On the 29th April, Lieutenant-General F. C. A. Stephenson was appointed to the command of the Army of Occupation, in succession to Sir Archibald Alison.
Lord Dufferin left the carrying out of his scheme of Egyptian reform in the able hands of Sir Evelyn Baring, and returned to Constantinople on the 3rd May.[88]
CHAPTER XXVIII.
OPERATIONS AGAINST THE MAHDI.
The situation in the Soudan at the period referred to at the close of Chapter XXVI. was, it must be confessed, critical enough, and it is not surprising that, on the 7th November, 1882, Lord Granville caused the Khedive to be informed that the British Government were unwilling to take any responsibility in regard to it. Left to their own resources, the Egyptian Government had no alternative but to re-enlist about 10,000 of Arabi's old officers and men for service in the South.
Early in November the collection of these soldiers and their concentration at the Barrage, near Cairo, began. Most of them had to be brought in chains, and desertions were frequent. They were transported by detachments to Berber, viâ Souakim, their arms and ammunition being sent separately. Altogether, 9,500 were collected and despatched.
Most of these troops were deplorably ignorant of all notions of drill, and were little more than an armed mob. Their officers were no better. Many of them had been engaged in the recent operations in Lower Egypt, which did not tend to increase their military spirit. Others looked on service in the Soudan as a sentence of death, and deemed that the Khedive's purpose in sending them was to get rid of them. Considering, also, the superstitious notions which many of them had of the power and invincibility of the Mahdi, and of the valour of his savage followers, it can hardly be supposed that the new levies were such as to inspire confidence, or that to advance with such a rabble was to court anything else but defeat.
The first thing to be done was to try to teach them something. They were, for this purpose, isolated from the town in a camp on the western bank of the Nile. Here Abdel Kader devoted himself personally to giving them instruction in drill, teaching them to fire and lecturing their officers.
Meanwhile, on the 11th November, the Mahdi sent Amr-el-Makashef to attack Duem, on the west bank of the White Nile. After some delay, the Mahdist forces arrived before the town. The garrison telegraphed for assistance, and a battalion of the newly arrived levies was sent to their relief, but, owing to a dispute amongst the native officers in command, it effected nothing, and Duem was left to take its chance.
After this failure, it is not surprising that Abdel Kader telegraphed to the Egyptian Government, requesting that some European officers might be placed at his disposal, and on 16th December, Colonel Stewart and two other British officers arrived at Khartoum. They found that place quiet, but Obeid and Bara were still unrelieved, and Abdel Kader was standing out for seven additional battalions before he would advance to their assistance.