a few hours. The
telegrams which were despatched that evening were the last to reach
England before the event. During the night heavy rain fell, and all the
country was drenched. The telegraph-wire had been laid along the ground,
as there had been no time to pole it. The sand when dry is a sufficient
insulator, but when wet its non-conductivity is destroyed. Hence
all communications ceased, and those at home who had husbands, sons,
brothers, or friends in the Expeditionary Force were left in an
uncertainty as great as that in which we slept--and far more painful.

The long day had tired everyone. Indeed, the whole fortnight since the
cavalry convoy had started from the Atbara had been a period of great
exertion, and the Lancers, officers and men, were glad to eat a hasty
meal, and forget the fatigues of the day, the hardness of the ground,
and the anticipations of the morrow in deep sleep. The camp was watched
by the infantry, whose labours did not end with the daylight. At two
o'clock in the morning the clouds broke in rain and storm. Great blue
flashes of lightning lit up the wide expanse of sleeping figures, of
crowded animals, and of shelters fluttering in the wind; and from
the centre of the camp it was even possible to see for an instant
the continuous line of sentries who watched throughout the night with
ceaseless vigilance. Nor was this all. Far away, near the Kerreri Hills,
the yellow light of a burning village shot up, unquenched by the rain,
and only invisible in the brightest flashes of the lightning. There was
war to the southward.

CHAPTER XIV: THE OPERATIONS OF THE FIRST OF SEPTEMBER

The British and Egyptian cavalry, supported by the Camel Corps and Horse
Artillery, trotted out rapidly, and soon interposed a distance of eight
miles between them and the army. As before, the 21st Lancers were on the
left nearest the river, and the Khedivial squadrons curved backwards
in a wide half-moon to protect the right flank. Meanwhile the gunboat
flotilla was seen to be in motion. The white boats began to ascend the
stream leisurely. Yet their array was significant. Hitherto they had
moved at long and indefinite intervals--one following perhaps a mile,
or even two miles, behind the other. Now a regular distance of about
300 yards was observed. The orders of the cavalry were to reconnoitre
Omdurman; of the gunboats to bombard it.

As soon as the squadrons of the 21st Lancers had turned the shoulder of
t