Arabian Sands (32 page)

In the sharp cold of the winter morning we rode to the Saar camp, passing herds of fat milch camels, which the herdsboys had just driven out to pasture. Small, black, goat-hair tents were scattered about the valley. Naked infants romped round them, and dark-clad women sat churning butter or moved about getting sticks or herding goats. I noticed with anxiety that several familes had already struck their tents and loaded their camels. The small children were seated in camel-litters,
¹
the first I had seen in southern Arabia, though I was familiar with them in the north. I hoped these preparations did not mean that the Saar were leaving Manwakh.

As we approached, the bin Maaruf formed up to receive us and greeted us by firing low over our heads, before sweeping down on us, yelling and brandishing their daggers. We got off our camels to greet their sheikhs and some Karab, Manahil, and Mahra who were with them. A little apart from the others was a group of four or five so-called
saiyids.
They had come up here from the Hadhramaut, hoping no doubt to profit from the credulity of the Saar, who would unhesitatingly accept their improbable claims that they were descended from the Prophet. Their pallid, indoor faces seemed to me as out of place in this gathering of weathered tribesmen as did their clothes, which were of the Indonesian style fashionable in the towns of the Hadhramaut.

Bin Kabina had led the wild rush which welcomed us and I was glad indeed to see him. He looked well, but his shirt was in ribbons. There were, however, new clothes for him in my saddle-bags.

After we had drunk coffee and exchanged our news we chose a camping place near by, where low-growing bushes and a bank of drifted sand gave us a little shelter from the cold north wind. We were still unloading when a dozen Saar came racing across the low dunes; their camels, travelling at about eighteen miles an hour, were urged on by the wild yells of their riders, who rode them with effortless mastery. The camels swept forward across the undulating ground with raking, pounding strides, their necks stretched out low in front of them as they surged up to the crests, and swept down into the hollows. But there was nothing ungainly about these great beasts, which moved as gracefully as galloping horses. The lads who rode them were among the finest in the tribe, lithe, hard-bodied, and alert. They were the scouts who went out at dawn to scour the desert, alert for the tracks of strangers. Hearing shots, they had supposed that the camp was being attacked and had ridden back to help.

At first sight these bin Maaruf were very different from the other Saar.
¹
They wore long white shirts, cut with pointed sleeves which reached to the ground, and head-cloths and head-ropes of northern fashion. They were distinguished too
by the herds of she-camels which they kept for breeding and for milk. All their camels were in excellent condition, for they had been on rich grazing near Najran.

We required nine camels, and next day my Rashid wandered round the encampments making inquiries. We knew that we should have to pay high prices, for we could get them nowhere else and we were in a hurry. We each of us needed a riding camel, as Muhammad, bin Kabina, and Amair had decided to leave theirs, which were in poor condition, with some Manahil who were here on a visit. I decided to buy four baggage camels since we should have a very long way to go before we reached the Trucial Coast. Bin Ghabaisha, who was a good judge, soon found himself a black
hazmia
for the equivalent of fifteen pounds. We chaffed him about his choice, for there is a prejudice against riding these black camels, but he said that she was a fine animal – which she was – and that he needed her for work and not for display. Whenever anyone approached her she flipped her tail up and down in a ridiculous manner, a sign that she had recently been served successfully.

Bin Kabina bought a young grey with a very long stride. She was six months gone in calf, but this would not matter since camels carry their young for a year. Gradually we collected the number we needed. I bought a small thoroughbred from Oman, a very willing animal but with an irritatingly short stride.

We also needed saddles and head-ropes. The woollen head-ropes were difficult to come by. A
saiyid
had an old one which he sold to bin Ghabaisha for the equivalent of ten shillings. It was worth less than a shilling. The same man sold my Rashid various other things, overcharging them in each case. It happened that two days later he got conjunctivitis and came to me scarcely able to see, as I sat with a crowd of Arabs. Brusquely he demanded medicine. I told him I should be delighted to treat him but would require five shillings for each eye. He turned to the crowd and said, ‘Does the Christian not know I am a
saiyid,
a descendant of Muhammad?‘ I said I was aware of this, but it did not alter my charges for treating him. He went away muttering angrily, but the pain drove him
back. I took his money and was able to cure his eyes. This is the only time I have ever charged for doctoring anyone.

