 CHAPTER I THE REBELLION OF THE MADDEE The north-eastern quarter of the continent of Africa is drained and watered by the Nile. Among and about the head streams and tributaries of this mighty river lie the wide and fertile provinces of the Egyptian Sudan. Situated in the very center of the land, these remote regions are on every side divided from the seas by five hundred miles of mountain, swamp, or desert. The Great River is their only means of growth, their only channel of progress. It is by the Nile alone that their commerce can reach the outer markets, or European civilization can penetrate the inner darkness. The Sudan is joined to Egypt by the Nile, as a diver is connected with the surface by his air-pipe. Without it there is only suffocation. AUT NILIS AUT NI HEAL The town of Khartoum, at the confluence of the blue and white Niles, is the point on which the trade of the south must inevitably converge. It is the great spout through which the merchandise collected from a wide area streams northward to the Mediterranean shore. It marks the extreme northern limit of the fertile Sudan. Between Khartoum and Aswan the river flows for twelve hundred miles through deserts of surpassing desolation. At last the wilderness recedes and the living world broadens out again into Egypt and the Delta. It is with events that have occurred in the intervening waste that these pages are concerned. The real Sudan, known to the statesmen and the explorer, lies far to the south, moist, undulating, and exuberant. But there is another Sudan, which some mistake for the true, whose solitudes have pressed the Nile from the Egyptian frontier to Omderman. This is the Sudan of the soldier. Destitute of wealth or future, it is rich in history. The names of its squalid villages are familiar to distant and enlightened peoples. The barrenness of its scenery has been drawn by skillful pen and pencil. Its ample deserts have tasted the blood of brave men. Its hot, black rocks have witnessed famous tragedies. It is the scene of the war. This great tract, which may conveniently be called the military Sudan, stretches with apparent indefiniteness over the face of the continent. Level planes of smooth sand, a little rosier than buff, a little paler than salmon, are interrupted only by occasional peaks of rock, black, stark, and shapeless. Rainless storms dance tirelessly over the hot, crisp surface of the ground. The fine sand, driven by the wind, gathers into deep drifts, and silts among the dark rocks of the hills. Exactly as snow hangs about an alpine summit. Only it is a fiery snow, such as might fall in hell. The earth burns with a quenchless thirst of ages, and in the steel-blue sky scarcely a cloud obstructs the unrelenting triumph of the sun. Through the desert flows the river, a thread of blue silk drawn across an enormous brown drugit. And even this thread is brown for half the year. Where the water lapsed the sand and soaks into the banks, there grows an avenue of vegetation which seems very beautiful and luxuriant by contrast with what lies beyond. The Nile, through all the three thousand miles of its course vital to everything that lives beside it, is never so precious as here. The traveller clings to the strong river as to an old friend, staunch in the hour of need. All the world blazes, but here is shade. The deserts are hot, but the Nile is cool. The land is parched, but here is abundant water. The picture painted in burnt sienna is relieved by a grateful flash of green. Yet he who had not seen the desert or felt the sun heavily on his shoulders would hardly admire the fertility of the riparian scrub. Unnourishing reeds and grasses grow rank and course from the water's edge. The dark, rotten soil between the tussocks is cracked and granulated by the drying up of the annual flood. The character of the vegetation is inhospitable. Thorn bushes, bristling like hedgehogs and thriving arrogantly, everywhere predominate and with their prickly tangles obstruct or forbid the path. Only the palms by the brink are kindly, and men journeying along the Nile must look often towards their bushy tops, where among the spreading foliage the red and yellow glint of date clusters proclaims the ripening of a generous crop and protests that nature is not always mischievous and cruel. The banks of the Nile, except by contrast with the desert, display an abundance of barrenness. Their characteristic is monotony. Their attraction is their sadness. Yet there is one hour when all is changed, just before the sun sets towards the western cliffs, a delicious flush brightens and enlivens the landscape. It is though some titanic artist in an hour of inspiration were retouching the picture, painting in deep purple shadows among the rocks, strengthening the lights on the sands, gilding and beautifying everything, and making the whole scene live. The river, whose windings make it look like a lake, turns from muddy brown to silver gray. The sky from a dull blue deepens into violet in the west. Everything under that magic touch becomes vivid and alive. And then the sun sinks altogether behind the rocks, the colors fade out of the sky, the flush off the sands, and gradually everything darkens and grows gray, like a man's cheek when he is bleeding to death. We are left sad and sorrowful in the dark, until the stars light up and remind us that there is always something beyond. In a land whose beauty is the beauty of a moment, whose face is desolate, and whose character is strangely stern, the curse of war was hardly needed to produce a melancholy effect. Why should there be caustic plants where everything is hot and burning, in deserts where thirst is enthroned, and where the rocks and sand appeal to a pitiless sky for moisture? It was a savage trick to add the mockery of mirage. The area multiplies the desolation. There is life only by the Nile. If a man were to leave the river he might journey westward and find no human habitation nor the smoke of a cooking fire except the lonely tent of a Kababish Arab or the encampment of a trader's caravan till he reach the coastline of America. Or he might go east and find nothing but sand and sea and sun until Bombay rose above the horizon. The thread of fresh water is itself solitary in regions where all living things lacked company. In the account of the River War, the Nile is naturally supreme. It is the great melody that recurs throughout the whole opera. The general purposing military operations, the statesmen who would decide upon grave policies, and the reader desirous of studying the course and results of either, must think of the Nile. It is the life of the lands through which it flows. It is the cause of the war, the means by which we fight, the end at which we aim. Imagination should paint the river through every page in the story. It glitters between the palm trees during the actions. It is the explanation of nearly every military movement. By its banks the army's camp at night. Backed or flanked on its unfortable stream they offer or accept battle by day. To its brink, morning and evening, long lines of camels, horses, mules and slaughter-cattle hurry eagerly. Amir and Dervish, officer and soldier, friend and foe, kneel alike to this god of ancient Egypt, and draw each day their daily watering goatskin or canteen. Without the river none would have started. Without it none might have continued. Without it none could ever have returned. People who journey on the Nile, whether in commerce or war, will pay their tribute of respect and gratitude, for the great river has befriended all races and every age. Through all the centuries it has performed the annual miracle of its flood. Every year when the rains fall and the mountain snows of Central Africa begin to melt, the head streams become torrents and the great lakes are filled to the brim. A vast expanse of low, swampy lands, crossed by secondary channels and flooded for many miles, regulates the flow, and by a sponge-like action prevents the excess of one year from causing the deficiency of the next. Far away in Egypt, prince, priest and peasant look southwards with anxious attention for the fluctuating yet certain rise. Gradually the flood begins. The bar El Ghazal from a channel of stagnant pools and marshes becomes a broad and navigable stream. The Sobat and the Atbara from dry water-courses with occasional pools, in which the fish and crocodiles are crowded, turn to rushing rivers. But all this is remote from Egypt. After its confluence with the Atbara no drop of water reaches the Nile, and it flows for seven hundred miles through the sands or rushes in cataracts among the rocks of the Nubian desert. Nevertheless, in spite of the tremendous diminution in volume caused by the dryness of the earth and air, and the heat of the sun, all of which drink greedily, the river below Aswan is sufficiently great to supply nine millions of people with as much water as their utmost science and energies can draw, and yet to pour into the Mediterranean a low-water surplus current of sixty-one thousand five hundred cubic feet per second. Nor is its water its only gift. As the Nile rises its complexion is