After I had sent off my letter of the 3d, intelligence arrived that Theodore had broken up his camp before Magdala, and was moving to attack us. I need hardly say that the news was untrue. The Chief, however, was bound to act upon it, and consequently we were ordered to march at seven; and instead of halting, as previously intended, upon the edge of the ravine of the Djedda, we were to cross and encamp on the other side, so as to avoid the possibility of having to take such a strong position. Colonel Milward, who had marched the evening before with the Punjaubees, and two companies of the 4th, was ordered to cross early, and General Staveley was to bring up his force to the edge of the ravine. We started punctually at the time ordered, and marched across a precisely similar country to that we had traversed for the few previous days. Some miles before we reached the edge of the Djedda the whole aspect was changed. The yellow stubble and hay, which had before stretched away upon both sides, was all burnt, and the ground was covered only with a black ash. The flocks and herds which had dotted the country were gone, and scarcely a human being was to be seen over the black expanse. The snug homesteads and villages had disappeared, and in their places were bare walls and heaps of stones. I rode up to one of these. On the floor lay the half-charred thatch of the roof; among it were portions of broken pots and baking effects. Here was a long round stone, which was used as a rolling-pin to make the flat bread; there was a large vessel of baked earth and cow-dung which had once held flour or milk. A rat scuttled away as I looked in. There was not a living soul in what had once been a large village. This was indeed the desolation of war. Presently we saw rising, apparently a few feet above the plain, at a distance of five or six miles, a long perpendicular wall of rock. This, we knew, was the upper edge of the opposite side of the Djedda. The ground then sank a little in front of us, and, riding along the slight depression, we suddenly turned a corner, and below us lay the wonderful gorge of the Djedda. Its width from edge to edge was four or five miles, its depth to the stream 3800 feet. It was a wonderful ravine. As far as eye could see either way, the upper part upon sides appeared like two perpendicular walls of perhaps a third of its total depth. Then, on either side, was a plain or shoulder of from a mile to a mile and a half in width, with a gradual slope towards the stream. The lower portion was again extremely steep, but still with a gradual descent, and not mere walls of rock like the upper edges. It was easy to imagine the whole process of the formation of this gorge. Originally it must have been an arm of the sea; a gulf of five miles across, and with perpendicular cliffs upon either side, and its depth the level of the broad shoulders. Then the land rose, and a great river ran through the centre of what was now a