I slept in snatches on deck, waking every now and then to look round. The officers were sound asleep, lying in a neat row on the deck. It occurred to me that, taking into consideration the position in which they lay relative to the gun on the bank, a single shot might kill them all. So I roused them up very quietly, and bade them dispose themselves in various places. I remember how they waked with a sleepy grin, each looking for a separate corner, dropping into it and falling asleep again.
So far, our ruse had succeeded. At five o'clock the next morning (4th February) Mr. Benbow lit the fires, using the utmost caution, keeping the ash-pit draught plates almost shut, in order to prevent sparks, which would instantly betray us, from flying up the funnel. On deck, we were in suspense, all staring at the shot-riddled funnel. It kept its secret for fifty minutes; then suddenly it belched a fountain of hot ashes. It was then within ten minutes of daylight. Almost at the same moment a great shouting broke out in the fort, and a convulsive beating of tom-toms. Then the guns and rifles began to speak again.
What had happened was that when the pressure-gauge indicated 10 lb. of steam, the Arab captain of the stokers suddenly appeared at the engine-room hatch, and spoke swiftly in Arabic to his men, who, before Mr. Benbow could interfere, flung open the draught plates.
It was a close-run business. In the next ten minutes the steam had run up to 20 lb. pressure. Instantly we weighed anchor. The moment the steamer began to move, such a yell of rage went up from the Dervishes in the fort, as I never heard before or since. Leaping and screaming on the bank, they took up handfuls of sand and flung them towards us. They had thought us fled, and the steamer theirs. And there we were, and there was the steamer moving away up river towards Khartoum; and the men of Wad Habeshi were naturally disappointed.
I took the Safieh about a quarter of a mile up stream, both to confuse the enemy and to enable me to turn outside the narrow channel, and at a comparatively safe distance. Then we went about, and ran down at full speed, again concentrating our fire upon the embrasures of the fort. Once more, as we came abreast of Wad Habeshi, we turned both Gardners and both howitzers upon the embrasures, in one of which we burst a shell; while the 20 soldiers and the 14 bluejackets maintained their steady rifle fire.
We were running now with the stream instead of against it, and our speed was the greater, and we stormed past the fort without a single casualty; and then, just as we thought we were clear, lo! there was Gascoigne's hapless nuggar, stuck and helpless some 400 yards below Wad Habeshi, and in full bearing of its side embrasure. As all depended upon the safe passage of the Safieh, I ran on until we were a mile from the fort and out of its range, and then dropped anchor.
"RUNNING THE GAUNTLET."
THE ACTION OF THE "SAFIEH" AT WAD HABESHI, 14TH FEBRUARY, 1885