contradiction is life! I hate Her Majesty's Government for their leaving the Sudan after having caused all its troubles; yet I believe our Lord rules heaven and earth, so I ought to hate Him, which I (sincerely) do not."
One painful thought obsessed him. He believed that the two Egyptian officers, who had been put to death after the defeat in March, had been unjustly executed. He had given way to "outside influences"; the two Pashas had been "judicially murdered." Again and again he referred to the incident, with a haunting remorse. The Times, perhaps, would consider that he had been justified; but what did that matter? "If the Times saw this in print, it would say 'Why, then, did you act as you did?' to which I fear I have no answer." He determined to make what reparation he could, and to send the families of the unfortunate Pashas £1000 each.
On a similar, but a less serious, occasion, he put the same principle into action. He boxed the ears of a careless telegraph clerk—"and then, as my conscience pricked me, I gave him $5. He said he did not mind if I killed him—I was his father (a chocolate-coloured youth of twenty)." His temper, indeed, was growing more and more uncertain, as he himself was well aware. He observed with horror that men trembled when they came into his presence—that their hands shook so that they could not hold a match to a cigarette.
He trusted no one. Looking into the faces of those who surrounded him, he saw only the ill-dissimulated signs of treachery and dislike. Of the 40,000 inhabitants of Khartoum he calculated that two-thirds were willing—were perhaps anxious—to become the subjects of the Mahdi. "These people are not worth any great sacrifice," he bitterly observed. The Egyptian officials were utterly incompetent; the soldiers were cowards. All his admiration was reserved for his enemies. The meanest of the Mahdi's followers was, he realised, "a determined warrior, who could undergo thirst and privation, who no more cared for pain or death than
