BARTH’S TRAVELS
IN
NORTH AND CENTRAL AFRICA

The Minerva Library
OF FAMOUS BOOKS.

Edited by G. T. BETTANY, M.A.

1. CHARLES DARWIN’S JOURNAL during a Voyage in the ‘Beagle.’

2. THE INGOLDSBY LEGENDS.

3. BORROW’S BIBLE IN SPAIN.

4. EMERSON’S PROSE WORKS.

5. GALTON’S TROPICAL SOUTH AFRICA.

6. MANZONI’S THE BETROTHED LOVERS.

7. GOETHE’S FAUST (Complete). Bayard Taylor.

8. WALLACE’S TRAVELS ON THE AMAZON.

9. DEAN STANLEY’S LIFE OF DR. ARNOLD.

10. POE’S TALES OF ADVENTURE, MYSTERY, AND IMAGINATION.

11. COMEDIES BY MOLIÈRE.

12. FORSTER’S LIFE OF GOLDSMITH.

13. LANE’S MANNERS AND CUSTOMS OF THE MODERN EGYPTIANS.

14. TORRENS’ LIFE OF MELBOURNE.

15. THACKERAY’S VANITY FAIR.

16. BARTH’S TRAVELS IN NORTH AND CENTRAL AFRICA.

London: Ward, Lock & Co.

KANEMBU CHIEF.

THE MINERVA LIBRARY OF FAMOUS BOOKS.
Edited by G. T. BETTANY, M.A., B.Sc.

TRAVELS AND DISCOVERIES
IN
NORTH AND CENTRAL AFRICA.

INCLUDING ACCOUNTS OF
TRIPOLI, THE SAHARA, THE REMARKABLE KINGDOM OF
BORNU, AND THE COUNTRIES AROUND LAKE CHAD.

BY
HENRY BARTH, Ph.D., D.C.L.

With Full-page Illustrations and the Original Woodcut Illustrations,
and a Memoir of the Author.

WARD, LOCK, AND CO.,
LONDON, NEW YORK, AND MELBOURNE.
1890.

[All rights reserved.]

INTRODUCTION.

The travels of Dr. Barth in Northern and Central Africa rank among the foremost of the enterprises which have illuminated our ignorance about Central Africa. They have an especial value, too, as being almost the sole record of a state of things which has considerably changed since his time, and will no doubt rapidly change still further.

Henry Barth was born in Hamburg on February 16th, 1821. During his education at the Johanneum he showed a special taste for languages and history. In the autumn of 1839 he entered at the University of Berlin, studying philology under Böckh. While attending Carl Ritter’s geographical lectures, he displayed a predilection for the countries surrounding the Mediterranean, which he continued to manifest throughout his whole life. In August 1840 he went to Italy, travelling from Venice as far as Sicily. In 1841, after many fluctuations of mind, he fixed his attention definitely on the classical Mediterranean basin, and especially the history and influence of the Greek colonies. He took his degree in the summer of 1844 with an essay on the commercial history of the Corinthians, and in January 1845 started for three years’ travels in the Mediterranean. He traversed France, Spain, the northern coast of Africa, the peninsula of Sinai, Palestine, Syria, Cyprus, Asia Minor, and thence returned through Greece to Berlin just before the events of March 1848. Notwithstanding the political troubles, he gained the right of giving public lectures; and in the summer of 1849 he gave a course “On the Topography of Some of the Most Renowned Nations of Antiquity.” Then followed the message from Baron Bunsen which is detailed in the author’s preface, and the great journey which is here described. In it he travelled from Tripoli to Bórnu, then through Ádamáwa, Baghirmi, Sókoto, etc., to Timbúktu, finally returning to Tripoli in August 1855, after nearly six years’ absence. His great book, published in 1857 in German and English in five volumes, is the most important work ever written on the districts of which it treats. We here present the first half, with the original wood engravings and reproductions of some of the lithographic plates. Barth not being a naturalist, his work differs considerably from those of Darwin and Wallace; but to make up for this he is extremely rich in topographical, historical, and anthropological details.

On his return Barth found plenty of work to do. From 1863 he was Professor of Geography in the University. He founded the Carl Ritter Institute, and was President of the Geographical Society. On completing his book on Africa, he carried his researches farther among the Mediterranean lands. In the autumn of 1858 he travelled over the northern half of Asia Minor, from Trebizond through Cæsarea to Scutari. In 1861 he visited Spain; in 1862, the interior of Turkey in Europe; 1863, the Alps; 1864, Italy; 1865, Turkey again. In that year he died (November 25) after two days’ illness, in the midst of most zealous work. He wrote, beside the present work, “Travels, in the Coasts Bordering the Mediterranean,” vol. i., 1849; “Journey from Trebizond to Scutari,” 1860; “Journey through the Interior of Turkey in Europe,” 1864. His great philological work on the vocabularies of Central Africa was left incomplete, only two parts having been published, 1862-63.

G. T. B.

PREFACE.

On the 5th of October, 1849, at Berlin, Professor Carl Ritter informed me that the British Government was about to send Mr. Richardson on a mission to Central Africa, and that they had offered, through the Chevalier Bunsen, to allow a German traveller to join the mission, provided he was willing to contribute two hundred pounds for his own personal travelling expenses.

I had commenced lecturing at the University of Berlin on comparative geography and the colonial commerce of antiquity, and had just at that time published the first volume of my “Wanderings Round the Mediterranean,” which comprised my journey through Barbary. Having undertaken this journey quite alone, I spent nearly my whole time with the Arabs, and familiarized myself with that state of human society where the camel is man’s daily companion, and the culture of the date-tree his chief occupation. I made long journeys through desert tracts; I travelled all round the Great Syrtis, and, passing through the picturesque little tract of Cyrenaica, traversed the whole country towards Egypt; I wandered about for above a month in the desert valleys between Aswán and Kosér, and afterwards pursued my journey by land all the way through Syria and Asia Minor to Constantinople.

While traversing these extensive tracts, where European comfort is never altogether out of reach, where lost supplies may be easily replaced, and where the protection of European powers is not quite without avail, I had often cast a wistful look towards those unknown or little-known regions in the interior, which stand in frequent, though irregular, connection with the coast. As a lover of ancient history, I had been led towards those regions rather through the commerce of ancient Carthage, than by the thread of modern discovery; and the desire to know something more about them acted on me like a charm. In the course of a conversation I once held with a Háusa slave in Káf, in the regency of Tunis, he, seeing the interest I took in his native country, made use of these simple but impressive words: “Please God, you shall go and visit Kanó.” These words were constantly ringing in my ears; and though overpowered for a time by the vivid impressions of interesting and picturesque countries, they echoed with renewed intensity as soon as I was restored to the tranquillity of European life.

During my three years’ travelling I had ample opportunity of testing the efficacy of British protection; I experienced the kindness of all Her Britannic Majesty’s consuls from Tangiers to Brúsa, and often enjoyed their hospitality. It was solely their protection which enabled me to traverse with some degree of security those more desert tracts through which I wandered. Colonel Warrington, Her Majesty’s consul in Tripoli, who seems to have had some presentiment of my capabilities as an African explorer, even promised me his full assistance if I should try to penetrate into the interior. Besides this, my admiration of the wide extension of the British over the globe, their influence, their language, and their government, was such that I felt a strong inclination to become the humble means of carrying out their philanthropic views for the progressive civilization of the neglected races of Central Africa.

Under these circumstances, I volunteered cheerfully to accompany Mr. Richardson, on the sole condition, however, that the exploration of Central Africa should be made the principal object of the mission, instead of a secondary one, as had been originally contemplated.

In the meantime, while letters were interchanged between Berlin, London, and Paris (where Mr. Richardson at that time resided), my father, whom I had informed of my design, entreated me to desist from my perilous undertaking, with an earnestness which my filial duty did not allow me to resist; and giving way to Dr. Overweg, who in youthful enthusiasm came immediately forward to volunteer, I receded from my engagement. But it was too late, my offer having been officially accepted in London; and I therefore allayed my father’s anxiety, and joined the expedition.

It was a generous act of Lord Palmerston, who organized the expedition, to allow two foreign gentlemen to join it instead of one. A sailor was besides attached to it; and a boat was also provided, in order to give full scope to the object of exploration. The choice of the sailor was unfortunate, and Mr. Richardson thought it best to send him back from Múrzuk; but the boat, which was carried throughout the difficult and circuitous road by Múrzuk, Ghát, Aïr, and Zínder, exciting the wonder and astonishment of all the tribes in the interior, ultimately reached its destination, though the director of the expedition himself had in the meanwhile unfortunately succumbed.

Government also allowed us to take out arms. At first it had been thought that the expedition ought to go unarmed, inasmuch as Mr. Richardson had made his first journey to Ghát without arms. But on that occasion he had gone as a private individual, without instruments, without presents, without anything; and we were to unite with the character of an expedition that of a mission,—that is to say, we were to explore the country while endeavouring at the same time to establish friendship with the chiefs and rulers of the different territories. It may be taken for granted that we should never have crossed the frontier of Aïr had we been unarmed; and when I entered upon my journey alone, it would have been impossible for me to proceed without arms through countries which are in a constant state of war, where no chief or ruler can protect a traveller except with a large escort, which is sure to run away as soon as there is any real danger.

It may be possible to travel without arms in some parts of Southern Africa; but there is this wide difference, that the natives of the latter are exclusively Pagans, while, along all those tracts which I have been exploring, Islamism and Paganism are constantly arrayed against each other in open or secret warfare, even if we leave out of view the unsafe state of the roads through large states consisting, though loosely connected together, of almost independent provinces. The traveller in such countries must carry arms; yet he must exercise the utmost discretion in using them. As for myself, I avoided giving offence to the men with whom I had to deal in peaceful intercourse, endeavouring to attach them to me by esteem and friendship. I have never proceeded onwards without leaving a sincere friend behind me, and thus being sure that, if obliged to retrace my steps, I might do so with safety.

But I have more particular reason to be grateful for the opinion entertained of me by the British Government; for after Mr. Richardson had, in March 1851, fallen a victim to the noble enterprise to which he had devoted his life, Her Majesty’s Government honoured me with their confidence, and, in authorizing me to carry out the objects of the expedition, placed sufficient means at my disposal for the purpose. The position in which I was thus placed must be my excuse for undertaking, after the successful accomplishment of my labours, the difficult task of relating them in a language not my own.

In matters of science and humanity all nations ought to be united by one common interest, each contributing its share in proportion to its own peculiar disposition and calling. If I have been able to achieve something in geographical discovery, it is difficult to say how much of it is due to English, how much to German influence; for science, is built up of the materials collected by almost every nation, and, beyond all doubt, in geographical enterprise in general none has done more than the English, while, in Central Africa in particular, very little has been achieved by any but English travellers. Let it not, therefore, be attributed to an undue feeling of nationality if I correct any error of those who preceded me. It would be unpardonable if a traveller failed to penetrate further, or to obtain a clearer insight into the customs and the polity of the nations visited by him, or if he were unable to delineate the country with greater accuracy and precision, than those who went before him.

Every succeeding traveller is largely indebted to the labours of his predecessor. Thus our expedition would never have been able to achieve what it did, if Oudney, Denham, and Clapperton had not gone before us; nor would these travellers have succeeded so far, had Lyon and Ritchie not opened the road to Fezzán; nor would Lyon have been able to reach Tejérri, if Captain (now Rear-Admiral) Smyth had not shown the way to Ghírza. To Smyth, seconded by Colonel Warrington, is due the merit of having attracted the attention of the British Government to the favourable situation of Tripoli for facilitating intercourse with Central Africa; and if at present the river-communication along the Tsádda or Bénuwé seems to hold out a prospect of an easier approach to those regions, the importance of Tripoli must not be underrated, for it may long remain the most available port from which a steady communication with many parts of that continent can be kept up.

I had the good fortune to see my discoveries placed on a stable basis before they were brought to a close, by the astronomical observations of Dr. Vogel, who was sent out by Her Britannic Majesty’s Government for the purpose of joining the expedition; and I have only to regret that this gentleman was not my companion from the beginning of my journey, as exact astronomical observations, such as he has made, are of the utmost importance in any geographical exploration. By moving the generally-accepted position of Kúkawa more than a degree to the westward, the whole map of the interior has been changed very considerably. The position assigned by Dr. Vogel to Zínder gives to the whole western route, from Ghát through the country of Ásben, a well-fixed terminating point, while at the same it serves to check my route to Timbúktu. If, however, this topic be left out of consideration, it will be found that the maps made by me on the journey, under many privations, were a close approximation to the truth. But now all that pertains to physical features and geographical position has been laid down, and executed with artistic skill and scientific precision, by Dr. Petermann.

The principal merit which I claim for myself in this respect is that of having noted the whole configuration of the country; and my chief object has been to represent the tribes and nations with whom I came in contact, in their historical and ethnographical relation to the rest of mankind, as well as in their physical relation to that tract of country in which they live. If, in this respect, I have succeeded in placing before the eyes of the public a new and animated picture, and connected those apparently savage and degraded tribes more intimately with the history of races placed on a higher level of civilization, I shall be amply recompensed for the toils and dangers I have gone through.

My companion, Dr. Overweg, was a clever and active young geologist; but, unfortunately, he was deficient in that general knowledge of natural science which is required for comprehending all the various phenomena occurring on a journey into unknown regions. Having never before risked his life on a dangerous expedition, he never for a moment doubted that it might not be his good fortune to return home in safety; and he therefore did not always bestow that care upon his journal which is so desirable in such an enterprise. Nevertheless, almost all his observations of latitude have been found correct, while his memoranda, if deciphered at leisure, might still yield a rich harvest.

One of the principal objects which Her Britannic Majesty’s Government had always in view in these African expeditions was the abolition of the slave-trade. This, too, was zealously advocated by the late Mr. Richardson, and, I trust, has been as zealously carried out by myself whenever it was in my power to do so, although, as an explorer on a journey of discovery, I was induced, after mature reflection, to place myself under the protection of an expeditionary army, whose object it was to subdue another tribe, and eventually to carry away a large proportion of the conquered into slavery. Now, it should always be borne in mind that there is a broad distinction between the slave-trade and domestic slavery. The foreign slave-trade may, comparatively speaking, be easily abolished, though the difficulties of watching over contraband attempts have been shown sufficiently by many years’ experience. With the abolition of the slave-trade all along the northern and south-western coast of Africa, slaves will cease to be brought down to the coast; and in this way a great deal of the mischief and misery necessarily resulting from this inhuman traffic will be cut off. But this, unfortunately, forms only a small part of the evil.

There can be no doubt that the most horrible topic connected with slavery is slave-hunting; and this is carried on not only for the purpose of supplying the foreign market, but, in a far more extensive degree, for supplying the wants of domestic slavery. Hence it was necessary that I should become acquainted with the real state of these most important features of African society, in order to speak clearly about them; for with what authority could I expatiate on the horrors and the destruction accompanying such an expedition, if I were not speaking as an eye-witness? But having myself accompanied such a host on a grand scale, I shall be able to lay before the public a picture of the cheerful comfort, as well as the domestic happiness, of a considerable portion of the human race, which, though in a low, is not at all in a degraded state of civilization, as well as the wanton and cruel manner in which this happiness is destroyed, and its peaceful abodes changed into desolation. Moreover, this very expedition afforded me the best opportunity of convincing the rulers of Bórnu of the injury which such a perverse system entails upon themselves.

But besides this, it was of the utmost importance to visit the country of the Músgu; for while that region had been represented by the last expedition as an almost inaccessible mountain-chain, attached to that group which Major Denham observed on his enterprising but unfortunate expedition with Bú-Khalúm, I convinced myself on my journey to Ádamáwa, from the information which I gathered from the natives, that the mountains of Mándará are entirely insulated towards the east. I considered it, therefore, a matter of great geographical importance to visit that country, which, being situated between the rivers Shárí and Bénuwé, could alone afford the proof whether there was any connection between these two rivers.

I shall have frequent occasion to refer, in my journal, to conversations which I had with the natives on religious subjects. I may say that I have always avowed my religion, and defended the pure principles of Christianity against those of Islám; only once was I obliged, for about a month, in order to carry out my project of reaching Timbúktu, to assume the character of a Moslem. Had I not resorted to this expedient, it would have been absolutely impossible to achieve such a project, since I was then under the protection of no chief whatever, and had to pass through the country of the fanatic and barbarous hordes of the Tuarek. But though, with this sole exception, I have never denied my character of a Christian, I thought it prudent to conform to the innocent prejudices of the people around me, adopting a dress which is at once better adapted to the climate and more decorous in the eyes of the natives. One great cause of my popularity was the custom of alms-giving. By this means I won the esteem of the natives, who took such a lively interest in my well-being that, even when I was extremely ill, they used to say, “ʿAbd el Kerím[1] shall not die.”

I have given a full description of my preparatory excursion through the mountainous region round Tripoli; for though this is not altogether a new country, any one who compares my map with that of Lyon or Denham, will see how little the very interesting physical features of this tract had been known before, while, at a time when the whole Turkish empire is about to undergo a great transformation, it seems well worth while to lay also the state of this part of its vast dominions in a more complete manner before the European public.

Of the first part of our expedition there has already appeared the Narrative of the late Mr. Richardson, published from his manuscript journals, which I was fortunately able to send home from Kúkawa. It is full of minute incidents of travelling life, so very instructive to the general reader. But from my point of view, I had to look very differently at the objects which presented themselves; and Mr. Richardson, if he had lived to work out his memoranda himself, would not have failed to give to his Journal a more lasting interest. Moreover, my stay in Ágades afforded me quite a different insight into the life, the history, and geography of those regions, and brought me into contact with Timbúktu.

Extending over a tract of country of twenty-four degrees from north to south, and twenty degrees from east to west, in the broadest part of the continent of Africa, my travels necessarily comprise subjects of great interest and diversity.

After having traversed vast deserts of the most barren soil, and scenes of the most frightful desolation, I met with fertile lands irrigated by large navigable rivers and extensive central lakes, ornamented with the finest timber, and producing various species of grain, rice, sesamum, ground-nuts, in unlimited abundance, the sugar-cane, etc., together with cotton and indigo, the most valuable commodities of trade. The whole of Central Africa, from Bagírmi to the east as far as Timbúktu to the west (as will be seen in my narrative), abounds in these products. The natives of these regions not only weave their own cotton, but dye their home-made shirts with their own indigo. The river, the far-famed Niger, which gives access to these regions by means of its eastern branch, the Bénuwé, which I discovered, affords an uninterrupted navigable sheet of water for more than six hundred miles into the very heart of the country. Its western branch is obstructed by rapids at the distance of about three hundred and fifty miles from the coast; but even at that point it is probably not impassable in the present state of navigation, while, higher up, the river opens an immense highroad for nearly one thousand miles into the very heart of Western Africa, so rich in every kind of produce.

The same diversity of soil and produce which the regions traversed by me exhibit is also observed with respect to man. Starting from Tripoli in the north, we proceed from the settlements of the Arab and the Berber, the poor remnants of the vast empires of the middle ages, into a country dotted with splendid ruins from the period of the Roman dominion, through the wild roving hordes of the Tuarek, to the Negro and half-Negro tribes, and to the very border of the South African nations. In the regions of Central Africa there exists not one and the same stock, as in South Africa; but the greatest diversity of tribes, or rather nations, prevails, with idioms entirely distinct. The great and momentous struggle between Islamism and Paganism is here continually going on, causing every day the most painful and affecting results, while the miseries arising from slavery and the slave-trade are here revealed in their most repulsive features. We find Mohammedan learning engrafted on the ignorance and simplicity of the black races, and the gaudy magnificence and strict ceremonial of large empires side by side with the barbarous simplicity of naked and half-naked tribes. We here trace a historical thread which guides us through this labyrinth of tribes and overthrown kingdoms; and a lively interest is awakened by reflecting on their possible progress and restoration, through the intercourse with more civilized parts of the world. Finally, we find here commerce in every direction radiating from Kanó, the great emporium of Central Africa, and spreading the manufactures of that industrious region over the whole of Western Africa.

I cannot conclude these prefatory remarks without expressing my sincere thanks for the great interest shown in my proceedings by so many eminent men in this country, as well as for the distinction of the Victoria medal awarded to me by the Royal Geographical Society. As I may flatter myself that, by the success which attended my efforts, I have encouraged further undertakings in these as well as in other quarters of Africa, so it will be my greatest satisfaction, if this narrative should give a fresh impulse to the endeavours to open the fertile regions of Central Africa to European commerce and civilization.

Whatever may be the value of this work, the Author believes that it has been enhanced by the views and illustrations with which it is embellished. These have been executed with artistical skill and the strictest fidelity, from my sketches, by Mr. Bernatz, the well-known author of the beautiful “Scenes in Æthiopia.”

I will only add a few words relative to the spelling of native names,—rather a difficult subject in a conflux of languages of very different organization and unsettled orthography. I have constantly endeavoured to express the sounds as correctly as possible, but in the simplest way, assigning to the vowels always the same intonation which they have in Italian, and keeping as closely as possible to the principles adopted by the Asiatic Society. The greatest difficulty related to the “g” sound, which is written in various ways by the Africans, and puzzled even the Arabic writers of the middle ages. While the “k” in North Africa approaches the g in “give,” it takes the sound of it entirely in the Central African languages. On this ground, although I preferred writing “Azkár,” while the name might have been almost as well written “Azgár;” yet further into the interior the application of the g, as in “Ágades,” “Góber,” and so on, was more correct. The ع of the Arabs has been expressed, in conformity with the various sounds which it adopts, by ʿa, ʿo and ʿu; the غ by gh, although it sounds in many words like an r; ج by j; the چ, which is frequent in the African languages, by ch.

The alphabet, therefore, which I have made use of is the following:—

Vowels.

• a as in cat.
• á ” father.
• ʿa (not English) not unlike a in dart.
• e as in pen.
• é like the first a in fatal.
• i as in it.
• í ” ravine.
• o ” lot.
• ó ” home.
• ʿo (not English) not unlike o in noble.
• u as in put.
• ú ” adjure, true.
• ʿu not unlike oo in doom.
• y, at the end of words, instead of i.

