74 EGYPT AND THE SOUDAN.

for the primary purpose of evacuating the Soudan, by sending the civilian population and the Egyptian troops down to Assouan as soon as possible and by the best means that could be devised.

Between Dongola and Gondokoro there was a whole population of civilians with their wives and children, and between 20,000 and 30,000 Egyptian troops loyal to the government. They were so seriously threatened by the advancing rebels that it had become almost a question of hours rather than of days whether they could be got out at all. Of the centres around which these populations clustered, Khartum was the most important, and it was to Khartum that Gordon and Stewart were hastening. Before he left Cairo the general took an opportunity, in the presence of Sir Evelyn Baring and others, to speak to the khedive words of apology for anything which he might have said or done hastily or mistakenly in disparagement of his highness ; and the frank simplicity with which he confessed that under trying circumstances he had said and done things that he regretted, raised him in the opinion of both Tewfik Pasha and the prime minister. His last words with Nubar Pasha are said to have been: "I will save the honour of Egypt;" to which Nubar replied: "Never mind Egypt; save the women and children." There was no need to tell Gordon that.

In the subsequent language of Lord Granville, Gordon went for the double purpose of evacuating the country by the extrication of the Egyptian garrisons, and of reconstituting it by giving back to the chiefs their ancestral powers, which had been withdrawn or suspended during the period of the Egyptian government. Before he left Cairo he had suggested that a sultan of Darfur should be appointed as a check to the Mahdi. Consequently the khedive sent for Ameer Abd-el-Shakoor, the heir of the chief from whom the province had been seized, and he was reinstated on the condition that he should maintain freedom of commerce and suppress the slave-trade within his province. He agreed readily enough, and accompanied the general to the Soudan, or rather for a portion of the journey, for Gordon was to go by rail to Assouan, thence embark for Wady Haifa and Korosko, and cross the desert to Abu Hamed, a difficult and dangerous journey, after which he