The Sultan's Daughter (24 page)

The Bedouin continued to harass the column from its flanks and frustration added to the torments of the troops, for there was no ammunition apart from what each man carried, and that had to be husbanded against a pitched battle with the Mamelukes, so they were under strict orders not to return the Arabs' fire. Now and again men screamed with agony as they were stung by scorpions and a number of the weaker actually died of thirst or sunstroke.

At last, parched, blistered, their skin drawn taut over their cheek-bones and their eyes starting from their heads, they reached Rahmaniyeh and the Nile. Croaking and delirious, they swarmed down the bank to lap up the blessed water; some flung themselves fully clothed into the river and were drowned.

For a few days Bonaparte allowed the Army to rest at
Rahmaniyeh. While there, its lot was somewhat ameliorated by limitless water and great quantities of both luscious water-melons and wheat, although there were no mills to grind the corn into flour. On the 13th, learning that the Mamelukes were massing further up the river, Bonaparte ordered a resumption of the march. On the following day they reached the village of Chebreïss.

There the Army had its first serious encounter with the enemy. Murad Bey had assembled some three thousand of his cavalry on the left bank of the river up which Bonaparte was advancing. The Bey had also posted forces of his auxiliaries on both banks and had brought seven Turkish gunboats down from Cairo. The French flotilla, that had come up from Rosetta under a naval officer named Perrée, had on board, in addition to the unmounted cavalry, all the non-military personnel, and had been ordered to keep pace with the march of the troops on land. However it got too far ahead, so was first in contacting the enemy, and was so roughly handled by the Turkish gunboats that it was forced to retreat.

Bonaparte then arrived on the scene with his five Divisions. Each was marching in a square, with infantry six deep on all sides, the artillery at the corners and such mounted men as there were in the centre. As the Mamelukes drew near, the squares halted in positions enabling them to support one another by flanking fire. In great clouds of dust, yelling like fiends, Murad's splendid cavalry charged the squares, first discharging their pistols, then waving aloft their flashing scimitars. But the disciplined fire of the French was a thing they had never before met. Many of them went down in the first charge, the remainder rode round the squares in confusion, small bodies of them attacking again and again with great bravery; but they were driven off and, after this one bloody encounter, they retired into the desert, having lost over three hundred men.

The French were greatly heartened, for they had withstood the terrible onslaught yet sustained very few casualties. But when the march was again resumed a renewal of their hardships caused fresh outbreaks of discontent. It began to be generally said that Bonaparte had allowed himself to be
made a fool of by the Directors; that they had fired his imagination with lying tales about the riches of Egypt, in order to get rid of him; that the fabled Cairo did not exist, except perhaps as a collection of mud huts.

Now that they were marching up the bank of the Nile at least there was no shortage of water, and they could cool their weary bodies each evening by bathing in the river when the column halted. But the more water they drank the more they sweated, so that the dye from their uniforms began to stain their skins. Food for such numbers also continued to be a terrible problem, for meat was almost unobtainable and melons gave no sustenance. The only thing procurable in quantity was wheat, but there were neither mills to grind it nor ovens to bake it into bread; so they were reduced to pounding the grain on stones with their musket butts, making a mash by adding a little water and chewing the resulting uncooked mess.

The sands they trod seemed red hot. Out of a brassy sky the sun blazed down on their backs, myriads of flies appeared from nowhere and crawled over their sweating faces, the dust raised by thousands of marching feet choked and blinded them. Roger cursed the name of Talleyrand for having caused him to come on this ghastly expedition; the rest of the Army cursed that of Bonaparte.

On July 21st, after seven consecutive days of tramping through this living hell, they came in sight of the minarets of Cairo and the Pyramids. The city lay on the opposite bank of the river, the Pyramids some miles ahead of them and a little to the right. Between them and the triangular man-made mountains of stone lay Embabeh, a village that had been converted by the Mamelukes into a great, entrenched camp that ran down to the river bank. There, Murad Bey had mustered his whole force to give battle.

His rival, the crafty Ibrahim, had assembled his legions on the city side of the river. Later he said that he had expected the French to attack up both banks, but it was thought possible that he had hoped that Murad's men and Bonaparte's would each destroy so many of the others that he would become master of the situation without having fired a shot.

