122 EGYPT AND THE SOUDAN.

Gordon at Khartum? Would the order be given for the British troops who had defeated Osman Digma to open the route from Suakim to Berber? These were the questions that were being asked by Gordon at Khartum, by officials at Cairo, and by excited inquirers in England both in and out of parliament. The answer in each case was " no." Even if the members of the government had been willing to forego their own convictions and to yield to the urgent and repeated declarations of Gordon himself, they would have found themselves in opposition to the prevalent voice of the country, and would have been denounced by their political rivals.

" We cannot give back to barbarism that which has been won for civilization," said Lord Salisbury in March, at the time that the cabinet was seriously and finally considering whether it would be possible to comply with Gordon's demand, supported by the explanation that he made of the restrictions that might be placed on the government of the Soudan provinces by Zebehr. Lord Salisbury was in accord with the opinion of the ministry at that time. There were some evidences that Mr. Gladstone was in advance of many of his colleagues in the desire to leave Gordon free to act on his own conclusions, even to the extent of agreeing to the appointment of Zebehr; but the public voice and the voices of the opponents of the slave-trade, who evidently did not completely grasp the situation, were against it. Nor was their opposition unreasonable. The doubts whether Gordon might after all have been mistaken in the degree of turpitude of which he had formerly accused the rebellious and slave-hunting pasha, were cleared up by a communication to the Times by Mr. A.

Egmont Hake, Gordon's own biographer, in answer to a letter from a Cairo correspondent to the leading journal, which suggested that Gordon might have denounced Zebehr on partial evidence, and dwelt on the fact that Gordon had not produced the letter proving the complicity of Zebehr in the revolt for which his son was executed. Mr. Hake wrote: "The letter referred to could not be produced, for the simple reason that it was not in General Gordon's hands. I have now that very letter before me, together with a number of other Arabic documents bearing on the revolt in the