at it was an
illusion, they broke ranks, started off in pursuit of the sheet of
water, chasing the aerial phantom, although it receded with the pace of
their approach. At last they sunk down from thirst and fatigue, and
died! Twelve hours on the Nubian Desert without water means a certain
and terrible death; and even to this day, having been near such an end,
with all of its indescribable anguish, I seldom raise a glass of water
to my lips that I do not recall a day when I lay upon the burning sand,
awaiting with impatience the moment that should snap asunder the vital
cord and give peace to my burning body.

A mirage certainly presents an incomparable scenic effect. Once in its
midst, you are encompassed by an imponderable mirror. It reflects the
rocks, the mountains, the stray mimosa trees, and reproduces by inverted
mirage every prominent object of the extended landscape. It has the blue
of polished platinum, and lies like a motionless sea, stretching away
from the craggy bluffs. Sometimes during the noonday heat it dances
within a few yards of the caravan, and gives motion to every object
within its area, changing the waste to the semblance of rolling seas
peopled with the semblance of men.

Attacked by semi-blindness, with a blistering nose, and lips almost
sealed to speech because of the agony of attempted articulation, I found
the fifth day brought me to the extreme of suffering, when a terrific
simoon burst over the desert, gathering up and dispersing the sands with
indescribable fury. My mouth and nostrils were filled with earthy atoms,
and my eyes were filled with irritating particles. The storm grew so
dense and awful that it became a tornado, and we were soon enveloped in
total darkness. All routes of travel were obliterated, and destruction
threatened my command. These sand spouts are frequent, making a clean
swathe, burying alike man and beast, and often they blow for weeks.
During the approach of one of those death-dealing simoon's I noted a
sublime phenomenon. To southward were fine equi-distant sand spouts,
rising perpendicularly to a great height, and losing their swelling
capitals in the clouds. They seemed to stand as majestic columns
supporting the vault of the sky, and the supernatural architecture was
further heightened by mirage-lakes, whose waters seemed to dash against
the pillars as the green of doom-palms waved through the colonnade. The
spectacle appeared like the ruin of a supernal pantheo