This volume was written and in the printer's hands when an article by a Mr E. N. Bennett appeared in the columns of The Contemporary Review, entitled "After Omdurman." That gentleman made a series of grave charges reflecting upon the Anglo-Egyptian arms, not only during the Khartoum Expedition, but also on their conduct in Egypt and the Soudan since 1882. In the Daily Telegraph and elsewhere I have deservedly stigmatised Mr Bennett's allegations as untrue, stupid, and wantonly mischievous.

In the pages of The Khartoum Campaign, 1898, can be read the detailed version of events which happened in the field "before" as well as "after" Omdurman. I venture to think that abundant refutation will be found in the Work of most of Mr Bennett's scandalous assertions. Although it may seem to lend further temporary importance to what that gentleman has written, as his accusations were made public under the cover of a respectable magazine, perhaps a few words more may not be out of place.

Mr Bennett's article was seemingly framed on the specious pretext of, under a discussion of the principles of international law, questions of belligerency, Geneva Convention rules, and so forth, to base thereon a claim for the treatment of dervishes as combatants entitled to all the amenities of civilised warfare. Several pages of his composition are given up to treating upon that matter. For instance, he says—"Moreover, it is worth remembering that the dervishes were not 'savages' in the sense in which the word is applied to the followers of a Lobengula or a Samory. On the contrary, they satisfied all the requirements for recognition as an armed force." Now, that is an aspersion upon Lobengula and Samory in particular. For unredeemed devilishness, the dervishes have had no equals. The fact is, that the Mahdists made it a constant practice to ruthlessly slaughter all prisoners in battle, wounded or unwounded; to enslave, torture, or murder their enemies, active or passive; to loot and to burn; to slay children and debauch women. To set up a pretext that such monsters are entitled to the grace and consideration of the most humane laws, is to beggar commonsense and yap intolerable humbug. Yet British self-respect was such, Mr Bennett to the contrary notwithstanding, that the dervishes were treated as men, and not as wild beasts.

Started upon his false pursuit, Mr Bennett proceeds from error to error, abounding in reckless misstatements, atrocious imputations, and scattering charges void of truth. As briefly as possible, I will deal with his accusations. One of his first deliverances is as follows:—"It is, of course, an open secret that in all our Soudan battles the enemy's wounded have been killed. The practice has, ever since the days of Tel-el-Kebir, become traditional in Soudanese warfare. After the battle of Atbara, it was announced that 3000 dervishes had been killed. There was practically no mention of the wounded.... How, then, was it that no wounded were accounted for at the Atbara?" Again he writes:—"But I cannot help thinking that if the killing of the wounded had been sternly repressed at Tel-el-Kebir and during the earlier Soudan campaigns, our dervish enemies would have learned to expect civilised treatment," etc. Gaining courage, probably from his own audacity, Mr Bennett had the hardihood to virtually declare that the cruelties permitted by British officers made the dervishes what they were.

Now, I went through the 1882 war in Egypt as well as most of the campaigns in the Soudan. I am therefore in a better position than he to declare, that his allegations are a perversion of the truth. It was neither the practice at Tel-el-Kebir nor subsequent thereto for British led troops to kill wounded men. The insinuation that they did so, or connived at such slaughter, is a stupid or a malicious falsehood. In every battle within the period referred to, large numbers of wounded and unwounded prisoners were taken, and invariably great lenience was shown. Surgical treatment also was, whenever possible, always promptly rendered. Indeed, they were in countless cases treated as tenderly as our own wounded. This further: in action there are no soldiers less prone to needless blood-spilling, or men readier to forgive and forget, than "Tommy Atkins." Official returns exist setting at rest the fiction about Tel-el-Kebir and the Soudan battles. At Tel-el-Kebir many thousand prisoners were made, and in other engagements our hands were always full of dervish wounded. At El Teb, Tamai, Abu Klea, Abu Kru, Gemaizeh, Atbara, and elsewhere, wounded dervishes fell into our hands, and received every attention from the medical staff. And in some of these actions our troops were themselves in sore straits. Several hundred dervishes were picked up within and without the Atbara dem, including the leader Mahmoud and his two cousins. Be it remembered, our troops only remained there a few hours, marching back to the Nile.

