The first half of the 2nd Battalion of the Rifle Brigade arrived on the 2nd of August at Dakhala, during a blustering dust-storm. For all that, black and travel-stained, they were glad to detrain, and to plod through the sand, and breast the laden atmosphere, in order to get into camp hard by the Atbara. The following day the remainder of the battalion marched in under somewhat pleasanter conditions. Everybody turned out to cheer the smart, soldierlike detachments. On the 6th inst. the first half of the 1st Battalion Grenadier Guards arrived, and later on the remainder. The Sirdar and Generals Rundle and Gatacre, and the staffs went to greet them. A finer and more stalwart body of troops was never seen in the Soudan. Native opinion was more than favourable respecting them, and I heard observations on all sides that the Khalifa had no men he could set against them. The Sirdar and General Gatacre also expressed themselves much pleased with the appearance of the Grenadiers, who looked like seasoned soldiers and came in without a sick man in their ranks.



CHAPTER V.

DAKHALA CAMP: GOSSIP AND DUTY.

Dirt is the essence of savagery, and there is a superfluity of both in the Soudan. I have no desperate wish so to describe the vileness of the surroundings of the correspondents' camp at Dakhala that even casual thinkers will sniff at it. The place was bad enough in all conscience, and, mayhap, therein I have said all that is necessary. As for the worry of our lives, squatted as we were in the least agreeable quarter of the big rectangular fort, long will the memory of those days and nights burden our existence. What a time I had on those sand and dust heaps, where every puff of wind and every footfall raised clouds of pulverised cosmos. For two weeks, amid the wretched scene, hideous by night as by day, I persisted in existing. It was a huge pen with men, horses, camels, donkeys, dogs and poultry hobnobbing amid a daily wreckage of old provision tins, garbage of soiled forage and stable-sweepings and whatnot. All that, with a temperature of 116 degrees to 120 degrees Fahr. in the shade, wore the temper and added amazingly to the consumption of wet things. At the Grenadier Guards' mess one sultry evening they consumed twenty-eight dozen of sodas, and it was not a record night. Without giving anybody's secret away, I may say I know a gentleman who could polish off three dozen at a sitting, and unblushingly call for more. These are details of more interest to teetotalers than to the general public. Yet, not to let the subject pass without a word of caution to afflicted future travellers in the Soudan, the inordinate use of undiluted mineral waters of native manufacture is most dangerous to health.

We correspondents had to wink both eyes in much of our telegraphic news from the front, for military reasons. The press censor was Colonel Wingate, chief of the Intelligence Department. In his absence, Major-General Rundle, chief of staff, usually acted. Personally, either gentleman was all that could be desired. Both were alike ready and courteous in the discharge of their at all times rather onerous duty, giving frequent audience to the numerous contingent of eager newsmen, garrulous and prodigal with pencil and pen. Some of the new-comers to the business felt sorely hit, because they were precluded from writing at large upon all subjects connected with the campaign. The excision of their copy grieved and hurt them as much as if they had been subjected to a real surgical amputation. Yet those two officers but obeyed orders, for after all, and under every circumstance, the Sirdar, as I am well aware, was the real censor. It is perhaps fairly open to argument whether the course adopted in dealing with correspondents' copy was wise or necessary in a war against an ignorant and savage foe. There was, at least, one official blunder which gave occasion for much annoyance, and ought to have been promptly remedied, or better still, never committed. It was expected of Colonel Wingate, the censor, that amid multifarious important responsibilities as chief of the Intelligence branch he should find time daily to peruse and correct tens of thousands of words, often crabbedly written, in press messages. With the approach of the day of battle, his own department taxed more and more his entire attention, and side by side the correspondents' telegrams grew in length and importance. The task of proper censorship under such conditions was impossible for any human being to discharge adequately. On that account the public interest suffered, for press matters were often neither promptly nor fully despatched. As a rule, the correspondents were left in blissful ignorance of what had been cut out of their copy, as well as of the exact nature of the residuum transmitted. Besides these grievances there was one of favouritism alleged, but of that there is always more or less in every phase of life and association. All told, it may be thought that the correspondents' complaints were of no very serious character. That depends on how they are looked at. I have no taste for cavilling or grumbling over events that are past. Surely, however, there is a middle way somewhere to be found between the absolutism of a general in the field, who may gag the correspondents or treat them as camp followers, and the clear right of the British public under our free institutions to have news dealing with the progress of their arms rapidly transmitted home. I am well aware of the grave responsibilities that hedge a commander-in-chief, and the cruel injury that an unrestrained non-combatant may do him by recklessly writing on subjects calculated to jeopardise the success of a campaign and hazard countless lives and fortunes. The latter is an remote possibility. A commander-in-chief has to consider that any enemy worth his salt is usually kept informed by spies and deserters, and press-men who are known and cognisant of their duty are no more likely to betray secrets to their country's enemies than any officer or soldier in the Queen's service. And nowadays the private correspondence from troops in the field cannot be suppressed, and it is often published. Commanders of armies will either have to accept the presence of recognised writers, over whom they can exercise some control, or instead stand powerless before a dangerous flood of random army letters poured into the public press. The case can be met with judgment and care—plus penalties where deserved. I am bringing no charges here, but discussing a vexed and withal important question. I am glad to say that during the Omdurman Campaign there was no attempt, within my knowledge, of muzzling the press. This does not bear upon the Fashoda incident, but that came later.

Nasri Island as a base of concentration was, as I have intimated, a blind. Although we correspondents were not permitted to go up the river, or indeed move beyond the Atbara, until the Sirdar and headquarters had started, yet we kept ourselves fully informed of all that was happening at the front. There had been one or two little skirmishes between bands of mounted dervishes and our wood-cutting parties of Khedivial infantry. In these encounters our men had generally the best of the fighting, and the Baggara horsemen invariably retreated with a few empty saddles. In July Major-Generals Hunter and Gatacre had, during a small reconnaissance, proceeded as far up as Shabluka Cataract or Rapid on one of the gunboats. The enemy, it was seen, were in no great strength there, and the seven well-planned, thick-walled mud forts blocking the passage were weakly held. Those two officers landed with a small body of troops and surveyed a suitable camping site, at what they called Wad Hamid, but which, in reality, was north of that place and close to Wad Habeshi. The object was to find a spot easily accessible by river and land, and with not too much bush about. At that season, the Nile having in many places overflowed its lower borders, marshes extended for miles along the ordinarily solid river banks. Wad Habeshi was merely a native wood-cutting station at first, but little by little troops appeared on the scene, and a large entrenched camp, with lines extending for several miles, was duly formed. At the end of July two steamers, which had made the perilous voyage up the Nile from the province of Dongola, came in and made fast alongside the mud bars at Dakhala.

It was still early in August when all the four battalions of Major-General Hon. N. G. Lyttelton's Second British Brigade reached Dakhala. They were quartered in a cool and cleanly camp by the Atbara, to the south-east of the fortified lines. The 21st Lancers also arrived at Dakhala in due course. Major Williams' Field Battery, the 32nd R.A. of 15-pounders; Major Elmslie's 37th R.A., with the new 50-pounder Howitzers firing Lyddite shells; and Lieut. Weymouth's two 40-pounder Armstrong guns, besides other cannon and Maxims, were likewise on time. Very smartly the batteries and Maxims were stowed aboard native craft, which were taken in tow by gunboats to Wad Hamid. Detachments of gunners accompanied the pieces and carriages, but the majority of the artillerymen were ferried to the west bank, whence they marched overland to the new camp. It was at Wad Habeshi that the army was first actually marshalled as a concrete force, and forthwith took the field. Not a moment was lost by day or night in moving men and supplies onward. The little paddle steamer captured from the dervishes during the 1896 Dongola Expedition, which had been repaired and sent to Dakhala, was continually carrying troops and stores from the east to the west bank. As the Nile was running at the rate of six miles an hour in its wide bed, the "El Tahara," as the craft was called, had to make a big circuit to effect a passage. The "El Tahara" was one of the boats General Gordon built at Khartoum but never lived to launch. As she was a new craft, the Mahdi changed her name, calling her "The Maid," instead of "Khartoum," as it had been intended to dub her. She was an excellent vessel, with fine engines much too powerful for her frame.



Both Surgeon-General Taylor, on behalf of the British division, and Surgeon-Colonel Gallwey, for the Egyptian troops, completed their arrangements for succouring the sick and wounded upon the march from Shabluka to the attack upon Omdurman. Adequate provision was made for field hospitals, floating hospitals and relief stations, for medical officers, and attendants, with cradlets and stretchers, to follow each military unit into action. For the British infantry it meant, substantially, that behind each battalion a medical officer and two non-commissioned officers should march, accompanied by six camels bearing cacolets, and men with nine stretchers. A somewhat modified scheme was got out for the cavalry and artillery, as well as for the other Khedivial troops. In the anticipated action before Omdurman, temporary operating stations were to be set up, out of ordinary rifle-range, and native craft, which had been fitted up with cots, were to be brought as near the scene as practicable to receive the wounded.

