152 EGYPT AND THE SOUDAN.

to 2000 men encamped here. We could see where the tents of the three chiefs had been, and the stables of their horses. Nothing of any value was found in the camp; a few cooking-pots, walkingsticks, one or two pieces of wood with verses from the Koran written on them, some inferior straw mats, were all that we could find. No arms of any kind were discovered, but a thousand rounds of Remington ammunition were found in one of the houses. The broad wady by which we had purposed to march to the attack led directly round the back of the camp to the cultivated ground behind, and had wide, easy passages leading right into the heart of the camp."

It was very disappointing to find that the enemy had fled, the more so as it was now evident that they might continue to retire from place to place, and it would be impossible for the column to come up with them. At that time the Black Watch was struggling in the Rahami Cataract, where the head of the battalion had been for three days, and not a boat had reached Birti.

Before they concentrated at Birti on the 4th of February they had been four days in the seven miles of cataract, working from dawn to dusk, and had lost one man drowned, and two boats. The Cornwalls were then still in the same cataract. The Gordons had passed through that of Kab-el-Abd. It was weary work, and the Black Watch and Staffords having been sent on to Castle Camp, the place selected by Colonel Butler beyond Birti, General Earle made arrangements for the later comers to move forward immediately on their arrival, and Colonel Colville was therefore ordered to instruct the vakeel to cross the river with the mudir's troops and to occupy the country during the advance of the column to Berber, and to be ready on the 6th to advance Avith an escort to Salamat that he might accompany the headquarters, and assist in collecting information. Colville was also to cross the river and to bring the uncles of Suleiman, who were still with the vakeel, and some other sheikhs who had surrendered and were to be kept with our force as hostages for the good behaviour of their people, who were in the country which the column was about to leave.