Dec. 29th.—About five hours after we started, the route opened into a bon fide hamadah. All around us stretched a limitless plain. Our course lay always south, and we journeyed ten hours, with sand in the evening.

Yesterday I had observed a few footmarks of the giraffe, but to-day they were everywhere visible. They were double, as this animal does not move its feet one after another, like the camel or the horse, but two of its feet together, or simultaneously. We saw the footprints of young as well as old ones. This plateau is the real home of the giraffe. No place could be better adapted for such an unwieldy creature. There is abundance of small tholukh, on which it feeds; all the country is open around to it, and it is out of the reach of ferocious animals. Towards the evening the marks of the giraffe disappeared, and were succeeded by the footprints of what is here called the wild ox (but which Overweg believes to be a large species of gazelle), so that one animal appears to have made room for the other. The day was cool and cloudy.

The plain is intersected with shallow beds and streams, and in some places evident marks of an abundance of water in the rainy season.

30th.—We started early for the well, but did not reach it till late in the evening, after a march of nine hours. The well is called Chidugulah, and is situated on the side of a valley of some depth. In the bed of this valley Overweg found some infusoria, clay or stone.

Many people started in the night to get water, and give their animals a drink. There is but a small supply, and what there is has a muddy, chocolate colour. The last water we took up from the valleys of Asben had a milky hue, so that when the coffee was made of it, it looked like cafÉ au lait.

Bandits and hostile tribes frequent this well of Chidugulah, and rest hereabouts to pillage caravans. Our people spoke of the Oulimad, and Overweg dreamed he was fighting with them. I dreamed the same night of large turtles, for it had been said they are found in this plateau, and their marks had been traced to-day. I learn now that large turtles, two feet and a-half long, and one foot and a-half broad, are found here. The back shell of one was used for a watering trough by the people we met en route. We had sand all day, rising occasionally in considerable mounds. I observed the prevailing winds in the formation of these mounds; for there is always an inclined plane towards the quarter whence the wind blows; whilst to where it blows the mounds are scarped. The winds prevailing now are E.N.E.; and the wind has nearly always come from this direction since our arrival in Aheer. In another season, however, there may be a total change. In full summer it may be south, for what we know. In fact, Amankee says, in summer the wind always comes from the south. At this season the sand is covered with nice herbage in some places, but in the hot weather it must be all dried up. This is, in truth, the spring time in this country; the birds are all laying. There are also young birds fledged. In Haussa there is no word for "fledged."

This route must really present, in some parts, for many hours together, an ocean of sand; as, I think, it is described in the Itinerary procured by Davis. To-day the footprints of the giraffe have entirely disappeared.

In summer it must be very difficult for large caravans to obtain water from this well, for our people were full half a day filling four or five skins. What a blessing, nevertheless, is the existence of the Chidugula, for there is no water for three days farther. The boys killed this morning a jerboah, or what the Germans call a jumping mouse. I saw one yesterday, jumping before my camel's feet. There are a great number here. This jerboah is of a different colour from those I have seen in Tunis; being white all over the lower part of the body and neck, straw-coloured on the top of the head and along the back; whilst those in Tunis are nearly of the same colour as ordinary mice. This species is also small, three inches and a-half long, and the tail is double the length of the body. The hind legs are nearly as long as the body, and the fore legs not half an inch. Near the tip of the tail there is an inch of black. Many young jerboahs were caught, all of the same description. The Haussa people call it a mouse, but have besides a special name.

We are now about the middle of the Sahara, including the radii of the western and northern coasts, and we here find an immense plateau, stretching many days north and south, east and west. So far Le Brun's conjecture is right, that the central parts of Africa are plateaux, or one vast plateau. But more of this hereafter. This plateau extends to the Bornou route, and how much further east is yet to be ascertained. In the west we yet also want information. North and south it extends along the territory of Aheer some eight days, or about one hundred and sixty miles. Overweg reckons the height of the plateau, above the level of the sea, at some fifteen hundred feet.

