143 CHAPTER XXVI.

THE EVE OF THE GREAT BATTLE.

FROM Um Teref camp the army advanced by three very shortmarches to thebattleground near Omdurman. The whole distance covered from Tuesday,August 30th, to Thursday,September ist,wastwenty-threemiles, but this slow advance was deliberately chosen in order to give time for the cavalry to reconnoitre the enemy's positions, and for the flotilla to attack and destroy his riverside batteries. During this advance the Sirdar sent a letter into the Dervish lines,addressed to the Khalifa, warninghim that if he tried to defend Omdurman the place would be bombarded, and suggesting that to avoidunnecessary loss of life,the women and children should be removed from the town. The Khalifa appears to have treated this humane warningwith careless contempt.

theygained the open plain they formed in fivegreat masses, and then began to advance, with drums beating and flags flying, evidently eager for battle. Broadwood gave the order to his mounted troops to retire. The Lancers had comeup on the Dervish right, and as the enemy advancedthev exchangeda fewshots with them. Inthis skirmishCorporal Barry was shot in the knee, the first of the British troops wounded in action during the campaign. This was the onlj casualty. As the cavalry fell back on the camp, the infantry and artillery formed up in battle array. But the Dervishes did not come on. Having watched for awhile the retirement of the mounted troops, they went back into Khartoum, and doubtless the Khalifa told them that the infidels were afraid to face them. On the Wednesday Colonel Broadwood rode out with the Egyptian cavalry and camel corps, thehorse battery and three Maxims,and sweeping away to the right approached Omdurman onits westernside. Meanwhile the 21st Lancers advanced direct on the city, between Broadwood's line of march and the Nile, passing through Kerreri, which was found to have been evacuated by the Dervishes. Broadwood occupied the hill of Jebel Fereid, just five miles west of the centre of the city. From that commanding eminence Omdurman could be seen spread out like a panorama. Though it was known from Slatin's description to be a city of great extent, all those who looked out on it from the rocky hill-top were almost startled by the sight of its enormous size. There was the great wilderness of houses, crowded together for mile after milealong the river bank. High over them rose the white domeof the Mahdi's tomb, with the gilded balls of brass upon its apex glittering in the sun. Over the city roofs a clump of green palms on the other side of the Nile markedtheposition of Khartoum.

Presently the war-drums began to beat in Omdurman, and out from every street and alley s>n its seven miles of western front theKhalifa's warriors came pouring, with hundreds of flutter-'ng standards to serve as rallying points. As Whilst this reconnaissance was in progress Keppel had steamed up to the end of Tuti Island with his four best gunboats, the Melik, Sheikh, Sultan, and Xasir,andhad carefully observed theriversidedefences. On the way uphe had shelled and set on fire a Dervish campon the hills betweenKerreri andOmdurman. The camp was of no great extent, and the Dervishes who fled from it towards the city appeared to be only a strongdetachment placed on the hills as an outpost to observe the Egyptian advance. A little further on Keppel surprised a party of the enemy's cavalry who were watering their horses at the Nile bank. He ran close in and scattered them with shell and Maxim fire. Five of them surrendered and were brought back prisoners on board the Sultan,when the flotilla returned from its successful reconnaissance.

The programme for next day, Thursday, was that thegunboats co-operating with the friendlies were to clear Halfiya village, the east bank of theNile opposite Omdurman, and Tuti Island of the Dervishes, and then get the howitzers into position opposite the city, and with these and the guns of the ships attack anddestroy the Dervish riverside batteries and shell the city itself. The Sirdar had his army in bivouac at a small ruined village, known as Agaiga or Figaia, about a mile and a half south of Kerreri. The