 CHAPTER IX. When we reached the foot of the hill on which Hagarain stands we dismounted. There was tremendous work to get out the sword of the oldest soldier. He had used it so much as a walking stick that it was firmly fixed in the scabbard. The scabbards are generally covered with white calico. A very steep, winding, slippery road led us to the gate where soldiers received us and conducted us to a courtyard, letting off guns the while. There stood the Sultan Abdul Imberik Hamut Al-Kaiti, a very fat, evil-looking man pitted by smallpox. After shaking hands he led us down the tortuous streets to his palace, and then took us up a narrow mud staircase, so dark that we did not know whether to turn to the right or left. We sometimes went one way, and sometimes the other. At length we reached a small room with some goat-hair carpets, and we and the Sultan, the soldiers, his and ours, the Bedouin, and my groom, Imberik, all seated ourselves round the wall, and after a long time a dirty glass of water was handed round as our only entertainment. As we had had nothing to eat since sunrise, and it was about two o'clock, we did not feel cheerful when the Sultan abruptly rose and said he must pray. Praying and sleeping are always the excuses when they want to get rid of guests or say, not at home, and indeed the sleeping excuse prevails in Greece also. Some time after our four chairs were brought, but we sat till near four o'clock homeless, and getting hungrier and hungrier, when the Sultan reappeared, telling my husband all our things were locked up in a courtyard and giving him a great wooden key. We hastened to our home, up a long dark stair past many floors, all used as stalls and stables, etc., only the two top floors being devoted to human habitation. Each floor consisted of one fair-sized room and one very tiny den, a kitchen. The whole Indian party had the lower room and three of our soldiers the den. I cannot think how they could all lie down at once, and they had to cook there besides. Above that we had the best room, the botanist and naturalist the den, and Theos made his abode on the roof where he cooked. The Bedouin, having unloaded the camels in the courtyard across the street, refused to help us, and, as no one else could be got, my husband and all his merry men had to carry up the baggage, while I wrestled with the beds and other furniture in our earthy room. The instant the baggage was up, the Bedouin clamored for payment, and it was trying work opening the various packages where the bags of money were scattered, and to begin quarreling when we were so weary and hungry. We had been told that our journey to Hagarain would take twenty days, whereas it only took thirteen, and that we must take two camels for water, which had proved unnecessary. Besides, the camels had been much loaded with fish and other goods belonging to the Bedouin. My husband said he would pay for the twenty days and they would thus have thirty dollars as backsheesh. But in the end the soldiers from Maquella said we must pay backsheesh. It would be an insult to their sultan if we did not and they would go no further with us. The local sultan also insisting fourteen more dollars had to be produced. Our own soldiers soon came shouting and saying they must have half a rupee a day for food, which my husband thought it wise to give, though the wazir at Maquella had said he was to give nothing. They were hardly gone when the sultan came back personally, conducting two kids and saying we need think of no further expense. We were his guests and were to ask for what we wished. All my husband asked for was daily milk. We got some that day, but never again. My groom, embodic, then came, saying he must have food money. That being settled he returned, saying the sultan said he must have half a rupee a day for my horse, which became very thin on the starvation he got. All this time we could get no water, so not till dark could Matheus furnish us with tea, cold meat, bread, and honey. We were fortunate in having plenty of bread. We had six big sacks of large cakes of plain bread dried hard, and of this we had learnt the value by experience. We kept it sheltered, if there was any fear of rain, as in Abyssinia, for instance, even before a meal soaked it in water, wrapped it in a napkin a few minutes, and then dried it up to the consistency of fresh bread. We were often obliged to give it to the horses, for the difficulty asked of forage makes them unfit to travel in such barren places. We also took charcoal and found that, with it and the bread, we had our meals long before the Indian party, who had a weary search for fuel before they could even begin with, pat-a-cake, pat-a-cake, baker's man. The making of chipottes also causes delay in starting. As to the honey it is most plentiful and tastes like orange flowers, but really it is the date flower which imparts this flavour. It is much more glutinous than ours. It is packed for exportation and to bring as tribute, in large round tin boxes, stopped up round the edges with mud. It is used in paying both taxes and tribute. We were quite worn out with this day. The sultan received a present next morning of silk for-robe, a turban, some handkerchiefs, two watches, some knives, scissors, needle cases, and other things, but he afterwards sent Saleh to say he did not like his present at all and wanted dollars. He got tin rupees and was satisfied. We again visited him with our servants and soldiers and were given tea while we talked over the future and all seemed fair. Later the sultan came to visit us and talk about the escort. He said we must take five soldiers, bargained for their wages, food, and backsheesh, and obtain the money. My husband inquired about some ruins near Meshad, three hours by camel from Haggarein, and said that if the sultan would arrange that we should dig safely he could have forty dollars, and he settled to go with my husband next day to see the place. Accordingly next day the sultan came with eight soldiers, singing and dancing all the way, and some men of the Nehid tribe as siyadah, as we were then in their land. The sultan showed us two letters in which it was said that we were to have been attacked between Sif and Qaidun, and we remembered having seen a man on a camel apparently watching for us, but instead of coming forward he galloped away, and thus it appears we got past the place from which they meant to set upon us before the attacking party could arrive. During the days we were at Haggarein several weddings were celebrated. To form a suitable place for conviviality they cover over a yard with mats, just as the Abyssinians do, and the women to show their hilarity on the occasion utter the same gurgling noises as the Abyssinian women do on a like occasion, and which in Abyssinia is called Ululta. From our roof we watched the bridegroom's nocturnal procession to his bride's house, accompanied by his friends bearing torches, and singing and specifying to their hearts' content. On our return from the ruins near Meshad, Taseer, our soldier, came to us and was very indignant about the price the sultan charged for his soldiers. He was given ten rupees to attach himself to us as an earnest of the good-back sheesh he would get at the coast, as he said all the other soldiers would go back from Shibam, and really in that case I think he would have been glad of our escort. Then Saleh, who had one hundred rupees a month and eight with everyone, came to demand half a rupee a day for food. This was granted as we thought it could come off his back sheesh, and he soon appeared to make the same request for Mahmud, the naturalist. Mitheus was furious, as Mahmud ate partly with him, and no one was angrier with him than Saleh. It was settled that we should give him tea, bread, and foranas, and they all went off balling. Afterwards we heard Saleh had said, Mr. Bent is giving so much money to the sultan. Why should we not have some? We really thought at first that we should be able to encamp at Meshad and dig, for there was a Sayyid who had been in Hyderabad, and was very civil to us. But this happiness only lasted one hour. The sultan said it would really not be safe unless we lived in Haggadayn. So we had to give it up, as it was an impossibility to dig in the heat of the day, with six hours' journey to Fatigues. Besides, we must have paid many soldiers and we were told no one would dig for us. So much was said about the dangers of the onward road that Saleh was sent with the letters for Shibam and Shahr, and told to hold them tight, and say that if we could not deliver these in person we should return to the Weli of A'adin, and say that the sultan of Haggadayn would not let us go on. This frightened him. So he made a very dear bargain for fifteen camels, and we were to leave next day. We were glad enough to depart from Haggadayn, which is so picturesque that it really might be an old, medieval, fortified town on the Rhine, built entirely of mud and with no water in its river. All the houses are enormously high, and they have a kitchen and oven on each floor. The bricks of which they are built are about one foot square and withdrawing them. They have shooting holes from every room, and meticulations over the outer doors and along the battlements. And what makes the houses seem to contain even more stories than they do is that each floor has two ranges of windows, one on the ground so that you can only see out if you sit on the floor, and another too high to see out of it all. Below every lower window projects a long wooden spout. The narrow lanes are mere drains, and the whole place a hot bed of disease. The people looked very unhealthy. When cholera comes they die like flies. As I wind up to this last evening Mahmud came into our room and soon began to say his