lISmilhSK;^ LIBRARV 3 1924 100 3T 014 DATE DUE 'iLkia^ ■" 1 '"7"' J GAYLOflD PRINTED IN U.S.A, Cornell University Library The original of this bool< is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924100211014 In compliance with current copyright law, Cornell University Library produced this replacement volume on paper that meets the ANSI Standard Z39.48-1992 to replace the irreparably deteriorated original. 2005 CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY GIFT OF The Est.^te of Professor A. Henry Detweiler O s H =«, Z . ■* I S ^^ o g s o u H a: H g < o w I-) u EGYPT BY J. C. McCOAN WITH A SUPPLEMENTARY CHAPTER OF RECENT EVENTS By WILFRED C. LAY, Ph.D. ILLUSTRATED NEW YORK PETER FENELON COLLIER MDCCCXCVIII PREFACE. The following pages are the outcome of what may claim to be an intimate acquaintance with Egypt, accLuired during a long residence in the Levant and several length- ened visits to the country, made .specially within the past three years to collect statistical and other information on the spot. Whatever, therefore, may be their merits or defects, few or none of the latter can be laid at the door of previous writers, who have indeed left me almost a virgin corner in the wide field of book-making on Egypt. The antiquities of the country have been exhaustively iescribed by a hundred pens, from Strabo to the last Excellent edition of Murray' s Handbook ; but, in English at least, I know of no systematic attempt to sketch its present material and administrative condition. In Ger- man, Messrs. Stephan and Liittke, in their Das HeuUge Aegypten and Aegypten Neue Zeit, have in part done so, but on very different lines from those of the present vol- ume, and in neither case at all completely up to the date of their publications — respectively five and four years ago — since which, too, the situation has in many respects changed. I may at once, therefore, say that my obliga- tion to these writers is nil. In French the case is differ- ent. Beside Clot Bey's Apergu General sur V Egypte — which, although published forty years ago, contains much that is still instructive — and M. GaUion-Danglar's iv PREFACE. Lettres snr TEgypte Contemporaine (1865-75) — reprints containing much tliat was merely ephemeral, and which, necessarily omit the whole of the recent administrative and judicial reforms — De Regney Bey's Statistique de VEgypte, and Dor Bey's Instruction Publique en Egypte (1872) and Statistique des Ecoles Oiviles (1875) are fuU of information of which I have freely availed myself, though not always adopting M. de R%ney's figures up to even his date of vso-iting. But barring these publi- cations and such few others as are acknowledged in foot-notes, my information has been either personally collected at first hand, or has been communicated direct from the best official or private sources. In these latter cases I have spared no paius to collate and, as far as possible, to test the accuracy of the statements received. That the result is in every case exact, I cannot venture to say ; but that in all it is approximately so, I have little hesitation in asking the reader to believe. Besides many minor obligations, my acknowledgments are especially due to Ali Pasha Moubarek, Musteschar oi the Ministry of Public Works ; to Riaz Pasha, Minister of Public Instruction, and to Dor Bey and Mr. Rogers, Inspector-General and Director of the same Department, for the materials of the chapter on that subject ;* to Mr. Fowler for the admirable map, which, better than any other yet published, depicts Egypt from the Mediter- ranean to the Equator, and also for much valuable infor- mation as to the Barrage and the Soudan railway ; to General Marriott for details of the new railway adminis- tration ; to Mr. Scrivenour and Mr. CaiUard for similar information respecting the Customs and Post Office; to * This and the chapter on " Slavery " appeared in substance in the February and May numbers of Praser's Magazine- PBEFAOE. V Mr. George and Mr. Dougla^ Gibbs, for particulars respecting the telegraph.s ; to Mr. Bartlett, a practical farmer of long local experience, for much of the chapter on Agriculture ; to Mr. E. J. Moss, for many details of Alexandrian trade ; to M'Killop Pasha, for nearly all I haye said about the light-houses ; and to Mr. Anderson, for much of my information respecting the Daira sugar factories and other works. A word in anticipation of a possible objection by my critics : Of the social life of Egypt I have said hardly anything — for the sufficient reason that this has been photographed once for all by Mr. Lane, whose vivid por- traiture of the manners and customs of both Arab and Copt is as true stUl as it was forty years ago. The spread of education and the influence of a much larger European society have effected a few changes, but in the main the native private life of 1877 differs but little, if at all, from that of 1835, and in the Modern Egyptians incompajably the best description of it is still to be found. J. C. M. lemple, Jvly %nd UST OF ILLUSTRATIONS EGYPT Cairo The Pyramid and Sphinx . General Charles George Gordon PUBLISHERS' NOTE TO THE KEW EDITION. The occurrences of tlie last five years have served only to augment the interest and value of this work as a picture of " Egypt as it Is." The reader who wishes to gain accurate information as to the present condition of that country, and the nature and objects of the conflict now raging there, will find the facts essentially neces- sary to the formation of sound conclusions duly set forth in this volume. That the prosperity of Egypt and the general wel- fare of her people has been promoted by the subjection of the government to European intervention there can be no doubt. On the whole, that intervention has been "wisely directed, and been the means of delivering the people from many grinding oppressions, and laying the foundations of a better civilization. But human nature in Egypt is the same that it is elsewhere. The followers of Mahomet do not like to be nnder the rule of Christians, and the instinct of nation- ality among them is strong. The native populations re- volt at seeing the Khedive under the sway of foreigners, who receive large salaries for administering the govern- ment according to European and Christian methods, and they choose to take the risk of whatever evils may re- sult from placing the government again in the hands of native rulers. The Egyptian instinct of nationality is represented by Arabi Bey, who, if he is less patriotic and noble than Ms partisans affirm, is certainly not the ruffian and cut" Vlii PUBLISHERS' NOTE. throat that many too readily suppose him to be. It is impossible not to feel some degree of sympathy with a man, however mistaken he may be, who seeks the de- liverance of his country from a foreign yoke. The questions at issue in the present struggle are ex- ceedingly complicated, and therefore difficult of satisfac- tory adjustment. The European powers, each one jeal- ous to a greater or less extent of the others, are at cross- purposes and unable to agree upon a common plan of action. England, meanwhile, whose interests are of a more pressing nature than those of the other powers, has undertaken the task of putting down what it calls the rebellion of Arabi Bey and his followers, and restoring the authority of the Khedive, subject only as aforetime to the suzerainty of the Porte and the intervention of the Powers. She disclaims any wish or intention to conquer the country and annex it to her own Empire, as she doubtless might do if unopposed by the other Pow- ers, but professes to be acting in the interest of Europe and modern civilization, with no purpose of self-aggi-an- dizement. , What will be the outcome, immediate or remote, of the conflict upon which England has entered, it would be idle to predict. That the Suez Canal will be protect- ed for the world's use, in any event, no doubt need be entertained ; but what changes may take place in the government of Egypt it is impossible to foresee. Let us hope that, as a consequence of those changes, or in spite of them, the course of civilization and Christianity in the East may be promoted. August 1, 1883. CONTENTS CHAPTER I. TEBSITOBY. P fflr Bartle Prere's Testimony to Recent Egyptian Progress — Territory has Shared in the General Development — Boundaries of Egypt Proper Extension South of these — Present Divisions — The Delta — The Northern Lakes— Middle Egypt— The Fayoum— The Said— Phils- The Eastern Desert — The Oases — Red Sea Coast — Geological Divisions — ^Nile Soil — ^Nubiato the Soudan — Total Extent it Present Territory CHAPTER II. POPITLATIOIf. Diversity of Eaeee— Conflicting Estimates of Total — Census of 1859 — Rate of Inerease — Present Estimated Totals — Fellaheen — Bedoween — Copts — Abyssinians — Nubians — Jews — Rayah Greeks — -Syrians — Ar- menia '-—Foreigners — Industrial Distributions of the Whole . CHAPTER UL C'lTLBiS Ain) TOTTirS. CSiles and " Mohafzas "—Towns and Villages — Alexandria — First View of Egypt — Napoleon's Estimate of Alexandria — The Old Civilisation and the New — Topography of the Modem City — ^Its Commercial Revival — Ramleh — To Cairo— The Queen of Eastern CSties — Hausmannisation — The Esbekieh — Cairene Mosques — The Citadel — Social Attractions — Heliopolis — The Pyramids and Sphinx — " Eothen's " Prophetic Rhap- sody — The Nile Voyage — Cairene Trade — Helwan — Rosetta — Dami etta — Port Said — El-Arish and Ismallia — Suez — Souaklm and Massiv wah — The other Provincial Chief Towns ... . . 37 ix CONTENTS BQTPT AKD THE POBTB. BMSa The Problem of their Relation— The Conquest never EstabBshed Full Sovereignty of the Porte — Continued Power of the Mamlouk Beys — The French Invasion— Mbhembt All — Elected Viceroy — War •with the Porte— The Treaty of 1840— His Subsequent Administration and Death — Ibrahim, Abbas, and Said Pashas — Accession of ISMABi, a New Epoch — Change of the Succession — " Khedive " — Intema,- tional Eecognition of these Changes — Conflict of Juristic Opinion as to their Effect — De facto Establishment of an Arab Kingdom - " Egypt for the Egyptians — Probable Outcome of the Wax — Inde- pendence or British Protection ..•..,. 75 CHAPTER V. ADMINIBTBATIOIT. L'6tat, e'eat le Khidi/oe — Council and Ministers merely Exeontants of hlB Will — His Early Life — After his Accession — Abdeen — Routine of his Highness's Daily Life — His Personal Character — The Ministries — The late Moufettish — His Inordinate Power — The Present Ministry of Finance — Of Foreign Affairs — Of the Interior — Of War and Marine — Of Commerce — Of Public Works and Agriculture — Of Public In- struction and the Wakfs — The Custom House and Post Office — Pro- vincial Administration — Mudirs, M^moujs, Nazirs, and Sheikhs-el- beled — The Chamber of Delegates — Character of Egyptian Officials 68 CHAPTER VL FINAKCBB. Revenue and Expenditure Forty Years ago — Situation at Commencement of the Present Eeign — Present Main Elements of Egyptian Finance— What the Revenue now consists of — The Expenditure — Explanation of its Increase — History of the State Debt — ^The Crisis of Last Year — Mr. Cave's Mission, and his Report — The French Unification Scheme — Its Failure — The Qoschen-Joubert Scheme— Its Merits and Defects — Its Acceptance by the Khedive — The New Financial Admin- istration—Its Guarantees — The Essential Solvency of the Country US CHAPTER vn. THE DAIEAB. In all. Seven of these Administrations — Only Two Responsible for the Daira Debt — The Daira Sanieh — Its Great Estates and Factories — Their Defective Management — Its Income and Expenditure— The aONTBNT8. xi FAGB Dalra Khassa — History of the Debt — Inter-relatioLS of both with the State Treasxiry — Crisis of Last Year — Exclusion of Dalra Debt from the GoBchen-Joubert Scheme — Investigation of Assets and Liabilities — Recent Arrangement for Redemption of the Debt . , . . 136 CHAPTER vm. COMMBBCB. Steady Growth of Egyptian Trade — Great Increase dniing Present Reign — Review of Ten Years ending 1875 — Exports — Their Chief Details — Ninety per cent, of the whole shipped from Alexandria — Principal Foreign Markets — Diminution of the Transit Traffic compensated by Growth of General Trade — Imports — Whence chiefly received — Their Increase an Evidence of Augmented National Wealth — Proba- ble Re-adjustment of the Customs Taiifi . . . , , 167 CHAPTER IX. AQHICITLTtrRB. ThlB has always been the Staple Industry of Egypt— Its Present Prin- cipal Conditions — Land Tenure — Its Varieties and Chief Incidents — Extent of Land held under each — Their Respective Rent Charges — Large Taxable Reserve in the Tithe Lands — Labour Supply — Suf- ficient with certain Reforms — Wages — Water-supply wholly depend- ent on the Nile — " Good " and " Bad " Niles — How the Inundation is controlled — SakMas, Shadoofs, and Taboots — Their Antiquity — Great Economy of Labor if they were replaced by Cheap Machinery — Methods of Cultivation stUl Rude — Cotton Culture— Capability of its Expansion — Cereals — Their Varieties and Yield -Non-Cereal Oops — Average Gross Value of Produce — With Improved Irriga- tion, Area of Cultivation may be Largely Increased . . . 171 . CHAPTER X. PUBLIC INSTEDCnON. Foundations of Present System laid by the Caliphs — Decadence under the Mamlouks — Revival under Mehemet Ali — His Military Schools — His Neglect of Education after the Peace — Further Decline under Abbas Pasha — Greater Liberality of Said — Revival under the Khedive — Three Systems now at Work — The State Schools — Girls' Schools, their Great Success — The Blind and Normal Schools — Municipal Civil Schools — Mosque Colleges — The Azhar — Arab Primary Schools — Native Non-Moslem Schools — Foreign Missionary Schools — Aggre- gate of the whole — Educational Level of Egypt relatively to BuroTie 200 Xii CONTENTS. CHAPTER XI. PUBLIC W0EK9. fAsa The Great Aggregate of these — Railways — i'rincipal Linea of the Sys- tem — Nearly all Constructed during the Present Eeign — Their Aver- age Cost — Low Working Cost — Former Abusive Management — The New Administration— The Soudan Line — Canals — Their Two Classes — How they Control and Distribute the Irrigation — Great Additions made to the System during the Present Reign — The Barrage — Its Proposed Completion — Harbour Works— M, Alexandria — At Suez — Lightliouses — Details of the Present Service — Its Efficiency — Telegraphs — Existing Lines — External Communication — Bridges— Kasr-en-Nil — Ghizeh — Others Built during Present Reign . . 326 CHAPTER Xn. THE 8CBZ OANAIi. This Work a Source of Permanent Loss to Egypt — Its Political Compen- sations — Ancient History and Variations of the Scheme — Contem- plated by Bonaparte — Conflicting Surveys — Opposed by Stephenson — Cairo-Suez Railway Constructed as Substitute — M. de Lesseps — First Concession from Said Pasha — English Opposition— Formation of Company — Commencement of Work — Fresh- Water Canal — With- drawal of Corvee Labour — Reference to Emperor Napoleon — TTih Ex- cessive Award — Further Financial Incidents — Description of the Canal — Economy of Distance — Seven Years' Traffic — Proportion of Flags — Dispute as to Dues — Its Settlement — Capital Account — Cost to Egypt — Compensations — Report of Directors for 1876 . . 3SS CHAPTER XUL JUDICIAL REP0BM8. The Capitulations — Their Abuse in Egypt — Resultant Scandals — First Action of the Government for their Reform — Memorandum of Nubar Pasha — Negotiat ons with the English and French Governments — Appointment of an International Commission— Its Favourable Report — Opposition of the Porte — French Resistance — Assent of the Other Powers — Inauguration of the New Courts — Their Organisation and Jurisdiction — Great Success of the Reform — Its EfEect on the Future of Justice in Egypt. ' . . . . ; . ... 374 CONTENTS. xiii CHAPTER XIV. MAirorAcmEiirG aot) otheb dtdubtries. PAsa Skilled InduKries not Improved Proportionately to Agrictilttire and Com- merce—Misdirected Efiorts of Mehemet Ali to Promote them— Ofll- oial List of Trades Incomplete— ^«nffi/s, or Trade Guilds— Weavers — Metal Workers — Workers in Wood— Masons and Bricklayers- Tanners and Curriers — Potteis — ^Paper-making — The Bonlak Mill — Bakers and Millers— Embroiderers— Goldsmiths— Turners— The Old Muehrabeeyahs—Moiein Skilled Labour chiefly done by Europeans —Artificial Egg-hatching — Cotton-factory Workers — Poverty of Min- eral Resources — Saltpits — Natron Lakes — Petroleum— Fisheries — 1 "le Boatmen— General Inferiority of Native Skilled Work — No Chance of Competing with Europe — True Policy of Government to Encourage Agriculture 287 CHAPTER XV. Popular Misconception on this Subject — Difference between Eastern and Western Slavery — Property in the Person almost the only Common Feature — Status of Slave better m Egypt than in Turkey — Univer- sality of the Institution — Different Classes of Slaves— Circassians now Rare — Abyssinians and Soudanis — Egyptian Slaves protected by Religion and Public Sentiment — Additional Safeguards decreed by the Khedive — Their Abuse by the Consuls — Consequent Limitation of Consular Interference — Existing Facilities of Emancipation — The Slave Trade legally Abolished, but still surreptitiously carried on — How it is fed — Prices — The Institution now merely a mild Domestic Servitude — Acknowledged Cruelties of Slave-hunting — The EChedive honestly bent on its Abolition — Colonel Gordon's Commission . SOS CHAPTER XVI. FAUNA AND FLOBA. The Camel— The Ass— The Horse— The Ox— The Buffalo— Sheep and Goats — The Pig, "Unclean" to Christian, Moslem, and Jew — Dogs and Cats — Indigenous Wild Animals — Crocodiles and Hippopotami — Abundant Ornithology — Tame Fowl — Wild Fowl— Ophidians — Fish — Native Trees less numerous than Animals — Palms — Sycamores — Acacias — Tamarisks — Poplars — Cypresses — Mulberries — Olives — Ex- otics, very numerous — Their Varieties 320 Xiv CONTENTS. CHAPTER XVn. CLIMATB. PAGI Generally, Dry and Hot — Considerable Difference between Coast and In terior — No Real Winter in Egypt — Tbe Khmnnn—'i/i6a.n Summer Temperature at Cairo — Scarcity of Rain — Climate of tbe Istbmus — Mean Aiinual Rates of Temperature — Regularity of tbe Wind — Egyptian and European Deatb-rates — Tbe Nile Valley anciently Famous as a Sanitarium — Testimony of Rev. A. C. Smith — Corrobo- rated by Drs. Dalrymple, Patterson, Walker, Zagiel, and Pmner — Endemic Diseases — Improving Sanitary Administration — Consensus of Medical Opinion in favour of Egypt as a Health Resort . . 838 CHAPTER XVllL THE SOUDAN. Its Geograpbical Area — Dongola — Berbera — Taka — Sbendy and HalfS— Sennaar — Khartoum — Kordofan — Darfour — The Sbillook Country — Darfertit and Donga — Sir S. Baker's Expedition — Colonel Gordon — Successful Results of his First Expedition — His new Commission as Governor-General — Expressed Determination to Extinguish the Slave Trade — Tbe Opposing DiflBculties — Antiquity and Widespread Sources of tbe Traffic — Trade of tbe Soudan — Its Export Routes — Duvelopment that may be Expected with Improved Conmiunications — Results already Achieved — The Khedive's Claim on European Confidence . 84» APPENDIX A. THB TICEBBGAL FAMHiT ..■•••• 865 APPENDIX B. BGTPTIAN CTIERENCr, WEIGHTS, AND MEASUBBfl . . 366 APPENDIX 0. EGYPTIAN CALEHDAES . . . . 