he best route for railway was the Wady El-Arish. The Suez Canal,
moreover, can be easily defended. It is over two hundred feet wide, with
banks rising to a height of forty feet. A railway runs along the whole
Canal, and most of the ground to the east is flat, offering a good field
of fire either to troops on the banks or to ships on the Canal.

A considerable force of British troops, under the command of
Major-General Sir John Maxwell, were assigned for the protection of the
Canal. About the end of October it was reported that 2,000 Bedouins were
marching on the Canal, and on November 21st a skirmish took place
between this force and some of the English troops in which the Bedouins
were repelled. Nothing more was heard for more than two months, but on
January 28, 1915, a small advance party from the Turkish army was beaten
back east of El-Kantara. British airmen watched the desert well and kept
the British army well informed of the Turkish movements. The Turks had
found it impossible to convey their full force across the desert, and
the forces which finally arrived seemed to have numbered only about
twelve thousand men. The main attack was not developed until February
2d.

According to an account in the London Times, on that date, the enemy
began to move toward the Ismailia Ferry. They met a reconnoitering party
of Indian troops of all arms, and a desultory engagement ensued to which
a violent sandstorm put a sudden end about three o'clock in the
afternoon. The main attacking force pushed forward toward its
destination after nightfall. From twenty-five to thirty galvanized iron
pontoon boats, seven and a half meters in length, which had been dragged
in carts across the desert, were hauled by hand toward the water. With
one or two rafts made of kerosene tins in a wooden frame, all was ready
for the attack. The first warning of the enemy's approach was given by a
sentry of a mountain battery who heard, to him, an unknown tongue across
the water. The noise soon increased. It would seem that Mudjah
Ideem--"Holy Warriors"--said to be mostly old Tripoli fighters,
accompanied the pontoon section, and regulars of the Seventy-fifth
regiment, for loud exultations, often in Arabic, of "Brothers, die for
the faith; we can die but once," betrayed the enthusiastic irregular.

The Egyptians waited until the Turks were pushing their boats into the
water, then the Maxims attached to the battery suddenly spoke, and the
guns opened at p