In the wild district of Bakara, for ten years prior to the commencement of our story, there had lived, in the strictest seclusion, a man whose name was suddenly to burst upon the world like the unexpected flash of a meteor across the sky, and to leave behind a trail of blood.
This man devoted his whole life to the exercises of religion.
He lived on the wild fruit and roots which grew about his place, he drank nothing but water, and he spent twelve hours out of the twenty-four in prayer.
He slept only four hours each night, and the remaining eight were devoted to study and the obtaining of the necessaries of life.
The Arabs who lived near looked upon him as a sacred teacher who would ere long receive a mission from the prophet.
Mohammed Ahmed was born at Dongola in 1843. He removed to Bakara and commenced his hermit life about 1870.
Every morning he would go to the door of his hut and intone the Adan of the Mueddins, which translated would read:
“Allah is most great. I testify that there is no god but Allah. Come to prayer. I testify that Mahomet is the apostle of Allah. Come to prayer, come to security! Prayer is better than sleep.”
As regularly as the Mueddins of the mosque would he intone this Adan, and at midnight, after sleeping two hours, he would rise from his bed, open the door, and in a strong, musical voice would chant the ula.
“There is no deity but Allah. He hath no companion—to him belongeth the dominion—to him belongeth praise. He giveth life and causeth death. He is living and shall never die. In his hand is blessing, he is almighty. Great is Allah! His perfection I extol!”
The Arab neighbors wondered who this mysterious hermit could be, but years passed, and never could they get an opportunity to speak with him.
At last he wandered forth, his face shining with an ethereal radiance, his bright eyes piercing and beautiful.
“Who are you?” asked an exiled Arab chief.
The hermit spoke—the first time to a human being for many years.
“Have you not heard that there should arise a twelfth Imaum?”
“Thou art the Mahdi!” answered the chief.
Within a few days the Arab chief was sent with a message to each governor and chief of a tribe, the burden of which was:
“Turn from your evil ways of living. Oppress not the people. I, the Mahdi, have ordered it. I will punish the oppressors of the poor. Prepare for my coming.”
Rauf Pasha, the Egyptian governor general of the Soudan, received the message.
He sent for Abu Saud, the great Mohammedan theologian, and showed him the message.
“What thinkest thou?” asked Rauf Pasha.
“The prophet foretold the coming of the Mahdi.”
“But would he not come from Mecca?”
“Allah il Allah! His ways are not our ways,” answered Abu Saud.
“Go thou to Bakara as my special commissioner, and find out whether this is indeed the Mahdi.”
No sooner had the theologian started out on his mission than Rauf Pasha said to himself:
“Abu Saud will represent the prophet, but my soldiers shall go and bring this so-called Mahdi to Khartoum, and I will make him obey me.”
Abu Saud held many theological discussions with Mohammed Ahmed, and embarked on the state steamer fully convinced that the Mahdi had indeed come.
No sooner had Abu Saud started on his homeward journey than a company of soldiers arrived and demanded that the Mahdi should go with them to Khartoum.
The prophet went to the door and intoned the Adan.
A hundred Arabs obeyed the call to prayer, and with faces turned toward Mecca, they joined in the prayer offered by the Mahdi.
When the prayer was over Mohammed Ahmed said to the soldiers:
“Go thou and tell thy master, Rauf Pasha, that it is he who must obey me.”
The captain of the Egyptian soldiers made reply:
“We have orders to take you to Khartoum, and that we shall do.”
The standard bearer unfurled his flag, and the sun shone on the crescent emblazoned on the blood-red banner of Egypt.
“Allah is with me,” said the Mahdi, devoutly. “Fight not against your Imaum.”
The soldiers laughed and called on Mohammed to surrender.
“By the great Allah and the illustrious prophet, the Mahdi will never surrender!”
That was the signal for an order to fire on the followers of the Mahdi.
In less than an hour every Egyptian soldier had been annihilated, and all their arms and ammunition fell into the hands of the Arabs, together with the steamer which had brought them down the Nile from Khartoum.
The first blood had been shed, and the alleged Mahdi had been victorious.
The followers of Mohammed went on board the steamer, and sailed down the Nile in the direction of Kordofan.
