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Updated: June 14, 2025
On the following morning Abou Saood came to take leave. He pretended to devote himself to my service, and declared that he should now at once return to Fabbo and organize the best of his people into an irregular corps for the government, and he should act with energy as my vakeel, and assist me in every manner possible. He then went back to Fabbo. This is the last time that I ever saw Abou Saood.
This man, Umbogo, declares that Abou Saood wrote to Suleiman, instructing him to wait until I should have passed on, and then to bring all his slaves to Fabbo. "I immediately sent Captain Mohammed Deii with fifty men, including twenty-five of the 'Forty Thieves, with orders to liberate all slaves that might be discovered within the zareeba.
I now determined to establish a station at Fatiko, to represent the government during my absence in the south. Abou Saood had sworn fidelity. Of course I did not believe him, but as the natives had welcomed the government, I could not leave them without protection. It was therefore arranged with Abou Saood that after the expiration of the contract, all operations should cease.
I therefore changed the conversation to Abou Saood. Kabba Rega and his sheiks all agreed that he had arrived here some time ago in a very miserable plight, exceedingly dirty, and riding upon a donkey.
I had only learnt this on arrival at Gondokoro; thus when corn was so scarce that the rations were reduced, while those of meat were increased, we had an addition of 126 mouths! The policy of the slave-traders was identical with the feelings of the officers and men, all of whom wished to abandon the expedition and return to Khartoum. Abou Saood worked molelike in his intrigues.
We had thus suddenly appeared upon the greensward of the plateau without the slightest warning to the inhabitants of Fatiko. About a mile before us stood the large station of Abou Saood, which occupied at least thirty acres. On our right we were hemmed in by a wall of granite, sloped like a huge whale, about three-quarters of a mile long and 100 feet high.
He had an intimate knowledge of all that had taken place; which had been reported to him by his spies; and he declared that Abou Saood had long ago arranged a plan with Kabba Rega for our destruction should we arrive from Gondokoro.
I wrote, on 5th August, a letter addressed to Abou Saood, summoning hum to appear instantly at Fatiko: at the same time I promised him a free exit; without which written assurance I might as well have summoned the "man in the moon".
The defeat had spread consternation among the various stations, as it followed closely upon the destruction of a station belonging to Abou Saood in the Madi country. This zareeba had been under the command of a vakeel named Jusef, who had exasperated the natives by continual acts of treachery and slave-hunting.
In 1870, while I was camped at Tewfikeeyah, I entirely suppressed the river traffic; but the fact of my leaving over-taken three vessels with 700 slaves belonging to Abou Saood at the close of the expedition, on my return towards Khartoum, must be a damning proof of complicity on the part of certain government officials.
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