The night at the ruins was dry and cool, even cold; disturbed
only by the coughing of the men, the moaning of the camels, and
the bleating of the sheep. We would willingly have spent here
another day, but water and forage were absolutely wanting; and
the guides assured us that even greater marvels, in the shape of
ruins and quartz-reefs, lay ahead. We set out shortly after five
a.m. (March 31st): the morning was pearly and rosy; but puffs of
a warmer wind announced the Dufun (local Khamsin), which promised
us three days of ugly working weather. Leaving Umm el-Karayat by
the upper or eastern valley-fork, we soon fell into and descended
its absorbent, the broad (northern) Wady el-Khaur. Upon the right
bank of the latter rose the lesser "Mountain of Quartz," a cone
white as snow, looking shadowy and ghostly in the petit jour, the
dim light of morning. For the next two hours (= seven miles) we
saw on both sides nothing but veins and outcrops of "Maru,"
worked as well as unworked. All was bare and barren as the
gypsum: the hardy 'Aushaz (Lycium), allied to the tea-tree, is
the only growth that takes root in humus-filled hollows of the
stone.

Presently the quartz made way for long lines and broad patches of
a yellow-white, heat-altered clay, often revetted with iron, and
passably aping the nobler rock: from one reef I picked up what
appeared to be trachyte, white like that of Shaghab. The
hill-casing of the valley forms no regular line; the heaps of
black, red, and rusty trap are here detached and pyramidal, there
cliffing as if in presence of the sea. The vegetation improved as
we advanced; the trees were no longer black and heat-blasted; and
we recognized once more the dandelion, the thistle, the senna,