The recent campaign in the Soudan was a bloodless one to the
correspondent with the expedition, or, rather, on the tail of the
advance. Yet I think, in spite of this little drawback, there is
enough in the vicissitudes of my colleagues and myself during the
recent advance of the Egyptian troops up the Nile to warrant me
addressing you this afternoon. Especially as toward the end of the
campaign the Sirdar, or Commander-in-Chief of the Egyptian army, Sir
Herbert Kitchener, became more sympathetic with our endeavors to get
good copy for our journals, and allowed us to return home by the old
trade route of the Eastern Soudan, over which no European had passed
since the revolt of the Eastern tribes in 1883. Unfortunately, the
period for campaigning in the Soudan is in the hottest months in the
year, on the rising of the Nile at the end of July, when the cataracts
begin to be practicable for navigation. At the same time, in spite of
the heat, it is the healthiest period, for the water, in its brown,
muddy, pea soup state, is wholesomer to drink, and the banks of the
river, which, when exposed at low Nile, give off unhealthy
exhalations, are protected from spreading fever germs by the flood. To
show you how much the people of Egypt depend for their very existence
on this extraordinary river, the average difference between high and
low Nile, giving favorable results, is 26 feet. Twenty-eight feet
would cause serious damage by inundation, and the Nile as low as 20
feet would create a famine. The flood of the river depends entirely on
the equatorial rains which cause the Upper White Nile to rise in April
and the Blue Nile early in June. The muddy Atbara, joining her two
sisters about the same time, sends the flood down to Lower Egypt
toward the end of August at the rate of 100 miles a day. The Blue Nile
in the middle of September falls rapidly away, while the Atbara leaves
the trio in October. The White Nile is then left by herself to recede
slowly and steadily from a current of four knots an hour to a sluggish
and, in many parts, an unwholesome stream. Flies and mosquitoes
increase, and fever is rife.
I arrived in Cairo on a sweltering day in July, and found four
colleagues, who had been waiting for a week the Sirdar's permission to
proceed to the front, still waiting. Luckily, the day after my arrival
a telegram came from headquarters, saying that "we might proceed as
far as Assouan and their await further orders." This, anyhow, was a
move in the right direction; so we at once started. It was rather a
bustle for me to get things ready, for Sunday blocked the way and
little could be done, even on that day, in Cairo. I procured a
servant, a horse and two cases of stores, for the cry was "nothing to
be had up country in the shape of food; hardly sufficient sustenance
to keep the flies alive." My colleagues, who had the start of me, were
able to procure many luxuries--a case of cloudy ammonia for their
toilet, and one of chartreuse, komel and benedictine to make their
after dinner coffee palatable, and some plum pudding, if Christmas
should still find them on the warpath, were a few of the many items
that made up the trousseau of these up-to-date war correspondents,
though at least one of them had been wedded to the life for many
years. Unfortunately I had no time to procure these luxuries, and I
had to proceed ammonialess and puddingless to the seat of war. My
comrades were quite right. Why not do yourself well if you can? One of
them even went in for the luxury of having three shooting irons, two
revolvers and a double-barrel slug pistol, so that when either of the
weapons got hot while he was holding Baggara horsemen at bay, there
was always one cooling, ready to hand. He also, which I believe is a
phenomenal record with any campaigner, took with him thirteen pairs of
riding breeches, a half dozen razors and an ice machine. Even our
commander-in-chief, when campaigning, denies himself more than two
shirts and never travels with ice machines. But the thirteen pairs
impressed me considerably. Why thirteen, more than fifteen, or any
other number? I came to the conclusion that my colleague must
certainly be a member of that mystic body the "Thirteen Club," and as
he had to bring in the odd number somewhere to keep the club fresh in
his memory, he occasionally sat upon it.
I found, after all, there was some wisdom in his eccentricity, for,
when riding the camel, mounted on the rough saddle of the country, I
often wished that I had my friend's forethought, and I should have
been glad to have supplemented mine with his odd number. No doubt my
colleague's idea in having such a variety of nether garments was to
use them respectively, on a similar principle to the revolvers, when
he rode in hot haste with his vivid account of the latest battle to
the telegraph office.
But, unfortunately, this recent campaign did not, after all,
necessitate these elaborate preparations, for there were no dervishes
for us to shoot at or descriptions of bloody battles to be
telegraphed. At all events, the cloudy ammonia and the thirteen
breeches, with the assistance of a silken sash--a different color for
each day of the week--made the brightest and smartest looking little
man in camp. However, when I reflect on this new style of war
correspondent, who, I forgot to mention, also carried with him two
tents, a couple of beds, sundry chairs and tables, a silver-mounted
dressing case, two baths, and a gross of toothpicks, and I think of
the severe simplicity of the old style of campaigning when a famous
correspondent who is still on the warpath, and who always sees the
fighting if there be any, on one arduous campaign took with him the
modest outfit of a tooth brush and a cake of carbolic soap, I joyfully
feel that with the younger generation our profession is keeping pace
with the luxury of the times.