To keep up morale, Gordon had a military band perform concerts in the central plaza every Friday and Sunday evenings for free, and cast his own decorations for his men. Though the telegraph lines to Cairo were cut, Gordon used the remaining telegraph lines to build his own telegraph network within Khartoum linking the men holding the walls of Khartoum to the Governor-General's palace, thus keeping him well informed of what was happening. To slow down the "Ansar" assaults, Gordon built primitive landmines out of water cans stuffed with dynamite and to confuse the enemy about his numbers, he put up wooden dummies in uniform along the walls of Khartoum facing the Blue Nile.