Diphthongs.

• ai as i in tide (ay at the end of words).
• oi (oy), as in noise.
• au (aw), as ow in now.

Consonants.

• b as in beat.
• d ” door.
• f ” fan.[2]
• g ” got.
• j ” join.[3]
• k ” keep.
• l ” leave.
• m ” man.
• n ” not.
• ñ ” the Spanish “campaña,” like ni in companion, onion.
• p ” pain.[2]
• r ” rain.
• s ” son.
• t ” tame.
• v ” vain.
• w ” win.
• y ” yet.
• z ” zeal.

Double Consonants.

• gh as in ghost, and the g in grumble.
• ks as x in tax, excise.
• kh as ch in the Scotch word loch.
• th as in tooth.
• ts as in Betsy.
• ng as in wrong.

HENRY BARTH, Ph.D.

St. John’s Wood, London, May 1, 1857.

Transcriber’s Note: The author’s orthography is not always consistent. Accents, spelling, hyphenation etc in his transcriptions of the languages of Africa have been retained as printed, except in the Index, where, if a spelling was used that appeared nowhere else in the book, the assumption has been made that the form in the main text is the correct one and the index entry has been changed to match that. Some obvious printer errors in English words have been corrected.

CONTENTS.

LIST OF PLATES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.

LIST OF PLATES.

ILLUSTRATIONS IN THE TEXT.

MAP OF NORTH AND CENTRAL AFRICA, SHOWING DR. BARTH’S ROUTES.

TRAVELS AND DISCOVERIES
IN
AFRICA.

CHAPTER I.
FROM TUNIS TO TRIPOLI.

Mr. Richardson was waiting in Paris for despatches, when Mr. Overweg and I reached Tunis, by way of Philippeville and Bona, on the 15th of December, 1849; and having, through the kind interference of Mr. Ferrier, the British vice-consul, been allowed to enter the town after six days’ quarantine, we began immediately to provide ourselves with articles of dress, while in the meantime we took most interesting daily rides to the site of ancient Carthage. Having procured many useful articles for our journey, and having found a servant, the son of a freed slave from Gober, we left Tunis on the 30th of December, and passed the first night in Hammám el Enf. Early next morning we followed the charming route by Krumbália, which presents a no less vivid specimen of the beauty and natural fertility of the Tunisian country than of the desolate state to which it is at present reduced. We then passed the fine gardens of Turki, a narrow spot of cultivation in a wide desolate plain of the finest soil; and leaving el Khwín to our right, we reached el Arbʿain.

Both these places enjoy a peculiar celebrity with the natives. El Khwín is said to have been once a populous place; but nearly all its inhabitants were destroyed by a spring of bituminous water, which according to tradition, afterwards disappeared. El Arbʿain, the locality of the “forty” martyrs, is a holy place; and ʿAli, our muleteer, in his pious zeal, took up a handful of the sacred earth and sprinkled it over us. It is a most picturesque spot. Keeping then along the wild plain covered with a thick underwood of myrtle, we beheld in the distance the highly picturesque and beautiful Mount Zaghwán, the Holy Mountain of the ancient inhabitants, which rose in a majestic form; and we at length reached Bir el buwíta, “the well of the little closet,” at one o’clock in the afternoon. The “little closet,” however, had given place to a most decent-looking whitewashed khán, where we took up our quarters in a clean room. But our buoyant spirits did not allow us long repose; and a quarter before eleven at night we were again on our mules.

I shall never forget this, the last night of the year 1849, which opened to us a new era with many ordeals, and by our endurance of which we were to render ourselves worthy of success. There were, besides ourselves, our servants, and our two muleteers, four horsemen of the Bey, and three natives from Jirbi. When midnight came my fellow traveller and I saluted the new year with enthusiasm, and with a cordial shake of the hand wished each other joy. Our Mohammedan companions were greatly pleased when they were informed of the reason of our congratulating each other, and wished us all possible success for the new year. We had also reason to be pleased with them; for by their not inharmonious songs they relieved the fatigue of a long, sleepless, and excessively cold night.

Having made a short halt under the olive-trees at the side of the dilapidated town of Herkla, and taken a morsel of bread, we moved on with our poor animals without interruption till half an hour after noon, when we reached the funduk (or caravanserai) Sidi Bú Jʿafer, near Súsa, where we took up our quarters, in order to be able to start again at night, the gates of the town being kept shut till morning. Starting before three o’clock in the morning, we were exactly twelve hours in reaching el Jem, with the famous Castle of the Prophetess, still one of the most splendid monuments of Roman greatness, overhanging the most shabby hovels of Mohammedan indifference. On the way we had a fine view, towards the west, of the picturesque Jebel Trutsa, along the foot of which I had passed on my former wanderings, and of the wide, out-stretching Jebel Useleet.

Another ride of twelve hours brought us, on the 3rd of January, 1850, to Sfʿakes, where we were obliged to take up our quarters in the town, as our land-journey was here at an end, and we were to procure a vessel to carry us either direct to Tripoli, or to some other point on the opposite side of the Lesser Syrtis. The journey by land is not only expensive, particularly by people who are encumbered with a good deal of luggage, as we then were, and very long and tedious, but is also very unsafe, as I found from experience on my former journey. The island of Jirbi, which forms the natural station of the maritime intercourse between the regency of Tunis and that of Tripoli, had been put under the strictest rules of quarantine, rather from political considerations than from those of health, all intercourse with the mainland having been cut off. It was therefore with great difficulty that we succeeded in hiring a “gáreb” to carry us to Zwára, in which we embarked in the forenoon of Saturday the 5th of January.

During our two days’ stay in Sfʿakes we made the acquaintance of a Jew calling himself Baránes, but who is in truth the Jew servant named Jacob who accompanied Denham and Clapperton, and is several times mentioned in the narrative of those enterprising travellers as self-conceited and stubborn; yet he seems to be rather a clever fellow, and in some way or other contrives to be on the best terms with the governor. He communicated to us many anecdotes of the former expedition, and, among other things, a very mysterious history of a Danish traveller in disguise whom they met in Bórnu coming all the way from Dar-Fúr through Wadaï. There is not the least mention of such a meeting in the journal of the expedition, nor has such an achievement of a European traveller ever been heard of; and I can scarcely believe the truth of this story, though the Jew was quite positive about it.

The vessel in which we embarked was as miserable as it could be, there being only a small low cabin as high as a dog-kennel, and measuring, in its greatest width, from six to seven feet, where I and my companion were to pass the night. We thought that a run of forty-eight hours, at the utmost, would carry us across the gulf; but the winds in the Lesser Syrtis are extremely uncertain, and sometimes so violent that a little vessel is obliged to run along the coast. At first we went on tolerably well; but the wind soon became unfavourable, and in the evening we were obliged to cast anchor opposite Nekta, and, to our despair, were kept there till the afternoon of Tuesday, when at length we were enabled to go forward in our frail little shell, and reached Méheres—not Sidi Méheres, as it is generally called in the maps—in the darkness of night. Having made up our minds rather to risk anything than to be longer immured in such a desperate dungeon as our gáreb, we went on shore early on Wednesday morning with all our things, but were not able to conclude a bargain with some Bedouin of the tribe of the Léffet, who were watering their camels at the well.

The majestic ruins of a large castle, fortified at each corner with a round tower, give the place a picturesque appearance from the seaside. This castle is well known to be a structure of the time of Ibrahim the Aghlabite. In the midst of the ruins is a small mosque. But notwithstanding the ruinous state of the place, and the desolate condition of its plantations, there is still a little industry going on, consoling to the beholder in the midst of the devastation to which the fine province of Byzacium, once the garden of Carthage, is at present reduced. Several people were busily employed in the little marketplace making mats; and in the houses looms, weaving baracans, were seen in activity. But all around, the country presented a frightful scene of desolation, there being no object to divert the eye but the two apparently separate cones of Mount Wuedrán, far in the distance to the west, said to be very rich in sheep. The officer who is stationed here, and who showed us much kindness, furnishing us with some excellent red radishes of extraordinary size, the only luxury which the village affords, told us that not less than five hundred soldiers are quartered upon this part of the coast. On my former journey I had ample opportunity to observe how the Tunisian soldiery eat up the little which has been left to the peaceable inhabitants of this most beautiful, but most unfortunate country.

Having spent two days and two nights in this miserable place without being able to obtain camels, we resolved to try the sea once more, in the morning of the 11th, when the wind became northerly; but before the low-water allowed us to go on board, the wind again changed, so that, when we at length got under weigh in the afternoon, we could only move on with short tacks. But our captain, protected as he was by the Promontory of Méheres, dared to enter the open gulf. Quantities of large fish in a dying state, as is often the case in this shallow water when the wind has been high, were drifting round our boat. The sun was setting when we at length doubled the promontory of Kasr Unga, which we had already clearly distinguished on the 8th. However, we had now overcome the worst; and when on the following morning I emerged from our suffocating berth, I saw, to my great delight, that we were in the midst of the gulf, having left the coast far behind us. I now heard from our raïs that, instead of coasting as far as Tarf el má (“the border of the water”), a famous locality in the innermost corner of the Lesser Syrtis, which seems to preserve the memory of the former connection between the gulf and the great Sebkha or Shot el Kebír (the “palus Tritonis”), he had been so bold as to keep his little bark straight upon the channel of Jirbi.

Our voyage now became interesting; for while we were advancing at a fair rate, we had a charming view of the mountain-range, which in clear contours extended along in the distance behind the date-groves on the coast, seen only in faint outlines. The western part of the chain is very low, and forms almost a group apart, but after having been intersected by a gap or “gate,” the chain rises to greater elevation, being divided, as it would seem from hence, into three separate ranges enclosing fine valleys.

We had hoped to cross the difficult channel to-day; but the wind failing, we were obliged to anchor and await the daylight, for it is not possible to traverse the straits in the night, on account of their extreme shallowness. Even in the light of the following day, when we at length succeeded, our little bark, which drew only two or three feet, struck twice, and we had some trouble to get afloat again. On the conspicuous and elevated promontory the “Jurf,” or “Tarf el jurf,” stood in ancient times a temple of Venus, the hospitable goddess of the navigator. Here on my former journey I crossed with my horses over from the main to the Island of Jirbi, while from the water I had now a better opportunity of observing the picturesque character of the rugged promontory. After traversing the shallow basin or widening, we crossed the second narrowing, where the castles which defended the bridge or “kantara,” the “pons Zitha” of the Romans, now lie in ruins on the main as well as on the island, and greatly obstruct the passage, the difficulty of which has obtained celebrity from contests between Islam and Christianity in comparatively modern times.

Having passed safely through this difficult channel, we kept steadily on through the open sea; and doubling Rás Mʿamúra, near to which our captain had a little date-grove and was cheerfully saluted by his family and friends, we at length entered the harbour of Zarzís, late in the afternoon of Sunday, and with some trouble got all our luggage carried into the village, which is situated at some distance. For although we had the worst part of the land journey now before us, the border-district of the two regencies, with the unsafe state of which I was well acquainted from my former journey, and although we were insufficiently armed, we were disposed to endure anything rather than the imprisonment to which we were doomed in such a vessel as our Mohammed’s gáreb. I think, however, that this nine days’ sail between Sfákes and Zarzís, a distance of less than a hundred and twenty miles, was on the whole a very fair trial in the beginning of an undertaking the success of which was mainly dependent upon patience and resolute endurance. We were rather fortunate in not only soon obtaining tolerable quarters, but also in arranging without delay our departure for the following day, by hiring two horses and three camels.

Zarzís consists of five separate villages—Kasr Bú ʿAli, Kasr Mwanza, Kasr Welád Mohammed, Kasr Welád Sʿaid, and Kasr Zawíya; the Bedouin in the neighbourhood belong to the tribe of the Akára. The plantation also is formed into separate date-groves. The houses are in tolerable repair and neatly whitewashed; but the character of order and well-being is neutralised by a good many houses in decay. Near the place there are also some Roman ruins, especially a cistern of very great length; and at some distance is the site of Medinet Ziyán, of which I have given a description in the narrative of my former journey.

Besides the eight men attached to our five animals, we were joined here by four pilgrims and three Tripolitan traders; we thus made up a numerous body, armed with eight muskets, three blunderbusses, and fourteen pistols, besides several straight swords, and could venture upon the rather unsafe road to the south of the Lake of Bibán, though it would have been far more agreeable to have a few trustworthy people to rely on instead of these turbulent companions. Entering soon, behind the plantation of Zarzís, a long narrow sebkha, we were struck by the sterile and desolate character of the country, which was only interrupted by a few small depressed localities, where a little corn was cultivated. Keeping along this tract of country, we reached the north-western corner of the Lake of Bibán, or Bahéret el Bibán, after a little more than eight miles. This corner has even at the present day the common name of Khashm el kelb (the Dog’s Nose), while the former classical name of the whole lake, Sebákh el keláb, was only known to Tayyef, the more learned of my guides, who, without being questioned by me, observed that in former times towns and rich cornfields had been where the lake now is, but had been swallowed up by a sinking of the ground. The real basin has certainly nothing in common with a sebkha, which means a shallow hollow, incrusted with salt, which at times is dry and at others forms a pool; for it is a deep gulf or fiord of the sea, with which it is connected only by a narrow channel called Wád mtʿa el Bibán. The nature of a sebkha belongs at present only to its shores, chiefly to the locality called Makháda, which, indenting the country to a great distance, is sometimes very difficult to pass, and must be turned by a wide circuitous path, which is greatly feared on account of the neighbourhood of the Udérna, a tribe famous for its highway robberies. Having traversed the Makháda (which at present was dry) without any difficulty, we entered upon good arable soil, and encamped, after sunset, at about half a mile distance from a Bedouin encampment.

Starting from here the following day, we soon became aware that the country was not so thinly inhabited as we had thought; for numerous herds covered the rich pasture-grounds, while droves of gazelles, now and then, attested that the industry of man did not encroach here upon the freedom of the various orders of creation. Leaving the path near the ruins of a small building situated upon a hill, I went with Tayyef and the Khalífa to visit the ruins of a Roman station on the border of the Bahéra, which, under the name of el Medaina, has a great fame amongst the neighbouring tribes, but which, with a single exception, are of small extent and bad workmanship. This exception is the quay, which is not only of interest in itself, formed as it is of regularly hewn stones, in good repair, but of importance as an evident proof that the lake was much deeper in ancient times than it is now. Traversing from this spot the sebkha, which our companions had gone round, we soon overtook them, and kept over fine pasture-grounds called el Fehén, and further on, Súllub, passing, a little after noon, a group of ruins near the shore, called Kitfi el hamár. At two o’clock in the afternoon, we had directly on our right a slight slope which, according to the unanimous statement of our guides and companions, forms the frontier between the two regencies; and keeping along it we encamped an hour afterwards between the slope and the shore, which a little further on forms the deep gulf called Mirsá Buréka.

Starting at an early hour, we reached after a march of ten miles the ruins of a castle on the sea-shore, called Búrj el Melha, to which those of a small village, likewise built of hewn stone, are joined, while a long and imposing mole called el Míná juts out into the gulf. Four and a half miles further on we reached the conspicuous hill on the top of which is the chapel of the saint Sidi Sʿaid ben Salah, sometimes called Sidi Gházi, and venerated by such of the natives as are not attached to the Puritan sect of el Mádani, of which I shall speak hereafter. All our companions went there to say a short prayer. Here we left the shore, and, having watered our animals near a well and passed the chapel of Sidi Sʿaid, close to which there are some ruins, we passed with expedition over fine meadows till we approached the plantation of Zowára, when, leaving Mr. Overweg and my people behind, I rode on with the Khalífa, in order to procure quarters from my former friend Sʿaid bu Semmín, who, as I had heard to my great satisfaction, had been restored to the government of that place. He had just on that very day returned from a visit of some length in the capital, and was delighted to see me again; but he was rather astonished when he heard that I was about to undertake a far more difficult and dangerous journey than my former one along the coast, in which he well knew that I had had a very narrow escape. However, he confided in my enterprising spirit and in the mercy of the Almighty, and thought if anybody was likely to do it, I was the man.

We had now behind us the most dreary part of our route, having entered a district which in ancient times numbered large and wealthy cities, among which Sabratha stands foremost, and which even in the present miserable state of the country is dotted with pleasant little date-groves, interrupted by fine pasture-grounds. In the westernmost part of this tract, however, with the exception of the plantation of Zowára, all the date-groves, as those of Rikdalíye, Jemíl, el Meshíah, and Jenán ben Síl, lie at a considerable distance from the coast, while the country near the sea is full of sebkhas, and very monotonous, till the traveller reaches a slight ridge of sand-hills about sixteen miles east from Zowára, which is the border between the dreary province of that government and a more favoured tract belonging to the government of Bú-ʿAjíla, and which lies a little distance inland. Most charming was the little plantation, of Kasr álaiga, which exhibited traces of industry and improvement. Unfortunately our horses were too weak and too much fatigued to allow us to visit the sites either of Sabratha or Pontes. The ruins of Sabratha are properly called Kasr álaiga, but the name has been applied to the whole neighbourhood; to the ancient Pontes seem to belong the ruins of Zowára eʾ sherkíyeh, which are considerable. Between them lies the pretty grove of Om el hallúf.

About four o’clock in the afternoon we traversed the charming little valley called Wady bú-harída, where we watered our horses; and then following the camels, and passing Asermán with its little plantation, which is bordered by a long and deep sebkha, we took up our quarters for the night in an Arab encampment, which was situated in the midst of the date-grove of ʿUkbah, and presented a most picturesque appearance, the large fires throwing a magic light upon the date-trees. But there are no roses without thorns: we were unfortunately persuaded to make ourselves comfortable in an Arab tent, as we had no tent of our own; and the enormous swarms of fleas not only disturbed our night’s rest, but followed us to Tripoli.

We had a long stretch the following day to reach the capital, which we were most anxious to accomplish, as we expected Mr. Richardson would have arrived before us in consequence of our own tedious journey; and having sent the Khalífa in advance to keep the gate open for us, we succeeded in reaching the town after an uninterrupted march of thirteen hours and a half, and were most kindly received by Mr. Crowe, Her Majesty’s consul-general, and the vice-consul Mr. Reade, with whom I was already acquainted. We were surprised to find that Mr. Richardson had not even yet been heard of, as we expected he would come direct by way of Malta. But he did not arrive till twelve days after. With the assistance of Mr. Reade, we had already finished a great deal of our preparations, and would have gladly gone on at once; but neither the boat, nor the instruments, nor the arms or tents had as yet arrived, and a great deal of patience was required. However, being lodged in the neat house of the former Austrian consul, close to the harbour, and which commands a charming prospect, our time passed rapidly by.

On the 25th of January Mr. Reade presented Mr. Overweg and me to Yezíd Bashá, the present governor, who received us with great kindness and good feeling. On the 29th we had a pleasant meeting with Mr. Frederic Warrington on his return from Ghadámes, whither he had accompanied Mr. Charles Dickson, who on the 1st of January had made his entry into that place as the first European agent and resident. Mr. F. Warrington is perhaps the most amiable possible specimen of an Arabianized European. To this gentleman, whose zeal in the objects of the expedition was beyond all praise, I must be allowed to pay my tribute as a friend. On setting out in 1850, he accompanied me as far as the Ghurián; and on my joyful return in 1855 he received me in Murzuk. By the charm of friendship he certainly contributed his share to my success.

CHAPTER II.
TRIPOLI.—THE PLAIN AND THE MOUNTAIN-SLOPE; THE ARAB AND THE BERBER.

As soon as it became apparent that the preparations for our final departure for the interior would require at least a month, Mr. Overweg and I resolved to employ the interval in making a preliminary excursion through the mountainous region that encompasses Tripoli in a radius of from sixty to eighty miles. With this view, we hired two camels, with a driver each, and four donkeys, with a couple of men, for ourselves and our two servants, Mohammed Belál, the son of a liberated Háusa slave, and Ibrahim, a liberated Bagirmi slave, whom we had been fortunate enough to engage here; and through the Consul’s influence we procured a shoush, or officer, to accompany us the whole way. Neither the instruments provided by Her Majesty’s Government, nor the tents and arms, had as yet arrived. But Mr. Overweg had a good sextant, and I a good chronometer, and we were both of us provided with tolerably good compasses, thermometers, and an aneroid barometer. Mr. Frederic Warrington, too, was good enough to lend us a tent.

We had determined to start in the afternoon of the 4th of February, 1850, so as to pass the first night in Ghargásh; but meeting with delays, we did not leave the town till after sunset. We preferred encamping, therefore, in the Meshíah, a little beyond the mosque, under the palm-trees, little knowing at the time what an opportunity we had lost of spending a very cheerful evening. Soon after starting, we emerged from the palm-groves which constitute the charm of Tripoli, and continued our march over the rocky ground. Being a little in advance with the shoush, I halted to wait for the rest, when a very peculiar cry, that issued from the old Roman building on the roadside, called “Kasr el Jahalíyeh,” perplexed us for a moment. But we soon learnt, to our great surprise, not unmixed with regret, that it was our kind friend Frederic Warrington, who had been waiting for us here the whole night. From the top of the ruin, which stands on an isolated rock left purposely in the midst of a quarry, there is a widely extensive view. It appears that, before the Arabs built the castle, this site was occupied by Roman sepulchres. A little further on we passed the stone of Sidi ʿArífa. This stone had fallen upon the head of a workman who was digging a well. The workman, so runs the legend, escaped unhurt; and at Sidi ʿArífa’s word the stone once more sprung to the surface. Further on, near the sea-shore, we passed the chapel of Sidi Salah, who is said to have drawn by magic to his feet, from the bottom of the sea, a quantity of fish ready dressed.

