364 THE EMPTY QUARTER

should see the latest of the great battle-fields of Arabia,
strewn with the skulls and bones of the Sharifian army,
caught and annihilated by the Wahhabis under the walls of
Turaba. And at last we should reach Mecca on the ninetieth
day after our setting forth from Hufuf.

The camels which had carried us across the desert would
carry us through the pilgrimage. And then we would part
for ever, myself and my companions, to remember the good
and forget the evil of our strange association in an enterprise
which had filled my dreams for 14 years and racked
their nerves for as many weeks. To them and the great
beasts that bore us—hungering and thirsting but uncom-
plaining—the credit of a great adventure. Mine the pleasure
of telling the tale with heartfelt homage to the Arabian
Caesar.

* Let a man be true in his intentions and his efforts to ful-
fil them, and the point is gained whether he succeed or not.'

TEE E!ND.