Page:On the Desert - Recent Events in Egypt.djvu/101

 

THE ASCENT OF MOUNT SERBAL.

We had not yet come unto Mount Sinai, but we had come to another mountain which disputes with Sinai the claim to be the Mount of the Law, and which cannot be passed by without a fixed and steady gaze. No traveller on the desert fails to see Serbal, for it is of such imposing majesty, standing alone and dwarfing all surrounding heights, that it is seen afar off above the tops of the mountains. Nor is it visible only on the Peninsula, but at a great distance beyond, both on land and sea. Those who pass up and down the Red Sea catch sight of it as the great object on the horizon; and beyond the waters both of Suez and of Akaba, it is seen at once from the shores of Africa and of Arabia.

I shall never forget a view of Serbal that we had from the top of the Nakb el-Budra (the Pass of the Sword's Point), one or two long marches before we came under his shadow. We had been all day moving slowly through a succession of wadies, which were like mountain gorges, when we came into a narrow pass, where our advance was stopped by high barriers of rock, which we scaled only by turning from side to side as by a winding stair. When we had climbed to the top, a new horizon was opened before us far to the South, which uncovered a sea of mountains, in the midst of which uprose Serbal, towering above them all. From that moment we never lost sight of this monarch of mountains, but were all the