Among
the first to realise the gravity of the situation was Queen
Victoria. 'It is alarming,' she telegraphed to Lord Hartington on
March 25th. 'General Gordon is in danger; you are bound to try to
save him... You have incurred a fearful responsibility.' With an
unerring instinct, Her Majesty forestalled and expressed the
popular sentiment. During April, when it had become clear that
the wire between Khartoum and Cairo had been severed; when, as
time passed, no word came northward, save vague rumours of
disaster; when at last a curtain of impenetrable mystery closed
over Khartoum, the growing uneasiness manifested itself in
letters to the newspapers, in leading articles, and in a flood of
subscriptions towards a relief fund. At the beginning of May, the
public alarm reached a climax. It now appeared to be certain, not
only that General Gordon was in imminent danger, but that no
steps had yet been taken by the Government to save him.
On the 5th, there was a meeting of protest and indignation at St.
James's Hall; on the 9th there was a mass meeting in Hyde Park;
on the 11th there was a meeting at Manchester. The Baroness
Burdett-Coutts wrote an agitated letter to "The Times" begging
for further subscriptions. Somebody else proposed that a special
fund should be started with which 'to bribe the tribes to secure
the General's personal safety'.
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