My Task Was To Suppress The Slave Trade, When The Khartoum Authorities
Well Knew That Their Tenants Were Slave-Hunters;
To establish legitimate
commerce where the monopoly of trade had already been leased to traders;
and to build up a
Government upon sound and just principles, that must
of necessity ruin the slave-hunting and ivory-collecting parties of
Khartoum.
It was easy to conceive that my mission was regarded as fatal to the
interests of the Soudan. Although the actual wording of the contracts
was pure, and the lessees bound themselves to abstain from
slave-hunting, and to behave in a becoming manner, it was thoroughly
understood that they were simply to pay a good round sum per annum
punctually, and that no questions would be asked. There were no
authorities of the government in those distant countries, neither
consular agents to send home unpleasant reports; thus, when fairly away
from all restraint, the traders could act as they pleased. It appears
hardly credible that although the wording of the contracts was almost
holy, no examination of the vessels was made before their departure from
Khartoum. Had the Soudan government been sincere in a determination to
lease out the White Nile for the purpose of benefiting the country by
the establishment of legitimate commerce, surely the authorities would
have convinced themselves that the traders' vessels contained cargoes of
suitable merchandise, instead of being loaded with ammunition, and
manned by bands of armed pirates.
If the owner of a pack of wolves were to send them on a commission to
gather wool from a flock of sheep, with the simple protection of such
parting advice as "Begone, good wolves, behave yourselves like lambs,
and do not hurt the mutton!" the proprietor of the pack would be held
responsible for the acts of his wolves. This was the situation in the
Soudan. The entire country was leased out to piratical slave-hunters,
under the name of traders, by the Khartoum government; and although the
rent, in the shape of large sums of money, had been received for years
into the treasury of the Soudan, my expedition was to explode like a
shell among the traders, and would at once annihilate the trade. I now
understood the reason for the alteration in my proposed territorial
limit from the 14 degrees N. lat. to the 5 degrees. Khartoum is in lat.
15 degrees 35' N. Gondokoro is N. lat. 4 degrees 54', thus, if my
jurisdiction should be reduced to the south of Gondokoro, the usual
traffic of the White Nile might continue in the north during my absence
in the south, and the original contracts would be undisturbed.
It is a duty that I owe to the Khedive of Egypt to explain these
details. It would at first sight appear that the expedition to suppress
the slave-trade was merely a theatrical announcement to court the
sympathy of Europe, but which, in reality, had no solidity. I am
perfectly convinced that the Khedive was thoroughly sincere in his
declared purpose of suppressing the slave-trade, not only as a
humanitarian, but as an enlightened man of the world, who knew, from the
example of the great Powers of Europe, that the time had arrived when
civilization demanded the extinction of such horrors as were the
necessary adjuncts of slave-hunting.
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