The Land of Midian (Revisited) Volume I Part 5

Galut Ali.

Usman amir.

Alewa Ahmed.

30. Mohammed Ajizah.

And lastly (31), the carpenter, 'Ali Sulayman; a "knowing dodger," who brought with him a little stock-in-trade of tobacco, cigarette-paper, and similar comforts.

There were five soldiers, or rather matchlock-men, engaged from the fort-garrison, El-Muwaylah:--

Husayn Bayrakdar; a man who has travelled, and has become too clever by half. He was equally remarkable as a liar and as a cook.

Bukhayt Ahmed, generally known as El-Ahmar from his red coat; a d.i.n.ka slave, some sixty years old, and looking forty-five. He was still a savage, never sleeping save in the open air.

Bukhayt Mohammed, popularly termed El-Aswad; a Forawi (Dar-Forian) and a good man. He was called "The Shadow of the Bey."

Ahmed Salih; a stout fellow, and the worst of guides.

Salim Yusuf.

The head of the caravan was the Sayyid' Abd el-Rahim, accountant at the Fort el-Muwaylah, of whom I have spoken before. He was subsequently recommended by me to his Highness for the post of n.a.z.ir or commandant.

Haji Wali, my old Cairene friend, who lost no time in bolting.

There were also generally three Bedawi Shaykhs, who, by virtue of their office, received each one dollar (twenty piastres) per diem.

The servants and camp followers were:--

Anton Dimitriadis, the dragoman; a Bakkal or small shopkeeper at Zagazig, and a tenant of Haji Wali.

Giorgi (Jorgos) Sifenus, the cook, whose main disadvantage was his extreme and ultra-Greek uncleanliness.

Petro Giorgiadis, of Zante; a poor devil who has evidently been a waiter in some small Greek cafe which supplies a cup per hour.

These three men were a great mistake; but, as has been said, poor health at Cairo prevented my looking into details.

Yusuf el-Fazi, Dumanji or quartermaster from the Mukhbir, acting servant to Captain Ahmed, and a thoroughly good man. He was also recommended for promotion.

Ahmed, the Sais or mule-groom; another pauvre diable, rascally withal, who was flogged for selling the mules' barley to the Bedawin. He was a.s.sisted by the Corporal (and barber) Mohammed Sulayman and by five quarrymen.

Husayn Ganinah; a one-eyed little Fellah, fourteen years old, looking ten, and knowing all that a man of fifty knows. He was body-servant to Lieutenant Yusuf.

As usual, the caravan was accompanied by a suttler from El-Muwaylah, one Hamad, who sold tobacco, coffee, clarified b.u.t.ter, and so forth. He was chaffed with the saying, Hamad fi'

bayt ak--"Thy house is a pauper."

Finally, there were two dogs: Juno, a Clumber spaniel, young and inexperienced; Paiki, a pariah, also a pup.

Besides these two permanents, various "casuals," the dog 'Brahim, etc., attached themselves to our camp.

Chapter II.

The Start--from El-muwaylah to the "White Mountain" and 'Aynuah.

I landed at El-Muwaylah, described in my last volume,[EN#18] on the auspicious Wednesday, December 19, 1877, under a salute from the gunboat Mukhbir, which the fort answered with a rattle and a patter of musketry. All the notables received us, in line drawn up on the sh.o.r.e, close to our camp. To the left stood the civilians in tulip-coloured garb; next were the garrison, a dozen Bash-Buzuks en bourgeois, and mostly armed with matchlocks; then came out quarrymen in uniform, but without weapons; and, lastly, the escort (twenty-five men) held the place of honour on the right. The latter gave me a loud "Hip! hip! hurrah!" as I pa.s.sed.

The tents, a total of twenty, including two four-polers for our mess and for the stores, with several large canvas sheds--pals, the Anglo-Indian calls them--gleamed white against the dark-green fronds of the date-grove; and the magnificent background of the scene was the "Dibbagh" block of the Tiha'mah, or lowland mountains.

The usual "palaver" at once took place; during which everything was "sweet as honey." After this pleasant prelude came the normal difficulties and disagreeables--it had been reported that I was the happy possessor of 22,000 mostly to be spent at El-MuwayIah.

The unsettled Arabs plunder and slay; the settled Arabs slander and cheat.

A whole day was spent in inspecting the soldiers and mules; in despatching a dromedary-post to Suez with news of our unexpectedly safe arrival, and in conciliating the claims of rival Bedawin. His Highness the Viceroy had honoured with an order to serve us Hasan ibn Salim, Shaykh of the Beni 'Ukbah, a small tribe which will be noticed in a future page. Last spring these men had carried part of our caravan to 'Aynunah; and they having no important blood-feuds, I had preferred to employ them.

