andria into a proper state of defence, and arranging a provisional
government, Bonaparte set out for Cairo, which he deemed it necessary
to reach without loss of time. He began his march by
way of Damanhour with the main body of the army on the evening
of the J'th of july; general Desaix having preceded him with his
division on the 4 th; and the division of general Kleber, who was
left to command at Alexandria till his wound was healed,7 beinepr;
ordered on the 5 th to take possession of Rosetta, leave a garrison
there, and proceed up the left bank of the Nile. Annoyed by
extreme heat in their forced march across a sandy desert, and
perpetually harassed in their rear by the arabs, they reached Damanhour
on the 8th. After a day’s rest, they proceeded toward
Rhamanie; midway to which place the division of general Desaix
was attacked by a body of six thousand mamalukes: but the artillery
of the french, and the advantages of discipline, soon compelled
them to retire.
Meanwhile Mourad bey, at the head of his numerous army of
cavalry, and having seven gunboats, with IQ or 36 pounders, on
the Nile, waited for the french at the village of Sharbrass. On the
13th at daybreak the hostile armies were in sight of each other.
Bonaparte had commanded the french flotilla to follow the movements
of the army, and to harass the right of the enemy by a
brisk cannonade. Forming his troops in parallelograms, with
their baggage, and such as were lamed by their march, in the
centre; and drawing them up in divisions, disposed in the order
■of steps, so that one flanked another, with their fieldpieces pointing
on every side; the mamalukes found no weak point, on which