An attempt made to lay a cable from Dakhala to the west bank was not over successful. It was found that the great sag, caused by the current, carried the cable down stream, so the whole length ran out before the opposite bank was reached. The steamer "Melik" was the telegraph ship, and paid the cable out from a wooden reel placed on her stern quarter. A few days after the failure she was employed picking up the wire, most of which was recovered by Captain Manifold, R.E., who was the director of military telegraphs in the last as in the three previous expeditions against the dervishes. The recovered line was relaid across the Atbara, which is barely a third of the width of the Nile. From the south bank of the Atbara two land lines pass up the east shore of the Nile. Upon a lofty corresponding pair of trestles an overhead wire was also hung across the smaller river. A few miles south of Dakhala a cable had been laid to an island and thence to the west bank. From the latter point an ordinary land wire ran along the desert to Metemmeh. Later on it was laid to Omdurman. The line was put down step by step as the troops advanced. Thus an alternative system of telegraphic communication with Khartoum was early provided for.

It stirred the blood of everybody in our dull camp to see detachment after detachment of the second British brigade detrain. Most of us turned out and like schoolboys followed the drums and fifes as they played the troops to their camping-ground. A half-battalion of the Grenadier Guards, led by Colonel Villiers-Hatton, arrived at Dakhala on the 6th of August. Hale and strong the big fellows looked in their campaigning khaki. "First-class fighting material," as Arabs and negroes, who are by no means poor judges, were openly heard to confess in their interchange of confidences. There is always much camp chaff and yarning amongst "Tommies"—and their officers, too, for that matter—at the expense of England's picked battalions. "Have you seen the 'Queen's Company,' my man," asked a subaltern of the Grenadiers one day of a private in the Northumberland Fusiliers. Now the "Queen's Company" are all over six feet in stature, and there was a friendly rivalry in grenadiership between them and certain Fusilier regiments. The question was asked when the troops were marching over undulating but rather bare ground where the tufted grass was little over knee high. It happened the officer had been detached on other duty, and was anxious to rejoin his command. "I think, sir," said the Northumbrian, saluting respectfully, "that they have got lost in the long grass." The subaltern looked unutterable things, but the "Tommy" held a stoical face and said not a word more till the officer went off to hunt anew for his men. For all the chaff, every one was glad to see the Guards, and to speak of them as the Queen's soldiers. Of the second brigade General Gatacre said that a better body of troops could not be wished for by any general.

I rode out to several of the brigade field-days, or rather, mornings, for there was plenty of drilling and field exercises for Lyttelton's men. The brigade was repeatedly practised in attack formation against imaginary bodies of dervishes, as well as at assaulting supposed works. On more than one of these occasions the gallant Colonel of the Guards, not having his charger up at that date, led his Grenadiers afoot, and once, at any rate, was mounted on donkey-back. Particularism gets lost in the desert. In the manoeuvres the troops were usually led in line, the flanks being supported by two or three companies in quarter column, and the centre having in rear a few sections of companies ready to fill gaps. Save for a little noise in passing orders, the result of a fast-becoming obsolete school of training, even captious criticism could find no actual fault with their work. Advancing across wadies and scaling knolls upon the desert, the troops were instructed to open fire with ball cartridge. The range given was 500 yards, and the ammunition used was the tip-filed Lee-Metford bullets. As at the Atbara, without halting, the line moved slowly on, the front rank firing as at a battue, each man independently. There were a few section volleys tried, the soldiers pausing for an instant to deliver their fire. Once or twice also, the rear rank was closed up, and joined in the fusilade. One effect was to paralyse the deer and birds within range. I noticed that the tip-filed bullets did not usually spread, and that their man-stopping quality was something of a myth. Even the dum-dum does not invariably "set up" on striking an object. For the Omdurman Campaign a new hollow-nosed bullet was issued for the Lee-Metfords. So far as I was able to judge, it generally spread on hitting, and made a deadly wound, tearing away bone and flesh at the point of exit.

On the 12th of August the 21st Lancers, together with camel and mule transport animals, were crossed to the west bank in readiness for marching to Wad Hamid. Saturday, the 13th August, was a very busy day at Dakhala. On that date the Sirdar went by steamer to the front, direct to Wad Habeshi. It was given out he was merely going on a flying visit for inspection. There was renewed active drilling of troops. Eight steamers that came down were reloaded and sent back with troops and stores in the course of twenty-four hours. General Gatacre went to Darmali, and there assisted in the embarkation of his old brigade, Major-General A. Wauchope's. The task was effected within the course of twelve hours, the Camerons, Seaforths, Lincolns and Warwicks, with their kits and supplies, being densely packed upon the steamers "Zafir," "Nazir," "Fatah," and the barges and giassas, which these craft towed. Had the Thames Conservancy writs run on the Nile there would have been terrible fines exacted for unlawful overcrowding. On the 14th August these stern-wheelers, heavily laden with Wauchope's men, steamed at a fast rate past the Atbara camp, on their way south. These craft, the first of which took part in the 1896 Dongola Expedition, turned out to be really the most useful and dependable of the whole Nile flotilla. They steamed remarkably well, towed splendidly, and were, besides, good fighting craft. The three Admiralty-designed twin-screw steamers, "Sheikh" "Sultan" and "Melik," were not as fast as had been expected; they could not tow any reasonably big load, and, though they were stuffed with many novelties, few of the innovations were of the least practical value. They needed all their engine power to steam and when under weigh had none to spare for driving the circular saws to cut firewood for fuel, or to start the dynamos to work the search lights with which they were fitted. Major Collinson, commanding the 4th Khedivial Brigade, left Atbara camp for the front with the 17th and 18th Battalions, or half his force, the 1st and 5th Battalions having preceded him some time previously.



CHAPTER VI.

MARCHING IN THE SOUDAN—FROM DAKHALA TO WAD HABESHI.

What a land the Soudan is! As a sorely-tried friend said to me, after passing a succession of sleepless nights owing to the dust and rain storms, and overburdened days because of the heat, "What do the British want in this country? Is it the intention of the Government to do away with capital punishment and send all felons here? I am not surprised the camel has the hump. I would develop one here myself. What an accursed country!" Yes, it is not an elysium; and when one allows the dirt, heat, and discomfort to wither all power of endurance, the Soudan becomes a horror and anathema, particularly in the summer time. Now, the camel is to me the personification of animal wretchedness, a fit creature for the wilderness. The Arabs have a legend that the Archangel Michael, anxious to try his skill at creative work, received permission to make an attempt, and the camel was the issue of his bungling handiwork. Poor brute, his capacity for enjoyment is, perhaps, the most restricted of the whole animal kingdom. Ferocious of aspect, with a terrible voice, he is nevertheless the most timid of beasts, and his fine air of haughty superciliousness is, like the rest, but a sham. It might be fancied that he is for ever nursing some secret grief, for he takes you unawares by lying down and suddenly dying. Yet that is ordinarily but his method of proclaiming an attack of indigestion.



I struck my tent at Dakhala on the 15th of August, packed my gear, and during the course of the day crossed over to the west bank with my servants, horses, camels and other belongings. Having obtained permission from headquarters to go up to the front, I decided to go by land, marching with the cavalry and guns, for I was not free to travel except in their company, at least until we reached Metemmeh but of that anon. The column in question was under Colonel Martin of the 21st Lancers, and comprised three squadrons of that regiment, or about 300 men mounted upon Arab horses; three batteries, the 32nd R.A., the 37th R.A. (howitzers), and the Egyptian Horse Artillery; two Maxims with division and transport trains, and a number of officers' led horses. As I have already explained, the guns of the 32nd and 37th field batteries, together with the limbers and ammunition, were sent on to Wad Habeshi by water. There was much merrymaking as usual that evening, for we were to start on the morrow. I squatted like many more in the low rough scrub by the river's brink with my caravan around me. During the evening I went out to dine with some officer friends. As I had over a mile to walk to their pitch, the poor glare of the camp fires made the darkness more inky, and I had sundry narrow escapes from tumbling into ditches and water holes. Our bivouac was an ill-omened beginning to the route march of the column under Colonel Martin. One of the periodical summer gales came on, raising whirlwinds of dust and sand. To complete our discomfiture a thunderstorm followed, and there was a heavy sprinkling of rain for herbage, but too much for men. Truly, misfortunes rarely befall singly. It was a big Nile year, not a flood, but enough and to spare. A blessing, no doubt, for Lower Egypt, but a calamity for us, for during the night the river rose 2 feet, and overflowed its low, level banks. The water overran part of the camping ground, compelling many a drenched soldier to shift his quarters hurriedly. We got through the dark and troublous night somehow, though keenly vexed by the muttered discontent of the camels, and the persistent, blatant, variegated amorous braying of 500 donkeys. A cat upon the tiles, a Romeo, was to this as a tin whistle to a trombone. Sleep was a nightmare. It was after six a.m. before the head of the column moved out towards the desert track. The rear did not get away before eight o'clock, much too late an hour for marching in the Soudan. The weather was hot, the sun scorching despite a brisk southerly breeze. Lieutenant H. M. Grenfell had charge of the fine Cyprus mule train for carrying the British divisional baggage. There was with the column a great following of native servants mounted upon sturdy Soudan donkeys. The gawky camel shuffles along, a picture of woe with a load of 2 cwt. to 4 cwt., whilst the little moke trips smartly with almost an equal weight upon his back. Two Jaalin guides were supposed to show us the shortest and best track. Major Mahan, of the Egyptian Cavalry, had been told off to keep an eye on them and to assist us generally during the march. Two squadrons of Lancers rode in front, whilst the rest of the troopers were supposed to protect the flanks and act as "whippers-in" to the column. Fortunately, there was no enemy nearer than Kerreri or Omdurman, for our line was usually stretched out for a great distance; two, three, and four miles often intervened between the head and rear of the column.

