ht slaves himself, and recognised the
rights of others in what are called human chattels, even although that
man had done more than any individual or any government to kill the
slave trade at its root. It was not until his remarkable mission to
Khartoum, only four years after he left Egypt, that public opinion
woke up to a sense of all he had done before, and realised, in its
full extent, the magnitude and the splendour of his work as
Governor-General of the Soudan.

CHAPTER IX.

MINOR MISSIONS--INDIA AND CHINA.

General Gordon arrived in London at the end of January 1880--having
lingered on his home journey in order to visit Rome--resolved as far
as he possibly could to take that period of rest which he had
thoroughly earned, and which he so much needed. But during these last
few years of his life he was to discover that the world would not
leave him undisturbed in the tranquillity he desired and sought.
Everyone wished to see him usefully and prominently employed for his
country's good, and offers, suitable and not suitable to his character
and genius, were either made to him direct, or put forward in the
public Press as suggestions for the utilization of his experience and
energy in the treatment of various burning questions. His numerous
friends also wished to do him honour, and he found himself threatened
with being drawn into the vortex of London Society, for which he had
little inclination, and, at that time, not even the strength and
health.

After this incident he left London on 29th February for Switzerland,
where he took up his residence at Lausanne, visiting _en route_ at
Brussels, Mr, afterwards Lord, Vivian, then Minister at the Belgian
Court, who had been Consul-General in Egypt during the financial
crisis episode. It is pleasant to find that that passage had, in this
case, left no ill-feeling behind it on either side, and that Gordon
promised to think over the advice Mrs Vivian gave him to get married
while he was staying at the Legation. His reply must not be taken as
of any serious import, and was meant to turn the subject. About the
same time he wrote in a private letter, "Wives! wives! what a trial
you are to your husbands! From my experience married men have more or
less a cowed look."

It was on this occasion that Gordon was first brought into contact
with the King of the Belgians, and had his attention drawn to the
prospect of suppressing the slave trade from the side of the Congo,