“This obstacle that presented itself constantly, at the end of every well-digested method, was yourself.”
“I! How was that?”
“On the 5th of April you ceased to be so, but until then, I could not carry any scheme into execution without reference to you. You were in our eyes the Pasha still. You were the Governor and Commander of these people. I could not propose to you to fight them. You believed in them constantly. Each day you said, ‘They will come, but it never came across your mind to ask yourself, ‘What will they do after they do come, if they find they outnumber us three to one?’ Had they come before the 5th of April, my plan was to separate from you and leave you with them, and form camp, with every detail of defence considered, seven or eight miles from you. All communications were to be by letter, and guides were to be furnished after we had gone in the advance a day’s march, to show you the road to our last camp. No force of any magnitude would be permitted to approach my camp without a fight.
“But after the 5th of April this method was altered. I should have been wrong were I to separate from you, because I had a proof sufficient for myself and officers that you had no people, neither soldiers nor servants; that you were alone. I proposed then as I propose now; should Selim Bey reach us, not to allow Selim Bey, or one single soldier of his force, to approach my camp with arms. Long before they approach us we shall be in position along the track, and if they do not ground arms at command—why, then the consequences will be on their heads. Thus you see that since the 5th of April I have been rather wishing that they would come. I should like nothing better than to bring this unruly mob to the same state of order and discipline they were in before they became infatuated with Arabi, Mahdism, and chronic rebellion. But if they come here they must first be disarmed; their rifles will be packed up into loads, and carried by us. Their camp shall be at least 500 yards from us. Each march that removes them further from Wadelai will assist us in bringing them into a proper frame of mind, and by-and-by their arms will be restored to them, and they will be useful to themselves as well as to us.”
The day following our arrival at Mazamboni’s, Shukri Agha, Commandant of Mswa, had at length appeared. He had started from his station with twenty soldiers. Arriving at Kavalli on the plateau, he had but ten left; on reaching our camp he had but two, his trumpeter and flag-bearer. All the rest had deserted their captain. It is needless to comment on it.
It is now the 7th of May. I hear this evening that there is quite a force at Lake Shore Camp. Preparations for departure have been made during the last four days. We will start to-morrow. We have been in this country since the 18th of January—110 days. If this force proposes to follow us, they can easily overtake such a column as ours, and if they impress me that they are really desirous of accompanying us, we will not be adverse to granting them some more time.
On the 7th of May I requested Lieutenant Stairs to bury twenty-five cases of ammunition in the ground-floor of his house, in order that if the rebel officers appeared and expressed earnest penitence, and begged to be permitted to stay at Mazamboni’s, they might have means of defence. Mr. Stairs performed this duty thoroughly and secretly.
1889.
May 8.
Bunyambiri.
