ounting part of his men, Colonel Martin
materially delayed the enemy's advance, for the dervishes sent out
lines of black riflemen to deal with the Lancers. A rattling skirmish
at 500 to 800 yards ranges was in a few minutes in full progress. News
was sent back to the Sirdar that the enemy's army were coming on _en
masse_, and step by step Colonel Martin's troops were retired towards
Mount Surgham and the river. Our retreat was pressed, and the regiment
had to mount and trot off behind the shelter of Surgham to avoid the
vigorous advance of the dervishes. Among our mounted troops there were
relatively few losses, although the enemy must have suffered
considerably. I noticed many of them being knocked over by the
Lancers' fire. Before 3 p.m. the Sirdar had all his infantry and guns
in position, awaiting the expected attack within his lines at Kerreri.
A few mud-huts on the south face of the zereba materially added to the
strength of the position. Our cavalry had all to continue retiring,
and ultimately the Lancers went down to the river so as to clear the
front of the army. Surgham Hill was occupied by a few of the
dervishes. From there they must have had an excellent view of our
camp; indeed, they had as good a panoramic peep at us as we had at
them. For some reason the Khalifa thought better of attacking us that
day, and so halted with his main body quite out of range. Towards
sunset his men gradually retired, going back to their former position.
They had left their camp-fires burning, and their chunks of meat and
cakes of rough grain cooking under the supervision of slaves and
followers when they came out against the Lancers. So it happened on
the eve of the coming battle both armies rested quietly in their
respective camps, eating, sleeping, and the devout praying, within a
five miles' march of each other. For supper our men had stringy bully
beef and biscuit or bread. The dervishes had hunks of freshly roasted
mutton, goat and cattle, done on the embers, and bannocks of dhura
meal. Extra precautions were again observed to secure the Sirdar's
army from any night attack.

CHAPTER X.

THE BATTLE OF OMDURMAN--FIRST PHASE OF THE FIGHT.

In this and the succeeding chapter, the account given of the victory
of Omdurman is substantially the same as that which appeared in the
columns of various issues of the _Daily Telegraph_. The narrative,
although hastily prepared, gives an accurate description of the fight,
an