The desert of the Exodus : journeys on foot in the wilderness of the forty years' wanderings : undertaken in connexion with the ordnance survey of Sinai, and the Palestine exploration fund . After afew minutes the ravine widens out, and you enter astreet of dw^ellings, temples, and cisterns, all cutout of the rock,—not so elaborate in their detailsas those in Wddy Musa, and w^anting the beautifulcolouring of the latter, but still very pretty, andapparently of older date. At every point are stair-cases made in the small clefts, and sometimes inthe face of the rock, most of them leading to plat-
The desert of the Exodus : journeys on foot in the wilderness of the forty years' wanderings : undertaken in connexion with the ordnance survey of Sinai, and the Palestine exploration fund . After afew minutes the ravine widens out, and you enter astreet of dw^ellings, temples, and cisterns, all cutout of the rock,—not so elaborate in their detailsas those in Wddy Musa, and w^anting the beautifulcolouring of the latter, but still very pretty, andapparently of older date. At every point are stair-cases made in the small clefts, and sometimes inthe face of the rock, most of them leading to plat- FROM FETE A TO SIIIIIAX. 453 forms on high places designed perhaps for sacri-ficial purposes. Some of the temples have plasteron the Ulterior walls, and this is rudely painted torepresent stones. One has a very elaborately paintedceilmg, containing a pretty device of flowers, festoonsof grape-vines and convolvuli, vnt\\ Cupids playingabout on the branches and some of them holdingdra\\Ti bows. The execution is by no means contemp-tible, and is apparently Roman. As you emerge fromthe Sik, there is a temple on the left with an elegantfa9ade of four columns. The whole ravine is full. AT Kl. llMllli lit olcaiidrrs. and caip(lc<l willi the softest giass:it tenniiuitcH aliiii|ill\ in a narrow cltlt. at tlic 454 FHOM IETRA TO SlIJUAX. top of wliich is a tiiii])lo, and the facade of thishas fallen down and bloclvcd up the way. The city,or village, is called El Bdrid, and was undoubtedlyHorite in its origin (as the excavations are obviouslyin this case (dl dwellings), but has been occupied bylater peoples. This is evident from the frescoesabove mentioned, and from the fact that on the rockson either side we found several NabathfBan inscrip-tions. The Arabs have a tradition that the formerinhabitants of the city found a door in the rockleading to a rich and fertile subterranean land, withwhich they were so pleased that they entered it,made their dwellings therein, and closed
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Keywords: ., bookauthorpalm, bookcentury1800, bookdecade1870, booksubjectbible
