882 
pliky's j^atubal histobt. [Book y, 
story there are still existing in its vicinity many vestiges which 
tend to prove that the locality was once inhabited ; such as 
the remains of vineyards and plantations of palm-trees. 
Suetonius Paulinus\ whom we have seen Consul in our 
own time, was the first Koman general who advanced a 
distance of some miles beyond Mount Atlas. He has given 
us the same information as we have received from other 
sources with reference to the extraordinary height of this 
mountain, and at the same time he has stated that all the 
lower parts about the foot of it are covered with dense 
and lofty forests composed of trees of species hitherto un- 
known. The height of these trees, he says, is remarkable ; 
the trunks are without knots, and of a smooth and glossy 
surface ; the foliage is like that of the cypress, and besides 
sending forth a powerful odour, they are covered with a 
flossy down, from which, by the aid of art, a fine cloth might 
easily be manufactured, similar to the textures made from the 
produce of the silk- worm. He informs us that the summit 
of this mountain is covered with snow even in summer, and 
says that having arrived there after a march of ten days, he 
proceeded some distance beyond it as far as a river which 
bears the name of Gler^ ; the road being through deserts 
covered with a black sand^, from which rocks that bore the 
appearance of having been exposed to the action of fire, pro- 
jected every here and there ; localities rendered quite uninha- 
bitable by the intensity of the heat, as he himself experienced, 
1 The same general who afterwards conquered the Britons under Boa- 
dicea or Bonduca. While Propraetor in Mauritania under the Emperor 
Claudius, in the year A.D. 42, he defeated the Mauri who had risen in 
revolt, and advanced, as PHny here states, as far as Mount J\.tlas. It is 
not known from what point Pauhnus made his advance towards the Atlas 
range. Mannert and Marcus are of opinion that he set out from Sala, 
the modern SaUee, while Latreille, Malte Brun, and Walkenaer think 
that his point of departure was the mouth of the river Lixos. Sala was 
the most southerly town on the western coast of Africa that in the time 
of Pliny had submitted to the Roman arms. 
2 Some of the editions read * Niger' here. Marcus suggests that that 
river may have been called * Niger' by the Phoenician or Punic colonists 
of the western Mauritania, and 'G-er' or ' Gar' in another quarter. The 
same writer also suggests that the Sigilmessa was the river to which 
Paulinus penetrated on his march beyond Atlas. 
3 The Sigilmessa, according to Marmol, flows between several moun- 
tains which appear to be of a blackish hue. 
