5S EGYPT AND THE SOUDAN.

is to report what course he considers to be best to follow, to that of an active acrent intrusted with considerable authority, and expected to carry out the plan which he had proposed to the best of his ability under the conditions mentioned. Earl Granville had already authorized Sir E. Malet to consult with Gordon and to give any further instructions that might be founded on a better knowledge of the country than the English government possessed, and this very considerable alteration in the instructions purported to have been made by the adoption of the views of the Egyptian government. The khedive and his advisers were even then prepared to go a great deal further still; but only under the impression that they were in accord with the views of the British government, an impression which was afterwards confirmed by the virtual endorsement of Lord Granville in the name of the ministry.

Gordon had been met at Port Said on the 24th of January by Sir Evelyn Wood. They had been subalterns together in the Crimea, and now here they were, after nearly thirty years, grasping hands and united in the work of delivering Egypt from internal anarchy and external insurrection. That Gordon Pasha, the exgovernor-general of the Soudan, had come to deliver the country from the Mahdi, was soon repeated by the more loyal Arabs with a kind of exultation; and the assurance of the khedive and the Egyptian ministry in the practical ability and immense influence of Gordon was not less than that of the natives who had served with him and called him the just pasha. The great question was, whether he had come too late.

There was no further delay at Cairo. The two days spent there were only just sufficient for the necessary conferences with the khedive, the ministers, and the consul-general, and almost before they had ended, the khedive, at Gordon's own request, gave him a firman appointing him Governor-general of the Soudan with full powers, civil and military. Sir E. Baring in reporting this to Earl Granville said, " Under the circumstances it was very necessary that this step should be taken." Surely this was the beginning of confusion and misconception; for, if Gordon was the plenipotentiary of the khedive, and England was not to interfere