f them attempted to
lionise him, while others paid him the most fulsome compliments, both
being things that he particularly disliked. The ordinary conventional
dinner-party, where a man is condemned to take in a lady with whom he
has nothing in common, and next to whom he must sit for a couple of
hours or so eating and drinking things which do not agree with him, was
to Gordon a special object of antipathy. Writing from Cairo on March
15, 1878, he says:--

"I am much bothered, but I get to bed at 8 P.M., which is a
comfort, for I do not dine out, and consequently do not drink wine.
Every one laughs at me; but I do not care."

Again, when in South Africa, he writes:--

"How I hate society; how society hates me! I never tell you the
sort of life I lead, it is not worth it; for it is simply the life
I led at home, being asked out, and refusing when it is
possible;--when I go, getting humiliated, or being foolish. This
latter is better than not being exposed--keeping one's self in
cotton wool, for that brings out no knowledge of self, such as is
brought out by being with others. At the same time, I think it is
not right to be much in society, indeed I fight against it truly,
and have only dined out about seven times since I have been here."

On October 24th, 1884, when he had made up his mind not to return to
England, even if he should get away from Khartoum, he says:--

"I dwell on the joy of never seeing Great Britain again, with its
horrid, wearisome dinner-parties and miseries. How we can put up
with those things passes my imagination! It is a perfect bondage.
At those dinner-parties we are all in masks, saying what we do not
believe, eating and drinking things we do not want, and then
abusing one another. I would sooner live like a Dervish with the
Mahdi, than go out to dinner every night in London. I hope, if any
English general comes to Khartoum, he will not ask me to dinner.
Why men cannot be friends without bringing the wretched stomachs
in, is astounding."

But though Gordon did not like the artificial conventional society one
meets at ordinary dinner-parties, it must not be supposed that he was
in any way gloomy. His friend, Prebendary Barnes, says about him: "The
seriousness of Gordon's temper did not prevent him from being a bright
and agreeable companion, especially when those with whom he talked
could join him in sm