along the ragged front, causing an immediate and general check, and indeed a retirement on the part of many who thought they were obeying a command. Fortunately a staff officer in the nick of time galloped forward shouting "No retirement, men ! Come on! come on !" There was a general rally, and then forward we went again.

Those cries of "Retire" had been treacherously raised by a couple of "Glasgow Irishmen, "who had somehow evaded the precautions that were in force since the days of Fenianism to prevent the enlistment of disloyal characters. They had been proved cowards or something worse on two occasions when the regiment was before Kafr Dowar; and in virtue of instructions coming through the captain, the non-commissioned officers of the company appointed a sergeant and a corporal to watch the conduct of these two men in the battle. They were charged to use their own discretion, and if that step became necessary to put them summarily to death. When the treacherous dogs raised their shout of Retire. the non-commissioned officers appointed to watch them promptly did their duty. I saw Sergeant

kill one of them with a thrust of his sword-bayonet; and also saw Corporal

fire at the other, who fell dead, but whether he was killed by the corporal's bullet or by one from the enemy I cannot undertake to say. The regiment was unanimous that both richly deserved to die, in which conviction every honest soldier will concur.

By this time it was clear daylight, and it was now apparent that in the semi-darkness, the scramble at the trenches, and the hand-to-hand fighting, the brigade had fallen into confusion, and that in the charging and struggling whirl the four regiments had got all mixed up and intermingled. There was a short halt in order to re-form, and, this roughly and hastily effected, the brigade swept down toward Tel-el-Kebir lock, driving all opposition before it. Just before this halt I received another "butt-ender," which smashed my water-bottle to pieces and knocked me down, but I was immediately dragged up on to my legs again by my fighting chum, who exclaiming, "Steel for leather! take that, you !" sent his bayonet into the Egyptian who had felled me. The regiment when re-forming had suffered

from a cross fire coming from the trenches on either flank, to silence which skirmishers were thrown out to the left. They speedily cleared the trench and drove the enemy along it through a cross trench into trenches farther to the left and rear. The detachment attacking the former came on a gun, the gunners belonging to which stood their ground and fought to the last man; they were killed, the gun was taken, and then brought into action against its

owners.

As the regiment was pursuing its advance, I had the misfortune to be detached by an order from the sergeant-major to take charge of a prisoner, a man over six feet high and as black as a coal. He was sullen and would not move; I tried to stir him with a hint from the butt end of my rifle, on which he bolted, and I had to stop his flight with a bullet. Setting out to follow the regiment I came suddenly face to face with a big Egyptian officer, revolver in one hand, sword in the other. He fired and hit me on the right hand, but the bullet glanced off a ring I wore, and I rushed at him with the bayonet. He warded off my first thrust and my second; I then feinted, he swung his sword round for the parry and had not time to recover it before the bayonet was in him. A pull on a blue seal hanging from his tunic brought to light a silver watch, which I still keep as a remembrance of him.

When I reached the crest of the hill overlooking Tel-el-Kebir lock, there lay below me the many hundred tents of the Egyptian camp, and I could see the enemy swimming the canal, and running like deer across the desert in thousands. The Second Brigade was hurrying forward, as also the Scottish division of the Royal Artillery at a gallop; when the gunners passed the Highland Brigade, such a cheer went up as they shouted "Scotland forever!" Halting, they unlimbered, loaded, fired a round or two with great effect, and then, as it seemed in a few seconds, they were off again at a tearing gallop. One of their shells fell into a magazine, and the noise of the explosion was loud enough to wake the dead. Another struck and disabled the engine of a train pulling out from the railway station. It could not proceed, but another made shift to start, and although a shell struck and shattered the hindmost carriage, it held on and got

away. A steady rattle of musketry indicated the route of the Indian contingent advancing south of the canal; and soon after the Highland Brigade had reached Tel-el-Kebir lock, Sir Garnet galloped up with Sir Archibald Alison, called out to us The battle is won, men !" and sent the 42d to clear the village. Just as we were cheering the General, the cavalry came galloping forward to take up the pursuit, and shouting with many oaths, You jocks haven't left us the chance of a fight!" shot past in a whirl of dust above which flashed lanceheads and waving swords.

