"It is quite clear, my good friend," said he, " that you have missed your vocation. God created you to be a great traveller and a scientific explorer. Take notes,

Quiès, take notes. When you come back, you will regret it if you have not taken any."

"I shall never come back!" sighed the unhappy doctor. "That is always your song."

Quiès raised his eyes to heaven.

A very quiet horse," he repeated, and then he disappeared, for Mdlle. Haydée came stalking into the stable where the interview just recorded had taken place.

Those among us-and they form the majority—who have never hunted bigger game than hares and partridges, cannot imagine an ostrich hunt in the Sahara, across the endless steppes which the Arabs call, in their expressive language, the "Land of Thirst," and throughout whose entire extent there is not a stream of running water or a spring. The only moisture it ever has comes from the rains that fall during the storms, and form little pools, to which the wandering tribes resort in haste for their supply of water, as the sun dries them up quickly. It is, therefore, no light matter to undertake a twelve days' sojourn in such a desert, and La Carriole must have taken infinite trouble to organize such an enterprise successfully.

The caravan, which was placed under his command, comprised no less than fifty camels, twenty-five horses, ten mules-camels and mules carrying eight barrels of water, ten sacks of barley, victuals for fifteen days, salt, and all the necessary camp gear. It happens, sometimes, that the ostriches reported by the scouts to be at a short distance, have gone off during the night ten or even fifteen leagues farther to the south. The hunting party then encamp in a daïa, and resume their progress on the following day until the bedou or the gaad becomes feasible.

By these two names the principal methods of hunting the ostrich are known. In the bedou the hunter pursues the bird alone and with the same horse. The chase is a

mad gallop, and by no means without danger. The gaad is the pursuit of the game by several hunters, in relays, and the birds are driven into the ambuscade prepared for them by beaters.

La Carriole and his party had decided upon adopting the gaad. At the last moment, that is to say during the night which preceded the start, Quiès experienced some hesitation. Being feverishly wakeful, he sat up in his camp bed every few minutes.

"Stay," he thought, "let me consider. Am I wise to encounter such terrible exertion in order to fly from a danger which I may possibly exaggerate? No, certainly not! If this horrible brute was capable of such a deed, these men, who do not wish me any ill, would not leave her at large. And, besides, she has never shown any spite against me."

Chance-still chance!-would have it that at the very same moment Mdlle. Haydée, tormented doubtless by some insect, made a prodigious bound and uttered a formidable roar in the next room. Quiès' jaw fell, his hair rose on his head, and cold perspiration suffused his skin. He cut short his fine argument with the muttered words,— "I think it is prudent not to stay here."

He then rose, lighted his candle, placed it on the little deal table which, with his camp bed and a chair, formed the entire furniture of his room, and occupied himself for a full half-hour in covering a sheet of paper with his close, small, and precise handwriting.

This task accomplished, he blew out his candle, and raised his eyes to heaven. The sun, still invisible, was casting some pale yellow gleams upon the horizon, and the daïas of the plain were emerging from their bed of deep shadow like so many luminous specks. The stars were disappearing one by one, and seemed to be soaring into the eternal heights. All around was rest and sleep. No human sound broke the mournful and imposing silence of the desert.

Quiès was overpowered by an unspeakable emotion. Never since he left Saint-Pignon les Girouettes had the terrible fatality which held him fast more heavily oppressed him. Although he had borne severer trials, he had never scanned the future with a more anxious eye, or turned upon the past a more mournful glance. Never had his former peaceful existence been recalled so plainly to his wistful fancy, with all its blessings, its calm and simple

pleasures, its firm friendships, and its nights without nightmare! Slow tears oozed from his eyes, and fell heavily on the paper which he had left on the table in front of him.

Perhaps that tear was a mea culpa. In the hour of sorrow we are impartial judges of ourselves. For the first time Quiès was awakened to a sense of his egoism, too long indulged, and of the innumerable failings of

which he had been guilty. He said to himself that the evil which had now befallen him was but the chastisement cf his faults. He was enduring his purgatory in this world. He did not, however, go so far as to believe that paradise was closed against him for ever.

The morning call sounded by the camp trumpeters interrupted his reverie and arrested his tears. He cast one look at Mdlle. Haydée, who was stretching herself out and showing her white teeth at the door, sighed deeply and went in search of Commandant La Carriole, whom he accosted with an air of great solemnity.

"My good, dear, excellent friend," said he, handing him the sheet of paper on which he had been writing shortly before, folded, but not sealed, "take great care of this paper. Put it in your pocket. It contains my last wishes."

Why, Quiès!" exclaimed the Commandant, “you must be mad!"

"I am going to my death. There are presentiments that do not deceive us."

"Nonsense, man!"

"I am going to my death, I tell you. You will be my testamentary executor. My cousin Ragot is my sole heiress, I confirm her rights, charging her only to pay in my name-it is not much—some debts of gratitude which I enumerate. You will see to this, my dear friend. I also charge you to express to all those who love, or have loved me, my deep regret for having so ill understood the duties of friendship."

Really, Quiès, one would think you were speaking seriously."

"I am speaking very seriously."

"Reflect then that a ten or twelve days' trip into the plain is no great affair. We are so well provided that you will be as well off at the camp as in your own room. No one dies of a little fatigue, and that is the only risk you run."

"God grant it! You have chosen a very quiet horse for me?"

"A girl might ride it. See, here it comes."

A Spahi had just come up, leading two small Arab horses, bony, nervous animals, thinned by the training they had gone through. Quiès thought that the horse

which he took for the quieter of the two was far from being quiet enough for him, but he was resigned to his fate. Aided by a push on one side and a pull on the other, he succeeded in getting into the saddle, and, holding on desperately by his horse's mane, he followed the Commandant, and rejoined the caravan beneath the mamelon of Awhata.