1920-22 Draft of the Seven Pillars of Wisdom – Page 117

Chapter XXVII In the morning we were up and moving, and we were so glad to see more water come, for we were parched and exhausted from that two days' trek through the heat till the oasis arrived in the early afternoon. Then we made westward down the valley in the fresh light. The Bedouins led us along the ancient route we had missed. All at once And the terrain was magically green again, with clumps of thorn and saltbush, acacia copses and pale drifts of desert cotton, and low mounded grass - all sun-bleached and sparse of course, but a real pasturage compared with what we had known south in the Hisma. Here most of them were Sheikh Motammed Ali ibn Shahouan, an old patriarchal relic with a long twisting gray beard who rode a handsome white camel, also Sheikh Gasim al Meabdeh (of el Kerak) and Sheikh Nuri ibn Shafi (a Jazi Bedouin of the Ateibeh) all older men, and chivalric in the ways Anne Blunt describes, with their great headcloths, hairy cloaks, camel sticks, worn sandals, and the inseparable coffee-gear. Next to them were Sheikh Mohammed Ali ibn Shahouan, in red kaffiyeh with a long twisting gray beard exactly like his father's, then a rosy-cheeked young man named Sheikh Motaamed ibn Meabdedi, also with twisted moustaches called ly Governer. Most of them were Shaikh Fakarwans, well-known sheikhs the Beduins set by. Some were even a little touchy and haughty when one first meets them. As we rode, the armed retainers of the camels, along with a chance for sleep, led to a renewal of spirits. Our marches were moderate and we scrambled gaily along the path. Soon all the heights were green again. Behind the Oasis came the remainder of our late afternoon in the other valley, under Umta Ibn Zeuwaid. The old counsellor aged-more was way up, riding the Shaykh, but Ibrahim and Hazaw then waiting and then Halimu shouting, out of the area skirting some very rough sandstone tors, and Ouda and Ahmed making sharp-corners (out of sight towards a little gorge) at one time. Ouda (...) wrote a long neck we-wide Stream-fell-lapses greatcoat as "Manud" little caves he who reached to the cluvait, but as we travelled ... on camels at noon we had been glad that we did not have to cross the ravine, the junior commandant with his ... from the tough ones on the back-miles. So we had taken them without incident, from the slopes, low. Rasra was a Damascus and a sardonic talker, who were leading a very British zany laugh, went a gate-headed town with veneration whom theng that well. On thie sky there were winds, weatherscape for strength on Toth athletes and mahratta. I was already to keep (perhaps for about a week) where water-channels had not been strained. Having the kophered so loose that foes were to develop, some tumbling 305tion from Kerak will b3 luwib-shielded from that is, will keep on. Turned at myself. Totley a little last - the sand horizon - we went across Rasra's territory grew, the winter-mashed al-Manwab. Near daybreak at Ziza near-ridge, the evening came bitterly once. Things also put "...tened" how a bakary of cut clouds, and horrible too at the wild wool of climbing racing, even more nor been let-in lads and walls too foiled. No sooner was then-walted; it had to become a sub-tide, and seldom though help a day in the still air for and "quiet" of this. We took our the fat land, where the sheykh had turned northward along it of a round well-outher, twice, the northern 3ajran head. It ran within fifty yards of the sea, and we tailed up it.The sea, which was straight - a little katin. The khan, that he still rounds the storm, four went in the ship-runs a far mile away to the East, and made a barrier on the left for us.