zeal for the public service, I preferred; as your Lordship knows, to remain; and this for the very purpose you beg my against very remonstrance of my advisers.
My letter of the 21st January last from Hong Kong, to the Secretary of State, heim of these facts, and of my apprising inability, any longer to resist the pressure of my sickness, expressed the hope that I should, by no means incur his disapproval in leaving, by the first available means, the only alternative being Death, for Europe:
The medical Certificates of 1857, and 1855 and 1859, which were before Sir F. Browning when, by his official letter of the 24th January last, His Excellency concurred my departure, for England, must have also come under your Lordship's notice.
And the letter of Monday, the 4th instant, by which, within forty hours after my arrival from Hong Kong, I reported myself to the Secretary of State as having returned on sick leave, did not mention my return on "sick leave".
The Governor-General's letter of the 14th April, concerning "The duration of that sick leave, now that my health had been partially re-established", replied through your Office, confined itself to intimating that my sick leave had been granted.
And yet, down to this hour, I have not had so much as an intimation that my return to this country was not without the approval of the Secretary of State or Her Majesty's Government.
I must here conclude my correspondence with your Lordship, upon the subject. I had intended to have dismissed it personally with your Lordship, upon my approaching separation from office, 17 March - 4 days before the Government despatch reached me.
But I cannot do so without repeating my regret that, not only my personal interests, but the great public interests, which it was my duty to bring before the Queen's Government, have suffered so much injury, from the mode of communication, into which it has pleased your Lordship to compel me to enter with yourself, on the subject, and my correspondence with the Secretary of State at the same time that you avowed your objections.