The Austin weekly statesman. (Austin, Tex.) 1883-1898, 1885-06-18
Bill Nye on FL lIahdi.

The great heather and full-blown
prophet was once poor boy without
"a dollar in his Pocket. Years ago when
little Mahdi used to snare suckers
along the White Nile, no one thought
that to-day he would be the champion
heavy weight prophet of the known
world 1t shows what can be done by
brave, courageous little boy even in
a foreign land.
In appearance he is a brunette of
about the style of the successful meer-
chaum pipe. He does not dress as we
looks some like an Etruscau hens
nest. On chilly days he adds other ar
ticleS OF apparel to this turban, though
during the Summer months that is
sufficient for evening dress. In the
morning. he puts on his turban, buckles
a six-shooter around his waist and
he is dressed. 1t doesn't take Mahdi
long to make his toilet.
Years ago he decided that he would
retire 20 a lonely island in the Nile
and put himself in training for a
! prophet, so he crawled into a cave and
lived there on whatever he could get
hold of. While others were Down at
Khartoum, having good time at the
skating rink, Mahdi remained in his
gloomy cave, setting up the pins to GO
into the prophet business and murder
the kings English.
Some people began to hear of FL
Mahdi, and SIS he put card in all the
morning papers of the Soudan, he at
once had all the prophesying he could
do and had to hire an amanuensis or
an assistant prophet to help him out.
During the holidays, when trade was
brisk, the Mahdi had to sit up and
prophesy till 10 or II o'clock at night.
His real name is Mohammed Ach-
med, and he was the son of a petty
sheik, whose name / have forgotten
This man waa an inferior person and
very ordinary sheik, am told-iust
such a shiek as you could go in and
find on the ten-cent counters of the
,Soudan anywhere.
Mohammed Achmed for long time
showed one of the prevailing charac-
terlsticS of tramp, and so they began
| to educate him as fakir. A fakir is
a man who has permission to ramble
though the country. chiseling people
out of money and groceries in the
name of religion. He is sort of a
Oriental gospel bum, whose business
is to go around over the country
weeping over the sins of people who
are too busy to be hipocrites. These
fakirs are always devout, hungry and
sad, They yearn for bright immor-
tally, but they are in no great rush
about acquiring it. They are perfect
ly willing to wait till the Egyptian
bullets run out. am glad that we
have no faklrs in America.
By and by Mohammed Achmed got
a call to rise up William Riley and
gather the clans of the SOudan togeth-
er. He went to them and told them
in confidence that he was the only
genuine, all wool prophet on the Nile,
and if they wanted some fun, to get
their double barrel shot guns and join
the gang. They did so. None of
them ever did anything at home to
obtain livelihood, so they could go
away on the warpath all Summer and
their business wouldn't suffer at all.
They then proceeded to murder the
kings English, who had come there 10
conquer and acquire their sand pile.
The Arabian style of warfare is pc
culiar. 1t consists largely in drinking
.alkali water on their part and in re-
curing their enemies to do the same
for ninety days. So becomes simply
a question of who has the frmest and
most durable Bessemer steel bow
els.
No one but a Bendouin would haye
thought of such style. of warfare. It
is not, therefore, question of courage
or everlasting justice, it is question
of who can drink concentrated I've all
Summer and take his alimentary ca
nal home with him in the fall.
In the battle, the Arab charge is pc
culiar in the extreme. The Arab does
not stand up in line of battle for an
hour, while the commanding officer
ga!lops up and down the line on a
"heavy" horse and the enemy pours a
CALLING fire into his ranks. He sails
up toward the enemy, waves his ORR
entail night shirt in the Egyptian air
shoots some one ana goes away.
When the battle-ground is examined
on the following day, it is discovered
that eight hundred brave and hand
some English soldiers are killed and
one moth-eaten Arab has stepped on
his Gothic shirt tail and sprained Lis
ankle.
Ell Mahdi is not a bal looking man
at all, and the report that he has lost
his teeth, so that when he gives his
oeders he has to gum Arabic, is not
trIIp BILL NYF