grown. Other foodstuffs raised are lentils, beans, onions and
melons. The date-palm is cultivated along the Nile valley below
Khartum, especially on the west bank in the Dongola mudiria and
in the neighbouring oases. Dates are also a staple product in
Darfur and Kordofan. Ground-nuts and sesame are grown in large
quantities for the oil they yield, and cotton of quality equal to
that grown in the Delta is produced. The Sudan was indeed the
original home of Egyptian cotton.
For watering the land by the river banks sakias (water-wheels) are used, oxen being employed to turn them. There are also a few irrigation canals. In 1910, apart from the date plantations, about 1,500,000 acres were under cultivation. In 1910 a system of basin irrigation was begun in Dongola mudiria.
Gum and rubber are the chief forest products. The gum is obtained from eastern Kordofan and in the forests in the upper valley of the Blue Nile, the best gum coming from Kordofan. It is of two kinds, hashab (white) and talh (red), the white being the most valuable. Rubber is obtained from the Bahr-el-Ghazal—where there are Para and Ceara rubber plantations—and in the Sobat district. The wood of the sunt tree is used largely for boat-building and for fuel, and the mahogany tree yields excellent timber. Fibre is made from several trees and plants. Elephants are hunted for the sake of their ivory. The wealth of the Arab tribes consists largely in their herds of camels, horses and cattle. They also keep ostrich farms, the feathers being of good quality. The Dongola breed of horses is noted for its strength and hardness. The camels are bred in the desert north of Berber, between the Nile and Red Sea, in southern Dongola, in the Hadendoa country and in northern Kordofan. The Sudanese camel is lighter, faster and better bred than the camel of Egypt. The camel, horse and ostrich are not found south of Kordofan and Sennar. The negro tribes living south of those countries possess large herds of cattle, sheep and goats. The cattle are generally small and the sheep yield little wool. The Arabs use the cattle as draught-animals as well as for their milk and flesh; the negro tribes as a rule do not eat their oxen. Fowls are plentiful, but of poor quality. Donkeys are much used in the central regions; they make excellent transport animals.
Mineral Wealth.—In ancient times Nubia, i.e. the region between the Red Sea and the Nile south of Egypt and north of the Suakin-Berber line, was worked for gold. Ruins of an extensive goldmine exist near Jebel Erba at a short distance from the sea. In 1905 gold mining recommenced in Nubia, in the district of Um Nabardi, which is in the desert, about midway between Wadi Halfa and Abu Hamed. A light railway, 30 m. long, opened in June 1905, connects Um Nabardi with the government railway system. The producing stage was reached in 1908, and between September 1908 and August 1909 the mines yielded 4500 oz. of gold. Small quantities of gold-dust are obtained from Kordofan, and gold is found in the Beni-Shangul country south-west of Sennar, but this region is within the Abyssinian frontier (agreement of the 15th of May 1902). There is lignite in the Dongola mudiria and iron ore is found in Darfur, southern Kordofan and in the Bahr-el-Ghazal. In the last-named mudiria iron is worked by the natives. The district of Hofrat-el-Nahas (the copper mine) is rich in copper, the mines having been worked intermittently from remote times.
Trade.—The chief products of the Sudan for export are gum, ivory, ostrich feathers, dates and rubber. Cotton, cotton-seed and grain (durra, wheat, barley) sesame, livestock, hides and skins, beeswax, mother-of-pearl, senna and gold are also exported. Before the opening (1906) of the railway to the Red Sea the trade was chiefly with Egypt via the Nile, and the great cost of carriage hindered its development. Since the completion of the railway named goods can be put on the world's markets at a much cheaper rate. Besides the Egyptian and Red Sea routes there is considerable trade between the eastern mudirias and Abyssinia and Eritrea, and also some trade south and west with Uganda and the Congo countries. The Red Sea ports trade largely with Arabia and engage in pearl fishery. The principal imports are cotton goods, food-stuffs (flour, rice, sugar, provisions), timber, tobacco, spirits (in large quantities), iron and machinery, candles, cement and perfumery. The value of the trade, which during the Mahdist rule (1884–1898) was a few thousands only, had increased in 1905 to over £1,500,000. In 1908 the exports of Sudan produce were valued at £E515,000[1]; the total imports at £E1,892,000.
