BOOKS.

GORDON'S JOURNALS AT KARTOUM.* IT may be admitted at once that Mr. Egmont Hake, aided in the long-run by Mr. Godfrey Thrupp, has thrown into the work of editing Gordon's Journals not a little of Gordon's own enthusiasm. As a mere contribution to literature, this is a much more satisfactory performance than the second and concluding volume of his Story of Chinese Gordon. At the same time, we could have wished that Sir Henry Gordon had himself entirely undertaken the task of preparing his brother's Journals for publication. Not only would he in all probability have done a little more of the " pruning " which the hero of Kartoum peremptorily insisted on in the event of his hastily-jotted daily reflections being given to the world, but he would have refrained from Mr. Hake's partisan hissing, groan- ing, catcalling, and shouting out in the transpontine tones of Mr. Chaplin, "Traitors to Gordon ! Yah !" The taste of Sir Henry Gordon's own contributions to this volume is almost perfect. These consist mainly of papers on "General Gordon's Position at Kartoum" and "The Mission of Colonel Sir Charles Wilson, C.B." He investigates the charges made against Sir Charles Wilson for not proceeding to Kartoum at latest on the morning of January 22nd, and for not having, when he did proceed up the Nile, pushed on to Kartoum itself to ascertain General Gordon's fate beyond a doubt ; and he comes to the conclusion "On neither head of charge does any blame attach to Sir Charles Wilson." It is evident from his other paper or memorandum that Sir Henry Gordon has very decided views as to the course the late Government ought to have adopted in " supporting " his brother. But, in spite of provocation—or rather, temptation

• The Touren?, of INor-General C. G. Gordon. C.B., at Kartoum. Printed from the original MSS. Introduction and Notes by A. Egmont Hake. Loudon: Regan Paul, Tiencb, and Co. 1885.

—to write in a contrary fashion, his tone is that of scrupulous fairness and high-bred amenity; he is a master of style in De

Quincey's sense of "obeying Cassar's rule of shunning, tan quasi

scopulum,any insolens verbum." We, who have not endorsed every detail of the policy of Mr. Gladstone's Government in the Soudan, but have recognised that from first to last they acted with an honesty of purpose equal to Gordon's own, cannot do better than make two quotations from Sir Henry Gordon's comments on his brother's journals. In the first place we are told,—

" General Gordon accepted (and disclaimed the right to express any

opinion of his own upon) the policy of leaving the Soudan. It will be seen, however, that he did not, after his return to the Soudan, remain long of that opinion. His heart warmed at once to the people whom he bad faithfully governed, and whose affections he found, or at all events believed, were constant to him."

The words we have italicised speak significantly for themselves they also speak well for the fair-mindedness of Sir Henry Gordon. In the second place, we recommend readers of these- Journals, who may be sometimes amused and sometimes vexed —they will never allow themselves to be irritated—by the tone- of Gordon towards Sir Evelyn Baring, Mr. Egerton, and other exponents of " official " views, to read these words by his brother :—

"If General Gordon had known how much in unison Sir Evelyn Baring's advice had been with his own, and what support he had received at Sir Evelyn's hands, he would have been eager, had his, life been spared, to acknowledge that co-operation I must say a few words with respect to the severe comments which occur in places throughout the Diaries upon the meagre information he receive* from the Intelligence Department, in connection with which the names of Major Chermside and Major Kitchener are mentioned. Now, with regard to the former of these officers' he was at Suakin, and, therefore, does not come into the question. With respect, how- ever, to Major Kitchener, I am persuaded that he did all in his power to get messengers into Kartoum, for just in the same way General Gordon fancied he got them out ; and yet how few succeeded in reaching their destination. In the same way, too, as General Gordon fancied his messengers had reached, so too did Mr. Egerton fancy his had been successful, for at the end of July be hinted that General Gordon could have sent messengers out in the same way as others had got in, and yet at that date only one had done so. It is due to Major Kitchener to say that from the time he went to Dongola, he certainly kept us acquainted with the position of affairs at Kartoum- in a manner most reliable, and deserving of much credit."

