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After réveillé at 3.45 a.m., and breakfast at 4.30, the Battalion moved off at six, reaching er Rabah at 11, but not being able to move into its bivouac area till 1 p.m., after which camels had to be unloaded, fires lit and dixies boiled before tea could be served to the men.
Rabah now ordered the slave leading the two fleet dogs to keep close up and be in readiness to slip them. "We may see deer at any time now," he said. "They abound in these sandy deserts which form their shelter, and yet are within easy distance of fields where when such vegetation as is here fails them they can go for food." A few minutes later a deer started from a clump of bushes.
We remained at Mahamdiya till August 26th, occupying the inner picket line at night, and training by day. On that date the Brigade moved to er Rabah, a large palm grove, a mile or so north of Katia, which it closely resembled.
Our stay at Rabah lasted until September 11th, when we marched due west and took over a camp from the 4th R.S.F. north of Romani and close to the great landmark Katib Gannit. This was a vast pile of sand, its top 240 feet above sea level and rising a good 150 feet at a wonderfully steep angle from the minor sand dunes around it.
It is almost worth while walking a long way for the sake of the appetite one gets at the end." The meal was an excellent one. One of the slaves who had been brought was an adept at cooking, and fish, birds, and venison were alike excellent, and for once the vegetables that formed so large a portion of the ordinary Egyptian repast were neglected. "What are we going to do to-morrow, Rabah?"
There we may expect to find game of all kinds in abundance." The tents, which were made of light cloth intended to keep off the night dews rather than to afford warmth, were soon pitched, fires were lighted with fuel that had been brought with them in order to save time in searching for it, and Rabah went off to search for fish and fowl.
"For one month in the year," Rabah said, "this is a river, for eleven it is little more than a swamp, though the shallower boats can make their way up it many miles. But a little water always finds its way down, either from the Nile itself or from the canals.
The second stage of our Crusade began on October 12th, when the Battalion marched away from Katib Gannit, this time carrying packs. Officers were allowed 30 lb. valises. And in general our possessions were boiled down and the necessities of life became barer than ever. The first march, an easy one, was to Rabah, and was over by midday the Battalion furnishing pickets for that night.
Chebron, although he had kept on bravely, was fatigued with his walk and was glad to throw himself down on the sand and enjoy the prospect, which to him was a new one, for he had never before seen so wide an expanse of water. When on the top of the hill he had made out a faint dark line in the distance, and this Rabah told him was the bank of sand that separated the lake from the Great Sea.
Here and there it was dotted with dark patches which were, Rabah told him, clumps of waterfowl, and in the shallow water near the margin, which was but a quarter of a mile away, he could see vast numbers of wading birds, white cranes, and white and black ibises, while numbers of other waterfowl, looking like black specks, moved about briskly among them.
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