From Where It Ends To Deraye, The Seat Of Ibn Saoud, Are
Ten Days More.
The Djebel Shammor is inhabited by the Arabs Shammor,
many of whom have become Fellahs, and live in villages in these
mountains.
They are true and faithful Wahabis.
[FN#2] Salamia is a ruin eight or ten hours S.E. of Hamah.
[p.665] APPENDIX. No. V.
A Route to the eastward of the Castle El Hassa.
FROM Kalaat el Hassa, towards E.S.E. continues the already mentioned
Wady el Hassa. Passing the Tel Esshehak, two days journey from it, you
meet with a great number of Tels, in the midst of which there is a well
of good spring water called Byr Bair [Arabic]; near it is a tombstone,
said to be the burial place of the son of Sultan Hassan. From Bair
eastwards the Wady and its vicinity are called the district of Hudrush
[Arabic]; it is without water, with the exception of the rain water
which collects in the low grounds. The Hudrush extends for two days, as
far as the country called Ettebig [Arabic]. From the beginning of
Hudrush the Wady makes a bend to the N. and describing a half circle,
again returns in the Tebig to its original direction. To the N. from
Hudrush and Tebig the plain takes the name of Szauan [Arabic], (i.e.
flint) and extends for two days till it borders upon the Wady Serhhan.
The plain Szauan is covered so thickly with small black flints, that the
Arabs, whenever they are about to light a fire there, cover the ground
with earth, which they carry with them, in order to prevent the
splinters of the flint heated by the fire, from flying about and hurting
them. There is but one spring in the Szauan: it is about two hours from
Wady Serhhan, and at the same distance from Hudrush and Tebig, and is
called Byr Naam el aatta Allah [Arabic], in honour of a Christian
travelling merchant, who about sixty years ago lying upon the flint,
heard the noise of the water under his head, and thus discovered the
spring. On the western side of the Szauan, nearer to the Wady Serhhan
than to the Hudrush, is a castle called Kaszr Amera [Arabic], and at a
quarter of an hour from it, on the foot of a hill, the ruins of a
village. Between the Kaszr and the village is a low ground where the
rain water collects, and forms a small lake in winter half an hour in
length. Before the castle is a well more than thirty feet deep, walled
in by large stones, but without water. Over the well are four white
marble columns, which support a vaulted roof or Kubbe, such as are often
seen at wells in these countries. The castle is built of white square
stones, which seem not to have been cemented together. Its dimensions
are thirty-six or forty feet from W. to E. and twenty-five from S. to N.
The entrance door, which is only about three feet high, is on the S.
side, and leads into an apartment half the size of the whole building.
In the middle of the western wall of this apartment is another door, as
low as the former, leading to a second apartment of the [p.666] same
size as the former, except that one corner is partitioned off to form a
third chamber.
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