We Were
In "A Darkness That Might Be Felt." Suddenly The Wind Arrived, But Not
With The Violence That I Had Expected.
There were two persons with me,
Michael Latfalla, my agent, and Monsieur Lombrosio.
So intense was the
darkness, that we tried to distinguish our hands placed close before our
eyes; - not even an outline could be seen. This lasted for upwards of
twenty minutes: it then rapidly passed away, and the sun shone as
before; but we had FELT the darkness that Moses had inflicted upon the
Egyptians.
The Egyptian Government had, it appeared, been pressed by some of the
European Powers to take measures for the suppression of the slave-trade:
a steamer had accordingly been ordered to capture all vessels laden
with this in famous cargo. Two vessels had been seized and brought to
Khartoum, containing 850 human beings! - packed together like anchovies,
the living and the dying festering together, and the dead lying beneath
them. European eye-witnesses assured me that the disembarking of this
frightful cargo could not be adequately described. The slaves were in a
state of starvation, having had nothing to eat for several days. They
were landed in Khartoum; the dead and many of the dying were tied by the
ankles, and dragged along the ground by donkeys through the streets. The
most malignant typhus, or plague, had been engendered among this mass of
filth and misery, thus closely packed together. Upon landing, the women
were divided by the Egyptian authorities among the soldiers. These
creatures brought the plague to Khartoum, which, like a curse visited
upon this country of slavery and abomination, spread like a fire
throughout the town, and consumed the regiments that had received this
horrible legacy from the dying cargo of slaves. Among others captured by
the authorities on a charge of slave-trading was an Austrian subject,
who was then in the custody of the consul. A French gentleman, Monsieur
Garnier, had been sent to Khartoum by the French Consulate of Alexandria
on a special inquiry into the slave-trade; he was devoting himself to
the subject with much energy.
While at Khartoum I happened to find Mahommed Her! the vakeel of
Chenooda's party, who had instigated lily men to mutiny at Latooka, and
had taken my deserters into his employ. I had promised to make an
example of this fellow; I therefore had him arrested, and brought before
the Divan. With extreme effrontery, he denied having had anything to do
with the affair, adding to his denial all knowledge of the total
destruction of his party and of my mutineers by the Latookas. Having a
crowd of witnesses in my own men, and others that I had found in
Khartoum who had belonged to Koorshid's party at that time, his
barefaced lie was exposed, and he was convicted. I determined that he
should be punished, as an example that would insure respect to any
future English traveller in those regions. My men, and all those with
whom I had been connected, had been accustomed to rely most implicitly
upon all that I had promised, and the punishment of this man had been an
expressed determination.
I went to the Divan and demanded that he should be flogged. Omer Bey was
then Governor of the Soudan, in the place of Moosa Pasha deceased. He
sat upon the divan, in the large hall of justice by the river. Motioning
me to take a seat by his side, and handing me his pipe, he called the
officer in waiting, and gave the necessary orders. In a few minutes the
prisoner was led into the hall, attended by eight soldiers. One man
carried a strong pole about seven feet long, in the centre of which was
a double chain, riveted through in a loop. The prisoner was immediately
thrown down with his face to the ground, while two men stretched out his
arms and sat upon them; his feet were then placed within the loop of the
chain, and the pole being twisted round until firmly secured, it was
raised from the ground sufficiently to expose the soles of the feet. Two
men with powerful hippopotamus whips stood, one on either side. The
prisoner thus secured, the order was given. The whips were most
scientifically applied, rind after the first five dozen, the
slave-hunting scoundrel howled most lustily for mercy. How often had he
flogged unfortunate slave women to excess, and what murders had that
wretch committed, who now howled for mercy! I begged Omer Bey to stop
the punishment at 150 lashes, and to explain to him publicly in the
divan, that he was thus punished for attempting to thwart the expedition
of an English traveller, by instigating my escort to mutiny.
This affair over - all my accounts paid - and my men dismissed with their
hands full of money, - I was ready to start for Egypt. The Nile rose
sufficiently to enable the passage of the cataracts, and on the 30th
June we took leave of all friends in Khartoum, and of my very kind
agent, Michael Latfalla, well known as Hallil el Shami, who had most
generously cashed all my bills on Cairo without charging a fraction of
exchange. On the morning of 1st July, we sailed from Khartoum to Berber.
On approaching the fine basalt hills through which the river passes
during its course from Khartoum, I was surprised to see the great Nile
contracted to a trifling width of from eighty to a hundred and twenty
yards. Walled by high cliffs of basalt upon either side, the vast volume
of the Nile flows grandly through this romantic pass, the water boiling
up in curling eddies, showing that rocky obstructions exist in its
profound depths below.
Our voyage was very nearly terminated at the passage of the cataracts.
Many skeletons of wrecked vessels lay upon the rocks in various places:
as we were flying along in full sail before a heavy gale of wind,
descending a cataract, we struck upon a sandbank - fortunately not upon a
rock, or we should have gone to pieces like a glass bottle.
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