ng
carried away from his companions.

Up to this time he had been vainly striving to detach the sheik from his
hold upon the hump. On perceiving the danger, however, he desisted from
this design, and at once entered upon a struggle of a very different
kind,--to detach himself.

In all probability this would have proved equally difficult, for,
struggle as he might, the tough old Arab, no longer troubling himself
about the control of his camel, had twisted his sinewy fingers under the
midshipman's dirk-belt, and held the latter in juxtaposition to his own
body, supported by the hump of the maherry, as if his very life depended
on not letting go.

A lucky circumstance--and this only--hindered the young Irishman from
being carried to the Arab encampment; a circumstance very similar to
that which on the preceding night had led to the capture of that same
camel.

Its halter was again trailing.

Its owner, occupied with the "double" which it had so unexpectedly been
called upon to carry, was conducting it only by his voice, and had
neither thought nor hands for the halter.

Once again the trailing end got into the split hoof--once again the
maherry was tripped up; and came down neck foremost upon the sand.

Its load was spilled--Bedouin and Hibernian coming together to the
ground--both, if not dangerously hurt, at least so shaken, as, for some
seconds, to be deprived of their senses.

Neither had quite recovered from the shock, when Harry Blount and Colin,
coming up in close pursuit, stooped over the prostrate pair; and neither
Arab nor Irishman was very clear in his comprehension, when a crowd of
strange creatures closed around them, and took possession of the whole
party; as they did so yelling like a cohort of fiends.

In the obfuscation of his "sivin" senses, the young Irishman may have
scarcely understood what was passing around him. It was too clear to his
companions,--clear as a catastrophe could be to those who are its
victims.

The shot fired by the sheik, if failing in the effects intended, had
produced a result almost equally fatal to the three fugitives,--it had
given warning to the Arabs in their encampment; who, again sallying
forth, had arrived just in time to witness the "decadence" of the camel,
and now surrounded the group that encircled it.

The courageous representative of England and the cool young Scotchman
were both taken by surprise, too much so to give them a chance of
thinking either of