Page:Mount Seir, Sinai and Western Palestine.djvu/122



It was also agreed to that no money should be paid till the return of the party in safety; and that if any sum should be extorted by the inhabitants of Petra during the visit the amount was to be deducted. These were hard terms according to the views of the Sheikhs, and in fact quite unprecedented. The reader who knows something of travellers' visits to the rock-hewn city will probably concur in thinking that they sere sufficiently liberal, and that the arrangement regarding the time of payment was not unnecessary.

Thus was the morning of wrangling and turmoil closed in, at least, outward harmony and peace. Our camp was pitched in the centre of a recess amongst the sandstone cliffs, and close by the pass which opens out on the Arabah plain. The Arabs took up their quarters at the foot of the cliffs, forming little groups around their fires; and over their coffee and pipes discussed with abundant vigour the events of the day. I held Divine Service in the dining tent, selecting as the first lesson for the evening the account of the death of Aaron on Mount Hor, as given in Numbers xx. All retired early to rest, preparatory to a start next morning before daybreak.

Monday, 10th December.—All our party but myself were on their camels by four o'clock, the intention being to ascend Mount Hor, make observations, and afterwards go down into Wâdy Mûsa and visit Petra, where I hoped to join them. They were accompanied by one of the Sheikhs of Petra and Sheikh Ali. Major Kitchener took his theodolite; my son took his camera and a good supply of dry plates for photographing. Hart was very sanguine of a good ingathering of specimens both zoological and botanical, and supplied himself with preserving apparatus accordingly; and Laurence took charge of the thermometrical aud barometrical