Writings

[5668]

Thanks to the many good offices and insistence of His Excellency Gordon Pasha to ensure the friendship of the King of Abyssinia and peace in the provinces of the Blue Nile on its borders, His Highness the Khedive has consented to the election of the new heretical Coptic Bishop for the Abyssinians, who will travel from Nubia, entering Adua via Cadaref and Ghalabat.

[5669]

On 13th January I received your esteemed letter N.1, in which you let me know that the Superior General of the Sisters of St Joseph, after a decision by her council, has decided not to send any more Sisters to my Vicariate, and instead, to recall those who are still there.

[5670]

Although I am very upset by this decision, I am nonetheless far from feeling discouraged or humiliated, for I am certain that the sweetest Heart of Jesus which beats for unhappy Africa will provide help otherwise. The Apostolate of Central Africa is very difficult and demanding and requires great sacrifices: but it is possible, and God will help us.

[5671]

However, from the long silence maintained during the past year by the Mother General, who every day became justifiably more and more upset by the death of the last two excellent Sisters and by the turn she saw things were taking, I clearly realised that it would end like this; because recently no Sister has offered herself for Central Africa, and right from the start Mother General had only sent me those who asked for my Mission.

[5672]

There is no doubt that the Sisters of St Joseph have great merits for Central Africa, because they made huge sacrifices and worked there with great zeal and dévouement, and also with many results, especially the Eastern Sisters, converting many to the faith and helping the missionaries to put an end to concubinage and find a Christian solution for many families. This is why the 7th anniversary of the Apostolate of the Sisters of St Joseph in my Mission will be a golden page in the history of Central Africa that will never be forgotten. All the Sisters, those who died, those who returned and those who are currently in the houses of Khartoum and Cairo, always declared to me, in conversation and in writing, that they were and are happy with the way I always treated them and that they found me a true Father and Superior.

[5673]

However, it is necessary that Your Eminence know and honour the truth: that not one of the late Sisters of St Joseph, or perhaps only a few, died of the inclemency of the African climate, and that if they had been sent from Europe in time, if they had all been acclimatised in Cairo…, perhaps not one would have died because of the climate, as has been the case with the missionaries, for from 1871 to this moment no European priest acclimatised in Cairo has yet died in Central Africa; and of the three who did die, two died from the contagious epidemic which killed them (which also happens in Europe with the cholera), I was the cause of the third, for due to the urgent needs of the mission, I had him come to the Vicariate before he could be acclimatised in Cairo. But of the Sisters,

[5674]

1. Two died from violent falls from camels, that is, Sr Teresa and Sr Arsenia.
2. Two were already declared consumptive by the doctor of the Hospital in Cairo, that is, Sr Giuseppina and Sr Maddalena, and they extended their lives in the Sudan.
3. Two died at the age of almost sixty, that is, Sr Emiliana and Sr Genoveffa: the former was Superior in Cyprus and Saida for 30 years, the latter was in India for 16 years, and for another 9 years, Superior at the Cairo Hospital.

[5675]

4. Two, that is Sr Enrichetta and her companion, died in the epidemic.
5. While instead, for example, the 4 Sisters of the 1873 expedition, who spent the summer season in Cairo and made the journey to the Sudan in winter, are all alive and healthy; and so others would not have died.

[5676]

But however it may be, I am in a quandary at the moment; it is absolutely essential that I fill the gap the Sisters of St Joseph are leaving and remedy this, by converting Mother General, should the attempt succeed, to allow me to keep those I have and to send me others; or by providing in some other way.

