Travels in Kordofan

by Ignaz Pallme

The form of government of Kordofan resembles that of other countries under Egyptian sway, that is to say, it is despotic; but the inhabitants of this province are subjected to particularly severe oppression, being situate, as we have above observed, at so great a distance from the seat of government, that it indeed almost amounts to an impossibility to proffer a complaint to the first authorities.

The people feel themselves, therefore, extremely miserable, the more so since, under the dominion of Sennaar and Darfour, neither property nor life were endangered, as they are at present. The difference may be deduced from the fact, that, in former times, nearly all the women wore ornaments of gold, a metal which is now rarely, or never seen in the province.

Under the government of Darfour, there were no taxes, no duties, trade was free, and everywhere reigned opulence. Now the reverse is observed. Duties and imposts of every description oppress the people, and have reduced them to abject poverty. The old proverb, “Where a Turk sets his foot no grass will grow,” is, in this province, adequately exemplified. The originator of all this misery was, undoubtedly, the Defturdar, the conqueror of this country. With the conquest, government was out of the question, for every one was subjected to arbitrary and tyrannical treatment. Mehemed Ali, indeed, recalled the Defturdar, but the people experienced, on the whole, no material relief by this measure, for the subsequent governors were by no means idle in scraping treasure together, and gradually exhausted all the sap from this already impoverished country. The province is now governed by the Bey, (colonel,) of the first regiment of the line, quartered at Lobeid, to whom the Casheffs, (chief magistrates of the five districts, and generally captains in the same regiment,) are subordinate. The Bey is again responsible to the Pasha (general) of Khartoom, who is, at the same time, governor of the whole Belled Soodan.[11]

The Bey, or governor, is the superior authority in all civil and military affairs; his decision is peremptory; but, in matters of importance, orders must be received from Khartoom. In judicial cases, the kadi passes judgment, and the governor sees it executed; this, however, is generally a mere blind, to keep up the appearance of a just administration of the law to the people, for every judgment is perfectly arbitrary.

The revenue consists of the ordinary taxes, and in the levy of custom duties, but these are never exacted in proper proportion, or after a fixed scale; for when a contribution is ordered to be levied from Cairo, the country is generally forced to contribute double the amount,—a very natural consequence, when we consider that all the government situations are held by officers, who purchase their commissions from the governor. It is, of course, an understood thing, that one functionary endeavours to outbid the other, in which practice he is encouraged by the knowledge, that he will in time be able to make good his outlay. They certainly cannot reckon on enjoying their privileges for any length of time; for if a person present himself, and pay a few purses of money more, the colonel is not long in finding a cause for turning one of his former employes out of office, and conferring the vacant situation on the new candidate. Every officer, therefore, endeavours to extort as much as he possibly can by oppression, in the shortest possible time, in order to reimburse himself for his expenditure, and to gain something by his bargain. Each casheff, or captain of a district, is provided with a few subordinate officers, who are distributed in the distant localities. These subalterns, and the Sheikhs el Belled, or village magistrates, must occasionally make presents to the casheffs. The sheikhs are by no means thoughtless of themselves; and lastly, the copts, who perform the duties of secretaries, all and every one prey upon the small gains of the poor inhabitants, so that we may easily conceive what the unfortunate people have to suffer. Mehemed Ali, acquainted with the arbitrary proceedings of the governors, and subordinate functionaries, notwithstanding the great distance from the scene of their rapacity, has done everything in his power to put a limit to these impositions. Thus, in the years 1838 and 1839, a greater part of the employés were summoned before a commission of enquiry, and sent into different provinces,—in short, everything was done to bring about a just administration, but all in vain. With the best intentions, the Viceroy was incapable of curing the cancer which preyed upon the bowels of the land; and although, indeed, much of the property, which had been unjustly scraped together,—or we should rather say, the plunder of the government functionaries,—was confiscated; the Viceroy was, in the end, the gainer, not the people. To the latter, nothing is returned; and this restitution, indeed, would be no easy undertaking, inasmuch as the individual sufferers could not be readily found, and Mehemed Ali, moreover, does not trouble himself in the slightest about the matter. It is true that the country swarms with spies, who observe every action of the government officers with great accuracy, and make their reports in a higher quarter; but the state, in these cases, confiscates the plunder, as I have before mentioned, and the poor people receive no indemnification. The interests of the separate functionaries are, moreover, too closely united for the one to place any impediment in the way of the other. The judges are bribed, and a mere deposition, or loss of office, generally terminates the affair. When the detected fraud is, however, too flagitious, the criminated officer is immediately sent into a distant province, and then prosecuted, in order that he may have no opportunity of coming to an understanding with his judges, or accusers. In this case he is certainly lost; but the state confiscates the proceeds of his rapacity, and his successor plunders and extorts again, as much as he possibly can, as long as he can manage to keep his actions secret.

