To lighten the work of preparation for departure and to compensate for his refusal to show himself in the provinces, Stanley granted Emin’s request that an officer of the expedition might go back with him. Jephson was selected for this by no means easy position, and a letter was given him to the Khedive and his minister which read: “I am sending you one of my officers with instructions to read this to you. I am going back to bring my people and goods and settle upon the Nyanza. In a few months I shall be here again to listen to what you may purpose. If you say ‘We go to Egypt’ I will take them by a safe route. If you say ‘We will not leave the country,’ then I shall say farewell to you and go back with my own to Egypt.”
Stanley made two other propositions. In case he and his people decided not to go back to Egypt he (Stanley) would go with him and his people to the northeastern corner of Victoria Lake, establish a residence there and a chain of stations to Mombasa—a plan which would certainly be frustrated by the hostility of the natives. At last Stanley offered to incorporate the Equatorial Provinces with the Congo Free State, provided an unbroken union could be secured to the west coast. The fate which attended the rescue expedition was sufficiently eloquent to spare a reply to either proposition. So Stanley took his way back through the gloomy forest and left Emin making preparations for his departure.
Hardly had Emin departed for Lado, to take the troops there to the lake, when a certain Soliman Aga, a Nubian and former slave and a man of low condition, openly threw off the mask and summoned soldiers and officials to meet him. At this meeting he urged resistance, at the same time making the meanest accusations against the Christians. He sent messengers to Faliko, Msua, Wadelai, and urged them to unite in order to avert the calamity which the Pasha was about to visit upon the province. All were certain that they were to be taken to the south to be sold into slavery. The discontented natives replied secretly and quickly to the insurrectionary call and from the frequent comings and goings of messengers and their unusual intercourse with clerks and officials, Casati, who remained in the south, quickly came to a conclusion. Aga issued his commands absolutely and despotically. Woe to him who ventured to question them! Reason and justice, reflection and freedom had no influence. The soldiers shuddered at his unjust and cruel treatment. The Danagla trembled for their very existence. The stations were silent and abandoned. The powerful figure of the despot confronted them at the gates, often in furious anger and sometimes in a condition of excessive drunkenness, which made him still more terrible. In the nighttime furious beating of the great drums, shrill tones of fifes and discharges of musketry explained the business upon which the leader and his friends were engaged.
When Emin issued his order to move the war material in the magazine at Dufile, southward, the soldiers unanimously resisted. Mistrust seized them. They saw they were no longer free of will, but would be driven by force and that they and their families would be exposed to the mercy of the natives and outside enemies. On the thirteenth of August (1888) the troops at Lahore were mustered upon the plaza of the village. Jephson, accompanied by Emin and various officers, read the letter of Stanley which the governor himself had translated into Arabic and invited the soldiers to express their intentions. An unusual murmur and a scarcely repressed disquiet were manifest, but no one among them ventured to say a word. Then suddenly a soldier stepped out from the ranks with his gun upon his arm. He advanced and, turning to the governor, said they were ready to withdraw and had fixed the corn harvest for the time. Jephson asked for a written promise which he could send to Stanley. Then the soldier became presumptuous and replied that this was not the way for the government’s soldiers to be treated. This order was deceitful, for the Khedive had commanded, not expressed, his wish. He had ordered the rescue of all, not their submission to autocratic power.
Indignant at the soldier’s audacity, Emin stepped up to him, seized him by the neck, and ordered him to be disarmed and imprisoned. The soldiers to a man broke ranks and gathered together in threatening groups, pointing their guns at the governor, who had drawn his sabre to compel obedience. Quick action by the officers alone prevented an outbreak. The troops withdrew to keep guard at the arsenal, but refused their regular night service at the governor’s residence. On the nineteenth of August, Emin and Jephson entered the station at Dufile by the northern gate. The way into the village was forsaken. Not a single person met them and it was as silent everywhere as the grave. As they reached their house their entrance was prevented by a picket of soldiers on guard. The governor was taken prisoner, but Jephson in his capacity of guest was not included in their hostile designs. A new government was set up in Wadelai which was to secure justice for all!
Dreadful news followed. In October, three steamers for Khartoum appeared before Redjaf. The armed Mahdists, who came in them, attacked and captured the station after a brief resistance. Three clerks and three officers, who heroically defended the entrance to the fort, were slain. A horrible massacre of men, women, and children ensued. No one was spared. Other assaults by the Mahdists followed and all were successful. The mutineers were panic-stricken, for they knew not how to withstand the advancing enemy. Casati availed himself of the situation by persuading the men who had usurped the government that it was necessary to remove the governor from the vicinity of the enemy’s operations.
