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_Chapter XV_
_THE SELDJA GORGE_
It is good, after such visions of human infirmity and of death, to ride
over the plain to the Seldja gorge, an astonishing freak of nature. I was
twice within its towering walls of rock; the first time on horseback,
accompanied by a young Tripolitan miner, and in the evening; yesterday
again, in the torrid noon, afoot, alone.
You will do well, in every case, to ride as far as the _bordj_, or
rest-house, that stands near the entrance of the cleft, since there are
about four wearisome miles of level country to be traversed after leaving
Metlaoui. On the first occasion the Tripolitan ran for this whole long
stretch beside my horse, which trotted briskly; he amused himself, none
the less, in belabouring its hind-quarters with a club to make it go still
faster, and I confess to being not scandalized, not inordinately
scandalized, at this performance. We grow hard among the implacable desert
stones. Besides, it was only a hired beast. Any true lover of animals will
understand.
Skirting the foot of the hills that trend along, apparently closed, one
suddenly encounters a broad stream-bed with a rivulet meandering down its
centre; this is the Seldja-water (_arabice_, Thelja).
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