—Pray do come on Monday, and bring Rintoul if you can.

I do not think of any document that we shall need.

The Times to-day seems to be preparing for Hawes's explanatory dodge. The article is as official to my mind, as if we had seen Hawes write it.

If so, you will get nothing worth out of the Colonial Office —nothing but delusion and disappointment. My hopes, such page 63as they are, rest wholly on the chance of Stanley's taking up the matter as a useful party move. We shall get nothing from the Office but what they can't help yielding. It would be comfortable if we had their answer; for hypothetical cases are an ill foundation for real work. I have no more faith in Hawes than in any Jew "Fence" of Rosemary Lane. He would be delighted to put you over your time, and then laugh at you. If he were not at his tricks, you would have had the Yes or No before now.

I feel incapable of doing anything well until we know where we are.