In the first place we scented liver and bacon for breakfast. In the second place it seemed to promise a settlement of the long-standing dispute between me and the General. The General has a preposterous theory about the existence and hostility of a vast number of mythical Arabs in our immediate neighbourhood. Now this is obviously absurd. With the exception of three palm-trees, which belong to us, there is nothing but sand for about two hundred miles in all directions, and even an Arab cannot subsist entirely on sand. Of course, if there were any Arabs near us, they would be so enraged at finding themselves at a spot two hundred miles from anything except sand that they would be violently hostile to anyone, especially to the people who had engaged the only three palm-trees in the neighbourhood. But it is their existence that I dispute with the General. It is true he took a most unfair dialectical advantage, about a fortnight ago, by having a large battle. But my contention is that the enemy on this occasion were merely orange-sellers from the nearest town, hired by the General for the purpose of argument. These two shepherds, however, did seem to support his theory of the existence of Arabs, but as to their hostility there was still room for doubt. They were both extraordinarily old and unbelievably dirty. Also they were, as was very natural, extremely frightened. Seeing that they knew themselves to be the only living people for quite a number of miles round, it must have appeared to them that the entire ---- Frontier Force had come out solely for the purpose of capturing them, and that, as it had ridden some forty miles to do it, it would not be in a good temper. It was therefore rather hard to judge of their hostility, because as soon as they were confronted with the General and the interpreter they gave one yell of "Allah!" and fell flat, face downwards, in the sand, from which position they refused to move. They would not even budge when the interpreter took all their clothes off with a view to searching them. They probably thought this was merely a preliminary to skinning them. When they were finally induced to speak, I believe they were understood to say that we were the first men they'd seen for eight years. I don't wonder they were frightened. If you have lived all your life all alone in the middle of a howling desert with Grandfather it's a very frightening thing when a complete Frontier Force marches forty miles for the sole purpose of capturing you. But the day's excitement was not over yet. Towards evening I took my troop off at a gallop in person and captured a camel. It was a very young camel, hardly bigger than a sheep on stilts, and it cried like a child at the sight of me. This, I hope, was not so much due to my frightful appearance in my red moustaches as to the fact that it had probably never seen a man at all (not being eight years old), let alone an army.