And, after all, it is only the _Real_ that matters; particularly to the frontiersman who lives close to the earth and beyond the ken of the subtleties of Civilisation, for he sees, with the eye of the untrammelled, the dominion of the world’s outer ranges and the bigness of things as they are. Wherefore, with pen directed by hand accustomed to rope a load, coax a rein, fondle a rifle, heal a wound, or kindle a camp-fire, I set out, as an awkward man of the outdoor places, without geographical technicalities, to describe the Great Sahara as I have come to read its character in the wake of many a trail over leagues of intimate sands. Let us first endeavour to picture something of the vastness of the Sahara. In approximate area—excepting the Libyan Desert—it is about eighteen times larger than Britain and Ireland and about half the area of the United States. Large as that may seem, it must be taken into count that there is a sentimental vastness far beyond that—the sentiment of environment. To illustrate this. Suppose that one sets out to travel for a day, or a week, or a month, through rich, inhabited country with good roads, and with the good things of life always closely about one. Is it not the case that the plenitude of the countryside pleases to such a comforting extent that _Distance_ is prone to be unesteemed, and unthought of as a cause for anxiety? Consequently, under such circumstances, all _fear of distance_, and _the significance of overpowering immensity_, do not enter into calculation. But it so happens that that is a tremendously important factor, which must always be reckoned with, in any considered treatment of the Sahara, where conditions are entirely opposite. No one would hesitate to cross America to-day, but could anyone contemplate a journey in the Great Desert without, at once, being confronted with lively dread of its vastness and desolation? Indeed, so strong is this influence that the eventual result, once one enters that mystical land, is that the mind becomes almost disqualified to reckon in terms of numerals. All that one is constantly aware of is, that limitless leagues of drear desolate sand lie ahead, and that, no matter what effort is made, no matter how well the caravan travels, the twenty or thirty odd miles that are the record of a day’s endeavour leave one apparently in the same position as before, with horizon, and sand, and sky no nearer to the vision than from camps that lie on the trail behind.