Page:On the Desert - Recent Events in Egypt.djvu/72

 probably a sack of grain for their families, and a few ounces of tobacco for themselves.

After these two encounters, we saw no man that day. We marched on quite alone, and began to feel more and more the loneliness of the desert. Not only was there no man in sight, but not a living thing. The utter absence of life affected us strangely, as it brought the sense not only of solitude, but of silence. Even while it was yet broad day, there fell on us a silence as of the night. The earth grew calm and still, as if suddenly the course of nature had stopped, and all things had ceased to live. Although the Red Sea still gleamed in the distance, yet as we moved away from it, we could no longer hear the lapping of its waves; and there was no sign of life on sea or land, or in the sky. Not a bird wheeled in the air; not even an insect's hum broke the stillness of the desert. Even nature seemed to have hushed her voice; no murmuring brook made music in our ears; no sough of the wind in the pines whispered to us in the gloaming. The only sound that fell on the ear was the steady step of the camel crunching through the hard crust; and when we passed through long stretches of soft sand, even that seemed muffled, as the broad foot, soft and springy as the tiger's, sank under us almost without a sound. So oppressive was the stillness that it was a relief to hear the song of the cameleer, though it had little music in it, for is was always in the minor key, and low and feeble, as if he trembled to hear the sound of his own voice in the deep solitude. It seemed as if we had gone out of the world, and entered the Halls of Eternal Silence, and were moving on into a mysterious realm, where the sound of human voices would be heard nevermore.

In studying the geography of the desert, the first lesson to be learned is to know what is meant by a wady.