But 'Abd el-Nabi, of the Tagayat-Huwaytat clan, had been spoilt by over-kindness during my reconnaissance of 1877; besides, I had given him a bowie-knife without taking a penny in exchange. In my first volume he appears as a n.o.ble savage, with a mixture of the gentleman; here he becomes a mere Fellah-Bedawi.

The claimants met with the usual ceremony; right hands placed on the opposite left b.r.e.a.s.t.s--this is not done when there is bad blood--foreheads touching, and the word of peace, "Salam,"

ceremoniously e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed by both mouths. Then came the screaming voices, the high words, and the gestures, which looked as if the Kurbaj ("whip") were being administered. The Huwayti stubbornly refused to march with the other tribe, whom, moreover, he grossly insulted: he professed perfect readiness to carry me and mine gratis, the while driving the hardest bargain; he spoke of "our land," when the country belongs to the Khediv; he openly denied his allegiance; he was convicted of saying, "If these Christians find gold, there will be much trouble (fitneh) to us Moslems;"

and at a subsequent time he went so far as to abuse an officer. I had "Shaykh'd" him (Shayyakht-uh), that is, promoted him in rank, said the Sayyid 'Abd el-Rahim; and the honour had completely changed his manners. "Nasaggharhu" (We will "small" him), was my reply. The only remedy, in fact, was to undo what had been done; to cut down, as Easterns say, the tree which I had planted. So he was solemnly and conspicuously disrated; the fee, one dollar per diem, allotted as travelling and escort-allowance to the chiefs, was publicly taken from him, and he at once subsided into an ign.o.ble Walad ("lad"), under the lead of his uncle, Shaykh 'Alayan ibn Rabi. The latter is a man of substance, who can collect at least two thousand camels. Though much given to sulking, on the whole, he behaved so well that, the Expedition ended, I recommended him to his Highness the Viceroy for appointment to the chieftains.h.i.+p of his tribe, and the usual yearly subsidy. With him was a.s.sociated his cousin, Shaykh Furayj, an excellent man, of whom I shall have much to say; and thus we had to fee three Bedawi chiefs, including Hasan. The latter was a notable intriguer and mischief-maker, ever breeding bad blood; and his termper was rather violent than sullen. When insulted by a soldier, he would rush off for his gun, ostentatiously light the match, walk about for an hour or two threatening to "shyute," and then apparently forget the whole matter.

All wanted to let their camels by the day, whereas the custom of Arabia is to bargain for the march. Thus, the pilgrims pay one dollar per stage of twelve hours; and the post-dromedary demands the same sum, besides subsistence-money and "bakhs.h.i.+'sh." But our long and frequent halts rendered this proceeding unfair to the Bedawin. I began by offering seven piastres tariff, and ended by agreeing to pay five per diem while in camp, and ten when on the road.[EN#19] Of course, it was too much; but our supply of money was ample, and the Viceroy had desired me to be liberal. In the Nile valley, where the price of a camel is some 20, the average daily hire would be one dollar: on the other hand, the animal carries, during short marches, 700 lbs. The American officers in Upper Egypt reduced to 300 lbs. the 500 lbs. heaped on by the Sudani merchants. In India we consider 400 lbs. a fair load; and the Midianite objects to anything beyond 200 lbs.

I have no intention of troubling the reader with a detailed account of our three first stages from El-Muwaylah to the Jebel el-Abyaz, or White Mountain.[EN#20] On December 21st, leaving camp with the most disorderly of caravans--106 camels instead of 80, dromedaries not included--we marched to the mouth of the Wady Tiryam, where we arrived before our luggage and provisions, lacking even "Adam's ale." The Shaykhs took all the water which could be found in the palm-boothies near the sh.o.r.e, and drank coffee behind a bush. This sufficed to give me the measure of these "wall-jumpers."

