The First Dates Are Eaten In The Begining Of June, And At That Period Of Their Growth Are Called Rotab; But The General Date- Harvest Is At The End Of That Month.

In Egypt it is a month later.

Dates are dressed in many different ways by the Arabs; boiled in milk, broiled with butter; or reduced to a thick pulp

[p.358] by boiling in water, over which honey is poured; and the Arabs say that a good housewife will daily furnish her lord, for a month, a dish of dates differently dressed.

In these gardens a very common tree is the Ithel, a species of tamarisk, cultivated for its hard wood, of which the Arabs make their camels' saddles, and every utensil that requires strong handles.

In the gardens we seldom find the ground perfectly level, and the cultivation is often interrupted by heaps of rocks. On the N.W. and W. sides of the town, the whole plain is so rocky as to defeat all attempts at improvement. The cultivable soil is clay, mixed with a good deal of chalk and sand, and is of a grayish white colour: in other parts it consists of a yellow loam, and also of a substance very similar to bole- earth; small conical pieces of the latter, about an inch and a half long, and dried in the sun, are sold, suspended on a piece of riband, to the visiters of Medina. It is related that Mohammed cured a Bedouin of Beni Hareth, and several others, of a fever by washing their bodies with water in which this earth had been dissolved; and the pilgrims are eager to carry home a memorial of this miracle. The earth is taken from a ditch at a place called El Medshounye, in the neighbourhood of the town.

All the rocky places, as well as the lower ridge of the northern mountainous chain, are covered by a layer of volcanic rock: it is of a bluish black colour, very porous, yet heavy, and, hard, not glazed, like schlacken, and contains frequently small white substances in its pores of the size of a pin's head, which I never found crystallised. The plain has a completely black colour from this rock, and the small pieces with which it is overspread. I met with no lava, although the nature of the ground seemed strongly to indicate the neighbourhood of a volcano. Had I enjoyed better health, I should have made some excursions to the more distant parts of the gardens of Medina, to look for specimens of minerals; but the first days of my stay were taken up in making out a plan of the town, and gaining information on its inhabitants; and I was not afterwards capable of the slightest bodily exertion. It was not till my return to Cairo, that, in reading the description of Medina, which I had purchased at the former place, (and of

[p.259] which, and of the descriptions of Mekka, I could never find copies in the Hedjaz, notwithstanding all my endeavours,) I met with the account of an earthquake and a volcanic eruption which took place in the immediate neighbourhood of Medina about the middle of the thirteenth century; and upon inquiry I learnt from a man of Medina, established at Cairo, that the place of the stream of lava is still shown, at about one hour E. of the town. During my stay, I remember to have once made the observation to my cicerone, in going with him to Djebel Ohod, that the country appeared as if all burnt by fire; but I received an unmeaning reply; no hint or information afterwards in the town which could lead me to suppose that I was near so interesting, a phenomenon of nature.

Some extracts from the work to which I have alluded, describing this eruption, may be thought worthy of the reader's attention, and are given in the subjoined note. ["On the first of the month Djomad el Akhyr, in A.H. 654, a slight earthquake was felt in the town; on the third, another stronger shock took place, during the day; about two o'clock in the ensuing morning, repeated violent shocks awakened the inhabitants, increasing in force during the rest of the morning, and continuing at intervals till Friday the sixth of the month. Many houses and walls tumbled down. On Friday morning a thundering noise was heard, and at mid-day the fire burst forth. On the spot where it issued from the earth a smoke first arose, which completely darkened the sky. To the eastward of the town, towards the close of day, the flames were visible, a fiery mass of immense size, which bore the appearance of a large town, with walls, battlements, and minarets, ascending to heaven. Out of this flame issued a river of red and blue fire, accompanied with the noise of thunder. The burning waves carried whole rocks before them, and farther on heaped them up like high mounds. The river was approaching nearer to the town, when Providence sent a cool breeze, which arrested its further progress on this side. All the inhabitants of Medina passed that night in the great mosque; and the reflection of the fire changed that night into day-light. The fiery river took a northern direction, and terminated at the mountain called Djebel Wayra, standing in the valley called Wady el Shathat, which is a little to the eastward of Djebel Ohod [two miles and a half from Medina]. For five days the flame was seen ascending, and the river remained burning for three months. Nobody could approach it on account of its heat. It destroyed all rocks; but, (says the historian,) this being the sacred territory of Medina, where Mohammed had ordained that no trees should be cut within a certain space, it spared all the trees it met with in its course. The entire length of the river was four farsakh, or twelve miles; the breadth of it four miles; and its depth, eight or nine feet.

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