During many nights before the push every road on the coastal sector was crowded with slow-moving, well-ordered traffic. By day all was normal, except for significant glimpses of camps in the wide olive groves around Ludd, and in the orchards and orange groves about Jaffa. But as darkness fell the whole countryside would become thronged with masses of horse and foot and guns, and every kind of transport, groping their way through blinding clouds of dust. The roads were impassable outside the organized columns; the night was loud with the shouts of drivers speaking divers languages. A few hours before the great push began this night traffic culminated in a general move northward, the cavalry moving up close behind the infantry, and the supplies following the cavalry. Every road was massed with motor-lorries and horse transport; every track with endless strings of camels. Each unit in the great army was pressing up as closely as possible to the starting gate. [Illustration: TURKISH PRISONERS AT BEERSHEBA STREET MARKET, JERUSALEM Inset—JERICHO Showing the pretty little Garden Oasis LIGHT HORSE CROSSING JORDAN ] [Illustration: IN THE JORDAN VALLEY ] [Illustration: SPRING WATER, CLEAR AND COLD ] The bombardment opened at dawn, a heavy barrage. For half an hour the startled Turks were battered in their trenches. Then, abruptly, the bombardment ceased. “Now the infantry,” said a Brigadier of horse “and then!...” THE ADVANCE Our battalions leaped forward as the gunnery died away, and carried the Turkish trenches after a brief struggle. They simply overwhelmed the enemy riflemen, and even the German machine gunners and Austrian artillerymen, after a wild burst of bad shooting, were forced to flight or submission. Within half an hour the infantry had made a gap for the great force of Indian and Yeomanry cavalry waiting near the coast, and soon afterwards they opened another a few miles inland. The expectant horsemen jumped off like thoroughbreds from the barrier. THE GREAT RIDE BEGINS