done before, but I cannot forget its
tortures any more than the newest of new-comers. Not until we reached
Assouan could we secure a fair supply of water and get a bath and an
enjoyable meal. That same afternoon, I, with three other
correspondents, was allowed to take passage on barge No. 9, which,
with two giassas, was taken in tow up to Wady Halfa by a sternwheeler.
Among others proceeding on the craft to join the army were
Major-General Wauchope and Surgeon-General Taylor, and a number of
other army medicoes, fresh in their new dignity as officers of the
"Royal Army Medical Corps." Under the instruction of Surgeon-General
Taylor, Surgeon-Major Wilson was good enough to present each of us
with a packet of first field dressings, a kindness which I
appreciated, but of which I hoped not to have need.

[Illustration: GROUP OF STAFF OFFICERS.--COLONEL WINGATE IN CENTRE.]

CHAPTER III.

MUSTERING FOR THE OVERTHROW OF MAHDISM.

A hackneyism lacks the picturesqueness of originality, but is as
useful in its way as a public road to a desired destination. The
quotation which I am at the moment anxious to make use of is, "The
mills of the gods grind slowly, but they grind exceeding small." Time
the avenger had all but fulfilled the meed of punishment for the evil
day of 26th January 1885, when the streets of Khartoum ran with blood,
and the headless body of General Gordon was left to be hacked and hewn
by ferocious hordes of dervishes. Major-General Sir Herbert H.
Kitchener had so managed that the decisive blow should be delivered in
the most effective manner. Stage by stage he had moved forward and
improved his lines of communication. The advanced base, or point of
departure for the campaign, was no longer Wady Halfa, or Korti in the
province of Dongola, as in 1884, but Dakhala. Nay, with the
unassailable power and command of the Nile his flotilla gave him, it
might be said the real base of the Sirdar's army was where he chose to
fix it, even hard by Omdurman. As for the Khalifa, ruined to some
extent by years of successes and easy victories, he was committing the
fatal military error of over-confidence. He had drawn around him from
all parts of the Soudan the best of his trusty warriors, the pick of
the fighting tribes of Africa. The leaders were mostly sheiks who were
too far committed to hope for pardon and restoration, in the event of
defeat, from the Khedivial Government. Besides, there were still
plenty of ig