96 
TRAVELS IN AFRICA. 
Chap. XLI. 
in advance, we ascended the eastern slope, which was 
extremely steep and very difficult for the camels. 
Gradually our companions, fearing to expose them- 
selves by staying behind, collected around us, and we 
proceeded in a south-easterly direction, when we soon 
came to another and more favoured valley, called 
Hinder! Siggesi, its bottom adorned with a thicker 
grove of date-trees and with beautiful corn-fields — 
that is to say, fields of wheat with their golden stalks 
waving in the wind — while the high ground, being 
elevated above the bottom of the valley about 120 feet, 
was planted near the brow with fields of millet, which 
was just ripe, but not yet reaped. What with the 
rich vegetation, the steep cliff's, the yellowish crop, 
the burning hamlet, and the people endeavouring to 
make their escape, it formed a very interesting scene, 
which is represented in the accompanying view. 
Keeping along the western brow, which in some 
places, where the rock lay bare, was extremely steep, 
we observed that several natives, including even two 
or three horsemen, had taken refuge in the thickest 
part of the date-grove, watching our motions. A 
small hamlet of straw huts of a peculiar shape, not 
unlike those of the Koy&m described on a former 
occasion, and lying at the very brink of the steep 
rocky declivity, had been set on fire. Our wild, law- 
less companions now began to descend into the valley 
at a spot where the slope was more gradual, raising 
a war-cry in order to frighten those people who 
were hid in the grove. Five good horsemen would 
