Comïmuiicatcd with distant springs, and conveyed water,1 Whenever the
Jkmst Saw ocessiom to avail himself of such à retoqrce,'to every, part
of 'the valley. Three-ofthese aqueducts were ranged one above the
other,; with a eonsideitefeifr space between them ; and, as we locked up
to thé R ^a^ vilis above them, surrounded with well grôwn firs, and
hther chcHce trees, I thought them highly Ornamental to die prospect.
The hollowed trunks of large trees, which -weieunt some .parts fixed
in the soil which covered the rock, and in others sustained by,beams
inserted in it, across deep- dells, and.along the Sides of- precipices,
gave â passage,to the -waters. The eye could: trace these conduits for
more than two miles in continuation ; they exist as nobl&ihough
modest monuments of the genius of -the people, ■ and lose very lit® in
comparison with the more costly, models of antiquity? SoJ plain but
iùgeüiûus-'a -contrivance certainly merits admiration, esjpl^ïy when
We see the inventors of it intrenched, in impervious mountains, aènnà
whom, thè sciences never yet became a study, and Who- ar^ totally
excluded, as well by natural - impediments, as local prejudices, drom
all communication with more enlightened, nations. - The most perfect'
comprehension of the science of hydraulics,-.could, hardly, in the present
instance, have suggested to them-ariy improvement-. . |
" Our return,: when we chose to vary from the road by which we
came, was in front of the palacfe- of Lam’ Ghassafoob, on the south
side of which was a long narrow tract of level ground, supporting
many tall flagstaff's, that- had narrow banners of white cloth reaching
nearly from'one end to the other, and inscribed with the mystic words,
‘•Plate VTT.