Early next morning I set the quarrymen to work, with pick and basket, at the north-western angle of the old fort. The latter shows above ground only the normal skeleton-tracery of coralline rock, crowning the gentle sand-swell, which defines the lip and jaw of the Wady; and defending the townlet built on the northern slope and plain. The dimensions of the work are fifty-five metres each way. The curtains, except the western, where stood the Bab el-Bahr ("Sea gate"), were supported by one central as well as by angular bastions; the northern face had a cant of 32 degrees east (mag.); and the northwestern tower was distant from the sea seventy-two me'tres, whereas the south-western numbered only sixty. The spade showed a substratum of thick old wall, untrimmed granite, and other hard materials. Further down were various sh.e.l.ls, especially benitiers ( Tridacna gigantea) the harp (here called "Sirinbaz"), and the pearl-oyster; sheep-bones and palm charcoal; pottery admirably "cooked," as the Bedawin remarked; and gla.s.s of surprising thinness, iridized by damp to rainbow hues. This, possibly the remains of lachrymatories, was very different from the modern bottle-green, which resembles the old Roman. Lastly, appeared a ring-bezel of lapis lazuli; unfortunately the "royal gem," of Epipha.n.u.s was without inscription.

Whilst we were digging, the two staff-officers rode to the date-groves of Wady Tiryam, and made a plan of the ancient defences--the results of the first Khedivial Expedition had either not been deposited at, or had been lost in, the Staff bureau, Cairo. They found that the late torrents had filled up the sand pits acting as wells; and the people a.s.sured them that the Fiumara had ceased to show perennial water only about five or six years ago.

The second march was disorderly as the first: it reminded me of driving a train of unbroken mules over the Prairies; the men were as wild and unmanageable as their beasts. It was every one's object to get the maximum of money for the minimum of work. The escort took especial care to see that all their belongings were loaded before ours were touched. Each load was felt, and each box was hand-weighed before being accepted: the heaviest, rejected by the rich, were invariably left to the poorest and the lowest clansmen with the weakest and leanest of animals. All at first especially objected to the excellent boxes--a great comfort--made for the Expedition[EN#21] at the Citadel, Cairo; but they ended with bestowing their hatred upon the planks, the tables, and the long tent-poles. As a rule, after the fellows had protested that their camels were weighted down to the earth, we pa.s.sed them on the march comfortably riding--for "the 'Orban can't walk." And no wonder. At the halting-place they unbag a little barley and wheat-meal, make dough, thrust it into the fire, "break bread,"

and wash it down with a few drops of dirty water. This copious refection ends in a thimbleful of thick, black coffee and a pipe.

At home they have milk and Ghi (clarified b.u.t.ter) in plenty during the season, game at times, and, on extraordinary occasions, a goat or a sheep, which, however, are usually kept for buying corn in Egypt. But it is a "caution" to see them feed alle spalle altrui.

Nothing shabbier than the pack-saddles; nothing more rotten than the ropes. As these "Desert s.h.i.+ps" must weigh about half the st.u.r.dy animals of Syria and the Egyptian Delta, future expeditions will, perhaps, do well to march their carriage round by El-'Akabah. The people declare that the experiment has been tried, but that the civilized animal sickens and dies in these barrens; they forget, however, the two pilgrim-caravans.

At this season the beasts are half-starved. Their "kitchen" is a meagre ration of bruised beans, and their daily bread consists of the dry leaves of thorn trees, beaten down by the Makhbat, a flail-like staff, and caught in a large circle of matting (El-Khasaf). In Sinai the vegetation fares even worse: the branches are rudely lopped off to feed the flocks; only "holy trees" escape this mutilation. With the greatest difficulty we prevented the Arabs tethering their property all night close to our tents: either the brutes were cold; or they wanted to browse or to meet a friend: every movement was punished with a wringing of the halter, and the result may be imagined.

We slept that night at Wady Sharma. Of this ruined town a plan was made for "The Gold-Mines of Midian," by Lieutenant Amir, who alone is answerable for its correctness. We afterwards found layers of ashes, slag, and signs of metal-working to the north-east of the enceinte, where the furnace probably stood. The outline measures 1906 metres, not "several kilometres;" and desultory digging yielded nothing but charcoal, cinders, and broken pottery. It was not before nine a.m. on the next day that I could mount my old white, stumbling, starting mule; the delay being caused by M. Marie's small discovery, which will afterwards be noticed. We crossed both branches of the Sharma water; and, ascending the long sand-slope of the right bank, we again pa.s.sed the Bedawi cemetery. I sent Lieutenants Amir and Yusuf to prospect certain stone-heaps which lay seawards of the graves; and they found a little heptangular demi-lune, concave to the north; the curtains varying from a minimum length of ten to a maximum of eighty me'tres, and the thickness averaging two metres, seventy-five centimetres. It was possibly intended, like those above Wady Tiryam, to defend the western approach; and, superficially viewed, it looks like a line of stones heaped up over the dead, with that fine bird's-eye view of the valley which the Bedawi loves for his last sleeping-place.