From this point our kind friend Mr. Frederic Warrington returned with his followers to the town, and we were left to ourselves. We then turned off from the road, and entered the fine date-plantation of Zenzúr, celebrated in the fourteenth century, as one of the finest districts of Barbary, by the Sheikh eʾ Tijáni, passing by a great magazine of corn, and a mouldering clay-built castle, in which were quartered a body of horsemen of the Urshefána. Fine olive-trees pleasingly alternated with the palm-grove, while the borders of the broad sandy paths were neatly fenced with the Cactus opuntia. Having passed our former place of encampment in Sayáda, we were agreeably surprised to see at the western end of the plantation a few new gardens in course of formation; for there is a tax, levied not on the produce of the tree, but on the tree itself, which naturally stands in the way of new plantations. Having halted for a short time at noon near the little oasis of Sidi Ghár, where the ground was beautifully adorned with a profusion of lilies; and having passed Jedaim, we encamped towards evening in the wide courtyard of the Kasr Gamúda, where we were kindly received by the Kaimakám Mustapha Bey, whom I was providentially destined to meet twice again, viz. on my outset from, and on my final return to, Fezzan. The whole plantation of Zawíya, of which Gamúda forms a part, is said to contain a hundred and thirty thousand palm-trees.

Ibrahim gave me an interesting account to-day of Negroland. Though a native of Bagirmi, he had rambled much about Mandara, and spoke enthusiastically of the large and strong mountain-town Karawa, his report of which I afterwards found quite true; of the town of Mendif, situated at the foot of the great mountain of the same name; and of Mora, which he represented as very unsafe on account of bands of robbers,—a report which has been entirely confirmed by Mr. Vogel. Our chief interest at that time was concentrated upon Mandara, which was then supposed to be the beginning of the mountainous zone of Central Africa.

While the camels were pursuing the direct track, we ourselves, leaving our former road, which was parallel to the sea-coast, and turning gradually towards the south, made a circuit through the plantation, in order to procure a supply of dates and corn, as we were about to enter on the zone of nomadic existence. The morning was very fine, and the ride pleasant. But we had hardly left the plantation, when we exchanged the firm turf for deep sand-hills which were broken further on by a more favoured soil, where melons were cultivated in great plenty; and again, about four miles beyond the plantation, the country once more assumed a genial aspect. I heard that many of the inhabitants of Zawíya habitually exchange every summer their more solid town residences for lighter dwellings here in the open air. A little before noon we obtained a fine view over the diversified outlines of the mountains before us. In the plain there are many favoured spots bearing corn, particularly the country at the foot of Mount Mʿamúra, which forms a very conspicuous object from every side. As we advanced further, the country became well inhabited, and everywhere, at some distance from the path, were seen encampments of the tribe of the Belása who occupy all the grounds between the Urshefána and the BuʿAjíla, while the Urjímma, a tribe quite distinct from the Urghámma, have their settlements south-west, between the Nuwayíl and the BuʿAjíla. All these Arabs hereabouts provide themselves with water from the well Núr eʾ dín, which we left at some distance on our left.

The encampment near which we pitched our tent in the evening belonged to the chief of the Belása, and consisted of seven tents, close to the slope of a small hilly chain. We had scarcely pitched our tent when rain set in, accompanied by a chilly current of air which made the encampment rather uncomfortable. The chief, Mohammed Chélebi, brought us, in the evening, some bazín, the common dish of the Arab of Tripoli. We wanted to regale him with coffee, but, being afraid of touching the hot drink, and perhaps suspicious of poison, he ran away.

Continuing our march southward through the fine and slightly undulating district of el Habl, where water is found in several wells, at the depth of from fifteen to sixteen fathoms, we gradually approached the mountain-chain. The strong wind, which filled the whole air with sand, prevented us from obtaining a very interesting view from a considerable eminence called el Ghunna, the terminating and culminating point of a small chain of hills, which we ascended. For the same reason, when I and Ibrahim, after lingering some time on this interesting spot, started after our camels, we lost our way entirely, the tracks of our little caravan being totally effaced, and no path traceable over the undulating sandy ground. At length we reached firmer grassy soil, and, falling in with the path, overtook our people at the “Bir el Ghánem.”

Hence we went straight towards the slope of the mountains, and after little more than an hour’s march reached the first advanced hill of the chain, and began to enter on it by going up one of the wadys which open from its flanks. It takes its name from the ethel (Tamarix orientalis), which here and there breaks the monotony of the scene, and gradually widens to a considerable plain bounded by majestic ridges. From this plain we descended into the deep and rugged ravine of the large Wady Sheikh, the abrupt cliffs of which presented to view beautiful layers of red and white sandstone, with a lower horizontal layer of limestone, and we looked out for a well-sheltered place, as the cold wind was very disagreeable. The wady has its name from its vicinity to the chapel, or zawíya, of the Merábet Bu-Máti, to which is attached a large school. On setting out from this hollow we ascended the other side, and soon obtained an interesting view of the varied outlines of the mountains before us, with several half-deserted castles of the Arab middle ages on the summits of the hills. The castle of the Welád Merabetín, used by the neighbouring tribes chiefly as a granary, has been twice destroyed by the Turks; but on the occasion of nuptial festivities, the Arabs, in conformity with ancient usage, still fire their muskets from above the castle. The inhabitants of these mountains, who have a strong feeling of liberty, cling to their ancient customs with great fondness.

We descended again into Wady Sheikh, which, winding round, crossed our path once more. The regular layers of limestone, which present a good many fossils, with here and there a layer of marl, form here, during heavy rains, a pretty little cascade at the foot of the cliffs. We lost much time by getting entangled in a branch of the wady, which had no outlet, but exhibited the wild scenery of a glen, worn by the torrents which occasionally rush down the abrupt rocky cliffs. Having regained the direct road, we had to cross a third time the Wady Sheikh at the point where it is joined by Wady Ginna, or Gilla, which also we crossed a little further on. In the fertile zone along the coast, the monotony of the palm-groves becomes almost fatiguing; but here we were much gratified at the sight of the first group of date-trees, which was succeeded by others, and even by a small orchard of fig-trees. Here, as we began to ascend the elevated and abrupt eastern cliffs of the valley, which at first offer only a few patches of cultivated plateau, succeeded further on by olive-trees, a fine view opened before us, extending to the south-east as far as the famous Roman monument called Enshéd eʾ Sufét, which is very conspicuous. Having waited here for our camels, we reached the first village, whose name, “Ta-smeraye,” bears, like that of many others, indubitable proof that the inhabitants of these mountainous districts belong originally to the Berber race, though at present only a few of them speak their native tongue. These people had formerly a pleasant and comfortable abode in this quarter, but having frequently revolted against the Turks, they have been greatly reduced, and their villages at present look like so many heaps of ruins.

Having passed some other hamlets in a similar state of decay, and still going through a pleasant but rather arid country, we reached the oppressor’s stronghold, the “Kasr il Jebel,” as it is generally called, although this part of the mountains bears the special name of Yefren. It lies on the very edge of the steep rocky cliffs, and affords an extensive view over the plain. But though standing in a commanding position, it is itself commanded by a small eminence a few hundred yards eastward, where there was once a large quadrangular structure, now in ruins. The castle, which at the time of our visit was the chief instrument in the hands of the Turks for overawing the mountaineers, contained a garrison of four hundred soldiers. It has only one bastion with three guns, at the southern corner, and was found by Mr. Overweg to be 2,150 feet above the level of the sea. The high cliffs inclosing the valley are most beautifully and regularly stratified in layers of gypsum and limestone; and a man may walk almost round the whole circumference of the ravine on the same layer of the latter stone, which has been left bare,—the gypsum, of frailer texture, having been carried away by the torrents of rain which rush violently down the steep descent. From the little eminence above mentioned, there is a commanding view over the valleys and the high plain towards the south.

After our tent had been pitched, we received a visit from Haj Rashíd, the Kaimakám or governor, who is reckoned the second person in the Bashalík, and has the whole district from Zwára as far as Ghadámes towards the south-west and the Tarhóna towards the south-east, under his military command. His salary is 4,600 mahhbúbs annually, or about 720l. He had previously been Basha of Adana, in Cilicia; and we indulged, to our mutual gratification, in reminiscences of Asia Minor.

Early in the morning I walked to a higher eminence at some distance eastward from the castle, which had attracted my attention the day before. This conspicuous hill also was formerly crowned with a tower or small castle; but nothing but a solitary rustic dwelling now enlivens the solitude. The view was very extensive, but the strong wind did not allow of exact compass observations. While my companion remained near the castle, engaged in his geological researches, I agreed with our shoush and a Zintáni lad whom I accidentally met here, and who on our journey to Fezzan proved very useful, to undertake a longer excursion towards the west, in order to see something more of this interesting and diversified slope of the plateau.

I was anxious to visit a place called Ta-gherbúst, situated on the north side of the castle, along the slope of a ravine which runs westward into the valley; accordingly, on leaving the site of our encampment, we deviated at first a little northwards. Ta-gherbúst is said to have been a rich and important place in former times. Some of its inhabitants possessed as many as ten slaves; but at present it is a heap of ruins, with scarcely twenty-five inhabited houses. From hence, turning southward, we descended gradually along the steep slope, while above our heads the cliffs rose in picturesque majesty, beautifully adorned by scattered date-trees, which, at every level spot, sprung forth from the rocky ground, and gave to the whole scene a very charming character. A fountain which gushed out from a cavern on a little terrace at the foot of the precipice, and fed a handsome group of date-trees, was one of the most beautiful objects that can be imagined.

The Turks, two years ago, made a small path leading directly down from the castle to this fountain, which supplies them with water. After sketching this beautiful spot while the animals were watering, we followed a more gradual descent into the valley of el Ghasás, which here with a rough level widens to a plain, while its upper or southern part, called Wady Rumíye, forms a very narrow and picturesque ravine. We then continued our march in a westerly direction, having on our right the plain extending, with slight undulations, towards the sea, and on our left the majestic offshoots of the plateau jutting into the plain like vast promontories, with a general elevation of two thousand feet. This grand feature is evidently due to the waters which, in ancient times, must have rushed down the slope of the plateau in mighty streams. At present, the chief character of the country is aridity. On asking my guide whether great torrents are not still occasionally formed along those ravines strong enough to reach the sea, he replied, that once only—forty-four years ago—such a torrent was formed, which, passing by Zenzúr, gave a red colour to the sea as far as the Island of Jirbi. He also informed me that, in general, all the waters from the ridge joined the Wady Haera.

On our left, in the valley Khalaifa, a group of date-trees, fed by an abundant spring called Ain el Wuaníye, forms a conspicuous and interesting object; while, in general, these valleys or ravines exhibit, besides small brushwood, only trees of the siddre (Rhamnus nabeca), jári, and batúm tribe. The batúm-tree (Pistacia Atlantica) produces the fruit called gatúf, which is used by the Arabs for a great variety of purposes. Small brushwood or gandul, also, and various sorts of herbage, such as sebót, shedíde, and sháde, enliven the ground.

As we advanced, we changed our direction gradually to the south-west, and entered the mountainous region. On our right there extended far into the plain a steep narrow promontory, which had served as a natural fortress to the mountaineers in the last war with the Turks; but no water being found near it, its occupants were soon reduced to extremities. Having gone round the last promontory on our left, we entered the picturesque valley “Welád ʿAli,” once adorned with orchards and groves of date-trees, but at present reduced to a desolate wilderness, only a few neglected fig-trees and scattered palms still remaining to prove how different the condition of this spot might be. After we had commenced our ascent along the side of the ravine, in order to return upon the level of the plateau, we made a short halt near a cluster of about eighty date-trees. But the ascent became extremely steep, especially near the middle of the slope, where the water, rushing down in cascades, has laid bare the limestone rock, and formed a sort of terrace. Here, on the east side of the cascade, is a spring in a well, called ʿAin el Gatár mtʿa Welád ʿAli. On both of the summits overlooking the slope are two villages of the Riaina, the eastern one a little larger than the other, but at present not containing more than about thirty stone-built cottages. In both we tried in vain to buy a little barley for our cattle, as we knew not whether, at our halting-place for the night, we might be able to obtain any; but we got plenty of dried figs for ourselves. This slope, with its ravines and valleys, might certainly produce a very considerable quantity of fruit; and in this respect it resembles in character that of the so-called Kabylia in Algiers. The rearing of fruit-trees seems to be a favourite occupation of the Berber race, even in the more favoured spots of the Great Desert.

Continuing our march on the summit of the plateau, we reached the village Kasr Shellúf, which exhibited far greater opulence, as it had escaped being ransacked by the Turks in the last war. Most probably in consequence of this circumstance, its inhabitants are more hospitably disposed than those of Riaina: but the cave or cellar in which they wanted to lodge me, had nothing very attractive for a night’s quarters, so that I urged my two companions onward. Having continued our south-westerly direction for awhile, and passed another village, we thought it safer to turn our steps eastwards, and took the direction of the zawíya or convent situated on the summit of the promontory; but when we reached it, just after dusk, the masters or teachers of the young men, who are sent to this holy place for education, refused to admit us for the night, so that we were obliged to go on and try to reach one of the five villages of Khalaifa. At length, after a very difficult descent down the steep rocky slope in the dark, we succeeded in reaching the principal village, and, after some negotiation, occasioned by the absence of the Kaid Bel Kasem, who is chief of the Khalaifa as well as of the Wuërje, we at length obtained admission, and even something to eat, my companions (rather against my will) representing me as a Turk.

Our route on leaving the village was very pleasant, winding round the sloping sides of several ravines, among which that formed by the rivulet Wuaniye, and adorned with date-trees, was the most beautiful. Ascending gradually, we reached again the level of the plateau, and obtained an extensive prospect, with the remarkable monument Enshéd eʾ Sufét as a conspicuous and attractive landmark in the distance. The elevated level had a slight undulation, and was clothed with halfa (Cynosurus durus) and gedím. However, we did not long continue on it, but descended into the well-irrigated valley Rumíye, which is extremely fertile, but also extremely unhealthy, and notorious for its fevers. The beauty of the scenery, enlivened as it is by a considerable torrent foaming along the ravine, and feeding luxuriant clusters of palm, pomegranate, fig, and apricot trees, surpassed my expectation.

Having kept awhile along this picturesque ravine, we ascended its eastern side, and then followed the very edge of the steep, directly for the castle; but before reaching our tent we were obliged to cross a deep branch of the ravine. There was some little activity to-day about the castle, it being the market-day; but the market was really miserable, and the Turkish troops, exercising outside the castle, could ill supply the want of national welfare and prosperity. If a just and humane treatment were guaranteed to these tribes, even under a foreign rule, the country might still enjoy plenty and happiness. Most of the tribes westward from the Riaina—namely, the Zintán, who formerly were very powerful, and even at present hold some possessions as far as Fezzan, the Rujbán, the Fissátu, the Welád Shebel, the Selemát, the Arhebát, the Harába, the Génafid, the Kabáw, and the Nalúd, belong to the Berber race.

After a friendly parting from the Kaimakám, we broke up our encampment near the kasr, in the afternoon, in order to continue our tour eastward along the varied border of the plateau, under the guidance of a faithful black servant of the governor, whose name was Barka. Having passed several smaller villages, we reached Um eʾ Zerzán, a considerable village, situated on a round hill in the midst of a valley, ornamented with fine olive-trees, and surrounded by fine orchards. Um eʾ Zerzán is well known among the mountaineers as a centre of rebellion. The neighbourhood is full of reminiscences of the late war, and about two miles in the rear of the village are the remains of strong walls called el Matarís, behind which the Arabs made some stand against the Turks. Having passed a solitary rustic dwelling surrounded with a thriving olive-plantation, we reached the ruins of a castle or village from which the Roman sepulchre, known among the Arabs by the name Enshéd eʾ Sufét, burst suddenly upon our view.

After an extremely cold night on this high rocky ground, the thermometer in the morning indicating only 5° above freezing-point, with the dawn of day I mounted the hill opposite to the monument, commanding an extensive view.[4] It was a level tableland, uninterrupted by any higher eminence; but the landscape seemed to me highly characteristic, and I made a sketch of it.

Upon this hill there was formerly a castle built of hewn stone. The foundation walls, which are still traceable, show that it faced the east, the eastern and the western sides measuring each 57 ft. 8 in., the northern and southern, not more than 54 ft. On the eastern side there was a strong outwork protecting the gate, and measuring 16 ft. 11 in. on the north and south sides, and 12 ft. 1 in. on the east side, where there was a large gate 9 ft. 1 in. wide. This outwork juts off from the castle at 17 ft. 6 in. from the south corner. It was evidently a Roman castle; but after the dominion of the Romans and Byzantines had passed away, the Berbers appear to have strengthened it by adding another outwork on the west side, not, however, in the same grand style as the Romans, but with small irregular stones, putting bastions to the corners, and surrounding the whole castle with considerable outworks on the slope of the hill.

The Roman castle has been swept away; but the Roman sepulchre is still preserved, with almost all its architectural finery, and is still regarded by the surrounding tribes with a certain awe and reverence.[5] It was most probably the sepulchre of a Roman commander of the castle in the time of the Antonines; hence, in my opinion, the name Sufét, by which the natives have distinguished it. It is certainly not a Punic monument, though it is well known that the Punic language was generally spoken in several towns of this region much later than the second century after Christ. The style of its architecture testifies that it belongs to the second century; but no inscription remains to tell its story.

This interesting monument is situated on an eminence a little less elevated than that on which the castle is built, and south-westward from it. Its whole height is about 36 ft. The base or pedestal measures 16 ft. 8¾ in. on the west and east, and 16 ft. north and south. Its elevation varies greatly from east to west, on account of the sloping ground, the eastern side measuring 3 ft. 2 in., the western 5 ft. 7 in. In the interior of this base is the sepulchral chamber, measuring 7 ft. 1 in. from north to south, and 6 ft. 6 in. from east to west, and remarkable for the peculiar construction of the roof. Upon this lowest part of the base rises a second one 15 ft. 9 in. west and east, 14 ft. 3¾ in. north and south, and 2 ft. 1 in. high; and on this a third one, measuring 14 ft. 7½ in. west and east, 13 ft. 10¼ in. north and south, and 1 ft. 7 in. in height. Upon this base rose the principal part of the monument, 13 ft. 7 in. high, and measuring at its foot 13 ft. 11½ in. west and east, decorated at the corners with pilasters, the feet of which measure 1 ft. 1¾ in., and the shaft 9¾ in. The moulding is handsomely decorated. Upon this principal body of the monument is constructed the upper story, about 10 ft. high, decorated with pilasters of the Corinthian order. On the south and west sides the walls are plain; but on the east side they are ornamented with a bow window enclosed with pilasters of the same order, and on the north side with a plain window running up the whole height of the body. Inside of this chamber stood, probably, the statue of the person in whose honour the monument was erected. The upper compartment has a plain moulding about four feet high, and surmounted by a cornice. The material of this interesting monument is a very fine limestone, which under the influence of the atmosphere has received a vivid brownish colour, almost like that of travertine. It was taken from a quarry, which extends all round the monument, and is full of caverns now used by shepherds as resting-places when they tend their flocks hereabouts.

Our camels had already gone on some time before we parted from this solitary memorial of Roman greatness; and after a little distance we passed the ruins of another Roman fort called Hanshír Hámed. The country hereabouts, forming a sort of bowl or hollow, and absorbing a great deal of moisture, is very fertile, and is also tolerably well cultivated; but after a while it becomes stony. Having here passed a village, we reached a beautiful little valley, the head of the Wady Sheikh, which is irrigated by two springs, that feed a splendid little orchard with all sorts of fruit. Here lies Swédna, a considerable village spreading over the whole eminence, and known on account of the murder of Mohammed Efendi. As the valley divides into two branches, we followed the main wady, and afterwards crossed it, where it formed a pretty brook of running water. We then wound along a narrow valley overgrown with halfa and sidr, and, changing our direction, took the road to Kikla. The valley soon became decked with olives, which gradually formed a fine plantation. This is the chief branch of industry of the inhabitants, the ground being rather stony, and not so fit for grain. The district of Kikla contains numerous villages, all of which suffered much from the last war, when a great number of people were slaughtered, and their dwellings ransacked, by the Turks. Several of these villages lay in small hollows, or on the slope of ravines, and exhibited rather a melancholy appearance. After some delay, we resumed our easterly direction towards Rabda, and soon came to the spot where the elevated ground descends abruptly into the deep and broad valley called Wady Rabda, over which we obtained an interesting view. To the left the slope broke into a variety of cones and small mounts, among which the Tarhóna—“the mill,” so called from a mill that stood formerly on its summit—is remarkable for its handsome shape; while in front of us rose an almost perpendicular cliff of limestone, on a turn of which, in a very commanding position, lies the village Jáfet, enclosed, and naturally defended, on every side by a deep ravine. Here we commenced our descent, which took us a whole hour; on the middle of the slope we passed a kiln for preparing gypsum. At length we reached the side valley, which joins the main wady on the west. It was ornamented with a few solitary date-trees, and the beautifully shaped slopes and cones of the Tarhóna were just illuminated by a striking variety of light and shade. The soil, a fertile marl, remained uncultivated. Gradually we entered the main valley, a grand chasm of about four miles and a half in width, which has been formed by the mighty rushing of the waters down the slope of the plateau. In its upper part it is called Wady Kérdemín, in its lower part Wady Sert. The industry of man might convert it into a beautiful spot; but at present it is a desolate waste, the monotonous halfa being the only clothing of the ground.

The eastern border presents a perpendicular rocky cliff about 1,500 feet high, on the brink of which lies the village Misga. The western border consists of a cluster of detached mounts and rocks. Among these a black cone, which attracted Mr. Overweg’s attention, was found on examination to be pure basalt, with certain indications of former volcanic action. From beyond this remarkable cone, a mount was visible crowned with a castle. As we proceeded, the valley became enlivened by two small Arab encampments. Here we gradually obtained a view of the date-grove of Rabda, which, from the foot of the steep eastern cliffs, slopes down into the bottom of the valley, and is overtopped, in the distance, by the handsome bifurcated Mount Manterús. But Rabda was too far off to be reached before sunset; and we encamped in the wady, near a group of five tents inhabited by Lasába or el Asába Arabs, whose chief paid us a visit and treated us with bazín, but declined tasting our coffee, probably thinking with his fellow-chief the other day, that we were in the service of the Turks, and wanted to poison him. All the people of these regions regard strangers with suspicion.

