by Dr Birkbeck Hill. That exceedingly
interesting volume placed at the disposal of the public the evidence
as to his great work in Africa, which might otherwise have been buried
in oblivion. It was written under considerable difficulties, for
Gordon would not see Dr Hill, and made a stringent proviso that he was
not to be praised, and that nothing unkind was to be said about
anyone. He did, however, stipulate for a special tribute of praise to
be given to his Arab secretary, Berzati Bey, "my only companion for
these years--my adviser and my counsellor." Berzati was among those
who perished with the ill-fated expedition of Hicks Pasha at the end
of 1883. To the publication of this work must be attributed the
establishment of Gordon's reputation as the authority on the Soudan,
and the prophetic character of many of his statements became clear
when events confirmed them.

After a stay at Southampton and in London of a few weeks, Gordon was
at last induced to give himself a short holiday, and, strangely
enough, he selected Ireland as his recreation ground. I have been told
that Gordon had a strain of Irish blood in him, but I have failed to
discover it genealogically, nor was there any trace of its influence
on his character. He was not fortunate in the season of the year he
selected, nor in the particular part of the country he chose for his
visit. There is scenery in the south-west division of Ireland, quite
apart from the admitted beauty of the Killarney district, that will
vie with better known and more highly lauded places in Scotland and
Switzerland, but no one would recommend a stranger to visit that
quarter of Ireland at the end of November, and the absence of
cultivation, seen under the depressing conditions of Nature, would
strike a visitor with all the effect of absolute sterility. Gordon was
so impressed, and it seemed to him that the Irish peasants of a whole
province were existing in a state of wretchedness exceeding anything
he had seen in either China or the Soudan. If he had seen the same
places six months earlier, he would have formed a less extreme view of
their situation. It was just the condition of things that appealed to
his sympathy, and with characteristic promptitude he put his views on
paper, making one definite offer on his own part, and sent them to a
friend, the present General James Donnelly, a distinguished engineer
officer and old comrade, and moreover a member of a well-known Irish
family.