ate as on the face of the moon.

At midnight the sky becomes dark once more. The Persians have clambered
up on to their camels, and the swaying motion soon carries them into the
land of dreams. Soon no one is awake but the leader, who guides the
first camel, and myself, who am riding on the last. Suddenly heavy
drops begin to fall, and in a minute the rain pelts down on camels,
loads, and sleepers.

In a second the pace of the caravan is changed. Hear how hurriedly and
anxiously the bells swing and beat! They peal as if to awaken soldiers
and citizens in a burning town. Now the rain patters down on the level
desert and the camels begin to slip. We must hasten if our lives are
dear to us, or the desert will suck us in at the eleventh hour. The men
shout to urge on the camels. Now the bells clang as though to wake up
the dead to judgment.

There goes a camel down in the mire. Poor animals, they are lost on such
ground, for they have not hoofs like horses, but soft callous pads. When
they slip they do so thoroughly and suddenly. All four legs fly up in
one direction, and the heavy body with the loads thumps down in the
other. It is bad enough for the camel, but still worse for his rider. A
moment before he sat so well packed up, longing for the edge of the
desert sea, and now he lies sprawling in the slush.

One after another the camels fall and have to be helped up again. All
this causes delay, and meanwhile the clay is gradually becoming softer.
At every step the camels sink in deeper, the rain still pelts down, and
the bells ring jerkily. If they cease to ring, it will be because the
desert has conquered; at this very moment they stop.

"What is the matter?" I call out.

"We are at the Devil's ditch," answers a voice in the darkness.

The bells ring slowly again as the camels wade one after the other
through a trench full of salt water. I tighten my knees when my turn
comes. I cannot see the water, but I hear it spurting and splashing
round the legs of the camels in front of me. Now my camel slides down a
nasty mud bank. He slithers and wriggles about to keep himself up, and
then he, too, tramps through the water and scrambles up the other side.

"Tamarisks," I hear some one shout. Welcome sound! It means that we are
safe, for nothing grows in the salt desert. When we come to the first
tamarisks we are again on sandy ground. Then all danger is past, and
what does it matter if we are dead tired? Two more hours an