But His Judgment Was Proved By The Event,
And The Arrival Of A Selected Assortment Of Heads Turned Doubt To Triumph.
The Dervishes Did Not Long Remain In Abyssinia, As They Suffered From The
Climate.
In December the army returned to Gallabat, which they commenced
to fortify, and their victorious general followed his grisly but
convincing despatch to Omdurman, where he received the usual welcome
accorded by warlike peoples to military heroes.
But the famous and faithful
slave may have been more gratified by the tears of joy which his master and
sovereign shed on beholding him again safe and successful.
The greater struggle was still to come. The whole of Abyssinia was
convulsed with fury, and King John in person prepared to take the field
and settle the quarrel for ever. He assembled a mighty host, which is said
to have amounted to 130,000 foot and 20,000 horsemen. The rumours of this
formidable concentration reached Gallabat and Omdurman, and in spite of
the recent victory caused deep alarm. The Khalifa saw his frontiers - even
his existence - menaced, for King John had declared that he would sweep the
Dervishes from off the face of the earth: and in the hour of need the
general on whom so much depended died of some poisonous medicine with
which he had endeavoured to cure himself of indigestion. Abu Anga was
buried in his red-brick house at Gallabat amid the lamentations of his
brave black soldiers, and gloom pervaded the whole army.
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