136 WITH THE CAMEL CORPS UP THE NILE.

not one of us had been touched. So far so good, but on hearing the death-returns, we were horrified to find that so many of our friends in other regiments had fallen. Nine officers killed and nine wounded, chiefly among the Heavies, with whom we had come out, and whom we knew so well, made a fearful gap amongst our friends. Burnaby, Gough (of the Royals), Wolfe, Carmichael, Law, Atherton, Darley, Piggott, and De Lisle,* all killed ! St. Vincent not expected to live ; and seven or eight others, equally well known to us, wounded !

It was an awful slaughter. On the knoll immediately outside the square lay the bodies of eighty-six Englishmen, waxlike in death and covered with dust and blood. Hardly a square foot but was hidden by the stiffening carcases of men and camels : here B 's corpse, the head nearly severed from the body ; there C 's, a bullet-hole through the face, and a gaping spear-wound in the neck it was horrible. I did not care to look on any more, lest I should come across the mutilated bodies of more * These last two sailors.