EL MAHDI.

Manawatu Standard, Volume X, Issue 40, 15 July 1885, Page 2

EL MAHDI.

This great heathen ajad full-blown prophet was once a poor boy, without a dol . lar m his pocket.- Years ago, when little Mahdi used to snare suckers along the White Nile,, no one -thought that today he'would be the champion beayy weight prophet of the known<^world. It shows what can be done by a brave, courageous little boy, even m aforeign land. In appearance he is a BrunettQ of abqut . , /.the, style pf ihe. successful •meerschaum . pipe. He does not dress as we do, but wears a white tiirban^ that looks some ' thing like a; Etruscan hen's-hest. On chilly days he adds other articles of apparel to this turban, though during the summer months that is sufficient for evening dress. In the mprning he puts on, his turban, buckles a six-shooter arouiuL his waist, and he is dressed. ,It | does not take Mahdi long to make nig | toilet. . . r ; Years ago he decided that he would retire to a lonely island m the Nile, and put himself m. training for a prophet, so he crawled into a cave and lived there on whatever he got hold of. While others were down at Khartoum, having a goodtime at the skating, rink, Mahdi remained i m his glopniy cave setting up the pins to I go into the prophet business and murder the Queen's English. - 'Some people began to hear of El Mahdi, atod as he put a card m all the morning papers of the Soudan, he at once had all the prophesying he could do and had id hire an .amanuensis or assistan^prophet to help him out. During the holidays when ; trade the Mahdi - ; hid''to;;siit^p-fand^pr6pi^j v tffl : '-ten or eleven o'clock at night!;'' • "■ / His real name is Mahommed Achmed, and .he was.the .BOXL of 'ap«tty^ shiekr r 5 whose name I have forgotten:: This man .was anvinferior person and a very ordinary, shiek; lam told— just such a shiek as ..you-could go m and. find oh "the tencent counter. of. the Soudan anywhere, . Mohammed Achmed for a,lorig -time showed one of the prevailing characteristics, of a tramp, and so they began to educate him as a fakir. A fakir fs a man. > who > has permission to ranlble through the country cblsfeling people but of money and groceries m the name of religion; 'He is a sort of briental gospel bum, whose business is to, go, around over /the \ country !■ weeping over the " sins of the people who are too busy to be hypocrites. These fakirs are always devout,' hungry arid sad .They yearn fof a bright immortality, but they are m no great rush about it till the Egyptian .pullets run ibut. I am glad ."- that we have no fakirs m America^ By and by i£phammed"Achmed got a call to rise up William Riley and gather the! clans of the Soudan together. He went to them and.told them m confidence that he was the .only genuine, all-wool prophet on the Nile, and if they wanted some' funto get their double barrel! guns and join the gang: Th§y did so. None of them ever did anything at h»me to obtain a livelihood,* so" they 'could go' a way on the warpath all sumnief and - : their business wouldn't suffer-at all. ■ They then 'proceeded tip murder the QueenV English, who had fcome there to conquer and acquire their sand pile.' The Arab style pf warfare is peculiar. It consists largely in* drinking alkali water on their part and m requiring their, enemies to do the same for ninety days. .So it :becbmes simply a question of whp has the firmest and most durable' Bessemer steel bowels. ■ .'■ .... No one but a Bedouin would have thought of such a style, of warfare: It is 'riot, therefore a question of courage or everlasting justice, it is a question of who can drink'^concentrated lye all summer . and take his alimentary canal home. with, him m the fall. , ' " Tn battle, the Arab charge is peculiar m the extreme. The Arab does hot stand up m line of battle fpr- an houi> -while the commanding- officer gallops up and down the line on a j* heavy*" ,horßa . ■ and the enemy pours a galling fire into his ranks,. He sails up toward the enemy, waves his oriental night shirt m the air, shoots some one and goes away. When the ba.tfle^ground is examined the following day, it is discovered tliat efeht hundred brave and handsome English soldiers arei killed and one old moth eaten Arab hasi stepped on his Gothic shirt tail and sprained his ancle. \ • El Mahdi is not a bad-looking -man at all, and the report that he hasjlost his teeth, so that when he gives his orders he has to gum Arabic, is not true>.— Bill Nye, m the New York M ercury.

(BY BLEp^RIC TELEGRAPH.— COPYRIGHT.) fREUTER'n- TEIiEGRAMB.I ' London, .July 18. . Lord Wolseley arrived here to-day from Egypt.