Writings

[1754]
As soon as I received your letter, although I am very busy, “I went from Herod to Pilate, from Annas to Caiphas, then I returned to Pilate” (= I left no stone unturned) to obtain information about Conrad and accomplish what your eminent charity had asked of me. But while I was doing so, who arrived but the “villain of the piece”, that is, the Pole. It seems to me that he looked very well, because he is well fed and rested.
[1755]
He told me that he had found a true mother in you and that he had received everything from you, Auguste and Désiré. However, I would have liked him to follow all your maternal advice, especially since Auguste has the goodness to love him deeply. But youth will always be youth. The fear of losing the year, he said, made him decide to go to Paris which I do not believe because, with regard to education, I have all possible acquaintances. Because I am very busy I have been unable to go and see him and examine things thoroughly – as long as he is in good health. However, I shall have no words to thank you for your great kindness to me. I would like to stay with you for a year, care for my dear Auguste with my love and impart to him all my talents and my knowledge, but alas, I must return to Egypt. I shall be unable to spend more than a few days with you. Nonetheless I will establish the centre of my work in Paris and hope that in the future I shall spend more time in your company.
[1756]
I shall be founding a Committee of lady patronesses in Paris: I would very much like you and Marie to belong to it. Please let me know how long you will be staying far from Paris. Do give me your news, and of your dear children. I will send you some booklets.
[1757]
I am still in your forty days of prayer. In the octave following All Souls I celebrated a Mass for your dear husband. If you see Madame Poysson, please give her my regards. As I express all my gratitude and the sentiments of my great affection to you, I have the fortune to declare myself

Your most devoted Fr Daniel Comboni
Mère Emilie is very well. She has just written to me.


Translated from the French.

[1758]
I have just acknowledged receipt of the letter in which you did me the honour of telling me what was said about my Work at the last meeting of the members of the Propagation of the Faith. I am infinitely grateful to you. Please allow me make some observations on this topic. As regards M. Cloquet’s journal, I was given a promising idea and of course I did not think that this publication would contradict the Work of the Propagation of the Faith. If I entrusted “L’Apostolat” with the publication of my Plan for the regeneration of Africa, it was only for reasons of economy and so as not to be responsible for paying for the cost of printing, but I was far from intending to make “L’Apostolat” the organ of my Work in Paris. On the contrary, it would be a pleasure and a duty of gratitude to provide both the Annals and the Journal of Catholic Missions with information on the Mission of Central Africa and on my Institutes in Egypt.
[1759]
As regards forming a Committee in Paris, there was certainly a misunderstanding about the functions and purposes it should have. It was supposed that it was destined to raise funds for the Missions in central Africa and for my African Institutes; but the fact is that it was only intended to procure a building for my Work where we could bring together and train any French members destined for my mission, in accordance with what has already been going on in Verona where the Work of the Good Shepherd, blessed and praised by Pope Pius IX and directed by His Lordship the Bishop of Verona, supports a Seminary for our Italian Missionaries with the alms it collects. A similar house in Paris is indispensable to me, both because of my relations with the French Government which has such great influence in the East, and because in France it is easier to find people who dedicate themselves to the Mission.
[1760]
I expected not to be able to rely on the Propagation of the Faith for this foundation since they had already told me that its resources were reserved for the foreign Missions. However, if I can be sure I am mistaken, from this moment and forever I give up my own involvement in it, both with regard to the support of my Seminary in Verona and to the foundation of the one in Paris. Moreover, what I truly feel and really do not want, by founding the Committee in question, is to displease the Propagation of the Faith; indeed I turned precisely to people who are already members of the Council of this capital Work, which I myself shall always make it my duty to support and develop as I have done in the past.
[1761]
I shall never undertake anything without always referring to the Council of the Propagation of the Faith. I would be most grateful to you, Monsieur, if in addition to all the kindnesses for which I am indebted to you, you would also convey my devoted and respectful sentiments to all the members of the Propagation of the Faith. Please accept, Monsieur, the assurance of my deep respect and believe me, with all my gratitude,

Your devoted servant

Fr Daniel Comboni,
Apostolic Missionary


Translated from the French.

[1762]
The kind collaboration you grant to Missionaries who are dedicated to the education of children in infidel countries, encourages me to explain this dimension of the situation and needs of my Mission.
[1763]
Dedicated to the apostolate in central Africa for twelve years, to achieve this goal I have first had to found, with the authorisation of Propaganda, two Institutes in Cairo where African youngsters, boys and girls, are educated in the principles of the Catholic faith, subsequently to become useful helpers in the conversion of the peoples in the heart of Africa. This system which I presented to His Holiness Pius IX and to a large number of Bishops and Superiors of African Missions, was considered the only one which could procure the salvation of the natives of Central Africa.
[1764]
The Institute for boys, founded in Cairo and directed by four Missionaries from my Seminary in Verona, currently has about ten students.

The Institute for girls is directed by the Sisters of St Joseph of the Apparition from Marseilles, and by many African teachers already trained in the Mazza Institute in Verona. It has seventeen pupils at the present time. They have already made remarkable progress in piety and instruction. They successfully cultivate all the appropriate feminine skills, so as to become good family women.
[1765]
The children we are educating burden us with great expenses, for their purchase as well as for their upbringing and keep. We sometimes find them, sick and weak, trailing about the streets or at the cross-roads; we do not hesitate to take them in, since next to each of the above-mentioned Institutes, we have set up an infirmary and a pharmacy, because we have learned that charity to the sick is a powerful means with which to win souls for Jesus Christ. You gentlemen will easily understand what a heavy burden we assume for their sake, and how much we need you to come to our aid. Moreover, in making this request, I am only interpreting the wishes of Mgr Ciurcia, Vicar and Apostolic Delegate of Egypt who is responsible “ad interim” for the Vicariate of Central Africa and who has deigned to give me a letter of recommendation in this regard.
[1766]
As my Work develops, which I have every reason to hope, I shall later be calling upon other French religious to help me, since I could see the special attitude of their nation’s children to apostolic works. To conclude, I point out to you, gentlemen, that there is no doubt that the conversion of a large number of central African tribes will depend upon the success of the two Institutes I have had the honour to mention to you, and I am convinced that this cause, to procure God’s glory and the salvation of souls, will induce you to grant the wishes of the one who, full of hope in your charity, has the honour to declare himself

Your humble servant,

Fr Daniel Comboni,
Apostolic Missionary in Central Africa
Superior of the Institutes of Africans in Egypt


Translated from the French.

[1767]
Although I do not have the pleasure to be personally acquainted with you, I know how good your religious sentiments are and how proverbial is your generosity. I therefore take the liberty, which I hope you will be kind enough to forgive, of writing this letter to you to request a donation for a work which is essentially Catholic, the “Regeneration of Africa”, and for the propagation of our holy religion in those vast regions, a donation which God has promised he will “generously reward” when it is given for love of him.
[1768]
It is a question of saving thousands of souls. St Augustine assures us that “whoever saves a soul, saves his own”. What greater reward?

The Holy Father has frequently blessed this work and helped it with his limited resources, and has granted its benefactors many graces and indulgences.

[1769]
Poor by vocation and necessity, I sacrifice my whole life to go to the aid of my brethren in Christ as a missionary priest in Central Africa, who is familiar with the needs of that new-born Christian society, and today I come to implore your benevolent and charitable heart to be concerned for so many unfortunates who lie submerged in darkness and the most horrible idolatry.
[1770]
I would never have wished to disturb you, except that I know how good and understanding you are to the misfortunes of others and this is why I am certain that likewise you will not be unmoved before the evils of the unhappy Africans, evils all the more serious since they can be eternal, if Christian charity does not make missionaries and the means to redeem them available, converting them to happy beings who will ever bless their generous Catholic benefactors. Please forgive this liberty I have taken and believe me your grateful and devoted servant and chaplain,
S.M.B.

Fr Daniel Comboni


Translated from the Spanish.

