Hardly had Emin departed for Lado, to take the troops there to the lake, when a certain Soliman Aga, a Nubian and former slave and a man of low condition, openly threw off the mask and summoned soldiers and officials to meet him. At this meeting he urged resistance, at the same time making the meanest accusations against the Christians. He sent messengers to Faliko, Msua, Wadelai, and urged them to unite in order to avert the calamity which the Pasha was about to visit upon the province. All were certain that they were to be taken to the south to be sold into slavery. The discontented natives replied secretly and quickly to the insurrectionary call and from the frequent comings and goings of messengers and their unusual intercourse with clerks and officials, Casati, who remained in the south, quickly came to a conclusion. Aga issued his commands absolutely and despotically. Woe to him who ventured to question them! Reason and justice, reflection and freedom had no influence. The soldiers shuddered at his unjust and cruel treatment. The Danagla trembled for their very existence. The stations were silent and abandoned. The powerful figure of the despot confronted them at the gates, often in furious anger and sometimes in a condition of excessive drunkenness, which made him still more terrible. In the nighttime furious beating of the great drums, shrill tones of fifes and discharges of musketry explained the business upon which the leader and his friends were engaged. When Emin issued his order to move the war material in the magazine at Dufile, southward, the soldiers unanimously resisted. Mistrust seized them. They saw they were no longer free of will, but would be driven by force and that they and their families would be exposed to the mercy of the natives and outside enemies. On the thirteenth of August (1888) the troops at Lahore were mustered upon the plaza of the village. Jephson, accompanied by Emin and various officers, read the letter of Stanley which the governor himself had translated into Arabic and invited the soldiers to express their intentions. An unusual murmur and a scarcely repressed disquiet were manifest, but no one among them ventured to say a word. Then suddenly a soldier stepped out from the ranks with his gun upon his arm. He advanced and, turning to the governor, said they were ready to withdraw and had fixed the corn harvest for the time. Jephson asked for a written promise which he could send to Stanley. Then the soldier became presumptuous and replied that this was not the way for the government’s soldiers to be treated. This order was deceitful, for the Khedive had commanded, not expressed, his wish. He had ordered the rescue of all, not their submission to autocratic power.