ii6 
MR- LUCAS'S 
the degree of latitude, tlie elevation of the land, the diftance of 
the fea, and the direction of the wind, is comparatively cool ; 
jEen Alii. and in fome places, as in tlie neighbourhood of Mount Atlas^ 
and on the Coails of the Mediterranean, occafionally exhibits 
* the phenomena of an European Winter. At Tripoli, the Ther- 
mometer is fometimes feen at the 40th degree of Farenheit's 
fcale, and on the 31 ft of December, in the year 1788, was ob- 
Lucas, ferved, at nine in the morning, to have fallen within four de- 
grees of the freezing point ; a coldnefs that was follov/ed by a 
light Ihower of fnovv^. 
In all countries, the animals which Nature and the attention of 
man have provided for the conveyance of the Traveller, and 
for the tranfit of his merchandize, are fuited to the charafter of 
the foil, and to the fmoothnefs or inequality of its furface. Of 
Ben Alii, the foil of Africa, to the North of the Niger, the prevailing cha- 
ra£ler is fand ; and though in the neighbourhood of rivers, and 
in all thofe diftrids which receive from the adjacent mountains, 
the advantage of numerous fprings, the fand is blended with a 
vegetable mould, yet the ground, in general, is remarkably foft 
and dry. In general, too, the furface of the land, though in 
fome places broken by naked rocks^ and fwelling, in others, to 
mountains 
