volume 2 - Robert Bedrosian's Armenian History Workshop

Tall Td'hdn. 207
impassable. We had intended to follow this route to
Sinjar, but Muhammad decided that we had better
continue our journey northwards and try to strike a
track which he knew of to the south of the salt lake at
the western end of the Sinjar range.
We left Shaddadiyah at 7 a.m., November i8th,
and according to Muhammad's decision we rode northwards.
The day was bright and clear and we made
good progress, and were glad that we had resumed our
journey. We passed several mounds, among them being
Tall 'Arkanah and Tall Musetir, and about noon we
crossed a road to 'Araban and left a little range of
hills on our right. Then suddenly the sun disappeared
and great heavy clouds banked themselves up, and by
one o'clock rain was falling heavily, and going became
difficult. We passed Mishnak,^ and then Abu Shulah,^
and several small mounds, but soaked to the skin as we
were I had no wish to stop to look at anything. We
hoped to reach Tall Ta'ban by the time of sunset, but
the poor camels shthered and slipped about on the greasy
ground to such an extent that we moved very slowly.
The rain continued to fall, and as the evening came on
this changed to icy sleet, and when darkness fell and
Ta'ban was not in sight, the beasts and ourselves were
miserable sights. Presently out of the gloom, away in
the west, thuree horsemen appeared galloping towards us
with their long spears poised in their hands as if to attack
us; Muhammad managed to make his camel trot and
rode to meet them, and meanwhile we pushed on as
fast as we could. Presently we saw that the horsemen
had no intention of calling upon us to stand and deliver,
for they rode up to us with Muhammad, and one of them
told me that they had been sent by their shekh to bring
us to his camp, where he wished us to pass the night.
Their words and bearing were so friendly that I decided
to go with them and in a very short time we came to
their encampment, which contained many tents. They
' Mentioned by Layard, Nineveh and Babylon, p. 304.
° Spelling uncertain ; see Layard, ibid., p. 304.