ss and a revolver, and a water-bottle and
a whole Christmas-treeful of things dangling from you. The hot-house at
Kew is excellent as a conservatory, but not adapted for exhibitions upon
the horizontal bar. I vote for a camp in the palm-grove and a halt
until evening."

Mortimer rose on his stirrups and looked hard to the southward.
Everywhere were the same black burned rocks and deep orange sand.
At one spot only an intermittent line appeared to have been cut through
the rugged spurs which ran down to the river. It was the bed of the old
railway, long destroyed by the Arabs, but now in process of
reconstruction by the advancing Egyptians. There was no other sign of
man's handiwork in all that desolate scene.

"It's palm trees or nothing," said Scott.

"Well, I suppose we must; and yet I grudge every hour until we catch the
force up. What _would_ our editors say if we were late for the action?"

"My dear chap, an old bird like you doesn't need to be told that no sane
modern general would ever attack until the Press is up."

"You don't mean that?" said young Anerley. "I thought we were looked
upon as an unmitigated nuisance."

"'Newspaper correspondents and travelling gentlemen, and all that tribe
of useless drones'--being an extract from Lord Wolseley's 'Soldier's
Pocket-Book,'" cried Scott. "We know all about _that_, Anerley;" and he
winked behind his blue spectacles. "If there was going to be a battle
we should very soon have an escort of cavalry to hurry us up. I've been
in fifteen, and I never saw one where they had not arranged for a
reporter's table."

"That's very well; but the enemy may be less considerate," said
Mortimer.

"They are not strong enough to force a battle."

"A skirmish, then?"

"Much more likely to be a raid upon the rear. In that case we are just
where we should be."

"So we are! What a score over Reuter's man up with the advance!
Well, we'll outspan and have our tiffin under the palms."

There were three of them, and they stood for three great London dailies.
Reuter's was thirty miles ahead; two evening pennies upon camels were
twenty miles behind. And among them they represented the eyes and ears
of the public--the great silent millions and millions who had paid for
everything, and who waited so patiently to know the result of their
outlay.

They were remarkable men these body-servants of the Press; two of them
already veterans in camps, the other setting out upon h