[5677]

Since a wise proverb says: “let those who want to go, go; and those who do not want to go, send”, I must go to Marseilles and Rome to remedy and provide for this most important matter. Therefore after thinking a great deal about my affairs for the good of my most important Vicariate, I have resolved to beg Your Eminence, with your outstanding goodness to allow me to come to Europe for a few months, and especially to Rome, for the needs of my Vicariate. Since as well as the most important business of the Sisters mentioned above, I am prompted to carry out my idea, subject to approval, for the following strong reasons:

[5678]

1. I am in absolute need of communicating with Your Eminence and of opening my heart to you on many points which concern the good of this important mission.
2. Following the death of my incomparable General Administrator, Fr Antonio Squaranti, who was the right arm of my Work both in the Vicariate and in Verona, I have become aware of many important matters to be settled and negotiated for the whole Work.
3. My health, undermined by the extraordinary efforts and anxieties for which I am taken to task by Gordon Pasha’s good English doctor: to recover, I need rest and the help of the thermal waters in Europe, or at least those of Helouan in Cairo. I have virtually not slept at all for five months, I have persistent trouble in eating and I am stricken with constant bouts of fever.

[5679]

Consequently I would consider leaving here as my Representative in the Vicariate, the Superior of Jebel Nuba, Fr Luigi Bonomi, whom I summoned temporarily to Khartoum to replace the late Fr Squaranti in the General Administration (he is a capable man and well known to the Eminent Cardinal di Canossa who deeply appreciates him), and taking the necessary rest my shaky health requires by going to Europe for a few months to negotiate and conclude those matters that concern the absolute good of my Vicariate.

[5680]

Since if I wait for Your Eminence’s venerable permission in Khartoum, I shall no longer be able to cross the desert because the season of tropical heat is imminent, I will now make the most of the facilities granted me by Gordon Pasha to go via Suakin and the Red Sea to my establishment in Cairo, where I beg Your Eminence to send me the requested permission to come to Rome and kiss the feet of the new Pontiff Leo XIII.

[5681]

Nevertheless, the results and the souls saved in this year hit by so many disasters, are more than twice the number saved in previous years, especially in Khartoum, Kordofan and Jebel Nuba.
The Devout Mothers of Africa have now settled in the kingdom of Kordofan and the whole city greeted them enthusiastically.

[5682]

The 4 Sisters of St Joseph are staying in Khartoum, and as well as the mission there is the government hospital which Gordon Pasha wants to entrust to the Sisters.
After all the Lord will arrange things for the best for his glory and for the good of Africa, which he certainly wants to save.
Prostrate as I kiss your Sacred Purple and await your venerable permission in Cairo (Egypt), with full respect, I remain Your Eminence’s
most humble, respectful and devoted son,

+ Daniel, Bishop and Vicar Apostolic

[5683]

I am infinitely grateful for your precious letter of 16th January last. Crosses and great tribulations are the hallmark of God’s works. Many say so with their lips and preach it from pulpits; but when crosses arrive they are disheartened, distressed and weak. The missionaries and Sisters of Central Africa must be lambs for the slaughter, people destined to great suffering for Jesus Christ. They must not be anything else, because otherwise they would not be apostles but clowns, and good for nothing. I would like this to be inculcated in our African Institutes; I shall not be satisfied until they are brought down to this point, and with God’s grace they will be.

[5684]

In the meantime I am pleased to see that about this […] our men educated at the Verona Institute are much better than the Roman or Neapolitan ones. I think the Neapolitans will all end by running away, on one pretext or another, but basically through lack of spirit and fear. It doesn’t matter. God selects his chosen ones. Instead ours, such as Fr Losi, Fr Bonomi, Fr Fraccaro and especially our Veronese Sisters, are braver than before. So are the Sisters of St Joseph who are here. But since their Mother General has no more to send (because no obediences are given for Central Africa and Australia unless they are requested), even they will end by being recalled.

[5685]

To provide for the Vicariate and to see to a mountain of outstanding matters, since my health has collapsed and the English doctor has absolutely ordered me to travel, to take the thermal waters, etc., I shall probably go to Cairo; thus I hope, as well the other things to arrange with Fr Rolleri, that he will come to Khartoum, which would be of great benefit to the Work.

