[11]Vide Strabo, p. 49, 50; edit. Casaub.
CHAPTER III.
Some Account of Fezzan.
The greatest length of the cultivated part of the kingdom of Fezzan, is about 300 English miles from north to south, and the greatest width 200 miles from east to west; but the mountainous region of Harutsch to the east, and other deserts to the south and west, are reckoned within its territory.
The borderers on the north are Arabs, nominally dependant on Tripoly, but their obedience is merely nominal, and they take each opportunity of public weakness or commotion to throw off the yoke. Fezzan to the east is bounded by the Harutsch, and line of deserts. To the south and south-east is the country of the Tibboes. To the south-west that of the Nomadic Tuaricks. On the west are Arabs.
The kingdom contains a hundred and one towns and villages, of which Mourzouk is the capital. The principal towns next in order to the imperial residence are Sockna, Sibha, Hun, and Wadon to the north; Gatron to the south; Yerma to the west; and Zuila to the east.
The climate of Fezzan is at no season temperate or agreeable. During the summer the heat is intense; and when the wind blows from the south is scarcely supportable, even by the natives. The winter might be moderate were it not for the prevalence of a bleak and penetrating north wind during that season of the year, and which chilled and drove to the fire not only the people of the place, but even myself, the native of a northern country.
It rains at Fezzan seldom, and then but little in quantity. From November 1798 to June 1799, there was not a single thunder storm; the 31st of January, 1799, there were some faint lightnings without thunder. Tempests of wind are however frequent, both from the north and the south, whirling up the sand and dust, so as to tinge the very atmosphere yellow. There is no river, nor indeed a rivulet deserving note throughout the whole country. The soil is a deep sand covering calcareous rock or earth, and sometimes a stratum of argillaceous substance.