[1771]
The day before yesterday I received your dear letter. How many things I have to tell you! The most delightful is that I know you will be in Paris on the 12th or the 13th, and I am determined to wait for you there. The thought of going to Quimper and Prat-en-Raz in the midst of all my business caused me to hesitate, however great my pleasure would have been; I am now glad because in a week I shall have the luck to see you in Paris.
[1772]
Egypt is waiting for me, but I am waiting for Madame de Villeneuve, my dear Auguste and your dear children whom I love deeply; had I made the journey to Prat-en-Raz, I should have felt guilty about the expense, since I am not permitted, in conscience, to spend a penny for my own pleasure. In any case, I should have come to Prat-en-Raz had I not had the luck to see you in Paris.
[1773]
We will talk about the Urbansky affair when we meet. He has been very silly to leave you and Auguste. It is quite right that he should regret it now, since I spoke to him clearly and in a fatherly way. When you wrote tome to consult his doctor and his superiors at the school, I went everywhere. It cost me a lot of time and effort to obtain news of the school, sponsorship, etc., but I could never find the people I was supposed to consult. He is now arriving in Paris. I think he will no longer look as well as he did when he came to Paris. He is yet another boy who does not think enough, although he is a good chap. I have found a good confessor for him because he seldom goes; it appears that he is respectful of him.
[1774]
When you think of your dear husband you should never have the thoughts you expressed to me. Think that God’s mercy is infinite and that it is impossible that he should not have found grace with God after so many prayers and devotions on your part. You were an admirable wife, since you are a mother the like of whom I have never found on this earth. God is love. God’s anger melts into sweetness before love.
[1775]
I believe – I am convinced – that God has answered your love and your admirable dedication for him; love and dedication which you had for him before and after his death. Think that your husband was an excellent man who did honour to society. He was an honest man. His only sin was that he was not a practising Catholic. This may have depended on his education and on his finding himself immersed in business. Nonetheless I know that he was a charitable man and that he was good to his neighbour. This virtue cannot remain unrewarded. In addition, through Christian marriage the man becomes one with the woman, and since you did a lot of good before and after his death, I find one more reason to have great trust in God’s mercy. Trust, then, in the Good Lord, and be certain that God has had mercy on him. Continue to pray for him and to be calm, and spend all the months of November of your life praying for his repose, for it is a month of grace and mercy.
[1776]
As for the indulgences of the great Cross of Jerusalem, if you have the Crucifix, you can enjoy the plenary indulgence every time you do the Stations of the Cross. Relics do not come with any indulgence. All the objects that have touched the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, the Fathers of the Holy Land have assured me, have a plenary indulgence every time one kisses them and confesses and takes communion, etc. It is certain that there is a plenary indulgence on the point of death. Moreover, to assure you of everything, I shall write to you later when I have consulted the details of the Jerusalem Indulgences.
[1777]
I have not had any letters from Princess Maria for some time, that is, since 8th November, when she told me she had been ill. If she has not written to you it is a sign that she did not receive your letter, since she loves you and holds you in great esteem. So write to her, because it gives her great pleasure to get letters from you, and tell her about Auguste and the Signora Maria. I shall write to her about you immediately today. Please give my respects to Madame Poysson. I shall be very glad to see her again.
[1778]
I am waiting impatiently for you to arrive in Paris. Auguste will be so good if he or you will let me know directly, because I will come to the station or to your house immediately. Pray for my father who is ill. He will reciprocate your prayers, because for many years now he has prayed for eight or nine hours a day; he is a good man; he is a little scrupulous, quite the opposite of his son. Please accept the expression of my highest esteem and affection,

Fr Daniel Comboni


Translated from the French.

[1779]
Sicut placebit Domino ita fiat: sit semper nomen Domini benedictum. At this moment I have received a dispatch conceived in these terms: “I fear that Dalbosco will not live until the evening, please reply stop Tommasi”. Yesterday I had a letter which told me my father had been seriously ill for 36 days. To this add the many crosses which God’s bounty is pleased to bestow on me. Our beloved Jesus is very good; it is a really loving invitation which moves us to love him truly. Although I am finding things extremely complicated (at present) yet I have no words to thank God as he deserves.
[1780]
If Fr Dalbosco were to go to Paradise (which I feel is certain), what shall we do to arrange things for the little Seminary in Verona? In brief, Monsignor and my most venerable Father, let us throw ourselves into the arms of Jesus who has great love and ingenuity and is well able to manage things: sit nomen eius benedictum in saecula.
[1781]
I am making preparations to come to Verona: I have obtained a free passage for myself from Susa to Verona, and for eight from Verona to Genoa. I am waiting for the passage from Paris to St Michel, and from Monaco, Nice and Marseilles for the caravan. Moreover I am sure that the Foreign Ministry will offer me a free one from Marseilles to Alexandria, but I have not concluded this matter because the Minister was absent; he is in Compiègne.My plan is to wait for this, go to Lyons to collect the 5,000 francs, go via Turin to talk to Don Bosco… and fly to Verona. Should Your Excellency like me to change this plan, you only have to say so and I will obey for your venerable commands.
[1782]
Moreover let us trust in Jesus: I am too happy to be honoured by him with so many crosses, precious treasures of his divine grace. Since we are working for the conversion of the most forsaken souls on earth and intend to work only to do his divine will, thus may Jesus be ever praised in prosperis et adversis, nunc et in saecula. If the Lord lets our Fr Alessandro live, I will bless him; if he calls this chosen soul to paradise, we shall have one more advocate in heaven. I kiss your sacred vestments, and declare myself in the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary,

Your most humble and unworthy son,

Fr Daniel Comboni

[1783]
We have suffered a great loss: but we have not lost Jesus and therefore we have everything. Indeed, this very loss is perhaps a gain, because Fr Alessandro Dalbosco who was a little saint, will pray to God from the heights of heaven and help us with his intercession in the great fight. D.nus dedit, D.nus abstulit… sit nomen D.ni benedictum.
[1784]
I will of course be leaving Paris in three or four days. I have already taken my leave of Madame Thérèse who is very well. I have found a Diocese that dispenses 20,000 Masses a year: Nîmes. I am staying with the Bishop, a member of the Propagation of the Faith of Lyons for 30 years, and a former student at the Seminary des Chartreux in Lyons (whose Superior is a friend of mine) and I will try to twist his arm so that he sends you many Masses. From Lyons, I go to Turin and Verona.
[1785]
Whatever the confusion in which we find ourselves, let us place our trust in God and in the Queen of Africa. Men and money; money and men. These are two absolute necessities. Your Excellency, by means of the Apostolate and my journeys on railways and steamers, we shall find money and men. Patience, trust, courage and constancy, but in the Hearts of Jesus and Mary, will enable us to establish the work and save a great number of souls. The Queen of Spain has recommended to me her daughter and Conte di Girgenti, who will be coming to Egypt. I have planned their journey for them.
[1786]
In my grief at Fr Alessandro’s death, I have one great comfort: that of seeing that Jesus is sending me crosses. If all God’s works are founded on the Cross, can we expect to found the one in Africa with the wind behind us?… No; let us kiss the cross and trust in Jesus.
I kiss your sacred vestments, and receive the whole heart of

Your most unworthy son,

Fr Daniel Comboni

[1787]
Giovanni Battista Zanoni

Zanoni comes from a very respectable and well-to-do family in Verona, where he was born in 1820. In his youth he devoted himself to his studies and acquired a good knowledge of Italian and Latin literature at school; but later he turned to mechanical and hydraulic engineering, a subject in which he showed great dedication. For several years he practised it in his home town and acquired such skill that he very quickly became known, after his master the famous Professor Avesani, as the best in the field. It was he who in 1838 first showed the Emperor Ferdinand I of Austria a model of a steam engine for the railway, for which he had invented a condenser designed to accumulate a considerable amount of steam, which would otherwise be lost, in order to provide more power to the engine. The invention earned Zanoni an honourable mention on the part of the Emperor and a gold medal of merit at the Venice Exhibition. Later, he had the satisfaction of seeing his condenser introduced in many European countries, especially in England. In 1844 he entered the religious life and joined the Order of St Camillus de Lellis, known as Clericorum Regularium Ministrantium Infirmis. He had the intention of devoting himself as a simple lay brother to the healing of the sick, but his Superiors immediately recognised him as a man of talent and true piety. They persuaded him not only to pursue his literary studies, but also to undertake the study of philosophy and theology so as to become a priest. In the years 1850–51, we studied dogmatic theology together at the Verona Seminary. Zanoni sat on the same bench as myself and the pious Fr Angelo Melotto who later, as a Missionary in Central Africa, visited the tribes of Kich and Eliab withme on the white Nile and died inmy arms at Khartoum. It was at this time that Zanoni was fired by the thought of going to Africa to devote himself to the conversion of Africans and opened his soul to that venerable and wise Missionary, now dead, for whom he had a special devotion.

