three o'clock
With an occasional rest the expedition made slow but certain headway during the night , halting for the day when the rapidly brightening east warned them that old Sol would soon have to be reckoned with . A barrel of water was buried in the sand , a bamboo brought for the purpose being planted upright near the spot , and after a hasty breakfast the tired men were soon asleep under a light awning carried for the purpose ; one man , however , being constantly on watch . By noon the heat had become intolerable . Roasting in the sun seemed preferable to stewing under the canvas , and by three o'clock the party were on their way again . They rested at midnight , and rested better . The fourth night found them still on the sand-dunes , and by this time the weird journey was beginning to tell upon the white men . The silence and mystery of the night , the vast expanse of sand shown so vaguely in the moonlight , the soft-treading , grotesquely-shaped camels , which seemed far less real and tangible than the black shadows thrown by them across the sand , and by day the blinding glare of the sun thrown back from the all-surrounding sand so fiercely that in spite of their sun-goggles they were nearly blinded , combined to make them high - strung and irritable .