changed. The clear blue river becomes thick and red, laden with the magic mud that can raise cities from the desert sand and make the wilderness a garden. The geographer may still in the arrogance of science describe the Nile as a great steady flowing river fed by the rains of the tropics, controlled by the existence of a vast head reservoir and several areas of repose, and annually flooded by the accession of a great body of water with which its eastern tributaries are flushed, taken from the encyclopedia Britannica. But all who have drunk deeply of its soft yet fateful waters, fateful since they give both life and death, will understand why the old Egyptians worship the river, nor will they even in modern days easily dissociate from their minds a feeling of mystic reverence. South of Khartoum and the military Sudan the land becomes more fruitful. The tributaries of the Nile multiply the areas of riparian fertility. A considerable rainfall, increasing as the equator is approached, enables the intervening spaces to support vegetation and consequently human life. The greater part of the country is feverish and unhealthy, nor can Europeans long sustain the attacks of its climate. Nevertheless it is by no means valueless. In the east the province of Senar used to produce abundant grain, and might easily produce no less abundant cotton. Westward the vast territories of Kordofan and Darfur afford grazing grounds to a multitude of cattle, and give means of livelihood to great numbers of baghara or cowherd Arabs, who may also pursue with activity and stratagem the fleet giraffe and the stillfleeter ostrich. To the southeast lies Bar El Ghazal, a great tract of country occupied by dense woods and plentifully watered. Further south and nearer the equator the forests and marshes become exuberant with tropical growths, and the whole face of the land is moist and green. Amid groves of gigantic trees and through planes of high waving grass the stately elephant roams and herds which occasionally number four hundred, hardly ever disturbed by a well-armed hunter. The ivory of their tusks constitutes the wealth of the equatorial province. So greatly they abound that Amin Pasha is provoked to complain of a pest of these valuable pachyderms. Taken from the life of Amin Pasha, Volume Chapter 9. And although they are only assailed by the natives with spear and gun, no less than twelve thousand hundred weight of ivory has been exported in a single year. Ivid. All other kinds of large beasts known to man inhabit these obscure retreats. The fierce rhinoceros crashes through the undergrowth. Among the reeds of mullin-colly swamps huge hippopotami, crocodiles and buffaloes prosper and increase. Antelope of every known and many unclassified species, serpents of peculiar venom, countless millions of birds, butterflies and beetles are among the offspring of prolific nature. And the daring sportsman who should survive his expedition would not fail to add to the achievements of science and the extent of natural history as well as to his own reputation. The human inhabitants of the Sudan would not, but for their vices and misfortunes, be disproportioned in numbers to the fauna or less happy. War, slavery and oppression have, however, afflicted them until the total population of the whole country does not exceed at the most liberal estimate three million souls. The huge area contains many differences of climate and conditions, and these have produced peculiar and diverse breeds of men. The Sudanese are of many tribes, but two main races can be clearly distinguished—the Aboriginal natives and the Arab settlers. The indigenous inhabitants of the country were negroes as black as coal. Strong, virile and simple-minded savages, they lived as we may imagine prehistoric men, hunting, fighting, marrying and dying, with no ideas beyond the gratification of their physical desires, and no fears save those engendered by ghosts, witchcraft, the worship of ancestors, and other forms of superstition common among peoples of low development. They displayed the virtues of barbarism. They were brave and honest. The smallness of their intelligence excused the degradation of their habits. Their ignorance secured their innocence. Yet their eulogy must be short, for though their customs, language, and appearance vary with the districts they inhabit, and the subdivisions to which they belong, the history of all is a confused legend of strife and misery. Their natures are uniformly cruel and thriftless, and their condition is one of equal squalor and want. Although the negroes are the more numerous, the Arabs exceed in power. The bravery of the Aboriginals is outweighed by the intelligence of the invaders and their superior force of character. During the second century of the Mohabitan era, when the inhabitants of Arabia went forth to conquer the world, one adventurous army struck south. The first pioneers were followed at intervals by continual immigrations of Arabs not only from Arabia, but also across the deserts from Egypt and Morocco. The element thus introduced has spread and is spreading throughout the Sudan as water soaks into a dry sponge. The Aboriginals absorbed the invaders they could not repel. The stronger race imposed its customs and language on the negroes. The vigor of their blood sensibly altered the facial appearance of the Sudanese. For more than a thousand years the influence of Mohabitanism which appears to possess a strange fascination for negroid races has been permeating the Sudan. And, although ignorance and natural obstacles impede the progress of new ideas, the whole of the black race is gradually adopting the new religion and developing Arab characteristics. In the districts of the north where the original invaders settled, the evolution is complete and the Arabs of the Sudan are a race formed by the interbreeding of negro and Arab, and yet distinct from both. In the more remote and inaccessible regions which lie to the south and west, the negro race remains as yet unchanged by the Arab influence. And between these extremes every degree of mixture is to be found. In some tribes pure Arabic is spoken, and prior to the rise of the Madi the Orthodox Muslim faith was practiced. In others Arabic has merely modified the ancient dialects, and the Mohabitan religion has been adapted to the older superstitions. But, although the gap between the Arab negro and the negro pure is thus filled by every intermediate blend, the two races were at an early date quite distinct. The qualities of mongrels are rarely admirable, and the mixture of the Arab and negro types has produced a debased and cruel breed, more shocking because they are more intelligent than the primitive savages. The stronger race soon began to prey upon the simple aboriginals. Some of the Arab tribes were camel breeders, some were goat herds, some were bagarras or cowherds. But all without exception were hunters of men. To the great slave market at Jeddah a continual stream of negro captors has flowed for hundreds of years. The invention of gunpowder and the adoption by the Arabs of firearms facilitated the traffic by placing the ignorant negroes at a further disadvantage. Thus the situation in the Sudan for several centuries may be summed up as follows. The dominant race of Arab invaders was unceasingly spreading its blood, religion, customs, and language among the black aboriginal population, and at the same time it harried and enslaved them. The state of society that arose out of this may be easily imagined. The warlike Arab tribes fought and brawled among themselves in ceaseless feud and strife. The negroes trembled in apprehension of capture or rose locally against their oppressors. Occasionally an important shake would affect the combination of many tribes and a kingdom came into existence, a community consisting of a military class armed with guns and of multitudes of slaves at once their servants and their merchandise, and sometimes trained as soldiers. The dominion might prosper viciously till it was overthrown by some more powerful league. All this was unheeded by the outer world from which the Sudan is separated by the deserts, and it seemed that the slow, painful course of development would be unaided and uninterrupted. But at last the populations of Europe changed. Another civilization reared itself above the ruins of Roman triumph and mohabitan aspiration, a civilization more powerful, more glorious, but no less aggressive. The impulse of conquest which hurried the French and English to Canada and the Indies, which sent the Dutch to the Cape and the Spaniards to Peru, spread to Africa and led the Egyptians to the Sudan. In the year 1819, Mohammed Ali, availing himself of the disorders alike as an excuse and an opportunity, sent his son Ismail up the Nile with a great army. The Arab tribes, torn by dissension, exhausted by thirty years of general war, and no longer inspired by their neglected religion, offered a weak resistance. Their slaves, having known the worst of life, were apathetic. The Black Aboriginals were silent and afraid. The whole vast territory was conquered with very little fighting, and