fire to it, on the further side of a canal
which must hinder their making a wide sweep to the north, the wind would
carry it towards the enemy; and, they would be fortunate if it did
not stifle them or compel them to jump into the river, where, when the
flames reached the morass, they must inevitably perish.

As soon as the helmsman's keen eyes had made sure, from the mast-head,
that the Arabs had forded the river at a point to the south, they set
fire to several places and it roared and flared up immediately. The wind
swept it southwards, and with it clouds of pale grey smoke through which
the rising sun shot shafts of light. The flames writhed and darted over
the baked earth like gigantic yellow and orange lizards, here shooting
upwards, there creeping low. Almost colorless in the ardent daylight,
they greedily consumed everything they approached, and white ashes
marked their track. Their breath added to the heat of the advancing day;
and though the smoke was borne southwards by the wind, a few cloudlets
came over to the boat, choking the sisters and their deliverers.

A large vessel now came towards them from Doomiat and found the narrow
channel barred by the other one. The captain was related to Setnau, and
when Setnau shouted to him that they were engaged in a struggle with
Arab robbers, his friend followed his advice, turned the boat's head
with considerable difficulty, and cast anchor at the nearest village to
warn other vessels southward bound not to get themselves involved in so
perilous an adventure. Any that were coming north would be checked by
the fire and smoke.

The six horsemen left on the eastern shore beheld the spreading
blaze with rage and dismay; however, they had by this time bound the
palm-trunks together, and were preparing by their aid to inflict condign
punishment on the refractory Christians. These, meanwhile, had not been
idle. Every man on board was armed, and one of the ship-wrights was sent
on shore with a sailor, to steal through the reeds, ford the river at
a point lower down and, as soon as the Arabs put out to the attack, to
slaughter their horses, or--if one of them should be left to go forward
on the road to Doomiat--to drag him from his steed.

The six men now laid hold of the slightly-constructed float, on which
they placed their bows and quivers; they pushed it before them, and
it supported them above the shallow water, while their feet only just
touched the oozy bottom. They w