But among the miracles with which God honored him, Abu Al-Sumud Bey arrived with two steamers, and terror struck the hearts of the inhabitants. Everyone realized that those innocent souls had gone, their lives a sacrifice to the governor-general's mismanagement and lack of foresight. Khartoum was abandoned by a number of its people and notables.

When Abu Al-Sumud Bey arrived in Khartoum, he was preceded by Al-Faki Al-Balkin. The governor-general sent for Al-Mali and Al-A'ayyat and told them what we mentioned about Al-Mahdi. Sheikh Shaker, the Mufti of the Appeals Court, advised him to go himself on the steamers to the island of Aba to quell this sedition. But the governor-general rebuked him and spoke harshly to him. It is narrated by some witnesses that he said to him, "Do you want your wife to be widowed, and your children to be orphaned?" Then the governor-general appointed the famous Qaimaqam Ali Bey Latfi (Abu Koka), along with two battalions of infantry, cannons, and rockets, to guard the island of Aba and await the arrival of reinforcements from the Nile. One might be astonished by these strange actions and the governor-general's work. How could two steamers guard an island over fifteen miles long, and what is the benefit of this haste? Stranger than this and that is that Al-Mahdi issued an order to his followers, saying that the Prophet, peace be upon him, had seen in a dream a type of boat called "Al-Turur" or "Al-Subaj," which resembles a raft, floating on the water like ships crossing the Nile to the western bank, and that God would seize the reins of the infidel Turks, so they would not be able to harm them until they reached the safety of the Red Sea, and from there...