Writings

[3492]
After my explorers had left the Nuba territory, where they had stayed only a short time, the great chief Kakum sent one of his officials to El Obeid to tell me that quite a number of chiefs from the mountains, hearing of the arrival of the Missionaries, had gone to Delen (Mako in the Nuba language) to see them and that, based on what they had learned about them, they had asked the chief Kakum to make us decide to go and settle among them. If I had a hundred Missionaries we could do great good.
[3493]
This envoy from Kakum, on the way to El Obeid, met some Baqqarah Arab nomads who are Muslim. They asked him if he was Christian too, since the Nuba, after the visit of our expedition, are already saying they are Christian. He answered in the affirmative. At once the Arabs tore off his “ghorbab” (the rich garment of the Nuba) and beat him. The envoy arrived in El Obeid the very day I was leaving for Khartoum. I assured him that we would go to them and made him a present of a long shirt. He returned home very satisfied.
[3494]
It is 49 days since I left El Obeid and my Missionaries write to me that the Nuba do not stop sending messengers to know when we will be going to them. It seems that the hour of salvation has come for these people. I hope, therefore, that we shall be able to form a Christian community there among them which will make the apostolate possible in the other tribes.


Daniel Comboni


Translated from the French.

[3495]
I am pleased to send Your Eminence the enclosed report on the exploration of the Nuba territory, which was sent to me by Fr Carcereri, from whom you will soon be hearing the interesting details. This tribe being barely four days away from El Obeid, we could already allow ourselves to lay the first stones of the planned spiritual structure which will perhaps have vital consequences for the Redemption of Africa. I shall not fail to send you all similar information and tell you of the method of action which seems to me most appropriate for undertaking this new mission; but only after my arm has recovered somewhat.
Thanking Your Most Reverend Eminence for your precious letters N. 4 and N. 5 which I shall answer as soon as possible, I kiss the Sacred Purple and remain in the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary,
Your Most Reverend Eminence’s most humble, devoted and obedient son

Daniel Comboni
Pro-Vicar Apostolic

[3496]
Let us pray for the most unhappy black peoples of Central Africa, which amount to one tenth of the whole human race, that God, who can do everything, may once and for all remove from their hearts the curse of Ham and grant them the blessing that only the name of Jesus Christ, God and Our Lord can confer.



PRAYER

[3497]
0 Lord Jesus Christ, only Saviour of the entire human race, who already rules from sea to sea and from the river to the ends of the earth, open wide Your Most Sacred Heart to these most wretched souls in Central Africa, who are all
still in the darkness and the shadow of death, that by the intercession of the most compassionate Virgin Mary, your Immaculate Mother, and her most glorious Spouse Joseph, these Africans may abandon their idols, prostrate themselves before you and join your Church. You who live, etc.
Pater, Ave, Gloria.



The Rescript of the Sacred Congregation of Rites follows.
It concords with the original Decree held in this Chancellery of the Vicariate Apostolic of Central Africa.

Issued in Khartoum, Central Africa, by the Chancellery of the Vicariate Apostolic on 25th January 1874.



(Place + Stamp)



Daniel Comboni
Pro-Vicar Apostolic of Central Africa

[3498]
I am just back from the White Nile, where I accompanied as far as Tura-el-Khadra my devout and excellent missionary, Fr Giovanni Losi, three Sisters of St Joseph and other individuals whom we loaded onto sixteen camels bound for Kordofan. His Excellency Ismail Pasha, Governor General of the Egyptian possessions in the Sudan, made freely available to me for this purpose a large steamer; and by the time Your Most Reverend Eminence receives this letter, the important Mission of El Obeid will be equipped with a new Institute of Missionary Sisters who are destined to do great good. To this effect I have already acquired, paid for and restored a comfortable house separated from our Church and dwelling by a large public highway called Derb-el-Sultanía, or Imperial Street.
[3499]
With the next post, I shall send you a brief general report on the present state of the Vicariate, that is, what has been done so far and what we must do in the future to plant the faith firmly in Central Africa.
[3500]
I shall limit myself here to giving you some detailed news of a number of incidental but important matters.
As soon as I reached Khartoum last year, seeing that our church was small, I thought of building a new larger one; but when I returned three months ago from Kordofan, I found that it was most urgent to build the house for the Sisters, who have been living until now in a rented house rather far from the Mission. This decision of mine greatly pleased the Vienna Committee, which immediately set about finding aid. To build the house for the Sisters in accordance with the plan sent from Vienna as long ago as 1854, at least 200,000 francs are necessary: but with only 50,000 francs, according to precise calculations, I hope to build according to the same design a part of the establishment, that is, 12 fine solid rooms, each 6 metres long and 5 metres and 48 centimetres wide, which can serve hic et nunc as a dwelling, a workshop and a school for the female Institute, allowing me to continue the building when I have more resources.

