The financial position of the Egyptian Government in the Soudan was as bad as the military and political. The Khedive's Governor-General at Khartoum, Ismail Yakoob Pasha, was nominally responsible for the administration of Darfour, although Zebehr reaped all the gain. This arrangement resulted in a drain on the Khedive's exchequer of £50,000 a year. The revenue failed to meet the expenditure in the other departments, and this was mainly due to the fact that the slavers no longer paid toll or tithe in the only trade that they had allowed to exist in the Soudan. What share of the human traffic they parted with was given in the way of bribes, and found no place in the official returns. All the time that this drain continued the Khedive was in a constant state of apprehension as to the danger which might arise to him in the south. He was also in receipt of frequent remonstrances from the English and other Governments as to the iniquities of the slave-trade, for which he was primarily in no sense to blame. On the other hand, he derived no benefit from the Soudan; and if he thought he could have obtained a secure frontier at Abou Hamid, or even at Wadi Halfa, he would have resigned all the rest without a sigh. But it was his strong conviction that no such frontier was attainable, and Ismail clung to his nominal and costly authority over the Soudan in the hope that some improvement might be effected, or that, in the chapter of accidents, the unexpected might come to his aid.
Alarmed as to his own position, in view of the ambition of Zebehr, and harassed by the importunities of England, Ismail, acting on the advice of his able and dexterous Minister, Nubar Pasha, one of the most skilful diplomatists the East has ever produced, came to the decision to relieve himself from at least the latter annoyance, by the appointment of Gordon. This was the main object the Khedive and his advisers had in view when they invited Gordon to accept the post of Governor of the Equatorial Provinces in succession to Sir Samuel Baker, who resigned what he found after many years' experience was a hopeless and thankless task. The post was in one sense peculiar. It was quite distinct from that of the Egyptian Governor-General at Khartoum, who retained his separate and really superior position in the administration of the Upper Nile region. Moreover, the finances of the Equatorial districts were included in the general Soudan Budget, which always showed an alarming deficit. These arrangements imparted a special difficulty into the situation with which Gordon had to deal, and his manner of coping with it will reveal how shrewd he was in detecting the root-cause of any trouble, and how prompt were his measures to eradicate the mischief. From the first he fully realised why he was appointed, viz. "to catch the attention of the English people"; but he also appreciated the Khedive's "terrible anxiety to put down the slave-trade, which threatens his supremacy." With these introductory remarks, the main thread of Gordon's career may be resumed.