Khartum

“ To the east of the Khalifa's enclosure lies the house of his son, which is furnished much in the same style as that of his father, but with even greater luxury. Several large brass chandeliers from Khartum are suspended from the ceilings; and there is an immense garden made from earth transported from the banks of the Nile, and in which hundreds of slaves are employed daily. The latter are justly irritated with the great love of show which is the distinguishing characteristic of their young master, whilst they themselves are provided with scarcely enough food for their maintenance. ”

“ Opposite the city is Tuti Island, while beyond the island on the farther bank of the White Nile is Khartum. Founded by the Mahdi, or the Mohammedan Messiah, and the scene of the most atrocious cruelties and extravagances of the Khalifa who succeeded him, Omdurman once contained about one million of African Sudanese. It was then a great military camp, composed of one hundred thousand mud houses and inhabited by tribes from all parts of the million square miles embraced in the realm of that savage ruler. ”

“ They were almost the first of the northern tribes to join the mahdi in 1884, and it was their position to the north of Khartum which made communication with General Gordon so difficult. The Jā’alin are now a semi-nomad agricultural people. Many are employed in Khartum as servants, scribes and watchmen. They are a proud religious people, formerly notorious as cruel slave dealers. ”

“ At the same time he should not ignore the interests and wishes of the tribe in selecting as Sheikh a man whom the tribe would accept, and who would at the same time have sufficient power to uphold the Government authority. I then appointed Zogal Bey as my representative, and ordered him not to interfere in the conduct of the case, and to report the matter fully to Khartum. ”

“ Stuffed crocodiles fell down from racks and got underfoot: men walked about with elephant tusks under their arms; dragomans solicited a last tip; a six-foot seven Dinka, black as ink and splendid as a Greek statue, brought flowers from the Palace for some departing acquaintance of the Sirdar and his wife. Officers in evening dress dashed up through the sand, on donkey-back, to see the last of friends, their mess jackets making vivid spots of colour in the electric light. All the fragrant blossoms of Khartum seemed to be sending farewell messages of perfume on the cool evening air. ”

“ Otherwise Khartum was deserted, the khalifa making Omdurman his capital and compelling disaffected tribes to dwell in it so as to be under better control. While Omdurman grew to a huge size the population of the country generally dwindled enormously from constant warfare and the ravages of disease, small-pox being endemic. The Europeans in the country were kept prisoners at Omdurman. Besides ex-officials like Slatin and Lupton, they included several Roman Catholic priests and sisters, and numbers of Greek merchants established at Khartum. ”

“ Religious movements, such as that now going on, have a certain amount of glamour from a distance, and induce sympathy; but when examined more closely, they are neither so seductive nor so alarming. I shall intrust you with letters to the Government which I want you to send secretly to Khartum, and which will inform them of the nature of your mission. As the expedition will probably start for Kordofan next month, I want you to do your utmost to prevent the Mahdi sending a force into Darfur or despatching proclamations to the tribes inciting them to revolt. ”

“ The principal houses were distributed amongst the Emirs; and, on the day after the town fell, the Mahdi and Khalifa Abdullahi crossed over from Omdurman in the steamer "Ismaïlia" to view the scene of their bloody victory and massacre; without a sign of pity or regret, they occupied the houses selected for them, and, addressing their followers, described the disaster which had overtaken Khartum as the just judgment of Heaven on the godless inhabitants of the city, who had repeatedly rejected the Mahdi's summons to them to surrender and become his faithful followers in the true religion. ”

“ He turned towards his own quarters, but a question from Hillyard arrested him.
"What about that message for me?"
"I know nothing about it," Luttrell answered, "beyond what I wrote. The telegram came from Khartum. No doubt they can tell you more at Government House. Good night!"
CHAPTER VII In the Garden of Eden
Just outside Senga to the north, in open country, stands a great walled zareba, and the space enclosed is the nearest approach to the Garden of Eden which this wicked world can produce. The Zoological Gardens of Cairo and Khartum replenish their cages from Senga. ”