On the morning of the seventeenth of November Emin was sent under military escort and with the salute of cannon to the steamer which was to take him to Wadelai. There was a little creature on board who had suffered terrible anxiety for many long weeks. It was Ferida, Emin’s poor little child. She was so young that she could hardly comprehend her father’s situation. She only knew that something dreadful might happen. Captain Casati had so successfully used his influence that she was kept at his house during Emin’s imprisonment. Her father had often been away on journeys, but here it was very different. There was something terrible in the air. Almost every day she besought Casati to take her to her father and when her wish was not granted, she would ask a hundred times if any harm had happened to him. Now the terrible time seemed to her like a long, wretched dream. With sparkling eyes she clung to her “good little father” and was so delighted that she sang and danced about the deck.
When the steamer arrived at Wadelai, the people crowded to the shore and expressed their joy in loud and enthusiastic shouts. It was like the triumph of a conqueror. The magistrates in white clothes overwhelmed him with expressions of devotion and hand kissing. Honored by the troops, greeted with the thunder of artillery, and overcome with surprise at the cordiality of his welcome, Emin made his way to his residence where he received the congratulations of the officers. They were a faint-hearted, fickle people, however, and if the rebel government had been introduced in the morning, they would have welcomed it with the same enthusiasm.
While Emin was thus daily exposed to the danger of death, either at the hands of the Mahdists or his own people, the relief expedition was also near destruction more than once. It seems almost incredible that Stanley should have taken the same route through the dreadful forest in which he had wandered for six months, at the cost of losing half his people. When he left half of his force with six hundred carriers in Jambuja, on the banks of the Aruwimi, under command of Major Bartelot, it was with the expectation that Tippoo Tib, the famous Arab merchant, would speedily furnish transportation and enable them to reach the Albert Nyanza. But Stanley had been out of the forest for months and not one of Major Bartelot’s men had appeared. A year had passed since he left them and now he asked himself the question, “Why do they not come? Have they suffered some calamity, perhaps sickness, revolt of the people, or destruction by the natives? Perhaps they have all perished, and these two hundred and seventy-nine men and the supplies of every kind promised to Emin are all gone.” These questions tormented the leader and no satisfactory answer came to quiet him. After leaving the sick and incapacitated in Fort Bado, under the care of Dr. Parke, he plunged again into that dark, gloomy forest, that cruel wilderness, from which his people had but just escaped.
At last, on the seventeenth of August (1888) the expedition, after finding several canoes on the river, came to a great bend of the Aruwimi at Benalja and observed upon the opposite bank a village with a strong enclosure. White costumes were visible, and looking through the field glass Stanley saw a red flag, upon which was a white crescent and star, the Egyptian symbols. Stanley sprang to his feet shouting, “The major, boys! Row faster!” Loud cries and hurrahs followed and the canoes shot swiftly ahead. When within hearing distance he called to some men upon the shore: “What people are you?”
“We are Stanley’s people.”
They rowed ashore and Stanley sprang out and addressed a European officer:
“Well, Bonney, how are you? Where is the major?”
“The major is dead, sir.”
“Dead! Good God! How did he die? Of fever?”
“No, sir, he was shot.”
“By whom?”
“By the Manjema, the bearers whom Tippoo Tib sent us.”
“How are our people?”
“More than half of them are dead.”
Stanley was speechless. He mechanically gave orders for the landing of his men and then followed Bonney to the camp in order to learn the complete details of the tragedy. Human beings worn with sickness, mere skeletons, crawled past and gave him welcome with their hollow voices—welcome to a churchyard!
One hundred graves in Jambuja, thirty-three men left in camp to perish, ten bodies on the way, forty persons in Banalja who had a feeble hold upon life, twenty deserters and sixty left in a moderate condition. How did such a loss happen? Bonney explained. Stanley had left the major in Jambuja fourteen months ago with instructions to await the arrival of those six hundred carriers which Tippoo Tib had promised should accompany them to the Albert Nyanza. Eight times the major made the journey to Stanley Falls to remind Tippoo Tib of his promise. The greedy Arab took advantage of the necessities of the expedition to raise the price of his service and a year elapsed—a year of frightful, murderous desolation in that unhealthy camp at Jambuja. At last some of the bearers came, but they were of the Manjema tribe, a savage cannibal people, not inclined to obey the orders of whites. They finally left Jambuja, that yawning grave, and reached Banalja, where Bartelot was killed. Bonney’s diary describes the event.
