asts, with groves of date-trees. Here we
had time to regain our strength; and our masters being generally in
better humour, we were in consequence less harshly dealt with.

Still, our existence was daily becoming more and more unendurable, and
only the hope of ultimately escaping kept up our spirits, and prevented
us sinking altogether into despair. Had we consented to abandon our
religion, our homes, and civilisation, we might have been raised to a
high position among these barbarians; and I believe that Boxall and I
might have become sheikhs ourselves. The beautiful Coria, the youngest
of the sheikh's daughters, showed me at first many marks of her esteem;
but my refusal to embrace their religion, even for her sake, changed her
love into hatred, and she became my most bitter persecutor.

At length we heard that we were approaching a town, which we hoped might
prove to be at no great distance from the borders of Algiers. Our
knowledge of the interior of Africa, however, was very imperfect; or, I
may say, we knew nothing at all about it--our only recollection of the
Desert being a vast blank space, with a few spots upon it marked
"oases," with Lake Tchad and Timbuctoo on its southern border, and a
very indefinite line marked Algiers and Morocco. The place we were
approaching was, we heard, the permanent abode of the sheikh; and the
country, though arid according to European notions, was more fertile
than any we had yet seen--palms and other trees being scattered about,
with ranges of hills in the distance.

The Arabs manifested their joy by singing and uttering shouts of
delight, praising the country to us as if it were a perfect paradise.
Here and there were fields of barley, with some low tents in their
midst; and a grove of date-trees circling a well, near which was an open
space. The sheikh advanced into the centre, and the camels immediately
halting, they were unloaded, and all hands set to work to erect the
tents. The tribe had reached their home, after their long pilgrimage.

There seemed, however, no prospect of our lot being improved. We had
not been long settled when a cavalcade arrived, the persons composing
which differed greatly in appearance from those among whom we had so
long lived. Their leader was a handsomely dressed, fine-looking Arab.
He wore a haique, over which was a cloak of blue cloth, with a
well-arranged turban on his head. The costume of his followers was
nearly as becoming; thei