February 13, 1915. 
LAND AND WATER 
vehicles and could distribute water and munitions 
from such a point. As the land falls rather steeply 
down on to the level of the sea a little before the 
Pilgrims' Road reaches Suez, such an arrangement 
would have the further advantage of avoiding the 
difficulty of bringing the rails down that slope. 
A direct connection with the Mecca Railway 
past Akaba (or just round the top of its gulf), 
whereby communication might be established with 
Palestine, Syria, and the depots in the north, has 
been rightly pointed out by competent critics to be 
a task of great difficulty, and probably impossible 
in the case of such a campaign as this. And that 
for the following reason. From the Mediterranean 
Sea to the southern point of the Sinaitic Peninsula 
the land gradually rises up to the ridge marked on 
the sketch, d, d, d, d, d, which (if there were any 
water to speak of in that land) might be called 
" the watershed." This stretch rising up^rom the 
Mediterranean is the desert of El Tih, diversified 
by several groups of high hills, but distinct from 
the great limestone peaks in the southern triangle 
beyond. 
These have been compared in their for- 
mation to the Alps, and they occupy all the tongue 
of the Peninsula, shaded upon the sketch-map with 
cross hatching. It is in the heart of this latte* 
formation that the Jeb-el-Musa, or Hill of Moses, 
stands, which is traditionally identified by many 
with Sinai — much where 1 have marked upon the 
sketch the letter X. Now, the consequence of this 
formation is that from and above Akaba there is 
a deep gorge. The edge, or escarpment, of the 
Sinaitic plateau runs along the line e, e, e, e, e; 
and it so happens that immediately upon the other 
side of Akaba, along the line b,;b, b, b, you have 
another escarpment rising steeply towards the 
Arabian Desert. So that, to establish a line from 
the existing railway along the Pilgrims' Road, 
even if you took it round so far from the sea that 
it was nowhere in danger by fire from that quarter, 
you would have to build for the crossing of the 
Ghor, the profound trench 3,000 feet in depth be- 
tween the cliffs at b, b, b, b and the opposing cliffs 
at e, e, e, e. It is exceedingly unlikely, or rather, it 
is impossible, that the enemy should attempt this ; 
but it is conceivable, though not perhaps probable, 
that he might attempt the laying of a line of 
narrow-gauge field railway up the Wadi-el-Arish, 
as I have suggested. 
The attack with which the Egyptian garrison 
has just dealt struck at two and perhaps three 
points, marked upon the accompanying sketch, A, 
B, and perhaps C, of which A is El Kantara, the 
end of the northern, or sea, road, B the most im- 
portant Toussoum, just south of the Ismailia lake, 
and C the slight skirmish reported north of Suez. 
The shaded portions along the line of the Canal re- 
present areas where water in greater or less width 
prevents immediate access. The main attack near 
Ismailia at B had the advantage that it threatened 
the junction between the lateral railway of the 
Canal and the railway to Cairo. To attack at the 
point A had the advantage that the invading troops 
had marched by the shortest route — the age-long 
sea-road of all invasions from the Levantine coast 
to Egypt. The attack near C — if it was in any 
force, or was correctly reported — would mean that 
some portions of the enemy had already used the 
Pilgrims' Road ; this point has the advantage that 
it is the nearest point to Cairo. 
But it matters little where the Canal is crossed 
so long as it is effectively crossed at amj point ; and 
its molestation is possible, and might be long con- 
tinued, without its crossing being effected at all. 
Prisoners have already given accounts of the 
roads by which they came (the northern road is so 
far reported only), but we have not yet sufficient 
evidence of which of the three possible routes will 
be, or has been, taken by the main force. It is 
probable, or certain, that this first attempt was 
made by three separate bodies coming by ivarious 
routes, or at least by the southern and the northern 
routes simultaneously. From the same source — 
the statements of prisoners — we have evidence that 
depots of water are established somewhat to the 
east of the Canal, upon which depots it is hoped 
that a fairly continuous presence of troops may 
depend. But the whole of this evidence is still so 
fragmentary that nothing certain can be based 
upon it. 
As the reader will observe if he looks at the 
sketch published in these comments some week3 
ago, and here reproduced, regular fresh-water 
supply is not obtainable until the western bank of 
the Canal is reached. There there is a sweet water 
canal fed from the Nile. It was further remarked 
in the article then printed, that the best chance 
of a crossing would obviously be where the banks 
were high, the passage of the water narrow (a 
minimum of 180 feet), and cover from the fire of 
ships in the Canal most easily obtainable. These 
conditions are combined, or rather the height of 
the Sand Dunes suggests them, opposite Tous- 
soum, where the strongest attack appears to have 
been made. 
One last point is noteworthy in connection 
with these attacks on the Canal and those which 
are likely to succeed it : which is, that the enemy 
are apparently depending here upon mixed and 
inferior material for their recruitment. If ever 
they should be able to bring, by petrol traffic, fairly 
heavy pieces to threaten the Canal, and should de- 
pend upon the fire of such pieces, the compara- 
tively small number of men upon whose efficiency 
the action of those pieces must depend would ren- 
der the problem of recruitment for this army less 
acute ; but so far as its main forces are concerned, 
a large proportion of them are Syrian in origin, 
in some measure disaffected, and, as we are told 
by those who have had opportunities for personally 
judging the matter, poor material. We have also 
in the official information from Egypt the remark 
that the collapse of the Turkish attack was accom- 
panied by a certain measure of voluntary deser- 
tion, especially from this same Syrian element. 
THE ACTION AT BOLIMOW. 
Next let us turn to the violent assault de-« 
livered this week upon the Russian lines defend- 
ing Warsaw. 
Although the movement resulting upon it has 
been slight, the attack made by von Hindenbcrg 
upon the lines of the Bzura and the Rawka was 
not without its importance, both as evidence of the 
enemy's condition here, and as an appreciable suc- 
cess for our Ally. 
The ground is already familiar to those who 
have followed the sketch-maps published in these 
comments. The front of the Bzura and its little 
tributary the Rawka runs about three days' march 
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