dreds of instances of the hawk-eyed vigilance
of the governor-general. The vast provinces under his sway had never
been ruled in this fashion before.

One strain runs through all his numerous letters written during the five
years he remained in the Soudan, and that is the heart-rending condition
of the thousands of slaves who were driven through the country, and the
cruelty of the slave-hunters. Were we to begin quoting from those
letters, we should outrun the limits of this sketch. He had broken the
neck of the piratical army of man-stealers, and their forces were
scattered and comparatively powerless. So many slaves were set free that
they became a serious inconvenience, as they had to be fed and provided
for.

And yet there was no shout of joy at the capital, whence he had set out
years before, armed with the firman of the khedive to put an end to the
slave trade. On the contrary, We find him saying: "What I complain of in
Cairo is the complete callousness with which they treat all these
questions, while they worry me for money, knowing by my budgets that I
can not make my revenue meet my expenses by L90,000 a year. The
destruction of Sebehr's gang is the turning-point of the slave-trade
question, and yet, never do I get one word from Cairo to support me."

One more extract:

"Why should I, at every mile, be stared at by the grinning skulls of
those who are at rest?

"I said to Yussef Bey, who is a noted slave-dealer, 'The inmate of that
ball has told Allah what you and your people have done to him and his.'

"Yussef Bey says, 'I did not do it!' and I say, 'Your nation did, and
the curse of God will be on your land till this traffic ceases.'"

This man, Yussef Bey, was one of the most cruel of the slave-hunters,
and renowned for the manner in which he tortured his victims, more
especially the young boys. He also cruelly murdered the interesting and
peaceful king of the Monbuttos, so graphically described in
Schweinfurth's "Heart of Africa."

In June, 1882, Yussef Bey met his deserts, for going out with an army of
Egyptian troops to meet the Mahdi, he and all his men were cut to
pieces, scarcely one surviving.

Much of Gordon's time, during his first expedition, had been occupied in
strengthening the Egyptian posts south of Gondokoro, stretching away
toward the country of King M'tesa. So badly were they organized that it
took him twenty-one months to travel from Gondokoro to Foweira and
Mrooli, his southern