Riding across the cemetery and picking our way amongst the open graves, we reached and entered at last the mouth of the valley, which cut into the solid range of hills like a great fissure, with walls of yellow limestone rising on either side to a height of some four hundred feet. Here we were sheltered from the wind, and at intervals there was the deep shadow of the rocks to give us comfort. Overhead, the strong blue of the sky formed an almost startling setting to the bold crest of the cliffs, where white-winged vultures circled above us or perched on ledges of rock to take stock of our cavalcade. In places the cliffs rose sheer to the sky; sometimes the rock shelved back with tumbled _débris_ of boulders and gravel sloping a third of the way up it; or again, huge pinnacles of rock and cavernous ledges broke up the face of the cliff, as it were into grimaces. A prehistoric torrent had scooped out a deep recess in the base of the cliffs on either side, and had tumbled a mass of water-worn boulders into the bed of the valley, where they lay encased in gravel. This torrent at one time must have rushed and roared down from the desert, half filling the valley on its way to join the huge Nile; but now it has sunk to a trickling subterranean stream, infiltrating through the gravel, its presence only indicated by the few bushes of scrub, and occasional stunted tamarisks and other trees which grow amidst the boulders in its old bed. A path worn by Coptic pilgrims, and perhaps by others before them, wound in and out amidst the rocks, and upon this our horses picked their way. Now it would lead us over the soft gravel in the middle of the valley; now it would rise high upon the sloping hillside to avoid a mass of boulders below; and now it would pass over a level platform of rock, upon which the horses clattered and slipped. The pace was necessarily slow, and, as it was now past five o’clock, we were beginning to feel weary and uncommonly thirsty. The sun presently passed off the valley, and shone only upon the upper part of the cliffs, thus throwing a soft glow around us which gave a wonderfully rich tone to the browns and greys of the rocks. As we proceeded farther up the wady, the clumps of vegetation became less infrequent, and here and there one was surprised to see a small purple-flowered creeper winding amongst the stones. Protruding from small holes in the face of the rock another kind of creeper was growing. This is called by the natives by a word which we would translate as “capers.” It has a small round leaf of a silvery green, and it hangs down in thick clusters from the minute holes in the rock wherein, as by a miracle, it has taken root. I do not know its technical name, but I can testify to its beauty as we saw it, in the glow of the late afternoon, surrounded by the barren magnificence of the cliffs and rocks.