Page:The lives of celebrated travellers (Volume 1).djvu/290

 suspended from the back of a camel, being too weak to ride on horseback, and attended by a servant mounted upon an ass, while another animal of the same species carried his cooking apparatus and provisions. To shield himself from the burning winds which swept with incredible fury along these parched and naked plains, he stretched a small sheet over his head, which, falling down on both sides of the pannier, served as a kind of tent. Thus covered, he contrived to keep himself tolerably cool by continually wetting the sheet on the inside; but being clothed in an exceedingly thin garment, open in several parts, he next day found that wherever the wet sheet had touched him the skin peeled off as if it had been burned. Having procured the assistance of a guide, they deserted the ordinary road, and struck off by a less circuitous, but more difficult track, through the mountains. The prospect for some time was as dull and dreary as could be imagined; consisting of a succession of sandy deserts, here and there interspersed with small salt ponds, the glittering mineral crust of which showed like so many sheets of snow by the light of the stars.

At length, late on the night of the 20th, though the darkness precluded the possibility of perceiving the form of surrounding objects, he discovered by the aroma of plants and flowers diffused through the air that he was approaching a verdant and cultivated spot; and continuing his journey another day over a rocky plain, he arrived at the foot of the mountains. Here he found woody and well-watered valleys alternating with steep and craggy passes, which inspired him with terror as he gazed at their frowning and tremendous brows from below. By dint of perseverance, however, he at length reached the summit of Mount Bonna, or at least the highest inhabited part, though spiry rocks shooting up above this mountain plateau on every side intercepted all view of the surrounding country. The chief of the moun