The Khalifa Abdullah, Pierced By Several
Balls, Was Stretched Dead On His Sheepskin; On His Right Lay Ali-Wad-Helu,
On His Left Ahmed Fedil.
Before them was a line of lifeless bodyguards;
behind them a score of less important chiefs; and behind these, again,
a litter of killed and wounded horses.
Such was the grim spectacle which
in the first light of the morning met the eyes of the British officers,
to some of whom it meant the conclusion of a perilous task prolonged over
many years. And while they looked in astonishment not unmingled with awe,
there scrambled unhurt from under a heap of bodies the little Emir Yunes,
of Dongola, who added the few links necessary to complete the chain.
At Omdurman Abdullah had remained mounted behind the hill of Surgham,
but in this his last fight he had set himself in the forefront of the
battle. Almost at the first discharge, his son Osman, the Sheikh-ed-Din,
was wounded, and as he was carried away he urged the Khalifa to save
himself by flight; but the latter, with a dramatic dignity sometimes
denied to more civilised warriors, refused. Dismounting from his horse,
and ordering his Emirs to imitate him, he seated himself on his sheepskin
and there determined to await the worst of fortune. And so it came to pass
that in this last scene in the struggle with Mahdism the stage was cleared
of all its striking characters, and Osman Digna alone purchased by flight
a brief ignoble liberty, soon to be followed by a long ignoble servitude.
Twenty-nine Emirs, 3,000 fighting men, 6,000 women and children
surrendered themselves prisoners. The Egyptian losses were three killed
and twenty-three wounded.
. . . . . . . . . .
The long story now approaches its conclusion. The River War is over.
In its varied course, which extended over fourteen years and involved the
untimely destruction of perhaps 300,000 lives, many extremes and contrasts
have been displayed. There have been battles which were massacres,
and others that were mere parades. There have been occasions of shocking
cowardice and surprising heroism, of plans conceived in haste and emergency,
of schemes laid with slow deliberation, of wild extravagance and cruel
waste, of economies scarcely less barbarous, of wisdom and incompetence.
But the result is at length achieved, and the flags of England and Egypt
wave unchallenged over the valley of the Nile.
At what cost were such advantages obtained? The reader must judge
for himself of the loss in men; yet while he deplores the deaths of brave
officers and soldiers, and no less the appalling destruction of the valiant
Arabs, he should remember that such slaughter is inseparable from war,
and that, if the war be justified, the loss of life cannot be accused.
But I write of the cost in money, and the economy of the campaigns cannot
be better displayed than by the table below:
Railway: EP 1,181,372
Telegraph: EP 21,825
Gunboats: EP 154,934
Military Expenditure:
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