Volume Ii Part 11 (1/2)
[Picture: Plan view of hollow]
[Picture: Section view of hollow]
The size and depth of the fuljes varies greatly; some are, as it were, rudimentary only, while others attain a depth of 200 feet and more. The deepest of those I measured proved to be 280 feet, including the sand hill, which may have been 60 feet above the general level of the plain; its width seemed about a quarter of a mile. At the bottom of these deep fuljes, solid ground is reached, and there is generally a stony deposit there, such as I have often noticed in sandy places where water has stood. This bare s.p.a.ce is seldom more than a few paces in diameter. I heard of, but did not see, one which contained a well. The wells of s.h.a.gik do not stand in a fulj, but in a valley clear of sand, and those of Jobba in a broad circular basin 400 feet below the level of the Nefd.
The fuljes, I have said, run in strings irregularly from east to west, corresponding in this with their individual direction. {244} They are most regularly placed in the neighbourhood of the rocks of Aalem, but their size there is less than either north or south of it. The shape of the fuljes seems unaffected by the solid ground beneath, for at the rocks of Ghota there is a large fulj pierced by the rocks, but which otherwise retains its semi-circular form.
The physical features of the Nefd, whether they be ridges or mounds or fuljes, appear to be permanent in their character. The red sand of which they are composed is less volatile than the common sand of the desert and, except on the summits of the mounds and ridges, seems little affected by the wind. It is everywhere, except in such positions, sprinkled over with brushwood ghada trees and tufts of gra.s.s. The sides of the fuljes especially are well clothed, and this could hardly be the case if they were liable to change with a change of wind. In the Nefd between Jobba and Igneh I noticed well defined sheep tracks ascending the steep slopes of the fuljes spirally, and these I was a.s.sured were by no means recent. Moreover, the levelled track made according to tradition by Abu Zeyd is still discernible in places where cuttings were originally made. Sticks and stones left in the Nefd by travellers, the bones of camels and even their droppings, remain for years uncovered, and those who cross do so by the knowledge of landmarks constantly the same. I am inclined to think, then, that the Nefds represent a state of comparative repose in Nature. Either the prevailing winds which heaped them up formerly are less violent now than then, or the fuljes are due to exceptional causes which have not occurred for many years. That wind in some form, and at some time, has been their cause I do not doubt, but the exact method of its action I will not affect to determine. Mr.
Blandford, an authority on these subjects, suggests that the fuljes are s.p.a.ces still unfilled with sand; and if this be so, the strings of fuljes may in reality mark the site of such bare strips as one finds in the intermittent Nefds. It is conceivable that as the s.p.a.ces between the sand ridges grew narrower, the wind blocked between them acquired such a rotatory motion as to have thrown bridges of sand across, and so, little by little, filled up all s.p.a.ces but these. But to me no theory that has been suggested is quite satisfactory. What cause is it that keeps the floors of the deeper fuljes bare; floors so narrow that it would seem a single gale should obliterate them, or even the gradual slipping of the sand slopes above them? There must be some continuous cause to keep these bare. Yet where is the cause now in action sufficient to have heaped up such walls or dug out such pits?
Another strange phenomenon is that of such places as Jobba. There, in the middle of the Nefd, without apparent reason, the sand is pushed high back on all sides from a low central plain of bare ground three or four miles across. North, south, east, and west the sand rises round it in mountains 400 and 500 feet high, but the plain itself is bare as a thres.h.i.+ng-floor. It would seem as if this red sand could not rest in a hollow place, and that the fact of Jobba's low level alone kept it free.
Jobba, if cleared of sand all round, would, I have no doubt, present the same feature as Jof or Taibetism. It would appear as a basin sunk in the plain, an ancient receptacle of the drainage from Mount Aja. Has it only in recent times been surrounded thus with sand? There is a tradition still extant there of running water.