Government.—The administration is based on the provisions of a convention signed on the 19th of January 1899 between the British and Egyptian governments. The authority of the sovereign powers is represented by a governor-general appointed by Egypt on the recommendation of Great Britain. In 1910 a council consisting of four ex officio members and from two to four non-official nominated members was created to advise the governor-general in the exercise of his executive and legislative functions. Subject to the power of veto retained by the governor-general all questions are decided by a majority of the council. Each of the mudirias into which the country is divided is presided over by a mudir (governor) responsible to the central government at Khartum. The governor-general, the chiefs of the various departments of state and the mudirs are all Europeans, the majority being British military officers. The minor officials are nearly all Egyptians or Sudanese. Revenue is derived as to about 60% from the customs and revenue-earning departments (i.e. steamers, railways, posts and telegraphs), and as to the rest from taxes on land, date-trees and animals, from royalties on gum, ivory and ostrich feathers, from licences to sell spirits, carry arms, &c., and from fees paid for the shooting of game. Expenditure is largely on public works, education, justice and the army. Financial affairs are managed from Khartum, but control over expenditure is exercised by the Egyptian financial department. The revenue, which in 1898 was £E35,000, for the first time exceeded a million in 1909, when the amount realized was £E1,040,200. The expenditure in 1909 was £E1,153,000. Financially the government had been, up to 1910, largely dependent upon Egypt. In the years 1901–1909 £E4,378,000 was advanced from Cairo for public works in the Sudan; in the same period a further sum of about £E2,750,000 had been found by Egypt to meet annual deficits in the Sudan budgets (see Egypt, No. 1 [1910], pp. 5–6).
Justice.—The Sudan judicial codes, based in part on those of India and in part on the principles of English law and of Egyptian commercial law, provide for the recognition of “customary law” so far as applicable and “not repugnant to good conscience.” In each mudiria criminal justice is administered by a court, consisting of the mudir (or a judge) and two magistrates, which has general competence. The magistrates are members of the administrative staff, who try minor cases without the help of the mudir (or judge). The governor-general possesses revising powers in all cases. Civil cases of importance are heard by a judge (or where no judge is available by the mudir or his representative); minor civil cases are tried by magistrates. From the decision of the judges an appeal lies to the legal secretary of the government, in his capacity of judicial commissioner. Jurisdiction in all legal matters as regards personal status of Mahommedans is administered by a grand cadi and a staff of subordinate cadis. The police force of each mudiria is independently organized under the control of the mudirs.
Education.—Education is in charge of the department of public instruction. Elementary education, the medium of instruction being Arabic, is given in kuttabs or village schools. There are primary schools in the chief towns where English, Arabic, mathematics, and in some cases land-measuring is taught. There are also government industrial workshops, and a few schools for girls. The Gordon College at Khartum trains teachers and judges in the Mahommedan courts and has annexed to it a secondary school. The college also contains the Wellcome laboratories for scientific research. Among the pagan negro tribes Protestant and Roman Catholic missions are established. These missions carry on educational work, special attention being given to industrial training.
Defence.—The defence of the country is entrusted to the Egyptian army, of which several regiments are stationed in the Sudan. The governor-general is sirdar (commander-in-chief) of the army. A small force of British troops is also stationed in the Sudan—chiefly at Khartum. They are under the command of the governor-general in virtue of an arrangement made in 1905, having previously been part of the Egyptian command.
For topography, &c., see The Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, a compendium prepared by officers of the Sudan government and edited by Count Gleichen (2 vols., London, 1905); for administration, finance and trade the annual Reports [by the British agent at Cairo] on Egypt and the Sudan, since 1898; and the special report (Blue Book Egypt, No. ii., 1883) by Colonel D. H. Stewart. Consult also J. Petherick, Travels in Central Africa (2 vols., London, 1862); W. Junker, Travels in Africa, 1875-1886 (3 vols., London, 1890–1892); G. Schweinfurth, The Heart of Africa (2 vols., London, 1873); J. Baumgarten, Ostafrika, der Sudan und das Seengebiet (Gotha, 1890); E. D. Schoenfeld, Erythräa und der ägyptische Sudân (Berlin, 1904); C. E. Muriel, Report on the Forests of the Sudan (Cairo, 1901); H. F. Witherby, Bird Hunting on the White Nile (London, 1902). For ethnology,
- ↑ A £E (pound Egyptian) is equal to £1, 0s. 6d. British currency.