[5686]

Then I absolutely must go to Syria to commend myself to the Maronite Patriarch (with whom I am already corresponding; however the proverb says “let those who want to go, go; and those who do not want to go, send”; but in a year there has been nothing but nice words) to provide teachers of both sexes for the Vicariate (and also for Verona, I mean, Arabs), because with the departure of the Sisters of St Joseph, many of whom were Arabs, I am left with no schools.

[5687]

In brief, I am in a mess, but leaving the world to gossip as it please, I trust in the Heart of Jesus and in my duty which I must fulfil. This year the number of conversions is double that of other years, because this is how God’s works are;
in Jebel Nuba there have been more than 330; but when the language has been mastered, at which Fr Bonomi has been toiling, the whole tribe, apart from a few of the elderly, will become Catholic. Your son kisses your Sacred Purple,

+ Daniel Bishop

Sr Grigolini and our Verona Sisters have settled well in Kordofan.

[5688]

While I was waiting for some Sisters, not only for this house but also for the government hospital here in Khartoum, which Gordon Pasha has offered me for our Sisters, as was written to you on my request; whilst I am still ill, a letter from His Eminence the Cardinal Prefect, our Father, informs me that after the deliberations of your general council, you came to the decision not only not to send me any other Sisters but even to withdraw those who are currently associated in my Work.
This is what I clearly foresaw and greatly feared, after God, with his inscrutable decrees, called to the glory of heaven the three last Sisters who had perfect health and possessed a true religious spirit and admirable dedication.

[5689]

Lastly, I am infinitely sorry, because the Congregation of St Joseph has done great good to me and to Central Africa, and the new victims of charity buried in the land of Africa will be the glorious seed of Christians and converts. I will always remember your Congregation, you who have always been generous to me and very open, and that incomparable Mother whom God called to himself, who was a glory to Catholic women, a force of the Church and a great benefactress of Central Africa: our late Mother General.

[5690]

His Eminence tells me I should come to an agreement with you about the Sisters being recalled. Sr Severina has repeatedly told me that she will only leave Khartoum after the Kharif, because at the present time the hot season is approaching and she does not want to cross the desert to be scorched by the sun. Moreover, I need a little time to provide for Khartoum and I cannot suddenly leave a great Institute of girls without Sisters. I must provide for it.

[5691]

But since hope is man’s life and he never loses it however debilitated he may be by fevers and past sufferings (since this year which is about to end has been the most terrible of all the epochs in Central Africa’s history) I myself will face the desert, and, with His Eminence’s permission, I shall make a short journey to Europe, either to arrange something with you, if possible (although I do not have much hope because the first General Assistant and especially the Superior of the hospital in Cairo, who will certainly have spread the word, do not deem it appropriate to make further sacrifices for Central Africa) or to provide otherwise for the needs of the Khartoum Mission.

[5692]

I shall therefore come personally to discuss with you whatever the good Lord may dispose. Personally, I am sure that the Cross is the regal way that leads to triumph for all God’s Works. The Catholic Church is founded on the blood of Martyrs and it is through martyrdom that Missions prosper. Almost all your Sisters have converted and saved a certain number of souls. It would be hard for them in other Missions to have the consolations they have had in their Central African apostolate.

[5693]

For my part, I have always treated them as true daughters and they have borne me witness on this. I hope they will never forget me or Central Africa.
In the hope of seeing you soon, please write to me in Cairo, where I shall await His Eminence’s permission to return to the eternal city.
Pray for
Your most devoted

+ Daniel Comboni
Bishop and Vicar Apostolic Vicar.

All four Sisters are in perfect health.

Translated from French

[5694]

Here is the rest of my short report on the famine and mortality in Central Africa. I would gladly give you further serious and interesting details, but my health is broken and I am too weak.

[5695]

I hope you received my letter n. 4 of 17th February, with the statistical table and the beginning of the short report.
Also for the future, from now on, I beg you to have the amount of the allocations sent every year to Mr Brown et Fils in Rome, which is the safest way for me to receive them in Central Africa.

