30 to
11.30, and the loss again was something under three hundred. With
conservative generalship the losses of the battles of the future
will be much less than those of the past, and as a consequence the
battles themselves will last much longer, and it will be the most
enduring rather than the most fiery which will win. The supply of
food and water to the combatants will become of extreme importance
to keep them up during the prolonged trials of endurance, which
will last for weeks rather than days. On the other hand, when a
General's force is badly compromised, it will be so punished that a
quick surrender will be the only alternative to annihilation.
On the subject of the quarter-column formation which proved so
fatal to us, it must be remembered that any other form of advance
is hardly possible during a night attack, though at Tel-el-Kebir
the exceptional circumstance of the march being over an open desert
allowed the troops to move for the last mile or two in a more
extended formation. A line of battalion double-company columns is
most difficult to preserve in the darkness, and any confusion may
lead to disaster.
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