We needed a guide. Ali told me that bin Daisan, a middle-aged man from the bin Maaruf, knew these Western Sands better than anyone else. We spent several evenings in bin Daisan’s tent trying to persuade him to come with us. I offered him money and a rifle, but avarice fought a losing battle in his mind with the caution that comes with middle age. Each night, by the time we left him, he would have agreed to come with us, but in the morning we would get a message saying that his family refused to agree.

Everyone assured us that we should certainly be killed by the Yam or the Dawasir as soon as we met them on the far side of the Sands. They told us that three large parties of Yam were even then raiding round Al Abr and had killed two Saar a few days ago. They said contemptuously that my Rashid were too young and inexperienced to know what lay ahead of us. Young they certainly were, for Muhammad was perhaps twenty-five years old, Amair twenty, and bin Kabina and bin Ghabaisha seventeen, yet they refused to be intimidated or to desert me. Muhammad suggested one evening that instead of crossing to the Wadi Dawasir we should cross the Sands farther to the east through Dakaka, but when I told him that Thomas and Philby had already been there and that it was the Western Sands that I wished to explore, he said,’ Don’t worry. We will go with you wherever you want to go, whatever the Saar may say. ‘However, we agreed that we must get hold of a Saar to come with us so as to have protection from that tribe. Many of the Saar, who hate the Rashid, were talking almost openly of following us when we left and killing us in the Sands. Not only were there bitter scores to settle between these two tribes, but they knew that I had a lot of money with me, as well as our rifles, ammunition, and camels. Our Manahil friends warned us against going without a Saar
rabia,
and yet where were we to get one? Two young Karab had volunteered to come with us, but they neither knew these sands nor would their presence protect us from the Saar.

Ali and I went back again to bin Daisan, and at last, after I had offered him more money, he agreed to accompany us.
We arranged to water our camels and fill our water-skins next day and to leave the day after that. Next morning as we were getting ready, a Mahra arrived from Shagham well, in the nearby Makhia, with news of bin Murzuk and the Abida raiders. They had looted the Rashid and Manahil and captured many camels and killed two Rashid herdsmen. The Mahra told us that the Abida had themselves been surprised while watering in the dark on Thamud well, and that five of them had been killed, but that the pursuit party, which was small, had been driven off. He had seen and spoken with the Abida at Shagham two days before; they had two very badly wounded men with them, and were consequently moving slowly on their way back to their own country, angry at their losses. He advised us to wait for a few days before we started. Though I was almost superstitiously unwilling to put off our departure, now that bin Daisan had at last made up his mind to go with us, I realized that there was nothing else to do. Everyone assured me that the raiders under bin Murzuk would follow us and kill us without mercy, if they, or any other Abida who were behind them, crossed our tracks.

The pursuit party had used as their battle-cry
Murzuk ya talabta
(Death to Murzuk), a battle-cry obviously invented for the occasion, and this for some reason convinced the Rashid that the pursuers had been from their own tribe, and neither Manahil nor Mahra. They were desperately anxious for every scrap of information about the raid, and especially about one of the pursuers who had been killed in the fight at Thamud. The Mahra repeated to them the description of this man, as he had heard it from the Abida, and he also described his rifle which he had seen. Muhammad and the others said, ‘It is Salim bin Mautlauq; without a doubt it is Salim,’ but they were puzzled by the description of the rifle, which they said belonged to no one in their tribe. For weeks they were to discuss this question, hoping against hope that it was not Salim bin Mautlauq who had been killed. We did not hear what had happened until a year later on the Trucial Coast.

