CH. IX. THREATENING WEATHER. 217 



peculiar to the tribes of the Great Atlas. Whether the 

 slight variations in the triangular patch of coloured stuff 

 with rude embroidery that is inserted at the back, serves 

 to distinguish the men of one tribe from another, we failed 

 to ascertain. The women, who make but a faint show 

 of concealing half the face when approaching strangers, 

 seemed to be rather better favoured than those we had 

 seen in the lower valley. They partly shave the head, and 

 twine the remaining hair into two broad plaits, bringing 

 these forward crosswise over the forehead. 



"With a view to possible difficulties arising with the 

 sheik, we had taken Abraham with us, leaving the camp 

 at Hasni for twenty-four hours in charge of Crump, 

 Hooker's English attendant ; but it was arranged that the 

 former was to return on the following morning, much to 

 his own satisfaction, as the cold and discomfort of this 

 Alpine village seemed to make both him and the Marocco 

 soldiers perfectly miserable. 



Our evening meal was enlivened by one of some 

 precious bottles of generous wine that Maw had added to 

 our stores, reserved for special occasions, such as the 

 present. After this we should gladly have gone to sleep, 

 if stern duty had not forbidden any such luxury. The 

 minimum of evening work for the travelling botanist is to 

 lay out between dry paper the contents of his boxes and 

 portfolios filled during the day. On this occasion the 

 operation was more troublesome than usual, as we struggled 

 to screen our single flickering candle from the night wind 

 in the least exposed corner of the verandah, and midnight 

 had come and gone before we stretched our mattresses on 

 the earthen floor, first duly dusted with insect powder, 

 and soug-ht rest. In our exposed position the cold was 

 very sensible through the night, though the thermometer 

 did not fall below 45° Fahr. 



The morning sky was so gloomy that no one awoke 

 so early as we had intended; and at sunrise on May 16, 

 when we loudly called ior breakfast, the light was still so 



