FROM SUEZ TO SINAl/' 



263 



and the sprinkling of the blood of the lamb upon their 

 doorposts, before they left Egypt, may have prepared the 

 Israelites for the fuller revelation of God's remedy for sin ; and 

 if, as may have been the case, it -was the Second Person in the 

 Trinity wlio spoke with Moses on the mount, then we have our 

 Saviour Himself instituting the sacrifices which were the types 

 and shadows of the New Covenant, of His own great sacrifice on 

 Calvary. The memories of our stay in this region can never be 

 effaced, and we can only hope that the lessons of Sinai may 

 never grow dim. 



Having said good-bye to the monks, we started on our way 

 to Tor on Tuesday (March 19th). We had a new set of Bedouins 

 and fresh camels. The beast provided for myself was an 

 immense lohite camel, very easy in its movements. My first 

 camel from Suez made, or caused me to make, 5,000 movements 

 to and fro each hour. The next one I changed to, after the 

 first fell with me, made 4,700 each hour ; and this last camel, 

 being still larger, made only 4,120. All depends on the height 

 of the animal. This white animal was so big that it was quite 

 impossible to get into the saddle, while it was lying down, 

 without much assistance. 



We had a magnificent view of Jebel Musa from the Wadi 

 Sabaiyeh. If this mountain had a plain in front of it like the 

 AVadi er-Eaha before Jebel Sufsafa, it would be difficult to 

 decide wdiich eminence most corresponded to the Sinai of the 

 Bible, but this wadi or plain below Jebel Musa does not compare 

 for a moment with Er-Eaha as a camping-place for the Israelites 

 — nor is there any sign of water here. 



On the following day (Wednesday) the scenery was marvel- 

 lously grand, the climax being reached at the point where the 

 granite mountains closed in and formed a gorge or canon very 

 much like those seen in parts of the Sik at Petra. Tlie 

 mountains are either red, brown, or grey granite, each colour 

 beginning and ending suddenly, with frequent veins of black, 

 or dark green, porphyry or diorite. These veins generally run 

 vertically or nearly so, sometimes six feet wide, sometimes 

 twenty or thirty feet wide, or even more, but the line of division 

 between the porphyry and granite is clean-cut and generally 

 absolutely straight. The effect is most wonderful, and the fact 

 that the mountains are granite, and that the colours begin and 

 end suddenly, differentiates these rocks from those of Petra, 

 where all is sandstone and wdiere the colours are so marvellously 

 intermingled. 



On our way we often met travelling Bedouins. There seems, 