prayers. We could not make out why, but it turned out he had no light in his room. All together we had not a reposable time in Hagarain. We were told early next day that fourteen men of the Nahad tribe had come as our siyata. Though we had been told two would be sufficient, so we had to agree to take four. Then we were asked to pay those who had come unbidden. The sultan came himself about it, and his children came to beg for anise. At last the sultan, who had often said he felt as if he were our brother, obtained twelve rupees, which he asked for to pay his expenses for the kids and honey, and said my horse had eaten the worth of twice as much money as he had asked before. When we finally got off we found the old rascal had only sent half the Nahadi, and had only sent two soldiers, and so had really made forty dollars out of us over that one item. The Nahad men had ten dollars each. They are not under the sultan of Mkela, but independent. The Nahad tribe occupy about ten miles of the valley through which we passed, and the toll-money we paid to this tribe, for the privilege of passing by, was the most exorbitant demanded from us on our journey. When once you have paid the toll-money, Siyad, and have with you the escort, Siyadah, of the tribe in whose territory you are, you are practically safe wherever you may travel in Arabia. But this did not prevent us from being grossly insulted as we passed by certain Nahad villages. Qaidun, where dwells the very holy man so celebrated all the country round, for his miracles and good works, is the chief center of this tribe. We had purposely avoided passing to near this town, and afterwards learnt that it was owing to the influence of this very holy Siyad that our reception was so bad amongst the Nahad tribe. All about Haggadayn are many traces of the olden days when the frankincense trade flourished, and when the town of Doen, which name is still retained in the wedi Doen, was a great emporium for this trade. Acres and acres of ruins, dating from the centuries immediately before our era, lie stretched along the valley here, just showing their heads above the weight of super-incumbent sand, which is invaded and overwhelmed the past glories of this district. The ruins of certain lofty square buildings stand upon hillocks at isolated intervals. From these we got several inscriptions, which proved that they were the high platforms alluded to on so many hemorrhidic inscribed stones as raised in honor of their dead. As for the town around them, it has been entirely engulfed in sand. The then dry bed of a torrent runs through the center, and from this fact we can ascertain from the walls of sand on either side of the stream, that the town itself has been buried some thirty feet or forty feet by this sand. It is now called Ray Doen. The ground lies strewn with fragments of hemorrhidic inscriptions, potteries, and other indications of a rich harvest for the excavator, but the hostility of the Nehid tribe prevented us from paying these ruins more than a cursory visit. And even to secure this we had to pay the sheikh of the place nineteen dollars, and his greeting was ominous as he angrily muttered, solemn to all who believe Muhammad is the true prophet. We were warned that our eyes should never be let to see Meshed again. We might camp before we got there or after, as we wished. So we're led by a roundabout way to Adib, and saw no more of the leperous Seyyid who told such wondrous tales about the English king who once lived in Hagarain, and how the English, Turks, and Arabs were all descended from King Sam. So he told the adaiht fable of how the giants and rich men tried to make a paradise of their own, the beautiful garden of Irim, and defied God, and so destruction came upon the tribe of Ayd, the remnant of whom survived Adin on Jebel Shemsan, in the form of monkeys. This is the Muhammadan legend of the end of the Sabian Empire. We were much amused with what Imam Sharif said to this Imam Sharif is himself a Seyyid or Sharif, a descendant of Muhammad, his family having come from Medina, so he was always much respected. He said to him, you think these English are very bad people, but the Quran says that all people are like their rulers. Now we have no spots or diseases on our bodies, but are all clean and sound, which shows plainly that our ruler and the rest of us must be the same. Now you, my brother, must be under the displeasure of God, for I see that you are covered with leprosy. This was not a kind or civil speech, I fear, but not a ruder one than those addressed to us. This leprosy shows itself by an appearance as if patches of white skin were neatly set into the dark skin. At Adib they would not allow us to dip our vessels in their well, nor take our repast under the shadow of their mosque. Even the women of this village ventured to insult us, peeping into our tent at night and tumbling over the jugs in a manner most aggravating to the weary occupants. The soldiers had abandoned us and gone to sleep in the village. A dreary waste of sand led past Keren to Badoura. I arrived first with Imam Sharif, a servant and a soldier. We dismounted as there was some surveying to be done. The people were quite friendly, we thought, though they crowded round me shouting to see the woman. I went to some women grouped at a little distance, and we had no trouble as long as we were there. We had left before the camels came, and heard that the rest of the party had been very badly received. Stones were thrown, and shots raised of pigs, infidels, dogs, come down from your camels and we will cut your throats. We attributed this to Sala Hassan, for he made enemies for us wherever we went. At this village they were busy making indigo dye in large jars like those of the forty thieves. We were soon out of the Nahed country. Our troubles on the score of rudeness were happily terminated at Haura, where a huge castle belonging to the Al-Qaity family dominates a humble village surrounded by palm groves. Without photographs to bear out my statement I should hardly dare to describe the magnificence of these castles in the Haudermount. Haura is seven stories high, and covers fully an acre of ground beneath the betelene cliff, with battlements, towers, and meticulations bearing a striking likeness to Holy Root. But Holy Root is built of stone, and Haura, say for the first story, is built of sun-dried bricks. And if Haura stood where Holy Root does, or in a rainy climate, it would long ago have crumbled away. Haura is supposed to be the site of an ancient hemorrhidic town. We were told that the Sultan of Hagarain is not entirely under Makalla, but that he of Haura is. The castle of the Sultan is nice and clean inside, and it was pleasant, after some very reviving cups of coffee and ginger and some very public conversation to find our canvas homes all erected on a hard field. A pleasant change from our late dusty places. Mahmud obtained a fox, which was his first mammal, saving a bushy tailed rat. We were sent a lamb and a box of honey, and soon after the governor arrived to request a present. He asked thirty rupees, but got twenty, and the new soldiers in place of the Nahadi men were to have five rupees on arrival at Qutun. We were now nearing the palace of Sultan Salah bin Muhammad al-Qaity of Shibam, the most powerful monarch in the Hadramaut, who has spent twelve years of his life in India and whose reception of us was going to be magnificent, our escort told us. As we were leaving Haura, just standing about waiting to mount, I felt something hard in one finger of my glove which I was putting on. I thought it was a dry leaf, and hooked it down with my nail and shook it into my hand. Imagine my terror on lifting my glove at seeing a scorpion wriggling there. I dropped it quickly, shouting for Mahmud in the collecting-pottle, and then caught it in a handkerchief. This was the way that Bouthya binti introduced himself to the scientific world, for he was of a new species. It turned out that the oldest soldier was father to the Sultan of Haura. He went no farther with us. The next day, three miles after leaving Haura, we quitted the Wedi Kasar, and at last, at the village of Al-Aimani, entered the main valley of the Hadramaut. It is here very broad, being at least eight miles from Cliff to Cliff, and receives collateral valleys from all sides, forming, as it were, a great basin. Hither, too, our way had been generally northward, from Makkala to Tochum, northeast and then northwest. Now we turned westward down the great valley, though still with a slight northward tendency. We passed Ranima, Ajlania on a rock to the right, and Hanan and the Wedi Menwe behind it on our left. Wellstead, in his list of the Hadramaut towns, mentions Hanan as Ainan, and as a very ancient town on the hill near which are inscriptions and rude sculptures. For seven hours we traveled along the valley. Which, from its width, was like a plain till we were within a mile of the castle of Al-Qutun, where the Sultan of Shibam resides. Thus far all was desert and sand, but suddenly the valley narrows, and a long vista of cultivation was spread before us. Here miles of the valley are covered with palm groves. Bright green patches of Lucerne, called Kedlib, almost dazzling to look upon after the arid waste, and numerous other kinds of grain, are raised by irrigation. For the Hadramaut has beneath its expanse of sand a river running, the waters of which are obtained by digging deep wells. Skin buckets are let down by ropes and drawn up by cattle by means of a steep slope, and then the water is distributed for cultivation through narrow channels. It is at best a fierce struggle with nature to produce these crops, for the rainfall can never be depended upon. We had intended to push on to Al-Qutun, but Sultan Salah