“ For more than seventy years, since the time of Mohammed Ali, it remained under the rule of Egypt, and was open to civilisation. In the chief towns were found Egyptian and European merchants. In Khartum itself, the foreign powers had their representatives. Travellers of all nations could pass through the land unharmed, and found protection and help through their aid. Telegraphs and a regular postal service facilitated intercourse with the most distant countries. Mohammedan mosques, Christian churches, and mission schools looked after the religious and moral education of the young. ”

“ They did all that men could, and the blame rests only on the head of a weak Government, that could not make up its mind until it was too late. Yet “the siege of Khartum lasted for three hundred and seventeen days—only nine less395 than the great siege of Sebastopol, in which General Gordon first saw active service. For more than ten months the wild tribes of the Sudan were kept in check by the genius, the indomitable resolution, and fertile resources of one man ”

“ His advice to Mahommed to stir up revolt in Darfur and Kordofan being justified by the result, he became his most trusted counsellor, and was soon declared principal khalifa or vicegerent of the mahdi, all of whose acts were to be regarded as the mahdi’s own. The mahdi on his deathbed (1885) solemnly named him his successor; and for thirteen years Abdullah ruled over what had been the Egyptian Sudan. Khartum was deserted by his orders, and Omdurman, at first intended as a temporary camp, was made his capital. ”

“ Khandesh, a district of Bombay in the valley of the Tapti; a great cotton-growing centre; Dhulia, the capital.
Kharkoff (194) , important town in Little Russia, 350 m. NE. of Odessa; has immense horse and wool fairs, and manufactures sugar, soap, felt, and iron; it is a Greek bishopric, a university seat, and has various schools of learning.
Khartoum (60) , a caravan depôt in the Soudan, just above the confluence of the Blue and White Niles, 1100 m. S. of Cairo; was an active slave-trade centre, and commercially important; was captured by the Mahdists in 1885, when General Gordon fell ”

“ In Virgil's Æneid we find Queen Dido of Carthage worshipping and sacrificing to the gods of Rome, but whether this error is due to Roman lack of imagination or otherwise it would be difficult to say. Carthaginian religion was strongly influenced by Assyrian belief. The chief gods worshipped in [Pg 330] Carthage were Baal-ammon or Moloch, Tanit, goddess of the heavens and the moon, Ashtart or Ishtar, and Eshmun, the patron deity of the city. The cult of Tammuz-Adonis was also greatly in vogue, as was that of the god Patechus, a repulsive monster who may have been of Egyptian origin. ”

“ The view that the Horites were cave-dwellers was based on the likeness between the name Horite and the Hebrew word hor, which signifies mountain. The connection between the names is now denied, and the Horites of the Bible are identified with the Kharu or Khalu of the Egyptian texts. The Kharu appear in the Annals of Tahutmes III (XVIII 6) and of Amen-hotep IV (XVIII 10) , among the people against whom the Egyptians fought on the way to Naharain i.e. Mesopotamia. [60] But the word Kharu on the Egyptian side has been interpreted as “mixed multitude.” ”

“ I do not know the exact limits of Khatri occupation to the West, but certainly in all Eastern Afghānistān they seem to be just as much a part of the established community as they are in the Punjab. They find their way far into Central Asia, but the further they get the more depressed and humiliating is their position. ”

“ The name Khatu recalls that of the Khoith tribe which the Armenian historians mention as in this locality. Khaturu is perhaps Hâtera in the caza of Lidjô, in the sandjak of Diarbekîr, and Arzania the ancient Arzan, Arzn, the ruins of which may be seen near Sheikh-Yunus. Tila-Tela is not the same town as the Tela in Mesopotamia, which we shall have occasion to speak of later, but is probably to be identified with Til or Tilleh, at the confluence of the Tigris and the Bohtan-tcha. ”

“ Some of them believed the tale readily enough, for all had asked whence Khaled was and none had got an answer. Could a man be of the desert, they asked, and yet not be known by name in any of the tribes, nor his father before him? Surely, there was a secret, they said, and he who will not tell the name of his father has a reason for changing his own. And as for his being brave and having fought well in the war with the Shammar, how could a man have been a robber if he were not brave, and why should he not fight manfully, since he had everything to gain and nothing to lose? ”