Still further abominable charges Mr Bennett lays at the door of his countrymen who command British and Khedivial troops. The Sirdar himself is included in his rigmarole of accusations. But whether dealing with particulars or the general course of events, Mr Bennett discloses that he has scarcely a nodding acquaintanceship with truth. He has said:—"This wholesale slaughter was not confined to Arab servants," i.e., killing wounded dervishes. "The Soudanese seemed to revel in the work, and continually drove their bayonets through men who were absolutely unconscious.... This unsoldierly work was not even left to the exclusive control of the black troops; our British soldiers took part in it."

On whatever ground Mr Bennett may seek to support these assertions, they are unwarranted and untruthful libels. There was no wholesale slaughter of wounded dervishes, nor was there anything done in the least justifying or providing a decent pretext for that ferocious accusation. Very many thousands of dervish wounded fell into our hands that day and later. Officers have written to the press, denying these charges and the rest of Mr Bennett's tale of monstrosity. The Sirdar himself has confirmed by a personal cablegram my refutation of them. Here is another of Mr Bennett's suggestions of evil-doing, by innuendo and assertion:—"It was stated that orders had been given to kill the wounded." And, "If the Sirdar really believes that the destruction of the wounded was a military necessity," etc. Can colossal crassness go further? There is not and never was a scintilla of truth for the charge of wholesale slaughtering of wounded dervishes, nor that the Sirdar ever issued such an order, or that any reputable person ever received it, or ever had it hinted to him. The accusation is an unmitigated untruth, and absolutely at variance with all that was said and done by the Sirdar before and during the course of the battle and the pursuit. I certainly never heard of the matter until Mr Bennett made the accusation, and I cannot trace its authorship beyond himself. From the Sirdar down, contradictions of the charge have deservedly been slapped in Mr Bennett's face.

But it is almost sheer waste of words to follow and refute line by line the article "After Omdurman." Other of Mr Bennett's accusations were: that the 21st Lancers, on the way to the front, robbed hen-roosts and stricken villagers; that once in Omdurman the Soudanese troops abandoned discipline, looted, ravished, and murdered the whole night long; that on land and water our cannon and Maxims were deliberately turned upon unarmed flying inhabitants, massacring, without pity, men, women, and children. An these charges had been true, I should have hastened to denounce the culprits, whoever they were, in the interests of humanity and country. Happily, Mr Bennett's tale is utterly without foundation, whatever reflection that casts upon his condition. The Lancers passed through nothing but deserted villages, where there were neither natives nor roosts to rob, even had they been so disposed. As for the Soudanese troops, their discipline throughout was perfect; there was no looting, no ravishing nor murder done by them or any other divisions of the soldiery. Nor did our gunners on shore or afloat ever fire upon unarmed people. Let it be recalled that those whom Mr Bennett so flippantly accuses are honourable gentlemen and fellow-countrymen. Three things in this connection are worthy of special note. When the first dervish attack upon our zereba was repulsed and Wad Melik's dead, dying and shamming warriors carpeted the north slopes of Jebel Surgham and the plain in front. "Cease fire" was sounded. Thereafter the dervishes arose from the ground in hundreds and thousands and walked off, without awakening a renewal of our fire from cannon, Maxims, or rifles. At the entry into Omdurman the artillery and gunboats were ordered to be careful how they fired, and grave risks were incurred by the Sirdar and staff in personally counselling to friend and foe a cessation of fighting.

Inaccuracy and sensationalism Mr Bennett is welcome to, and to the sort of notoriety it has brought him. Cheap maudlin sentiment may profess a pity for those "dervish homes ruined" by the successes of British arms. The dervishes in their day had no homes. Nay, they made honest profession that their mission was to destroy other people's, and do without carking domesticity, as that detracted from the merit of preparation for paradise. As I have elsewhere said, one of the "fads" of the day is to hold that liberalism of mind is always characterised by being a friend to every country and race but your own. Exact truth is as illusive to discovery by that as other pernicious methods. That there may have been one or two instances of cruelty practised on the battle-field is possible. Something of the kind always takes place in warfare as in everyday life. But only the amateur would magnify a few instances into a catalogue of charges. Alas! you cannot eliminate from armies, any more than from ordinary communities, the foolish, insane, and criminal.

THE AUTHOR.