It Had Delayed The March Several Hours, As It Had Been Many Times Released From Difficulties By Unloading, Reloading, And Dividing The Heavier Portions Of Baggage Among The Other Camels Which Received A Smaller Pay.

At length, upon arriving upon the deep sand of the beach, about a mile distant, it had fallen down, and given up everything except the ghost.

It was a natural annoyance to the owners of the other camels that Iiani should be paid highly for a useless animal, while they had to carry its load divided among them assisted by a division of the smaller weights among the servants' riding mules. The evening was passed in grumbling: everybody was in a bad humour. It was declared impossible to pitch the tent upon the sandy beach by the pool of fresh water, as there was no holding-ground for the tent-pegs. I quickly instructed them in making faggots of tamarisk-boughs which, tied to the ropes and buried in the sand, were much more secure than pegs in the hardest soil; and the tent was at length arranged. A small species of curlew tempted its fate by visiting the fresh-water margin just before our dinner-hour; I bagged it; and as the cook was in a bad humour, I made a fire of driftwood, with which the beach was strewed, and when the glowing embers had succeeded to the flame and formed a red-hot heap, I cut two forked sticks, which, placed on either side upright in the sand, supported my bird upon a long skewer of green tamarisk-wood. A little salt, pepper, and a smear of butter occasionally, produced a result that would have beaten Christo's best attempts.

On the following morning we were all once more in good humour; the old camel had not died, but had been brought into camp late at night. It now formed the object for everybody's joke, and its owner liani was recommended to "try and sell it," or "to make it a present to a friend," or "to ride it himself;" the latter course would have been a deserved punishment. Iiani escaped further remarks by jumping upon his mule and riding ahead, and we followed our guide without delay along the deep sandy beach.

We rode for fourteen miles along cliffs bordering the sea, with the deep hollows occasioned by the natural drainage causing a continual series of ups and downs, which reminded me forcibly of the coast of South Devon between Torquay and Dawlish. The difference lay in the rocks, which were all plutonic, and in the scenery upon our left, which was a wild and confused mass of mountains, scarred by deep and dark ravines, while the more distant summits exhibited the still-existing pine-forests; these had disappeared from the slopes which faced the coast, and had afforded facilities for exportation. We halted in a deep glen between exceedingly steep hills, through which a torrent-bed had cut its course directly to the sea.

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