PREFACE.

An interval of five years has elapsed since the termination of my
engagement in the service of His Highness the Khedive of
Egypt, "to suppress the slave-hunters of Central Africa, and to
annex the countries constituting the Nile Basin, with the object
of opening those savage regions to legitimate commerce and
establishing a permanent government."

This volume--"Ismailia"--gives an accurate description of the salient
points of the expedition. My thanks are due to the public for the kind
reception of the work, and for the general appreciation of the spirit
which prompted me to undertake a mission so utterly opposed to the
Egyptian ideas of 1869-1873; at a time when no Englishman had held a
high command, when rival consulates were struggling for paramount
influence, when the native officials were jealous of foreign
interference, and it appeared that slavery and the slave trade of the
White Nile were institutions almost necessary to the existence of
Egyptian society.

It was obvious to all observers that an attack upon the slave-dealing
and slave-hunting establishments of Egypt by a foreigner--an
Englishman--would be equal to a raid upon a hornets' nest, that all
efforts to suppress the old-established traffic in negro slaves would be
encountered with a determined opposition, and that the prime agent and
leader of such an expedition must be regarded "with hatred, malice, and
all uncharitableness." At that period (1869) the highest authorities
were adverse to the attempt. An official notice was despatched from the