[Footnote 416:  The general opinion of the army was that the charge of the Lancers “was magnificent, but was not war.”  See G.W.  Steevens’ With Kitchener to Khartum, ch. xxxii.]

Meanwhile, Macdonald’s brigade, consisting of one Egyptian and three Sudanese battalions, stood on the brink of disaster.  The bands from the Kerreri Hills were secretly preparing to charge its rear, while masses of the Khalifa’s main following turned back, rounded the western spurs of Gebel Surgham, and threatened to envelop its right flank.  The Sirdar, on seeing the danger, ordered Wauchope’s brigade to turn back to the help of Macdonald, while Maxwell’s Sudanese, swarming up the eastern slopes of Gebel Surgham, poured deadly volleys on the Khalifa’s following.  Collinson’s division and the camel corps were ordered to advance from the neighbourhood of the zariba and support Macdonald on that side.  Before these dispositions were complete, that sturdy Scotsman and his Sudanese felt the full weight of the Khalifa’s onset.  Excited beyond measure, Macdonald’s men broke into spasmodic firing as the enemy came on; the deployment into line was thereby disordered, and it needed all Macdonald’s power of command to make good the line.  His steadiness stiffened the defence, and before the potent charm of western discipline the Khalifa’s onset died away.

But now the storm cloud gathering in the rear burst with unexpected fury.  Masses of men led by the Khalifa’s son, the Sheikh ed Din, rushed down the Kerreri slopes and threatened to overwhelm the brigade.  Again there was seen a proof of the ascendancy of mind over brute force.  At once Macdonald ordered the left part of his line to wheel round, keeping the right as pivot, so that the whole speedily formed two fronts resembling a capital letter V, pointing outwards to the two hostile forces.  Those who saw the movement wondered alike at the masterly resolve, the steadiness of execution, and the fanatical bravery which threatened to make it all of no avail.  On came the white swarms of Arabs from the north, until the Sudanese firing once more became wild and ineffective; but, as the ammunition of the blacks ran low and they prepared to trust to the bayonet, the nearest unit of the British division, the Lincolns, doubled up, prolonged Macdonald’s line to the right, and poured volley upon volley obliquely into the surging flood.  It slackened, stood still, and then slowly ebbed.  Macdonald’s coolness and the timely arrival of the Lincolns undoubtedly averted a serious disaster[417].

[Footnote 417:  See Mr. Winston Churchill’s The River War, vol. ii. pp. 160-163, for the help given by the Lincolns.]