i86 TRAVELS IN AFRICA, 
Charje on Friday the 7th of Jane, and having pafled another 
defert fpace, after fix hours reached another village, called Bu- 
lak. This is a wretchedly poor place, the houfes being only 
fmall fquare pieces of ground inclofed with a wall of clay, or 
unburned bricks, and generally without a roof. It furnifhes 
good w^ater, and the people live by the fale of their dates. The 
caravan remained a day at Bulak, and having left it on Sunday 
the 9th, arrived at Beiris on Monday the loth, after nearly 
fourteen hours march through a barren tradt. Here the Chabir 
thought proper to go through the fame ceremony as at Charje, 
On the 13th we employed two hours in pafTmg from Beiris 
to Mughefs, the laft village of the Oafis toward the Southern 
defert. We left Mughefs on the morning of the 15th, and on 
Thurfday the 20th, in the morning, arrived at Sheb. At this 
place, by digging to the depth of a few feet in the fand, is found 
a fupply of indifferent water. A tribe of the wandering Arabs, 
called Ababde^ who come from the neighbourhood of the Nile, 
fometimes infefts it. Sheb is marked by the production of a 
great quantity of native alum, as the name imports. The fur- 
face, near which the alum is found, abounds with a reddifli 
ftone ; and in many places is feen argillaceous earth. Having 
left Sheb on the 21ft, we arrived at Selime' on the 23d. This 
is a fmall verdant fpot, at the foot of a ridge of rocks of* no great 
height, nor apparently extending very far. It affords the beft 
water of any place on the route ; but though there be verdure 
enough to relieve the eye from the dry fterility of the fur- 
rounding furface, it affords no vegetable fit for the fupport either 
of man or beaft. At Selime is a fmall building, which has 
apparently 
