And others of the caravan deserted, and others were lost.
And now they had come so far into the desert that they could not return, but must keep on their way, and on the fifth day they came to the Hill of the Drum.

And all through the night they could not sleep for the booming of the Drum.

And some of the caravan went mad there, and fled screaming into the waste.
And now there was only a great haze about them, and they looked at one another with terror, saying: "Were we ever any place where green was, where birds sang, or there was sweet water?
Or maybe we are dead.

Or maybe this was all our life, and the pleasant towns, and the lamplight in the villages, and the apricots in the garden, and our wives and children, maybe they were all a dream that we woke in the middle of.
Let us lie down and sleep that we may dream again." But Marco Polo would not let them lie down, for to lie down was death.
But he drove them onward.

And again they complained: "Surely God never saw this place that He left it so terrible.