[1788]
Even during the period that he exercised his priestly ministry in the religious house, Zanoni did not abandon his engineering speciality and the related subjects, architecture and painting, to which he had applied himself so much as a layman. As he was spending most of his time in the hospitals run by the members of his Order, he also dedicated himself to the scientific and practical study of medicine, surgery and pharmacy. He is equally familiar with agriculture as well as having some knowledge of different sorts of crafts. He is an able iron-caster, blacksmith, clock mender, builder, carpenter, etc. and is extraordinarily active. As a churchman he is a good preacher, an excellent religious and an able infirmarian. He knows Italian, Latin and French and is now learning Arabic. On several occasions his Superiors made use of him in various important functions. He was thus spiritual Director in various houses; from 1858 he was Prefect of the Camillian house in Mantova and in 1862 was sent to Rome to participate in the election of the Superior General of his Order.
[1789]
He was still Prefect of the house in Mantova when the enforcement of the diabolical law of 7th June 1866 suppressed his Order. This was the reason why, when he had learned of our Plan for the conversion of Africa, he made insistent requests to the Holy See to be allowed to dedicate himself to this Work which he had desired since the beginning of his religious life. To his great joy he received this permission by means of the Rescript of the 7th of July last year. In every branch of his knowledge he has left a mark, wherever he has been: in Verona, Padua, Venice, Mantua and finally Marseilles.Worth mentioning among these are: the Church of Our Lady (Auxilium Christianorum), S. Giuliano in Verona, the choir and other places in the vicinity of the Church of St Anne at the home for the elderly and destitute in Padua, two model steam engines in the Venice Science Academy, as well as the convent and chapel of the Convent of St Joseph in Mantua which has several paintings and sculptures and a magnificent project for the construction of a hospital that was preferred to all others and received a prize from the municipality; finally the orphanage of his Order in Mantua and two large paintings he did in Marseilles last November for the Mother House of the Sisters of “St Joseph of the Apparition”. His previous Superiors were very sorry to see him leave to join our expedition to Egypt. I am quite convinced that the Work for the regeneration of Africa will receive great benefits from his apostolic zeal, from his knowledge of mathematics and from his skills in engineering and the fine arts, as well as from his competence as Superior and administrator.
[1790]
Stanislao Carcereri

He was born in 1840, in a family of poor but God-fearing farmers, at Cerro, a small town in the diocese of Verona, birthplace of Fr Angelo Vinco, who met his death on the White Nile below the fourth degree of Latitude North. At 11, by virtue of an apostolic privilege due to his youth, he entered the Order of the Regular Clerics of St Camillus de Lellis. Gifted with eminent talent, he made such progress in Italian and Latin literature as well as in philosophy and theology that his Superiors immediately appointed him to teach various subjects. Having been educated since his youth in Christian wisdom, he developed an intense spirit of piety in this holy environment so that he distinguished himself among the pupils of St Camillus by exercising all the virtues as a model of life pleasing to God.

[1791]
In 1859 he took the strict state examination with honours, to gain the title of Doctor Philosophiae in the Verona high school; but was unable to complete it because he was affected by a dangerous illness. Later, in a school at S. Maria del Paradiso, he taught world history, geography, statistics, Latin literature, philosophy, religion, canon law and dogmatic and moral theology. In 1862 he was appointed as Provincial Secretary and Archivist of the Lombardy-Venetia Province and lately was the Superior of the community ofMarsana nearVerona. Equipped with a sharp intelligence, high spirituality and zeal for souls, he is well suited to spiritual counselling. As a priest he is a good preacher, most able at explaining the catechism and giving spiritual help to religious, priests and the people. He has a perfect knowledge of Latin and Italian, is quite familiar with Greek, German and French and has now dedicated himself to learning Arabic.
[1792]
The idea of joining the Catholic Missions had already come to him in 1857. After the first sign of the suppression of religious Orders in Italy, at the beginning of 1867, in his desire to become a Missionary to the infidels, he applied to the Seminaries of Milan and Lyons and received a favourable reply, should the suppression of his Order actually come about. At that time, at the beginning of Lent last year, providential circumstances gave me the opportunity to discover the generous aspirations which animated him and his confreres Zanoni, Tezza and Franceschini. I therefore hastened to recruit these four men. The Bishop of Verona, Mgr Canossa, did everything he could to achieve this end and they thus turned their attention to the part of the world which is the most unhappy and the most in need of help. God has blessed the work with his Providence in choosing Stanislao Carcereri as Apostle to the Africans.
[1793]
Notwithstanding the Brief from His Holiness Pius IX, his Superiors did not want to allow him to leave; repeatedly offering him to join the Generalate in Rome. He resisted, and the permission given to him very quickly by the Vicar of Jesus Christ was for him another sign of God’s will, calling him to Africa, the only place – as he felt – where his soul could find satisfaction. For this, he abandoned everything: promising hopes, even his elderly father, whom he entrusted to his elder brother, an excellent and pious religious of the Order of St Camillus de Lellis. Now he is comforted at having received the wishes and blessings of those who previously had tried to turn him away from his resolve, in which they should have seen the will of Heaven. He feels very happy in his vocation for which he thanks God every day.
[1794]
Giuseppe Franceschini

Franceschini is the son of a very God-fearing family. He was born in 1846 at Treviso, later coming to Venice with his father, who was employed as doorman in the Austrian government office in Venice. He very diligently attended the school of the Fathers of the Congregation of St Philip. This is where he was filled with a spirit of true piety, where he found his vocation to the religious life and where, with six of his companions who later entered different religious Orders, he dedicated himself to the monastic life. This young cleric has extraordinary talent, is of excellent spirit and is quick and enterprising. In 1860, he entered the Order of St Camillus de Lellis, where his behaviour made him loved by all. From the very beginning of his religious life he had a strong inclination for the missionary life and sought to prepare himself for it worthily and with great care. In this preparation not only did he dedicate himself with extraordinary fervour to his studies, but he also applied himself to the arts and crafts that are necessary for such a state. Among other things he is a very good cook and has acquired considerable skills as a tailor, a cobbler, a carpenter and also as an infirmarian. He is very active and succeeds in all he does at the moment, being able to train himself in so many things in which he encounters so much need and so much discomfort. He has a perfect knowledge of Italian and Latin, a reasonable knowledge of Greek and French and knows a little German. Now he is busy learning Arabic. Although he is still only Subdeacon, he has completed all the theological studies with great success.

[1795]
On the basis of Pius IX’s Brief of 5th July, he received permission to come with us to Africa, and this is where he has reached the aim of his most fervent desires. We look forward to the best success from his great virtues, from his spirit of dedication and piety, which gives him extraordinary energy, and from his activities which are all aimed at the good and benefit of Africans.


[1796]
The Congregation of the Sisters of “St Joseph of the Apparition”

In view of the fact that the first religious Congregation chosen by Providence for the conversion of Africans, and therefore for the direction of the female Institutes, destined to form elements for the Missions in Central Africa in accordance with the Plan we formulated for this purpose, was that of the Sisters of St Joseph of the Apparition, known as the Sisters of Christian Charity, it is right that we should now introduce them to our pious collaborators and generous benefactors from Catholic Germany. The Congregation of the Sisters of St Joseph of the Apparition was founded in 1829 by Madame de Vialar, who founded the first house in Gaillac in the Département of Tarn in the Languedoc at her own expense. Its Statutes were first approved in 1835 by the Archbishop of Albi. This pious foundress, burning with Christian charity and zeal for the salvation of souls, was also keen to prepare elements for the foreign Missions, and through them to consecrate her life and her Institute to this work. The education of young girls, free education for the poor, the direction of homes and care for the sick, domestic services for prisoners, visiting the old and the poor in their homes and the conversion of infidels; such are the aims of this Congregation which has been introduced by many Bishops and Vicars Apostolic into their Dioceses and Missions and which was highly praised by the wise Pope Gregory XVI in his apostolic Letters of 1840, published by the Sacred Congregation for Bishops and Regulars.