After a few days of such marching as we had, straggling became the normal condition of affairs, except so far as the leading squadrons of Lancers were concerned. The last three days of the journey, in fact, became a sort of "go-as-you-please" tramp. To inexperience and want of wise forethought may be set down most of the difficulties, hardships, and losses that befell that column on its 140-mile march south, whereof later.

During the earlier portion of our first day's march (16th August) the track lay along the edge of a pebbly desert, which left but a skirting of one to three miles of loam and rank vegetation between its measureless sterility and the tawny Nile waters. The small rounded pebbles and the fine sand of the Nubian wilderness were surely fashioned in some great lake or sea of a prehistoric past. Far as we were from the dervishes, a childish terror of them was entertained by the servants. At the last moment several domestics decamped, my cook among them. I rode back three miles to catch the rascal. With unwonted alacrity and prescience he had recrossed to the opposite bank before I arrived at the place of bivouac, and, having no time, I had to retrace my steps without his enforced attendance. It had been arranged that the column should only go fifteen miles the first day. What with winding and twisting to avoid flooded khors or shallow gulleys we marched over twenty miles I fancy. At any rate, with no protracted halting for meals or for baiting the animals, we trudged on throughout the heat and worry of the day until sunset. It was putting both men and animals to the severest possible strain, and few of the soldiers, at least, had had any preliminary hardening, for they had been travelling for days by boat and train and were out of condition. As a rule, the Lancers trotted a few miles ahead, halted, dismounted, and waited for the convoy to come up. Then they would ride on again, halt, and so on, repeating the proceeding many times during each day's march. From start to finish the column was ever a loosely-jointed body. The pace was slow, little more than 2 1/4 miles an hour, though Sir Herbert Stewart's Bayuda desert column managed to average upon a longer and almost waterless route, from Korti to Metemmeh, 2 3/4 miles an hour. In that campaign, however, most of our marching was done during the cooler hours of very early morning and late eventide.

The head of the column turned in towards the river about three p.m. on the 16th, at Makaberab, or, as the natives call it, Omdabiya—i.e., the place of hyenas. For over a mile, men and animals had to make their way through halfa-grass scrub, and then over bare alluvial land, deeply sun-cracked and scored in all directions. The ground was cris-crossed like a chessboard, the lines being a foot to two feet apart, and four to six inches wide, and several feet in depth. There were numberless spills through these pitfalls. One camel snapped his leg, and many mules and horses were strained and lamed. It was indeed fat land, and had formerly grown cotton. The cracks, as we found later, were full of scorpions. During that night's bivouac, and in the early morning, very many men and animals were stung by these venomous pests. Only one soldier succumbed from a scorpion sting during the campaign. The pain of the wound is as an intense burning or wounding, and continues troublesome for hours. Ammonia was freely used by the doctors when the stings were severe, but where whisky could be got, that was preferred.



We were early astir on the 17th inst., but it was not until daylight or 5.30 a.m. that it was safe for the column to pick its way out of the field of cracks. Why the spot was selected, except as an earthly trial, I am unable to state, officially or otherwise. Hard by, on either hand, there was solid and most passable ground for bivouacking. We had a good many stragglers on the 16th inst., most of whom came rather late tumbling and grumbling to supper and bed on the rough dank ground. Others lost their way and wandered to the Nile, where they were guided by natives, and later were lucky to get a lift to the front upon gunboats. Two men of the 21st Lancers left upon the desert with a sick comrade down with sunstroke, watched him die, and, scraping a grave, buried him where he expired. Lieutenant Winston Churchill, who was detained until late at Dakhala, in trying to follow us, lost his way, and had to pass the night alone upon the desert. He sat holding his horse till daybreak, and then, burning with thirst, made his way to the Nile. Subsequently he hired a native guide and was enabled to come up with the column on the afternoon of the 17th. Spending the night alone upon the desert has been many times my lot in Soudan campaigns.

During Wednesday's march, 17th August, we crossed the low shoulders of many rocky ridges. They are called "jebels" (hills), but most of them, including Jebel Egeda, which we passed, are little, if any, higher than Primrose-Hill, London, though it is not a conical, but a long, barn-roofed range. Near there I saw an enormous native cemetery. It extended to perhaps fifty acres, the pebble-covered mounds over the graves dotting the bare desert and the sides of the hills. I have an impression that there are ancient funeral mounds near there, and that the burying-place of Aliab is older than the invasion of the Arab Jaalin. There were fragments of sculptured stones, granite, and blocks of sandstone, and I noticed one broken memorial slab covered with Greek characters. Farther on we had to turn aside to avoid wadies and khors, up which the Nile had flowed. We were able to water the animals at some of those places. The mules and horses buried their noses in the flood and drank greedily, and the camels also had a fine, long-necked thirst. We were ourselves too parched to care about the impurities of the Nile, and soldiers and officers swallowed great draughts of the soupy stuff.

Late in the afternoon of the 17th the column turned to the river to bivouac at Kitaib, a twenty-two miles journey for the day. Too late it was found that the ration depot there, from which the column was to draw fresh supplies, was upon the farther side of a newly-made inlet. The column had to repack, and turn west to round the creek. We reached Kitaib No. 2 about six p.m. Part of the battery mules and transport, however, got leave to remain at the first halting-place, as they stood in no need of supplies, and I unpacked by myself, bivouacking under a clump of tall mimosa trees hard by a vast deserted village and a long grove of date palms. I believe that over a score of men lost the road that night and ultimately wandered to the river and got to the front by steamer. There were several cases of heat exhaustion and sunstroke, but happily few of a serious nature. Two troopers, who floundered through the marshy land, got taken aboard a gunboat when they were utterly prostrate. Others, whose horses went lame or had to be killed, were ordered down to the Nile to secure passage on as best they could. In the darkness, as I was eating my evening meal by candle-light, two Lancers shouted and rode up. They had the too common but true story to tell of having missed the track. I found supper and breakfast for them, and started them off with their troop at eight o'clock next morning, the 18th August, for the column left Kitaib at a late hour. My servants were glad of the soldiers' arrival, for they were terribly afraid of robbers, the district being infested with marauding natives. During the night several fugitives from Omdurman passed us going north. Eighteen Shaggieh, who had escaped in a sail-boat, were but four days out from Khartoum. They professed to be delighted to get away. The Khalifa, they said, had ordered every sail-boat to go south of Khartoum. Taking advantage of a thunderstorm, they headed down stream and got away. According to them, the dervishes were killing all the Jaalin who were suspected of trying to escape north, and the Shaggieh and other northern tribesmen stood in little better plight. All natives, other than blacks and Baggara, who could get away from Omdurman were running off, as they believed the fall of the dervish rule was assured. The Khalifa's son, Osman, whose title was Sheikh Ed-Din, wanted to make terms. For months the youth had been in disgrace, but his father had reinstated him in the position of Commander-in-Chief of the Forces. Osman openly declared that fighting against the Sirdar and the English was hopeless, and that it was wiser to try and treat with us. Khalifa Abdullah and his brother Yacoub, however, would not hear of treating for peace, urging that their own people in that event would kill them. The only possible course was war to the death. From an excellent source I learned that the dervishes were well supplied with guns and ammunition, and that the Khalifa had about five millions sterling of treasure laid by.

From Kitaib can be seen the dozen pyramids of Meroe, part of the kingdom of the famous Queen of Sheba. To right and left upon the opposite bank are catacombs, ruins of old temples, towns and forts of a bygone civilisation. The country on both sides of the Nile in that region has spacious alluvial belts, big as the Fayoum and as susceptible to the arts of the cultivator. Such hills as there are rise for the most part abruptly from flat land capable of limitless irrigation. To anticipate somewhat: the region, south of Abu Hamed, up to and even beyond Khartoum, has all the natural advantages of Lower Egypt and something more. Berber is but 245 miles from Suakin. The Nubian kingdom of antiquity, or that of the Queen of Sheba, must have been of enormous extent, marvellous fertility and great richness. Ethiopia may yet fulfil the prophecy. From Kitaib we marched about eighteen miles to Maguia, passing through a forest of mimosa bush, the track but rarely branching out amongst the halfa-grass upon the more open country. About three p.m. the column turned in towards a side stream and settled down near the village of Maguia. The wind rose as usual at night, yet for all that the bivouac was fairly good, and there was plenty of grazing. Next day, the 19th, we managed to make an early start, getting away about 5.30 a.m. The distance to be traversed was but fourteen or sixteen miles, and the column reached the halting-place, Magawiya, about two p.m. We made our way over broken, cracked ground to the river's edge, and there bivouacked under the shade of a magnificent forest of stately date palms. The ripening fruit had been extensively plucked by thieving natives, but there was enough left for our men. It was a most picturesque scene for a camp, but an unwholesome place for all that. It was given out that the column was to rest a day at Magawiya, as the place was a wood and food supply depot. During the course of the evening the sternwheeler "Kaibur" came in, and a sick officer, Lieutenant Russell, and about a score or more of men were sent back upon her to Dakhala, or Atbara camp. It merits record that a party of Egyptian gunners carried upon a native bed or angreeb a sick British artilleryman from Maguia to Magawiya, from bivouac to bivouac. That was something like good comradeship and esprit de corps.