“ Crooke states that, “their women have a reputation for their beauty and fair complexion. The proverb runs, ‘A Khatri woman would be fair without fine clothes or ornaments,’ and, ‘Only an albino is fairer than a Khatri woman.’”2 Their legend of origin is as follows: “When Parasurāma the Brāhman was slaying the Kshatriyas in revenge for the theft of the sacred cow Kāmdhenu and for the murder of his father, a pregnant Kshatriya woman took refuge in the hut of a Sāraswat Brāhman. ”

“ In the seventh century B.C. it would have seemed as though the whole civilized world was to be dominated by Semitic rulers. They ruled the great Assyrian empire and they had conquered Egypt; Assyria, Babylon, Syria were all Semitic, speaking languages that were mutually intelligible. The trade of the world was in Semitic hands. Tyre, Sidon, the great mother cities of the Phœnician coast, had thrown out colonies that grew at last to even greater proportion in Spain, Sicily and Africa. Carthage, founded before 800 B.C., had risen to a population of more than a million. ”

“ Nay, they are lucky if they escape with a whole skin.
"I sense your incredulity, good Alcemides; you will fear that I exaggerate conditions in Khauran. Such conditions would be unthinkable in any of the Western countries, admittedly. But you must realize the vast difference that exists between West and East, especially this part of the East. In the first place, Khauran is a kingdom of no great size, one of the many principalities which at one time formed the eastern part of the empire of Koth, and which later regained the independence which was theirs at a still earlier age. ”

“ There remained Carthage—the great Carthage, and her mighty empire—mighty in a far different degree than Phoenicia's had been. Rome annihilated it. Then occurred that which has no parallel in history—an entire civilization perished at one blow—banished, like a falling star. The Periplus of Hanno, a few coins, a score of lines in Plautus, and, lo, all that remains of the Carthaginian world!
"Many generations must needs pass away before the struggle between the two races could be renewed; and the Arabs, that formidable rear-guard of the Semitic world, dashed forth from their deserts. ”

“ Her coat was bright bay, glossy and smooth and without any white markings. By all these signs, which belong to the purest blood, the people of the village knew that she was of the fleetest reared in Arabia. And Khaled was glad that the people admired her, since she was the chief of his few possessions, which indeed were not many.
He did not know beforehand what he should do, nor what he should say when in the presence of the Sultan of Nejed, still less how he could venture to ask Zehowah in marriage, having no gifts to offer and not being himself a prince. ”

“ Then Abdullah laughed aloud.
'Who shall deliver over the Bedouin to a white-faced people, who live on boiled chestnuts and ride astride of a camel? And when a man has got a kingdom, why should he give it up to any one, except under force?'
'There is a reason for this, too,' Almasta answered unabashed. 'For the King of the Persians, whom they call the Padeshah, has an only daughter, of great beauty, and Khaled is to receive her in marriage as the price of Nejed. Then he will by treachery destroy the Padeshah's sons and will inherit Persia also, as he has inherited Nejed ”

“ The town is built on a hill terrace about 1000 ft. above a well-watered plain of exceptional fertility which lies to the south and supports a large population. Kharput probably stands on or near the site of Carcathiocerta in Sophene, reached by Corbulo in A.D. 65. The early Moslem geographers knew it as Hisn Ziyad, but the Armenian name was Khartabirt or Kharbirt, whence Kharput. ”

“ Of Carthage I think it better to be silent, than to say but little; especially as time bids me hasten to other matters.
Next to the Catabathmos [79] , then, which divides Egypt from Africa, the first city along the sea-coast [80] is Cyrene, a colony of Theræans [81] ; after which are the two Syrtes [82] , with Leptis [83] between them; then the Altars of the Philæni [84] , which the Carthaginians considered the boundary of their dominion on the side of Egypt; beyond these are the other Punic towns. The other regions, as far as Mauretania, the Numidians occupy; the Moors are nearest to Spain. ”