As soon as it became apparent that the preparations for our final departure for the interior would require at least a month, Mr. Overweg and I resolved to employ the interval in making a preliminary excursion through the mountainous region that encompasses Tripoli in a radius of from sixty to eighty miles. With this view, we hired two camels, with a driver each, and four donkeys, with a couple of men, for ourselves and our two servants, Mohammed Belál, the son of a liberated Háusa slave, and Ibrahim, a liberated Bagirmi slave, whom we had been fortunate enough to engage here; and through the Consul’s influence we procured a shoush, or officer, to accompany us the whole way. Neither the instruments provided by Her Majesty’s Government, nor the tents and arms, had as yet arrived. But Mr. Overweg had a good sextant, and I a good chronometer, and we were both of us provided with tolerably good compasses, thermometers, and an aneroid barometer. Mr. Frederic Warrington, too, was good enough to lend us a tent. We had determined to start in the afternoon of the 4th of February, 1850, so as to pass the first night in Ghargásh; but meeting with delays, we did not leave the town till after sunset. We preferred encamping, therefore, in the Meshíah, a little beyond the mosque, under the palm-trees, little knowing at the time what an opportunity we had lost of spending a very cheerful evening. Soon after starting, we emerged from the palm-groves which constitute the charm of Tripoli, and continued our march over the rocky ground. Being a little in advance with the shoush, I halted to wait for the rest, when a very peculiar cry, that issued from the old Roman building on the roadside, called “Kasr el Jahalíyeh,” perplexed us for a moment. But we soon learnt, to our great surprise, not unmixed with regret, that it was our kind friend Frederic Warrington, who had been waiting for us here the whole night. From the top of the ruin, which stands on an isolated rock left purposely in the midst of a quarry, there is a widely extensive view. It appears that, before the Arabs built the castle, this site was occupied by Roman sepulchres. A little further on we passed the stone of Sidi ʿArífa. This stone had fallen upon the head of a workman who was digging a well. The workman, so runs the legend, escaped unhurt; and at Sidi ʿArífa’s word the stone once more sprung to the surface. Further on, near the sea-shore, we passed the chapel of Sidi Salah, who is said to have drawn by magic to his feet, from the bottom of the sea, a quantity of fish ready dressed.