The Expeditionary Force which was thus concentrated, equipped, and supplied for the culminating moment of the River War, was organised as follows:

Commander-in-Chief: THE SIRDAR

The British Division: MAJOR-GENERAL GATACRE Commanding

1st Brigade 2nd Brigade BRIGADIER-GEN. WAUCHOPE BRIGADIER-GEN. LYTTELTON 1st Btn. Royal Warwickshire Regt. 1st Btn. Grenadier Guards " " Lincoln Regiment " " Northumberland Fusiliers " " Seaforth Highlanders 2nd " Lancashire Fusiliers " " Cameron Highlanders " " Rifle Brigade

The Egyptian Division: MAJOR-GENERAL HUNTER Commanding

1st Brigade 2nd Brigade 3rd Brigade 4th Brigade COL. MACDONALD COL. MAXWELL COL. LEWIS COL. COLLINSON 2nd Egyptians 8th Egyptians 3rd Egyptians 1st Egyptians IXth Soudanese XIIth Soudanese 4th " 5th (half) " Xth " XIIIth " 7th " 17th " XIth " XIVth " 15th " 18th "

Mounted Forces

21st Lancers Camel Corps Egyptian Cavalry COLONEL MARTIN MAJOR TUDWAY COLONEL BROADWOOD 4 squadrons 8 companies 9 squadrons

Artillery: COLONEL LONG Commanding

(British) 32nd Field Battery, R.A.(with two 40-pounder guns) 8 guns " 37th " " " (5-inch Howitzers) . 6 guns (Egyptian) The Horse Battery, E.A. (Krupp) . . . 6 guns " No. 1 Field Battery, E.A. (Maxim-Nordenfeldt) 6 guns " No. 2 " " " . . . . 6 guns " No. 3 " " " . . . . 6 guns " No. 4 " " " . . . . 6 guns

Machine Guns

(British) Detachment 16th Co. Eastern Division R.A. . 6 Maxim " " Royal Irish Fusiliers . . 4 " (Egyptian) 2 Maxim guns to each of the five Egyptian batteries . . . . 10 "

Engineers

Detachment of Royal Engineers

The Flotilla: COMMANDER KEPPEL

1898 Class Armoured Screw Gunboats (3): the Sultan, the Melik, the Sheikh

each carrying: 2 Nordenfeldt guns 1 quick-firing 12-pounder gun 1 Howitzer 4 Maxims

1896 Class Armoured Screw Gunboats (3): the Fateh, The Naser, the Zafir

each carrying: 1 quick-firing 12-pounder gun 2 6-pounder guns 4 Maxims

Old Class Armoured Stern-wheel Gunboats (4): the Tamai, the Hafir*, the Abu Klea, the Metemma

each carrying: 1 12-pounder gun 2 Maxim-Nordenfeldt guns

Steam Transport

5 Steamers: The Dal, The Akasha, the Tahra, The Okma, the Kaibar

[*The steamer El Teb, wrecked at the Fourth Cataract in 1897, had been refloated, and to change the luck was renamed Hafir.]

The total strength of the Expeditionary Force amounted to 8,200 British and 17,600 Egyptian soldiers, with 44 guns and 20 Maxims on land, with 36 guns and 24 Maxims on the river, and with 2,469 horses, 896 mules, 3,524 camels, and 229 donkeys, besides followers and private animals.

While the army were to move along the west bank of the river--the Omdurman side--a force of Arab irregulars, formed from the friendly tribes, would march along the east bank and clear it of any Dervishes. All the debris which the Egyptian advance had broken off the Dervish Empire was thus to be hurled against that falling State. Eager for plunder, anxious to be on the winning side, Sheikhs and Emirs from every tribe in the Military Soudan had hurried, with what following the years of war had left them, to Wad Hamed. On the 26th of August the force of irregulars numbered about 2,500 men, principally Jaalin survivors, but also comprising bands and individuals of Bisharin; of Hadendoa from Suakin; of Shukria, the camel-breeders; of Batahin, who had suffered a bloody diminution at the Khalifa's hands; of Shaiggia, Gordon's vexatious allies; and lastly some Gellilab Arabs under a reputed son of Zubehr Pasha. The command of the whole motley force was given to Major Stuart-Wortley, Lieutenant Wood accompanying him as Staff Officer; and the position of these officers among the cowed and untrustworthy Arabs was one of considerable peril.

While the infantry divisions were marching round the heights of Shabluka to the camp opposite Royan island, the steamers and gunboats ascended the stream and passed through the gorge, dragging up with them the whole fleet of barges and gyassas. The northern end of the narrow passage had been guarded by the five Dervish forts, which now stood deserted and dismantled. They were well built, and formed nearly a straight line--four on one bank and one on the other. Each fort had three embrasures, and might, when occupied, have been a formidable defence to the cataract.

