there real foes in every direction, determined if possible to frustrate
his mission, but in addition there was physical suffering to endure
from climatic and other causes. "No one can conceive," says he in a
letter written on April 10th, "the utter misery of these lands, heat
and mosquitoes day and night all the year round. But I like the work,
for I believe that I can do a great deal to ameliorate the lot of the
people." Two days after this he passed through a place called St.
Croix, which had been a Roman Catholic mission station, but so
unhealthy was it that it had at last been abandoned. After thirteen
years of work not a single convert had been made, although during that
period the missionaries had plodded on in the face of discouragement,
and in spite of the appalling havoc that death and sickness had made in
their ranks. Out of twenty missionaries thirteen had died of fever, two
of dysentery, and two had been invalided. A few banana trees were all
that remained of the settlement at which these heroes had been
sacrificed.

Gordon reached Gondokoro on April 16th, just twenty-four days after
leaving Khartoum. Everybody was much surprised to see him, for it was
not even known that he had been appointed. He remained only six days,
and then started back to Khartoum, in order to get his baggage. Not
finding it there, he went on to Berber to hurry up the escort, but not
till he had given the corrupt Governor of Khartoum a bit of his mind.
"I have had some sharp skirmishing with the Governor-General of
Khartoum," said he in a letter home, "and I think I have crushed him.
Your brother wrote to him and told him he told _stories_. It was
undiplomatic of me, but it did the Governor-General good." Having
secured his baggage, he returned to Gondokoro. _En route_ he writes
from the entrance of the Sanbat River:--

"We arrived here from Khartoum a week ago, and I have made a nice
station here, and made great friends with the Shillock natives, who
come over in great numbers from the other side of the river. They
are poorly off, and I have given them some grain; very little
contents them. I have employed a few of them to plant maize, and
they do it very fairly. The reason they do not do it for themselves
is, that if they plant any quantity they would run the chance of
losing it, by its being taken by force from them; so they plant
only enough to keep body and soul together, and even that is so