[5696]

In sum, it is a fundamental maxim of my Plan for the Regeneration of Central Africa, which we have followed until now and which we always find the most appropriate, reasonable and necessary (to act otherwise would harm both the native people and the Mission itself) with regard to food, lodging, clothing, etc., to
1) bring up the children in the orphanages in conditions which make no changes in their way of living in everything concerning their material life;

[5697]

2) direct their instruction by regulating its level according to the state to which they are called. Thus the education imparted to them will bring them later on to be able to exert, at very little cost to the Vicariate, the greatest influence among their compatriots. Why create new needs for these peoples and make them give up their customs and those of these lands? I have acquired a fair amount of experience in this regard.
The children I found in Khartoum when I was made responsible for the Vicariate of Central Africa in 1872 had been accustomed to European ways, and I needed great patience to change the conditioning of the older pupils.

[5698]

But the new orphanages I have founded here in Kordofan function differently: I have left all that was good in their habits, improving them, but always in accordance with their country’s natural state. This is far better for these children who are growing up without pretences, humble, submissive and very happy in their normal condition, while the African boys and girls educated in the most perfect and strictly observant monasteries in Europe make the same demands and claims here as European Missionaries and Sisters.

[5699]

This is why for some years I have no longer been accepting African boys and girls educated in Europe and in the convents of the East. We educate them here in their humble condition and in the simplicity of the spirit of Jesus Christ and of our holy religion, without introducing them to the pollution of European commodities and civilisation, and we have already had some very comforting results.
Lastly, you understand well my views and what I want to say, I hope that you consider it a good plan and that you will find it suitable and necessary for the instruction and education we need to give the indigenous children in our Missions.
Monsignor, please deign to accept the sentiments of devotion and gratitude with which I remain
Your most devoted servant,

+ Daniel Comboni
Bishop of Claudiopolis i.p.i.
Vicar Apostolic of Central Africa

Translated from French.

[5700]

I beg your pardon for my long silence and my delay in giving you news of the Vicariate of Central Africa that you have helped so much through the admirable zeal of the generous, charitable ladies of the Apostolic Society. You have clothed and saved so many young girls, you have redeemed so many child slaves, bringing them into the sheepfold of Jesus Christ! You have earned such merit by wonderfully adorning God’s house and attracting to the spectacle of the Catholic Church’s magnificent ceremonies the gaze of infidels who had never seen such marvels and were lying in the shadow of death!

[5701]

But, as though all you have done for the Africans were nothing at all, you extended your immense charity even further to cover the needs of the Gospel workers whom you clothed in Church vestments and fortified by sending wine to these lands where it cannot be found, to quench one’s thirst: because we pay more than the price of wine in Europe for merissa and for muddy, dirty and brackish water!

[5702]

May God reward you a hundredfold, Madame, in this life and the next, for all the good you are doing for his glory by adorning his Church and helping his Missionaries in their evangelising mission.

[5703]

I have told you, Madam President, begging your pardon for my silence, that after the appalling famine and drought which has ravaged Central Africa, there has been an unprecedented mortality rate:
1. In one part of my Vicariate, three times the size of France, half the population has died, as has more than half the cattle; in other vast areas three quarters of the population and all the animals have died.
2. In large villages and towns not far from Khartoum, not only has all the population died, but so have all the cattle, the animals and also all the dogs who are the only providential guards of public safety in these places.

[5704]

My Missionaries, my Sisters and all the members of the Mission have been more or less dangerously ill and at death’s door. Three Missionaries, including my great Vicar and administrator, Fr Antonio Squaranti (my right hand), died in the epidemic, as have two Sisters, four first-rate European lay brothers and thirteen African male and female teachers. There was one period in September when I was the only priest left to administer the sacraments to the dying, day and night. I had to be not only bishop, but also superior, priest, vicar, administrator, doctor, surgeon, nurse, etc., etc.
In the end I fell ill myself because of the unheard-of fatigue, worries, grief and fevers. I have been in this state for the last two months and my strength is depleted.