sent a messenger to beg us not to arrive till the following morning, that his preparations to receive us might be suitable to our dignity, as the first English travellers to visit his domains. So we encamped just on the edge of the cultivation, about a mile off at Fahud, where under the shade of palm trees there is a beautiful well of brackish water with four oxen, two at each side to draw up the water. Outside the cultivation, in its arid waste of sand, the Hadramaut produces but little. Now and again we came across groups of the camel-thorn, tall trees somewhat resembling the home oak. It is an Arabic, a most complicated tree. Its fruit, like a small crab apple, is called bedom, very refreshing and making an excellent preserve. Its leaves, which they powder and use as soap, are called rassal, meaning washing, whereas the tree itself is called ayub, and is dearly loved by the camels who stretch their long necks to feed off its branches. We wondered what kind of reception we should have, for people's ideas on this point vary greatly. In order not to offend the sultan's prejudices too much, we determined to dissemble, and I decided not to wear my little camera, and Imam Sharif packed the plain-table out of sight. We settled that he should have the medicine-chest in his charge and be the doctor of the party, and addressed him as Hakim. Imam Saleh feared so much what the future might hold in store that he removed his drawers and shoes and advised Imam Sharif to do the same as Muhammad had never worn such things. Imam Sharif refused to take these precautions, saying that if Muhammad had been born in Kashmir he would have assuredly worn both drawers and shoes. Imam Sharif wore a Norfolk jacket and knicker-bockers, and a turban went on the march, but in camp he wore Indian clothes. However, we were soon visited by the sultan's two wazirs on spirited Arab steeds, magnificent individuals with platted turbans, long lances, and many gold mohors fixed on their dagger-handles, all of which argued well for our reception on the morrow by the sultan of Shibam. We were a good deal stared at, but not disagreeably, for all the soldiers were on their best behavior, and Hila and Sif we had to be tied up, airless in our tints, as if we left them open a minute when the crowd, tired of seeing nothing, had dispersed, and one person saw an opening, the whole multitude surged round again, pressing in, shouting and smelling so bad that we regretted our falling and having tried to get a little light and air. We saw, among others, a boy who had a wound in his arm, and therefore had his nostrils plugged up. Bad smells are said not to be so injurious as good ones. Some women came and asked to see me, so I took my chair and sat surrounded by them. They begged to see my hands, so I took off my gloves and let them lift my hands about, from one sticky hand to another. They looked wonderingly at them and said mesquines so often and so pittingly that I am sure they thought I had leprosy all over. Then they wished to see my head, and having taken off my hat my hair had to be taken down. They examined my shoes, turned up my gaiters, stuck their fingers down my collar and wished to undress me. So I rose and said very civilly, Peace to you, o women, I am going to sleep now, and retired. Arab girls, before they enter the harem and take the veil, are a curious sight to behold. Their bodies and faces are dyed a bright yellow with turmeric. On this ground they paint black lines with antimony over their eyes. The fashionable color for the nose is red, green spots adorn the cheek, and the general aspect is grotesque beyond description. We stayed in bed really late next morning till the sun rose, and then prepared ourselves to be fetched. The two young mazirs, Salim bin Ali and Salim bin Abdullah, cousins, came again at 730 with two extra horses, which were ridden by my husband and Salih, as Imam Sharif stuck to the donkey which we named Mahsoud, happy. End of Chapter 9 Chapter 10 of Southern Arabia. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Southern Arabia by James and Mabel Bent. Chapter 10, Our Sojourn at Kotun. Like a fairy palace of the Arabian Knights, white as a wedding cake, and with as many battlements and pinnacles, with its windows painted red, the color being made from red sandstone, and its balustrades decorated with the inevitable chevron pattern. The castle of El Kotun rears its battlemented towers above the neighboring brown houses and expanse of palm groves. Behind it rise the steep red rocks of the encircling mountains, the whole forming a scene of Oriental beauty difficult to describe in words. This lovely building, shining in the morning light against the dark, precipitous mountains, was pointed out to us as our future abode. My horse, Basha, seemed to have come to life again and enjoyed galloping once more, for we had left the servants, camels, et cetera, to follow. As we approached, Fetejois announced our arrival, and at his gate stood Sultan Salah to greet us, clad in a long robe of canary colored silk, and with a white silk turban twisted around his swarthy brow, he was a large stout man, negroid in type, for his mother was a slave, and as generous as he was large, to Arab and European alike. He looked about fifty-five or sixty, but said his age was forty-five or forty. At first, on being seated in his reception room, we were very cautious in speaking of our plans, as we were surrounded with all sorts and conditions of men. He placed at our disposal a room spread with doggaston carpets and cushions, furnished with two tables and three chairs, and not a mouthful of our own food would he allow us to touch, a hospitality which had its drawbacks, for the Arab cuisine is not one suited to Western palates. We were very glad of this hospitality at first, as it would give Metejois a holiday, which he could devote to the washing of clothes, water being so plentiful. I will describe one day's meals, which were invariably the same. At eight o'clock came several cups, all containing coffee and milk, honey, eggs hard-boiled and peeled, and a large thin leathery kind of bread made plain with water, and another large thin kind made with ghee, and like pastry. At two thirty came two bowls like slot bowls, one containing bits of meat, vegetables, eggs, and spices and sauce, under about an inch of melted ghee, the other a kind of soup. They were both quite different, but at the same time very much alike, and the grease on the top kept them furiously hot. There were little pieces of boiled lamb and little pieces of roast lamb, tiny balls of roast meat and also of boiled, a mound of rice and a mound of dates. And upon requesting some water we were given one large glassful. Identically the same meal came at nine thirty, an hour when the bona fide traveller pines to be in his bed. These things were laid on a very dirty, colored cotton cloth, but no plates or knives, et cetera, were provided. At several odd times through the day a slave walked in and filled several cups of tea, a few for each of us. The cups were never washed by him. After struggling for a few days, many of the party having had a recourse to the medicine chest, we were at length compelled humbly to crave his majesty to allow us to employ our own cook. This he graciously permitted, and during the three weeks we passed under his hospitable roof, our cook was daily supplied by the sultanas, most excellent housewives we thought them, with everything we needed. One of the most striking features of these Arabian palaces is the wood carving. The doors are exquisitely decorated with it, the supporting beams and the windows, which are adorned with fretwork instead of glass. The dwelling rooms are above, the ground floor being exclusively used for merchandise and as stables and cattle stalls, and the first floor for the domestic offices. The men's servants lie about in the passages. We lived on the second floor. The two next-dories were occupied by the sultan and his family, and above was the terraced roof where the family sleep during the summer heat. Every guest room has its coffee corner, provided with a carved oven, where the grain is roasted and the water boiled. Around are hung old china dishes for spices, brass trays for the cups, and fans to keep off the flies. Also the carved sensors, in which frankincense is burnt and handed round to the guests. Each one of whom fumigates his garments with it before passing it on. It is also customary to fumigate with frankincense a tumbler before putting water into it, a process we did not altogether relish as it imparts a sickly flavor to the fluid. We found the system of door fastening in vogue a great nuisance to us. The wooden locks were of the tumbler order. The keys were about ten inches long and composed of a piece of curved wood. At one end were a number of pegs stuck in irregularly to correspond with a number of the tumbling bolts which they were destined to raise. No key would go in without a tremendous lot of shaking and noisy rattling, and you always had to have your key with you, for if you did not lock your door on leaving your room, there was nothing to prevent its swinging open. And if you were inside, you must rise and unbolt it to admit each person, and to bolt it behind him for the same reason. We got very friendly with Sultan Salah during our long stay under his roof, and he would come and sit for hours together in our room and talk over his affairs. Little by little he was told of all our sufferings by the way, and he was very angry. We also consulted him as to our plans, and told him how badly Salah was behaving. We used some times to think of dismissing Salah, but thought him too dangerous to part with. It was better to keep him under supervision, and leave him as much in the dark as