has not been pierced for rings. The oral region forms a * I have remarked this occipital projection in all the Akas yet seen by me. 388 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN muzzle ; the lips are somewhat everted, the upper being notably short. The jaw is orthognathic, without the elevations and depressions noticed by Schweinfurth; and the chin does not retreat as much as is usual with negroes and negroids. The profile, with its overhanging forehead, its trilobate nose all tip, and its oral region projecting, despite the short upper lip, like a cynocephalus, is also characteristic of the Aka. The body is evidently steatopygous ; at the same time there is no letter S form, no undue prominence of stomach. The hands are “pudgy the fingers resemble a small bunch of bananas ; the upper skin is scaly, like that of a black fowl, and the palms are notably yellow. The feet are comparatively broad and flat. Finally, the voice is soft and pleasant, as I have noticed amongst several of the negro tribes, especially the Somal. Briefly, having once seen the little man it would be impossible to forget him, or to mistake the strongly marked and peculiar type to which he belongs. Besides studying the pygmy there was little to do on board the Flora. A lumpy sea sent all the passengers to their berths, and a thick fog hid from us every beauty of the view. Despite the late hour, we landed at unfortunate Corfu ; and found the Israelite shopkeepers demanding such exaggerated prices for lace, arms, ornaments, and other bibelots , that purchase was out of the question. At last as DEPARTURE PROM EGYPT. 389 the Bora, or north-easter, was threatening to set in, we landed at Trieste on Saturday, May 12th, two months and ten days after my departure ; and, re¬ stored to marvellous good health and spirits, I was once more, so to speak, at home. CONCLUSION. These pages have made public property a secret jealously kept by me, because it was not wholly my own, during the last twenty-three years. My re¬ connaissance of the Midianite coast-lands in April 1877 has not only proved the existence ol gold in the Arabian Peninsula, so long denied by the highest authorities : it has introduced another rich metalliferous region to the world. By discovering vasts deposits of iron in manifold shapes, it has shown the curious error of the ancient and classical geographers ; and it has remarkably confirmed the list of metals, “ the gold and the silver, the brass (copper), the iron, the tin, and the lead,” taken from the Midianites (Num. xxxi. 22) ; adding to them zinc, antimony, and wolfram, or tungsten ; with others of minor importance. The Khedivial Expedition was, it is true, pre¬ vented, by the advanced season, from carrying out the discovery ; from tracing the valleys to their water -sheds, and from laying down the superficies and the limits of the new Ophir. These measures, which may result in opening an unworked California, CONCL USION. 391 must be left to a “ serious exploration,” of which H.H. the Viceroy has courteously invited me to take the lead. The once wealthy and commerical Land of Midian, now “ destitute of that whereof it was once full,” has become a desolation among the nations. The cities and goodly castles of the sea-board are ruinous heaps, almost level with the ground. “ The Desert has resumed its rights ; the intrusive hand of cultivation has been driven back ; the race that dwelt here have perished ; and their works now look abroad in loneliness and silence over the mighty waste.” The interior, formerly so rich in oases if not in smiling field and pasture-land, has been dis¬ forested to a howling wilderness ; and the area of some three thousand square miles, which, thirty- one centuries ago, could send into the field 135,000 swordsmen, is abandoned to a few hundreds of a mongrel Egypto-Bedawi race, half peasants, half nomads, whose only objects in life are to plunder, maim, and murder one another. But Destruction is a mere phase of Reproduc¬ tion ; and man can do again what man has undone. The