the victorious army, leaving garrisons, returned in triumph to the Delta. What enterprise that an enlightened community may attempt is more noble and more profitable than the reclamation from barbarism of fertile regions and large populations? To give peace to warring tribes, to administer justice where all was violence, to strike the chains off the slave, to draw the richness from the soil, to plant the earliest seeds of commerce and learning, to increase in whole peoples their capacities for pleasure and diminish their chances of pain, what more beautiful ideal or more valuable reward can inspire human effort? The act is virtuous, the exercise invigorating, and the result often extremely profitable. Yet as the mind turns from the wonderful cloud-land of aspiration to the ugly scaffolding of attempt and achievement, a succession of opposite ideas arises. Industrial races are displayed stinted and starved for the sake of an expensive imperialism which they can only enjoy if they are well fed. Wild peoples, ignorant of their barbarism, callous of suffering, careless of life but tenacious of liberty, are seen to resist with fury the philanthropic invaders, and to perish in thousands before they are convinced of their mistake. The inevitable gap between conquest and dominion becomes filled with the figures of the greedy trader, the inopportune missionary, the ambitious soldier, and the lying speculator, who disquiet the minds of the conquered and excite the sordid appetites of the conquerors. And as the eye of thought rests on these sinister features it hardly seems possible for us to believe that any fair prospect is approached by so foul a path. From 1819 to 1883 Egypt ruled the Sudan. Her rule was not kindly, wise, or profitable. Its aim was to exploit, not to improve the local population. The miseries of the people were aggravated rather than lessened. But they were concealed. For the rough injustice of the sword there were substituted the intricacies of corruption and bribery. Violence and plunder were more hideous since they were cloaked with legality and armed with authority. The land was undeveloped and poor. It barely sustained its inhabitants. The additional burden of a considerable foreign garrison and a crowd of rapacious officials increased the severity of the economic conditions. Scarcity was frequent. Famines were periodical. Corrupt and incapable governors-general succeeded each other at cartoom with bewildering rapidity. The constant changes, while they prevented the continuity of any wise policy, did not interrupt the misrule. With hardly any exceptions the Pashas were consistent in oppression. The success of their administration was measured by the ministries in Egypt by the amount of money they could extort from the natives. Among the officials in the Sudan, by the number of useless offices they could create. There were a few bright examples of honest men, but these, by providing a contrast, only increased the discontents. The rule of Egypt was iniquitous, yet it preserved the magnificent appearance of imperial dominion. The Egyptian proconsul lived in state at the confluence of the Niles. The representatives of foreign powers established themselves in the city. The trade of the South converged upon cartoom. Thither the subordinate governors, Bays and Moudirs, repaired at intervals to report the state of their provinces and to receive instructions. Thither were sent the ivory of Equatoria, the ostrich feathers of Kordofan, gum from Darfur, grain from Senar, and taxes collected from all the regions. Strange beasts, entrapped in the swamps and forests, passed through the capital on their journey to Cairo and Europe. Complex and imposing reports of revenue and expenditure were annually compiled. An elaborate and dignified correspondence was maintained between Egypt and its great dependency. The casual observer, astonished at the unusual capacity for government displayed by an Oriental people, was tempted to accept the famous assertion which Nubar Pasha put into the mouth of the Qidive Ismail. We are no longer in Africa, but in Europe. Yet all was a hateful sham. Quote, the government of the Egyptians in these far-off countries is nothing else but one of brigandige of the very worst description. End quote, by Colonel Gordon in Central Africa April 11, 1879. The arbitrary and excessive taxes were collected only at the point of the bayonet. If a petty chief fell into arrears, his neighbors were raised against him. If an Arab tribe were recalcitrant, a military expedition was dispatched. Moreover, the ability of the Arabs to pay depended on their success as slave-hunters. When there had been a good catch, the revenue profited. The Egyptian government had joined the International League against the slave trade. They combined, however, indirectly but deliberately, to make money out of it. From Egypt, No. 11, 1883. In the miserable, harassing warfare that accompanied the collection of taxes, their vice-regal commanders gained more from fraud than force. No subterfuge, no treachery, was too mean for them to adopt. No oath or treaty was too sacred for them to break. Their methods were cruel, and if honor did not impede the achievement, mercy did not restrict the effects of their inglorious successes, and the affeed administrators delighted to order their timid soldiery to carry out the most savage executions. The political methods and social style of the Governor's General were imitated more or less exactly by the subordinate officials, according to their degree in the provinces. Since they were completely hidden from the eye of civilization, they enjoyed a greater license in their administration. As their education was inferior, so their habits became more gross. Meanwhile, the volcano on which they disported themselves was ominously silent. The Arab tribes obeyed, and the black population cowered. The authority of a tyrannical government was supported by the presence of a worthless army. Nearly forty thousand men were distributed among eight main and numerous minor garrisons, isolated in a roadless country by enormous distances and natural obstacles, and living in the midst of large, savage populations of fanatical character and warlike habits, whose exasperation was yearly growing with their miseries, the vice regal forces might depend for their safety only on the skill of their officers, the excellence of their discipline, and the superiority of their weapons. But the Egyptian officers were at that time distinguished for nothing but their public incapacity and private misbehavior. The evil reputation of the Sudan and its climate deterred the more educated or more wealthy from serving in such distant regions, and none went south who could avoid it. The army which the Qidives maintained in the Delta was, judged by European standards, only a rabble. It was badly trained, rarely paid, and very cowardly, and the scum of the army of the Delta was the cream of the army of the Sudan. The officers remained for long periods, many all their lives, in the obscurity of the remote provinces. Some had been sent there in disgrace, others in disfavor. Some had been forced to serve out of Egypt by extreme poverty, others were drawn to the Sudan by the hopes of gratifying peculiar tastes. The majority had harems of the women of the country, which were limited only by the amount of money they could lay their hands on by any method. Many were hopeless and habitual drunkards. Nearly all were dishonest. All were indolent and incapable. Under such leadership the finest soldiery would have soon degenerated. The Egyptians in the Sudan were not fine soldiers. Like their officers they were the worst part of the Qidaevil army. Like them they had been driven to the south. Like them they were slothful and afeet. Their training was imperfect, their discipline was lax, their courage was low. Nor was even this all the weakness and peril of their position, for while the regular troops were thus demoralized there existed a powerful local irregular force of Bazingers, Sudanese Riflemen, as well armed as the soldiers, more numerous, more courageous, and who regarded the alien garrisons with fear that continually diminished and hate that continually grew. And behind regulars and irregular alike the wild Arab tribes of the desert and the hearty blacks of the forests, goaded by suffering and injustice, thought the foreigners the cause of all their woes, and were delayed only by their inability to combine from sweeping them off the face of the earth. Never was there such a house of cards as the Egyptian dominion in the Sudan. The marvel is that it stood so long, not that it fell so soon. The names of two men of character and fame are forever connected with the actual outburst. One was an English general, the other an Arab priest. Yet in spite of the great gulf and vivid contrast between their conditions, they resembled each other in many respects. Both were earnest and enthusiastic men of keen sympathies and passionate emotions. Both were powerfully swayed by religious fervor. Both exerted great personal influence on all who came in contact with them. Both were