Writings

[789]
My most beloved Rector Fr Bricolo will have told You of my reasons for being in Turin. Providence destined me at the same time to collaborate in the work of which I am about to tell You. Your Most Illustrious Excellency will have heard how the “ungovernment” of Italy has promulgated the providential Law of equality, by which it subjects clerics to National Service, thus removing the privilege of exemption which was enjoyed previously for the growth of the Italian Clergy. The most zealous Canon Mgr Ortalda, Director of the Propagation of the Faith in Turin, has thought of mobilising the force of Italian missionaries spread over the two worlds, consisting of about 35 Bishops and 1,500 Missionaries, in order to remove this iniquitous law. As the grenadiers of the armies of Christ, in order to ensure their succession in all the areas in which they toil, with our help, next October they will present an address to the Senate (of which I am sending You a printed outline). This Address has so far gained the approval of more than 100 Bishops, and of Cardinal de Angelis (for without wishing to, the Government of Piedmont has put him in a position where he can do far more than in Fermo, since he is the Angel of the Council of all the dioceses of central and northern Italy). The Address will then be presented by me to Cardinal Barnabò and the Pope for their approval. Together with the list of Italian Bishops and Missionaries, as an attachment there will be that of the diplomatic agents and missionaries, which I have just finished with the help of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
[790]
Since it has been decided to include in the list of Italian Bishops and Missionaries abroad also the ones in Rome and Venice, with the approval of De Angelis and everyone, I am in charge of collecting, among others, also those of the Venice, Trent and Trieste regions. Therefore, with Mgr Ortalda we decided to turn to Your Most Reverend Excellency to have all the Missionaries of the Venice, Tyrol and Trieste areas, since most of them belong to religious orders from which Bishops may request name and surname, place of birth and the Mission to which the Missionaries belong. We therefore entreat you, Monsignor, to render this service to the Holy Cause, which moreover is for the benefit of the part of the Diocese that is subject to the Government of Turin. When Your Excellency has requested the list, I beg you to be so kind as to send it either to me or, in my absence, to Fr Bricolo. I would be most grateful if you could immediately give the appropriate orders and instantly advise the Bishops of the Venice region and His Highness of Trent, for them to make a list immediately.
[791]
Cardinal De Angelis frequently speaks to me of his former Preacher, and has charged me with sending you his respects. If you want anything from Piedmont and Lombardy you only have to tell me. On Thursday and Friday last, together with Canon Ortalda and Canon Anglesio, the companion of the Venerable Cottolengo, Director of […] I was in Genoa for the departure of 5 Missionaries to China. I attended this holy occasion with the Brignole Sale widow, the Marchesa Durazzo Negroni, a cousin of Marchesa Clelia. The latter sends her greetings to the Marchesa, your sister-in-law.
[792]
In the last few days, by the grace of God and with the help of Don Bosco and Countess Gloria, the late Marchesa Barolo’s right arm, I was able to win back to Christ Signora Antonietta Manca, a woman of 25 who was staying in my hotel, the Bue Rosso, and who was one of the many dozens of favourites kept by His Majesty Victor Emanuel II, King of Italy. She is now under the protection of Countess Gloria, who has accommodated her in one of her villas. After spiritual exercises and Confession with a Holy Priest, she will be sent back to her mother’s in Cagliari, where I have already informed the Vicar General on the matter; he will try to return her to her husband (if he wants her). See, Monsignor, how incredible this thing is. A few years ago, Antonietta Manca went to the King to obtain a transfer for her husband from Turin to Cagliari, her home town. She valde pulcra placuit regi, and it was her ruin as a wife. She abandoned her husband and had an allowance of 500 francs a month, as well as many 1,000 franc notes which the King often gave her. She told me so herself and is repentant for her faults. Countess Gloria, whom Fr Bosco recommended to me, will pursue this holy work. Please give my regards to the Vicar General, Marchese Ottavio and the Marchesa’s sister-in-law and mother, and Fr Vincenzo. Kissing your sacred robes, I declare myself

Your Most Reverend and Illustrious Excellency’s
most humble and devoted servant and son

Fr Daniel Comboni

We would like the list to include both the Missionaries who are currently abroad and those who have already returned home.

[793]
Today, under Mary’s protection, I want to write to you again about our dear Pippo. First I must say that since I wrote to you from Genoa my heart has not stopped palpitating with the fear that my letter might have brought you displeasure for having ingenuously told you the entire fault of this dear boy. Dear Lulù, I had the best intentions. I hesitated a long time and wavered, and thought it over well, and I prayed ardently before writing. I thought that you are a mother, and more than a mother. But at the same time it seemed to me a betrayal not to reveal all, so that measures could be taken to avoid further escapades, for the great love I have for you, for my Pippo and for the honour of the Carpegna family. If I have erred, I beg you to have the same trust as I had in you. Imagine! It was such a shock for Pippo to suspect that his mother was informed of his fault that the boy has made a thousand promises never more to do anything that might displease his mother.
[794]
Yesterday he wrote to Adelaide asking her to be the one to make his confession to his sweet mother. He does not have the courage, he is extremely embarrassed and I hope this has been a solemn lesson for him. You must therefore treat him gently, because if you use threats it does nothing; for you can imagine what pride and spirit of independence the military institution brings with it. I caution you not to tell that I have written to inform you of his fault. You must always insist on the point of truth that Annetta wrote to you, as Countess Baldini told me yesterday, because, as Pippo is still young, he is very annoyed with whoever wrote to you. There would be trouble if he knew I wrote to you. When Adelaide’s letter eventually arrives you will still be able to keep my name out of it; because in future I want to continue informing you of everything. Now that I find Pippo seriously shaken, before Guido arrives (who is all-powerful over Pippo) it seems appropriate that I visit Pinerolo, where I hope Adelaide will be prepared to accompany me. She has promised that she will do everything she can to come with me on Thursday or Friday. I hope this warning given by a good woman, Adelaide, and by my humble self will not be futile. Adelaide is remarkable at performing your duties here in Turin,my dear Ludmilla. It seems to me that she could not be more caring for a son of her own, than she is for Pippo; and that is due to the love she has for Pippo and for you. If you had seen her yesterday, you would certainly have been convinced of what I am saying.
[795]
Moreover, be sure to demand an exact account of the money Pippo is spending, giving him and Adelaide appropriate instructions. This too is a means of preventing any escapades, since it costs Pippo 10 francs a time, as he confessed to me. In order to get everything out of him, I have to show appropriate tolerance, opening his heart through trust. The poor dear boy does not know that I wish to inform You of everything, for his own good. Indeed, I told him to keep it as secret as possible from everyone, and as a point of honour, promising me never to do it again. Furthermore, it is an escapade which, between ourselves, we should be compassionate to Pippo about, given his nature and the company he keeps. And to tell the truth, I have observed that he is very modest and a beginner in such disorders, since he is so displeased about it now and too embarrassed to write to his mother about it: she who for him is the strongest shield against committing such actions again. The company of the young Gualtiero is not appropriate for Pippo, who thinks on the other hand that he can spend more than he truly can, and especially when it comes to having fun. Be rightly gentle with Pippo, yet firm and inflexible in your thoughts and soften your threats. Give instructions to Adelaide about all she can spend, but give the freedom to supplement in certain circumstances when Pippo might be in danger of giving a bad impression.
[796]
Please write to me in Turin at the Bue Rosso hotel to say how you honestly feel about my two letters, this one, and the one I sent you last Thursday from Genoa. Tell me your state of mind, whether you have great sorrow for Pippo, etc., etc., even though, dear Countess, I can read your heart, as if I had your spirit under a microscope. Give a loving kiss for me to Maria, who I hope quite soon to be able to kiss freely myself, and pray for the one who vows you true, loyal, ardent and
Christian friendship for ever.

Fr Daniel

Please give my greetings to Fr Luigi Fratini, and tell me where he is,because I wrote several times and he has not answered me.

[797]
I was hoping to see you and Fr Olivieri in Rome and I hear instead that you are both in Marseilles. However, Signor Casamara has led me to hope that I may see you within this month in Rome, where I shall be arriving the day after tomorrow. In Cologne they ardently want detailed descriptions of progress in the Holy Work for the redemption of Africans. Germans by nature want to see portraits, to read, to know, etc. and then they give money profusely. That Society is making great progress, and would be making more, and would be raising more money if we gave them more news. The Society has asked me to contact you and Fr Olivieri to urge you to write more often and more at length. I believe you have more than enough material to satisfy them. The very best thing would be for You and Fr Olivieri to visit Cologne when you come up north. It would certainly be of benefit to the work.
[798]
I am absolutely longing to see you both, and to talk about our dear Africa. I am depressed to see how little has been done by us and the Franciscans for Central Africa. Your Rescue work has certainly done more good than ours to Africa with fewer sacrifices: I am convinced of this as I said openly in Cologne, to Fr Mazza and to Barnabò. Now among other things, I want to discuss at length with Propaganda about ways of bringing greater benefits to Africa while making fewer sacrifices.
[799]
Some time ago in Venice Mgr Canal gave me four copies of the life of an African girl who died recently, and written by Marovich. Please write to me in Rome, dear Biagio, and tell me news of how your work progresses, and whether I can hope to see you both in Rome. Nearly all my young African boys have died; the African girls are all well, and are impatient to return to help their fellow countrymen because their education is now complete. But where can I send them if the affairs of the poor African Mission are paralysed? God will decide what is best for them. The other day Kirchner came to see us in Verona. Only one of my companions is healthy and available for Africa. I long to know whether the difficulties in getting Africans out of Egypt have ceased, and whether the holy efforts of evangelical charity are still required to bring Africans to Europe. I would like to know a thousand things and to talk at length about Africa. Please convey my respects to the holy old man, the true father of Africans, and urge him to pray for me. Also give the canonical ancient Maddalena my greetings, and remind her to include me in her prayers. To you, too, I send my highest esteem and friendly greetings.

