Ismailia | Page 5

their owners; the brutality lay in their capture, with the attendant lawlessness and murders; but that was far away, and the slave proprietors of Egypt had not witnessed the miseries of the weary marches of the distant caravans. They purchased slaves, taught them their duties, fed and clothed them--they were happy; why should the Khedive of Egypt prohibit the traffic and thus disturb every household in his territory?
There is no Hyde Park or Trafalgar Square in Egypt, there are no agitators nor open-air meetings, fortunately for the modern ruler, or he would have had an unpleasant expression of the popular sentiment at the close of my administration. The break-up of the White Nile slave-trade involved the depression of trade in Khartoum, as the market had supplied the large bands of slave-hunters. The ivory of the numerous adventurers still remained in the White Nile stations, as they feared confiscation should their vessels be captured with the ever accompanying slave cargo. Thus little ivory arrived at Khartoum to meet the debts of the traders to the merchants in Cairo and Alexandria. These owed Manchester and Liverpool for calicoes supplied, which had been forwarded to the Soudan.
The direct blow at the White Nile slave-trade was an indirect attack upon the commerce of the country, which was inseparably connected with the demand of the Soudan employers of brigands.
This slight outline of the situation will exhibit the difficulties of the Khedive in his thankless and Herculean task of cleansing the Augean stables. He incurred the wrath of general discontent; his own officials accused him of deserting the Mahommedan cause for the sake of European Kudos, and while he sacrificed his popularity in Egypt, his policy was misconstrued by the powers he had sought to gratify. He was accused of civilizing "through the medium of fire and sword" by the same English journals which are now extolling the prowess of the British arms in Caffraria and the newly-annexed Transvaal!
In this equivocal position it would have been natural either to have abandoned the enterprise at the termination of my own engagement, or to have placed a Mahommedan officer in charge of the new provinces. Instead of this, His Highness adhered most strictly to his original determination, and to prove his sincerity he entrusted the command to an English officer of high reputation, not only for military capacity, but for a peculiar attribute of self-sacrifice and devotion. Colonel C. E. Gordon, R.E., C.B., was appointed Governor-General of the Soudan and equatorial districts, with supreme power.
This appointment extinguished the delusions which had been nourished by the Soudan authorities, "that at the expiration of Baker Pacha's rule the good old times of slavery and lawlessness would return." There was no longer any hope; the slave-trade was suppressed, and the foundation was laid for the introduction of European ideas and civilization. It will now be interesting to trace an outline of the advance of Egypt during the last five years.
The main difficulty in my original enterprise was the obstruction of the White Nile by the accumulation of matted vegetation, which impeded navigation, and actually closed the river. Upon arrival at Gondokoro, after the tedious process of cutting through 50 miles of swamp and vegetable matter, via the Bahr Giraffe, I had requested the Khedive to issue an order that the Governor of Khartoum should immediately commence the great work of re-opening the White Nile.
His Highness without delay forwarded the necessary instructions, and in two years the work was completed by Ismail Ayoob Pacha, with the loss of several vessels which had been overwhelmed by the sudden bursting of vast masses of floating swamps and entangled reeds. It had been necessary to commence operations below stream, to enable the blocks of vegetation to escape when detached by cutting from the main body.
The White Nile was restored to navigation a few months after my return to England, and was clear for large vessels by the time that Colonel Gordon arrived in Khartoum.
I had originally sent up six steamers from Cairo to ply between Khartoum and Gondokoro; these had been simply employed as far as Fashoda station, but as the Nile was now open, they at once established a rapid and regular communication with the equatorial provinces. The terrible difficulty had vanished, and Gondokoro was linked with the outer world from which it had been excluded. The appliances which had been prepared with much care could now be utilized. With the river open, supplies and reinforcements could be immediately forwarded, and the ivory which had accumulated in the government stations could be brought to market. In addition to the physical advantages of restored communication, a great moral change was effected throughout the officers and troops; they felt no longer banished from the world, but accepted their position as garrisons in Egyptian territory.
At Gondokoro I