368 APPENDIX D. MILITABT GEADEB AND KATES OF PAY . • • i • • 369 CONTENTS. XV PASS APPENDIX B. COST OF LrvntQ in bgtpt .... . . . • 870 APPENDIX F. EGTPnAN TRADB WITH GBBAT BEITAIH 871 APPENDIX G. MB. cave's EBPOBT ON THE FnfANCIAl CONDITIOH OP EGYPT . 373 APPENDIX H. SHE FINAIIOIAIi DBOBBBS ... . • • r 808 EGYPT AS IT IS. CHAPTER L TEEKITOEY. Sir Bartle Prere's Testimony to Recent Egyptiaa Progress — Territory has Shared in the General Development — Boundaries of Egypt Proper — Exten- sion South of These— Present Divisions — The Delta— The Northern Lakes —Middle Egypt— The Fayoum— The Said— Philae— The Eastern Desert— The Oases— Red Sea Coast — Geological Divisions— Nile Soil— Nubia to the Soudan — Total Extent of Present Territory. "There is one Arab Power to wMch the eyes of all Mends of Africa naturally turn with hopefulness. Egypt has ever been the great centre of African civilisation m the hands of the present dynasty, which may fairly be said to represent much that is excellent in European civilisation. Of the enormous increase of the aggre- gate wealth of the country there can be no doubt. Steam and railways have done at least as much for Egypt as for almost any European country." In the progress thus at- tested by so competent a witness as Sir Bartle Frere,* lies the raison d'etre of the present volume. On Egypt of the past and the charms of modem travel — if the lotus-Hfe of Nile voyaging can be so called— from the Mediterranean to the Cataracts a whole literature has been written ; but the shelves of the British Museum may be searched in vain for any comprehensive account of the economical • At the Edinburgh Philosophical Institution, January 5, 1874 1 1 2 EGYPT AS IT IS. state of the country as it is. Yet this New Egypt, which has risen not on the ruins of, but side by side with the imperishable old — railways and telegraphs, sugar factories and cotton-gins mingling not incongruously with pyra- mids, rock-tombs, temples, and hieroglyphs dating from before Abraham — is rich beyond any other part of Africa in practical interest to the capitalist and the politician. There, in the northern extremity of this great continent, as nowhere else but in our own colonies of the south, the new civilization has taken root, and, slow as necessarily is its growth in a soil impoverished by so long a barbarism, it already gives promise of a strength and expansiveness which have no parallel in the East. In any attempt to sketch the outcome, thus far, of this great national revival, the country itself first claims notice, not alone as the scene of the changes in progress, but as having also largely shared in the development. A glance, therefore, at the area over which this salutary revolution is at work may conveniently precede some detailed statement of its results. The limits of the territory now subject to the Khedive can, however, be only approximately fixed. Egj^pt proper is boxinded definitely enough on the north by the Mediterranean, from Cape Hazaif to El-Arish on the frontier of Palestine; westward, by the Libyan desert; east, by a line drawn from El-Arish to Akabah at the head of the gulf of that name, and thence enclosing the peninsula of Sinai, down the western shore of the Red Sea to Cape Benas; and on the south by the First Cata- ract, between Assouan and Philse. But the regular paral- lelogram thus described forms less than one-fifth of the whole geographical area over which the Cairo Government now claims dominion. In 1821-2, an expedition under Ismail Pasha, the third son of Mehemet Ali, over-ran and annexed Nubia; and since then have been added the BEYOND TEE FIRST OATABAOT. 3 whole of the western coast of the Red Sea, and that of the Indian Ocean as far as Berbera, opposite Aden, and inland the Nile basin, anywhere between Khartoum and the Equator.* But beyond Khartoum, the authority of the Khedive is as yet only in course of consolidatioL, and no definite Une can be drawn as its exact southern bound- ary. Practically, however, its limit may for the present be fixed at Gondokoro (lat. 4° 55' N.), beyond which Gordon Pasha is now operating to complete the work be- gun by Sir Samuel Baker, by effectively annexing the country between that point and the shores of the Albert and Victoria Lakes. A rough extension of the western boundary Une from the parallel of PhUse, up through the Desert, so as to iaclude Darfour, the Darfertit country, Gondokoro, and the territory south of Sennaar, round con- terminously with Abyssinia to the Red Sea at Massowah, would therefore more or less accurately describe the present limits of Egyptian sovereignty towards the Equa- tor. A glance at the map will show that the vast tract of Eastern Africa thus enclosed measures more than 1,600 miles from north to south, and has an average breadth of about 350 miles from the Red Sea into the Libyan desert. * " fflstoiy teaches us that Egypt is bounded on the north by the Mediter- ranean, and on the south by the Cataract of Assouan. But history, in fixing these limits, does liot take into account the indications furnished both by geography and ethnography. At the north-east of the African continent, from the sea to the Equator, there extends an immense tract of country formed by the Nile, and fertilised by it alun*i. On the other hand, of the various races that people the banks of the river, some are uncivilised, savage, and incapable of governing themselves, while on this side of the tropic we meet with a nation which, on the contrary, merits the admiration of mankind on account of its glory, its industry, and all the elements of civilisation contained in it. History then ought rather to say that Egypt ex- tends wherever the Nile flows, and that consequently Egypt has the right to claim as her domain all the countries watered by this celebrated river as fax as they extend towards the south." — Mariette Bey, Aperffu, de I'Sutoiri trUgypte, 1872. g. EGYPT AS IT 18. But interesting as may be the future of tlie great group of countries witMn this area south of Egypt proper, two- tMrds of it are as yet little more than a geographical ex- pression. Now, as fifty years ago, the "Egypt" both of politics and trade is still confined to the Delta and the rich river valley between its apex and Assouan, and to a description of the present condition of these the following pages will be mainly limited. The old territory, then, of the Pharaohs, of the Ptole- mies, the Csesars, the Arabian Caliphs, the Turks, and now of the Khedive, lies withiu lat. 31° 37' and 24° 3' N., between the Mediterranean and the First Cataract, above which the NUe, issuing from the rocky glen of Nubia, sweeps in a smooth but rapid stream round the little island of Philse, and then, a couple of miles below, hurries down the rapids* of Assouan — Juvenal's Syene — ^into the Mizraim of the Hebrews, the Misr of its pres- ent possessors, and the Egypt of western geography. The country whose southern boundary is thus definite- ly fixed, properly divides itself into Upper and Lower Egypt, the latitude of Cairo (30° 6' N.) being the most obvious hne of demarcation ; but modem geographers and the actual Government have recognised the ancient distribution into three provinces, now respectively called Lower, Middle, and Upper Egypt — El-Bahari, El- Yos- tani, and El-Said — the further administrative subdivi- sions of which will in due course be described. In point of area, fertility, and commercial activity, the first of * These NUe cataracts, of which there are in all seven, are not in fact cata- racts at all, but mere rapids, in which the stream is obstructed by broken ridges of rock that rise above its surface and vex it into whirling eddies which, though difficult and even dangerous of passage, have no resemblance to the tremendous " falls " of the great American rivers. This First Cata- ract of Assouan consists of a series of such obstructions extending over thiea miles, from the small island of Sehayl up to within two miles of Philffl, and the entire descent over the whole distance is only about seventy feet. THE DELTA. g these three main divisions to which, because of its trian- golaj shape, the Greeks gave its name of the Delta, is the most important section of the country. The base of the irregular triangle enclosed within the two branches of the river, and to which this name strictly applies, is only eighty-one miles long, and its entire area about 2,000 square miles. The complete shore-line of this larger dis- trict extends for about a hundred and sixty miles along the old historic sea from the well-known landmark named the "Arab's Tower" to the ruins of Pelusium ; but the actual territory of Egypt stretches considerably farther east and west. This coast-line includes the three ports of Alexandria, Rosetta, and Damietta, to which has now to be added that of Port Said at the entrance of the Suez Canal. Inland, this fine district tapers to a potat near the village of Om-el-Dinar, close to which — about eighty miles from the sea and twelve below Cairo— the Nile di- vides into the two great branches which, flowing respec- tively north-west and north-east, enter the Mediterra- nean at Rosetta and Damietta.* The five other ancient mouths of the river have long ago silted up, and theL courses can now be hardly traced over the great alluvia] plain and through the network of canals and lakes which interpose between the sea and this pomt.f Strictly, Alexandria lies outside the Delta, but ia common phrase * In the time of Herodotus the apex of the Delta was at Cercasoram, te? BJilea below Memphis, or six miles higher up than at present. f The seven estuaries known to the ancients were — 1, the Canopic, corre- sponding to the present outlet from Lake Etko, or, according to others, to thai of the jiboukir or Maadee Lake ; 2, the Bolbotine mouth at Rosetta ; 3 the Sebenitic, probably the opening into the present Lake Bourlos ; 4, the Phat. nitic or Bucolic, at Damietta ; 5, the Mendesian, which is lost in Lake Men. ealeh, the mouth of which is represented by that of Debeh ; 6, the Tauitic oi Baltic, some traces of which are visible eastwards of Lake Menzaleh, nndei the modem name of Om-Faridje ; and 7, the Pelusaic, which seems to be rep. resented by what is now the most easterly outlet of Lake MenzaJeh, when the rums ol Pelusium are still Viaibl9<' 6 EGYPT AS IT 18. the latter includes the whole of the cultivable lands as well east and west of, as within, the two branches of Ihe river. Some description will be given further on of the magnificent harboni works now in progress, which, when completed, will render this fine port the safest and most commodious in the Mediterranean. Enough here to say that the predictions of its decadence after the opening ol the Suez Canal have been wholly falsified, and that with a population of more than 212,000, railway communica- tion with all parts of the interior, and a steadily increas- ing trade, this historic city is recovering much of its former prosperity, and is rapidly becoming, in fact as ia name, the Liverpool of the East. The position of Rosetta and Damietta is of course much inferior, the bars at theit respective mouths of the Nile confining their trade within narrow limits, but the official statistics show both to be making steady growth ia industrial and commercial activ- ity. The chief inland towns of the section are Tanta, Zagazig, Damanhour, and Mansoiirah, to which subse- quent allusion will be made. The fertile land of the Delta is separated from the Medi- terranean by a chain of brackish lagoons which are them- selves fenced in from the sea by narrow belts of rock and sand-bank, on which a few wild and stunted date-palms form the only vegetation. The chief of these lakes are Mareotis, Etko, Bourlos, and Menzaleh. The first is the most western, and though now little more than a salt marsh — except during the inundation, when its contents are swelled by filtration— it was up to about 200 years ago navigable, and contributed considerably to the commer- cial importance of Alexandria, immediately behind which . it lies. A project for the drainage of this lake has been mooted, but although a vast tract of valuable land would thus be reclaimed to cultivation, the cost of the work will TEE NORTHERN LAKES. 7 probably postpone for some years any attempt to carry it ont. Lake Etko, a few miles farther east, is only sepa- rated from the sea by a still narrower strip of shore, and when nearly full, during the inundation, spreads ap to the town of Rosetta. Bourlos, also close along the sea, extends more than forty miles east of the latter town, with an average but irregular width of nearly ten miles, and, like the others, is shallow throughout. Lake Menza- leh, the most eastern and largest of the series, extends from near Damietta to the mouth of the old Tanitio branch, for about forty miles in length by eighteen in width. It is deeper than the other lakes, and supports a considerable fishing population iu the villages and islands along its southern shore. Altogether a frontier of nearly 200 miles is covered by these lagoons. Immediately above the village of Om-el-Diuar, the Delta narrows iato the vaUey of Middle Egypt, which contains Cairo, the Pyramids, the fine province of the Fayoum, and the broad belt of cultivated and fertile land on both banks of the river, as high up as Manfalout. The average width of the whole cultivable vaUey above Cairo to Assouan is about six miles, but at some points it much exceeds this ; whUe at others the hills which almost continuously flank the river on both sides, close in upon it so as to narrow the arable space to less than a mile. The eastern of these ranges rises, northwards, near the Isthmus of Suez, whence it approaches Cairo in the spur called the Jebel-Mokattem, which trends round towards the river a few miles above the city, and then, following the winding course of the stream, skirts it, with occasional breaks, far up into Nubia. The best known of the openings in this range are the so- called VaUey of the Wanderings, leading from the neigh- bourhood of Cairo to the head of the Q-ulf of Suez ; and, higher up, the defile through which pass the caravan g EGYPT AS IT IS. routes from Kenneli and Coft to Cosseir. Westwards the Libyan range first approaches the river in nearly the same latitude from the direction of the Fezzan, south of Tripoli, «ind similarly flanks it, though less closely, up to far be- yond Philse. About eighty miles by river above Cairo, nearly due west of Beni-souef, a deep sinuosity in this chaia forms the splendid valley of the Fayoum, which has been justly called the Garden of Egypt. The most fertile tracts of the Delta fall below this specially favoured dis- trict, which, abundantly watered by an artificial cut from the NUe, and a complete network of canals, blooms over its whole area of nearly 700 square miles, vrith the most varied luxuriant vegetation. The Fayoum, ia fact, enjoys a pre-eminence as to soU and products over nearly every other part of Egypt. Besides yielding rice and grain ia equal abundance vsdth the other provinces, it abounds in dates, flax, cotton, the vine, and almost every variety of fruit. It is also famous for its plantations of roses, the rose-water from which forms one of its chief exports to Cairo and the Levant. In the north-western extremity of this fine proviace is the large lake called the Birket-el- Kom, thirty -five miles long by five or six broad, which some antiquarians have confounded with the sacred lake Mceris, now dried up, and the site of which was long doubtful till satisfactorily identified by Linant Bey. The water of the Birket-el-Korn is brackish, and contributes little or nothing to the fertility of the surrounding region. Besides its capital, Medinet — anciently, first Crocodopohs and then Arsinoe — the Fayoum reckons seventy other towns and villages, the whole of which are densely peo- ■pled. From this great bend in the Libyan range a caravan route leads westwards to the Little Oasis, and higher up other breaks occur behind Girgheh and Esneh, through which tracks pass to the Oases of Dakhleh and Khargheh ; THE FAYOUM. 9 while openings of lesser note afford communication with other fertile spots that dot the depressed region west of the river, and to which aUnsion will presently be made. Returning to the File, the vaUey from Beni-souef up to Manfalout forms a tract of great beauty and fertility, thickly studded with towns and villages on both sides of the river. West of Miuieh, the thriving capital of an ex- tensive district, a large swamp caUed the Bathen stretches upwards to Achmonnein, which Sicard and D'AnviUe have on very fanciful grounds sought to identify with Lake Moeris. Thence on, past the rock-tombs of Beni-hassan, the ruius of Antinoe and Hermopolis Magna, and the large village of MeUawee to Manfalout, where Middle Egypt ends, the same uniformity of fertile river bank, varying only in width, continues. A few miles higher up the voy- ager reaches the flourishing town of Assiout, the capital of Upper Egypt, and the chief entrepot of the caravan trade between Cairo, Darfour, and Sennaar. Above this, the vaUey narrows into the proportions of a mountain glen, in which at several points the eastern range, especially, presses close upon the stream. In this section of the country occur, after the Pyramids, its most famous monu- mental remains — the temple ruins of Abydos, Denderah, Thebes, Esneh, Edf ou, Koum-Ombos, and Elephantiua — ^the shattered but still splendid memorials of a dead faith and civilisation with which the world can nowhere else show anything to compare, but further notice of which forms no part of the purpose of this volume. Behind Kenneh, on the eastern bank opposite Denderah, the valley widens into a broad fertile plain, and the NUe here makes its nearest ap- proach to the Red Sea, at a distance of only eighty miles from the little port of Cosseir. Thence upwards, beyond Thebes to Assouan, the cidtivable land on either side con- tracts almost to the river bank ; until, above the First Cata- 10 EGYPT AB IT IS. ract, it vanislies for some distance altogether in the rocky defile through which the river rashes down from Nubia. Philffi— the Loretto of ancient Egypt— which stands just above the boundary thus reached, has been compared to an emerald set in gold ; and this allusion to its luxuriant vegetation, as contrasting with the arid surface of the sur- rounding desert, is equally applicable to much of the Delta and to the whole of the valley between its apex and As- souan. The Nile is, indeed, everywhere an agreeable ob- ject, not so much owing to the majesty of the stream or the variety of its scenery, as to this strong contrast between the freshness and animation of its banks and the desola- tion that reigns beyond. Nor could any transition be more abrupt : for as sharply as the boundary lines on a survey- or's map, verdure and sand meet exactly where the area of irrigation ends, the highest fertility immediately join- ing the most desolate sterility in the world. Beyond the Libyan desert, stretches westward to the Fezzan and southwards into the unexplored wastes of central Africa, — a vast arid plain of gravel or fine drifting sand, with rare tufts of camel-thorn and the dwarf tamarisk for its only vegetation, but peopled nevertheless by several no- mad tribes. Eastwards, in the great wilderness between the Nile and the Red Sea, which from the still larger number of its Bedoween population can hardly be called desert, the scene is less dreary, being broken by rugged mountains and numerous ravines, clothed for the most part with scanty verdure. This eastern desert has, be- sides, the advantage of several springs, and is crossed by caravan routes which in Upper Egypt are still traversed in exactly the same manner as when the "company of mer- chants ' ' found Joseph in the pit. Mines of various metala and quarries of porphyry and other valuable stones are scattered among the mountainous tracts, and were in part THE EASTERN DESERT. \\ worked so lately as the reign of Mehemet AU, wlieii tlie cost of fuel and difficulty of transport led to their aban- donment.