The Arkansaw traveler., 1885-05-16
BslNo scuppEREp.
ILesser to London TelrgrapA.l |

@Scuppefed is . wotd which l had never met with till came to SuAkim, aAd its horrible signi6cance is . new ex. perience te British troops. To he scup. pefed" means here being hacked to the Hadendowas do 1t nobody but them. selves can tell, but night after night they come into the middle of our camp, stab and hack tew soldiers, and 30 out again scathless. Sometimes they creep h i've abreast past our sensries sometimes they come right up to our teuts half mile within the line ot redouhtS and pickets and bring camels and horses with them. But, whatever the audacity ot their en- trance, the impunity of their departure is the same. Our guards turn out, hugles sound the alarm, signals Hash, rifies are let oil, a gunboat fires overhead into black space-but next morning there are only our own mutila,ed and dead in evil dencs of the assassins' presence, The Hadendowas have left none behind them, or had none to leave. It Is horrible in the highest degree, this monotony of midnight murder. and depressing be- yond language to find our headquarters' SN0u ~PPsASn"y So onsC1ehapsG oy SA' peTience.
 The front of our camp is cousiderabl, over three miles in stretch, while the relative positions of the tents have been arranged. apparently. solely for the con. venience oi Osman D'gna's hyenas. The standing order for the immediate en- ttenchment of all lines was not enforced, and the time and manner for defending their regiments were left to the discretion of their respective colonels, the result having proved so inadequate that if it were not for the hideous consequences 1t would be absurd. Our sleeping soldiers he virtually at the mercy of the enemy and in the Hadendowss inexplicablc for bearance the country has much to be very grateful for. They have Tefrai1ed from slaughter with a selfdenial that in such foes is positively heroic. The Cold streams slep, two nights with nothing between them aud the s,ealthy, murder, ous spears of the Sudanese; till day be. fore yesterday the headquarters s,aff went to bed without even an earth work to pro. tect them from the snake-like attack oi the enemy. Yet the H Hadendowas were content with aA odd soldier or two here or there. With the lives of the generals and their staffs in their hands they sneaked instead into ,he tents of privates
 To the Providence that protects the help less, Generals Greaves, McNeil and the rest owe their lives-to nothing else Our sentTies cannot see these satages Once past our pickets the redoubts can. not fire on them. On the sand their feet fall without sound. The nights are of extraordinary darkness, moreover they are experts in all the treacheries of war. fare Silent as shadows, they are terribly swift in massacre, and the ground they travel over is murderous beyond descrip. tion. R.vines so deep that horsemen can pass unseen along them, ambMscade our whole front, while streaks and patches of thick brush superAuously off:r con. tinuous lines of covert in every direction to foe that needs no such helps to con cealment. Crawling along on all fours they traverse the space between them and their victims with all the patient caution of wild beasts stalking prey. They reach the doomed tent. For the sake of the sea-breezs the doorway is open, and the next instant the murderer Is standing by the sleeping soldiers side. He feels hand passing over his body and starts A cry Is rising to his lips It is strangled in his throat by groan of pain, and be. fore the gallant fellow can even warn his comrades, the fierce spear is driven home through his body, the heavy two handled sword has fallea across him. But the tent is alarmed. There is no time to lose l Slashing this way and that, the ranrlArara stak anA karL ...s,k k~ E.... Of hends, and then as the camp starts to its feet in clamor they are of. Not a sound betrays their passing. There Is no trace of blood to tell of retribu,ion. They are gone-back into the vilIanous gullies, back into the scattered brush and next we can imagine them sitting to refresh themselves outside our line of redoubts-- 10 listen gleeiuliy to the storm they have raised-the bugles telling the old tale of murder completed and the murdesers gone, the aimless volleys of rifles, the din of voices, the impotent utterances of our indignant guns roaring for an impossible vengeance. They hear the tempest oi the camps alarm swell up and dwindle away, and then quietly get up and pass on to where their friends are waiting to congratulate and to rejoice--to rub their spear heads against the red tips of the assassins' weapons, 10 smear their swords with the blood still vet on their blades And in our camp? The hospital strctchers there are carrying away the mangled, mutiiated bodies of out men. their comrades standing to their arms, savage with useless rage, as they look at the lantern-lit group of surgeons and wounded. 1t is a horrible episode. vet of