EXPERIMENTS WITH PATIENCE. 8 J demands that we should surrender to him. But to me it is all one whether Lupton Bey has surrendered or has not surrendered. And whether he has captured twenty thousand steamers like the Abbas, or twenty thousand (officers) like Stewart Pasha (or not); it is all one to me.

I am here like iron, and hope to see the newly-arrived English; and if Mahomed Achmet says that the English die, it is all the same to me. And you must take a copy of this and give it to the messenger from Slatin, and send him out early in the morning that he may go to him. It is impossible for me to have any more words with Mahomed Achmet, only lead; and if Mahomed Achmet is willing to fight, he had better, instead of going to Omdurman, go to the White Nile by the moat. And after this the messengers whom he wants to send to us must not come by the Omdurman; they had better come by the moat before mentioned. And send a literal copy of this according to orders (when it has been sealed by you), by the emissary of Slatin Bey to be delivered, and explain to him that this is by our order." A bold, determined answer. Gordon would have sent no other even had things appeared worse— if that had been possible.

Affairs were bad enough, and the people he had to deal with, the soldiers and servants, were, as he said, enough to break anyone's heart. "If these Arabs (one's servants) are not eating; they are saying t\\e.\r prayers ; if not saying their prayers, they are sleeping; if not sleeping, they arc sick. One snatches at them at intervals. Now figure to yourself the position: you cannot do anything with them, while in the fortresses, eaiijig, saying prayers, sleeping, or sick, and they know it. You would be a brute if you did (which I fear I often am). You want to send an immediate order; and there is your servant bobbing up and down, and you cannot disturb him. It is a beautiful country for trying experiments with your patience. It is very curious that if I am in a bad temper, which I fear is often the case, my servants will be always at their prayers; and thus religious practices follow the scale of my temper; they are pagans if all goes well."

It need scarcely be said that these journals at Khartum