ANTALO. 69 



pisana covered some of the bushes and the aloe plants, 

 and I found two or three small species of Pupa, but, as 

 usual, only very few kinds occurred. 



We rode on the next day, the 28th March, to Buya, 

 near Antalo, over very similar country. Several patches 

 of trap occur, the mode of occurrence being in general 

 rather obscure, although some of them are clearly inter- 

 stratified in the limestone. No dykes were observed. 

 The town of Antalo lies three or four miles west of the 

 route followed by the army, on the side of a hUl, a 

 portion of which evidently consists of sandstone, and 

 which is very probably capped by trap. The plain to 

 the east of Antalo, in which stood the camp of Buya, is 

 very extensive, and mostly covered by black soil, resem- 

 bling the "regur" of India. The camp was one of the 

 most important dep6ts of the army, and a considerable 

 body of men were stationed here, with large commissariat 

 and other stores. I never could understand by what 

 remarkable lucus d non lucendo principle of nomen- 

 clature this camp, like the corresponding station at 

 Adigrat, was always spoken of as entrenched, because it 

 was surrounded by a wall of loose stones. I do not at 

 all wish to ridicule this apparently very trifling defence ; 

 it was behind no better that a whole army was kept 

 at bay for weeks by a few determined men at Cawnpore, 

 in 1857 ; and even the famous defences of the Lucknow 

 Residency were not much more formidable ; but the name 

 appeared to me singularly inappropriate. On the same 

 principle a waUed city should be one surrounded by a 

 ditch — e.g. Calcutta. 



