AFRICAN CAMP FIRES 



ishly continued their interrupted bargaining. In 

 fact so fully embarked on the tides of commerce 

 were they that they failed to notice the tides of 

 nature widening between us. One old man, in 

 especial, at the very top of his mast, jerked hither 

 and thither by the sea, continued imploringly to 

 offer an utterly ridiculous carved wooden camel 

 long after it was possible to have completed the 

 transaction should anybody have been moonstruck 

 enough to have desired it. Our ship's prow swung; 

 and just at sunset, as the lights of Suez were twin- 

 kling out one by one, we headed down the Red Sea. 



30 



