Arabian Sands Read online

  We always camped crowded together. All around us was endless space, and yet in our camps there was scarcely room to move, especially when the camels had been brought in for the night and couched around the fires. When we started on this journey we had divided ourselves into messes of five or six people, who each carried their own food. I fed with old Tamtaim, Sultan, and three others. One was Mabkhaut, a slightly built man of middle age; he was good-humoured and considerate, but he seldom spoke, which was unusual among these garrulous Bedu. Another was Musallim bin Tafl, who had been pointed out to me by the Wali as a skilful hunter. He was avaricious even by Bedu standards, quick-witted and hardworking. He was often in Salala, hanging about the palace, and had had in consequence the unusual experience of some contact with the outside world. He volunteered to do the cooking for our party.

  When we had enough water he would cook rice, but generally he made bread for our evening meal. He would scoop out three or four pounds of flour from one of the goatskin bags in which we carried our supplies, and would then damp this, add a little salt and mix it into a thick paste. He would divide the dough into six equal-sized lumps, pat each lump between his hands until it had become a disc about half an inch thick, and would then put it down on a rug while he shaped the others. Someone else would have lighted the fire, sometimes with matches but generally with flint and steel. There was plenty of flint in the desert and the blade of a dagger to use as steel. They would tear small strips off their shirts or head-cloths for tinder, with the result that each day their clothes became more tattered in appearance. Musallim would rake some embers out of the fire to make a glowing bed, and then drop the cakes of dough on to it. The heat having sealed the outside of the cakes, he would turn them over almost immediately, and then, scooping a hollow in the sand under the embers, would bury them and spread the hot sand and embers over them. I would watch bubbles breaking through this layer of sand and ashes as the bread cooked. Later he would uncover the cakes, brush off the sand and ashes and put them aside to cool. When we wished to feed he would give one to each of us, and we would sit in a circle and, in turn, dip pieces of this bread into a small bowl containing melted butter, or soup if we happened to have anything from which to make it. The bread was brick hard or soggy, according to how long it had been cooked, and always tasted as if it had been made from sawdust. Sometimes Musallim shot a gazelle or an oryx, and only then did we feed well. After we had eaten we would sit round the fire and talk. Bedu always shout at each other, even if they are only a few feet apart. Everyone could therefore hear what was being said by everyone else in the camp, and anyone who was interested in a conversation round another fire could join in from where he was sitting.

  Soon after dinner I would spread out my rug and sheepskin and, putting my dagger and cartridge belt under the saddlebags which I used as a pillow, lie down beneath three blankets with my rifle beside me. While I was among the Arabs I was anxious to behave as they did, so that they would accept me to some extent as one of themselves. I had therefore to sit as they did, and I found this very trying, for my muscles were not accustomed to this position. I was glad when it was night and I could lie down and be at ease. I had sat on the ground before, but then I had been travelling with men whom I knew well, and with them I could relax and lie about. Now I would get off my camel after a long march and have to sit formally as Arabs sit. It took me a long time to get used to this. For the same reason I went barefooted as they did, and at first this was torture. Eventually the soles of my feet became hardened, but even after five years they were soft compared with theirs.

  It hardly occurred to the Bedu that there could be other ways of doing things than those to which they were accustomed. When they fetched me from the R.A.F. camp at Salala they had seen an airman urinating. Next day they asked me what physical deformity he suffered from which prevented him from squatting as they did. In the mountains it was easy to go behind a rock to relieve myself. Later, on the open plains, I walked off to a distance and squatted as they did, with my cloak over my head to form a tent. Except when we were at a well, we used sand to scrub our hands after we had fed, and to clean ourselves after we had defecated. Bedu are always careful not to relieve themselves near a path. In the trackless sands Arabs who stopped behind to urinate turned instinctively aside from the tracks which we ourselves had made before they squatted.

  Muslims are usually very prudish and careful to avoid exposing themselves. My companions always kept their loincloths on even when they washed at the wells. At first I found it difficult to wear a loin-cloth with decency when sitting on the ground. Bedu say to anyone whose parts are showing, ‘Your nose!’ I had this said to me once or twice before I learnt to be more careful. The first time I wiped my nose thinking that there was a drip on the end of it, for the weather was very cold.

