d till half-past nine, when we fell down with faintness at
another bush.

We again undressed and buried ourselves in sand, lying without speaking
a word for quite nine hours. At dusk we dragged ourselves on again with
halting steps. After three hours of march Kasim again stopped suddenly.
Something dark peeped out from among the dunes--three fine poplars with
sappy foliage. The leaves were too bitter to eat, but we rubbed them on
the skin until it became moist.

Here we tried to dig a well, but the spade fell out of our powerless
hands. We then lay down and scraped with our hands, but could not do
much. Instead we collected all the dry branches we could find and made a
blazing fire as a beacon for Islam, and to attract attention from the
east, for we knew that a caravan road ran along the Khotan river.

At four o'clock on May 4 we moved on again, but after five hours we were
utterly exhausted. We threw ourselves heedlessly on the sand, for Kasim
was unable to dig the usual burrow. I wriggled naked into the cool dune
and lay there ten hours without closing an eye.

When at last the shadows spread over the earth and I was ready to set
out, Kasim murmured that he could go no farther. I did not even remember
to bid him farewell when I went on my way alone through the darkness and
sand. Just after midnight I sank down by a tamarisk. The stars twinkled
as usual, and not a sound was audible. Only the beat of my heart and the
ticking of my watch broke the awful silence. Then I heard a rustling
sound in the sand. "Is that you, Kasim?" I asked. "Yes, sir," he
whispered back. "Let us go a little farther," I said, and he followed me
with trembling legs.

We were not troubled now so much by thirst, for our bodies had become as
dry as parchment and seemed to have lost all feeling; but our strength
was at an end. We crawled for a long distance on our hands and feet,
dazed and indifferent, as if we were walking in our sleep.

But soon we waked up into full consciousness. Dumb with astonishment we
stopped before the trail of men. Shepherds from the river must have seen
our fire the day before and have come to look for us. We followed the
trail up a high dune where the sand was closely packed and the marks
were more distinct. "It is our own trail," said Kasim in a despairing
voice. We had gone round in a circle, and now we could do no more for a
while. Sad and worn out, we fell down in the track.

It was May 5. We had slept half a