We lay for the greater part of the day within some two or three miles of the shore, but the Atlantic rollers were too heavy to allow a nearer approach, or permit the landing of cargo. This happens too frequently to excite remark; and these great waves, originating in the passage of cyclones in the mid-Atlantic, often arrive so suddenly in the calmest weather as to create a serious danger for the seaman. At the least it is prudent to keep up a sufficient pressure of steam in the boiler to make it easy to gain the offing on the shortest notice; and we heard of several cases where the coast steamers had called in succession at all the Atlantic ports of Marocco without being able to communicate with any one of them, and cargo and passengers had been carried on to the Canary Islands with the uncertain prospect of being landed on the return voyage. Fogs offer another serious impediment to navigation on this coast. During the summer the low country for a distance of eight or ten miles from the shore is not rarely covered during the morning with a thick mist that clears away before mid-day. At such times ships dare not approach the sandy coasts, and, when the sky clears, the scarcity of landmarks makes it extremely difficult for the seaman to ascertain his exact position. As the same difficulty prevented us from touching Rabat on our return voyage, we can add nothing to what has been told by preceding travellers. Counting Sallee as a suburb of the larger town, the population is estimated at 40,000, or more than all the other Atlantic ports put together. The inhabitants are said to suffer from three scourges—prolonged droughts, the invasion of locusts, and, worst of all, the annual visits of the Sultan, whose body-guard of several thousand soldiers has to be fed at their cost. To the naturalist a stay of some days at Rabat might be of great interest if he were able to accomplish a visit to the famous forest of Mamora, which fills a large part of the space, some twenty miles in width, between the mouth of the Bouregrag and the larger river Sebou that carries to the sea the drainage of the high mountains near Fez. The scene of most of the wonderful tales that circulate among the people of North Marocco—adventures with lions, robbers, and other wild animals—is laid in the forest of Mamora; but excepting one solitary plant, brought thence by the Abbé Durand—a very distinct species of _Celsia_—nothing is known of the fauna and flora of the forests of this part of Marocco. These appear to cover a considerable tract parallel to the Atlantic coast, and probably consist mainly of the cork oak, which in any other country might become a considerable source of profit. Eastward of the forest the country south of the Oued Sebou is a marshy tract, breeding endemic fevers that are said to extend to Sallee and Rabat.