Your devoted and affectionate

Fr Daniel Comboni, Apostolic Missionary

[800]
Even today a mysterious darkness still covers those distant expanses which go to make up the immensity of Black Africa. Down through the centuries both civil governments and private companies have laboured energetically to organise research into that limitless territory and have sent out well-equipped expeditions to further that purpose. Despite countless such efforts carried out at very great human cost, the impenetrable veil, drawn for so many centuries across the face of Africa, has never been torn aside.
[801]
Right up to the present day intrepid explorers have concerned themselves with that unknown part of the world. They have allowed themselves no respite in seeking to complete their research, to solve the remaining geographical problems and to discover the continent’s hidden treasures, with the aim of enriching natural history and developing commerce. At the same time, Christian philanthropists have turned their attention to the spiritual and social conditions of those peoples bowed beneath Satan’s power and have, in their turn, poured out the results of their brotherly pity and worked to better the Africans’ sad lot. Indeed, right up to our own day, these feelings of compassion have found powerful and effective expression, and praiseworthy things have been done to lift the unhappy Black race from its deplorable condition, by setting it on the path of a life lived by the light of Christian truths.
[802]
Without mentioning here the numerous different expeditions of zealous Missionaries, which various religious orders and ecclesiastical societies have organised in past centuries, with the authority of the Sacred Congregation of Propaganda Fide and the purpose of raising the standard of the Cross in the arid sandy wastes inhabited by the Africans. It must suffice to recall how Pope Gregory XVI of happy memory founded the Mission of Central Africa; and how the immortal Pius IX, now gloriously reigning, in confirmation of his predecessor’s decrees, sent Missionaries to Central Africa. These, travelling along the Nile, penetrated into the newly erected Vicariate Apostolic in 1848. This is the largest Vicariate Apostolic in the world, covering an area twice that of Europe. In this immense field, once it had been opened up to the zeal of Evangelical Love, there laboured, with unheard-of industry, several worthy Priests, from Austrian and Bavarian Germany and especially from the German Tyrol, who were recruited by the distinguished Committee of the Association of Mary and through the enthusiastic interest of the praiseworthy Professor Mitterrutzner. These were followed by the Missionaries of the Mazza Institute from Verona and finally by a large group of Franciscans. This chosen cohort of Christ’s soldiers overcame difficult obstacles, made enormous sacrifices and finally succeeded in founding four important stations on the banks of the majestic Nile, which flows between the Tropic of Cancer and the Equator. As their communication centre they chose the capital of the Egyptian Sudan, the political conditions and geographical position of which destined it to be the forward base for Europeans who venture into those distant lands.
[803]
Yet all these generous and loving endeavours, all this most noble concern for Africa, spread over more than fifteen years, were dashed to pieces on the rock of base selfishness, of innumerable adversities and of the harsh climate of those unfortunate lands which proved so deadly for the European. With the sacrifice of the lives of three-quarters of the Athletes of Christ who had dedicated themselves to this difficult enterprise, the meagre fruit of a limited number of somewhat shaky conversions was bought at a high price.
[804]
For some time we too studied those distant peoples at first hand and, in so far as it was possible, given the virulent diseases that often nearly killed us, we researched their nature, customs and social conditions. We discovered, among other things, that besides the harsh climate which is the first obstacle to hinder the conversion of the Africans, there is also the conspicuous lack of a living centre which would be able to give continuity to the work of the propagation of the Faith in Central Africa.
[805]
If any Mission whatsoever is to be guaranteed continuity, it must have a well-established centre from which there may without pause proceed a spirit of vitality. This spirit will spread like life-giving rain over the field of the mission to care for its most precious first fruits, its material needs and its exercise of the ministry. This living Centre would administer and make possible the annual recruitment of new Missionaries, from among whom it would be possible to reinforce the band of missionaries in the field, continually reduced in number by the harshness of the climate, the extremely hard work, and martyrdom. Such a centre of vitality is clearly desirable in the Institutes and Seminaries of Europe which exist to serve the Missions of Asia, America and Oceania. This is so because between Europe and these three continents there exists a certain similarity of temperament, customs and climate. At the very least, between the one and the others there exists a potential for intercommunication and a readiness continually and lastingly to receive the fascinating impressions of life which the spirit of the Gospel usually impresses on the structures of human society.
[806]
Such a useful centre sending out the spirit of vitality so very necessary for the preservation and continuity of the foreign Missions would not, however, if it existed in Europe, be helpful and effective in the matter of the conversion of the Africans. Experience has clearly shown that European Missionaries cannot carry out the work of redemption in those burning regions of the African interior, because the conditions are ruinous for their health, and also that they cannot bear the weight of the exertions, the multiplicity of the discomforts or the harshness of the climate. In the same way, experience has shown that in Europe Africans cannot receive a complete Catholic education which enables them subsequently to be dependable, in body and soul, in promoting in their native land the propagation of the Faith. This is because either they cannot live in Europe or, by the time they return to Africa, they have become unsuitable for that continent because of the European habits which have become almost second nature to them, habits which become repugnant and harmful in the conditions of African life.
[807]
We have seen with our own eyes how fatigue, privations and the fatal African climate have brutally cut down even the most physically robust Missionaries. There were, indeed, those who survived the dangerous journey down the White Nile and who prepared themselves to preach the Gospel to the Africans, by learning the language of the tribe among whom a Catholic Mission had been set up. Yet hardly had they done so than they quickly succumbed and soon died, thus rendering fruitless their work for the conversion of the Africans who, because of the continual decimation of the Missionaries, still lie in the power of the most degrading fetishism. Further, Propaganda, which knows all the institutions which have undertaken the education in Europe of individuals of the African race, is well able to confirm the ineffectiveness and inadvisability of the creation of an indigenous clergy, educated in our countries, yet destined to evangelise Central Africa.
[808]
Experience has thus clearly shown that the system followed until now, while most useful for the conversion of unbelievers in other parts of the world, is no less than plainly inadvisable for the regeneration of the African interior. This is because, in the first place, European Missionaries are not able to live in the torrid heat of those regions and thus do not succeed in establishing and giving continuity to the Faith there and, in the second place, because Africans educated in Europe, for the reasons set out above, become unsuitable for the exercise of the apostolic ministry in their own countries. The Sacred Congregation of Propaganda Fide is therefore faced with a hard dilemma: either to announce the closing of the important Mission of Central Africa, or to urge the drawing up of a project which holds out better founded hopes of success for the conversion of the Africans.
[809]
The heart of every good and faithful Catholic, inflamed as it must be by the spirit of the love of Jesus Christ, will surely be deeply wounded and grievously disturbed by the appalling idea of seeing the Church suspend, perhaps for many centuries, her work on behalf of so many millions of souls still languishing in darkness and the shadow of death. So the path so far followed must be abandoned, the old system must be changed and a project must be drawn up which will lead more effectively to the desired end. This will serve to strengthen the superhuman virtue of Christian love and will cancel forever from the mind of the Christian philanthropist the distressing thought of leaving those vast and populous regions cloaked in unbelief and barbarity, when they are clearly the most needy and abandoned in the world. This is why, in our weakness, we have tried to sketch out a way which would probably, if not certainly, lead to the making of provisions for the future regeneration of those abandoned souls, on whose good our every waking thought will always be centred, and for whom we would be happy to pour out the last drop of our blood.
[810]
It is thus that a project has flashed into our mind, one which, if it does not in fact contain all the good points contained in plans so far worked out for the other Missions of the world, will perhaps, nevertheless, be effective in producing a considerable improvement in the unhappy conditions of the Africans. Thus they will arrive, travelling gradually along the way marked out by Providence, to take their share of the inexpressible fruits of the Redemption of the God-Man.
[811]
Not only the inhabitants of the African interior, but also those peoples who live along the coast and in all the other parts of the great peninsula, although divided into thousands of different tribes, have more or less the same temperament, habits, tendencies and customs, well enough known to those who have concerned themselves with them over a long period. It seems to us, therefore, that the Love of the Gospel may offer them similar remedies and help, such as to be effective in communicating to the great family of the Africans the precious advantages of the Catholic Faith. We would consequently consider it opportune, and indeed almost necessary, that among the many ideas that could be put into effect for the regeneration of the Africans, that one ought to be chosen which unites in itself an absolute unity of conception together with a general simplicity of application.
[812]
And this would seem to us to be the case with the project which we have developed for the conversion of the Africans, a project which, although vast in its extension and very difficult to put entirely into effect, nevertheless seems to us both one and simple in its conception and application.
[813]
This project would, therefore, not restrict itself to the old-established borders of the Mission of Central Africa, which, for reasons set out above, have proved unhelpful, but it would rather include the whole African race; it would consequently extend and develop its activity over almost all the countries of black Africa.
[814]
Now, although the Holy Apostolic See has never succeeded in planting the faith with stability among the huge tribes of Central Africa, it has, however, been profuse in its loving concern for the Islands and Coastal regions which surround the great African peninsula and has founded there twelve Vicariates, nine Prefectures Apostolic and ten Dioceses. Indeed these flourish more or less splendidly.
[815]
In the north there are the two Vicariates Apostolic of Egypt and Tunisia and the three Prefectures Apostolic of Upper Egypt, Tripoli and Morocco.
[816]
In the west there are the five Vicariates Apostolic of Senegambia, Sierra Leone, Dahomey, Guinea and Natal and the three Prefectures Apostolic of Senegal, the Congo and the islands of Annabon-Corisco and Ferdinando-Pò.
[817]
In the south there are the two Vicariates Apostolic of the Western and Eastern Districts of the Cape of Good Hope.
[818]
In the south-east there is the Vicariate Apostolic of Madagascar and the three Prefectures Apostolic of Zanzibar, the Seychelles and the Nossibè, Ste Marie and Mayotte islands.
[819]
In the north-east there are the two Vicariates Apostolic of Abyssinia and the Gallas.
[820]
Further, among the ten existing Dioceses, those of Algiers in the north and of St Denis on Réunion Island in the Indian Ocean in the south-east are especially successful. It is therefore natural that in order to put the suggested Project into effect, these Vicariates, Prefectures and Dioceses, already established around Africa, will have to be asked to help and co-operate. They witness at especially close quarters the distressing misery and extreme need of the vast populations of the interior, populations on whom the bright star of the Faith has not yet shone. Accordingly, they will be able validly to contribute with their authority, advice and work in assisting and facilitating the great undertaking of the regeneration of the vast and numerous tribes of the African interior.
[821]
The Project, therefore, which we would dare to submit and propose to the Sacred Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith, would be the creation of innumerable Institutes of both sexes to surround the whole of Africa. These would be carefully situated at the least possible distance from the interior of the continent, in stable and fairly civilised areas, in which both Europeans and Africans could live and work.
[822]
The men’s and women’s Institutes, each situated and set up according to the regulations of the canonical provisions, would admit young African men and women, with the aim of educating them in the Catholic Religion and in Christian civilisation, and of thus creating one men’s and one women’s group, destined, each in its own way, gradually to advance and to spread into the African interior, there to plant the Faith and civilisation they have received.
[823]
To the direction of these Institutes would be called the religious Orders and the Catholic Institutes of men and women, as approved by the Church or recognised or permitted by the Sacred Congregation of Propaganda Fide, with the permission of the latter and the mutual consent of the Heads and Superiors General of those Orders and Institutes. Further to this, and with the permission of Propaganda, there could to the same purpose be founded new Seminaries for the African Missions, modelled on the existing Seminaries for the foreign Missions, with the application of all those guidelines which experience would indicate as advisable in the case of Africa.
[824]
These Institutes would be placed under the jurisdiction of the existing Vicariates and Prefectures Apostolic on the African Coast or of such Vicariates and Prefectures as the Sacred Congregation of Propaganda Fide might decide to set up, as the work of the Project develops.
[825]
The personnel in charge of these Institutes would direct their students according to the rules and spirit of their own Societies, suitably adapted to the requirements of the African interior. Their special aim would be the direction and successful organisation of the Institutes for African men and women, without, however, neglecting to promote and effect, as far as possible, the good of the country where the Institutes are situated.
[826]
The education to be given to all the individuals of either sex who belong to the Institutes surrounding Africa must be characterised by the following goals: to impress and plant in their souls the spirit of Jesus Christ, integrity of behaviour, firmness of Faith, the principles of Christian morals, a knowledge of the Catholic catechism and the basic elements of necessary human knowledge. Besides this, all the men will be instructed in the practice of agriculture and in one or more skills of first importance; and every woman will be similarly educated in the most necessary of women’s skills. Thus the former will become honest, virtuous, useful and active men, and the latter virtuous and capable mothers and wives. We believe that this active application to work, in which we want all the members of the African Institutes to be involved, will have a powerful influence for the moral and spiritual good of the individual Africans, who are especially inclined to laziness and inaction.
[827]
Once an individual student has completed his religious and secular education in the Institute and leaves its jurisdiction, the administration will do everything in its power to help and advise him, so that he may be placed in such a situation as to help him keep to the healthy religious and moral principles which were impressed on him through the education he received.
[828]
From each of those Institutes surrounding the great African peninsula there will be formed Bodies of men and women, destined gradually to move into Central Africa with the aim of initiating and consolidating there the saving work of Catholicism, and of setting up Mission Stations, from which will shine forth the light of Religion and civilisation.
[829]
The Groups of young African men, made up of those individuals most suited for the purpose, will be composed of:
1. capable catechists to whom will be given a broad knowledge of the sacred sciences;
2. capable teachers who will receive every possible instruction in the most important sciences adaptable to the countries of the interior;
3. capable craftsmen, to whom will be given a practical knowledge of the necessary skills most useful in the interior to make them into virtuous and capable farmers, doctors, phlebotomists, nurses, pharmacists, carpenters, tailors, builders, shoemakers, etc.
The group of young African women, similarly formed from those individuals most suited for the purpose, will be composed of:
1. capable school mistresses, to whom will be given the most complete education possible in Religion and Catholic morals, so that they may spread these principles and their practice in the degraded African female society on which, as is the case among us, depends almost entirely the regeneration of the great family of Africans;
2. capable women teachers and housewives who must promote the education of women in reading, writing, keeping accounts, spinning, sewing, weaving, caring for the sick and practising all the domestic skills most useful in the countries of Central Africa.

