32 RAMBLES OF A NATURALIST. 
commonest bird at Bougzoul was the English Skylark, next 
to that the Calandra, and then Reboud’s Lark ( Calendrella 
minor, Cab.; C. reboudia, Tristram): The Skylarks were 
still in flocks, but the Calandras had paired. 
February 11th. Went a twelve-mile drive in the broiling 
sun with the keeper of the caravanserai. At some Arab 
tents we were entertained with coffee, hot bread, and Mzadb 
dates, in return for which we gave our hosts as much powder 
and shot as we could spare. Coming home we saw eight 
Cranes (Grus cinerea) marching abreast across the plain in 
the grey twilight. We guided the cart nearly to within 
gunshot, when they all ran together with their heads up, 
and without uttering any call, slowly sailed away, to seek 
safer quarters in the adjoining marsh, There is just enough 
traffic to mark a road over the desert to Ain-oussera, a 
lonely caravanserai with a muddy stream winding before the 
entrance. Nothing but a scanty herbage clothes the plain, 
a coarse kind of grass, to the height of two or three feet, 
(different from what grows in the weds,) forming a bleak 
retreat for the Desert Wheatear, the Dotterel, and the 
Tawny Pipit. Well may Dr. Tristram term this place “a 
genuine piece of desert.” In front, behind, and on either 
side stretches the vast Sahara. Sometimes level, often un- 
dulating, like a great sea of sand it stretches away. In 
some places the soil is soft and sandy (where it is red it is 
very soft), in some, hard and pebbly; but the herbage is 
everywhere reduced to a minimum. Every chott and 
Sebkhra* is coated with a saline incrustation, and the tan- 
talising mirage leads the traveller to suppose that he has 
in view a magnificent lake. Seen from afar the resemblance 
is perfect, but as he draws near, the mists are dissipated, and 
the lake resolves itself into bushes, rocks, or even camels. 
As the setting sun sheds its glare over this treeless plain of 
© Salt lakes of more or less extent. 
