showers. It is alfo called Beladullah, or the Country of God, on account of this double blelling. The dates of Gerri are fent to the Mek, and are referved on purpofe for him. They are dry, and never ripen, nor have any of the moift and pulpy fubilance of the dates of Barbary. They arc firm and fmooth in the fkin, and of a golden colour.
On the 1st of October, at half pafl five in the morning ^ve left Gerri, the Acaba continuing on the eafl. and weft, hut the two extremities curving like a bow or an amphi- theatre. This ridge of mountains is compofed of bare, red flone, without any grais. At ten minutes after eight we changed our road to N. E. endeavouring to turn the point of the Acaba about three miles off, and at ten o'clock alight- ed among green trees to f<;ed our camels. At three o'clock in the afternoon we left our refting-place in the wood. The mountains, which were then on our left hand, are thofe of the Acaba of Gerri ; but thofe on the right ftill ran parallel to our courfe, and ended in the Acaba of Mornefs : we were now two miles from the river, its courfe due north. About twenty minutes part four we came to the Acaba of Mornefs, ji ridge of bare, (lony hills, and half an hour after we palled it. There is very little afcent, and the road is only loofe^ broken ftones, which laft about a quarter of an hour.
At {iX o'clock in the evening we came to Hajar el AfTad, • or Hajar Serrareek, the firil fjgnifying the Lion's Stone, the next the Stone of Thieves, a beggarly, ftraggling village, where there is 'a fakia, and fmall ftripes of dora, as if fown in a garden, and watered from the well at pleafure. Hajar el AlTad is the boundary between Wed Ageeb and the Mek ..of Chendi ; it is a yellow Hone fet upon a rock, which they 2 imagine
