134 
JOURNEY FROM 
the only living things we had seen, jackalls, gazelles, and water-fowl 
excepted, since we quitted the little encampment at Sooleb. Sixteen 
miles south of Mahad Hassan, the marsh finishes at Giraff ; we 
arrived there on the night of the 1 1th, and pitched the tents upon 
some sand-hills bordering a plain thickly covered with low brushwood, 
which extended as far as the eye could reach, and from its green 
appearance seemed to promise some signs of habitation. Our 
journey across the marsh had been monotonous and uninteresting in 
the extreme ; no objects had appeared to enliven the scene, and 
no sounds were heard but the voices of our own camel-drivers, and the 
tiresome unvaried songs of our Arab escort, which usually consisted 
of no more than three or four words, repeated eternally without any 
change of tone, and apparently without the consciousness of the 
performers themselves. 
The only sounds which broke in upon the stillness of the night 
were the prayers of our friend the Dbbbah as he chanted them at 
intervals in a low and drousy tone, and the howhngs of his name- 
sakes *, who prowled about the tents, occasionally mingled with the 
shriller cries of the jackalls. 
We had passed a tolerably comfortable night at Giraff, and were 
preparing to proceed early on our journey the following morning, 
when, to our no small surprise, we found that the camel-drivers 
refused to load their camels, and, on inquiring the cause of this 
strange behaviour, we were told they would not proceed any farther, 
* We have already stated that Shekh Mahommed was called el Dubbah, or the 
Hyaena. 
