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.

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