various species of mimosa and other spreading trees, under which the
shepherds and herdsmen find shelter from the sun.

[1] Tintalous is 40 short and 30 long days from Ghât, N.N.E.;
60 short and 50 long from Mourzuk, N.E.; 20 short, 15 long,
from Zinder or Damerghou, S.S.W.; 7 long, 10 or 12 short,
from Bilma, E.; 38 to 45 days from Tuat, N.W. (_viâ_
Taghajeet). Maharees, of course, trot and gallop in half
the time. These are native statements.

The principal feature of Tintalous itself is what may be called the
palace of En-Noor. It is, indeed, one, compared with the huts and stone
hovels amidst which it is placed. The materials are stone plastered with
mud, and also the wood of the mimosa tree. The form is an oblong square,
one story high, with an interior courtyard, and various appendages and
huts around on the outside. There is another house, and also a mosque
built in the same style, but much smaller. Of the rest of the
habitations, a few are stone sheds, but the greater part are huts made
of the dry stalks of the fine herb called bou rekabah, in the form of a
conical English haystack, and are very snug, impervious alike to rain
and sun. There are not more than one hundred and fifty of these huts and
sheds, scattered over a considerable space, without any order; some are
placed two or three together within a small enclosure, which serves as a
court or yard, in which visitors are received and cooking is carried on.
There is another little village at a stone's-throw north. The
inhabitants of these two villages consist entirely of the slaves and
dependants of En-Noor.

All around Tintalous, within an hour or two hours' ride, there are
villages or towns of precisely the same description, more or less