Nevertheless, even without his jealous compatriot, Murad's force was truly formidable. It consisted of not fewer than ten thousand Mameluke cavalry, their twenty thousand Coptic helots and several thousand Arab auxiliaries. In addition the Turkish Viceroy, refusing to believe Bonaparte's declaration that he had come to Egypt as the Sultan's friend only to oust the Mamelukes, had sent his Janissaries to Murad's aid.

The seething mass of helots had been armed and, twenty deep, formed a living barrier behind the shallow earthworks that had been thrown up in front of the village. At frequent intervals along the line were cannon, brought out from the city and manned by the Turks. The Arabs, on their racing camels, were stationed on the inland flank with their backs towards the Pyramids, ready to come in and massacre the wounded. In the centre, a mile-long host of Mamelukes—the lineal descendants of Saladin's chivalry who had driven the Crusaders from the Holy Land—cavorted on their splendid Arab steeds, their bronze casques, scimitars and rich equipment glittering in the sun. Each man was armed with a pair of pistols and a dagger in his girdle, a second pair of pistols in his saddle holsters, a battle-axe hanging from the saddle and a scimitar ground to such sharpness that it would cut a thread of silk.

The five Divisions of the French Army again advanced in squares. That of Desaix on the extreme right faced the Pyramids. Then came Reynier's; Dugua's was in the centre and those of Vial and Bon were opposite Embabeh. The General-in-Chief and his Staff occupied the middle of the centre square. Galloping up and down, his eyes flashing with the light of battle, Bonaparte strengthened the morale of his troops by crying to them, ‘Soldiers! Remember that from the summit of the Pyramids forty centuries look down upon you.'

While still out of cannon shot he then surveyed the enemy's positions through his telescope. Noting that the Turkish guns were fortress pieces without wheels, so could not be manoeuvred during the battle, he temporarily held back his left and ordered his right to advance, with the object of outflanking Murad and driving his cavalry back so that it should mask the Turkish cannon. Desaix's Division, supported
by Reynier's, went forward at the quick step towards a cluster of palm trees with some mud huts among them. But Murad proved no mean opponent. Realising Bonaparte's intention, he launched eight thousand of his cavalry upon the right flank of the French Army. Next moment the ground shook to the thunder of thirty-two thousand hoofbeats.

Officers who were there that day and lived to fight through all Napoleon's campaigns afterwards declared that no cavalry charge before or since ever equalled the onslaught of the Mamelukes. The belief that those who die in battle go straight to the delights of Allah's Paradise made them completely fearless. Although the foremost fell by the hundred, mown down by the musket balls and grape-shot from the guns of the French, the following ranks leapt their horses over the great swathe of dead and dying and flung their mounts and themselves upon the squares. They gave no quarter and expected none. Yet their valour was in vain. The French stood firm and neither square broke.

As the survivors wheeled away Desaix and Reynier advanced to carry out the turning movement. Bonaparte then ordered Vial and Bon to attack the entrenchments. Elated by their comrades' heroic stand, the two Divisions formed column and streamed forward cheering wildly. The Turkish cannon were old and ill-aimed; several of them blew up. The enormous rabble of helots, the majority of whom were armed only with spears, flails and billhooks, read death in the fierce faces of the veterans of Italy. Flinging down their weapons, they fled. There ensued a massacre. Many of the remaining Mamelukes were driven in upon the terrified helots and, rather than surrender, at least a thousand of them rode their horses straight into the river where, weighed down by their heavy equipment, they were drowned.

The Battle of the Pyramids lasted barely half an hour. During it Bonaparte had sat his horse impassively in the centre of the square formed by Dugua's Division. He had not found it necessary to employ it. Not a man in it had done more than fire a few shots.

