something in order there, telling him in the meanwhile to ask the new guide to make haste and to say that we would wait for him by the rocks of al-Ḳwejmi. Thereupon I swung myself into the saddle and, saluting all those present, rode off to the south. My companions were glad to get away from the camp of the Rawâẓîn, for they were afraid that they might make us prisoners, rob us, and send us back to Tebûk.
To the southeast of Ašhab rise the two low, white knolls of aṯ-Ṯwêrên, to the south of them the cone of ar-Rḫejmi, and to the west of the latter the isolated knoll al-Batra. Al-Batra is said to have shifted to its present position from the east and to have brought flints with it, for only upon it and upon about fifty tiny hills situated to the north of it can flints be found. There are none anywhere else in the uplands of Ḥesma. The small, low hills with the flints are called the “baggage of Batra,” Ḥellet al-Batra. To the north-west of al-Batra stands a solitary ṭalḥ tree, and near it is the mšâš of Beni ʻOḳba. Another well of the same name is situated on the southern border of the plain of az-Zâwije southwest of the hill Ǧlejf as-Semen. The plain of az-Zâwije extends from al-Mkejmen as far as the foot of the granite mountains of ar-Rawjân and al-Meljân and is bordered to the east by the volcanic wall of Ǧedîrt aṣ-Ṣefi with its south-western spur al-Leḥjâne. The chain of granite mountains dividing the coast, known as at-Tihama, from the uplands of Ḥesma forms a ridge, which, with the eastern spurs, is five to ten kilometers broad and is known as aš-Šefa’. The inhabitants of the Tihama coast give the name of al-Ǧeles (the rocky plain) to the eastern uplands, because they are composed of rocky plains.
At 8.54 we crossed the river bed of al-Ḫambara, in which there grows a great deal of ṭalḥ. To the west of us Sbejḥ pointed out in a channel the rain well, mšâš, of al-Mašḳaḥ. By the gap through which the šeʻîb of al-Mašḳaḥ finds its way to the west, on the north side, is the spring of as-Sidd and, on the south, that of aš-Šiḳri. Around the latter the road leads to the pass Naḳb al-Malḥaǧe. This is a deep notch between high, rocky walls, black below and red above, from which a lower group of sandstone hills runs to the east.
From 9.16 to 11.24 we waited for the new guide in a sheltered place among the rocks of al-Ḳwejmi. While we were drawing a map of the surrounding district we were joined