[1797]
In a few years, the new Institute spread to quite a number of dioceses in France. Since Madame de Vialar found that she had gathered around her a considerable number of virgins whom she had formed herself for the apostolic life, in 1836 she departed for Algeria accompanied by Sister Emilie Julien. I believe they were the first Sisters to go there after the country was conquered by the French army. They founded two establishments there. It is difficult to describe the miracles of Christian charity and the dedication of these two Sisters in the most dangerous circumstances, which included infectious diseases, plagues and cholera which infest these unfortunate regions, and all the afflictions, labours and persecutions which they had to bear in the first few years for the love of God.
[1798]
However, following the example of our Divine Saviour and his beloved Bride, the Church, whose history is a succession of sufferings and trials, this work too was destined by God to be born and to grow at the foot of the Cross in the midst of the greatest tribulations. Just as Jesus Christ’s Passion and Death were followed by his Resurrection and just as the Church after persecution and martyrdom has always won, so too did the persecutions and trials of the Congregation of St Joseph of the Apparition lead it to spread to Tunis and Tripoli, in Berber territory and to other countries of North Africa, where it has done great good.
[1799]
Madame de Vialar returned to France to see the various houses of the Congregation again and to found a Mother House in Marseilles, as a most appropriate centre for the direction of the Institute and the departures of the Sisters to the various foreign Missions. With the help of some of the most capable and selfless Missionary Sisters, she was able, in a few years, to found numerous establishments. These included Malta, Greece, Lebanon, Asia Minor, Armenia, the East, India and Australia. I myself got to know the Institute in 1857 in Jerusalem, where I visited their house near the Holy Sepulchre, directed by the Maltese reverend Sister Jenech, and I had the opportunity to see the many fruits of the sacrifices made by the Daughters of St Joseph. Later, in my travels around Europe and other countries, in which divine Providence makes use of these generous Sisters as instruments for the salvation of many millions of souls who now enjoy the vision of God in Heaven, I found very much precious evidence of their activities.
[1800]
The first heroine of this Congregation’s apostolate is Sister Emilie Julien, the present Superior General. I have known her since 1860. She has helped me several times to do good to souls. After her glorious activities full of crosses and sacrifices in North Africa, where for six years from the age of 21 she was the Superior of several establishments, in 1846 she went to Syria with her Sisters and with the Most Reverend Fr Massimiliano Ryllo S.J., who for sixteen years was an apostolic missionary in Syria and died in Khartoum as Pro-Vicar Apostolic for Central Africa. She was the first person since the famous Crusades to found a convent for nuns in the Holy City, in the land which saw the accomplishment of the great mysteries of our salvation.
[1801]
By founding the first convent of nuns she raised within the walls of Sion the banner of Christian charity which filled the hearts of the women of the Gospel, and she planted the lily of holy virginity for the good of the infidels. It was also she who founded the houses of Bethlehem, Jaffa, Sidon, Aleppo, Cyprus and others which are flourishing in the East. She directed them all in her capacity as Provincial Superior for the East, resident in Jerusalem.
[1802]
After Madame de Vialar’s death in Marseilles, Sister Emilie Julien was elected Superior General of the whole Congregation. She returned to Europe, but transferred her residence to Rome where she opened a novitiate. At the same time she started the “Apostolic Association” of which she has been president since 1863, and which according to the model of the one in Paris is a meeting place for pious ladies, even of the highest society, who work for the supply of church ornaments and provide the necessary religious objects for the foreign Missions. During the last eleven years of her residence in Rome, Mother Emilie has gained the esteem and admiration of our Pope, of Cardinal Barnabò, General Prefect of the Sacred Congregation of Propaganda, of a great many other Princes of the Church and not least of the Princes and Princesses of the royal houses of Europe and of the Roman nobility.
[1803]
A sublime charity, an admirable prudence, sound and distinguished talents in the knowledge of man and human affairs and how to deal with them, a noble courage, a heroic trust in Providence and a total faith in God’s will – these are the basic character traits of this woman of the Gospel, who has given so much service to the Church and to the Missions. She has had to weather tremendous storms and trials of all kinds, but her patience, resignation and virtue have preserved in her a marvellous peace. It must be said that with that “Fiat”, which is always on her lips, she can face all evils. As well as the Province of Tuscany, which consists of eight houses, from Rome she founded other houses in different parts of the world, one of which was the Cairo Hospital in 1864. It was also during Sister Emilie Julien’s generalate that our Holy Father Pope Pius IX, on 31st January 1863, on the recommendation of several Bishops from the countries where the Congregation has its houses, in consideration of the copious fruits obtained by it, confirmed the Institute as a Congregation of simple vows and also with its present statutes, placing it under the jurisdiction of the Ordinaries in accordance with the norms of Canon Law and the apostolic Constitutions, and through the Secretariat of State appointed Cardinal Barnabò as its protector.
[1804]
Should we not in all this perhaps admire adorable Providence, who chose precisely the Daughters of St Joseph to be the first directors of our first Institute for the conversion of Africa? A set of providential circumstances gave birth to this Institute in the famous land of the Pharaohs, a few paces from the Holy Grotto where that great Patriarch lived with the Holy Family, and its presence there for seven years has brought down the idols of Egypt and founded in their place the faith in Jesus Christ and a seed-bed of religious life which produces so many heroes for Heaven and, by spreading everywhere, has adorned the Catholic Church with so many models of virtue. Through its marvellous works and its glorious conquests in the whole universe, it has crowned the Church with triumphs through all the ages and will crown it till the end of time.
[1805]
Sister Maria Bertholon Superior of the Institute of the Sisters in Cairo

Sister Maria, the daughter of honest parents, was born on 9th February 1837 in Lyons. Although she attended with great diligence and not unfruitfully the school of the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament, whose Mother House is in Autun, from the age of seven, she showed little inclination for the religious life in her youth. It was only when she was seventeen, after reading the Annals of the Propagation of the Faith and hearing the preaching of a Jesuit that she considered entering some Congregation dedicated to the holy Missions. She chose the Convent of Jesus and Mary, with great self-denial refusing an invitation from the pious sisters of the Blessed Sacrament who had taught her. She was on the point of joining the Order, when the advice of a worthy Missionary home from Syria where he had witnessed the great good done by the Sisters of St Joseph of the Apparition, made her decide to dedicate her energies in this Institute. She was 20 when she began her novitiate in the Mother House in Marseilles, under the direction of Sr Clotilde Delas, novice mistress at the time. This good veteran Missionary who had spent 14 years in Algeria and Tunis (she is currently Superior in Tuscany where I have visited her several times) was really needed to form Maria’s determination and cultivate in her the spirit of self-denial and dedication of the Gospel women of ancient times. Providence, who called her to become a good mother to African girls, had also disposed her to those occupations which are not the least important in Missionary service. For four years she lived at Requista in the Department of Aveyron, where she had been assigned the second class of a school. From the Diocese of Rodez, where she carried out all the house’s offices, visited the sick and helped all kinds of poor in their homes, she was then sent to Africa.

[1806]
The fundamental traits of Sr Maria Bertholon’s character are an eminently Christian charity, true, sincere humility and great energy. She only speaks her mother tongue and a smattering of Italian, but is very skilled in all the branches of domestic work. Educated at the school of true piety, she has acquired the virtues of self-denial and renunciation of her own will to an eminent degree, and it was this which made it easier for her to accept the sacrifice when she was called by the Missions that were the goal of her vocation. When we arrived in Marseilles, she had been assigned to Malta, but we succeeded in having her assigned to the sisters who were to accompany the African girls to Cairo. Her soul rejoiced when the Superior simply told her: you are going to Egypt. She did not know that she herself was destined to be the Superior, and to her great surprise and distress heard from us, on her arrival in Cairo, the news of the appointment to which God had called her. She refused to believe that she had been chosen for such an important office for which, in her deep humility, she felt she was unworthy and incapable.
[1807]
Despite our objections, she wanted to be subject to someone else or to renounce her office in the Mission, although she had so longed for it. The intervention of the Superior General, who reminded her of her vow of obedience, was needed to make her accept. She is now fulfilling the duties of a Superior, only in order to do God’s will, with admirable perfection, and has thrown herself into learning Arabic with great enthusiasm. In the three months that she has been with us, she has given us adequate proof that she is capable of her role and that she will be of great use to the apostolate in the heart of Africa.
[1808]
Sister Elisabetta Cambefort

Sister Elisabetta is 35. She was born into a well-off family in Montauban. When she was six, she was sent as a boarder to the Sisters of the Holy Name of Jesus where she stayed only 18months, since her mother’s death obliged her to return to her family. She was allowed to continue to attend the convent school. From that period she thought of consecrating herself to the religious life. She had to overcome many obstacles set in her way by her family, in order at last to enter the Congregation of St Joseph of the Apparition, recommended to her by Rev. Fr Blancart, Missionary of the Congregation of Mount Calvary, since she wished to devote herself to the foreign Missions. She joined the Novitiate in Marseilles under the direction of Sr Clotilde Delas, whom she later followed to Montelupo in Tuscany. Here she stayed for eight years, in the service of prisoners and the home for fallen young girls. In November last year, she was recalled to Marseilles and there received the mandate to accompany the African girls to Cairo. In addition to her mother tongue, Sr Elizabeth speaks Italian very well and she too is now learning Arabic. She is expert at all the domestic tasks and a
model of piety.

[1809]
Sister Maddalena Caracassian

One fine morning in July a few years ago, I was sitting in my lodgings on the fourth floor in Rome when a venerable elderly priest entered my room, breathless, accompanied by an old lady dressed in black. It was easy to see by his face that was shining with joy that some extraordinarily happy event had befallen him, and the lively bright eyes of the old woman also betrayed an intimate joy. The priest was Fr Nicolò Olivieri, commonly revered by all and who is now in Heaven, and the lady with him was his serving woman, old Maddalena. The purpose of his visit was to take me to see the young African girls who had just arrived from Syria after he had saved them from slavery in Egypt. They were guests of the Sisters of St Joseph of the Apparition. Everyone knows how much help the Sisters of St Joseph of the Apparition have given to redeeming slaves. The African girls come from Egypt in twos or threes, and are first taken to Palestine to the houses of these Sisters and thence, to Europe.

