When morning broke, they had not accomplished
more than half the distance. All through the hot day-time they lay
panting on the ground, eating now and then a date, tormented with
thirst and heat; and when evening came, they dragged themselves to
their feet again, and recommenced their painful journey. Step by step,
hour by hour, each harder and longer than the last, moment by moment
they grew more feeble, less able to bear up, till it seemed as though
they could no longer struggle on. At last, the morning broke. Ahmed
raised his blood-shot eyes, seized Mustapha's arm, and pointed. There,
not a hundred yards away, was the oasis, its trees and bushes outlined
against the sky.
Poor Mustapha was so spent that his father had to drag him across the
short dividing space. It was a small oasis, and not very fertile; its
well was shallow and scanty, but no ice-cooled sherbet ever seemed more
delicious than did its brackish waters to the parched tongues of the
exhausted men.
All day and all night they lay under the shadow of the cactuses and the
acacia-trees, rousing only to drink, and falling asleep again
immediately.
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