Transcribe Ward, Henry Augustus. Letter to Selden, Susan Ward (1855-08-26)

Paris. August 26th/55 My dear Aunt Susan, I have again let a long season elapse without writing you for which I am very sorry, but it has been unavoidable as you will in a measure discover on reading my account of myself. When I last wrote you, we were on the eve of leaving Cairo for our desert trip. Let me run briefly over it.

  Our first three days brought us to Suez, over a

monotonous road, bare of all interest except as having been (a part of it) the 'valley of the wandering".

  Our first experience of camel riding was

anything but agreeable, but , having once become habituated to their constant swaying motion we got along very well. At Suez we stopped 3 days, passing up & down the shore of the Red Sea in search of shells & e. We then sent our camels around by the </u isthmus > and a little boat took us across in five minutes to </u Asia > and the </u Peninsula of Mt Sinai. > We had originally proposed to strike directly across (S.E.) to the Mt. But we found the Red Sea so productive in objects of Nat. Hist. that we concluded to follow its eastern bank (South) to the </u Ras Abou Mahomed, or the extreme southern point of the peninsula.