We shall not know for some days the effect of
the battle at Omdurman, where it may give a fatal blow to the self- confidence of the Baggaras, who are the Khalifa's most trustworthy soldiers, but its immediate results are excellent. The native or fellaheen troops will now trust themselves, and all doubt as to their readiness for hand-to-hand fighting has disappeared. The road to Dongola has been cleared, and the tribesmen throughout the Soudan have been warned by an unmistakable object-lesson that Egyptian troops under British officers differ from Egyptian troops under Turkish officers in all the qualities that make up an army. It is probable that the Dervishes, who are stubborn, will fight again, but men of their opinions are bewildered by defeat, which they think a sentence from above, and they will at
once feel the result of their misgovernment, every tribe they have oppressed flying at their throats. The capture of Suardeh gives the Egyptians command of the river at a point from which it is open to armed steamers for two hundred Supported by a fleet of such boats, the army can reach Dongola without waiting for the railway, but the Sirdar's policy is evidently to make complete preparations, leave nothing to chance, and then strike. One reads of the operations against the Matabeles with a sense of regret, though they are necessary, but only the ignorant can regard the destruction of the Khalifa's power as anything but a blessing to mankind. He is almost worse than the Sultan.