The Higher Ground Was
Overgrown With A Kind Of Cactus, Which Here Becomes A Tree, Forming Shady
Avenues.
Its quadrangular fleshy branches of emerald green, sometimes
forty feet high, support upon their summits large round bunches of a
bright crimson berry:
When the plantation is close, domes of extreme
beauty appear scattered over the surface of the country. This "Hassadin"
abounds in burning milk, and the Somal look downwards when passing under
its branches: the elephant is said to love it, and in many places the
trees were torn to pieces by hungry trunks. The nearest approaches to game
were the last year's earths; likely places, however, shady trees and green
thorns near water, were by no means uncommon. When we reached the valley's
southern wall, Beuh informed us that we might ride all day, if we pleased,
with the same result. At Zayla I had been informed that elephants are
"thick as sand" in Harawwah: even the Gudabirsi, when at a distance,
declared that they fed there like sheep, and, after our failure, swore
that they killed thirty but last year. The animals were probably in the
high Harirah Valley, and would be driven downwards by the cold at a later
period: some future Gordon Cumming may therefore succeed where the Hajj
Abdullah notably failed.
On the 15th December I persuaded the valiant Beuh, with his two brothers
and his bluff cousin Fahi, to cross the valley with us, After recovering a
mule which had strayed five miles back to the well, and composing sundry
quarrels between Shehrazade, whose swains had detained her from camel-
loading, and the Kalendar whose one eye flashed with indignation at her
conduct, we set out in a southerly direction.
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