[5705]

I would like to give you a short report on the famine, drought and mortality in Central Africa, which are far worse than those in China and India and in all the other Missions in the world; and a brief report on the 25 African boys and girls we have taken in with the funds of the Apostolic Society, to whom we have given names in accordance with Mgr Gaume’s orders; but I should need a little more strength. My health is undermined by a complete lack of sleep and appetite. I hope to be able to recover with the half glass of Bordeaux wine which I drink once a day, thanks to the charitable consignment of a hundred bottles sent by the Apostolic Society.

[5706]

The names we have given the children so far are the following: Giuseppe, Giovanni Battista, Alessandro, Pietro, Andrea, Carlo, Agostino, Stefano, Alessio, etc., etc.; Vittorina, Maria, Agnese, Clemenza, Cecilia, Rosa, Antonietta, Carolina, Eleonora, Marta, etc. I have interesting details to tell you about these children, especially about the way they were violently abducted from their homes and their parents.

[5707]

For the love of God, please send me wine every year. There is such a shortage of it that last year for several months we celebrated Mass only on Sundays in Kordofan; I was sending some small bottles of wine by post from Khartoum. Here, the Missionaries who have survived the famine are weak and exhausted; Liebig soup cubes and tapioca for their broth will do them a world of good.

[5708]

Among the church vestments in the Vicariate, we do not have a chasuble nor a particularly beautiful vestment for pontifical occasions. I have the magnificent crozier that you sent me, but lack the corresponding chalice, chasuble and cope. I would be especially glad if the Apostolic Society could also send me some hard-wearing cloth for the Missionaries’ clothes and some material to clothe the slave women we buy, who come to us dressed with the skin of our grandmother Eve before the sin of our first ancestors.
All the women in Jebel Nuba walk around like this, whether married or not; they would need frocks or very ample shifts. The same is true for the African boys: the French tunics worn by workmen would do very well for them, especially if they are long and in one piece, and made of cotton.
I am forced to end this letter, as I am still dreadfully weak. Pray for your grateful servant,

+ Daniel Comboni
Vicar Apostolic of Central Africa

Translated from French

[5709]

Your telegraphic dispatch from Massaua requesting news of Gessi reached me when I was seriously ill with a fever; since there was only vague and uncertain news, I did not reply, for it would have been madness to spend money uselessly to give news that might be unreliable.

[5710]

I can now give you some real news, confirmed by Gordon Pasha and by someone who came to me, sent by Gessi from the place where he is. In the meantime he has been awarded the title of Bey; the Khedive’s diploma reached Khartoum this morning, and my excellent friend the good Emin Effendi (Schnitzler), Governor of the Equator, has also been made Bey. These two appointments were highly praised by public opinion because both men deserve them. But the appointment of Giegler, chief of the telegraph service, as Pasha and Wakil of the Hoccumdar produced the same effect in Khartoum as when Rosset was made a Knight of the Italian Crown, in which you were somewhat the loser, because Rosset was far better known in Khartoum than you, and he certainly did not merit a decoration, since he has never done a thing to deserve one.

[5711]

Now the matter has become more serious, because Rosset has died, and all his assets were liquidated. In the end there was not even enough to cover his wife’s dowry of 500 pounds sterling; and now, besides all his other creditors, two gentlemen have been left high and dry, that is the above-mentioned Governor of the Equator, Emin Bey, who lost all his assets of 360 Egyptian guineas which he had deposited with Rosset who had spent them, and the English Vice-Consul, Giorgi Stambulieh who, to help him and win his favour, had lent him 300 pounds sterling. He and Emin Bey were left penniless. An excellent Catholic engineer from Nyanza Albert, Ibrahim Khalifa from Tripoli, would also have met the same fate, arriving in Khartoum with a mind to deposit 350 guineas and 460 gold napoleons with Rosset, but I dissuaded him in conscience because I knew of the condition of Rosset (whom, however, I helped in other ways).