The loot collected from the corpses on the battlefield was enormous. The scimitars and daggers of the Mamelukes were beautifully chased and inlaid with gold, while many were set
with precious stones. Their casques, girdles and the harness of their horses were also embellished with gems, and their pistols had silver barrels. As a protection against sabre cuts, each man was wrapped in layer after layer of rich silk shawls and, as they always carried their wealth with them, there were, in their saddle-bags, purses containing anything up to three hundred gold pieces. The French despoiled such dead as were to be seen and then for days afterwards fished in the river with stout hooks to draw up other bodies, for it was reckoned that on average the equipment of a Mameluke was worth ten thousand francs.

Bonaparte was naturally pleased that after the demands he had made on his men they should reap this rich reward, but he was even more pleased at the capture of many hundred magnificent horses on which to mount his cavalry, and about the same number of camels which would be useful for a baggage train. His casualties, too, had been amazingly light. Owing to the squares having held, only thirty men had been killed and some three hundred wounded.

The gallant Murad Bey had been wounded in the face but had succeeded in getting away a part of his Army, although their numbers were insufficient to menace the French further for the time being. Ibrahim Bey's force was still intact on the other side of the river and at present Bonaparte had not the means to cross it; so he decided to encamp at Ghizeh. There he occupied Murad's country house, a delightful airy mansion in which his Staff were surprised to find divans and scores of cushions covered in the finest damasks and silk from Lyons. In the cool of the evening they celebrated their victory in the beautiful garden which was planted with many ornamental trees and with vine-covered arbours on which hung grapes as fine as any they had ever seen.

Meanwhile in Cairo anarchy had broken out. Ibrahim Bey, having no mind that his force should suffer the fate of Murad's, decided to retire towards Syria, and the Turkish Viceroy fled with him. Upon this the long-oppressed Copts streamed out of the slums and set about attacking the palaces and houses of the rich. Unlike Alexandria and the towns the French had so far seen, Cairo was a city with a population of three hundred thousand. Living there were hundreds of
wealthy merchants of many nationalities, who owned fine mansions, big harems and scores of slaves. Finding themselves in peril of their lives, many of them mounted on camels and, with their households and most valuable possessions, endeavoured to escape the mobs by leaving the city. Others barricaded themselves in their houses and, with their retainers, strove to defend them. There ensued a night of terror, looting, rape and murder.

The following day the subordinate Pasha—left behind without instructions by the Turkish Viceroy—the leading European merchants and the Sheiks of the Mosque of Jamil-Ayer met together and agreed to save themselves by entering into negotiations with the French. Bonaparte, delighted to acquire the city without having to fight for it, received most graciously the deputation they sent to him, and terms of surrender were quickly agreed.

A number of boats were procured and on the 23rd General Dupuy was sent across the river with half a Brigade, to accept the formal surrender of the city. Roger accompanied him. He found the palaces of both Ibrahim and Murad had been partially looted and, considering the latter the finer of the two, he took possession of it for the General-in-Chief. With him he had brought the soldier who had acted as his servant since leaving Toulon, a cheerful young Provençal named Jean Marbois. Together they then looked round for accommodation that would suit Roger, should Bonaparte decide to make Cairo his headquarters for sometime.

In a nearby street they found a pleasant but unpretentious three-storey house. The owner, an Arab merchant, had fled and his four servants were making merry there. Roger informed them sharply that he intended to occupy it and would employ them at the wage they had been receiving, but if they left the place he would have them hunted down and thrown into prison. Then he left Marbois in charge and returned across the river to make his report.

On the 25th Bonaparte entered Cairo and took up his residence in Murad's palace with Bourrienne, Duroc, Eugène de Beauharnais and several other members of his Staff. Meanwhile, Lannes had arranged suitable accommodation for the other senior officers and for billeting the troops
in the now-empty barracks of the Janissaries and other large buildings.

As Cairo had surrendered it had, by the laws of war, escaped the horror of being given over to the troops to sack. Moreover, Bonaparte was most anxious to conciliate the Mohammedan citizens so he had ordained that their mosques, religious customs and their own laws were to be respected. All the same, to instil fear into any of the inhabitants who might be tempted to question the status of the French as their masters, in the principal square he had the heads lopped off of a score of those who had shown themselves to be unwilling hosts, and declared that, after all his soldiers had been through, it would be unreasonable to put too severe a restraint upon their enjoying a fair degree of licence during their first few nights in Cairo.