384 TRAVEL, ADVEXTURE, AND SPORT. 



The appearance of this driving cloud from our 

 verandah was grand in the extreme. We now were 

 convinced that a sandstorm, and that one of no ordi- 

 nary kind, was about to burst upon us in all its fury ; 

 for the cloud, now that we came to look at it, and 

 into it, evidently held no rain in its lurid depths. 

 The dark shades of it were of the deepest purple, 

 and the edges, as it came boiling up from the west- 

 ward, were tinted a glorious gold. Every instant, as 

 the light played over the surface, we beheld colours 

 varying from a brilliant orange to the deep, dark, 

 sombre tones of red and purple. Birds of all descrip- 

 tions, screaming wildly, Avere endeavouring, some by 

 rapid flight, some by soaring high into the yet clear 

 vault of heaven, to avoid the sand-laden atmosphere 

 that was surging towards us in a way wondrous to 

 behold. In less than fifteen minutes from the time 

 we first observed it, the fiery breath of the storm was 

 upon us. First came the moan of a rushing mighty 

 wind as it swept angrily by. There were a feAv date- 

 trees in the garden below. Their large sturdy leaves 

 were for an instant strangely agitated ; the next they 

 were torn away with a crash, and then hurried along 

 to leeward as are the light leaves of a beech before an 

 autumn breeze. The stout trees themselves swayed 

 to and fro, then bent down, and bowed humbly 

 before the wrath of the gale. A few seconds more 

 and the town was plunged into an utter darkness as 

 of midnight. Though two of us were standing within 



