_2nd._--Occupied in taking notes of routes. The whole day overcast but no rain. Rais alternately laughs and admires the Ghadamsee people. He was endeavouring to prove to me what profound respect the bandits of The Desert entertain for these Marabout people, and said, "If a camel of the Ghadamseeah falls down in The Desert and dies, and no person present has a camel to lend them, they leave the goods or the load of the camel on the high road until they fetch one. Should a bandit pass by in the meanwhile and see the goods, and recognize them to belong to an inhabitant of Ghadames, he does not even touch them, but passes by and calls for the blessing of Heaven upon the Holy City of The Desert." This, one would say, is too good to be true, at the same time, I have no doubt the banditti of The Desert have a species of religious respect for these pacific-minded, unresisting merchants. I took an opportunity of asking Rais about the use and value of his charms. His Excellency replied, "They are to protect me when exposed to robbers like the Shânbah, or to other evils. These charms will then render me great assistance." I I have already said Rais is as big a ninny in these superstitious matters as any of his Maraboutish subjects. _3rd._--Am still in great doubt as to the route I shall take for the interior. Every route has its separate advantages, and separate dangers. In this perplexity what can I do but wait the turn of events? . . . . . Another overcast morning, as dull and foggy as Old England's November. A perfect Thames-London fog. I was accustomed to think that in the bright sky of an African desert such a mass of cloud and haziness was impossible. Still, though gloomy and drear, there is more boldness and definiteness of outline than in England. After a person has been living long under the bright skies of the Mediterranean, he may mistake a clear winter's day on Blackheath, as I have done, for a moonlight, owing to the want of those sharp angles by which nature draws her landscapes in Southern Europe. To-day the face of the heavens has cast its shadows upon the countenance of the population, for all is dull in business. Every one is awaiting the result of the skirmishes between the Touaricks and the Shânbah.