[830]
These great Groups will gradually be transferred from each of the different Institutes which surround Africa to various points in the countries of the interior. While each individual member will work to propagate Religion and civilisation, as he has been trained, and to develop agriculture in those unspoiled and unoccupied lands, he will remain free to embrace whatever state of life to which he feels inclined.
[831]
From the group of catechists formed by the young African men, there will be drawn a group composed of those individuals who most distinguish themselves for their holiness and knowledge and in whom there appears to be the readiness to enter the clerical state. These will be directed towards the priesthood. In the training of this special group, the great variety of subjects which Seminarians in Europe are obliged to study will be avoided. The teaching will be limited to those theological and scientific subjects that are of first importance, such as are sufficient for the requirements and needs of those countries. Also, given the quick physical and intellectual development of the Africans, we would not wish this training to be prolonged to the twelve or more years usual in Europe. We would consider six to eight years sufficient, as might be judged advisable in each case.
[832]
However, the peculiar instability and weakness which characterises the African race must mean the use of the greatest caution in deciding when aspirants to the Priesthood may be allowed to proceed to Holy Orders. We are fully convinced that it is absolutely necessary to lay down that they must not be allowed so to proceed until after several years of proven constancy and chastity, spent living in an exemplary and active fashion, and in the ministry of God’s Word, exercised in the existing Missions of the African interior, in a strict and irreproachable celibacy.
[833]
From among the young African women who do not feel inclined to the married state will similarly be chosen the group of the Virgins of Charity, made up of those individuals who have most distinguished themselves by their holiness and in the practical teaching of the catechism, of languages and of feminine skills. This special section will constitute the elite of the women’s group and will be entrusted with the direction of the girls’ schools, with carrying out the most important tasks of Christian charity and with exercising the ministry of the Catholic woman among the tribes of Africa.
[834]
In this fashion, through the most important ministry of the indigenous Clergy and of the Virgins of Charity, assisted by the good work of the catechists, teachers, craftsmen, school mistresses, women teachers and housewives, many Catholic families will gradually be formed and flourishing Christian associations will be founded. Our Holy Religion will spread its saving influence over the African family and will gradually extend its wholesome sway over the vast expanses of the unexplored regions of the whole of Africa.
[835]
Experience having shown that it is only a long and continuous stay in the countries of the interior, and not a temporary stay, that is dangerous and even fatal for Europeans, the setting up of Missions and the founding of Christian communities in the countries of Central Africa will be personally begun and set in motion by European Missionaries, commissioned for that purpose by their respective Vicars and Prefects Apostolic. The latter will also, however, decide which native catechists and Priests may suitably be entrusted with the permanent direction of the Missions and Christian communities, once they have been founded and set in motion by the European Missionaries.
[836]
On the other hand, the statistics of the African Mission show that European women, given their advantageous physical flexibility, the character of their moral life and their social and domestic habits, withstand the harshness of the African climate much longer than European men. Accordingly, with the approval and permission of the respective Vicars and Prefects Apostolic, regular Institutes of European women may be set up in the countries of the African interior, which would for the reasons just mentioned be less harmful to the women’s health, so as more effectively to offer the marvellous and important services of the Catholic woman to the work of the regeneration of the great African family.
[837]
Since the temperament and character of the African race is very fickle and inconstant, we think it wise and necessary for the Sacred Congregation of Propaganda Fide to authorise the Vicars and Prefects Apostolic to organise frequent apostolic visitations to the Missions and Christian communities of those parts of the interior within their legitimate and respective jurisdiction. The purpose of such visitations would be to correct, confirm and improve the state of Catholicism in those dangerous areas, where base selfishness and the fanatical fury of Islam often corrupt and devastate the work of the Christian priesthood, and where the tenor of life, the climate and other special circumstances contribute to weaken both the body and the spirit, and to enfeeble ecclesiastical discipline, putting the faith at great risk. Suitable European Missionaries should be commissioned to undertake such visitations and, without running any risk whatsoever to their lives, as we have explained above, they can carry out their important Mission to the great advantage of all.
[838]
In order to develop the gifts of the most able members of the indigenous Clergy, and to train them as able and enlightened leaders of the Christian communities of the interior of Africa, the Association in charge of directing the new project will, as its great work progresses, found four great African Theological-Scientific Universities at the fourmost important points of Africa. In our opinion these would be Algiers, Cairo, St Denis on Réunion Island in the Indian Ocean and one of the more important cities on the Atlantic coast.
[839]
In these four University Centres, as in other important places on the Islands and along the coast of Africa, there may in due course be founded great centres of specialisation in craft studies. These would be for the young African craftsmen found to be most suited to amore advanced training. Thus, by means of the introduction of these crafts which would improve the material conditions of the immense African tribes, the Missionaries would find it easier to introduce the Faith in a deeper and more stable way.
[840]
To put the new Project into effect and to direct it, a Committee shall be set up in one of the capital cities of Europe. This Committee, composed of capable and active Prelates, Ecclesiastics and distinguished Lay people, will be responsible to the Sacred Congregation of Propaganda Fide. It will be governed by a President and will take the name of the Association of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary for the Conversion of Africa.
[841]
The special Mission of this Committee will be:
1. Through a procurator based in Rome to communicate with the Sacred Congregation of Propaganda Fide and to deal with matters concerning each of the most important of the new Association’s undertakings inasmuch as they concern the Sacred Congregation.
2. To conduct dealings with the generalates of the Orders and the men’s and women’s Congregations in the foundation of the African Institutes and to keep in touch with the same generalates, with the Vicars and Prefects Apostolic of Africa and with the administrators of the African Institutes.
3. To provide, with the agreement of the Sacred Congregation of Propaganda Fide, the financial and material means for the carrying out of the new Project.
4. To found Institutes, Seminaries and craft Schools for the African Missions in the most suitable Centres in Europe and America.
5. To set up a Corps of educated and zealous European Missionaries to conduct personal dealings with the Vicars and Prefects Apostolic of Africa and with the heads of the Institutes concerning the interests of the new Association, and to explore the coasts and most important points of Africa to find sites for the African Institutes.
6. To study and put into effect the most effective methods for the improvement of the system of executing the new project.
7. To gather and publish annually in different languages reports of the progress of the new Association, and to draw from practical experience such lessons as will improve the condition of the African Institutes and the Christian communities so as to help in the regeneration of Africa.

[842]
It is our firm hope that this Project of the Association of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary for the Conversion of Africa, once it has received the gracious approval of the Apostolic See, will receive the co-operation of all those Holy Institutes which have until now concerned themselves with, or sought to further, the spiritual advantage of the African race. We also hope it will be protected and assisted by those pious Associations which provide the financial and material means for the Holy Works set up for the propagation of Faith in Jesus Christ.
[843]
Finally our soul is full of the dearest hope that the unity, simplicity and usefulness of the new project of the Association of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary for the Conversion of Africa will please the mind and heart of the Holy Father, the immortal Pontiff Pius IX, of his Eminence the Cardinal Prefect General and their Eminences and Right Reverend Members and Consultors of the Sacred Congregation of Propaganda Fide. We trust it will at the same time find an approving echo, support, favour and help in the heart of the Catholics of the entire world, clothed and filled as they are by the spirit of that superhuman charity which embraces the immense vastness of the universe and which our divine Saviour came to bring to the earth: ignem veni mittere in terram, et quid volo nisi ut accendatur?
[844]
If the Holy Apostolic See is pleased to smile with approval on the new Project of the Association of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary for the Conversion of Africa, we would be happy to dedicate our limited energies and our whole life to co-operate in the great work, firm in the certainty that it will succeed because we have come to see in it the will of God. God in his greatness will cancel once and for all the terrible curse which has borne down for so many centuries on the miserable children of Ham, and his blessing of peace will spread over the great family of the Africans, there to remain forever.
[845]
If, though, the Holy Apostolic See does not decide to approve this new Project, we shall be happy to submit ourselves fully to the adorable dispositions of God’s Providence and we will have a new reason rightly to exclaim with the great Apostle: servi inutiles sumus.
[846]
Fr Daniel Comboni

of the Mazza Institute

Apostolic Missionary of Central Africa

Rome, 18th September 1864

Day of the Beatification
of Sister Margaret Mary Alacoque
of the Visitation

[847]
P.S. His Holiness Pius IX has deigned to encourage the carrying out of this new Project for the Conversion of Africa; and his Eminence Cardinal Barnabò, the Prefect General of the Sacred Congregation of Propaganda Fide, wishes that it should receive the assistance of the Pious Association of the Propagation of the Faith in Lyons and Paris.
[848]
As a consequence of this new project there will follow the execution of the Plan of the Very Reverend Father Nicholas Mazza, to whose Institute will be assigned a Vicariate or Prefecture Apostolic in Central Africa assisted by the Association of Mary in Vienna.


Father D. Comboni

[849]
It is with the greatest sorrow that I hear of our holy Fr Olivieri’s serious illness. Let us hope in God that he will recover. In Rome we shall have to talk a great deal about our dear Africa. The three new converts from Constantinople are coming to France to be employed. They are equipped with a thousand letters of recommendation, and as they have also asked me for one, I beg you to be as good to them as you can. On Saturday I shall introduce them to the Pope, as Cardinal Barnabò ordered. Here in Rome there is Fr Lodovico’s nephew. I have presented to Propaganda my plan for the creation of many Institutes to surround the whole of Africa. We will discuss this in Rome. Give my respects to Fr Olivieri, and my greetings to Maddalena. Pray to the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary for your

Most affectionate

Fr Daniel Comboni, Apostolic Missionary

[850]
I have just heard the news that the Verona bank, Fratelli Smania, has ready for me and for my poor Africans the sum of 1,472 francs. I cannot find words to express my sentiments of gratitude. I do not think you will ever regret having come to my rescue.
[851]
A Spanish Priest has been in Rome for the past few days; he has come here to obtain approval for a charitable association for Africa. Cardinal Barnabò sent him to me so that he may explain the project to me and let me decide. It seems that Propaganda wants to put under my Plan and channel through my hands all the work undertaken for Africans. First of all, before giving his approval, the Cardinal wanted to hear my opinion of Fr Lodovico’s project as regards the foundation of two houses in Egypt, and in line with my indications the accord was concluded with the Apostolic Delegate of Egypt. Fr Lodovico is waiting for me in Naples to reach an agreement with me. The Pope and Propaganda are proving to be very obliging towards me and are willingly accepting my proposals and granting my wishes. Let us thank God and pray for the fulfilment of the divine will for the good of Africa.

