A Pilgrimage to Nejd, the Cradle of the Arab Race. Vol. 2 [of 2]. Lady Anne Blunt

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СКАЧАТЬ by snakes, who spit poison into the pool so that nothing can drink there. But at evening comes the ariel (a fabulous antelope), who strikes the water with his horns, and by so doing makes it sweet. Then all the beasts and birds of the desert follow him, and drink. The Sheykh of the Montefyk is bound to send camels and guides with all dervishes who come to him at Suk-es-Shiôkh to make the pilgrimage to Refay. The boys did not say that they had themselves seen the place.

      We are not on the high road now, having left it some miles to the right, and our march to-day has been mostly through Nefûd. The same swarms of locusts everywhere, and the same attendant flocks of birds, especially of fine black buzzards, one of which Abdallah was very anxious to secure if possible, as he says the wing bones are like ivory, and are used for inlaying the stocks of guns and stems of pipes. But he had no success, though he fired several times. Wilfrid was more fortunate, however, in getting what we value more, a bustard, and the very best bird we ever ate. Though they are common enough here, it is seldom that they come within shot, but this one was frightened by the hawk, and came right overhead.

      About noon, we came to a solitary building, standing in the middle of the Nefûd, called Kasr Torba. It is square, with walls twenty feet high, and has a tower at each corner. It is garrisoned by four men, soldiers of Ibn Rashid’s, who surlily refused us admittance, and threatened to fire on us if we drew water from the well outside. For a moment we thought of storming the place, which I believe we could have done without much difficulty, as the door was very rotten and we were all very angry and thirsty, but second thoughts are generally accepted as best in Arabia, and on consideration, we pocketed the affront and went on.

      Soon afterwards, we overtook a young man and his mother, travelling with three delúls in our direction. They were on the look-out, they said, for their own people, who were somewhere in the Nefûd, they didn’t quite know where. There are no tracks anywhere, however, and they have stopped for the night with us. Very nice people, the young fellow attentive and kind to his mother, making her a shelter under a bush with the camel saddles. They are Shammar, and have been on business to Haïl.

      February 12. – Our disappointment about water yesterday, has forced us back on to the Haj road and the wells of Khuddra, thirteen or fourteen miles east of last night’s camp. We had, however, some sport on our way. First, a hare was started and the falcon flown. The Nefûd is so covered with bushes, that without the assistance of the bird the dogs could have had no chance, for it was only by watching the hawk’s flight that they were able to keep on the hare’s track. It was a pretty sight, the bird above doubling as the hare doubled, and the three dogs below following with their noses in the air. We made the best of our way after them, but the sand being very deep they were soon out of sight. Suddenly we came to the edge of the Nefûd, and there, a few hundred yards from the foot of the last sand-bank, we saw the falcon and the greyhounds all sitting in a circle on the ground, watching a large hole into which the hare had just bolted. The four pursuers looked so puzzled and foolish, that in spite of the annoyance of losing the game, we could not help laughing. Hares in the desert always go to ground. Mohammed and Abdallah and Awwad were keen for digging out this one, and they all worked away like navvies for more than half an hour, till they were up to their shoulders in the sandy earth (here firm ground), but it was in vain, the hole was big enough for a hyæna, and reached down into the rock below. Further on, however, we had better luck, and having run another hare to ground, pulled out not only it, but a little silver grey fox, where they were both crouched together. I do not think the hares ever dig holes, but they make use of any they can find when pressed. We also coursed some gazelles.

      There are fourteen wells at Khuddra, mere holes in the ground, without parapet or anything to mark their position, and as we drew near, we were rather alarmed at finding them occupied by a large party of Bedouins. It looked like a ghazú, for there were as many men as camels, thirty or forty of them with spears; and the camels wore shedads instead of pack saddles. They did not, however, molest us, though their looks were far from agreeable. They told us they were Dafir waiting like the rest for the Haj; that their Sheykh, Ibn Sueyti, was still two days’ march to the eastwards, beyond Lina, which is another group of wells something like these; and they added, that they had heard of us and of our presents to the Emir, the rifle which fired twelve shots, and the rest. It is extraordinary how news travels in the desert. I noticed that Mohammed when questioned by them, said that he was from Mosul, and he explained afterwards that the Tudmur people had an old standing blood feud with the Dafir in consequence of some ghazú made long before his time, in which twenty of the latter were killed. 7 This has decided us not to pay Ibn Sueyti the visit we had intended. It appears that there has been a battle lately between the Dafir and the Amarrat (Ánazeh), in which a member of the Ibn Haddal family was killed. This proves that the Ánazeh ghazús sometimes come as far south as the Nefûd. These wells are seventy feet deep, and the water when first drawn smells of rotten eggs; but the smell goes off on exposure to the air.

      The zodiacal light is very bright this evening; it is brightest about two hours after sunset, but though I have often looked out for it, I have never seen it in the morning before sunrise. It is a very remarkable and beautiful phenomenon, seen only, I believe, in Arabia. It is a cone of light extending from the horizon half-way to the zenith, and is rather brighter than the Milky Way.

      February 13. – We have travelled quite twenty-four miles to-day, having had nothing to distract our attention from the road, and have reached the first of the reservoirs of Zobeydeh.

      To my surprise this, instead of being on low ground, is as it were on the top of a hill. At least, we had to ascend quite two hundred feet to get to it, though there was higher ground beyond. It is built across a narrow wady of massive concrete, six feet thick, and is nearly square, eighty yards by fifty. The inside descends in steps for the convenience of those who come for water, but a great rent in the masonry has let most of this out, and now there is only a small mud-hole full of filthy water in the centre. We found some Arabs there with their camels, who went away when they saw us, but we sent after them to make inquiries, and learnt that they were Beni Wáhari, a new artificial compound tribe of Sherârat, Shammar and others, made up by Ibn Rashid with a slave of his own for their Sheykh. They are employed in taking care of camels and mares for the Emir. They talk of eight days’ journey now to Meshhed Ali, but Wilfrid says it cannot be less than fifteen or sixteen.

      Mohammed, who has been very anxious to make himself agreeable, now he is quite away from Haïl influences, has been telling us a number of stories and legends, all more or less connected with his birthplace Tudmur. He has a real talent as a narrator, an excellent memory, and that most valuable gift, the manner of a man who believes what he relates. Here is one of his tales, a fair specimen of the extraordinary mixture of fable and historic tradition to be found in all of them:

      Suliman ibn Daoud (Solomon, son of David) loved a Nasraniyeh (a Christian woman), named the Sitt Belkis, 8 and married her. This Christian lady wished to have a house between Damascus and Irak (Babylonia), because the air of the desert was good, but no such a house could be found. Then Solomon, who was king of the birds as well as king of men, sent for all the birds of the air to tell him where he should look for the place Belkis desired, and they all answered his summons but one, Nissr (the eagle), who did not come. And Solomon asked them if any knew of a spot between Damascus and Irak, in the desert where the air was good. But they answered that they knew of none. And he counted them to see if all were there, and found that the eagle was missing. Then he sent for the eagle, and they brought him to Solomon, and Solomon asked him why he had disobeyed the first summons. And Nissr answered, that he was tending his father, an old eagle, so old that he had lost all his feathers, and could not fly or feed himself unless his son was there. And Solomon asked Nissr if he knew of the place wanted by Belkis; and Nissr answered that his father knew, for he knew every place in the world, having lived four thousand years. And Solomon commanded that he should be brought before him in a box, for the eagle could not fly. But when they tried to carry the eagle he was so heavy that they could not lift him. Then Solomon gave them an ointment, and told them to rub the bird with it and stroke him thus, and СКАЧАТЬ