2236 THE DOWNFALL OF THE DERVISHES I saw some of these corpses lying in the shallow water near the bank of the river, and as it seemed to be nobody’s business to bury them, it is not surprising that our Guardsmen and other soldiers contracted the germs of enteric fever at Omdurman !

Inside the Khalifa’s arsenal there were many curious things—spears, bows and arrows, coats of chain mail, machine guns, Krupps, various kinds of ammunition, and other warlike apparatus, ancient and modern. Three carriages of European make were also visible, which were said to have been used by the Khalifa on state occasions, though these vehicles could never have got beyond the main streets, for the simple reason that outside the town no roads exist.

Most of the Dervish ammunition used in the battle seems to have been of home manufacture. All the Martini cartridges I picked up amongst their dead were extremely well made of “solid drawn” brass, and stamped with a K and a ZZ. I imagine that these letters may stand for Khartum and Pentekachi, the unfortunate Greek who succeeded in manufacturing gunpowder for the Mahdi,