Fr Daniel Comboni

Translation from the German.

[852]
I am very sorry not to be able to communicate anything consoling about my Africans this year. Apart from Michele Ladoh and little Antonio, all the others have contracted a bad African disease, which, despite all the care given them in Christian charity, assumed a malignant form for these poor Africans and for several it ended in a frightening death. If we are depressed due to these misfortunes which have removed all our hope of being able to educate my Africans in Europe for the benefit of the Central African Mission, nevertheless the angelic lives of these beloved children, who had been entrusted to us, and their precious death, fill us with an indescribable consolation and this can be given to you for the sacrifices you have made in favour of the Africans of Verona.
[853]
This time I would like to tell you about our Pietro Bullo who, after an exemplary life, died like an angel. First, however, I must tell you how I obtained this boy and afterwards inform you of the journey I made on the Red Sea to scrape together a respectable number of pupils for our African Institute.
[854]
In September 1860 I received a letter from India from the Most Reverend Celestino Spelta, Vicar Apostolic of Yu-pè and General Visitor in China (I had met this gentleman the year before my journey from Cairo to Rome and I had informed him of the aims of our Institute), in which he told me that there were a large number of African boys in Aden who were quite suited to our Institute in Verona. I told my Superior Fr Nicola Mazza, who nevertheless wanted to ascertain first of all in amore precise way the truth of this information and only afterwards to decide on the matter. But as yet he did not know how to obtain these more precise reports. On 10th October of that year a Carmelite missionary brought two Africans to us in Verona, whom Fr Giovenale da Tortosa, the Prefect of Aden, had entrusted to him when his ship stopped in Aden on its way from Malabar. The Prefect had begged this missionary from India to take several more of these boys with him, but having little money, he was only able to take two. We examined these two and found them very well suited to our purpose, and willing. So then without any further thought my Superior ordered me to leave for India.
[855]
I remember how Fr Mazza gave me an estimate for the travel expenses and the purchase of the Africans. Thinking I would find 40 to 50 boys, I thought I would need 25,000 francs. My Superior examined his wallet and said: “I only have 13 florins”. “So I shall have to stay in Verona”, I answered. “Not at all”, he replied, “in three days you will leave for India”.
[856]
It was lucky I had not become obstinate about my opinion. I went to Venice to obtain passports for the young Africans I had to accompany to Naples, and on the third day Fr Mazza blessed my departure, gave me 2,000 francs (which he had received from Count Giuseppe Giovanelli and his pious wife, who gave 900 francs) and said “Leave all the same; here are 2,000 francs, but I cannot give any more right now. Pray that God lets me find more money, because I want to help you, but you go in any case”. Two hours later I was leaving Verona to deliver to Fr Lodovico da Casoria in La Palma Institute 4 boys who could not tolerate the Verona climate.
[857]
In conversation with Fr Lodovico I heard that Fr Olivieri’s fine work was a prey to terrible persecutions, both at the hands of the Turks and on the part of several European consulates.
[858]
The previous year, returning to Egypt from Central Africa, I had myself witnessed Fr Biagio Verri’s afflictions. He was in prison with 5 African women, who after being reported by some members of the English Consulate, which had always proved hostile to the spread of Catholicism, were considered as slaves by the Egyptian government. In its stipulations following the eastern war, the Paris treaty had forbidden slavery and the trade of Africans. This just law, which had been promoted by European civilisation and the Gospel, was manipulated, badly interpreted and modified by the Turks. Thus they considered Fr Olivieri and his companion Biagio Verri as slave traders, since they used money to buy the poor African girls from the hands of the jallaba (slave traders).On the other hand I had already heard that Fr Olivieri’s most implacable enemies were the gentlemen of the English Consulate in Alexandria, who had assured the Pasha that the Catholic priests were practising the slave trade, and that such a disorder would have to be stopped. Such false information from the English, and the false interpretation the Egyptians gave to the ransoming of slaves, brought Fr Verri great troubles and countless difficulties. Knowing all this and having heard that the struggle against Fr Olivieri’s work was continuing, I decided to go to Rome, where I hoped to obtain good recommendations for the English Consulate in Egypt.
[859]
God granted my wish. Mgr Nardi, a friend and benefactor of my Institute, took me toMr Hennessy Pope, a Member of the House of Commons in London, who, when he knew the purpose of my journey, obtained for me from Odo Russell, the British Ambassador in Rome, a letter of recommendation in which he asked Her Britannic Majesty’s Consul General in Egypt to give me full protection and obtain for me from the Pasha of Egypt a permit to take with me from Alexandria to Europe all the Africans I might present, stating that they were no longer slaves but completely free. At the same time as sending me this letter, Lord Hennessy Pope wrote that when I am in Egypt, should I have any difficulties with the English Consulate or with the Egyptian government, I could write to him in London at the House of Commons, where he would be glad to give me protection so that I could succeed in my enterprise.
[860]
With this letter of recommendation and several others that could be of use to me with various consulates in Egypt, having received the Holy Father’s blessing, I left the Eternal City and set sail from Civitavecchia on board the Carmel, a French vessel which took me to Malta. This journey on the Carmel proved more fortunate than the one I had made on the Stella d’Italia from Genoa to Naples, during which my four Africans suffered greatly .Much more dangerous, however, was the journey from Malta to Alexandria on the French ship Euphrat which began to sink into the sea on account of a terrible storm, which caused us great fear. With God’s help we reached the African coast, off Alexandria.
[861]
In Cairo I had the good fortune to speak to the Pole Fr Anastasio, who had just come back from India. Over there, he had heard that both in Bombay and on the Malabar coast there are a large number of Africans that I could buy very easily. Many had even been offered to him but he had been unable to take them with him, because he did not know what to do with them. Without staying any longer in Egypt, I left by train for Suez, where I boarded the Nepual, a ship of the English Peninsular-Oriental navigation company. I had to pay 450 francs for a second class passage. After seven days of dangerous sailing, the whole length of the Red Sea, I reached Aden.
[862]
I shall pass over my visit to Bombay and the Zanguebar coast, because those ventures were unsuccessful, since all the Africans I found there had either been employed by Indians or by Portuguese Catholics or were not given to me. I shall dwell only on the interesting things that happened to me in Aden.
[863]
I think it is necessary for me to explain why there are so many Africans on the Arabian coast. At the beginning of 1860 quite a number of jallaba (Abyssinian slave traders) travelled all over their country and the vast regions of Galla, Tigray, Ankober, Gudru, Omara, Ashalla, Damo, Nagaramo, Dobbi, Ammaia, Sodo, Nono, Sima, etc. and captured more than 400 slaves, men and women. The way in which they took possession of these poor Africans is horrible. They took advantage of the hospitality they found among a few Galla families to gain precise knowledge of the prey they wanted to seize and by night they stole the children, put them on horses and dromedaries and fled to the south. Several parents who realised the danger for their children were killed as they tried to oppose this monstrous rape.
[864]
Our poor Pietro Bullo was stolen in a similar manner. He had gone a little way from the tukul where his parents lived to play with other children. There he received from a jallaba, Haymin Badassi, a present of a few forest berries and was led even further away from home with most of his playmates. But all of a sudden the jallabas seized hold of him and the other children and carried them off on horseback. To stop him screaming they bound his head in strips of cotton so as to prevent any possibility of his seeing anything or shouting. But this did not stop the cries of the other boys who had been stolen and as Pietro’s mother rushed in that direction wailing and calling for her son, she was struck by a spear and fell dead on the ground.
[865]
For three months the jallabas travelled on towards the south, then they gathered together on the coast of Zanzibar. There they loaded 400 Africans, mostly boys, onto three sailing ships. From there they took them in the direction of the Persian Gulf and Muscat, in whose markets, as in the markets of the whole of inland Arabia, they intended to sell the boys. It is enough to say that in those countries the slave trade is not controlled by the European powers and can therefore be practised without fear of punishment. I cannot express how much those poor boys suffered on the journey from Zanzibar to Cape Guardafui. In Aden I came to know from quite a number who had been on these Arab boats that the boys had received food once every three days and that some, who were overcome by hunger or had died due to mistreatment or other sufferings, had been thrown overboard. Quite a number also died on the journey from the land of the Gallas to Zanzibar.
[866]
Then as the three ships rounded Cape Guardafui, they were accosted by the Somalis. These are the inhabitants of the coastal areas, and although they are also Africans, they have nevertheless been entrusted by the English government in Aden with controlling the slave trade and reporting to the Governor of Aden all those they find in possession of Africans, and that they suspect of practising the slave trade along the coast of their vast country. They seized the boys and the perpetrators of this despicable trade who, without success, tried to incite everyone against them, especially the strongest boys on the ship, telling them the Somalis would kill them all. The Somalis then boarded the ships, tied up the slave traders and the most dangerous boys and set sail for the coast of Aden. As they approached this city, they were met by a troop of English soldiers. The slave traders and the skippers of the three ships, fearing the death penalty, trembled with fright, made ultimate efforts to incite the boys to rebellion against their captors, constantly assuring them that in their hands they were bound to be tortured and beaten to death, and that first they would undoubtedly feed them abundantly only to kill them later as they had said and prepare them as food. And the boys did indeed rebel and throw a few into the sea, but at the same time they also had the displeasure of seeing a lot of their comrades die and be wounded. Our little Pietro did not have to suffer any of the treatments that were dealt out to all the rest. Finally they reached Aden, disembarked, were surrounded by the English soldiers and were led to the middle of a large square, where they had to stay for several days.
[867]
I say nothing of the dissolute behaviour that could have taken place on the journey from Zanzibar to Aden among that mass of poor boys and girls who on the ships were bound tightly together like goats and who were abandoned to the whim of the immoral and bestial men who guarded and accompanied them for over a month. What fate met the slave traders, those perpetrators of injustice, I cannot tell you, because I discovered nothing certain in Aden. I only know that a few days after their arrival in Aden the youths were lined up in single file in a large square. Boys and girls were then matched with each other according to size. More than a hundred such marriages were made in a single day. They were then all set free by the English. Several of these African couples who were strong and fit for work boarded ships and were taken to Bombay and to the Malabar coast.
[868]
A certain number of boys, who because of their tender age were not yet able to get married, stayed in Aden. Thus 14 boys and likewise 3 girls were placed with a Spanish merchant to wash coffee in his great warehouses. This merchant was Signor Bonaventura Mass, who was most esteemed both by the Mission and its Superior, a Spanish Capuchin. It had not occurred in the meantime to anybody that they should take care of the poor Africans. Nobody had thought of giving them the greatest good of all, the most beautiful celestial blessing, the Catholic faith.
[869]
But divine Providence, always rich in mercy, sent them in Aden an angel of peace in the person of Mgr Spelta, Bishop of Hu-pè, Apostolic Visitor to China, who stopped for six hours on his way through Aden. He came to hear the story of these youths and persuaded the Prefect Apostolic of Aden, Fr Giovenale da Tortosa, to take up the matter, to educate them, to have them take part in the work of the missionary station and to send them to Europe where several Institutes could see to their education and make sure they were on the right path. Fr Giovenale took the bishop’s advice and distributed the youths in Catholic households, keeping three in his own house. Each evening they would gather in the Mission house. There an Irish soldier with extraordinary zeal mechanically drilled them in the English catechism, which the children learnt by heart no less mechanically. Being very talented youths they quite quickly learnt the Hindi language which as well as Arabic is spoken in Aden.
[870]
On my arrival in Aden, I found 12 boys and two girls (Gallas) in the condition I have described. My first thought was to conceal the purpose of my trip from everyone and even from Fr Giovenale himself. In order to safeguard my interests I was cautious at first not to arouse the suspicions of the English government and clergy, since the latter views with suspicion the arrival of any stranger, but above all of any priest. Fr Giovenale, therefore, thought that I was just on my way from Bombay to Suez and thus candidly told me the whole story of the youths. I sought to examine them closely and so went to see them in their lodgings. I had already examined them in the Mission house, where they were assembled one evening to learn their prayers and the Catholic catechism. Finally I set my sights on 9 boys among whom there was also our Pietro Bullo who, although he was one of the smallest, showed extraordinary intelligence, a rare docility combined with great docility to the grace of Jesus Christ; it could be hoped that he would become a pious and useful Catholic. The other boys did not seem to me suited to the purposes of my Institute; the girls refused to follow me.
[871]
At this point I revealed my plans to Fr Giovenale, who helped me to succeed in my intentions. He went to the boys’ employers and induced them to hand them over to me. Naturally I sought in every way to win the boys over. All of them except for Antonio Dubale decided to follow me to Europe. Our Pietro, who was living with an Indian doctor, could not be separated from me for more than two hours at a time. So he told his employer that he no longer belonged to him, but to me, and he wanted to come and live with me in the mission house. To no avail the doctor asked the little one to stay with him until my departure, when he would have given him permission to follow me. Pietro would not hear of it and came to me. He made such a fuss on my account that with his enthusiasm he even influenced the doctor’s son in my favour. The little twelve-year-old Indian came to me repeatedly in the mission house and begged me to accept him too for the colleges in Europe. Although I always refused, he constantly implored me at every moment to take him with me to Europe. One day, after he had pressed me again, for a long time and insistently, I told him: “I cannot take you because you are not black, whereas my Institute is founded only for blacks”. “Well”, he replied, “I’ll become black; I will try to colour myself black with ink, then I shall be able to come and stay with you: I would willingly leave my father to follow you”.
[872]
I had quite a business getting Giovanni and Battista, but in the end with Fr Giovenale’s help I was able to get eight boys. I then had to overcome the more serious difficulties which I had to fear from the English government of India, since it is always opposed to Catholicism. Fr Giovenale could not help me in this for he was having a disagreement with the Governor, who had forced him to pay a 4% tax for the church and considered the furnishings of the church and
the priestly vestments as private property.

