UMMESOGEIR SIWAH. 
433 
these are conceived to have been merely broken 
trunks of an elongated form. This petrified wood 
was generally black, but sometimes lightish grey, 
when it resembled natural wood so completely, as 
to be sometimes brought in for the purpose of 
firing. 
After a journey of eleven days, the party ar- 
rived, on the 15th September, at a small village 
situated on a rock, called Ummesogeir. This 
rock, sequestered by such immense deserts from 
the rest of the world, contains only about 120 
inhabitants. They are hospitable, simple, and 
peaceable ; and subsist by collecting dates, which 
are sold to the Arabs, and sometimes carried to 
Alexandria. Once only, it is said, a party of 
Bedouin Arabs attempted to strip them of their 
little domain ; but they were driven offj the inha- 
bitants ascribing their success to the miraculous 
influence of one of their holy men. 
From Ummesogeir, a journey of twenty-four 
hours brought them to Siwah, an extensive oasis, 
containing the only considerable mass of popula- 
tion which occurs on the route to Fezzan. Siwah 
is built upon and around a mass of rock, which, 
according to tradition, was hollowed out into 
caves, for the abode of the ancient inhabitants. 
The houses, in fact, bear still a resemblance to 
caves, and are huddled together so close, and in 
such confusion, that many of them want lights 
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