possible about our projects. The Sultan took special interest in our pursuits, conducting us in person to archeological sites, and manifesting a laudable desire to have his photograph taken. He assisted both our botanist and naturalist in pursuing their investigations into the somewhat limited flora and fauna of his dominions, and was told by Imam Sharif that his work with the sextant was connected with keeping our watches to the correct time. He would freely discourse, too, on his own domestic affairs, giving us anything but a pleasing picture of Arab harem life, which he described as a veritable hell. Whenever he saw me reading, working with my needle or developing photographs, he would smile sadly and contrast my capabilities with those of his own wives, who, as he expressed it, are unable to do anything but painting themselves and quarreling. Poor Sultan Salah has had twelve wives in his day, and he assured us that their dissensions and backbidings had made him grow old before his time. His looking so old must be put down to the cares of polygamy. At Al-Qutun the Sultan had at that time only two properly acknowledged wives, whom he wisely kept apart. His chief wife, or Sultanah, was sister to the Sultan of Mekella, and the Sultan of Mekella is married to a daughter of Sultan Salah by another wife. In this way, do Arabic relationships get hopelessly confused? The influence of the wife at Al-Qutun was considerable, and he was obviously in awe of her. So much so that when he wanted to visit his other wife, he had to invent a story of pressing business at Shibaam. Our wives, said he one day, are like servants and try to get all they can out of us. They have no interest in their husband's property, as they know they may be sent away at any time. And in this remark he seems to have properly hit off the chief evil of polygamy. He also told us that, having got all they can from one husband, they go off to a man that is richer. Though how they make these arrangements, if they stick to their veils, is a mystery to me. Then again, he would continually lament over the fanaticism and folly of his fellow countrymen, more especially the priestly element, who systematically oppose all his attempts at introducing improvements from civilized countries into the Hadramat. The Sayyids and the Mullahs dislike him, the former who traced their descent from the daughter of Muhammad, forming a sort of hierarchical nobility in this district. And on several occasions he has been publicly cursed in the mosques as an unbeliever and friend of the infidel. But Sultan Salah has money which he made in India and owns property in Bombay. Consequently he has the most important weapon to wield that anyone can have in a submitted country. The Sultan told us a famous plan they have in this country for making a fortune. Two Hadramis set out for India together, a father and son or two brothers. They collect enough money before starting to buy a very fine suit of clothes each, to start trade in a small way. They then increase the business by credit, and when they have got enough of other people's money into their hands, one departs with it to the inaccessible Hadramat, while the other waits to hear of his safe arrival. And then he goes bankrupt and follows him. Sultan Salah had not a high opinion of his countrymen, and told us several other tales that did not redound to their credit. Before I went to India, I was a rascal, Harami, like these men here he constantly asseverated, and his love for things Indian and English is unbounded. If only the Indian government would send me a Muhammadan doctor here, I would pay his expenses and his influence, both political and social, would be most beneficial to this country. It is certainly a great thing for England to have so firm a friend in the centre of the narrow, habitable districts between Aden and Muscat, which ought by rights to be ours. Not that it is a very profitable country to possess, but in the hands of another power it might unpleasantly affect our road to India, and in complying with this simple request of Sultan Salah, an easy way is open to us for extending our influence in that direction. Likewise, from a humane point of view, this suggestion of Sultan Salah is of great value, for the inhabitants of the Hadramat are more hopelessly ignorant of things medical than some of the savage tribes of Africa. Certain quacks dwell in the towns, and profess to diagnose the ailments of a Bedou woman by smelling one of her hairs brought by her husband. For every pain, no matter where, they brand the patient with a red-hot iron, kaya, to relieve a person who is eaten too much fat, they will light a fire around him to melt it. To heal a wound, they will plug up the nostrils of the sufferer, believing that certain scents are noxious to the sore, the pleasant scents being the most harmful. Iron pounded up by a black smith is also a medicine. On an open sore they tie a sheet of iron, tin, or copper with four holes in the corners for strings. We heard of the curious case of a man who, for a wager, ate all the fat of a sheep that was killed at a pilgrimage. He lay down to sleep under a shady tree, and all the fat congealed in his inside. The doctor ordered him to drink hot tea, while fires were lit all around him, and thus he was cured and was living in Shibam when we were there. We had a crowd of patients to treat while stationed at Al-Qutun, and I have entered quantities of quaint experiences with these poor helpless invalids in my notebook. We had many an interesting stroll round the Sultan's gardens at Al-Qutun, and watched the cultivation of spices and vegetables for the royal table, or rather, floor, the lucerne and clover for his cattle, the indigo and henna for dying purposes, and the various kinds of grain. But on the cultivation of the date-palm the most attention is lavished. It was just then the season at which the female spade has to be fractified by the male pollen, and we were interested in watching a man going round with an apron full of male spades. With these he climbed the stem of the female palm, and with a knife cut open the bark, which encircles the female spade. And as he shook the male pollen over it he chanted in a low voice, May God make you grow and be fruitful. No portion of the palm is wasted in the Hadramout. With the leaves they thatch huts and make fences. The date stones are ground into powder as food for cattle, and they eat the nutty part which grows at the bottom of the spades, in which they call quorzan. On a journey a man requires nothing but a skin of dates, which will last him for days. And when we left, Sultan Salah gave us three goat skins filled with his best dates, and large tins of delicious honey, for which the Hadramout was celebrated, as far back as Pliny's time. Beginning of footnote eleven, Pliny, six, twenty-eight, section one hundred and sixty-one, Melis, Cureque, Preventu, end of footnote eleven, which he sent on camels to the coast for us, as well as a large inscribed stone that I now have in my house. Enumerable wells are dotted over this cultivated area, the water from which is distributed over the fields, before sunrise and after sunset. The delicious creaking noise made by heaving up the buckets greeted us every morning when we woke. Delicious, because it betokened plenty of water. And these early morning views were truly exquisite. A bright crimson tinge would gradually creep over the encircling mountains, making the parts in shade of a rich purple hue, against which the feathery palm trees and whitewashed castles stood out in strong contrast. All the animals belonging to the sultan are stabled within the encircling wall and immediately beneath the palace windows. The horse's stable is in the open courtyard, where they are fed with rich Lucerne in dates, when we should give corn. Here also reside the cows and bullocks, which are fed every evening by women, who tie together bunches of dried grass and make it appetizing by mixing therewith a few blades of fresh Lucerne. The sheep and the goats are pinned on another side, while the cocks and hens live in and around the main drain. All is truly patriarchal in character. The sultan only possesses four horses, and one of these, a large white mare, strangely enough, came from the Cape of Good Hope, via Durban and Bombay. The sultan of McKella hub three, the Arab coarser, lives farther north. As for the soldiers, they sent, as if it were a matter of course, for some money to buy tobacco, and were given two or three dollars each, and we gladly parted from them friends. The sultan of McKella had paid them for a fortnight's food, and had written to sultan Salah to pay what was owing. My groom was dismissed also without backsheesh. He was only a rough fellow taken from the mud-brick works at McKella, and my poor basha would have fared ill if really dependent on embark for care. My entreaties alone saved him from being publicly bastonadoed, as the sultan wished, when he heard of all his rudeness and disobedience. The sultan was most anxious to arrange for our onward journey, and wrote seven letters to different sheikhs and sultans, and sent them to us to read. But we could not read them ourselves, and would not let Salah, so we were none the wiser. The sultans of Saywoon and Tareem are brothers of the Qatiri tribe, but have no real authority outside their towns. We were anxious to proceed along the Hadramout Valley, and to reach the tomb of the Prophet Houd. The sultan also went to Shibam to meet some of the arbiters of our fate, and the sultan of Saywoon agreed to let us pass, but others said we had five hundred camels loaded with arms and all sorts of other fables, and they all quarreled dreadfully about us, so the sultan returned to Al-Qutun to await replies to his letters. The