Volume I Part 13 (1/2)

Dr. Beke, I am persuaded, is right in denying that Mount Sinai occupies the site at present a.s.signed to it; but I cannot believe that he has found it in the Jebel el-Yitm, near El-'Akabah. His ”Mount Barghir” is evidently a corruption of the ”Wali” on the summit, Shaykh Bakir--a common Arab name. His ”Mountain of Light”

is a term wholly unknown to the Arabs, except so far as they would a.s.sign the term to any saintly place. The ”sounds heard in the mountain like the firing of a cannon,” is a legend applied to two other neighbouring places. All the Bedawin still sacrifice at the tombs of their Santons: at the little white building which covers the reputed tomb of Aaron, sheep are slaughtered and boiled in a huge black cauldron. The ”pile of large rounded boulders” bearing ”cut Sinaitic inscriptions” (p. 423) are clearly Wusum: these tribal-marks, which the highly imaginative M. de Saulcy calls ”planetary signs,” are found throughout Midian. The name of the Wady is, I have said, not El-Ithem, but El-Yitm, a very different word. Lastly, the ”Mountain Eretowa,”

or ”Ertowa” (p. 404), is probably a corruption of El-Taur (El-Hisma), the ”inaccessible wall” of the plateau, which Dr.

Beke calls Jebel Hisma. My old friend, with his usual candour and straightforwardness, honestly admitted that he had been ”egregiously mistaken with respect to the volcanic character of (the true) 'Mount Sinai.”' But without the eruption, the ”fire and smoke theory,” what becomes of his whole argument?[EN#132]

Save for the death of my friend, I should have greatly enjoyed the comical side of his subject; the horror and disgust with which he, one of the greatest of geographical innovators, regards a younger rival theory, the exodist innovation of Dr. Heinrich Brugsch-Bey. The latter is the first who has rescued the ”March of the Children of Israel” from the condition of mere guesswork described by the Rev. Mr. Holland.

Under the guidance of our new acquaintances, we rowed to the site of Elath, which evidently extended all round the Gulf-head from north-east to north-west. Linant and Laborde (”Voyage de l'Arabie Petree,” etc., Paris, 1830) confine it to the western sh.o.r.e, near the mouth of the Wady el-'Arabah, and make Ezion-geber to face it as suggested by the writings of the Hebrews. Disembarking at the northern palm-clump, we inspected El-Dar, the old halting-place of the pilgrim-caravan before New 'Akabah was founded. The only ruins[EN#133] are large blocks under the clearest water, and off a beach of the softest sand, which would make the fortune of a bathing-place in Europe. Further eastward lies an enclosed date-orchard called El-Hammam: the two pits in it are said to be wells, but I suspect the treasure-seeker. Inland and to the north rise the mounds and tumuli, the sole remains of ancient Elath, once the port of Petra, which is distant only two dromedary marches. During rain-floods the site is an island: to the west flows the surface-water of the Wady el-'Arabah, and eastward the drainage of the Wady Yitm has dug a well-defined bed. A line of larger heaps to the north shows where, according to the people, ran the city wall: finding it thickly strewed with scoriae, old and new, I decided that this was the Siyaghah or ”smiths'

quarter.” Between it and the sea the surface is scattered with gla.s.s, shards, and slag: I inquired in vain for ”written stones,”

and for the petroleum reported to exist in the neighbourhood.

Shaykh Mohammed declared that of old a chain stretched from the Pharaohnic island-castle to the Jebel el-Burayj or Kasr el-Bedawi on the Midianite sh.o.r.e: this chain is a lieu commun of Eastern legends. The ”Bedawi's Castle” is mentioned by Robinson and Burckhardt (”Syria,” p. 510), as lying one hour south of El-'Akabah. Moreover, the Wady Yitm, whose upper bed shows two ruins, was closed, at the narrow above the mouth, by a fortified wall of stone and lime, thus cutting off all intercourse with the interior. The Bedawin declare it to be the work of King Hadid (Iron), who thus kept out the Beni Hilal of El-Nejd. We were shown large earth-dams, thrown across the embouchure of the torrent to prevent the floods injuring the palm-groves of New 'Akabah. These may date from ancient days, when the old city here extended its south-eastern suburb; as usual, they have become a cemetery, modern and Moslem; and on the summit of the largest the holy Shaykh el-Girmi (Jirmi) still names his ruined tomb.

Walking round the eastern bay, where the ubiquitous black sand striped the yellow sh.o.r.e, we observed that the tide here rises only one foot,[EN#134] whereas at Suez it may reach a metre and a half to seven feet. According to the chart, the springs attain four feet at ”Omeider” (El-Humayzah), some nineteen direct knots to the south; and in the Sharm Yaharr we found them about one metre. Presently we entered, by wooden doors with locks and keys, the carefully kept palm-groves, walled with pise and dry stone.