[1810]
We went down to the street, followed by old Maddalena. The pious old man had a terrible cough, and it was obvious that he would not have much longer to live. When we reached Piazza Farnese, we turned right into Piazza della S. Trinità dei Pellegrini. Here, before entering the Piazza del Monte di Pietà, under an archway is a miraculous image of Our Lady that is the object of great veneration. The devout Olivieri had the habit of kneeling to pray before this image every morning, when he went to the post from his lodgings in the monastery of the Trinitarians at S. Crisogono in Trastevere. I had accompanied him several times to this street a quarter of an hour’s walk away, and had witnessed all the sighs he heaved for the poor African girls and the fervour and tears with which he commended them to the Blessed Virgin. This time, kneeling on the bare ground, in his fervour the exclamation, “Thank you, mother, O thank you, thank you so much!” perhaps unconsciously, suddenly escaped his lips at the end of his prayers.
[1811]
We continued on our way and passing S. Carlo in Piazza dei Catinari and S. Caterina dei Funari, arrived at the house of the Sisters of St Joseph in Piazza Margana. Hardly were we seated in the parlour, when a few little African girls entered, accompanied by two sisters. They were followed by three young Armenian girls, dressed in black and wearing the beautiful headdresses typical of their country. They gave us the impression that they came from families of some standing and were well educated. They had arrived from Constantinople with the African girls. At first, I hardly noticed these three white girls for my whole attention was taken up by the little African girls and even more, by our dear Olivieri who was gazing at them blissfully, as well as by admirable old Maddalena who had been to Egypt 16 times and now once more, as though she were still young, felt the wish to return. Aquarter of an hour later, Mgr Hurmy, Archbishop of Armenia, entered and this circumstance finally directed our attention to the Armenian girls. One of them was our Sr Maddalena, on whose face innocence and sincerity can be read.
[1812]
Who would have thought then that this young woman would be one of the first to act as mother to the black girls and follow me to Egypt, to devote herself forever to our Work for the regeneration of Africa? Sr Maddalena is 19 and comes from an affluent merchant family in Erzurum. Her father, Signor Giovanni Caracassian, died a few months after she was born. Her mother, whose name is Serpuis (which in Armenian means saint) was very devout. She was widowed at the age of 21. After receiving advantageous proposals for another marriage, she rejected them with the observation that since she had to raise three souls for heaven she had enough on her hands. She dedicated herself totally to her children’s education; her daughter Caterina, who is now married and herself the mother of three, her son Gregorio who is 21 and now a merchant, and our little Maddalena. Under her mother’s prudent guidance, she was imbued with a spirit of piety from childhood and since she gave signs of great intelligence and cleverness, her maternal uncle, Fr Serafino Pagia, a pious priest of the Armenian-Catholic rite, took on the task of educating her diligently in religion and the elementary sciences. His efforts were well rewarded. At the age of eight, she was sent to the school of the Sisters of St Joseph of the Apparition in Erzurum. There, in addition to domestic work, she acquired a thorough knowledge of the Armenian, Turkish and French tongues, under the direction of Sr Accabia Akccia, an Armenian, and Sr Maria, a French woman. The latter was her teacher in all the domestic skills. Already by the end of her seventh year Maddalena was considering consecrating herself to the religious life, but only when she was thirteen, in the face of all the obstacles opposing her, did she decide on the Institute of the Sisters of St Joseph of the Apparition.
[1813]
Grace can always get the better of temperament. Maddalena deeply loved her good mother, who had never thought of seeing herself one day, and perhaps for ever, separated from her daughter whom she loved in a very special way. I do not know which of the two, mother or daughter, was proof of the greater strength and generosity during more than a year of continuous and painful strife. And of course Signora Serpuis Caracassian, following the wonderful example of mothers enlivened by a true Christian spirit, in offering her daughter, made St Joseph a complete sacrifice. To consecrate herself to God, Maddalena was separated forever from the mother she loved so tenderly. She left Erzurum. After an eight-day journey on horseback, she arrived in Trebisond in Anatolia, where she embarked on a packet-boat making Black Sea crossings and sailed to Constantinople. In this capital of the Turkish kingdom, she lived with the Sisters of Charity of St Vincent de Paul. She then crossed the Dardanelles and via Greece, Messina and Naples arrived in Rome. She immediately joined the Novitiate under the eye of the Superior General. The venerable Superior fully recognised her talents and the spirit that motivated her and had her instructed in all the branches of knowledge necessary to make an apostolic woman of her.
[1814]
It could be said that Sr Maddalena was born for religious life. During the whole period that she lived in the Eternal City, she was admired as a model of all the religious virtues. She has no will of her own; her will is God’s will, manifested to her through her Superiors; her will is always to do her duty in everything demanded of her. The innocence and purity of her soul and her obedience, together with a ready and penetrating intelligence, are the precious gifts with which divine grace has abundantly enriched her. Her usual confessor was Mgr Arsenio Avek-Waratan Angiarakian of the Order of Conventual Armenians, Archbishop of Tarsus. Later, when that worthy Prelate went to the East to prepare the patriarchal election, her confessors were Fr Villefort and Fr Franco, of the Society of Jesus. She is familiar with Armenian, Turkish, French and Italian, and is now studying Arabic with great success.
[1815]
On the occasion of her religious profession, Cardinal Barnabò received her vows, and on 24th November she was entrusted to me. I had to take her and the African girls from Rome to Marseilles. Here, her Superior General assigned her to accompany the African girls, and to our establishment in Cairo. Her virtues, her many beautiful qualities and the hopes we consequently placed in her, induced us to ask the Superior General to make us a formal promise never to remove her from our undertaking. Mother Emilie Julien then made me a declaration conforming to our wishes, and we are having Sr Maddalena instructed in the Abyssinian, Denka, Bari, and Gallas tongues, etc., as well as in medicine and surgery, and, in brief, in all the appropriate subjects that will make her a woman according to the Gospel and according to the needs of our work for the regeneration of Africa. I hope that God will make this young woman a true daughter of Christian charity and Apostle of the Africans.
[1816]
Biographical outlines of the African teachers of the first Institute of Cairo in Egypt

Why are these biographies necessary?

Of all the evils that torment the unfortunate peoples of Central Africa, one of the most deplorable, which I have often seen with my own eyes among the White Nile tribes, is the violent or clandestine abduction of poor human beings, whose soul is just as precious and whose heart just as noble as our own, and especially of children, of both sexes. This tremendous moral aberration, this disregard of all humanity is partly the effect of frequent warring between tribes, different regions and even villages, and partly an effect of the infamous greed of the strongest and most powerful to improve their own situation by means of the slave trade. Now, at the very moment when I am describing these things, there are hundreds of thousands of these victims who because of war and the greed of the merchants are torn from their country, exposed to all kinds of evils and condemned never again to see their parents’ faces or the land of their birth, and to be forced all their life to sigh under the cruel burden of the harshest slavery.

