The sultans of Fezzan probably think that the only means of keeping these people in order is by keeping them poor. Their only produce is dates, but those are of excellent quality. No vegetables are raised here, and we could not even procure an onion. Almost every town in Africa has its charm or wonder, and Tegerhy is not without one. There is a well just outside the castle gates, the water of which, we were told most gravely, “always rose when a kafila was coming near the town! that the inhabitants always prepared what they had to sell on seeing this water increase in bulk, for it never deceived them!”—In proof of this assertion, they pointed out to me how much higher the water had been previous to our arrival than it was at the moment we were standing on the brink. This I could have explained by the number of camels that had drank at it, but I saw it was better policy to believe what every body allowed to be true: even Boo-Khaloom exclaimed, “Allah! God is great, powerful, and wise! How wonderful! Oh!” Over the inner gate of the castle there is a large hole through to the gateway underneath, and they tell a story of a woman dropping from thence a stone on the head of some leader who had gained the outer wall, giving him, by that means, the death of Abimelech in sacred history. The situation of Tegerhy is rather pleasing than otherwise: it is surrounded by date trees, and the water is excellent; a range of low hills extends to the eastward; and snipes, wild-ducks, and geese, frequent the salt-pools, which are near the town. The natives are quite black, but have not the negro face: the men are slim, very plain, with high cheek bones, the negro nose, large mouth, teeth much stained by the quantity of tobacco and _trona_ (or muriate of soda) which they eat; and even snuff, when given to them, goes directly into their mouths. The young girls are most of them pretty, but less so than those of Gatrone. The men always carry two daggers, one about eighteen inches, and the other six inches, the latter of which is attached to a ring and worn on the arm or wrist. A Tibboo once told me, pointing to the long one, “this is my gun; and this,” showing the smaller of the two, “is my pistol.” The women make baskets and drinking-bowls of palm leaves with great neatness.