THE NARRATIVE IN GORDOn's JOURNALS. 85 of November (then I calculate they will be at Metammeh—Shendy), and that a small party will come on here; so we have now 7 days in October and 15 days in November to wait = 22 days—three weeks to add to the 226 days we have already passed, owing to Baring (who I shall remember) and his peace manceuvres. One of the papers Slatin sent to me says that Graham was willing to send them to Berber and could have done it, but Evelyn would not give the order. I asked only for 200 men to be sent there (vide my telegram in Stewart's journal).

" I dwell in the joy of never seeing Great Britain again, with its horrid wearisome dinner parties and miseries. How we can put up with those things passes my imagination! It is a perfect bondage. At those dinner parties we are all in masks, saying what we do not believe, eating and drinking things we do not want, and then abusing one another. I would sooner live like a dervish with the Mahdi, than go out to dinner every night in London. I hope if any English general comes to Khartum, he will not ask me to dinner. Why men cannot be friends without bringing the wretched stomach in is astounding."

It must be remembered that the journals in which these entries occur were composed of a narrative of events at Khartum, expressions of opinion, comments on the situation, and emphatic declarations of the best way to deal with it. They were addressed to the officer in command, and their delivery had been long delayed.

It was the difficulty of communication, the interception of messages, the block of telegrams, that caused much of the misunderstandinir. Gordon in Khartum conceived that he was abandoned, neglected, ignored; those who were anxious to aid him, getting only some out of several messages, thought them ambiguous, or wrongly interpreted such as reached them; and the result was that there had been fatal delay at the commencement of the enterprise, and then an attempt which, because of the small force at disposal, could only have completely succeeded if it had been made immediately on receiving Gordon's appeal, before the enemy had begun ' Stewart had Kept an exact and elaborate journal which he took with him on board the ill-fated Abbas, and it was not recovered.