Exactly At Noon Mas’Ud Seized The Halter Of The Foremost Camel, And We
Started Down The Fiumara.
Troops of Badawi girls looked over the
orchard walls laughingly, and children came out to offer us fresh fruit
and sweet water.
At two P.M., travelling South-west, we arrived at a
point where the torrent-bed turns to the right[;] and, quitting it, we
climbed with difficulty over a steep ridge of granite. Before three
o’clock we entered a hill-girt plain, which my companions called “Sola.” In
some places were clumps of trees, and scattered villages warned us that
we were approaching a city. Far to the left rose the blue peaks of
Taif, and the mountain road, a white thread upon the nearer heights,
was pointed out to me. Here I first saw the tree, or rather shrub,
which bears the balm of Gilead, erst so celebrated for its tonic and
stomachic properties.[FN#26] I told Shaykh Mas’ud to break off a
[p.149] twig, which he did heedlessly. The act was witnessed by our
party with a roar of laughter; and the astounded Shaykh was warned that
he had become subject to an atoning sacrifice. [FN#27] Of course he
denounced me as the instigator, and I could not fairly refuse
assistance. The tree has of late years been carefully described by many
botanists; I will only say that the bark resembled in colour a
cherry-stick pipe, the inside was a light yellow, and the juice made my
fingers stick together.
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