130 KHARTOUM CAMPAIGN.

wilderness about them they are but toy hills.) Few of them are much over 150 feet high, large as they often loom in the deceiving light of the Soudan. Many are but 50 feet in height, and there are regular, peaky, and prettily-shaped little mountain ranges, the summits of which overtop the plain but five to ten yards, Such hills children might build in play by the sea-shore. Surgham was quite a big one, and the signallers soon took possession of it, flagging and “helioing ” back to camp. From its top I was enabled to see Omdurman, with Khartoum in the distance. The Mahdi’s white, cone-shaped tomb, its dome girt with rings, and ornamented with brazen finials, globe and crescent, shone not six miles away in the midst of miles of mud and straw huts. Four arabesque finials rose, one from each corner of the supporting wall. Before the town was a wall of white tents, the original camping ground of the Khalifa’s levies and reinforcements drawn from distant garrisons. Midway to Omdurman, or within three miles of where I stood, was the whole dervish army. Clearly they had moved out from the city, and were organised as a force prepared for instant battle. Their tents, camels, and impedimenta had been left behind. Only a few low shelter-tents marked the lines in which the Khalifa’s army lay in the sparse bush. There were flags and banners by hundreds, indicating the position of the leaders, chiefs and lesser emirs. The Khalifa’s great black banner, with its Arabic lettering sewn in the same material, was displayed from a lofty bamboo pole, planted in the dense central part of the force. To the left of it, our