At nightfall the column was formed up so that the men slept upon the ground within supporting distance of each other. Sentries and patrols also were set, but the force was not one, I fancy, that would have been able to offer a stubborn resistance to a surprise party of dervishes. On Saturday, the 20th of August, as was anticipated, the troops remained in camp and enjoyed much needed rest and opportunities for washing. Several gunboats and steamers passed us during the day going south, including one upon which were a number of correspondents who were enjoying their dolce far niente under awnings in a breezy draught with inexhaustible supplies of filtered and mineral waters. We saw the Grenadier Guards, the Lincolns, and other battalions pass us, and steam slowly up stream towards Wady Hamed. On Sunday, the 21st, a really early start for the first time was effected. We were to march as far as Abu Kru that day, and encamp near the spot held by Stewart's handful of men in 1885. Major Williams, R.A., went off with his battery, the 32nd, at 3.30 a.m., and the 37th battery accompanied him. Lieutenant H. Grenfell got away at four a.m., and the Lancers at 5.20 a.m. I pushed ahead of the troops in order to have time to revisit some of the old ground I had been over with the Desert Column in 1884-85. It was odd, that though hundreds still survived who marched with Sir Herbert Stewart, there were but fifteen persons in the whole of the Sirdar's army who got through to Metemmeh. Of those still less went in and left with the force that fought at Abu Klea and Abu Kru. Of the very numerous body of correspondents there were but two. I regretted that there were not several score or more of old officers and men who went through the terrible Bayuda Desert campaign. Most of them would have sacrificed much to have been in at the death of Mahdism.



Metemmeh had been made a slaughter-pen by the dervishes under Mahmoud. It was truly an awful Golgotha. Dead animals lay about in all directions in thousands, without and within the long, straggling, deserted town. I rode up and looked at the remains of the little fort and the loopholed walls on the south end of Metemmeh, close to which I had ridden on 21st January 1885, and got hotly fired at for my pains. Then I walked over the ruins of the Guards' triangular fort at Gubat. The place was still capable of defence, and the trenches and rifle-pits were much as we left them on 13th February with General Buller. As for the graves, they were intact. The big earthwork we all helped to raise near the river was covered with water, except a corner of the western parapet. It was, however, partly thrown down, and the ditch and slopes were overgrown with grass and bushes. Then I rode away to Abu Kru battle-field and had a look at what remained of the zereba, the little detached fort I had asked might be built, and the graves of our dead. Some of these had been rifled. Heaps of dead animal bones lay about, for we lost many camels that 19th January 1885. The enemy had gathered up and buried all their own dead. So overgrown was the place that it was barely recognisable. I stood, however, again where Stewart received his fatal wound, where Cameron, of the Standard, and St Leger Herbert lay with soldier comrades, and I wandered round to where Lord Charles Beresford worked the Gardners against the dervishes outside Metemmeh, whilst I found the range for him through my glasses, by watching the spatter of the bullets upon the sand. That night my thoughts were full of bygone scenes and doings in the most heroic campaign of modern history, Stewart's magnificent ride from Korti to Metemmeh. There came back to me the pain felt on the receipt of the evil news of Gordon's death, brought to us by Stuart Wortley, and of the slaughter at Khartoum, all of which might so easily have been averted but for——

On Monday, 22nd August, the batteries again got away before the Lancers, starting at 3.30 and four a.m. The day's march was to Agaba, about twenty-six miles, and the next day's about nineteen to Wad Habeshi. Wady Hamed, which is nearer Jebel Atshan, was where one of Gordon's steamers, the "Tal Howeiya," returning with Sir Charles Wilson's party, was wrecked on 29th January 1885. Making a detour into the desert on quitting Abu Kru, I left Colonel Martin's column, and rode on with one native servant to Wady Hamed. As a matter of fact, the camp was neither at Wad Habeshi nor Wady Hamed, but between the two. The latter, however, was the official name. But that my man was very apprehensive of meeting patrolling dervishes, I would have ridden direct across country, starting from a point opposite Nasri Island, where the depot of supplies was. On the pretext of watering the horses he got me back to the river. The consequence was that I rode over fifty miles on Monday. However, I managed to reach Wady Hamed before sunset. On my way in I met the Sirdar, out, as usual, on an inspecting tour. He was good enough to greet me kindly and direct me to the correspondents' camp; those of my comrades of the Press who voyaged by steamer had just arrived. The new camp was an immense place over three miles long. It was a zerebaed enclosure lying along the margin of the Nile in a field of halfa-grass broken up with clumps of palms and mimosa. The country all around was as a vast prairie. Beyond the reach of the Nile's overflow the sand and loam was bare of vegetation. The river was studded with scores of verdant islands, and to the south we could see the peaks and ridges of Shabluka, through which the Nile, when in flood, surges like a mill race between narrow rocky barriers.



CHAPTER VII.

WITH THE ARMY IN THE FIELD—WAD HAMID TO EL HEJIR.

Wad Hamid was a camp of magnificent distances, restful to the eyes but distressful to the feet. The soil was rich loam, and at no remote date had been mostly under cultivation. There were several pretty clumps of dhoum palms, and a few scraggy mimosa by the river's margin. Of tree-shade for the troops there was practically none. Much of the thorny bush had been cut to form a zereba. In fact, there were two zerebas, the British division having a dividing line between their quarters and those of the Khedivial force. There was also a semblance of cleared roadways about the camp, but the ground was too spacious to be easily made snug and tidy. Wad Hamid camp was quite five miles nearer to Omdurman than Wad Habeshi. We were within the long stretch known as the Shabluka or Sixth Cataract. For 15 miles or thereabouts the Nile pours in deep, strong flood through a narrow valley, which in places contracts to a gorge or canyon. The channel is studded with islets and rocks, and at one point the river races through a wedge-shaped cleft, apparently little more than 100 yards in width.

After my long ride in from Metemmeh I had to let my horse rest for two days. So until my servants arrived with my spare led horses I had to go about afoot. My camels and baggage were with the column. It was more of a hardship tramping from place to place in the hot dusty camp than roughing it upon the bare ground and living upon scratch and scrappy meals of biscuit, "bully beef," and sardines, till my men came in, put up my tent, and cooked my food. The British division was at the south end of the long rectangular encampment. An interval of a mile or more separated the divisional headquarters, whilst some of the battalions had their lines 2 miles apart. Beyond all, another 2 miles off, was the camel corps bivouacking by the rocks and foothills of the Shabluka range. Their only shade from the noon-day glare was such as they could get behind detached black granitic boulders and blocks. Wad Hamid camp, viewed not too closely, was a pleasing picture set in a background of dark hills with a bordering of wide tawny river flowing in front. There were a good many tents in the British lines, but relatively few in the Khedivial, for there fellaheen and Soudani had sheltered themselves as usual under palm leaf and grass huts, or beneath their brown soldier blankets. It was one of the clever campaigning dodges recently taught the native soldiers by our officers, to attach loops of twine or tape along the edges of their spare blankets, so that these coverings could be quickly laced together and spread over light bamboos or sticks, forming very comfortable quarters. The Sirdar's headquarters tents were always distinguishable by the big waving Egyptian flag, a crescent and star on a red ground, and near it a bigger "drapeau rouge" flaunted the talismanic lettering—"Intelligence Headquarters." Before Major-General Gatacre's divisional headquarters flapped Britain's emblem, a full-sized Union Jack. Major-General A. Hunter's tent had an Egyptian flag dangling from a native spear, and the Brigade-Commanders all had their respective colours planted before their quarters. Colonel H. A. Macdonald, "Fighting Mac," had a characteristic brigade banner, readily distinguishable. It was an ensign made up of four squares or blocks of different colours, the colours of the respective battalions of the command. To descend to particulars, besides the Sirdar's and the Generals' flags, there were battalion and company colours, and hospital, artillery, engineer, and various other flags. In the Khedivial army the battalions were known by numerals from 1 to 18. The Arabic numeral of each native battalion was worn by the men on their tall fezes and the khaki covers for the head-gear. It was found necessary to devise a head-covering to shield the men from sunstroke. That worn over the fez could be so adjusted as to afford shade for the nape of the neck, and in front a scoop for the eyes, so that the article became transmogrified into something between a kepi and a helmet. The British "Tommies'" khaki helmet-covers were ornamented with coloured cotton patches and regimental badges. Of course the object of the patches was to enable officers and men to identify easily their respective commands. The Rifles wore a square dark green patch, which the Soudan sun bleached to a pea green. The Lancashire Fusiliers wore a yellow square patch, and the Northumberland Fusiliers a red diagonal band round the helmet. As for the Grenadier Guards their insignia was a jaunty red and blue rosette. In Wauchope's brigade the Lincolns sported a plain square white patch, the Warwicks a red square, the Seaforths a white plume, nicknamed the "duck's tuft," and the Camerons a "true blue" square patch.

