The Arabs as Fighting Men.

Te Aroha News, Volume II, Issue 97, 11 April 1885, Page 5

The Arabs as Fighting Men.

Wabs are not made with rose-water, and it is impossible to march troops into that "sepulchre of armies," the Soudan, without exposing them to risk of casualties. Nevertheless, the deoimation of the gallant little force with which General Stewart is plunging across the desert to the Nile has produced a very painful impression, which no description of the courage and heroism of our soldiers can entirely romovet This is the second time that a British square has been broken in the Soudan, and although the sterling qualities of our men were more conclusively proved by the way in which they rallied^ after the Arabs were in their midst than if they had never allowed them to penetrate their ranks, it is not right that British aquases should be broken by Africans. The French could not do it at Waterloo, and the Soudanese could not have done it either at Tamasi or at Abu Klea but for some mistake—due, probably, in both cases to overeagernees. At Tamasi the front of the advancing square rushed forward too rapidly for its right flank to keep pace with it, and the Arabs, seizing their opportunity, swarmed into the opening in the shoulder of the square. At Abu Klea, Lord Wolseley says that the square broke by sheer weight of numbers. Supposing 10,000 men in all attacked, if 5,000 of them concentrated their rush upon the rear face, this would re« present a weight of human flesh and blood of nearly 300 tons, a tolerably heavy bpdy to be hurled with a momentum of ten miles an hour upon a thin line of 500 men. But 5,000 men do not move together solid, and breech-loaders, to say nothing of the Gardner gun, ought to have kept them off. The real reason is probably that given by the special correspondents. "The onset was so rapid that the skirmishers had scarcely time to reach the square " before the enemy fell in force upon the heavy ! dragoons, who, instead of standing in line, " had broken forward in the endeavour to fire on the rebels." Whatever may have been the mistake, they paid for it dearly, and retrieved their fault by hardest fighting against the greatest odds. No praise can be too high for the coolness with which the little handful of men maintained the honour of the English name against overwhelming numbers of one of the bravest races in the world. From General Stewart, to the humblest private "groom fought like noble, squire like knight, as fearlessly and well," and the fanaticism of the desert was shattered on the solid ranks of those who far off in the Bayuda Desert attested with their blood their allegiance to duty. Nor can any Englishman refuse to pay a tribute of respect and admiration to those brave sons of the desert who charged upon the British square with a heroism recalling the traditional valour of the Saracens, in whom our crusading ancestors found foes well worthy of their steel. We need not grudge them the glory of their fate in perishing before the irresistible hail of the breechloaders of the infidel ; but we may venture to hape that such splendid material for a sepoy army will before long be moulded into a force which under our direction will establish an English peace from Dongola and Suakim to the great equitorial lakes. The discovery that the Mahdi's men fight as bravely on the west side of the Nile as they do on the hills before Suakim is a very [ unwelcome revelation of the difficulties with which we have to contend. But if General Gordon, with nothing but his own indomitable and resourceful courage to aid him, has succeeded in holding the Mahdi and all his herdes at bay at Khartoum, there ought to be no serious difficulty in making our way with such a force as that which Lord Wolseley commands from one end of the continent to the other. Of course, our difficulty is enormously increased by the religious enthusiasm of the Soudanese. A good fighting faith for which you are not afraid to die, and for which all your neighbours are ready to die in heaps, is about the strongest thing in this world, and the nearest equivalent to Vril that the mind can conceive. Before the Mahdi arose to fire these poor creatures with a burning faith in his divine mission, they could be lorded over by the rabble of the delta. Now they shatter English squares, and still stand erect and defiant, daring the thunderbolts of our empire, unconquered, and it may be unconquerable. —From the "Pall Mall Gazette," January 22nd.