[EN#82] None of the tribes or families now inhabiting Midian represent the ancient Midianites; and all speak the vulgar half-Fellah Arabic, without any difference of accent or vocabulary from their neighbours. [EN#83] See the preceding notes on El-Makrízi. [EN#84] The Ma'ázah spoke of Kanátir (arches, i.e. aqueducts) and Bibán (doors or catacombs). [EN#85] I inquired in vain concerning the ruins near Sharm Burayttah, south of Yambú' in the Harb country. Wellsted, who visited the site (11. xi.), conjectures them to be Niebuhr's "El-Jár." He makes that near the point "as large as Yembo, extending about a mile in length, and half that space in breadth, with a square fort in the vicinity, the remains of which have towers at the corners and gates." Near the middle on either side, the tall walls are six feet thick, strong enough where artillery is unknown. At the landing-place are a quay paved with large hewn stones, and a jetty of solid masonry in ruins. The sailors dug and found only shapeless fragments of corroded copper and brass; coloured glass, as usual more opaque than the modern, and earthenware of the kind scattered about Egyptian ruins. About one mile from the fort were other remains, built of coral, now much blackened by exposure; and similar constructions on the further side of the Sharm could not be examined, as the Harb Bedawin were jealous and hostile. [EN#86] The name is from Gen. xx. 1, and it signifies the country lying to the south of Palestine. See "The Negeb," by the late Rev. E. Wilton (London, 1863), and vol. ii. "The Desert of the Exodus," so often alluded to in these pages. [EN#87] "The Gold-Mines of Midian," Chap. IX. [EN#88] Kúfah <Arabic> or <Arabic> in Persian means a basket or a coffin. [EN#89] Roaring when the rider mounts, halts, or dismounts, is considered a proof of snobbish blood among the Bisha'ri'n: for some months the camel-colt is generally muzzled on such occasions till it learns the sterling worth of silence. For an admirable description, far too detailed to place before the general public, of the likeness and the difference between the dromedary of the Bishárín and the Númaní and Maskatí, the purest blood of the Arabs, see pp. 145--154, "L' Etbaye, etc., Mines d Or," by my old friend Linant de Bellefonds Bey, now Sulayman Pasha. Paris: Arthus Bertrand (no date). [EN#90] The contents worked into shape by Mr. William J. Turner, of the Royal Geographical Society, appear in the Appendix. [EN#91] "Desert of the Exodus," p. 347. [EN#92] "The Gold-Mines of Midian," Chap. VI. [EN#93] In "The Gold-Mines of Midian" (passim) this "Spring of the She-Cook" appeared as the "She-Cork!" [EN#94] A region to the north-west of 'Aynúnah, afterwards visited by Lieutenant Yusuf. See Chap. IX.