132 TRAVELS IN AFRICA, 
the Red Sea, correfponding with Egypt, contain l)Ut a fmall 
number of tribes ; and the Arabs on the Eaft in general are 
little formidable. The Muggrebins are more ferocious, and 
might fend forth thirty thoufand men capable of bearing arms, 
could they ever be united, a thing almoft impoffible, their par- 
ties feldom exceeding four or five hundred, and the tribes being 
divided by inteftine enmities. The LefTer Oafis, now El-wah 
el-Ghu7'hi^ forms a kind of capital fettlement, if I may fo fpeak, 
of the Muggrebin Arabs, who extend even to Fezzan and Tri- 
poli. They are dreffed in a linen or cotton fhirt, over which 
is wrapped a blanket of fine flannel j all have fire-arms and are 
good markfmen, and their mufquets are their conftant compa- 
nions. Their chief employment lies in breeding horfes 
camels, and {heep. They are very hardy and abftemious, a 
fmall cake of bread and leathern bottle of water fupplying a 
man with ample provifion for a day. 
It is faid that feveral ruins are to be found at El-wah-el- 
Ghurh'i. Of the Oafis Magna, now El-wah, I fhall fpeak at large 
in treating of my journey to Dar-Fur ; but muft obferve that 
the dlftance between this Oafis and that ftyled Parva is erro- 
neoufly laid down in the moft recent maps. I was informed 
by the Muggrebins at El-wah, that Charje, the moft northern 
village of that diftrid, was but two days journey from the 
neareft part of El-wah-el-Ghurhi ; that is, about forty miles. 
Oafis Magna feems rightly to correfpond with the latitude of 
* They fell the males, and themfelves generally mount mares in their warlike 
expeditions. 
Dendera, 
