Belah, about eight miles short of Gaza, and here troops and an army
of Egyptian labourers were working night and day, week in week out,
off-loading trucks with a speed that enabled the maximum amount of
service to be got out of rolling stock. There were large depôts down
the line too. At Rafa there was a big store of ammunition, and at
Shellal large quantities not only of supplies but of railway material
were piled up in readiness for pushing out railhead immediately the
advance began. A Decauville, or light, line ran out towards Gamli from
Shellal to make the supply system easier, and I remember seeing
some Indian pioneers lay about three miles of light railway with
astonishing rapidity the day after we took Beersheba. Every mile the
line advanced meant time saved in getting up supplies, and the radius
of action of lorries, horse, and camel transport was considerably
increased.

To supply the Gaza front we called in aid a small system of light
railways. From the railhead at Deir el Belah to the mouth of the wadi
Ghuzze, and from that point along the line of the wadi to various
places behind the line held by us, we had a total length of 21
kilometres of light railway. Before this railway got into full
operation horses had begun to lose condition, and during the summer
ammunition-column officers became very anxious about their horses. The
light railway was almost everywhere within range of the enemy's guns,
and in some places it was unavoidably exposed, particularly where it
ran on the banks of the wadi due south of Gaza. I recollect while the
track was being laid speaking to an Australian in charge of a gang of
natives preparing an earthwork, and asked why it was that a trench was
dug before earth was piled up. He pointed to the hill of Ali Muntar,
the most prominent feature in the enemy's system, and said that from
the Turks' observation post on that eminence every movement of the