ely for the purpose of capturing them, and that, as it
had ridden some forty miles to do it, it would not be in a good temper.
It was therefore rather hard to judge of their hostility, because as
soon as they were confronted with the General and the interpreter they
gave one yell of "Allah!" and fell flat, face downwards, in the sand,
from which position they refused to move. They would not even budge when
the interpreter took all their clothes off with a view to searching
them. They probably thought this was merely a preliminary to skinning
them. When they were finally induced to speak, I believe they were
understood to say that we were the first men they'd seen for eight
years. I don't wonder they were frightened. If you have lived all your
life all alone in the middle of a howling desert with Grandfather it's a
very frightening thing when a complete Frontier Force marches forty
miles for the sole purpose of capturing you.

But the day's excitement was not over yet. Towards evening I took my
troop off at a gallop in person and captured a camel. It was a very
young camel, hardly bigger than a sheep on stilts, and it cried like a
child at the sight of me. This, I hope, was not so much due to my
frightful appearance in my red moustaches as to the fact that it had
probably never seen a man at all (not being eight years old), let alone
an army.

The curious aversion which it conceived for my moustache threatened to
hold up the entire Frontier Force for the rest of the day, for it would
neither be led nor driven. Fortunately, however, we had a very black
Soudanese camel-driver with us as guide, and he came and spat at it,
which soothed it considerably, and it followed him like a lamb. We got
it back to camp next day and it is tied up near my tent. It has
apparently made up its mind to waive the moustache question, and we now
spit at one another in the friendliest fashion whenever I pass. I hope
in time to train it to bring up my bath water in the morning from the
three palm-trees.

_Later._--The camel was the last episode of the campaign, and we
returned to ---- yesterday. The total bag of a four days' expedition
was--sheep, 8; shepherds, 2; camel, 1. The human section was
subsequently released on the grounds that their political views were
satisfactory.

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[Illustration: A well-known octopus family, having heard of the undersea
photography, decides to pose.]

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