reformers. The Arab was an African reproduction of the Englishman, the Englishman a superior and civilized development of the Arab. In the end they fought to the death, but for an important part of their lives their influence on the fortunes of the Sudan was exerted in the same direction. Muhammad Ahmed, the Madi, will be discussed in his own place. Charles Gordon needs little introduction. Long before this tale begins his reputation was European and the fame of the ever-victorious army had spread far beyond the Great Wall of China. The misgovernment of the Egyptians and the misery of the Sudanese reached their greatest extreme in the seventh decade of the present century. From such a situation there seemed to be no issue other than by force of arms. The Arab tribes lacked no provocation, yet they were destitute of two moral forces essential to all rebellions. The first was the knowledge that better things existed. The second was a spirit of combination. General Gordon showed them the first. The Madi provided the second. It is impossible to study any part of Charles Gordon's career without being drawn to all the rest, as his wild and varied fortunes lead him from Sebastopol to Peking, from Gravesend to South Africa, from Mauritius to the Sudan. The reader follows fascinated. Every scene is strange, terrible, or dramatic. Yet remarkable as are the scenes, the actor is the more extraordinary, a type without comparison in modern times and with few likenesses in history. Rare and precious is the truly disinterested man. Potentates of many lands in different degree, the Emperor of China, the King of the Belgians, the Premier of Cape Colony, the Kedive of Egypt, competed to secure his services. The importance of his offices varied no less than their nature. One day he was a subaltern of sappers. On another he commanded the Chinese army. The next he directed an orphanage, or was Governor General of the Sudan, with supreme powers of life and death and peace and war, or served as private secretary to Lord Rippon. But in whatever capacity he labored he was true to his reputation. Whether he is portrayed bitterly criticising to gram the tactics of the assault on the Redan, or pulling the head of Lar Wang from under his bed-stead and waving it in paroxysms of indignation before the astonish eyes of Sir Halide McCartney, or riding alone into the camp of the rebel Suliman and receiving the respectful salutes of those who had meant to kill him, or telling the Kedive Ismail that he must have the whole Sudan to govern, or reducing his salary to half the regulation amount because he thought it was too much, or ruling a country as large as Europe, or collecting facts for Lord Rippon's rhetorical efforts, we perceive a man careless alike of the frowns of men or the smiles of women, of life or comfort, wealth or fame. It was a pity that one, thus gloriously free from the ordinary restraining influence of human society, should have found in his own character so little mental ballast. His moods were capricious and uncertain, his passions violent, his impulses sudden and inconsistent. The mortal enemy of the morning had become a trusted ally before the night. The friend he loved to-day he loathed to-morrow. Scheme after scheme formed in his fertile brain and jostled confusingly together. All in succession were pressed with enthusiasm. All at times were rejected with disdain. A temperament naturally neurotic had been aggravated by an acquired habit of smoking, and the General carried this to so great an extreme that he was rarely seen without a cigarette. His virtues are famous among men. His daring and resource might turn the tide of war. His energy would have animated a whole people. His achievements are upon record, but it must also be set down that few more uncertain and impracticable forces than Gordon have ever been introduced into administration and diplomacy. Although the Egyptian government might loudly proclaim their detestation of slavery, their behaviour in the Sudan was viewed with suspicion by the European powers, and particularly by Great Britain. To vindicate his sincerity, the Kedive Ismail in 1874 appointed Gordon to be Governor of the Equatorial Province in succession to Sir Samuel Baker. The name of the General was a sufficient guarantee that the slave trade was being earnestly attacked. The Kedive would gladly have stopped at the guarantee and satisfied the world without disturbing vested interests. But the mission, which may have been originally instituted as a pretense, soon became in Gordon's energetic hands very real. Circumstances, moreover, soon enlisted the sympathies of the Egyptian government on the side of their zealous agent. The slave dealers had committed every variety of atrocity for which the most odious traffic in the world afforded occasion. But when, under the leadership of Zubair Rahamna, they refused to pay their annual tribute, it was felt in Cairo that their crimes had cried aloud for chastisement. Zubair is sufficiently described when it has been said that he was the most notorious slave dealer Africa has ever produced. His infamy had spread beyond the limits of the continent which was the Senevis exploits to the distant nations of the north and west. In reality, his rule was a distinct advance on the anarchy which had preceded it, and certainly he was no worse than others of his vile trade. His scale of business was, however, more extended. What William Whiteley was in respect of goods and chattels, that was Zubair in respect of slaves, a universal provider. Magnitude lends a certain grandeur to crime, and Zubair in the height of his power, at the head of the slave merchant's confederacy, might boast the retinue of a king and exercise authority over wide regions and a powerful army. As early as 1869 he was practically the independent ruler of the bar El Ghazal. The cadaive resolved to assert his rights. A small Egyptian force was sent to subdue the rebel slaver who not only disgraced humanity but refused to pay tribute. Like most of the cadaival expeditions the troops under Belil Bay met with ill fortune. They came, they saw, they ran away. Some less speedy than the rest fell on the field of dishonor. The rebellion was open. For the less it was the cadaive who sought peace. Zubair apologized for defeating the vice regal soldiers and remained supreme in the bar El Ghazal. Then he planned the conquest of Darfur at that time an independent kingdom. The Egyptian government were glad to join with him in the enterprise. The man they had been unable to conquer they found it expedient to assist. The operations were successful. The king of Darfur, who was distinguished no less for his valour than for his folly, was killed. The whole country was subdued. The whole population available after the battles became slaves. Zubair thus wielded a formidable power. The cadaival government, thinking to ensure his loyalty, created him a Pasha, a rank which he could scarcely disgrace, and the authority of the rebel was thus unwillingly recognized by the ruler. Such was the situation when Gordon first came to the Sudan. It was beyond the power of the new governor of the equatorial province at once to destroy the slave-hunting Confederacy. Yet he struck heavy blows at the slave trade, and when in 1877, after a short visit to England, he returned to the Sudan as governor-general and with absolute power, he assailed it with redoubled energy. Fortune assisted his efforts, for the able Zubair was enticed to Cairo, and once there the government refused to allow their faithful ally and distinguished guest to go back to his happy hunting-grounds. Although the slave-dealers were thus robbed of their great leader, they were still strong, and Zubair's son, the brave Suleiman, found a considerable following. Furia set his father's captivity, and alarmed lest his own should follow, he meditated revolt. But the governor-general, mounted on a swift camel and attired in full uniform, rode alone into the rebel camp and compelled the submission of its chiefs before they could recover from their amazement. The Confederacy was severely shaken, and when in the following year Suleiman again revolted, the Egyptian troops under Gesi Pasha were able to disperse his forces and induce him to surrender on terms. The terms were broken, and Suleiman and ten of his companions suffered death by shooting, taken from Von Slaten, Baron Rudolf Karl, fire and sword in the Sudan, page 28. The League of the Slave-Dealers was thus destroyed. CHAPTER I Towards the end of 1879 Gordon left the Sudan. With short intervals he had spent five busy years in its provinces. His energy had stirred the country. He had struck at the root of the slave trade. He had attacked the system of slavery. And, as slavery was the greatest institution in the land, he had undermined the whole social system. Indignation had stimulated his activity to an extraordinary degree. In a climate usually fatal to Europeans he discharged the work of five officers. Careless of his methods he bought slaves himself, drilled them, and with the soldiers thus formed, pounced on the caravans of the hunters. Traversing the