day the sultan was absent the women were determined to have a little enjoyment from our presence themselves. So a great many servants came bringing the sultan's ten-year-old daughter Sheikhah, a rather pretty little girl, with long earrings all round her ears, which, like all the other women, hang forward like fringed bells. An uneven number is always worn, and a good set consists of twenty-three. They are rings about two inches in diameter, with long drops attached. Her face was painted with large dots, stripes, and patterns of various colors, and she had thick antimony round the eyes. Her neck, arms, and shoulders were yellow, and her hands painted plain black inside and in a pattern like a lace mitten on the back, the nails being red with henna. I was also asked to pay a visit to the ladies. I went upstairs. Every floor is like a flat, with its bathroom containing a huge vase called kezba, and the bath is taken by pouring over the person from a smaller utensil, water which runs away down drain holes to the wooden spouts. I found myself in some very narrow passages among a quantity of not-over-clean women who all seized me by the shoulders, passing me on from one to the other till I reached a very large carpeted room with pillows round it, some very large-looking glasses, and a chandelier. I advanced across the room amid loud exclamations from the seated ladies, and was pointed out a position in front of the two principal ones who were seated against the wall. One was the chief wife of the sultan, and the other a daughter married to a sayid, whose hand his father-in-law must always kiss. He is a very disagreeable-looking man, who was much offended because Imam Sharif would neither kiss his hand, being a sayid himself, nor let his own be kissed. I squatted down, and round me soon squatted many more ladies. They were certainly not beautiful, but one, who was nearest to me and seemed to be my guardian or showman, had a very nice, kind, clever face. Her lips were not so large as most. We seemed all to be presided over, as we literally were, by a kind of confidential maid, who sat on the little raised hearth in the corner, amongst all the implements for the making of coffee and burning of incense, chanting constantly, salak aleh muhammad, and something more, of which I can only remember that it was about the face. Sometimes she was quiet a little, and then, above all the den, she raised her shout, accompanying it with an occasional single loud blow with a stone pestle and mortar. There was no difficulty about seeing the gold anklets the ladies wore, for their clothes, as they sat, were well above their knees. Their feet were painted like fanciful black slippers with lace edges. Their examination of me was very searching, even reaching smelling-point, and I feel sure I was being exercised, for so much was being said about muhammad. At last an old lady said to me, there is no God but God, with which I agreed, and murmurs of satisfaction went round, while she nodded her head triumphantly. Later on she pointed to the ceiling and asked, if I considered this was the direction in which a law dwells, and seemed glad when I agreed. Of course no infidel would, she thought. Presently the woman who had prepared the frankincense brought it down in a small chafing dish, continuing the same chant and handing it round. I wondered if I should be left out, or left till the last, but neither happened, and when my turn came, like the rest, I held my head and hands over the fumes, and we were all fumigated inside our garments. I may have been partaking in some unholy right, but my ignorance will be my excuse, I hope. I was then told I might go, which I was glad of, as I had been afraid to offend them by going too soon. I was asked, as I left, if I should like to see their jewelry. Of course I said yes, and had hardly got home and recovered from the deafening row when I was fetched again. There were crowds more women of all classes, clean and dirty, and as they came trooping in to see me the room seemed to resound with the twittering sound of their kisses, for the incoming visitor kissed the sitter's hand, while the sitter kissed her own, and there was kissing of foreheads besides. Numerous little baskets were brought in with immense quantities of gold ornaments, some very heavy, but with few gems in them, absolutely none of value. They consisted of coral, onyx, a few bad turquoises, crooked pearls, and many false stones. Everything was of Indian work. Sheikh came in in a silk dress with a tremendous, much alloyed silver girdle, and loaded with chains and bracelets of all sorts, clinking and clashing as she came. We had very good coffee with ginger and cloves in it, and at this time there was a very great deal of religious conversation and argument, and as they were exciting themselves I thought I would go, for I did not feel very comfortable. But the chief lady said to me, in a very threatening and dictatorial voice, La ilaha illa Allah, Muhammad Rasul Allah. I looked as much like an idiot as I could, and pretended neither to notice nor understand, but I was padded and shaken up by all that were near enough neighbors to do so, and desired to look at that lady. Again she said, La ilaha illa Allah, in the same tone, and I was told I must repeat it. So she said the first part again in a firm tone, and I cheerfully repeated after her, There is no God but God. Then she continued, Muhammad is his prophet, I remained dumb. Then the name Aisa, Jesus, went round, and I bowed my head. The coffee woman then called out, Aisa was a prophet before Muhammad. They then asked me if Aisa was my prophet. I could only say that he is, for my Arabic would not allow of a further profession of my faith. I gladly departed and gave Sheikha afterwards two sovereigns for her necklace. They said they would show me their clothes, but they never did. I have described the shape of these dresses, but I omitted to say that they are gaily trimmed with a kind of ribbon about two inches wide, made of little square bits of colored silks and cottons sewn together. This is put round the armholes over the shoulder and down to the hem of the garment over the seam, where a curious gusset or gore runs from the front part to the corner of the train. The dress is trimmed round the neck, which is cut square and rather low, and generally hangs off one shoulder, and across the breast it is much embroidered, beads and spangles being sometimes introduced. These women seem to live in a perpetual noise. They gurgled loudly when we arrived, and we could always hear them playing the tambourine. Tiny girls wear, as their only garment, a fringe of plates as a nubia, and their heads are shaven in grotesque patterns, or their hair done in small plates. Boys have their heads shaven also, all except locks of long hair dotted about in odd places. I never saw such dreadful objects as the women make of themselves by painting their faces. When they lift their veils, one would hardly think them human. I saw eyes painted to resemble blue and red fish, with their heads pointing to the girl's nose. The upper part of the face was yellow, the lower green with small black spots, a green stripe down the nose, the nostrils like two red cherries, the paint being shiny. Three red stripes were on the forehead, and there was a red mustache, there being also green stripes on the yellow cheeks. There was a delightful tiny room on the roof, just a little place to take and make coffee in, and we were allowed to clamber up to this, but not without calling a slave and assuring ourselves that there was no danger of my husband meeting any of the ladies, for it commanded the roof, to which we had not access. We liked going up there very much, for the views were splendid and we could see down into the mosque, which is built like cloisters, open in the middle. I took some photographs from there, and also, with the greatest difficulty, managed to get one of the room itself by tying my camera, without its legs of course, with a rope to the outside of the fretwork frame of the little window, which was on a level with the floor. It was hard work not to be in the way myself, as I had to put both arms out of the next window to take out the slides and to guess at the focus. The Sultan, though his Hindustani was getting a trifle rusty, said he greatly liked the company of Imam Sharif, whose uncle had in some way befriended him in India. Intelligent conversation he had not enjoyed for a long time. He was certainly a little scandalized that Imam Sharif lacks ways in religion, for he was one day sitting without his turban when some coffee was brought. The Sultan put his hands up to cover Imam Sharif's head, saying, my brother, you're drinking with a bare head, and this is contrary to the Quran. The same remark was often made in camp by people who looked into his tent. They said, look, he is a Christian, his head is bare. At the same time, no one thought anything of the Bedouins' bare heads. During this period of uncertainty we made several little explorations of the surrounding valleys. One day we started out with the Sultan who had on his long coat, which made him look like a huge sulfur-colored canary. It was lined with light blue. He, my husband, Saleh, and a groom rode the four horses. Imam Sharif and I had our Basha and Mahsoud, and a camel most smartly decorated, carried the Wazir Salim bin Abdullah and a soldier. Other soldiers followed on foot. We went about five miles to Al-Agran to see some ruins perched on a rock beneath the high wall of the plateau, portally situated with palms, gardens, and wells. The ruins, which are those of a well-built fortress, consist of little more than the foundation, but all embedded in modern houses, so that excavations would be impossible. It must once have