INTRODUCTION.
In February 1883 Dr. Junker had penetrated so far into the heart of Africa that he found himself at the zeriba Ali Kobo, on the banks of the Welle Makowa, in a region hitherto traversed by no other European.
For three years this indefatigable traveller had been exploring north and south, east and west, the districts watered by the Welle, in the hope of finding a definite solution to the important geographical problem propounded by his friend Dr. Schweinfurth, thirteen years previously, as to whether the Welle was connected with the Shary and thence with Lake Tchad, or whether it flowed into the Congo.
It needed only a few more weeks of perseverance and progress towards the west, and the explorer would have attained his end and reaped the reward of his labours. He was within a few days’ march of the Congo and was about to push onwards, when letters from Lupton Bey brought news of startling import and put an end to further investigations.
Dr. Junker had for a considerable time been quite aware how the country around Khartoum was harassed by the revolutionary action of an agitator who professed himself to be the “Mahdi,” that is, a deliverer invested with a supernatural mission. He had been apprised that the powerful tribe of the Dinka had taken arms, and was threatening the military settlements and zeribas on the Bahr-el-Ghazal; and had further learnt from Lupton Bey, who was the representative of the Egyptian government in that province, that the route between the Niam-niam country and the landing-place of Rek on the Bahr-el-Ghazal was completely blockaded, while the Mahdists were at the same time making an alarming progress. Lupton Bey’s advice to him was that he should endeavour forthwith to return to Egypt; and letters received at Semmio, his station in the Niam-niam country, as well as those which came to hand some weeks later, so far from representing the outlook in a more reassuring light, pictured it as dark and overclouded. The Dinka round Meshra-er-Rek, and the Mahdi’s forces about Khartoum, were steadily gaining ground, so that the northern route was ever becoming more and more impracticable. The conviction, therefore, could not fail to take hold on his mind that he would be obliged to remain in the south for the repression of the two revolts before he could carry out his design of returning to Europe by way of Egypt and the Nile.
A certain presentiment of the hard times which he would have to face had already occurred to him. In his journal of August 1, 1883, he made the entry:—“All hope of seeing my country this year is fading away. Thanks to frequent communications from Lupton Bey, I have been kept informed of the events on the Bahr-el-Ghazal. Our gaze is fastened on the north, whence with the utmost anxiety we are looking for relief. The Khartoum steamer is expected. The last news from Lupton is urgent; Hassan Mussa has been killed; sixty more guns have fallen into the hands of the rebels: the road to Meshra-er-Rek is again closed, and 900 soldiers are about to make an effort to reopen it. My fears for the population of the Rohl and for the station of Rumbek are verified, for Lupton writes, ‘Rumbek is destroyed, only six soldiers managing to escape,’ while he further announces the desertion of about thirty Dongolese, drawn over by some fakirs to the Mahdi. If the disasters that I forebode should come to pass, and the Arabs, driven down from the north, should invade the Bahr-el-Ghazal, I foresee that there will be no alternative for us but to retreat by the south. O that help may arrive from Khartoum!”
But the hope was in vain. There was no longer any chance of relief from the north. Neither Meshra nor Lado was again to welcome a steamer from Khartoum. The northern road was closed, and the entire situation in the Soudan was critical to a degree of which Dr. Junker in his remote station in the Niam-niam country could form no conception.
The situation, in fact, was more than serious. In Kordofan and the Bahr-el-Ghazal district the Arab and the negro were persistently joining the rebels; Sennar and El-Obeid were threatened; the Egyptian corps in Darfur, as well as the detachments under Lupton and Emin, was absolutely cut off from the rest of the Soudan, and the Mahdi, whose audacity increased with his prestige, had under him an army of at least 100,000 men. Moreover, the government troops had met with sanguinary reverses, and were reduced to such a state of alarm that symptoms of rebellion had begun to appear in their ranks. The governor-general, Abd-el-Kadir, was almost overpowered, and compelled no longer to send for a few battalions from Cairo, but to implore that an army might be despatched to his aid. Altogether, things were becoming desperate.