country on a fleet dromedary, on which in a single year he has said to have covered 3,840 miles, he scattered justice and freedom among the astonished natives. He fed the infirm, protected the weak, executed the wicked. To some he gave actual help, to many freedom, to all new hopes and aspirations. Nor were the tribes ungrateful, the fiercest savages and cannibals respected the life of the strange white man. The women blessed him. He could ride unarmed and alone where a brigade of soldiers dared not venture. But he was, as he knew himself, the herald of the storm. Oppressed yet ferocious races had learned that they had rights. The misery of the Sudanese was lessened, but their knowledge had increased. The whole population was unsettled, and the wheels of change began slowly to revolve. Nor did they stop until they had accomplished an enormous revolution. The part played by the Second Force is more obscure. Few facts are so encouraging to the student of human development as the desire, which most men in all communities manifest at all times, to associate with their actions at least the appearance of moral right. However distorted may be their conceptions of virtue, however feeble their effort to attain even to their own ideals, it is a pleasing feature and a hopeful augury that they should wish to be justified. No community embarks on a great enterprise without fortifying itself with the belief that from some points of view its motives are lofty and disinterested. It is an involuntary tribute, the humble tribute of imperfect beings, to the eternal temples of truth and beauty. The sufferings of a people or a class may be intolerable, but before they will take up arms and risk their lives some unselfish and impersonal spirit must animate them. In countries where there is education in mental activity or refinement this high motive is found in the pride of glorious traditions or in a keen sympathy with surrounding misery. Ignorance deprives savage nations of such incentives. Yet in the marvellous economy of nature this very ignorance is a source of greater strength. It affords them the mighty stimulus of fanaticism. The French communists might plead that they upheld the rights of man. The desert tribes proclaim that they fought for the glory of God. But although the force of fanatical passion is far greater than that exerted by any philosophical belief, its sanction is just the same. It gives men something which they think is sublime to fight for. And this serves them as an excuse for wars which it is desirable to begin for totally different reasons. Fanaticism is not a cause of war, it is the means which helps savage peoples to fight. It is the spirit which enables them to combine, the great common object before which all personal or tribal disputes become insignificant. What the horn is to the rhinoceros. What the sting is to the wasp. The Mohammedan faith was to the Arabs of the Sudan. A faculty of offense or defense. It was all this and no more. It was not the reason of the revolt. It strengthened, it characterized, but it did not cause. Quote, I do not believe that fanaticism exists as it used to do in the world, judging from what I have seen in this so-called fanatic land. It is far more a question of property, and is more like communism under the flag of religion. End quote from General Gordon's journals at Cartoon, Book 1, Page 13. Those whose practice it is, to regard their own nation as possessing a monopoly of virtue and common sense, are want to ascribe every military enterprise of savage peoples to fanaticism. They calmly ignore obvious and legitimate motives. The most rational conduct is considered mad. It has therefore been freely stated, and to some extent believed, that the revolt in the Sudan was entirely religious. If the worst untruths are those that have some appearance of veracity, this impression must be very false indeed. It is perhaps an historical fact that the revolt of a large population has never been caused solely or even mainly by religious enthusiasm. The reasons which forced the peoples of the Sudan to revolt were as strong as the defense which their oppressors could offer was feeble. Looking at the question from a purely political standpoint, we may say that upon the whole there exists no record of a better case for rebellion than presented itself to the Sudanese. Their country was being ruined, their property was plundered, their women were ravished, their liberties were curtailed, even their lives were threatened. Aliens ruled the inhabitants, the few oppressed the many, brave men were harried by cowards, the weak compelled the strong. Here were sufficient reasons, since any armed movement against an established government can be justified only by success, strength is an important revolutionary virtue. It was a virtue that the Arabs might boast. They were indeed far stronger than they, their persecutors, or the outside world had yet learned. All were soon to be enlightened. The storm gathered, and the waters rose. Three great waves impelled the living tide against the tottering house founded on the desert sand. The Arabs suffered acutely from poverty, misgovernment, and oppression. Infuriated he looked up and perceived that the cause of all his miseries was a weak and cowardly foreigner, a despicable Turk. The antagonism of races increased the hatred sprung from social evils. The moment was at hand. Then, and not till then, the third wave came. The wave of fanaticism, which, catching up and surmounting the other waves, covered all the flood with its white foam, and bearing on with the momentum of the waters, beat in thunder against the weak house so that it fell, and great was the fall thereof. Down to the year 1881 there was no fanatical movement in the Sudan. In their utter misery the hopeless inhabitants had neglected even the practices of religion. They were nevertheless prepared for any enterprise, however desperate, which might free them from the Egyptian yoke. All that delayed them was the want of some leader who could combine the tribes and restore their broken spirits, and in the summer of 1881 the leader appeared. His subsequent career is within the limits of this account, and since his life throws a strong light on the thoughts and habits of the Arabs of the Sudan, it may be worthwhile to trace it from the beginning. The man who was the proxmic cause of the river-war was born by the banks of the Nile, not very far from Dangala. His family were poor, and of no account in the province. But as the prophet had claimed a royal dissent, and as a sacred example was sprung from David's line, Mohammed Ahmed asserted that he was of the Ashraf, descendants of the prophet, and the assertion, since it cannot be disproved, may be accepted. His father was a humble priest, yet he contrived to give his son some education in the practices of religion, the principles of the Koran, and the art of writing. Then he died a careray while on a journey to Khartoum, and left the future Mahdi, still a child, to the mercies of the world. Solitary trees, if they grow at all, grow strong, and a boy deprived of a father's care often develops if he escaped the perils of youth, an independence invigor of thought which may restore in afterlife the heavy loss of early days. It was so with Mohammed Ahmed. He looked around for an occupation and subsistence. A large proportion of the population of religious countries passed their lives at leisure, supported by the patient labor of the devout. The young man determined to follow the profession for which he felt his talents suited, and which would afford him the whitest scope. He became a priest. Many of the religious teachers of Heathen and other countries are devoid of enthusiasm and turn their attention to the next world, because doing so affords them an easy living in this. Happily this is not true of all, it was not true of Mohammed. Even at an early age he manifested a zeal for God's service, and displayed a peculiar aptitude for learning the tenets and dogmas of the Mohammedan belief. So promising a pupil did not long lack a master in a country where intelligence and enthusiasm were scarce. His aspirations growing with his years and knowledge he journeyed to Khartoum as soon as his religious education was completed, and became a disciple of the renowned and holy Sheikh Mohammed Sharif. His devotion to his superior, to his studies and to the practice of austerities, and a strange personal influence he was already beginning to show, won him by degrees a few disciples of his own, and with them he retired to the island of Aba. Here by the waters of the White Nile Mohammed Ahmed lived for several years. His two brothers, who were boat-builders in the neighborhood, supported him by their industry. But it must have been an easy burden, for we read that he hollowed out for himself a cave in the mud-bank, and lived an almost entire seclusion, fasting often for days, and occasionally paying a visit to the head of the order to assure him of his devotion and obedience. I take this passage from Fire and Sword in the Sudan, by Slatin. His account is the most graphic and trustworthy of all known