cooping a long hole, lying in it and shovelling the sand back over
him. It was not a success, and there was nothing to do but pace up and
down in a vain endeavour to get warm. Hours passed in a dreamy fashion
until at length Mac's attention was drawn by signs of activity in the
camp. He went there and found some cooks round their dixies and iron
rails in the open just starting a fire. He immediately made friends,
and speedily assisted the fire to become a respectable blaze. Others
came from the squadron and soon the cooks were hospitably handing out
mugs of tea and bread for toast. It was the camp of the Lancashire
Artillery, Mac learned, who had arrived from England a month since.
The sergeant-cook soon joined the great-coated circle round the fire.

"Yus," he said, with the confidence of a host to whom deference should
be paid, "Yus. Hi 'eard as 'ow them Noo Zealanders wus comin', an' I
says ter meself as 'ow it 'ud be another o' these 'ere lingos we'd 'av
ter try an' parley. An' I think's as 'ow that don't suit us chaps
zactly. But the fust of you fellers I sees this mornin' I says ter 'im
like, 'Goo' mornin,' maate!' An' 'e says ter me 'Goo' mornin,' maate,'
jest the same as meself! We thought as 'ow you'd talk some funny
lingo, I tell yer I did. But yuse jest speak same's us, an' I wus
glad."

Daylight revealed a scene as inspiring to an untravelled New Zealander
as America to Columbus. Close at hand stood an oriental city of
splendid architecture, the early light touching with romance its
minarets and pillared galleries. Spread before him, and stretching
away into the distance until lost in a soft blue mistiness, lay Cairo,
its forest of minarets, its domes and its square-topped houses.
Beyond, unmistakable in the blue distance, were the old familiar
outlines of the great pyramids. Behind him, the great yellow desert
spread away to the horizon and the rising sun, and was bordered on the
other hand by a forest of palm trees, almost hiding many fine houses
with shady courts and playing fountains.

The sun soon brought warmth into the troopers' frozen limbs, and they
went to work watering and feeding the horses. Later in the morning
they moved to the site of the camp to be, about a mile away. It was a
wind-smoothed stretch of untouched desert, but speedily horse-lines and
white tents broke its vastness. That night Mac, doing his turn of
horse-picket while the tired camp slept, walked out a little