ay the same objection applies as
to tea, etc., it is not so, for opium has for ages been a tabooed
article among Chinese respectable people. I own reluctance to
foreign intercourse applies to what I said, but the Chinese know
that the intercourse with foreigners cannot be stopped, and it,
as well as the forced introduction of opium, are signs of defeat;
yet one, that of intercourse, cannot be stopped or wiped away
while the opium question can be. I am writing in a hurry, so am
not very clear.

"What I mean is that no one country forces another country to
take a drug like opium, and therefore the Chinese feel the
forced introduction of opium as an intrusion and injustice;
thence their feelings in the matter. This, I feel sure, is the
case.

"What could our Government do _in re_ opium? Well, I should say,
let the clause of treaty lapse about it, and let the smuggling be
renewed. Hongkong is a nest of smugglers.

"Pekin would, or rather could, never succeed in cutting off
foreign intercourse. The Chinese are too much mixed up (and are
increasingly so every year) with foreigners for Pekin even to try
it. Also I do not think China would wish to stop its importation
altogether. All they ask is an increased duty on it."

CHAPTER X.

THE MAURITIUS, THE CAPE, AND THE CONGO.

There was a moment of hesitation in Gordon's mind as to whether he
would come home or not. His first project on laying down the Indian
Secretaryship had been to go to Zanzibar and attack the slave trade
from that side. Before his plans were matured the China offer came,
and turned his thoughts in a different channel. On his arrival at
Aden, on the way back, he found that the late Sir William Mackinnon, a
truly great English patriot of the type of the merchant adventurers of
the Elizabethan age, had sent instructions that the ships of the
British India Steam Packet Company were at his disposal to convey him
whereever he liked, and for a moment the thought occurred to him to
turn aside to Zanzibar. But a little reflection led him to think that,
as he had been accused of insubordination, it would be better for him
to return home and report himself at headquarters. When he arrived in
London at the end of October 1880, he found that his letters, written
chiefly to his sister during his long sojourn in the Soudan, were on
the eve of publication