32 WITH KITCHENER IN THE SOUDAN then, and I own that I should shrink from that. As Gregory Hilliard I don’t mind carrying a parcel or helping to load a dray, but I should not like, as Gregory Hartley, to be known to be doing that sort of thing. Personally I feel not the smallest humiliation in doing so, but I don’t think it would be fair to Geoffrey. I should not like it myself, if I were an earl, for fellows who knew him to be able to say that my brother was knocking about in Egypt as an interpreter or mule-driver, or something of that sort. That certainly has to be taken into consideration. It is not likely that I should get any sort of berth that an officer would be appointed to, for every officer in the army whose regiment is not coming out here will be rushing to the War Office to apply for any sort of appointment that would enable him to come out to the war.

“ Again, it is almost certain that when this business is over —and I don’t suppose it will last long after we get an army out here—a fresh Egyptian force will be raised. You may be sure that the greater portion of our troops will be hurried back as soon as it is over, and that as the present Egyptian army will be altogether smashed up, it will be absolutely necessary that there should be a force of some kind or other that can put a stop to this Mahdi fellow’s doings. He has overrun half the Soudan, and infficted serious defeats on the Egyptian troops there. He has captured a considerable portion of Kordofan; and of course it is owing to his insurrection that those rows have occurred down at the Red Sea, where our men have been fighting. It is likely enough that they may appoint some British officers to the new force, and I might get a fair position on it. They will want interpreters there; promotion will be sure to be rapid, and I might have opportunities of distinguishing myself and get an appointment where I could, without discrediting it, take my own name again.

These are only among the things that might be ; but at the worst I am certain to get some sort of post at Alexandria,