LIST OF DESERT-PLANTS COLLECTED NEAR ALEXANDRIA. 141 



XIX. List of Desert-Plants collected at Ramleh, near 

 Alexandria, Egypt , from September iSy^to April 1876. 

 By H. A. Hurst, Esq. 



Read before the Microscopical and Natural-History Section 

 January 15th, 1877. 



In placing before the Section a list of the plants collected 

 during the winter of 1875-76 at Ramleh, Egypt, I may 

 remark that there is another place of the same name in 

 Palestine, between Joppa and Jerusalem. In both cases, 

 I believe the name to be derived from the Arabic R-M-L, 

 signifying sand, its derivative being used to express a 

 desert. 



It is a narrow slip of undulating ground between the 

 Lake Maadieh on the right hand, looking north, and the 

 sea on the lett. It abuts on the ground where Caesar had 

 his camp, b.c. 48, remnants of which remained till lately, 

 when its traces were almost completely effaced by Ismael 

 Pasha, the stones being taken to build one of his many 

 palaces, a very striking building, at present uninhabited, 

 and one of Egypt^s many monuments to waste. 



Ramleh is interesting to Englishmen as the site of the 

 battle of Alexandria, in 1801, when the English, under Sir 

 Ralph Abercromby, defeated the French, who were then in 

 possession of Egypt. It will be remembered that the 

 leader fell, mortally wounded, in the action. 



At the present moment the place bears much the same 

 relation to Alexandria which Bowdon does to Manchester, 

 or Richmond to London. There is a railway running to 

 it from Alexandria, the furthest station being about five 

 miles distant from CleopatiVs Needle ; and the ground is 



