Abstract
At the meeting of the Geographical Society, on Monday evening, Mr. Wilfrid S. Blunt read a paper entitled “A Visit to Nejd,” in which he gave an interesting account of a journey made last winter in company with his wife, Lady Anne Blunt, from Damascus southwards to Jôf and the Jebel Shammar in Central Arabia. The results of Mr. Blunt's expedition may be thus briefly summed up. The oases of Kâf and 'Ittery have now been visited and the Wady Sirhan explored by Europeans for the first time. By taking barometrical observations along its entire length, Mr. Blunt ascertained that the Wady Sirhan from Ezrak to Jôf lies on nearly a uniform level of 1,800 feet above the sea, from which he thinks that it was formerly an inland sea, and is miscalled a Wady or valley. Along the whole distance he roughly surveyed the pilgrim road, marking the position of the wells and the reservoirs made by Zobeyde. Mr. Blunt has also constructed a map of the Jebel Shammar district. The most interesting outcome of his journey, probably, is the collection of a series of facts relating to the physical condition of the great sand desert of Nefud, and in some material respects his observations are at variance with those of Mr. Palgrave. Mr. Blunt appears to be the first to call attention to the deep horse-shoe hollows, called by the Arabs fulj, with which the whole surface of the plain is pitted.
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Geographical Notes . Nature 21, 142–143 (1879). https://doi.org/10.1038/021142b0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/021142b0