The stump of a charred and whitened twig glowed red.

Durrance set his foot upon it, and a tiny thread of smoke spurted into the air.
"Very lately," he said to himself, and he followed Mather into the fort.

In the corners of the mud walls, in any fissure, in the very floor, young trees were sprouting.

Rearward a steep glacis and a deep fosse defended the works.

Durrance sat himself down upon the parapet of the wall above the glacis, while the pigeons wheeled and circled overhead, thinking of the long months during which Tewfik must daily have strained his eyes from this very spot toward the pass over the hills from Suakin, looking as that other general far to the south had done, for the sunlight flashing on the weapons of the help which did not come.