Long before Kordofan was reached, the people flocked to the standard of the Mahdi, and Mohammed Ahmed was welcomed as the long-promised leader who was to triumph over the Turks and drive them from the Soudan and Egypt.
The Mahdi would raise the crescent above the cross, and the whole world should be subjugated to the faith of Mahomet.
Such was the rise of that wonderful man, and still more remarkable enthusiasm, which caused the plains of the Soudan to be dyed crimson with the blood of Egyptian and Turkish and English soldiers.
Rauf Pasha was alarmed at the enthusiasm of the people, and he sent to the governor of Fashoda stringent orders to crush the Mahdi and his followers.
The orders were welcome, for the governor loved fighting, and his people were fond of plunder.
He therefore gave orders for his soldiers to be in readiness for the march early on the following morning.
The trumpet sounded, and nine hundred soldiers, about half of them unarmed, however, set out for the Arab village of Senari.
When the village was reached the governor himself raised the banner of Egypt, and shouted:
“Down with the Arabs! Death to the infidels!”
Senari was fired on.
The people were panic-stricken.
Men rushed for their houses, and called on Allah to protect them.
Women and children were shot down without mercy.
The blood-red flag of Egypt, with its golden crescent, was not more crimson than the streets of the Arab village.
The soldiers pillaged every house.
Men saw their children hewn into pieces with the heavy swords of the soldiers; they saw their wives mutilated in the most horrible manner, but were powerless to resist.
They were unarmed.
From Senari the victorious Fashodians marched to Bari, and again commenced a carnival of slaughter and plunder.
The Arabs of Bari showed considerable spirit, for they armed themselves with knives, long sticks and various other weapons, and rushed upon the bayonets and muskets of the invaders, fighting against terrible odds and at great disadvantage.
Again the same scenes of horrible brutality were witnessed.
The butchery was at its height when a cloud of dust and sand was seen in the distance, and in a few minutes a gallant band of well-armed Arabs rode into the center of the village, and charged the Fashodians with an impetuosity entirely foreign to the Arab nature.
“Come on, boys!” shouted Sherif el Habib, in good Arabian. “I don’t know what the quarrel is about, but the villagers are the weakest.”
“That’s so!” shouted Max; “and in my country we always go to help the under dog of the fight.”
Our friends, Mohammed and Sherif, with their lieutenants, Max and Ibrahim, arrived at the very nick of time.
The governor of Fashoda believed that the Mahdi had come.
The villagers declared that Allah had answered their prayers, and that very thought caused them to fight with desperate courage, even though they were practically unarmed.
“The Mahdi!” shouted the people.
“Great is the prophet!”
“Allah il Allah!”
The air was filled with the shouts of the Arabs, and it was not until a lull took place that Sherif el Habib was able to explain that the Mahdi had not come, that in fact they were seeking for him.
Max fought desperately, and when the scimiter was knocked from his hand he almost cried with vexation.
But he created a consternation which led to a panic.
It was unexpected and to the Fashodians inexplainable.
Max had amused himself on his journey in making a number of giant cartridges—consisting of a paper shell and nearly half a pound of powder.
He had intended them for any rock he wanted to dislodge or blast, and when he felt for his revolver, he accidentally discovered one of these heavy cartridges in his saddlebag.
Madcap as he was even when fighting, he conceived a plan unique and terrible.
Quietly riding forward on his camel to the standard bearer of the Fashodians, he managed to place the cartridge under the saddlebag and lighted the fuse.
The standard bearer turned quickly on his camel to repel, as he thought, the attack made by Max, but was surprised to see the American ride away.
The fight was raging furiously when a loud report was heard, and the standard bearer was flying through space.
Alas! his beauty was defaced and his usefulness ended, for the madcap had charged the cartridge so well that the poor bearer of the crescent of Egypt was rent into a hundred pieces, and his remains had to be left scattered on the ground.
The Fashodians were superstitious, and believed that the prophet must have indeed come.
To add to their terror, a great army of Arabs was seen approaching, and a great cry arose from the throng:
“The Mahdi has come!”
And into the thickest of the fight rode a stately looking man with clear, bright eyes and intelligent, broad forehead.
In a voice of authority he shouted:
“To your homes! Repent ye. I am your Imaum, the Mahdi.”