ickening of mind to contact with them.

CHAPTER V

THE GORDON RELIEF EXPEDITION

The incarceration of Gordon in Khartoum was a matter of deep concern
to every soldier and sailor in the British Empire, particularly to
those of us who were in and around Egypt at the time. It has not
always been plain to the British soldier in Egypt, why he was there;
but he seldom asks why he is anywhere. In the matter of Gordon,
however, the case was different. They all knew that Gladstone had sent
him and refused to relieve him; at least, the relief was so
long-drawn-out, so dilatory, that it was practically useless.

I had made application for my discharge from the service by
purchase--a matter of one hundred dollars--and had my plans made out
for further study; but the plight of Gordon gripped me as it gripped
others, and I determined to throw every other consideration aside, and
get to the front. There was one chance in a thousand, and I took it. A
marine officer of the ship was called for and his valet was a man who
had almost served his time; had seen much service and was not at all
anxious for any more. I went after him, bank-book in hand:

"I will give you all I possess if you will let me go in your place."

"It's a go," said this man as a gleam of joy overspread his face. The
officer himself was glad, and the whole thing was arranged; and in
forty-eight hours, I was on board the Peninsula and Oriental steamship
_Bokhara_ bound for the Red Sea. The officer was the most brutal cad I
have ever met. He strutted like a peacock, and seemed to take delight
in humiliating, when an opportunity would present itself, anybody and
everybody beneath him in rank--he was a captain.

The trip through the Suez Canal might be considered a new stage of
development, for I travelled as a second-class passenger. To be
consulted as to what I should eat or to have any choice whatever, was
not only new, but startling. In turning a curve in the Canal, we
encountered a sunken, water-logged ship which stopped the traffic. We
were there four or five days, and the life of ease and luxury, with
opportunity for reading and social intercourse with well-gowned people,
was so enjoyable that, had it not been for the fact that Gordon was in
danger in Khartoum, and I wanted to have a hand in his relief, I should
have enjoyed staying there a month. We disembarked at Suakim on the Red
Sea, and we were--the officer and myself--immediately attached to the