[3501]
Since I have been planning this project for a few months, already in El Obeid, I drew a cheque on my bursar St Joseph. And now I see that the venerable old gentleman (under whose beard rests the money for the building of two establishments among the Nuba within one year, and whom I have fined 50,000 francs for having allowed, in the Plains of Kordofan, that terrible fall from the camel which broke my arm) appears to be honouring my signature. In only 15 days St Joseph has sent me the not inconsiderable sum of 30,540 gold francs, 4000 francs of which were sent to me by His Highness Franz V, Archduke of Eastern Austria, Duke of Modena, with a long letter of three whole pages in his own hand, written to me by this most Catholic and devout Catholic Prince who is crazy about the Work for Africa. A further 12,500 francs were given to me by Their Apostolic Majesties, Emperor Ferdinand I and Empress Maria Anna Pia of Austria (the sister of the venerable Maria Cristina, Queen of Naples), announced in a letter of 13th December from the Imperial Castle in Prague and sent to the Marian Committee in Vienna for transmittal to me by hand. This Imperial House, which I know personally, has in a short time made donations for my Work in Africa amounting to 32,995 gold francs, and there is the prospect that it will continue to give me its powerful protection in the future.
[3502]
Central Africa requires gigantic resources; but it has an excellent administrator in St Joseph, and the Sacred Heart of Jesus is rich in mercy and cash. Now that Your Eminence’s supreme charity has obtained approval for that Latin prayer which I sent you from Khartoum in June last year, pro conversione Chamitarum Africae Centralis ad Ecclesiam Catholicam, and that our Holy Father has enriched it with a plenary indulgence for anyone who recites it every day for a month, and a 300 year indulgence for whoever says it only once, I can assure you that Central Africa will be well provided for in all things, since once such a prayer has spread all over the Catholic world, it will produce prayers, vocations and money, which are precisely the three ingredients needed for the conversion of unfortunate Africa.
[3503]
Concerning, therefore, the construction of the house for the Sisters in Khartoum, on the 9th of this month I blessed the first stone and with more than 30 men working on it, with the 600 ardebs of mortar bought and paid for, with the 400,000 large bricks bought and paid for, and with the 300 sunt (a wood as strong as ebony) rafters and 20 large sunt beams (for which I paid 7 scudi each) the foundations are already laid and by June the Sisters will be living in the new house. By so doing, I hope to be making things which will be solid and lasting. It seems to me that the Sacred Heart is with us and that he will help me to overcome the enemies of the Holy Work.
[3504]
It is not unlikely that I will soon be visiting the territory of the old Stations on the White Nile, that is, Holy Cross and Gondokoro and as far as the sources of the Nile. I hope His Excellency the Pasha, Governor General of the Sudan (who is visiting Gondokoro for the first time, where the headquarters of a new Muderia or Egyptian Province has been established) and the Austrian Consul, himself once Master of the Mission of Gondokoro, will accompany me with three steamers. I will complete this visit in just two months, since the steamer takes only 15 days to go from Khartoum to Gondokoro, whereas with the sailing boats 5 months and 5,000 francs in expenses would not be sufficient to make this pastoral visit and suffer all kinds of hardships. Instead, with the Pasha’s steamers, one travels in comfort and the only expense is a tip for the captains and the sailors.
[3505]
I now want to give you a new proof of the capital importance of the Mission of Obeid, which is the true door of Africa, and the starting point and operations base to implant the Faith in the Central part of the Vicariate. The fact is that the kingdom and empire of Darfur, whose territory starts three days’ journey from El Obeid, and whose capital and whose Sultan’s residence is a 15-day journey by camel, is about to become an Egyptian province. Gibert Bey, the Governor of Shiakka on the Bahar-el-Ghazal to the south of the kingdom of Darfur, attacked the people of Darfur under the false pretext that they were coming to his province to practise the slave trade; and he won a decisive victory, killing the Vizier of the Sultan of Darfur.
[3506]
The grand Pasha of Khartoum (who gave me this news by reading me Gibert Bey’s hand-written letters and telegrams to the Khedive of Egypt) sent reinforcement troops to El Obeid, ordering its Governor to attack Darfur from the east. Darfur is hermetically closed, the water wells surrounding it having been destroyed: but the Governor general sent 5,000 camels with water to the besieging troops. Since they have cannons and fire-arms in good working order, the victory of the Egyptians will be assured. Now Darfur has been closed to foreigners for centuries, and the old law of its Sultans is to put to death any foreigner. This law was always enforced, save in a few rare exceptions as in the case of the present Pasha of Kordofan who, about twelve years ago as he has told me himself, having gone to Darfur with rich gifts from the Viceroy of Egypt, was held hostage there for 22 months and he said himself that he suffered greatly because each day he was afraid of being slaughtered.
[3507]
Now if Darfur were to become an Egyptian province, the true Church of Jesus Christ will be in a position to plant the Cross there in a short time. Although Darfur is in exactly the same condition as Kordofan, that is, Muslim, its capital Tendelti would nevertheless become the closest door to the vast empire of Bornù, in other words, what El Obeid is today for the Nuba people and other huge tribes of the Centre of the Vicariate. The Governor General assured me simply that it is the Khedive of Egypt’s intention to reach as far as the empire of Bornù. But I will write to you about this later.
[3508]
In the meantime it is necessary for us to assure our action among the Nuba, an enterprise in which I feel certain Your Eminence’s wise judgement will be positive. However, I will not take one step without hearing the oracle of Propaganda, in the firm conviction that my steps will be blessed by God when they are guided by the Sacred Congregation, teacher of prudence and wisdom in all that concerns apostolic missions.
[3509]
It appears the Khedive of Egypt has finally seen through Baker’s deceits and knows the real truth about the alleged victories and discoveries of the routes from Gondokoro to Zanzibar. He seems to be highly angered by this braggart, who devoured 29 million francs without even going beyond the boundaries of the Catholic mission of Gondokoro. Now he has sent another English colonel who was previously involved in navigation works on the Danube. His assignment is to try to succeed in Baker’s enterprise. In any case, it is in the interest of the Mission of Central Africa to maintain and consolidate good relations with the Egyptian government, and to show the greatest prudence in dealing with it so as to bring to a happy conclusion the great affair of the slave trade. I have made some serious studies on this issue of wise conduct, which could be a source of immense good for the Faith, but which could also lead to snags and mournful consequences should the greatest prudence not be shown. I kiss your sacred purple
Your most humble and devoted son