“On the nineteenth of July (1888) a Manjema woman began beating the drum and singing. That is their daily practice. The major sent a boy to her and ordered her to stop, whereupon loud, angry voices were heard as well as two shots which were fired in defiance. The major sprang from his bed and taking his revolver said, ‘I will kill the first one I find shooting.’ I implored him not to mind their daily practice, but to stay where he was, as it would soon be over. He went, revolver in hand, where the Soudanese were. They told him they could not find the men who fired the shots. The major then went to the woman who was drumming and singing and ordered her to stop. At that instant Sanga, husband of the woman, fired a shot through an aperture in an adjoining hut, the ball piercing him directly below the region of the heart, coming out through his back and penetrating a part of the veranda below, while he fell to the earth dead.”
The camp was at once in the greatest excitement. It looked as if all, soldiers and carriers, Zanzibarites, Soudanese, and Manjema might start at once in every direction taking with them the luggage and arms. It required all Lieutenant Bonney’s energy to stop the plundering and force them back to duty, and it was only accomplished by the adoption of harsh measures. The major’s body was buried and his murderer was sentenced to be shot. Then came Stanley and now it was hoped everything would go well.
Stanley was a man of extraordinary energy, who never indulged in outbursts of emotions, but he was wellnigh discouraged when he heard this mournful story and realized the troubles of the expedition which he had hoped to find in excellent condition. But he looked forward with confidence and fortunately his own strong men were loud in praise of the beautiful region on the Nyanza, where there was plenty of meat and bread and beer and where the poor starved people at Banalja would soon recover their strength.
After a short rest, the third march through the gloomy forest began. There were dangers in plenty and the whole caravan came near starving. Notwithstanding all Stanley’s efforts, it was not possible to save his men from their folly. Everyone was instructed, as soon as a banana grove was reached, to provide himself with food enough for several days, but these great thoughtless boys would throw away their food when it became burdensome, and thus many began to suffer for lack of sustenance, which might have been avoided by a little care.
On the eighth of December, while pitching camp, Stanley noticed a boy staggering with weakness. When asked what was the trouble he said that he was hungry. He had thrown away five days’ rations hoping to find more food that day. Upon further inquiry he found that at least one hundred and fifty had followed his example and had had nothing to eat that day. The next morning Stanley sent all his effective men, two hundred in number, back to the last banana grove, expecting that they would return in two days loaded with supplies of the fruit. The small supply of meal was soon consumed and Stanley opened his European provision chest. Each one of the one hundred and thirty men was given a morsel of butter and condensed milk which was mixed with water in a kind of thin soup. At last they searched in the forest for berries and mushrooms.
From day to day their anxiety increased and they moved about more slowly and feebly. Nothing was heard or seen of the expedition which had been sent out. Five days had passed already. Perhaps they were lost in the forest or had succumbed to hunger before they reached the banana trees. If so, all in the camp were doomed. In this unknown corner of the forest every trace of them would disappear. The graves would remain hidden forever, while the Pasha himself would spend month after month wondering what had become of the relief expedition.
At last, on the sixth day, Stanley decided to set out with a small number of his people in search of food, leaving Bonney to care for the sick and exhausted. He left a scant stock of provisions for them, but there was no other way to save them. Sixty-five men and women and twelve boys went with him. They marched until evening and then threw themselves upon the ground to rest. No fire was kindled as they had nothing to cook. Few of them slept. Frau Sorge (“mistress anxiety”) occupied the camp and filled their minds with visions of suffering, despair, and death.
When the darkness began to disappear and light fell upon the outstretched groups, Stanley, mustering up courage, shouted: “Up, lads, up! To the bananas! Up! If God so wills, we will have bananas to-day.”
In a few minutes the camping place was deserted and the weary ones were once more on their way, some limping because of their hurts, some hobbling because of sores, and others stumbling because of weakness. At last Stanley heard a murmuring sound and suddenly saw a great abundance of green fruit. In a trice all weakness and every trace of despair disappeared. English and Africans, Christians and heathen, each in his own language, shouted “God be praised.” Fire was quickly kindled, the green fruit was cooked, and an enjoyable meal gave them strength for their return. In an hour they were on their way back to the camp of hunger, which they reached at half past two in the afternoon. They were given a welcome such as only the dying can give when their rescue is sure. Then all, young and old, forgot the troubles of the past in the joy of the present and agreed to be more careful in future—until the next time.