The rapid thrusting forward of his whole army from Darmali and Dakhala within a period of ten days was not the least astonishing and brilliant strategical feat achieved by the Sirdar. In that space of time troops, stores, and all the impedimenta for an army of 25,000 men had been moved forward about 150 miles in an enemy's country. No doubt he knew his foe; he certainly always had them under the closest observation. For that reason the Sirdar was able to do things, and did do them, that other Generals would have blundered over. The great river before the camp, with its flotilla of gunboats, looking like American river-steamers, the forest of masts, the lofty poles of the lateen-rigged giassas, and the abundance of commodious barges gave a broad hint how the transport of so many men and so much material had been so smartly effected. Provisions, forage, ammunition, all on the most liberal scale, he had got together. With the troops there were to be carried supplies for fifteen days, and enough to last as long again were to be accumulated upon Royan Island at the south end of the Sixth Cataract. Placing the reserve supplies and base hospitals upon islands meant that both would be safe from any raiding dervishes. Beyond Wad Hamid everybody was to move in the lightest possible order. Officers had to limit their baggage, so that it should not weigh more than 60 lbs., and the men were to march in the lightest of kits. Camel transport was cut down, and all animals not absolutely necessary were to be left behind. For the conveyance of the baggage of each British battalion 32 camels were allowed. All the men's heavy baggage, overcoats, knapsacks, kit bags were sent on by river transport in native craft. A blanket a-piece was what the men had, and that was carried for them by the baggage camels. Quite enough for any European to carry in the Soudan in August were his clothes, rifle, accoutrements, and 100 rounds of ball cartridge. The native battalions had assigned to each command 39 to 42 camels, as well as two giassas or nuggars. These carried all the regimental belongings, and also most of the men's things, for the Khedivial troops never marched with kits, blankets, or any encumbrances upon them. Clad in comfortable knitted jerseys, with breeches, putties, and good serviceable high-lows, the men of the native regiments stride freely along, each bearing only rifle, bayonet, and ammunition.

The massing of the forces at Wad Hamid was all but complete. Part of the Rifle Brigade, detained on the river by storms and contrary head winds, were the only absentees. On the opposite bank of the Nile had been mustered the mixed body of friendly natives, who, accompanied and supported by a gunboat, were to clear that side of the dervishes when the Sirdar advanced. It was known that they would have to deal with, probably, 1000 Mahdists under Zeki Osman. Our allies included Ababdeh, Bisharin, Jaalin, Shaggieh, Shukrieh, Aburin, and other tribesmen led nominally by Abdul Azim, the brave Ababdeh Sheikh. They were armed with Remington rifles, but carried in addition their own swords and spears. That they might be better led and prove to be of real value, Major Stuart-Wortley, with Lieut. Charles Wood as his A.D.C., was sent across to take the command. Wortley was received with every demonstration of heartiness by the Sheikhs, who placed themselves and their followers entirely under that able officer's orders. The friendlies were most enthusiastic and eagerly asked to be led against their dervish enemies. As these allies and the Sirdar's forces were to march by the river's margin when possible, signalling would be nearly always practicable between them. Telegraphic communication was opened to Wad Hamid from Dakhala by Captain Manifold, R.E., and his sappers almost as soon as the troops got into camp. With much hard work the line had been put upon poles as far south as Nasri. When the army subsequently advanced, as poles were not readily procurable the bare iron telegraphic wire was laid upon the ground. In the crisp, hot atmosphere of the Soudan, as there is little leakage, long distances can be worked through an unprotected wire laid upon the desert. When there were rain-storms of course telegraphic communication over such lines became impossible.

On 23rd August, the day following my arrival at Wad Hamid, the Sirdar held a great review of his army. At 6 o'clock in the morning the force was paraded upon the open desert a mile and half inland from the Nile. Reveille had been at an hour before sunrise. It was a pleasant morning, for a fresh breeze was blowing, and the air was agreeably cool. Several of the younger soldiers, however, succumbed to the effects of the tropical sun during the few hours the troops were kept employed, and they had to be carried back to camp. Although the cavalry, with part of the artillery and Maxims, did not parade, there was a big enough force upon the ground to make an imposing display. The army was drawn up in line with a front over a mile in length. Major-General Gatacre's division was upon the left, with the Grenadier Guards forming his right. The Queen's soldiers were ranged in mass of companies, column of fours right, whilst the native soldiery were brigaded in line, Macdonald upon the extreme right, with Collinson's brigade in reserve. The troops wheeled into column, deployed, changed front, and engaged in firing exercise. As might have been expected, there was more celerity and accuracy in changing formation displayed by the British than in the native brigades. All the men were very keen at their work, the expectation of being about to engage the enemy doubtless lending special interest to their field-day. The camp, as all camps ever were, was full of strange yarns—"shaves" about what was going on at Omdurman, and the Khalifa's intentions. "Abdullah would fight? No, he would run away; he was laying down mines in the Nile to blow up our gunboats. A Tunisian had devised a torpedo, but as it was being lowered from a dervish boat, the machine exploded, and the engineer was hoisted with his own petard." Then there were stories of extraordinary discoveries of precious minerals—gold mines by the score. Two young officers, who wished some fun with a distinguished military gentleman not unconnected with South Africa, persisted in finding diamonds, pieces of rock-crystal, which, with an air of mystery and importance, they submitted to his contemptuous inspection. But a Major had the better of the expert on one occasion. He vowed he had found diamonds, genuine diamonds, upon the open desert, as good as any in South Africa or anywhere else; that he would be sworn to forfeit L50 if the expert did not endorse his judgment. He had picked up in one small spot no less than five. Burning with impatience to see these precious jewels, the expert begged for just one peep at them. The Major gratified him with some feigned reluctance; produced a "five of diamonds," a castaway from some "Tommy's" pack of cards.

On the night of the 23rd of August Wad Hamid camp was swept by a fierce storm of wind and rain. The temperature dropped 22 deg., and it became positively chilly. As we were within the rainy belt, which extends up to 17 deg. North, visitations of that sort during the summer were to be expected. The troops bore the discomfort of cold and wet clothes uncomplainingly, waiting for daybreak, and the tardy sun, to get dry and warm. Bugle calls were a work of supererogation on the morning of Wednesday, 24th August, everybody having been astir long before reveille. It had been given out in general orders—one of those gracious niceties of military courtesy never exhibited to the correspondents in these later Soudan campaigns—that the Khedivial troops were to proceed that day to the south of Shabluka Cataract. The journey thither was to be made by the army in two stages, and the British division was to follow on Thursday. Wad Bishari, about half-way, was the first portion, and there the men were to bivouac one night. Next day they were to complete the distance, making a detour to avoid the rough hills of Shabluka, and going into a new camp laid out at El Hejir. At 5 a.m. Macdonald's and Lewis's brigades paraded, and under the command of Major-General Hunter, stepped off. So the end at last began to loom in sight. Major-General Gatacre wished to go part of the way the same day, in order to reduce the distance to be marched, but the Sirdar put his veto thereon, observing that if the "Tommies" could not do a little march of 13 miles, they could not walk any distance. In the afternoon, at 4 o'clock, the remainder of the Khedivial division—Maxwell's and Collinson's brigades—set out for Wad Bishari to join their comrades. The men were in fine spirits as they left, cheering and singing to the strains of their bands as they gaily marched away. Some of the Egyptian soldiers were told off to remain at the worst places of the Cataract to assist in towing the native craft through the rapids.

The bugles called the men of Lyttelton's brigade to duty at 3 a.m. on Thursday, the 25th of August. I cannot say that the call awoke them from slumber, for all night there had been most disturbing noises coming from the riverside, where native soldiers were reloading giassas with stores going forward to Royan Island, for that new depot. Royan occupies a position at the south gateway of Shabluka. It is a finely conspicuous island, for upon the north end there is a lofty barn-roofed jebel or hill. From the summit of Jebel Royan, at an altitude of 600 feet, can be seen 40 miles away the outlines of Omdurman and Khartoum—that is in the morning or evening, when the distorting freaks of the mirage are not in evidence. The steamboat skippers who had ten-horse power steam sirens, used them, after the manner of their kind, and made night doubly hideous. At 3 a.m. began our orchestra in the 2nd British brigade lines. All the camels, horses and mules had to be watered and fed. The cheerful camels then had to be loaded, that operation being carried on as usual with a terrible grunting chorus, all the brutes taking part. The gunboats got off before daylight. At five o'clock sharp, ere it was full daylight, Lyttelton's men started, marching off in three parallel columns, each battalion having its own advance guard. Four Maxims were with the brigade. Behind the infantry was part of the Egyptian transport train. The Sirdar inspected the column, and saw them started fairly on the way to Wad Bishari. Major-General Gatacre, as usual, rode out with them to the bivouac, and then galloped back to camp. The troops were in great glee at setting off. The men marched briskly, their officers tramping beside them. On the whole, the track was tolerable, mostly compact sand and gravel. In some places, however, it was rough and full of loose stones, and the sand lay deep and soft in several khors and wadies that had to be crossed. The worst bit was in the second day's march into El Hejir, where a detour had to be made to avoid the Shabluka Hills.