Soon after we had started we entered upon cultivated ground,—the first trace of industry we had seen in this spacious valley. The eastern cliffs formed here a wide chasm, through which a lateral valley joined the Wady Sert. On the southern shore of this valley lies the Kasr Lasába, from which a torrent that came forth from it, and crossed our route, presented a refreshing spectacle. Emerging gradually from the valley, we obtained an extensive view over the plain called el Gatís. Westward, as far as the well called Bír el Ghánem, little was to be seen which could gladden the eye of the husbandman. Towards the north-east the level is interrupted by a small range of hills, the culminating points of which, called el Guleát and Mʿanmúra, rise to a great elevation. Beyond this range the plain is called Shefána, the country of the Ur-shefána. At nine o’clock we reached the fine date-grove of the westernmost village of Rabda. It is fed by a copious spring, which arrested our attention. Following it up to trace its source, we were greatly surprised to find, in the heart of some date-trees, a basin fifty feet in length, and about thirty in breadth, in which the water was continually bubbling up and sending forth a considerable stream to spread life and cheerfulness around. The water gushed up at a temperature of 72° Fahr., while that of the air was only 52°. Besides dates, a large quantity of onions is produced in this fertile spot. The village itself was in former times the residence of Hamíd, a powerful Arab chieftain, who at one time ruled the whole mountainous district, but was obliged to yield to the Turks, and lives at present about Beni-Ulíd, where I had to deal with him on my home-journey in 1855.

The groves of the two villages of Rabda are not far apart. On the north-eastern side of the village are seven holy chapels called el Hararát. The eastern village lies upon a hill, over a hollow, in which spreads a date-grove, likewise fed by a spring called ʿAin Rabda eʾ sherkíyeh. On crossing a brook we obtained a view of the Jebel Shehésh, which, attached to the Tarhóna, stretches a long way westward, and even el Gunna was seen faintly in the distance. Thus we approached gradually the interesting bicorn of the dark-coloured Jebel Manterús, which we were bent on ascending. Alighting at the foot of the mount, near the border of a deep channel, we sent the camels on, but kept the shoush and our guide back to wait for us. It took me twenty-five minutes to reach the eastern and higher summit, on which there is the tomb of a merábet, a holy shepherd called Sidi Bu-Mʿaza; but I was disappointed in my expectation of obtaining a great extent of view, the cone of Mount Tekút and other mountains intervening. Towards the south only, a peep into the Wady el Ugla, bordered by high cliffs, slightly rewarded me for my trouble; and the mount itself is interesting, as it exhibits evident traces of volcanic action.

I had reached the western lower cone in descending, when I met my companion in his ascent, and, being anxious to overtake the camels, I started in advance of him, accompanied by the guide, along the Wady el Ugla. But my companions did not seem to agree as to the path to be pursued; and my guide, overlooking on the rocky ground the footsteps of the camels, which had taken the direct path to the Kasr Ghurián, wanted to take me by the wady, and, instead of ascending the eastern cliffs of the ravine, kept along it, where, from being narrow and rocky—the mere bed of a torrent,—it widens to a pleasant, cultivated, open valley, with rich marly soil, and adorned with an olive-grove. On a hill in the centre lies the first village of the district Ghurián.

We had begun to leave the principal valley by a lateral opening, when the shoush, overtaking us, led us back to the more northern and more difficult but shorter path which our camels had taken. The ascent was very steep indeed; and the path then wound along the mountain-side and across ravines, till at length we reached the olive-grove which surrounds the Kasr Ghurián; but in the dark we had some difficulty in reaching it, and still more in finding our companions, who at length, however, rejoined the party. In order to obtain something to eat, we were obliged to pay our respects to the governor; but the Turks in the castle were so suspicious that they would scarcely admit us. When at last they allowed us to slip through the gate in single file, they searched us for arms; but the governor having assured himself that we had no hostile intention, and that we were furnished with a letter from the basha, sent a servant to procure us a lodging in the homestead or housh of a man called Ibrahim, where we pitched our tent. It was then nine o’clock; and we felt quite disposed to enjoy some food and repose.

We paid a visit to the governor, who, as well as the aghá, received us with the civility usual with Turks, and, in order to do us honour, ordered the garrison, consisting of two hundred men, to pass in review before us. They were good-looking men and well conditioned, though generally rather young. He then showed us the magazines, which are always kept in good order, for fear of a revolt, but will be of no avail so long as the command rests with ignorant and unprincipled men. It is built on a spur of the tableland, commanding on the south and south-west side the Wady Rummána and the highroad into the interior. Towards the north the lower hilly ground intervenes between it and Mount Tekút.

Having returned to our quarters, we started on foot a little after mid-day, on an excursion to Mount Tekút, which, from its elevation and its shape, appeared to us well worth a visit. Descending the slope by the “trík tobbi,” a road made by the Turks, we reached the eastern foot of the mountain, after an hour and a half’s expeditious march through the village Gwásem, and olive-groves, and over a number of subterranean dwellings. My companion went round to the south side in search of an easier ascent. I chose the cliff just above us, which, though steep, indeed, and difficult on account of scattered blocks and stones, was not very high. Having once climbed it, I had easier work, keeping along the crest, which, winding upwards in a semicircle, gradually led to the highest point of the mountain, on the north side, with an absolute elevation of about 2,800 feet. On the top are the ruins of a chapel of Si Ramadán, which, I think, is very rarely visited. The crest, which has fallen in on the south-east side, encloses a perfectly circular little plain, resembling an amphitheatre, and called Shʿabet Tekút. The mount appears evidently to have been an active volcano in former times, yet my companion declared the rock not to be pure basalt. The view was very extensive, and I was able to take the angles of several conspicuous points. After we had satisfied our curiosity, we descended along the northern slope, which is much more gradual, being even practicable for horses, and left the “Shʿabet” by the natural opening. Thence we returned along the path called Um eʾ Nekhél, which passes by the Roman sepulchre described by Lyon in general terms, and situated in a very conspicuous position.

Accompanied by the shoush, I made an excursion in a south-westerly direction. The villages, at least those above the ground, are generally in a wretched condition and half deserted; still the country is in a tolerable state of cultivation, saffron and olive-trees being the two staple articles of industry. Passing the little subterranean village of Shuedeya, we reached the Kasr Teghrínna, originally a Berber settlement, as its name testifies, with a strong position on a perfectly detached hill. At present the kasr, or the village on the hill-top, is little more than a heap of ruins, inhabited only by a few families. At the northern foot of the hill a small village has recently been formed, called Menzel Teghrínna. On the west and east sides the hill is encompassed by a valley with a fine olive-grove, beyond which the Wady el Arbʿa stretches westwards; and it was by this roundabout way that my guide had intended to take me from Wady el Ugla to Kasr Ghurián. Protected by the walls, I was able to take a few angles; but the strong wind which prevailed soon made me desist.

From this spot I went to the villages called Ksúr Gamúdi. These once formed likewise a strong place, but were entirely destroyed in the last war, since which a new village has arisen at the foot of the rocky eminence. A few date-trees grow at the north foot of the hill, while it is well known, that the palm is rare in the Ghurián. As I was taking angles from the top of the hill, the inhabitants of the village joined me, and manifested a friendly disposition, furnishing me readily with any information, but giving full vent to their hatred of the Turks. As the most remarkable ruins of the time of the Jahalíyeh—or the pagans, as the occupants of the country before the time of Mohammed are called,—they mentioned to me, besides Ghirze, a tower or sepulchre called Metuïje, about two days’ journey south-east; Beluwár, another tower-like monument at less distance; and in a south-west direction ʿAmúd, a round edifice which has not yet been visited by any European.

The valley at the foot of the Ksúr Gamúdi is watered by several abundant springs, which once supplied nourishment for a great variety of vegetables; but the kitchen-gardens and orchards are at present neglected, and corn alone is now cultivated as the most necessary want. The uppermost of these springs, which are stated to be six in number, is called Sma Rhʿain—not an Arabic name. Beyond, towards the south, is Jehésha, further eastward Usáden, mentioned by Lyon, with a chapel, Geba with a chapel, and, going round towards the north, Shetán, and further on Mésufín. The country beyond Kuléba, a village forming the southern border of the Ghurián, is called Ghadáma, a name evidently connected with that of Ghadámes, though we know the latter to be at least of two thousand years’ standing.

Continuing our march through the valley north-east, and passing the village Bu-Mát and the ruined old places called Hanshír Metelíli and Hanshír Jamúm, we reached the ruins of another old place called Hanshír Settára, in the centre of the olive-grove. The houses, which in general are built of small irregular stones, present a remarkable contrast to a pair of immense slabs, above ten feet long and regularly hewn, standing upright, which I at first supposed to be remnants of a large building; but having since had a better opportunity of studying this subject, I concluded that they were erected, like the cromlechs, for some religious purpose. On the road back to our encampment, the inhabitants of Gamúdi, who were unwilling to part company with me, gave vent to their hatred against the Turks in a singular way. While passing a number of saffron-plantations, which I said proved the productiveness of their country, they maintained that the present production of saffron is as nothing compared to what it was before it came into the impious hands of the Osmanlis. In former times, they said, several stems usually shot forth from the same root, whereas now scarcely a single sample can be found with more than one stalk,—a natural consequence of the contamination or pollution (nejes) of the Turks, whose predominance had caused even the laws of nature to deteriorate. In order to prove the truth of this, they went about the fields and succeeded in finding only a single specimen with several stems issuing from the same root.

KASR GHURIAN.

Passing the subterranean villages of Suayeh and Ushen, and further on that called Housh el Yehúd, which, as its name indicates, is entirely inhabited by Jews, we reached our encampment in the housh of Ibrahím. The subterranean dwellings which have been described by Captain Lyon, seem to me to have originated principally with the Jews, who from time immemorial had become intimately connected with the Berbers, many of the Berber tribes having adopted the Jewish creed; and just in the same way as they are found mingling with the Berbers in these regions—for the original inhabitants of the Ghurián belong entirely to the Berber race—on friendly terms, so are they found also in the recesses of the Atlas in Morocco.

I then went to see the market, which is held every Thursday on the open ground at the east side of the castle, close to the northern edge of the ridge. Though much better supplied than that near Kasr Jebel, it was yet extremely poor; only a single camel was offered for sale. This results from the mistrust of the inhabitants, who, in bringing their produce to the great market at Tripoli, are less exposed to vexations than here. When taking leave of the Kaimakám, we found the whole castle beset by litigants. I saw in the company of the governor the chief of the Haj caravan, the Sheikh el Rakeb, of whose grand entrance into the town I had been witness. The aghá, wanting to show us their little paradise, accompanied us into the Wady Rummána, which, in a direction from south-east to north-west, winds along the southern foot of the ridge on which the castle is situated. Though it looks rather wild and neglected, it is a charming retreat for the leisure hours of a governor of a place like this. It is irrigated by a very powerful spring issuing from the limestone rock in a channel widened by art, and then dividing into several little rills, which are directed over the terraces of the slope. These, of course, have been raised by art, and are laid out in orchards, which, besides the pomegranates which have given their name to the valley, produce sferéj (sfarájel)—the Malum Cydonium—of an excellent quality, figs, grapes, and almonds. A path, practicable even for horses, leads down from the castle to the spring. Before I left this charming spot, I made a sketch of the valley, with the castle on the cliffs.

CHAPTER III.
FERTILE MOUNTAIN REGION RICH IN ANCIENT REMAINS.

It was past three in the afternoon of Thursday, February 14th, when we started from the dwelling of our host, in order to pursue our route in a south-easterly direction. We were agreeably surprised to see fine vineyards at the village called Jelíli; but the cultivation of olive-trees seemed almost to cease here, while the country became quite open, and afforded an unbounded prospect towards the distant southern range, with its peaks, depressions, and steep slopes. But the fine olive-groves of Sgáif proved that we had not yet reached the limit of this useful tree. We were just about to descend the slope into the broad valley called Wady Rán, when, seeing darkness approaching, and frightened by the black clouds rising from the valley, together with a very chilly stream of air, we began to look seriously about for some secure shelter for the night. To our right we had a pleasant little hollow with olive-trees; but that would not suffice in such weather as was apparently approaching, and we therefore descended a little along the cliffs on our left, where our shoush knew that there were caverns called Merwán. Scarcely had we pitched our tent on the little terrace in front of these, when the rain began to pour down, and, accompanied with snow, continued the whole night.

When we arose next morning, the whole country was covered with snow about an inch deep, and its natural features were no longer recognisable. Placed on the very brink of a bank partly consisting of rocky ground, with many holes, partly of marly soil and accordingly very slippery, we could not think of starting. At half-past six, the thermometer stood at 34° Fahr. Fortunately our tent, which had been fitted by Mr. Warrington for every kind of weather, kept the wet out. The caverns were very irregular excavations, used by the shepherds as temporary retreats, and full of fleas. The snow did not melt till late in the afternoon, and the rain fell without intermission the whole night.

In the morning the bad weather still continued, but the cold was not quite so severe. Tired as we were of our involuntary delay in such a place, we decided upon starting; but it was difficult to get our half-frozen people to go to work. At length we set out, accompanied by an old man, whom we hired as guide, on the deep descent into Wady Rán. The soil was often so slippery that the camels could scarcely keep their feet; and we were heartily glad when, after an hour and a quarter’s descent, we at length reached stony ground, though still on the slope. Here the valley spread out before us to right and left, with the village Usíne, inhabited by the Merabetín Selahát, situated on the top of a hill, and distinguished for the quality of its dates, which are of a peculiar kind, short and thick with a very broad stone,—while at the foot of the western heights another village was seen, and on the top of them the castle Bústam. Here the great valley is joined by a smaller ravine, called Wady Nkhal, with a small village of the same name. We crossed two paths leading to Beni Ulíd, passing by Wady Rán, which went parallel to our course on the right, and where there are two springs and a date-grove, while to the left, we obtained a view of Sedi-úris, situated on a cone overtowering the northern end of Wady Kominshát. We then approached closely the steep glen of Wady Rán, and, after some turnings, crossed the small rivulet which flows through it, and, a little further on, recrossed it. Then, traversing the valley called Wady Marníyeh, we entered a fine fertile plain surrounded on all sides by heights, among which the Kelúba Naʿame was conspicuous on our right. But the camels found the marly soil, fully saturated as it was with rain, very difficult, especially after we had entered the “Shʿabet sóda.” For this reason, also, we could not think of following the direct path, which leads over the hills. At the western end of the shʿabet are the villages Deb Beni ʿAbas and Suadíyeh, with olive-groves. All the waters of the district are carried into Wady Rán, which joins the Wady Haera.

The country begins to exhibit decidedly a volcanic character, and from all the heights rise bare basaltic cones, while the lower part is covered with halfa. This character of the country seems to have been well understood by the Arabs, when they gave to these basins, surrounded by basaltic mounts, the name “Shʿabet,” which we have already seen given to the crater of the Tekút. Here, at a short distance on our left, we passed “another Shʿabet,” distinguished as “el Akhera.” At length we found an opening through the hilly chain on our right, behind an indented projection of the ridge called “Sennet el Osis,” and then suddenly changed our course from north-east to south-east. As soon as we had made the circuit of this mount, we obtained a view of the highest points of the Tarhóna, and directed our course by one of them, Mount Bíbel, which is said to be sometimes visible from Tripoli. Tales of deadly strife are attached to some localities hereabouts; and, according to our guide, the torrent which we crossed beyond Wady Ruéra poured down, some years ago, a bloody stream. But at present the scene wants life, the Kasr Kuséba, situated on the apex of a cone, being almost the only dwelling-place which we had seen for five hours. Life has fled from these fertile and pleasant regions; and the monotonous character which they at present exhibit necessarily impresses itself on the narrative of the traveller.

At length, after having entered the gorges of the mountains, we reached the encampment of the Merabetín Bu-ʿAáysha, and pitched our tent at a short distance from it. These people have considerable herds of camels and sheep; as for cattle, there are at present very few in the whole regency of Tripoli, except in the neighbourhood of Ben-gházi. Their chief, ʿAbdallah, who lives in Tripoli, is much respected. The valleys and plains hereabouts, when well saturated with rain, produce a great quantity of corn, but they are almost entirely destitute of trees. Having been thoroughly drenched to-day by heavy showers, we were in a very uncomfortable condition at its close.

About an hour before sunrise, when the thermometer stood at 41°, I set out to ascend an eminence north from our tent, which afforded me an excellent site whence to take the bearings of several prominent cones. After my return to the tent, we started together in advance of the camels, that we might have time to ascend the broad cone of Jebel Msíd, which had arrested our attention. We soon passed a well, or rather fountain, called Bir el ʿAr, which gives its name to some ancient monument (“sanem,” or idol, as it is called by the Arabs) at a little distance, and which the guide described as a kasr tawíl Beni Jehel, “a high fortress of the Romans.” The country was varied and pleasant, and enlivened, moreover, by flocks; but we saw no traces of agriculture till we reached the well called Hasi el abiár, beyond which we entered upon a volcanic formation. As we ascended along a small ravine, and entered another irregular mountain-plain of confined dimensions, we found the basalt in many places protruding from the surface. The more desolate character of the country was interrupted in a pleasant way by the Wady Nekhél, which has received its name from the number of palm-trees which grow here in a very dwarfish state, though watered by a copious spring. Following the windings of another small valley, we reached a plain at the foot of Mount Msíd, while on the right a large ravine led down from the heights. Here we commenced our ascent of the cone; and on the slope of the mountain we met with large pillars similar to those which I had seen in the ruins of Hanshír Settára. The pillars succeeded each other at regular distances up the slope, apparently marking the track to be followed by those ascending for religious purposes. The ascent was very gradual for the first twelve minutes; and twelve minutes more brought us to its summit, which was crowned with a castle of good Arabic masonry of about the thirteenth century. Its ruined walls gave us a little protection against the very strong blasts of wind; but we found it rather difficult to take accurate angles, which was the more to be regretted as a great many peaks were visible from this beautifully shaped and conspicuous mount.

It was a little past noon when we pursued our journey from the western foot of this once holy mount, and, turning its southern side, resumed our north-easterly direction. We then soon came to the “Wady hammám,” which forms here a wider basin for the brook running along it towards Mejenín, so as to produce a pleasant and fresh green spot. Having watered our animals, we entered a plain from which detached basaltic hillocks started up; and some ruins of regularly hewn stones, scattered about, bore testimony that the Romans had deemed the place worthy of fixed settlements. A small limestone hill contrasts handsomely with these black basaltic masses, among which the Leblú, the highest summit of a larger group to our right, is particularly remarkable. At the foot of the Jebel Jemmʿa was an encampment of the Welád ʿAli; but I cannot say in what degree they are connected with the family which has given its name to the valley in the Yefren. From this side in particular, the Jebel Msíd presents the form of a beautiful dome, the most regular I remember to have ever seen. It seems to rise with a proud air over its humbler neighbours. Having then passed a continuous ridge of cones stretching south-south-east, and cleared the basaltic region, we entered a wide plain covered with halfa, and, cutting right across it, we reached the fertile low plain Elkeb, where another encampment of the Welád ʿAli excited the desire of our people to try their hospitality for our night’s quarters; but some distance to the left two enormous pillars were to be seen standing upright, and thither we repaired. Here I had an opportunity of accurately investigating a very peculiar kind of ancient remains, giving a clue, I hope, to the character of the religion of the early inhabitants of these regions, though it seems impossible to give a satisfactory explanation respecting all the details of their structure.

It consists of a pair of quadrangular pillars erected on a common basis, which is fixed into the ground, and measures 3 ft. 1⁵⁄₁₂ in. in length, and 2 ft. 10 in. in width. The two pillars, which measure 2 ft. on each side, being 1 ft. 7²⁄₁₀ in. asunder, are 10 ft. high. The western pillar has three quadrangular holes on the inside, while the corresponding holes in the eastern pillar go quite through; the lowest hole is 1 ft. 8 in. above the ground, and the second 1 ft. ½ in. higher up, and so the third above the second. The holes are 6 in. square.

Over these pillars, which at present lean to one side, is laid another enormous stone about 6 ft. 6½ in. long, and of the same width as the pillars, so that the whole structure bears a surprising resemblance to the most conspicuous part of Stonehenge and other ruins in Malabar. But besides these, there are other very curious stones of different workmanship, and destined evidently for different purposes; some of them are large, flat, and quadrangular, very peculiarly worked, and adapted, probably, to sacrifices. One of them is 3 ft. in length and breadth, but with a projection on one side, as is represented in the woodcut, and 1 ft. 2 in. high. On the surface of this stone, and parallel to its sides, is carved a channel 4⁸⁄₁₀ in. broad, forming a quadrangle; and from this a small channel branches along the projecting part. Several stones of similar workmanship lie about. There is also the remnant of an enormous stone 3 ft. 7½ in. at the back and across, but rounded off at the corners, looking like a solid throne, excepting that on the upper side there is an excavation measuring 1 ft. 3²⁄₁₀ in. at the back, 9⁶⁄₁₀ in. on the front, and 1 ft. 1²⁄₁₀ in. across, and about 10 in. deep, with a small opening. This stone looks very peculiar, and probably formed an altar. These ruins are certainly very remarkable. Any one who looks at them without prejudice or preconceived opinion, will be impressed with the belief that they belonged to a place of worship; though how this peculiar structure could be adapted to religious purposes, I will not undertake to decide. I will only say that my distinct impression on the spot was, that the structure was a rude kind of sundial, combining the vertical with the horizontal principle. That it could not be intended as a common doorway, even if it were connected with another building, is evident from the narrowness of the passage; but it may have had the purpose of serving as a sort of penitential or purgatory passage in consecrating and preparing the worshippers, previous to their offering sacrifices, by obliging them to squeeze themselves through this narrow passage, the inconvenience of which was increased by the awful character attributed to this cromlech. The religious character of the whole structure can scarcely be doubtful, from the nature of the flat stone, the channel in which was certainly intended to carry off the blood of the victim.

