170 
AFRICA SINCE 18S8 
tlie upper Nile, even to the Gi*eat Lakes and the valley of the 
Red sea. Ab}’ssinia lay between these possessions, and the 
Khedive desired to conquer it. He sent two large armies, which 
marched up the eastern branches of the Nile to Abyssinia ; both 
armies were defeated. The son of the Khedive, in command of 
the second army, was captured with a large number of men, 
but was subsequently ransomed. 
A Mohammedan, born in Dongola, calling'himself El Mahdi — 
i. e., the leader, prophet, or guide — appeared in the Sudan about 
1880, and raised the flag of the Prophet on a small island in the 
Nile near Khartum. Soon Arabs from the desert joined him, and 
later the Bedouins flocked from all parts of Egypt. About the 
same time Arabi Pasha, then an officer in the Egyptian army, 
cons{)ired with El Mahdi and seized Cairo, the Khedive and 
English retiring to Alexandria. Sir Garnet Wolseley was sent 
to command the English and Indian armies, and at the battle 
of Tel-el-Kebir, September, 1882, Arabi was defeated and taken 
]>risoner. He was subsequently sent to Ceylon, but the disaffec- 
tion in the upper Nile continued to extend, and soon the whole 
population of the Sudan and upper Nile was gathered under 
the banner of the prophet El Mahdi. He defeated four expedi- 
tions, and in 1883 General Hicks Pasha, with an Anglo-Egyptian 
army of 10,000, was sent against him. They marched into the 
desert, and for months nothing was heard of the expedition, then 
slowly the news of its annihilation reached Cairo. In June El 
Mahdi ca]>tured Khartum, killing General Gordon a few days ' 
])efore General Wolseley with the English army came in sight of 
the city — too late. They returned without even attempting to 
avenge his death. 
El Mahdi died a few months later, but his army was not dis- 
])ersed. Osman Digna, the general of the Mahdists, overran the 
region east of the Nile, ca])turing and massacring Egyptian 
garrisons at different places and marching to the very gates of 
Suakin on the Red Sea, where the Mahdists desired to have a sea- 
port for communication with Arabia, in order to obtain a good 
market for slaves from the interior of Africa. With these 
INIahdists the Italians have now to contend. Soon after their 
occupation of Massowah they acquired control of Tigre and 
Kassala, then held by the Mahdists and Dervishes. These 
fanatics, encouraged by the defeat of the Italians, are now said 
to be preparing to attack Kassala. 
The English, for the purjjose of aiding the Italians and re- 