At last Fort Bodo was reached and there fortunately Stanley found all well and hoped that troubles were at an end. In the eight months of his absence he expected that Emin Pasha would certainly be ready to take his departure, and that the united company could enter upon its journey to the coast without delay. He impatiently waited daily news from the Pasha, for he must certainly be in camp by the lake with his people in the neighborhood of the storehouse which he had engaged to erect. At last a messenger came from Kavalli and Stanley learned what we have already learned. The news occasioned him bitter disappointment and a feeling of dread. The letter read:
Dufile, 6. 11. 88Dear Sir,—I have been held a prisoner here since August. We knew as soon as the Mahdists arrived and captured the station of Redjaf that we should be attacked one day or another, and there seemed to be little hope that we should escape. Jephson, who has been of great assistance to me in all my difficulties, will inform you what has been done here and will also give you valuable advice in case you decide to come here as the people wish. Should you come, you will greatly oblige me if you will take measures for the safety of my little girl, for I am very anxious about her. Should you, on the other hand, decide not to come, then I can only wish you a safe and happy return home. I beg you to convey to your officers and men my hearty thanks and my most cordial gratitude to all those in England by whose generosity the expedition was sent out.Believe me, dear sir,Your most devoted,Dr. Emin
Dufile, 6. 11. 88
Dear Sir,—I have been held a prisoner here since August. We knew as soon as the Mahdists arrived and captured the station of Redjaf that we should be attacked one day or another, and there seemed to be little hope that we should escape. Jephson, who has been of great assistance to me in all my difficulties, will inform you what has been done here and will also give you valuable advice in case you decide to come here as the people wish. Should you come, you will greatly oblige me if you will take measures for the safety of my little girl, for I am very anxious about her. Should you, on the other hand, decide not to come, then I can only wish you a safe and happy return home. I beg you to convey to your officers and men my hearty thanks and my most cordial gratitude to all those in England by whose generosity the expedition was sent out.
Believe me, dear sir,Your most devoted,Dr. Emin
Thus Emin was in the power of his barbarous inferiors, who, if they felt so disposed, could end his life any moment. But the province was in danger of being overrun by the swarms of Mahdists, and in that case there would be no alternative for man, woman, or child, but death or slavery. The efforts of the relief expedition had been wasted for a year, a very hell of torment had been endured, and hundreds of lives had been sacrificed, only at last to hasten the doom of Emin, for there is no doubt that the arrival of Stanley with his tattered, hungry people kindled the torch of revolt. The people of the Equatorial Provinces would not leave their country and exchange its comfort for poverty and wretchedness, and deaf to every protest of reason imprisoned their governor, who they believed would take them to strange countries, sell them as slaves, and forsake them. Fortunately Jephson reached the camp and Stanley learned from his own mouth what had transpired. He described the dissensions and insubordination of the Soudanese officers which made it impossible to organize any defence against the enemy approaching from the north.
Stanley was indignant at the condition of affairs. “As they will not go they can stay and perish. But how can we save the Pasha?”
“The Pasha would come to us if there were nothing to hinder,” said Jephson, “but he will not be rescued alone. These people have deceived him, imprisoned him, and treated him shamefully, and yet he will not be induced to forsake them when it means their certain destruction.”
“That is bad,” said Stanley. “We shall have to carry him off by force.”
The situation was a doubtful one. Stanley could not wait any longer at his camp on the shore of the lake, for he was in a country destitute of supplies and he was constantly exposed to danger from the hostile people in his vicinity. At last he succeeded in getting Emin with some of his most faithful officers to come to the camp and after endless discussions, deliberations, and protests, the tenth of April, 1889, was fixed upon for the march to the coast. Those of the Soudanese who would not join them within two months must take the consequences. Emin gave up with a sad heart. Over and over he declared he could not leave his people. The indifferent manner with which Stanley imposed his will grieved the man whom the negroes rightly designated as “father and mother of their country.” At last he had to yield. Of all his people only six hundred were in camp at the right time and saved from the dreadful cruelty of the Mahdi.
