The steep, rocky cliffs, with their sharp, spire-like summits rising almost perpendicularly out of the blue sea, are typical of the desert wastes inland.
"And this is the India they talk so much about!" says Gerome, contemptuously, as we watch the desolate shores from the deck of the steamer.

I do not correct the little man's geography.

It is too hot for argument, for the heat is stifling.

There is not a breath of air stirring, not a ripple on the smooth oily sea, and the sides of the ship are cracking and blistering in the fierce, blinding sunshine.
Under the awning the temperature is that of a furnace, and one almost regrets the cold and snow of three weeks ago, so perverse is human nature.
Mark Tapley himself would scarcely have taken a cheerful view of things on landing at Sonmiani.

Imagine a howling wilderness of rock and scrub, stretching away to where, on the far horizon, some low hills cut the brazen sky-line.