her good camel Simel, and kissing his great lips.

The black goats, with long silky ears, are already cropping the grass.
The father sits again at the tent-door, and smokes his long pipe; the
children bury their bare feet in the sand, and heap it into little
mounds about them; while the mother is bringing out the dates and the
bread and butter.

It is an easy thing for them to move: they are already at home again.
But although they have so few cares, we do not wish ourselves in their
place, for we love the home of our childhood, "be it ever so humble,"
better than roaming like an exile.

But all the time I haven't told you how Gemila looks, nor what clothes
she wears. Her face is dark; she has a little straight nose, full
lips, and dark, earnest eyes; her dark hair will be braided when it
is long enough. On her arms and her ankles are gilded bracelets and
anklets, and she wears a brown cotton dress loosely hanging halfway to
the bare, slender ankles. On her head the white fringed handkerchief,
of which I told you, hangs like a little veil. Her face is pleasant,
and when she smiles her white teeth shine between her parted lips.

She is the child of the desert, and she loves her desert home.

I think she would hardly be happy to live in a house, eat from a
table, and sleep in a little bed like yours. She would grow restless
and weary if she should live so long and so quietly in one place.