At 5 in the afternoon of the 25th of August the 1st British brigade, Major-General Wauchope's men, also left for El Hejir via Bishari. The "Rifles" or, rather, half the battalion, marched with them. Owing to various causes, the "Rifles" were not all assembled with the British division until the army reached El Hejir. In the end, the second half of the battalion of that crack corps was transported by water direct to El Hejir. They had quite a grievous mishap at Wad Hamid. The upper part of a barge, on which many of the men's kits and coats were stored, collapsed, and most of the articles fell into the river and were lost. Wauchope's brigade marched forward in five parallel columns, with intervals for deploying between each. The men turned towards the west to get clear of the cultivable belt, for the track afforded easier going along the margin of the desert. Behind the brigade, protected by the usual rear-guard, were six Maxims, the medica corps, a transport column, and a numerous following of native servants riding on heavily laden donkeys. The battalion bands played favourite regimental tunes as the men marched away. The pipers of the Camerons gave the "Earl of Mansfield," whilst, with fifes and drums, the Seaforths' pipers skirled "Black Donald of Balloch." News was heliographed into Wad Hamid headquarters before we left that the gunboats had seized Royan Island and established a post there, the natives not disputing possession.

By the end of that week, 27th August, Wad Hamid camp was evacuated. Nasri Island, however, was retained as a depot, and a small force was left there. On Friday, the 26th of August, after a great fantasia and war-dance, Stuart Wortley's column of armed friendlies moved south. That evening they encountered and drove back a small body of dervish horsemen. On our side of the Nile, part of the cavalry had been scouting up to 10 miles south of El Hejir. Captain Haig, with a squadron of Egyptian horse, fell in with a small body of Baggara under Sheikh Yunis, and had a brush with them, one or two being wounded on either side. The Sirdar and headquarters embarked at 9 a.m., 27th August, on the gunboat "Fatah," to steam through Shabluka. I left Wad Hamid the same day with one servant, rode through to El Hejir, 22 miles, and arrived in the afternoon, having ridden out of my way to see the narrower gorges of the Cataract. The spaciousness of the previous camp was conspicuously absent at El Hejir. In rather thick bush and on partly overflowed alluvial ground, the lines were drawn closely together. As the river kept rising, it soon became difficult, without making a considerable detour, to pass from one part to another of the ground by the water's margin.



CHAPTER VIII.

EL HEJIR TO UM TERIF—INCIDENTS AND ACCIDENTS.

Your Arab is picturesque but poisonous: a fine specimen of a man, though his usefulness in the economy of things is not apparent, at least upon the surface. He dislikes steady, hard work, is a dreamer with a deeply religious tinge, but all the same cruel and remorseless in the pursuit of any object. We were well into the region that he had ruled and ruined: a country capable of easily producing wealth, charred and laid waste. The indigenous negro, on the other hand, is not averse to toil,—nay, generally delights in it under normal conditions,—is simple in his tastes, true in his conduct according to his lights, and readily turned to better things. Your Arab seems to be the reverse of all that, and yet he is a delightful person in his way, though a belated savage. Burned villages, blackened hearths, destruction on every hand, these were the telltale evidences before our eyes of what the Khalifa and his hordes had achieved. Behind all that there were the ruins of a great and long departed civilisation that the early flood of Arab invasion doubtless did something to destroy. Once again, as in the Atbara campaign, was the army closely followed by bands of the faithful wives of the black soldiers. These women as aforetime pitched their camp ordinarily half a mile or so in rear of the men's, choosing broken ground and thick bush through which they could escape if attacked by dervish raiders. In rude huts and shelters built with their own hands amid the thorny mimosa and dhoum palms, they washed, ground corn, made bread, cooked food, patched and mended, and waited upon their uxorious soldier lords. "If handsome were what handsome does," these negresses would have been beautiful, but they were very far from it, poor creatures, except as I hope in the eyes of their husbands. Talk of the cares of a young family, not even that vexed their stout hearts and merry natures nor made them lag in marching to war with their spouses. Alas! even the pains and toils of maternity were fought down by young negro mothers, and I had my attention called more than once to women with almost new-born babies in their arms trudging along to keep up with the army. In such cases the women and men generously did all in their power to lighten the burden of the new mothers. Their household goods were borne upon other already overloaded backs, and if a donkey was procurable the mother and child were set to ride upon its back.

El Hejir camp was fenced about with a stout hedge of cut mimosa. Besides that there were several smaller zerebas enclosing different commands and several of the headquarters. There was plenty of halfa grass for grazing and an abundance of mimosa for firewood for the men's cooking pots and the steamers' boilers. Roads had been laid out, and troughs of mud were built, at which the horses and camels were watered, for the river's bank was unsafe. The site of the camp was not unattractive. In front the great river was dotted with luxuriant islands. On the left hand rose Jebel Royan, a Bass-rock-like hill rising from Royan island around which the Nile flowed like a sea. Again the Khedivial division had sheltered itself in straw huts, tukals and under blanket shelters. The British soldier had a few tents and much uncovered ground at his disposal for bivouac. It may be added that the health and general spirits of the army were splendid.

At El Hejir the press correspondents, or at any rate those representing the big dailies, except the Times, discovered they had a grievance. The news agencies shared that feeling with their colleagues. Even into war the affairs of business life obtrude. It is not an unmixed evil to have a grievance; trouble and ridicule come of having too many at the same time. I drafted a letter to Colonel Wingate on the subject—a sort of "Round Robin" which the majority of the correspondents signed, after which it was given to that gentleman, who stood in a sort of god-fatherly position to us. A form of telegram was also written and handed him for his vise, that it might be forwarded, though in somewhat slightly altered phraseology, to each of our journals. These papers explain themselves, and as they have never seen the light and the incident is as yet one of the unrecorded events of the campaign, I append them:—

"(CABLEGRAM) Daily Telegraph, LONDON.

"Matter-Notoriety, Times has two correspondents here although one, Howard, ostensibly represents New York Herald, but all his messages are addressed Times, London, where read. I suggest your getting World or other American newspaper, which would give advantage additional correspondent. Recollect all telegrams are despatched in sections of 200 words. Times therefore gets 400 words messages. Correspondents have lodged formal complaint.

"BURLEIGH. "El Hejir."



The following is a copy of the letter handed in:—

"28th August, 1898, "EL HEJIR CAMP.

"Sir,—It has been a matter of notoriety for some days that the London Times has two correspondents with the Sirdar's army, Colonel F. Rhodes and the Hon. Hubert Howard. No doubt it may be said that the latter represents the New York Herald to which he is nominally accredited. We are, however, well aware that his dispatches are forwarded directly to the Times Office where it is not over-straining the question to say that they are there read and used. Under the rules, all telegraphic messages must be delivered in sections of 200 words, each correspondent being only permitted to send in rotation that number of words and no more.

"The fact that the Times has practically two representatives to other newspapers' one gives them a manifestly unfair advantage.

"We need scarcely state, that in a campaign of this importance the British public are most keenly interested. Our Editors would have sent out, had not the military regulations precluded their doing so, more than one representative from each newspaper or agency to accompany the army. We respectfully submit that it is our duty to claim equal facilities with the Times, and we ask you to take such action as may be necessary, that our employers shall not be placed at any disadvantage.—Yours respectfully,

"To Colonel Wingate, "Chief Intelligence Department."



It was a fine way of spending the Sunday, but really we were all too busy to bear the troops company at any of the services that day. Colonel Wingate laid the matter before the Sirdar, who struck with the justice of our plea summoned us all before him, when we stated our case anew. He gave his decision, that the Times correspondents twain should only have the right to send 100 words each by telegram. We disclaimed having any desire to curtail their letter-writing. That did not matter. The affair I am glad to say was conducted throughout with much good feeling, both Colonel Frank Rhodes and Mr Hubert Howard acknowledging the right of our contention, and the affair gave rise to no break in friendship. Colonel F. Rhodes acted very promptly and generously, for before the Sirdar gave his decision he came to us and offered his individual undertaking, that he would decline to send a line by telegraph, leaving to Mr Howard the sole right to wire.

On Saturday the 27th August, whilst the deeply laden stern gunboat "Zafir" with giassas in tow alongside was coming up the river, she suddenly commenced to sink. The water rushed over her fore-deck, and the officers, soldiers and crew were unable to beach her on the east bank before she went down. Indeed there was a scurry to get into the giassas and cut them loose lest they also should be lost. The vessel went down about ten miles north of Shendy, subsiding in water 30 feet deep, and only part of her funnel and upper structure remained visible. With her there was temporarily lost over 70 tons of stores, including much ammunition and many bales of clothing. She had been chosen by Commander Keppel, R.N., as the flag-ship of the flotilla and was rightly regarded by the "Admiral" as a fine vessel. It appeared that through over-loading and rough weather water got into the hold, and within two minutes, or before anything could be done to save her, she sank. Captain Prince Christian Victor was aboard, he having been assigned to duty with the "Admiral," for the craft carried a number of soldiers as well as an ordinary crew. Both the Prince and Commander Keppel had narrow escapes. Providentially, no lives were lost, everybody being picked up by the giassas or managing to scramble ashore. As soon as possible afterwards operations were commenced to recover part of the cargo. The ship was secured from drifting by a hawser being passed around her standing gear, and made fast to stout trees ashore. Then some of the natives dived and several of the Maxims and boxes of ammunition were salved. As for the craft there was nothing to be done under the circumstances but to place a guard and wait until the fall of the Nile enabled her to be unloaded and refloated. Whilst Commander Keppel and his officers and crew were making the best of it, the little ex-dervish steamer "El Tahara" hove in sight with Major-General Rundle and several officers on board. She lent all the assistance possible and then taking in tow the giassas with Prince Christian Victor, Commander Keppel and the rest of the shipwrecked crew, except the guard left behind, the "Tahara" with an extra head of steam, churned up to El Hejir.