An additional, and chief grievance, is the circumstance of the Viceroy being obliged to treat the governors with the utmost lenity and forbearance; for he knows full well how dangerous it would be to irritate them, and thus, perhaps, to goad them on to rebellion. In one moment the whole Belled Soodan would be lost, and not so easily regained. The troops of the garrison consist of native negroes, who implicitly obey those who give them the most, or merely make them the largest promises, and who more especially treat them with kindness. The country in general detests the Viceroy, believing him to be the cause of all the oppression under which it groans, as it considers all the acts of injustice, under which it has to suffer, to be perpetrated by his orders. In case of a governor, therefore, rebelling against the government, the whole province would instantly attach itself to his faction, if he merely released them of a portion of their taxation. To re-conquer the country by force of arms would be a more difficult matter than it was twenty years ago; we know what resistance the negroes of Kordofan and Sennaar offered the Turks, when armed with spears and swords only; and at present, there are 15,000 muskets in the arsenal at Khartoom, which would give the insurgents no small advantage. Mehemed Ali knows all this very well, and acts very wisely in conciliating the governors: the authority of the latter is, therefore, virtually far greater than that of the Viceroy, and most wofully do they use it to their advantage; for, with few exceptions, they exert unlimited power, are masters over life and death, as also over the property of the people. A code of laws has certainly been instituted, but these are totally disregarded, and in every case will is law. Judgment is sometimes even passed according to the whim or fancy of the individual in the most unjustifiable manner. During my residence in this country, I had the opportunity of convincing myself of this fact.

A Turk, who travelled with a large quantity of goods, was murdered in the desert of Bahiouda,[12] and robbed of his property. All investigations and endeavours to detect the murderer proved fruitless; thus much was, however, subsequently discovered, that the goods had been sold at Darfour, and it was suspected that the perpetrator of the crime was secreted in Kordofan. Several persons were taken into custody, and examined, but in vain; the delinquent could not be discovered. A prophetess, who, by casting a handful of shells on the sand, pretended to be able to look into futurity, and to explain the past, arrived, by means of her mystic art, at the conclusion, that the son of the Sheikh of Haraza was the murderer. The result of her sorcery was imparted to the governor, Mohammed Bey, in conversation over a pipe of tobacco. The governor, a man of weak mind, who placed more confidence in the idle talk of an old woman, than in common sense, gave credence to this tale, and had the man accused instantly arrested, and conducted by a party of soldiers to Lobeid; he was then loaded with irons, and cast into prison; whereupon the investigation immediately took place. Although he asserted that he was at that time in quite a different place, and was able to corroborate this statement by witnesses, the testimony of a fortune-teller was regarded as better evidence, and the unfortunate man was subjected to the most cruel tortures to force a confession from him. He was bound, by order of the governor, hand and foot, close to a large fire, whence a soldier took a burning branch, and burnt his body; he received twenty wounds, and not until he writhed like a worm with pain and anger did the governor put a stop to the cruelty. The true criminal was shortly after this discovered, and the son of the Sheikh, who had been so frightfully tortured, was now proved to be innocent; but no one could alleviate his sufferings, and any further compensation was totally out of the question.

When an individual is guilty of any offence, the examination generally takes place as soon as he is arrested, judgment is quickly passed, and instantly executed. Two circumstances are, however, necessary for the conviction of the party accused,—namely, detection in the act, or confession. If he plead not guilty, and deny the charge, he is submitted to torture, and thus it frequently happens that the innocent suffer for the guilty.

Stealing a slave, an ox, a camel, an ass, &c., is punished by the loss of a hand. The judgment is executed by the first butcher casually met with in the streets. The delinquent is ordered to lay his hand upon a block, in which situation it is held down by two men: the butcher then chops it off. The stump is immediately thrust into a vessel containing butter, heated nearly to the boiling point, which stands in readiness, for the purpose of stopping hæmorrhage, and preventing mortification, and the limb is then enveloped in a rag. In the course of ten minutes all is over, and the sufferer returns home.

Murder, with the exception of negroes, is of very rare occurrence. One single instance of this crime occurred in the year 1838; the murderer was detected, and, after a short examination, hung on a gibbet erected in front of the house of the governor. In praise of Mehemed Ali, it must be stated that there is not at present that danger for an European travelling through the country as was the case during the time it was under the government of Darfour, when no Djelabi could venture to undertake a journey into this province, excepting under the protection of a considerable escort. At present, any person may traverse the country from one end to the other without fear. I myself, on nearly all occasions, travelled alone, or merely accompanied by my servant, and never met with the slightest delay from robberies, or other hinderances; on the contrary, I was everywhere received with the utmost hospitality and courtesy,—the more so when it became gradually known that I was no Turk, although of white colour, but a Frank.