Within twenty-four hours after the Sirdar's entry Omdurman began to assume the signs of orderly government. Thousands of the prisoners as well as the natives were set to work to clean up the place. The wounded were all carried into temporary hospitals and the dead were decently interred in Moslem burial-places out upon the desert. Then the thoroughfares were scrupulously scavengered by gangs of yesterday's furious foemen, blacks and Baggara. The dead things were put under ground, and the stagnant pools were drained or filled in. Within a week it became actually possible to walk without an attack of violent nausea in Omdurman. Visits were constantly paid to the battle-field for the double purpose of rescuing any wounded dervishes there might be and counting the dead. The large number of the enemy who for days survived shocking wounds, to which a European would have instantly or speedily succumbed, was appalling. These wretched creatures had been seen crawling or dragging themselves for miles to get to the Nile for water or into villages for succour. Food and water were sent out to them by the Sirdar's orders on the day after the battle, when it was seen that the natives gave neither heed nor help to other than their own immediate kinsmen upon the field. Even in the town rations were distributed to the needy. The gunboats going up and down the river saw many sorry sights. Wounded dervishes were lying by hundreds along the river's bank. Some, whose thirst had maddened them, had drunk copiously, and then swooned and died, their heads and shoulders covered with water and the rest of their bodies stretched upon the strand. General Gatacre and Lieut. Wood on riding to revisit the zereba near Kerreri, met a dervish, part of one of whose legs had been blown off by a shell. The man was hobbling along, leaning upon a broken spear handle, making for Omdurman, with his limb burned and roughly tied up. They gave him food and water and passed on meeting others. A mile away, the mounted orderly drew the General's attention to an object upon the ground with the exclamation: "Blest if it isn't that bloke's foot!" which sure enough was the case. A number of officers were told off to count the enemy's dead upon the battle-field. Sections of the ground were assigned to each. The actual count was 10,800 dead bodies, which did not include all the slain, for there were those who died in Omdurman, and afar upon the desert. One of the officers wrote, "I won't enter into details of our day's work. It suffices to say, that a piece of cotton-wool soaked in eucalyptus placed in the nostrils and an ample supply of neat brandy were only just sufficient to keep us on our legs for the six hours that we were at the job." He and two others had undertaken to make a sketch in addition to helping to count the slain. Unfortunately, the sketch was lost.