bed of a torrent nearly a mile broad,[1] covered with a thin coat of caked mud: in the centre is a line of pits from three to four feet deep, with turbid water at the bottom. Around them were several frame-works of four upright sticks connected by horizontal bars, and on these were stretched goats'-skins, forming the cattle trough of the Somali country. About the well stood troops of camels, whose Ísa proprietors scowled fiercely at us, and stalked over the plain with their long, heavy spears: for protection against these people, the citizens have erected a kind of round tower, with a ladder for a staircase. Near it are some large tamarisks and the wild henna of the Somali country, which supplies a sweet-smelling flower, but is valueless as a dye. A thick hedge of thorn
- ↑ This is probably the "River of Zayla," alluded to by Ibn Sa'id and others. Like all similar features in the low country, it is a mere surface drain.
French Government, entitled, 'Voyage en Abyssinie execute pendant les annees 1839-43, par une commission scientifique composee de MM. Theophile Lefebvre, Lieut, du Vaisseau, A. Petit et Martin-Dillon, docteurs médecins, naturalistes du Museum, Vignaud dessinateur.' The botanical portion of this work, by M. Achille Richard, is regarded either as a distinct publication under the title of Tentamen Floræ Abyssinicæ, or as a part of the Voyage en Abyssinie. M. Richard enters into some of the particulars relative to the synonyms of the plant, from which it appears that Vahl referred Forskäl's genus Catha to the Linnæan genus Celastrus, changing the name of Catha edulis to Celastrus edulis. Hochstetter applied the name of Celastrus edulis to an Abyssinian species (Celastrus obscurus Richard), which he imagined identical with Forskäl's Catha edulis, while of the real Catha edulis Forsk. he formed a new genus and species under the name of Trigonotheca serrata Hochs. Nat. Ord. Hippocrateaceæ. I quote the following references from the Tentamen Floræ Abyssinicæ, vol. i. p. 134: 'Catha Forskalii Nob. Catha No. 4. Forsk. loc. cit. (Flor. Ægypt. Arab. p. 63). Trigonotheca serrata Hochs. in pl. Schimp. Abyss, sect. ii. No. 649. Celastrus edulis Vahl, Ecl. i, 21.' Although in the Flora Ægyptiaco-Arabica of Forskäl no specific name is applied to the Catha at p. 63, it is enumerated as Catha edulis at p. 107. The reference to Celastrus edulis is not contained in the Eclogæ Americanæ of Vahl, but in the author's Symbolæ Botanicæ (Hanuiæ, 1790, fol.) pars i. p. 21. (Daniel Hanbury signed).
