CHAPTER VI

THE STORY OF KHARTUM

FROM the 19th April, 1884, to the 26th January, 1885, run 282 days; and thus long was the period of what, were one speaking of any other man than Gordon, one would have called his agony. Many a soldier who would have calmly and even joyously faced death on the battlefield might have broken down under the strain of those months of terrible suspense. At no time could it have seemed certain to the beleaguered soldier that his rescue was impossible; yet at no time could he have sustained himself in hours of weariness and depression by the belief that it was probable, still less that it was near. Not to know the worst, yet at the same time to lack all encouragement to hope for the best, is an ordeal equally well calculated to dash the spirits of the sanguine and to sap the fortitude of the strong. The cheerfulness of many a mercurial spirit would have sunk under it; the patience of many a sterner temperament would have given way; and, to both alike, the temptation to end it all by some desperate act of selfexposure might well have proved irresistible.

But Gordon, whether on the more serious or the lighter side of his character, was not like other men. To the moral support of a courage which nothing could daunt, and an endurance proof against all trials, he added intellectual resources of composed, of cheerful, nay, of humorous reflection, which the happiest and securest of his far-off fellow-countrymen might with reason have envied him. The daily record of his inner life during those long months of waiting has been preserved

for us in journals which are almost as precious a possession of the English race as his memory and his example. In the solitude of his confinement he had abundant leisure to speculate on the future of the distracted region to which he had come to die, and ample opportunity to review with penetrating insight, and a spice of not unkindly satire, the characters and conduct of those official personages with whom he had lately had to do, and even to add here and there touches of humorous selfportraiture which are, perhaps, the most interesting of all. Never did condemned man leave behind him a diary which, while bearing such high testimony to his deeper qualities of self-devotion and religious faith, gave at the same time so delightful a picture of the man.

But it is time to turn from the contemplation of Gordon in his lonely vigil at Khartum, to the less elevating spectacle presented by Her Majesty's Government at Westminster. Let us for a moment recall one or two incidents and dates. It was on the 19th April, 1884, that communication with Khartum was finally cut off, and it was precisely on the same day of the following month that the fall of Berber extinguished the last possibility of adopting what all the most competent authorities agreed in pronouncing the most hopeful scheme of relief. But even before the earlier of these events, the position of Gordon had begun to arouse anxiety in the House of Commons-a feeling which, if it had been much less legitimate than it was, would probably not have been allowed by Lord Randolph Churchill and the Fourth Party to languish for lack of stimulus. As early as the 16th March, indeed, the leader of that party had endeavoured to induce the House to refuse its assent to the third reading of the Consolidated Fund Bill before "receiving further information as to the military operations in the Sudan, the position of General Gordon at Khartum, and the policy of Her Majesty's Government in Egypt Proper." In the course of the slashing speech which Lord Randolph had always ready on such occasions, he asked "which of the two policies were the

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Government going to adopt the 'rescue' or the 'retire'?" and added the following significant words:-" There was one rescue which the Government, if they did not adopt it very soon, would be compelled to adopt, or they would have to make way for others—the rescue of General Gordon. He did not believe that even honourable Members who were in favour of a pacific policy carried to an extravagant degree would object to strong measures being taken without delay for the rescue of General Gordon. If the matter were left to chance, and General Gordon were sacrificed, owing to the neglect, and indifference, and callousness, and heartlessness of the Government, then they would not keep their seats for twenty-four hours after the news was known." The event showed that Lord Randolph considerably over-rated the swiftness of the retribution which overtook the Government, and, of course, he could not foresee that it would take the grotesque shape of a defeat on a question of taxing alcoholic liquors; but their punishment, though delayed, was unmistakable.

For the next five or six weeks the Government were plied almost nightly with questions as to the position of Gordon and the tenor of the advices which they received from him; and it was on the 21st of April, two days after his complete isolation, that Mr Gladstone, compelled at last to make a partial avowal of the gravity of the situation, drew one of the subtlest and most famous of all his subtle distinctions. After describing the condition of Shendy and Berber as reported to him in the latest despatches from Cairo, the Prime Minister said that with regard to Khartum itself, the information contained in their last telegram from General Gordon was, so far as the question of Gordon's position was concerned, in complete concurrence with what had reached them from Sir Evelyn Baring, "the general effect being, according to the expression used, that he is hemmed in-that is to say, that there are bodies of hostile troops in the neighbourhood forming a more or less complete chain around it. I draw a distinction between that

and the town being surrounded, which would bear technically a very different meaning." Whether, however, there was much practical difference in the meaning would depend upon whether the " 'more or less complete chain" of hostile forces around Khartum was, as a matter of fact, a "more" or a "less" complete one, and as such matter of fact we know now, at any rate, that it was complete enough to prevent any communication with Gordon for the next nine months, and, indeed, until the eve of his death at his post.

On the following night, and again a week later, the Government were interrogated as to their adhesion to the opinion that the "position of General Gordon is one of security at Khartum," and with the same unsatisfactory result. On the 1st May the Prime Minister was asked in so many words whether he was able to state to the House when the Government intended to send an expedition for the relief of General Gordon. Mr Gladstone replied that he had no statement to make on the subject. On the following day Sir Michael Hicks Beach gave notice of a motion expressive of the regret of the House to find that "the course pursued by Her Majesty's Government has not tended to promote the success of General Gordon's mission, and that even such steps as may be necessary to secure his personal safety are still delayed." The debate upon it opened on the 12th of March, and it was in the course of Mr Gladstone's reply to the speech of the mover that he uttered the memorable and often quoted declaration that an attempt to put down the Mahdist insurrection in the Sudan would be a "war of conquest against a people rightly struggling to be free." It was, he said, the duty of the Government to ask Gordon's "advice and opinion" (the advice of a man who had been nearly two months cut off from all communication with them!) "as to the best mode and circumstances, and form and time of affording him succour, should the necessity arise." The motion was defeated, but the Government, considering their then strength in the House

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of Commons, had, comparatively speaking, a narrow escape. Their majority fell to twenty-eight, and probably they recognised from that moment that, whatever their own individual prepossessions or collective differences on the question might be, Parliamentary supported by national purpose would eventually compel them to take action.

Nevertheless, they still delayed even the definite announcement of their willingness to do so. On the 27th May Mr Gladstone parried with generalities a question put to him as to whether any actual preparations had been made up to that date to organise an expedition for the relief of General Gordon. Lord Hartington's contribution to the discussion was a little more reassuring, but not much. In answer to an ironical suggestion by Lord Randolph Churchill that the Government would begin in October to think what measures of relief could be taken, the Secretary for War said: "The Government are thinking now, and have long been thinking, what measures they could take for the relief of General Gordon."

On the 11th July the Government were again questioned, and on the 18th July they were pressed to say whether they "still considered it inexpedient to take steps for the relief of General Gordon," but in each case without effect. And up to the very last day of the session of 1884 their replies were in the same strain. They contented themselves with taking a vote of credit, for the purpose-as Lord Hartington put it in answer to a question addressed to him on the 11th August-of "putting themselves in a position, if necessary, to adopt measures for the relief of General Gordon," and at the present time, added the Secretary for War, they were "taking active measures in discharge of their responsibility." Not till after Parliament had risen did it become a matter of public knowledge that this phrase of Lord Hartington's meant the despatch of a relief expedition, and the second week in August