[1817]
Wars are very frequent, almost continuous in those lands; they are generally sparked by the traditional hatred between families, villages or tribes, or by of the theft of cattle or children or the illegitimate occupation of a friendly region. The African considers taking revenge on his enemy a natural and necessary law, and becomes as fierce as a tiger; he sacrifices everything to this vendetta, his own life and that of his family members. The abduction of children is practised in Africa among friends and enemies, and so slavery and the trade in human beings has thrived. A father and mother would never sell their children; since paternal and maternal love is so great and true among Africans, they would rather risk their life. A single exception in this matter is marriage. This is a real business deal which the father arranges with the husband for a price established in accordance with the father’s situation and the girl’s endowments.
[1818]
When we were with the Africans of Bahr-el-Abiad in the African interior, we were highly esteemed and loved. They made a total distinction between us and the other whites, whether Turks or European merchants, whom the Africans feared, despised and considered as enemies. This is why their children are allowed to visit us and to hear our teaching, but they never give their children to us to be educated in Khartoum or in Europe; the parents would never let their children be far from the family nucleus and the region. But how can so many thousands of Africans still be sold today, publicly and clandestinely, on the markets in Khartoum, Kordofan, Dongola, Suakim, Jedda, Berber, Cairo and in the other cities on the African coast? This is due to their violent abduction and secret snatching by the Muslims who still supply and deal in a tremendous trade in slaves; and due to Islam which fosters slavery, the shame of humanity, despite all the treaties between civilised governments and the strict but ineffectual laws of the Turkish government and despite the good intentions of Isma’il Pasha, Viceroy of Egypt. Here in Cairo, just the other day on 17th March, a large caravan arrived of poor black slaves, forcefully torn from their land. As usually happens when these caravans of wretched human beings travel down the Nile by boat, they are stowed like herrings in the bottom of the boat and covered with boards. Naturally it often happens after such shipments that many are found dead.
[1819]
The Baqqarah and many other Muslim tribes that immigrated from Arabia in the 7th and 14th centuries of the Christian era, after wandering slowly over eastern and northern Africa, spread inland and brought the superstition and fanaticism of Islam to the Africans. These Muslims who live in the regions bordering on black tribes and who even actually own some of them, are generally the ones who secretly or by force abduct the poor children from their families. They then sell them as if they were sheep or oxen to other Muslims, and the latter smuggle them to the Jallabas, whose business is to run the exchange of slaves in the markets. So the poor Africans move from market to market, from master to master, and after surviving the greatest hardships of tiring and dangerous journeys, often walking barefoot over the burning sands of the desert during which a large number of them die a cruel death, they reach the coasts of Africa to be sold to terrible masters who treat them like dogs and, under the harsh protection of Mohammed’s despotic law, reserve a wretched life for them, a life that brings them prematurely to eternal death.
[1820]
Only He who by his sacrifice on Golgotha wanted to eradicate slavery from the earth forever, He who proclaimed true freedom to mankind, calling all nations and every single human being to be children of God to whom man regenerated by the true faith may say Abba Pater, it is only He who will be able to set Africa free from the stain of slavery. Only Catholicism will be able to restore full freedom to a large part of the human family which is still groaning under the shameful yoke of slavery. It is precisely this which constitutes the great importance of our Work for the regeneration of Africa, blessed by our venerable Pope Pius IX, though some would see it as merely philanthropic work. We have the great objective of bringing the light of the Faith to all the regions of Central Africa still inhabited by primitive peoples, to establish it there soundly and forever, to raise the shining banner of the freedom of the Son of God and thus restore to life many thousands of souls who are still sleeping in the shadow of death.
[1821]
This is the aim that distinguishes the noble Association for the help of poor African children in Cologne, because this Association is the soul of the great enterprise. It was this Association which suggested, voted for and founded this work of redemption which, with God’s blessing, will become the most grandiose apostolate of the 19th century for the salvation of the most abandoned continent, for the salvation of the most wretched and despised populations of human society.
[1822]
After this brief explanation it will be easy to understand the serious reasons that led me to write these short biographies of our dear African women, destined to become the first apostles to the Africans living in the interior of the country. Nine of them received the benefits of our pious Association of Cologne, another four received the spirit of our Holy Religion at the heart of Catholic Germany. Through these biographies, through these simple but true accounts, our venerable collaborators and our dear benefactors will gain:
1. Atrue idea of the miserable conditions of the African tribes, whose spiritual regeneration they are helping and promoting by means of their offerings.
2. Ajust and lofty concept of the great Work of which they are the fortunate members and they will also feel encouraged to make the necessary sacrifices to help this work with all their strength in the future.
3. They will find in these short biographies good and pious reading, able to nourish their own piety and to give a new impulse to their compassion.
4. They will discover one of the most convincing arguments to demonstrate that our Work for the regeneration of Africa, according to our Plan, is the radical means which to human reason seems the most suited to converting Africans to Catholicism.
5. They will learn to appreciate all the more the great zeal which animated the late Reverend Fr Nicolò Olivieri and his sublime work of Christian charity, so effectively supported by our venerated Association of Cologne.

I begin with the biographies of the African girls who were educated in the convents of Catholic Germany.

[1823]
I – Petronilla Zenab

Petronilla is about 21 years old. It is interesting to hear briefly about the ways of Providence that brought her to the heart of Catholicism. According to what she told me in a few words in her mother tongue during her journey to Egypt, I was able to ascertain that she was born in the kingdom of Kafa, and precisely, among the Gallas. An Abyssinian slave trader abducted her by force, since she had been left alone at her parent’s farm. She then travelled with him for three months through the kingdoms of Enarea and Shoah to the Red Sea coast, and from Yemen was taken with another 15 girls on an Arab boat across the sea to Mecca and thence to Medina. She stayed in this city, sacred to Muslims, for six months, until a Turk on a pilgrimage to Mecca purchased her and took her beyond Jedda to the Red Sea and across the desert of Suez, to Cairo. There, with four other African girls, she was sold to a Turk called Omar, from whom she was bought by the noble Consul General of Sardinia, Signor Cerrutti, for Fr Olivieri. He entrusted her to the pious Signora Rossetti in Cairo with whom she stayed for a fortnight and then took her to Alexandria, where, under the protection of old Maddalena and with another 13 African girls, passing through Trieste and Verona, she arrived in Milan. She was then sent to Salzburg, via the Tyrol and Munich, where she arrived at the end of February 1856. She spent a day and a night with the Ursuline Sisters and then moved to the Benedictine convent, whose Superior Ildegunde took great care of her and admitted her among the young boarders.

[1824]
After Ildegunde’s death, the Superior who succeeded her was also a real mother to our little black girl with a true Christian spirit. She entrusted her to the directress of the boarders, Sister Mary Wenefreda, who loved her affectionately and for whom Petronilla still cherishes keen sentiments of gratitude for all the kindnesses she lavished upon her. It took almost six months to prepare her for Baptism. The Archbishop of Salzburg, the Most Reverend Mgr Massimiliano Giuseppe von Tarnoczy, instructed her, and her godmother was Signora Francesca Schider, the wife of the Empress Caroline’s personal doctor. Petronilla several times had the honour to appear before the Empress who showed her much kindness.
[1825]
I must express my sincerest thanks to the worthy Benedictine Sisters of Salzburg for educating this child in the spirit of our holy faith and genuine piety and for making her a true daughter of Christian charity. The education given to African girls in Germany is usually very sound. The Sisters instruct their African pupils not only in religion, but also in all the tasks of ordinary life. They even take greater care of them than necessary, so that when they return to Africa, they find it difficult to adapt to the poor conditions of their homeland. First and foremost, however, they never let them lack what is essential to them: a firm faith and a lofty spirit of piety, and for this reason the monasteries in Germany have an important part to play in our work’s development.
[1826]
Since the climate in Salzburg was too cold, the good Sisters decided to try whether the climate in France would suit Petronilla better. In September 1863 they made Rev. Fr Leandro Capella responsible for taking the African girl to Paris at his own expense. She stayed there for a month and a half with the Daughters of the Holy Cross. But the air of Paris was still too chilly for the little African. Thus it was decided to take Petronilla to the South, and Mother Xaveria, Superior of the Sisters of St Joseph in Syria, took her to Marseilles where she lived in the Mother House until November last year.
[1827]
Petronilla saw Fr Olivieri four times in Salzburg and was present during his last illness which struck him in Marseilles. She saw him in his last hour when, after all his suffering, he was lifted from his bed and laid on the bare ground on which he died like a saint. I cannot recall these admirable signs of this man’s holiness without weeping. Olivieri died on the bare ground, supported among others by our dear, good Petronilla whom he had won for Christ. Moreover, there was not much difference between the bare floor and his bed which I saw in Marseilles. This is the same bed that Fr Biagio Verri, motivated by the same spirit of self-denial, penance and Christian charity, usually sleeps on.
[1828]
Petronilla belongs to one of the best tribes of Africa. She has a firm and serious character and is reliable, reasonably intelligent and devout. It seems that she longs to dedicate herself to the conversion of the infidel Africans. We rely on her greatly. Petronilla understands German and French fairly well and is now learning Arabic. She is very proficient in all the feminine skills. All this, together with a very sound capacity for judgement and staunch constancy, enables us to hope that she will do great good for Africa; I am entirely confident that she will respond very well to our programme for leading Africa to regeneration through Africa herself.
[1829]
II – Amalia Amadu

Amalia is now about 19 years old. She was born in the great kingdom of Bornu in Central Africa. She was playing in a field one day with other children when some Muslims on horseback approached and abducted them all. They were gagged with strips of cotton and strapped on to two horses, and were whipped if they made the slightest effort to shout. They headed for the interior of the country and soon, protected by the darkness and without being followed, they reached a hut that must have been about half a day’s journey from the children’s village. Amalia was later sold to a jallaba who with more than 100 young African girls and four small boys, travelled for 4 months on end, taking them through the Sahara and the desert, over the constantly scorching sands to Cairo.

[1830]
There, put on view in the big slave market, she was sold again to a certain Abraham Hut with whom she remained with another four girls for about six months, doing nothing. A Turk then purchased her on Fr Olivieri’s behalf. She was handed over to old Maddalena and immediately afterwards travelled with Fr Olivieri across the Mediterranean to Trieste. Passing through Milan, the Tyrol and Munich, where she stopped for three days in the convent of the Daughters of the Pious Schools, she reached the village of Beuerberg in Bavaria towards the end of 1856 and was entrusted to the convent of the Order of the Visitation of Mary.
[1831]
In accordance with the example of St Francis of Sales, those good and pious Sisters did all they could to make Amalia a true daughter of Mary. They succeeded: the young African girl became good, obedient, and expert in all the feminine skills, full of good will and true piety. She was baptised on 19th June 1857 by the Archbishop of Munich, Rev. Mgr Gregorio Scherr. Princess Amalia Adalbert of Bavaria was her godmother. She was confirmed on 1st July 1858 by the same Archbishop and on that occasion, her sponsor was Countess Arco-Valley.
[1832]
Amalia cherishes fond and grateful memories of the good Sisters of Beuerberg and their Superior, SrMaria Carolina von Pelkhoven; She also feels deep gratitude and affection for Sr Luisa Regis, to whom she owes her ability in the feminine skills. In September Mgr Matteo Kirchner, to whom the Central African mission is indebted for his many services and sacrifices and in whom it also found a worthy champion of the apostolate, wrote to me asking if Amalia could join the
expedition to Egypt which was being organised. After my reply in the affirmative, in October the Superior of the convent in Beuerberg sent her to Munich where she met two African girls in the convent of the Benedictine Sisters. The three then left for Verona, accompanied by Rev. Sig. Stefano Reger, inspector and confessor of Seligenthal at Landshut. They stayed there for a fortnight with the Daughters of Christian Charity, known as the Canossians, a Congregation founded by the Marchesa Maddalena di Canossa, the Bishop of Verona’s aunt. They then left under the protection of the Missionaries and a devout lady, my compatriot, Margherita Bettonini-Tommasi, and reached Marseilles on 27th October. On 29th November we set out for Egypt. Amalia’s true piety, obedience and extraordinary understanding, allow me to hope that we can make her an able instrument for the conversion of Africa, especially as she is now in good health, although, as the Superior of Beuerberg wrote tome, she was occasionally ill during her stay in Bavaria. She is the only one of the other African girls who has survived. In October, the Superior of Beuerberg sent me a modest sum to be used for her benefit.

