St. Tammany farmer. [volume] (Covington, La.) 1874-current, 1885-05-30
A PORTRAIT OF THE MEhDL


His Early Life Though Conseers.ing
Himself to . Life of Seelnsion and PIety.
He Still Kept Nm Eye Open to the Main
Chance.
Alfred NJ. Cote, LID, gives to the
Catholic World the following pen picture
of the Mehdi:
Imagine man about forty years
of age, of medium height. as lean. a.
the saying is, as shotten herring.
with a mahogany complexion, coal
black beard and eyes. and three vertical
slashes on his pallid cheeks; add to this
q long cotton shirt as garment.
narrow turban as q head dress. a pair
of wooden sandals, and in the hands
dry as those of a mummy-a string of
ninety beads, corresponding to an equal
number of divine attributes, and you
have the Mehdi. Those who have seen
him say that Mohammed-Ahmedp plays
to perfection the part of a visionary
dervish, waving his head when walking.
and murmuring constant prayers, his
eyes fixed on heaven. His father was
a carpenter on Naft Island, in the Nu-
bian province of Dongola, and about
1852 came with his four children to
Chindi, a small city on the banks of the
Nile, south of Berber. When still very
young he was placed as an apprentice
under the care of one of his uncles, a
ship-builder of Chabakah. opposite Sem
naar. 1t seems that the future prophet
was not without his failings, for one
day his uncle thought well of fogging
him in regular French style. The
proceeding was not appreciated. and
the child ran away until he arrived in
Khartoum, where he entered sort of
school or convent of begging dervishes,
who were in charge of the monument
erected over the venerated remains of
Cheick Hoghali. patron of the city.
There his life was remarkable one for
his piety: but rs to education, he never
learned how to write or even how to
read fluently. Later he went to SIM
liar institution in Berber, then to one
in Aradup, on the south of Kena. In
the latter city he became. in 1875, the
favorite disciple of an eminent fakir,
Cheick Nur-el-Daim, and finally was
ordained by him and went to Abbas
Island. White Nile. His fame as
sanity man was every year on the in
crease He lived in a kind of pit or
subterranean repository for grain,
called a silo. which he had dug up with
his own hands. and there he passed his
life. fasting and praying, burning in
cense day and night. and repeating
the name of Allah for hours at time
until he would fall to the ground pant
ing and exhausted. If anybody spoke
to him he gave back no answer. except
sentences from the sacred books of
Islam. Earthly things seemed to in
spire him only with disgust and pity.
He had made vow to absorb himself
in the contemplation of divine perfec-
tions and to weep all his life for the
sins of mankind. But his tears did not
destroy his powers of vision. and he
kept his best eye wide open to business;
and the faithful coming by thousands
and depositing rich offerings at the
mouth of his silo. he never failed to see
the gifts nor to stow them away care
fully for stormy days. In 1878 he had
become SO wealthy that he felt the
necessity to declare that Allah had
ordered him to leave his silo and to take
unto himself a large collection of wives,
whom, rs truly practical man, he
chose among the most influential fami-
lies of the country, especially that OF
the Bagaras, the most opulent slave
traders on the White Nile.
Every one has still fresh in his
memory the appalling determination of
Hicks Pasha's II 900 men. surrounded
on the 9Th of November, 1sS3-the first
day of the fourteenth century of the
hegira-at Kasghil, while marching on
Ell Obeid. This horrible butchery, hap
pening on the threshold of the century
announced as the one of the last
prophet, gave bloody conservation to
Mohammed-Ahm who, after the
three days battle, went all over the
battlefield, piercing with his spear the
ghastly corpses of his enemies, and ex-
claiming: 1T is I: I, the prophet. who
DESTROYED the heretics!' Compared to
him. Mohammed was no more. in his
mind, than small phophet. He alone
was the only great and powerful
Messiah announced by Mohammed
himself. The Sultan of Constantinople
was no more the supreme Caliph. the
chief of Islamism; it was he, Mo-
hammed- Ahmed, and he ordered his
own name to be invoked in public wor-
ship in the place of Mohammed's right
after the name of Allah
II have said enough to show what
kind of man is the Nubian Mehdi.