nearly all sandy places, a hole is scooped in the sand and then covered
over, or left to be filled by the action of the wind after the khafilah
is supplied. Two pretty palms point, as with two fingers, to the buried
wells of El-Makmak.

Some of our people noticed the lizard to-day. This seems to be the
omnipresent animal of the Sahara, inhabiting its most desolate regions
when no other living creature is seen. It changes in species with the
nature of the country. To-day, those seen are large; very soon they will
become small, meagre, and will change colour. In the valleys I have
observed them nearly the same colour as the sandy soil. Perhaps the
beetle is nearly as common as the lizard in the desert, being found in
its most arid and naked wastes. It is generally a big, round,
black-bottle beetle, which produces a trail in the sand that may be
mistaken for that of the serpent.

Still the following day we had to cross the same kind of desert, under
the enervating influence of the gheblee, or hot wind; the thermometer in
the sand reached 130°. Although the camels were eight hours on foot,
little progress was made. I stopped an hour to rest in Wady El-Jumar,
where were two or three palm-groves. One of the Fezzanees ferreted out a
lot of dates, hidden in the sand, and taking some distributed them
amongst us.

Thus refreshed we pushed on to encamp in Wady El-Takadafah, where there
is a well of water, good to drink, but disagreeable in smell, like that
of Bonjem. The odour resembles that of a sewer, and is produced by
hydrogen of sulphur. We have had good water every day in this sandy
tract, and I have no doubt that some may be found in every wady, a
little below the surface. Birds begin now to reappear: a few swallows, a