been a place of considerable importance. There was a scrap of very well-cut ornament, which looked as if it might have belonged to a temple. It was from Al-Agran, or Algran, that we obtained a stone with a spout to it, with rather a long Sabiyan inscription on it, a dedication to the God Sayyan, known to have been worshipped in the Hadramat. We were given coffee in a very dirty room, which we were all the time longing to tear down, that we might dig under it. CHAPTER XI. The Wadi Sair and the Sabra Salah. On January 17 we started from Al-Katun with only seven of our camels, and two of the sultans, packed with forage, to be away several days. The sultan wished to lend his horses, but my husband refused. However, he had to ride one, a gray, for fear of giving a fence. And this was given to him as a present afterwards, and he rode it whenever the rocks allowed, till we reached the coast. We eventually sent this horse Zubda, Butter, and Mybasha back to their respective donors, though they really expected us to take them to Aden. We had two men of the Nahad tribe as our Asyera. Our start took a very long time, for the sultan, attended by many people, came a mile on foot. We traveled four hours and a half, partly through land that would have been cultivated, had there been rain, and partly through salt desert, till we turned northwest into the Wadi Sair, where there is a sandy desert. From the entrance to Wadi Sair we could see Shabam in the distance, an unpromising looking spot along Sandhills. We were able to find shelter at Hanya, under an enormous thorny Badam tree covered with fruit, and we felt like birds out of a cage, for we never could walk out at Al-Katun without a crowd, and the greasiness and spiciness of the food was beginning to pawl. We had a delightful camp, but had to be very careful not to drop things in the sand, as they so quickly disappeared. We had a new man, called Izelam, who had to take care of the horses, pluck chickens, and help in pitching the camp. His wonder at the unfolding and setting up of the beds, chairs, etc., was great. There was also an old man called Hadar Abul. He and one of the soldiers could talk Hindustani, so with Imam Sharif's help we were somewhat independent of Sala, though we had thought it necessary to bring him to keep him from working us harm. We continued our way at the Wadi Sair for about five hours, and camped at Al-Had in a field near a house, close to some high banks which radiated intense heat, and suffered the more that we had to wait a long time for the tea that we always had with our luncheon, as our water had been stolen in the night. We always tried to save some to carry on and start with next day, fearing we might fear worse in the next place we came to. The well at this spot is the last water in this direction, for we were reaching the confines of the great central desert. Wadi Sair, being such a waste of sand, is very sparsely populated. The Bedouin here, like the Turkomans, live in scattered abodes, little groups of two or three houses dotted about, and solitary homesteads. It belongs to the Qatiri tribe who are at war with a Yafai. They once owned Shahar and Makala and took Al-Katun, but in a war in 1874 the Yafai were supported by the English, hence their friendship for England. The animosity still continues, and there is little intercourse between Shuwan and Shubham, though only 12 miles apart. The Qatiri have more of the Bedouin about them, and the Yafai have more of the Arab. Our Sair was $25. The people were preparing for rain, which may never come. They had had none for two years, but if they get it every three years they are satisfied as they get a sufficient crop. As it comes in torrents and with a rush, each field is provided with a dike and a dam, which they cut to let the water off. This dike is made by a big scraper, like a dustpan, called Ms. Hop, harnessed by chains to a camel or bollocks. The camel goes over the existing bank, and when the dustpan reaches the summit, the men in attendance upset the surface sand or soil. That has been scraped off, and carry the scraper down. When this is done the field is lightly plowed. There is nothing more to do except to sit and wait for rain. We saw signs of great floods in some parts. Whenever we found ruins still visible in or near the Hatremont, we found them on elevated spots above the sand level, from which we might argue that all centers of civilization in the middle of the valleys lie deeply buried in sand, which has come down in devastating masses from the Highland and the Central Desert. The nature of the sand in this district is twofold. Firstly, we have the less, or firm sand, which can be cultivated. And secondly, the disintegrated desert sand, which form itself into heaps and causes sandstorms when the wind is high. The mountains diminish in height. The farther north one goes. The character of the valleys is pretty much the same as that of those to the south of the main valley. Only they are narrower and much lower, and thus the deep indenture of the valley system of the Hatremont gradually fades away into the vast expanse of the Central Desert. The Wasir had been given a bag of money to buy fowls and lambs for us. The Sala came and said, the Wasir wants some money for a lamb, so it was sent and returned. It had not been asked for and caused some offense, but that odious little wretch only wished to make mischief. The Bedouin are rather clever at impromptu verses. And when we were in Wadi Ser, they made night hideous by dancing in our camp. The performers ranged themselves in two rows, as in Sir Roger DeCoverly. Time is kept by a drum and by perpetual hand clapping and stamping of the feet, whilst two men execute elaborate capers in the center. Singing as they do so, such words as these. The ship has come from Europe with merchandise. They shot at the minaret with a thousand cannon. Bedouin women also take part in these dances, and the Arabs think the dance is very impious. It was very weird by the light of the moon in the campfire, but wary someone we wanted to sleep, particularly as they kept it up until after we were all a stir in the morning, yelling, bawling, singing, and screeching. Isolam being the ringleader. The ground was shaken as if horses were galloping about. A Bedouin was playing a flute made of two leg bones of a crane bound together with iron. At a distance of half an hour from our camp, there is a stone with an inscription. This was visited on the day of our arrival, but we went again next day that I might photograph it. Very difficult in the position in which it is. It is a great rough boulder about ten feet high that has slipped down from the mountain with large rough Sabian letters just punched on the surface of no depth, but having a whitish appearance. The letters run in every direction, sometimes side by side, sometimes in columns. The central and most important word which my husband was able to make out, with the help of Professor Hommel's admirable dictionary of hitherto ascertained hemorrhetic words is Massabam or Caravan Road. The stone seemed to be a kind of signpost for as the old Bedou shake who was with us said, there was in olden days about five hundred years ago a caravan road this way to Mecca before the Bahra Safi made it impossible. The Bahra Safi is a quicksand north of Shabwa, but none of those present had been there and they all laughed at Vaughn Reed's story of King Safi and his army being engulfed in it. The Bedou shake with his retinue came to see that we took no treasure out of the stone. There are a good many old stones built into the side of the stream bed. Having taken a copy and a photograph, which my husband sent later to Dr. D. H. Mueller in Vienna to decipher, we departed. We were told that the Wadi Ser goes four hours from that stone to the great desert. We then turned back and followed our kafela to Alagom at the junction of Wadi Ser and Wadi about two hours journey. Alagom is a large cluster of high houses surrounded by stables and houses excavated in the sandhills where the inhabitants and their cattle live in hot weather. This is quite an idea suited to the Bedouin who live in caves when they can find them. The Bedouin in southern Arabia never have tents. We found that Salah had joined the camelmen in resisting our own people who wanted to camp under trees. They had unloaded in the open and Salah and Isolam had then retired into the village till the tents were pitched. So, as we were to remain in this place two days, we had them moved. We had by this time some of the Qatiri tribe with us as Asyera. At Algarin, the Wadi Ser is entered by a short collateral valley called the Wadi Konab, in which valley is the tomb of the prophet Salah, one of the principal sacred places of the district. Qabra Salah is equally venerated with the Qabra Haud, also called the Tomb of the Prophet Abayr, for from what we could gather from the statements of intelligent natives, Abayr and Haud are synonymous terms, which is to be found in the Taqmimi country further up the main valley. The Prophet Haud was sent to reclaim the tribe of Ad. The Mahra tribe are descended from a remnant of the Adites, as also are the Hadrimi, according to the legends. Once a man named Kolab, when seeking for camels, came upon a beautiful garden of Aram de Tal'amad, which is supposed to have been in the desert near Adn, he found and brought away a priceless jewel which came into possession of the first Omniad Caliphah, Nurajedid. Those who embraced Islamism on the preaching of the Prophet Haud were spared, but the rest either were suffocated by a stifling wind, or survived in the form of apes, whose descendants still inhabit Jabal Shamshan at Adn. A remnant are also said to have fled to the Korea Maria Islands. We again met with considerable