tuous sensations which it never fails to produce. Wine or brandy, they say, does not stand in competition with it. The Hashisha, or leaves o f the plant, are dried and cut like tobacco, with which they are smoked, in v e ry small pipes ; but when the person wishes to indulge in the sensual stupor it occasions, he smokes the Hashisha pure, and in less than h a lf an hour it operates; the person under its influence is said to experience pleasing images: he fancies himself in company with beautiful ■women; he dreams that he is an emperor, or a bashaw, and that the world is at his nod. There are other plants which possess a similar exhiliratiug quality, among which is a species o f the Palma Cbristi, the nuts o f which, mixed with any kind o f food, affect a person for three hours, and then pass off. These they often use when they wish to discover the mind o f a person, or what occupies his thoughts. Snobar.— This is a plant much used b y the tanners in the preparation o f leather: it grows on Mount A tlas and about Tetuan. L otu s .— T h e Lotus, or water lily , grows in the rivers and streams o f E l G a rb ; it is called by the Arabs Nufar. T he lotus, or nymphaea lotus, has often been mistaken for a v e ry different plant, called b y the ancients Lotus, or Rkamnus Lotus, and which served formerly for food to a certain people in A frica, thence named L o to p h a g i; this plant, which is a shrub similar in appearance to the- w ild ju ju b e , or buckthorn, is called by the A rab s Seedra, and grows about the A tla s mountains east o f Marocco and Terodant. It has been described b y Mr. Mungo Park in his Tra ve ls in Africa . Mallows.— T his herb is much used b y the Arabian doctors; and the fruit is eaten b y the Arabs as antifebrile: the generical name is K u b b a iz a * T h e garden Jew’s mallow, ca lled Melokia, is also much esteemed as a strong incentive to venery. Coloquintida, called by the Arabs El Heridal, is found along the coast, on the sandy shore above the high water mark from Agadeer to Wedinoon, an extent of about two hundred m ile s : it had never been imported into this country till last y ea r, b y myself, when it sold at 3s. 8d. per lb. Throughout this fertile country roses, and various beautiful flowers which' are carefu lly reared in hot houses with us, grow spontaneously in the p la in s : o f these I have seen in Temsena, and about Rabat, and in Suse, lupins, jonquils, wall-flowers and hyacinths o f various colours and exquisite fragrance (of the latter there is a beautiful kind, being a Spanish brown, inclining to scarlet.) T h e roses about Marocco grow in the streams and ditehes. A t T afile lt they have a powerful fragrance : it is from the leaves o f the Worde F ille lly , or Tafilelt rose, that the celebrated Attar o f roses (commonly called Otto o f roses) is extracted : the word Attar is an Arabic word signifying a distillation or filtration.-f- Surnag.— T his vegetable grows on the declivities o f the Atlas mountains. T h e Moors drink a decoction o f it for the purpose o f inciting them to venereal pleasure. Truffles.— This root, called b y the Arabs T e r fe z , is somewhat similar to the potatoe, and about the size o f a lemon ; it * Sonini, in his travels in Egypt, called it hobezd; there is, however, ho A in • the word, but a guttural k ( ¿ ) an error originating in a partial, and but an oral, knowledge of the' Arabic language; or possibly he had seen the word written by a professed Arabian scholar, who frequently omits the punctuation, which he can make out by the tenour of the discourse; -in this case the word wonld have been written with the letter A (j*). •f Iti passing these plains, where such a variety of beautiful flowers grow spontaneously, it has often occurred to me that this country was once in a considerably higher degree of cultivation than it is at present.
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