  At first I found living with the Bedu very trying, and during the years that I was with them I always found the mental strain greater than the physical. It was as difficult for me to adapt myself to their way of life, and especially to their outlook, as it was for them to accept what they regarded as my eccentricities. I had been used to privacy, and here I had none. If I wanted to talk privately to someone it was difficult. Even if we went a little apart, others would be intrigued and immediately come to find out what we were talking about and join in the conversation. Every word I said was overheard, and every move I made was watched. At first I felt very isolated among them. I knew they thought that I had unlimited money, and I suspected that they were trying to exploit me. I was exasperated by their avarice, and wearied by their importunities. Whenever during these early days one of them approached me, I thought, ‘Now what is he going to ask for?’ and I would be irritated by the childish flattery with which they invariably prefaced their requests. I had yet to learn that no Bedu thinks it shameful to beg, and that often he will look at the gift which he has received and say, ‘Is this all that you are going to give me?’ I was seeing the worst side of their character, and was disillusioned and resentful, and irritated by their assumption of superiority. In consequence I was assertive and unreasonable.

  Some rain had fallen three months earlier on the northern slopes of the Qarra mountains, and there was a little green grazing in some of the valley-bottoms where freshets had run down. The Bedu were loath to leave this grazing and push on into the empty wastes which they knew lay ahead. They dawdled along doing one hour’s marching one day, and perhaps two the next, while my exasperation mounted. Whenever we came to a patch of grazing they vowed that it was the last and insisted on stopping; and then next day wewould find more grazing and stop again. Anyway, most of this grazing did not seem to me to be worth stopping for. Usually it was only a few green shrubs. I did not yet realize how rare any fresh vegetation was in this desert. I still thought in terms of so many marching hours a day, which had been easy to do in the Sudan where we hand-fed our camels. I fretted at the constant delays, counting the wasted days instead of revelling in this leisurely travel. Unfairly, I suspected that the Arabs were trying to lengthen our journey in order to collect more money from me. When in the evenings I would protest and insist that we must do proper marches, Sultan and the others would add to my exasperation by saying that I knew nothing about camels, which was true. I would, however, explain indignantly what a lot of experience I had had with them in the Sudan. I found it difficult to understand what they were saying and this added to my frustration.

  Bedu, attracted from afar by the fresh grazing, were herding camels and goats in the valleys through which we passed. They were hungry, as Bedu always are, and they collected each evening in our camp to feed at our expense. Everyone had heard that the Christian had great quantities of food with him. These unwanted guests never waited for an invitation before sitting down with us to feed. They just joined us and shared whatever we had for as long as they were with us. Many of them followed us, turning up evening after evening. My companions accepted their presence with equanimity, since they would have done the same; and,
anyway, no Bedu will turn a guest away unfed. But I was irritated by their assumption that we should feed them, and disturbed by their numbers. I realized that we had not brought enough food with us and that we were going to be short before we returned to Salala. In my more bitter moments I thought that Bedu life was one long round of cadging and being cadged from.

  It was three months before I returned to Salala. They were hard months of constant travel during which I learnt to admire my companions and to appreciate their skill. I soon found these tribesmen far easier to consort with than more progressive town Arabs who, after discarding their own customs and traditions, have adopted something of our ways. I myself infinitely preferred the Bedu’s arrogant self-assurance to the Effendi’s easily wounded susceptibilities. I was beginning to see the desert as the Bedu saw it, and to judge men as they judged them. I had come here looking for more than locusts, and was finding the life for which I sought.

