Then, as the light failed,
we returned to the river to water and encamp, passing into the zeriba
through the ranks of the British division, where officers and men,
looking out steadfastly over the fading plain, asked us whether the enemy
were coming--and, if so, when. And it was with confidence and satisfaction
that we replied, and they heard, 'Probably at daylight.'
When the gunboats had completed their bombardment, had sunk a Dervish
steamer, had silenced all the hostile batteries, and had sorely battered
the Mahdi's Tomb, they returned leisurely to the camp, and lay moored close
to the bank to lend the assistance of their guns in case of attack. As the
darkness became complete they threw their powerful searchlights over the
front of the zeriba and on to the distant hills. The wheeling beams of
dazzling light swept across the desolate, yet not deserted, plain.
The Dervish army lay for the night along the eastern slope of the Shambat
depression. All the 50,000 faithful warriors rested in their companies near
the flags of their Emirs. The Khalifa slept in rear of the centre of
his host, surrounded by his generals. Suddenly the whole scene was lit
by a pale glare. Abdullah and the chiefs sprang up. Everything around them
was bathed in an awful white illumination. Far away by the river there
gleamed a brilliant circle of light--the cold, pitiless eye of a demon.
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