It must strike the observer, in regarding these ruins, that while they are so rude in principle, their style of execution evidently bears traces of art; and I think it not improbable that the art may be ascribed to Roman influence. We shall further on see another specimen of these curious pillars combined with the ground-plan of an almost regular Roman temple. But from whatever quarter this artistic influence may have proceeded, there cannot be the least doubt that the character of the structure is, on the whole, not Roman, but indicates quite another race; and if we take into regard what I have just said about the influence of art visible in this structure, and that such influence could scarcely proceed from any other quarter than that of the Carthaginians or the Romans, we must attribute these remains to the Berber race, who, during the historical period, were the exclusive possessors of these inland regions. Analogous structures have been found, however, not only in England and Ireland on the one side, and in several parts of India, principally in the Nilgherries, on the other, but also in Circassia, Southern Russia, on the South Arabian coast, and in the Somali country.

These remarkable ruins are at a short distance from the foot of a fortified hill, which is crowned with ancient fortifications of hewn stone, to which are added later works of small stones. Other ruins of cut-stone buildings lie about; and on an eminence at a little distance eastward is a small castle belonging to the earlier times of the Arabs, while on the highest top of the hilly chain behind the Arab encampment, and which is called Gábes, are likewise ruins. The ruins of a whole village, partly built of regularly cut stone, and even exhibiting the ornament of a column, were found the next morning near our encampment, which our people had placed on the slope of the hills bordering the plain towards the north-east. All these ruins are evident proofs that the fertile plain Elkeb, and the adjoining one, called Madher, were once well cultivated and thickly inhabited. Their situation is very favourable, as the direct road from Tripoli to Beni Ulíd and Sokna, by way of the valley Melgha, passes close by. We had here descended to an average height of about one thousand feet above the level of the sea.

During the night there was heavy rain, which lasted till morning, and delayed our starting till rather late. After about a mile and a half’s march, we ascended a little from the plain to the undulating pastures of the Dháhar Tarhóna, which soon became enlivened by the tents and herds of the Megaigera, and where I was glad to see at length a few cows. The ground, though scantily covered with herbage, was dotted with lilies, which my companion called balúdt, though this name is generally understood to signify the ash-tree. Our guide from Meruán informed me here that the water of this district takes its course not towards the north, as might be expected, but towards the south-east, running from hence to Temásla, on this side of Beni Ulíd, thence into the Wady Merdúm, and thence into Wady Sofejín, which, as is well known, descends towards Tawárgha. A little further on we left, on a small eminence to the left, another hanshír surrounded by cultivated ground. It had been an inconsiderable place, built chiefly of small stones; but even here two enormous pillars or slabs were to be seen standing in the midst of the rubbish. There were two holes in each of these pillars, going quite through, and widening on one side.

At half-past nine o’clock, when passing the Hanshír Bu-Trehébe, at a distance of more than two miles on our left, we had a fine retrospective view of the various peaks of the Ghurián range, while on our left a lower range approached more and more, with two summits rising from it to a greater elevation. About noon we passed another site, called Hanshír Suán, where are the remains of a large castle, with an inner and outer fortification, built of small stones, but in a very neat and regular style. The country, chiefly owing to the murkiness of the sky, had begun to assume a very sombre character, and was crossed by stripes of red sand, which, however, affords the best soil for the growth of the pumpkin; but in the afternoon it improved greatly, showing fine pasture-ground and ample corn-fields and, among the ruins of ancient times, the rare example of a well-proportioned and neatly worked Ionic capital, which I found at the border of a ravine. Further on, upon a detached low rock, which had been hewn into rectangular walls, and surrounded with a ditch, were seen ruins of cut stone, very similar in appearance to those of Kasr Jahalíyeh, near Gargash. We at length found traces of living beings, in an Arab encampment situated in a green hollow, where we learnt that the Kaïd or governor of Tarhóna, whose residence we were in search of, was at present encamped near the spring called ʿAin Shershára.

The country gradually assumes a more diversified aspect, agreeably succeeding its former monotony. A considerable mountain-range, with manifold crags, peaks, and ravines, approaches from the south-south-west and, turning north-east, presents an insurmountable barrier to an advance in that direction, while the plain sweeps nicely in a concave towards its foot; but it is quite bare and desolate, and only now and then is seen a poor remnant of the large olive-grove, consisting, according to the statement of our shoush, of 10,000 trees, which Bey ʿAbd Allah, in Masráta, my host on my former journey, had ventured to plant here five years ago. My people maintained, whether correctly or not I cannot say, that the strong gales which prevail in this plain did not allow the young olive-tree to thrive. I think the failure is due rather to the character of the inhabitants, who, unaccustomed to this branch of culture, have not paid the necessary attention to the young trees.

Having passed a small wady, we came in sight of the encampment of the governor, which stretched out in front of us in a well-chosen situation at the southern foot of a small cone. A Turkish officer’s green tent, pitched a little in advance, was surrounded by several smaller ones, while another group of twelve Bedouin tents, in a higher position up the slope of the mount, contained the household. The governor received us in a very friendly but rather affected manner, which seemed peculiar to him, and might even be thought becoming in a man who has assisted his country’s foes in exterminating all the members of his family, formerly one of the foremost in the country. His friends, who try to represent him as an honest man, say that he was forced to the deed, after having once entered into Turkish service. This man, Bel Kásem el Lohéshi Mahmúdi, has since played a conspicuous part in the present revolution; for he it was who led the Turkish force last year against Ghóma, his near relative but most bitter enemy, who, having been a prisoner in Trebizond for many years, suddenly made his escape from thence during the Russian war, and, issuing from the Tunisian frontier, appeared in Jebel Yefren. El Lohéshi was routed, and taken prisoner, and, according to the first report, slain by the successful rebel. When we visited el Lohéshi, he had occupied his new post only for the last year, having been before governor of the Jebel. During all the period he had been in Tarhóna, he assured us he had not moved his encampment from this place; which I can well understand, as it is a very pleasant spot. His principal business, of course, consists in collecting the tithes, in registering which he was busily employed. He knew very little of the province under his government; and it was to other men that I had to look for information.

Having pitched our tent near that of the governor, we proceeded to make ourselves acquainted with the locality, and, a few paces north from our encampment, stumbled upon the famous brook called ʿAin Shersher, or ʿAin Shershára, which, proceeding from the junction of three springs, forms here a cascade of about twenty-five feet over the firm calcareous rock. Running west a short distance, it then turns north and, breaking through the mountain-slope in a deep picturesque glen, takes the direction of the Wady Ramle, which, however, it only reaches during great floods.

It seems as if this pleasant spot had already been a favourite residence in the Roman times, as is amply shown by the fine ruins of a large building of hewn stone, which the torrent has rent asunder and scattered on both sides. From this place, ascending the side of a very wild ravine, we reached the height which overlooks the Bedouin encampment, and on the morning of the following day made a more distant excursion to the mount called Bu-tauwíl, about three miles north, which was represented to us as affording a very distant prospect, and the name of which seemed to promise more than ordinary elevation.

As to the view we were rather disappointed; yet we were well repaid for our trouble from the character of the country traversed, and the unexpectedly pleasing aspect of the terrace spread out at the western foot of the mountain, which must have formed a favourite retirement in the times of the Romans, so literally strewn is it with the ruins of buildings of hewn stone. In descending it, about three hundred feet below the summit, we first came to a Roman tomb, 8 ft. 7 in. long, and 7 ft. 9 in. broad, rising in two stories, the lower being about 10 ft. high from the base to the moulding, and ornamented with pilasters at the corners. A little further on, to the west, was another tomb, just on the brink of the slope into the valley below; but it has been destroyed, and at present the chief interest attaches to a monumental stone, which most probably stood upright on its top, and fell down when the monument went to pieces, so that it now lies in a merely casual position on the floor of the sepulchre, which has been repeatedly rifled by greedy hands. This stone is 7 ft. 2 in. long, and has on one side, in high relief, the figure of a man, of natural size, clothed in a toga. The workmanship is good, and certainly not much later than the time of Severus. Close at hand are other ruins lying about; and further west are several groups of buildings. Three olive-trees and a palm-tree adorned this beautiful retired spot.

Having returned to our encampment, I and my companion resolved to separate for a few days, Overweg wishing to examine the neighbourhood of the ʿAin Shershára for geological purposes, while I was rather bent upon executing the original plan of our route all round the mountain-range. We agreed to meet again at the castle called Kasr el Jefára in the plain near the sea-shore. We borrowed another tent from the governor for Mr. Overweg during his stay at this place, while I procured a horseman, with whom, together with Ibrahím, our shoush, and one of the camel-drivers, I was ready for starting an hour before noon; for the heat of the sun was not much to be dreaded at this season of the year. Overweg accompanied me as far as Kasr Dóga.

Winding along narrow ravines, after about one mile’s march we passed, on an eminence to our right, another specimen of large pilasters with an impost, and ruins of buildings of large square stones close by. After much winding, we cleared the narrow channel ascending the hills, which were covered with halfa; but here too there was not a single tree to be seen, and my guide said that there were no olive-trees in the Tarhóna except in Máta, a place situated between Mount Bu-tauwíl and Kasr Jefára, from which the tribe Máta derives its name. I have noticed before, as remarkable, the three olive-trees near Bu-tauwíl. It was about one o’clock in the afternoon when we came in sight of the Roman monument called Kasr Dóga; and its brown colour almost induced us to conclude that it was of brick; but on approaching nearer, we found that it was built of hewn stone. We were astonished at the grand dimensions of the monument, as it appeared evident that it was originally a mere sepulchre, though in after times blocked up by the Arabs, and converted into a castle.

The front of the monument faces the south with ten degrees of deviation towards the west. The whole body of the building, rising upon a base of three steps, measures 47 ft. 6 in. in length, and 31 ft. 4 in. in breadth. The entrance or portal, equidistant from both corners, was 12 ft. 6 in. wide; but it has been entirely blocked up with hewn stone, so that it is now impossible to get into the interior of the monument without great labour, and only a glimpse can be obtained of a kind of entrance-hall of small dimensions. Of the interior arrangement, therefore, nothing meets the view; but on the top of the solid mass of building, rising to a height of 28 ft. 10 in., the ground-plan of the third story, which has been demolished to obtain materials for closing the entrance is distinctly visible. Here the vestibule measures 10 ft. 10 in., the wall of the interior chamber or cell being adorned with two columns, which are no less than 3 ft. 10 in. apart: the inner room itself measures 22 ft. 4 in. in length within the walls. The monument, although more massive than beautiful, is a fair proof of the wealth of this district in ancient times. Opposite to it, on a limestone hill of considerable elevation, is another specimen of the cromlech kind in good preservation, besides other ruins. In the hollow at the south-east side of the sepulchre there are six deep and spacious wells sunk in the rock.

Here my companion left me, and I continued my route alone, passing through a well-cultivated tract, till I reached an encampment of the Welád Bu-Séllem, where we pitched our tent. Here I met a cousin of Haj ʿAbd el Hádi el Meráyet, who had once been master of half the Tarhóna district, but was made prisoner by the Turks, and sent to Constantinople. This man also reappeared on the stage last year.

We set out early in the morning, the country continuing flat as far as the chapel of Sidi ʿAli ben Salah, which, standing on a hill, is a conspicuous object for many miles round. At a short distance from this chapel, I observed the ruins of a castle built of large square stones taken from older buildings; it measures 42 ft. in every direction, and exhibits a few bad but curious sculptures, among others an ass in relief. Around are the ruins of a small village, and flat stones of immense size, similar in workmanship to those described above, but no upright pillars.

Beyond the chapel of the saint the country became more hilly, and after some time we entered a ravine joining the Wady Gedaera, which exhibited the remains of three broad and firmly constructed dykes, crossing the ravine at the distance of about eight hundred yards from each other. They were built of small stones, and were evidently intended to exclude the water from the lower part of the valley. Another eight hundred yards below the innermost dyke, the ravine widens out into a fine verdant hollow, stretching from west to east, and provided with several wells. On a detached hill rising in the midst of this basin, is situated the Kasr Dawán, built partly of older materials of hewn stone, partly of small stones, and probably of the same age as the dykes. The whole floor of the basin is strewn with ruins; and a considerable village seems to have extended round the castle: where the ground was free from stones, it was covered with ranunculuses. Altogether, this spot was interesting—the stronghold of a chieftain who appears to have had energy and foresight, but whose deeds are left without a record.

As soon as we emerged from this ravine the whole character of the country changed, and through a pleasant valley we entered a wider plain, bordered in the distance by a high range of mountains, among which the Jebel Msíd, crowned with a zawíya or convent, is distinguished by its height and its form.

The fine pasturage which this plain affords to the cows of the Mehaedi enabled their masters to regale us with fine fresh sourmilk, which interrupted our march very pleasantly. On the site of an ancient village, near the margin of a small torrent, I found the above curious specimens of upright pilasters, together with the impost, remarkable for their height as well as for the rough sculpture of a dog, or some other animal, which is seen on the higher part of one of them. About seven hundred yards beyond the torrent called Ksaea, we had on our right a large building of hewn stone about 140 yards square, besides six pairs of pilasters together with their imposts; but some of them are lying at present on the ground. These structures could never have been intended as doors or passages; for the space between the upright stones is so narrow, that a man of ordinary size could hardly squeeze his way through them. Other ruins are on the left.

Here we entered the mountain-chain which forms the natural boundary between the district of Tarhóna and that of Meselláta, and at the present time separates scenes of nomadic life from fixed settlements. The highest part of the chain round the Jebel Msíd remained on our left, while the height on the right decreased in elevation. The chain has little breadth; and we hardly reached its crest when the country that presented itself to our view had quite a different appearance from that just left behind, presenting among other objects the castle of Meselláta, surrounded by an olive-grove. In this spot ancient sites and modern villages with stone houses are intermixed, while thick olive-groves enliven the whole, and constitute the wealth of the inhabitants.

Having passed a village called Fatír, lying in a ravine that runs south-west, we soon descried, in a hollow at the southern foot of the Kasr Sʿaade (a small ancient fortress), the first olive-plantation and the first orchards belonging to Meselláta. From this place onward they succeed each other at short intervals. Having passed a small eminence, with a fine olive-grove in the hollow at its foot, we entered the beautiful and well-inhabited plain of Meselláta. Here a great deal of industry was evinced by the planting of young cuttings between the venerable old olive-trees, or ghúrs Faraón as the Arabs call them. My shoush affirmed that the inhabitants of Meselláta are the most industrious and diligent people in the whole regency, taking good care of their plantations, and watering them whenever they need it The whole country has here a different character from that of Tarhóna, the naked calcareous rock protruding everywhere, while in Tarhóna the plains generally consist of a clayey soil. This district is only about one thousand feet above the sea, while the average height of the Jebel (Yefren) and the Ghurián is about two thousand feet. Here the olives had been collected a month ago; in the former districts they remained still on the tree.

Cheered by the spectacle of life and industry around us, we continued our pleasant march, and having crossed an open space of rough rocky ground filled with cisterns, we reached the castle of Meselláta, an edifice of little merit, built with square stones from old ruins, and lying at the northern end of the village Kúsabát, which properly means “the Castles.” While my people were pitching my tent behind the castle, on the only spot which would allow of the pegs being driven into the ground, I went to pay a visit to Khalíl Aghá, who resided in the castle; but I found it to be so desolate and comfortless that I left it immediately, taking with me the sheikh Mesáud and a shoush named Ibrahím Tubbát, in order to view the Kalʿa or Gellʿah, a very conspicuous object, visible even from the sea. Keeping along the western side of the village, which consists of from three hundred to four hundred cottages built of stone, and occupies a gentle slope towards the south, the highest point of which, near the mosque, is 1,250 feet above the level of the sea, we reached a pleasant little hollow adorned with gardens, which being fenced with hedges of the Indian fig-tree, rendered the spot extremely picturesque. From hence we ascended the naked calcareous eminence, from the top of which the fortress overlooks a great extent of country. Going round its demolished walls, from east to west, I was able to descry and to take the bearings of a great number of villages belonging to the district of Meselláta, some of them peeping out of olive-groves, others distinguishable only by the smoke rising up from them.

The fortress itself is evidently a work not of Mohammedans, but of Europeans, and was most probably constructed by the Spaniards in the first half of the sixteenth century. It is built in the form of a triangle, one side of which, running north-west and south-east, measures about 108 yards; another, running east-north-east and west-south-west, measures 78½ yards, and the third, S. 5 W. and N. 5 E., 106½ yards. At the corner between the first and the second wall, is a polygonal bastion; between the second and third a round bastion, and a small one also between the third and the first wall. Descending from the fortress, I went with Mesáud through the village, the dwellings of which are built in a much better style than is usual in the regency. It is also stated that, in comparison with the rest of the country, its inhabitants enjoy some degree of wealth, and that the market is well supplied.

I rose at an early hour, in order to continue my route, and entered a very pleasant country, rendered more agreeable in appearance by the fineness of the morning. Winding along through hilly slopes covered with luxuriant corn-fields and wide-spreading olive-trees, we reached at half-past eight o’clock an interesting group of ruins consisting of immense blocks, and amongst them one like the flat quadrangular stones represented above, but having on its surface, besides the little channel, a large hole; also a block of extraordinary dimensions, representing a double altar of the curious massive sort described above. Close to these remarkable ruins, in a fine corn-field, is a small castle, situated upon a natural base of rock, in which subterranean vaults have been excavated in a very regular way. Towards the south, at the distance of about half an hour’s march, the large castle of Amámre rises into view. We then reached the fine plantation of Rumíyeh, while on a hill to the left lie other scattered ruins.

We met a good many people going to the Thursday market at Kúsabát. Further on, near another little grove, we found a small encampment of the Jehawát, a tribe which claims the possession of this whole district. We then passed a castle irregularly built of large square stones about twelve yards square. Having crossed a hollow, we obtained a good view over the country, in which the “Merkeb Sʿaid n ʿAli” (the most advanced spur of this chain towards the coast) formed a distinguished point, while we had already reached the last low breaks of the mountain-country towards the east. Meanwhile the greater dimensions of the ruins remind the traveller that he is approaching the famous remains of Leptis. I found here, a little to the right of our path, near a Bedouin encampment, the ruins of a temple of large proportions, called Sanem ben Hamedán, and of rather curious arrangement, the front, which faces the north and recedes several feet from the side-walls, being formed by double ranges of enormous stones standing upright—they can scarcely be called pilasters,—while the inner part is ornamented with columns of the Ionic order. The whole building is about forty paces long, and thirty-six broad; but the architectural merit of its details is not sufficient to repay the trouble of exact measurements. About a thousand yards further on, to the east, are the ruins of another still larger monument, measuring about seventy-seven paces in every direction, and called by the Arabs Kasr Kérker. It has several compartments in the interior—three chambers lying opposite to the entrance, and two other larger ones on the east side. Nearly in the middle of the whole building, there is a large square stone like those mentioned above, but having on one of its narrow sides a curious sculpture in relief.

The camels having been allowed to go on, I hastened after them with my shoush as fast as my donkey could trot, and passed several sites of ancient villages or castles, and numerous fine hollows with luxuriant olive-trees. I scarcely ever remember to have seen such beautiful trees. The country continues undulating, with fertile hollows or depressions. We reached the camels at Wady Lebda, which I found perfectly dry.

Close to our left we had cultivated ground and ruins. Near the sea-shore, the spacious and pleasant site of Leptis spread out on the meadow-land, while a little further, on rose a small ridge, on the top of which is situated the village Khurbet Hammám. After we had passed a pleasant little hollow, the plain became for a while overgrown with thick clusters of bushes; but on reaching the plantation of Swail, an almost uninterrupted line of villages stretched along the sahel (sea-shore) amid corn-fields and groves of olive and date-trees. According to my shoush, a great deal of corn is cultivated also in the valleys behind this plain; and numerous well-trodden paths were seen leading from the sahel into the hilly country on its southern side. After plentiful rains, this part of the plain is inundated by the waters of the Wady Bondári, which is called after the general name of the low range bordering the plain. Having passed several little villages of the sahel, and paid my due tribute of veneration to “el Dekhaele” (the oldest and tallest palm-tree in the whole district), a little before five o’clock in the afternoon I reached the village called Zawíya Ferjáni, where we pitched our tent in the stubble-field near a date-grove, and rested from our pleasant day’s march, experiencing hospitable treatment from our hosts.

The country hereabouts is regarded as tolerably healthy, but ʿAbd eʾ Saʿade, a village a little further eastward, has suffered greatly from malignant fevers, which are attributed to the unwholesomeness of the waters of the Wady Kʿaám, as I noticed on my former journey; hence the population has become rather thin, and industry has declined. At some distance from the wady, cultivation ceases entirely, and, instead of groves and gardens, a wide and wild field of disorder and destruction meets the eye. This rivulet, which is identical with the Cinyps, was in great vogue with the ancients, who knew how to control and regulate its occasional impetuosity. Immense walls, which they constructed as barriers against destructive inundations, remain to testify to their activity and energy. Of these one group, forming a whole system of dykes, some transverse, some built in the form of a semi-circle, is seen near the spot, where a beautiful subterranean aqueduct which supplied Leptis issues from the wady; another enormous wall, 650 yards long, and from 4 to 4½ yards thick, stands about three quarters of a mile higher up the valley.

