5 BERBER IN 1885.

CHAPTER XL THE ADVANCE TO BERBER AND THE ATI1AKA.

HAVING captured Abu Hamed, General Hunter took steps to hold the place against a possible attack by the garrithe same lines that had been adopted after Ferkeh in preparation for the advance on Dongola. Abu Hamed became in 1897 what Kosheh had been in 1896, an advanced base where troops were concentrated and supplies collected, the railway being brought up to il across the desert, and a dockyard being improvised on the riverside for fitting out the gunboats after theyhadbeenhauled up the cataracts of the Monassir and Shaiggiyeh country from Merowe. In this operation the experience obtained in the previous year in the cataracts between Haifa and Ferkeh proved most useful ; and though many expected that it would be impossible to get the newer and heavier boats up the cataracts, they arrived at Abu Hamed oneby one without a single hitch occurring in the work,or a single life being lost among the hundreds of menemployedin the operation.

son of Berber, where the Emir Yunes was in command. He placed his guns and three of his battalions in an entreiiehed camp outside the village, sending the fourth to form an advanced post some miles up the river. The best houses in the village were convertedinto hospitals and storehouses. A convoy with supplies of food and ammunition camein almost immediately from Korosko by the desert route that runsby Murat— the first convoy or caravan that had passed that wayfor thirteen or fourteen year-This pioneer convoy wascommanded by-Lieutenant McKay of the Egyptian army, who had gone out to Egypt with the rank of sergeantinstructor from the Grenadier Guards. and won his commission on the Nile frontier. Further supplies arrived from Kassingar, and steps were taken to improve the track in this direction. Hunter expected reinforcements at an early date, and the Sirdar's headquarters would soon be established at Abu Hamed, towards which the railway was now being pushedrapidly across the desert fromHaifa.

The general opinion was that there would be a big battle for the possession of Berber, and the Sirdar prepared for its capture on precisely The advance on Berber was fixed for September. The town is a long series of straggling villages stretching for nearly five miles along the Nile, ami a very difficult place to defend against a joint attack of an army and a gunboat flotilla. Yunes, the Dervish Emir who commanded there, seems to have woke up \crysoc-i to the danger of his position. The only way he couldhave secured the possession of Berber was by an attack on Abu Hamed, and he was not