[873]
Placing all my trust in God, who died for Africa too, I went to the Governor and asked him to interview the two boys I brought before him, to see whether they wished to follow me to Europe. Moreover I requested that, should he find that they had taken this decision of their spontaneous accord, he should free them, issue them with passports and do me the favour of declaring them Anglo-Indian subjects. After making some objections at first, he granted my wishes. Then I took courage and thought it right to bring before him also the other 6 young Gallas; but he would not hear of it. However, by never ceasing to pester him with my pleas, I convinced him to seek advice from the members of his government, one of whom was the English pastor. They discussed the matter and came up with the suspicion that I had come to proselytise; in addition they declared that I was acting against the law which prohibits the slave trade.
[874]
So they decided not to grant my request. Then I declared to the gathering that I would address the Government itself to obtain the protection of these poor youths who wished to make full use of their freedom and, in accordance with their own wishes, wanted to follow me to Europe; but all in vain. I then demonstrated to the Governor that he was obliged to protect the freedom of these youths resident in British territory, and that if he gave them permission to follow me he was doing nothing but protecting their freedom. I also gave him other reasons and arguments for granting them English protection, and in the end the Governor decided to examine the youths. I therefore introduced to the Governor, Municipal Councillor Playfair, the youths, each of whom I had already taught how to answer. He examined each one individually, gave them all a certificate of freedom together with an Indian passport and put them down as English subjects. With these three documents I was certain to be able to take the eight Galla youths with me.
[875]
Now the only one lacking was Antonio, who would have liked to follow me, but had not yet decided to do so, because his master, an Englishman by the name of Greek who treated him very well, did not want to let him go. As soon as this man realised that I intended to take the little one away, a thing he feared due to the excellent services Antonio provided in his household, he forbade him to visit the mission house. However Antonio, who is most intelligent, understanding that if he stayed in his master’s house he would not have been able to become Catholic, decided to follow me against his master’s will. Mr Greek (a civil servant) discovered his little African’s intention, did not leave him alone for a single moment and always took him to the office with him for fear that, taking advantage of his absence, I might convince the boy to follow me. And he was certainly right. I went several times to Mr Greek’s house and begged him to give me the boy; but all my pleas were in vain. So I sent Fr Giovenale to the English official, but the latter answered him that if Signor Comboni continued to insist on taking the boy away and to request this of the Governor this might well lead to his having the other youths taken away from him.
[876]
Fr Giovenale brought this answer back to me: I interpreted it in a sense that was favourable to me. Two days later I paid Mr Greek a visit in his office, which was in the Governor’s house. We discussed politics, trade, England’s glorious history, her conquests, the influence the country was having on the civilisation of America and Australia. After we had chatted like this for an hour, people came to the office on business. Mr Greek seemed prepared to bid me farewell, but I pretended not to notice. I let many people come in and I withdrew somewhat into the background looking at pictures and maps in the part of the room where Antonio was. Observing that Mr Greek was very busy with the persons who had come to see him, I slowly got closer to the door, signalled to Antonio to follow me and left the office with the boy without the Englishman’s knowledge. I went at once to Mr Playfair, introduced Antonio and said: “Here is another youth who wants to follow me; be so kind as to examine him and if you find that he truly wishes to become a pupil of my Institute in Verona, declare him free, issue him a passport and register him as an English subject”. The Governor granted all my requests.
[877]
As soon as I returned to the mission house, I told the Prefect Apostolic: “Here is the boy I wanted, go to Mr Greek and tell him that I have done as he wished. Tell him that through your mediation he had made it clear to me that, if I wanted to have the boy, I had to go to the Governor; now I have the boy precisely because I went to the governor, who granted me everything, as you can see from these papers”. The Prefect went to Mr Greek and told him all this; Mr Greek was most angry, came to the mission house, threatened to hit me and have me lose all the boys again.
[878]
He wanted to take little Antonio away from me by force, but I told him: “Sir, with your behaviour you would be compromising yourself. You are acting against the freedom of the African who wishes to accompany me. If you seek to take possession of the boy by force you are breaking the law and are guilty of the crime of the jallaba, thus deserving the same punishment as they do. The Governor cannot move a finger against me or against the boy, because I hold a legal authorisation in writing which I shall show to the Government in London if it ever dared to ask me for my documents. You, and the Governor, would then be punished for your injustice”. These words of mine and the Prefect Apostolic’s arguments won over Mr Greek, who drank a couple of bottles of good porter (English beer) with us and we became friends.
[879]
In Aden I was only able to get together 9 children, but this number was too little for the purpose of my trip. On board the Nepaul I had heard from a missionary, who was going to a congress of missionaries that was due to take place in the south-eastern part of Madagascar, that in the Mozambique Channel there were a large number of African slaves who were being sold for 50 francs each. Signor Mass of Aden, who had been several times to Mozambique and was trading intensively with the neighbouring islands of Mayotte, Nos-Beh and Comores, confirmed the truth of this report. He promised me his protection and free transport for the Africans from Mayotte to Marseilles and on his own ships, which were to take the route of the Cape of Good Hope and cross the Atlantic Ocean. But how could I carry out this plan when all I had left was 600 francs? Before my departure my Superior Fr Mazza had given me 2,000 francs and had told me: “Take this money; I do not have any more; pray the Good Lord to let me receive some more; then I shall send you another good amount”. I implored the Lord with insistence and constancy, but the Lord did not hear my prayer, because in all my trip my Superior did not send me a penny.
[880]
I therefore resolved to put off implementing my plan, to return to Europe and to discuss the question of the purchase of Africans in Mozambique with Fr Olivieri. Indeed I proposed this deal to Fr Biagio Verri in Cairo and he seemed quite prepared to accompany me to the south-eastern coast of Africa; but later when I discussed it with Fr Olivieri, that holy old man told me that he did not feel fit enough to implement so vast a plan nor for the struggle against the innumerable difficulties and dangers that were to be expected on the journey round the Cape and through the Atlantic Ocean. So I stayed on in Aden with my 9 boys and with the 600 francs I had left. With that amount I just did not know how I was going to return to Europe. But Providence is always there to help in work done for the glory of God. Very soon the French frigate, the Du Chayla, arrived in Aden commanded by Captain Tricault, the present Secretary General of the French navy in Paris. The frigate was coming from China and heading for Suez. On board was His Excellency Baron Cross, Ambassador Extraordinary to the courts of Japan and China. The Baron had just signed a commercial treaty between France and the Celestial Empire. I introduced myself to the commander and the ambassador and talked to them of Central Africa and the scope of my enterprise. I told them that I could assist them as chaplain of the ship, since theirs had fallen ill in Ceylon. Baron Cross and Monsieur Tricault were generous enough to grant free passage and accommodation on the frigate from Aden to Suez not only to me but also to my 9 Africans.
[881]
The journey up the Red Sea took 11 days; but between Mokha and Suakim we were caught in a fierce storm which reached its climax off Jeddah. Finally, on 25th March we reached Suez. A 19–gun salute greeted the arrival of the French ambassador on Egyptian soil. On 26th March we reached Cairo at the same time as Said Pasha, the Viceroy of Egypt, who was returning from a pilgrimage to Mecca. My Africans were in fine form. As soon as I reached Cairo, I went to His Excellency Sir Colquehoun, Her Britannic Majesty’s Consul General and Agent in Egypt, to give him the letter of recommendation from Mr Odo Russell, English Ambassador in Rome. This letter requested the English government to give free passage to all the African boys I was accompanying from Alexandria to Europe. The Consul General received me with great courtesy and together we went to see the Pasha. After showing him the passports and the charter in which the boys were declared English subjects from India (since Aden comes under the Governor General of Bombay) I was issued with a firman, signed by the Pasha, which ordered the head customs officer of Alexandria to grant free passage to the little Indians accompanied by Daniel Comboni. Then, since this affair had gone so well for me, Fr Kirchner, the Pro-Vicar Apostolic of Central Africa, entrusted to me another young girl by the name of Caterina Zenab.
[882]
Caterina Zenab was staying with the Good Shepherd Sisters. She had helped us one day with the compilation of a glossary when we had been working with the Kich, who live on the White Nile at 6 degrees Latitude North. Then I left for Alexandria and asked the Good Shepherd Sisters to bring me the African Caterina Zenab two days later. Since I was in dire financial straits the first thing I did was to look for a free passage to Europe. Providence helped me again: at the French Vice Admiral’s office I was granted a passage from Alexandria to Marseilles and only had to pay 400 francs for food. I then had the firman signed by the Governor of Alexandria, Rashid Pasha. From the Austrian Consul General I also obtained a passport and a document for Caterina Zenab. According to these papers this African girl was declared an Austrian subject, as coming from the Austrian mission house in Khartoum. Four hours before the Marsey was due to sail, I went to the port with the 9 boys to embark, having previously instructed two sisters of charity to bring the African girl aboard for me two hours later.
[883]
The previous year they had caught Fr Olivieri with his 5 Africans, and now they suspected me of being one of his assistants who had bought the Africans to bring them to Europe. Therefore I was obliged to go with the boys into the office of the head of the customs and to provide better explanations on the question of the slaves; they maintained that my Africans were Abyssinians (and Gallas do in fact have the same colouring and the same features). From my pocket I drew the Pasha’s firman, and the chief or rather the sheikh read it, he looked carefully at the boys’ faces and exclaimed: “These boys are not Indian, but they come from Abyssinia. The Pasha (he went on) did not see the boys, because if he had seen them, he certainly would not have made this firman”. Then I produced the documents from the Governor of Aden while I pointed out to him that if the boys had not been Indian, the Governor of Aden would not have issued any passports. I insisted that the boys really were subjects of the English government. The sheikh had us surrounded by guards and commanded them to take us to a room in the prison building, where the accused were held before being sentenced.
[884]
All my explanations were in vain, all the reasons I produced to convince him to let us board the French ship with the boys were without effect. Instead the order was given for us to be put in prison. In the first place I made sure of getting back from the sheikh all the papers since they could be useful later to prove my innocence, and I also had a letter delivered to the good sisters of charity asking them to keep the African girl with them until further notice. We were then taken to prison. There we spent a couple of hours during which the Turkish officers on guard asked the boys a thousand questions. They threatened me with three shots in the chest. I smiled without answering a thing, while in Indian, for it is not understood in Egypt, I ordered the boys: “Tanda Makharo, ciprausap boito – keep quiet and be silent; daiman ciprau, daiman ciprau – be silent and do not answer”.
[885]
After a couple of hours I said to one of the officers: “Call the customs chief for me, or bring me to him”. I emphatically repeated this request, and he eventually decided to go to the sheikh and bring him tome. As soon as he came in I said: “You are holding me in this place; don’t you know that I am a European? You will pay dearly for this crime”: He answered: “You have bought Abyssinians in Cairo and Alexandria with the purpose of taking them away from Alexandria to Europe, which in itself is forbidden; you corrupted some officials of the English Consulate to obtain the papers by which the boys are declared to be Indian. But I can distinguish Indians from Abyssinians very well, because Africans have their passports on their faces. These are Abyssinians whom you have bought despite the recent ban by Said Pasha; therefore you will pay dearly for having broken the law”.
[886]
My attempts to prove to him that the boys were Indian and not Abyssinian and that they came from India (in fact, as regards government, Aden is under India) were unsuccessful. I was just as unsuccessful in proving to him that Egypt would be accountable to England for the infringement of the liberty of a European and subjects of the English Crown, all equipped with the necessary passports, that one of its customs officers was perpetrating. In the end I told him with severity: “Don’t you know I am European? Do you not realise that by keeping me in prison you are putting yourself in the wrong? If you do not release me within three hours, I assure you that your own head will be in peril. I will go as far as to have you punished by death because you have imprisoned a European. Even if I had been guilty of the most serious crimes, you would not be allowed to keep me prisoner; you would have to take me to my nation’s representative, to the Consul, because only he would be entitled to judge me. I know your law better than you know it yourself. You will be in trouble if you do not set me free”.
[887]
We went on arguing in a very animated way certainly for another quarter of an hour; in the meantime the sheikh had again fallen prey to a great fear. He was getting ready to go, when he came back to set me free again. Before I followed him I ordered the boys in Indian to speak neither Arabic, nor Abyssinian, nor Galla, but to keep the most rigorous silence, for their lives could depend on this. Leaving the prison, I told the sheikh in Arabic: “Today was my turn, tomorrow will be yours”, words which caused him great fear.
[888]
I immediately sought help from the British Commercial Consul in Alexandria, Mr Sidney Smith Launders, for what had happened to me concerned him in so far as in Egypt this was considered a commercial matter. I gave him a letter written to him for me by the English Consul General in Cairo, Colquehoun, and I explained my predicament to him. The Consul treated me in a most friendly manner, but was surprised at my plea, and refused to give me his assistance. In fact he had already had to involve himself on other occasions in these African affairs for Fr Olivieri. This had greatly annoyed him because, as regards Africans, he had always found the Egyptian government hostile. I entreated him with tears in my eyes to support me all the same with the Pasha of Alexandria and in his presence to vouch for the validity of the Viceroy Said’s firman, which contained orders. He refused his help, though with regret. So as forcefully as I could I told him: “You are obliged to take up the question of these black boys before the Pasha of Alexandria, for they are no longer slaves, but English subjects. The Egyptian government, by the very fact of putting them in prison and not letting them leave Alexandria, has abused its powers, has infringed the rights of free human beings, has offended the English government by spurning the seal and signature of an English governor. In Alexandria, you represent England. Therefore you must vindicate the shame that has been brought to the name and authority of England”. The Consul then recognised his duties and agreed to give me his protection, but involving himself in this affair was costing him a great sacrifice. In my great affliction at seeing this, I said to him: “If you don’t convince yourself that the name of the English government has been seriously insulted by the Egyptian government in its refusal to allow these boys, subjects of Her Majesty Queen Victoria, and in possession of English passports, to sail from Alexandria to Europe, I feel compelled to go to London and to take this matter before the English government, a step which would certainly not earn you any praise. Just remember that by virtue of your duties you are obliged to protect these boys and to prevent the name of England from falling into disrepute”.
[889]