* The aridity of the lowlands is extreme during nearly half the year, and the heat insupportable even by the Bedoween. lifear the sea, a little below lat. 29° N., are the secluded Coptic convents of St. Anthony and St. Paul, from among the monks of the former of which the Patriarch of that sect is now invariably chosen. Besides the river vaUey, the Fayoum, and the Delta, thus briefly described, cultivable Egypt includes a num- ber of fertUe tracts in the western desert, known as the Oases. In all, five of these " tufted isles That verdant rise amid tlie Libyan wilds " now acknowledge the sovereignty of the Khedive. But the desert that surrounds them offers such formidable difficulties that they have been but seldom visited by modern travellers. Tliey present, however, many inter- * Since tliis was written, Captain Burton, tlie disting^shed traveller, has, at the request of the Khedive, and in company with M. Marie, an able min- ing engineer in the service of his Highness, partially explored the desert eastern coast of the Gulf of Akabah — the ancient land of Midian — and re-dis- covered extensive quarries of quartz and chlorite, abounding in rich veins of both gold and sUver, with remains of Eoman mining works on a large scale, and other traces of a busy population in a region which is, seemingly, stUl full of mineral wealth. From Maknfi, the capital of Midian, up to Akabah at the head of the Gulf, Captain Burton reports the country as auriferous, and he believes the district southwards, as far as Jebel Hassani, to possess the same character. He also found tin and antimony, and washed gold dust out of the streams that run down through the gorges of the granite and porphyry hills which separate the coast from the interior. Should these impressions of Captain Burton be confirmed by the chemical reports on the numerous specimens of deposits he brought away with him, the discovery will be im- portant as well as interesting. In the meantime, the Khedive, who is now fully alive to the fact that all schemes of development in his dominions must be subjected to commercial tests, awaits the result of these assays, and should they be favourable, will probably invite European capitalista to re-open and work this Arabian El Dorado — as Captain Burton confidently afBims it to be. 12 EGYPT A8 IT 18 esting features, and, fiscally, arewortli 10,000^. a year to . the Cairo exchecLuer. They extend almost in a line with the hollow region of the desert, parallel to the general direction of the Nile valley, and within an average dis- tance of about ninety miles from the river. The fertility of the whole is dne to the lowness of their soU, which enables them to retain moisture ; for they are in reality rather depressions below, than elevations above, the sur- ronnding sand. The most southern is the Great Oasis, called from its chief town the Wah-el-Khargeh, which lies nearly due west of Thebes (lat. 25° 43' N.), and has a length of about 200 miles by nearly twenty broad. Fifty miles west of the extremity of this lies the Wah-el- Dakhleh, twenty-four mUes long by ten broad, whose first European visitor was Sir A. Edmonstone, iu 1819. Seventy miles farther north is the small oasis of Farafeh, famous iu Egypt for its olives ; and next beyond it, in the parallel of Minieh (lat. 28° 4' N.), rise the date groves of the Wah- el-Behnesa, or Little Oasis, a rock-bound valley twelve miles long by about six broad, of which the Wah-el- Hayz, a day's journey south, is regarded as a continua- tion. West of this latter is the Wah-el-Zeroora, or Oasis of the Blacks, which is, however, rather one of a series ext^iding westwards, than properly a member of the Egyptian group. And lastly, away beyond the Fayoum, nearly 150 mUes from the NUe, hes the Wah-el-Siwah, or Oasis of Ammon, historically famous as the site of the great Jovian temple and oracle whose priests proclaimed Alexander's sonship to the god, and foretold his mastery of the world. The ruins of the temple may still be traced, and the oasis, which is about niae miles long by three broad, is otherwise rich ia archaeological remains. Al- though tributary to Egypt, the inhabitants of this se- cluded spot are in language and manners wholly Libyan. THS OASES. 13 The region of tlie Oases termiaates northwards in the Wady-Natroon, or desert of the Natron Lakes, so called from a series of eight rock-waUed basins, whose banks and waters are covered with crystallisations consisting of mu- riate of soda or sea-salt, and of natron or sub-carbonate of soda, known ia commerce under the name of irona. This desolate tract contains four Coptic monasteries, the re- mains of the once famous anchorite settlement of Mtria. Parallel to, and separated from it only by a line of slightly elevated ground, runs the Bahr-bela-ma,* or "waterless river," a long depression at several points below the level of the NUe, and which, having been traced from the Med- iterranean, through the desert west of the Fayoum up to near the Wah-el-Dakhleh, is by some thought to be the dry bed of a branch of the river that once passed ia this direction and entered the sea westwards of Alexandria. These Oases are, however, rather insular dependencies than integral parts of Egypt proper, although they lie well within the imaginary hne of its western frontier. About the E.ed Sea coast a word or two will suffice. From a little south of Suez down to near Massowah, a broken mountaia chain flanks the shore at a nearly uni- form distance of from ten to twelve miles, the chief passes through which are those leading from Gosseir to Kenneh and Coft, and from Souakim to Taka and Berber. In lat. 27° 24' N., Abou-sar-el-kibls, a small walled town, almost whoUy without trade, occupies the site of Myos Honnos — ^in the time of Strabo the chief port of the Eed Sea. Nearly a degree of latitude farther south stood old Gos- seir, the Leucos Portus of Ptolemy, which has long since given place to the modem town of the same name, five miles lower down. At the top of a deep gulf behind Gape Benas, in the parallel of Philae, are the ruins of Berenice, * Called also the Bahr-ei-Fargh. 14 EGYPT AS TT 18. wMch during the Roman occupation of Egypt eclipsed Myos Hormos and became the chief emporium of their eastern trade. Thence to Sonakim, iu lat. 19° 48' N., no other practicable port occurs, nor below this agaia tUl Massowah is reached, in latitude 15° 44'. This, as yet^ forms the most southern Egyptian station on the Red Sea, though sovereignty is claimed over the whole down to the Straits of Bab-el-Mandeb, outside which the ports of Zeyla and Berbera,* on the Indian Ocean, have been occupied, and foothold has thus been gaiaed in the Gralla and SomauH countries, of which the fine district of Harar, in the formei, has already acknowledged the sovereignty of the Khedive. The Red Sea coast is at various points skirted by groups of islands, but these, like the belt of mainland between the mountaios and the sea, are barren and for the most part uninhabited. While the country outside the river valley and the Delta is thus diversified, three distinct geological regions occur between Philse and the Mediterranean. The most southern of these is granite, which extends from the sacred island through the cataract to Assouan, and affords also syenite and some other crystalline primitive rocks, re- markable for their durability and capability of polish. From these rocks were quarried the colossal statues, pil- * Zeyla was obtained a couple of years ago by cession from tlie Porte, which claimed a shadowy soyereignty over the local chief, and Berbera by the simple and less expensive process of landing a small force on the spot. This latter station is the scene of a great annual fair, held between October and April, for the caravans from the interior, and during half the year carries on a considerable trade — mostly in the hands of the Banyan merchants — with the opposite coast. Hitherto, the want of water has been the great obstacle to the permanent occupation and development and growth of this settlement, but in 1876 » complete service of iron pipes was carried from the town to some fine springs six or seven miles ofi in the hills, and the water-supply is now abundant. There are said to be extensive coal beds nsar Zeyla, but both it and Berbera are chiefly valuable as points de depart for farther annexations. GEOLOaiOAL DiriSIOWS. 15 lars, and other monoliths which figure prominently among the monumental wonders of Egypt. Next to this comes the sandstone region, extending from Assouan to Esneh, and yielding a stone which, though soft and easily worked, is also very durable, as may be seen from the still mag- nificent sphinx-avenues and palace^temples of Thebes, which are built chiefly of this stone. From Esneh north- wards the formation is limestone, the chief material of the Pyramids, which below Cairo disappears in the deep alluvium of the Delta, to crop up again in a ridge on the coast, extending from Alexandria to near Aboukir. The soU both of the Delta and the entire Nile Yalley is the direct creation of the river, whose mud deposit has in the course of unmeasured ages reclaimed the valley from the desert, and the Delta from the sea ; and as the operation still goes on, the result is the continuing elevation of both the river-bed and the land on either side as far as the annual overflow extends. This increase of soil is estimated to proceed in Upper Egypt at the rate of about five inches in a century ; but in the Delta, where the flooded area is greater, it takes place more slowly. The scientific staff which accompanied the French expedition of 1798, and collected the materials for the magnificent Description de VEgypte since published by the French government, made numerous experiments to ascertain the depth of the alluvial matter thus deposited. By sinking pits at various intervals, both on the banks of the river and on the outer edge of the stratum, they found (1) that the surface oi the soU declines from the margin of the stream towards the foot of the Mils ; (2) that the thickness of the deposit averages ten feet near the river, and decreases gradually as it recedes ; and (3) that beneath the mud there is a bed of sand analogous to the substance brought down by the river when in flood. An analysis of the soil thus formed 16 MQTPT A8 IT m gives nearly one-half of argillaceotis earth, with about one-quarter of carbonate of Hme, the remainder consisting of water, oxide of iron, and carbonate of magnesia. On the very river banks the slime is mixed with much sand, which, it loses in proportion as it is carried further from the river, untU at a .certaia distance it becomes nearly a pure marl, which, besides beiag employed largely la the manufacture of bricks, pottery ware, and pipes, serves as a sufficient manure for the adjoining land beyond the actual limit of the annual flood.* Such are the main divisions and chief natural features of Egypt proper. With the boundary line of the First Cataract a distinct country, or rather series of countries, begins. Of this, the first long Urik from Philse to Don- gola still retains its old name of Ntjbia, and, like the lower valley, consists of little more than the narrow margin of arable land watered by the river, which no- Trhere exceeds four miles, and at several points disappears * It may be worth while here to quote the lively and stUl faithftil picture Df rural Egypt up to this point, given by Amrou, its Saracen conqueror, in his answer to the Caliph Omar, as recorded by Gibbon : — " Commander of the Faithful, Egypt is a compound of black earth and green plants, between a pulverised mountain and a red sand. The distance from Syene to the sea is a month's journey for a horseman. Along the valley descends a river, on which the blessing of the Most High reposes both in the even- ing and morning, and which rises and falls with the revolutions of the sun and moon. When the annual dispensation of Providence unlocks the springs and fountains that nourish the earth, the Nile rolls his swelling and Bounding waters through the realm of Egypt ; the fields are overspread by the salutary flood, and the villages communicate with each other in their painted barks. The retreat of the inundation deposits a fertilising mud for the reception of the various seeds ; the crowds of husbandmen who blacken the land may be compared to a swarm of industrious ants, and their native indolence is quioKenef bsf thfl lash of the taskmaster, and the promise of the flowers and fruits of a plentiful increase. Their hope ia seldom deceived ; but the riches which they extract from the wheat, the barley, and the rice, the legumes, the fruit-trees, and the cattle, are un- equally shared between those who labour and those who possess. According to the vicissitudes of the seasons, the face of the country is adorned with a eiher wave, a verdant emeraiftt and the^deej jellow of a golden harvest." NUBIA. 17 altogether. Eastwards this fertile strip is boionded by the desert to the Red Sea at Sonakim, its only practica- ble port, and westwards by a continnation of the same Libyan wilderness that flanks Egypt proper lower down. A difference of language and tribal population divides it into two parts — the Wady Kenoos and the Wady ISTouba, the first of which extends from Assouan to Leboua, and the second thence to Dongola; but the physical aspect of the two districts is nearly identical. In both the river valley is lined for the greater part by sandstone and granite hills, which here, as below, at several points closely approach the stream, and nowhere up to Wady Haifa (lat. 22° N.) does cultivation range much beyond the liver banks. At this point the Second Cataract be- gins and extends through the Dar-el-Hadjar in a series of swift rapids for nearly one hundred miles, to Sukkoot, where the valley widens and the prevailing sterility of the lower basin disappears. Fine fertile plains stretch out on both sides of the river, which here also encloses islands of considerable extent, and for the most part well culti- vated. Owing to the height of its banks, the NUe in this region seldom or never overflows, and artificial irrigation is almost everywhere necessary. This now, as before Candace, is still effected by means of the old cumbrous sakJcias, or Persian water-wheels, which throughout Nu- bia do the work of the pole-and-bucket shadoof more generally employed by the Egyptian fellaheen. Up through the district of Mahass to above the Third Cata- ract the range of cultivation continues wide, but it con- tracts again above the long and beautiful island of Argo, a few rmles south of which, at Ordee, or New Dongola, ia lat. 18° N., Nubia proper termiaates and the Beled-es- 8oudan^ or Country of the Blacks, begins. In a separate chapter gome descsjption will be given of IQ EGYPT A8 IT IS. this latter group of countries, and of the administrative revolution which is now being carried out in them by Gordon Pasha. It need only, therefore, be here said that, as the official geography of Cairo now claims, they extend a thousand miles farther south, eastwards to the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean, and westwards beyond Darfour. Excluding, for the present, Abyssinia and the GaUa and Somauli countries, which are already overlapped by these successive annexations, the "Greater Egypt" thus formed comprises the vast slice of eastern Africa from the Medi- terranean to the Victoria Nyanza, and thence along the Equator to the frontier of Zauiibar — a territory more than five times larger than that ruled by the Pharaohs, the Ptol- emies, the Antonines, and the Caliphs. For the present, however, the southern limit of the Khedive's doro.ioion may, as before remarked, be struck for all adminiatradve purposes, at Gonaokoro, in the parallel of Pazoglou , Prom this point to the Mediterranean stretch more than twenty- three degrees of latitude, which, with an average width of 350 miles, cover a surface more than twice that of France, or even of Austria. Three-fourths of this may be desert, but there stiU remains an aggregate of cultiva- ble areas larger than united Italy. The French survey of 1798 computed the total surface of Egypt proper to be 20,000 square leagues, or 115,200 square miles, but of this only 9,582 square miles (including the Nile bed and the islands within it, together representing 294,217 acres) were then watered by the river. Since then, however, improved irrigation has extended the cultivable face of the country below Assouan to 11,351 square miles — equal to 7,264,640 acres — of which 4, 625 000 are now actually under tillage. No similar survey has been made of Nubia and the Soudan, but their total cultivable surface may be roughly estimated at above 150.000 square miles ; or, in round TOTAL AREA. 19 numbers, from tlie Mediterranean to the latitude of Fazo- glou more than 160,000 square miles of arable soil, abun- dantly peopled, and needing only good government and industrial development to be welded into a homogeneous and powerful State. CHAPTER IL POPULATION. Diversity ol Eaces— Conflicting Estimates of Total — Census of 1859 — Bate of Increase— Present Estimated Totals — Fellaheen — Bedoween — Copts — Abys- Binians — Kubians — Jews — ^Rayab Greeks — Syrians — Armenians — Foreign- ers — Induatrial Distributions of the Whole. Whatever may have been tlie origin of tlie ancient Egyptians — whether Semitic or Aryan, as ethnologists much dispute — their modern successors are many -raced, and no two estimates of their number agree. Arabs, Copts, Turks, Nubians, Gfreeks, Jews, Armenians, and Levantines of every shade of mixed Eastern and Euro- pean blood, they have been variously computed at from 1,500,000 by Sir Gardiner Wilkinson, to 6,250,000 by the latest official Egyptian returns.* But when the former of ihese estimates was made no trustworthy statistics ex- ited ; and it can only therefore be regarded as the ran- iom guess of an otherwise well-informed observer, based Dn assumptions which later investigation has shown to 30 incorrect. So, too, with Mr. Lane's reckoning of lees ;han 2,000,000 made nearly fifty years ago;t not only iid that exclude the Arab tribes on both sides of the S"ile, who, although nomad, pay regular taxes to the jrovernment and otherwise acknowledge its authority, 3ut it considerably reduced the totals of the various settled communities as estimated by their respective * Statistique de FEgypte, 1878. \ Modern Egyptians, i. 83. 