was Nature's blessing to them to enable the poor
beasts to exist in these waterless regions."

"That's what I said to him," replied the professor; "but he said that
might be a great benefit, but his medical experience of patients was
that most of their troubles from early childhood arose from disordered
stomachs, and if human beings suffered so much from only having one,
what must it be to have a plurality of these necessary organs like a
camel! Enough to make anything ill-tempered, he said. Well, you don't
laugh."

"No," said Frank sadly; "my spirits are too low."

"The time of day, my lad. I always feel at my worst about daybreak.
You'll be better soon. I say we are getting on capitally, and I feel no
fear about our plan."

"I do," said Frank sadly.

"Why, what fresh doubts do you feel?"

"Over this dumb business. There seem to be always fresh difficulties
cropping up."

"Seem," said the professor coolly. "Things that seem are generally like
clouds: they soon fade away in the sunshine. What is the new `seem'?"

"About the Sheikh's men. Now, for instance, they must notice that I am
talking to you."

"Of course they do, my lad. You may take it for granted that they know
quite as much as we do, and that they grasp the fact that we are playing
parts to deceive the dervishes."

"And sooner or later, out of no ill-will, but by accident, they will
betray us."

"Take it for granted that they will not do anything of the sort. These
Arabs are narrow-minded, and there is a good deal of the savage about
them in connection with their carelessness regarding human life. But my
experience of the Arab is, that he is a gentleman, and I would as soon
trust one whom I had made my friend as I would a man of any nation. Now
then, I've knocked that difficulty on the head. What is the next?"

"There are no more at present," said Frank, smiling. "I suppose, then,
that I need not keep trying to play my part while we are in company with
our own party only?"

"Certainly not, my dear boy," said the professor. "Your great
difficulty really is to contain yourself fully when strangers are with
us."

"I shall try my best," said Frank.

"Yes, my fine fellow, you had better. Now then, we've made our start,
and you don't feel so glum, do you?"

"No."

"There's the reason," said the professor cheerily, as he pointed to the
sun peering over the edge of the desert. "Nothing like that golden ball
for sweeping away cl