_Jebel Shammar_.-A little north of lat.i.tude 29, the Nefd ceases as suddenly as it began. The stony plain reappears unchanged geologically, but more broken by the proximity of a lofty range of hills, the Jebel Aja. Between these, however, and the sand, there is an interval of at least five miles where the soil is of sandstone, mostly red, the material out of which the Nefd sand was made, but mixed with a still coa.r.s.er sand washed down from the granite range. This rises rapidly to the foot of the hills. There, with little preliminary warning, we come upon unmistakeable red granite cropping in huge rounded ma.s.ses out of the plain, and rising to a height of 1000 and 1500 feet. The shape of these rocks is very fantastic, boulder being set on boulder in enormous pinnacles; and I noticed that many of them were pierced with those round holes one finds in granite. The texture of the rock is coa.r.s.e, and precisely similar to that of Jebel Musa in the Sina peninsula, as is the scanty vegetation with which the wadys are clothed. There are the same th.o.r.n.y acacia, and the wild palm, and the caper plant as there, and I heard of the same animals inhabiting the hills.
The _Jebel Aja_ range has a main direction of E. by N. and W. by S. Of this I am convinced by the observations I was able to take when approaching it from the N.W. The weather was clear and I was able to see its peaks running for many miles in the direction mentioned. With regard to its length I should put it, by the accounts I heard, at something like 100 miles, and its average breadth may possibly be 10 or 15. In this I differ from the German geographers, who give Jebel Aja a direction of N.E. by S.W., on the authority I believe of Wallin. But as they also place Hal on the southern slope of the hills, a gross error, I do not consider the discrepancy as of any importance.
Of _Jebel Selman_, I can only speak according to the distant view I had of it. But I should be much surprised to learn that any portion of it pa.s.sed west of the lat.i.tude of Hal. That portion of it visible from Hal certainly lies to the S.E., and at an apparent distance of 30 miles, with no indication of its being continued westwards. It is by all accounts of the same rock (red granite) as Jebel Aja.
Between Jebel Selman and the Nefd lie several isolated hills rising from broken ground. All these are of the sandstone formation of the Hamad, and have no geological connection with Aja or Selman. Such are Jebels Jildiyeh, Yatubb, and Jilfeh, Jildiyeh the tallest having a height of perhaps 3800 feet above the sea, or 300 above Hal.
Hal lies due east of the extreme eastern b.u.t.tress of Jebel Aja, and not south of it as has been supposed. Both it and Kefar, as indeed all the towns and villages of the district, lie in a single broad wady, draining the south-eastern rocks of Aja, and sweeping round them northwards to the Nefd. The height of Hal is 3,500 feet above the sea, and the plain rises southwards behind it, almost imperceptibly. The small isolated hills close to the town, belong, I think, geologically to the granite range. The main drainage of the plain south of Hal would seem to be received by the Wady Hannasy, whose course is north, so that the highest part of the plain is probably between Aja and Selman, and may be as much as 4,000 feet above the sea. This, I take it, is the highest plateau of Arabia-as Aja is its highest mountain, 5000 to 5600 feet,-an all sufficient reason for including Jebel Shammar in the term Nejd or Highland.
I feel that I am taking a very serious liberty with geographers in placing Hal 60 miles farther south than where it is found in our modern maps. I consider, however, that until its position has been scientifically determined, I am justified in doing this by the fact, that my dead reckoning gave it this position, not only according to the out journey, but by the return one, measured from Meshhed Ali. I am so much in the habit of measuring distances by a rough computation of pace and time, that I doubt if I am much out in the present instance. On this, however, I forbear to dogmatise.
I had hoped to conclude this sketch with a list of plants found in the Nefd. But our small collection has proved to be so pulverised by its journey, that Sir Joseph Hooker, who kindly undertook to look over it, has been able to identify hardly half-a-dozen specimens.
