xxiv INTEODUCTION. 
Assuan, he traversed a country studded over with small, rounded, detached mountains 
of sandstone and granite, the highest of which rises to about 360 metres above the 
plain. Here the temperature in the early morning, in the beginning of February, 
was not more than 5° Centigrade. The route beyond this lay through the valley of 
Esserba, full of brush-wood and many acacia-trees, all of which were green owing 
to a recent fall of rain. In this valley there was a Bisharin encampment of eight 
mat huts. The track continued through rocky ravines with natural reservoirs of water, 
and everywhere were Bisharin and Ababdeh. The ravine through which his route 
lay became wide and filled with plants and trees. Here Linant de Bellefonds says : — 
" Un bouc sauvage, bel animal aux longues soies s'enfuit a. notre approche, nous lui 
donnames la chasse inutilement : car il gagna les montagnes avant que nos dromadaires 
pussent l'atteindre et il se trouva a l'abri de nos balles." The description of this 
animal suggests the wild sheep, Ovis tragelaphus, rather than an ibex, which the 
author calls the " Capricorne " 1 . 
Beyond this was the Wadi Gehetre, cut through rather high mountains of crystalline 
rocks, where he encamped, as it contained a natural reservoir, which at the time 
of his visit, 4th February, had been replenished by recent rains. It also yielded 
plenty of fodder for the camels, and wood to act as fuel to warm the travellers ; but 
the cold at night was so great that the caravan, instead of starting in the morning, 
had to wait until the benumbed camels had been thawed by the sun. The route 
continued through a similar country, and passed the old gold-workings of El Seiga, 
in a valley of that name defined by isolated mountains. Further on, it lay through 
a frightful undulating desert plain, covered with sandstone and the calcareous detritus 
of the surrounding hills, granite rocks standing up through the sand. Crossing the 
mountains it reached the valley Seguel, filled, here and there, with small very green 
mimosa-trees, and then another valley, where good water was found by digging in the 
sand. Traversing small hills and winding amid little valleys, with a sparse vegetation, 
the route arrived at the Wadi Allaki. This great wadi, where Liuant de Bellefonds 
met with it, was a fine wide valley containing plants and shrubs, relatively abundant 
as far as the mountains which were some distance off. Game, consisting of red 
partridges, gazelles, and hares, was abundant. As this valley is traced eastwards it 
becomes narrowed, and at its head is found the site of the ancient gold-mines of 
Derehib, with the remains of a ruined town and two castles. Linant de Bellefonds 
visited a number of the wadis that open into Wadi Allaki in the upper part of 
its course. One of them, confined between small, almost perpendicular, mountains, 
contained water in its bed, and a variety of trees, some of them very large. At 
1 A herd, according to native report, of 13 sheep (Ovis tragdaplms) frequented Semna, 64 kiloros. south 
of Wadi Haifa, in the summer of 1890. They were supposed to have come from Jebel el Hiss, 96 kiloms. 
8.W. of the Elba mountains, and to have been driven to the Nile by the drought that prevailed, from 
1S36-91, in the Albai district. (Sclater, Proc. Zool. Soc. 1895, p. 85.) 