Wells were being sunk; and a depth of nine to ten feet gave tolerably sweet water. Striking the broad northern trail which leads to the Wady Yitm and to the upper El-'Arabah, still a favourite camping-ground of the tribes,[EN#135] we reached the modern settlement, which has something of the aspect of a townlet, not composed, like El-Muwaylah, of a single house. The women fled at our approach, as we threaded the alleys formed by the mud tenements.

The fort[EN#136] is usually supposed to have been built by Sulta'n Selim I., in A.D. 1517, or three years before his death, after he had subdued the military aristocracy of the Mamluks, who had ruled Egypt for three centuries. Much smaller than that of El-Muwaylah, it is the normal affair: an enceinte once striped red and white; curtains flanked by four Burj, all circular, except the new polygon to the north-west; and a huge, gloomy main-gateway fronting north, and flanked by two bastions. On the proper right side is a circle of stone bearing, without date, the name of ”Sultan Selim Khan el-Fatih,” who first laid out the pilgrim-route along the Red Sea sh.o.r.e. Inside the dark cool porch a large inscription bears the name ”El-Ashraf Kansur (sic)[EN#137] El-Ghori,” the last but one of the Circa.s.sian Mamluk kings of Egypt, who was defeated and slain by the Turkish conqueror near Aleppo in A.D. 1501. Above it stand two stone s.h.i.+elds dated A.H. 992 (= A.D. 1583--1584). In the southern wall of the courtyard is the mosque, fronted by a large deep well dug, they say, during the building of the fort: it still supplies the whole Hajj-caravan with warmish sweet water. On the ground lies a good bra.s.s gun with Arabic inscription and numerals; and the towers, commanding the little kitchen-gardens outside the fort-wall, are armed with old iron carronades. The garrison, consisting of half a dozen gunners and a few Ba'sh-Buzuks, looks pale, bloodless, and unwholesome: the heats of summer are almost unsupportable; and 'Akabah has the name of a ”little h.e.l.l.”

Moreover, they eat, drink, smoke, sleep, chat, quarrel, and never take exercise: the officers complained sadly that I had made them walk perhaps a mile round the bay-head. And yet they have, within two days of sharp ride, that finest of sanitaria, the Hisma, which extends as far north and south as they please to go.

I at once made arrangements for a dromedary-post to Suez, and wrote officially to Prince Husayn Pasha, requesting that his Highness would exchange the Mukhbir for a steamer less likely to drown herself. Moreover, the delay at Maghair Shu'ayb had exhausted our resources; and the Expedition required a month's additional rations for men and mules. The application was, it will appear, granted in the most gracious manner, with as little delay as possible; and my wife, who had reached Cairo, saw that the execution of the order was not put off till the end of March.

Messrs. Voltera Brothers were also requested to forward another instalment of necessaries and comforts; and they were as punctual and satisfactory as before. For this postal service, and by way of propitiatory present, Shaykh Mohammed received ten dollars, of which probably two were disbursed. We therefore parted fast friends, he giving me an especial invitation to his home in the Hisma, and I accepting it with the firm intention of visiting him as soon as possible.

Meanwhile Mr. Clarke and Ali Marie were busy with buying up such stores as El-'Akabah contains; and the officers of the fort, who stayed with us to the last, were profuse in kind expressions and in little gifts which, as usual, cost us double their worth. In these lands one must expect to be ”done” as surely as in Italy.

What the process will be, no one knows till it discloses itself; but all experts feel that it is in preparation.

NOTE ON THE SUPPLIES TO BE BOUGHT AT EL-'AKABAH.

The following is a list of the stores with their prices. It must be borne in mind that the Hajj-caravan was pa.s.sing at the time we visited El-'Akabah.

A large sheep cost half a napoleon; the same was the price of a small sheep, with a kid.

Fowls (seventy-one bought), thirteen pence each; pigeons, sixpence a head.

Eggs (sixty), two for threepence.

Tobacco (8 lbs.), coa.r.s.e and uncut, but welcome to the Bedawin, one s.h.i.+lling per pound.

Samn (”liquefied b.u.t.ter” for the kitchen) also one s.h.i.+lling per pound. This article is always dear in Arabia, but much cheaper than in Egypt.

Pomegranates (fifty), four s.h.i.+llings a hundred.

Onions (one kanta'r or cwt.), one sovereign.

Thin-skinned Syrian raisins, fivepence per pound.

Dried figs, twopence halfpenny per pound.