56 RAMBLES OF A NATURALIST. 
Professor Newton. The name alaudipes for the Bifasciated 
or curve-billed Lark, takes précedence I presume of C. 
desertorum, Stanley, being twenty-four years older; and in 
that case five of Des Fontaines’ specific names would be 
adopted. 
Often in my rambles I intruded on the haunts of the 
cunning Crateropus fulvus, a bird first made known to 
science by Des Fontaines. It is exactly the colour of sand, 
like so many other birds in these arid regions.* 
The venerable Kadi Bouhammed, who was chief of Mellika 
in Dr. Tristram’s time, is doubtless gathered to his fathers; 
the present man is Salki Benadulla. Barbaaisa Bembamen 
is Kadi of Bou-Noura, and Adown of Benisguen. All 
these towns are in the same oasis, and the dry course of the 
Wed N’ca winds between them. Bou-Noura is a heap of 
ruins ; half the town has been dismantled, and the crumbling, 
unroofed, long-deserted houses have grown brown like the 
rocks which surround them. El Ateuf and Benisguen are 
in better preservation, and contain some shops or magazines, 
the principal wares, says Canon Tristram, “being leather, 
dyed cloths, and all sorts of materials for tanning and dye- 
ing.” Benisguen has long been the rival of Gardaia, and 
that its inhabitants still aspire to the chieftainship of the 
oasis was proved by a new wall which we found them con- 
structing, and which affords an instance of the intestine 
rivalry which has rendered every stand against the French 
abortive. The day is far distant when the burnous will 
vanquish the tricolor flag. 
We did not start upon our return journey until the last 
day of the month. Then bidding a hearty farewell to the 
Sheiks, and giving them at their request a certificate of our 
© I should think the species observed by Mr. W. T. H. Chambers in 
Tripoli (Ibis, 1867, pp. 101 and 104) is more likely to have.been this 
species than C. acacre. 
