When At About One
Hour’S Distance Short Of The Modjeb I Was Shewn To The N.E. Of Us, The
Ruins Of Diban (Arabic), The Ancient Dibon, Situated In A Low Ground Of
The Koura.
On the spot where we reached the high banks of the Modjeb are the ruins
of a place called Akeb el Debs (Arabic).
We followed, from thence, the
top of the precipice at the foot of which the river flows, in an eastern
direction, for a quarter of an hour, when we reached the ruins of Araayr
(Arabic), the Aroer of the Scriptures, standing on the edge of the
precipice; from hence a foot-path leads down to the river. In the Koura,
about one hour to the west of Araayr, are some hillocks called Keszour
el Besheir (Arabic). The view which the Modjeb presents is very
striking: from the bottom, where the river runs through a narrow stripe
of verdant level about forty yards across, the steep and barren banks
arise to a great height, covered with immense blocks of stone which have
rolled down from the upper strata, so that when viewed from above, the
valley looks like a deep chasm, formed by some tremendous convulsion of
the earth, into which there seems no possibility of descending to the
bottom; the distance from the edge of one precipice to that of the
opposite one, is about two miles in a straight line.
We descended the northern bank of the Wady by a foot-path which winds
among the masses of rock, dismounting on account of the steepness of the
road, as we had been obliged to do in the two former valleys which we
had passed in this day’s march; this is a very dangerous pass, as
robbers often waylay travellers here, concealing themselves behind the
rocks, until their prey is close to them. Upon many large blocks by the
side of the path I saw heaps of small stones, placed there as a sort of
weapon for the traveller,
[p.373] in case of need. No Arab passes without adding a few stones to
these heaps. There are three fords across the Modjeb, of which we took
that most frequented. I had never felt such suffocating heat as I
experienced in this valley, from the concentrated rays of the sun and
their reflection from the rocks. We were thirty-five minutes in reaching
the bottom. About twelve minutes above the river I saw on the road side
a heap of fragments of columns, which had been about eight feet in
height. A bridge has been thrown across the stream in this place, of one
high arch, and well built; but it is now no longer of any use, though
evidently of modern date. At a short distance from the bridge are the
ruins of a mill. The river, which flows in a rocky bed, was almost dried
up, having less water than the Zerka Mayn and Wale, but its bed bears
evident marks of its impetuosity during the rainy season, the shattered
fragments of large pieces of rock which had been broken from the banks
nearest the river, and carried along by the torrent, being deposited at
a considerable height above the present channel of the stream.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 246 of 453
Words from 127751 to 128297
of 236498