Threshing up against the current, the gunboats and stern-wheelers one after another entered the gorge. The Nile, which below is nearly a mile across, narrows to a bare 200 yards. The pace of the stream becomes more swift. Great swirls and eddies disturb its surface. High on either side rise black, broken, and precipitous cliffs, looking like piles of gigantic stones. Through and among them the flood-river pours with a loud roaring, breaking into foam and rapids wherever the submerged rocks are near the surface. Between the barren heights and the water is a strip of green bushes and grass. The bright verdant colour seems the more brilliant by contrast with the muddy water and the sombre rocks. It is a forbidding passage. A few hundred riflemen scattered Afridiwise among the tops of the hills, a few field-guns in the mud forts by the bank, and the door would be shut.

The mounted forces marched from Wad Hamed at dawn on the 27th and, striking out into the desert, skirted the rocky hills. Besides the 21st Lancers and nine squadrons of Egyptian cavalry, the column included the Camel Corps, 800 strong, and a battery of Horse Artillery; and it was a fine sight to see all these horsemen and camel-men trotting swiftly across the sand by squadrons and companies, with a great cloud of dust rising from each and drifting away to the northward.

The zeriba of the camp at Royan had been already made and much of the ground cleared by the energy of the Soudanese division, which had been the first to arrive. An advanced depot was established at Royan island which was covered with white hospital tents, near which there was a forest of masts and sails. The barges and boats containing the stores and kits awaited the troops, and they had only to bivouac along the river-bank and shelter themselves as quickly as possible from the fierce heat of the sun. The dark hills of Shabluka, among and beneath which the camp and army nestled, lay behind us now. To the south the country appeared a level plain covered with bush and only broken by occasional peaks of rock. The eternal Nile flowed swiftly by the tents and shelters, and disappeared mysteriously in the gloom of the gorge; and on the further bank there rose a great mountain--Jebel Royan--from the top of which it was said that men might see Khartoum.

The whole army broke camp at Royan on the 28th of August at four o'clock in the afternoon, and marched to Wady el Abid six miles further south. We now moved on a broad front, which could immediately be converted into a fighting formation. This was the first time that it had been possible to see the whole force--infantry, cavalry, and guns--on the march at once. In the clear air the amazing detail of the picture was striking. There were six brigades of infantry, composed of twenty-four battalions; yet every battalion showed that it was made up of tiny figures, all perfectly defined on the plain. A Soudanese brigade had been sent on to hold the ground with pickets until the troops had constructed a zeriba. But a single Dervish horseman managed to evade these and, just as the light faded, rode up to the Warwickshire Regiment and flung his broad-bladed spear in token of defiance. So great was the astonishment which this unexpected apparition created that the bold man actually made good his escape uninjured.

On the 29th the forces remained halted opposite Um Teref, and only the Egyptian cavalry went out to reconnoitre. They searched the country for eight or nine miles, and Colonel Broadwood returned in the afternoon, having found a convenient camping-ground, but nothing else. During the day the news of two river disasters arrived--the first to ourselves, the second to our foes. On the 28th the gunboat Zafir was steaming from the Atbara to Wad Hamed, intending thereafter to ascend the Shabluka Cataract. Suddenly--overtaken now, as on the eve of the advance on Dongola, by misfortune--she sprang a leak, and, in spite of every effort to run her ashore, foundered by the head in deep water near Metemma. The officers on board--among whom was Keppel, the commander of the whole flotilla-- had scarcely time to leap from the wreck, and with difficulty made their way to the shore, where they were afterwards found very cold and hungry. The Sirdar received the news at Royan. His calculations were disturbed by the loss of a powerful vessel; but he had allowed for accidents, and in consequence accepted the misfortune very phlegmatically. The days of struggling warfare were over, and the General knew that he had a safe margin of strength.

The other catastrophe afflicted the Khalifa, and its tale was brought to the advancing army by the Intelligence spies, who to the last--even when the forces were closing--tried to pass between them. Not content with building batteries along the banks, Abdullah, fearing the gunboats, had resolved to mine the river. An old officer of the old Egyptian army, long a prisoner in Omdurman, was brought from his chains and ordered to construct mines. Two iron boilers were filled with gunpowder, and it was arranged that these should be sunk in the Nile at convenient spots. Buried in the powder of each was a loaded pistol with a string attached to the trigger. On pulling the string the pistol, and consequently the mine, would be exploded. So the Khalifa argued; nor was he wrong. It was resolved to lay one mine first. On the 17th of August the Dervish steamer Ismailia moved out into the middle of the Nile, carrying one of the boilers fully charged and equipped with pistol detonator. Arrived at the selected spot, the great cylinder of powder was dropped over the side. Its efficiency as a destructive engine was immediately demonstrated, for, on the string being pulled by accident, the pistol discharged itself, the powder exploded, and the Ismailia and all on board were blown to pieces.