Although The Road From Mekka To Medina Was Considered Safe Even For
Caravans Unarmed Like Ours, Yet Stragglers Are Always
Exposed; and had
it not been for the terror with which, a few days before, Mohammed Aly's
victory over the
Wahabys had inspired all the neighbouring Bedouins, I
should probably have been punished for my imprudence in walking on
alone. We rode the greater part of the night, over a plain more gravelly
than sandy, where some ashour trees
[p.295] grow among the acacias, the same species (Asclepia gigantea)
which I have so often mentioned in my Nubian Travels. This ground is
called El Barka. After a seven hours' march, we stopped at El Kara.
January 17th. We slept a few hours during the night, a circumstance that
seldom occurred on this journey. El Kara is a black, flinty plain, with
low hills at a great distance to the east: it bears a few thorny trees,
but affords no water. I was struck by its great resemblance to the
Nubian Desert, south of Shigre. Although in the midst of winter, the
heat was intense the whole morning of our stay at Kara. Nobody in the
caravan had a tent, and I was more exposed than any person; all the
others being mounted on a shebrye, or shekdof, a sort of covered camel-
saddle, which affords some shelter from the sun, both while on the
camel, and when placed on the ground: the shebrye serves for one person,
and the shekdof for two-one sitting on each side of the camel.
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