exposures and perils; there was still a way of escape; it was not too late to draw back; the broad plain beneath us that stretched westward, opened an easy passage to the coast. Which way should we choose? The Doctor turned to me to decide. One way was ease and safety and speedy deliverance; in the other was uncertainty and danger. Yet there was a temptation in the very idea of plunging into that which was comparatively untravelled. From yonder heights stretched out the Great and Terrible Wilderness, which seemed to beckon us by its very desolation. There was a fascination in the illimitable desert, in its vagueness, vastness, and mystery. It did not take me long to decide: one sweep of the eye round the horizon, and we clambered down the rocks, mounted our camels, and turned their heads towards the way of the Wilderness.