I think there had been an intention at headquarters to make a few days' stay at El Hejir, and get the army well in hand before going closer to the enemy. The gunboats began embarking all their ammunition and commenced putting up their extra bullet proof protecting shields. But the Nile persisted in rising and again flooding part of our camp, interposing once more between the British and Egyptian lines a broad arm of water. So again the army was ordered to "move on." Drills and sundry other plans for exercises fell through and special precautions were taken to guard camps and convoys from surprise as the army drew nearer to Omdurman.

On Sunday, 28th August, at 3.40 a.m., the bugles were sounding in the Egyptian portion of El Hejir camp. It was nearly an hour later before reveille went in the British lines and the Lincolns made us think of our sins and forswear all sleep by playing their awakening air, "Old Man Barry." By 5 a.m., Major-General Hunter's division of four brigades, with bands playing, were streaming out of their zereba openings and taking the broad, well-worn tracks across the sand and gravel ridges towards Um Terif. Macdonald's brigade was in the van, and was followed in order by Lewis's, Maxwell's, and Collinson's, with the baggage of each brigade behind the command. The guns were upon the right of the division, the steamers covering the left. As for the cavalry and camelry, spread over a wide front, their duty was to search for the enemy and make sure the troops should have ample warning of the approach of any dervishes. The two military attaches, Major Calderari, Italian, and Captain Von Tiedmann, German, rode on with the native troops. It was a cool morning and the battalions headed by their bands playing all the while marched as if going to a review. The Soudan soldiers' wives turned out again and mustered along the line of route just beyond the camp confines. As the battalions passed them, they shouted and gesticulated to their husbands, calling on them to behave like men and not turn back in battle. Yet probably over half of these same doughty black soldiers had been dervishes before they came over to us. "Victory or death," was the cry of these fiery Amazons to their warrior lovers. He would have been recreant indeed or a marvellously brave man that would have returned to one of them a confessed runaway from battle. It was not surprising that the Sirdar did not object to their presence in the field, and occasionally saw that they were helped with rations when food was not otherwise procurable.

The desertion of El Hejir proceeded apace. In the afternoon of Sunday at four o'clock, when the fierce heat of day had declined, Major-General Gatacre's division in its turn marched off to Um Terif. The brigades moved onward in parallel columns, with the artillery in the interval and the 21st Lancers covering the front, flanks and rear of the infantry. Tommy was jubilant and carolled, as he tramped, topical songs and patriotic ditties. He heeded not the boisterous south wind that ladened the atmosphere with dust till there was darkness as of a city fog. Battle-day and settling of old scores was near, and withal the end of the campaign, so he pounded along. It was a rough tramp by the light of a growing moon. About 9 p.m. they reached their camping and were assigned their usual position, facing south, the side nearest the enemy. There was necessarily some delay as the battalions were being told off to their assigned limits where each had to pass the night ready to spring to arms. Detachments were detailed to cut bush and form a zereba, whilst others attended to the indispensable culinary department.

Each day our cavalry had seen slowly retiring before them a few of the mounted dervish patrols. Nearing Um Terif, the enemy's scouts became more numerous and inquisitive. Whilst a company of the Lancashire Fusiliers stood on guard during the making of the zereba the infantry had their first encounter with a dervish. From the desert there came a rush and rattling over the gravel and loose stones, as from a stampeded horse or mule. It was coming in their direction but neither sentry nor main body thought of challenging. In an instant a mounted Baggara dashed past the sentries and ran plump against a corner of the company bowling over two or three men. Whether it was a deliberate madcap charge, or the fellow was bolting from the other battalions and lost his way is never likely to be known. Possibly he did not anticipate finding British troops three-quarters of a mile from the river. At any rate he dropped or threw his spear wildly, then, wheeling about, galloped back into darkness almost before the fact that he was an enemy had been realised. The men's rifles were unloaded, so the dervish was not fired upon. And had they been loaded, under the circumstances even then the officer, as he informed me, would have hesitated to shoot, lest he should unnecessarily alarm the whole camp. The spear left behind by the dervish horseman was one of the lighter barbed-edge kind.

Um Terif camp was not a pleasant location. There was overflowed land between the troops and the river, and the ground we had to bivouac upon was rough. On Monday morning, the 29th August, before full dawn, four squadrons of Egyptian horse and four companies of Tudway's Camel Corps proceeded on a reconnaissance towards the Kerreri. The twin-screw gunboat "Melik" also steamed up the river a few miles, but neither quest resulted in adding much to the information already possessed as to the Khalifa's intentions and exact whereabouts. Whether or not we were to have our first battle at Kerreri none knew. The fact was that during the night there had been a violent thunderstorm accompanied by wind and rain. Daylight came with a cessation of rain but the gale blew steadily from the south, raising quite a sea on the Nile and a fog of sand and dust on land. It was impossible to see or move any distance with security, and that was no doubt the cause why the reconnaissances in both instances drew blank.

Formal councils of war were rare events during the campaign. A chat with his officers, the eliciting of their opinions off-hand and a watchful pair of eyes in every direction early and late, was enough for the Sirdar. The delays caused by the storms however were becoming embarrassing, and it was certain the men's health would suffer if they were compelled to linger much longer en route. Still it was well to be quite ready before pushing in to attack the Khalifa whose large army, it was reported, would fight desperately. At a council of war held on Monday, August 29th, at which all the Generals, including the Brigadiers, were present, it was decided to remain until the next day in Um Terif. The flotilla had been unable to concentrate in time, the strong current and head wind making most of the vessels unduly late in arriving from El Hejir. A piece of good news came to us from the friendlies over the river. They were wont to march abreast with us, moving up the east bank. We could usually see them across the half mile or more of water that intervened, streaming along in their conspicuous garments under the mimosa and palms, or treading through the bush and long grass. On their way to their encampment opposite they had fallen in with a small band of dervishes who were busily looting a village. The natives of the place had offended the Khalifa by absenting themselves from Omdurman, and so were being cruelly maltreated. Major Stuart-Wortley's Arabs ran forward and opened a sharp rifle fire upon the raiders, who replied with a few shots and then bolted. A hot pursuit was instituted and five of the dervish footmen were caught. The friendlies also had the luck to capture a dervish sailing boat laden with grain. That evening at sunset, a few Baggara horsemen and footmen were seen upon the nearest hills watching the Sirdar's camp.

It was at Um Terif that the army, with all its equipment, was for the first time got together within the confines of the same encampment. From there also it set out next day in battle array, ready to encounter the Khalifa's full strength. In the clear atmosphere of the early morning and in the late afternoon when the bewildering mirage and dancing haze had vanished, from any knoll could be seen the large village of Kerreri. There the Mahdists had built a strong mud-walled fort by the bank of the Nile. They had besides blocked the road with a military camp big enough to shelter in huts and tukals several thousand men. Information brought us by natives, spies and deserters, was to the effect, that only a small body of dervishes had been left at Kerreri under Emir Yunis for the purpose of observing the movements of our army. Kerreri, which the Arabs pronounce with a prolonged Doric or Northumbrian roll of the r's, as though there were at least a dozen of them in the word, is upon the margin of a belt of rough gravel, stone, and low detached hills that extend to the southward, to Omdurman and beyond. The alluvial strip by the Nile, along which we had marched so many days, gave place to ridges and hummocks of sand, gravel, and rock.

So we waited impatiently at Um Terif for the flotilla with the fifteen days' supplies on board. Meanwhile the axes of an army of soldier wood-choppers were clanging upon the hard timber, which was being felled for firewood. The ruin of agriculture had meant the growth of bush, and there was an abundance of useful mimosa and sunt growing on the alluvial lands by the river.

I ought to reproach myself, but I don't, for not having written of the aggravating southern gale with its accompaniment of drifts of horrid dust and sand as the "terrible khamseen" or sirocco. Travellers' tales about having to bury yourself in the sand, or at least swathe head and body in folds of cloth, in order to avoid being choked with grit, I know. The real thing is bad enough without resorting to poetic or journalistic licence, though some will do that anyhow. It is sufficiently trying to grow hot and perspire so freely that the driving dust, the scavenger drift of chaos and the ages, caught by the moisture, courses down the features and trickles from the hands in so many miniature turbid streamlets. During a dust-storm everybody has the appearance of a toiling hodman. Feminine relations would have wept had they seen and recognised their soldier lads in that sorry state. Even the dashing officers and men of the Grenadier Guards ceased to be objects of admiration, and the War Office would have howled with exquisite torture at sight of their hair and clothes. Speak of wrapping clothes around head or body to keep out the dust? It is sheer nonsense to prate so. Why it is hard enough to gape and gasp and catch a mouthful of sanded breath, without that added worry. There is nothing for it, but to grin and bear it and get through with the swallowing of that proverbial peck of dust in a life-time, as quickly and quietly as possible.

The fighting gunboats or armed flotilla consisted of the "Sultan," Lieutenant Cowan, R.N.; "Sheik," Lieutenant Sparks, R.N.; "Melik," Major Gordon, R.E.; "Fatah," Lieutenant Beatty, R.N.; "Nazir," Lieutenant Hon. Hood, R.N.; "El Hafir" ("El Teb"), Lieutenant Stavely, R.N.; "Tamai," Lieutenant Talbot, R.N.; "Metemmeh," Lieutenant Stevenson, R.E.; and "Abu Klea," Captain Newcombe, R.E. On the loss of the "Zafir," Commander Keppel, R.N., transferred his flag to the "Sultan," one of the new twin-screw gunboats.



