" Perhaps
he calculated that the public announcement of his wishes would
oblige the Government to yield to them; if so, he was completely
mistaken, for the result was the very reverse. The country,
already startled by the proclamation in favour of slavery, could
not swallow Zobeir. The Anti-Slavery Society set on foot a
violent agitation, opinion in the House of Commons suddenly
stiffened, and the Cabinet, by a substantial majority, decided
that Zobeir should remain in Cairo. The imperialist wave had
risen high, but it had not risen high enough; and now it was
rapidly subsiding. The Government's next action was decisive. Sir
Gerald Graham and his British Army were withdrawn from the Sudan.
The critical fortnight during which these events took place was
the first fortnight of March. By the close of it, Gordon's
position had undergone a rapid and terrible change. Not only did
he find himself deprived, by the decision of the Government, both
of the hope of Zobeir's assistance and of the prospect of
smashing up the Mahdi with the aid of British troops; the
military movements in the Eastern Sudan produced, at the very
same moment, a yet more fatal consequence. The adherents of the
Mahdi had been maddened, they had not been crushed, by Sir Gerald
Graham's victories. When, immediately afterwards, the English
withdrew to Suakin, from which they never again emerged, the
inference seemed obvious; they had been defeated, and their power
was at an end.
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