Sir Sidney then realised what he had to do, and when I went to the Rashid, the Governor of Alexandria, he gave me his interpreter. My threats had made such an impression on the customs chief that as soon as I had been released from prison he had gone straight to the Pasha and told him his version of the affair with the Africans. When we reached the Diwan and stood before Pasha Rashid, I spoke and told the Pasha: “Why did your customs officers not permit me and my little Indians to pass through the port of Alexandria to reach the French vessel, despite the fact that we all had regular passports and the firman of the Effendina (= the Lord) Viceroy of Egypt?” “My employees have done their duty”, answered the Pasha, “because these boys are not Indian, as you declared before Effendina Said. I am convinced they are Abyssinian slaves you bought in Cairo or in Alexandria, and that in order to be able to ship them to Europe you corrupted a few English consular officials who then abused the seal and visa of the Consul by declaring the boys not to be Abyssinian but that they came from India. Indians are not black, but these boys are black. The Viceroy was deceived by the declarations of the English officials and granted them a firman without ever having seen the boys. You have committed a serious crime for which you will pay dearly; I assure you of this through God who is merciful and good: bism Allah errahmàn errahim”. It was easy to answer this accusation.
[890]
I replied to Rashid Pasha: “These boys are not Abyssinian, but Indian. Whoever told you that the boys are slaves bought by me is a liar; they are Indians who come directly from India. On this matter you may refer to the French consul, who has heard all about me and my boys, and to the French ambassador in China, who passed through Alexandria a week ago. Three gentlemen who are in town at the moment can confirm this. You can have a telegram sent to Suez, where the Du Chayla which brought me and these boys to Egypt, is moored at present. In the end you will just have to recognise the value of the Viceroy’s firman and the papers and passports that were given to me in the Indies. You are a just man, a son of the Prophet, who has pure eyes which do not allow themselves to be blurred by the clouds of impiety. Therefore do justice and your duty; bism Allah errahmàn errahim”.
[891]
Rashid Pasha seemed convinced, but his doubts did not leave him completely in peace, for he told me: “Who can assure me that these boys are not Abyssinian? Who can prove to me in the name of God that they are Indian and that you did not buy them in Egypt?” “These papers”, I replied, as I showed him the passports signed in Aden, “these papers prove that I am telling the truth; if you do not let my boys through you are scorning the English nation and I swear to God that England will want satisfaction from you: bism Allah”. We argued like this with animosity for half an hour. The Pasha had an endless litany of objections and I had just as many arguments to bring it home to him quite clearly that the boys were subjects of the Anglo-Indian government. The sheikh of the customs authorities, who was present at the scene, whispered in the governor’s ear that the boys’ complexion was black in colouring. So the Pasha wanted to see them, protesting that if they were white he would set them free, but if that were not the case he would keep them in prison. Now things were becoming very dangerous for me, because the boys were black: a most perilous circumstance for me, if that was enough to further convince the Pasha to follow the sheikh’s advice and opinion. Several times the Pasha expressed the desire to see the boys, saying: “Have the boys come forward; if they are white I will set them free, if not, they stay under arrest”. “To decide this matter you do not need to see the boys: the Viceroy’s firman and the English passports should suffice”.
[892]
“But I want to see the slaves”, he said. Four times I refused to bring the boys before him, because this seemed too risky to me. In the end I had to yield to the Pasha’s orders, and accompanied by two guards, I went to fetch the boys. They were full of fear and had suffered greatly in prison. I explained to them that I was going to introduce them to the great Pasha, in whose presence they should speak neither Arabic nor Abyssinian, but only Indian, otherwise their life would be at risk. I repeated this several times in Indian and urged them to trust in God, who would save them. Then I went with the boys and the guards to Rashid Pasha. As soon as we had entered the great diwan, where there were more than 24 people, everyone exclaimed: “Homma Hhabbaih Kollohom – they are all Abyssinian”. I denied this, because although the features of the Gallas are like those of the Abyssinians, the Gallas are definitely not Abyssinians. But they just went on saying they were Abyssinians and I alone kept maintaining they were Indian. After a long dispute, I turned to the Pasha and said: “All right, if you absolutely insist my boys are Abyssinian, have some of the many Abyssinians living in Alexandria called in. Order them to ask the boys some questions and it will be plain to see: if they speak or understand Abyssinian, you are right and you will be able to keep them in prison, but if they do not understand Abyssinian, you have to set them free”.
[893]
My proposal was accepted by all the members of the grand Diwan. Three Abyssinians were immediately called in, who as soon as they saw the boys said to one another: “These boys come from our homeland. Where do you come from? Who has bought you? Where did you first see your master?” All these questions were very insidious. But the boys gave no answer. Instead, at each question they looked at me and I told them in Indian to remain silent. One Abyssinian said to the boys: “You must answer, you sons of the Prophet, your lord commands you to answer”. However, the boys kept quiet. Hence the Abyssinians declared that my boys obviously did not understand Abyssinian and therefore did not belong to their nation. In brief, I will remind you that the Pasha called in some Indians employed at the English Consulate. They asked the boys all sorts of questions, which they answered quite well. The Indians declared that the boys spoke just a little Indian, but I affirmed that they knew it well.
[894]
In dialogue, little Bullo narrowly missed giving me away when he once answered that he was a Galla. Fortunately, he spoke his answer so timidly that it was not heard and God helped me repair the damage this might have caused me by letting Giovanni speak, who knew Indian very well. So at last the Indians declared to the Pasha that the boys were Indian. “Now I recognise they are truly Indian”, he said and ordered the boys to be handed over to me and for us to be allowed to depart freely to Europe. As soon as the Rashid gave this order, the sheikh turned pale. Remembering the words I had said to him“if you do not set the boys free within three hours, I swear to you by the Prophet’s beard that your head will no longer be secure”, he thought that the hour of my revenge had come. So he wished to reach the point of rendering me harmless. Quite out of his mind with fear, he approached the Pasha and told him resolutely: “Effendina (my lord), I swear to you in the name of the Prophet that these boys are not Indian but Abyssinian. I have been to India several times but I have never met Indians this colour. Indians are nearly white, yet these boys are black”. And indeed he was right, because Indians have a different colouring from Abyssinians. So the Pasha ordered me to explain.
[895]
This left me in a serious predicament. Never before had I invoked God and the Holy Virgin, Queen of Africa with so much fervour as in this situation in which I could so easily waste all my efforts. With renewed courage, I gave a fiery look at the sheikh and said in the presence of the Pasha: “You may well have visited India several times but I do not believe you have been everywhere in India, otherwise you would have seen natives this colour. India is very big and it is most likely that the destination of your journey was the ports such as Madras, Calcutta, Bombay, Mangalore, etc., but you certainly have not visited the inland parts of India. There are many areas and towns that you know only by name. Therefore how can you say that you know the peoples of India and maintain that my boys are not Indian?”
[896]
At these words the poor sheikh was filled with the greatest dismay and thought he was completely lost. “Yes, you are right”, he replied with consternation, “I have never been to inland India and the Indian towns of which you speak. Are they perhaps located in the region of Cape Gal?” “Oh no”, I answered, “these areas are much more distant than Cape Gal”. You can imagine how pleased I was to see the sheikh become so humble and how I thanked the Lord with all my heart for his prompt assistance. After these heated arguments, the Pasha rose from his seat, took my hands in his and said to me: “Oquod esteriahh – sit down, rest – I see clearly that you are right and that these boys are Indian; your words are in perfect harmony with your papers, therefore I do not even want to examine your papers, since your word is enough; you are a man of truth and of justice; you only have to open your mouth for mine to order your will to be obeyed”. After saying these words he had chibbuks and coffee brought in. I smoked and drank to the Pasha’s health, who made me the most flattering promises of friendship. In the meantime I tried to steer our conversation to other matters and told him that he was a just man and that the whole of Alexandria resounded with praises to him. This was true. Then bidding farewell with salam alèks, I departed with my boys. As soon as I had descended the palace steps, the sheikh came up to me and said: “Your Highness has found the justice you deserve. I thought the boys were Abyssinian, but now I am convinced they are Indian. May your face be resplendent and your mouth utter only words of peace: la allah ila allah ou Mahhommed rassielallah” (there is no God but God and Mohammed is his prophet). I stared at him with burning eyes and answered: “If I were a Muslim and a son of the Prophet like you, I would seek vengeance and your cowardice would cost you dear, but I abhor the Prophet and his Koran, which teaches vengeance. I follow the Gospel of Jesus Christ, who teaches to forgive the enemy. Therefore I forgive you with all my heart and want to forget all the harm you did me. I gaze upon you in peace and my mouth has uttered words of forgiveness”.
[897]
As soon as I had pronounced these words, the sheikh threw himself at my feet, kissed the bottom of my coat and exclaimed: “May happiness live in you forever, may your father’s beard and your mother’s eyes be blessed. May you see children and grandchildren to the third and fourth generation; may you be eternally happy in chaallah, etc.”. Then he rose, and after an exchange of salamalèks, I went off to the house where I had settled the boys upon our arrival in Alexandria. Those discussions had lasted until sunset, so that the French ship which was to take me to Marseilles had sailed. But two days later I caught the Lloyd Austriaco and decided to sail for Trieste, via Corfu. The French embassy was good enough to lend me the money. I took 60 guineas and tried to leave, since I was afraid the enemies of Catholicism might report my boys to the government for not being indigenous Indians. With the Lloyd Austriaco agent I reached an agreement that the passage from Alexandria to Trieste would cost 1,210 francs and boarded the Nettuno with my 9 African boys and the African girl Caterina Zenab.
[898]
Reaching the port in Alexandria, we found the sheikh, who had prepared a comfortable boat which took us free of charge out to the Austrian steamer. The crossing did not last 5 days but 8, for we were assailed by a tremendous storm, the most violent the captain had seen in the 20 years he had spent on the Mediterranean. The boys were astonished at the sight of the mountains on the island of Canea shining white: they had never seen snow. The Nettuno, which was commanded by one of the ablest captains of the Lloyd Austriaco, had to turn back along the Dalmatian coast to Corfu. However, this storm was not the worst of the 8 (eight) I suffered in the journeys this small undertaking of mine has made me do. But God protected me visibly until our successful arrival in Verona, which took place on 14th April 1861. Providence also helped me rapidly to pay the debts I had made in Alexandria. God be praised forever!
[899]
During their arrest in Alexandria, my Africans had been told by the Muslims that Europeans were buying Africans to fatten them up and eat them. The boys could not get this prejudice out of their minds, all the more since they had already heard it said by Muslims in Zanzibar and Aden. The most frightened of all was Pietro Bullo.
[900]
Once, in Alexandria, through a window of their room, they were assured by an Arab that Europeans killed Africans and with their heads, once they had removed the brains, made an exquisite roast. Upon hearing such things little Pietro ran away from the house and I found him only after a long search in one of Alexandria’s markets. Now, on board the Nettuno, when he was confronted with a table laden with a variety of dishes it was impossible to get him to eat anything. He stared at me several times with a deranged look in his eyes and said: “I know very well why you set all this food before us: you want to fatten us up and eat us”. But on the journey from Trieste to Verona I managed to convince him of the contrary. When a good opportunity arose I once said to him: “Listen, my Pierino, do you know how much it has cost me to bring you from Aden to here?” “Lots”, he replied. “Would you perhaps know” – I continued – “how much a cow costs in your country?” “Very little”, he thought. “Well now, with the hundreds of thalers you have cost me I could have bought at least 20 cows in your country. If I had really bought you with the intention of eating you, I would certainly have been mad, because I would have more to eat with 20 cows than with you who are smaller than even one cow”. This argument convinced him, as it did the other boys too, and they no longer thought that I had bought them to eat them.
[901]
Little Pietro had some extraordinary qualities. When he was seized by the jallabas he spoke only Galla and Abyssinian. But on his way from the Galla to Aden and from Aden to Verona he learned a fair amount of Arabic and precisely the pure language spoken in the Yemen. In his stay with the Indians of Aden he learned Hindi quite well and 6 months after his arrival in Verona he could also speak Italian quite fluently. He made great progress at school. He was extraordinarily perspicacious and always wanted to know the why and the wherefore of everything. In European public schools he would have been able to succeed more splendidly than the most expert scholars. But the most noteworthy thing was his way of feeling genuinely Catholic and his sublime conception of Christian morality; at the end it was so engraved in his heart that he abhorred sin in a way that was amazing.
[902]
He preferred pious conversations, interested himself with delight in the life of Jesus Christ, of his saints and above all of his martyrs. Moreover he had an ardent desire to be a martyr for Jesus Christ. He told me of this desire several times. He was of a fiery temperament, but to make him gentle it was enough to remind him of the Saviour on the Cross. His great inclination towards piety is evident from what has been said. He prayed with ardent fervour and the sound of the bell calling him to fulfil his religious duties was the most pleasing thing he could hear. I cannot describe the devotion and reflection with which he received Holy Communion twice a week. Although the boys of the Verona Institute usually go to confession every two weeks, Pietro, like the majority of the other boys from his country, went every Saturday, and on the main feast days received the Most Holy Sacraments. Pietro, Giovanni and Battista were models of piety for all the boys in the college and their Superiors, who were frequently heard to say that they would rather teach 200 young Gallas than a dozen Italians or Europeans in general. Our Pierino had a special abhorrence for lies. I frequently heard his confession of his faults and the actions he thought of as sinful, but he never accused himself of a single lie. I am of the opinion that this is due to the character of the Gallas, who in this respect are different from other Africans, who never tell the truth, and flatter people. Instead, the Gallas love the truth and Pietro would never have told a lie even if it might have saved his life. Furthermore he possessed the virtues of self-denial and humility to a high degree. He was always afraid of doing harm and often asked his Superiors whether this thing or that was allowed.
[903]
I want to pass over in silence the other virtues which adorned his beautiful soul, inclined towards meditation and solitude. In the last months of his illness he was very quiet and particularly sought inner peace. I think the answer to that is in the illness with which he was afflicted. When I was leaving for Germany last October, he came to my room once more before my departure and said: “You are leaving, dear Father, but you will not see me again, because when you come back I shall be dead. I feel I am going to die”. In the summer we had let him off studying and sent him to Roveredo, where he spent three months in the care of a distinguished doctor and boarded with a family which esteemed him greatly and treated him with maternal tenderness. He returned to Verona and took up his studies again, but in September his illness came back, and although he recovered a little, his life was coming to an end.
[904]
In November all the Gallas came down with an infectious disease which I had encountered only in Africa. I was assured that Pietro tolerated it with admirable patience, indeed even with joy. I myself heard him say last September in the midst of the most atrocious pain: “Even more, my God, make me suffer even more, because you died on the cross for me”. With these sentiments and having received the Holy Sacraments he died in January 1864 resplendent with celestial joy.

