2 WITH THE CAMEL CORPS UP THE NILE.

necessary to rescue General Gordon from his perilous position at Khartoum, which he had held since the previous February.

" Better late than never ; " accordingly an expedition was equipped to proceed up the river, in pursuance of a determination which ought to have been carried out at least three months earlier.

The idea had only recently been started that, in order to allow of troops acting with any success up the Nile, it was absolutely necessary that a certain proportion of them should be mounted on camels, both for facility of transport across the desert (if necessary) to Khartoum, and for rapidity of action.

Accordingly a Camel Corps was organised, drawn half from the Cavalry and half from the Infantry.

The Cavalry part was to be composed of detachments from all the Cavalry regiments in Great Britain at the time, subdivided into " Heavies" and "Lights;" the Infantry part of detachments from the Brigade of Guards and from the regiments already out in Egypt, these last to go by the name of (Camel) Mounted infantry.