348 EXTRACTS FROM 
yellow slippers and plain sabre, showed that he was not very 
well off. 
There was not much variety in our passage through this 
narrow valley, though here and there very bad bits of the 
road had to be traversed with caution, and we had plenty of 
opportunities of admiring the skill with which the Arab 
horses crossed the slippery grass and slanting rocks, in places 
where a false step would have entailed a fall into the abyss 
below. The bird-world was also but poorly represented in 
these desolate mountains, for with the exception of one or two 
solitary storks and a few vultures and eagles that flew over 
our heads, there was nothing moving. 
After a long ride the valley ended, and the path brought 
us to the brow of a high mountain, from which there opened 
a splendid prospect. Immediately below us was the steep 
slope of a deep basin-like valley quite surrounded by high 
hills; and right and left were innumerable summits and long 
ridges, all of a uniform grey-green—a true steppe landscape. 
From the bottom of the valley a narrow gorge led in a south- 
westerly direction, and through it one got a little glimpse of 
the deep blue waters of the Dead Sea and of the bare white 
cliffs of the high, finely-formed mountains on its further shore. 
The path wound down the abrupt declivity in steep zigzags, 
and most of the pack-animals of the large caravan were just 
making this difficult descent with an incessant tinkling of 
their bells, while the foremost of them had already reached 
the bottom of the valley, where our indefatigable servants had 
begun to put up the tents on a stony meadow. 
All the gentlemen went on except the Grand Duke and 
myself, and we waited on the ridge until the entire camp was 
pitched, utilizing the time by laying out a dead kid behind a 
hill-top, which would allow us to approach unseen. 
Hundreds of vultures and eagles were flying over from the 
