262 KHARTOUM CAMPAIGN.

and gardens if they wished. Everybody availed himself of the opportunity. In a few minutes a throng of officers and men who had scrambled over the débris filled the roofless rooms and packed the stairway where Gordon was struck down. I was surprised to find that even the youngest, most callow soldiers knew their Khartoum and the story of Gordon's fight and death. So deep and far had the tale travelled. There were speculations and suggestions as to how the end exactly came about that were a revelation to me, so full of information and pregnant of observation were many of the men’s remarks. Throng succeeded throng in the rooms and _ stairways, whilst others went to explore the outhouses and the gardens.

The passion flowers and the pomegranates were in bloom, but the oranges and limes were in fruit. Leaves and buds were plucked by all of us as souvenirs. Brigade-Major Snow, who was with the Camel Corps in 1884-85 across the Bayuda desert, produced a tiny bottle of champagne that was to have been drunk in Khartoum when we got there.

He opened it, and shared the driblet with a few of the old campaigners. By one p.m. we were all back again in Omdurman, leaving behind two companies of the 11th Battalion to hold Khartoum for the two flags, the hoisting of which, side by side, the Egyptians regarded as natural and most proper.