54 TRAVEL, ADVENTURE, AXD SPORT. 



" Quid quisque vitet, nunquam homini satis 

 Cautum est, in horas ; " 



and thinking how just was the remark, and how a 

 tride lignum also had caused the writing of it, I 

 vowed that this should be the last time that the 

 drowsy god should overcome me in the saddle. A 

 previous conquest of his had led me into trouble some 

 months before. We had left Baghdad some days, 

 and as the weather was very hot, Ave generally man- 

 aged to get over the greater part of the march before 

 day broke. The night in question we had been in 

 the saddle since midnight, and after many ineffectual 

 attempts at resistance, I finally succumbed. I was 

 awoke by the tinkling of bells all round me : the 

 sound, I knew, announced the passing of a caravan. 

 By the faint light of a sickly moon I could see, on 

 all sides of me, a sea of long black boxes surging by 

 me. There appeared to be some scores of mules, 

 each laden with two of these boxes, which were 

 balanced like panniers across his back. The boxes 

 were five and six feet long, and many of them but 

 loosely nailed together. My horse had carried me 

 into the midst of a moving cemetery ; for these 

 pah ! another sense besides that of sight informed me 

 were all coffins. They contained the bodies of the 

 devout, who had died in the true faith, and who were 

 now being taken to Kerbela to be eventually buried 

 by their sorrowing relatives in the consecrated ground 

 around the tomb of the holy martyr Hoosein. It was 