Daniel Comboni,
Pro-Vicar Apostolic

I will reply very soon to your venerable letters on the Conventions with the Delegate Apostolic and the Mother General; Fr Carcereri is dealing with the matter.

[3510]
In a few days I shall send you a long report: for the moment I am very busy. Our admirable Sr Giuseppina is moving towards eternity. Twenty days ago I gave her Extreme Unction and the papal blessing. She is better today, but I believe that Sr Giuseppina will go to heaven within this month. I would be very happy to keep her, if only in bed, for 50 years: she is a worthy Christian heroine.
[3511]
On the first of this month our Sisters Germana, Maddalena and Ignazia arrived in Kordofan and triumphantly entered the capital, El Obeid. Everyone was happy to greet these glorious virgins of St Joseph who have had the courage to overcome all the great difficulties and be the first to go to the most central Mission in Africa, where the Gospel had never penetrated until 1872. I shall write to settle and re-establish our affairs. In the meantime I beg you to send me to Cairo many Arab Sisters like Sr Anna, Sr Germana and Sr Giuseppina. I hope that after the feast of St Joseph you will be able to send me at least half a dozen. I am infinitely grateful for your bounty, my good mother, because you even planned to send me the late Sr Abdù. You are doing everything you possibly can to come to the rescue of the Mission.
[3512]
At present I am in contact with Sr Angelica whom I wish would come to Central Africa. One Arab Sister, dear Mother, is worth two Missionaries here, but not all the Arab Sisters: there are also the ones who resemble Sr Giuseppina, Sr Germana and Sr Anna. For the love of God, strip Syria and Palestine of the Arab Sisters for now, and send them to me. This year I shall open a new Mission among the Nuba people in south-west Kordofan and Arab Sisters are needed there immediately, to respond to the wishes of these people who want to embrace our holy Faith. I commend myself to your motherly heart.
[3513]
The construction of the Khartoum house continues. Just for the foundations of the 12 rooms which will be finished in June, 202,000 bricks 25 centimetres in length, 12 in breadth and height, were required. In two years there will be a large house with a magnificent garden. Sr Germana says she likes Khartoum better than Marseilles. It is on two magnificent rivers.
I shall write to the President of the Propagation of the Faith asking him to pay you on my account, 3,000 francs that is, which is what remains due on the Lorenzo deal. Good bye, dear Mother! Give my regards to Sr Caterina and the Sisters in Rome. Pray that I receive vestments for the church.

