work required, before should leave for England. yard. You come into it We sailed at once, rounding Cape Masandam, the Arabian gate post of the Gulf, where it is only twenty-five miles across to the Persian shore, The extremity of the point is a tattered peninsula of hills whose heart is penetrated by deep volcanic fiords, the whole being joined by a narrow neck to the mainland to the southward. On its barren slopes there clings a settlement, said to be formed of the last remnants of the aboriginal inhabitants of Arabia, children of Shem, undiluted by the restless Bedouin blood of Ishmael, the race now dominating the remainder of that highly undesirable land.

I four sides of a central court

It was refreshingly cool at Maskat, outside the Gulf limits, for the Monsoon had "broken." The gracious meisture and coolness which the Monsoon brings across the sea to India does not actually reach these deserts; but it affects the whole Indian ocean generally, so that every coastline bathed by its waters rejoices therein. The five days that followed at Maskat, while we waited for the mail, were pleasant enough. There was a good deal of back surveywork to be plotted and reports to be written, and the busy days on board the ship were usually ended by cheerful sundownings at the Residency, with tennis and tea. The Residency was a house, however, to be approached with some circumspection, in spite of the hospitality of its inhabitants. It is built around the

through an archway at the back, and find a broad flight of stairs on the right hand, leading to the cool verandah and living-rooms on the first floor, which thus are well raised above the heat of the ground, and look widely forth on the harbour. Mrs Resident was a lady whose kindness of heart extended itself far past the plane of humanity, and reached down, even, to our distant and nasty little relatives, the Apes. She kept, in the courtyard of the Resideney, a collection of the more highly-coloured of these creatures. No Thames barge, brilliant in red, blue, and yellow, can display more startlingly effective bows, or a more originally conceived stern decoration than could these Simian guardians of the stairs; and no bargee ever had such a command of the language of exeoration as they. They gnashed their teeth, yearningly, at the unfortunate visitor; they leapt and danced at the full extent of their straining waist-chains, clucking and gibbering at him, or hideously shrieking battle, murder, and sudden death; they seized the hand-railmercifully a stout one, and they could only just reach itand shook it in impotent fury. In brief, they put the wind up you. By closely hugging the wall on the starboard hand, and not hauling to the wind again, until well past these dangers, it was, however, just possible to circumnavigate them; and the delightful wel

work required, before I four sides of a central courtshould leave for England. We sailed at once, rounding Cape Masandam, the Arabian gate post of the Gulf, where it is only twenty-five miles across to the Persian shore. The extremity of the point is a tattered peninsula of hills whose heart is penetrated by deep volcanic fiords, the whole being joined by a narrow neck to the mainland to the southward. On its barren slopes there olings a settlement, said to be formed of the last remnants of the aboriginal inhabitants of Arabia, children of Shem, undiluted by the restless Bedouin blood of Ishmael, the race now dominating the remainder of that highly undesirable land.

It was refreshingly cool at Maskat, outside outside the Gulf limits, for the Monsoon had "broken." The gracious moisture and coolness which the Monsoon brings across the sea to India does not actually reach these deserts; but it affects the whole Indian ocean generally, so that every coastline bathed by its waters rejoices therein. The five days that followed at Maskat, while we waited for the mail, were pleasant enough. There was a good deal of back surveywork to be plotted and reports to be written, and the busy days on board the ship were usually ended by cheerful sundownings at the Residency, with tennis and tea. The Residency was a house, however, to be approached with some circumspection, in spite of the hospitality of its inhabitants. It is built around the

yard. You come into it through an archway at the back, and find a broad flight of stairs on the right hand, leading to the oool verandah and living-rooms on the first floor, which thus are well raised above the heat of the ground, and look widely forth on the harbour. Mrs Resident was a lady whose kindness of heart extended itself far past the plane of humanity, and reached down, even, to our distant and nasty little relatives, the Apes. She kept, in the courtyard of the Resideney, a collection of the more highly-coloured of these creatures. No Thames barge, brilliant in red, blue, and yellow, can display more startlingly effective bows, or a more originally conceived stern decoration than could these Simian guardians of the stairs; and no bargee ever had such a command of the language of execration as they. They gnashed their teeth, yearningly, at the unfortunate visitor; they leapt and danced at the full extent of their straining waist-chains, clucking and gibbering at him, or hideously shrieking battle, murder, and sudden death; they seized the hand-railmercifully a stout one, and they could only just reach itand shook it in impotent fury. In brief, they put the wind up you. By closely hugging the wall on the starboard hand, and not hauling to the wind again, until well past these dangers, it was, however, just possible to circumnavigate them; and the delightful wel

come that greeted the visitor to carry the tea things up that on the top landing made quite atrocious precipice. In my well worth the Passage Peril- cowardly and sympathising ous below. One day there was heart I could not blame him. to be a picnic, which (it was Not so Mrs Resident. With so arranged) was to take place high originality of method, on the top of the steep rooky and entire knowledge of orags that rose immediately human-and especially of behind the Residency, to a Arab-nature, she summoned height of about three hundred to the verandah her whole feet. There was no path, it household, there seemed to was real mountaineering, and be about twenty of them. involved stepping upwards, Selim was then ceremoniously nearly perpendicularly, from conducted to the largest and one dangerous and precarious grandest chair, while the refoothold to the next. It was mainder of the "boys" were supposed to be cooler up there directed to pass before him, than on the shady verandah, there enthroned, and to salaam, and in any case it was a deep and lowly, proffering rechange. Such pionies had speotful salutations to one who often taken place before, and had grown so great as even to special wooden trays, upon equal the Mem Sahib in the which to carry up the tea giving of orders-the very things, formed part of the Mem herself, upon whom the Residential equipment. No eyes of all, hitherto, had diminution was permitted in waited! It was great fun; the glory of the repast. It and no strike was ever more was set forth on the topmost effectively or good-humouredly orag as exquisitely as on the broken. By the time the fourth verandah; the silver, the linen, reverential mocker had passed, the delicate china-all had to Selim had had enough of it. be carried up by the "house- He leapt from the chair, seized boys." No difference whatever his tray of silver, and preswas allowed, and they must ently, with several others, his have been jugglers of no mean chamois - assistants, was soalattainments to have scaled ing the difficult peaks, where these precipices, as they con- presently we followed them, stantly did, carrying the deeply impressed. heavy trays, without either smashing or spilling anything. When we, from the Sphinx, arrived that afternoon and had successfully evaded the raging monkeys, we were in time to witness an impressive scene and to learn a lesson in household management.

It appeared that Selim, head house-boy, had struck! He had refused point-blank again

The mail steamer came at last, and the orders she brought were for us to visit, and report on, Chahbar, a good-sized bay, 150 miles away on the Makran coast, opposite Maskat— whether Persian or Beluchi, it would be difficult to say. It was of strategio importance, and that was enough for us. We sailed immediately for that delectable spot, and spent