The British Campaign in the Soudan. 187 was Osman-Digma’s frying-pan, which had the honor of being sent to England as atrophy. On the following day, General Graham returned to Suakim with all his forces, and on the Ist of April he re-eembarked, leaving only a battalion of marines and some war-vessels to hold the place, and declaring the campaign to be at an end.

Yes, it was at an end; but not because its object had been accomplished, or because Osman-Digma was conquered, but because it was evidently impossible to continue it. General Graham was too skilful a soldier not to know that his troops could not follow the enemy under a torrid sun and through waterless deserts and mountains, and that if they remained at Suakim during the summer, the climate would destroy them. But the departure of the British was inevitably construed as a triumph for the Mahdi’s cause. All the wavering tribes joined his standard, and from that time forward Suakim was closely blockaded, if not besieged, from the land-side.

Meanwhile the news of Graham’s invasion had reached Khartoum and neutralized all the effect of Gordon’s peaceful protestations. Before the middle of March he was attacked at Khartoum, and then began that wondrous defence, whose details will probably never be fully known, since its hero has perished. Never was there a brighter illustration of the power of a strong will and an upright and noble mind. One man alone, forsaken by his government, without help, an utter stranger in ideas, language, customs, and religion, was enabled by the mere force of his character to mould into a fighting army a heterogeneous crowd of Egyptians, Soudanese, and negro savages, and to hold them in hand for ten months, under hardships and privations, im spite of their natural and