Much to our satisfaction, the sheik now withdrew, committing us to the charge of an active, but unarmed young Shelluh, with strict injunctions to lead as far as the snow, but not to allow us to proceed farther. It is hard to say whether the sheik and his people felt any real uneasiness as to the possibility of a casual encounter with natives of the Sous valley; but it was pretty clear that they had succeeded in frightening our attendants, as our Mogador men, usually so active and attentive, soon dropped behind, and were not again seen till our return in the afternoon. We took the most direct course in the ascent, following a slight gully down which flowed a mere trickling rivulet, fed by the snows on the upper slope of the mountain, and pushed on rather fast with a view to get as high on the mountain as possible before the sun reached the meridian. Bearing in mind the great diversity in the vegetable population which is seen in Southern Spain (the high mountain region nearest to the Great Atlas), where neighbouring peaks of different mineral structure exhibit numerous quite distinct species, and very few identical features, and having found the flora of the lower valley to a great extent different from that of Aït Mesan, we confidently reckoned on obtaining still greater evidence of distinctness in that of the upper region. It was therefore with some surprise that, as we continued the ascent, we met, one after another, many of the peculiar species that we had first seen in the ascent from Arround to the Tagherot Pass, and comparatively few not already familiar to us. For once, however, it must be owned that during part of this day, our emotions as botanists yielded to the interest that we felt in the near prospect of a peep into _terra incognita_.