'On the same day Gordon telegraphed to us completely changing his ground about Suakim. He had previously prevented our doing anything except trying to relieve the towns blockaded, but on March 1st told us to do something to draw the Hadendowa down to Suakim. On the 2nd, General Graham having beaten the Arabs at Teb, the Admiral asked us to send more troops and to threaten Osman Digna's main force, a suggestion which concurred with Gordon's. And on March 5th the Cabinet met and decided that, while it was impossible to send Zebehr to the Soudan, General Graham was to be allowed to attack Osman Digna's main force.... Chamberlain then suggested that I should go to Egypt: Hartington evidently thought that somebody should go, and thought he had better go himself. Lord Granville would not have either, as might have been expected.... I suggested a way out of the Zebehr difficulty, and wrote to Chamberlain: "If I were sent out to do this, I believe I should get away the forces from the interior and have Zebehr elected, entirely without our action, by the Notables at Khartoum. On the whole, this would do if we did not do it. This would, in my opinion, be improved by Turkish approval under Turkish suzerainty, but that you do not like." Chamberlain answered: "Perhaps we cannot help having Zebehr, but surely we ought not to promote him, directly or indirectly; not only because he is a slave- hunter, but also because he will probably attack Egypt sooner or later, and very likely with the help of our subsidy." I replied: "I am quite clear that we must not set up Zebehr, but if we retire we cannot prevent his election by the Notables; and they would elect him." In the meantime Gordon had completely thrown over Baring's suggestion that Zebehr should be sent (but so sent that he and Gordon should not be in the Soudan together) by telegraphing that the combination at Khartoum of Zebehr and himself was "an absolute necessity," and that it would be "absolutely necessary" for him to stay at Khartoum with Zebehr for four months; and Stewart had now completely come over to Gordon's policy about Zebehr personally. On the other hand, Baring and the military authorities in Egypt were unanimously opposed to the idea of sending a small British force to Wady Halfa. 'On March 7th it was decided to give an inland district to the Abyssinians, but not to offer them a port (which was what they wanted), on account of its not being ours to give away from the Turks. The Cabinet would not hear of receiving a Turkish Commissioner at Cairo.