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From Cairo we take the railway to Ismailia, the little town situated midway on the Suez Canal, between the two seas, at the Bitter Lakes, through which the course of the canal runs. It is a pretty and attractive place, containing four or five thousand inhabitants, and is a creation of the last few years.
At the same time, the new headquarters of the Eastern Force came into existence at Ismailia under the command of Lieut.-General Sir Charles Dobell, K.C.B., C.M.G., D.S.O., under whose direction thus came more immediately the operations in the eastern desert. This review of the advance across the desert has of necessity been superficial.
Arriving at Port Said, the fleet sailed up the Suez Canal to Ismailia, which they occupied without resistance, and the troops at once began to land. On the 24th an advance was made on Ismailia, and at a distance of seven miles the enemy was encountered. The force was not sufficient to attack the enemy, but an artillery fire was kept up hotly all day.
All that day the town had been perturbed by rumours of a great battle fought at Kassassin in the desert east of Ismailia. Messengers had raced ceaselessly through the streets, shouting tidings of victory and tidings of disaster. There had been a charge by moonlight of General Drury-Lowe's Cavalry Brigade, which had rolled up Arabi's left flank and captured his guns.
Among the cities he built in the Delta were Ramses and Pithom. Pithom, or Pa-Tum, is now marked by the mounds of Tel el-Maskhuta, on the line of railway between Ismailîa and Zagazig; it lay at the eastern extremity of Qoshem or Goshen, in the district of Succoth. Like Ramses, it had been built by Israelitish labour, for the free-born Israelites of Goshen had been turned into royal serfs.
The centre part of each vessel was crowded with a large number of Dutch or German boys, going out as soldiers to Acheen, who certainly did not appear to be enjoying their voyage. We passed Chaloux and reached Ismailia just at nine o'clock, not without considerable effort on the part of the pilot.
A territory extending from the brook of Jabbok on the north to the brook of Arnon on the south, from the Jordan Valley on the west to the Arabian desert on the east; railways running up from the sea at Haifâ, and down from Damascus, and southward to the Gulf of Akabah, and across to Ismailia on the Suez Canal; a government of local autonomy guaranteed and protected by the Sublime Porte; sufficient capital supplied by the Jewish bankers of London and Paris and Berlin and Vienna; and the outcasts of Israel gathered from all the countries where they are oppressed, to dwell together in peace and plenty, tending sheep and cattle, raising fruit and grain, pressing out wine and oil, and supplying the world with the balm of Gilead such was Oliphant's beautiful dream.
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