heart they too fled, and the whole Egyptian army were in full
rout. With hardly a moment's delay, the cavalry were pushed on in
pursuit, and, riding forward with scarcely a halt, reached Cairo in
twenty-four hours. Although there was a strong garrison here, it at
once surrendered, and Arabi Pasha gave himself up to the English. The
instant the news reached the Egyptian army facing Alexandria, it
dispersed in all directions, and the war in Egypt came to an abrupt
termination.

On every occasion throughout this war, when the British came in contact
with the enemy they behaved with great valour; but the nature of the
conflict, and the poor fighting power of the Egyptian troops, afforded
comparatively few opportunities for the display of deeds of individual
heroism.

England, however, has every reason to be proud of the conduct of her
soldiers and sailors during the Egyptian Campaign, which was
accomplished with a dash and rapidity, and with a smallness of loss, in
comparison with the number of the enemy's troops and the strength of
their artillery, altogether unprecedented in the annals of modern
warfare.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN.

CAMPAIGNS AGAINST THE MAHDI--1883-1885.

Although the defeat of Arabi was complete, another and much more serious
danger to Egyptian civilisation soon after arose in the Soudan. An Arab
of Dongola, a Moslem fanatic, who had been accepted by many of the Arabs
as the Mahdi or prophet, the expected Messiah of Islam, had, as far back
as 1881, resisted and defeated the Egyptian forces, and during 1882, by
repeated successes, had largely increased his power and the number of
his adherents. In 1883 serious preparations were made by the Egyptian
Government for a campaign against these rebels; and in August an army of
over 10,000 men of all arms was collected and despatched against the
Mahdi under the command of Colonel Hicks, a retired Indian officer, and
at this time a Pasha in the Egyptian service; and with him were many
other English officers. For some weeks nothing was heard in lower Egypt
of the expedition, but at last news reached Khartoum that the whole
force had become entangled in a defile in which an ambuscade had been
prepared by the enemy, and that after three days' fighting, the
ammunition being exhausted, the army had been annihilated by the
superior numbers of the Mahdi's followers. In this awful slaughter
there fell with Hicks Pasha, the Governor of the Soudan, and more than
10