We proceeded to Ghortabah, our old place. Two of the prisoners (about twelve of whom we had with us), and one of the Turks, died from the excessive heat. The two couriers that were sent with despatches for the Government were attacked near this place by the Arabs, and the horse of one was so injured, that it was necessary to kill him; the man who rode the horse was also shot through the leg. This was probably in revenge for the exactions of the Bey of the Camp on the tribes. On our return to Ghafsa, we had rain, hail, and high wind, and exceedingly cold--a Siberian winter's day on the verge of the scorching desert. The ground, where there was clay, very slippery; the camels reeled about as if intoxicated. The consequence was, it was long before the tents came up, and we endured much from this sudden change of the weather. Our sufferings were, however, nothing as compared to others, for during the day, ten men were brought in dead, from the cold (three died four days before from heat), principally Turks; and, had there been no change in the temperature, we cannot tell how many would have shared the same fate. Many of the camels, struggling against the clayey soil, could not come up. Eight more men were shortly buried, and three were missing. The sudden transition from the intense heat of the one day to the freezing cold of the next, probably gave the latter a treble power, producing these disastrous effects, the poor people being sadly ill-clad, and quite unprepared for such extreme rigour. Besides, on our arrival at the camp, all the money in Europe could not have purchased us the required comforts, or rather necessaries, to preserve our health. Cold makes everybody very selfish. We were exceedingly touched on hearing of the death of a little girl, whom we saw driven out of a kitchen, in which the poor helpless little thing had taken refuge from the inclemency of the weather. Santa Maria arrived from Ghabs without accident, having scarcely seen a soul the whole of the way. He certainly was an enterprizing fellow, worthy of imitation. He calculated the distance from Ghabs to Toser at 200 miles. There are a number of towns in the districts of Ghabs better built than those of Nefta and Toser; Ghabs river is also full of water and the soil of the country is very fertile. The dates are not so good as those of the Jereed. Ghabs is about 130 miles from Ghafsa. We here took our farewell of Santa Maria; he went to Beja, the head-quarters of the summer-camp: thence, of course, he would proceed to Algiers, to give an account of his _espionage_. Next season, he said, he would go to Tripoli and Ghadames; he had been many years in North Africa, and spoke Arabic fluently.