THE RETURN OF SIR SAMUEL BAKER.

Grey River Argus, Volume XIV, Issue 1708, 24 January 1874, Page 4

THE RETURN OF SIR SAMUEL BAKER.

(from the daily news, oct. 7. ) To hear Sir' Samuel Baker talking over his adventures is like listening to a fairy tale. The world, it is said, is made of contrasts, but surely never was there a stranger' contrast than between talking over recent adventures at the table d'hote of the Louvre, and going through these adventures amid the most hairbreath escapes. Who could imagine that the unassuming gentleman, who begs to follow you with the paper, and who seems a little particular, that his sole should be well done, was but the other day struggling for his life, almost single-handed, against ; savages, i and living on flour soaked in water ; or that the lady who tells you in a matter-of-fact tone, ,that , she' is going out shopping, was, within tlie year, handing her husband his rifle while the bullets whistled .around her, and sleeping night after/night in the, open on. a bundle of damp grass I The.ontlines of Sir Samuel Baker's . expedition have already been given to the public in letters which he ad- , dressed from Ism alia .to his tjrothery Colonel James Baker, and there is no he-; cessity for now - recapitulating; them. Rather let me attempt to fill in some of the outlines by recounting details, of which . mention has been made in the course of !. conversation with Sir Samuel and Lady Baker, of both ofwhom it may truly be said . that their heroism is equalled by • their modesty. ' ; :, Sir Samuel Baker's |( original arrange-' ment was ; that he was" to have 1 65.0 troops;"under the command of Egyptain,officers, oye"r whom . he was to .have Wb'sblute and supreme power. Instead., >of this, he h»,d; , o'hly 1200 men, who consisted of artillery ;""ftiih ten guns, and two :infantry regiments—both armed with old /percussion „ muskets. Sir; Samuel Baker established „ (E&liU of forty-eight men, commanded by, his most trustworthy. officer, Colonel Abdul Kadr^ ' and passing familiarly .by fh§ name ; of Abdul Kadr and •the 1 forty thieves.. On the inarch to Gon-: xJokoro, ,about, ; a ,huridred.'. were lost through pestilence and canajr cutting., 'War 'alniost:.at / once ; /ecaueof between Sir ■Samuel Baker and the surrounding Bari ~tnbes7 greatly resembling-Kaffirs. They ; defused tb'acknowledge'rthe .Government, incited thereto by the slaYe-traders. Some* month's ; elapsed in effecting their subjjugation. The fighting t consisted of .•night i attac3<s.r;by ; tfte J^aryj, who were finally subdued by a thirty days' excur T sion 'of a flying column of 450' -nien.-' Then .arose a general desire among the Egyptianoflicers to 'return home. Mos'toft these, had, risen from the ranks, and were mdh bf 'litjtle character. Their excuse was the scarcity of grain. Their real

;_ c &use was Sir Samuel Baker's order that ■ ll who took slaves shoidd; suffer death,L tho officers having secret relations with the slave dealers. On ,,she, 12th of September, 1871, a round robbin was sent to Sir Samuel Baker to this effect, signed by every officer except Abdiil Kadr and the aides. Sir Samuel's reply was to issuo an order to march at midnight to attack an outlying Bari settlement. The result of the attack, which was successful, was the acquisition of grain enough for a twelvemonth's supply, and the destruction of a mutinous organisation. But it reappeared. Sir Samuel Baker next issued an 1 order that all actual invalids should be sent to Khartoum. During his absence the officer in command sent down no fewer that 600 men, thus reducing the strength of the expedition to more than one-half. .Sir Samuel Baker had now only 500 men, including officers, with whom to pursue his project. When he left Gondokoro, some j'ears ago, the country was full of populous and smiling villages. Returning he found it a wilderness. The natives had perforce become allies of the slave-dealers, and in their turn had been ravaged by tribes suffering from the attacks of the slavers. The whole country was thus reduced to a state of anarchy.. But having been invited by the slavedealers to make common cause against the Government, they had combined and dropped intestine quarrels. When the expedition first reached Gondokoro there was not even a hut for Lady Baker, while there were fifty- three vessels with cargoes requiring storage, and thus the troops had at once to create a station and to fight. Its fortificationsbeing complete, "Sir Sainuel' 'Baker, notwithstanding the defection already narrated, resolved to penetrate further south with 212 picked men of the troops still left. Sir Samuel Baker pushed on southward to Fatiko, about 1 60 miles south of Gondokoro..