winter climate of Midian is admirable; and even a population of European miners could work in it from October to May. The summers, though hot, are not unhealthy, and the lofty and picturesque mountain ranges that line the coast are ready-made 392 THE GOLD-MINES OE MID IAN Sanitaria. Every valley, with its perennial spring, which these rain-attractors draw from the clouds, is capable of cultivation ; of smiling once more with garden, orchard, and luxuriant field. Upon a coast-line shown by the chart to be only eighteen (dir. geog.) miles in length, the Expedition found three large mining-establishments, the Wadies Taryam, Sharma, and Aynunah, where, I have reason to think, the precious metals were worked till the seventh century of our era, and perhaps much later. If the Ancients, with their imperfect technological appliances, could make these places pay, a fortiori we Moderns may hope to turn them into sources of wealth ; whilst the interior, should it be what I am convinced it is, will presently cause a total change in the condition of North-Western Arabia. Under the progessive and civilising rule of Egypt, which may now be said to have entered into the community of European nations, Midian will awake from her long and deadly lethargy ; her skeletons of departed glory will revive ; and she will enjoy a happier and more vigorous life than any she has yet known. I finished my sixteen days in the old land, whose novelties are so striking, with the conviction that Y oltaire was, for once, in error when he wrote — “ Nous ne vivons jamais, nous attendons la vie.” alia! Is i|i Hack N O RTH-W To accompany Capt * Burton js d llamrA Author's Route JoboIZalid j ooo* || Ayjuiiuik iShrrm, Dnliiil". Jiebel,Tiryum & ' »* Petroleum. JebdKl-Dibbah d MUh W AO> Y YubuaV Plan of WADY SHARNtA FORT A VILLAGE . ,'JiutliPedJc 6000 ,Jd.«a ' *ShiDT •; RuW London. , C. Xega/i Taut, APPENDIX I. -*o* A. \ List of Supplies for a Desert Excursion, of six to ten persons, lasting sixteen days, and a cruise of five (total twenty-one days), supplied by Madame Chiaramonti, of Suez. MATERIEL. Chairs (rickety), table, napkins: to be returned after the Expedition. 15 (20)* cases wine, vin ordinaire (tolerable). 1 case wine, assorted (Faval for Madeira, and not drinkable). 5 cases cognac (peculiarly bad). 5 (12) bottles absinthe. 15 kilogr. ground coffee. 2\ kilogr. tea. 5 (2) kilogr. chocolate. 100 tins preserved meats, of sorts. 2 bales rice. 5 sheep, with fodder for 10 (3) days. 30 fowls, with food for ditto (3). 400 eggs (should have been greased). 50 kilogr. sugar. x5 (2°) boxes butter. 10 okes (each 3lbs. 30Z.) common butter. 10 tins concentrated milk. 15 kilogr. cheese. 10 kilogr. Italian pastes (vermicelli, etc.). Italian pastes, assorted, pates assorties. * The numbers in parentheses are the number which ought to have been taken. 394 THE GOLD-MINES OF MID IAN. 24 kilogr. bread. 2 quintals charcoal (coals carried to Newcastle !). 1 bag of potatoes. 20 (10) kilogr. beans and haricots (very useful). 45 (60) kilogr. onions. 50 kilogr. flour. 150 (172) kilogr. biscuits. 10 kilogr. chewing-tobacco (useful as presents, and smoked by the Arabs who never chew). 25 kilogr. salt. 2 kilogr. natron (intended as presents to the Arabs. Nonsense !). 20 packets candles. 3 dozen boxes matches. 5 (10) okes Turkish tobacco. 10 (20) boxes Zenobia cigars (smoked by friends). 1 box cigarette paper (all exhausted, much wasted). 48 (100) bottles soda. 24 bottles lemonade gazeuse (nauseous stuff): 6 (12) bottles syrup. 6 (12) bottles oil. 4 (6) bottles vinegar. 4 (12) cases beer. 20 bottles pickles. 10 okes common soap (much wasted). 1 case dried dessert-fruits (raisins very good against thirst): 200 (400) oranges and lemons. 10 pots mustard. 200 g. sulphate of quinine. 12 parasols (coarse make, and very useful)-. Besides which, we carried some “ Merceries,” when a good house¬ wife would have sufficed; Phenol (carbolic acid); good for bruises; vinaigre de toilette , utterly useless, and other notions, which were given away. The total expenditure upon these stores was about 2,500 francs, ( = ^£100). Madame Chiaramonti also claimed fifty francs for lost napkins and other damages. The two French servants re¬ ceived each 150 francs, with twenty-five of bakhshish. APPENDIX /. 