The Political Methods And Social Style Of The
Governors-General Were Imitated More Or Less Exactly By The Subordinate
Officials According To Their Degree In The Provinces.
Since they were
completely hidden from the eye of civilisation, they enjoyed a greater
licence in their administration.
As their education was inferior, so
their habits became more gross. Meanwhile the volcano on which they
disported themselves was ominously silent. The Arab tribes obeyed, and
the black population cowered.
The authority of a tyrannical Government was supported by the presence
of a worthless army. Nearly forty thousand men were distributed among
eight main and numerous minor garrisons. Isolated in a roadless country
by enormous distances and natural obstacles, and living in the midst of
large savage populations of fanatical character and warlike habits,
whose exasperation was yearly growing with their miseries, the Viceregal
forces might depend for their safety only on the skill of their officers,
the excellence of their discipline, and the superiority of their weapons.
But the Egyptian officers were at that time distinguished for nothing
but their public incapacity and private misbehaviour. The evil reputation
of the Soudan and its climate deterred the more educated or more wealthy
from serving in such distant regions, and none went south who could
avoid it. The army which the Khedives maintained in the Delta was, judged
by European standards, only a rabble. It was badly trained, rarely paid,
and very cowardly; and the scum of the army of the Delta was the cream of
the army of the Soudan. The officers remained for long periods, many all
their lives, in the obscurity of the remote provinces. Some had been sent
there in disgrace, others in disfavour. Some had been forced to serve out
of Egypt by extreme poverty, others were drawn to the Soudan by the hopes
of gratifying peculiar tastes. The majority had harems of the women of
the country, which were limited only by the amount of money they could
lay their hands on by any method. Many were hopeless and habitual
drunkards. Nearly all were dishonest. All were indolent and incapable.
Under such leadership the finest soldiery would have soon degenerated.
The Egyptians in the Soudan were not fine soldiers. Like their officers,
they were the worst part of the Khedivial army. Like them, they had been
driven to the south. Like them, they were slothful and effete. Their
training was imperfect; their discipline was lax; their courage was low.
Nor was even this all the weakness and peril of their position; for
while the regular troops were thus demoralised, there existed a powerful
local irregular force of Bazingers (Soudanese riflemen), as well armed
as the soldiers, more numerous, more courageous, and who regarded the
alien garrisons with fear that continually diminished and hate that
continually grew. And behind regulars and irregulars alike the wild Arab
tribes of the desert and the hardy blacks of the forests, goaded by
suffering and injustice, thought the foreigners the cause of all their
woes, and were delayed only by their inability to combine from sweeping
them off the face of the earth.
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