Having started in the afternoon from the mouth of the wady, I re-entered Zawíya ʿAbd el Ferjáni from the rear, but finding that my people had gone on to Leptis, I followed them, after a little delay, by the way of Wady Súk, where every Thursday a market is held (“Súk el khamís,” a name applied by Captain, now Rear-Admiral, Smyth to the neighbouring village), and then over the open meadow-plain, having the blue sea on my right, and came up with my people just as they were about to pitch my tent at the foot of an enormous staircase leading to some undefined monument in the eastern part of the ancient city of Leptis. During the forenoon I was busily employed in a second investigation of some of the ruins of Leptis, which have been so well described and illustrated by Admiral Smyth. Near the small creek called Mirsá Legátah, and a little east of the chapel of the Merábet ben Shehá, a small castle has been lately built by the Turks, about a hundred paces square. It has quite a handsome look with its pinnacles and small bastions.

Leaving the site of this celebrated city, we proceeded, early in the afternoon, through a diversified hilly country, till we reached the high hill or mount of Mérkeb Sʿaid-n-ʿAli, which is visible from a great distance. This I ascended in order to correct some of my positions, particularly that of el Gellʿah in Meselláta, but found the wind too violent. Passing an undulating country, overgrown with the freshest green, and affording ample pastures to the herds of numerous Arab encampments, I pitched my tent near a small dowar of the Beni Jéhem, who treated us hospitably with sour milk and bazín.

The country continued varied, hill and dale succeeding each other; but beyond Kasr Aláhum (an irregular building of a late age), it became more rough and difficult, especially near the steep descent called Negási. Soon after this we descended into the plain, not far from the sea-shore, where we crossed several flat valleys. From the Wady Bú Jefára, where a small caravan going from Zlíten to the town overtook us, a monotonous plain, called Gwaea mtʿa Gummáta, extends to the very foot of the slope of Meselláta. Having traversed the desolate zone called el Míta mtʿa Terúggurt, whence may be descried the “úglah” near the shore, the residence of my old friend the sheikh Khalífa bú-Ruffa, we reached the broad and rock-bound valley Terúggurt itself, probably the most perfect wady which this part of the coast exhibits. To my great satisfaction, I met Overweg at the Kasr Jefára.

K. Jefára is also called Karabúli, from the name of a Mamlúk who, in the time of Yusuf Basha, built here a sort of convent or chapel. It is rather a “funduk,” or caravanserai, than a “kasr,” or castle, and the gates are always left open; but its situation is important, and it is the residence of a judge or kaíd. A battle between Ghóma and the Turks was fought in 1855 at no great distance from it. The country around is a monotonous plain, enlivened only by three small clusters of palm-trees towards the north. The following morning we proceeded, and encamped on the eastern side of Wady Raml. On Tuesday we returned to Tripoli well satisfied with our little excursion, and convinced that the Regency of Tripoli is not by any means so poor and miserable as it is generally believed to be.

CHAPTER IV.
DEPARTURE FOR THE INTERIOR.—ARRIVAL AT MIZDA.—REMAINS OF A CHRISTIAN CHURCH.

Meanwhile the instruments provided by Government had arrived, and proved in general well adapted for their purposes.[6] But the tents and arms had not yet reached us; and I thought it better to provide a strong, spacious, and low tent, which, even after the Government tents arrived, did not prove superfluous, although perhaps rather too heavy. All tents intended for travellers in hot climates should be well lined, and not high. Those which we received were quite unfit for the country whither we were going, and while they were so light that they could hardly withstand a strong blast of wind, they scarcely excluded the sun, particularly after a little wear and tear. All the tents ought also to have top-ropes, which can alone secure them in a tornado such as are common in those climates. Mr. Richardson was soon obliged to provide himself with another tent, so that in the course of our journey we had altogether five tents, but generally pitched only two, or, where we encamped for a greater length of time, four.

Mr. Overweg and I sustained a heavy loss in the secession of our black servant Ibrahím, who might have proved of great service to us in the interior, as he spoke the Bórnu and Bagrímma languages, and had himself wandered about a good deal in those little-known districts between Mándara and Bagírmi. But he declared that he could not remain in our service along with our servant Mohammed ben Belál, the son of a liberated Góber slave, who was a very clever but unscrupulous and haughty fellow, and bore the character of a libertine. But another cause of detention was the protest of his wives, who would not allow him to go unless he divorced them. We tried every means of settling the matter, but without success; so that we had only two servants, one of whom, Mohammed eʾ Zintáni, the lad I have mentioned before, would certainly not go further than Fezzán.

At length all was ready for our outset, except the boat, which caused Mr. Richardson a great deal of trouble, as it had been divided in Malta into two pieces instead of four. I proposed that we should pitch our tents for some days at ʿAin Zára, in order that we might be duly seasoned for our long journey. I would advise every traveller, who would calculate upon all the means of ensuring success, to adopt a similar course. A few days’ stay in his tent will familiarize him with the little store which is henceforward to form his principal, if not his only resource, and will enable him to bear the heat of the sun with ease.

It was late in the afternoon of the 24th of March, 1850, when Overweg and I, seated in solemn state upon our camels, left the town with our train, preceded by the consul, Mr. Crowe, in his carriage, by Mr. Reade, and by Mr. Dickson and his family, of whom we took a hearty leave under the olive-trees near Kasr el Haeni. We then continued our route, and in fine moonlight pitched our tent on the border of ʿAin Zára. This locality takes its name from a broad swampy hollow or depression to the south, thickly overgrown with reeds and rushes. At present no one lives in it; the wells are filled up with earth, and the date-trees, cared for by nobody, are partly overwhelmed by the sand which has accumulated in large mounds. Still it is an attractive spot, having just a little of cultivation and a little of sandy waste. A few olive-trees spread their fresh cool shade over a green meadow, forming a very pleasant resting-place. It was at this very spot that, in August 1855, on my joyful return, I again met Mr. Reade the vice-consul, and passed a night there.

Here we remained encamped till Friday the 29th. In the afternoon of the 27th, Mr. Frederic Warrington, who wished to escort us for a few days, came out, accompanied by the American consul Mr. Gaines, and brought us the satisfactory news, that on the following Friday Mr. Richardson would move from the town, and that we should meet him at Mejenín. I and my countryman required eight camels for our luggage, besides the two which we rode ourselves, and which were our own. I had been so fortunate as to procure an excellent Arab camel of the renowned breed of the Bú-Saef, which was my faithful companion as far as Kúkawa; and Mr. Warrington had made me a present of a handsome Ghadamsi saddle or basúr, with pillows and Stambúli carpet, so that I was comfortably mounted.

After a great deal of trouble (the camel-drivers and our men being as yet unaccustomed to our unwieldy luggage), we at length succeeded in making a start. After leaving the olive-trees and the little palm-grove of ʿAin Zára, we very soon entered deep sand-hills, which sheltered us from the strong wind; and after more than two hours we came upon pasture-grounds, which furnished our camels with a variety of herbs and gramineæ, such as the shʿade, the shedíde, and various others unknown to me. The progress of an Arab caravan (where the camels march each after its own inclination, straying to the right and to the left, nipping here a straw, and there browsing on a bush) must be rather slow in districts where the stubborn animal finds abundance of food. This way of proceeding is extremely tedious and fatiguing to the rider; and to obviate it the Tuarek, the Téb, and the people in the interior fasten all the camels one behind the other. Owing to our slow progress, the sun was almost setting when we overtook Mr. Warrington, who had pitched his tent on a fine pasture-ground near Bir Sbaea. The last hour and a half’s ride from the well Jenáwa lay along well-cultivated and flourishing corn-fields extending along the narrow wady of Mejenín, and intermingled with a rich profusion of flowers, principally the beautiful blue “khobbés.”

Having indulged for some hours in the quiet enjoyment of a fine morning and an open green country, I went with the shoush to look after Mr. Richardson’s party. After an hour’s ride through luxuriant corn-fields, and pasture-grounds enlivened by the horses of the Turkish cavalry, we found Mukni, the sailor, and all Mr. Richardson’s baggage; but he himself had not yet come up. I could not persuade the people to remove to our encampment; so I returned, after having paid a visit to the binbásha of the cavalry, who had been stationed here for the last seventeen years. He had contrived to procure himself a cool retreat from the sultry hours, by forming a regular tank, about two feet and a half square, in the midst of his tent, and keeping it always full of water. In the afternoon I made a long excursion with my Zintáni through the plain, beyond the chapel of Sidi Bargúb, in order to buy a sheep; but though the flocks were numerous, none of the shepherds would sell, as pasturage was abundant and every one had what he wanted.

Foggy weather indicated that rain was approaching; and just in time Mr. Richardson with his party arrived, and pitched his enormous lazaretto tent opposite our little encampment. Mr. Reade also had come from the town, in order to settle, if possible, the misunderstanding with our servant Mohammed, and see us off. It is an agreeable duty for me to acknowledge the many services rendered us during our stay in Tripoli. Our whole party was detained here the following day by the heavy rains; and Overweg and I were happy to get hold of the black servant of the ferocious pseudo-sheríf mentioned by Mr. Richardson, when that troublesome fellow was sent back to town, as we were much in want of another servant.

We fairly set out on our exhibition. The country became more diversified as we approached the defile formed by the Bátes and Smaera, two advanced posts of the mountain-chain, while the varied forms of the latter, in high cones and deep abrupt valleys, formed an interesting background. But the country hereabouts is cultivated with less care than Wady Mejenín; and the ground being more stony, presents of course more obstacles than the latter, while both districts are inhabited by the same tribes, viz. the Urgáat and the Akára. Even here, however, in the circle formed by the surrounding heights, was a fine extent of plain covered with corn-fields. Just at the entrance of the pass there is a well, where the road divides; and after a little consultation, we took the western branch, as our people feared that on the eastern we should not find water before night. Changing, therefore, our direction, we seemed awhile to keep off entirely from the mountain-range till we reached the wide but very rugged and rocky Wady Haera, which it was our object to reach at this spot, in order to fill our water-skins from the pools formed by the rains. The wady, indeed, looked as if it sometimes bore in its floods a powerful body of water; and a considerable dyke had been constructed in the early times of the Arabs, extending for two hundred paces from the wady eastward; but it has fallen to ruin, and the path leads now through the breach.

Resuming our march, after a good deal of delay, we turned sharp off towards the mountains, and at an early hour encamped on a very pleasant spot adorned with numerous sidr-trees (Rhamnus Nabeca); but instead of enjoying it in quiet, Overweg and I felt disposed to direct our steps towards a hill called Fulíje, about half an hour’s walk eastward, which promised to be a convenient point for obtaining correct angles of the prominent features of the chain, and proved to be so in reality. Having executed this task, therefore, we returned to our companions well satisfied, and spent the evening in the comfortable tent of Mr. Warrington. We had now reached the slope of the chain, where some of our people supposed that the boat would cause difficulties; but it could not well do so after being cut into quarters, which fitted to the sides of the camels rather better than the large quadrangular boxes. The most troublesome parts were the long oars and poles, which caused the camel much exhaustion and fatigue, by constantly swaying backwards and forwards.

The ground, soon after we had started the next morning, became stony, and, at three miles distance, very rugged and intersected by a number of dry watercourses. The landscape was enlivened not only by our own caravan, composed of so many heterogeneous elements, but also by some other parties who happened to be coming down the slope: first the Kaimakám of the Jebel, then a slave caravan, consisting of about sixty of these poor creatures, of whom the younger, at least, seemed to take a cheerful interest in the varied features of the country. The Wady Bú Ghelán, where the ascent commences, is here and there adorned with clusters of date-trees. In about an hour the first camels of our party reached the terrace of Beni ʿAbbás; and till the whole had accomplished the ascent, I had leisure to dismount from my tractable Bú-saefi, and to sit down quietly under a fine olive-tree near the chapel of the Merábet Sámes, watching them as they came up one by one, and cheered by the conviction that the expedition was at length in full train. The country was here hilly, and the path very often narrow and deeply cut in the marly soil. Further on, Overweg and I, together with our shoush, turned off a little to the right from the great caravan-road, and, passing through fine corn-fields interspersed with flowers of different kinds, reached the village Gwásem, lying at a short distance from the eastern foot of Mount Tekút, where we were treated with sourmilk by a friend of our companions. When we had overtaken our caravan, I found time to pay a visit to the Roman sepulchre, and ascertained that the base measured 24 ft. in every direction, the principal body of the monument, containing the sepulchral chamber, having fallen in entirely. From this point we began to ascend the second terrace, and reached the level of the plateau at two o’clock in the afternoon. The country had now a much more interesting appearance than when I was here two months before, being at present all covered with green corn. Having started in the direction of the castle, we descended, a little before reaching it, along the shelving grounds towards Wady Rummána, and encamped on the spot where the troops usually bivouac.

Here we remained the following day, when, in order to settle formally the demands of our camel-drivers, we had all our things accurately weighed by the officials of the castle. The little market did not grow busy till ten o’clock. The chief articles for sale were three head of cattle, one camel, some sheep and goats, a few water-skins, some barley, a few eggs, and sandals; but at noon it was moderately thronged. In the afternoon we paid a visit to several subterranean dwellings, but were disappointed in not getting access into an entirely new structure of this kind, formed of a much harder sort of clay. Our cheerful friend Mr. Warrington, in order to treat our party before he separated from it for a length of time which nobody could foresee, got an immense bowl of kuskus prepared, seasoned in the most savoury manner; and our whole party long indulged in the remembrance of this delicate dish as a luxury beyond reach. The site of our encampment was most pleasant: below us the wady, rich with varied vegetation; while towards the north the Tekút, with its regularly shaped crater towering proudly over the lower eminences around, formed a most interesting object. Though busy at an early hour, we did not get off till late; for many things were still to be settled here. We separated from Mr. Warrington: and of the three travellers I was the only one whom he was ever to see again.

Our path was at first very winding, as we had to turn round the deep indentation of the Wady Rummána, after which it took a straighter course, passing through several villages, with their respective olive-groves, till we reached Bu Sriyán, where the cultivation of the olive-tree ceased entirely for some distance, and the country became more open. Here we made another considerable deviation from our southerly direction, and followed a wide valley with much cultivated ground. Having reached the village Sémsa, situated upon an eminence to our right, we turned off eastward into a very pleasant ravine with an olive-grove, and then began the steep ascent towards the height Kuléba, which forms the passage over this southern crest of the plateau. While the camels in long rows moved slowly onwards, with their heavy loads, on the narrow and steep rocky path, I, allowing my camel to follow the rest, ascended directly to the village, which is situated round the eastern slope, and is still tolerably well inhabited, although many a house has fallen to ruin; for it has a considerable extent of territory; and owing to its situation as the southernmost point of Ghurián, the inhabitants are the natural carriers and agents between the northern districts and the desert. On the highest crest, commanding the village, there was formerly a castle; but it has been destroyed by the Turks.

Having descended a little into the barren valley, we encamped, at two o’clock in the afternoon, on the slope of the western hills, near the last scanty olive-trees, and not far from the well, from which we intended to take a sufficient supply of water to last us till we reached Mizda. While our people, therefore, were busy watering the camels and filling our water-skins, Overweg and I, accompanied by two of the inhabitants of the village, who had followed us, ascended a conspicuous mount, Jebel Toëshe, the highest in the neighbourhood, on the top of which a village is said to have existed in former times. We took several angles; but there is no very high point about Mizda which could serve as a landmark in that direction. The country through which we were marching, along irregular valleys, mostly of limestone formation, exhibited scattered patches of corn for about the first three miles, after which, almost every sign of cultivation suddenly ceased, and the “Twél el Khamér,” stretching from north-west to south-east, about two miles distant on the right, formed, as it were, the northern boundary of the naked soil. On its slope a few trees of the kind called radúk by the Arabs were seen from the distance. We then entered desolate stony valleys, famous for the bloody skirmishes which are said to have once taken place there between the Urfílla and the Welád Bu Séf, in the time of ʿAbd el Jelíl. Refreshing, therefore, was the aspect of Wady Ranne, which, extending from east to south-west, was overgrown with green herbage, and had two wells.

A little beyond, near the hill, or rather slope, called Shʿabet el Kadím, the latter part of which name seems, indeed, to have some reference to antiquity, we found the first Roman milestone, with the inscription now effaced: but further on, Mr. Overweg, who went on foot and was far behind the main body of our caravan, succeeded in discovering some milestones with inscriptions, which he regretted very much not being able to show me. Hereabouts commences the region of the batúm-tree, which, with the fresh green of its foliage, contributes a good deal to enliven and adorn some favoured spots of this sterile, gravelly tract. To the left of our path were some remarkable basaltic cones, starting up from the calcareous ridge. The ground was strewn with numerous flint-stones. About four o’clock P.M. I went to look at a curious quadrangular and regularly hewn stone, three feet in breadth and length, but only eight inches thick, which was standing upright at some distance from the caravan. It was evidently meant to face the west; but no trace of an inscription was to be seen. About a mile further on we encamped at the foot of the western chain, which rose to a height of about three hundred feet, and formed a narrow cleft with the eastern chain, which at this point closes upon it. In this corner (which collects the humidity of two valleys), besides several batúm-trees, a little corn had been sown. Panthers are said to be numerous in this region.

The next day we directed our march towards the pass, crossing the dry beds of several small torrents, and a broader channel bordered by plenty of batúm-trees. After an hour’s march, we had reached the summit of the pass, which now began to widen, the heights receding on each side, and a more distant range bounding the view. We found in the holes of the rocky bottom of Wady Mezummíta, which we crossed about half-past eight, several pools of rain-water, affording us a most refreshing drink; but it was quite an extra treat, owing to recent heavy rains which had fallen here, for in general the traveller cannot rely on finding water in this place. The ground becoming very stony and rugged, our progress was excessively slow—not above half an English geographical mile in seventeen minutes. The hills on our right displayed to the view regular layers of sandstone. Another long defile followed, which at length brought us to a plain called Wady Lilla, encompassed by hills, and offering several traces of former cultivation, while other traces, further on, bore testimony to the industry of the Romans. A small herd of goats, and the barking of a dog, showed that even at present the country is not wholly deserted. In our immediate neighbourhood it even became more than usually enlivened by the passage of a slave-caravan, with twenty-five camels and about sixty slaves, mostly females.

After having passed a small defile, we at length emerged into the north-west branch of the valley of Mizda, called here Wady Udé-Sheráb, the channel of which is lined with a considerable number of batúm-trees. Crossing the stony bottom of this plain, after a stretch of three miles more we reached the western end of the oasis of Mizda, which, though my fancy had given it a greater extent, filled me with joy at the sight of the fine fields of barley, now approaching maturity—the crop, owing to the regular irrigation, being remarkably uniform—while the grove of date-trees encompassed the whole picture with a striking and interesting frame. So we proceeded, passing between the two entirely separated quarters, or villages, distinguished as the upper, “el fók,” and the lower, “el utah,” and encamped on the sandy open space a little beyond the lower village, near a well which formerly had irrigated a garden. People going to Tripoli encamp at the other end of the oasis, as was done by a caravan of Ghadamsi people with slaves from Fezzán, on the following day.

Mizda, most probably identical with the eastern “Musti kome” of Ptolemy, appears to have been an ancient settlement of the indigenous inhabitants of North Africa, the Berbers, and more particularly of a family or tribe of them called “Kuntarár,” who even at present, though greatly intermixed with Arabs, have not entirely forgotten their Berber idiom. The oasis lies in the upper part of Wady Sofejín, or rather a branch of it, stretching out from south-west to north-east, which has in some parts a great breadth. The natural advantage, or productive principle, of the locality seems to lie in the circumstance that the humidity carried down by the Wady Sheráb is here arrested by a hill, and absorbed by the clayey soil. This hill is of a lengthened form, and consists entirely of gypsum.

The wells have little depth, and the water is drawn to the surface by means of oxen; but there being at present only three specimens of this precious animal in the place, the wells are far from being made use of to the extent which is practicable and has been once practised, as may be concluded from the pillars which extend to a considerable distance on the plain. The town, as I said, consists of two distinct quarters or villages, of which the western one, situated at the eastern foot of the hill, is by far the larger; it is built exactly in the character of the ksúr of the Algerian Sahara, with high round towers decreasing a little in width towards the upper part, and furnished with several rows of loopholes. The wall, purposely built with a great many salient and retiring angles, is in a state of decay, and many of the houses are in ruins; but the village can still boast a hundred full-grown men able to bear arms. The chief of this village always resides in it, while that of the other generally lives at some distance under tents. The circumference of the village, together with the palm-grove attached to its eastern side, and consisting of about two hundred trees, is 2,260 paces.

The lower or south-eastern village, the circumference of which is 600 paces, is separated from the former by an interval of about 400 paces, and has at present no palm-grove, all the gardens having been destroyed or ruined by neglect, and only twenty or thirty palm-trees now remaining scattered about the place. About 100 paces further down the declivity of the valley, is a group of three small gardens surrounded by a wall, but in bad condition; and at about the same distance beyond, another in the same state. The only advantage peculiar to this quarter is that of a large “zawíya,” the principal articles in the inventory of which are eight holy doves. But this also has now become but an imaginary advantage, as, according to its learned keeper’s doleful complaints, it is very rarely visited. In this as well as in the other quarter, all the houses are built of gypsum. As Mizda is a very remarkable feature in the country, I thought it worth while to make a particular sketch of the oasis also from this side.

This oasis is very diminutive; but two caravan-routes, one from Murzuk and one from Ghadámes, join at this point. The inhabitants are of a mild disposition, and enjoy the fame of strict honesty. Everything is here considered as secure; and the camels which cannot find food in the neighbourhood, are driven into the green valley at four or five minutes’ distance, and left there without a guardian. I make these statements advisedly, as reflections of a different kind have been made on their character. The people seem to suffer much from sore eyes. When we asked them about the most remarkable features of the road before us, they spoke of a high mount, Teránsa, which, however, we did not afterwards recognize.

In the afternoon I made an excursion with Overweg to Jebel Durmán, situated at the distance of a mile and a half south-east. It is rather a spur of the plateau jutting out into the broad valley, and, with its steep, precipitous, and washed walls, nearly detached and extremely narrow as it is—a mere neck of rock—looks much like a castle. Upon the middle of its steep side is a small zawíya belonging to the Zintán. The prospect from this steep and almost insulated pile could not, of course, be very extensive, as the mount itself is on the general level of the plateau; but we obtained a fine view over the sea of heights surrounding the broad valley and the several tributaries of which it is formed. Night was setting in, and we returned to our tent.