opposition from the Bedouin and our escort when we proposed a visit to Qabra Salah next day. However, this was overcome by threats of reporting the opposition to Sultan Salah on our return to Al-Qutun. So next morning we started. The Sultan of Shabaam's people were just as anxious to go as we were, for they were delighted to get the chance of making a pilgrimage to Soholya Place, which being in an enemy's country, they would not have done but for our escort. A short ride of two hours brought us nearly to the head of Wadi Konab, and there situated just under the cliff in an open wilderness is this celebrated tomb. It consists simply of a long uncovered pile of stones, somewhat resembling a potato pie with a headstone at either end, and a collection of fossils from the neighboring mountains arranged along the top. Hard Bay is a small house where the pilgrims take their coffee, and the house of the Bedou Mullah, who looks after the tomb, is about a quarter of a mile off. Beyond this there is no habitation in sight. A more desolate spot could hardly be found. The tomb is from 30 to 40 feet in length, and one of the legends concerning it is that it never is the same length, sometimes being a few feet shorter, sometimes a few feet longer. The Bedouin have endless legends concerning this prophet. He was a huge giant, they said, the father of the prophet Haud, or a bear. He created camels out of rock, and hence is especially dear to the wandering Bedou. And he still works miracles, for if even unwittingly anyone removes a stone from this grave it exhibits symptoms of life and gives the possessor much discomfort until it is returned. Once a dome building was erected over the tomb, but the prophet manifested his dislike of being thus enclosed, and it was removed. Men are said to go blind if they steal anything connected with the tomb. Once a man took a cup from the coffee house, unaware of the danger he incurred, tied it to his girdle, and carried it off. It stuck to him till he restored it. Another man took a stone away and gave it to his children to play with, but it hopped about till taken back again. At the time of the Sierra, or pilgrimage, which takes place in November, crowds of Bedouin, we are told, come from all over the valleys and hills around to worship. All our men treated the grave with greatest respect and said their prayers around it barefoot. I do not know what they would have done to Imam Sharif if he had not comported himself as the others did, so that wretched men had to walk barefoot all round on the sharp stones, and thus we obtained the measurements. He got dreadfully prickled by thorns and coveted the fossils very much. The stones of which the tomb is composed are about the size of cannonballs, and look just as if newly put together and quite weedless. People stroke the upright stone at the head and then rub their hands on their breast and kiss them, and do the same at the foot. The wazir would have led us up close to it, but the Bedouin hated our being there at all, and would by no means let us sleep there, as we wished to do. We overheard our horrid little Salah Hassan telling the bystanders that we live on pork. When we first got there, we were permitted to approach within a few yards of the tomb so that we saw it very distinctly, but when, after eating our luncheon and taking a siesta under a tree, we again advanced to inspect it, the Bedouin Mullah attacked us with fierce and approprious language, and fearing further to arouse the fanaticism of these wild people, we speedily mounted our horses and rode away. We hoped to be able to visit Qabra Haoud, the tomb of Nabi Salah's son in the main valley, but as it will appear we were to be disappointed. I am told on reliable Arab authority that it is similar in every way to the Qabra Salah, just a long pile of stones about forty feet in length, uncovered and with its adjacent mosque. These two primitive tombs of their legendary prophets, zealously guarded and venerated by the Bedouin, are a peculiar and interesting feature of the Hadramout. It is a curious fact that when one turns to the tenth chapter of Genesis, the best record we have of the earliest populations of our globe, we find the patriarchal names Salah, Abair, and Hazamabith, which last, as I previously stated, corresponds to Hadramout, following one another in their order, though not an immediate sequence. I am at a loss to account for these names still being venerated by the Bedouin, unless one admits a continuity of legendary history almost too wonderful to contemplate, or else one must consider they were heathen sites of veneration which have under Muslim influence been endowed with orthodox names. Certain it is that these tombs in the midst of the wilderness are peculiarly the property of the Bedouin, and though visited and to a certain extent venerated by the Arabs, the latter do not attach so much importance to them as they do to the tombs of their own wallies or saints, which are always covered tombs near or in the center of the towns. Another curious point I may mention in connection with these tombs is that the Arab historian Hyakwit in his Mugham tells us of a God in the Hadramout called Al-Ghalsad, who was a gigantic man. Perhaps this God may have some connection with the giant tombs of Salah and Abair. Also, Makrisi, who wrote in the 10th century AD, speaks of a giant's grave he saw near Shabwa, near Al-Agam. We saw a quantity of very ancient stone monuments situated on slightly elevated ground above the sand. At first we imagined them to be tombs, but on closer inspection we discovered that the erections, which are large, unhewn ones of the Kromlech type, are decorated inside with geometric patterns, somewhat similar to those we found in the Meshon Al-An ruins. And therefore my husband was more inclined to believe they were originally used for religious purposes. There are traces of letters above the pattern. The buildings are about twenty feet square and several are surrounded by circular walls. They are apparently of extreme antiquity and doubtless far anterior in date to any other hemeritic remains that we saw in the Hadramout. Thawassir joined us, as usual, on our return from the Qabra Salah, as we sat outside our tent in the moonlight with Imam Sharif and the Indian interpreters, and we had a pleasant evening. We were perfectly charmed to see great preparations for sleep going on among the Bedouin. We thought they really must be tired after dancing the whole night and walking the whole day. They were busy putting themselves to bed in graves dug in the loose dust, not sand. Turbines, girdles, and so forth being turned into bedclothes, just as they were still. Isolam began capering about and they all got up shouting and screaming, but Thawassir, seeing my distress, with the greatest difficulty, quieted them, as he did when they broke out again at three o'clock in the morning. It took us six hours the following day to ride back to Alcatoun, where, not being expected, we could not get a meal of even bread, honey, and dates for about an hour and a half, and then had to wait till we were very sleepy indeed for supper. We endured great hunger that day. Salem Ben Ali, the other Thawassir, had not come with us because he was not well. The day of our reception, in curvetting about, he fell from his horse and had suffered various pains ever since. The sultan had had another stone brought for us from Al Grand. We did not care to take this away, as it had very little writing on it. Only Al Amin, to the protection. It is circular, one foot four and a half inches in diameter, two and a half inches high, made of coarse marble. We saw a similar circular stone at Rye Down. The wildest reports were going about as to the water stone we already had. It was almost the cause of an insurrection against the sultan of Shabam. They said, It is very wrong to give that stone to a Gavir, as they call us, for all the K's are pronounced G. Only think of our carelessly letting him have it. The Englishman has taken fifteen jewels of gold and gems out of it and named a high value. You are sure of this? said the sultan to the ring leader. Oh yes, quite certain, he said. So the sultan led him to our room where the stone was and said, Do you know the stone again? Look closely at it. Has anything happened to it but a washing? The man looked extremely small. They said my husband's only business was to extract gold from stones. It is extraordinary how widespread this belief is. It is firmly rooted in Greece. Many a statue and inscription have been shivered to atoms because of it and our interest in inscriptions was constantly attributed to a wish to find out treasure. We once saw two men in Asia Minor industriously boring away into a column to find gold, they told us. They already had made a hole about eight inches deep and four or five inches wide. They think that the ancients had a way of softening marble with acid. We had again at this time a great many patients for as we really had affected some cures the first time we were at Alcatoun, our fame had spread. We always had Matthias and Amam Sharif to help us to elicit the symptoms and also to consult with us as to the cures because some remedies which suit Europeans were by no means suited to the circumstances of our patients. For instance the worst coughs I have ever heard were very prevalent but it would be useless to ask the sick to take a hot foot bath and stay in bed. The one blue garment which in different shapes was all the men and women wore was little protection from the chill of the evening. The women's dresses were always hanging off their backs and the men who had each two pieces of thick blue cotton about two yards long by one and a half yard wide with fringes half a yard long wore one as a permanent petticoat