1899] Ruling the Soudan 311 



Khartoum, declaring they will now be ruled by the Queen of England 

 and the Khedive of Egypt. This lets the cat out of the bag. I was 

 quite sure the thing was in contemplation from the reticence of Lord 

 Salisbury. All these weeks he has been allowing the rest of his Cabinet 

 to make altruistic speeches about the Soudan having been ' reconquered 

 for Egypt,' but has been mute himself, remaining by his telegram to 

 Monson. The high moral nature of the transaction has been appealed 

 to by every newspaper in England notwithstanding Bennett's exposure 

 of the atrocities of the campaign. I have written to congratulate Ben- 

 nett on his courage. 



" 13//; Jan.— Indoors all day writing about the new settlement in the 

 Soudan. It is ludicrous to follow the antics of the so-called Liberal 

 papers, the ' Chronicle,' the ' Westminster Gazette,' and the rest, in 

 their endeavour to make the seizure of the Upper Nile for England fit 

 in with their moral heroics about England's duty of ' reconquering it 

 for Egypt.' What they don't understand is that Lord Salisbury was 

 very quietly playing with them. He was delighted at the time of his 

 ultimatum to France to get the support of the Radical Press, and he let 

 them run on to their hearts' content about England being Egypt's trustee 

 and the Nile being Egypt and Egypt being the Nile — that was Rose- 

 bery's phrase — and it pleased him that the Nonconformist conscience 

 should call heaven and earth to witness what a moral and unselfish 

 nation we were, and how abominable were the French, who would 

 pilfer Egypt's inheritance. He was glad to get the support of the 

 Exeter Hall people and the bishops and the clergy by letting them 

 boast of the evangelical missions they were going to start at Khartoum, 

 all the while having up his sleeve this card of Kitchener's, English 

 Viceroyalty of the Soudan in the name of Her Gracious Majesty and 

 a strictly Mohammedan Protectorate. The world are fools, or rather, 

 they ask to be deceived, and deceived they are. The ' Chronicle ' will 

 very soon come fully into line with the ' Telegraph,' and find it an ex- 

 ceedingly clever trick to have made a cat's-paw of the Egyptian Govern- 

 ment in English interests. What can be more amusing than to add the 

 Upper Nile to the British Empire, and make the Egyptian fellah pay 

 for his conquest and maintenance, the profit being wholly for England. 

 Meynell tells me that when Sir William Butler (who is his brother- 

 in-law) met Kitchener on his arrival at Dover, he said to him, 'Well, 

 if you do not bring down a curse upon the British Empire for what you 

 have been doing, there is no truth in Christianity.' Kitchener only 

 stared. 



" 14th Jan. — Drove to Abbotsworthy to stay with George Lefevre, 1 

 where we have had a deal of talk about politics. Lefevre is of opinion 

 that Rosebery's retirement from the Leadership of the Liberal party 



1 Now Lord Eversley. 



