Proceedings of the expedition to explore the northern coast of Africa, from Tripoly eastward

by Frederick William Beechey; H. W. Beechey

The wind had by this time increased to a violent gale, and we were very soon wet to the skin: but although such a state may not appear to be at all times an enviable one, it was in fact very much so on this occasion; for the clouds of sand which would have been hurled in our faces by the wind, had the surface of the desert been less wet, would have proved a much greater annoyance. With this reflection we pursued our journey very contentedly, and our Arab friends, composing Shekh Mahommed’s escort, appeared to be equally well satisfied; for they soon began to open the several budgets of songs with which an Arab is never unprovided, roaring them out to the full extent of their well-practised and powerful lungs, till they fairly drowned the noise of the gale.

At 10 A.M. we passed through Wady’m’Seyd, a small stream somewhat inferior to Wady Ramleh, and soon entered upon the extensive plain of Jumarr. Wady’m’Seyd may be termed the eastern limit of the long sandy tract which stretches from thence far to the westward, and passing to the southward of Tripoly, is bounded, in that direction, by the Gharian mountains.

The sandy nature of the ground to the westward of Wady’m’Seyd had latterly led us away from that part of the coast, and we now endeavoured to regain the beach; but the sands were so soft that our horses sank up to their saddle-girths, and our utmost efforts to reach it were unavailing: we were in consequence obliged to give up the attempt, and leave this portion of the coast line incomplete. Among the sand-hills we found several patches of rocky ground strewed with fragments of pottery, but no vestiges of building were discernible. The plain of Jumarr, from the excellence of its soil, would no doubt be extremely productive; but notwithstanding this advantage, and its vicinity to the metropolis, a small part of it only is cultivated, and but few Arab tents were to be seen. The Gharian range may here be considered to be about seven miles from the coast; and the heavy rains and torrents from the mountains have made several large ravines in this neighbourhood, which crossed our path in their passage to the sea: the most considerable of these are Wady Terragadt and Wady Booforris. Soon after four o’clock we reached Guadigmata, where we found a small Arab encampment, and pitched our tents for the night.

It is in the neighbourhood of Guadigmata, between that place and Wady’m’Seyd, that we must look for the Graphara of Scylax. For as that city is described by the geographer as being midway between Abrotonum and Leptis Magna, that is, a day’s sail from each—Guadigmata being 26 miles from Lebida, and the whole distance from Lebida to Tagiura 58½—it follows that the site of Graphara might be fixed three miles to the westward of Guadigmata; which would place it at 29 miles’ distance from each of the cities in question, or half way between Lebida and Tagiura [8].

There are, however, no remains to the westward of Guadigmata (between that place and Wady’m’Seid) that we could perceive in our route; but two miles beyond Guadigmata there are some remains of building on a rising ground to the eastward of it, which are too much buried under the soil to allow us to give any satisfactory description of them. Two large upright stones, which seem to have been the jambs of a gateway, are all that are now standing; and not even the ground plans of other parts of these remains could be obtained without excavation. We learnt, however, from Captain Smyth that, in the neighbourhood of Wady’m’Seyd, there is a small boat-cove resembling an ancient cothon; and near it the ruins of several baths with tesselated pavements; which must have been situated on that part of the coast which we were not able to visit, for the reasons mentioned above. To the eastward of these, another small port was also discovered by Captain Smyth (formed by a point of land between the Wadies of Ben-z-barra and Abdellata), at which the produce of the country is shipped off in the summer. The mouth of the Abdellata is described by this officer as forming a picturesque cove, and he observed on its left bank (a little way inland) a village consisting of troglodytic caverns, excavated in the sand-stone rock; many of which being furnished with doors, are used by the natives instead of the usual matamores, or subterranean storehouses, as granaries.

The former of the ports here described may possibly have been that of Graphara required; but as there are more extensive remains in the neighbourhood of that at Abdellata (or Abdellati), which we shall presently have occasion to mention, we will not venture to fix it as such decidedly.

On the day after our arrival at Guadigmata, the weather proving still very bad, we did not proceed on our route; but spent the day in examining and securing our baskets of provisions many of which we found to have been wet through, and in making those other little arrangements which, notwithstanding all precautions, are usually found to be necessary a day or two after the commencement of a long journey.

We continued our route on the following morning, and found the country beyond become gradually hilly, and the road to be again intersected by Wadys, or ravines, extending themselves from the mountains to the sea[9]. By four we had arrived at Sidy Abdellàti: so called from a celebrated Marábut, whose tomb, surrounded by gardens and date-trees, stands conspicuous on the banks of one of the Wadys. The country about it is everywhere well cultivated, the wells are numerous, and the hills were covered with sheep and goats; but notwithstanding the numerous flocks in our neighbourhood, we found considerable difficulty in procuring a single lamb for our party.

While we were here a disturbance took place which had, at one time, assumed rather an alarming appearance. Our camel-drivers had allowed their beasts to stray over the cultivated grounds of the neighbouring Arabs, who came to demand remuneration, or to revenge themselves, in the event of not obtaining it, upon the owners of the camels[10]: the latter, together with our Arab escort, formed a tolerably strong party, and thinking themselves in a condition to do so, did not hesitate to resist the demand; a scuffle accordingly took place, in which many blows were exchanged, baracans torn, and knives and pistols brought into action. The arrival of Shekh Mahommed put an end to the fray before any serious consequences had ensued, and he satisfied the assailants by reprimanding the camel-drivers, and promising to make them keep their animals within bounds. We were ignorant ourselves of the cause of the disturbance, and seeing our party suddenly attacked, we naturally ran to their assistance, which certainly would not have been the case had we known they had been the aggressors. This made us more cautious afterwards, as we found that our drivers took advantage of the strength of the party to improve the condition of their camels.

The most conspicuous character in this disturbance was a trusty black slave of our conductor the Dúbbah, who appeared to have inherited from his master the art of raising his voice above that of every other person. Having had his pistols wrested from him, he was so hurried away by the violence of his passion as to seem quite unable to give it sufficient vent; and had just raised his knife to plunge it into an Arab, when he was prevented by one of our party, who presented a musket at him and deprived him of his weapon; for although he was fighting on our side, we were not of course desirous that he should proceed to such unjustifiable extremes.