, whence water was obtained
in still greater quantity. These discoveries modified, though they did
not solve, the water question. They substantially increased the carrying
capacity of the line, and reduced the danger to which the construction
gangs were exposed. The sinking of the wells, an enterprise at which the
friendly Arabs scoffed, was begun on the Sirdar's personal initiative;
but the chronicler must impartially observe that the success was won
by luck as much as by calculation, for, since the first two wells were
made, eight others of greater depth have been bored and in no case has
water been obtained.

As the railway had been made, the telegraph-wire had, of course,
followed it. Every consignment of rails and sleepers had been
accompanied by its proportion of telegraph-poles, insulators, and wire.
Another subaltern of Engineers, Lieutenant Manifold, who managed this
part of the military operations against the Arabs, had also laid a line
from Merawi to Abu Hamed, so that immediate correspondence was effected
round the entire circle of rail and river.

The labours of the Railway Battalion and its officers did not end with
the completion of the line to Abu Hamed. The Desert Railway was made. It
had now to be maintained, worked, and rapidly extended. The terminus
at Halfa had become a busy town. A mud village was transformed into a
miniature Crewe. The great workshops that had grown with the line
were equipped with diverse and elaborate machines. Plant of all kinds
purchased in Cairo or requisitioned from England, with odds and
ends collected from Ishmail's scrap heaps, filled the depots with
an extraordinary variety of stores. Foundries, lathes, dynamos,
steam-hammers, hydraulic presses, cupola furnaces, screw-cutting
machines, and drills had been set up and were in continual work. They
needed constant attention. Every appliance for repairing each must be
provided. To haul the tonnage necessary to supply the army and extend
the line nearly forty engines were eventually required. Purchased at
different times and from different countries, they included ten distinct
patterns; each pattern needed a special reserve of spare parts. The
permutations and combinations of the stores were multiplied. Some of the
engines were old and already worn out. These broke down periodically.
The frictional parts of all were affected by the desert sand, and needed
ceaseless attention and repair. The workshops were busy night and day