On the tenth of April, 1889, the horn gave the signal to prepare for departure. Stanley kept his word. The caravan was arranged in marching order and at seven o’clock moved away, while behind them a dense black cloud of smoke and crackling flames from the burning camp said farewell to them.
Their course took them over a range of grassy, treeless hills, whose monotony was dispelled by valleys with groups of palms. Farmers and shepherds occupied the region and millet, sweet potatoes, and bananas were cultivated. The march was very regular when one considers that the most of the people were unaccustomed to efforts of this kind and that there was a considerable number of children and women and old broken-down men. Stanley rode at the head of the expedition followed by the Zanzibarites and Manjema bearers. Emin led his own people and hardened veterans brought up the rear, who urged on the laggards and relentlessly drove them along. Ferida rode continually by the side of her tender father. He now began to rejoice for her sake that they were going to a safe and peaceful country, where his little daughter could be educated and properly brought up.
Emin thought with a sad heart of those left behind and there was much to trouble him on the journey, for his servants and soldiers were so thoroughly convinced that they would be abandoned at Wadelai that when they pitched their camp that night at Niamgabe, sixty-nine of them eluded the vigilance of the sentinels and escaped. So sure were they that they would be attacked by the natives on the road that the most stringent measures were adopted to prevent further desertions. Unfortunately Stanley was taken seriously ill at this time, and they had to remain at Niamgabe nearly a month, until by the efforts of Emin and Dr. Parke, he recovered. It became difficult, therefore, to procure provisions at that place and still more difficult to maintain order in the great expedition.
Early on the eighth of May they moved forward again and Emin found much consolation in turning his attention to scientific matters. He discovered new and unknown species of plants and insects which he investigated and added to his collections and soon made the greatest discovery of all. For the first time he had an opportunity to make a close observation of a great mountain phenomenon, which had been seen from a distance by Casati and by Stanley on the first expedition, but which was now thoroughly investigated for the first time. This was the snow mountain Ruwenzori (Cloud King), as the natives called it, according to Stanley, separating the Albert Nyanza from the Albert Edward Lake. Its mighty glaciers and copious rainstorms fed the Semliki, a great tributary of the Nile, thus solving the question of the sources of this tributary which had so long been obscure. The spectacle of this snow mountain below the equator in a world of heat and sunshine is a magnificent one. Deep, dark valleys lie along its base. Beautiful trees, shrubs, and ferns bedeck its slopes, with timber below and the flowers of the Alpine world, while its lofty summit and glaciers belong to the region of eternal snow. In company with Lieutenant Stairs and forty men Emin undertook the ascent of the mountain, but did not get far because of deep intersecting valleys and the lack of food and proper clothing for the higher region.
At the south end of Victoria Lake they turned southward and there took an easterly direction. On the seventeenth of October the French missionaries, Fathers Girault and Schynse, joined them. On the tenth of November the bearers shouted: “To-day we shall come to Mpapua,” and about noon from an eminence they beheld a station with a German flag waving. Lieutenant Rochus Schmidt welcomed them to German territory and accompanied them with his soldiers to the coast. They soon exchanged the sight of the parched and thorny wilderness for a land fragrant with lilies and clad in spring greenery. The Makata plain, with its green grass and its numerous groups of villages, was ample compensation for the four months of wretchedness and hardship they had endured.
THE SNOW MOUNTAIN
THE SNOW MOUNTAIN
Shortly after this messengers from Major Wissmann, governor of German East Africa at Bagamojo, met them with ample supplies. As the travellers were pursuing their way by moonlight on the third of December they heard the report of a cannon. It was the evening gun at Zanzibar. The Zanzibarites gave a joyous shout, for it told them that their long journey across the continent was at an end. The Egyptians and their attendants also joined in the shout, for they now knew that in the next twenty-four hours they would see the ocean over which they would go safely and comfortably to Egypt, their future home.
Major Wissmann went to the river Kingani to welcome the travellers, taking saddled horses with him which Emin and Stanley mounted. Accompanied by the major and Lieutenant Schmidt, they entered Bagamojo. The streets were decorated with palm branches and crowded with the dusky population extending good wishes to the approaching travellers. As they came near the major’s headquarters at their left they beheld the expanse of the Indian Ocean, a great, clear, blue, watery plain.
“Look, Pasha,” said Stanley, “we are at home.”
