rsevering and literally gave the workers no
rest. The bridge made little progress, but nobody worried very much. The
men appeared to be content to advance three yards, as it were, and slip
back two; there was no hurry over the business. Indeed, it looked like a
lapse on the part of the engineers to choose such an unsheltered and
unsuitable spot for a bridge; it would almost certainly be swept away by
the floods of the rainy season.

Curiously enough, moreover, their comrades a mile away laying the line
parallel with the wadi were working at a snail's pace now, compared with
their previous efforts, and were not making the slightest attempt to swing
the line in toward the crossing. This was unpardonable, but the Turks
noticed nothing out of the ordinary, and unerringly bombed the
working-party in the wadi, quite content at finding so obvious a target.
But the whole business seemed a gross waste of time and labour--unless you
followed the wadi for about a mile farther along. This very unusual
negligence on the part of the engineers was then fully explained.

At this point the wadi narrowed appreciably, though there was little else
to the uninitiated eye to recommend it as a crossing. The engineers,
however, were well satisfied, for here, out of sight of inquisitive
aeroplanes, men were toiling as if for their lives; there was nothing
casual or lackadaisical about this effort. While the Turks were assiduously
bombing the dummy, the real bridge was being built at a great pace and
without interference.

The shaped stones for the foundations were brought by the railway as far as
it had then reached and transported thence by night into the wadi. The
rough stones for the approaches and embankments came from higher up, where
the Turks by their bombing activities had kindly saved the engineers the
trouble of blasting. At the appointed place and time the line curved in
towards the bridge, crossed it, and having reached Shellal proceeded along
the wadi to Gamli, thence to Karm, some ten miles from Beersheba. This last
stretch of line was not completed till later, for the Turks, doubtless
becoming uneasy, made serious efforts to hamper the work of construction.

For three months they made repeated attacks on the Yeomanry and Australians
screening the engineers but met with no success, and the line was carried
on inexorably, if slowly, towards the appointed goal.

It was fairly obvious now from which direction our third attempt on