“How many got into us, Stephen?” asked the general, tapping his snuff-box.

“I should put them down at a thousand or twelve hundred, sir.”

“I did not see any get out again.  What the devil were the Wessex thinking about?  The Guards stood well, though; so did the Mallows.”

“Colonel Flanagan reports that his front flank company was cut off, sir.”

“Why, that’s the company that was out of hand when we advanced!”

“Colonel Flanagan reports, sir, that the company took the whole brunt of the attack, and gave the square time to re-form.”

“Tell the Hussars to ride forward, Stephen,” said the general, “and try if they can see anything of them.  There’s no firing, and I fear that the Mallows will want to do some recruiting.  Let the square take ground by the right, and then advance!”

But the Sheik Kadra of the Hadendowas saw from his knoll that the men with the big hats had rallied, and that they were coming back in the quiet business fashion of men whose work was before them.  He took counsel with Moussa the Dervish and Hussein the Baggara, and a woestruck man was he when he learned that the third of his men were safe in the Moslem Paradise.  So, having still some signs of victory to show, he gave the word, and the desert warriors flitted off unseen and unheard, even as they had come.

A red rock plateau, a few hundred spears and Remingtons, and a plain which for the second time was strewn with slaughtered men, was all that his day’s fighting gave to the English general.

It was a squadron of Hussars which came first to the spot where the rebel flag had waved.  A dense litter of Arab dead marked the place.  Within, the flag waved no longer, but the rifle stood in the mimosa bush, and round it, with their wounds in front, lay the Fenian private and the silent ranks of the Irishry.  Sentiment is not an English failing, but the Hussar captain raised his hilt in a salute as he rode past the blood-soaked ring.

The British general sent home dispatches to his Government, and so did the chief of the Hadendowas, though the style and manner differed somewhat in each.

The Sheik Kadra of the Hadendowa people to Mohammed Ahmed, the chosen of Allah, homage and greeting, (began the latter).  Know by this that on the fourth day of this moon we gave battle to the Kaffirs who call themselves Inglees, having with us the Chief Hussein with ten thousand of the faithful.  By the blessing of Allah we have broken them, and chased them for a mile, though indeed these infidels are different from the dogs of Egypt, and have slain very many of our men.  Yet we hope to smite them again ere the new moon be come, to which end I trust that thou wilt send us a thousand Dervishes from Omdurman.  In token of our victory I send you by this messenger a flag which we have taken.  By the colour it might well seem to have belonged to those of the true faith, but the Kaffirs gave their blood freely to save it, and so we think that, though small, it is very dear to them.