.. tamarisk and mastic." He fell asleep soon after, and this
time his sleep was longer, though not so deep... He was watching
hawks flying in pursuit of a heron when a measured tramp of hooves
awoke him, and hard, guttural voices.
"The Arabs have arrived," he said, and drawing aside the curtain of
his tent, he saw at least twenty coming through the blue dusk, white
bournous, scimitars, and long-barrelled guns! "Saharians from the
desert, the true bedouin."
"The bedouin but not the true Saharian," his dragoman informed him.
And Owen retreated into his tent, thinking of the hawks which the
Arabs carried on their wrists, and how hawking had been declining in
Europe since the sixteenth century. But it still flourished in
Africa, where to-day is the same as yesterday.
And while thinking of the hawks he heard the voices of the Arabs
growing angrier. Some four or five spurred their horses and were
about to ride away; but the dragoman called after them, and Owen
cried out, "As if it matters to me which hawk is flown first." The
quarrel waxed louder, and then suddenly ceased, and when Owen came
out of his tent he saw an Arab take the latchet of a bird's hood in
his teeth and pull the other end with his right hand.
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