CHAPTER IX.

ADVANCE TO KERRERI—SKIRMISHING WITH THE ENEMY.

"Death and his brother sleep" can only be staved off; they overcome in the end. The tired soldiers dropped into profound slumber, although the night of the 29th August at Um Terif was boisterous and the cruel enemy near. It was one of the real surprises of the campaign, that the Mahdists never really harassed us, or ventured to rush our lines under cover of night, or in the fog of a dust storm. It has often been too hastily assumed that the dervishes never attacked by night. By the Nile and in the Eastern Soudan they repeatedly pushed attacks under cover of darkness, or worried their opponents by persistent sniping,—as for instance at Tamai, before Suakin and Abu Klea. Then again, their final and successful assault upon Khartoum was delivered at dawn. Hicks Pasha's force was hammered early and late. It is all the more strange, therefore, that they left the Sirdar's army severely alone, never practising their familiar harassing tactics and seeking to secure an advantage. Numerous, swift of foot, with spears and swords, the odds would have been much more in their favour had they come down like wolves in the night. It is difficult to say exactly what would have happened, and it is not pleasant to contemplate what might have befallen. In such a conflict the Sirdar's losses would have been great. Could it have been that the Khalifa believed some of the stories set about that our army intended paying him a surprise visit by night, as we did Mahmoud, and so he kept his men in camp quietly waiting for us. The utmost precautions were taken by the Sirdar and his generals to protect the lines. A strong zereba surrounded the camp; sentries were doubled, and active patrols were on the alert all night. The gale continued until after sunset, when heavy rain clouds gathered, obscuring the moonlight. By and by there came on a violent and protracted thunderstorm, accompanied by an almost continuous deluge. There was nothing to be done but to lie fast wrapped in great coat or blanket and await the passing of the hours, wet, chilled, ruminating on all sorts of queer subjects. I managed to undo a corner of my packed tent and under it obtained relative warmth, and dryness in spots.

The persistence of that storm bred despair. It was nearly 8 a.m. on Tuesday the 30th August, when, having drenched us all to the marrow, the rain ceased. The sun, although two hours high, was battling with a fine mist. It was in a perfect downpour of rain at four o'clock in the morning, that reveille had been sounded. And it was in sludge and slush camels and mules were fed and loaded, and horses baited and saddled. By 5.20 a.m. the army was at length on the march out of camp, our faces set towards a village called Merreh, best indicated upon the maps as Seg or Sheikh el Taib, the latter being the name of a low hill. The distance the force was expected to trudge was about eight miles, but the overflowed land put two miles more on. When daylight came we could see Abdul Azim's friendlies upon the opposite side of the Nile. Led by Major Stuart-Wortley, with whom were Lieutenant R. Wood and Captain Buckle, the camels of their column kept pace with ours. Closely skirting the east bank that day, Abdul Azim's warriors had their right supported by one of the gunboats.

With the Sirdar and staff riding at the head of the infantry columns, the army advanced in the formation in which it had been determined to attack the enemy at Kerreri. Once more our mounted troops pushed far ahead, covering a wide stretch of country, the 21st Lancers under Colonel Martin on the left, the Egyptian cavalry under Colonel Broadwood and eight companies of the Camel Corps under Major Tudway on the extreme right. The infantry presented a front of three brigades marching in echelon. A battery of artillery was attached to each infantry brigade except Collinson's brigade. Three battalions were detached from the whole force to guard the baggage and transport which followed in the rear. In front on the left, or nearest the Nile, was Wauchope's brigade. The four British battalions thereof marched side by side in column, the Lincolns upon the right, the Warwicks on the left, with the Seaforths and Camerons between them. To the right of Wauchope's brigade was Maxwell's, and next it Lewis's Khedivial brigades. Behind each of the three leading brigades above named (reading from left to right) were Lyttelton's, Collinson's, and Macdonald's commands. Seen upon the desert the army had the appearance of a huge square with front a mile broad. The day being cloudy, and cooler than usual for the season, General Gatacre and his brigadiers voted at a council to extend the march. That course was adopted, the army keeping on, but with very many brief halts for the brigades to regain their formation. By the extra tramp the troops were enabled to pass beyond the broad margin of thick bush out upon the comparatively open, pebbly, and rocky ground, which sloped to a narrow strip of soft, wet loam fringing the river. About 1 p.m., when still fully one mile north of the hill of Sheikh el Taib, the army halted and a camp was made. Access to the Nile was very difficult, for overflowed, boggy land interposed. Roads, however, were made with cut bush, and the animals were led over them to be watered. During the army's march the Lancers scoured the country far in front. They managed to get into touch with some dervish patrols whilst scouting. The opposing troopers looked at each other from relatively open ground, and standing separated by only a few hundred yards. One Baggara horseman came within 150 yards of our men. The Lancers, keen to engage with steel, did not attempt to fire upon their intrusive foemen, but innocently tried instead to bag them. Several times our troopers advanced to the charge, but the enemy, when the Lancers sought to put hands upon them, were gone. That day the Baggara horsemen were met with in far greater numbers than previously. By instructions, the Lancers rushed one of the many small villages, or groups of native mud-dwellings and beehive straw huts that dotted the sparse bush-land a mile or more inland from the river beyond Sheikh el Taib. Several of the enemy hastened away, and in one of the huts a man in dervish dress was found awaiting the troops. He turned out to be a secret agent of Colonel Wingate's Intelligence Department. The spy in question was a Shaggieh, named Eshanni, and but thirty hours out from Omdurman. I was led to understand that he gave much valuable information as to the position and strength of the Khalifa's force and the state of affairs in Omdurman. We were told that the Khalifa meant to attack us at or near Kerreri. There was an old-time prophecy of the Persian Sheikh Morghani, whose tomb is near Kassala, that the English soldiers would one day fight at Kerreri. Mahomed Achmed and Abdullah had further added to the prediction that there they were to be attacked and defeated by the dervishes under the Khalifa. Kerreri plain, therefore, had become a sort of holy place of pilgrimage to the Mahdists. It was called the "death place of all the infidels," and thither at least once a year repaired the Khalifa and his following to look over the coming battle-ground and render thanks in anticipation for the wholesale slaughter of the unbelievers and the triumph of the true Moslems.

All except those on duty were abed by last post on 30th August at Sheikh el Taib camp. Lights were ordered out, and the camp for a time relapsed into darkness and silence. Headquarters and all other tents had been struck and packed. During the night there was shooting, the crack of the musketry sounding relatively near, but occasioning little annoyance. The bullets were badly aimed if directed against the British quarters. Whether the firing was really meant for "sniping" by the dervishes, or was only a note of warning to their friends of our presence, was not easy to decide with any degree of certainty. There was no big roll of wounded to test the enemy's intent by, and a later incipient alarm caused in another part of the camp in the small hours was possibly all a mistake. One thing the dervishes did do. After the manner of hill-men, they lit beacon fires on the rocky ridges around us to warn the Khalifa of our whereabouts.



That night the camp lines had been drawn still closer than ever, only 260 yards' front being given to each battalion. On the morning of 31st the troops were early astir. By 5.30 a.m. the main body, following the mounted troops, had faced to the right, and were marching to the westward so as to clear the bush and get out upon the open desert tracks leading to Omdurman. The ground the army passed over was broken, and there was scrub with several small khors to cross, so the force proceeded slowly and cautiously. Four of the gunboats steamed up the river, keeping abreast of our widely spread out cavalry. About six o'clock the Lancers had again ascended to the top of El Taib, a hill from which at that hour I was enabled to get a view of the dervish camp. It appeared to be about ten miles due south. The Mahdists were disposed in three long dense lines, at almost right angle to the river. They were partly hidden among the low scrub west of Kerreri town or village, their right being quite 2000 yards from the Nile, which showed they had a wholesome respect for the gunboats. Flags and helios were speedily busy in the hands of our signalmen sending back information to the Sirdar. Seeing groups of dervishes within range, as well as bands of Baggara horsemen, the gunboats opened fire from their 15-pounders and Maxims shortly after 7 a.m., driving the enemy's nearest patrols into hiding or out of range.

In one of the numberless villages passed, there were several mutilated and charred human bodies, victims of dervish suspicion, greed and cruelty. Pushing well ahead on our right the Khedivial mounted force got a chance to send a few volleys into groups of Abd el Baki's scouts. That Emir commanded the dervish outlying forces. It was still quite early when after an easy journey of eight miles the infantry turned aside towards the river. The army was halted at a place called Sururab, a few miles north of Kerreri. Why it was called Sururab I know not, nor have I found the name on any map; but that was the official designation given to the place where the force subsequently bivouacked. The only reasonable fault to be found with Sururab was that the river banks were exceedingly difficult of access. Our camps were getting from bad to worse. That day flocks of huge vultures were to be seen circling overhead as the army advanced. It may have been our approach that disturbed them from their carrion feasts in the devastated villages and the abandoned dervish camps. Omdurman itself must also have long been a choice feeding place for them.