[This report by Fr Comboni was accompanied by the following letter:]

[905]
Enclosed herewith I send you my report which, when published in the Annals, will help promote the good works to which we are consecrated. First of all I must tell you that last Thursday, 19th September, I had an audience with the Holy Father. I was thus able to speak to His Holiness of your Society and I received from the Holy Father a blessing for your Society and above all for the members of its presidential council which I send you by means of this letter. I informed His Eminence Cardinal Barnabò, Prefect of the Sacred Congregation of Propaganda Fide, of the great good your precious Society is doing and he too blessed your noble and difficult work. I then received a letter from Marseilles, in which Fr Biagio Verri informs me that Fr Olivieri has a serious illness and will die of it.
[906]
I have been able to gather much information on the life of this holy man. Two priests of the same age as Fr Olivieri, who knew him from his childhood until 1840, have given me a lot of information about his life before he started his work for the rescue of Africans. Casamara, a Trinitarian priest in Rome, and various other respectable personalities gave many details concerning the history of his missionary activity and they will give me more. Therefore, although it is not an easy task, nevertheless, with a little patience I hope to be able to write a complete biography of this extraordinary man.
[907]
During my absence from Verona, Fr Francesco Bricolo, Director of the Mazza Institute, is standing in for me. I have just heard from him that Antonio Dubale, who was very healthy as I left Verona (as I said at the beginning of my report), has now caught the same disease, so that the only one still healthy is Michele Ladoh.
[908]
Francesco Amano had to have his right leg amputated. However, I can assure you that they are all models of self-denial and piety. Battista, who had to have most of his thighs amputated, told the surgeon and those taking care of him: “Forgive me for giving you so much trouble, and I thank you with all my heart for the love and patience you have for me”. And during this atrocious operation he never stopped praying.
[909]
Salvatore, Gaetano and Pietro are dead.
As regards the African girls’ college, things are going very well. When this year’s final examination has been held and the prizes awarded, I shall give you the names of the ones who are particularly outstanding. The undeniable reality, on the one hand that Africans cannot live in Europe, as we have sadly experienced in Naples, in Rome and recently in Verona, and on the other the fact that European missionaries cannot survive the climate of Central Africa, makes me search incessantly for the remedy and presses me to put into practice the ideas that came to me last year during my stay in Cologne. At present I am in Rome precisely to deal with the Holy See and specifically with the Sacred Congregation of Propaganda Fide as regards a new plan concerning the African mission. I have written this plan and submitted it to Propaganda. It is not limited only to the old mission for Central Africa, but covers the whole great African family and thus embraces the whole of Africa.

