eable footprints of the warrior-king. It is surely
the most wonderful survival of history that one should still be able to
gaze upon him, high-nosed and masterful, as he lies with his powerful
arms crossed upon his chest, majestic even in decay, in the Gizeh
Museum. To the captives, the cartouche was a message of hope, as a sign
that they were not outside the sphere of Egypt. "They've left their
card here once, and they may again," said Belmont, and they all tried to
smile.

And now they came upon one of the most satisfying sights on which the
human eye can ever rest. Here and there, in the depressions at either
side of the road, there had been a thin scurf of green, which meant that
water was not very far from the surface. And then, quite suddenly, the
track dipped down into a bowl-shaped hollow, with a most dainty group of
palm-trees, and a lovely green sward at the bottom of it. The sun
gleaming upon that brilliant patch of clear, restful colour, with the
dark glow of the bare desert around it, made it shine like the purest
emerald in a setting of burnished copper. And then it was not its
beauty only, but its promise for the future: water, shade, all that
weary travellers could ask for. Even Sadie was revived by the cheery
sight, and the spent camels snorted and stepped out more briskly,
stretching their long necks and sniffing the air as they went.
After the unhomely harshness of the desert, it seemed to all of them
that they had never seen anything more beautiful than this. They looked
below at the green sward with the dark, star-like shadows of the
palm-crowns; then they looked up at those deep green leaves against the
rich blue of the sky, and they forgot their impending death in the
beauty of that Nature to whose bosom they were about to return.

The wells in the centre of the grove consisted of seven large and two
small saucer-like cavities filled with peat-coloured water, enough to
form a plentiful supply for any caravan. Camels and men drank it
greedily, though it was tainted by the all-pervading natron. The camels
were picketed, the Arabs threw their sleeping-mats down in the shade,
and the prisoners, after receiving a ration of dates and of doora, were
told that they might do what they would during the heat of the day, and
that the Moolah would come to them before sunset. The ladies were given
the thicker shade of an acacia tree, and the men lay down under the
palms. The great green leaves swi