hat inhospitable shore.

In whispers the three mids made known their thoughts to one another.
Harry Blount no longer doubted the truth of Colin's statements; and
O'Connor had become equally converted from his incredulity. The conduct
of the women towards the unfortunate castaway, which all three
witnessed, told like the tongue of a trumpet. It was cruel beyond
question. What, when exercised, must be that of their men?

To think of leaving their old comrade in such keeping was not a pleasant
reflection. It was like their abandoning him upon the sandspit, to the
threatening engulfment of the tide. Even worse: for the angry breakers
seemed less spiteful than the hags who surrounded him in the Arab camp.

Still, what could the boys do? Three midshipmen, armed only with their
tiny dirks, what chance would they have among so many? There were
scores of these sinewy sons of the desert, without counting the shrewish
women, each armed with gun and scimitar, any one of whom ought to have
been more than a match for a mid. It would have been sheer folly to
have attempted a rescue. Despair only could have sanctioned such a
course.

In a whispered consultation it was determined otherwise. The old sailor
must be abandoned to his fate, just as he had been left upon the
sandspit. His youthful companions could only breathe a prayer in his
behalf, and express a hope that, as upon the latter occasion, some
providential chance should turn up in his favour, and he might again be
permitted to rejoin them.

After communicating this hope to one another, all three turned their
faces shoreward, determined to put as much space between themselves and
the Arab encampment as night and circumstances would permit.

CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE.

A CAUTIOUS RETREAT.

The ravine, up which the maherry had carried the old man-o'-war's-man,
ran perpendicularly to the trending of the seashore, and almost in a
direct line from the beach to the valley in which was the Arab
encampment. It could not, however, be said to debouch into this valley.
Across its mouth the sand-drift had formed a barrier, like a huge
"snow-wreath," uniting the two parallel ridges that formed the sides of
the ravine itself. This "mouthpiece" was not so high as either of the
flanking ridges; though it was nearly a hundred feet above the level of
the beach on one side, and the valley on the other. Its crest, viewed
_en profile_, exhibited a saddle-shaped curve, the concav