[910]
Before this plan is approved by the Church, I have been instructed by Cardinal Barnabò to make a journey in order to contact all the religious societies and organisations which have so far worked in the field of African missions, including Fr Olivieri, Fr Mazza, Fr Lodovico da Casoria, the Society for the propagation of the faith in Lyons and Paris, the Franciscan Order, Spanish societies, etc.
[911]
The Holy Father, to whom I have presented my plan, is very pleased with it and blesses it. As he said, he wants all the forces involved to wage a general battle in order to tackle head-on the Christianisation of Africa “viribus unitis”. It seems to me that the plan I submitted to Barnabò is well designed for this purpose. Naturally, once I have heard the opinions and deliberations of the individual societies and formed a precise idea of the conditions in Africa and particularly of the situation in the different mission points, I will adjust my plan accordingly. When the first steps will eventually be taken with the help and advice of many experts, God will then undoubtedly show us the right way for the regeneration of Africa.
[912]
What the Holy Father and the Sacred Congregation have in mind is simple: not to confine our actions to one part of Africa, but to aim for the entire African race. Since it has the same customs, the same habits and defects and the same nature, we can come to its aid as a whole with the same means and the same remedies. If my plan is approved, my greatest wish is that the Society of Cologne may grow greater still: from a stream to become a great river.
[913]
Let us pray that the Lord and the Queen of Africa may bless me, for I have unconditionally consecrated myself to the conversion of Africa, and may they bless and propagate my plan, for this will provide the means for the implementation of the plan. I send you and all the members of the Society my most sincere thanks,esteem and affection.

Your most affectionate

Daniel Comboni, Apostolic Missionary

[914]
On the basis of the Plan of the Association of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary for the Conversion of Africa, a draft of which I have presented to Your Eminence, I would venture right away to propose that the portion of the old Vicariate Apostolic of Central Africa, whose evangelisation was attempted by German and Austrian Missionaries, by those of the Mazza Institute and by the Franciscans, be formed into 2 Vicariates or Prefectures Apostolic, one being called Eastern Nile, the other Western Nile, entrusting one to the Mazza Institute of Verona and the other to the Reformed Province of the Seraphic Order of Naples, as Your Eminence may judge appropriate.
[915]
The financial and material means to support both these Missions could be raised by the Society of Mary in Vienna. Your Eminence knows how this elevated Committee, on account of the recent disastrous events affecting the African Mission after it was entrusted to the Seraphic Order, would like to give the money to the Mazza Institute whenever it is in a position to send its Missionaries to Africa (also because the Institute is under the rule of Austria, where all the offerings come from), without depending on the Franciscan Fathers, as was further confirmed by a communication between the Committee and Fr Lodovico da Casoria. Now to persuade that elevated Committee to support both the proposed Missions, in addition to the unfailing resources of Your Most Reverend Eminence’s authority, I should commit myself energetically to reaching this objective, in the firm conviction that by dividing the subsidies between the two Congregations, the greater good of unfortunate Africa would be achieved.
[916]
The consequences of such a decision would be: 1. the rapid establishment of two male Institutes and two female Institutes in Egypt by Verona and Naples; 2. the reintegration of the Shellal Mission Station near Aswan; 3. the establishment of a Mission Station in Khartoum in the near future, which would be the first stable beginning for the two Missions. For the implementation of these important arrangements, it would seem appropriate for Your Eminence to deal directly with the Most Reverend General of Ara Coeli, and to confer with Vienna and the Mazza Institute, Your Eminence should authorise me with a letter. Either before or after my trip to France, I would carry out the venerable assignment with commitment. Always pleased to act and think as best pleases Your Most Reverend
Eminence, I await your venerated decisions.


Fr Daniel Comboni

[917]
The grief which afflicts my spirit at the knowledge that my most beloved Superior is still saddened about me is such that I have the extreme need to break silence and to run like the prodigal son into the arms of the loving father. I do not know precisely of what crime I am guilty that has so perturbed my dear Superior. But the thought that in the midst of all the matters I have dealt with and the many things I have done since my return from Africa, although always aiming at God’s glory and the salvation of souls, I must certainly have made some mistakes and must be guilty before God and before you, is enough justification for your just anger with me, and I therefore throw myself at your feet and implore your bounteous and generous pardon. Ah my dear Father! If I could only purchase your heart’s consolation with my blood, I would do so. But the thought that I have caused grief to my beloved Superior, the idea that my dear Father’s heart is afflicted because of me, is the most tremendous punishment of all. I believe that the last four months of suffering and sorrow which I have been through since I knew that my Superior was saddened about me must be enough to compensate for any crime.
[918]
Say then, my beloved Father, a word of comfort to your desolate son. Speak in tones of peace and of love for me, for this is dearer tome than all the delights of the world. The bounteous welcome of the Holy Father, the courteous and confidential welcome with which I am honoured by Cardinal Barnabò as father to son, the affection with which I am treated in Rome by Princes, Cardinals, Bishops, Prelates, Seculars and Noble Ladies, the esteem in which I am held all over Europe, despite my unworthiness, have no power to win my heart and have no impact on the affection I have for my Institute and for my Superior. I tread scornfully over all this for the love of my Institute and my good old Master, for whom I have sacrificed everything, even my own pious true father. And now to hear that I shall have to abandon my Institute forever and resign, that is a mouthful I cannot swallow. What I have suffered over the last four months, I repeat, is enough to compensate for any crime.
[919]
Think carefully, dear Father, for it is impossible to work and do much without incurring someone’s disapproval. Consider that the world is evil, and that even within the walls of the Sanctuary there are evil men. Consider that those who have spoken ill of me to you are certainly not guided by Jesus Christ’s spirit of charity. The Gospel says: corripe primo inter te et ipsum solum. As God lives no one has said a thing to me; but suddenly without warning, they gave me dic Ecclesiae. The priestly ministry was established to correct vice and edify virtue. In my case, by distancing me from the paternal jurisdiction of the Institute, for their part these very people would like to throw me at once into the abyss. But God watches, for he does not want the death of the sinner, but rather his conversion and life. I am in the hands of God and of my dear Superior. From both I implore and hope for forgiveness and help.
[920]
Therefore I long to see the venerable countenance of my white-haired father serene and consoled: I long to see my brothers of the Institute happy, I long to work for the glory of God and the Institute, and to receive a word of comfort and forgiveness from my beloved Superior.
[921]
Come! Have mercy, my dear Father. Give this word of consolation for me to Fr Bricolo, and free me from this painful purgatory which I do indeed abide with resignation but which fills me with grief. I hope Fr Bricolo will immediately console me on behalf of my beloved old Father and Superior.
[922]
This new plan of mine for the Association of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary for the Conversion of Africa receives the approval of all. I have consulted 14 Cardinals, 6 Archbishops, the General of the Jesuits together with others among the most distinguished members of the Society; and I met with the approval of all. It seems that in future Cardinal Barnabò wishes to regulate all the foundations in the whole of Africa according to this plan. He wants me, immediately upon my return to Verona, to leave for France, in order to reach an agreement with Propaganda in Lyons and Paris, obliging them in the name of the Holy See to allocate whatever financial aid may be necessary. Then I will have to reach an agreement with the Central Houses of the 13Vicariates of the entire African coast; and then the Pope will issue the “Decree” upon my return to Rome this spring. I will keep you, my dear Superior, personally in touch with all this and I shall be happy to receive from you advice, orders and whatever you wish.
[923]
Cardinal Barnabò wanted to persuade me to set up the Committee of the Association of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary in Paris. For the moment I have answered with an absolute No. I do not want the new Plan to be under the influence of any political power. France and Austria are too selfish, and they would want to “Frenchify” or “Austrianise” all the Catholic missionary works as can be seen from the examples of the Pious Societies of Lyons and Paris and of Vienna. In order to preserve the independence of the individual mission stations in Africa, which will be founded as the Plan develops, I want the vital Centre to retain absolute freedom of action. This will be the case if the Committee is set up in a free city. For the time being I have made no decision, though I am thinking of the city of Cologne, which is great, Catholic, but on the other hand under a Protestant government.
[924]
As a corollary to my Plan, my dear Superior, I shall have a Vicariate Apostolic in Africa entrusted entirely and exclusively to the Mazza Institute, without it depending on any other authority but Rome alone. This is the wish my dear Superior has had for many years, and which will become a reality in a few months’ time. My General Superior of the Institute will be either Vicar or Prefect Apostolic of the African Mission; and the Head the Institute will send out will be either Pro-Vicar or Pro-Prefect of the said Mission. I got this idea across to the Cardinal by proposing the division of the existing Vicariate in two: that is 1. of the Eastern Nile, 2. of the Western Nile. My beloved Superior will choose the one he wants; and I will make sure he gets it, after I have reached an agreement with the charitable Associations.
[925]
The Cardinal has appointed me to unite all the forces and Institutions so that they may act viribus unitis on Africa. He is of the opinion that my Plan will regulate Africa for many centuries, and that only this plan will enable the Faith to be firmly established in the Heart of Africa. We will encounter a thousand difficulties: but with the help of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary, all will be overcome. Great shrewdness will be called for to escape the vigilance and control of Protestant England: but if God gives us life, all will be overcome, and the devil’s horns will be weakened.
[926]
I believe this plan is the work of God, because the thought of it burst upon me on 15th September while I was doing the triduum to Blessed Margaret Mary Alacoque; and on 18th September, the day this Servant of God was beatified, Cardinal Barnabò finished reading my Plan. I worked on it for nearly 60 continuous hours. In spite of all this, before seeking the Holy See’s approval, I will have many copies printed so as to be able to present it to all the Societies for Africa and to the most distinguished Prelates in the world. I will listen to the advice and improvements suggested by them all, and we shall present the Project thus perfected to the Holy See. I think this is wise, because the plan takes in almost the whole of Africa, inhabited almost entirely by the black African people.
[927]
And should some Cardinal or Archbishop tell me that he does not like it, I shall answer, as I did to a sick Bishop in Rome: “Give me and propose tome a better Plan, and I will immediately tear up my own”. In ten days’ time I shall be in Verona. My Superior, you must make preparations to send me to Africa by next spring, for I have recently made similar arrangements with Fr Lodovico in Naples. My greetings to the Bishop. Send a pardon, a word of peace and love

to your most unworthy son Fr Daniel

P.S. It may be that the Institute’s assumption of responsibility for a Mission in Africa whose funds are provided by the Society for the Propagation of the Faith is an excellent and prudent safeguard for the conservation and survival of the Institute itself.


Fr Daniel