Suez Mail News.

Thames Star, Volume XIII, Issue 4348, 7 December 1882, Page 3

Suez Mail News.

• ■-THB-lIG-HT AT TEL-EL-KEBIR. 'V Colonel.iTalbot's description of the moonlight cavalry charge at. Tel«el-Kebir is worth transcribing:—"We marched along the line of sand ridges, an occasional order to trot alone breaking the - silence. We must hare marched five or six miles, when it was broken by the boom of a gun and the hissing of a shell. General Lowe shortly ordered our guns to unlimbet and reply, and the 7th Dragoon Guards to clear the front of' our guns, which they did by retiring, making us the first line. The HoiMeiiold Cavalry continued to advance at a walk, when in a moment became visible'a white line of infantry in our immediate front, which opened a tremendous fire upon us. Not a moment was to be lost: ' Form front in two lines!' 'Draw swords!' 'Charge!' and*, we were upon them. Until we got'within a hundred yards they continued to fire; but in one moment the brilliant light from the firing line, the rattle of the^re, and the whirring of the bullets ceased ; the white line had faced about, and was in flight. We road them down in jrolid rank; but, as they dispersftdv^'wy opened out and pursued. They fell like ninepins, many of them unwounded, who fired and stabbed cur horses as we galloped past them. We charged for three hundred yards; then Ewart called out, ♦ Bally !' and we set to * work to collect our men. ... I can

imagine no more splended sight than this moonlight charge of our fine fellows on their dark horses against the guns, sup* ported, bj the white line of infantry, whose fire was so brilliant in the night that it looked just like the lighting of some grand pyrotechnic display." The following is'ft letter from a youngster Who ' had not been gazetted more than three . monthf:—"Jost as the sky was beginning to gray, some Bedouins were seen in full flight in front of the 74th, who immediately fired on them. Then, all of a /sadden, tremendous fire was opened on us along the whole line at about 800 yards. We advanced as fast as we could. At 200 yards there was no holding the ■ men/ We charged, cheering as loud as , . we could; and reached the whole line. Just in front of my company was a bastion of eleven Krapp guns. We crossed the v ditch, and climbed the parapet somehow I don't know how. We found about ' 100 gnnners inside, fully armed. I killed four myself, and have been sorry for it ever since; bat if I hadn't they would have done the same with me, and I preferred the former. When we got through the bastion we found little opposition, the enemy being in full flight! > BKITISH INFANTRY IN ACTION. In his despatch giving an account of the battle "at Tel-el-Kebir' Siir Garnet Wolseley says :—" Ido not believe that at any previous period of our military history has the British Infantry disiin I guished itself more than upon this occasion. I have heard it said of our present Infantry Begiments that the men are too young, and their training for manoeuvring - and for fighting, and their powers of endurance, are not sufficient for the requirements of modern war. After a trial of an exceptionally severe kind; both in - 1 movement and attack, I can say emphatically, that I never wish to have under mt orders better infantry battalions than those whom I am proud to have comguided it Tel el-Kebir.

[ Contemporary records of Egyptian ! history exist as far back as the time of Senophern, a monarch of the third dynasty. T This king ruled 1100 years before the birth of Abraham, 2200 years before the siege of Troy, and 2600 jears before the foundation of Rome. And at that time the religion of Egypt was giving, ruling power. Religion was the principle of national life in Egypt, and permeated the whole being of the people. Regarded with a view to its spiritual conten f, it seems to have embodied, together with a vast pantheon deities, some esoteric ideas of a supreme and sole God.