[1833]
III – Amalia Katmala

Amalia Katmala, who is called Emilia in our Institute to distinguish her from Amalia Amadu, is about twenty. She was born in a village called Bego, a day’s journey from the south-eastern boundary of the great kingdom of Darfur, which Europeans are forbidden to cross on pain of death. A Muslim trader in gum arabic, returning from Darfur, stopped in Bego to collect the gum. Our little African girl’s family gave him hospitality which he exploited, staying on for several months. The family trusted him and treated him as a friend. Such he appeared: but he was the sort of friend who takes and gives nothing in return.

[1834]
However, this Muslim, who behaved like a Nubian, was motivated by an invincible desire to improve his financial condition by any means and decided to steal his host’s daughter together with her little brother. He succeeded, perhaps by secret talents, in persuading a friend older than Emilia to take the two little ones into the forest to gather wood; an opportunity to do so soon came. When the three children returned from the desert bearing on their heads the wood they had gathered, the cruel gum merchant met them and ordered them to throw away the wood and follow him. He tore their bundles from their heads, grabbed them by the hand and took them away with him. When the children started to cry, he flung them brutally to the ground, drew a long knife from his left sleeve and threatened to kill them at the slightest scream. Shocked and trembling, they kept silent and patiently followed their abductor for three hours until they reached a hut in which he locked them up. They were shut in this hut for 8 days. During those days Emilia refused to eat, but in the end was forced to do so.
[1835]
After a week, three men took the prisoners to Darfur, where they again stayed, for a fortnight. During this time Emilia was separated from her brother. He was sold and from that time she never saw again either her brother or her companion who had taken them into the desert. Later she herself travelled to Kordofan with a jallaba, in the company of three boys and a large number of Africans. This trip which they were forced to do on foot and under the relentless burning rays of the sun walking barefoot on the hot sand, lasted three months. They were given no other food on the journey than what is known as “belilla” (half-cooked durra or black corn). In Kordofan Emilia was sold to a Nubian who took her on a camel laden with cow skins to Dongola. From Dongola they continued across the desert along the left bank of the Nile, passing Wâdi-Halfa and Hint, to Cairo. The journey took about three months. In Cairo, Emilia was sold to an African eunuch, the head of a Turkish harem, and was then handed over to the woman in charge of training young African girls for the Pasha’s harem. Here the inscrutable intentions of divine Providence were manifest. Emilia should have been taught to become the unhappy instrument of sin, of the shameful dissoluteness of the Muslim; instead, God’s bounty destined her for himself. She fell ill and was therefore returned to the eunuch as useless.
[1836]
He had her sold through an Arab woman with other useless girls, and so she fell into the hands of a European gentleman who bargained for her on behalf of Fr Olivieri and took her to a Catholic woman who lived in the house expressly rented by that apostle of the Africans and founder of the Work for saving slaves. There she stayed eight days with another seven African girls and was then moved to Alexandria, to the convent of the St Vincent de Paul Sisters, where she made the acquaintance of Alessandra Antima. In the winter of 1856 she sailed for Trieste with the latter in the company of Fr Olivieri, a Trinitarian, old Maddalena and numerous other African girls.
[1837]
From Trieste, Emilia and Alessandra went to Verona where they stayed with the Canossian Sisters, then to the Sisters of Mercy of Lovere in Milan, from them to the Visitation Sisters in Salò, then on to Arco, to the Sisters of the Seven Sorrows, and finally to the merciful Canossian Sisters in Trent. They spent a year in Italy in this way. They were then taken, via Munich where during an eight-day visit they met the Chaplain of the royal court, Müller, to stay with the Bernadine Sisters in Seligenthal, in the diocese of Regensburg. Emilia obtained a place with the young boarders in the convent. Sr Maria Angela Zetl became her teacher for reading and writing, and Sr Engelberta Häkl instructed her in domestic work. These Sisters laid a firm foundation in her of piety and morality, which I had sufficient opportunity to admire during our first brief meeting. She also owes deep gratitude to Sr Ignazia Steckmüller, and for this reason still loves her now with a very special affection. Emilia remained more than a year in the convent before receiving holy Baptism which was given to her by the Bishop of Regensburg, the Very Rev. Mgr Senastrey, on 3rd April 1859, in the convent church. Mrs Amalia Kalchgruber, the wife of the Councillor of the Bavarian Government was her godmother. She received Holy Confirmation from the same Bishop a few days later, and Signora Francesca Simson of Munich was her sponsor.
[1838]
It seems that Emilia preferred domestic to intellectual work although she also has a modest training in this. She is good at domestic tasks and knows how to make herself useful especially in the kitchen; she was occupied with cooking for three and a half years in the convent. To civilise Africa everything is useful and therefore, because of her sound moral formation and her love of work, our Emilia will be of use to the apostolate of Africa. Last September, the Prior of the monastery of the Bernardines, Mgr Alfonso Brandt, asked me to accept Emilia and Alessandra Antima and employ them in our Work. At the same time he sent me a conspicuous sum to cover the costs of the journey, the fruit of the kindness of the venerable monastery of Seligenthal and the Society of St Ludwig of Munich.
[1839]
IV – Alessandra Antima

This young African girl is perhaps 19 years old. She was born in Darfur, and was kidnapped while playing with other children, taken to Kordofan and Khartoum and thence, across the Bayyuda Desert and the desert located to the west of the Nile, to Cairo. This journey lasted more than three months. In Cairo she fell into the hands of a Turk who kept her with him for six months and then took her to Alexandria and sold her to an Arab lady. Fr Olivieri bought her from the latter. From this point her story coincides with Emilia’s. As we know, Alessandra came to the Cistercian convent in Seligenthal. Her teacher was first the late Sr Gotfrida and then Sr Maria Luisa. Both devoted themselves zealously to teaching her to read and write in German. She was taught domestic work with the same zeal by Sr Ida.

[1840]
She was also baptised on 3rd April 1859 by the Bishop of Regensburg in the monastery of Seligenthal and was then confirmed. Her godmother at her Baptism was Princess Alexandra of Bavaria, who was represented by Signorina Anna Neuhuber of Landshut, and Signora Teresa Hunger of Munich was her sponsor at her Confirmation. Alessandra spent eight years in Seligenthal and three years at Wadsassen near Eger. Sr Ildegarda Smith, the Superior’s sister, took special care of her which is why Alessandra is bound to this good soul with deep fondness and gratitude. Above all, the Bernadine Sisters implanted in Alessandra’s heart a deep moral sense, which is the main strength with which to resist all the dangers that threaten women who wish to devote themselves to the thorny work of the apostolate in the heart of Central Africa.

(Fr Daniel Comboni)


Translated from the German.

[1841]
In the evening of 22nd December 1868, I was staying in Paris where I was collecting alms for the African children and where I had been sent to recover my health. On that day I had reaped a good harvest for my children and had returned weary to my lodgings, giving thanks to God. While I was saying my breviary, suddenly at about 10.00 p.m. someone knocked at my door. Surprised to be sought at such a late hour, I took a lighted candle and went to meet the person knocking, to ask him what he wanted of me. The stranger, an elegantly dressed gentleman with aristocratic manners, answered bowing: “Excuse me, sir, for disturbing you at this hour. I have come to call you to a dying man who wants to speak to you before he dies”. “But”, I added, “why are you seeking spiritual assistance from me, an outsider, instead of from your parish priest?” “The dying man asked expressly for your help and not someone else’s; if you want to fulfil the last wish of someone at death’s door, there is no time to lose”.
Without saying anything further, I followed the stranger downstairs. In the street I saw a magnificent carriage. The gentleman courteously signed to me to enter it and so we sat down on the jump seat. To my great surprise, by the light of the street lamps I noticed another three men in the carriage, with such suspicious-looking faces that I started to jump down, but at that moment one of them put one hand out to prevent me, and with the other, raised a dagger to my breast; the others took their pistols and aimed them at me, so that I could no longer think of escaping. They promised that if I offered no resistance, they would dome no harm. But what might I not fear from those mysterious men? Without resisting, I let them blindfold my eyes and I thought my end had come. I asked the Almighty to have mercy on me. We drove for about two hours. When we came to a standstill, they helped me down and we entered a vast house; there were staircases and winding corridors in all directions. Finally they removed the blindfold from my eyes and the same stranger closed the door behind me. I found myself in a magnificent room furnished with great elegance: rosewood furniture, ormolu clocks, softly upholstered chairs and sofas; but I looked around in vain for a bed and a sick man. I did not know what to say or think.

