The Four-Horned Giants at Bay.
The rhinoceros-like Arsinotheres of Egypt in the Eocene Period, attacked by a pack of hyena-like Pterodons.
“I hate to leave here, Uncle George,” said the boy, looking around him regretfully, “it’s all been so jolly and everything has seemed so new. But,” he added, with the action of brushing insects away from his eyes which had become habitual after the weeks spent on the edge of the desert, “I admit I’ll be glad to get away from the flies.”
Two days later, the caravan was once more upon the move. Back again over the trail to Tamia they went, passing by the ruined temple of Qasr el Sagha, seeing the ruins of Dine in the distance; not far from the place where Perry had found the Eosiren, and on through the little village of Kom Mushim, a mere cluster of huts on the edge of an ancient Egyptian city. Thence through fields of roses, from which the famous attar of roses is made, the camels passed and on to the headquarters of the expedition at Tamia, where an Arab entertainment was given by the Mamour of the district in honor of the expedition.
Next day the homeward journey was begun. Up through the Fayum hollow, again, the camels climbed and out on the desert beyond. Not skirting the edge of the Nile this time, but striking boldly over the waste, Michawi led the caravan, and the noon halt came in the open blaze of the sun, the pyramids of Ghizeh showing faintly in the distance.
The party had hardly traveled more than an hour’s journey after the halt, when a queer hot whiff of air reached Perry’s nostrils. He remembered the smoking sands that he had seen from the crest of the cliff above the camp, when looking over the Libyan desert, and glanced over his shoulder. The camel drivers had noted it, too, but there was no gain in urging the camels onwards, even if the animals could have been persuaded, safety was too far away.
In front of them was a line of low sand-dunes, and before they reached this, Michawi halted the caravan. The camels knelt down, laid their necks along the ground and closed their nostrils with the special protection Nature has given them. Every one dismounted, and the Arabs threw themselves upon the stony ground, to leeward of their camels, covering their faces with their garments.
“Lie down, Perry,” said his uncle, who was following the Arabs, “you can’t stand up and defy a Sahara sand-storm that way!”
But the boy wanted to see all that there was to see, and stood upright, facing the quarter from which the storm was coming. Imperceptibly the wind seemed to grow hotter and still more hot, and the fine particles of sand tingled against the lad’s face. The sky slowly turned gray with a tint of orange-color, but as yet the breeze was not strong. A moaning sound was in the air, very faint, like the whine of the sea in a shell.
Then, without the slightest warning, with a screech the sand-storm struck. Perry went down like a nine-pin and rolled over and over, as a tumble weed rolls upon the prairies, until he fetched up against one of the kneeling baggage camels. To the screech of the storm overhead was added a deep vibrant tone from the sand-dunes ahead. Perry remembered that Mr. Wyr had told him that in a sand-storm all the dunes begin to move, and he knew the noise was caused by the rapid action of the particles of sand grinding over each other.