uld be still greater against him,
because his courage was lessened.

He knew the danger which menaced, and the suffering he would have to
endure the instant he rose from behind the poor shelter; yet it was
necessary, and the boy staggered to his feet.

There was nothing to guide him in the right direction, for all around
was blackness and flying grit; yet he believed his way lay directly in
the teeth of the storm, and because of such belief pressed onward,
resolving that he would continue as long as was possible.

As he said to himself so he did, staggering this way and that, but
ever pressing forward on the course which he believed to be the true
one, blinded, choking, bewildered by the swirling particles until he
was dimly conscious of falling, and then he knew no more.

At the moment Dick fell vanquished, hardly more than a quarter of a
mile distant were two men mounted on Indian ponies, and leading three
burros laden with a miner's outfit for prospecting.

To them the sand-storms of the desert were not strange; and with the
knowledge born of experience they made preparations for "riding out the
gale," when the low, dark cloud first appeared in the eastern horizon.

The animals were fastened with their heads together; the riders
bending forward in the saddles, and, as well as it could be
accomplished, throwing over all the heads a number of blankets.

The two horsemen had taken the precaution while assuming this position
to present their backs to the wind, and each had tied one end of his
blanket around his waist in such manner that it could not be stripped
off by the tempest.

Two or three blankets were fastened to the heads of the animals, and
thus the faces of all were protected.

When the sand had whirled around them until the animals were buried
nearly to their bellies, the riders forced the bunch onward ten or
fifteen paces, continuing to make this change of location at least
every five minutes during the entire time the tempest raged; and thus
it was they escaped being buried in the downpour of sand.

From the time the first blast struck Dick, until the "dancing giants"
whirled away to the westward, leaving the sky unclouded and the yellow
sands shimmering in the sunlight, no more than thirty minutes had
passed; yet in that short interval one human life on which others
depended would have been sacrificed, unless these two travellers who
were uninjured should chance to reach that exact spot where lay