Nov. 1906. | ACACIAS IN VARIOUS PLACES. 12 
or 
often form rough hedges near the villages. They are very 
prominent in the rocky islets of the second cataract at Wady 
Halfa. The species of which [ took special note were Acacia 
Seyal, L. “Seyal,” the Shittah of the Bible; a shrub usually 
seven feet high, with a stem ten inches in diameter. It 
occurs in erevices of granitic rocks and also in sand or 
alluvium, sometimes at altitudes fully five feet above the 
level of high Nile. This is of great importance both as 
fuel and for use in the “ sakkiehs ” or waterwheels (Nos. 3364, 
3333). A. albida, Del., “Arras” or “Tolla’ih,” a plant 
twenty feet high, was found in a wind-sheltered position some 
two miles south of Korosko. It also extends above the limits 
of high Nile and occurs in the Wady Halfa islets (3369, 
3403). A. tortilis, Del., “ Sallah” or “ Seyal,” also above the 
inundation limit and in the sandy granitic soil of the islets 
(3370). A. arabica, Willd., “ Garrad” of Berbers, “Sunt” of 
Egyptians, Babool; tairly common at or a little above the 
level of high Nile (8381). A. /wta, R. Br., fairly common 
in granitic rocks at the first cataract; a shrub or small tree 
just about the inundation limit (3456). These acacias are all 
liable to injury from the numerous camels, donkeys, and goats. 
In some places they seem to be disappearing altogether. 
With the exception of A. lwta, they all extend over a very 
wide range of country from Abyssinia and the Upper Nile to 
Senegambia: probably they are found all along the southern 
border of the Sahara. A. arabica extends eastward through 
Persia to Afghanistan. Some of them form woods of 
enormous extent, as, eg., the Seyal, from about 29° N, 
lat. to Konka. This species goes as far south as 9° N. lat. 
on the Nile. A. ¢ortilis is the gum-acacia of the Tripoli 
desert. According to Ascherson in Rohlf’s “ Kufra,” it is this 
species that makes the acacia woods in South Tunis between 
Gafsa and the coast on the southern flanks of the mountain 
Ben Hedma at 343° Grad. It is also generally distributed 
on the stony desert on the road to Sokna from Beni Ulid 
and south of Misda. When upon the Anglo-French Sierra 
Leone Boundary Commission, I was able in the hinterland 
of that colony to reach an altitude of 3000 to 3500 feet at 
the Farana branch of the Niger. Here the ordinary monsoon 
forest had already been modified. The country was grass- 
1 The numbers refer to my herbarium book. 
