The south of Libya is deep sand and parched earth, desert for the most part, completely infertile, all flat land, devoid of green shoots and grass and growing things and water, except perhaps for a standing pool left by the rain—and this is turbid and stinking, unfit even for a very thirsty man to drink. For this reason the country is uninhabited—for who could live in a land so wild, arid, and barren, oppressed by continual drought? The very heat of the sun, the downright fiery hotness of the air, and the temperature of the seething sand make the country completely inaccessible.