128
CHAPTER VI.
FROM THE ZAYLA HILLS TO THE MARAR PRAIRIE.
I have now, dear L., quitted the maritime plain or first zone, to enter the Ghauts, that threshold of the Ethiopian highlands which, beginning at Tajurrah, sweeps in semicircle round the bay of Zayla, and falls about Berberah into the range of mountains which fringes the bold Somali coast. This chain has been inhabited, within History's memory, by three distinct races,--the Gallas, the ancient Moslems of Adel, and by the modern Somal. As usual, however, in the East, it has no general vernacular name. [1] The aspect of these Ghauts is picturesque. The primitive base consists of micaceous granite, with veins of porphyry and dykes of the purest white quartz: above lie strata of sandstone and lime, here dun, there yellow, or of a dull grey, often curiously contorted and washed clear of vegetable soil by the heavy monsoon. On these heights, which are mostly conoid with rounded tops, joined by ridges and saddlebacks, various kinds of Acacia cast a pallid and sickly green, like the olive tree upon the hills of Provence. They are barren in the cold
