Page 275.—_The simoom._] Dr. Clarke (iv. 252.) says of the simoom, as experienced by him in Palestine, “Its parching influence pervaded all places alike, and coming as from a furnace, it seemed to threaten us all with suffocation. The author was the first who sustained serious injury from the fiery blast, being attacked by giddiness accompanied with burning thirst, headach, and frequent fits of shivering ensued, and these ended in violent fever.” Notwithstanding the respectable authorities for its deadly effects in the desert, the accurate Burckhardt (Travels in Nubia, p. 189) says, “I inquired, as I had often done before, whether my companions had often experienced the Semoum, which we translate by the poisonous blast of the desert, but which is nothing more than a violent south-east wind. They answered in the affirmative; but none had ever known an instance of its having proved fatal. I have been repeatedly exposed to the hot wind in the Syrian and Arabian deserts, in Upper Egypt and Nubia. The hottest and most violent I ever experienced was at Suakin, yet even there I felt no particular inconvenience from it, although exposed to all its fury in the open plain. For my own part I am perfectly convinced that all the stories which travellers, or the inhabitants of the towns of Egypt and Syria, relate of the Semoum are greatly exaggerated, and _I never could hear of a single well-authenticated instance of its having proved mortal either to man or beast._ I never observed that the Semoum blows close to the ground, as commonly supposed, but always observed the whole atmosphere appear as if in a state of combustion: the dust and sand are carried high into the air, which assumes a reddish, or bluish, or yellowish tint, according to the nature and colour of the ground from which the dust arises.”