A Narrative of the Expedition to Dongola and Sennaar | Page 2

those
provinces that submitted without fighting. Perfect security of person
and property was assured to the peaceable, and severe examples were
made of those few of the soldiery, who, in a very few instances,
presumed to violate it. The good consequences of this deportment
toward the people of these countries have been evident. All have seen
that those who have preferred peace before war have had peace without
war, and that those who preferred war before peace have not had peace
but at the price of ruin.
The destruction or disarmament of the brigands, who have heretofore
pillaged those countries with impunity--the establishment of order and
tranquility--the security now assured to the peasants and the
caravans--and the annexment of so many fine provinces and kingdoms
to the sway of the Viceroy of Egypt,[2] are not the only consequences
of this expedition that will give him glory.
This expedition has laid open to the researches of the geographer and
the antiquarian a river and a country highly interesting, and hitherto
imperfectly known to the civilized world. The Nile, on whose banks we
have marched for so many hundred miles, is the most famous river in
the world, for the uncertainty of its source and the obscurity of its
course. At present this obscurity ceases to exist, and before the return
of the Pasha Ismael this uncertainty will probably be no more. The
countries we have traversed are renowned in history and poetry as the
land of ancient and famous nations, which have established and
overthrown mighty empires, and have originated the religions, the
learning, the arts, and the civilization of nations long since extinct; and
who have been preceded by their instructors in the common road which
every thing human must travel.
This famous land of Cush and Saba, at present overawed by the camps
of the Osmanii, has presented to our observation many memorials of
the power and splendor of its ancient masters. The remains of cities
once populous--ruined temples once magnificent--colossal statues of

idols once adored, but now prostrated by the strong arms of time and
truth--and more than a hundred pyramids, which entomb the bodies of
kings and conquerors once mighty, but whose memory has perished,
have suspended for awhile the march of our troops--have attracted the
notice of the Franks, who voyage with the army with the favor and the
protection of the Pasha,[3] and which doubtless ere long, by engaging
the attention and researches of men of learning, will unite the names of
Mehemmed Ali and Ismael his son with the history and monuments of
this once famous and long secluded land, in a manner that will make
the memory of both renowned and inseparable.
That the further progress of the Pasha Ismael southward of his present
position will be successful, there is every reason to believe; and I derive
great pleasure from the reflection, that his success will still further
augment the glory of the man whom the Sultan delights to honor, and
who has done so much for the honor of the Mussulmans.
The Reader will find that I have sometimes, in the course of this
Journal, included the events of several days in the form of narrative,
particularly in my account of the Second Cataract. Wherever I have so
done, it has been occasioned by paroxysms of a severe ophthalmia,
which afflicted me for fifteen months, and rendered me at times
incapable of writing.

A NARRATIVE
&c. &c. &c.
I arrived at the camp at Wady Haifa on the Second Cataract, on the
16th of the moon Zilhadge, in the year of the Hegira 3255,[4] where I
found about four thousand troops,[5] consisting of Turkish cavalry,
infantry and artillery, and a considerable proportion of Bedouin cavalry
and Mogrebin foot soldiers, besides about one hundred and twenty
large boats loaded with provisions and ammunition, and destined to
follow the march of the army to the upper countries of the Nile.

17th of Zilhadge. Presented myself to his Excellency the Pasha Ismael,
by whom I was received in a very nattering manner, and presented with
a suit of his own habiliments.
On my asking his Excellency if he had any orders for me, he replied,
that he was at present solely occupied in expediting the loading and
forwarding the boats carrying the provisions of the army, but that when
that was finished he would send for me to receive his commands.
I employed this interval in noticing the assemblage that composed the
army. The chiefs and soldiers I found well disposed to do their duty,
through attachment to their young commander and through fear of
Mehemmed Ali. They were alert to execute what orders they received,
and very busy in smoking their pipes when they had nothing else to do.
On the 19th I was sent