SHAW. 
239 
are reported to have fled, makes its appearance on 
the borders of the Sahara. The chief annoyanc^ 
of the inhabitants is from scorpions, which swarm 
to such a degree as to fill even the houses. Their 
bite, however, though poisonous, is not mortal ; 
not at least in those which occur in the cultivat- 
ed tracts on the sea coast. The most terrible 
scourge which the animal creation presents are 
the locusts. They are common, indeed, to all 
Africa ; but the desert seems here to pour them 
forth in extraordinary multitudes. They move 
in vast bodies like armies ; and every attempt 
hitherto made to stop or to divert their progress 
has proved completely abortive. 
Shaw was peculiarly struck by the total down- 
fall of those sciences, of which Barbary, at no dis- 
tant period, had been the favourite seat ; particu- 
larly the various branches of mathematics and 
chemistry. He saw quadrants, astrolabes, and 
other mathematical instruments, constructed with 
very considerable ingenuity ; but they were mere- 
ly kept as antique curiosities ; neither the mode 
of their construction, nor their actual use, being 
at all understood. Of arithmetic, which has been 
said to be invented by the Arabs, not one in 
twenty thousand can now perform the most ele- 
mentary operations. Medicine and chemistry 
are in a state of equal depression ; nor do there 
appear to remain even any traditionary practices 
15 
I 
