'Southern Nejd: Journey to Kharj, Aflaj, Sulaiyyil, and Wadi Dawasir in 1918.' [‎24r] (52/100)

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South-east of Stilaiyyil along the Majma channel lies a
group of twenty-three wells known as Latwa, reputed in ancient
times to have been the original site of Sulaiyyi] but consisting
now of only a few small isolated palm-groves and a fairly large
area of corn-fields owned and tilled by the people of the main
oasis (mainly A1 Hanaish, who own all except three of the wells).
This strip of cultivation lies for the most part on the left bank
of the storm channel close under the Naajaniya ridge, at various
points on which lie groups of masonry ruins of which the most
considerable is one called Qasr Thari.
At the end of the Latwa tract the actual junction of the
Majma and the wadi A seasonal or intermittent watercourse, or the valley in which it flows. takes place in a wide circular patch of
sand and loam besprinkled with tamarisks and Ghadha bushes.
The combined channel now runs close under the Naajaniya ridge
past piles of sand which block the rest of the valley to a point
where the Naajaniya and Tuwaiq slopes run down to nothing
and the Wadi A seasonal or intermittent watercourse, or the valley in which it flows. Dawasir, henceforth recognizable only by its
broad Ghadha covered sand strip, runs out slightly south of
east over a great bare plain, called Farsha, over whose horizon
it finally disappears apparently spreading out its tentacles of
sand wider and wider as it goes until they are finally swallowed
up by the sands of the great desert. Beyond this point I did
not go but the view I obtained from a cairn set high on the last
ridge of Naajaniya was sufficient to establish beyond question
the ultimate direction and fate of the wadi A seasonal or intermittent watercourse, or the valley in which it flows. , whose storm channel
indeed at this point has, as will be seen later on, long ceased to
be a functionary part of the great southern drainage system of
ancient times in as much as the waters it carries in flood are
borrowed from the Majma and petty rivulets from northern
and southern Tuwaiq and survive but a little way beyond
the point from which I turned back.
As for Southern Tuwaiq it falls back south-westwards from
the Sulaiyyil basin, as far as one can see, tilted up from the low
slope bordering the Farsha to the high rim of the western escarp
ment, whose steep outer cliff, receding in an endless echelon
of gaunt headlands, faces the far distant sea range of Asir across
the Dawasir desert. So far as I could ascertain, the plateau is
again divided at about two or three days journey to the south
by a wide drainage channel called Fau and finally loses its
identity in the sands of the great desert in a locality known as
A1 Mundafin. Across the plateau the main trade route to Nejran