66 practically condemned the conduct of the Government. In a full House, the Government only escaped censure by a majority of 14. 'If," General Gordon wrote on November 8, "it is right to send up an expedition now, why was it not right to send it up before?" The fact that General Gordon's pathetic question admits of no satisfactory answer must for ever stand as a blot on Mr. Gladstone's political escutcheon. than I do that the preparations were delayed from May to August." I may add that, some ten years later, I sent to Lord Northbrook a typewritten copy of the portion of this work which deals with the Soudan. He wrote the following words on the margin opposite the passage to which this note is attached: "I am afraid that all this is quite true. As I had the misfortune to be a member of Mr. Gladstone's Government, I have to bear the blame with the rest. never to serve under him again!" But I resolved APPENDIX Note on the Khedive's telegram to General Gordon of The following entry occurs in General Gordon's Journal (vol. ii. p. 359), dated November 25, 1884: "Tewfik, by a telegram, cancels his Firman, which gives up the Soudan, which I have torn up. "A telegram to the Ulemas from Tewfik says: 'Baring is coming up with Lord Wolseley.'" It appears from the numerous discussions which have taken place in connection with the Gordon mission that some misapprehension exists with regard to the circumstances under which the telegrams to which allusion is here made were sent. I propose, therefore, to state what actually took place. On September 14, 1884, the Khedive sent a telegram to General Gordon. The full text of this telegram is given in a note to an article written by Sir Reginald Wingate, and published in the United Service Magazine of July 1892. For my present purposes the following extracts will suffice: "We inform you now that a great change has taken place since the time that the aforenamed (i.e. the British) Government advised the evacuation of the Soudan, and communication with you had been cut. . . . But the English troops will shortly occupy Dongola, and Colonel Chermside, the Governor of Suakin, has been ordered to communicate with the tribes regarding Kassala; also Major Kitchener, one of the officers of my new army, is ordered to confer at Dongola, and we hope he will shortly be able to open communication with you. Again, it becomes necessary, under these circumstances, to modify the Firman which we had granted you, so that your authority will now be confined to being Governor of the Soudan, including Khartoum, Sennar, Berber, and their present vicinities. You will also receive the necessary instructions from the British Government, through Sir E. Baring and Lord Wolseley, who has been made Commander-in-Chief of the English expedition, and who is at present in Cairo." At the same time, a telegram was sent to the Ulema of Khartoum, urging them to do their utmost to maintain the honour of the Government. VOL. I 2 Q So far as I am aware, no British authority was consulted before these telegrams were sent. I certainly never saw them until long after General Gordon's death. Inasmuch, however, as General Gordon could not know that the Khedive had sent the telegrams solely on his own authority, this point is of slight importance. On receipt of the Khedive's message, General Gordon appears to have published the Proclamation given in Appendix Y to his Journal (vol. ii. p. 552). This Proclamation contains the following passage: "Formerly the Government had decided to transport the Egyptians down to Cairo and abandon the Soudan; and, in fact, some of them had been sent down during the time of Hussein Pasha Yusri, as you yourself saw. On our arrival at Khartoum, on account of pity for you, and in order not to let your country be destroyed, we communicated with the Khedive of Egypt, our Effendi, concerning the importance and inexpediency of abandoning it. Whereupon, the orders for abandoning the Soudan were cancelled." From a perusal of these documents, it is easy to judge of what took place. On February 27, 1884, that is to say, nine days after his arrival at Khartoum, General Gordon had practically announced to the public the abandonment of the policy which he was sent to carry out. In a Proclamation issued on that day he said: "British troops are now on their way to Khartoum.”1 He had many misgivings as to the correctness of this proceeding. The Khedive's telegram of September 14, 1884, is worded in such a manner as to render it possible to misapprehend its meaning. General Gordon, therefore, readily seized the opportunity to put himself, as he thought, in the right. A mere comparison of the dates of General Gordon's original Proclamation and of the Khedive's telegrams is sufficient to show that, as evidence as to how far General Gordon endeavoured to carry out his instructions on his arrival at Khartoum, the entry in the Journal on November 25, 1884, is valueless. 1 Vide ante, p. 490. END OF VOL. I |