31st.—The last day of the year! One year gone in Africa this tour! How many more are to pass? Alas! who can tell?—We came to-day nine hours, always south, over a perfect desert-plain, mostly sandy. A cold north-east wind was blowing all the day. The people dread it as death itself; as well they may, for they are nearly naked. Their Soudan cotton clothes afford them little or no protection against such a bleak north-easter. Europeans are astonished to see these people shivering with cold in this bleak weather, and forget that they themselves are well clothed. This remark is very applicable to the northern coast, where hundreds of the poor are seen shivering, with only a thin blanket thrown around them in the coldest day of winter. When they see a European well covered with tight cloth clothes, and flannel underneath, they may well call out sega, "cold," as they often do; and we are ready to laugh, and forget they are naked.

In this part of the desert birds of prey abound. We passed to-day some twenty large vultures, feeding on a dead camel. When the caravan filed by they all took wing, and perched themselves in a row on a rising mound of sand, and there waited until we had passed before them, like so many soldiers. These were black vultures, and of enormous breadth of wing. Many wild oxen, or what are so called, were seen, and everywhere the footprints of ostriches and gazelles. His highness En-Noor made us a present of two ostrich eggs, and we supped on this out-of-the-way delicacy the last day of the year. The date of the black country (Soudan) is deserving of notice. It is called in Bornou, bitu; and in Haussa, aduwa and tinku, both tree and fruit. Its kernel, or stone, is very large, and the little pulpy matter upon it has the taste of a bitter sweet. It is about the size of an almond, and covered with a green husk, a little thick. This fruit is now ripening fast in Aheer. The tree is covered with thorns, very large, and projecting in every direction. The leaves are small, almost without veins, and with a thick stalk.

To-day we had the karengia, or bur, with a vengeance. En-Noor had already advertised us of its appearance hereabouts two days ago. It is certainly the most troublesome thing that can well be conceived for all travellers, and more so for Europeans. This bur is from a species of herbage bearing grain, very small, and which the people make bazeen of, like ghaseb and other grain. All feet of men, women, and animals, were to-day covered with this teasing bur.

The animals seen on this plateau, it will be seen, are in reality mostly of the harmless kind. The giraffe, the wild ox (considered a species of immense gazelle, or stag), the gazelle, a large and small species, the ostrich, the guinea-fowl, the hobara (in Haussa, tuja), various kinds of vultures, the crow, many small birds, the lizard (in small numbers), the jerboah, the locust, butterflies, and other insects, the thob, the large turtle, &c. Overweg says the footmarks of the hyÆna were also seen.

En-Noor's people caught a young ostrich, only a few hours hatched. It is now kept as a pet. Several eggs have been also picked up. The ostrich has been seen feeding on the gum of the tholukh-tree.

As to trees, we have still the eternal tholukh, or mimosa. What an omnipresent tree is this in Africa! The mimosa is found at the Cape, with the ethel; it is found in all the northern Sahara, and the ethel with it, wherever there is some water, as in the wadys of Fezzan. In all the western Sahara it abounds, producing the finest gums. Consider also the gum-trade at Mogador and Senegal! In the plain of Timbuctoo, the mimosa is found in scattered forests. Our people pretend, however, that the tholukh does not occur in Soudan, its place being filled up by various thorny trees, much resembling the mimosa. We have around us some other stunted shrubs. All trees are dwarfish in these plateaux.

Various distinguished characters are amongst the servants and slaves of En-Noor. One fellow is called the "King of the Donkeys," another wench is styled the "Queen of the Goats;" Zumzug is properly named Proban berau, "a great thief," from his thievish propensities. Then there is the "Lad of the Arrows," the fellow who is always boasting of how many people he has killed with arrows, &c. &c.; but Zumzug requires especial notice from me, on account of his having run off to Aghadez with a caftan of mine; and also from the curious circumstance that En-Noor keeps such a thief amongst his slaves, so confounding the honest with the thievish servants.

