Note 163 — JOURNAL.
Reading edition
General Gordon intends H.M. Government to understand by this statement, that, in the position of a Major-General in H.M. service, he would give all his services to the retreating expedition, were he ordered to do so, though such an order would be most unwelcome; but that he would do nothing of the kind until some one replaced him as Governor-General. He is really applying to himself the remarks he made a few pages back: “In military affairs it is different: one is ordered to go here and there, and one obeys (even if one thinks it unwise, having represented it), but in diplomacy there is no such call.”—Ed.