Schnitzer, EDUARD, better known as EMIN PASHA, was born of Jewish parents at Neisse in Silesia, on the 28th of March 1840, and was educated at the Gymnasium of Neisse until 1858, when he commenced the study of medicine at the university of Breslau; and he graduated at Berlin in 1864. Soon after, he proceeded to Turkey with the view of settling there in practice, and had till 1873 an appointment at Seutari on the staff of Hakki Pasha. During this appointment Schnitzer gained an intimate acquaintance with Armenia, Syria, and Arabia, and it was during this period of his life that he adopted the name of Emin and the habits and customs of the Turks. He took the name the better to enable him to identify himself with the people and to disarm their prejudices. After a brief visit to Nissa in 1875, where his studies in natural history were continued, we find him in 1876 entering the Egyptian medical service as Dr Emin Effendi. He proceeded to Khartoum, was sent by Ismail Pasha, the governor-general, to the Equator, and appointed by Gordon Pasha chief medical officer of the Equatorial Province. This appointment he held until 1878, being employed, however, by Gordon Pasha, who greatly appreciated his talents, in various diplomatic missions and tours of inspection. In 1878 Gordon Pasha appointed Emin Effendi governor of the Equatorial Province, which position he held until the arrival of Mr
Stanley's expedition in 1889. In 1879 he was raised to the rank of Bey, in 1887 to that of Pasha.
An extraordinary linguist, Emin acquired, besides French, English, Italian, Turkish, and Arabic, a knowledge of several Slavonic languages, as well as many central African dialects. He was known as a skilful medical man, and his ability as a governor and an administrator is witnessed to by the fact that he for years, cut off from all communication with the outside world, single-handed maintained his position at the farthest outpost of civilisation. It is true that after the expedition sent to his relief arrived his troops revolted; but this is to be explained by the fact that his ignorant men were disappointed at the sorry spectacle which the expedition presented after its heroic march to their assistance. Emin gained a wonderful insight into the habits and customs of the people amongst whom he has lived, and probably no one has added more to our anthropological knowledge of central African tribes than he. For over seven years he carried on meteorological investigations with such success that Lado has become the standard to which all barometrical observations are referred in East Equatorial Africa. With reference to his geographical work, his route surveys extend over more than 4000 miles, and he made a triangulation survey of the country extending from the Victoria and Albert Lakes in the south to Lado in the north, to the river Djur in the north-west, to Mombuttu and the river Welle in the south-west. Between 1878 and 1883 eleven geographical papers of extreme value were published by him in Petermann's Mittheilungen. Emin's services to natural history were exceptionally great; throughout the whole of his residence in central Africa he showed himself an intelligent and painstaking collector. It is impossible to specify the number of examples he sent to Enrope, but one collection sent to the British Museum in 1878 consisted of over 100 mammals, 350 birds belonging to 179 species, many reptiles, batrachians, 380 butterflies belonging to 356 species (15 of which were new to science), besides many beetles, scorpions, and a large number of land and fresh-water shells. The results of his labours in this direction have almost completely elucidated the distribution of the flora and fauna of central Africa. Apart from this work, Emin made valuable botanical collections; and his cultivation experiments, carried on for many years, will prove of service in the agricultural development of central Africa. Steadily working at the central African languages, he collected numerous and valuable vocabularies, the most important being of the Waganda, Wanyoro, Wahuma, Madi, Bari, and Mombuttu dialects.
When it is considered that all the work here indicated was performed by a man weighted with the government of a large uncivilised province, and who was for years cut off from all communication with Europe, it will be seen what force of character and energy he possessed. Emin Pasha was no military genius, but he proved himself to be an enlightened ruler and a bitter foe to the slave-dealers, managing to abolish slave-dealing throughout his province. He constantly endeavoured to civilise the people committed to his charge, and in this he succeeded to a very large extent. In December 1889 Emin Pasha arrived at Zanzibar with Mr Stanley. He met with an accident there from which he nearly lost his life, and from whose effects he suffered for three months. Notwithstanding this, and the urgent desire of his friends in Europe for his return home, such was his energy and his love for the country which he had left that he entered the service of the German government, and returned at the head of a large expedition to central Africa. He was energetic in extending the German sphere of influence, made favourable treaties with native chiefs, and founded German stations on the Victoria Lake; besides sending large zoological and ethnographical collections to the museum in Berlin. But he never regained his old influence, and seems, defeated in his hopes, to have been marching for the west coast when, about the 22d October 1892, he was slain by the Arabs in the Manyema country.
See Stuhlmann, Mit Emin Pascha ins Herz von Afrika (1894); Vita Hassan, Die Wahrheit über Emin Pascha (1893); Uganda and the Egyptian Soudan, by the present writer and the Rev. C. T. Wilson (2 vols. 1882); Emin Pasha in Central Africa: his Letters and Journals (trans. by Mrs Felkin, 1888); Petermann's Mittheilungen (1878-83); Scottish Geographical Magazine (1886-89); Proceedings of the Zoological Society (1888); Journal of the Anthropological Institute (1888); Stanley, In Darkest Africa (1890); and the standard Life by G. Schweitzer, Emin Pasha: his Life and Work (trans. 1898).