January 1, 1851.—A strong, bleak, north-east wind ushers in the New Year. It began yesterday, and is likely to continue for some time. Most comfortless and disagreeable weather is this for the caravan. The people do not like to move, and show a decided tendency to hibernation. Some camels are also lost—escaped from the numbed fingers of their drivers. I, too, feel it cold; and yet there is so much of home in this weather—this keen, bracing air—that I cannot complain.

Our people caught the camels at length, and we proceeded still southwards. After three hours' travelling we appeared to have passed the most barren portion of the plateau, and came upon a new species of tree, called in Haussa, tadana. We have this day had a splendid sight of ostriches—eleven feeding in a troop near us, quietly like so many sheep—eccentric birds of their species, showing no tendency to scud away. Perhaps I shall never see so many again together. They were all black, with maybe a white feather or two underneath the sombre plumage.

The small tholukh-trees are full of birds' nests. In the Northern Sahara a bird's nest was not to be seen, but here the trees are all covered with them. Amongst the various smaller ones, we came upon a huge vulture's nest on a very small tholukh, which seemed to bend and look unhappy beneath the weight of this den of rapacity and violence. There are hereabouts no rocks for the eagles to build upon. We halted amidst abundance of herbage and small trees, which afforded a little shelter from the wind.

It is, perhaps, as well that we begin the year with this most bleak and unlovely day. We may have a better one to terminate 1851. I was obliged to increase my travelling clothes, and put on an extra holi on account of the cold wind; and yet the temperature was not very low, it being only 46° at sunrise. The wind evidently comes over an immense extent of plain towards the east, perhaps some forty or fifty days' journey. We made six hours and a-half.

2d.—We started early, and moved at first to the beat of the drum. Already yesterday we had seen symptoms that the desert was drawing to a close. To-day we fairly got out of it, and entered upon a wilderness of small trees. The vegetation has not, however, yet improved in proportion to our nearness to Soudan; for this dwarf forest of tholukh and various other trees cannot be compared to the splendid desert vegetation in the Aheer valleys; these are pigmy mimosas in comparison with those of Aheer. The surface of the ground is now undulating sand and red earth, and every trace of stone has almost disappeared; the soil is also covered with karengia and other herbs, all dry and sapless. We seem to be traversing a limitless stubble-field, covered over or sprinkled with small trees. Few animals enliven the scene; a crow here and there struts or flies. All the small birds seem to have sought covert from the cold. The same north-east wind as yesterday blows with remorseless strength.

I observed great numbers of ant-hills, and very large ones, too. Some of the paths from these hills are straighter than the roads made by man over the Sahara. So, also, the birds in Aheer, and on this route, build better houses for themselves than men do. We halted amidst karengia, and had great difficulty in finding a place clear of them. En-Noor suffers dreadfully from the cold, and we help to keep him alive by our coffee, which he drinks shivering, and then admits to have given him renovated heat and strength. This coffee keeps the old fellow in a good humour, and he is extremely civil to us.

3d.—We started early, and made four hours and a-half, when we stopped at the village Inasamet, or Unwessemet. The weather is still the same, and the route continues to wind through a scattered wilderness of small trees, amongst which Overweg thought he had discovered a species of wild orange.

We now see signs of approaching habitations, such as flocks of sheep straying, and droves of oxen feeding begin to appear. There seems to be a great number of birds of prey hereabouts. I counted at least thirty vultures, who watched the passing of the caravan, in hopes to see a camel fall and be abandoned.

We encamped a stone's throw beyond the houses. The well is called by the same name as the village. The inhabitants are Tuaricks, and some of them of a very pure race, almost white; whilst others, again, are dark: they are called Tagama. The women and children all came out to sell their cheeses, and a few other things. I purchased two small fowls and a good number of cheeses, which seem to be the principal articles of produce: they are made quite square, three or four inches a side, and a quarter of an inch thick. I purchased these with imitation silver rings, of which the people are immensely fond, preferring them to the imitation gold ring. I got two cheeses for a ring—a plain hoop: the fowls cost each three of these toys. The women and girls bothered me much with their curiosity and their bartering. Some of them are as stout as the Mooresses of the coast, and nearly all are well-looking; many with very good features, and fair for this country. All are polite enough, men, women, and children. We are glad to find the people more civil, the nearer we approach to Soudan. We pray and hope this amendment may continue; for hitherto, since we left Mourzuk, we have always had the people, with the exception of those of Tintalous, more or less hostile towards us. Some of our customers came to ask if the rings were really silver, for the blacksmith of the village had said they were only pewter. We replied, they were de-de silver; that is, looked like it, or equal to it. They are, indeed, a most excellent imitation of silver, and answer quite as well the purpose of adorning these Targhee beauties.

