Page:Africa by Élisée Reclus, Volume 2.djvu/105

 Big textSince the French conquest of Algeria, most of the trans-Saharian traffic, in order to avoid the territory of the Rumi, has been deflected from its natural channel to the Ghadames route, lying scarcely 15 miles from the conventional frontier between the French and Turkish possessions. Further political changes, and especially the development of the railway system, must necessarily involve a still greater displacement of the old commercial highways.

Ghadames lies only 300 miles from Tripoli, and to the nearest point on the coast towards the common frontier of Tripolitana and Tunisia the distance scarcely exceeds 240 miles, a journey for an ordinary caravan of ten or twelve days. Throughout nearly the whole of its extent, this much-frequented trade route is moreover easily traversed, and little exposed to the raids of the Urghamma

marauders on the Tunisian border. Hence Ghadames has been frequently visited by European explorers since the time of Laing, who first reached this place in 1826. Richardson, Dickson, and Bonnemain followed each other towards the middle of the century; Duveyrier resided here in 1860, and two years later a French mission under Mircher studied its geographical features and commercial relations. During his journey to Central Sudan in 1865, Rohlfs made a detour to visit Ghadames, and since then Largeau and several other French explorers have traversed the neighbouring frontier to survey the oasis, which the French annexation of Tunis has brought into still closer relation with the European world.

The sandy plain of gypsum where Ghadames stands at an altitude of 1,170 feet according to Duveyrier, or of 1,300 according to Vatonne, would present a most