“We have scarcely shut our eyes,” says this intrepid, indefatigable traveller, “when we are called by the guide to renew the march. It is still night, but the desert is visible, dim and ghostly under the cold pale light of the rising moon. Vegetation has entirely disappeared; there is scarcely a twig even of the hardy saxaul. Side by side with us move our own shadows, projected long and black over the moonlit sand, like fearful spectres pursuing us to our doom. “Thin streaks of light begin to shoot up the eastern sky. The moon grows pale, the shadows fade out, and at last the sun, red and angry, rises above the horizon. After the sharp cold of the night its rays strike us agreeably, suffusing a pleasant sensation of warmth over our benumbed limbs. Then it grows uncomfortably warm, then hot, and soon we are again suffering the pangs of heat and thirst; our eyes are again blinded by the fiery glare, and our lungs scorched by the stifling noonday atmosphere.” Throughout that day the ride was continued, and even far into the night. Early next morning the traveller reached the summit of the mountain range behind which lies Khala-Ata. With feelings of eager expectancy and hope, he spurred forward his horse, and with his field-glass looked down upon the bleak bare plain which stretched far away in the direction of Bokhara; there, at the distance of eight miles, he saw a dome-like mound, encircled by small tents, which shone in the morning sunlight, and at various points were grouped masses of soldiers in white uniform, and the sheen of steel. At last, then, he had overtaken Kauffmann!