TRIPOLY TO BENGAZI. 121 in different parts of the marsh; and most of these places are honoured with a name by their Mahometan visitors or occasional inhabitants. The road, if such we may call it, either winds along the margin of these little islands, or traverses them, when necessary for greater security. The first of these which occurs, after leaving Mesurata, is the little oasis called Towergah ; lying out of the track at a distance of seven or eight miles from the coast : it has a village, and a considerable plantation of date-trees.

A little beyond this is said to be another small insulated spot called Wady Haifa, where date-trees are also to be found ; but this was not in sight from the immediate neighbourhood of the coast.

The surface of the marsh, in the direction of these places, presents a smooth, unvaried level, as far as the eye can reach, wholly destitute of any vegetation ; it consists entirely of an incrustation of salt and alluvial deposit. In following the route along the coast, the first rising ground which occurs, of any tolerable dimensions, is Melfa*; where are the remains of an old, dilapidated Mardbht, and occasionally a patch of vegetation, affording a scanty supply to a few miserable-looking goats.

To this succeeds Sooleb, which we have already pointed out as the southern limit of the marsh, according to the dimensions given Arar occurs before Melfa ; but, though a good deal above the level of the mar It cannot well be considered as an island, but is rather a continuation of the little range of high land which we have mentioned as running along the coast in the neighbourhood of the causeway. It consists wholly of heaps of sand, overspread occasionally with vegetation, and is remarkable as possessing a tall and solitary date-tree, the only one to be met with on the coast of the Syrtis, in a tract of more than four hundred miles.

R