On the 12th of January our whole party arrived at Bengazi, having employed on the journey two months and seven days from the time of our departure from Tripoly. Shortly after our arrival, the heavy rains commenced, and continued with little interruption, until the beginning of March, accompanied with constant gales of wind from the north-east and north-west. The state of the town during this period may truly be said to have been miserable; the houses being chiefly put together with mud, were continually giving way, and falling in; and we were frequently apprized of occurrences of this nature, in our own immediate neighbourhood, by the shrieks and cries of women, whose families had been sufferers on some of these occasions. The streets during part of the time were literally converted into rivers; the market was without supplies, owing to the impossibility of driving cattle into the town; and the number of sheep and goats which perished in the neighbourhood of Bengazi, from the extreme inclemency of the weather, amounted (we were informed) to several thousands. For ourselves, we were fortunate in having one room in our house which was capable of resisting the rain, the terrace on its roof having been cemented by one of the Beys, who had occupied it a short time before; and this, we really believe, was the only room in the town which could be fairly considered weather-proof. The court-yard round which our apartments were built (if they may be dignified with so imposing an appellation) assumed for a long time the appearance of a pond, and a narrow space was only left here and there on its borders, by which we could pass from one room to another. From the state of our own house, which we have already said might be considered as the best in the town, the condition of other parts of Bengazi, during the rains, may be in some measure imagined; although it will scarcely be possible for the inhabitants of civilized countries, unacquainted with the nature of Arab towns, to conceive half the wretchedness and the utter want of comfort which they present on similar occasions. The houses of Bengazi are built after the usual manner of Arab buildings, that is to say, with rough and unequally-shaped stones, put together with mud instead of mortar; they generally consist of a ground floor only, built round a square court-yard, which is exposed to the weather, and into which the doors of the chambers open, which seldom communicate with each other: the court is not paved, and in houses of more than ordinary consequence, there is sometimes a well in the centre. The roofs are flat, and are formed of rafters (chiefly of young pine-trees from the neighbouring forests) over which are laid mats, and on these there is generally a quantity of sea-weed, or other vegetable rubbish; over the whole is spread a thick stratum of mud, which is beat down as hard as Arab laziness will admit of at the time when the terrace is made[1].