“At the foot of these masses, to the southward and to the westward, are the varied and cultivated lands of Mesurata: there are seen endless groves of palm-trees and olives, among which are scattered numerous villages and gardens, rich tracts of corn land, flocks of sheep and goats, and every where a moving and busy population. To the northward and on the eastern side, the hills are bounded by a promontory of sand-stone and the sea. To the south-eastward, a tenantless and desolate waste, without a single object rising from its surface, lies stretched in one long unbroken line, as far as the eye can range. Not a single tree or shrub is on that side to be seen; not a single house or tent; not a single human being or animal of any description. In fact, the effect of the Greater Syrtis, from this place, is that of a dreary moor – a wide tract of level waste land without any thing to distinguish one part of it from another but the windings of a marsh, which threads its dark surface, and is lost in different parts of the unbroken horizon. A more comfortless scene can scarcely be imagined than is presented by the opening of this celebrated region, so little known at any period of history.
“As a general description of the marsh above mentioned, we should say that it commences at Mesurata, and extends southward along the coast as far as Giraff; occupying altogether a space of 101 miles by 15, and narrowing towards its southern termination. A small part of the marsh only was covered with water when we crossed it; but from the alternate laminae of salt and alluvial deposits, as well as from the numerous small shells, principally of the trochus kind, which cover its surface, it is evident that the sea at times wholly inundates it. Our guides were constantly representing to us the danger there was of sinking, with all the usual hyperbole of Arab description. As we suspected, however, that they only made difficulties in order to save themselves the trouble of attending us in our excursions, we paid but little attention to their observations of this nature; and continued to cross the marsh, whenever our duties rendered it necessary that we should examine either the coast or the country beyond it, taking no other precautions than those of keeping in such places as appeared to ourselves to offer the firmest footing. The crusted surface occasionally gave way under our horses’ feet, and discovered hollow spaces of various depths underneath, at the bottom of which appeared water: but as none of us ever sank in very deeply, we concluded that these hollows were too trifling to be dangerous, till experience at length convinced us that a portion of truth was mixed up with the exaggerated accounts of our guides, and induced us to use more precaution.”
In following the route along the coast of the Greater Syrtis, which must have been us formidable to the vessels of the ancients as its sands were supposed to have been to their armies, the first rising ground which occurs, of any tolerable dimen-
