the mountains across the Gulf of Suez took on a lovely tint, indistinct pale pink, while the sky above the mountains was of a slaty blue; and then came an exquisite deep broad band of rich salmon pink, while above that yellowish green fading into blue. Our route lay along the desert by the sea for several hours, passing two or three points where the mountains run into the sea at high tide. The camels are very surefooted; they never stumble on level ground as the Syrian horses constantly do, but on muddy ground or slippery rocks they slide about terribly. We had some experience of this. After passing the last promontory, the desert plain of Er-Markha opened out before us, taking two and a-quarter hours to cross. Murray's description of this plain is well worth quoting, as to this writer it appeared a veritable Inferno of scorching heat— "For about two hours the road traverses this plain in a southeasterly direction, and a weary trudge it is. The sun is scorchingly hot, and blazes down upon the traveller from a sky whose blue expanse is unchequered by a single cloud. On the right the waters. of the gulf, of an even deeper azure, seem to shimmer in a mirror-like motionless expanse, that is hardly broken by a ripple even where they reach the shore. The soil around is dry, baked and glowing. Fortunate is he who does not have to encounter a Khamseen to add to the exhausting heat, but meets rather with the fresh sea-breeze, which generally rises in the afternoon, and changes the character of the scene.' This plain of Er-Markha must undoubtedly be identified as the Wilderness of Sin" where the Israelities murmured for food, and quails and manna were first given. Although we covered the distance from Suez to this place in five days, it was not until the fifteenth day of the second month after leaving Egypt that the Israelites reached this spot; and more than ever before we felt able to appreciate the privations which they had to endure. Here it was that we saw the first signs of population, even though of a wandering character, there being a Bedouin encampment in the distance and several flocks of goats wandering in search of scanty herbage, tended by Bedouin girls. The flocks are always tended by girls and not by men or boys; and so it was when Moses fled from Egypt and came to Jethro, whose seven daughters he found watering their father's flock near Horeb, i.e., Mount Horeb in Wâdi Feiran. Before us to the east a wâdi opened, and the mountains, to the east, south-east and south, were marvellously beautiful, and the colours extraordinary. On the left, yellow limestone brilliant in the sunshine, and then a black mountain (Jebel er-Markha), and then another yellow mountain, and behind all a magnificent range of dull crimson or red sandstone mountains and a broad band of crimson where the first yellow joined the black mountains; but no attempt at description can give any adequate idea of the mountain scenery and colours. Already our luncheon hour was long past, but we could not pitch our tent on the plain. So we pushed on, hoping to find shade somewhere up the Wâdi Hanak el-Lakam. Half-a-mile from the mouth of the wâdi we saw the first shade we had been conscious of all day, and there, under " the shadow of a great rock in a weary land," we gratefully pitched our luncheon tent. Now, as a fact, we were at the entrance to the mountains of Sinai proper, and limestone and sandstone soon gave place to granite. The ground rose gradually amidst increasingly fine scenery, and at length we came to the top of the pass Nakb el-Budera ("Pass of the Sword's Point "). A very steep and difficult pathway brought us over the crest, and looking back we had a glorious panorama of granite mountains, which reminded me of pictures I had seen somewhere in childhood, marvellous peaks and ranges of red granite, and here and there black mountains again. On the way up the wâdi in the afternoon we met an old Bedouin whose two donkeys were grazing, also a few goats in charge of a woman, but no other signs of life. The Bedouin's name was Aaron, and I photographed him and one of our men "saluting by the way," first shaking hands, then gracefully bowing and leaning forward three times until forehead touched forehead, and then they generally kiss on both cheeks. Up till this point it would almost have been possible to drive a motor car all the way from Ayûn Mûsa (except where our way was cut off by the sea) as the wâdis are broad, and there is always some smooth sandy surface to be found. From the summit of the pass we had a lovely view down various broad wâdis with the sea away to the west. The formation of the mountains is extraordinary, sometimes all red granite, at other times limestone of various colours (often brilliant whitish yellow) and sometimes absolutely black; probably limestone calcined till it looks like the refuse from a coal mine, also heaps of black volcanic slag, like refuse from iron-smelting works, indeed almost every shade of colour, though nowhere of the same brilliancy as Petra, unless we except the marvellous range of red granite seen from the Nakb el-Budera to the north and east when turned to a brilliant crimson by the setting sun. Every wâdi since we left the plain and entered the mountain region of Sinai is bounded on both sides by an indescribable scene of desolation. For unknown ages earthquakes and the action of the scorching sun have been splitting the limestone and granite mountain slopes, and then huge blocks of stone have been poured down towards the wâdi, and the wâdi sides consist of nothing but these heaps of refuse; some blocks of stone being hundreds of tons in weight. At the end of Wâdi Q'ena (on Wednesday, March 13th) we passed the Wâdi Maghara on the left, down which at a short distance lie the ancient mines quarried for turquoises, from the earliest Egyptian dynasties. From here we follow the Wâdi Sidr, until we enter the Wâdi Mukatteb (" Wâdi of the Inscriptions"). The inscriptions in question long baffled all attempts to decipher, but are now known to be Nabathean and to have been executed by the inhabitants of Petra and other passers-by, including Greeks, one of whom, a Greek soldier, wrote, "A bad set of people these. I, the soldier, have written this with my own hand." At the summit of the Wâdi Mukatteb we reach another narrow rocky pass, and obtain a magnificent view of Mount Serbal right before us. At length, we strike the apparently interminable Wâdi Feiran at its northern bend as it comes up from the sea and here turns south-east. As guide books are full of the beauties of the Oasis of Feiran, we expected almost every turn to reveal, not only Serbal in all its grandeur, but also the oasis itself. On and on, however, we went for at ast six hours, and the sun set before we touched the first oas or any water. The most impressive fact of the day's ride, apart from the almost oppressive silence, was the absence of any human or other form of life; scarcely even a lizard was seen moving. At last we touch damp sand in the dry river-bed, and soon come to running water. About a mile before touching the water we pass a huge rock with piles of stones before it, also stones on the top. Professor Palmer was told by Bedouins that this was the rock that Moses struck and water came forth, when the Israelites were cut off from the waters of the oasis by the Amalekites, who were about to fight against Israel in order to prevent their access to these waters. A truly wonderful feature of the wâdis we passed on our journey was that every one of them was a dry watercourse, many showing signs of tremendously powerful rivers in stormy weather; and on either side we passed immense widely-spread-out heaps of rubble and stones which had been swept down the smaller lateral wâdis, and these again cut through as by a knife by the central torrent |