ever do: we have provision and water enough for
us and the horses for to-day, and we can easily divide, and make it
last two days. We are caught and must do the best we can; at least we
can never free ourselves, if we stand still and bewail our fate."

"Oh, uncle! this is terrible," said Edward, gazing abstractedly around
where nothing but desolation met his eye.

"We can do no better than help ourselves out of it," said Jane,
encouragingly. "Be a man, Edward, and, doing your best, take your
chance with the rest."

"That is a brave girl," said Howe, with a nod of approval. "Let us be
courageous; the darkest hour of the night is that just before the dawn.
Is it not so, chief?"

"Always," answered the chief. "I have heard our old men speak of these
deserts, but they are more vast and dreary than even the report
portrayed them. But if we would escape, every moment is precious, and
we must haste away."

Alas! a new evil had visited them, for on going to their horses they
found them lame, stiff, and hardly able to move. One refused to rise
from the bed of sand, and no effort could move him. Constant travel in
the desert beneath the burning sun, had done the work for him; he was
useless, and to save his dying from thirst and starvation, they killed
him. They did that with sorrowful hearts, well knowing if they waited
to take him with them, it would be death to them, and that he could
never escape from his girdle of sand, if left alive.

The other horses soon began to show sufficient activity to warrant
their travelling, and again they rode on. That day they had sufficient
to last them, but they could not make it hold out longer unless they
put themselves on short allowance. Halting at noon, where not a ray of
deliverance shone upon them any more than their first day out, they
concluded to kill the three spare horses in order to save the water and
grass for the rest. Selecting the three that exhibited the greatest
signs of lassitude, they killed them. Confident now of holding on their
course another day, they took their luggage on the horses they rode,
and again set out. A copious shower of rain fell before night which was
a great relief, as it refreshed their heated bodies as well as their
horses, and cooled the temperature of the sand, from which they had
been greatly annoyed by its scattering, and sometimes almost blinding
their eyes, causing them to become inflamed and exceeding painful. That
night also rain fell; b