I saw to-day, on a single bough of tholukh, and a very small bough, three birds' nests suspended in a festoon. I tasted the wild water-melons of this part of the Sahara, and found them bitterness itself. But I am told by our Gatronee, that the Tibboos have a method of extracting the bitterness from this wild fruit. The people brought me en route some fruit, called in Bornou kusulu, and mageria in Haussa; that is, the nebek or fruit of the sider or lote-tree. They were dry, but sweet and nice, and of a pleasant, acid sweet. Provisions thus are becoming more plentiful and varied. Dr. Barth has bought some meat of el-wagi, the name given by Yusuf for the bugar wahoush, or wild ox of the Arabs.

The greater part of the trees in this region are of the species called in Haussa, tadani, and in Bornouese, kabi. Were these trees adorned with leaves—they are now fallen off, in consequence of the cold—the country about would seem covered with a dense forest.

Our arrival amongst the Tagama is a new era in our journeying, it being some time since we saw any men besides Kailouees. Overweg thinks the men thieves and bad, and the women lascivious; but I observed in their conduct nothing different from other Tuaricks. A man, however, offered several women to Barth. I have never yet had such offers. Amongst the things brought for sale are young ostriches and the eggs of ostriches. I ate in the evening some flesh of the giraffe; it is pretty well tasted, and something like beef. Hunting the giraffe is a great occupation with the people of this village, and the flesh of the animal a source of subsistence for them. They have, however, besides, cattle and flocks; and the karengia, which has proved such an annoyance to us, is the principal farinaceous food of these Tagama, as the bou rekaba is the principal food of poor families in Aheer. Inasamet has, perhaps, a hundred huts, covered with the skins of the bullock, and probably of the giraffe. The latter animal is hunted by men mounted on horseback, who throw their spears at it, and wound it under the belly. This is said to be the only way of killing it, for the rest of its body is covered with a sort of rhinoceros hide, of great thickness. Of this hide they make famous sandals, which wear long.

It is difficult to decide how far this immense plain—which extends as far as Aghadez on the N.W., to Gouber on the S.W., perhaps as far as the plain of Senezrouft, on the route of Timbuctoo—passing, besides, eastwards across the route of Bornou,—how far this vast space of desert is a plateau to the surrounding countries; that is, whether higher or lower than their level. We do not think it is a plateau in reference to Aheer. There is another route to Damerghou, westward of this, on which is situate the forest of Kob-kob, the place mentioned in the itinerary which I procured from the people of Ghadamez.

4th.—The morning was cold, with wind. The Tagama, I observe, have many horses. Like their more civilised brethren in Europe, these people find this the most tractable and convenient animal in every case where the desert does not interfere.

We came south seven hours and a-quarter; after four, the wavy country broke up into a deep valley; in another hour, on the right, was seen a pool of rain-water—a small lake, stretching nearly a mile long. The country, as yesterday, was undulating, and covered with a dwarf forest; but the trees were thicker, and the ground was covered with dried herbage, mostly karengia. It is our constant occupation, morning and evenings, for half an hour, to pick the burs out of our clothes. The animals seen were mostly small birds; some flights of blackbirds, two-thirds the size of the English blackbird; and crows and doves in numbers. Near the water I picked up the feathers of the guinea-fowl, and the piece of a shell of a large turtle. Burrows of the hyÆna and the ant-eater dotted the ground. En-Noor told me that lions also abound in the thickets. The lions conceal themselves in the trees, and the hyÆnas burrow under ground.

