While I was enjoying the scenery of the place, Dídi stepped suddenly behind me, and tried to throw me down, but not succeeding, laid his hands from behind upon the pistols which I wore in my belt, trying, by way of experiment, whether I was able to use them notwithstanding his grasp; but turning sharply round, I freed myself from his hold, and told him that no effeminate person like himself should take me. He was a cunning and insidious fellow, and I trusted him the least of our Kél-owí friends. Ánnur warned us that the freebooters intended to carry off the camels that we ourselves were riding, in the night; and it was fortunate that we had provided for the emergency, and were able to fasten them to strong iron rings. While keeping the first watch during the night, I was enabled by the splendid moonlight to address a few lines in pencil to my friends at home. _Thursday, August 22._—The Kél-owí having had some difficulty in finding their camels, we did not move at an early hour. To our great astonishment, we crossed the rocky bed of the torrent, and entered an irregular defile, where a little further on we passed another pond of rain-water. When at length we emerged from the rocks, we reached a very high level, whence we had a clear prospect over the country before us. Four considerable ranges of mountains were clearly distinguishable in the distance, forming an _ensemble_ of which the accompanying sketch will give an idea. We then entered valleys clothed with a fine fresh verdure sprinkled with flowers, and with a luxuriant vegetation such as we had not seen before. The senna-plant (_Cassia senna_) appeared in tolerable quantity. Mountains and peaks were seen all around, in a great variety of forms; and at twenty minutes past nine we had a larger mountain mass on one side, from which a dry watercourse, marked by a broad line of herbage issued and crossed our route. [Illustration]