238 WITH KITCHENER IN THE SOUDAN for the Khedive, the bands again struck up, and twenty-one uns were fired. As the last gun echoed out, the Guards played the Dead March in “ Saul,” and the black band the inarch called “ Toll for the Brave,” the latter in memory of the Khedive’s subjects who had died with Gordon. Then minute-guns were fired, and four chaplains—Anglican, Presbyterian, Methodist, and Catholic—by turns read a psalm or a prayer. The pipers then wailed a dirge, and finally the Soudanese bands played Gordon’s favourite hymn, Abide with me.”

At the conclusion General Hunter and the other officers shook hands with the Sirdar one by one. Kitchener himself was deeply. moved, and well he might be! Fourteen years of his life had been spent in preparing for and carrying out this campaign, and now the great task was done. Gordon was avenged ; of the Dervish host the remnant were scattered fugitives. The Mahdi’s cause, the foulest and most bloodstained tyranny that had ever existed, transforming as it did a flourishing province into an almost uninh*feited desert, was crushed for ever; and it was his patient and unsparing labour, his wonderful organization, that had been the main factor in the work. No wonder that even the Iron Sirdar almost broke down at such a moment.

The bugles sounded, and the troops broke up their formation, and for half an hour wandered through the empty chambers of the palace and the wild and beautiful garden. Another bugle call, and they streamed down to the water’s edge, took to the boats, and returned to Omdurman.

The long-delayed duty which England owed to one of her noblest sons had been done: Gordon had had his burial. None knew where his bones reposed, but that mattered little. In the place where he was slain all honour had been done to him, and the British flag waved over the spot where he disappeared for ever from the sight of his countrymen.

On Gregory’s return he found Zaki in a state of the highest excitement.