EIN AGA 309 



Here we found a sad reminder of the perils Natron 

 traders undergo. Eight men with forty-live camels, 

 convinced by the fact that a weighing machine, to 

 regulate the collection of taxes, had been set up at 

 Selima, ventured to Bir Natron alone instead of 

 forming part of a great caravan. They were set 

 on at night by the Bedaiat. Their camels and one 

 of their members disappeared, and the remainder 

 arrived footsore to exhaustion at Selima to tell the 

 tale, which my men had deducted already from the 

 footprints of seven men and no camels we found at 

 Ein Aga. 



Ein Aga was the first sheltered spot I reached since 

 leaving Haifa. I would much have preferred to put 

 off my bath indefinitely, not having washed for six 

 days, but the presence of water shamed me into it. 



As some grazing for the camels was promised some 

 miles further on at Legia (incorrectly called Legia 

 Amran, which place is near the Nile), we went to it. 

 We passed several depressions like that of Ein Aga 

 before reaching the one it is in. There, and in a less 

 extent at Ein Aga, one sees a peculiar formation of 

 clay. At first a more or less level stretch of hard red 

 clay is seen, then a wilderness of hummocks at Ein 

 Aga, uniform and wide apart — at Legia more crowded 

 — with their high ends toward the north and looking 

 like rough models of walruses. They are, as a rule, 

 6 feet high and 10 feet long. At Legia is also seen 

 a part where it seems as if a boiling caldron of clay 

 had suddenly solidified. 



In all parts of the desert one finds beautifully 



