Page 223 - Third Book of Reading Lessons

222 THIRD BOOK OF
sometimes buried. Small spots of great beauty and rtility, called oases, are interspersed through this vast desert, which serve as agreeable resting places r the traveller. They are densely peopled, carefully cultivated, and governed by petty princes.
3. The countries bordering on the Mediterranean were distinguished in ancient history. Egypt had attained a high degree of civilisation at a very re­ mote period; and Carthage, the rst commercial nation of antiquity, disputed with Rome the empire of the world. These countries are remarkable r their· rtility, and mjght, under proper culture, be made to vie with the most voured regions of the earth. The countries along the eastern and western coasts are also uitful, producing the most-delicious uits, and plants of extraordinary size.
4. The Nile is the only river in A ica, of any considerable magnitude, which lls into the :Med­ iterranean Sea. The rivers which ow into the At­ lantic are numerous, but inconsiderable when com­ pared with the great rivers of other continents. The principal are-the Niger, Senegal, Gambia, Rio Grande, Congo, and Orange. The Zambezi ows into the Indian Ocean. The termination of the Niger was long unknown ; it is now generally be­ lieved, that after a course nearly as long as that of the Nile, it ows through di erent mouths into the
Gulf of Benin. Numberless A ican rivers never ;1 reach the ocean, but terminate in lakes, or are lost ·1 in the sand.
5. The mountains of A ica are more remarkable r their breadth than height; they rm, as it were, one great plateau, presenting towards each coast a succession of terraces, on which, during the rainy