phet had appeared to
him in a vision and told him to do so.

Towards the end of November, news arrived that a further reinforcement
of troops had left Khartum for El Obeid. This information occasioned a
great stir in the camp, because there was some idea that English troops
had been sent. These must have been the arrival of the first batch of
troops destined eventually to form part of the Hicks Expedition; but
even then it was too late to send any help to El Obeid.

One day it came to the Mahdi's ears that provisions were being smuggled
into El Obeid, where they were sold at enormous prices, and to stop this
he made the investment still closer. Some of the smugglers were caught,
and as a punishment their right hands were cut off, and their handless
arms tied to their necks; they were then led round the camp as a warning
to others.

Meanwhile, as the siege of El Obeid was drawing to a close, other places
in Kordofan were falling into the Mahdi's hands. The town of Bara had
been reduced to great straits. A force marching to its relief under Abu
Kuka, was attacked by Fiki Minneh: the majority were killed, and it was
only through the bravery of Surur Effendi that a few hundred of them
succeeded in reaching the town. The notorious Nur Angar, who was on the
walls of the town, rendered no assistance during the siege, and went
over to the enemy. At length, on the 5th of January, Bara was forced to
capitulate through famine, and the garrison was sent to the Mahdi's
camp.

The victory was celebrated by a salute of guns, and the unfortunate
garrison in El Obeid took this to be the approach of relieving troops;
but the Mahdi made it known to Said Pasha that, on the contrary, it was
in celebration of the fall of Bara--an incident which caused the gloom
to deepen over the doomed city; and all hope of delivery was abandoned.
Yet the Mudir still continued to hope against hope that he should be
relieved from Khartum, and his sanguine spirit kept up the courage of
the garrison. But it could not last much longer; the soldiers were too
weak even to hold their rifles in their hands, and Said Pasha realized
that further resistance was useless. In desperation, therefore, he
proposed to blow himself up in the powder magazine, and this he
certainly would have done had not the senior officers urged that in
doing so numbers of other lives would have been sacrificed as well.
There was now nothing left to be done but to surrender, and this even