INCIDENTS OF TRAVEL IN EGYPT, ARABIA PETRÆA, &c. 1-22-73 CHAPTER I. The Caravan.-A sudden Change of Purpose.-Perils of a Storm. My caravan consisted of five camels, four Arabs, Paul, and myself. We moved silently down the valley, and I tried hard to fasten my thoughts upon Gaza, the strong city of the Philistines, the city of Delilah and Samson, and to amuse my discontented spirit with imagining the gates which he carried away, and the temple which he pulled down; but it would not do; Petra, the rock of Edom, the excavated city, was uppermost in my mind. We had been marching in perfect silence about four hours, and I was sitting carelessly on my dromedary, thinking of every thing but what I saw, when Toualeb pointed to a narrow opening VOL. II.-B in the mountain, as the road to Akaba. I raised my head unconsciously, and it struck me, all of a sudden, that I was perfectly recovered, and fit for any journey. It was a day such as can only be seen in the mountainous desert of Arabia, presenting a clearness and purity in the atmosphere, and a gentle freshness in the air, which might almost bring to life a dying man. I stretched myself and brandished my Nubian club; my arm seemed nerved with uncommon vigour, I rose in my saddle strong as the slayer of the Philistines, and turning the head of my dromedary towards the opening in the mountains, called out briefly and decidedly, to "Akaba and Petra." Paul was astonished; he took the pipe from his mouth, and for a moment paused; then knocking out the ashes, he slipped from his dromedary and ran up to the side of mine, looking up in my face with an expression of countenance that seemed to intimate strong suspicions of my sanity. After gazing at me as steadfastly as he could without being impertinent, he went away, still apparently in doubt, and I soon saw him following with Toualeb, in earnest conversation. Toualeb was even more astonished than Paul. The Arabs are not used to any of these mercurial changes of humour; and, according to their notion, if a man sets out for Gaza he must go to Gaza; they cannot conceive how one in his right reason can change his mind; and Toualeb would have been very easily persuaded that an evil spirit was hurrying me on, particularly as, like Paul, from the beginning he had opposed my going by Petra and Idumea. Finding me resolute, however, he soon began to run, and brought back the camels, which were some distance in advance, and for several hours we moved on in perfect silence through the wild and rugged defile. The mountains on each side were high, broken, and rugged, and ever presenting the same appearance of extreme old age. The road was rougher than any I had yet travelled, if road it might be called; it was the only opening among the mountains by which we could pass at all, made by the hand of Nature, and so encumbered with fallen rocks, that it was exceedingly difficult for our camels to advance. I did not intend to push far that day; and a little before dark I proposed to encamp in a narrow pass between the mountains, where there was barely room to pitch our tents; but appearances threatened rain, and Toualeb, pointing to the accumulation of stones and rocks which had fallen from the mountain and been washed through the pass, told me it would be a dangerous place to spend the night in. There was no earth to drink the falling rain, and, pouring down the hard and naked mountain sides, it formed a torrent in the pass, which hurried and dashed along, gathering force at every moment, and carrying with it bodies of sand and stones that would have crushed to atoms any obstruction they might meet in their resistless progress. I felt at once the force of the suggestion; and as I had no idea of being disturbed in the night by such a knock at the door of my tent as one of these gigantic missiles would have made, we kept on our difficult way. At dark we were still in the ravine. Toualeb was right in his apprehensions; for some time before we reached the end of the pass, the rain was falling in torrents, the rocks and stones were washing under our feet, and we heard the loud roar of thunder, and saw the forked lightning play among the mountain-tops. It was two hours after dark before we reached a place where it was prudent to encamp. We pitched our tent in the open valley; the thunder was rumbling, and ever and anon bursting with a terrific crash among the riven mountains, and the red lightning was flashing around the hoary head of Sinai. It was a scene for a poet or painter; but, under the circumstances, I would have given all its sublimity for a pair of dry pantaloons. Thunder and lightning among mountains are exceedingly sublime, and excellent things to talk about in a ball-room, or by the fireside; but, my word for it, a man travelling in the desert has other things to think of. Every thing is wet and sloppy; the wind catches under his tent before he can get it pinned down; and when it is fastened, and he finds his tight canvass turning the water like a cemented roof, and begins to rub his hands and feel himself comfortable, he finds but the beginning of trouble in a wet mat and coverlet. I was but poorly prepared for a change like. this, for I had been so long used to a clear, un COMFORTLESS REPENtance. 13 clouded sky, that I almost considered myself beyond the reach of the changing elements. It was the beauty of the weather, more than any thing else, that had tempted me to turn off from the road to Gaza; and, hardly equal to this change of scene, my heart almost sank within me. I reproached myself as if for a wilful and unjustifiable disregard of prudence, and no writer on moral duties could have written a better lecture than I inflicted upon myself that evening. In wet clothes I was literally sitting on the stool of repentance. Drooping and disheartened, I told Paul that I was already punished for my temerity, and the next morning I would go back and resume the road to Gaza. For the night, however, there was but one thing to be done, and that was to sleep if I could, and sleep I did. A man who rides all day upon a dromedary must sleep, come what may, and even thunder among the mountains of Sinai cannot wake him.. Daylight brought back my courage; the storm was over; the sun was shining brightly as I ever saw it even in the East; and again there was the same clear and refreshing atmosphere that had beguiled me from my prudent resolution. I, too, was changed again; and, in answer to the suggestion of Paul, that we should retrace our steps, I pointed towards Akaba, and gave the brief and emphatic order, "Forward !" We continued for several hours along the valley, which was closely bounded on either side by mountains, not high, but bare, cracked, and crumbling |