Your son, Daniel Comboni


Translated from the French.

[3514]
I must confess frankly that I have failed in my duty and in the imperious demands of my heart by remaining silent for so long. I have literally imitated the procrastinating sinners. As soon as I was appointed Pro-Vicar Apostolic of Central Africa and had hastened back to Verona, I had decided to pass through Brescia and deliver my greetings to Limone. But the urgent need to rush to Vienna and Cairo with a strong expedition prevented me, despite my intentions, from coming to spend a day in Brescia as I had wanted. But from Cairo, from Khartoum and from Kordofan I yearned to inform Your Excellency and your Most Reverend and venerable Secretary of the excellent progress being made in this arduous African enterprise. But I did not do it, although our little Annali del Buon Pastore in Verona, which should have been sent to you at my request as soon as it was published, must have given you a vague idea of my holy Work and perhaps of the Catholic Missions.
[3515]
In any case, as I beg forgiveness for such a long silence, I can assure you that I have not stopped praying for a single day in my unworthiness, or having prayers said here in the heart of Africa for Your Most Reverend Excellency and the Very Reverend Fr Carminati, and for the whole of my beloved native Diocese of Brescia, of which I preserve a most vivid and indelible memory. Now I shall just give you a very quick account of the successful development of this Work of the Sacred Heart, because my arm which was fractured prevents me from doing so at length. On 16th November, I left El Obeid, the capital of Kordofan, with My Vicar General, to return to my main residence in Khartoum. On the morning of the 25th, after a hard 9 day camel journey, my camel, already mad and frightened, started running faster than a horse, and threw me to the ground where I lay half dead and spitting blood. I did not even have time to commend myself to the Sacred Heart. When I came to, I realised that my left arm was broken.
[3516]
I had the tent pitched in the desert, and after soaking [my arm] for 42 hours continuously in water and date vinegar, I had to remount the camel for 5 days so as to avoid dying there in the desert. At the camel’s every step I had renewed spasms of pain in my broken and bruised left arm. God alone knows how I suffered. Finally reaching the White Nile at Omdurman, the Grand Pasha of Khartoum sent me his steamer which brought me to the mission. But there is not a doctor in the whole of Central Africa who knows the elementary principles of medicine and surgery.
[3517]
Our doctor is the Crucified Jesus. The Pasha sent me his cat-skinner, who tied up my arm and put it in a sling. I remained in great pain for 82 days with the arm slung to my neck; but the arm stayed badly mended and crooked, without the strength to move a leaf. I celebrated Mass on 2nd February; but with the greatest difficulty and forced to hold the host between my index and middle finger, because I could not bring my thumb and fingers together. After many pleas from my Arab Mother Superior, I agreed to let myself be seen by a so-called Arab doctor. He came on the eve of the feast of Saints Faustinus and Jovita. He was a Hercules and with a face like Judas Iscariot. After examining the arm, he assured me that I could be healed in 24 hours should I let myself be operated on. I accepted.
[3518]
The next day, he came with eight splints of date palm, a handful of goat hair, a piece of tiger tail and rubber: he was accompanied by two other Muslim cat-butchers: he grabbed my arm and, with the help of the other two, literally twisted it, and then with his muscular thumb, working with all his strength, pushed my protruding bone half an inch back into place, tearing the flesh and nerves and everything: then with a handkerchief he soaked the rubber, the goat hair and the tiger tail and bound my arm; then he strapped the splints around it in such a way that it seemed to stop my circulation, and left me there half dead on my angareb (a sort of bed we sleep on). How Jesus Christ must have suffered when they bound him and nailed him to the Cross! But the fact is that after a week of such continuous stricture I found that the arm was almost healed, the bone back in its place and now as I write, I am able to work as before: For all this I owe thanks first to the Lord, then to St Joseph and finally to the Turkish cat-butcher, who treated me in his manner with little delicacy and gentleness, but with great success.
[3519]
