On the right (northern) bank of the Blue Nile is the suburb of Khartum North, formerly called Halfaya,[1] where is the principal railway station. It is joined to the city by a bridge (completed 1910) containing a roadway and the railway, Khartum itself being served by steam trams and rickshaws. The steamers for the White and the Blue Nile start from the quay along the esplanade. West of the zoological gardens is the point of junction of the Blue and White Niles and here is a ferry across to Omdurman (q.v.) on the west bank of the White Nile a mile or two below Khartum. In the river immediately below Khartum is Tuti Island, on which is an old fort and an Arab village.
From its geographical position Khartum is admirably adapted as a commercial and political centre. It is the great entrepôt for the trade of the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan. By the Nile waterways there is easy transport from the southern and western equatorial provinces and from Sennar and other eastern districts. Through Omdurman come the exports of Kordofan and Darfur, while by the Red Sea railway there is ready access to the markets of the world. The only important manufacture is the making of bricks.
The population is heterogeneous. The official class is composed chiefly of British and Egyptians; the traders are mostly Greeks, Syrians and Copts, while nearly all the tribes of the Sudan are represented in the negro and Arab inhabitants.
At the time of the occupation of the Sudan by the Egyptians a small fishing village existed on the site of the present city. In 1822 the Egyptians established a permanent camp here and out of this grew the city, which in 1830 was chosen as the capital of the Sudanese possessions of Egypt. It got its name from the resemblance of the promontory at the confluence of the two Niles to an elephant’s trunk, the meaning of khartum in the dialect of Arabic spoken in the locality. The city rapidly acquired importance as the Sudan was opened up by travellers and traders, becoming, besides the seat of much legitimate commerce, a great slave mart. It was chosen as the headquarters of Protestant and Roman Catholic missions, and had a population of 50,000 or more. Despite its size it contained few buildings of any architectural merit; the most important were the palace of the governor-general and the church of the Austrian mission. The history of the city is intimately bound up with that of the Sudan generally, but it may be recalled here that in 1884, at the time of the Mahdist rising, General Gordon was sent to Khartum to arrange for the evacuation by the Egyptians of the Sudan. At Khartum he was besieged by the Mahdists, whose headquarters were at Omdurman. Khartum was captured and Gordon killed on the 26th of January 1885, two days before the arrival off the town of a small British relief force, which withdrew on seeing the city in the hands of the enemy. Nearly every building in Khartum was destroyed by the Mahdists and the city abandoned in favour of Omdurman, which place remained the headquarters of the mahdi’s successor, the khalifa Abdullah, till September 1898, when it was taken by the Anglo-Egyptian forces under General (afterwards Lord) Kitchener, and the seat of government again transferred to Khartum. It speedily arose from its ruins, being rebuilt on a much finer scale than the original city. In 1899 the railway from Wadi Haifa was completed to Khartum, and in 1906 through communication by rail was established with the Red Sea.
[1] The village of Halfaya, a place of some importance before the foundation of Khartum, is 4 m. to the N., on the eastern bank of the Nile. From the 15th century up to 1821 it was the capital of a small state, tributary to Sennar, regarded as a continuation of the Christian kingdom of Aloa (see [Dongola]).
KHASI AND JAINTIA HILLS, a district of British India, in the Hills division of Eastern Bengal and Assam. It occupies the central plateau between the valleys of the Brahmaputra and the Surma. Area, 6027 sq. m.; pop. (1901), 202,250, showing an increase of 2% in the decade.
The district consists of a succession of steep ridges running east and west, with elevated table-lands between. On the southern side, towards Sylhet, the mountains rise precipitously from the valley of the Bārāk or Surma. The first plateau is about 4000 ft. above sea-level. Farther north is another plateau, on which is situated the station of Shillong, 4900 ft. above the sea; behind lies the Shillong range, of which the highest peak rises to 6450 ft. On the north side, towards Kamrūp, are two similar plateaus of lower elevation. The general appearance of all these table-lands is that of undulating downs, covered with grass, but destitute of large timber. At 3000 ft. elevation the indigenous pine predominates over all other vegetation, and forms almost pure pine forests. The highest ridges are clothed with magnificent clumps of timber trees, which superstition has preserved from the axe of the wood-cutter. The characteristic trees in these sacred groves chiefly consist of oaks, chestnuts, magnolias, &c. Beneath the shade grow rare orchids, rhododendrons and wild cinnamon. The streams are merely mountain torrents; many of them pass through narrow gorges of wild beauty. From time immemorial, Lower Bengal has drawn its supply of lime from the Khasi Hills, and the quarries along their southern slope are inexhaustible. Coal of fair quality crops out at several places, and there are a few small coal-mines.
The Khasi Hills were conquered by the British in 1833. They are inhabited by a tribe of the same name, who still live in primitive communities under elective chiefs in political subordination to the British government. There are 25 of these chiefs called Siems, who exercise independent jurisdiction and pay no tribute. According to the census of 1901 the Khasis numbered 107,500. They are a peculiar race, speaking a language that belongs to the Mon-Anam family, following the rule of matriarchal succession, and erecting monolithic monuments over their dead. The Jaintia Hills used to form a petty Hindu principality which was annexed in 1835. The inhabitants, called Syntengs, a cognate tribe to the Khasis, were subjected to a moderate income tax, an innovation against which they rebelled in 1860 and 1862. The revolt was stamped out by the Khasi and Jaintia Expedition of 1862-63. The headquarters of the district were transferred in 1864 from Cherrapunji to Shillong, which was afterwards made the capital of the province of Assam. A good cart-road runs north from Cherrapunji through Shillong to Gauhati on the Brahmaputra; total length, 97 m. The district was the focus of the great earthquake of the 12th of June 1897, which not only destroyed every permanent building, but broke up the roads and caused many landslips. The loss of life was put at only 916, but hundreds died subsequently of a malignant fever. In 1901 the district had 17,321 Christians, chiefly converts of the Welsh Calvinistic Mission.