“Yes, thank God!” he replied. At the same instant the batteries fired a salute, announcing to the war vessels lying at anchor that the governor of the Equatorial Provinces had arrived in Bagamojo.
They dismounted at the door of the German officers’ mess and were escorted to a veranda, decorated with palm branches and flags. Several round tables stood there and an elegant breakfast was served to which they did ample justice. The Pasha had never been in a happier mood than he was that afternoon when, surrounded by his friends and countrymen, he answered a thousand questions about the life he had led during his long seclusion in the interior of Africa. About four o’clock the rest of the expedition entered the city. The people were conducted to cabins near the shore, and when the bearers threw down their burdens and the sick men and women and tired children were provided for, all felt the greatest relief and understood the significance of this arrival at the seacoast. In the afternoon a banquet was given at which thirty-four persons were present, including the German officers and physicians, the commanders of the war vessels, various missionary fathers and Emin and Stanley as the guests of honor.
Major Wissmann conducted his guests to a long dining-hall, below the windows of which the Zanzibarites were celebrating the end of their troubles by dancing and singing. The feast was an excellent one and was seasoned with universal joyousness. Major Wissmann made a speech of welcome to his countryman, “the meritorious and famous governor of the Equatorial Provinces.” The Pasha replied in a manner that delighted the whole company. He was particularly happy and genial and went from one end of the table to the other greeting his friends, and then stepped out upon the veranda. Suddenly Stanley’s valet whispered to him that the Pasha had fallen from the veranda wall and was dangerously hurt. Owing to his short-sightedness he had mistaken a window for a door, and stepping out had plunged to the ground. All rushed out and found him lying unconscious and near him a little pool of blood. Emin was taken to the hospital and at first suffered great pain. As his recovery from the fall would inevitably be slow, Stanley left on the sixth of December on theSomali, escorted to Zanzibar by the whole flotilla—the English war vesselTortoise, the German vesselsSchwalbeandSperber, and Wissmann’s three steamers. He was received with great enthusiasm at Zanzibar and was overwhelmed with honor later in England, while Emin lay upon his sick bed in Bagamojo.
Owing to the strenuous labors of the suffering victim for a year past and the shock to his nerves, Emin’s recovery was slow. It was only due to the watchful care of the German physicians, who firmly opposed his removal, that the accident did not have worse consequences. Major Wissmann, Lieutenant Schmidt, and all the German officers rendered most valuable assistance, and when Emin had recovered sufficient strength to get about again he felt as if he had returned home after a long journey. This feeling first came to him when he saw the German flag waving from the bastion of Mpapua, for the fatherland, as it were, had come to meet him. Emin had not gone to Germany, but Germany had come to Africa. There arose in his soul a longing to serve the fatherland in the foreign world. He gave the matter serious thought, however, before coming to any conclusion. First of all, he was an Egyptian subject, but the Khedive, as he was aware, had little for him to do. He was a governor without a province and in Alexandria or Cairo he would only spend a scanty pension in idleness while still feeling young and active.
During the return march Stanley had repeatedly proposed to Emin that he should enter the service of British East Africa. That company would certainly have appreciated the service of such an experienced man, but it did not altogether suit him. He would travel with Stanley to Egypt and back to England to raise the necessary funds and associates in the undertaking, but he was not altogether pleased with Stanley’s company. He had been hurt several times by the stern and regardless action of the American. Perhaps Emin was not entirely free from blame. His own irresoluteness had often induced Stanley to adopt a very firm attitude, but whatever their relations were, their continuance was no longer desired by him.
It was Emin’s dearest wish to remain in German East Africa, where he had been so cordially treated, and devote his service to the fatherland. To one of his retiring nature the idea of exhibiting himself in Europe was not attractive. He certainly would have received ovations everywhere. He would have been wined and dined and honors would have been showered upon him. But what did he care for them? His nature revolted against making an exhibition of himself and of becoming a central figure in celebrations. He would rather remain in Africa with his savages and collect beetles and bird skins. His thirst for knowledge was not to be appeased.
Thus it happened that Emin, hardly arisen from his bed of suffering, was again contemplating a mission to the interior of that continent out of which Stanley had but just conducted him with so much effort. But one thing troubled him—his anxiety for his child. Ferida had been kept far away from him during his illness and when she was brought back to him her joy was unbounded.