About twenty-five Rashid and a few Mahra had followed the Abida and found them watering their camels at Thamud. They knew that water was short and that, as the Abida numbered
about a hundred and fifty, they would be all night watering their animals. They had crept towards the well. It was a cloudy night and they had got close before they were challenged. They fired a volley and then rushed the Abida using their daggers. Hopelessly outnumbered, they were soon driven back. When they collected again, where they had left their camels, they found that Salim was missing. A Mahra said that he had been killed near the well and produced his rifle. He explained that he had picked it up, leaving his own rifle which was no good. Saud, Salim’s brother, said at once that he was going back and the others went with him. When they reached the well there was no one there and no sign of Salim. At dawn they followed the tracks which he had made as he had crawled away. They found him a mile away, unconscious, shot through the chest and neck. When he recovered consciousness he told them that a fatally wounded Abida had called out, ‘Is there not one of them dead that I may look on him before I die?’ and that someone had then seized him by the legs and dragged him over to the dying man, round whom many people were collected; the dying man had cursed him, and then someone had shot him again. When he came to, there was no one there and he had crawled off into the dark trying to get to the place where the Rashid had left their camels. He recovered from his wounds a few months afterwards.

Two days later we went to the well at Manwakh, bin Daisan having assured us again the night before that he was coming with us. We arranged with him to leave next day and he said he would meet us on the well. We travelled there with a family that was camped near us. They said we could use their gear for watering. The man rode a camel loaded with great coils of rope, with pulleys, well-buckets, rolled up water-skins, and a large watering-trough fashioned from skins stretched over a framework of wooden hoops. His son rode bareback on one of seven camels, and a woman and two small children drove a herd of goats. Others, too, were going down to the water. It was six miles away and we took two hours to get there. When we arrived there was already a crowd round the well mouth. Men and women drew on the ropes together, singing as they
pulled, hand over hand. On each rope, as one bucket jerked up from the dark depths, slopping water down the glistening walls, another descended empty. Each clammy, dripping leather bucket was seized as it reached the scaffolding, and hastily tipped into a trough, round which moaning camels jostled in haste to quench their thirst. Rows of bulging black skins lay upon the sand, guarded from the trampling feet of men and beasts by shrill-voiced children. Camels were watered, couched, and later driven away; others arrived, breaking into a shuffling trot as they approached; colts frisked, stiff-legged, around their dams; men shouted with harsh voices to watchful, darting herdsboys; goats bleated, camels roared, the singing at the well-head rose and fell, the sun climbed higher, and the dark stain of spilt water spread farther across the ground.

Abdullah bin Nura and several elders arrived. They told us that they would not allow bin Daisan or anyone else from the bin Maaruf to go with us, and advised us to give up our plan to cross the Sands, as the Yam would certainly kill us if we did. I had half expected bin Daisan to let me down. We answered little and went apart to talk it over. Ali suggested that two young Saar from his own section of the Hatim might go with us if I gave each of them a rifle and fifty cartridges. They had never crossed the Sands but had watered at the Hassi near Sulaiyil and were confident that they could find the well once we had arrived on the other side. He said that if they were with us we should be safe from the Saar. I asked the Rashid what they thought, and Muhammad answered, ‘We are your men. We will go where you go. It is for you to decide.’ I told bin Kabina to make coffee while I thought it over, and we went and sat beneath the cliff, where we had unloaded our camels. It seemed crazy to try to cross the Empty Quarter without a guide. It was about four hundred waterless miles, which would take at least sixteen days, and bin Daisan had told me that the dunes were very high and difficult. I remembered how hard had been the journey which we had done the year before, and how little margin we had to spare, even when guided by al Auf. I asked the Rashid if they thought we could get across without a guide, and Muhammad said,’ We live in
the Sands. We can take you across without a guide. The danger will be from the Yam after we have got to the other side.’ I told Ali that we would go, and asked him to fetch the two Saar, and he said he would bring them in the evening.

Unlike my companions, I was far more concerned with the physical difficulties of crossing the Empty Quarter, especially without a guide, than worried by what would happen to us if we ran into Arabs on the far side. I did not think that they would take us for raiders, since we would be leading four laden camels. I knew that our clothes and saddling would show them that we came from the south and belonged to the hated Mishqas, but I hoped to be able to get speech with any Arabs we might meet before they opened fire; and if they belonged to Ibn Saud I though they might hesitate to kill us once they discovered I was a European, for fear of the King’s anger. I knew that if they were from the Yemen we should be doomed. Looking back on the journey I realize how hopelessly I under-estimated the danger and how very slight were our chances of survival.