It was about noon on the twelfth day after our departure from Suez, when, after slowly beating up the narrow creek leading to Yambu' harbour, we sprang into a shore-boat and felt new life when bidding an eternal adieu to the vile "Golden Wire." I might have escaped much of this hardship and suffering by hiring a vessel to myself. There would then have been a cabin to retire into at night, and shade from the sun; moreover, the voyage would have lasted five, not twelve, days. But I wished to witness the scenes on board a pilgrim ship,-scenes so much talked of by the Moslem palmer home-returned. Moreover, the hire was exorbitant, ranging from L40 to L50, and it would have led to a greater expenditure, as the man who can afford to take a boat must pay in proportion during his lan [p.224] journey. In these countries you perforce go on as you begin: to "break one's expenditure," that is to say, to retrench expenses, is considered all but impossible. We have now left the land of Egypt. [FN#1] The reader who has travelled in the East will feel that I am not exaggerating. And to convince those who know it only by description, I will refer them to any account of our early campaigns in Sind, where many a European soldier has been taken up stone dead after sleeping an hour or two in the morning sun. [FN#2] The Zodiacal Light on the Red Sea, and in Bombay, is far brighter than in England. I suppose this is the "after-glow" described by Miss Martineau and other travellers: "flashes of light like coruscations of the Aurora Borealis in pyramidal form" would exactly describe the phenomenon. It varies, however, greatly, and often for some days together is scarcely visible. [FN#3] Niebuhr considers that the stars are brighter in Norway than in the Arabian deserts; I never saw them so bright as on the Neilgherry hills. [FN#4] Written in the days of the vans, which preceded the Railway. [FN#5] On one occasion I was obliged personally to exert myself to prevent a party of ladies being thrust into an old and bad transit-van; the ruder sex having stationed itself at some distance from the starting-place in order to seize upon the best. [FN#6] Abraham, for breaking his father's idols, was cast by Nimrod into a fiery furnace, which forthwith became a garden of roses. (See Chapter xxi. of the Koran, called "the Prophets.") [FN#7] David worked as an armourer, but the steel was as wax in his hands. [FN#8] Solomon reigned over the three orders of created beings: the fable of his flying carpet is well known. (See Chapter xxvii. of the Koran, called "the Ant.") [FN#9] These are mystic words, and entirely beyond the reach of dictionaries and vocabularies. [FN#10] In Moresby's Survey, "Sherm Demerah," the creek of Demerah. Ali Bey calls it Demeg. [FN#11] See "The Land of Midian (Revisited)" for a plan of Al-Dumayghah, and a description of Al-Wijh (al-Bahr) These men of the Beni Jahaynah, or "Juhaynah" tribe-the "Beni Kalb," as they are also called,-must not be trusted.