247 CHAPTER IV.

EVENTS ON THE NILE FROM 1882 TO MAY, 1898.

In December, 1882, Colonel Stewart (11th Hussars) arrived at Khartoum with orders to report on the situation.

is valuable report,* dated 9th February, 1883, went thoroughly into the question of finance and administration, and recommended drastic reforms, stating that the Egyptians by themeslves were totally incapable of governing such a huge tract as the Sudan.

Almost the first event of 1883 was the fall of El Obeid, on the 17th January. For six months Mohammed Pasha Said had held out, but was eventually obliged by famine to capitulate. The gallant commander was shortly afterwards killed by his captors, and the Mahdi transferred his headquarters to the town.

Meanwhile Abd el Gader Pasha, Governor of Khartoum, was doing his best to suppress the rebellion in the angle between the White and Blue Niles, and on the 24th February he beat the Emir Ahmed el Makashif at Meshra el Dai, and raised the siege of Sennar town for a time. In response to his former appeal to Cairo for reinforcements, troops were being collected, and Hicks Pasha was sent with a crowd of some 10,000, mostly undrilled, Egyptians to his support, arriving in Khartoum, via Suakin and Berber, on the 4th March.

Abd el Gader was, shortly before Hicks's arrival, superseded by Ala el Din Pasha. After a strong reconnaissance in force up the White Nile, during which Makashif was heavily defeated and killed at Marabia on the 29th April, Hicks began preparations for an advance into Kordofan on a large scale. He started in September from Dueim with about 8,200 men, marching on El Obeid vid Khor Abu Habl, this route having been recommended to him as holding much water. The Mahdi, informed of their approach, collected some 40,000 men and encamped in the forest of Shekan.

Misled and betrayed by their guides, and suffering terribly from want of water, Hicks's force advanced into the forest on the 5th November, was set upon by the enemy in overwhelming numbers and annihilated, some 300 only escaping death.

The news of this disaster naturally raised the Mahdi's influence to the highest pitch, and produced a corresponding depression on the Egyptian side. At Khartoum, which had been virtually in a state of siege since July, there was a panic, but De Coetlogon (left by Hicks with the depot), Power, Herbin, and Hansal (British, French and Austrian Consuls respectively), collected food and outlying garrisons, and strengthened the defences by the end of the year. Sennar was meanwhile again besieged.

The effect of Hicks's disaster on the Home Government was that it was decided that the Sudan should be abandoned and the garrisons evacuated. General Gordon was the man chosen to carry out this difficult task, and he, accompanied by Colonel Stewart, arrived in Khartoum on the 18th February, just a month after the proclamation in that town of the Government's intentions.

Gordon was enthusiastically received at Khartoum, and proclaimed, in addition to the foregoing, that the suppression of the slave trade by Egyptian means was now aboUshed, and that the Sudan was now independent, with himself as Governor-General. A large exodus northward consequently took place.

Gordon quickly came to the conclusion that if the Sudan were evacuated, the only man capable of keeping it in order after the Egyptians had retired would be Zubeir Pasha. His request for him, however, was refused by the "overnment, so Gordon resolved to hold Khartoum at all costs and crush the enemy if possible.

Meanwhile the flood of Mahdism was spreading northwards, and after a fruitless attempt — owing to the rising of the Robatab tribe — on the part of Captain Kitchener and Lieutenant Rundle to communicate with and assiat Hussein k* Foreign Office Bluebook, Egypt, No. 11, 1883.

w 1883 Fall of Et Obeid, 17th January, 1883.

Hicks arrives.

Battle of Marabia.

Annihilation of Hicks's Expedition, 5th November, 1883.

1884. Gordon arrives.