=Source.=--Lord Cromer's _Modern Egypt_, vol. i., p. 589.
(Macmillans.)
It has been already shown that General Gordon paid little heed to
his instructions, that he was consumed with a desire to "smash
the Mahdi," and that the view that he was constrained to withdraw
everyone who wished to leave from the most distant parts of the
Soudan was, to say the least, quixotic. The conclusion to be drawn
from these facts is that it was a mistake to send General Gordon
to the Soudan. But do they afford any justification for the delay
in preparing and in despatching the relief expedition? I cannot
think that they do so. Whatever errors of judgment General Gordon
may have committed, the broad facts, as they existed in the early
summer of 1884, were that he was sent to Khartoum by the British
Government, who never denied their responsibility for his safety,
that he was beleaguered, and that he was, therefore, unable to get
away. It is just possible that he could have effected his retreat,
if, having abandoned the southern posts, he had moved northward
with the Khartoum garrison in April or early in May. As time went
on, and nothing was heard of him, it became more and more clear
that he either could not or would not--probably that he could
not--move. The most indulgent critic would scarcely extend beyond
June 27 the date at which the Government should have decided on the
question of whether a relief expedition should or should not be
despatched. On that day the news that Berber had been captured on
May 26 by the Dervishes was finally confirmed. Yet it was not till
six weeks later that the Government obtained from Parliament the
funds necessary to prepare for an expedition.