346 FROM NORTH POLE TO EQUATOR. 



Unutterably poor are these nomad herdsmen, who pitch their 

 tents here as long as their small flocks of goats can find anything 

 to eat. Their struggle for existence is a continuous succession of 

 toil, and want, and misery. Their tent is of the simplest; a long 

 dark web of cloth, made of goats' hair, is laid across a simple frame- 

 work, and its ends pinned to the ground; a piece of the same stuff 

 forms the back-wall, and a mat of palm-leaves forms the door in 

 front. The web is the wife's self-made dowry, the materials for 

 which she gathered, spun, and wove from her eighth to her sixteenth 

 year. A few mats which serve as beds, a block of granite and a 

 grindstone for pounding the grain got in barter, a flat plate of 

 clay to roast the cakes, two large jars, some leather sacks and skins, 

 an axe and several lances, form the total furnishings. A herd of 

 twenty goats is counted a rich possession for a family. But these 

 people are as brave as they are poor, as lovable as they are 

 well-built, as good-natured as they are beautiful, as generous as 

 they are frugal, as hospitable as they are honourable, as chaste 

 as they are devout. Ancient pictures rise in the mind of the 

 Occidental who meets with these folk for the first time; he sees 

 biblical characters face to face, and hears them speak in a manner 

 with which he has been familiar from his childhood. Thousands of 

 years have been to these nomads of the desert as one day; to-day 

 they think, and speak, and act as did the patriarchs of old. The 

 very greeting which Abraham uttered meets the stranger's ear; 

 the very words which Rebecca spoke to Abraham's servant were 

 addressed to me, when, tortured with thirst, I sprang from my 

 camel at the well of Bahiuda, and begged a beautiful brown damsel 

 for a drink of fresh water. There she stood before me, the 

 Rebecca of thousands of years ago, alive and in unfading youth, 

 another and yet the same. 



On the arrival of the caravan the whole population of the 

 temporary settlement assembles. The chief steps forward from 

 their midst, and utters the greeting of peace; all the rest bid the 

 strangers welcome. Then they offer the most precious of gifts, 

 fresh water; it is all that they have to give, and it is given with 

 dignified friendliness, ungrudgingly, yet without urgency. Eagerly 