It would serve no purpose to consider this book from the controversial or political point of view. The case neither for General Gordon nor for the late Government, which

receives so large a share of his animadversions, is complete. His Diaries only deal with the siege of Kartoum from September 10th to December 14th, 1884, and are but a con-

tinuation of the much more elaborate Journal which was lost when Colonel Stewart was captured or killed, and in the pre- paration of which Gordon had no small share. Until this other Journal is recovered,—and it is to be hoped that no effort will be wanting to recover it,—we cannot be in possession of the whole of Gordon's views as to his position in Kartoum and as to the future of the Soudan. On the other hand, the members

of the late Government who can be supposed to be in any degree responsible for the fall of Kartoum and the failuni of

the expedition for its relief, have not been placed in such a position that they can defend themselves against his charges. They have had no opportunity of speaking out since the Journals- appeared. Moreover, the " officials " who get so little mercy here,—Sir Evelyn Baring, Mr. Egerton, and, to a lesser extent,.

Lord Wolseley, and his lieutenants of the Relief Expedition them- selves,—are, of necessity, tongue-tied. Nor should it be for-

gotten that Gordon, being a man of moods and impulses, might have formed a different opinion of the motives of the late-

Government and their subordinates, military and diplomatic than he here expresses, had he not perished when Kartoum fell._ The quotation we have already given from his brother gives more -than countenance to such a belief. Finally, those political sections of the Journals which are not devoted to what is at present known in Parliament as "contentious business," deal with proposals. for the settlement of the Soudan, including the recall of Zebehr, the garrisoning by the Turks, and the various schemes that he thought of in the event of Lord Wolseley's reaching Kartoum in time. All such castles in the air are disposed of by Gordon's concluding prophecy :—

" It is, of course, on the cards that Kartoum is taken under the nose of the Expeditionary Force, which will be just too late.. The Expeditionary Force will, perhaps, think it necessary to retake it ; but that will be of no use, and will cause loss of life uselessly on both sides. It had far better quietly return with its tail between its legs ; for once Kartoum is taken the sun will have set, and the people will not care much about the satellites. If Kartoum falls, then go quietly back to Cairo, for you will only lose men and spend money uselessly in carrying on the campaign."

We prefer, therefore, to deal with the moral aspects of these ournals,—to consider them as revelations of a remarkable nature in the last extremity. From this point of view they constitute a

most interesting addition to our knowledge of Charles Gordon, both as a man and as a military strategist. Before he went to Kerte= the second time, we all knew both the simple faith which animated and supported him in a career without precedent in the military annals of the country, and the simple—it would be hardly true to say perfect—love of humanity which casts out both fear and cruelty. Not less did we know his marvellous sympathy with, and power of fascinating, men and tribes of a savage or half savage character, his still more marvellous genius for making the utmost of them in a military sense. All these virtues are disclosed once more in the Journals telling of the last months but one of the siege of Kartonm. On the same day in which he jotted in his Diary,— "Now mark this, if the Expeditionary Force,—and I ask for no more than two hundred men,—does not come in ten days, the town may fall ; and I have done my best for the honour of our country," he also wrote to his sister,—" God rules all ; and as God will rule to His glory and our welfare, His will be done I -am quite happy, and, like Lawrence, have tried to do my duty." It is plain that Gordon never had, in all his varied experiences, such wretched military material as the bulk of what he found left in Kartonm when he arrived there. "The Cairo Turkish 'Bashi-Bazouks, the Shaggyeh, and the Fellaheen soldiers I will back against any troops in the world for cowardice." But Gordon's -tenderness was never more conspicuous than it was in the time -of which we have a record here. He was compelled to arrest men whom he knew to be traitors to himself ; and yet we find shim worrying himself with wondering whether he had done 'rightly in arresting them. But this is all an old story, so far as Gordon is concerned. What these Journals show, as no pre- vious chapter in his history has shown, is the keen, sceptical, impulsive, variable mind of Gordon—within the limits of his -oreed. Captain Burton and others of his friends have placed it on record that he was never of one mind for two days in sue- cession. The Journals show what this means. It has been said that a Scotch Calvinist outside of his Calvinism is the shrewdest and the least credulous of mortals ; and Gordon was to the extent of three-fourths a Scotch Calvinist. Here is his -own confession when writing of the loss of Stewart, Power, and Herbin in the Abbas,' about which he never ceases to make -regretful remarks, and which he rightly attributed, without know- ing the actual facts, to treachery :—" Stewart was a man who did not chew the cud; he never thought of danger in prospective ; he was not a bit suspicious (while lam made up of it)." Caring only -to preserve the religions integrity and the moral continuity of his life, Gordon considered himself in one sense free, and in another bound, to accept every impression from without, and to shape lie objective life—for which and its consistencies he cared as little as for society and its dinners—in accordance with them. This variability constituted both Gordon's weakness and his strength. It rendered him unfit to run in official harness, and unable to sympathise much with those who were compelled -by circumstances, and perhaps also by official loyalty, so to run. If our diplomatists and other officials were to resign for the reasons that Gordon evidently regarded as sufficient, we might as well give up our Empire at once. At the same time, n morally strong nature, "made up of suspicion" on the in- tellectual side, is especially fitted to deal with such races as Gordon mingled with in his career. It was his possession of such a nature that made him a king of Chinese and blacks. The most practical suggestion, therefore, in this volume—it may prove eminently practical if we are ever involved in war with Russia in Asia—is this :— I believe that a good recruitment of blacks and Chinese would give England all the troops she wants for expeditions mingled with