20 DIVERSE ESTIMATES. 21 chiefs. A few years later, M. Mengin, a Frencli historian of the reign of Mehemet Ali, computed the whole at nearly 2,900,000 ; but although Ms estimate had the ad- vantage of being based on an official return of the num- ber of houses throughout the country, he demonstrably under-numbered the quota of heads per house in all the chief towns of Lower Egypt, besides repeating Mr. Lane's omission of the entire nomad population. Strabo and Diodorus, reasoning from the cultivable area of the country, its extreme fertility, the great fecundity of Egyptian women, and the evidently vast amount of dis- posable labour, reckoned the population under the Pha- raohs at between 6,000,000 and 7,000,000, and modem criticism has accepted the estimate as proximately exact Clot Bey, writing in 1840 with all the materials for a judgment up to that date before him, reckoned the deca- dence since the Persian conquest at about one-half, leav- ing a then total of between 3, 000, 000 and 4, 000, 000. * But making fuU allowances for the waste of Ufe consequent on the many revolutions through which the country has passed, and for the more modem losses occasioned by the internecine feuds of the Mamlouks and the campaigns of Mehemet AH, there is stUl reason to believe that, even thirty -seven years ago, the total population exceeded the larger of these estimates. A rough census taken in 1859, during the viceroyalty of Said Pasha, returned the whole inhabitants of Egypt proper at 5,125,000; and allowing for even a considerable margin of error in that computa- tion, there would stOl remain nearly 5,000,000 as the pop- ulation strength of the country three years before the accession of the present Khedive. Since then the cholera epidemic of 1865 and the typhus pest that followed it * Apergu General mr VEgypte, 1. 166. 22 EO TPT AS IT la. swept away about 100,000, but tlie steady and increasing excess of birtlis over deaths has much more than recouped the loss thus occasioned. The latest official returns show that, while this gain of life over death averaged annually 88,470 during the ten years ending 1861, it had, through better sanitary administration and general improvement in the material condition of the country, risen in the five following years to 46,902, and in 1867-71 to 68,296— a rate of increase, as compared with Europe, which is inferior only to that of Great Britain, Prussia, Russia, and Swe- den during the corresponding period, and which, if con- tinued, would double the existing population in less than sixty years.* It is evident, therefore, that if the census returns of 1859 were even approximately accurate, the present inhabitants of Egypt proper must number rather over than under 5,500,000. Of ISTubia and the Upper Nile countries only the very roughest estimate can be formed, on a mean of the conjectures of various travellers, Irom Bruce and Burkhardt to Baker and Nachtigal, which would give for the whole another 10,000,000 or 11,000,000. But although these southern provinces will undoubtedly form important factors in the future of Egyptian politics, their present economical value is small as compared with the territory below Philse, and no more precise estimate of either the number or ethnological distributions of their inhabitants need, therefore, be here attempted. No official classification of the population of Egypt proper has been published, but the following is believed to be approximately correct : * Although the collection of accurate statistics is as yet very imperfectly organised in Egypt, in the matter of births and deaths the registration ig very careful, and these figures — quoted from the periodical return mads to the Defter-khana (State Archive Department) — may be accepted as suffi- olently exact. CONSTITUENT TOTALS. 23 Settled Arabs (fellaheen) . . . 4,500,000 Bedoween 300,000 Turks 10,000 Copts 500,000* Abyssinians 3,000 Nubians and Soudanis (mostly slaves) . . 40,000 Jews 20,000 Eayah Greeks 20,000 Syrians 7,000 Armenians 10,000 Various foreigners 90,000 Total, about 5,600,000 Of the dozen or more elements which, thns constitute the present motley population of the country, the settled Arabs, who form four-fifths of the whole, although one in creed, are nearly as diverse in race as the minor commu- nities which complete the tale. Two-thirds of them may be set down as descendants of the Copts who embraced Islam after the Arab conquest (a.d. 640), or who have since apostatised, and by intermarriage have long ago fused with theii- conquerors and with the Moslem immi- gration from east and west. The actual army of Amrou was small, and, though mostly of pure Arabian blood from the neighbourhood of Medina, would have been swamped in this great conversion but for the influx of whole tribes of other Arabs from the Hedjaz, from Mauri- tania, and the coasts, who gradually mixed with and more or less assimilated the ex-Coptic element in the districts where they settled, and together formed the great labour- ing class of the feUaheen. These immigrants did not, however, completely amalgamate among themselves, and * This estimate ia based on a statement made to the writer by the Coptic Bishop of Cairo. 24 EGYPT AS rr m. even yet the much finer physique of the fellahs of Lower and Middle Egypt— the Arab element in whom descends mostly from the tribes that came originally from beyond the Ked Sea — disti" ^ ^^ahes them clearly from the Moorish Moghrebees of the Said. Amongst the town populations the distinction of tribes has been almost wholly lost, but traces of it are to be met with iu the remoter villages, where many old customs of their desert ancestry still survive. Physically, the fellaheen — with the distinction noted in favour of Lower as compared with Upper Egypt — are a fine muscular race, the average height of the men being from five feet eight to five feet nine inches, and that of the women in proportion. Under nine or ten years of age, most of the children have very spare limbs and dis- tended abdomens, but as they grow up their forms rapidly improve, and in fuU age the majority, as a rule, become re- markably well-proportioned — with fine oval faces, bright deep-set black eyes, straight thick noses, large but weU- formed mouths, full lips, beautiful teeth, broad shoulders, and well-shaped limbs. From twelve — the usual age of marriage — to eighteen or nineteen, nearly all the women are splendidly formed, and many of them are of real beauty ; but once past their 'teens they rapidly wither, and as a rule are little better than wrinkled hags before thirty — a fact on which a recent writer is liberal and philosophical enough to base a strong apology for po- lygamy.* In Cairo and throughout the larger towns of the Delta, those who have not been much exposed to the sun have a clear olive complexion and a very delicate skin, but the less sheltered villagers are of a more bronzed and coarser hue. In Middle Egypt the colour is stiU darker, and in the Saifd it deepens, towards the Nubian frontier, to the tint of a Barbadienne bronze. Time and • Egypt of the PhwraoM emd of the Khediiie, pp. 833, 834. THE FBLLAMEBN. gg dynastic revolutions have wronglit but little change in either the condition or character of this great mass of the Egyptian population. As they vrere under the Pharaohs, the Ptolemies, the Romans, and the v/^^.'phs, so in the main are they now — the most patient, the most pacific, the most home-loviag, and withal the merriest race ia the world. In this latter respect the oppression of more than forty centuries has failed to damp their natural buoyancy of spirit ; and nowhere more than amid the mud huts and seemingly abject poverty of a feUah village does "the human heart vindicate its strong right to be glad." The men are temperate and honest, but the women, if not quite meriting Lane's harsh judgment that they are "the most licentious of aU females who lay claim to be con- sidered as members of a civilised nation," have at least long lost the robust virtue of the Bedoweeyeh, and as a class, whUe physically the finest, are said to be ethically the fraUest of their sex in the NUe VaUey. It is the fashion to write and speak of this large section of the Khedive's subjects as being intolerably oppressed, ground down by crushing taxation, and generally wretched be- yond any parallel elsewhere. This exaggeration has, no doubt, its origin mainly in the superficial impressions of strangers, who, coming fresh from Europe — where, ia a different civilisation, a totally different standard of peasant life prevails — discover in the scant clothing, the simple food, and the primitive huts of these Egyptian ryots evi- dences of altogether special misery and administrative abuse. But no inferences could weU be more fallacious. Apart from the fact that these external features accord with the climate, and have been stereotyped since before the Pyramids were buUt, it may be affirmed that the gen- eral condition of the fellaheen will compare favourably with that of almost any other peasantry in the East. If 26 EGYPT AS IT IS. economical facts prove anything at all, the vast increase in the agricultural and other exports of the past dozen years, and the nearly corresponding return outlay on European manufactured goods, demonstrate a measure of material improvement among the producing classes which may be vainly sought for elsewhere out of Europe. That the taxation is heavy — but not oppressive — is ad- mitted ; and that, until lately, the methods of its collec- tion have been often brutal may also be conceded. But, apart from the traditional cruelty of tax-gathering all the East over, the Egyptian peasant has been noted in all time, from Cheops to Ismafl, for his unwillingness to pay taxes at aU. It is, in fact, a point of honor to bear any amount of "stick,"' if by so doing the impost, or any pai't of it, can be evaded. The feUah, indeed, who will not do so is despised by even his own wife as a poltroon, and if, after only a dozen or score of blows, he disgorges the coin which endurance of fifty might perhaps have saved, the conjugal estimate of his spirit is shared gen- erally by his fellows. Hence a difficulty of no trifling importance in the way of the new financial administra- tion. Those who know Egypt best believe that nothing short of "stick logic" will, as a mle, persuade a feUah to pay his dues, be they ever so equitable ; and if Mr. Romaine and his colleagues will not use it, the chances are much against the revenue. But a much wider line than that which marks the dif- ference of origin between the two sections of the settled Arab population separates both from the Bedoween, who represent those of the original immigration who retained their old nomad habits and, with them, much of the proud independence that distinguishes the race every- where from Barbary to Oman. These number in aU some sixty tribes . roughly estimated at about 300,000 strong, THE BEDOWEEir. 27 the whole of •whom, since the vigorous action taken against them by Mehemet Ali, are in complete subjection to the Q-overnment, and the desert on both sides of the Nile is now as safe for caravans or even private travellers as are the streets of Alexandria and Cairo. The most powerful tribes are the Ababdehs and Bisharis, who claim patri- monial rights over the great eastern wilderness south of the parallel of Cosseir, far up into Nubia ; the Henadi or Henadouehs, whose territory extends northwards to the latitude of Beni-souef ; the Mehaz, the Serr^bria, and the Quatt&b, thence down to Cairo ; and the Halaybis and Benl-Ali, who divide between them the desert east of the Delta to the Syrian frontier. Across the Gulf of Suez, the Tor Arabs of Sinai are probably the friendly tribe, miscalled Midianites, who guided Moses as far as Ezion Oeber on the Gulf of Akabah ; and, beyond them, the Alawin — the hostile Edomites who refused him passage through their country and compelled the long detour round the east side of Mount Hor. But these, too, are now as obedient to the Grovemment of Cairo as their feUow- nomads in Egypt proper, and where the Israelites were turned back Cook's and Gaze's tourists pass safely on payment of a trifling hacJcsheesTi to the local sheikh. Few or none of these tribes are stationary, except on the skirts of the wilderness, where they pass some months of the year on the green spots with their flocks and herds, cul- tivating patches of grain-land, and visiting the neighbour- ing towns for the purposes of traffic. The latest published returns of the movements of these nomads states the num- ber of those who thus camped during the year on the border of the settled districts at 40,000, of whom above 19,000 visited the province of Esneh, and nearly 6,000 the Payoum. For convenience of pasturage, each tribe is broken into subdivisions of from forty to one hundred 28 EGYPT AS IT la tents, governed by minor sheikhs, chosen from amongst the heads of families, who in turn choose the supreme chief of the tribe, whose authority, though practically hereditary, is still in theory elective. These Bedoween consider themselves the aristocracy of the race, and rigid- ly abstain from intermarriage with the settled inhabitants, whom they regard as degraded, and contemptuously call the "dwellers among brick." The introduction of the TurMsTi element into Egypt dates from the Ottoman conquest, in 1517, when Sultan SeUm dethroned the last of the Mamlouk Borghite dy- nasty, usurped the title of "Caliph," and nominally re- duced the country to the rank of an Ottoman province. But the change was followed by only a small immigration of conquerors, who settled chiefly in Cairo, and neithei then nor subsequently did these fuse with the native Mos- lem races. For nearly two hundred and forty years they monopolised most of the chief posts in the administration, but without exercising much real authority in the country. But towards the middle of the last century the Mamlouks — who in the meantime had remained a distinct and strict- ly warlike caste, kept up and recruited by the white-slave trade with the Caucasus — had regained most of their old ascendency, and during the next fifty years the resident Turkish colony not only lost nearly all share iu the govern- ment, but the sovereignty of the Sultan over Egypt was virtually extinguished. Nor was the position of this Otto- man aristocracy at aU retrieved by the revolution effected by Mehemet Ali, who, only half a Turk himself, had few sympathies vidth it. His obvious aim, too, being to re- found an Arab empire, his policy was to employ rather the native Egyptian than the Osmanli element in both the military and civil services ; and whether or not his suc- cessors have inherited his ambition, they have at leas! TURKS AND NUBIANS. 39 followed the same rule. Just as Arabic has become the official as well as vernacular language of the country, so Egjrptians have supplanted Turks in almost every branch of the administration, which in a few years bids fair to be wholly in Arab and Coptic hands. With some few official exceptions, the existing Turkish colony— of whom about 6,000 are settled in Cairo, 2,000 in Alex- andria, and 3,000 are scattered throughout Upper and Lower Egypt — consists mainly of artisans, shopkeepers, small proprietors, and members of the Ulema, of good position in their respective classes, but of little either social or political influence outside. The free Nubians are chiefly Barabras (or Berbers), who, though nominally Moslems, can be classed with neither the Ai-abs nor Turks. They belong to a tribe between the First and Second Cataracts, large numbers of whom migrate down into Egypt, chiefly to Cairo — as the Auvergnats and Savoyards do to Paris — to earn money in domestic service, and then return to their villages com- paratively rich with the fruits of their ten, fifteen, or twenty years' savings. They have an especial repute for honesty, and serve Moslem and Christian masters with equal zeal and fidelity. Next in order of number to these Mohammedan ele- ments, but before them in historical interest, stand the Copts, who are not only the most ancient, but strictly Bpeaking the only native Egyptian race. In spite of Yolney and ChampoUion, ethnologists are now generally agreed in regarding them as the descendants of the Pharaonic Egyptians, mixed more or less with the Per- sians left by Cambyses and the Greeks who followed the standard of Alexander, but still visibly preserving tha characteristics of the old-world race that built Thebes and worshipped Amoun-ra, To a portion, at least, of the Arab go EGYPT AS IT IS. population, which now so far outnumbers them, they bear a similar relation to that of the Gauls to the Franks under the Merovingian Kings ; but unlike these, the victors and the vanquished in Egypt never completely blended into one national whole. A majority of the native race em- braced the creed of their conquerors, and in time amalga- mated with them by intermarriage ; but a large remnant adhered to the older faith, and, preserving jealously all their special features of race and religion, have remained tin the present as distinguishable from the surroundiag communities as they were two thousand years ago. The etymology of their name has been disputed, but the weight of aathority inclines to regard it as the middle syllable of the word Mgyptius, * the oldest name of the NUe (anciently written JEg CatadeL A fine bath establishment 52 EGYPT A8 IT IS. KosETTA, third in the official list of "cities," though fourth in point of size and population, les forty miles east of Alexandria — with which it is now connected by- railway — on the western branch of the NUe, to which it , now gives its name, six miles in from the sea. It is con- siderably older than Cairo, having been founded during the Abbasside dynasty by one of the usurping Tooloonide kings, m a.d. 870. It was long one of the most important commercial towns of Egypt ; and before the cutting of the Mahmoudieh canal by Mehemet Aii the whole of the overland trade from India passed through it, in conse- quence of the decay of the old canal of Alexandria. When captured by the French in 1798, it had a popula- tion of more than 20, 000, which, after since dwindling to less than 14,000, has recovered to 15,000, with a corre- sponding revival of its commercial activity, which is, how- ever, still greatly impeded by a sand-bar at the mouth of the river, passable only by small craft. Extensive gar- dens and a very salubrious air render the town itself one of the most agreeable in Egypt, and, before Kamleh grew up, made it a favourite summer resort of Alexandriana and Cairenes. It was here that the British expedition, sent in 1807 under Greneral Eraser to effect a diversion in favour of the Mamlouks as a counter-stroke to French policy, suffered disastrous defeat by Mehemet Ali ; and here, too, eight years earlier, was found by the French, while digging the foundations of a fort a short way below the town, the famous "Rosetta Stone" now in the British tas been built over the spring — wMcb bas a natural heat of 86° Fabr. — and close by it an excellent botel. Tbe attractions of tbe place are already so great that M. Blanc, tbe