Then comes a third; and while he kneels, another servant comes from the spring, bringing a great bag made of camels’-skin, and filled with water.  Two of these bags are hung upon the camel, one on each side.  This is the water for all these people to drink for four days, while they travel through a sandy, rocky country, where there are no springs or wells.  I am afraid the water will not taste very fresh after it has been kept so long in leather bags; but they have nothing else to carry it in, and, besides, they are used to it, and don’t mind the taste.

Here are smaller bags, made of goats’-skin, and filled with milk; and when all these things are arranged, which is soon done, they are ready to start, although it is still long before sunrise.  The camels have been drinking at the spring, and have left only a little muddy water, like that in our street-gutters; but the goats must have this, or none at all.

And now Abdel Hassan springs upon his beautiful black horse, that has such slender legs and swift feet, and places himself at the head of this long troop of men and women, camels and goats.  The women are riding upon the camels, and so are the children; while the servants and camel-drivers walk barefooted over the yellow sand.

It would seem very strange to you to be perched up so high on a camel’s back, but Gemila is quite accustomed to it.  When she was very little, her mother often hung a basket beside her on the camel, and carried her baby in it; but now she is a great girl, full six years old, and when the camel kneels, and her mother takes her place, the child can spring on in front, with one hand upon the camel’s rough hump, and ride safely and pleasantly hour after hour.  Good, patient camels!  God has fitted them exactly to be of the utmost help to the people in that desert country.  Gemila for this often blesses and thanks Him whom she calls Allah.

All this morning they ride,—­first in the bright starlight; but soon the stars become faint and dim in the stronger rosy light that is spreading over the whole sky, and suddenly the little girl sees stretching far before her the long shadow of the camels, and she knows that the sun is up, for we never see shadows when the sun is not up, unless it is by candlelight or moonlight.  The shadows stretch out very far before them, for the sun is behind.  When you are out walking very early in the morning, with the sun behind you, see how the shadow of even such a little girl as you will reach across the whole street; and you can imagine that such great creatures as camels would make even much longer shadows.

Gemila watches them, and sees, too, how the white patches of sand flush in the morning light; and she looks back where far behind are the tops of their palm-trees, like great tufted fans, standing dark against the yellow sky.

She is not sorry to leave that old home.  She has had many homes already, young as she is, and will have many more as long as she lives.  The whole desert is her home; it is very wide and large, and sometimes she lives in one part, sometimes in another.