30 CHAPTER VI.

THE BATTLE OF HAFIR.

relaying an oldone, and all the railway iron had to bebrought up to the railhead, instead of the working parties having merely to collect the iron on the spot and supply the sleepers. The earthworksand road-bed of the line were constructed in advance by the Egyptian infantry. The railway reached Ferkeh on July 25th and Kosheh on August 4th. Kosheh camp was now the Sirdar's headquarters and the starting-place for the final advanceonDongola.

SUARDA, fortified and garrisoned by Mac-Donald's Soudanese brigade, was during June,July,and the greaterpart ofAugust, 1896, the advanced post of the expedition. For a short time after Ferkeh the Dervishes had a small garrison in the villages of Kedden and Kedurma, near the Kaibar cataract. There were stores of grain in the villages and a number of boats on the river, these depotshaving been the points from which they used to forward supplies by water to their camp at Ferkeh. They were turned out of these placesin the middle of June by alittle force under Captain Mahon. He left Suarda on June 16th with two squadrons of Egyptian cavalryand a detachment of theCamel Corps, a numberof friendly Arabs moving down the opposite bank of the Nile parallel with his advance. Mahon had to cover sixty miles to reach Kedurma. He did the distance in two marches, and on the 17th occupied the villages, which he found deserted. It had been hoped that the Dervish garrison under Osman Azrak wouldbe surprised and cut up or captured,but they got news of Mahon's approach and retired hurriedly without any show of resistance. A quantity of grain was seized in the villages, and a number of boats with heavy cargoes of corn were captured by the Friendlies, the Dervishes giving up the attempt to haul them up the cataract. After this the villagesofKermaon the east bank and Hafir on the west bank above the Third (or Hannek) Cataract were the advanced Dervish positions for the defence of Dongola.

Wad Bishara threw up earthworks at both places and concentrated a considerable force at Kerma.

At home in England there was some impatience at the long pause that followed the victory of Ferkeh. People asked what was the Sirdar waiting for. He was waiting and workingfor several things,all of them necessary to a successful advance. He had to accumulate supplies at Kosheh for his army. This was at first done by means of camel convoys from the head of the railway,but went on much quicker when the line was completed. He was also waiting for the annual rise of the Nile. Until the river wasnearitshighest he could notbring his gunboat flotilla up the miles of dangerous rapids and roaring cataracts between Haifa and Kosheh. And the gunboats werenecessaryboth for theattack on Dongola and for the operation of crossing the Nile,for which he wouldhave to secure commandof the river andboth its banks at some point above Kosheh. Unfortunately, the Nile rose very late in 1896, and the flood did not reach its usual level. It was what is known in Egypt as " a bad Nile" that year. It had been hoped that the four gunboats that had for years patrolledthe river betweenShellal and Haifa and three of thestern-wheel steamers wouldbe got over the cataractsin July. But it was not till August that they were able even to begin the ascent. During the weeks that followed the fight at Ferkeh there was a constant stream of fugitives from the Dongola province coming into the Egyptian outposts at Suarda. All were anxious to place themselvesat once under theprotection of the government. So numerous were they that at times the problem of providing them with food was a very serious one.

The difficult operation of bringing them up was carried out under the direction of Colonel Hunter, with the help of a number of naval and armyofficers. Thousands of soldiers and native labourers wereemployed in the work of hauling on the cables that steadied and dragged the steamers through the rapids. It was the biggest operation of the kind that had ever been attempted in Egypt. One by one the gunboats made their appearance at Kosheh. The two other cataracts between them and Dongola— those at Kaibar and Hannek— were not The desert railway reached Akasha at the end of the third week of June. The Railway Battalion were now so expert at the work that on several days they laid as much as a mile and a half of the track. After this its progress was slower, asit was a case of laying a new line,not