Of wild animals, I have ascertained the existence of the ostrich, the leopard, the wolf, the fox, the hyaena, the hare, the jerboa, the white antelope, and the gazelle in the Nefd; and of the ibex and the marmot in Jebel Aja. Of these it may be remarked that the ostrich is the most valuable and perhaps the most rare; I had not the luck to see a single wild specimen, though once a fresh egg was brought me. Neither did I see, except in confinement, the white antelope (Oryx beatrix), which is the most important quadruped of the Nefd. This antelope frequents every part of the red sand desert, and I found its track quite one hundred miles from any spring, so that the Arabs may be pardoned for affirming that it never drinks. The hare too is found and plentifully throughout; but the gazelle haunts only the outskirts within reach of the hills or of wells where the Arabs are accustomed to water their flocks. The same may be said of the wolf, the fox, and the hyaena, which seem fairly abundant.
The tracks of these grew frequent as we approached Jebel Aja, and it may be a.s.sumed that it is there they have their lairs, making use of the Nefd as a hunting ground. The Jebel Aja, a granite range not less than 5,500 feet above the sea, furnishes the water required by these animals, not indeed in streams, for none such are found in the range, but in springs and natural tanks where rain water is stored. These seem by all accounts to be fairly numerous; and if so, the ancient tradition of a wild horse having also been found in the Nefd, may not be so improbable as at first sight it seems. There is certainly pasture and good pasture for the horse in every part of it. The sheep of the Nefd requires water but once in a month, and the Nefd horse may have required no more.
Of reptiles the Nefd boasts by all accounts the horned viper and the cobra, besides the harmless grey snake called Suliman, which is common everywhere. There are also immense numbers of lizards.
Birds are less numerous, but I noticed the frilled bustard Houbara, and one or two hawks and buzzards. A large black buzzard was especially plentiful. The Bedouins of Nejd train the Lanner falcon, the only n.o.ble hawk they possess, to take hares and bustards. In the Nefd, most of the common desert birds are found, the desert lark, the wheatear, and a kind of wren which inhabits the ghada and yerta bushes.
Of insects I noticed the dragon-fly, several beetles, the common house-fly, and ants, whose nests, made of some glutinous substance mixed with sand, may be seen under these bushes. I was also interested at finding, sunning itself on the rocks of Aalem, a specimen of the painted lady b.u.t.terfly, so well known for its adventurous flights. This insect could not well have been bred at any nearer point than Syria or the Euphrates, respectively 400 and 300 miles distant. Fleas do not exist beyond the Nefd, and our dogs became free of them as soon as we reached Hal. Locusts were incredibly numerous everywhere, and formed the chief article of food for man, beast, and bird. They are of two colours, red and green, the latter being I believe the male, while the former is the female. They both are excellent eating, but the red locust is preferred.
Sand-storms are probably less common in the Nefd than in deserts where the sand is white, for reasons already named; nor do the Bedouins seem much to dread them. They are only dangerous where they last long enough to delay travellers far from home beyond the time calculated on for their supplies. No tales are told of caravans overwhelmed or even single persons. Those who perish in the Nefd perish of thirst. I made particular inquiries as to the simoom or poisonous wind mentioned by Mr.
Palgrave, but could gain no information respecting it.
In the Jebel Aja an ibex is found, specimens of which I saw at Hal, and a mountain gazelle, and I heard of a leopard, probably the same as that found in Sina. The only animal there, which may be new, is one described to me as the Webber, an animal of the size of the hare, which climbs the wild palms and eats the dates. It is described as sitting on its legs and whistling, and from the description I judged it to be a marmot or a coney (hierax). But Lord Lilford, whom I spoke to on the subject, a.s.sures me it is in all probability the Lophiomys Imhausii.
W. S. B.
[Picture: Lophiomys Imhausii]
HISTORICAL SKETCH OF THE RISE AND DECLINE OF WAHHABISM IN ARABIA.
COMPILED PRINc.i.p.aLLY FROM MATERIALS SUPPLIED BY LT.-COLONEL E. C. ROSS, H.M.'S RESIDENT AT BUs.h.i.+RE.