VOYAGES AND TRAVELS PRINTED FOR LONGMAN, HURST, REES, ORME, AND BROWN, PATERNOSTER-ROW; A GENERAL COLLECTION OF VOYAGES AND TRAVELS. ASIA TRAVELS IN ARABIA. BY CARSTEN NIEBUHR. ABRIDGED FROM THE ORIGINAL WORK. A JOURNEY FROM CAIRO TO SUEZ AND MOUNT SINAI. CHAP. I. Preparations for our departure. LTHOUGH the chief object of our voyage was to vifit Arabia, we were unwillingly detained in Egypt for nearly a year. Several circumstances obliged us to this involuntary delay. On account of the pretended fanctity of the Pilgrims, Chriftians are prohibited from travelling to Arabia by land, with the caravan for Mecca. They are under a neceffity, therefore, of waiting till the feafon when the Red Sea becomes navigable, and vessels fail from the harbour of Suez for Jidda. While we waited these opportunities, we found it equally impoffible to vifit mount Sinai, or Jibbel-el-Mokatteb, the celebrated hill of infcriptions, both of which we de figned to examine. The Egyptians had been at war, during all the laft year, with a fmall tribe of Arabs who dwelt in the environs of Tor, which rendered fuch a journey impracticable before the return of the caravan from Mecca, the conductor of which had been commiffioned to negotiate a peace with the offended Arabs. This fkirmishing war had arifen from the intemperate rapacity of the Arabs, who gain their livelihood by hiring out camels, and carrying goods between Suez and VOL. X. B Cairo. |