play-king of Homburg and Monaco, recently offered tbe Kbedive a large sum for permission to introduce tbe additional allure- ments of rouge et noir. Hi a Higbness, bowever, refused tbe offer, as he had previously refused a mueh larger one for leave to open another " Kursaal " in Cairo itself. DAMIETTA AND PORT SAID. 63 Museum, the trilingual inscription on wMch first fur- nished Dr. Young and Champollion with the key to the old sacred Egyptian writing. Eighty miles beyond, Damietta similarly gives its name to the eastern estuary of the Nile, five miles up from the sea. Here again, a bar at the river-mouth limits the navigation to vessels of not more than sixty tons, but these carry on a considerable coasting trade, and also with Greece. The chief exports are rice, dried fish from Lake Menzaleh, dates, hides, bones, linseed, and beans. It was formerly famous for its manufacture of leather, and for the striped Hnen cloths called Dimity (from Dimydt, the Arab name of the town), but both these have long ceased to be specialties of the place. The existing town — which, though standing on the eastern bank of the river, proper- ly belongs to the interior Delta — dates from the thirteenth century, but prior to that time a city of the same name — anciently Tamiathis — stood about four miles to the south. This latter then formed the chief eastern bulwark of Egypt against the crusaders, by whom it was more than once taken, and was indeed the basis of the operations of St. Louis in the unfortunate sixth crusade. It was in consequence razed, and re-built on its present site by the Mamlouk Sultan Beybars, who at the same time closed the river against the Frankish ships by sinking stone- laden barges across its mouth. The present population of the town, which is estimated at 29,400, consists chiefly of native Moslems, vsdth a few Syrians and Levantine Q-reeks. Poet Said, thirty miles farther east, owes its origin to the great canal, and is therefore barely eighteen years old. In April, 1859, M. de Lesseps and his little band of pioneer navvies landed on what was then a desolate strip of sand-bank between the Mediterranean and the shallows 64 EQTPT AS IT 18. of Lake Menzaleli, and began Ms great work by selecting the site of the city and port wMch were intended ulti- mately to rival and even to supersede Alexandria. The spot was chosen, not because the shortest line could be drawn from it across the Isthmus — that would have rui» farther eastwards, through the GuK of Pelusium— bu* because it was the nearest point to deep-sea water along the coast, and in honour of the then Viceroy it was named Port Said. The very site, however, of the future town had to be formed, and this was done by spreading over the sandy slip the argillaceous mud dredged from the ad- joining lake, which the fierce heat of the Egyptian sum- mer soon hardened into a sufficiently firm foundation for the workshops and other light" structures that rapidly sprang up along the Hue of the new harbour. The coast being here an open roadstead, the port had also to be arti- ficially created ; and this was effected by running out to sea two great concrete moles, respectively 2,726 and 1,962 yards long, and 1,500 yards apart. The space thus en- closed forms a triangular port of about 550 acres, with 30 feet of depth at the entrance, and is connected with an ianer harbour, called the " Grand Bassin Ismail," by a channel 300 feet wide and 26 deep, through which the great ship canal is reached. Joining on to this principal ianer basin are the "Bassin Sherif," the "BasSin des AteHers," now little used since the completion of the works, and the "Bassin du Commerce," north and west of which the principal part of the town itself Ues. The native quarter is scattered westward over the strip of sand between the sea and the lake. A fine lighthouse stands at the shore end of the western mole, from the lantern of which, 150 feet high, a first-class electric light flashes twenty miles out to sea, and smaller coloured lights are also placed at the seaward extremities of both. The uew 18MAILIA. 65 port tlms formed is — and until tlie completion of the great works at Alexandria wiU remain — the safest and most easUy-approaclied harbour anywhere between Tunis and Smyrna. As there are no springs on this part of the coast, the water-snpply of the town is pumped through a double row of iron pipes from the fresh-water canal at Ismaiilia, and to provide against accidents a three-days' provision is kept stored in a large reservoir called the " Chateau d'Eau." As might be expected from its origia and relations, Port Said is in appearance rather a French than an Egyptian town ; and its regularly-laid-out streets, squares, quays, hotels, and other adjuncts of a European seaport wholly lack the picturesqueness of the towns and cities of the Delta and NUe valley. Its trade is almost ex- clusively Hmited to the Supply of vessels passing through the canal, and its population — which includes some of the worst samples of Maltese, G-reeks, Jews, and Italians to be met with in the Levant — three years ago numbered 8,671 of aU nationalities. In size merely a fort and a village, El-Aeish owes its rank as a mohafza to its position as the frontier town between Egypt and Palestine. The little river, of the same name, which here forms the actual boundary, is dry dur- ing the greater part of the year, but after the rains it emp- ties into the Mediterranean a tolerably rapid though nar- row stream. Except as a Customs station and frontier garrison, the place is of no importance, and its population numbers only 2,284. like Port Said, Ismailia is a creation of the Suez Canal, Sixteen years ago its site was a barren waste of sand, and now, with a population of more than 3,000, it is the prettiest and most attractive town in Egypt. It is situated exactly in the centre of the Isthmus, on the western shore of Lake Timsah, through which the Canal QQ EGYPT AS IT m runs, and on its three other sides is belted by luxuriant gardens fiUed with, flowers and fruit-trees, for which the adjacent fresh-water canal supplies abundant irrigation. The town itself is weU built, chiefly of stone from the " Carrleres des Hy6nes " on the other side of the lake, and its broad macadamised streets and handsome squares, bor- dered with young vigorously -growing trees, have an air of neatness and even elegance to which the best parts of Cairo and Alexandria have not yet attained. Its main artery is the Quai Mehemet Ali, a fine avenue a mile and a quarter long and some forty yards wide, flanked on one side by the fresh-water canal, and on the other by a long chain of private houses, the most noteworthy of which are the pretty Swiss chalet of M. de Lesseps, and, a short way beyond, the wooden palace hastUy built to receive the Khedive's more illustrious guests at the opening of the Canal. At the end of this quay are the works for pump- ing water from the fresh-water canal into the conduit that supplies Port Said and the intermediate stations, as men- tioned above ; iu a weU-equipped etahlissement de hains you may bathe iu the salt water of Lake Timsah, and on coming out have a douche fresh from the Nile, 130 miles off. IsmaiOia is still less likely than Port Said to become a place of any considerable trade, but the excellence of its climate — tempered during the hot months by a constant breeze from the lake, and free at all seasons from the night-dews and sea-fogs of the lower Delta —and its facility of access by railway from Cairo and Alexandria are likely to render it a favourite bath- ing resort to the annual summer exodus from those cities. Suez, fifty miles farther south by the railway which closely skirts the fresh-water canal, has few or no features in common with this little caDital of the Isthmus. The SUEZ. 67 actual town dates from tlie middle of the fourteenth, cen- tury, when it took the place of Kolzonm (Clysma) — itself the successor of Arisnoe — and the site oi which is still marked by a mound about half a mile farther north. The position was always one of commercial importance, and a succession of towns had ripen, flourished, and disappeared in turn, on or near it, as vhe Ked Sea receded southwards to the head of the two gulfs in which it now terminates, and to the westernmost of which Suez gives its name. The discovery, however, of the Cape route to the East, a century and a half later, diverted the current of trade from its ancient channel, and the town sank into little more than a fishing village, galvanised only into occasional life by the passage of caravans between Arabia and Egypt. After the conquest of the latter by the Turks, Suez became a naval dep6t for the Ottoman fleet in the Red Sea, and from it were dispatched the expeditions which added Yemen, Aden, and other points on both sides of the Sea to the dominion of the Porte. But these con- tributed nothing to the commercial revival of the town, which further suffered severely during the French occupa- tion in 1798, when the place was nearly half demolished to make way for fortifications that were begun, but never completed. The adoption, however, of the overland route, in 1837, for the transit of the Indian mail, was the begin- ning of a new era for Suez, followed up as it was five years later by the establishment of a regular line of the P. and O. Company's steamers to India, to which a similar service of the French Messageries was subsequently add- ed. The traffic thus created was further developed in 1857 by the opening of the railway to Cairo, in substitu- tion of the old camel and four-horse-waggon service across the desert. Six years later the completion of the fresh- water canal from Ismailia furnished the town, for the first 68 EGYPT AS IT IB. time in its history, with, an abundant water supply,* and this — coupled with the various works ia connection with the maritime Cana_, the docks, quays, and other local im- provements — in less than ten years swelled the population from 4,000 in 1859 to 16,000 in 1868. With the comple- tion of the Canal, the activity of the place somewhat decreased, and the population fell to 13,000, which the gradual completion of the other works has since further reduced to between 11,000 and 12,000 — composed, besides natives, of Arabs from all parts of the eastern coast, Per- sians, Indians, and the usual medley of Greeks, Levan- tines, and Europeans, whom trade or labour has perma- nently attracted to the town. Of this last itself-, a word or two of description will suffice. The native quarter is chiefly built of sun-dried bricks, and except in containing four or five small mosques, a Greek church, and one or two unpaved squares, or meidans, differs little from the common run of large Egyptian villages. The Prefecture, or government-house, is an imposing brick structure, which groups withia its limits the residence of the gover- nor, the chief police, telegraph, and other public offices, and, on its northern front, the railway platform. North- wards of this lie the substantial storehouses of the for- eign steam companies, the water-works, the English and French hospitals, and the fine hotel buUt in 1845 by the Egyptian Government for the accommodation of overland passengers, and which is now leased by the P. and O. Company. This building abuts immediately on the old harbour, and is connected with the railway station, a few * It had previously been dependent on a couple of scanty and bracldsh Bprings, two hours distant on the Arabian coast ; on a third of similar quality a day's sail south on the African shore, and on such further supply as could be brought on camels' backs, and afterwards by railway, from Cairo — the whole provision from all these sources being barely sufficient for a population of at most 6,000. SOUAKIM AND MABSOWAH. 69 hundred yards off, by a special line of rails. More promi- nently than any of these, stands a fine chalet, bnUt by Said Pasha on the mound of Kolzoum, from which a splendid view is obtained. In front lies the town — sur- rounded on three sides by the desert — the harbour, road- stead, and month of the canal ; on the left are visible the rosy peaks of Sinai, and on the right the violet-tinted range of the Jebel-Attakah, with the land-locked gulf stretching blue and beautiful as an Italian lake between. The new harbour — the works in connection with which wUl be described in another chapter — lies nearly two miles south of the town, with which it is connected by a broad stone-faced embankment, supporting a fine carriage-road and a branch railway that conveys goods and passengers right down to the ships. Nearly due east is the Suez Canal Company's port, including extensive office buildings, the quay called "Waghom's Quay," on which the Com- pany has erected a statue of the indefatigable promoter of the overland route, and, beyond these, the entrance to the Canal itself. Suez completes the list of Egyptian "cities," but Soua- kim and Massowah — the two principal Red Sea ports after Suez — being separate administrations, also fall within the category of mohafzas. The former is situated, in lat. 19° 49' N., at the extremity of a narrow bay about fifteen miles long, and fringed on both sides by coral reefs. The town itself stands on the innermost of several smaU islands, and is separated by a strait about five hundred yards wide from its suburb, El-Geyf, on the mainland. The harbour, which is formed by a curving continental headland, lies east of the town, the west side affording no anchorage for ships. Souakim carries on a considerable trade with the opposite Arabian coast, its chief exports being dhoura from Taka, water-skins, leather, sacks, YQ EOTPT AS IT m hides, liquid butter, palm-leaf mats, and slaves from Senuaar and Darfour. It communicates witli the interior by a caravan route to Berber on the Nile, and its popula- tion is officially estimated at 4,078. Massowah, 270 miles farther down the coast, in lat. 15° 44' N., stands also on a small coral island separated fi-om the continent by the shallow channel of Adowa. The harbour, though narrow at the entrance, is deep and easily accessible, and affords safe anchorage for a large number of vessels. Owing to the scarcity of fresh water, the island and its immediate neighbourhood on the main- land produce nothing available for trade, but it carries on a considerable traffic with the Hedjaz and Yemen in gold dust, ivory, rhinoceros horns, and grain, brought down by caravans from Khartoum and the upper countries on the Blue and White Niles : it is also the terminal poinf southwards for the line of Egyptian Government steamers which ply between this point and Suez, touching at Djeddah and Souakim. Its position as the chief maritime outlet of Abyssinia will give it greater importance when- ever that country becomes Egyptian territory, but ia the meantime its population does not exceed 2,350. Of the 113 " towns " of Egypt proper, it wiU suffice to note merely the more important provincial chefs-lieux, many of which exceed in size and population most of the " cities " above noticed. Amongst these Tarda ranks first in commercial activity and number of inhabitants — these latter amountmg in 1872 to 60,000. It is the capital of the province of Grarbye, in Lower Egypt, and a principal station on the Alexandria and Cairo railway, seventy-six miles from the former, and fifty-five from the latter city. Pout branch hues from Damietta, Zifte, Dessouk, and Shibeen-el-Korn also here join the main trunk line, and additionally contribute to the commercial movement of TANTA ANB ZAGAZIG. 71 the town. Its chief local importance, however, is derived from three great fairs, or rather festivals, which are held annually in January, April, and August in honour of a famous Moslem saint caUed Sid-Achmet the Bedoween, who flourished in the thirteenth century, and whose tomb and mosque form one of the prettiest and richest monu- ments of their kiad in Egypt. Each of these f^tes lasts eight days ; and that in autumn especially attracts enor- mous crowds of both sexes, trade and religion then often combining to collect together as many as 600,000 dealers and pilgrims from aU parts of the East. But the scene is distinguished rather by riot than piety, and recalls the worst revelries of Bubastis and Canopus. The tomb is jealously guarded by stalwart dervishes, and as (in the words of Clot Bey) the intercession of the saint ^^ passe pour donner la fecondite aux femmes,''^ the spot is a favourite resort of pious ladies from whom Allah has withheld the honours of maternity, and whose grateful offerings on these occasions form a rich endowment of the shrine. Up to withia a few years ago the slave-market was one of the chief sights of these fairs, but this has been suppressed by the Khedive, and the traffic in humaa chattels, though still privately carried on, is now contra- band here as everywhere else throughout the country.* Zagazig, with a population of nearly 40,000, ranks next in size and commercial importance. Its situation on the branch line which connects Benhar— twenty-four miles off on the main Alexandria and Cairo railway — ^with Ismaiilia * Three similar, though leas famous festivals, are held at Desouk, in the neighbouring province of Garbyeh, in honour of Sheikh Ibrahim, a saint who ranks next after Sid-Achmet in the Egyptian calendar ; as many in the province of Behera, in honour of Sheikh-Attye-Abourrich ; and four others in the province of Minieh, in honour of as many several santons of lesser re- pute. Weekly or bi-weekly fairs, for trading purposes only, are also held in most of the principal towns throuffhout the country. 72 EGYPT AS IT m and Suez, and also as the junction-point of another line to Mansourah, renders it at once the centre of the trade of the' surrounding district, and of the railway system of the eastern Delta. Its growth therefore has been rapid, and with ihe aid of a numerous and enterprising colony of Europeans; it promises to become one of the largest and most prosperous towns of Egypt. The ruins of Bubastis are close by, and the fresh- water canal strikes the line at Ter-el-Kibeer, about sixteen miles farther east. Although private manufacturing enterprise has not yet much extended above Cairo, the development of native industry within recent years has swelled the population of As stout, the capital of Upper Egypt, from 18,000 at the death of Mehemet Ali to 27,500 three years ago. This pretty and thriving town, which occupies the site of the ancient LycopoHs, stands nearly a mile back from the left bank of the Nile, about 250 miles above Cairo, and is surrounded by one of the most fertile districts in the upper vaUey. It was here that the Mamlouk chiefs took refuge when driven from Lower Egypt, and for a time made a successful stand against Mehemet Ali. The town is connected with El-Hamra, its port on the river, by a fine tree-studded chaussee ; and besides some other minor local industries is famous for its pipe-bowls, which com- pete throughout Egypt and the Levant with those of Con- stantinople itself, It is at present the southern terminus of the line of railway on the left bank of the JSTile, which connects Upper Egypt with Alexandria, and, as mentioned elsewhere, is also the chief entrepot of the caravan trade between Cairo, Darfour, and Sennaar. Hamanhour, the capital of the province of Behera in the lower vaUey, thirty-eight miles from Alexandria on the trunk line to Cairo, had thirty years ago 9,000 in- habitants, but from being little more than a first-clasa MANSOUBAH AND KENNEH. 