, and so the skirmish before getting into camp, which all the
infantry expected with some degree of confidence and elation, did not
happen. By 10 a.m. the army had wheeled into the lines assigned it in
the southward portion of the scattered village of Kerreri. Once more
both wings rested upon the Nile, Gatacre's division in front (south),
Macdonald's brigade at the north, with Collinson's brigade within and
in reserve. The army encamped in an irregular triangular enclosure, on
one side being the river, our flanks and face being protected by the
gunboats. Our zereba outline was something like a broken-backed
pyramid.

Whilst the infantry were settling down in camp at Kerreri the cavalry
were pushing in the enemy's outposts. The British division cut and
built around their front a good stout thorny zereba. Lyttelton's
brigade and three batteries were placed nearest the river. Upon their
right was Wauchope's brigade, next to it was Maxwell's and Lewis's
brigades, and then to the right, Macdonald's crack command.
Collinson's brigade was held in reserve within the zereba; Colonels
Maxwell, Lewis and Macdonald had their front protected by a double
line of ordinary shelter-trenches dug in the loose sand and gravel.
The British Tommies had no trench. Going forward a mile or so to
rejoin the cavalry I climbed the rugged granitic slopes of Surgham
Hill. Like most of the "jebels," or mounts, in this region, compared
with the spacious 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