The Birmingham age-herald., 1907-07-21

Copyright, 1907 by Frank G. Carpenter)
 Tripoli, 1907. T HAVE just returned from Meohia, the
 great oasis which lies on the edge of the Libyan desert east of Tripoli cit. It faces the Mediterranean and is an island of green on the edge of this mighty ocean of sand It contains more than million date palms, fully as many olive trees, and vast groves of oranges and lemons. The oasis 's cut up by roads, much like the streets of d city. Each little farm has walls six or eight feet high, and everywhere are to be seen the tall frameworks of the wells by which the land is irrigated. The motive power for raising the water is cows, camels. donleys and women. In many places tun- nels or long inclined ditches, beginning at the wells and sloping downward for several hundred feet, have been dug, and in these as tracks, the COW, donkey, camel or woman trots up and down, drag ging the rope, running over a wheel on the top of the framework, which raises the water. At the end of the rope is a huge bag of skin open at both ends. This is dropped into the well, and, when it fills, the lower end Is pulled mp, thus forming a closed bottom, and the whole is dragged high up into the air. The bottom is now released, and the water pours out into trough, which carries it off into a reservoir. One of these buckets will hold about thirty gallons and, as the work goes on all day, the supply raised is enormous.
 An Oasis Farm.
 During my stay l visited some of the gardens. They are of all sizes, and are beautifully kept. One l remember was cut up by cement conduits. running along on the top of the ground. so arranged that every little tract could be irrigated at will Under the rich orange groves beds of beautiful flowers were to be seen here and there; and in most places three crops were growing on the same soil. over the whole rose date palms, with their ragged trunks. their wide-branched fan-like leaves quivering in the breeze and tker yellow fruit shining like gold under the sun. The trees below were loaded with oranges. pale yellow lemons, flaming pomegranites and even with peaches ana pears. O0 tle BIoulu llotll vegetables were growing, and l saw even alfalfa and grain of different kinds. This garden was in the charge of q Bedouin and several of his wives The women were boiling dates in a pot. about the size or an apple butter kettle. over fire, out in the open l don't know whether they were making date butter or date hcney, or whether they were merely cooking dates, for sale in the markets. The women were loaded with iewelry. I bribed one with a franc. and she let me take Ter photograph. The others were more bashful, and they wrapped them selves up in their shawls whenever the camera was pointed their way.
 The Cases of Barbary.
 rae oases of Tripolitana or Barbary, as it is often called, contain practically its whole population. They were scat tered over d territory one-ninth as large as the United States, and they have all together about one million people. A large number of them, such AS Mechia, are found along the shores of the Med ltcrranean; others are further south III the desert, in a great depression known as the Fezzah, and in addition there are others in the beds of dry rivers, where the water supply comes from springs or art tasian wells. There are caravan routes leading from Tripoli to all of these oases, and also routes crossing the desert to the Soudau from oasis to oasis