[5712]

Rosset, it appears, was poisoned in Darfur.
Returning to Gessi: he fought four battles against Ziber’s troops; more than 2,000 killed and 800 captured with 4 Zaribs, but Ziber was not vanquished. He then asked for reinforcements and Gordon Pasha ordered the Mudir of Dara in Darfur, a certain engineer Messedaglia from Verona, to go to Shaka with 700 men. The day before yesterday Gordon told me that Ziber had been overcome and that Gessi had won. But in a few days, Gordon himself will going to Kordofan and Shaka and will be returning with Gessi, who has really done himself proud.

[5713]

Courage, my dear doctor and friend. It seems to me that you have chosen the best way to achieve your purpose; I prefer it to all the others. For if you succeed, which I hope you will, in assuring yourself of King Giovanni’s friendship, you will also be able to establish trade with Abyssinia, and more fruitfully than elsewhere. But you must try to learn the language which, with your medical knowledge, will enable you to succeed with 80% more probability than Antinori and others.

[5714]

But you know the story, from Nuñes and Pietro Paes until today: one can never be sure of Abyssinian stability.
But beside you and with the Gallas, you will find some excellent characters. A thousand greetings when you see Mgr Massaia. Piaggia has left for the Mountains of Sennar and will perhaps press on for a long time, as far as Fadassi.

[5715]

Perhaps Fr Gennaro and I will make a trip to Rome and Syria, and I shall procure some Maronite teachers, because I want to set up schools everywhere. I have great hopes for the Jebel Nuba Mission.

[5716]

In the meantime I send you heartfelt greetings; give my regards to Callisto and telegraph me, that is, have Filippini telegraph from Massaua to me in Khartoum, and I will transmit the message to Cairo and Europe, etc. Correnti is no longer President of the Geographic Society.
All yours
Your most affectionate

+ Daniel Comboni
Bishop and Vicar Apostolic

Please give my respects to Mgr Touvier, Bishop and Vicar Apostolic of Abyssinia.

[5717]

I have travelled from Khartoum to Cairo via the Suakin desert in only 40 days.
The fever left me a short time after I entered the desert; but the general inflammation persists. I hope to get rid of it with the waters of Recoaro, and I still can’t sleep even a single hour in 24, which is why I am always tired. However, the worries and the general direction of the whole Work make me ever firmer in my unshakeable trust in God, that we shall succeed in destroying Satan’s kingdom for the conversion of Central Africa to Christ.

[5718]

However, to be in order, it is necessary for me to submit many important matters to Your Eminence’s wisdom and advice. I hope everything will be dealt with in a short time and that I shall be able to accomplish in a few months everything I need to do in Europe for Africa’s good; for as soon as the rains and the Kharif are over, I would like to return to the Vicariate immediately, especially to Jebel Nuba, which promises the liveliest hopes.

[5719]

But since time is short and I do not want to waste it, given my great weakness and the torment of being unable to sleep, I yearn to consult the Most Venerable Mgr Curcia who is here in Cairo (in rather poor health) with whom I hope within a few days to resolve a few small outstanding matters we must finalise together. I heard about them only the other day, because nothing had been said or written to me about them since 1874, either by the excellent Monsignor himself (to whom I shall be eternally grateful for all the good he has truly done for my Work and whom I regard and have always regarded since 1867 as my prime benefactor, my expert and wisest Advisor), or anyone else. Therefore, as I was saying, I would like to consult him to see if I can leave Egypt immediately for Rome; thus I should gain time without having to await Your Eminence’s official permission in writing to go there ad limina. I am sure Your Eminence will grant me this favour, and I may well leave Cairo before I receive your letter of obedience, providing the venerable counsel of the Vicar Apostolic Mgr Ciurcia approves.

[5720]

As regards financial means, thanks to the unfailing protection of my dear bursar St Joseph, the Vicariate’s finances have been restored. Many souls are preparing to join the faithful, especially in Kordofan and in Jebel Nuba: but we need good and devout Sisters. God will send them.
I kiss your Sacred Purple and remain with the deepest respect
Your Most Reverend Eminence’s most humble, devoted and obedient son

+ Daniel Comboni
Bishop and Vicar Apostolic