records of the Madi. He had terrible opportunities of collecting information. I have followed his version, Chapter 4, very closely on this subject. Meanwhile, his sanctity increased, and the labor and charity of the brothers were assisted by the alms of godly travellers on the river. This virtuous and frugal existence was disturbed and terminated by an untoward event. The renowned and holy Sheikh made a feast to celebrate the circumcision of his sons. That the merriment of the auspicious occasion and the entertainment of the guests might be increased, Sharif, according to the lax practice of the time, granted a dispensation from any sins committed during the festivities, and proclaimed in God's name the suspension of the rules against singing and dancing, by which the religious orders were bound. The ascetic of Abba Island did not join in these seemingly innocent dissipations. With the recklessness of the Reformer he protested against the demoralization of the age, and loudly affirmed the doctrine that God alone could forgive sins. These things were speedily brought to the ears of the renowned Sheikh, and in all the righteous indignation that accompanies detected wrongdoing, he summoned Muhammad Ahmed before him. The latter obeyed. He respected his superior. He was under obligations to him. His ire had disappeared as soon as it had been expressed. He submissively entreated forgiveness, but in vain. Sharif felt that some sort of discipline must be maintained among his flock. He had connived at disobedience to the Divine Law. All the more must he uphold his own authority. Being in anger, he drove the presumptuous disciple from his presence with bitter words, and expunged his name from the order of the elect. Muhammad went home. He was greatly distressed. Yet his fortunes were not ruined. His sanctity was still a valuable and, unless he chose otherwise, an inalienable asset. The renowned Sheikh had a rival, nearly as holy and more enterprising than himself. From him the young priest might expect a warm welcome. Nevertheless he did not abandon his former superior. Placing a heavy wooden collar on his neck, clad in sackcloth, and sprinkled with ashes, he again returned to his spiritual leader, and in this penitential guise implored pardon. He was ignominiously ejected. Nor did he venture to revisit the unforgiving Sheikh. But it happened that in a few weeks Sharif had occasioned a journey to the island of Abba. His former disciple appeared suddenly before him, still clad in sackcloth and defiled by ashes. Careless of his plain misery, and unmoved by his loyalty, which was the more remarkable since it was disinterested, the implacable Sheikh poured forth a stream of invective. Among many insults one went home. Be off, you wretched Dongalawi! Although the natives of the Dongala province were despised and disliked in the southern Sudan, it is not at first apparent why Mohammed should have resented so bitterly the allusion to his birthplace. But abuse by class is a dangerous though effective practice. A man will perhaps tolerate an offensive word applied to himself, but will be infuriated if his nation, his rank, or his profession is insulted. Mohammed Ahmed rose. All that man could do to make amends he had done. Now he had been publicly called a wretched Dongalawi. Henceforth he would afflict Sharif with his repentance no longer. Reaching his house, he informed his disciples, for they had not abandoned him in all his trouble, that the Sheikh had finally cast him off, and that he would now take his discarded allegiance elsewhere. The rival, the Sheikh El Qureshi, lived near Mesalaimiyah. He was jealous of Sharif and envied him as sanctimonious disciples. He was therefore delighted to receive a letter from Mohammed Ahmed, announcing his breach with his former superior, and offering his most devoted services. He received a cordial invitation, and the priest of Abba Island made all preparation for the journey. This new development seemed to have startled the unforgiving Sharif. It was no part of his policy to alienate his followers, still less to add to those of his rival. After all, the quality of mercy was high and noble. He would at last graciously forgive the impulsive but repentant disciple. He wrote him a letter to this effect. But it was now too late. Mohammed replied with grave dignity that he had committed no crime, that he sought no forgiveness, and that a wretched Dongolaoui would not offend by his presence the renowned Sheikh El Sharif. After this indulgence he departed to Mesalaimiyah. But the fame of his doing spread far and wide throughout the land. Even in distant Darfur it was the principal topic of conversation, says Slatin and Fire and Sword. Rarely had Afiki been known to offend his superior, never to refuse his forgiveness. Mohammed did not hesitate to declare that he had done what he had done as a protest against the decay of religious fervor and the torpor of the times. Since his conduct had actually caused his dismissal, it appears that he was quite justified in making a virtue of necessity. At any rate he was believed, and the people groaning under oppression looked from all the regions to the figure that began to grow on the political horizon. His fame grew. Rumor, loud-tongued, carried it about the land that a great reformer was come to purify the faith and break the stony apathy which paralyzed the hearts of Islam. Whisprings added that a man was found who should break from off the necks of the tribes the hateful yoke of Egypt. Mohammed now deliberately entered upon the path of ambition. Throughout Nubia the Shukri belief prevails. Someday, in a time of shame and trouble, a second great prophet will arise, a Mahdi who shall lead the faithful nearer God and sustain the religion. The people of Sudan always look inquiringly to any ascetic who rises to fame, and the question is often repeated, Art thou he that should come, or do we look for another? Of this powerful element of disturbance, Mohammed Ahmad resolved to avail himself. He requested and obtained the permission of the Sheikh Quraishi to return to Abba, where he was well known, and with which island village his name was connected, and so came back in triumph to the scene of his disgrace. Thither many pilgrims began to resort. He received valuable presents which he distributed to the poor, who acclaimed him as Zahed, a renouncer of earthly pleasures. He journeyed preaching through court of fund, and received the respect of the priesthood and the homage of the people. And while he spoke of the purification of the religion, they thought that the burning words might be applied to the freedom of the soil. He supported his sermons by writings which were widely read. When a few months later the Sheikh Quraishi died, the priest of Abba proceeded forthwith to erect a tomb to his memory, directing and controlling the voluntary labours of the reverent Arabs who carried the stones. While Mohammed was thus occupied, he received the support of a man, less virtuous than, but nearly as famous as himself. Abdullah was one of four brothers, the sons of an obscure priest, but he inherited no great love of religion or devotion to its observances. He was a man of determination and capacity. He set before himself two distinct ambitions, both of which he accomplished, to free the Sudan of foreigners and to rule it himself. He seems to have had a queer presentiment of his career. This much he knew. There would be a great religious leader, and he would be his lieutenant and his successor. When Zubair conquered Darfur, Abdullah presented himself before him and hailed him as the expected Mahdi. Zubair, however, protested with superfluous energy that he was no saint, and the impulsive patriot was compelled to accept his assurances. So soon as he saw Mohammed Ahmed rising to fame and displaying qualities of courage and energy, he hastened to throw himself at his feet and assure him of his devotion. No part of Slatim Pasha's fascinating account of his perils and sufferings is so entertaining as that in which Abdullah, then become Khalifa of the whole Sudan, describes his early struggles and adversity. Indeed, it was a very troublesome journey. At that time my entire property consisted of one donkey, and he had a gall on his back so that I could not ride him. But I made him carry my water-skin and bag of corn, over which I spread my rough cotton garment, and drove him along in front of me. At that time I wore the white cotton shirt, like the rest of my tribe. My clothes and my dialect at once marked me out as a stranger wherever I went, and when I crossed the Nile I was frequently greeted with, What do you want? Go back to your own country. There is nothing to steal here. What a life of ups and downs! It was a long stride from the ownership of one saddle-gulled donkey to the undisputed rule of an empire. The weary wayfarer may have dreamed of this, for ambition stirs imagination nearly as much as imagination excites ambition. But further he could not expect or wish to see. Nor could he anticipate as, in the complacency of a man who had done with evil days, he told the story of his rise to the