Last Of All, But Not Least In
Importance, Mahmud, Who Commanded The 'Army Of The West,' Was Ordered To
Leave Very Reduced Garrisons In Kordofan And Darfur, And March With His
Whole Remaining Force, Which May Have Numbered 10,000 Fighting Men,
To The Nile, And So To Omdurman.
Mahmud, who was as daring and ambitious
as he was conceited and incapable, received the summons with delight,
and began forthwith to collect his troops.
The Khalifa saw very clearly that he could not trust the riverain tribes.
The Jaalin and Barabra were discontented. He knew that they were weary of
his rule and of war. In proportion as the Egyptian army advanced, so their
loyalty and the taxes they paid decreased. He therefore abandoned all idea
of making a stand at Berber. The Emir Yunes - who, since he had been
transferred from Dongola in 1895, had ruled the district - was directed to
collect all the camels, boats, grain, and other things that might assist
an invading army and send them to Metemma. The duty was most thoroughly
performed. The inhabitants were soon relieved of all their property and of
most of their means of livelihood, and their naturally bitter resentment at
this merciless treatment explains to some extent the astonishing events
which followed the capture of Abu Hamed. This last place Abdullah never
regarded as more than an outpost. Its garrison was not large, and although
it had now become the most northerly Dervish position, only a slender
reinforcement was added to the force under the command of Mohammed-ez-Zein.
The power of the gunboats and their effect in the Dongola campaign
were fully appreciated by the Arabs; and the Khalifa, in the hopes of
closing the Sixth Cataract, began to construct several forts at the
northern end of the Shabluka gorge. The Bordein, one of Gordon's old
steamers, plied busily between Omdurman and Wad Hamed, transporting guns
and stores; and Ahmed Fedil was sent with a sufficient force to hold the
works when they were made. But the prophecy of the Mahdi exercised a
powerful effect on the Khalifa's mind, and while he neglected no detail
he based his hopes on the issue of a great battle on the plains of Kerreri,
when the invaders should come to the walls of the city. With this prospect
continually before him he drilled and organised the increasing army at
Omdurman with the utmost regularity, and every day the savage soldiery
practised their evolutions upon the plain they were presently to strew
with their bodies.
But after a while it became apparent that the 'Turks' were not advancing.
They tarried on the lands they had won. The steamers went no further than
Merawi. The iron road stopped at Kerma. Why had they not followed up their
success? Obviously because they feared the army that awaited them at
Omdurman. At this the Khalifa took fresh courage, and in January 1897 he
began to revolve schemes for taking the offensive and expelling the
invaders from the Dongola province.
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