THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



273 



these were the same people who had pre- 

 ferred a handful of rice to a silver dollar 

 only two days before. 



Our caravan had scarcely cleared the 

 khor and got well on to the three or 

 four miles of fertile, scrub-covered plain 

 which divides the sea from the moun- 

 tains, when the guide proved his mettle 

 by suggesting that we camp there for the 

 night. He had been made to understand 

 clearly that his whole business was to 

 bring us into the frankincense country at 

 a point where we might be sure of secur- 

 ing some little trees that could be carried 

 back to the ship, and he had glibly prom- 

 ised to introduce us to those trees by the 

 middle of the next forenoon. Now the 

 promises were so glibly renewed that my 

 mistrust of him became certain and, much 

 against his will, he was forced to push on. 

 Even so, it was after sundown when we 

 reached the glen behind Hadibo, where 

 the Wadi Motaha broke a way for us 

 through the solid wall of Haghier. 



AMONG THE BEDOUIN CAVE-DWELLERS 



The trail up the narrow gorge of the 

 Motaha, worn by camels' feet and the 

 torrential rains, is narrow, rocky, and ex- 

 ceedingly steep. In places it is scarcely 

 wider than the width of one's beast, and 

 the great thorn bushes beside it tear with 

 insatiable claws at flesh and clothing. 

 Flowers — yellow, blue, and crimson — 

 some familiar, but most of them strange, 

 and creeping vines over low trees gave 

 the whole jungle the appearance of a 

 lovely, unkempt garden — like a woman 

 with disheveled hair. Occasionally one 

 encountered the hideous cucumber tree, 

 with its swollen and whitish stems, look- 

 ing like enormous candles which had gut- 

 tered horribly. This tree grows nowhere 

 else, and the rest of the world is none the 

 worse for it. Its proper foliage consists 

 of a few tufts of leaves, with little yellow 

 flowers at the top of its knobby branches ; 

 but we saw vultures roosting in nearly 

 every tree and they seemed its fitting 

 fruit. 



After dark, when we were perhaps 

 1,000 feet up, lights appeared in the faces 

 of the cliffs. These were the bedtime 

 fires of the Bedouin cave-dwellers, who 

 live on nothing but the products of their 

 herds. They are a folk so timid that 



we caught no more than two or three 

 glimpses of them; but we heard their 

 shepherd calls in the morning, and all 

 through the night the lowing of cattle and 

 the bleating of goats betrayed them. 



At io o'clock, when we had been climb- 

 ing on foot and dragging the animals up 

 after us for some three hours, tired na- 

 ture refused to be longer denied. We 

 made camp on a partially bald knoll, lit- 

 tered with mounds and ancient grave- 

 stones, near a place called Dahamis. 

 While our Indian servants put up the tent 

 under a spreading euphorbia, the men of 

 Socotra ate a few handfuls of dates and 

 rolled themselves against their prostrate 

 beasts to sleep. 



AN ENTRANCING SCENE 



We were now about 2,000 feet up. 

 The air was deliciously cool and toward 

 morning it became even biting. Through 

 the tent flap one could look down upon 

 the whole valley behind us, bathed in a 

 heavy dew. Eight or ten miles away the 

 sandhills by the sea glistened in the full 

 moonlight like mounds of silver; nearer, 

 every leaf and stem in the scrub stood 

 out in black and silver filigree; euphor- 

 bias and adeniums, gouty and pompous 

 above the scrub, seemed like the fantasies 

 on a Japanese screen. The whole land- 

 scape was a series of wonderful traceries 

 in moonlight and shadow, entrancingly 

 lovely. 



With the dawn we were scrambling up 

 the slopes again. Animals and baggage 

 were left behind as useless. Guns were 

 even discarded ; the wild goat was free to 

 kick his heels in our faces, if he liked, 

 with perfect impunity. I, at least, was 

 obsessed by the one idea to get my trees 

 and get them back to the ship by the time 

 I had solemnly promised. 



We were now in a region of much 

 larger trees, many of them very curious 

 and all of them strange to me, except one 

 which resembled, and most probably was, 

 a species of the African baobab. Most 

 interesting of all were three species of 

 the famed dragon's blood — whose ruby- 

 red fluid was used to dye the robes of 

 olden queens — which stood all about us 

 on the slopes, like battalions of skirmish- 

 ers half hid in ambush. 



The natives call these trees A'ara-ccib 