However I have by no means spared my dear bursar, St Joseph, to whose care I had commended myself for a safe journey from Kordofan to Khartoum. Since this dear saint let me have such a terrible fall from the camel, I well and truly fined him to the tune of one thousand gold francs a day for every day I would have to keep my arm in a sling. Since I had to keep it in the sling for 82 days, and was only able to say Mass five times during that period, my much respected bursar is condemned to paying me a fine of 82,000 francs. So, on the feast of Saints Faustinus and Jovita, patrons of our dear Diocese of Brescia, (82 days after my terrible fall in the desert), I prepared a promissory note for my dear Saint, setting out that he would have to pay me four thousand one hundred Napoleons over six months. Already I can see that, as usual, my good Bursar is honouring my signature since, from that day until today, as I write to Your Excellency, I have received 38,706 gold francs. These include 5,000 florins sent to me by those miracles of charity, Her Apostolic Majesty the Empress Maria Anna and the Emperor Ferdinand I from Prague, and 4,000 francs from that jewel of a true Catholic Prince, His Royal and Imperial Highness, the Duke of Modena, Franz V, writing from Vienna.
[3520]
So my bursar, although he was very poor during his own life, is now the distributor of the treasures of heaven, and he has never failed to help me. In the mere six and a half years since I began this work, he has provided me with 600,000 francs, that is, he has paid me letters of credit for 30,000 Napoleons. I assure you, Monsignor, that St Joseph’s Bank is more reliable than all the Rothschild Banks. On top of all this, this good bursar maintains for Africa, without a penny of debt, two houses in Verona, two in Cairo, two in Khartoum and two in El Obeid, the capital of Kordofan with more than 100,000 inhabitants, where Mass was celebrated and Jesus Christ adored for the first time in 1872.
[3521]
I have gone on a little too much without realising. Now I shall give you a brief account of the Work’s progress. On 26th September 1872, I left Verona with a caravan of 13 individuals. After arranging many things in Cairo, on 26th January 1873, I left this metropolis on board two large boats with 31 passengers including missionaries, Sisters of St Joseph of the Apparition, lay brother craftsmen and African women teachers. After sailing up the Nile and crossing the great Desert of Atmur under 60 degrees Réaumur from midday to four o’clock, in 99 days of most arduous travelling, we reached Khartoum, where we were greeted with great jubilation by all sorts of people. After a month’s stay in this capital (which has 48,000 inhabitants), on board a steamer made available to me free of charge by the Grand Pasha of the Sudan, with whom I live in a much more friendly harmony than the poor Bishops of Italy do with their Prefects and Mayors, I set off again up the White Nile to Tura-el-Khadra where, with 17 camels, I crossed the interminable territories of the Hassanieh and the Baqqarah, and in only 9 days travelling fast I reached the capital of Kordofan, El Obeid on 19th June, where I was greeted by the Turks with no less celebration than in Khartoum.
[3522]
When in October of 1871, from Dresden, I gave the order to Fr Carcereri, my present Vicar General who was then Vice Superior of the Institutes for Africans in Egypt, to set off from Cairo with three other companions to make an exploration of Kordofan, I let them have 5,000 francs for this arduous and tiring exploratory journey. Now in El Obeid we have a Parish, two fully paid houses, one for the missionaries and the other for the Sisters, and a fully active mission. In Khartoum itself, from 1863 to 1869 there was only one Franciscan Father and until January 1873 there were only two fathers of the same Order in a splendid house built by the German Missionaries in 1856 under the direction of my illustrious predecessor, Monsignor Knoblecher. Today there are two Institutes, a proper Parish and the new house I am now building for the Sisters of St Joseph, who are doing great good there.
[3523]
To whom do I now owe such good results? Entirely to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, to whom I solemnly consecrated the whole Vicariate, with the blessing of the Holy Father Pius IX, on 14th September, on which we held a most solemn ceremony preceded by the baptism of 12 adults and concluded by the confirmation of 25 new converts. The prayer of Consecration was composed by the Apostle of the Sacred Heart, Fr Ramière. At the same time, in Khartoum I composed in Latin a short Prayer for the conversion of my one hundred million Hamites, who make up one tenth of the human race (of which the Vicariate Apostolic of Central Africa, the largest in the world, consists). Now the Holy Father Pius IX has granted a magnificent Indulgence of 300 years to whoever recites it just once and a Plenary Indulgence to anyone who recites it every day for a month.
[3524]
Your Excellency can see how much the Holy Father cares for this Holy Work born on the 18th September 1864, the day of the Beatification of Alacoque. I have also written to the Holy Father Pius IX for him to grant that the Friday after the Octave of Corpus Domini dedicated to the sweetest Sacred Heart of Jesus be made a Holy Day of Obligation in the entire Vicariate of Central Africa and be celebrated as a Double of the First Class with an Octave; but I have not yet received an answer, because this is a most serious matter and Rome is eternal. But I shall insist so much that the Holy See will end by granting me this grace.
[3525]
