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.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 506 of 669
Words from 137848 to 138121
of 182297
