ense thicket
until they reached the bottom of the hollow. They turned to the right
and jostled their way up through the struggling traffic along the
narrow, suffocating bed of the ravine. There were places where many
fine fellows had been laid low by snipers, places where they hurried,
if possible. There were times when they were jammed between mules and
the banks, and others when they had to wait many minutes for
opportunities of pushing on. After an hour of this sort of thing, they
came practically to the head of the ravine, and pushed into the scrub
on one side to make temporary bivouacs.

Here all slacked and rested their weary bodies, stretched out full
length under the stunted bushes. Weak, most of them, with dysentery
when the battle started, they had now had two days of it, and with the
heat, the short commons of water, and little sleep, they felt a wee bit
tired, and they made the most of the short hours.

The cool of evening came again, and with it orders to prepare for
further movements, this time to the firing line in support of their own
men on the summit of the hills above. They made the best possible meal
from the dry rations, dry enough when there was unlimited water, but
quite impossible to more than nibble in these almost waterless days.
Mac did not feel very hungry; but he had room inside his thin frame for
a tankful of water. He had started on Friday evening with a liberally
rum-tinctured bottleful, which had since been restocked with water as
strongly tainted with petrol. For the purpose of the advance, sealed
petrol tins of water had been brought from Alexandria, but the fillers
of the tins seemed to have paid no particular attention as to whether
they had first been emptied of petrol. His bottle was almost
half-empty, and he did not care for the prospect of going up to those
struggling lines without a fresh supply; but, just in time, a mule
train came up with full fantassas, and he got a half-bottle.

When dusk had almost deepened to darkness they joined the surging
traffic of mules, men and stretchers on the dusty track, and filed
laboriously up the steep hill. The din of battle heightened with the
deepening night. Indian mountain batteries barked furiously behind
them, and the heavier artillery sent shells shrieking up from far
below, to burst somewhere up there where the crest stood silhouetted
against the stars. From above came the incessant roar of bursting
bombs and shells and