A NEW MAHDI.

Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 596, 26 August 1909, Page 5

A NEW MAHDI.

TROUBLE ON THE RED SEA LITTORAL

TURKS DI-FEATED. ITALIAN GUNBOAT SENT TO YEMEN. ■ (Bj Telegraph.-l'reai AMuclatlon.—Oopfrliht.l ... (Rec., August 25, 0.5 p.m.) Romo, August 25. Tho Italian gunboat Volturuo has been sent to Hodeida, principal seaport of tho Turkish Arabian province of Yemen, on tho south-eastern Bhore of tho Red Sea, in order to protect Italian- interests against : the Mahdist revolutionaries. .Tho latter havo . annihilated several detachments of Ottoman troops, and aro now approaching Hodeida. ' THE LATEST"MESSIAH." . , The Arabian provinces of Turkey havo long been more or less out ,of hand, and 1 tho new regime at Constantinople has had too many troubles at home to do much in the Red Sea. The Turkish Government has been considering proposals to> allay unrest in Yemen by granting autonomy. The particular outbreak referred to in the cablegram had;its beginnings at Azir, in Yemen, where a new Mahdi, known as Seyid Mehmed, gathered' round him about. 25,000 followers. ' A Turkish force consisting' 'of five battalions and two' batteries of field artillery was dispatched to chastise him, but apparently the Mahdi has turned the tables. . ; '

Tho "Mahdi" among the Mosloms is the expected Messiah) said to have been promised by Mohammed. The title has boen claimed by several pretenders, the best known being Mobammed Ahmod, who headed a rising m the Eastern Soudan in 1&S1, and afterwards captured Khartoum.