The first day of spring is at Sockna a day of general rejoicing. It is then the custom, to dress out little tents or bowers on the tops of the houses, decorating them with carpets, jereeds, shawls, and sashes. A gaudy handkerchief on a pole, as a standard, completes the work, which is loudly cheered by the little children, who eat, drink, and play during the day in these covered places, welcoming the spring by songs, and crying continually, "O welcome spring, with pleasure bring us plenty." The women give entertainment in their houses, and the day is quite a holiday. From the top of the houses in which Captain Lyon lodged, these little bowers had a very pretty effect, every roof in the town being ornamented with one. Four ears of corn were this day seen perfectly ripe, which was very early for the season. The gardens here are excellent, compared with the others in Fezzan.
Ten miles east by south from Sockna is the town of Hoon. It is smaller than Sockna, but is built and walled in the same manner. It has three gates, three mosques, and a large building, which is dignified with the name of a castle, but it does not appear to have even a loop-hole for musketry. The palm groves and gardens come up close to the walls of the town, and completely conceal it. The soil is sand, but is fertilized by being constantly refreshed by little channels, from wells of brackish water. The inhabitants, who are of the tribe Fateima, bear a good character.
The town of Wadan is between twelve and thirteen miles east by north of Hoon. It appeared much inferior to either of the other two in point of neatness, comfort, and convenience; although its aspect is much more pleasing; it is built on a conical hill, on the top of which are some enclosed houses, called the castle. Here is a well of great depth, cut through the solid rock, evidently not the work of the Arabs. The tombs and mosques, both here and at Hoon, were ornamented with numbers of ostrich eggs. The inhabitants of Wadan are sheerefs, who are the pretended descendants of the prophet, and form the bulk of the resident population, and Arabs of the tribe Moajer, who spend the greater part of the year with their flocks in the Syrtis. A few miles eastward of the town, there is a chain of mountains, which, as well as the town itself, derives its name from a species of buffalo called wadan, immense herds of which are found there. The wadan is of the size of an ass, having a very large head and horns, a short reddish hide, and large bunches of hair hanging from each shoulder, to the length of eighteen inches or two feet; they are very fierce. There are two other specimens found here, the bogra el weish, evidently the bekker el wash of Shaw, a red buffalo, slow in its motions, having large horns, and of the size of a cow; and the white buffalo, of a lighter and more active make, very shy and swift, and not easily procured. The wadan seems best to answer to the oryx.
There are great numbers of ostriches in these mountains, by hunting of which, many of the natives subsist. At all the three towns, Sockna, Hoon, and Wadan, it is the practice to keep tame ostriches in a stable, and in two years to take three cullings of the feathers.
Captain Lyon supposes that all the fine white ostrich feathers sent to Europe are from tame birds, the wild ones being in general so ragged and torn, that not above half a dozen perfect ones can be found. The black, being shorter and more flexible, are generally good. All the Arabs agree in stating, that the ostrich does not leave its eggs to be hatched by the heat of the sun. The parent bird forms a rough nest, in which she covers from fourteen to eighteen eggs, and regularly sits on them, in the same manner as the common fowl does on her chickens, the male occasionally relieving the female.[Footnote] It is during the breeding season that the greatest numbers are procured, the Arabs shooting the old ones on their nests.
[Footnote: There is one peculiarity attending the ostrich, which is, that although the female lays from about twenty-five to thirty eggs, yet she only sits upon about fifteen, throwing the remainder outside the nest, where they remain until the young ones are hatched, and these eggs form the first food of the young birds.—EDITOR.]
On the 22d April, Captain Lyon and his companions left Sockna, in company with Sultan Mukni, for Mourzouk, which they entered upon the 4th May. The whole way is an almost uninterrupted succession of stony plains and gloomy wadys, with no water but that of wells, generally muddy, brackish, or bitter, and at fearful intervals. On the first evening, the place of encampment was a small plain, with no other vegetation than a few prickly talk bushes, encircled by high mountains of basalt, which gave it the appearance of a volcanic crater. Here, at a well of tolerably good water, called Gatfa, the camels were loaded with water for five days. The next day, the horse and foot men passed over a very steep mountain called Nufdai, by a most difficult path of large irregular masses of basalt; the camels were four hours in winding round the foot of this mountain, which was crossed in one hour. From the wady at its foot, called Zgar, the route ascended to a flat covered with broken basalt, called Dahr t'Moumen (the believer's back): it then led through several gloomy wadys, till, having cleared the mountainous part of the Soudah (Jebel Assoud), it issued in the plain called El Maitba Soudah, from its being covered in like manner with small pieces of basalt. Three quarters of an hour further, they reached El Maitba Barda, a plain covered with a very small white gravel, without the slightest trace of basalt.
"We did not see any where," says Captain Lyon, "the least appearance of vegetation, but we observed many skeletons of animals, which had died of fatigue in the desert, and occasionally the grave of some human being. All their bodies were so dried by the extreme heat of the sun, that putrifaction did not appear to have taken place after death. In recently dead animals, I could not perceive the slightest offensive smell; and in those long dead, the skin, with the hair on it, remained unbroken and perfect, although so brittle as to break with a slight blow. The sand-winds never cause these carcases to change their places, as in a short time, a slight mound is formed round them, and they become stationary."
Afterwards, passing between low, table-topped hills, called El Gaaf, the coffle encamped on the third evening in a desert, called Sbir ben Afeen, where the plain presented on all sides so perfect a horizon, that an astronomical observation might have been taken as well as at sea. From the excessive dryness of the air, the blankets and barracans emitted electric sparks, and distinctly crackled on being rubbed. The horses' tails, also, in beating off the flies, had the same effect.
The fourth day, the route passed over sand lulls to a sandy irregular plain, very difficult and dangerous. Here the wind, being southerly, brought with it such smothering showers of burning sand, that they frequently lost the track, being unable to distinguish objects at the distance of only a few yards.