"From Dr. Junker's letter you will have seen that Emin Bey has had the good fortune to have secured the loyalty of the people he governs. Emin seems to have learned Gordon's secret of securing the affection of his subjects, and has bravely stuck to them. There can be no doubt at all but that had he been anxious to leave he would with a few hundred of his soldiers have easily made a dash for the coast either through the Masai Land or this way, asking no permission from Mwanga (King of Uganda) or anyone else. He knows that there is no power here able to stop him. In fact years ago he wrote me that it would be nothing to him to storm this wretched village and drive off the cattle." "But what would be the fate of thousands of people who have remained loyal on the Upper Nile? Dr. Junker speaks of thousands. They do not want to be taken out of their own fertile country, and taken to the deserts of Upper Egypt." "Dr. Emin is on all hands allowed to be a wise and able Governor. But he cannot remain for ever where he is, nor can he succeed himself, even should the Mahdi's troops leave him undisturbed in the future. His peculiar position should be taken advantage of by our country, which undertook to rescue the garrisons of the Soudan." * * * * * "Mwanga's action with respect to the letters forwarded him for Dr. Emin, was as disrespectful as possible to the British Government which had received with such kindness his father's envoys. We asked him merely to forward the letters in the first place until he should receive word from Emin as to whether or not he was prepared to come this way, but he detained your packet altogether." In Mr. Mackay's letter to Sir John Kirk, June 28th, 1886, he says:-- "Dr. Fischer's difficulties would also only really begin after Kavirondo, as he then had the country of the dreaded Bakedi to cross, and Dr. Junker tells me that whole parties of Dr. Emin's soldiers have been repeatedly murdered by them." Dr. Fischer, it will be remembered, was engaged to proceed to Equatoria in search of Dr. Junker by that traveller's brother, and chose the road _viâ_ East coast of the Victoria Lake. Arriving at the N.E. corner of the Lake he returned to the coast. Mr. Mackay proceeds:-- "Dr. Junker is living here with us. He brought me a letter from Emin Bey dated the 27th January (1886). He then proposed sending his people at once this way--some 4000--in small detachments. This policy would be fatal. He also asked me to go to meet him with a view to bringing here two steamers which otherwise he would have to abandon. One of them he meant for the King, and the other for the mission." "Since then, however he finds that his people, officers and men, refuse to leave the Soudan, hence he is prepared to remain some years with them provided only he can get supplies of cloth, etc."