ain, where lie the scattered Christian stone of Deir
Warda, the Convent of the Rose.

'Up none of the other valleys of the Shephelah has history surged as
up and down Ajalon and past Gezer, for none are so open to the north,
nor present so easy a passage to Jerusalem.'

CHAPTER XII

LOOKING TOWARDS JERUSALEM

The Anzac Mounted Division had only the 1st Australian Light Horse and
the New Zealand Mounted Rifles Brigade operating with it on the 14th.
The Australians, by the evening, were in the thick olive groves on the
south of Ramleh, and on the ridges about Surafend. On their left the
Turks were violently opposing the New Zealanders who were working
along the sand-dunes with the port and town of Jaffa as their ultimate
objective. There was one very fierce struggle in the course of the
day. A force attacked a New Zealand regiment in great strength and for
the moment secured the advantage, but the regiment got to grips with
the enemy with hand-grenades and bayonets, and so completely repulsed
them that they fled in hopeless disorder leaving many dead and wounded
behind them. It was unfortunate that there was no mobile reserve
available for pursuit, as the Turks were in such a plight that a large
number would have been rounded up. General Cox's brigade seized Ramleh
on the morning of the 15th, taking ninety prisoners, and then advanced
and captured Ludd, being careful that no harm should come to the
building which holds the grave of St. George. In Ludd 360 prisoners
were taken, and the brigade carried out a good deal of demolition work
on the railway running north. The New Zealanders made Jaffa by noon
on the 16th, the Turks evacuating the town during the morning without
making any attempt to destroy it, though there was one gross piece of
vandalism in a Christian cemetery where monuments and tombstones had
been thrown down and broken. In the meantime, in order to protect the
rear of the infantry, five battalions of the 52nd Division with three
batteries were stationed at Yebnah, Mughar, and Akir until they could
be relieved by units of the 54th Division advancing from Gaza. To
enable the 54th to move, the transport lent to the 52nd and 75th
Divisions had to be returned, which did not make the supply of those
divisions any easier. The main line of railway was still a long way in
the rear, and the landing of stores by the Navy at the mouth of the
wadi Sukereir had not yet begun. A little later, and before Jaffa ha