395 B. List of Expenditures made during the Expedition commanded by Captain R. F. Burton, from March 29th to April 22nd, 1877- Piastres. Parahs. 186 O 2,124 0 10,648 o 6,098 o 2,680 o 5* 2 3 * *° o 430 20 1,200 o 440 o 400 o 1,400 o IOO o 203 20 IO 20 220 O 50 O L563 0 28,263 20 Telegrams. Hotel expenses. Cost of provisions, six to ten persons for twenty-one days. Total hire of camels. Total cost of guides, Shaykhs, and ship-expenses. For Sanbiiks from El Muwayle'h to Wady Aynunah. For boots, water-carriers, and messenger. Advanced at Suez to Haji Wali. Advanced by M. Marie to Expedition. Cost of two microscopes. Wages of two cooks during Expedition. Wages of Ali, the servant. Hire of a special camel to the Hisma, or Terre- Rouge. Postages. Cost of bags, etc. Cost of porterage and carriages at Suez. Advanced to Expedition, to Mr. Clarke. (which have been duly paid from the moneys in charge of Amir Effendi Ruschdi, of the Etat Major, acting under orders of the leader of the Expedition). The total sum supplied to the Expedition, by the order of H.H. the Viceroy, and H.H. Prince Husayn Kamil Pasha, Minister of the Interior, was: dollars 1073 (1 = 18*20 piastres tariff), Turkish sovereigns 150 (=100 piastres tariff). This re¬ reduced to piastres at the current rates, the total would be 3 45850*20 ‘ and the expenditure being 28,263*20, the surplus remaining in hand was, piastres 6,577, or $177*75. This sum was duly returned by me to H.H. Prince Husayn Kamil Pasha, Minister of Finance, etc. APPENDIX II. LIST OF CAPTAIN BURTON’S “ LAND OF MIDIAN ” PLANTS. (Supplied by the kindness of Professor Balfour, of the University, and Mr. Webb, Royal Botanic Garden , Edinburgh. ) Cleome droserifolia. Zilla myagroides. Fagona cistoides. „ arabica. Zygophyllum simplex. „ album. Crassocephalum flavum. Macrorhynchus nudicantis, Centaurea procurrens. Cucumis colocynthus. Polypogon monopeliensis.. Glycine schimperi. Leobordea lotoides. Tephrosa apollinea. Salsola vermiculata. Scirpus holoschaenus. Stipa tortilis. Solanum nigrum. Lavendula coronopifolia. Echium glomeratum. Silene picta. Erodium arabicum. Plantago psyllium. „ saxatilis. Euphorbia chamaesyce. „ cornuta. Anagallis arvensis. Aizoon canariense. Veronica anagallis. Asphodelus fistulosus. Anchusa, with yellow flowers. Veronica, near Beccabunga. Salvia. Suaeda. Santolina fragrantissima, not in flower. Cotula. Hagioscris, sp. cf. Picris, near Sprengeriana. Cf. Asterothix asperrimum. Glysophylla libanotica ? Genista ferox, barren shoot only. Rumex vesicarius, young male ? „ or bucephaloporus. Parietaria. Statice cf. graeca. Salvia, near molucella. Salvia, cf. aegyptica. Plantago, cf. cretica. Reseda, same as Lowne’s No. 2. Malcolmia aegyptica. APPENDIX III. -*o* LIST OF INSECTS. Hymenoptera. Formicidae. Camponotus sericeus, Fabr. Lipidoptera. Synchloe daplidice, Linn. Sphingomorpha chlorea, Guenei. Diptera. Tabanus rufipes, Walk. Orthoptera. Fam. Mantidcz. Eremiophila khamisin, Lefeb. Fam. Gryllidcz. Gryllus campestris, Linn. Fam . Locustidce. Poecilocera bufonia, Klug. CEdipoda cserulans, Latr. Forficula bimaculata, Pal. de Beam. Hemiptera. Nepa rufa, Linn. APPENDIX IV. -♦O SPECIMENS OF REPTILES PRESENTED BY CAPTAIN BURTON TO THE BRITISH MUSEUM. 1. Three lizards, viz., Acanthodactylus cantoris , Uromastyx spinipes , and Ceramodactylus dorice. The first is a species ranging from Northern India through Sindh into Persia; the second is common in Northern Africa; the third has been discovered in Persia only some four years ago. 2. Two snakes, both belonging to Zamenis ventrimaculatus , a species common in the Indo-African region. 3. Three toads ( Bufo ). They are too young to be specifically determined, but probably Bufo panther inus. British Museum , 21 st March , 1878. A. GUNTHER. 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