By this time telegrams were pouring into Constantinople from Hodaidah beseeching assistance; and the Porte, having at length realised how serious a turn affairs had taken, exerted all its activity in forwarding troops to the scene of war. By the time the new forces had embarked for Hodaidah, the whole country, with the exception of Sanaa and Amran and a small city in the Asir, by name Dhofir, had fallen into the hands of the rebels, the plains and seaboard towns holding aloof from any participation in the affair, though probably it was only the presence of better organised Turkish forces which kept in check the feeling which no doubt existed almost as strongly there as anywhere. The Beni Meruan, many of whose villages lie on the sea-coast, were pitilessly shelled by a couple of Turkish gunboats. Ahmed ed-Din remained at Sadah,[30] whither he had fled from Sanaa; nor at any part of the revolt did he take active part in the fighting, a fact that in no small degree accounts for the subsequent failure of the rebellion. In all probability he never left Sadah, though in his religious character his movements were always spoken about with much mystery. Sanaa at the end of October was still in a state of siege, the garrison and townspeople suffering greatly from hunger and disease, though in Amran the state of the inhabitants was still more pitiable. Badly fed as they were at all times, worse now than ever, one cannot but admire the immense pluck of the handful of Turkish troops who kept at bay for several months an immense horde of Arabs. Not only was their courage exhibited in the dogged resistance within the town, but in their constant and often successful sorties against the enemy. A short description of the city of Sanaa is necessary in order to explain the positions of besiegers and besieged during the whole of last autumn.