Geology of Mount Sinai and adjacent Countries. 269 



peculiar conformation of the lower mountain ranges ; — an 

 ascending valley, or 7vadi^ reaches to the very summit, where it 

 forms a plain, and then another wadi descends upon the other 

 side. Such is likewise the present general feature of the exten- 

 sive Wadi-el-Araba. And Captain Newbold observes (p. 47) 

 that " the longitudinal and transverse valleys by which the 

 southern or mountain region is strangely fissured, form the 

 natural routes and lines of drainage — the wadis of the Arabs." 

 Through these valleys no continually flowing rivers descend 

 to either gulf; but in the rainy season, after occasional 

 storms, and during the melting of the snows on the more 

 lofty mountains, winter- streams, or rather torrents, — the 

 y(iifia^loi of the ancients — carry down their temporary waters 

 to the sea. Still it appears to me, from the descriptions of 

 some travellers, that four or five small rivulets in some of the 

 valleys, as in Wadi Firan, W. Hebron, El Wadi, W. Kyd, 

 El Ain, &c., continue to flow through the greatest part, if 

 not the entirety, of the year. 



The Gulf of Akaba has been compared to a very long 

 ravine or lake ; and as its shores are mostly skirted by pre- 

 cipitous and lofty mountains, the navigation throughout its 

 length is exceedingly dangerous for small vessels, because 

 squalls and violent north winds so frequently arise and pre- 

 vail for some time. Indeed, from Wellsted's account, the 

 surveying ship Palinurus was in great danger of being 

 wrecked in it. Having already described this gulf, I will 

 only observe that the same intelligent officer did not consider 

 that it would prove too boisterous for steam-vessels, if it ever 

 became necessary to establish communication by them to 

 these coasts of Arabia. And I will here omit any delinea- 

 tion of the other wider and more extensive, but less hemmed 

 in by mountains, and consequently less dangerous branch of 

 the Red Sea — the Gulf of Suez, because it is now so well 

 known by reason of such numbers of English annually pass- 

 ing over its waters, either in going to or returning from our 

 Indian empire. The north wind also prevails in this gulf, 

 and the trees and bushes along the coasts of it, especially on 

 the Egyptian side, bend from it and extend their branches in 

 the opposite direction. 