73 village it has grown to be a prosperous town, witli a population of 26,000. The surrounding district is one of the most richly cultivated in Egypt, and produces in abundance cotton of the finest quality, for which the railway and the neighbouring Mahmoudieh canal afford cheap and ready means of transport. Mansourah, an old town on the right bank of the Damietta branch, comes next ia census rank, with a popu- lation of 16,000. It was here that St. Louis was defeated and captured by the Saracens ia 1250, and tradition stiU points to an old ruin as his place of imprisonment tUl released on payment of a heavy ransom and the surren- der of Damietta. The town, which is the capital of the province of Dahkalieh, is connected by railway with Cairo, Alexandria, and nearly aU parts of the Delta, and with Lake Menzaleh, thirty-seven miles off, by a canal which is navigable half the year. Like Damanhour, its chief trade staple is cotton, but it also manufactures a considerable quantity of sail-cloth and other Unen fabrics. Kenneh, the capital of the province of Kenneh-Cosseir, in Upper Egypt, about a hundred and fifty mUes above Assiout, forms the last town of which special note need be made. It stands in a couple of miles from the eastern bank of the Nile on a canal that connects it vdth the river, and being only about eighty miles from the Red Sea at Cosseir, has succeeded to Coft and Cos as the em- porium of trade between the Said, and the Arabian coast. It is for the same reason a chief rendezvous of Mecca pil- grims from the upper vaUey and the countries farther south. The town, is now, as three thousand years ago, famous for its manufacture of porous water- jars and bot- tles, which are still ia universal use throughout Egypt, and rafts of which floating down to Cairo and the Delta, form one of the picturesque features of the NUe navigation. 74 EGYPT AS IT IS. Its population of 13,200 includes a numerous colony of gJiawdzee, or dancing girls, of wliom there is also a strong contingent Mgher up at Esneh. On the opposite bank of the river stands Dendera (Tentyra), whose Ptolemaic tem- ple of Venus is one of the grandest and best preserved monuments of Egypt. Of the other provincial capitals there remain to be more briefly mentioned — in Lower Egypt, Shibeen, chief town of the province of Menoufyeh, with a population of 12,400 ; Benha (5,200), capital of Galioubyeh ; and Ghizeh (10,500), now rather a vUlage than a town, but still capital of the mudirieh opposite Cairo, which gives its name to the Great Pyramids ; and in Middle and Upper Egypt, Beni-Souef (7,000), a thriving town, capi- tal of the province of the same name ; Medinet (about 12,000), capital of the Payoum; Minieh (11,000), a large and prosperous town, chef -lieu of its province, about 160 mUes above Cairo (150 by rail), where one of the Khedive's finest sugar factories is now carried on ; Oirgheh (2,000), formerly the chief town of the Said, and still the seat of the oldest Roman Catholic establishment in Egypt ; it is now superseded as the provincial capital by SooJidg, a well-built and important town about twenty-five miles lower down ; and finally Esneh (7,000), a chief emporium of the Upper Mle and Abyssinian trade, which also enjoys the repute of being the healthiest place on the river. U. CHAPTER IV. EGYPT AND THE POETE. The Problem of their Relation — The Conquest never Established Fall Sove- reignty of the Porte — Continued Power of the Mamlouk Beys— The French Invasion — ^Mehbmbt Am — Elected Viceroy — War with the Porte — The Treaty of 1840 — His Subsequent Administration and Death — Ibrahim, Abbas, and Said Pashas — Accession of Ismail, a New Epoch — Change of the Succession — " Khedive " — International Recognition of these Changes — Conflict of Juristic Opinion as to their Effect — Be facto Establishment of an Arab Kingdom — "Egypt for the Egyptians" — Probable Outcome of the War — Independence or British Protection. Before proceeding to describe tlie administration and present condition of tlie territory and population thns noticed, it may be worth wMIe to state briefly tlie ele- ments of the problem involved in the international status now reached by Egypt and its ruler. We say problem, because not only is the relation of the Khe- dive to the Porte an anomaly in public law, but jurists dif- fer in their estimate of its exact political efEect, some re- garding his Highness as virtually a sovereign prince, while others faU to see that he has advanced beyond the mere vassal rank of Mehemet AU. A glance at the historical facts may help to suggest which of these views most nearly accords with the actual situation. The conquest of the country by Sultan SeHm I., in 1517, abolished the Mamlouk dynasty, but did not estab- lish in its stead the full sovereignty of the Porte. The great military aristocracy of the Beys remained in un- weakened force, and the conqueror was fain to conclude with them a regular treaty by which Egypt was consti- mQ EGYPT AS IT T8. tuted in effect a republic, feudally subject to the Sultan and Ms successors, but the government of which was still left in the hands of the Mamlouk chiefs, acting as a council of regency under a Pasha, whose almost only function was to receive and remit to Constantinople the stipulated tribute, and who was himself deposable at vrill by this Mamlouk divan. The Beys also retained the right of electtag their own chief, who, in concert with his fel- lows, levied taxes, maintained an army, coined money, and otherwise exercised supreme authority over the coun- try.* Shadowy as was the sovereignty thus left to the Porte, it became if possible stiU more unreal during the domestic turbulence and foreign wars of the succeeding reigns, untU, in 1763, the then dominant Bey refused pay- ment of the tribute, expelled the resident Pasha, and proclaimed himself "Sultan of Egypt and Lord of the Two Seas." Although this revolt was not successful, the Porte gladly compounded the treason by re-confirming the disaffected chiefs in their old powers ; and the depo- sition of its representative, by the simple fiat of the Beys, became thenceforward an incident of almost yearly oc- currence. To this merely nominal suzerainty had the authority of the Sultan been reduced when, in 1798, the French invasion under Bonaparte for three years extin- guished it altogether. After its re-establishment by the victories of Nelson, Abercrombie, and Sidney Smith, the authority of the Porte was more than ever disregarded by the Mamlouk chiefs, to such an extent that one vice- roy was deposed and executed, and another — Khosrew Pasha, afterwards famous as Grand Vizier — made prisoner and shipped back to Constantinople. Now it was that Mehemet Alt, the chief figure in modern Egyptian his- * SaTary, Lettres sur I'Egypte, torn, ii., lettre xv Gibbon, Decline and Fall, chap. Ix. WAB WITS TSE PORTE. Tl tory, first appeared prominently on the scene. Bom in 1768, at Cavalla in Roumelia, this remarkable man had a few years before these events been sent into Egypt, second in command of a company of Albanian irregulars, and after greatly distiagnishing himself in several engage- ments, first against the French, and afterwards agaiast the rebel Beys, he had won such popularity with the army and among the Cairene sheikhs that, in 1805, these to- gether proclaimed him Viceroy, and the Porte, although even then jealous of his growing influence, and suspecting his ambition, deemed it politic to recall its own nominee and ratify the elevation of the young Macedonian briga- dier. How the new vali in turn baffled the intrigues of the Stamboul divan to effect his overthrow, how he made himself sole master of Egypt by exterminatiag the Mam- louks, rescued the Hedjaz from the Wahabees, organised a powerful army and navy on the European system, annexed the Soudan, conquered Syria, and, after anni- hOating the Turkish army at Koniah in 1832, would have carried his victorious standards to the Bosphorus if Russia had not interposed— need not here be narrated. Enough to say that the treaty of Kutaieh, concluded in the foUowing year between the Porte and its great vassal, recognised the feudal sovereignty of Mehemet AU over Egypt, Crete, Syria, and the large district of Adana, on the sole condition of his paying tribute. But the peace thus dearly purchased by the Porte was as brief as it was hollow. Fresh complications resulted m renewed war ia 1839, when the total defeat of the Turks by Ibrahim Pasha, at Kezib, re-opened the defiles of the Taurus to the victors, and but for the speedy intervention of the European Powers would have again placed Asia Minor and Constantinople at their mercy. As if to atone for its 7g EGYPT AS IT IS. apathy in 1832, tlie Britisli Govenimeiit now espoused the cause of the Sultan with especial energy, and the opera- tions of Stopford and Napier on the coast of Syria forced Mehemet Ali to surrender that proviace, and content him- self with the international recognition of his own and his family's right to Egypt only. This was formally guaran- teed by the treaty of 1840 between the Porte, Austria, Great Britain, Prussia, and Russia, and was further con- firmed by the convention of the following year, to which France also became a party. The settlement thus ratified reserved to the Porte its old right of tribute, fixed the strength of the Viceroy's military forces, and imposed a few other restrictions ; but, barring these limitations, Egypt became under it more than ever legally as well as practically seK-governing, the order of succession being at the same time fixed in accordance with the imperial rule of descent to the eldest male of the family. His title to Egypt having been thus affirmed by the public law of Europe, Mehemet Ali abandoned all idea of further aggrandisement, and devoted himself during the next seven years to the social and material improvement of the country, with an aggregate of results which has indelibly fixed his place in history as the "Peter the Great" of Egypt. Indeed, with the exception of some additions and further reforms made by the present Khe- dive, the whole administrative system of the country is his work ; and, notwithstanding many admitted defects, how in^^omparably it is the most civilised and efficient of existing Mussulman Governments, the following chapters will aim at is bowing. In 1848, Mehemet Ali— then in his eightieth year — was attacked by a mental malady,* and * He lingered in tliis state tUl August 3, 1849, when he died, leaving five ions — Ibrahim, Said, Hussein, Halim, and Mehemet Ali. A sixth, Ismail (the second in age), had been murdered during his father's lifetime while AGOESSION" OF ISMAIL. 79 -vas succeeded by his eldest son Ibrahim Pasha, the hero of Koniah and Kezib. This prince, however, only reigned four months, and was in turn succeeded by his nephew Abbas Pasha, a voluptuary and a bigot, during whose feeble and reactionary rule the prosperity of the country languished, and the Porte, taking advantage of his weak- ness, more than once stretched its prerogative beyond the limits of treaty right. To him, in 1854, followed Said Pasha, the third son of Mehemet AH, an amiable and lib- eral-minded prince, who retrieved much of the mischief done by his predecessor, but lacked the vigorous intelli- gence and force of character required to give new impulse to the great work begun and so far advanced by his father. His reign will, however, be honourably remembered for the abolition of several mischievous Government monopo- lies established by his father, and maintaiaed by Abbas, and, especially, for the concession and commencement of the Suez Canal. Said died in January, 1863, and with the accession of his nephew, Ismail Pasha, the second son of Ibrahim, a new epoch in the political and social history of the country begins. Although the settlement of 1840-1 had made Egypt vir- tually independent, the official relation of its ruler to the Porte was still nominally that of a provincial vali, or gov- ernor-general, whose powers were iadeed larger, but his grade little if at aU higher, than that of the governor of Baghdad. In Constantinople he ranked after the Grand commanding the first expedition to the Soudan ; and a seventh, Toussoun, had also pre-deceased his father. Of the five who survived him, Haliui Pasha, at present residing in Constantinople, is the only one now living. Ibrahim Pasha left three sons — Achmet, who was accidentally drowned in the Nile in 1859 ; Ismail, the present Khedive, and Mastapha Fazyl, who died in Constantinople ia 1875. Toussoun Pasha left one son. Abbas, who succeeded Ibrahim Pasha in the Viceroyalty ; and Said Pasha, who in tu m succeeded him, also left one, Toussoun Pasha, who died last year. A note of the present viceregal f amUy will be found in Appendix A. 80 EGYPT AS IT IS. Vizier, of whom botli Abbas and Said liad more than once to acknowledge the precedence. Ismail, however, did not relish this wide disproportion between his nominal status and his actual power ; and accordingly, soon after his ac- cession, he began negotiations with Stamboul which in 1866 resulted in an imperial firman, by which, in considera- tion of the yearly tribute being increased from 376,000?. to 675,000?., he received the title and rank of EJiedW' el-Misr (King of Egypt) — commonly called Khedive* — and the succession to the throne was made direct from father to son, instead of descending to the eldest agnate of the family of Mehemet AU, as had been fixed by the treaty of 1840. But the old limitations of his prerogative as regarded the strength of the Egyi)|ian army, the right of contracting foreign loans vsdthout leave of the Porte, and of concluding commercial treaties, still remained ; nor~ was it till 1872 that these were removed by another fir- man, which — consoUdating aU that preceded it since the convention with Mehemet Ali — conferred on the Khedive every substantial attribute of sovereignty, except only ih&jus legationis, trammelled by the sole conditions of his paying the increased tribute, and lending the Sultan military aid in the event of war. It need hardly be said that these successive concessions cost the Egyptian treas- ury dear ; every fresh step towards autonomy was, in fact, purchased from both the Sultan and his Ministers at an exorbitant price ; and from Abdul- A2dz down to the fortunate aide-de-camp for whom court favour obtained the coveted mission of carrying each new Tidtt to Cairo, heavy blackmail was extorted by the whole. It was, indeed, notorious at Constantinople that during the sis or seven years over which these negotiations extended, the amount thus annually squeezed out of the Viceroy con- ^ Pronounced Khideev. CONFLICT OF JURISTIC OPINION. 81 siderably exceeded the total of the fixed tribute. In the result, however, both these firmans of 1866 and 1872 were communicated to and approved by the Powers who were parties to the settlement of 1840-1, and the new relation established by them between Egypt and the Porte may, therefore, be regarded as having similarly received inter- national sanction. The status thus finally created was so anomalous that it might well divide juristic opinion. It differed in many points from, and in some rose much above, that of Tunis, Servia, and E-oumania, no one of which enjoys — although the Bucharest Government has recently laid claim to — the distinctive sovereign right of concluding treaties. Yet while Martens, nearly ninety years ago, and Wheaton more than forty years later, placed the Danube Princi- palities-^whose Hospodars were directly appointed by the Porte — even then among "semi-sovereign" states. Sir Robert Phillimore questions the right of Egypt even now to this rank.* The force of this later opinion is, however, weakened by the fact that so long ago as 1836 this eminent jurist constructively endorsedf Wheaton' s recognition of the semi-sovereignty of Mehemet Ali, even before the hereditary title of the latter had been formally affirmed by the Powers ; and again, in 1854, stUl more distinctly con- ceded^: this rank to Abbas Pasha, although laboring under the erroneous impression that Tanzimat — the charter of re- forms issued by the Porte in 1838 — ^had been extended to Egypt, and that "so far the sovereignty" of the Viceroy had been " derogated from by the reservation" thus made "to the Sultan of the power of life and death over the subjects of the Pasha." But no such derogation ever took place ; for although the Porte addressed a Tidtt in this * The OluvrUeh, h. R. (Admiralty), vol. iv., p. 69. f ihtemationai Law. vol. i., p. 117. ^Idem, voL 2. 82 EGYPT A8 IT IS. sense to Abbas Pasha in 1852, even that feeble prince re- fused to acknowledge the pretension ; and the power of life and death over Egyptian subjects remained, as it still does, exclusively within the viceregal prerogative, without refer- ence to the Sultan in any case. When, therefore, it is re- membered that for all purposes of internal govemmenfc and of externally pledging the national credit, the Khedive is now as irresponsibly absolute in Egypt as the Sultan is in Turkey — or even more so, since he is not trammelled by even a paper Constitution — it seems difficult to deny him the benefit of Vattel's doctrine that "where the payment of tribute and homage leaves independence and supreme authority in the administration of the State, and only means certain duties to the lord of the fief, it does not pre- vent the state of the feudatory from being strictly sove- reign."* This is exactly the case of the Egyptian Govern- ment ; and as the title of the Khedive to this "supreme authority" is indefeasible so long as the conditions of its tenure are fulfilled, his claim to sovereignty of at least the second rank is incontestable if this ruling of the great Swiss civilian be good public law. The right even of Me- hemet AU to this status was constructively affirmed by the French courts nearly fifty years ago ;t and that of Ismail Pasha was similarly recognised by our own tribunals even before the last firmans had further ratified and increased his powers.:]: It is, however, fortunate for those who have a material stake in Egyptian credit that both the rank and obligations of the Khedive and his dominion depend rather on accomplished and accepted facts — the ultimate title in politics as in common life — than on the conflicting * Droit des Oens, 1. i., chap. 1. So too Grotius, b. i., chap. 3. f The case of M. Solon, Phillimore'a International Law, vol. ii., pp. 13&-9. X In the unreported caee of Melanidis v. Ismail Pasha, tried in the Coort of Crazunon Pleas in Jnne, 1866, and again in January, 1869. IT Allow AL ITEELIWB. 