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The mass, formerly mammilated, has been broken and denticulated by the destruction of softer strata. Already the lower crest, bounding the Sha'b Umm Khargah, shows perpendicular fissures which, when these huge columns shall be gnawed away by the tooth of Time, will form a new range of pillars for the benefit of those ascending the Sharr, let us say in about A.D. 10,000.
On the right rose a block of syenite, ruddy with orthose, all rounded lumps and twisted finials; it discharged a quantity of black sand that streaked the gravel plain. At four p.m. we camped on a broad divide, El-Kutayyifah, where an adjacent Sha'b, or "fold," supplied fresh rain-water.
But we had been privily told of another further down the valley, at the Sha'b el-Harr; and, although we much wanted a bottleful for photography, we determined to run the risk. The result is curious, showing how jealously water-secrets are kept in these lands.
The latter presently puts forth the jagged spine of black and repulsive plutonic rock, which notes the Sha'b Makhul, the corresponding versant of the Nakb Abu Sha'r. The Bedawin, who, as usual, luxuriate in nomenclature, distinguish between the eastern and western faces of the same block, and between the Wadys of the scarp and the counter-scarp.
It is hard to imagine that this little beast, which some one called a "Cleopatra's hasp," could be fatal: its small bag can hardly contain a couple of drops. Yet the vox populi is distinctly against me. The Shaykhs were anxious to push on for another half-hour, where, they declared, a rain-hole is found in the next ravine, the Sha'b el-Kahafah.
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