to break his fast at dawn--an Arab of pure blood would rather
have starved. He shirked answering questions concerning the
number of his tribe. "Many, many!" was all the information we
could get from him; and his Arabic wanted the pure pronunciation,
and the choice vocabulary, that usually distinguish the Juhayni
pilots. Arrived at his own shore, he refused to make arrangements
for disembarking his rice; he ordered, with bawling accents and
pointed stick, the sailors of the man-of-war to land it at the
place chosen by himself; and he bit his finger when informed that
a sound flogging was the normal result of such impudence.

We set out at 4.30 p.m. (March 24th); and steamed due west till
we had rounded the northern head of El-Raykhah, a long low island
which, lying west-south-west of El-Wijh, may act breakwater in
that direction. Then we went south-west, and passed to port the
white rocks of Mardu'nah Isle, which fronts the Ras el-Ma'llah,
capping the ugly reefs and shoals that forbid tall ships to hug
this section of the shore. It is described as a narrow ridge of
coralline, broken into pointed masses two to three hundred feet
high, whose cliffs and hollows form breeding-places for wild
pigeons: the unusually rugged appearance is explained by the fact
that here the "Jinns" amuse themselves with hurling rocks at one
another. Before night we had sighted the Ras Kurkumah, so called
from its "Curcuma" (turmeric) hue, the yellow point facing the
islet-tomb of Shaykh Marbat.[EN#46] Upon this part of the shore,
I was told, are extensive ruins as yet unvisited by Europeans,
the dangerous Juhaynah being the obstacle. To the south-east
towered tall and misty forms, the Ghats of the
Tihamat-Jahaniyyah. Northernmost, and prolonging the Libn, that
miniature Sharr, is the regular wall of the Jebel el-Ward; then