DIVISION OF THE ROUTE INTO ZONES. 
79 
called upon the brother of the Governor of Ghat, 
who was writing letters for us to-day. 
I feel in better health than when I left Tripoli. 
Yet we are all a little nervous about the climate of 
Mourzuk, which is situated in a slight depression 
of the plain, in a place inclined to be marshy. The 
Consul has just recovered from a severe illness. 
We had been, in all, thirty-nine days from Tripoli, 
a considerable portion of which time was spent in 
travelling. This makes a long journey ; but I am 
told that our camel-drivers should have brought us 
by way of Sebha, and thus effected a saving of three 
or four days. The greater portion of our sandy 
journey was unnecessary, and merely undertaken 
that these gentlemen might have an opportunity of 
visiting their wives and families. 
On a retrospective view of the route from Tripoli 
to Mourzuk, via Mizdah, I am inclined to divide the 
country, for convenience sake, into a series of zones, 
or regions. 
1st zone. This includes the sandy flat of the 
suburbs of the town of Tripoli, with the date-palm 
plantations and the sand-hills contiguous. 
2d zone. The mountains, or Tripoline Atlas, 
embracing the rising ground with their influence 
on the northern side, and the olive and fig planta- 
tions, covering the undulating ground on the southern 
side, where the Barbary vegetation is seen in all its 
vigour and variety. This may also be emphatically 
called the region of rain. 
