Such is the leaf of holy tradition in The Desert. It is astonishing how all nations love to indulge their gloomy musings with monsters. The extraction of the Russians from Gog and Magog is a curiosity; but the Russians, (_Moskou_, such is their name here,) are looked upon as a species of monster, whose jaw is capacious enough to swallow up all the Turks, and the Sultan of the East. The Rais has the greatest dread of them, whose native soil they have already gorged, "These Russians," he said to me one day, "are always, always, always advancing, advancing, advancing upon the Sultan." Who will say the patriotic Turk's apprehensions are groundless? With regard to the extraction of the Touaricks, I asked one of these people where his countrymen sprang from. He answered me, that formerly they were demons, (‮جنون‬) and came from a country near Kanou, on the banks of The Great River. Another told me, in true Hellenic style, "The Touaricks sprang out from the ground." An opinion has been advanced by some acquainted with ancient Eastern and African geography, that the Touaricks are from Palestine, and are a portion of the tribes of the Philistines expelled by Joshua; that the first rendezvous of the wanderers was the oasis of _Oujlah_, which is a few days' journey from _Siwah_, the site of the celebrated _Ammonium_; and thence they proceeded, wandering at will, to the west and south, peopling all the arid regions of the Sahara. The Sheikh of the slaves visiting me to-day, and describing Timbuctoo, said, "It is several times larger than Tunis; it is as large as _Moskou_ (or Russia)." _I._--"Who told you _Moskou_ was large?" _He._--"The people." So the Emperor of all the Russians may rejoice in the consciousness, that he and his people constitute as large a kingdom as Timbuctoo, and are celebrated in the gossip of Saharan cities.