“Oh papa,” she exclaimed, “now you are never going away from me again. We shall always be together.” Such appeals were hard for the father to bear after he had come to the decision to send her back to Europe. But the thousand anxieties which he had felt for the little helpless being in the wilderness were a lesson he could not for an instant forget. Now that they were at the coast, there was an opportunity to send her to her relatives in Germany without fear of danger. It would be wicked to take her with him again into a strange land.
So there came a tearful leave-taking. How hard it was for the child to obey the will of her father, although her old and trusty Arab nurse was going with her. It seemed to the little one that her heart was breaking and that she was going alone into a far-distant strange country. It was a bitter task for Emin also to separate from his child. He stood upon the shore and watched the steamer until all that he could see was a little cloud of smoke on the horizon. Then he turned away and sighed heavily. He had a presentiment that he might never see her again.
Poor little Ferida! What a sad journey for her. The Arab attendant, who had been in Emin’s house so many long years and had been considered true and devoted to the child, followed her own selfish designs. She schemed to appropriate her money and for this purpose presented in Cairo the papers, which proved her to be Emin’s daughter, for the purpose of securing the eight years’ arrears of pay due Emin. Fortunately her trick was prevented by the German ambassador, but he could not prevent the vile woman from tattooing the helpless little creature’s body, naturally a painful operation. These troubles passed, however. Ferida was placed in a railway carriage, this time under careful oversight. She passed through countries which seemed strange to her, especially when she found that all the people were white.
At last came a day when a gracious lady folded the poor fatherless child in her arms, and, caressing her a thousand times, called her her dear little daughter. It was Emin’s sister, Fraulein Schnitzer, who took the little one to Neisse and cared for her as a mother.
On the twenty-sixth of April, 1890, Emin left the coast in company with Lieutenant Langheld and Dr. Stuhlmann, a young Hamburg scholar, who assisted the Pasha in his scientific investigations. A hundred soldiers and four hundred armed bearers were with the expedition, which was directing its course for the great Victoria Nyanza. The object of the expedition was kept absolutely secret and the preparations were made very quietly so that the English should not frustrate the German plans.
The principal features of the plan for the journey were arranged by Major Wissmann. The line of the northern frontier was fixed as extending on the coast from Wanga to Kilima Ndschan, and across Victoria Nyanza through Buddu to the north to the Albert Lake. North of this line the English territory begins and an agreement bound the Germans not to cross it. At the outset the march, so long as it led through the coast region, was everywhere a difficult one, for the floods of the rainy season made the roads almost impassable and the fording of the swollen streams was dangerous to life. Shortly fever broke out, which is more dangerous in the open country than in the woodier regions.
MAJOR WISSMAN
MAJOR WISSMAN
On the nineteenth of June they met the expedition of Dr. Peters and Herr von Piedemann, who had started the year previously for Uganda, to supply Emin with munitions, but had been prevented from getting there by the prevailing disorders. Great was their surprise at finding Emin, whom they were seeking to rescue, leaving the coast fresh and active, with the intention of penetrating the interior as far at least as he had been before. Dr. Peters shared Emin’s opinion that the Germans should occupy Tabora, but Major Wissmann had strictly forbidden this as he feared that the undertaking was too great for Emin’s small force and a disaster would injure German prestige among the Arabs. It seemed, however, as if Emin were in the hands of destiny. He had issued his orders to march directly to the Victoria Nyanza, but it was impossible for him to secure the necessary number of porters. At last, as he succeeded in getting eighty-six Waramboans who lived in the neighborhood of Tabora and were going in that direction, he determined to go there. Everything went as he wished. Arriving at Kigwa, he was met by a deputation of Arabs who invited him to Tabora. They came from the Waramboans, whose chief had been killed in a battle with the Wangomans, and who implored the help of the Germans. They were on good terms with the colony. They had rendered good service to Wissmann in his encounters with Arab revolters and naturally believed they ought to have help in return.
So by dealing with them in a peaceful way, as well as by his familiarity with their habits and his skill in handling them, he succeeded (August 1, 1890) in making an agreement with them, the principal points of which were as follows: “All Arabs must subject themselves to the German government, with all their relatives and possessions, and hoist the German flag as a sign of their loyalty. They will be allowed to select their own governor, who shall be approved by the German government and be paid by it. The property rights of the Arabs and the practice of their religion shall be recognized by it. The governor shall maintain order and furnish German expeditions with supplies. Slave trading is strictly forbidden.”
