and
still, with the hot sun overhead, and round her the solitude of the
desert, she rode onward. Suddenly her keen eye sighted some horsemen in
the distance. They drew nearer and nearer; evidently they were making
direct towards her; and eventually some hundreds of fully-armed Bedawun
galloped up to her, with fierce, hoarse shouts, brandishing their spears
as if they thirsted for her blood. Her face, at the time, was covered,
as is the Eastern custom, with her yashmak; but just as the spears of
the foremost horsemen glittered close to her horse's head, she raised
her stately figure in her stirrups, drew aside the yashmak that veiled
her majestic countenance, waved her arm slowly and disdainfully, and
with a loud voice cried, "Avaunt!"

The horsemen, we are told,[20] recoiled from her glance, but not in
terror. "The threatening yells of the assailants were suddenly changed
for loud shouts of joy and admiration at the bravery of the stately
Englishwoman, and festive gunshots were fired on all sides around her
honoured head. The truth was that the party belonged to the tribe with
which she had allied herself, and that the threatened attack, as well as
the pretended apprehension of an engagement, had been contrived for the
mere purpose of testing her courage. The day ended in a great feast,
prepared to do honour to the heroine, and from that time her power over
the minds of the people grew rapidly."

* * * * *

This was probably the happiest, or at least the most successful, period
of her career. Her ambition was satisfied--she felt herself a power; her
pride received no wounds, and her will no check. But by degrees clouds
gathered on the horizon: her subjects, if ever they were her subjects,
grew impatient of a rule which did not fulfil their longings after
military empire. Her immense expenditure told upon her fortune, and its
gradual diminution compelled her to withhold the presents she had
formerly bestowed with so lavish a hand. She awoke at last to a
perception of the hollowness of her authority. Meanwhile, many of the
attendants who had accompanied her from Europe died; others returned to
their native country. She was left almost alone in her Lebanon retreat,
with only the shadow of her former power. The sense of failure must have
been very bitter, but she bore herself with all her wonted pride, and
made neither complaint nor confession. Without bestowing a regret on the
past, she en