83 dicta of jurists. Already, the foundations of an Arab kingdom, as distinct from Turkey in all but the tempo- rary incidents of tribute and military aid as Portugal is from Spain, are laid beyond reasonable fear of disturbance from any possible outcome of tbe Eastern Question ; and in view of this fact, which is now tacitly recognised by all Europe, it is idle any longer to regard Egypt as "A patient province of the Gfreat MoguL" Fifty, or even thirty, years ago there was still an influ- ential "Ottoman party" in the country, but hardly the tradition of this now survives. Among the peasantry, too, the more or less active sentiment of loyalty to the Porte which then prevailed has similarly died out — yielding to a personal sense of an exorbitant tribute for which nothing has been received in return, and of yet heavier extortions, which, though recorded in no budget, have been known to and felt by every Fellah between Assouan and the sea. With few (and certainly unconfessed) exceptions, " Egypt for the Egyptians" is now unmistakably the national as- piration, and no one who knows the country can doubt that, if the Khedive were to proclaim his independence to- morrow, he would be supported by every class of the pop- ulation. At the same time, the totally distinct sentiment of religious fealty to the Caliph has lost none of its force, and in any struggle involving positive peril to Islam — not merely political danger to the Porte — the Arab would in- fallibly make common cause with the Turk — just as Ire- land, if there were no Foreign Enlistment Act, would sim- ilarly help the Pope. But this impulse of religious sym- pathy would be quite as strong with both Khedive and PeUah if the political tie between the two countries were completely rent, and conflicts in no way with the other logic of events which ppiata clearly to that inevitable 84 EGYPT AS IT ra. and not distant consummation. The general loyalty with wMch the Porte' s requisition for a contingent has recent- ly been responded to argues nothing against this view oi the set of national feehng, nor will it retard by a day the shuffling off of the tributary yoke. It would as yet be premature to forecast the outcome of the present war to any of the interests concerned ; but nothing can be more certain in unaccomplished events than that, suffer who may, Egypt will be a gainer in the result. If the Porte escape heavy loss and humiliation, the Khedive will have earned the right to new concessions, tending to sever the few remaining fibres of the thread that still binds him to Stamboul ; while in the worst event of Turkish dismem- berment, he may safely count on emerging from the gen- eral wreck, pUoted by British friendship, it may be into complete independence, or at worst — or best — exchanging the costly suzerainty of the Porte for the fostering and disinterested protection of Great Britaiiu CHAPTER V ADMINISTRATION. V£tcA, Cave's "Report," p. 4. EGYPT A8 IT IS for an almost universally smoking population of nearly 6,500,000, and may be fairly expected to be approached, if not fully realised, under a more efficient system of cus- toms and excise control. The tax on which it is based is only 20 piastres per oke, or about Is. 6d. per lb. — less than half our English duty — and as the yearly importa- tion, over and above what is used of native growth, ex- ceeded 3,800,000 okes (=7,700,000 lbs.), a revenue of 600,0001. would stUl leave a margin of more than 10 per cent, for reduced consumption or other causes. For the present, however, the proceeds of this tax faU slightly below 264,000?. a year. The Moukabala and Village Annuities are not prop- erly taxation at all, but terminable receipts iuvolving, eight years hence, a large permanent reduction of rev- enue. The former — which means "compensation" — is the name given to a measure iatroduced iu 1871 to redeem half the land-tax, with a view to paying off the then float- ing debt with the proceeds, without having recourse to a foreign loan. At that time the great majority of Egyp- tian landowners had no legally regular title-deeds to their property, and ia consideration of their consentiug to pay six years' land tax iu advance — either ia one payment or ia six yearly instaUments — the Grovemment proposed to give them indefeasible titles, and to reduce this tax by one-half for all time. The measure was, however, found to be impracticable. Only the wealthier proprietors could afford to comply with its terms in either alterna- tive, and after about 8,000,000Z. of the estimated total of 27,825,000?. had been encashed, it was found necessary to commute the proposed six installments into twelve annual payments of about 1,530,000?. — reckoning a dis- count of 8i per cent, to be allowed on each installment — after the last of which, payable in 1885, half the tax. THE MOVKABALA. 133 wlietlier miri or oushur, wiU be forever redeemed. TMa modification of the measure of course defeated its origi- nal object, and saddled tlie Grovernment with, an engage- ment wMch, however advantageous to the landowners who could afford to bear the immediate burden, was fiscally ruinous to the Treasury ; seeing that for a sum of in all less than 27,000,000Z. spread over a dozen years, it thence afterwards surrendered for aU time nearly 2,500,000Z. a year of its surest and most easUy collected revenue. The money, however, was urgently needed, and the measure was therefore upheld till May of last year, when, the difficulties of the floating debt having culmi- nated, the Government — yielding to the pressure and evil counsels of the influential group of French financiers by whom the large mass of its Treasury bonds was chiefly held — decided on unifying the whole of its debt, funded and floating, on terms which, amongst others, provided for its redemption in sixty -five years. To enable it to bear the heavy interest-charge which this arrangement entailed, it was resolved not to reduce the land-tax, and by the decree of May 7th the Moukabala was abolished, the Government being left to make what compromise it could, if any, with the proprietors who had already paid under it up to that date. But the scheme of which this was a feature having failed to meet with acceptance in England, fell through, and on reconsideration the Gov- ernment, after consulting the Assembly of Delegates, de- cided on maintaining the Moukabala, and keeping faith with the contributory landholders. Accordingly, when the substituted project of Messrs. Goschen and Joubert was negotiated six months later, the Moukabala formed part of it, and is now again in revived operation, with this modification, that the discount or bonus of 8i per cent, by whose operation the half-tax was to be redeemed 124 EGYPT AS IT IS. witMa the twelve years is now withdrawn, and the whole of the reduction will come into force at once in 1886. The effect of this will be to augment the receipts from the measure by about 135,000?. a year — at the expense, of course, of those who previously received that amount in rebate. But even with this increment the present advantages derived from the item must be regarded aa dearly bought at the cost of the sacrifice it will entail eight years hence. This wOl no doubt be in great meas- ure recouped by the taxation of new land and the general expansion of revenue ia the meantime ; but that improve- ment would have accrued in any case, and the necessity for a measure which thus so largely discounts the future is, therefore, none the less to be regretted. The Village Annuities only resemble the Moukabala in being simi- larly terminable. These date from 1870, when, in con-~ sequence of the sudden reduction in the price of cotton which followed the temporary rise caused by the Ameri- can civil war, the growers were unable to repay the large advances made to them by the merchants and money- lenders during the inflation of the market. The Grovern- ment came to their relief, and, taking on itself the collec- tive debt of about 1,000,000?., issued in payment of it in- terest-bearing "Village Bonds" spread over seven years. This term was subsequently extended to twelve years, and the annuities wiU therefore expire in 1885, up tUl which time the Treasury is being repaid by the original debtors at the rate of 160,000?. a year. The termination of both these items will, consequently, involve an annual reduction in the revenue of about 1,820,000?. after 1885. Profits on KaUways, the next important item, may be credited with similar elasticity to that experienced in the Customs, arising from a steady increase in the traffic, gradual improvement _in _ the administration, and the MISCELLANEOUS BEGEIPT8. Igg continTiiiig extension of tMs class of pnblio worka AH three of these causes combine to explain the growth of revenue from this source from 361, 300^. ia 1863, the first year of the present reign, to 990,200?., the net amount received from it by the Treasury last year. The cheap- ness with which the lines are worked no doubt also con- tributed to this result — ^the cost of working being only about 46 per cent, of the receipts, or, if telegraph revenue and other "rents" received by the department be in- cluded, about 41 per cent., as compared with 53 per cent, spent on most European lines. This low proportion of working cost to revenue arises mainly from the moderate rate of speed at which trains are driven, and from the employment chiefly of native labor. Taking the aggre- gate of the lines now open at 1,100 miles — a mUeage which, in proportion to population, is greater than that of either Austria, Hungary, or Spain — and estimating their cost at the locally high average of 11,000?. a mile, these net profits of last year represent a dividend of nearly 8 per cent, on the capital spent on the system, irrespective of its indirect effect on other branches of revenue by promoting commercial activity and the gen- eral prosperity of the country. That stUl better results will be realised under the new European administration of the lines may be confidently expected ; and although the property in them is still retained by the Govern- ment, the "privileged" stock to which their revenue is now specially hypothecated, may, for aU practical purposes, be regarded as high -class railway deben- tures. The remaining aggregate of receipts, grouped under the head of "Miscellaneous," and amounting in the total last year to about 2,100,000?., is made up of 519,000?. received as octroi and other municipal dues in Cairo and 126 EGYPT AS IT 18. Alexandria; of 202,000Z. collected as indirect taxes by the provincial prefectures ; of 306,000Z. derived from the salt monopoly; of 467,000?. of special crovra rents and duties payable to the Ministry of Finance ; of 245,O0OZ, from the Post Office, salt-fish farming, lock, canal, bridge, and harbour tolls and dues (other than those of Alexandria) ; of 143,000?. net revenue from tbe Soudan ; and about 220,000?. of arrear taxes. This last item being deducted, the revenue for the year was roundly about 10,500,000?., of vfhich rather less than 7,000,000?. was the proceeds of actual taxation, the re- maiader representing the redemption of future taxes, the payment of old ones, railway receipts, canal, bridge, and other dues, which were not iu fact taxes in the ordi- nary sense, but payment for equivalents received. The whole positive taxation of the year, therefore, was about 25*. per head of the population, an amount which, although not oppressive, is still relatively high for a country in which the great mrjority of the people are much poorer than the corresponding classes in Europe. Indeed, the strain in this direction has reached a point beyond which, for some years at least to come, it cannot be safely carried, and the further growth of the Egyptian revenue must, therefore, depend rather on the reclama- tion of new land to cultivation and the general expansion of trade than on any possible iucrease in the present fiscal burdens of the country. It may be doubted, indeed, whether under the humane and more equitable system of assessment and collection which has been recently iutroduced, last year's aggregate of receipts will be even maiutaiued. The taxation of foreigners, who still most laequitably enjoy their old fiscal exemption under the Capitulations, might fairly be made to yield 200,000?. a year, but of this there is no present likelihood. GROSS REVENUE— EXPENDITURE. \21 and from furtlier taxation in any direction there is there- fore nothing to be reasonably hoped. II. Passing from revenue to Expenditure, the latter, we find, has grown rather more than pari passu with the former — an unsatisfactory feature, which is however ex- plained by the great outlay on public works and the yearly increasing charges of the public debt. But this side of the account is now simplified, and its figures for the future controlled by the recent arrangement which assigns a fixed sum for administration, and allots the balance of the revenue, be it much or little, for t e service of the debt. Previously there was no check upon the former, and where the outlay on it and the annuities on the debt exceeded the year's income, the deficit was met by the vicious expedient of fresh borrowing at usu- rious rates of interest, till borrowing became no longer possible, and the inevitable crisis of last year ensued. To this mischievous license the decree of November last put an end, and so long as it remauis ia force the spend- ing powers of the Government are limited — for the pres- ent and next year to 4,259,350?. and 4,403,961Z. respec- tively, and thence afterwards, till 1886, to 4,500,000?. a year. Although, therefore, the Estimates on this side of recent Budgets have now little more than an historical interest, their chief items — which, more or less modified, are still those of the current expenditure — ^ma,y be mentioned. First comes 685,308Z. for tribute to the Porte. Up till 1866 this item was only 376,000Z., but in that year, in considera- tion of the firman which changed the order of succession, the payment was increased to 670,308?., to which 15,000?. a year has since been added for the cession of Zeyla. The Civil List of the Khedive (300,000?.), raised by grants to the heir apparent, his Highness' s other sons, and the numeroua families of the preceding Viceroys to 560,000?. 128 EGYPT AS IT IS. —including 60,000Z. a year to Prince Halim Pasha— can- Qot be considered excessive. But nearly 880,O0OZ. for tlie Ministries of War and Marine migM be more easily re- duced, without injury or peril to any interest of the country; for, politically conditioned as Egypt now is, with absolutely nothing to fear from within or without, a standing army of 30,000 men and a navy to match, are clearly in excess of its military wants.* The reduction of the estimate for public works from 1,041,000?. in 1874, and 512,500Z. in 1875 to 205,000?. for last year, shows how purely optional had been the previous outlay m this direction ; and but that the contracts for the Soudan Railway, to which nearly the whole of this last sum is allocated, have been taken, even that amount might have been kept out of the year's Budget. As it is, barring this inevitable item, fresh expenditure on this class of works has been whoUy suspended, and for some years to come is not likely to be resumed on the old scale. The considerable item of 200,000Z. for the expenditure of the Rouznameh on yearly gifts to Mecca, the cost of the annual caravan, and other charitable outlay, vdll not readily bear reduction in a country on three-fourths of whose population the fervid national faith has stiU a powerful hold. But for the recent large addition of foreigners at high salaries to the staff of the chief Minis- tries, sensible economies might have been effected in the cost of nearly the whole by reducing the number of in ferior native employes, who swarm superabundantly both in Cairo and throughout the provincial administrations. As it is, the most that can be hoped for is that the eco- * Since tMs was written, several regiments have been virtually disbanded, nearly their whole rank and file having been sent home to their villages on unlimited furlough, and only the regimental cadres retained, [Later still, these have been recalled to service, to make up the contingent requisitioaed by the Porte.] TEE STATE DEBT. 123 nomic winnowing of tlie one class will balance the new additional expense of the other. The Ministers them- selves and the higher native functionaries are not extrav- agantly over-salaried, as in Turkey ; and in their case little or no reduction can be fairly made. The interest (198,829?.) on the Suez Canal shares, sold to the British Government, is of course a settled item till the bonds rank for dividend, in 1894, and was accordingly provided for in the increased administrative Budget fixed by the decree of November last. But one chapter of expense that weighed heavily on this side of the national account is now, it may be hoped, closed. Henceforth the Khedive may quite safely refuse payment of the blackmail to Constan- tinople, which, though officially unconfessed to, in some years notoriously exceeded the nominal tribute. It will be his own fault if he submits any longer to extortions which have now no more excuse in policy than in treaty right. This administrative first charge on the revenue may, therefore, be regarded as ample for aU its purposes ; and, except in the extreme event of another cattle mur- rain, a destructive Nile, or some similar force majeure necessitating extraordinary outlay, there is no reason to apprehend either need or disposition on the part of the Government to exceed the limit thus wholesomely im- posed. III. The Debt of Egypt has outstripped in rapidity of growth the large totals of revenue and expenditure just noticed. As settled by the decree of November last, it now roundly amounts to 80,393,000?., and yet the fii'st borrovsdng dates only from 1862,* when the commitments of Said Pasha to the Suez Canal Company, and the press- * Two small temporary loans had been previously contracted with Paris bankers, the first in August, 1860, for 28,000,000 frs., and the second in March, 1862, for 40,000,000 frs.. but neither was (quoted on the Bourse. 130 EGYPT A8 IT IS. uie of — for those halcyon days — a heavy home debt, compelled him to imitate the example of the Porte and appeal to the European money markets for a loan of 3,292,800Z, A simple statement of the terms on which this and the subsequent loans were effected will go far to explain, the recent financial straits of the Egyptian Gov- ernment. No particulars have been published of the rate at which this first operation of 1862 — a 7 per cent, stock, with a sinking fund of 1 per cent. — was taken by the contractors, Messrs. Pruhling and Goschen ; but as it was placed in two separate issues of 82J and 84J per 100, it may be assumed that commission and other charges re- duced the actual sum realised by the Treasury to a mean of not more than 80, or a net total of, roundly, 2,500,000Z., instead of 2,744,000?., the amount paid by the public. Be this as it ma.y, the proceeds of the operation met less than half the wants of the Government ; and, on the death of Said Pasha, in January, 1863, his successor found clamouring for liquidation a balance which there was no hope of discharging out of revenue. A second loan was thus necessitated, and this — for 5,704,200?., with 7 per cent, interest and 3 "87 per cent, sinking fund — was successfully issued by the same contractors towards the close of 1864, at 93 per 100, but, with commission and other deductions, only realised net 4,864,063Z. to the Government. It was hoped that the proceeds of this operation would clear off the balance of debt bequeathed by Said Pasha, and leave a considerable surplus for the public works which the new Viceroy had undertaken soon after his accession. But the expectation was falsi- fied by the cattle murrain that broke out shortly after- wards and for nearly two years ravaged the whole coun- try from the Delta to Nubia. This epidemic cost the country nearly 5,000,000?. — in loss of revenue, in im- THE LOAN OF 1868. 