It is the Heart of Jesus that must convert Africa. It seems the Holy Father has granted such a grace to the Republic of Ecuador in America, postulantibus its President and the Archbishop of Quito: I therefore hope that it will be granted also to this neglected part of the equatorial African world of mine, which for so many centuries has remained in the shadows of death.
[3526]
All my efforts so far have been aimed at properly consolidating and establishing the two chief Missions of Khartoum and El Obeid, which are the operations base from which to bring the faith to all the immense tribes of the Vicariate.
[3527]
Khartoum is the operations base for bringing the faith to all the tribes in the eastern part of the Vicariate, which are spread between Abyssinia, the Gallas and the White Nile to beyond the sources of the Nile on the 12th degree of Latitude South, which is the boundary of my jurisdiction. El Obeid, which is the real gate of Africa, is the operations base from which to bring the faith to all the tribes, kingdoms and empires located in the central part of my Vicariate. The climate in El Obeid is healthy and I hope to have an Austro-Hungarian Consulate erected there, its banner in these parts being the symbol of protection of the Catholic religion.
[3528]
On the basis of this plan for the organisation of the development of the Apostolate in Central Africa, the Heart of Jesus provoked a new step in our Apostolate. On the morning of Wednesday 16th July, dedicated to Our Lady of Mount Carmel, just as we emerged from our Hour of Adoration of the Guard of Honour of the Sacred Heart (which I have established every Wednesday in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament in all my houses of Egypt and Central Africa), a chief of the Nuba people, a vast tribe in the south-west of Kordofan, with a following of 15 people, entered the mission and invited me to establish a church and two houses in his tribe at Delen, for they are all prepared to become Christian. Since I have enough experience to know both the Africans and the Turks, I showed myself willing to second the wishes of these people: but I was slow to believe. I therefore asked the chief to come back in September, so that in the meantime I could take stock of my forces and gather the necessary information.
[3529]
Between Kordofan and the Nuba live the Baqqarah nomads, who practise assassinations and the slave trade, etc. Meanwhile, once these chiefs had left, I gathered precise information and consulted the Pasha of Kordofan, etc. He offered me 200 soldiers to accompany my explorers to the Nuba mountains. The fact is that on the morning of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary, 15th August, I decided to investigate these peoples, never as yet visited by any European and all idolatrous. I therefore ordered my Vicar General, who was in Khartoum, that the day after the solemn Consecration of the Vicariate to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, which he had to celebrate in Khartoum, he was to leave for El Obeid with appropriate provisions so that we might organise this important expedition together.
[3530]
Indeed, while he was on his way, on the morning of Wednesday 24th September dedicated to Our Lady of Mercy, after we came out from the Hour of Adoration pro Nigrizia, the great chief of the Nuba, who is a sorcerer, a king, a priest and a doctor, accompanied by 20 other persons, entered the mission and repeated his invitation to me to found a Church in his homeland. He was well pleased when I told him that the missionary who was to go to see his tribe, determine the place where the mission was to be founded and return to make preparations and see to all that is necessary for such a foundation, was already on his way. The chief visited the church and was struck by the statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the picture of the Sacred Heart and especially when he saw me play the accordion and the small organ of our little church. He was astonished by our hoes, pick-axes, saws, chisels and other tools for the arts and crafts. He stayed with us for a few days and then went away.
[3531]
When Fr Carcereri arrived, he refused the two hundred soldiers and contented himself with a guide. Accompanied by one other missionary and seven persons, he left for the Nuba territories, was welcomed with enthusiasm and, having determined the first site for a mission, returned to El Obeid. All the most interesting details of this expedition, as indeed of the whole Vicariate, Your Most Reverend Excellency will hear straight from the mouth of my Vicar General Fr Carcereri in person. I have sent him to Europe, that is, to Rome, Vienna, Verona and Paris on mission business and, as I write, he must have reached Cairo, since he left Khartoum on 11th December of last year. He has been instructed by me to pay his respects to Your Most Reverend Excellency and the Most Venerable Carminati.
[3532]
