ons for man and beast became necessary.

When the last monument to complete the chain had been erected it was
midnight, and it was decided to attempt the crossing of the desert strip
at an angle. Hour after hour they traveled, yet at daybreak no blue
haze, no lofty peak appeared in that simmering, sweltering, burning
waste. The trail behind them was as water struck with a whip. The sand
in front gave no alluring sign. The ponies labored--the mules were
restive. Silently as a moonbeam falling across the earth the cavalcade
moved. Another midnight, and Jack resorted to his knowledge of astronomy
to guide them from that fearful death which another day would probably
bring. The constellation of Cassiopea seemed to beckon him in her
direction. Again the red copper-colored sun appeared above the horizon;
a faint blue line in front gave hope of relief. The ponies were allowed
free rein to choose their own way.

As the sun rose higher and higher the heat drove the pack animals into a
frenzy. The oscillating motion of those in the saddle was almost
unendurable. Gloomily they looked at each other--the one seeing that
shrunken, skin-drawn, parched, pinched human horror in front, wondering
if he in turn looked the same. Still they lived and hoped. Again hour
succeeded hour until the midnight of another day arrived. Suddenly the
mules gave a joyful whinny and started up a sandy gulch at a brisker
pace than they had been traveling. The last of the water had been
divided that noon and no food had been tasted for three days. In another
hour they came to a rock where a little pool struggled only to lose
itself in the sand. But by scooping away the earth while the animals
were pawing, even biting, the very ground, Jack was at last able to save
a little of the precious fluid and appease their immediate thirst.

A short rest and the march was again resumed. By noon, gaunt and
hidedrawn, two Indian ponies stumbled along the burning sands. Two
horsemen with vacant, stony stare, pitifully reeled in their saddles as
their horses wabbled slowly, painfully into the camp of the "Lone
Fisherman." Pack mules with drooping, lifeless ears, tongues lolling
from their mouths and hoofs cracking from contact with the poisonous
alkaloids of the desert, staggered under their burdens as they toiled
after the silent spectres in the lead. The dust-begrimed, skin-dried,
withered, parched and blighted beings athwart those animated skeletons
were Jack and Yama