s, by which "the difficulty of transport is reduced to very
narrow limits." The mounted force was to consist of 400 men on native
horses and 450 men on horses or camels. The question of routes continued
to be the subject of animated discussion, and on the 29th of July a
committee of three officers who had served in the Red River expedition
reported:--

"We believe that a brigade can easily be conveyed in small boats from
Cairo to Dongola in the time stated by Lord Wolseley; and, further,
that should it be necessary to send a still larger force by water to
Khartum, that operation will present no insuperable difficulties."

Lord Wolseley sent out; Nile route adopted.

This most inconclusive report, and the baseless idea that the adoption
of the Nile route would involve no chance of bloodshed, which the
government was anxious to avoid, seem to have decided the question. On
the 8th of August the secretary of state for war informed General
Stephenson that "the time had arrived when some further measures for
obtaining accurate information as to his (General Gordon's) position,
and, if necessary, for tendering him assistance, should be adopted."
General Stephenson still urged the Suakin-Berber route, and was informed
on the 26th of August that Lord Wolseley would be appointed to take over
the command in Egypt for the purposes of the expedition, for which a
vote of credit had been taken in the House of Commons on the 5th of
August. On the 9th of September Lord Wolseley arrived at Cairo, and the
plan of operations was somewhat modified. A camel corps of 1100 men
selected from twenty-eight regiments at home was added, and the
"fighting force to be placed in line somewhere in the neighbourhood of
Shendi" was fixed at 5400. The construction of whale-boats began on the
12th of August, and the first batch arrived at Wadi Halfa on the 14th of
October, and on the 25th the first boat was hauled through the second
cataract. The mounted forces proceeded up the banks, and the first
half-battalion embarked at Gemai, 870 m. from Khartum, on the 5th of
November, ten days before the date to which it had been assumed General
Gordon could hold out. In a straggling procession the boats worked their
way up to Korti, piloted by Canadian _voyageurs_. The labour was very
great, and the troops, most of whom were having their first lesson in
rowing, bore the privations of their unaccustomed conditions with
admirable cheerfulness. By the 2