The men had been suffering so fearfully from thirst before they reached the canal, that I saw some of them drinking the blood that ran out of wounded camels. When we had drunk our fill of canal water the Assembly' was sounded and the roll was called, when many a poor fellow had to be marked as "absent," Men told each other of their adventures, narrated their escapes, and had time now to examine their bare legs, from which much skin had been lost in falling into and clambering out of the trenches. The most remarkable escape I remember was that of a color-sergeant who was looking at the enemy through a binocular when a bullet came along, shivered the glass and then dropped spent into his mouth, from which he spat it with the loss only of a couple of teeth. Some of us were detailed to search the Egyptian camp to make sure that none of the enemy remained lurking in it. A guard was set on Arabi's tent, through which I had passed in the advance, and had snatched a cutlet from the table, little wotting to whom tent and food had belonged. I had the luck to chance on a small shed full of melons, nuts, bottles of eau de Cologne, tins of Turkish tobacco and boxes of cigarettes. I filled my water-bottle with eau de Cologne, my haversack with cigarettes, and with a tin of tobacco and a bottle of eau de Cologne in my hand went in search of my captain. He was not to be found in the tent of which the officers had taken possession, and I handed the eau de Cologne bottle to a major, an Irishman, who swallowed the contents neat at a gulp, and then exclaimed, "Holy Jasus, isn't that good stuff" to the great amusement of the other officers. Presently I met my captain, to whom I gave the cigarettes, and

showed him where he could get all he wanted of lemons, tobacco, and eau de Cologne; he gave me a sovereign for my trouble.

. Volunteers were now called for to go and assist the wounded. I made one of the party, and started well equipped with pipe in mouth, a haversack full of cigarettes, a water-bottle full of eau de Cologne, and plenty of water. The sights of the battle-field were grewsome, now one looked at them in cold blood. The artillery had wrought fearful havoc. I remember one heap of twenty-four corpses, some blown absolutely into fragments, others headless, others with limbs lopped off. Some of the dead Egyptians were roasting slowly as they lay; their clothing had been ignited and was still smouldering. A man of the Rifles came along, drew his pipe from his pocket, and lit it at one of those bodies, remarking, somewhat brutally it struck me: "By- I never thought I should live to use a dead Egyptian for a light to my pipe" In the outer trench our dead and wounded lay more thickly than those of the enemy, but in the inner trenches aud on the spaces between, for one man of ours there were certainly ten Egyptians. In the redoubts, the black gunners lay dead or wounded almost to a man, for they had been fastened to the guns and to each other by small chains attached to ankle-fetters, so as to leave them free to work the guns, but hindering them from running away. Among them poor Lieutenant Rawson lay mortally wounded; it seemed bitter hard after his fine service in guiding the army; that he who had contributed so much to the victory should lie dying in the hour of triumph. When Sir Archibald Alison was told of his being wounded, he at once went to see him. "Didn't I lead them straight, sir?" were the dying man's last faint words-faithful unto duty even to the end.

The first wounded man I attended to was an Egyptian whose moans were piteous, and on examination I found him severely wounded in the belly. I poured some eau de Cologne down his throat, and used my own surgical bandage to bind up his wound so as to keep the flies from it. Then I lit a cigarette, put it in his mouth, placed more beside him, and gave him a drink of water. He kissed my hand, and muttered something about 'Allah.''

I had not left him far, when

I heard the crack of a rifle and a bullet whizzed by my ear. Looking round I saw the smoke of the shot drifting away from where my wounded man lay, and noticed that he was quietly taking aim at me again. He had time to fire a second shot, which also missed me, before I reached him, and I had no compunction in driving the life out of him with my bayonet, remarking to myself as I took the weapon out of him for the last time, "You won't come that game any more, you ungrateful brute !" Many such instances of this treacherous hate occurred. I myself had to wipe out four more wounded Egyptians whom I caught in the act of firing at our men after they had passed. To run the bayonet into a man who is down, one feels to be hardly the thing, and it was done reluctantly, but in such cases as I have described it was a clear act of compulsory duty.

Great droves of prisoners had been brought in, seemingly surprised and well pleased at being taken alive instead of being massacred. Most of them were chewing dates, and they jabbered with extraordinary rapidity, in a language quite unknown to any of us. Over the mass was placed a strong guard, and then burial parties were organized from among them, furnished with shovels, and marched under escort to the duty assigned them-the interment of their own dead. There was neither decency nor humanity in their method. Dead and seeming dead were huddled anyhow into the trenches and then the sand was shovelled over them. One could see limbs still moving and hands feebly raised in the effort to ward off the indiscriminate entombment, but the callous grave-diggers took no notice of those dumb, pathetic remonstrances. The smell from the bodies was already overpowering, which some accounted for by the habit on the part of the Egyptian of drinking quantities of oil.

