24 By Mountain, Lake, and Plain 



axis of the range frowning down on us from the 

 left hand. But for the soft shuffling pad of our 

 prehistoric steeds over the dry ground, the silence 

 was unbroken. I think it was the 1 great Tartarin 

 who discovered that the best means of accomplish- 

 ing a journey au chameau was to sell the camel 

 and take a diligence. Here we had no choice, but 

 in any case a good dromedary is not to my mind 

 a bad way of getting over long desert marches 

 preferable perhaps to a horse ; the latter gets so 

 very sick of the job. 



Camel-riding is not a fine nor a difficult art. 

 The main points are to forget all you ever knew 

 about equitation, and make yourself as like a 

 sack of potatoes as you can ; maintain, as a 

 riding-master would say, a "gentle feeling" on 

 your mount's nose, and for the rest, somehow 

 or other keep him at a trot. The latter is not 

 as easy as it sounds. If you are fortunate 

 enough to sit astride a well bred beast, it may be 

 left to his own good feeling, kept alive by an 

 occasional flourish of the stick; but with any 

 inferior kind of camel, the question is resolved 

 into a struggle between your watchfulness and an 

 unswerving determination on the part of your 

 mahri to break into his back - dislocating walk 

 whenever excuse or opportunity offers. Now 

 and again one comes across camels of the head- 