[1842]
What did I see but a respectable gentleman in an elegant armchair, vigorous, blooming with health and with the full strength of his virility, who called me graciously, beckoning me over to him; I answered that they had called me to a dying man, but that I realised I had been tricked, that he was very well, if my eyes were not deceiving me.
“You are right, reverend Father, my bodily health leaves nothing to be desired, but I am to die in an hour and I would like you to prepare me for a Christian death. To be brief, I will tell you that as a member of a secret society I was promoted to one of the highest levels because my influence in the state and in society, and my resolution in carrying out the most difficult undertakings, was appreciated. Ardent and willing, I have carried out our society’s aims for a good twenty-eight years. When I was chosen by fate to take the life of a venerable Prelate esteemed by all, I stubbornly refused this commission, although I was sure that my refusal would cost me my life according to our rigorous statutes. The sentence was pronounced: I must die in an hour. When I joined the society I did not want to swear to refuse spiritual assistance in life and in death, and since I would be a useful member, they accepted me even without this oath. That is why they have now consented to my request to have a priest brought to me. They then called you, a foreigner, as a person who has few contacts in the city, in order to avoid suspicion”. He further told me that his sentence would be carried out by cutting the two veins in the neck close to the clavicle, so that there would be no open wound. He added that he had caused many to die in this way for failing to keep their word or for other reasons. “There is no appeal against this sentence”, he told me, “our society’s secret network extends all over the world”.

[1843]
He then begged me to hear his confession, since time was limited. Never in my life had I said more fervently: “May the Lord be in your heart and on your lips so that you declare your sins to me properly”. An hour had not yet passed when the door burst open and three men appeared to take him away. He anxiously requested another half hour, to finish his confession. They refused, and seized him: but he invoked the promise made by his peers to allow him the freedom to prepare to die, and when I seconded him, they granted him twenty minutes grace. He ended his confession with the greatest contrition and after gratefully receiving absolution, kissed my hand, on which fell a furtive tear.
I was unable to give him Communion, both because I had not been delegated by the parish priest, and because those scoundrels had not left me the time; but from my neck I took a relic of the Holy Cross in a silver reliquary and gave it to him, telling him until his end to call on the One who had not been ashamed of the ignominy of the Cross, to save us from our sins. He accepted it, deeply moved, kissed it and put it round his neck under his clothing.

[1844]
I asked him whether he had any commissions for me; then he told me to ask forgiveness of his wife, the most virtuous woman in the world, for the excesses which had brought him to such a deplorable end. He added that he had a daughter who was a religious at the Sacred Heart, whom he loved ardently and who would be happy to hear that he had died a Christian death. I requested some sign as proof that I had truly talked to him, and I asked him to write something to them in my notebook. He wrote these lines in pencil: “My dear Clotilde, at the moment of leaving this world, I beg you to forgive me for the great sorrow I am causing you with my death! Give my dear daughter my greetings, and console one another with the certitude that I die reconciled with God and hope to see you in heaven. Say many prayers for my poor soul! Your own “Teodoro”
I then knew the name of the condemned man who implored me to fill him with courage and strength. I had barely said a few words when the door opened and four men entered and seized him. I begged them with the most heart-rending words I could think of to spare the life of so beloved a husband and father. Seeing that all my words were in vain, I threw myself at their feet, beseeching them to take my life rather than his. Their only reply was a kick. They had already bound the victim. As he left, he turned to me once more and said: “God reward you, Father, for all you have done for me, remember me in the Holy Sacrifice”!
After what we had said, they took the condemned man away and I remained as if stunned with fright. My lips trembling, I prayed to God to have mercy on that unfortunate who was no longer among men. Only He who knows all
knows what I suffered in that moment. But was not that a sound? Yes, and ever closer. The footsteps of people approaching. The door opened. I saw before me the terrible men of the vendetta. And what were those dark stains on their hands?

[1845]
My brother’s blood! Now, I said to myself, my turn has come! Without being asked, I held out my hands to be bound; but they did nothing except to blindfold my eyes. Again, up and down steps, along corridors, walking on and on, here the exquisite scent of a delicate perfume, there a putrid stench that penetrated me to the marrow. At last they removed the blindfold and I found myself in a brightly lit and magnificently furnished room. On the table set with a rich damask cloth, dishes overflowed with pastries and fruits from the south and all kinds of delicacies. Above the spirit lamp steaming from silver spouts, came the scent of real China tea; numerous bottles of diverse shapes, colours and labels gave the impression of a sumptuous Lucullan feast. A crowd of gentlemen and ladies drifted about the room, here nibbling a cake, there sipping from a glass, some chatting in one corner, others in another. Some ladies approached and offered me refreshments: I refused, saying that I had to celebrate Mass in the morning and that it was already 2.00 a.m. To tell the truth, I could not free myself from deep suspicion. Poison and the dagger are akin.
I then mentioned that I would like to leave; some gentlemen, but not those I had met earlier, accompanied me, blindfolding my eyes down all the flights of steps and at last they saw me into the carriage. After a journey of many hours, the carriage stopped. In silence, my companions helped me out and after a few steps, sat me down on a metal object. Was it a guillotine, or an instrument of torture? At every instant I imagined that either a blow would separate my head from my body, or a dagger pierce my heart. I remained in that anguish of death for an hour. No longer hearing anyone, I attempted to raise the band over my eyes a fraction. I saw I was in a well-tended garden, where flowers and vegetables were still sleeping their winter sleep.
I stood up and to look for a way to the street; I knocked at a door. A young woman opened it, astonished to have a visit at dawn. I apologised, telling her I had assisted a dying man, not wishing to say anything of what had happened to me, for fear that this family might be in agreement with the Freemasons. She told me I was three hours from Paris, and that if I wished to go there, her husband who had to take flowers and vegetables to Paris would take me on his cart. I gratefully accepted her offer, and set off towards Paris.

[1846]
That morning I did not say Mass because I was too shaken. The following day, I offered it for the victim of the secret society, and celebrated it in the church of the monastery of the Sacred Heart. Since I then had to talk to the Superior, she realised how deeply upset I was, and asked me the reason with concern. Recommending secrecy, I told her everything. She said that indeed the daughter of that unfortunate man was one of her religious who often prayed for her father whom she knew was a member of the secret societies; and that she would be deeply consoled to hear of his conversion. But I expressly forbade her to say a word about it for the time being. Two days later, on the feast of Christmas, I glanced at a Paris newspaper, and in the list of the deceased saw that there were unknown people, taken to the “Morgue”. Among the six corpses there however, I did not recognise the unfortunate man I was seeking. Then pinned to a wall I saw the precious reliquary of the true Cross: shocked, I looked more closely at the corpse closest to it. My God! It was really he, disfigured by death, but his features were recognisable. The better to convince myself, I uncovered his neck and shoulders; the two holes in his neck were visible; and the two veins in the neck had been pierced. There was no further doubt: it was he.
[1847]
The next day I returned to celebrate Mass at the Sacred Heart as I had promised. When it was over, a nun appeared at the door and said to me, sobbing: “I beg you to pray at Mass and in your prayers for my unfortunate father”. “May I ask what happened to your father?” “Ah!” she replied, “I fear I have lost him both in time and eternity!”… If he had suffered death in a state of grace, I could be resigned to his loss; but to die so soon after a life far from God… is terrible and tragic! Oh! If only I were able to save my father’s soul I would suffer all the illnesses and sorrows of this earth, I would be ready to take upon myself the very torments of hell, to save his soul”. “Be comforted, O Mother! The Saviour also took pity on the good thief. Your prayers for your father have been granted”. “I doubt it, because my father belonged to a secret society, whose members refuse any spiritual consolation to the dying”. “And what if your father did receive the help of religion?”
[1848]
The religious looked at me doubtfully, without hope. Then I drew that last page from my wallet and gave it to her. Her eyes were transfigured, she pressed those words to her lips, and falling to her knees, raised her hands to heaven. Looking up with her eyes brimming with tears, she cried out, her voice full of emotion: “Thanks be to God forever! My father is saved!”

(Fr Daniel Comboni)