Journey through Arabia Petraea, to Mount Sinai, and the excavated city of Petra, the edom of the prophesis . ugh not deficient in courage, have no meansfor enabling them to assail it with success. With-in the fortress several good habitations have beensuffered to fall into decay, while others have beenconstructed of mud in a most slovenly governor has taken to himself the south-western bastion, and enlarged it considerably. Thegunner, who is the military chief, inhabits thebastion to the south-east, and, like a veteran ar-tillery man, sleeps by the side of a cannon. Thisgun, a twelv
Journey through Arabia Petraea, to Mount Sinai, and the excavated city of Petra, the edom of the prophesis . ugh not deficient in courage, have no meansfor enabling them to assail it with success. With-in the fortress several good habitations have beensuffered to fall into decay, while others have beenconstructed of mud in a most slovenly governor has taken to himself the south-western bastion, and enlarged it considerably. Thegunner, who is the military chief, inhabits thebastion to the south-east, and, like a veteran ar-tillery man, sleeps by the side of a cannon. Thisgun, a twelve-pounder, and another which isplanted in the north-eastern tower, are the onlypieces capable of being discharged in case of anattack, — an event, however, of which happily thereis little danger. The gunner adds to his warlikeoccupations the more peaceable pursuits of amerchant: he has converted a ruined mosque intoa warehouse. A well lately excavated, and a palmtree, are the only objects which attract attentionin a court indifferently levelled, and surroundedby ruinous buildings blackened with EVENING SCENE. 117 A few mud huts belonging to Arabs, who liveon the small profits they derive from selling butterand other provisions to the soldiers of the garrison,some tombs of former inhabitants of the fortress,and of pilgrims arrested on their pious expeditionsby that malady which a sight of the prophets se-pulchre would have cured, occupy the northernborders of the fortress : on the east, hills of sand,forming part of the ranges of Djebel el Akaba, de-scend even to its walls. The mogreba at length approached : the emotionwhich the arrival of that hour excited in the for-tress and its neighbourhood had already subsided,and the sun, like a disk of fire, was about to dis-appear behind Mount Mahammar, gilding with itslast rays the prominent rose-coloured points ofthe granite rocks. The people belonging to thefortress were returning within its precincts, some toanswer the rol
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