mbibed large draughts of the refreshing fluid.
What happiness was then mine! How heavenly, to lay under the shade,
breathing the cool air, listening to the warbling of the birds, and
inhaling the perfume of the flowers, which luxuriated on that delightful
spot! After an hour I stripped, bathed myself, and, taking another
draught of water, fell into a sound sleep.

I awoke refreshed, but suffering under the cravings of hunger, which now
assailed me. I had been three days without food; but hitherto I had not
felt the want of it, as my more importunate thirst had overcome the
sensation. Now that the greater evil had been removed, the lesser
increased and became hourly more imperious. I walked out and scanned
the horizon with the hopes of some caravan appearing in sight, but I
watched in vain; and returned to the fountain. Two more days passed
away, and no relief was at hand: my strength failed me; I felt that I
was dying; and, as the fountain murmured, and the birds sang, and the
cool breeze fanned my cheeks, I thought that it would have been better
to have been swallowed up in the desert than to be tantalised by
expiring in such a paradise. I laid myself down to die, for I could sit
up no more; and as I turned round to take a last view of the running
water, which had prolonged my existence, something hard pressed against
my side. I thought it was a stone, and stretched out my hand to remove
it, that I might be at ease in my last moments; but when I felt, there
was no stone there it was something in the pocket of my jacket. I put
my hand in, unconscious what it could be; I pulled it out, and looking
at it before I threw it away, found that it was a piece of _hard dry
bread_. I thought that it had been sent to me from heaven, and it was
as pure an offering as if it had come from thence, for it was the gift
of innocence and affection--it was the piece of bread which my little
darling girl had received for her breakfast, and which on my departure
she had thrust into my pocket, when I imagined she had been searching
for fruit. I crawled to the spring, moistened it, and devoured it with
tears of gratitude to heaven, mingled with the fond yearnings of a
father's heart.

It saved my life; for the next day a small caravan arrived, which was
bound to Cairo. The merchants treated me with great kindness, tied me
on one of the camels, and I once more embraced my family, whom I had
never thought to see again. Since that I