66 THE EMPTY QUARTER

valley became more sand-ridden as we advanced towards and
followed the cliffs, where they bend round to form a great
promontory of eroded rocks at the junction of Jaub Anbak
with the estuary of Jaub Judairat. Here again we halted to
collect fossils from a fairly thick stratum of dazzling white
limestone sandwiched between an underlying band of
reddish-brown clay and an upper deposit of the fossil-less
pink sandstone which forms the desert floor east of the line
of these estuaries. A pair of ravens were in occupation of
these crags as we approached but did not remain to tempt
Providence ; and Farraj, Who went off to stalk them, never
got within effective rifle-range.

We now turned north-west towards the head df the
Judairat estuary, dotted with isolated and much-weathered
stacks of rock along the cliff on our right hand, between which
and the opposite ridge the mile-wide valley runs down east-
ward to the great salt-flat. Our objective was the two wells
of Judairat, of whose position 'Ali retained a vague memory
from a single visit ten or fifteen years before. A slight film of
green covered parts of the valley as the result of the late
summer1 rains, which had been far from bountiful, while the
autumn rains had failed altogether. A hare was shot here to
celebrate the first showing of spring, and we wandered along
wondering where the wells might be, while far off ascending
the western ridge we saw our baggage animals creeping
slowly towards the plateau. We would soon be passing
out of the Jiban estuaries back into the desert and Jafura.

Look you, said 'Ali suddenly, I am lost. I thought the
wells were here by these rocks, but I see them not. Perhaps
we should have sought them in that patch of bushes we
passed just now ; would you now that we go back to seek
them ? Almost as he pronounced the words he turned
abruptly to the right and pointed triumphantly to a shallow
saucer in the sands. I thought suspiciously that he was im-
posing on me. It was difficult to believe that the dip in the
ground had ever been a well. Yet there was camel-dung
about the circumference, though the mouth of the pit was

1 Called Sfiri, perhaps Asfari or Safari. The autumn rains are called
Wasmi> whence Mausim, our monsoon.