Who knows if the Sacred Heart will on this occasion arrange for my dear homeland, the Diocese of Brescia, to supply me with a few pious and able missionaries, or a few good craftsmen or lay brothers. When my Carcereri reaches Brescia, I humbly implore Your Excellency to send him to visit the Daughters of the Sacred Heart, where your venerable Sister died, the new Institute of the good Fr Pietro up in Castello, the Girelli Sisters at C.da S. Antonio and Fr Rodolfi. The visit of my representative to Brescia under Your Excellency’s protection will, I hope, be blessed by the Sacred Heart. My cousin Faustina Stampais from Maderno, who opened the female house in Kordofan and who is a Daughter of St Angela under the direction of the most devout and able Girellis, asks me to send her regards to Your Excellency, from whom she received Confirmation.
[3533]
On 11th December a second caravan of Sisters and missionaries reached me in Khartoum. Now even El Obeid has been enriched with an Institute of Sisters. One of them, Sr Xavérine from Bayeux in France, who loathes camels, most tiresome mounts, travelled for four days in the desert on a donkey: but since on the fifth night a hyena savaged the donkey’s back and two legs, she tackled the desert on foot for 13 days, travelling 13 or 14 hours a day, at times under 50 or 60 degrees Réaumur. She reached me in Khartoum completely exhausted; but she is now extremely well.
[3534]
I have no words to tell you the favourable impression the Sisters have made on these people. It is the first time since the world began that Brides of Christ have come to these scorching lands. Upon my arrival many Turks were astonished to see our Sisters. Some thought they were men from the moon, others thought they were women, but of another race. The Turks here certainly have great respect for the Sisters. I have some from Jerusalem, Syria, Lebanon, Armenia, France, Malta and Italy, and they all speak three, four or five languages. I have young ones of 20 and old ones of 40: but they are all equipped with a strong, sound religious education, proven morality and manly courage. They do not fear difficult and dangerous journeys, they sleep under a tree where a few hours previously a hyena or a lion has rested, they sleep on the sand at night in the open air or in a corner of a boat, they go into the houses of the infidels, treat their wounds and invite them to the faith, they go into the law-courts, they go to the markets and shop thriftily for the mission, while others see to the schooling and the moral education of the girls, and they stand before the Pasha to defend the cause of the wretched with courage and skilful ways, they obtain respect from the Turks, the powerful, the soldiers and the Africans, and they work for the Church as much and sometimes more than the most zealous missionaries themselves.
[3535]
All in all, after the experience of being with them in the midst of the most serious danger, in the face of which the bravest men in Europe would take fright, these Daughters of Catholic charity with the greatest calm and as if it were part of ordinary life stand upright and obtain respect from everyone. In a word, it is the power of the grace of the apostolic vocation that works such miracles in the missions; and while it has been ten years since many religious fled in terror from these burning sands although they had all had higher education in Europe, these instead often urge me to hasten to the more central tribes, where the needs are greater, to bring those Africans eternal salvation.
[3536]
While the love of Christ sustains them in these perilous trials, their hearts are wholly consumed by divine love, the Heart of Jesus is their only comfort, their strength, their life. Ah! Today’s turbulent world cannot understand the delights felt by the lovers of the most Sacred Heart of Jesus in suffering and dying for the love of him. A Cross, a tempest, an affliction borne for the Heart of Jesus is worth a hundred times more than the false comforts and delights of the world.
[3537]
I would like, Monsignor, to tell you of some of the admirable features of the grace of vocation in our Sisters of St Joseph of the Apparition, which was the first of all the Holy Institutes of the Church to face the African desert and set off into the heart of these populations which are the neediest in the world: but for the moment I shall limit myself to a single event which happened last October while I was in Kordofan and my Vicar General was among the Nuba.
[3538]
There is in Khartoum a Christian African girl, about 24, whose name is Teresa, baptised last year and in the service of a Christian gentleman. When she went to the market one day to do some shopping, she was abducted by a Muslim; and to make sure of his prey, this Muslim put in a plea to the Qadì, or magistrate, claiming that Teresa was his, that she had escaped from his house with no reason and that she had illicitly become a Christian. The Qadì interrogated the young woman as to whether it was true she had fled and had become a Christian: she answered that it was so. He then presented her with the Koran and threatened her with 500 lashes and death if she did not abandon Christianity and become Mohammedan again. She resolutely replied that she is a Catholic Christian and that she will die a Christian. So they tied her feet tight, tore off her clothes and dealt her feet 300 lashes of the korbash, a strip of hippopotamus hide. They invited her again at least twice to become Muslim again; and at her determined refusals, they dealt her another 300 korbash blows in the same conditions as before, then another two hundred: eight hundred all together. Her blood was gushing, her flesh was shredded in places, her bones were shattered and the marrow had flowed out of them: she just repeated : Ana Nassráni: “I am a Christian”.
