George Henty - With Kitchener in the Soudan - A Story of Atbara and Omdurman

He then walked down to the river, and found the black corporal sitting tranquilly by the side of his baggage. The man stood up and saluted, and on Gregory saying that he had now a house, at once told off two soldiers to carry the things.

Arriving at the hut, he found Zaki hard at work, shovelling the rubbish through the doorway. Just as he came up, the boy brought down his tool, with a crash, upon a little brown creature that was scuttling away.

"What is that, Zaki?"

"That is a scorpion, bey; I have killed four of them."

"That is not at all pleasant," Gregory said. "There may be plenty of them, up among the boughs overhead."

Zaki nodded.

"Plenty of creatures," he said, "some snakes."

"Then we will smoke them out, before I go in. When you have got the rubbish out, make a fire in the middle, wet some leaves and things and put them on, and we will hang a blanket over the window and shut the door. I will moisten some powder and scatter it among the leaves, and the sulphur will help the smoke to bring them down."

This was done, the door closed and, as it did not fit at all tightly, the cracks were filled with some damp earth from the watercourse.

"What did you pay for the shovel, Zaki?"

"Half a dollar, bey. Here is the other half."

"Well, you had better go and buy some things for yourself. Tomorrow I will make other arrangements. Get a fire going out here. There is a sauce pan and a kettle, so you can boil some rice or fry some meat."

Gregory then went again to the officer who was acting as quartermaster.

"I have been speaking to the General," the latter said. "You will mess with the staff. The dinner hour is seven o'clock. I am sure you will soon feel at home."

Gregory now strolled through the camp. The troops were in little mud huts, of their own construction; as these, in the heat of the day, were much cooler than tents. The sun was getting low, and the Soudanese troops were all occupied in cooking, mending their clothes, sweeping the streets between the rows of huts, and other light duties. They seemed, to Gregory, as full of fun and life as a party of schoolboys–laughing, joking, and playing practical tricks on each other.

The physique of some of the regiments was splendid, the men averaging over six feet in height, and being splendidly built. Other regiments, recruited among different tribes, were not so tall, but their sturdy figures showed them to be capable of any effort they might be called upon to make.

One of the officers came out of his tent, as he passed.

"You are a new arrival, I think, sir?" he said. "We have so few white officers, here, that one spots a fresh face at once."

"Yes, I only arrived two or three hours ago. My name is Hilliard. I am not attached to any regiment; but, as I speak the languages well, General Hunter is going, so he said, to make me generally useful. I only received my commission a few days before leaving Cairo."

"Well, come in and have a soda and whisky. The heat out here is frightful. You can tell me the last news from Cairo, and when we are going to move."

"I shall be happy to come in and have a chat," Gregory said, "but I do not drink anything. I have been brought up in Cairo, and am accustomed to heat, and I find that drinking only makes one more thirsty."

"I believe it does," the other said, "especially when the liquid is almost as hot as one is, one's self. Will you sit down on that box? Chairs are luxuries that we do not indulge in here. Well, have you heard anything about a move?"

"Nothing; but the officers I have spoken to all seem to think that it will soon begin. A good many came up with me, to Wady Halfa and the stations on the river; and I heard that all who had sufficiently recovered were under orders to rejoin, very shortly."

"Yes, I suppose it won't be long. Of course we know nothing here, and I don't expect we shall, till the order comes for us to start. This is not the time of year when one expects to be on the move; and if we do go, it is pretty certain that it is because Kitchener has made up his mind for a dash forward. You see, if we take Abu Hamed and drive the Dervishes away, we can, at once, push the railway on to that place; and, as soon as it is done, the troops can be brought up and an advance made to Berber, if not farther, during the cool season–if you can ever call it a cool season, here."

"Is there any great force at Abu Hamed?"

"No; nothing that could stand against this for a moment. Their chief force, outside Omdurman, is at Metemmeh under Mahmud, the Khalifa's favourite son. You see, the Jaalin made fools of themselves. Instead of waiting until we could lend them a hand, they revolted as soon as we took Dongola, and the result was that Mahmud came down and pretty well wiped them out. They defended themselves stoutly, at Metemmeh, but had no chance against such a host as he brought with him. The town was taken, and its defenders, between two and three thousand fighting men, were all massacred, together with most of the women and children.

"By the accounts brought down to us, by men who got away, it must have been an even more horrible business than usual; and the Dervishes are past masters in the art of massacre. However, I think that their course is nearly up. Of late, a good many fugitives from Kordofan have arrived here, and they say that there will be a general revolt there, when they hear that we have given the Dervishes a heavy thrashing."

"And where do you think the great fight is likely to take place?" Gregory asked.

"Not this side of Metemmeh. Except at Abu Hamed, we hear of no other strong Dervish force between this and Omdurman. If Mahmud thinks himself strong enough, no doubt he will fight; but if he and the Khalifa know their business, he will fall back and, with the forces at Omdurman, fight one big battle. The two armies together will, from what we hear, amount to sixty or seventy thousand; and there is no doubt whatever that, with all their faults, the beggars can fight. It will be a tough affair, but I believe we shall have some British troops here to help, before the final advance. We can depend now on both the Soudanese and the Egyptians to fight hard, but there are not enough of them. The odds would be too heavy, and the Sirdar is not a man to risk failure. But with a couple of brigades of British infantry, there can be no doubt what the result will be; and I fancy that, if we beat them in one big fight, it will be all up with Mahdism.

"It is only because the poor beggars of tribesmen regard the Dervishes as invincible, that they have put up so long with their tyranny. But the rising of the Jaalin, and the news we get from Kordofan, show that the moment they hear the Dervishes are beaten, and Khartoum is in our hands, there will be a general rising, and the Dervishes will be pretty well exterminated. We all hope that Mahmud won't fight, for if he does, and we beat him, the Khalifa and his lot may lose heart and retire before we get to Omdurman; and, once away, the tremendous business of trying to follow him will confront us. Here we have got the river and the railway, but we have no land carriage for an army, and he might keep on falling back to the great lakes, for anything that we could do to overtake him. So we all hope that Mahmud will retire to Omdurman without fighting, and with such a host as the Khalifa would then have, he would be certain to give battle before abandoning his capital."

"They are fine-looking fellows, these blacks," Gregory said.

"They are splendid fellows–they love fighting for fighting's sake. It is, in their opinion, the only worthy occupation for a man, and they have shown themselves worthy to fight by the side of our men. They have a perfect confidence in us, and would, I believe, go anywhere we led them. They say themselves, 'We are never afraid–just like English.'"