submissive Slatan, that the day would come when he would lead an army of more than fifty thousand men to destruction, and that the night would follow when, almost alone, his empire shrunk again to the saddle-gulled donkey, he would seek his home in distant Cortifan, while this same Slatan who knelt so humbly before him would lay the fierce pursuing squadrons on the trail. Muhammad Ahmed received his new adherent kindly, but without enthusiasm. For some months Abdullah carried stones to build the tomb of the Sheikh El Qureshi. Gradually they got to know each other. But long before he entrusted me with his secret, said Abdullah to Slatan, I knew that he was the expected guide. From Slatan, Fire and Sword, page 131. And though the world might think that the messenger of God was sent to lead men to happiness in heaven, Abdullah attached to the phrase, a significance of his own, and knew that he should lead him to power on earth. The two formed a strong combination. The Mahdi, for such Muhammad Ahmed had already in secret announced himself, brought the wild enthusiasm of religion, the glamour of a stainless life, and the influence of superstition into the movement. But if he were the soul of the plot, Abdullah was the brain. He was the man of the world, the practical politician, the general. There now commenced a great conspiracy against the Egyptian government. It was fostered by the discontents and justified by the miseries of the people of the Sudan. The Mahdi began to collect adherence and to extend his influence to all parts of the country. He made a second journey through court of fund, and received everywhere promises of support from all classes. The most distant tribe sent assurances of devotion and reverence, and what was of more importance, of armed assistance. The secret could not be long confined to those who welcomed the movement. As the ramifications of the plot spread, they were perceived by the renowned Sheikh Sharif, who still nursed his chagrin and thirsted for revenge. He warned the Egyptian government. They, knowing his envy and hatred of his former disciple, discounted his evidence, and for some time paid no attention to the gathering of the storm. But presently more trustworthy witnesses confirmed his statements, and Raouf Pasha, then Governor-General, finding himself confronted with a growing agitation, determined to act. He accordingly sent a messenger to the island of Abba, to some of Muhammad Ahmed to Khartoum, to justify his behavior and explain his intentions. The news of the dispatch of the messenger was swiftly carried to the Mahdi. He consulted with his trusty lieutenant. They decided to risk everything, and without further delay to defy the government. When it is remembered how easily an organized army, even though it be in a bad condition, can stamp out the beginnings of revolt among a population, the courage of their resolve must be admired. The messenger arrived. He was received with courtesy by Abdullah, and forthwith conducted before the Mahdi. He delivered his message and urged Muhammad Ahmed to comply with the orders of the Governor-General. The Mahdi listened for some time in silence but with increasing emotion, and when the messenger advised him as he valued his own safety to journey to Khartoum, if only to justify himself, his passion overcame him. What! he shouted, rising suddenly and striking his breast with his hand. By the grace of God in his prophet I am master of this country, and never shall I go to Khartoum to justify myself. From Slatin fire and sword, page 135. The terrified messenger withdrew. The rebellion of the Mahdi had begun. Both the priest and the Governor-General prepared for military enterprise. The Mahdi proclaimed a holy war against the foreigners, alike the enemies of God and the scourge of men. He collected his followers. He roused the local tribes. He wrote letters to all parts of the Sudan, calling upon the people to fight for a purified religion, the freedom of the soil, and God's holy prophet, the expected Mahdi. He promised the honor of men to those who lived, the favor of God to those who fell, and lastly that the land should be cleared of the miserable Turk. Better, he said, and it became the watchword of the revolt, thousands of graves than a dollar tax. From Orwalder, ten years' captivity in the Mahdi's camp. Nor was Raouf Pasha idle. He sent two companies of infantry with one gun by steamer to Abba to arrest the fanatic who disturbed the public peace. What followed is characteristically Egyptian. Each company was commanded by a captain. To encourage their efforts, whichever officer captured the Mahdi was promised promotion. At sunset, on an August evening in 1881, the steamer arrived at Abba. The promise of the Governor-General had provoked the strife, not the emulation, of the officers. Both landed with their companies and proceeded by different routes under the cover of darkness to the village where the Mahdi dwelt. Arriving simultaneously from opposite directions, they fired into each other, and in the midst of this mistaken combat the Mahdi rushed upon them with his scanty following, and destroyed them impartially. A few soldiers succeeded in reaching the bank of the river. But the captain of the steamer would run no risks, and those who could not swim out to the vessel were left to their fate. With such tidings the expedition returned to Khartoum. Muhammad Ahmed had been himself wounded in the attack, but the faithful Abdullah bound up the injury so that none might know that God's prophet had been pierced by carnal weapons. The effect of this success was electrical. The news spread throughout the Sudan. Men with sticks had slain men with rifles. A priest had destroyed the soldiers of the government. Surely this was the expected one. The Mahdi, however, profited by his victory only to accomplish a retreat without loss of prestige. Abdullah had no illusions. More troops would be sent. They were too near to Khartoum. Prudence counseled flight to regions more remote. But before this new hijirah the Mahdi appointed his four caliphs in accordance with prophecy and precedent. The first was Abdullah. Of the others it is only necessary at this moment to notice Ali Wad Helu, the chief of one of the local tribes, and among the first to rally to the standard of revolt. Then the retreat began. But it was more like a triumphal progress, attended by a considerable following and preceded by tales of the most wonderful miracles and prodigies. The Mahdi retired to a mountain in Kordafond to which he gave the name of Jable Masa. That being the mountain whence the expected guide is declared in the Koran sooner or later to appear. He was now out of reach of Khartoum, but within reach of Fashoda. The Egyptian governor of that town, Rashid Bey, a man of more enterprise and even less military knowledge than is usual in his race, determined to make all attempt to seize the rebel and disperse his following. Taking no precautions, he fell on the 9th of December into an ambush, was attacked unprepared, and was himself with fourteen hundred men slaughtered by the ill-armed but valiant Arabs. The whole country stirred. The government thoroughly alarmed by the serious aspect the revolt had assumed organized a great expedition. Four thousand troops under Yusef, a pashe of distinguished reputation, were sent against the rebels. Meanwhile the Mahdi and his followers suffered the extremes of want. Their cause was as yet too perilous for the rich to join. Only the poor flocked to the Holy Standard. All that Muhammad possessed he gave away, keeping nothing for himself, accepting only a horse to lead his followers in battle. Abdullah walked. Nevertheless the rebels were half-famished and armed with scarcely any more deadly weapons than sticks and stones. The army of the government approached slowly. Their leaders anticipated an easy victory. Their contempt for the enemy was supreme. They did not even trouble themselves to post sentries by night, but slept calmly inside a slender thorn fence, unwatched, saved by their tireless foes. And so it came to pass that in the half-light of the early morning of the 7th of June the Mahdi, his ragged caliphas, and his almost-naked army rushed upon them and slew them to a man. The victory was decisive. Southern Kordofam was at the feet of the priest of Abba. Stores of arms and ammunition had fallen into his hands. Thousands of every class hastened to join his Standard. No one doubted that he was the divine messenger sent to free them from their oppressors. The whole of the Arab tribes all over the Sudan rose at once. The revolt broke out simultaneously in Sennar and Darfur, and spread to provinces still more remote. The smaller Egyptian posts, the tax-gatherers and local administrators were massacred in every district. Only the larger garrisons maintained themselves in the principal towns. They were at once blockaded. All communications were interrupted. All legal authority was defied. Only the Mahdi was obeyed. It is now necessary to look for a moment to Egypt. The misgovernment which in the Sudan had caused the rebellion of the Mahdi, in Egypt produced the