After following the course of the river for perhaps half a mile, the road takes a more easterly direction, and one enters upon fifteen miles of stony desert, which extends, without water at this period, as far as the Wad Mdri, the easternmost of the rivers of Askura. This strip of dreary country is known as the “Sebaa shaabat,” or “seven undulations,” from the fact that such exist. No vegetation was to be seen but bunches of wild thyme, a few thorny bushes—the _sidra_ of the Arabs—and a little dry rank grass, and the latter only where there were signs of water collecting in the rainy season. The absence of animal life was most noticeable, and scarcely a bird was seen. From the summit of the Atlas this had been so, and a few red-legged Barbary partridge, a magpie or two, and a couple of ravens, were all I had come across. Of four-legged beasts still less, for though both gazelle and _muflon_ are to be found, we saw neither, and I can remember having perceived no other signs of animals than a couple of jerboa. Anything more dismal than the scene which presented itself could not be imagined. The two parallel ranges of mountains that bounded the plain on either hand were clearly visible, though here, I daresay, some thirty miles apart. The Great Atlas presented an appearance of grandeur certainly, but of little or no beauty, merely an unbroken line of immense limestone peaks, here and there capped in snow, while the Anti-Atlas, more broken and fantastic in character, loomed up to the south, a forbidding series of black and dark-red rocks. Nor did the country we were travelling through provide any relief to the eye, for what little vegetation there was to be seen was stunted and sun-dried. A pleasure, indeed, it was to descend by a rocky path to the valley of the Wad Mdri, the easternmost of the rivers that water the large and important oasis of Askura, and enters the gardens that line the bank of the stream. Here the palm-tree, which we had not seen since leaving Morocco, again appeared, adding an additional charm to the scene, which boasted, against a background of blue sky and snow-peaks, a number of betowered and decorated _ksor_ of great size, the largest and most ornamental we had as yet come across. The gardens, however, showed signs of being neglected, and the rough walls of loose stone had in many places half tumbled down. Again an ascent, and again another four miles or so of dreary stone-strewn desert; but over the latter portion of this we were cheered by the sight of the long line of palm-trees ahead, that marked the commencement of the larger portion of the Askura oasis and our night’s resting-place.