the Juhayni country with the laudable intention of "lifting" a
camel. He had, indeed, "taken his sword, and went his way to rob
and steal," under the profound conviction that nothing could be
more honourable--in case of success. He was driving off the
booty, when its master sallied out to recover the stolen goods by
force and by arms. Both bared their blades and exchanged cuts,
when the Baliyy found that his old flamberge was too blunt to do
damage. Consequently he had the worse of the affair; a slicing of
the right hand forced him to drop his "silly sword." He then
closed with his adversary, who again proved himself the better
man, throwing the assailant, and at the same time slashing open
his left leg. The wounded man lay in the "bush" till he gathered
strength to "dot and go one" homewards. Amongst these tribes the
Diyat, or "blood-money," reaches eight hundred dollars;
consequently men will maim, but carefully avoid killing, one
another.

The evening of our halt, with its lurid haze and its ominous
brooding stillness, was distinguished by a storm, a regular Arab
affair, consisting of dust by the ton to water by the drop. This
infliction of the "fearful fiend, Samiel, fatal to caravans,"
began in the west. A cloud of red sand advanced like a
prairie-fire at headlong speed before the mighty rushing wind,
whose damp breath smelt of rain; and presently the mountain-rim
was veiled in brown and ruddy and purple earth-haze. A bow in the
eastern sky strongly suggested, in the apparent absence of a
shower, refraction by dust--if such thing be possible. We were
disappointed, by the sinister wind, in our hopes of collecting a
bottle of rain-water for the photographer; nor did the storm,
though it had all the diffused violence of a wintry gale,