revolt of Arabipasha. As the people of the Sudan longed to be rid of the foreign oppressors, the so-called Turks, so those of the Delta were eager to free themselves from the foreign regulators and the real Turkish influence. While men who lived by the sources of the Nile asserted that tribes did not exist for officials to harry, others who twelved at its mouth protested that nations were not made to be exploited by creditors or aliens. The ignorant South found their leader in a priest. The more educated North looked to a soldier. Muhammad Ahmed broke the Egyptian yoke. Arabi gave expression to the hatred of the Egyptians for the Turks. But although the hardy Arabs might scatter the ephete Egyptians, the ephete Egyptians were not likely to disturb the solid battalions of Europe. After much hesitation and many attempts at compromise, the liberal administration of Mr. Gladstone sent a fleet which reduced the forts of Alexandria to silence and the city to anarchy. The bombardment of the fleet was followed by the invasion of a powerful army. Twenty-five thousand men were landed in Egypt. The campaign was conducted with celerity and skill. The Egyptian armies were slaughtered or captured. Their patriotic but commonplace leader was sentenced to death and condemned to exile, and Great Britain assumed the direction of Egyptian affairs. The British soon restored law and order in Egypt, and the question of the revolt in the Sudan came before the English advisors of the Qadai. Notwithstanding the poverty and military misfortunes which depressed the people of the Delta, the desire to hold their southern provinces was evident. The British government, which at that time was determined to pursue a policy of non-interference in the Sudan, gave a tacit consent, and another great expedition was prepared to suppress the false prophet, as the English and Egyptian deemed him, the expected Madi, as the people of the Sudan believed. A retired officer of the Indian Staff Corps and a few European officers of various nationalities were sent to Khartoum to organize the new field force. Meanwhile the Madi, having failed to take by storm, laid siege to El-Obeyed, the chief town of Kordafon. During the summer of 1883 the Egyptian troops gradually concentrated at Khartoum until a considerable army was formed. It was perhaps the worst army that has ever marched to war. One extract from General Hicks's letters will suffice. Writing on the 8th of June, 1883, to Sir E. Wood, he says, incidentally, Fifty-one men of the Krupp Battery deserted on the way here, although in chains. The officers and men who had been defeated fighting for their own liberties at Tel El Kibir were sent to be destroyed, fighting to take away the liberties of others in the Sudan. They had no spirit, no discipline, hardly any training, and in a force of over eight thousand men there were scarcely a dozen capable officers. The two who were the most notable of these few, General Hicks, who commanded, and Colonel Farquhar, the chief of the staff, must be remarked. El-Obeyed had fallen before the ill-fated expedition left Khartoum, but the fact that Slatin Bay, an Austrian officer in the Egyptian service, was still maintaining himself in Darfur, provided it with an object. On the 9th of September, Hicks and his army, the actual strength of which was seven thousand infantry, four hundred mounted Bashi Bazooks, five hundred cavalry, one hundred Circassians, ten mounted guns, four Krupps, and six Norden-felt machine guns, left Abderman and marched to Dou'em. Although the actual command of the expedition was vested in the English officer, Allah El-Din Pasha, the Governor-General who had succeeded Raouf Pasha, exercised an uncertain authority. Differences of opinion were frequent, though all the officers were agreed in taking the darkest views of their chances. The miserable host toiled slowly onward towards its destruction, marching in a southwesternly direction through Shat and Rahad. Here the condition of the force was so obviously demoralized that a German servant, Gustav Krupps, the servant of Berensekendorf, actually deserted to the Mahdi's camp. He was paraded in triumph as an English officer. On the approach of the government troops, the Mahdi had marched out of Obaid and established himself in the open country, where he made his followers live under military conditions and continually practiced them in war-like evolutions. More than forty thousand men collected round his standard, and the Arabs were now armed with several thousand rifles and a few cannon, as well as a great number of swords and spears. To these proportions had the little band of followers who fought at Abba grown. The disparity of the forces was apparent before the battle. The Mahdi, thereupon wrote to Hicks, calling on him to surrender and offering terms. His proposals were treated with disdain, although the probable result of an engagement was clear. Until the expedition reached Rahad, only a few cavalry patrols had watched its slow advance. But on the first of November the Mahdi left Obaid and marched with his whole power to meet his adversary. The collision took place on the third of November. All through that day the Egyptians struggled slowly forward, in great want of water, losing continually from the fire of the Sudanese riflemen and leaving several guns behind them. On the next morning they were confronted by the main body of the Arab army, and their attempts to advance further were defeated with heavy loss. The force began to break up. Yet another day was consumed before it was completely destroyed. Scarcely five hundred Egyptians escaped death, hardly as many of the Arabs fell. The European officers perished fighting to the end, and the general met his fate sword in hand at the head of the last formed body of his troops, his personal valor and physical strength exciting the admiration even of the fearless enemy, so that in chivalrous respect they buried his body with barbaric honors. Muhammad Ahmed celebrated his victory with a salute of one hundred guns, and well he might, for the Sudan was now his, and his boast that, by God's grace and the favour of the Prophet, he was the master of all the land, had been made good by force of arms. No further attempt was made to subdue the country. The people of the Sudan had won their freedom by their valor and by the skill and courage of their saintly leader. It only remained to evacuate the towns and withdraw the garrisons safely. But what looked like the winding up of one story was really the beginning of another, much longer, just as bloody, commencing in shame and disaster, but ending in triumph and, let us hope, in peace. I desire for a moment to take a more general view of the Madi's movement than the narrative has allowed. The original causes were social and racial. But, great as was the misery of the people, their spirit was low, and they would not have taken up arms merely on material grounds. Then came the Madi. He gave the tribes the enthusiasm they lacked. The war broke out. It is customary to lay to the charge of Muhammad Ahmed all the blood that was spilled. To my mind it seems that he may divide the responsibility with the unjust rulers who oppressed the land, with the incapable commanders who muddled away the lives of their men, with the vacillating ministers who aggravated the misfortunes. But, whatever is sent to the Madi's account, it should not be forgotten that he put life and soul into the hearts of his countrymen, and freed his native land of foreigners. The poor, miserable natives, eating only a handful of grain, toiling half naked and without hope, found anew if terrible magnificence added to life. Within their humble breasts, the spirit of the Madi roused the fires of patriotism and religion. Life became filled with thrilling, exhilarating terrors. They existed in a new and wonderful world of imagination. While they lived there were great things to be done, and when they died, whether it was slaying the Egyptians or charging the British squares, a paradise which they could understand awaited them. There are many Christians who reverence the faith of Islam, and yet regard the Madi merely as a commonplace religious imposter whom force of circumstances elevated to notoriety. In a certain sense this may be true, but I know not how a genuine may be distinguished from a spurious prophet except by the measure of his success. The triumphs of the Madi were in his lifetime far greater than those of the founder of the Mohammedan faith, and the chief difference between orthodox Mohammedanism and Madism was that the original impulse was opposed only by decaying systems of government and society, and the recent movement came in contact with civilization and the machinery of science. Recognizing this, I do not share the popular opinion, and I believe that if in future years prosperity should come to the peoples of the upper Nile, and learning and happiness follow in its train, then the first Arab historian who shall investigate the early annals of that new nation will not forget, foremost among the heroes of his race, to write the name of Mohammed Ahmed. End of chapter one.