A. PAGAN STRONGHOLD. 
53 
blossom. At sunset we reached and made fast under the village 
of Aboo Beshr. 
Before starting on the morning of August 29thj an old hag 
brought and threw over us dust from the grave of the saint Aboo 
Beshr_, saying that if we retained it on our clothes we should pass 
without injury the cataract of Wadi ^1 Homar. We found it to 
consist of a series of very tame rapids and whirlpools^ caused by 
dangerously immersed rocks of granite. The dust of the good 
sheiWs grave did not prevent us striking^ harder than was 
pleasant^ against some submerged rocks, much to the fear of my 
poor suffering wife, and the displacement of our rudder. 
The banks, that had heretofore borne signs of cultivation, by 
Sakyeh, now became narrow and sterile. A low range of bare 
trap-rock permitted no shrub or blade of grass to grow, but at 
their base, within a few feet of the river- edge, some coarse grass, 
with occasional stunted and ill-conditioned dom-palms, contributed 
to increase rather than diminish the wildness of the scenery. On 
the shelving side of the eastern range of hills appeared apparently 
an old Pagan stronghold, called Kab-il-Marra : it was constructed 
of dry stonework, and leading from it down to the river-side, ap- 
parently for the purpose of securing water to its once inhabitants, 
is a pathway protected by a double row of strong wall, built of the 
same material, and twelve feet high. At about the distance of a 
mile farther down stream, and on the summit of the range, are the 
crumbling remains of what struck me to have been a watch-tower, 
I should have liked to have examined these old ruins, but the stream 
is very powerful, and being now near high Nile, and the channel 
encumbered with numerous bluff rocks, some visible and others 
under water, our rets opposed the attempt. After an hour and a 