' .one-sixth English. As for those wretched Sepoys they are useless. I would garrison India with Chinese and blacks, with one-sixth English, and no army could stand against us. The Chinese in Shanghai had the greatest contempt for the Bombay Sepoys, and 'used to knock them about. Beloohees and Sikhs are a different class. I have the greatest contempt for the pure Indian &pop.

-Chinese or blacks, or Goorkas or Belochees, are far better would back the Mussulman8 of India against the lot of these snakes."

Next to variability of mood, the most notable characteristic of Gordon, as revealed in this volume, is his strange, wild—some- times almost farcical—humour. Calvinist to e very fibre of his being, in every action of his life, he was yet one of "the gay

Gordons." This lonely man, pacing un.weariedly the roof of his palace, surrounded by men whom he knows to be traitors and cowards, aware that his stock of biscuit is getting low, and that then "a cow" could break down his defences, finds the time, and has the heart, to watch the life and chronicle the humours of a turkey-cock that was one of his companions, and to sketch the portrait of an Arab who rivalled Puna's caricature of Mr. Gladstone in shirt-collars ! Here, again, is a specimen of his style of satiric attack :—

"I am sure I should like that fellow Egerton ; there is a big- hearted jocularity about his communications, and I should think the cares of life sat easily on him. He wishes to know exactly day, hour, and minute' that I expect to be in difficulties as to provisions and ammunition. Now I really think if Egerton was to turn over the 'archives' (a delicious word) of his office, he would see we had been in difficulties for provisions for some months. It is as if a man on the bank, having seen his friend in the river already bobbed down two or three times, hails, I say, old fellow, let us know when we are to throw you the life-buoy; I know you have bobbed down two or three times, but it is a pity to throw you the life-buoy until you really are in extremis, and I want to know exactly, for I am a man brought up in a school of exactitude, though I did forget (?) to date my June telegram about that Bedouin escort contract.'"

This is certainly superior " fun " to that of the ordinary comic opera. One of Gordon's best jokes is an unintentional one. He hears of a Frenchman being with the Mahdi, and in his simplicity he conjectures "it might be Renan, the author of the Life of Jesus, who in his last publication takes leave of the world, and is said to have gone into Africa not to reappear again. He was a Roman Catholic priest originally, is a great Arabic scholar, and evidently a very unhappy and restless man." However, with his usual kindliness, Gordon subsequently says, "If he comes to the lines, and it is Renan, I shall go and see him, for whatever one may think of his unbelief in our Lord, he certainly dared to say what he thought, and be has not changed his creed to save his life." One regrets almost as much the brightness and naivete that have been lost us through Gordon's death, as his simple faith, his electrically sensitive conscience, and his great, if guerilla, military genius. When Gordon fell, we have no doubt he fell with the faith of Balfour of Burley in his heart, and the insouciance of Bothwell on his brow and lips.