Thence we pa.s.sed through the dry Bab ("sea gap"), cut by a torrent in the regular line of the coralline cliff, the opening of the Wady Mellah, off which lay our Sambuk. Marching up the Wady Maka'dah, our experienced eyes detected many small outcrops of quartz, formerly un.o.bserved, in the sole and on the banks. The granite hills, here as throughout Midian, were veined and d.y.k.ed with two different cla.s.ses of plutonic rock. The red and pink are felsites or fine-grained porphyries; the black and bottle-green are the coa.r.s.e-grained varieties, easily disintegrating, and forming hollows [Ill.u.s.tration with caption: Fortification on the cliff commanding the right bank of Wady Sharma'.] in the harder granite. The ride was made charming by the frontage of picturesque Jebel 'Urnub, with its perpendicular Pinnacles upon rock-sheets dropping clear a thousand feet; its jutting bluffs; its three huge flying b.u.t.tresses, that seemed to support the mighty wall-crest; and its many spits and "organs," some capped with finials that a.s.sume the aspect of logan-stones. There was no want of animal life, and the yellow locusts were abroad; one had been seized by a little lizard which showed all the violent muscular action of the crocodile. There were small long-eared hares, suggesting the leporide; sign of gazelles appeared; and the Bedawin spoke of wolves and hyenas, foxes and jackals.

We camped upon the old ground to the southwest of the Jebel el-Abyaz; and at the halt our troubles forthwith began. The water, represented to be near, is nowhere nearer than a two hours' march for camels; and it is mostly derived from rain-puddles in the great range of mountains which subtends maritime Midian. But this was our own discovery. The half-Fellah Bedawin, like the shepherds, their predecessors, in the days of Abimelech and Jethro, are ever chary of their treasure; the only object being extra camel-hire. After eating your salt, a rite whose significance, by-the-by, is wholly ignored throughout Midian and its neighbourhood, they will administer under your eyes a silencing nudge to an over-communicative friend. 'The very children that drive the sheep and goats instinctively deny all knowledge of the Themail ("pits") and holes acting as wells.

At the head of the Wady el-Maka'dah we halted six days (December 24--30); this delay gave us time to correct the misapprehensions of our flying visit. The height of the Jebel el-Abyaz, whose colour makes it conspicuous even from the offing when sailing along the coast, was found to be 350 (not 600) feet above the plain. The Grand Filon, which a mauvais plaisant of a reviewer called the "Grand Filou," forms a "nick" near the hill-top, but does not bifurcate in the interior. The fork is of heavy greenish porphyritic trap, also probably t.i.taniferous iron, with a trace of silver,[EN#22] where it meets the quartz and the granite.

Standing upon the "old man" with which we had marked the top, I counted five several d.y.k.es or outcrops to the east (inland), and one to the west, cutting the prism from north to south; the superficial matter of these injections showed concentric circles like ropy lava. The shape of the block is a saddleback, and the lay is west-east, curving round to the south. The formation is of the coa.r.s.e grey granite general throughout the Province, and it is d.y.k.ed and sliced by quartz veins of the amorphous type, crystals being everywhere rare in Midian (?) The filons and filets, varying in thickness from eight metres to a few lines, are so numerous that the whole surface appears to be quartz tarnished by atmospheric corrosion to a dull, pale-grey yellow; while the fracture, sharp and cutting as gla.s.s or obsidian, is dazzling and milk-white, except where spotted with pyrites--copper or iron. The neptunian quartz, again, has everywhere been cut by plutonic injections of porphyritic trap, veins averaging perhaps two metres, with a north-south strike, and a dip of 75 degrees (mag.) west. If the capping were removed, the sub-surface would, doubtless, bear the semblance of a honeycomb.

The Jebel el-Abyaz is apparently the centre of the quartzose outcrop in North Midian (Madyan Proper). We judged that it had been a little worked by the ancients, from the rents in the reef that outcrops, like a castle-wall, on the northern and eastern flanks. There are still traces of roads or paths; while heaps, strews, and scatters of stone, handbroken and not showing the natural fracture, whiten like snow the lower slopes of the western hill base. They contrast curiously with the hard felspathic stones and the lithographic calcaires bearing the moss-like impress of metallic dendrites; these occur in many parts near the seaboard, and we found them in Southern as well as in Northern Midian. The conspicuous hill is one of four mamelons thus disposed in bird's-eye view; the dotted line shows the supposed direction of the lode in the Jibal el-Bayza, the collective name.