  Two memories in particular remain with me of this journey. I had turned aside into the sands of Ghanim with a dozen Arabs, while the others went on to Mughshin. It was eight days since we had left the well at Shisur and our water had been finished for twenty-four hours. We were near Bir Halu, or ‘the sweet well’, when we came on clumps of yellow-flowering tribulus, growing where a shower had fallen a few months before. We grazed our camels for a while, and I then suggested going on to the well, for I was thirsty. Eventually Tamtaim, Sultan, and Musallim came on with me; the others said they would join us later after feeding their camels. We arrived at the well, unsaddled our camels, watered them, and then sat down near the well. No one had yet drunk. I was anxious not to appear impatient, but eventually I suggested we should do so. Sultan handed me a bowl of water. I offered it to old Tamtaim, but he told me to drink, saying that he would wait till the others came, adding that as they were his travelling companions it would be unseemly for him to drink till they arrived. I had already learnt that Bedu will never take advantage over a companion by feeding while he is absent, but this restraint seemed to me exaggerated. The others did not arrive until five hours later, by which time I was thoroughly exasperated and very thirsty. Though the water looked deliciously cold and clear, it tasted like a strong dose of Epsom salts; I took a long draught and involuntarily spat it out. It was my first experience of water in the Sands.

  A few days later we passed some tracks. I was not even certain that they were made by camels, for they were much blurred by the wind. Sultan turned to a grey-bearded man who was noted as a tracker and asked him whose tracks these were, and the man turned aside and followed them for a short distance. He then jumped off his camel, looked at the tracks where they crossed some hard ground, broke some camel-droppings between his fingers and rode back to join us. Sultan asked, ‘Who were they?’ and the man answered, ‘They were Awamir. There are six of them. They have raided the Junuba on the southern coast and taken three of their camels. They ‘have come here from Sahma and watered at Mughshin. They passed here ten days ago.’ We had seen no Arabs for seventeen days and we saw none for a further twenty-seven. On our return we met some Bait Kathir near Jabal Qarra and, when we exchanged our news, they told us that six Awamir had raided the Januba, killed three of them, and taken three of their camels. The only thing we did not already know was that they had killed anyone.

  Here every man knew the individual tracks of his own camels, and some of them could remember the tracks of nearly every camel they had seen. They could tell at a glance from the depth of the footprints whether a camel was ridden or free, and whether it was in calf. By studying strange tracks they could tell the area from which the camel came. Camels from the Sands, for instance, have soft soles to their feet, marked with tattered strips of loose skin, whereas if they come from the gravel plains their feet are polished smooth. Bedu could tell the tribe to which a camel belonged, for the different tribes have different breeds of camel, all of which can be distinguished by their tracks. From looking at their droppings they could often deduce where a camel had been grazing, and they could certainly tell when it had last been watered, and from their knowledge of the country they could probably tell where. Bedu are always well informed about the politics of the desert. They know the alliances and enmities of the tribes and can guess which tribes would raid each other. No Bedu will ever miss a chance of exchanging news with anyone he meets, and he will ride far out of his way to get fresh news.

  As a result of this journey I found that the country round Mughshin was suffering from many years of drought. If there had been grazing we would have found Arabs with their herds, but we had just travelled for forty-four days without seeing anyone. I asked my companions about floods and they told me that no water had reached Mughshin from the Qarra mountains since the great floods twenty-five years before. It was obviously not an ‘outbreak centre’ for desert locusts. I now decided to travel westwards to the Hadhramaut along the southern edge of the Sands,1 where I would be able to find out if floods ever reached these sands from the high Mahra mountains along the coast. No European had yet travelled in the country between Dhaufar and the Hadhramaut.

  I had met with one of the Rashid sheikhs, called Musallim bin al Kamam, on my way to Mughshin, and had taken an immediate liking to him. I had asked him to meet me with some of his tribe in Salala in January, and to go with me to the Hadhramaut. I found bin al Kamam and some thirty Rashid waiting for me when I arrived in Salala on 7 January. I decided to keep Sultan and Musallim bin Tafl with me from the Bait Kathir and agreed to pay for fifteen Rashid, but bin al Kamam said that thirty men would come with us and share this pay. He explained that the country through which we should pass was frequently raided by the Yemen tribes. He had news that more than two hundred Dahm were even then raiding the Manahil on the steppes to the east of the Hadhramaut.

