FROM THE RANKS.

Te Aroha News, Volume VII, Issue 467, 30 April 1890, Page 5

FROM THE RANKS.

A Sergeant’s Account of Tel-el-Kebir. Ghastly Facts. (FROM OCR SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT.) London, March 7. One of the most notable articles, if not the most notable in the March “ Reviews,is a graphic account of the horrors of the Battl® of Tel-el-Kebir, related by an intelligen fc non-commissioned officer, Sergeant Palmer’ of the 79bh Highlanders. He describes all the ghastly circumstances with a simple, straightforward frankness which brings out their brutality better than the best description of the trained writer. Here are a few of the points : The March, The first march was of course our worst. The men were soft with inaction aboard ship, and the heat and drink told on them dreadfully. The scenes of it are vividlyin my memory still; how men wore knocked over by the sun and buried whore they fell; how others, falling exhausted, were borne to the adjacent railway line to await the chance of a passing train ; how the piteous yeHs of the prisoners being flogged cut the darkness like a knife. Then the mad struggle for water when the “Halt” sounded—the rush to the foul and stinking misnamed “Sweetwater Canal,” faces buried in the putrid water, men Fighting for Room to Kneel,

snatching and emptying the kettles as fast as they were filled, till at last they had to be escorted to the cooking places under the protection of guards, so that tea could be made, which with Bhip biscuit was the supper of officers and men. All night we lay in an abominable stench, the cause of which morning revealed. It came in great measure from the canal, which, as an Irishman said, was “shtiff ” with the dead bodies of camels and horses, and there were many human corpses as well. This ghastly water we were forced to drink, it was that or go without. I filtered my water-bottle full, against the day’s march ; the contents still remained the colour of mud and had a loathsome slimy taste. What of stench the canal did not yield came from the unburied bodies of horses and Egyptians that lay around the bivouac. The Captain’s Address. “Men, you are marching to-night to attack a strongly entrenched position called Tel-el-Kebir, mounting some 60 guns sweepingourlino of approach. On themarch from Nine Gun Hill there must be no smoking, the strictest silence must be kept, and unless ordered to the contrary, you are to continue the march steadily, no matter if the bullets and shells come hailstone fashion into the ranks. No bayonets are to be fixed till the order is given, and no man is to charge until the last note of tho bugle is finished. The bayonet alone is to do the work, and not a shot is to be fired until the trenches are carried. You are to fight on so long as a man stands up. Remember the country and the regiment you belong to; and fight now as fought the Highlanders of old !’ ‘ Prepare to Charge !’ The 79th had marched quite 100 yards with their rifles at the slope when the command “Prepare to charge!” was given. Down came the rifles of the front rank of the unbroken line, the “ Charge !” sounded, and as the last note of the bugle died away, a tremendous cheer was raised, the pipers struck up the slogan, and with our gallant colonel in front shouting, “Come on, the Camerons !” the ranks broke into double time, and still cheering with all their power, swept forward on the enemy’s position. One of the pipers, just as he began to play, had his bagpipes pierced by a bullet, and most discordant sounds escaped from tho wounded instrument. “ Gude faith,” cried the piper philosophically, “ but the bullet’s a deevilitch sicht better through her wame than through mine !’ “The Big Egyptian Officer.” Setting out to follow the regiment I came suddenly face to face with a big Egyptian officer, revolver in one hand, sword in the other. He fired and hit me on the right hand, but the bullet glanced off a ring I wore, and I rushed ab him with a bayonet. He warded ofl my first thrust and my second ; I then feinted, he swung his sword round for tho parry and had not time to recover it before the bayonet was in him. A pull on a blue seal hanging from his tunic brought to light a silver watch, which I still keep as a remembrance of him. “You Ungrateful Brute.” The first wounded man I attended to was an Egyptian whose moans were piteous, and on examination I found him severly wounded in tho belly. I poured some eau deColognedown his throat, arid used my own surgical bandage to bind up his wound so as to keep the flies from it. Then I lib a cigarette, put it in his mouth, placed more beside him, and gave him a drink of water. He kissed my hand, and muttered something about “Allah.” I had nob left him far when I heard the crack of a rifle, and a bullet whizzed by my ear. Looking round I saw the smoke of the shot drifting away from where my wounded man lay, and noticed that he was quietly taking aim at me again. He had time to fire a second shot, which also missed me, before I reached him, and I had no compunction in driving the life out of him with my bayonet, remarking to myself as I took the weapon out of him for the last time, “ You won’t come that game any more, you ungrateful brute!” Many such instances of this treacherous hate occurred. “ Potage ” v. “ Cikage.” When in the Egyptian camp I came across some little tin boxes labelled with a word which I hurriedly read as “ potage.” Some of the tins I brought in, and, promising my comrades a treat, I had a kettleful of water boiled, and emptied into it tho contents of the tins. After a good stirring the supposed Boup was served out. The first comment was thab it was curiously black. When it was cool enough to be tasted the wry faces made over it were a caution, and there was a roar of “ Blacking, by !” Blacking it was; the label which I had read “potage” was actually “enrage." :