Whenever The Power Of The Turks In The Hedjaz Declines, Which It Will
When The Resources Of Egypt Are No
Longer directed to that point by so
able and so undisturbed a possessor of Egypt as Mohammed Ali, the Arabs
Will avenge themselves for the submission, light as it is, which they
now reluctantly yield to their conquerors; and the reign of the Osmanlis
in the Hedjaz will probably terminate in many a scene of bloodshed.
[p.53] ROUTE FROM DJIDDA TO TAYF. [I was unable to take any bearings
during this excursion, as the only compass which I possessed, and which
had served me throughout my Nubian journey, had become useless, and no
opportunity offered of replacing it till December in this year, when I
obtained one from a Bombay ship which arrived at Djidda.]
ON the 24th of August, 1814, (11th of Ramadhan, A.H. 1230.) I set out
from Djidda, late in the evening, with my guide and twenty camel-drivers
of the tribe of Harb, who were carrying money to Mekka for the Pasha's
treasury. After having left the skirts of the town, where the road
passes by mounds of sand, among which is the cemetery of the
inhabitants, we travelled across a very barren, sandy plain, ascending
slightly towards the east; there are no trees in it, and it is strongly
impregnated with salt to about two miles from the town. After three
hours' march, we entered a hilly country, where a coffee-hut stands near
a well named Raghame. We continued in a broad and winding valley amongst
these hills, some sandy and some rocky, and, at the end of five hours
and a half, stopped for a short time at the coffee-hut and well called
El Beyadhye. Of these wells the water is not good. From thence, in one
hour and a half, (seven hours in all,) we reached a similar station
called El Ferayne, where we overtook a caravan of pilgrims, who were
accompanying goods and provisions destilled for the army: they had
quitted Djidda before us in the evening. The coffee-huts are miserable
structures, with half-ruined
[p.54] walls, and coverings of brushwood; they afford nothing more than
water and coffee. Formerly, it is said, there were twelve coffee-houses
on this road, which afforded refreshments of every kind to the
passengers between Djidda and the holy city; but as the journey is now
made chiefly during the night, and as the Turkish soldiers will pay for
nothing unless by compulsion, most of these houses have been abandoned.
The few that still remain are kept by some of the Arabs of the Lahyan
tribe, (a branch of the Hodheyl Arabs,) and Metarefe, whose families are
Bedouins, and live among the hills with their flocks. From Ferayne the
valley opens, and the hills, diverging on both sides, increase
considerably in height. At the end of eight hours, about sun-rise we
reached Bahhra, a cluster of about twenty huts, situated upon a plain
nearly four hours in length and two in breadth, extending eastward.
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