encamped (temperature: 30° C). The camels were hungry and tired and the road was stony, so that we could not leave this place after our evening meal. We therefore made a fire under a large boulder, but after cooking the supper we immediately extinguished it in order that its flame might not betray us. The camels knelt, one close beside the other; whereupon we fastened their two front legs together. Then we lay down in a circle around the animals, with the new guide between Ismaʻîn and Mḥammad. He was not called upon to act as guard during the night.
THE ŠEʻÎB OF AL-MISMA’ INTO WÂDI AL-ABJAẒ
On Saturday, June 11, 1910, we started off at 4.34 A. M. (temperature: 22° C) through the šeʻîb of al-Misma’ which forms the beginning of the šeʻîb of Asejḥer, in which, at five o’clock, our guide Slîmân pointed out to me the water of al-Ḫarada. He also showed me farther to the southeast on the left side of the wâdi of al-Abjaẓ the deep gaps formed by the šeʻibân of an-Nzêrât that join with aṣ-Ṣdejr and al-ʻEmejḳ. South of them we could see the šeʻibân of al-Mḥaṭṭa and al-Ṛâra extending to the šeʻîb of ʻAleǧân. At 5.20 we saw the narrow peak of Ab-aḏ-Ḏên to the southeast. We then came to the beginning of the šeʻîb of Zerâfa, which forms the western border of the territory belonging to the ʻEmêrât, a clan of the Ḥwêṭât at-Tihama numbering about one hundred tents. On the south their territory extends as far as the oasis of al-Bedʻ, on the north as far as al-Weli Samʻûl, and on the east it reaches to the mountain of Šemrâḫ and al-Maḳla. South of this clan the Mesâʻîd encamp, and to the north the ʻImrân. At 6.04 we rode between the rugged hills of al-ʻAjdijje and the mountains of Abu Rijâš, where the šeʻîb of al-Ḥḳâf begins. After being joined on the right by the šeʻibân of aš-Šarma and Ǧehâmân, which extend from the mountains of Ardâd, al-Ḥḳâf penetrates the hills of ar-Rafîd and ends on the seashore near the oasis of Ṭajjebt Ism.
Our guide explained that the territory between Ḥaḳl and Ṭajjebt Ism used to belong to the ʻAmarîn clan. They had migrated to Egypt and to the neighborhood of Wâdi Mûsa, so that only about ten families remained in the original territory and these few were now encamped with the ʻImrân. The latter are also accompanied on their nomadic wanderings by about
