I Was Fully Prepared For Some Difficulty, But I Trusted That When Once On The March I Should Be Able To Get Them Under Discipline.

Among my people were two blacks:

One, "Richarn," already described as having been brought up by the Austrian Mission at Khartoum; the other, a boy of twelve years old, "Saat." As these were the only really faithful members of the expedition, it is my duty to describe them. Richarn was an habitual drunkard, but he had his good points: he was honest, and much attached to both master and mistress. He had been with me for some months, and was a fair sportsman, and being of an entirely different race from the Arabs, he kept himself apart from them, and fraternized with the boy Saat.

Saat was a boy that would do no evil. He was honest to a superlative degree, and a great exception to the natives of this wretched country. He was a native of "Fertit," and was minding his father's goats, when a child of about six years old, at the time of his capture by the Baggara Arabs. He described vividly how men on camels suddenly appeared while he was in the wilderness with his flock, and how he was forcibly seized and thrust into a large gum sack and slung upon the back of a camel. Upon screaming for help, the sack was opened, and an Arab threatened him with a knife should he make the slightest noise. Thus quieted, he was carried hundreds of miles through Kordofan to Dongola on the Nile, at which place he was sold to slave-dealers and taken to Cairo to be sold to the Egyptian government as a drummer-boy. Being too young he was rejected, and while in the dealer's hands he heard from another slave, of the Austrian Mission at Cairo, that would protect him could he only reach their asylum. With extraordinary energy for a child of six years, he escaped from his master and made his way to the Mission, where he was well received, and to a certain extent disciplined and taught as much of the Christian religion as he could understand. In company with a branch establishment of the Mission, he was subsequently located at Khartoum, and from thence was sent up the White Nile to a Mission-station in the Shillook country. The climate of tie White Nile destroyed thirteen missionaries in the short space of six months, and the boy Saat returned with the remnant of the party to Khartoum and was readmitted into the Mission. The establishment was at that time swarming with little black boys from the various White Nile tribes, who repaid the kindness of the missionaries by stealing everything they could lay their hands upon. At length the utter worthlessness of the boys, their moral obtuseness, and the apparent impossibility of improving them determined the chief of the Mission to purge his establishment from such imps, and they were accordingly turned out. Poor little Saat, the one grain of gold amid the mire, shared the same fate.

It was about a week before our departure from Khartoum that Mrs. Baker and I were at tea in the middle of the court-yard, when a miserable boy about twelve years old came uninvited to her side, and knelt down in the dust at her feet. There was something so irresistibly supplicating in the attitude of the child that the first impulse was to give him something from the table. This was declined, and he merely begged to be allowed to live with us and to be our boy. He said that he had been turned out of the Mission, merely because the Bari boys of the establishment were thieves, and thus he suffered for their sins. I could not believe it possible that the child had been actually turned out into the streets, and believing that the fault must lie in the boy, I told him I would inquire. In the mean time he was given in charge of the cook.

It happened that on the following day I was so much occupied that I forgot to inquire at the Mission, and once more the cool hour of evening arrived, when, after the intense heat of the day, we sat at table in the open court-yard. Hardly were we seated when again the boy appeared, kneeling in the dust, with his head lowered at my wife's feet, and imploring to be allowed to follow us. It was in vain that I explained that we had a boy and did not require another; that the journey was long and difficult, and that he might perhaps die. The boy feared nothing, and craved simply that he might belong to us. He had no place of shelter, no food; had been stolen from his parents, and was a helpless outcast.

The next morning, accompanied by Mrs. Baker, I went to the Mission and heard that the boy had borne an excellent character, and that it must have been BY MISTAKE that he had been turned out with the others. This being conclusive, Saat was immediately adopted. Mrs. Baker was shortly at work making him some useful clothes, and in an incredibly short time a great change was effected. As he came from the hands of the cook, after a liberal use of soap and water, and attired in trousers, blouse, and belt, the new boy appeared in a new character.

From that time he considered himself as belonging absolutely to his mistress. He was taught by her to sew. Richarn instructed him in the mysteries of waiting at table, and washing plates, etc., while I taught him to shoot, and gave him a light double-barrelled gun. This was his greatest pride.

Not only was the boy trustworthy, but he had an extraordinary amount of moral in addition to physical courage. If any complaint were made, and Saat was called as a witness, far from the shyness too often evinced when the accuser is brought face to face with the accused, such was Saat's proudest moment; and, no matter who the man might be, the boy would challenge him, regardless of all consequences.

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