ady Gharby collecting provisions, and,
I imagine, passing their leisure hours with the Fezzanee ladies, which
they could not very well do in Mourzuk. The morality of these people is
easy enough, and no doubt the pilgrimage covers a multitude of sins.

Talazaghee is remarkable for some bas-reliefs cut on the naked sandstone
rocks of the wady, in a very peculiar style; the principal tableau, if I
may so call it, about four feet by three in size, is a battle between
two persons, one having a bird's head, and the other a bullock's, with a
bullock between them taking part in the fray. Each person is holding a
shield or bow. The sculptures are mere outline, but deeply graved and
well shaped. There are several other tableaux, representing animals, but
chiefly bullocks. This would seem to intimate, that in the days when
these forms of animals were chiselled bullocks were the animals employed
for the transport of men and merchandise over the desert. No camels
occur, as in other tablets. These sculptures are very properly said by
our escort to be neither Arab nor Tuarick, but belong to the people that
existed before these races. The principal tableau has a very Egyptian
look about it; the oxen are well formed, and would do credit to a modern
artist. There is one bas-relief figure of an ox with its neck in a
circle, as if representing some of the games of the Circus. The other
animals most distinctly seen are ostriches; the rocks around are,
besides, covered with Tuarick characters, but nothing interesting.

We started late on the 6th, for the Tuaricks had allowed their camels to
stray, and we waited some time for them: however, we were obliged, after
all, to start without them, and having made five hours and a half
halted. Our course had lain over the plateau, which about half way
became broken up into valleys. One of these, called Anan Haghaneen, led
us into the pleasant and picturesque wady of Mana Samatanee, where only
in this part of the route can be found herbage for camels. There are
also a few tholukh-trees. What a desolate region is all this, despite
the little spots of vegetation! There are no signs of animal life,
except traces of the wadan. For two days, they tell us, we are to have
little or no water. Now and then we pass desert mosques,--square, or
circular, or cross-shaped walls of stone, some with two entrances, built
for the devotion of chance passengers. The mountains on the east are
called El Magheelaghen. To-da