360 EXTRACTS FROM 
moment in the bed of the watercourse looking for a Hey’s 
Partridge which I had winged, when a shot was fired from 
the opposite bank and one of the sportsmen called-out that an 
Armadillo (!) had just been missed and that it was running 
before the dogs. The Bedouins and I were following the chase 
as fast as we could, when suddenly all was quiet, and we came 
to a tree round the stem and roots of which an edifice of 
branches had been built up several feet high. It was like a 
beaver’s dam ; indeed there is no other way of describing this 
admirable piece of animal architecture, which had circular 
entrances on two sides. 
When the Bedouins saw this erection they drew back rather 
uneasily, and Salim posted me close to one of the openings, 
while he ordered his men to light a fire at the other. As 
soon as the flames burnt up brightly and the building began 
to crackle a curious dragon-like creature, certainly more than 
four feet long, crept cautiously out, and was moving off at a 
most comical kind of trot when a well-directed shot put an 
end to its life. My interesting spoil was a lizard, and though 
I am not well up in reptiles, I fancied that we had one of 
the great Waran Lizards lying before us. Now came the 
question how to send the rare specimen back to camp unin- 
jured; and as the Arabs positively refused to touch its clammy 
body with their hands, we had to make a little litter of sticks 
on which to lay the mighty dead, and so sent it home by a 
Bedouin. We then went on with our sport, but soon found 
that the partridges had become shy from being so much shot 
at; and as there seemed to be no luck for us to-day with the 
wild boars, the whole party sought out a shady place under a 
tree and lay down on the grass tired with the great and 
oppressive heat. Even the Bedouins and their hardy dogs 
were thirsty and panting, but there was only a little water in 
the bed of the stream, and that not very clean. However, 
the worthy Achmed produced, as usual, some bottles of 
