THE WATERLESS WASTE 305

There was in fact plentiful fresh vegetation of the usual
varieties, but we soon passed beyond it, and my prophecy
was not fulfilled. An hour later, after vain search for good
pasture, we came to a halt at Zayid's insistence—he had
trotted up from far in the rear to remonstrate against our
continued advance—in a narrow depression on the south side
of a long ridge of high dunes. We were still in the tract of
Khillat Adraj, and had marched some 27 miles during the
day—a fairly reasonable but not particularly good perfor-
mance. However we had no reason to be displeased with our
record of 45 miles from Naifa since sunset the previous even-
ing, and the weather conditions continued favourable.
Indeed the sky was fairly heavily overcast all over during the
evening, though we could detect no sign of actual rain in any
direction, and the wind, gradually moderating to a mild
zephyr, came from the north. The lifelessness of the country
was rather depressing 9 for we had only seen four birds in the
whole area covered—a Wagtail and another Desert Warbler in
addition to those already mentioned being encountered a little
before our arrival in camp. We had meat, however, to cheer
us at dinner, though they again made the mistake of cooking
the dried strips—this time in butter. Dates too we had—a
strictly limited ration doled out by Sa'dan, who was in
special charge of the two precious skins and had my strict
instructions to husband the supply on the assumption of a
journey of twelve days. There was coffee and milk as usual
and, last but not least, there was a pot of tea for myself from
my small emergency stock, which I had reckoned would last
out the rest of the march at my normal rate of consumption
of three (small) pots a day. With a march in proepect for the
early hours we were early to bed and the night passed without
incident except for a change of the wind from north to east,
I was roused from my slumbers act hour after midnight to
find a few drops of rain falling from a lowering sky. Them
was still a light breeze from the east and a clammy moistBees
in the air. With no food or coffee to delay our start we were
soon in the saddle, marching about due west over gentle
undulating sand-dowBS with only thseee ridges—and those of
no great difficulty—to &egotia»te up to 5 a,m» when we halted