It was in this emergency that the British government, rousing itself from its protracted reserve, determined to substitute its own action for the inadequate efforts of the Khedive, and proceeded to equip 10,000 soldiers who should start from Suakin, make forced marches, and re-establish order in Kordofan.
All along, throughout this time, at Lado, at Meshra, and at Semmio, anxious eyes were turned towards Khartoum awaiting help. But no help was forthcoming. The drama of the Soudan had commenced.
On a stage of which the scenery extended from the Red Sea to Lake Victoria, from the frontier of Abyssinia to the remote confines of Darfur, scenes wild and bloody were about to be enacted. Face to face with the invincible Mahdi and his fierce general Osman Digna were now to appear successively Hicks Pasha, Baker Pasha, General Graham, and Admiral Hewett; in his turn should follow General Gordon, the hero sans peur et sans reproche; and then finally a second British army under the command of the renowned Lord Wolseley, the victor at Tel-el-Kebir.
And so for three years along the Nile there ensued a series of terrible struggles, of brilliant, sanguinary, yet futile engagements, of which the eventual results were alike disastrous to the cause of civilisation and damaging to English prestige.
The drama came to an end. When Baker was worsted, Khartoum captured, Gordon massacred, Wolseley in retreat, and the Soudan abandoned to the hands of the Mussulman and slave-hunter, it seemed as if civilisation was arrested, the hope of years was extinguished, inasmuch as not an individual remained who could give effect to the counsels of Europe. The Khamsin, which at the bidding of a fanatical leader had arisen in the desert, had made all things retire before it, and the region of the Nile-sources must again relapse into the gloom of night.
Such, at least, for a considerable time was the general conviction, until, one day, from beyond the domain of the bloodthirsty tyrant of Uganda, from Msalala, the Christian mission station by the southern shore of Lake Victoria, suddenly there rose the voice of Junker.
He announced that he was safe, and that Emin with the soldiers who had remained faithful to him was safe also; so too was the Italian explorer Casati. All three had succeeded in securing their liberty amidst the break-down of the Egyptian authority in the Soudan.
The time had come for Dr. Junker to realise the truth of what in 1883 he had written in his diary, that if the events he dreaded should come to pass, there would be no alternative but that he must take a southern route.
After two years and a half of suspense, of struggle and privation, the explorer resolved to attempt his retreat by this southerly route, that he might make Egypt and Europe aware of the existence and critical position of these last defenders of the lost Soudan. It was another year before he succeeded in reaching Zanzibar. Europe was stirred by his appeal, and this time, without hesitation or delay, England undertook to organise an expedition of relief.
But the difficulty was great: the obstacles were many. What forces would be requisite to break through the enemies by which Emin was environed? What route towards Wadelai should be chosen? The hordes of the Mahdi barred all access from the north; the warlike Masai and the battalions of Uganda held the east and the south; the regions to the west were utterly unknown. Beyond all there lay the further question as to who should be the leader of such an enterprise. The way into the heart of that mysterious region was over mountains and valleys, through deserts, virgin forests and marshes, amidst savage and relentless tribes, beneath the rays of the equatorial sun. Who should be found competent to conduct a caravan made up of numerous and promiscuous followers, equally ready to quarrel with nature and with their fellows, yet indispensable for the conveyance along that weary route of the double cargo of victuals, ammunition, and supplies?
The answer was forthcoming. Then it was that for the fifth time Central Africa was to behold the hero, at once the discoverer and deliverer of Livingstone. Stanley was ready for the task. He chose the Congo route, which he had himself opened up for the commercial enterprise of Europe, while the opposition of the Mahdi was closing all access by the Nile. More fortunate than Wolseley, who only reached Khartoum in time to register its fall and the slaughter of its defenders, he accomplishes his arduous undertaking, and after three years’ undaunted perseverance he has brought back Emin and Casati, with their faithful adherents, in safety and triumph to Zanzibar.
It is the history of this ever-memorable expedition and of the dramatic events that led up to it, together with the important geographical discoveries resulting from it, that forms the subject of the ensuing pages.