No. 643.
Mr. Farman to Mr. Evarts.
Cairo, May 22, 1880. (Received June 19.).
Sir: I have the honor to inform you that soon after the writing of my dispatch No. 399, of the 5th instant, 20 slaves were rescued at one of the railway stations of Cairo, on a train that came from Assioût. They were a part of the slaves that had come from Darfour with the caravan mentioned in my dispatch.
A few days since a portion of another caravan was surprised and taken on the desert three or four days distant from Assioût and about half way between that city and the oasis of El-Khargeh, which is about six days’ travel west of ancient Thebes. This oasis is on the great cavaran route from Darfour, and in going to it either from Thebes or Assioût, the whole distance traversed is a mountainous desert. It is a convenient point for caravans on their way from Central Africa to stop arid send their slaves in small bodies to Assioût, the Natron lakes, and other places along the border of the Lybian Desert, whence they can easily be secretly taken to the towns and villages of the valley and delta of the Nile.
The second caravan had been some time expected, and a body of soldiers were sent out on the desert to meet it, and succeeded in surprising and capturing a portion of it and rescuing 90 slaves. The caravan is supposed to have brought many more, the number being variously eatmated at from 400 to 1,000. Those that were rescued have been liberated.
The circumstances connected with the capture of the first caravan, and the conduct of the governor of the province of Assioût and several other functionaries, were such that these persons have been dismissed and are to be tried by a court-martial. They will be regarded by every native Egyptian as unfortunate rather than guilty of any crime, for no complaint would have been made against any one, and the whole matter of the sale of the slaves would have passed off without notice, as I stated in my previous dispatch, had it not been for the zeal of the teacher in the American school, Mr. Roth.
As soon, however, as the facts were brought to the notice of the English consul-general, he regarded it as his official duty to demand that vigorous measures be taken. At his request an Italian, Count Sala, has been appointed controller-general for the suppression of the slave trade. He is to reside at Assioût, and a small number of cavalry has been assigned to him with which to scour the borders of the desert for slaves that are supposed to be kept concealed in the mountains. For the moment the government appears to be acting vigorously, and its action will undoubtedly have good results. It must, nevertheless, be admitted that however great the zeal or earnest the desire of the Khedive to end this nefarious system of stealing children from their homes in Central Africa and transporting them one or two thousand miles across the [Page 1013] desert, subjecting them to privations and sufferings which no pen can describe, and of which many of them die, His Highness has difficulties to overcome that are almost insuperable, and will remain so until slavery is actually abolished, not only in Egypt, but throughout all the Ottoman Empire.
The people are in favor of the system of slavery, or at least have no objection to it. And simply on the west of Egypt, from the sea to the first cataract of the Nile, there are 700 miles of territory to be guarded, which borders on a mountainous desert, traversed only by half nomadic Arabs, who are more or less interested in the slave trade. The province of Darfour, which is one of the principal sources of slaves, is at present only under the most nominal rule of the Egyptian Government. Its inhabitants are more than semi-barbarous, and largely engaged in pillage and in the kidnapping and selling of children into slavery.
There is supposed to be a considerable number of slaves now secreted at El-Khargeh or in the mountains in its vicinity, the larger part of whom will very probably, sooner or later, be brought into the Nile Valley and sold.
I have, &c.,