of enormous taxes and the cruelties accompanying their collection, Egypt would to-day be in possession of Central Africa down to the shores of Lake Victoria Nyanza.
A few years of Egyptian rule in the conquered provinces of Central Africa, served to rouse a spirit of hostility among the inhabitants, and make them ready for revolt. On the appearance of El Mahdi, in the summer of 1881, thousands flocked to his standard. He was a sheikh named Mohammed Achmet, the son of a carpenter, and a native of Dongola. He was born in 1842, and educated in a village near Khartoum. According to Moslem custom, religion was his principal study. In 1870 he became a sheikh, and after a brief sojourn at Korka, near Fashoda, he established himself on the island of Abba, in the White Nile. Here he set up as a holy man, or dervish, of the highest class, and soon obtained a great reputation for sanctity. After a while a considerable number of dervishes gathered around him, and his fame spread rapidly. He extended his influence and power by marrying daughters of the principal chiefs of the Baggara Arabs, the powerful tribes who inhabit the country west of the White Nile and southeast of Kordofan and Darfur. They were constantly at war with each other, and by his tact and influence Mohammed Achmet succeeded in bringing the various tribes into harmony.
In May, 1881, when living at Marabieh, near the island of Abba, he suddenly proclaimed himself to be the Messiah, or Prophet, whose coming had been foretold by Mohammed. His followers styled him El-Mahdi, an Arabic word, meaning simply a "leader," or "guide," and not found in the Koran. The Ulema of Khartoum[1] promptly pronounced against Mohammed Achmet; he was likewise repudiated at Cairo and Constantinople, and soon became known in Egypt and Turkey as the "False Prophet."
- ↑ The Ulema is a body corresponding to the Synods in Christendom. They are appealed to by the Sultan respecting the right application of precepts of the Moslem faith.
