HUMAN REMAINS 305 



set out for. Just before turning back we came on 

 a human skeleton. On being touched the bones 

 crumbled to dust. The teeth in the jawbone had been 

 filed down by the action of the sand. Did these bones 

 belong to one of the race who inhabited this region, 

 when grass and game abounded, or did they tell the 

 drama of some escaped slave finding his liberty at last 

 after his headlong flight to the setting sun from the 

 caravan on the " Darb-el-Arbain " ? What a picture 

 for an artist — the bronzed skin, the yellow featureless 

 sand, and the pitiless blue sky. 



At the furthest point reached I made a small pyramid 

 of stones. These were small, distorted, yellow, and 

 flint-like. 



What lies beyond those sand-drifts to the west ? 

 The great central lake of fable ? The heavy dews that 

 fell the two nights we spent in the vicinity led me to 

 believe that it did ; but Captain Lyons, F.R.S., dis- 

 abused me of this idea, writing that even rain is not 

 unknown in this desert, and pointing out that every- 

 thing is against the formation of a water deposit here. 



A few miles from our halting-place were a couple 

 of widely separated ridges of black rock. From a 

 distance the mirage made them look like clumps of 

 trees, so I went to them. The one we passed was 

 about 50 yards long and 12 feet high, the eyrie 

 of two falcons (abu sugheir of the Arabs), veritable 

 lords of all they surveyed. 



About twenty miles from our most westerly halting- 

 place we crossed a line of sand-drifts, between which 

 were a few small tufts of scorched grass (this is found 