Thus Emin rendered great service to his government without loss of life and at a nominal cost. Then came a message from the French missionaries at the south end of Victoria Lake announcing threatening movements on the part of the natives which obliged him to go there with his entire forces. Arriving at Bussisi the danger seemed to be over, but the missionaries directed his attention to the strong Arab colony of Massansa, which was the headquarters of the slave trade. Peaceful negotiations were useless. A battle was fought, the village was stormed and rich spoils of ivory, arms, and slaves captured. Unfortunately four Arabs who were taken and sent by Emin to the coast for trial were murdered by the Wagandians as they were crossing the lake. That was a fatal event for Emin. The Arabs, with whom he had had such friendly relations, blamed Emin for the murder, claiming that he must have known the Wagandians were the deadly enemies of the poor prisoners. They swore eternal hatred and revenge, and they kept their oath only too well.
Emin finally decided to go to the west coast of the lake and establish a strong German station for trading purposes. After mature consideration he decided upon Bukoba, on the northern frontier, for the people there were friendly and supplies were abundant. On the sixteenth of November his force was at Bukoba, and aided by the natives Emin began the building of the station. The rainy season was a great hindrance. Emin not only succeeded, but was fortunate enough to earn the gratitude of the natives, for just at this time the Wagandians made one of their customary plundering raids and were punished by him.
At this time reports came from various quarters that the Maturki had arrived north of the Albert Edward Lake. The thought immediately occurred to him: “These are my people from the Equatorial Provinces. I must see them.” All other plans, all disobedience, all open hostility, all troubles were forgotten, for the Maturki had always been the governor’s truest friends. It seemed to him at that moment that they were dear children waiting for their father to take them home. All Dr. Stuhlmann’s protests were useless. In addition to this Emin received a message of disapproval from the coast, blaming him for his arbitrary proceedings at Tabora, also stating that Wissmann was not pleased with his going to the west shore when the south shore had been settled upon as the field of operations. This mistaken view of his purposes was unendurable to Emin, who for years had been guided entirely by his own judgment in all his operations. He did not wish to return to the coast until he had accomplished something important. As it was certain that the Soudanese would never appear on the Albert Lake he determined to carry out a scheme he had long planned in secret. He would go north, gather his people, and take them to German territory, or, still better, go west and crossing the continent make a union with Cameron.[7]A noble plan indeed!
On the twelfth of May, 1891, Emin asked Dr. Stuhlmann whether he would accompany him to unknown regions or return to the coast. The scheme seemed so attractive that he declared he would not leave him and was all the more easily persuaded as the Pasha could only spare him a few men and Stuhlmann would have to traverse a highly insecure region almost destitute of subsistence. So they went northwards. The journey was slow and toilsome, for the packs were too heavy for the bearers and most of the people had to do double duty all day.
Even yet Emin did not realize the difficulties. He was only occupied with the thought that he would see his former subjects again, whom he was forced by Stanley to leave. All this time the thought was uppermost in his heart what would become of these poor badly managed people, threatened north and south by fierce enemies and not united among themselves? Surely some dreadful fate would overtake them. At last came the day when the expedition actually entered the Soudan. It was hard for Emin to hide his excitement behind that demeanor of dignity and composure which he always maintained so as to keep the respect of his people. We cannot but think how eagerly their former governor listened to the story of matters in his province. It was sad enough!
A part of the Soudanese under the leadership of Selim Bey had followed Stanley’s expedition, but as they did not overtake it they came back full of resentment against those who had left them to their fate. But their effort was not entirely unrewarded. One day a cow stumbled into a gully and in getting her out they found a number of chests which Stanley had deposited there, as he had not men enough to carry them, filled with powder and cartridges. That was really a Godsend in time of need. It was only the lack of munitions that made the situation of these poor people so doubtful, for they daily feared attacks from the Mahdists, in which case they would have been slaughtered like a defenceless herd. Now they could maintain themselves in the five southern stations of the Equatorial Provinces. The discord among themselves was so great that it sometimes led to bloodshed. Several officers had usurped authority and fought on opposite sides and some traitors had even gone over to the Mahdists to induce them to enter the country. Want prevailed everywhere. The herds of cattle had perished from a disease which at certain times in Africa attacks these animals as well as giraffes and gazelles. Provisions were dear and the people wore skins. There was no recognized general authority. Officers as well as soldiers promoted themselves, and sometimes so rapidly that, as at Kavalli, there were more officers than soldiers.