186 The British Campaign in the Soudan.

entirely, and were left behind, and another fourth dropped to the rear exhausted, following as best they could after being relieved of their guns and cartridge-belts which were packed on camels. On that plain the thermometer rises to 120° or 130° in the sun in March every day, (150° or 160° in July and August), and this terrible heat which Europeans cannot withstand, is just enough to make the Bedouins feel comfortable. This and the absolute lack of water are some of the points completely overlooked by those who find it so easy to plan and criticise campaigns from the “ Horse-Guards” in’ London or the Head-quarters at Cairo. It is certain that 1f Osman-Digma had known to what helpless condition the fearful heat had reduced the British column on_ that march, he would have attacked it then and there, and a massacre like that of Hicks-Pasha would have occurred.

But unconscious of this circumstance, and warned by his experiences at Teb Tamai, he had resolved to avoid another encounter with the British on the plain, and to draw them into the hills. Accordingly, his forces slowly retired, skirmishing from a distance, inflicting no loss and suffering but little. On the 26th, starting very early from their water-depot, the British reached the wells of ‘Tamanieb, where the men and horses slaked their thirst.

This shght skirmish was magnified into a battle, and the English papers announced in big capitals the capture and destruction of the “town of Tamanieb,” when, in fact, this was the name of the wells; for no town was ever built on the desert. What was burnt was Osman’s camp of brush huts, such as he would leave behind him at every change of position. The most valuable object captured at Tamanieb, as stated by the English papers,