the hair halter and shouted "Avast!" until
both his arms and tongue were tired. All to no purpose. The camel
scorned his commands, lent a deaf ear to his entreaties, and paid not
the slightest heed to his attempt to pull up, except to push on in the
opposite direction, with its snout elevated in the air and its long
ungainly neck stretched forward in the most determined and provoking
fashion.

There was not much force in the muscular efforts made to check it. It
was just as much as its rider could do to balance himself on its hump,
which, of course, he had to do Arab-fashion, sitting _upon_ the saddle
as on a chair, with his feet resting upon the back of the animal's neck.
It was this position that rendered his seat so insecure, but no other
could have been adopted in the saddle of a maherry, and the sailor was
compelled to keep it as well as he could.

At the time the animal first started off, it had not gone at so rapid a
pace but that he might have slipped down upon the soft sand without much
danger of being injured. This for an instant he had thought of doing;
but knowing that while "unhorsing" himself the camel might escape, he
had voluntarily remained on its back, in the hope of being able to pull
the animal up.

On becoming persuaded that this would be impossible, and that the
maherry had actually made off with him, it was too late to dismount
without danger. The camel was now shambling along so swiftly that he
could not slip down without submitting himself to a fall. It would be no
longer a tumble upon soft sand, for the runaway had suddenly swerved
into a deep gorge, the bottom of which was thickly strewed with boulders
of rock, and through these the maherry was making way with the speed of
a fast-trotting horse.

Had its rider attempted to abandon his high perch upon the hump, his
chances would have been good for getting dashed against one of the big
boulders, or trodden under the huge hoofs of the maherry itself.

Fully alive to this danger, Old Bill no more thought of throwing himself
to the ground; but on the contrary, held on to the hump with all the
tenacity that lay in his well-tarred digits.

He had continued to shout for some time after parting with his
companions; but as this availed nothing, he at length desisted, and was
now riding the rest of his race in silence.

When was it to terminate? Whither was the camel conducting him? These
were the questions that now came before his mind.

He th