ol season--if you can ever
call it a cool season, here."

"Is there any great force at Abu Hamed?"

"No; nothing that could stand against this for a moment. Their chief
force, outside Omdurman, is at Metemmeh under Mahmud, the Khalifa's
favourite son. You see, the Jaalin made fools of themselves. Instead of
waiting until we could lend them a hand, they revolted as soon as we
took Dongola, and the result was that Mahmud came down and pretty well
wiped them out. They defended themselves stoutly, at Metemmeh, but had
no chance against such a host as he brought with him. The town was
taken, and its defenders, between two and three thousand fighting men,
were all massacred, together with most of the women and children.

"By the accounts brought down to us, by men who got away, it must have
been an even more horrible business than usual; and the Dervishes are
past masters in the art of massacre. However, I think that their course
is nearly up. Of late, a good many fugitives from Kordofan have arrived
here, and they say that there will be a general revolt there, when they
hear that we have given the Dervishes a heavy thrashing."

"And where do you think the great fight is likely to take place?"
Gregory asked.

"Not this side of Metemmeh. Except at Abu Hamed, we hear of no other
strong Dervish force between this and Omdurman. If Mahmud thinks
himself strong enough, no doubt he will fight; but if he and the
Khalifa know their business, he will fall back and, with the forces at
Omdurman, fight one big battle. The two armies together will, from what
we hear, amount to sixty or seventy thousand; and there is no doubt
whatever that, with all their faults, the beggars can fight. It will be
a tough affair, but I believe we shall have some British troops here to
help, before the final advance. We can depend now on both the Soudanese
and the Egyptians to fight hard, but there are not enough of them. The
odds would be too heavy, and the Sirdar is not a man to risk failure.
But with a couple of brigades of British infantry, there can be no
doubt what the result will be; and I fancy that, if we beat them in one
big fight, it will be all up with Mahdism.

"It is only because the poor beggars of tribesmen regard the Dervishes
as invincible, that they have put up so long with their tyranny. But
the rising of the Jaalin, and the news we get from Kordofan, show that
the moment they hear the Dervishes are beaten, and Khartoum is in our
ha