and the other as a girdle by day and went cold as a shawl often put on in a very uncomfortable way thrown on in front and left hanging open behind forming no protection to the back of the lungs. The poor little baby aged 15 months of the Wasir Salamban Abdullah was brought shrieking in agony gnawing hard at its emaciated little arms and all covered with sores. Our hearts were rung at this wretched site and we longed to help. We even thought of giving it part of a drop of Chlorodine much diluted but fortunately for us dared not do so. For my husband said to them I do not think the child will live long. It mercifully was released in a few hours. Then an old man came who had a flame in his inside. My husband examined him and decided that he had an abscess and to please him gave him a dessert spoonful of borax and honey which he swept up with his finger and I suppose it did relieve him for after some minutes he said the fire is gone out. It grieved us sorely when poor souls came to us so hopefully and so confident of help with a withered arm or an empty eye socket. Some was less serious complaints than these last. We recommended to go to Aden Hospital, a building of which we never thought at that time we should be inmates ourselves. We found the ladies to whom a plentiful supply of violent pills had been administered were better. But the sultan who had an attack of indigestion had to be taken in hand at once by us doctors. His wife required a tonic so we got out some citrate of iron and quinine a bright shiny greenish-yellow flaky thing which Imam Sharif assured us would be more beneficial and better liked if shown and admired as gold. So after some conversation about pious frauds I packed the medicine up neatly and wrote in ornamental letters golden health giver and this name being explained and translated gave great satisfaction. We were glad to be able to give the kind sultan a new bottle of quinine more acceptable than gold. While we were away Mamoud had found two little hedgehogs one was dead and stuffed the other we kept alive for some time and it always liked to creep into my clothes and go to sleep I suppose because I never teased it. In the little book of directions for zoological collectors we saw that little is known of the reproduction of lizards so special attention is to be paid etc. Mamoud had brought me two little fragile eggs to keep about half an inch long and I had put them in a matchbox if-toe and packed them in my trunk and on my return to Alcatoun I found two little lizards about one and a fourth inch long one alive and the other dead both had to be pickled as we did not understand how to bring so small a lizard up by hand. They proved to be new to science as was also a large lizard we found near Hara whose peculiarity is that he has no holes along his legs to breathe by like other lizards. His name is Aporoscales bentiti the first lizards egg I had I was determined should not slip through my fingers but a lack and well a day my fingers slipped through it. In the meantime we were terrible bones of contention and had the Wadi Hatramat all by the ears. We were very anxious indeed as to whether we could proceed any farther or should have to go back and whether we could do either safely. We wanted to go right along the Wadi Hatramat and to see Bir Bohat or Bahat a sol fatare as far as we could make out but Mosadi in the 10th century speaks of it as the greatest volcano in the world and says that it casts up immense masses of fire and that its thundering noise can be heard miles away. On the heights near is much brimstone which the Bedouin found useful for gunpowder. They consider this place is the mouth of hell and that the souls of the kathirs go there. In Iceland there's a similar accommodation for those souls. Vaughn Reed thinks it was the fawn's stiges of Ptolemy but M. de Geige thinks that Ptolemy alluded to some place farther west and south of Marib. Certainly the position given by Ptolemy does not coincide with that of Bir Bohat. From Arabian society in the middle ages by S. Lanepool I take the following notices of this place. Al-Qaswini says of Bir Bohat it is a well near Hadramant and the Prophet, God bless and save him, said, in it are the souls of Infidels and Hippocrates. It is an adite well in a dry desert and a gloomy valley and it is related of Ali, may God be well pleased with him, that he said, the most hateful of districts to God, whose name be exalted, is the valley of Barahaut, in which is a well whose waters are black and fetid, where the souls of Infidels make their abode. Al-Azmay has narrated of a man of Hadramat that he said, we find near Barahaut an extremely disgusting and fetid smell, and then news is brought to us of the death of a great man of the Chiefs of Infidels. Ejab el-Makluqat also relates that a man who passed a night in the valley of Barahaut said, I heard all night as Klamatiths, of O Rumae, O Rumae, and I mentioned this to a learned man, and he told me that it was the name of the angel commissioned to keep guard over the souls of the Infidels. Bir Barahaut is not far from Qabra Haoud, which is said by some to be even longer and wider than Qabra Salah. The route lies through the territory of the Qatiri, and the Yafi are quite ignorant of it. It would be quite unsafe for them to go to the sea along the valley, and they always use the road over the table-land. The Qatiri tyrannize over the Sultan of Shuwan, and are enemies to the Sultan of Shibam. Beyond them are the Minhali, who are also enemies, then the Amri, and the Tafnimi, who are friendly, and then come the Mahri. The Sultan told us that not even he could prevent us going along the kafila path, but we should not be admitted into any villages and should probably be denied water. One source of enmity between the Qatiri and the Yafi is, I believe, a debt which the Qatiri owe and will not pay. The Sultan of Shuwan borrowed three lax of rupees from a grandfather of the present Sultan of Makkala. He would not repay them. So after much squabbling the case was referred to the English at Aden, who, after duly considering the papers, gave Makkala and Shahir, bombarding them first, to the Yafi. In answer to the seven letters there was nothing from the Sultan of Shuwan, and the Sultan of Tarim sent a verbal answer, Do as you please, taking no responsibility. To which Sultan Sala replied, I have sent you a letter, send me a letter. The Sheikh of the Qatiri tribe came to Al-Katun and said he would take us. But on January 23 we heard that the Sultan of Shuwan had made a proclamation in the mosque there, forbidding the people to admit the unbelievers to the town, though we could easily go by the kafila road, leaving the town of Shuwan two miles on one side. The Sultan deemed it wiser for us not to attempt it, as brawls might arise, the two tribes being at war. So we then decided to mount on to the Aqaba, pass the inhospitable Shuwan and Tarim, and reach the friendly Ta-Mimi tribe. The Qatiri, kafila, or tribe, really came to Shuwan to be ready for us, but the Saeeds had collected a large sum of money and bribed the Sultan to send them away. We were hoping to get off to Shibam, but as the Sultan was neither well nor in a very good humor, we had to resign ourselves to settling down in Al-Kutun in all patience. He said he must accompany us, as he could not depend on his wasirs for they were too stupid. My husband and I were always occupied. He used to sketch in watercolors, and I had plenty of work developing photographs in a delightful little dark room where I lived and enjoyed as many skins of water as I could use, till I had to stop and pack my celluloid negatives like artificial flowers, for they curled up in the films contracted and split from the alkaline water. I had to put glycerin on them when I reached Adam. Our botanists nearly died of dullness and impatience. Mahmud was quite contented to sit quite still, and I do not think the Indian servants minded much. Poor Imam Sharif used to gaze up at half a dozen stars from a yard, but he dared not venture on the roof to see more. We took a stroll with a sultan one day, no crowd being allowed, and remarked how many things were grown for spices, those spices which were becoming rather worrisome to us. There was Samauta, an umbiliferous plant, the seed of which is used in coffee, and Habat Asoba for putting in bread, coriander, chili, fennel, and heft, a plant very much like tall cress, which is used in cookery and also raw, and which we liked as a salad, also attar, a purple creeping bean, very pretty and good to eat. There was another low growing bean, bignol, eggplant, cucumber, watermelon, henna, and indigo. The sultan had besides a private enclosure where he had some lime trees, not our kind of lime tree, of course, but the one which bears fruit, and I must not forget cotton from which the place originally took its name, as it is abundant in a wild state. At last another polite letter came from the Qatiri, and a letter from the sultan of Terim. I have both your letters, and you can do as you like. My answer is the same. This did away with all hope of progress in that direction. Our spirits, however, were much cheered by hearing that the sultan had received a letter from a saeed at Meshid, probably the nice one who had been in India and had leprosy in his legs, telling him how badly the sultan of Hagarin had behaved about us. As this was spontaneous, we hoped that the negotiation our sultan was going to undertake about our excavations at Meshid Rye Down or Kubar Al-Malik, for some part of the ruin is called the Tomb of the Kings, would turn out successfully. The sultan of Hagarin was summoned to Al-Khatun, but we were away before he came. I believe in the end he was turned out of his place, former misdeeds counting against him.