[3539]
If I had been in Khartoum, the Qadì would certainly not have committed such a crime, because he knows how the mission is in a position to make him account for it. The mission knew nothing of all this. By chance Teresa’s real master came to know it, and ran to the mission, where the Superior was absent; there was only another missionary, Fr Vincenzo, who ran to the police to reclaim the Christian: but he was insulted there. When the Superior, Fr Pasquale Fiore, returned home and heard of this, he brought the most influential persons into play to force the Qadì to free the Christian: but all to no avail. What did he do? He went to find my Mother Superior, Sr Giuseppina Tabraui, 31, born in Jerusalem, who was in bed with a high fever and told her of the grievous affair.
[3540]
What does the Superior do? “I shall go to the Pasha”, says she and, with complete disregard for her burning fever (she is now living her last hours, it is 15 days since I gave her all the Sacraments and the papal blessing in articulo mortis) she gets up, dresses, takes another Armenian Sister with her and barely standing upright with a stick, drags herself to the Diwan of the Grand Pasha and requests with determination to have the beaten girl handed over to her instantly, saying that she would be reporting the crime committed in hatred of the Catholic religion to me. The Pasha declared that he knew nothing of it, but that he would give satisfaction for it all to the Pro-Vicar Apostolic: he treated the Sister with every kindness, asked her to forgive the judge and to refer her every desire to him and he would be pleased and honoured to give her satisfaction. The meeting lasted half an hour. Having dragged herself back to the Institute, she found that two soldiers had already carried Teresa back there, covered in wounds, her flesh in shreds and her bones broken: she is now getting better, happy to have suffered for Jesus Christ. I would also have many things to write to you about the horrors of slavery.
[3541]
Slave merchants armed with guns set off by the hundreds and go to the tribes to hunt Africans. To capture a thousand they kill at least two hundred. On the roads one meets these slaves on foot, of all ages and sexes all mixed together, but mostly girls from 4 to 20, dressed like our mother Eve in her state of innocence, sometimes tied by the neck by ropes attached to a long beam resting on the shoulders of ten or twelve of these wretches all in a row, sometimes their hands tied behind their backs or fettered by the ankle with heavy chains, etc., etc. and thus goaded along by these ruffians’ spears, they travel like this on foot for two or three months, twelve or fifteen hours a day. Others, up to 800 (eight hundred) are stowed inside a single boat on four roughly built decks made of reeds and in these conditions they travel a thousand miles. These wretches must do everything they are told by their captors and are then sold after, as I said, having been violently wrenched from their families, while their father or frequently their mother or anyone who defends them, is killed.
[3542]
This is but a pale idea of the horrors of slavery which is raging in my Vicariate. But my Vicar General will tell you much more: but never will he be able to portray the horrors in as vivid colours as they are in reality. You see, Monsignor, what a Mission God has entrusted to me! But the Heart of Jesus will triumph over all. Please do commend me and my mission to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, have the Daughters of the Sacred Heart in Brescia and elsewhere pray for us, for they are so well imbued with the marvels of the love of Jesus Crucified and pierced by the cruel lance. From that Heart must flow the saving waters which must wash these poor unhappy souls and call the hundred million or more infidels of my Vicariate to the path to eternal salvation; and I beg you to have distributed in our beloved Diocese of Brescia the prayer pro conversione Chamitarum Africae Centralis, which at my orders will be sent to you by the excellent Rector of my African Institute in Verona, Fr Antonio Squaranti.
[3543]
I send a thousand respects to that most powerful athlete of the Christian and Brescian priesthood, the Most Reverend Carminati, to the Daughters of the Sacred Heart and Mother Gesualda; my regards to your pious and most faithful butler, grant me your holy blessing, as I am pleased to remain in the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary with filial devotion and respect
Your Most Reverend Excellency’s
most humble, devoted and respectful son


Daniel Comboni
Pro-Vicar Apostolic of Central Africa

Kindly forgive, with your innate bounty, such rough writing due to my arm not yet being fully healed and Monsignor dalla Casa not yet being known in the deserts of Central Africa.