He expressed himself, of course,
with eccentric ABANDON--it would have been impossible for him to
do otherwise; but he was content to indicate his deepest feelings
with a fleer. Yet sometimes--as one can imagine happening with
him in actual conversation--his utterance took the form of a
half-soliloquy, a copious outpouring addressed to himself more
than to anyone else, for his own satisfaction. There are passages
in the Khartoum Journals which call up in a flash the light,
gliding figure, and the blue eyes with the candour of childhood
still shining in them; one can almost hear the low voice, the
singularly distinct articulation, the persuasive--the self-
persuasive--sentences, following each other so unassumingly
between the puffs of a cigarette.As he wrote, two preoccupations
principally filled his mind. His reflections revolved around the
immediate past and the impending future. With an unerring
persistency he examined, he excused, he explained, his share in
the complicated events which had led to his present situation. He
rebutted the charges of imaginary enemies; he laid bare the
ineptitude and the faithlessness of the English Government. He
poured out his satire upon officials and diplomatists. He drew
caricatures, in the margin, of Sir Evelyn Baring, with sentences
of shocked pomposity coming out of his mouth.
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