Having heard our Zintáni make frequent mention of an ancient castle with numerous sculptures, and situated at no great distance, I resolved to visit it, and set out tolerably early in the morning of the 9th of April, accompanied by the Arab and one of our shoushes. We had first to send for one of our camels, which was grazing at about three miles’ distance, in the sandy bottom of the wady south-east from our encampment. It was only on this occasion that I became aware of the exact nature of the valley of Mizda, and its relation to the Wady Sófejín; for we did not reach this latter wady until we had traversed the whole breadth of the sandy plain, and crossed a mountain-spur along a defile called Khurmet bu Mátek, at the distance of at least eight miles from our encampment. This is the famous valley mentioned, in the eleventh century, by the celebrated Andalusian geographer El Bekri. Figs and olive-trees adorn its upper part, which is said to stretch out as far as Erhebát, a district one day and a half beyond Zintán; barley is cultivated in its middle course, while wheat, from which the favourite dish ʿajín is made, is grown chiefly in its lower part near Tawárgha. The valley seems worthy of better fortune than that to which it is reduced at present; for when we marched along it, where it ran S. 20 W. to N. 20 E., we passed ruins of buildings and water-channels, while the soil exhibited evident traces of former cultivation. I listened with interest to the Zintáni, who told me that the valley produced an excellent kind of barley, and that the Kuntarár, as well as the people of Zintán, his countrymen, and the Welád Bu-Séf, vied with each other in cultivating it, and, in former times at least, had often engaged in bloody contests for the proprietorship of the ground. When I expressed my surprise at his joining the name of his countrymen with those of the other tribes hereabouts, he gave me the interesting information that the Zintán had been the first and most powerful of all the tribes in this quarter before the time of the Turks, and held all this country in a state of subjection. Since then their political power and influence had been annihilated, but they had obtained by other means right of possession in Mizda as well as in Gharíya, and still further, in the very heart of Fezzán, by lending the people money to buy corn, or else corn in kind, and had in this way obtained the proprietorship of a great number of the date-trees, which were cultivated and taken care of by the inhabitants for a share of the produce. Formerly the people of Zintán were in possession of a large castle, where they stored up their provisions; but since the time of the Turkish dominion, their custom has been to bring home the fruits of their harvests only as they want them. In Wady Sháti we were to meet a caravan of these enterprising people.

While engaged in this kind of conversation we entered a smaller lateral valley of Wady Sófejín, and reached the foot of a projecting hill on its western side, which is crowned with a castle. Here it was that I was to find marvellous ancient sculptures and drawings; but I soon perceived that it would be as well not to cherish any high expectations. The castle, as it now stands, is evidently an Arab edifice of an early period, built of common stones hewn with some regularity, and set in horizontal layers, but not all of the same thickness. It forms almost a regular square, and contains several vaulted rooms, all arranged with a certain degree of symmetry and regularity. But while we pronounce the main building to be Arab, the gateway appears to be evidently of Roman workmanship, and must have belonged to some older edifice which the Arab chieftain who built this castle probably found in the place,—a conjecture which seems to be confirmed by several ornamental fragments lying about.

It is a pity that we know so little of the domestic history of these countries during the period of the Arab dynasties, though a step in advance has been made by the complete publication of Ebn Khaldún’s history; else we should regard with more interest these relics of their days of petty independence. This castle, as well as another, the description of which I shall subjoin here, though it was visited some days later, is called after a man named Khafáji ʿAámer, who is said to have been a powerful chief of great authority in Tunis no less than in Tarábolus (Tripoli).

The other ruin, related to this one as well by name as by the style of its workmanship—but in many respects more interesting, having been evidently once a place of Christian worship—stands on a narrow and detached neck of rock in the Shʿabet Um el Kharáb, and, from its whole plan, appears to have been originally and principally a church about forty-three feet square, sufficiently large for a small congregation, and with more art and comfort than one can easily suppose a Christian community in these quarters ever to have possessed. Hence greater interest attaches to this building than it would otherwise deserve. It closes with a plain apsis, in which there are two openings or doorways leading into an open room stretching behind it and the side-naves, and is divided into three naves, the middle one of which is eight paces, and the lateral ones six and a half wide. The naves are divided from one another by columns with differently ornamented capitals supporting arches, all in the so-called round style of architecture. I made purposely a sketch of two different capitals, in order to show their designs; and I think they are very characteristic. But it is curious to observe that the walls also appear to have been originally painted on stucco, though at present but a small piece of it remains near the corner; hence I conclude that the date of the painting was later than that of the erection of the church.

The front of the building has suffered in some degree from the depredations of the Arabs, who are said to have carried away a great many sculptures from this place—as much, indeed, a man from Mizda would have made me believe, as fifty-five camel-loads. However exaggerated this statement may be, it is evident that the whole layer over the entrance was originally covered with ornamental slabs, while now only two remain to the left of the doorway; and these, though in the same style of sculpture as the capitals, would rather seem to have been taken from another edifice. There are many debatable points involved in the consideration of this building. The first fact clearly shown is the existence of a Christian community or a monastery in these remote valleys, as late as the twelfth century at least, under the protection of a powerful chief; and this is not at all improbable, as we know that Mohammed expressly ordered that zealous priests and monks should be spared, and as we find so many monasteries in several other Mohammedan countries. That it was not merely a church, but a monastery, seems plainly indicated by the division into apartments or cells, which is still clearly to be seen in the upper story. Attached to the north side of the church was a wing containing several simple apartments, as the ground-plan shows; and on the south corner of the narrow ridge is a small separate tower with two compartments. Near this ruin there is another, which I did not visit, called Ksaer Labayed mtʿa Derayer, while a third, called Ksaer el Haemer, has been destroyed.

CHAPTER V.
SCULPTURES AND ROMAN REMAINS IN THE DESERT—GHARÍYA.

We lost the best part of the morning, our men not being able to find their camels, which had roamed over the whole wady. Our road was almost the same as that by which I had returned the previous day; and we encamped in the Wady Sófejín, on a spot free from bushes. From this place, accompanied by the Zintáni, I visited, the next morning, the castle or convent in Shʿabet Um el kharáb, which I have described, and thence struck across the stony plateau in order to overtake our caravan. It was a desolate level, rarely adorned with humble herb or flower; and we hastened our steps to reach our companions. Here I heard, from the Zintáni, that his father came every year about this season, with his flocks, to the valleys east of our road, and that he would certainly be there this year also. He invited me to go thither with him, and to indulge in milk to the extent of my wishes; as for myself, I declined, but allowed him to go, on condition that he would return to us as soon as possible.

Even after we had overtaken the caravan, the country continued in general very bare; but we passed some valleys affording a good deal of herbage or adorned with some fine batúm-trees. About five o’clock P.M. we encamped in Wady Talha, not far from a Roman castle or tower on a hill to our left. On visiting the ruin, I found it built of rough stones without cement, being about twenty feet square in the interior, with rounded corners, and with only one narrow gate, towards the east. But this was not the only remnant of antiquity in the neighbourhood, for in front of us, on the plateau, there appeared something like a tower of greater elevation; and proceeding early the next morning, when our people had only begun to load, to examine it, I found it to be a Roman sepulchre, originally consisting apparently of three stories; but of these only the base and the first story remain, while the stones belonging to the upper one are now scattered on the ground, and show that it was ornamented with small Corinthian columns at the corners. Even in the most desolate spot, everything left by the Romans has a peculiar finish. The first story, being all that at present remains, measures 5 ft. 4 in. on the east and west, and 5 ft. 9 in. on the north and south sides. Not far from this sepulchre are the ruins of another one, of which, however, nothing but the base remains, if, indeed, it was ever completed. By the time my drawing was finished, the caravan had come up.

I then passed several detached cones, the steep precipitous sides of which, formed by the breaking away of the strata, looked like so many castles, and traversing Wady Marsíd, reached the camels. They marched to-day at a very good rate, the quickest we had as yet observed in ordinary travelling—namely, half a mile in twelve minutes, making a little less than two and a half miles an hour; but we afterwards found that this had now become our usual rate, whereas before reaching Mizda we had scarcely ever exceeded two miles an hour. The load of the camels, of course, had been heavier in the beginning; but this can hardly be the only reason of the difference. The greater dreariness of the country, and the impulse of our camel-drivers and their beasts to get to their homes, must be taken into account. I must here observe that Overweg and I measured our rate repeatedly, with a chain provided by Government, although it was a very fatiguing labour, and injurious to our dignity in the eyes of our people. Gradually the day grew very uncomfortable, a hot west wind driving the sand into our faces, and totally obscuring the sky. Keeping along the Wady Téroth, sometimes more than a mile wide, we had on our left a broad mount, rising first with a gradual ascent, but in its upper part forming a steep and lofty wall called el Khaddamíyeh. Here, too, according to the information of my faithful Arab, there is said to be a Roman sepulchre. Having passed a small defile, and crossed another valley, we had other Roman ruins on our right, a castle as it seemed, and near it something like a sepulchre; but the sand-storm hardly allowed us to look, still less to go in that direction.

At three o’clock in the afternoon we turned off to the west into Wady Tagíje, and encamped near the bed of a torrent eight feet deep, which amply testifies that, at times, a considerable stream is formed here, a fact confirmed by the fresh and luxuriant herbage springing up in many parts of the valley among thick bushes and brushwood. Nor was it quite desolate even now; for the flocks of the Welád Bu-Séf were seen, and their tents were said to be not far off. The upper part of the valley is called el Khúrub.

This hot day proved a dies ater to my Arab, who had gone to visit his family. Having brought his old father with him, together with a goat, as a present, and a skin of milk, he unluckily arrived too late in the morning at our last night’s encampment. He then sent his father back with the goat, and began to follow us in the hope of soon overtaking the caravan; but he was obliged to march the whole intensely hot day without water, and he could not drink the milk in the skin, which became quite hot, so that he suffered greatly, and arrived in a very exhausted state.

The fine herbage procured us a whole day’s rest, as the camel-drivers were in no haste to bring up their camels. Not knowing this, but yet convinced that we should not start at an early hour, as the well was at some distance, and following the information received from the Zintáni, who was himself too lame to accompany me, I had taken my gun and pistols at an early hour in the morning, and gone in the direction of the valley to look after a monument. After nearly two hours’ march I distinguished something like a high pillar, and, proceeding straight towards it, found it to be one of the richest specimens of this kind of monument bequeathed to us by antiquity, and an indisputable proof that these regions, now so poor, must have then supported a population sufficiently advanced in taste and feeling to admire works of a refined character.

The monument rises, upon a base of three steps and in three stories, nearly to a height of forty-eight feet. The base contains a sepulchral chamber 4 ft. 10⅓ in. long, and 4 ft. ⅛ in. broad, with three niches, one on the north, and two on the east side. This side was the principal face of the monument, forming its most ornamented part. The first story measures at its base on the east and west sides 5 ft 5⅜ in., and on the north and south sides 4 ft. 10⅛ in.: it consists of six layers of stones, on the lowest of which is represented a pair of wild animals, probably panthers, with their fore legs or paws resting upon a sepulchral urn, as if they were watching it; on the next layer above is seen the handsome bust of a young female; two layers intervene without sculpture; and the fifth is ornamented on all the four sides with hunting-scenes. The frieze on every side is formed by four rosettes; but that on the north side has some additional decoration, the second rosette on that side, from the east, exhibiting a group of centaurs, and the fourth a cock. Upon this part of the frieze is a garland of clusters of grapes; then follows the moulding.

In the second story the third layer forms the sill and lower part of a false door very richly ornamented, and on the fifth layer a pair of genii hold a coronal over the door of the sepulchre, a representation which seems to intimate Christian ideas. Above it a niche contains the busts of a man and his wife; but on the north side an elderly woman occupies a niche with her bust, probably in her character as proprietress of the single sepulchral niche of the tomb below. Above is an ornament with two bunches of grapes; and then follows the frieze, of the common Ionic order. The moulding is surmounted by a pyramidal roof about twelve feet high, which has lost its summit; otherwise the whole monument, with the exception of the sepulchral chamber, which has been broken up in search of treasures, is in the best state of preservation, notwithstanding its very slender proportions,—a circumstance very remarkable, after a lapse of at least more than sixteen centuries. No wonder that the natives of these regions now regard these tall sepulchral monuments, so strange at present in this land of desolation, as pagan idols, and call them “sanem;” for I myself, when alone in front of the monument in this wide, solitary valley, and under the shadow of the deep, precipitous side of a plateau adjoining the Khaddamíye on the east, felt impressed by it with a certain degree of awe and veneration.

My sketch being finished, I was still attracted to a greater distance up the valley by something which seemed at first to be another monument; but it was only a mark fixed by the Arabs, and served but to lengthen my march back, which was more slow, as the heat had set in. But I was well satisfied with my morning’s work; and my companions were greatly astonished when they saw the sketch. In the afternoon I made with Overweg another excursion in the opposite direction, when after an hour’s march we ascended a height and obtained a most interesting view over this singular tract, which seems to be the fragmentary border of a plateau torn and severed by ravines and precipices, so that only wall-like cliffs, rising like so many islands out of a sea of desolation, indicate its height. A high craggy ridge towards the west, with precipitous pinnacled walls, looked like a castle of the demons. Just in a ravine on the border of this wild scene of natural revolutions, my companion had the good luck to find some very interesting fossils, particularly that beautiful specimen which after him has been called Exogyra Overwegi; but our zeal had carried us too far, and it grew dark as we commenced our return, so that we had some difficulty in groping our way back to our encampment, where we arrived weary and fatigued, after having caused our people a good deal of apprehension.

We were roused from our refreshing sleep as early as two o’clock after midnight; but this was a mere sham of our camel-drivers, who feigned making up for the loss of yesterday, and after all we did not get off early. Our road carried us from wady to wady, which were generally separated from each other by a defile, occasionally presenting some difficulty of passage. We left a castle of Roman workmanship, as it seemed, in the distance to the left, and further on to the right a slight stone wall called Hakl el Urínsa, dating from the petty wars between the Arab tribes. We had already passed a few small ethel-bushes; but now we came to a most venerable-looking old tree called Athelet Si Mohammed fi Useát, spreading out its weather-beaten branches to a considerable distance: under this I sat down quietly for a while, waiting for our people, who were still behind. The caravan at length came up; and continuing our march, we soon passed on our right hand the chapel of a great Merábet of the Welád Bu-Séf, called Si Rashedán. The Welád Bu-Séf in general enjoy great authority with the other tribes for their sanctity of life and purity of manners; they allow no stranger to come near their villages, but pitch a tent for him at a distance, and treat him well.

The Welád Bu-Séf are remarkable for the excellent breed of their camels, which they treat almost as members of their families. It is curious that this tribe, intent upon right and justice, has waged war incessantly from ancient times with the Urfílla, the most warlike and violent of the tribes of these regions. It is difficult to make out whether they are related to the Welád Bu-Séf of the western part of the desert, who are likewise distinguished by their peculiar manners, but who it seems would scruple, on religious grounds, to call a man ʿAbd eʾ nebi (Slave of the Prophet), which is the name of the ancestor of the Eastern Bu-Séf.

Emerging from a defile, upon high ground, early in the afternoon, we obtained a view over Wady Zémzem, one of the most celebrated valleys of this part of North Africa. It runs in general from west to east-north-east, and is furnished with a great many wells, the most famous of which are el Abiadh, Sméla, Nákhala, Urídden, Halk el Wady, and, a little further down, Téder. In half an hour we encamped in the valley, full of herbage and with a goodly variety of trees. A caravan coming from the natron-lakes, and carrying their produce to Tripoli, was here encamped. I could not withstand the temptation of ascending, in the afternoon, a projecting eminence on the south side of the valley, which was broken and rent into a great variety of precipices and ravines; but its summit, being on a level with the plateau, did not afford me such a distant view as I had expected. The cliff was formed of strata of marl and gypsum, and contained many fossil shells.

As soon as we left the bottom of the valley, the path, which became rugged and stony, led up the southern cliffs, went round the east side of the conspicuous promontory, and then continued to wind along between the slopes of the higher level of the plateau. A hill, distinguished from among the surrounding heights by the peculiar shape of its cone, has here received the significant name Shúsh el ʿabíd—the Slaves’ Cap. A little further on, the roads separate, that to the left leading along the principal branch of the valley to the little town Gharíya, while the eastern goes to the well Taboníye. One might suppose that in a desolate country like this, and just at the entrance into a desert tract of great extent, the caravans would gladly avail themselves of those abodes of life which still exist: but this is not the case; they avoid them intentionally, as if a curse were attached to them, and those places, of course, fall every day more and more into decay. After a little consultation, the path by Taboníye was thought preferable, and we took it. The rough and stony character of the country ceased, and we gradually entered a fine valley, called Wady Tolágga, richly clothed with a variety of trees and bushes, such as the sidr, the ethel, the ghurdok, and several others. After meeting here with a caravan, we caught the gladdening and rare sight of an Arab encampment, belonging to the Urínsa, and obtained some milk. Without crossing any separation or defile, but always keeping along the same valley, we approached the well Taboníye. But near it the vegetation is less rich; the soil is intermixed with salt, and covered with a peculiar kind of low tree called by the present inhabitants of the country, frʿo,—a term which in pure Arabic would only mean “a branch.”

While our people were busily employed pitching the tents, I went at once to examine a monument which, for the last hour of our march, had stood as a landmark ahead of us. I reached it at the distance of a mile and a quarter from our encampment, over very stony and rugged ground. It was well worth the pains I had taken; for, though it is less magnificent than the monument in West Tagíje, its workmanship would excite the interest of travellers, even if it were situated in a fertile and well-inhabited country, and not in a desolate wilderness like this, where a splendid building is of course an object of far greater curiosity. It is a sepulchre about twenty-five feet high, and rising in three stories of less slender proportions than the monument above described, and is probably of a later period. [The sketch on the preceding page] will suffice to give an exact idea of it.

Near this is another sepulchre, occupying a more commanding situation, and therefore probably of older date, but it is almost entirely destroyed; and a third one in an equally ruinous state, but of larger proportions than either, is seen further south-east. These monuments serve to show that the dominion of the Romans in these regions was not of momentary duration, but continued for a length of time, as the different styles of the remains clearly proves. It may be presumed that no common soldier could pretend to the honour of such a tomb; and it is probable that these sepulchres were destined to contain the earthly remains of some of the consecutive governors or officers stationed at the neighbouring place, which I shall soon describe.

Like a solitary beacon of civilization, the monument rises over this sea-like level of desolation, which, stretching out to an immense distance south and west, appears not to have appalled the conquerors of the ancient world, who even here have left behind them, in “lithographed proof,” a reminiscence of a more elevated order of life than exists at present in these regions. The flat valley below, with its green strip of herbage, stretches far into the stony level; and beyond, north-eastwards, the desolate waste extends towards Gharíya.

I returned to the encampment, which meanwhile had sprung up on the open space round the well, and was anxious to quench my thirst with a draught of the precious liquid; but the water was rather salt, and disagreed with me so long as I continued to use it,—that is, for the next seven days. That we might make good use of our leisure hours, all three of us went the next day to Gharíya, or rather Gharíya el gharbíya—i.e., western, to distinguish it from the more distant eastern place of the same name.

Cheerfully as we set forward, we were heartily glad when, after a three hours’ march, we saw the northern tower of the place become visible over the monotonous stony plain, the wide and unbounded expanse of which seemed to indicate something above a single day’s excursion. After having also descried the half-ruined dwellings of the village, we were eagerly looking out for the palm-grove, when we suddenly reached the brink of a deep ravine, in which, on our left, the fresh green plantation started forth, while all around was naked and bare. We crossed the ravine, leaving the grove on our left, and ascended the opposite cliffs towards the ruined cluster of miserable cottages, when, having traversed the desolate streets, we encamped outside the Roman gate, the massive and regular architecture of which formed a remarkable contrast to the frail and half-ruined structures of the village. We were greatly astonished to find such a work here.

It has but little resemblance to the Roman castle or station at Bonjem, such as it is seen in Captain Lyon’s drawing; for while the latter represents a single gateway flanked by two quadrangular towers, the building at Gharíya consists of three archways, flanked by towers with receding walls. The two smaller gateways have been almost entirely filled with rubbish; the upper layer likewise is gone, and only those stones which form the arch itself are preserved, the centre stone above the principal arch, bearing the inscription “PRO. AFR. ILL.” (provincia Africæ illustris), encircled by a coronal, while that above the eastern side-gate is ornamented with a large sculpture, the lower part of which it is difficult to make out distinctly, except the trace of a chariot and a person in curious attire following it, while the upper part represents two eagles in a sitting posture, with half-extended wings, holding a coronal, and at each end a female genius, in a flying posture, stretching out a larger and a smaller coronal. Besides this, and a few Berber names, there is no inscription now on the building; but an inscription found in another place, which I shall soon mention, and which was probably originally placed over the small archway on the right, seems to leave no doubt that this fortification dates from the time of Marc. Aurel. Severus Antoninus, and if not built in the years between 232 and 235 after Christ, at least was then in existence.

As the ground-plan, which is here subjoined, evidently shows, this is not by itself a complete building, and could only afford quarters to a very limited number of soldiers acting as a guard: in fact it can only be the well-fortified entrance into the Roman station; but of the station itself I was unable to discover any traces, though a great quantity of stones from some building lie scattered about in the village. The only ancient building which I was able to discover, besides the gate, was a cistern at the north-west corner of the wall, near the slope into the wady, which is here very precipitous. It was probably 60 ft. long, for at 30 ft. there is an arch dividing it; but one half of it, except a space of about 8 ft., has been filled with rubbish: its breadth is 5 ft. 3½ in. Perhaps the whole fortification was never finished; the inner edge of the stones would seem to intimate that not even the gateway received its entire ornament.