Having attended to several of the wounded, I began to wander back in the direction of Tel-el Kebir. Stray bullets, coming one knew not from where, were still flying about. I felt a sudden stinging in the right shoulder which caused me to drop my rifle, but I picked it up and went on although the pain of the shoulder was great. Presently I felt something trickling down my arm, which to my amazement was blood. I then realized

that I had sustained a bullet wound. There were surgeons close by, to whom I went and had a hasty dressing applied to the wound, which I was told was only a flesh injury, and would not give me much trouble. Feeling faint, however, I accepted the offer of a ride from a sailer who was mounted on a camel, and offered to take me to my regiment. Camel-back I found rougher than aboard-ship in a high sea. Then Jack and the animal did not seem to understand each other, the camel resenting Jack's attempts to steer it by hitting it on the head with a stick, Jack denouncing the beast in nautical language, and informing me that "the

would not answer the helm." Although in pain, I laughed so heartily that I fell off the camel, and for a time lay where I had fallen, all but insensible. Pulling myself together, I set out to walk and soon came across Sergeant Donald Gunn, of my regiment, lying dangerously wounded by a bullet in the lung. He could not walk and I could not carry him, but when I reached the regiment I reported his whereabouts as nearly as I could describe. He afterward told me, however, that he lay all day and the following night before being carried off the field, and he told me also that as night closed in it was surprising what a number of apparently dead Egyptians rose all over the field, and ran away apparently quite undamaged. The recovery of Gunn, who after having been wounded fought on and did great execution before he fell from sheer loss of blood, was long extremely doubtful; but he is now alive with the Distinguished Conduct medal on his breast, and holding the honorable position of one of her Majesty's gate-keepers. Soon after leaving Gunn, I was lucky enough to find a horse tied to a stake; mounting the beast, I rode him into camp, and later in the day sold him to an officer for 5l. I now had my wounded shoulder properly dressed, and was glad to know that I need not go into hospital because of it. My comrades bad gone out foraging and came in laden with poultry, which were promptly plucked and consigned to the camp-kettles: we were all sharp set, for we had eaten nothing but biscuit since leaving Kassassin. My contribution to the fare was not very successful. When in the Egyptian camp, I came across some little tin boxes labelled with a word which I

hurriedly read as " potage." Some of the tins I brought in, and promising my comrades a treat, I had a kettleful of water boiled, and emptied into it the contents of the tins. After a good stirring the supposed soup was served out. The first comment was that it was curiously black. When it was cool enough to be tasted, the wry faces made over it were a caution, and there was a roar of "Blacking, by —— !'' Blacking it was; the label which I had read "potage" was actually "cirage."

The total casualties of the British army engaged at Tel-el-Kebir amounted to 339, of which 243 occurred in the Highland Brigade, leaving 96 to represent the losses of the rest of the force. The 79th was

the first regiment across the outer intrenchment, because it fixed bayonets on the march, whereas the other regiments of the brigade halted to do this; but the advantage in time was only that of a few seconds. The defenders of Tel-el-Kebir cannot be said to have been taken by surprise, although no doubt they had little idea we were so close as we were when our approach was detected. They slept in the fighting positions, and were alert on the first alarm. We were under their fire for 300 yards, and a very heavy fire it was; but that nine-tenths of it was aimed too high-if indeed it was aimed at all— it must have wrought great havoc in our ranks.-Nineteenth Century.

In the dark one night I lay upon my bed. I heard the policeman's feet beat on the pavement; I heard the wheels of carriages roll home from houses of entertainment; I heard a woman's laugh below my window-and then I fell asleep. And in the dark I dreamed a dream. I dreamed God took my soul to Hell.

Hell was a fair place; the water of the lake was blue.

I said to God, "I like this place. God said, "Ay, dost thou ?" Birds sang, turf was by the water edge, and trees grew from it. Away off among the trees I saw beautiful women walking. Their clothes were of many delicate colors and clung to them, and they were tall and graceful and had yellow hair. Their robes trailed over the grass. They glided in and out among the trees, and over their heads hung yellow fruit like drops of melted gold.

I said, "It is very fair; I would go up--"

God said, Wait.'

And after a while I noticed a fair woman pass she looked this way and that, and drew down a branch, and it seemed she kissed the fruit upon it softly and went on her way, and her dress made no rustle as she passed over the grass. And when I saw her no more, from among the

stems came another woman fair as the last, in a delicate tinted robe; she looked this way and that. When she saw no one she drew down the fruit, and when she had looked over it long she put her mouth to it softly and went away. And I saw other and other women come, making no noise, and they glided away also over the grass. And I said to God, "What are they doing?"

God said, 66 fruit."

They are poisoning the

And I said, "How?"

God said, "They touch it with their lips, when they have made a tiny wound in it with their fore-teeth they set in it that which is under their tongues; they close it with their lip-that no man may see the place, and pass on.

I said to God, "Why do they do it?" God said, "That another may not eat.' I said to God, "But if they poison all then none dare eat; what do they gain ?" God said, "Nothing."

I said, "Are they not afraid they may themselves Lite where another has bitten ?"

They are afraid. In Hell

God said, "They all men are afraid."

And the water

He called me farther. of the lake seemed less blue. To the right among the trees were men