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On the 8th those extortionate men of Wadi al Ain sent to say they would take us by the Wadi bin Ali, turning out of Wadi Hadhramout at Al Gran, crossing the Wadis bin Ali and Adim, and reaching Sa'ah, where we could branch off for Bir Borhut.

The tribe of Al Jabber possess the parallel Wadis Adim and Bin Ali, and the road between them across the akaba is much traversed and apparently an ancient one. We went across on the level, eight miles, and then descended by a narrow valley leading into the Wadi Adim.

The Sohail, or star Canopus, is shedding his rays all over the globe. In one place he produces common leather, in another, or in Yamin, that called Adim, or perfumed. I heard a certain learned senior observing to a disciple: "If the sons of Adam were as solicitous after Providence, or God, as they are after their means of sustenance, their places in Paradise would surpass those of the angels."

The land of Adim to which Sanehat fled appears to be the same as Edom or the southeast corner of Syria. It was evidently near the upper Tenu, or Rutennu, who seem to have dwelt on the hill country of Palestine. The hill and the plain of Palestine are so markedly different, that in all ages they have tended to be held by opposing people.

The sultan told us we should find running water, and that it was a shorter way to Sheher. Besides this, there lurked in the background, not to be revealed till the last moment, a design to get the Tamimi to come to a place in Wadi Adim and take us to Bir Borhut, a name truly terrible to Matthaios and the Indian servants.

We never could ascertain whether the Tamimi had come or not, so on February 18, having given up all hope of joining them and changed ten camels, we set out, but not before nine o'clock. After Sa'ah the Wadi Adim becomes narrow, stony, and uninteresting, and our way lay for a good part along a stony river bed, gradually mounting, but almost imperceptibly.

In the valleys themselves there is very little slope, for we found that, with the exception of the Wadi Adim, all the valley heads we visited were nearly of uniform height with the main valley, and had a wall of rock approaching 1,000 feet in height, eaten away as it were out of the plateau.

From it the table-land slopes gently down to the northward towards the main valley of the Hadhramout, and eastwards towards the Wadi Adim. After two days more travelling we approached the heads of the many valleys which run into the Hadhramout; the Wadis Doan, Rakhi, Al Aisa, Al Ain, Bin Ali, and Adim all start from this elevated plateau and run nearly parallel.