24 ANCIENT KNOWLEDGE OF AFRICA. 



of the Desert the undisturbed possession of those insulated 

 spots of verdure, which were scattered at intervals amid the 

 desolation of the interior waste. 



Meantime, although these causes prevented the civiliza- 

 tion, and even the knowledge of the ancients, from ever 

 penetrating deeply beyond the Mediterranean border, yet 

 between it and the measureless Desert there intervened a 

 wide tract of alternate rock, valley, and plain, presenting a 

 varied, and often a picturesque landscape. This region, 

 intermediate between the known and the unknown, between 

 civiUzed and savage existence, excited in a somewhat pecu- 

 liar degree the curiosity of the ancients ; to whom, how- 

 ever, it always appeared dimly as through a cloud, and 

 tinged with a certain fabulous and poetical colouring. 



Herodotus, the earliest and most interesting of Greek 

 historians, when endeavouring to collect information respect- 

 ing the whole of the known world, was obliged, in the ab« 

 sence of written records, to have recourse to travelling ; and 

 his narrative is almost entirely the record of what he saw 

 and heard during his various peregrinations. By means of 

 a long stay in Egypt, and an intimate communication with 

 the native priests, he learned much that was accurate, as 

 well as somewhat that was incorrect and exaggerated, re- 

 specting the wide region which extends from the Nile to the 

 Atlantic. He justly describes it as much inferior in ferti- 

 lity to the cultivated parts of Europe and Asia, and sulTer- 

 ing severely from drought ; yet there were a few spots, as 

 Cinjrps and the high tracts of Cyrene, which being finely 

 irrigated, might stand a comparison with the richest portions 

 of the globe. Generally, however, in quitting the northern 

 coast, which he terms the forehead of Africa, the country 

 became more and more arid. Hills of salt arose, out of 

 which the natives constructed their houses, without any 

 fear of their melting beneath a shower, in a region where 

 rain was unknown. The land became almost a desei;^, and 

 was filled with such multitudes of wild beasts, as to Ill-con- 

 sidered their proper inheritance, and scarcely disputecj" with 

 them by the human race. Farther to the south, the soil no 

 longer afforded food even to these wild tenants ; there was 

 not the trunk of a tree nor a drop of water ; total silence 

 and desolation reigned. Such is the general picture which 

 Herodotus draws of this northern boundary of the great 