While I was busy making a drawing of the ruins, Overweg, who, in order to measure the elevation of the place by boiling water, had directed his steps to a rising ground at some distance north of the village, which was crowned with a tower, sent to inform me that on the tower was a large Roman inscription, which he was unable to make out; and as soon as I had finished my sketch I went thither. It is a round Arab tower, only two large ancient stones having been made use of as jambs, while a large slab, covered with an inscription, is used as an impost, owing to which circumstance the inhabitants generally regard even the tower as a Christian or Roman building. The inscription, which was evidently taken from the fortified station, is 32⁷⁄₁₂ in. long, and 15¹⁰⁄₁₂ in. high, and consists of nine lines. It has been read and interpreted by Mr. Hogg in the following manner.

I(mperatori) Caes(ari) M. Aurelio Severo Alexandro P(atri) P(atriæ) P(i)o Felici Aug(usto) Et pagus et senatus et castr(um) [or castrum munitum] et municipium ... d. d.; poni curavit Severianæ P. Nero situs vexillationis leg(ioni)s IV. S(cythicæ); [or legionis XXI. Victricis Severianæ] dec(urio) Maurorum e(t) solo (o)pere (e)andem vexillationem instituit.

“To the Emperor Cæsar M. Aurelius Severus, Father of his Country, Pious, Happy, Augustus, the district, the senate, the camp, and free town of ... dedicate (this).... P. Nero Decurion of the Moors, caused the station of the Severian regiment (horse) of the 21st Legion, Victorious, Severian, to be established; and he instituted by his own act the same regiment.”

As for the tower, or nadhúr, it was evidently erected in former times in order to give timely notice when a band of freebooters—“el jaesh” (the army), as they are called here—was hovering around the solitary village; for this seems to have been the chief cause of its destruction, the Urfílla being said to have been always watching and lying in ambush round this lonely place, to attack and rob small parties coming from or going to it; they are said even to have once captured the whole place. The consequence is, that it has now scarcely thirty male inhabitants to bear arms, and is avoided by the caravans as pestilent, the water, they say, being very unwholesome. The small remnant of the inhabitants have a very pale and ghastly appearance, but I think this is owing rather to the bad quality of their food than to that of the water. In former times it is said to have been celebrated on account of a merábet of the name of Sidi Mʿadi.

As soon as I had sufficiently examined the ruins and the village, I hastened to the bottom of the ravine. The contrast between the ruined hovels of the village, perched on the naked rock, and the green, fresh plantation, fed by a copious supply of water, is very great. Thick, luxuriant, and shady clusters are here formed, principally around the basin filled by the spring, which rushes forth from beneath a rock, and gives life to the little oasis; its temperature I found, at half-past one o’clock P.M., 70½° Fahr., while that of the air was 70°. The number of the date-trees, though small, is nevertheless larger than in Mizda, and may be nearer to 350 than to 300. The water of the ravine after a heavy fall of rain joins the Wadi Zemzem, the principal valley of this whole district, which together with Wady Sófejín and Wady Beï, carries all the streams collected hereabouts to the sea.

According to our Zintáni, the path leading to Taboníye from the western village first lies over the hammáda, then crosses a ravine called Wady Khatab, leads again over the plateau, crosses another wady, and at length, after about ten miles, as it seems, reaches the ravine of Gharíya eʾ sherkíya, stretching from west to east, the grove, of about the same extent as in the other oasis, being formed at the north and west bases of the rocky height upon which the place stands. At the side of the village there is, he said, a large Roman castle, far larger than that in the western one, of about eight or ten feet elevation at present, but without an arched gateway of that kind, and without inscriptions. On the east side of the eminence are only a few palms, and on the south side none. The village is distinguished by a merábet called Bu-Sbaeha. Neither from the Zintáni nor from anybody else did I hear that the inhabitants of these two solitary ksúr are called by the peculiar name Warínga; I learnt it afterwards only from Mr. Richardson’s statement, and I have reason to think that the name was intended for Urínsa.

We returned by a more northern path, which at first led us through a rather difficult rocky passage, but afterwards joined our path of yesterday. Overweg and I had no time to lose in preparing for our journey over the hammáda, or plateau, while Mr. Richardson was obliged, by the conduct of the ill-provided and ill-disciplined blacks who accompanied him, to follow us by night. We therefore got up very early next morning, but lost a good deal of time by the quarrels among our camel-drivers, who were trying, most unjustly, to reserve all the heavy loads for the camels of the inexperienced Tarki lad ʿAli Karámra, till they excited his indignation, and a furious row ensued. This youth, though his behaviour was sometimes awkward and absurd, excited my interest in several respects. He belonged to a family of Tawárek, as they are called, settled in Wady el Gharbi, and was sent by his father to Tripoli with three camels, to try his chance of success, although members of that nation, with the exception of the Tinylkum, rarely visit Tripoli. He was slender and well-formed, of a glossy light-black complexion, and with a profile truly Egyptian; his manners were reserved, and totally different from those of his Fezzáni companions.

At length we were under way, and began gradually to ascend along the strip of green which followed the shelving of the plateau into the valley, leaving the Roman sepulchre at some distance to our right. The flat Wady Labaerek, which is joined by Wady Shák, was still adorned with gattúf and rétem. It was not till we had passed the little hill called Lebaerek, and made another slight ascent, that we reached the real level of the terrible Hammáda; the ascent, or shelving ground, from Taboníye to this point being called el Mudhár mtà el Hammáda, and the spot itself, where the real Hammáda begins, Bú-safár, a name arising from the obligation which every pilgrim coming from the north, who has not before traversed this dreaded district, lies under, to add a stone to the heaps accumulated by former travellers.

But, notwithstanding all the importance attached to the dreary character of this region, I found it far less naked and bare than I had imagined it to be. To the right of our path lay a small green hollow, of cheerful appearance, a branch of which is said, probably with some degree of exaggeration, to extend as far as Ghadámes; but the whole extent of the Hammáda is occasionally enlivened with small green patches of herbage, to the great relief of the camel. And this, too, is the reason why the traveller does not advance at a rate nearly so expeditious as he would expect. In the latter part of our preceding journey we generally had made almost as much as two and a half miles an hour; but we scarcely got over two on this level open ground. Of course, the wider the space the wider the dispersion of the straggling camels; and much time is lost by unsteady direction. At the verdant hollow called Garra mtà eʾ Nejm the eastern path, which is called Trík el mugítha (via auxiliaris), and passes by the village of Gharíya, joined our path.

At Wady Màmúra I first observed the little green bird generally called asfír, but sometimes mesísa, which lives entirely upon the caravans as they pass along, by picking off the vermin from the feet of the camels. In the afternoon we observed, to our great delight, in the green patch called el Wueshkeh, a cluster of stunted palm-trees. Hereabouts the camel-drivers killed a considerable number of the venomous lizard called bu-keshásh; and the Tarki in particular was resolute in not allowing any which he saw to escape alive. After a moderate march of little more than ten hours and a half, we encamped in a small hollow called, from a peculiar kind of green bush growing in it, el Jederíya. A strong cold wind, accompanied by rain, began to blow soon after we encamped. The tent, not being sufficiently secured, was blown down in the night; and we had some trouble in pitching it again.

Continuing our march, we passed, about ten o’clock in the morning, a poor solitary talha-tree bearing the appellation of el Duhéda. Further on we found truffles, which in the evening afforded us a delicious truffle-soup. Truffles are very common in many parts of the desert; and the greatest of Mohammedan travellers (Ebn Batúta) did not forget them in relating his journey from Sejelmása to Waláta, in the middle of the fourteenth century. The sky was very dark and hazy; and the moon had an extraordinary “dára,” or halo. We slept this night without a tent, and felt the cold very sensibly.

The march of the following day was a little enlivened by our meeting with two small caravans: the first, of five camels; the second, belonging to Ghadámsi people, and laden with ivory, of fifteen. With the latter was also a woman, sitting quite comfortably in her little cage. Shortly after half-past one o’clock in the afternoon, we had reached the highest elevation of the Hammáda, indicated by a heap of stones called, very significantly, Rejm el erhá, 1,568 feet above the level of the sea. We encamped soon after, when a very heavy gale began to blow from the north-north-west driving the swallows, which had followed our caravan, into the tent and the holes formed by the luggage; but the poor things found no protection, for our tent, which was light and high-topped, was blown down again during the night, while a heavy rain accompanied the storm, and we as well as our little guests were left awhile without shelter, in a very uncomfortable situation.

We started rather late the following morning, entering now upon the very dreariest part of the Hammáda, called el Hómra. So far there had been only one track over this stony plateau; but in the afternoon a path, called Msér ben Wáfi, branched off towards the left. This path, which leads to the eastern parts of Wady Sháti, formed formerly the common road to Fezzán, the road by way of el Hasi being considered as too insecure, on account of the robberies of the Urfílla. Hence the latter is still called the new road, “Trík el jedíd.” Richardson, who had had enough of the inconveniences of travelling by night, easily got in advance of us this morning, after our short march of yesterday, and had advanced a good way by daytime. We were therefore anxious to come up with him; and on our way we encountered a heavy shower of rain before we pitched our tent. The whole caravan being once more united, the increased variety of our own party relieved a good deal of the feeling of monotony arising from the desolate character of the country through which we travelled. After marching about seven miles, we arrived at the greenest and largest hollow of the Hammáda, called Wady el Alga, which we ought to have reached yesterday, in order to be able to get this day as near the well as possible.

As it was, when we encamped in the afternoon, we had still a long day’s march before us, and therefore the next day, from general impulse, in order to make sure of our arrival at the well, we started at an early hour, keeping the caravan together by repeated shouting. After a march of about twelve miles, we reached the first passage leading down from the Hammáda and called Tníe Twennín; but it was too steep and precipitous for our rather heavily laden caravan, and we had to continue till we reached the Tníe el ʿArdha, a little after eleven o’clock, when we began to descend from the plateau along a rough winding pass. The sandstone of which it is formed presented to us a surface so completely blackened, not only in the unbroken walls of the ravine, but also in the immense blocks which had been detached from the cliffs, and were lying about in great confusion, that at first sight anybody would have taken it for basalt; but when the stones were broken, their real nature became apparent. Over this broad layer of sandstone, which in some places covered a bed of clay mixed with gypsum, there was a layer of marl, and over this, forming the upper crust, limestone and flints.

After a winding course for an hour, the narrow ravine, shut in by steep, gloomy-looking cliffs, began to widen, and our direction varied less; but still the whole district retained a gloomy aspect, and the bottom of the valley was strewn with masses of black sandstone, while the country ahead of us lay concealed in a hazy atmosphere, which did not admit of an extensive view. Eager to reach the well, the caravan being scattered over a great extent of ground, we three travellers, with one of the shoushes, pushed on in advance, the south wind driving the sand, which lay in narrow strips along the pebbly ground, into our faces. We cherished the hope of finding a cool little grove, or at least some shade, where we might recline at ease after our fatiguing march; but, to our great disappointment, the sand became deeper, and nothing was to be seen but small stunted palm-bushes. But even these ceased near the well, which was dug in the midst of the sandy waste, and had once been protected by an oval-shaped building, of which nothing but crumbling ruins remained.

It was a cheerless encampment after so fatiguing a march; but there was at least no more fear of scarcity of water, for the well had an abundant supply. No name could be more appropriate to this place than el Hasi (the well). There is no need of any discriminating surname; it is “the Well”—the well where the traveller who has successfully crossed the Hammáda may be sure to quench his own thirst and that of his animals. But it is not a cheerful resting-place, though it is the great watering-place on this desert road, as he has to cross the fearful “burning plain” of the Hammáda before he reaches the spot. There are several wells hereabouts, which might easily supply with water the largest caravan in an hour’s time; for the water is always bubbling up, and keeps the same level.

The well at the side of which we had encamped is rather narrow and deep, and therefore inconvenient for a large party; but it is, though slightly, protected by the ruins around against the wind, which is often very troublesome, and was particularly so on the evening of our arrival. Formerly there was here a sort of fortified khan, such as is very rarely seen in these parts, built by the tribes of the Notmán and Swaíd, in order to protect their caravans against the pillaging parties of the Urfílla, originally a Berber tribe. This building consisted of simple chambers, twenty, as it seems, in number, lying round an oval court which has entrances from north and south. It is thirty paces long by sixteen wide, the centre being occupied by the well, which, as it is dug in the sandy soil, bears the general name Hasi. It has a depth of five fathoms; and its temperature was found to be 71⅗° Fahr. The quality of the water, in comparison with that of Taboníye, was very good. The elevation of this place was found by Overweg to be 696 feet; so that we had descended from the highest point of the Hammáda 742 feet.

As it was, we felt heartily glad when our steady and heavy Tripolitan tent being at length pitched, we were able to stretch ourselves without being covered with sand. All the people were greatly fatigued, and required repose more than anything else. Out of regard to the men as well as to the camels, we were obliged to stay here the following day, though the place was comfortless in the extreme, and did not offer the smallest bit of shade. Scarcely any of our places of encampment on the whole journey seemed to me so bad and cheerless as this. If I had had an animal to mount, I would have gone on to a cluster of three or four date-trees, which are said to be at the distance of about three miles west from the well, and belong to the people of Zintán, to enjoy a little shade; but our camels were too much distressed.

CHAPTER VI.
WADY SHATI.—OLD JERMA.—ARRIVAL IN MÚRZUK.

There are three roads from el Hasi: the westernmost called Trík eʾ duésa, after a small cluster of palm-trees; the second, called Trík eʾ safar, stony and more desolate than the former, but half a day shorter; and the third, or eastern, leading directly to Bírgen. When we at length left our uncomfortable encampment at el Hasi, our camel-drivers chose the middle road, which proved to be dismal and dreary. But the first part of it was not quite so bad, the appearance of granite among the rocks causing a little variety, while tamerán and shíʿah clothed the bottoms of the valleys; and we had a single specimen of a beautiful and luxuriant batúm-tree. When, however, we began to enter the region of the sand-hills, intermixed with rocky ridges and cliffs, the character of the country became desolate in the extreme.

We travellers, being in advance, chose our resting-place for the first night near a high rocky mass called el Medál, against the wish of the camel-drivers, who would rather have encamped in the Shʿabet eʾ talha, further on. The summit of the rocky eminence afforded a very interesting prospect over this singular district; and our younger shoush discovered, lower down, some scrawled figures. He came running up to inform me of his discovery; but it was of no interest, a cow and a sheep being the only figures plainly recognizable. The Fezzáni people come hither in spring, when the rain-water collects in the cavities of the rocks, and stay some months, in order to allow the camels to graze on the young herbage, which then shoots up here in profusion. Ben Sbaeda during such a stay here had lost a son, near whose tomb the camel-drivers said a prayer, or zikr, early the next morning.

Continuing our march, we soon came to the Shʿabet eʾ talha, the bottom of which is clothed with the brushwood called arfísh, and with the rétem, or broom. Further on, when we came upon the higher rocky ground, the country grew more sterile, though we were so fortunate as to catch two gazelles. Black masses of sandstone jutted out on all sides, and gave a wild air to the desolate region through which we were passing. The sterile character of the scene underwent no change till next morning, when, on advancing about a mile and a half, we came to the Wady Siddre, which was enlivened by a few talha-trees. A narrow defile led us from this place to the Wady Boghár, whence we entered another defile. Mid-day was past, when we obtained a distinct view of the date-grove in Wady Sháti, and the high sand-hills which border the valley on the south. Towards the north it was rather open, and we hastened on to escape from the hot desert through which we were marching; but a good while elapsed before we reached the border of the valley, which on this side abounded in herbage. After a mile and a half we reached the first wild palm-trees, thriving in separate and casually formed groups. Then followed a belt of bare black ground, covered with a whitish crust of salt. The town, on the top of a broad terraced rock, seemed as far off as ever. But I urged on my Bu-Séfi along the winding path over the hard ground; Richardson and Overweg followed close behind, while the camel-drivers had fallen back to exchange their dirty costume for one more decent. At length we reached the north-western foot of the picturesque hill, and chose our camping-ground beyond the shallow bed of a torrent between the date-trees and the corn-fields, near the largest fountain,—a very agreeable resting-place, after the dreary desert which we had traversed.

We had felt tired so long as the place was yet ahead of us; but we had no sooner reached it than all fatigue was gone, and Overweg and I, under the guidance of a mʿallem, went forth to view the interesting features of the locality. It is certainly a very rare spectacle in this quarter of the world, to see a town on the top of a steep terraced hill in the midst of a valley, and occupying an advantageous position which might be supposed to have given the place great importance from very ancient times. Éderi seems to have been a considerable place till fourteen years ago, when the independent spirit of its inhabitants was broken by the despotism of ʿAbd el Jelíl ben Séf eʾ Nasr, the famous chief of the Welád Slimán. The old town on the top of the hill having been destroyed, and there being no longer a necessity for a fortified residence, under the civilized though exhausting government of the Turks, the new village was built at the northern foot of the hill, on which side lies the chapel of the Merábet Bu-Derbála, and another of less fame, a little east of the former, called Sidi ʿAbd eʾ Salám.

The new village has two gates. Crossing it, we ascended the steep narrow streets of the old town, which seems to have been densely inhabited, and from the highest part, which is one hundred and ninety feet above the bottom of the valley, obtained a very interesting view over a great part of the wady, with its varied features,—here, black sandstone, which in several places forms hills of considerable extent; there, green fields of wheat and barley; then, again, a large grove of date-trees scattered in long narrow strips behind the high sand-hills bordering the valley on the south. The black ground, covered with a whitish crust, lay bare and naked in many parts, while in others it was entirely overgrown with herbage. Towards the south the slope of the rock on which, the town stands is rather steep and precipitous. On this side lies the caverns which have been already noticed by Oudney, and which are interesting only on account of the oval-shaped form in which they have been excavated, as they are neither remarkable for dimensions nor for regularity; their general shape is this. A larger group of caverns has been made in a detached rocky eminence, upon which at present the cemetery is situated; but it is only seventy-two feet in length, and its ground-plan is far from being regular.

From this place I went through the adjoining grove, which, with a little more care, might easily become a very beautiful plantation; for there are a great many wells of very little depth, and the water is led through the channels with slight trouble. Our encampment in the beautiful moonlight, with not a breath of wind to disturb the tranquillity of the scene, was pleasant in the extreme, and we all felt much delighted and greatly restored.

Early on Sunday morning, after having finished my sketch of the village on the hill, with our encampment in the foreground, I took a walk all round the scattered groups of the plantation, which must have suffered a great deal from ʿAbd el Jelíl, even though the number of six thousand trees, which he is said to have cut down, be an exaggeration. Towards the east side the salt crust is still thicker than on the west, and is very unpleasant for walking. I found here that, in addition to wheat and barley, much amára was cultivated in the garden-fields, besides a few figs; but I saw no grapes. Several families were living here outside in light huts or sheds made of palm-branches, and seemed to enjoy some degree of happiness. At the south-east end of the plantation rose a hill also formed of marl, and very similar to that on which the town is situated. The names of the villages along the valley, proceeding from west to east, are the following: after Éderi, Témesán; then Wuenzerík, Berga (a couple of villages distinguished as B. el foka and B. el utíyah), Gúta, Turut, El Ghurda, Meherága, Agár, Gógam, Kosaer Sellám, Támezawa, Anerúya, Zeluáz, Abrák, Gíreh, Debdeb, and Ashkiddeh. The valley has two kaíds, one of whom, ʿAbd el Rahmán, resides at present in Temesán, while the residence of the other ʿAgha Hassan eʾ Rawi, is in Támezawa. Meherága seems to be the most populous of the villages. Abrák has the advantage of a school.

We left our picturesque encampment in order to commence the passage over the sand-hills which separate the shallow “rent” of Wady Shiyáti from the deeper valley the Wady el Gharbi, the great valley par excellence. It is rather singular that even the higher ground, which is elevated about fifty feet above the bottom of the valley, is entirely covered with a crust of salt. Having traversed this, we began the ascent of the sand-hills, which in several favoured spots presents small clusters of palm-trees, which too have their proprietors. Mukni, the father of Yusuf, Mr. Richardson’s interpreter, is said to have killed a great many Welád Slimán hereabouts. The most considerable of the depressions or hollows in the sand, which are decked with palm-trees, is the Wady Shiúkh, which afforded in truth a very curious spectacle,—a narrow range of palm-trees half-buried between high sand-hills, some of them standing on the tops of hillocks, others in deep hollows, with the head alone visible. At length after a good deal of fatigue, we encamped in Wady Góber, another shallow cavity between sand-hills with brackish water and a few palm-trees. Here our camel-drivers themselves possessed a few trees, and, of course, were more interested in the inspection of their own property than in starting at an early hour the next day.

When we resumed our march we found our work more difficult than before, the sand-hills assuming a steepness most trying for the camels, particularly at the brink of the slopes. We were several times obliged to flatten away the edges with our hands, in order to facilitate the camel’s ascent. I went generally a little in front, conducted by Mohammed ben Sbaeda, one of our camel-drivers, who, from the moment we had entered Fezzán, had exchanged the quarrelsome character by which he had made himself disagreeable to us, for very obliging and pleasing manners, and was anxious to give me every information. He told me that this belt of sand extended in south-west and north-east direction from Dwésa as far as Fukka, a place, according to him, five days’ march on this side of Sókna. He added, that, however high and steep we might think these sand-hills, they were nothing in comparison with those in the direction of the natron-lakes; but, in making this remark, I think he wanted to excuse himself and his companions for taking us this long way round by the west. He knew that it was our desire to visit the natron-lakes, and that our direct way to Murzuk led by those lakes, while their object was to take us to their native village Ugréfe. Mohammed stated that each district in Fezzán has its own peculiar dialect; and he contended that, while the inhabitants of Wady Sháti speak a good sort of Arabic, similar to that spoken in Mizda, the people of the great wady (Wady el Gharbi) make use of a corrupt dialect.