MEETING CARAVANS. 18*7 whistled drearily around my tent, but I glowed like fire from the oozing out of the heat I had absorbed, and the Arabs without, squatted around their fire of camel's dung, sang the wild, monotonous songs of the Desert.

We left Murr-hat at sunrise, on the morning of the sixth day. I walked ahead, through the foldings of the black mountains, singing as I went, from the inspiration of the brilliant sky and the pure air. In an hour and a half the pass opened on a broad plain of sand, and I waited for my caravan, as the day was growing hot. On either side, as we continued our journey, the blue lakes of the mirage glittered in the sun.

Several isolated pyramids rose above the horizon, far to the East, and a purple mountain-range in front, apparently two or three hours distant, stretched from east to west. " We will breakfast in the shade of those mountains," I said to Achmet, but breakfast-time came and they seemed no nearer, so I sat down in the sand and made my meal. Towards noon we met large caravans of camels, coining from Berber. Some were laden with gum, but the greater part were without burdens, us they were to be sold in Egypt. In the course of the day upwards of a thousand passed us. Among the persons we met was Capt. Peel's cawass, or janissary (whom he had left in Khartoum), on his return, with five camels and three slaves, which he had purchased on speculation. He gave such a dismal account of Soudan, that Achmet was quite gloomy for the rest of the day.

The afternoon was intensely hot, the thermometer standing at 100°, but I felt little annoyance from the heat, and used no protection against it. The sand was deep and the road a weary one for the camels, but the mountains which seemed so near