Hauled upon the rope, and
when it was safely landed, I gave it a blow with a sharp axe on the back
of the neck, which killed it by dividing the spine.
It was now dragged along the turf until we reached the camp, where it
was carefully measured with a tape, and showed an exact length of 12
feet 3 inches from snout to end of tail.
The stomach contained about five pounds' weight of pebbles, as though it
had fed upon flesh resting upon a gravel bank, and had swallowed the
pebbles that had adhered. Mixed with the pebbles was a greenish, slimy
matter that appeared woolly. In the midst of this were three undeniable
witnesses that convicted the crocodile of wilful murder. A necklace and
two armlets, such as are worn by the negro girls, were taken from the
stomach! The girl had been digested. This was an old malefactor that was
a good riddance.
I have frequently seen crocodiles upwards of eighteen feet in length,
and there can be little doubt that they sometimes exceed twenty; but a
very small creature of this species may carry away a man while swimming.
The crocodile does not attempt to swallow an animal at once, but having
carried it to a favourite feeding-place, generally in some deep hole,
it tears it limb from limb with teeth and claws and devours it at
leisure.
The camp of the "Forty Thieves" had been finished some time since: the
gardens were flourishing, and I erected a "shadoof," or Egyptian double
bucket and lever for irrigation. Two men could lift and throw out 3,600
gallons per hour. I made the calculation as nearly as possible: the iron
buckets contained slightly more than four gallons each; thus, two men
with the double shadoof lifted eight gallons every eight seconds (or one
lift in eight seconds): a gallon per second gave 3,600 per hour.
I never allowed the "Forty Thieves" to work at the general
head-quarters, but kept them as my personal escort. When at Tewfikeeyah
I had been particular in their drill, and I had endeavoured to teach
them to shoot accurately. The Egyptians became better shots than the
Soudanis, but I much preferred the latter; by degrees I drafted out all
the Egyptians excepting four, and filled their places with well-selected
blacks, mostly taken from the grenadier company of the regiment.
At the commencement of the expedition this small body of men had well
earned the title of the "Forty THIEVES" by which they were always known
among the English party, although publicly in the camp they were only
designated as "The Forty."
I had taken great personal care of this little corps, and the result was
most satisfactory. The thieves had been got rid of. I never forgave a
fault until after punishment had been received; I never allowed the
doctor to attend them when ill, but invariably attended to them myself.
I had endeavoured to instil a feeling of pride among them, and
encouraged them with an idea of their superiority to the other
regiments. I actually succeeded in establishing a code of honour
throughout the corps, until it was considered a disgrace to "The Forty"
that a theft should be committed. "Is he not one of 'The Forty'?" was
the usual exclamation if any doubt was thrown on the character of a
soldier. The fact of his belonging to "The Forty" was a sufficient
certificate.
The regimental arrangements at head-quarters had been sadly neglected,
as the men were necessarily so much engaged in other work that they had
no time for drill except on Fridays. The "Forty Thieves" were well
officered, having the advantage of a lieutenant-colonel and a captain,
together with two most active and courageous lieutenants, who had lately
received their promotion for good conduct: these were my faithful
Monsoor Agha, and Ferritch Agba. The young soldier, who had been
condemned to be shot for desertion the previous year, had shown such
devotion and activity that he was promised the next vacancy in the rank
of corporal. The non-commissioned officers were soldiers who had seen
much service, and the corps was in a highly efficient state with the
exception of the rifle practice.
While at Tewfikeeyah, having paid much attention to this all-important
point, I had instructed the officers and men personally, and I had
established prize-shooting to give an additional interest to the work.
Both officers and men now took an immense pleasure in rifle practice,
but it appeared almost impossible to make them good shots. Out of
forty-eight officers and men, I had only fifteen who could be called
real hitters; the others were only shooters.
The great difficulty was to instruct them in distances. I frequently
took them away from camp and made them guess the distance in paces from
some particular object, such as a tree, or white-ant hill. Very few of
the men had the slightest idea of this important subject; but at the
commencement, even the officers were perfectly ignorant. At length, by
constant practice at the target, varying the range from 100 to 300
yards, about a third of the corps became fair shots, and these few were
tolerably good judges of distance up to 400 yards. The colonel, Abd-el-
Kader, became an excellent shot, as he was an officer who took great
interest in his profession. The remainder of the corps shot as well as
they could, and took great pains; but although they were considered
crack marksmen by the line-regiments, their reputation would have
suffered if their deficiencies had been exposed. At any rate, they were
very dangerous with such a weapon as the snider, when firing into masses
of the enemy.