  The Rashid were kinsmen and allies of the Bait Kathir, both tribes belonging to the Al Kathir. They were dressed in long Arab shirts and head-cloths which had been dyed a soft russet-brown with the juice of a desert shrub. They wore their clothes with distinction, even when they were in rags. They were small den men, alert and watchful. Their bodies were lean and hard, trained to incredible endurance. Looking at them, I realized that they were very much alive, tense with nervous energy, vigorously controlled. They had been bred from the purest race in the world, and lived under conditions where only the hardiest and best could possibly survive. They were as fine-drawn and highly-strung as thoroughbreds. Beside them the Bait Kathir seemed uncouth and assertive, lacking the final polish of the inner desert.

  The Rashid and the Awamir were the tribes in southern Arabia who had adapted themselves to life in the Sands. Some of their sections lived in the central sands, the only place in the Empty Quarter with wells; others had moved right across the Sands to the Trucial Coast. The homelands of both the Rashid and the Awamir were on the steppes to the north-east and to the north of the Hadhramaut. The Bait Imani section of the Rashid still lived there, and we should pass through their territory on our way to the Hadhramaut. The Manahil lived farther to the west, between there and the Awamir. Beyond the Awamir were the Saar, bitter enemies of the Rashid. The Mahra, divided into many sections, lived in the mountains and on the plateau along the coast; beyond them were the Humum to the north of Mukalla.

  The Bedu tribes of southern Arabia were insignificant in numbers compared with those of central and northern Arabia, where the tents of a single tribe might number thousands. In Syria I had seen the Shammar migrating, a whole people on the move, covering the desert with their herds, and had visited the summer camp of the Rualla, a city of black tents. In northern Arabia the desert merges into the sown and there is a gradual transition from Bedu to shepherds and cultivators. Damascus, Aleppo, Mosul, and Baghdad exert their influence on the desert. They are visited by Bedu, who see in their bazaars men of different races, cultures, and faiths. Even in the Najd the Bedu have occasional contact with towns and town life. But here scattered families moved over great distances seeking pasturage for a dozen c
amels. These Rashid, who roamed from the borders of the Hadhramaut to the Persian Gulf, numbered only three hundred men, while the Bait Kathir were about six hundred. But these Arabs were among the most authentic of the Bedu, the least affected by the outside world. In the south the desert runs down into the sea, continues into the kindlier deserts of the north, or ends against the black barren foothills of the Yemen or Oman. There were few towns within reach of the southern Bedu, and these they rarely visited.

  My ambition was to cross the Empty Quarter. I had hoped that I might be able to do so with these Rashid after we had reached the Hadhramaut, but I realized when I talked with them that by then it would be too hot. I was resolved to return, and was content to regard this first year as training for later journeys. I knew that among the Rashid I had found the Arabs for whom I was looking.

  It was on this journey that I met Salim bin Kabina. He was generally known as bin Kabina, ‘the son of Kabina’, who was his mother. In other parts of Arabia it is common practice to call a man the son of his father; here it is more usual to use his mother’s name. Bin Kabina was to be my inseparable companion during the five years I travelled in southern Arabia. He turned up while we were watering thirsty camels at a well that yielded only a few gallons an hour. For two days we worked

  Tribal Map of Southern Arabia

  day and night in relays. Conspicuous in a vivid red loin-cloth, and with his long hair falling round his naked shoulders, he helped us with our task. On the second day he announced that he was coming with me. The Rashid sheikhs advised me to take the boy and let him look after my things. I told him he must find himself a camel and a rifle. He grinned and said that he would find both, and did. He was about sixteen years old, about five foot five in height and loosely built. He moved with a long, raking stride, like a camel, unusual among Bedu, who generally walk very upright with short steps. He was very poor, and the hardships of his life had marked him, so that his frame was gaunt and his face hollow. His hair was very long and always falling into his eyes, especially when he was cooking or otherwise busy. He would sweep it back impatiently with a thin hand. He had a rather low forehead, large eyes, a straight nose, prominent cheek-bones, and a big mouth with a long upper lip. His chin, delicately formed and rather pointed, was marked by a long scar, where he had been branded as a child to cure some illness. He had very white teeth which were always showing, for he was constantly talking and laughing. His father had died two years before and it had fallen on young bin Kabina to provide for his mother, young brother, and infant sister. I had met him at a critical moment in his life, although I only learnt this a week later.