. Artists and Arabs : or, sketching in sunshine . many pictures in our mindseye that a book might be written, called The 128 ARTISTS AND ARABS. Chap. VI. Bouzareah, as seen under the different phases ofsunshine and storm. It has often been objected to these Easternscfenes, that they have no atmosphere, and nogradation of middle distance; that there is notenough repose about them, that they lack mysteryand are altogether wanting in the poetry ofcloudland. But there are clouds. We have seen, for thelast few mornings (looking through the archedwindows of the great aloe-leaves) little companiesof
. Artists and Arabs : or, sketching in sunshine . many pictures in our mindseye that a book might be written, called The 128 ARTISTS AND ARABS. Chap. VI. Bouzareah, as seen under the different phases ofsunshine and storm. It has often been objected to these Easternscfenes, that they have no atmosphere, and nogradation of middle distance; that there is notenough repose about them, that they lack mysteryand are altogether wanting in the poetry ofcloudland. But there are clouds. We have seen, for thelast few mornings (looking through the archedwindows of the great aloe-leaves) little companiesof small white clouds, casting clearly-definedshadows across the distant sea, and breaking upthe horizon line with their soft white folds. They come like shadows, so depart.—reappearing and disappearing by some myste-rious law, but seldom culminating in rain. Yes, there are clouds. Look this time faraway towards the horizon line across the bay, andwatch that rolling sea which looks like foam, thatrises higher and higher as we watch it, darkening. Chap. VI. AN -AFRICAN STORM. 129 the sky, and soon enveloping us in a kin I of seafog, through which the sun gleams dimly red,whilst the white walls of the tombs appear coldand grey against a leaden sky. See it all passaway again across the plain of the Mitidja, anddisappear in the shadows of the lesser is a hush in the breeze and all is brightagain, but a storm is coming. Take shelter, if you have courage, insideone of the Marabouts tombs (there is plentyof space), whilst a tempest rages that shouldwake the dead before Mahomets coming. Sitand wait in there, perhaps an hour, whilst oneor t^^^o strong gusts of wind pass over, andthen all is still again; and so dark that we cansee nothing inside but the light of a pipe inone corner. We get impatient, thinking that itis passing off. But it comes at last. It breaks over the tombs,and tears through the plantation, with a tre-mendous surging sound, putting to flight the I30 ARTIST
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