Fatiko wasfound to be a nest of slavehunting stations about twenty miles apart, organised after a rude military fashion, and armed with muskets. They were all in the employ of one slavedealer in Khartoum, and were commanded by his son-in-law, Aboo Saood. This man had lately returned from the most southerly station in the Unyoro country, whither he had been to incite the King against Sir Samuel Baker. He had done the same with every tribe along the route, and had promised to initiate an attack on the Government troops. The stoppage of the slave trade, which Sir Samuel Baker came, to effect, meant ruin to him and to all other slavetraders of Khartoum. : All Sir Samuel Baker's subsequent losses and difficulties were the result of the intrigues of this 'designing, scoundrel. The natives who knew Sir Samuel Baker from his previous visit flocked to him for protection against the s\ive-hunters. They are of the bhoulli tribe, and the Pasha describes them as been a handsome, industrious, intelligent, acute people, practising both agriculture and hunting. They have villages'and mud and straw houses, well built, but very dirty. In this respect they differ from the Baris, who are . very cleanly people. F,atiko is the paradise of Central Africa, possessing a glorious cliamate, and being a most beautful country. Sic Saimi 1 Baker holds that it ought to become a leading coffee-producing country. It is a gaeat elevation , above the sea. Since Sir /Famrel Baker's previous visit, much of it had been devaated by the slave-hunters. From Fatiko, matters having being arranged there, Sir Samuel Baker led his forces . southward to Massindi, the capital of Unyoro, 318 miles from the headquarters of Gondokoro, and, on the dpposite side of the Victoria Nile. There he found reigning Kabba Eega, the son of his old friend Kamrasi. Kabba Rega is a great scoundrel, if it be right to speak of him in the present tense, seeing that Sir Samuel Baker left with his lieutenant positive orders that he should be shot. Sir Samuel Baker's aim was to annex that country to Egypt, and accepting the King as a vassel. accord him Egpptian protection against the curse of the country, the slave-hunt-ers, with Whom he was unable to cope. But Kabba Rega was urged by them to resistthis project, and his animosity resulted in the attempt to destroy Sir Samuel Baker a,nd his men by poisoned cider, and the subsequent night attack, with which Sir Samuel's published letters have already made the public, familiar. This attack was a very : near tiling. In Sir Samuel Baker's' words, it was one of a good many near things. Lady Baker, who had- been strolling with her husband, had fortunately, gone back into the hut before the ambuscade opened fire, bat she ran out into the midst of it with her husband's rifle, and ammunition, just as a man at his side fell shot through the heart, the bullets whistling around her plentifully. After a desperate but successful resistance, and after exemplary vehgance had been taken on the treacherous potentate of Unyoro, the return march began, first to the Victoria Nile, to join Rionga, whom Sir Samuel Baker determined to set xip as Sheik of Unyoro, and thence to Fatiko, to bring up reinforcements. Sir Samuel describes Massindi as a beautiful town. Before it became necessary, to destroy it he had an excellent and well laid out station, with a capital garden, in which after six weeks' cultivation there had ripened English vegetables, cucmbers,' melons, &c. The 'battle of Massindi was on the Bth of Sept., and on the 14th the retreat commenced. The pathway was but faintly defined^being over-grown and environed with tall grass. The little party had to march almost in Indian file. The two horses were laden with baggage, as were the few donkeys, on which" were also the r wo,unded. Lady Baker had to tramp the " whole seven days march, eighty miles, on f«ot. They camped at night in casual open spaces, or cut open camping ground with axes, throwing up every night a chevaux de fiise against native attacks. -All slept in the open air, under and on oilskins spread on the reeking wet grass. It was... very cold, at night, but fires were made; There was no food, except flour .and water, without salt, and wild vegetables. .Lady Baker . was : footsore, and almost worn Out j and -'Cf ten at a hill her husband, had to ; stretch oixt his hand behind him to tow her up. To add to the hardships, they were, almost constantly ; fighting, .the whole route being one long ambuscade. The road consisted of alternate mud and . water and tangled grass. Having set up Rionga, and settled some ■troobles that had. occurred at Fatiko during his j absence, , Sir Samuel Baker forwarded 'an irregular force of 200 mento '! operate .against Kabba Rega, which so punished his people that they were t horoughly cowed, ,, and,,. then retreating B outhward, evaouated Unyoro, vice Kabba

Rega, desposed. He is supported by a • force of- 200 troops under the command of Major Abdullah, an able officer quite strong enough to keep the country in order. The Egyptian Government has a monopoly of the ivory trade. By last accounts the whole territory was quiet and prosperous, and slavery extinct. Strictly speaking, says Sir Samuel, there was little slave trade in the country ; it Wcis necirly all slave stealing. Slave holding was almost Universal. Grown men were not stolen ; for they ran away. The kidnapping consisted of women and children, especially young boys, as these, in growing up, became attached to their owners and did not escape. The captivity could scarcely have been very arduous. The hardships consisted in the breaking up of_ homes and family ties, and the sufferings endured when being driven to the homes of new owners. The current price of a girl was ten cows, so that if one man succeeded in stealing another man's daughter he was virtually richer by ten cows. The demoralisation of tlie custom extended far and wide. The subject is too large and complicated either to be mastered in casual conversations, or explained even generally in a telegram. As to the geographical question, Sir Samuel Baker simply testifies to the information given him on all hands that the Albert Nyanza and Tanganyka are, to quote Livingstone, one water. If this is not true, and no communication exists, Sir Samuel is clear that the Tanganyka has no part in the Nile system. The Nile has no western affluent ; the Paha Gazal is a currentless marsh.