Our people are now on the threshold of Damerghou, and do not know yet what route they will take from this country to Kanou; whether by Tesaoua or Zinder. Even En-Noor seems quite undecided what he shall do.

5th.—We came well on to-day, eight hours and twenty minutes. After four or five hours we passed on the roadside a dozen huts, with skin-roofs or coverings. The people are some light, some dark; variegated, like most of the Tuaricks. The children of eight or nine years go quite naked. After two hours more we came upon the large village of Gumrum, or Gumrek. I saw many people, light and dark; the women are fat and bold, free in their conversation; and the men evidently fanatical. The latter shouted that we ought not to pass, because we were infidels. One fellow was very savage, and cursed me; he was an old grey-headed gentleman, and seemed quite excited. These people are also of the tribe of the Tagama. Amankee came up to me, whispering, "These are like the KalfadaÏ, they would rob you as they did, only they are all in the hands of the Sofo (En-Noor)."

The inhabitants of Gumrek have much cattle. We ourselves saw some five or six hundred head, and they must have more than double this number, besides flocks and horses. The men mostly ride horses, but their breed is miserably small and ill-looking. People in poor circumstances mount bullocks, as do all the women.

To the west, lately, there came off a great razzia. All this country around, for some hundred miles, is the noted theatre of such expeditions, which are mostly undertaken against the salt and other caravans, where there is considerable booty expected. The smaller caravans escape. When the Kilgris and Kailouees are in open hostility, they generally make this the theatre of their battles; the former carrying off the salt of the latter. This hostility is, like that of most of the wild tribes, of ancient date. The Kilgris have been driven from all this part of Asben by the Kailouees. The houses we passed in ruins are said to have been once occupied by the Kilgris. If so, they evidently were in former times powerful and opulent, and have since become relaxed and pusillanimous. At any rate, they have been expelled by the fiercer and more ferocious Kailouees. The Oulimad also come here to plunder occasionally. At Gurarek we saw a phenomenon which, after so much desert, gladdened indeed our eyes. This was a fine sheet of water, of great extent, covered with a forest of luxurious trees. It was a genuine Soudan picture, and we gazed at it with delight. I nevertheless thought of the pestilential exhalations of the stagnant pools further on in Soudan. The ground holds the water tightly, for wells are sunk near it of some depth before water is reached. This pool, or lake, dries up during the heat of summer, as is proved by the existence of wells sunk in their beds.

The country to-day was extremely pleasant, like some parts of the undulating county of Essex, after the harvest is gathered. I scarcely expected to find such reminiscences in Africa, on the frontiers of Pamerghou. If the vegetation were all in leaf, the scenery would be quite cheerful and happy-looking. The trees to-day thickened into forests down some slopes—but there is nothing tropical in all this verdure; one or two plants, at most, are all that could be considered as such. Many gazelles glanced on either hand as we proceeded: the guinea-hen was in great numbers, thirty or forty together, old ones and chickens. They run very quickly through the forests, and cannot be taken in the day. At night, however, some are snared. They feed on the karengia, and get immensely plump. Their flesh is greatly esteemed. Doves showed themselves in flights; and many beautiful small birds, some strangers to my eyes. One especially, a little black-and-white fellow, with an immense bushy tail. Vultures, in company with a variegated crow, were feeding on a dead camel. This curious crow has a white neck and breast. What a truly Saharan group is that which I have just noticed. The vulture feeding on a camel fallen in the desert, towards the end of an arduous journey!

We met a party of huntsmen, with three bullocks to carry their ghaseb. They had six dogs, and told us they were off after the giraffe. A few lizards now and then glanced over the path, and at every thirty or forty yards rose a busy ant-hill.

En-Noor and I converged to-day from the backs of our respective camels. He asked me particularly if I liked stout women, and whether stout women were found in England. I replied, gravely, that this species occurred in all Christian countries; a piece of zoological information which seemed highly to gratify him. His highness still pretends he does not know where he is going—that is, whether to Zinder or Tesaoua.

We encamped near a shallow wady, the first we have seen in this part of the country; i.e. a well-defined dry bed of a river.