6 BULLETIISr 1125, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



B. C). After a delay of 14 years this claimant won his suit and 

 had his title established (J, v. o, pp. 726-727) . 



ACCOUNTS OF OASIS DATES BY MODERN TRAVELERS. 



The first modern European traveler to visit Kharga Oasis seems to 

 have been Poncet (23), who wrote of his journey from Syout (mod- 

 ern Assiut, or Siut), in October, 1698, in his " Voyage to Ethiopia," 

 as follows: 



Having at my Return found all the Company met, we set forward on the 2d 

 of October early in the Morning, and from that very day we entered a frightful 

 Desert. . . . We arrived on the 6th of October at Helaoue: 'Tis a pretty 

 large borough and the last that is under the Grand Signior's Jurisdiction. . . . 

 Helaoue is very pleasant and answers fully its Name, which Signifies a 

 Country of Sweetness. Here are to be seen a great Number of Gardens watered 

 with Brooks, and a World of Date-Trees which preserve a continual Verdure. 



Paul Lucas, a French traveler who was commanded by Louis XV 

 to write the account of his voyages, about 1700, gives the earliest 

 modem account of the date industry of the Oasis of Baharia, from 

 which the United States Department of Agriculture obtained its first 

 importation of Saidy offshoots under their true name. He is cited by 

 Eennell {24) (Oeog. of Herodotus, v. 2, pp. 204:-205), as follows: 



There is in the desert, at the distance of some journeys * from Faiume (the 

 city so named), a place of inconsiderable extent full of palm trees which bear 

 the best dates in all Egypt. [The >;ame is said by Jacutus, respecting thy superior 

 quality of the fruits of the oases.] The Arabs, who possess and cultivate this 

 spot, draw their scanty supplies of water from the wells, which they have, with 

 much labour and industry, dug in the desert, and water them with great care. 

 They pay their tribute to the Pacha in dates. (Vol. ii, of the Third Voyage of 

 Lucas, p. 206.) 



Eennell says: 



A position of some journeys' distance from the Faiume, and in the desert to 

 the west, can answer to no other place than the Lesser Oasis, which by our data 

 falls at about five journeys from the town of Faiume; four from the nearest 

 part of the lalie of the same name. 



As the " Lesser Oasis," or " Oasis Parva," was the earlier designa- 

 tion of what is now known as Baharia, where in January, 1820, Cail- 

 liaud {9) noted that " the best dates of the region are called Saydeh ;" 

 no great stretch of the imagination is needed to suppose that in the 

 time of Lucas, about 1700, there were gardens of Saidy trees which 

 bore " the best dates in all Egypt," from which the tribute to the 

 pasha was paid, for we may be sure that potentate accepted as tribute 

 none but the best. 



William G. Browne (7) was the first modern traveler to reach the 

 Oasis of Siwa or Jupiter Ammon. In his account of this journey he 

 says: 



The information I had obtained in Alexandria having induced me to resolve 

 on attempting to explore the vestiges of the Temple of Jupiter Ammon from 

 that place, I procured a proper person as interpreter and made the necessary 

 arrangements with some Arabs, who are emplo.ved in transporting through the 

 desert dates and other articles between Siwa (a small town to the westward) 

 and Alexandria, to convey my baggage and provisions and to procure for me a 

 secure passage among the other tribes of Arabs, who feed their flocks at this 

 season in the vicinity of the coast. * * * When the Arabs had finished the 



* Ancient writers frequently refer to tlie distance traveled in a day by caravan as a 

 " journey." 



