frontier of the desert laid down a gray and yellow dead-line over which
no domestic plant might strike its root and live.

But the arable tracts were velvet green with young grain, the verdant
level broken here and there by a rustic's hut, under two or three
close-standing palms. Even from the surface of the Nile the checkered
appearance of the country, caused by the various kinds of products, was
noticeable. Egypt was the most fertile land in the world.

However, as the light bari climbed and dipped on the little waves
toward the north the Arabian hills began to approach the river. Their
fronts became abrupt and showed the edges of stratum on stratum of
white stone. About their bases were quantities of rubble and gray dust
slanting against their sides in slides and drifts. Across the
narrowing strip of fertility square cavities in rows showed themselves
in the white face of the cliffs. The ruins of a number of squat hovels
were barely discernible over the wheat.

"Set me down near Masaarah," Kenkenes said, "and wait for me." The
boatman ducked his head respectfully and made toward the eastern shore.
He effected a landing at a bedding of masonry on which a wharf had once
been built. The rock was now over-run with riotous marsh growth.

The quarries had not been worked for half a century. The thrifty
husbandman had cultivated his narrow field within a few feet of the
Nile, and the roadway that had once led from the ruined wharf toward
the hills was obliterated by the grain.

Kenkenes alighted and struck through the wheat toward the pitted front
of the cliffs. Before him was a narrow gorge that debouched into the