A SUDDEN TORRENT. 135 



being engaged with them till nearly midnight, I 

 closed the entrance of my hut with mats to prevent 

 the intrusion of any home or foreign Bedouins, and 

 was soon fast asleep. 



Thursday, 1th. — This morning I was awakened 

 rather unpleasantly by a heavy shower of rain, 

 which, penetrating my carpet roof, soon wet 

 me completely through. I got out, and re- 

 treated to the thick cover of a low mimosa tree, 

 over which some of the Bedouins threw my carpet, 

 and as many as could be covered by its shelter 

 came and sat close around me. A stream of thick 

 muddy water suddenly came into existence, hun- 

 dreds of small rills issuing from every hill top, 

 filling the hollow below our camp almost immedi- 

 ately, and where a few hours before we walked and 

 the camels fed, a river too deep to ford, and above 

 forty feet wide, rushed with great impetuosity into 

 the ravine we travelled along yesterday. A camel 

 having died in the night, a party of the drivers on 

 the occasion of this flood appearing, dragged the 

 body into the influence of its current which soon 

 carried it away. One of its tributaries, a brook of 

 considerable size, very shortly afterwards made its 

 way through the centre of our camp, and actually 

 turned one of the boxes over before some dams of 

 stones, and a small canal, could be made to direct 

 its course in another direction, so that the water 

 should not damage the stores, or the numerous bags 



