Lord Napier (of Magdala) has taken advantage of a public
dinner given him by the Corporation of Welshpool, to contradict the report that he had deceived Theodore. He never deceived him, having never altered his terms, which were the surrender of the prisoners and of the King. If he had received all the prisoners he should still have advanced on Magdala and taken the King. The "honour of England required that that man should come from his place," and he sent Lieutenant Prideaux back to what he and his envoy alike believed to be certain death, sooner than grant terms he felt to be inconsistent with that honour. This is not exactly the story Ministers told us in England, where they said the release of the prisoners was the only object of the expedition ; but perhaps Lord Napier acted on his own responsibility. We certainly have in him a General who thinks first of what will happen to England, and only afterwards of what will happen to himself. The refusal to treat while the prisoners were in Theodore's hands was an act of cool moral nerve, deserving as much credit as the conduct of Lieutenant Prideaux, who, Lord Napier says, received his " sentence " without a word of demur.
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