131 porting cattle to replace those swept away, in supply- ing agricultural macMnery, and in distributing com and other relief to the fellaheen who had suffered most from its effects. The Alexandria and Suez railway — the only one then existing in the country — had been left by the late Viceroy in a state of complete dilapidation, and to repair it, and renew the rolling stock, a special de- benture loan for 3,000,000?. was effected ia 1866— again through Messrs. Fruhling and Goschen — on the security of the railway itself. This, which was also a 7 per cent, stock, redeemable iu eight years,* was issued to the pub- lic at 92 per 100, but realised to the Government only 2,640,000?., on which the actual charges, therefore, be- came 8 per cent, for interest and 18-9 per cent, for sink- iiig fund, or an annuity ia all of 26 "9 per cent. In the meantime, the abolition of forced labour on the Suez Canal, and the modification, in other important respects, of the Said Pasha's contract with the Company, had raised a crop of differences between the latter and the Government. The Viceroy having been induced to refer these to the arbitration of the Emperor Napoleon, his Majesty awarded to the Company the enormous indem- nity of 3,360,000?., ia 12 per cent. Treasury bonds, to which was subsequently added, ia 1866, a further cash payment of 400,000?. for the re-purchase of the Wady domain, which the Company had bought some years be- fore from Said Pasha for 74,000?. To meet the mass of floatiag debt thus created, and at the same time to pro- vide ia part for the public works already begun or con- templated, the large 11,890,000?. loan of 1868 was next contracted, through Messrs. Oppenheiai and Co., in con- * This loan was actually repaid in six annual instalments of 500,000?. each, beginning on the 1st January, 1869, a rate equivalent, as above stated, to a sinking fund of 18*9 per cent. 132 EGYPT AS IT T8. cerl, witli the Imperial Ottoman Bank and the Society Generale of Paris. TMs, althongli like Said Pasha's loan of 1862, a 7 per cent, stock, redeemable in thirty years, was issued at the low price of 75 per 100, and contractors' commission and charges — which grew heavier with each new operation — being again deducted, produced to the Treasury only 7,193,334?., at a total annual cost of 13^ per cent. Nevertheless, with the amount realised, nearly the whole of the floating debt was paid off, and for a con- siderable time discount in Egypt feU to the unprecedent- edly low average of from 6 to 8 per cent. But the con- tinuing heavy outlay on harbours, railways, telegraphs, canals, and other great works, which were being carried out in a scale far beyond — not indeed the wants, but the concurrent means of the country, soon again compelled recourse to the issue of new Treasury bonds, to nearly the full extent of the expenditure thus incurred. The revenue had increased largely since the death of Said Pasha, ovsdng to the steady expansion which had taken place in nearly every branch of Egyptian industry and trade ; but the re-organisation and re-armament of the army, the construction of new coast defences, the doubling of the tribute to the Porte, and other large though officially unacknowledged payments to Stamboul, had swelled the expenditure in equal ratio, and, after payment of the charges on the foreign debt, left little or nothing for public works. The creation of a new floating debt at a greatly increased rate was the necessary result ; till in the spring of 1873, the total of these unfunded liabilities had risen to nearly 26,000,000?., on which the average interest charge was not less than 14 per cent. It was, therefore, resolved to fund the whole of this large amount ; and, with this view, a 7 per cent, loan for 32,000,000?. (nomi- nal\ designed to consolidate the whole, was negotiated NET PROCEEDS OF THE WHOLE. 183 with Messrs. Oppenheim and substantially tlie same group who had co-operated with them ia the loan of 1868. Partly owing, however, to the monetary disturb- ance occasioned by the American panic in the spring of 1873, and partly no doubt to the largeness of the opera- tion, the issue of the first half of this loan at 84J was not a success, and, although this amount had been taken "firm" by the contractors, the Khedive was induced to accept a much lower price, and the large remainder of the stock was obtained on terms which permitted its being gradually placed on the market at an average rate of about 70. This costly operation realised to the Grov- emment only 20,740,077?., of which, too, 9,000,000?. was paid, not in cash but itt long dated bonds of the floating debt, bought up by the contractors at various rates of discount (much it was said as low as 65), and delivered to the Treasury at 93 — an operation which, as Mr. Cave pointedly remarks, "materially enhanced the profit ac- cruing to the negotiators of the loan." Thus, out of five loans of a total nominal amount of 55,887,000?., the Egyptian Treasury received only about 35,000,000?. in cash or its equivalents at the current market rate ; and on this—according to a return fur- nished by the Minister of Finance — it had already repaid no less than 29,570,994?.* in interest and sinking funds up to the end of 1875, when 46,734,500?. nominal stUl re- mained to be redeemed. [Besides the national debt proper of Egypt, incurred * It seems doabtfnl from the wording of Mr. Cave's Report, from wMch tMs sum is quoted, -vyhetlier it includes ^■ o k! > S I PUBLIO mSTRTTOTION. 201 Egypt again became the home of science and philosophy, which flonrished there as, after the decline of the Bagh- dad Caliphate, they flourished nowhere else but ia the Moorish colleges of Spaia. With the fall of the Fatimites this splendid patronage ceased, and thence on through the turbulent Mamlouk dynasties that followed, and the stiU more anarchic times which succeeded the Turkish con- quest, Egyptian learning steadily declined till the savants who accompanied Bonaparte's expedition found even ia Cairo hardly a trace of even the letters or art that were rivaUing those of Cordova and Seville when Peter preached the first Crusade. The wide learning once taught at the Azhar had dwindled to lectures on the Koran and the tra- ditions of the Prophet, the study of the Arabic language, calligraphy, and elementary arithmetic, and geography ; while most of the colleges attached to the other great mosques had sunk nearly to a level with the primary schools, which tu their turn, although — thanks to their waJcfs — still numerous, had ceased to teach anytMng be- yond the recitation of the Koran. The French occupation was too short, and its main work too purely military, to leave room for any attempt at educational reform. The country was exhaustively surveyed, and many adminis- trative improvements begun, but in the matter of public instruction Menou left it in 1801 as Bonaparte had found it three years before. Nearly a quarter of a century later, however, the ambition and military necessities of Mehemet All supplied the impulse to a revival which, although discouraged by Abbas Pasha and only feebly assisted by Said, has attained proportions during the present reign that fairly entitle it to be called the intellectual renais- sanoe of Egypt. The first difficulty encountered by Mehemet All, in resolving after his successful "Wahabite campaigns to 202 EGYPT A3 IT 18. complete tte organisation of Ms army on a European basis, was the want of officers, both combatant and ad- ministrative ; and to supply tMs lie opened in 1825 a staff school at Cairo, under the direction of an intelligent young Turk, whom he had had specially trained in France with a view to this reform. This was followed by a medical school for the education of army surgeons, by special schools for military engineering, gunnery, veteri- nary medicine, languages, practical mechanics, and agri- culture, the professors in which were mostly Frenchmen or natives educated in France, and the whole of the pupils, as they became fit, were drafted into the State service. The success of these institutions encouraged an extension of the experiment, and during the next two or three years many Government primary schools were opened ia Cairo, at Alexandria, and in the chief provin- cial towns, as nurseries for the higher seminaries. Edu- cation in the whole was not merely free, but the pupils were lodged, clothed, fed, and even paid a small monthly wage at the expense of the Government. The result fully answered the expectations of the Pasha. Within little more than five years from the opening of his first school, a numerous stafE of sufficiently-trained officers enabled hiTn to complete his scheme of military reform, and in 1832 he began his rebellion against the Porte, with perhaps the best-organised Eastern army that had tiU then ever taken the field. The victories of Homs, of Bey- Ian, of Koniah, and Nezib, again, on a larger scale than in the Hedjaz, proved the immense advantage of the new over the old system of tactics and dritl ; and while the war lasted the schools which had contributed so much to these results continued to receive liberal State support. With the reduction of the army, however, after the peace of 1840-1, these military seminaries lost their raison MJEHEMET ALPS SCHOOLS. 203 cPetre, and with, it practically ceased the Viceroy's ia- terest in educational reform. The schools themselves indeed remained open, but the movement languished till, from having numbered more than 20,000 pupUs, they reckoned only 11,000 at his death. Under the reaction- ary Abbas the whole were closed, and for nearly six years public instruction in Egypt was again reduced to the elementary curriculum of the mosque colleges and primary schools. Said Pasha, more liberal, re-opened several of the special seminaries, and munificently assist- ed the foreign schools in Cairo and Alexandria, which, as we shall see, have rendered good service to Egyptian education, but he lacked the energy to prosecute the reform begun by his father ; and at his death in 1863 the medical school in Old Cairo was the only one of the Gov- ernment academies in at aU prosperous operation. Like his predecessor, too, he had done nothing whatever to improve the condition of the old Arab primary schools, which remained as the Mamlouks — ^it might be said the Saracens — had left them. In the matter of public instruction, therefore, as in much else, the present Viceroy, on his accession, found before him a wide field for reforming activity, and he soon disclosed a policy of working it, not merely in the interest of the army, but of the whole population. The military academies were reorganised on a basis of much greater efficiency than under Mehemet Ali, with the result, it may be here mentioned — as fuller description of these army schools does not properly fall within the scope of this ckapter — ^that except such as were commis- sioned during the preceding reigns, there is not now an illiterate officer in the Egyptian army, nor is even a corpo- ral promoted from the ranks without a knowledge of at least the "three Es." A brief sketch of the three sys- 204 EGYPT AS IT 18. terns of scholastic macMnery now at work in Egypt, over and above these military academies, will convey some idea of what has been done thus far for popular educa- tion. These are (1) the schools established and wholly or in part supported by the Government ; (2) the old mosque colleges and Arab primary schools ; and (3) the schools belonging to the non-Mussulman native communities and the various foreign colonies which, although not under State control, are very liberally assisted by the Khedive. The first of these groups comprises nine specially "Government Schools," the pupUs of which being fed, clothed, and lodged by the State, are for the most part, at the close of their course, drafted into one or other branch of the public service ; a School for the BUnd ; two Girls' Schools, a Normal School ; and twenty-three Municipal Schools, which supply a good primary and secondary education gratuitously to those who cannot afford to pay for it, and at a very moderate cost to those who can. The nine special schools are — the Polytechnic, the Book-keeping and Surveying, the Law and Lan- guages, two Preparatory, the Industrial, the Medical, and Pharmaceutic, the Midwifery, and a third Prepara- tory at Alexandria, the eight others being aU at Cairo. Although registered separately, the first three of these and one of the two Cairene preparatory schools are located in the same building, and are in reality rather divisions of one great establishment than distinct institu- tions. In the Polytechnic section — the most advanced of the whole, but which last year reckoned only thirty-three pupils with thirteen professors — the course of study extends over six years, and includes the higher mathemat- ics, chemistry and physics, geology, mechanics, Arabic, English or French (at the option of the student), geog- raphy, history, and drawing. The instruction given in TEB POLTTEOHNIO SCHOOL. 205 this school — which, and the next two, are grouped together in the spacious old buildiag of the Garb-el-Ga- mamls* — ^is ia all respects thorough, and the results, as shown at the yearly examinations, do real credit to its teaching staff, only one of whom, the drawing-master, is a European. The Book-keeping and Surveying school educates another class of employes, who are instructed, as its name indicates, in account-keeping, land-surveying, Arabic, French or English, writing, and drawing. It last year registered only twenty pupils, all resident, with the disproportionate staff of twelve professors, of whom the same drawing-master as in the Polytechnic was the only Prank. In the Law and Languages School the course is four years, and comprises Mohammedan and comparative European law — with now especial reference to the mixed code recently framed for the new tribunals — ^history, the Arabic, Turkish, Persian, French, and Italian languages, and Arabic and Roman writing taught by eleven profes- sors (the director and one other only being Europeans) to thirty-five students, of whom twenty were residents. Most of the native judges and subordinate ofiicers of the new Courts have been educated in this school, which must acquire increased importance as a nursery for both magistrates and pleaders, as the reforms now in course of experiment take root and prepare the way for a purely national judicature. * In the same building, whicli also lodges the Ministry of Public Instrao- tion, is the splendid Oriental library, founded in 1871 by Ali Pasha Mouba- rek, which is especiaDy rich in Uluminated and other MSS. of the Koran and its commentaries, collected mainly from the principal Cairene mosques. " Toutes les splendeurs de I'arabesque," justly says Dor Bey, " tout briHant colons des miniatures Orientales, tons les fantastiques caprices des majuscu les Arabes se sont donne rendez-vous dans ces larges in folio, qui, par le fim du travail et la beaute des couleurs, surpassent de beaucoup les magnifiquea missels ou Uvres d'heures qui font I'omement de nos bibliotheques, les dessina- teurs d'omementation y trouveraient une mine inepuisable des richesses." 206 EGYPT AS IT 18. Of more immediate, both, official and popular, value, however, is the Medical School at Kasr-el-Ain, which, founded in 1827 by Mehemet Ali, closed by Abbas Pasha in 1849, and reopened by Said in 1856, has since then, under the teaching of such celebrities as Professors Clot Bey, Reyer, Lautner, BUliarz, Griesinger, and other French and German specialists, restored Egyptian medi- ciae to the rank of a science, and replaced the Prankish quacks of the last generation by a native faculty which. has no equal ia the East. The Mohammedan prejudice against dissection has here long been got over, and the latest results of Western pathology having been freely accepted, this coUege of Kasr-el-Ain now yearly turns out physicians, surgeons, and apothecaries, many of whom would not discredit our best European schools. Its curriculum extends over five years, the first two of which are devoted to further pursuit of the general edu- cation already begun in the lower schools, and the remain- ing three to exclusively njedical studies. Last year its classes — taught by eighteen native professors, mostly educated in Europe — were attended by 195 pupUs, of whom 175 were residents, bound at the close of their course to enter the army or the civil service, and twenty independent outsiders who, though paying nothing for their instruction, are free to follow private civilian prac- tice where they will. Up till recently, a reUo of the old militarism of Mehemet All still survived in this institu- tion, in the manner in which its classes were recruited. The resident vacancies were annually filled by an arbi- trary draft of youths from the preparatory lyeees, three- fourths of whom were apportioned by lot to the medical, and the remainder to the pharmaceutical section of the school, without reference to individual taste or aptitude in any way. This method of impressment, which was THE MEDIOAL 80E00L 207 applied also more or less to the Polyteclmic and Survey- ing Schools, may have been necessary forty years ago, when Grovemment education meant only enforced prep- aration for the army, and was dreaded accordingly ; but as this is no longer so, and education is now becoming every year .more popular for its own sake, the practice operated injuriously alike upon the schools and un the branches of the public service of which they formed the nurseries. Amongst numerous other reforms, the present Minister has abolished this arbitrary method of allot- ments, and the pupUs are now permitted to choose and specially prepare for their own careers. A large and ex- cellently organised hospital in connection with this school furnishes ample means of dinical instruction to the students, and gratuitous medical treatment to all comers, irrespective of race, nationality, or religion. Attached to it also is the School of Midwifery, in which thirty young native women, also wholly maintained by the Government, are taught reading, writing, arithmetic, the elements of medical science, and obstetrics. After pass- ing through a three years' course of instruction, they are certificated and sent into the provinces, where the com- mon prejudice of Arabs and Copts shuts the door against male practitioners of this specialty. Next in importance to this flourishing medical college ranks the Industrial School at Boulak, the river port of Cairo, which though founded only in 1867, is already, as an agent of techni- cal education, rivalling the success of its mature neigh- bour of Kasr-el-Aiin. Just as the latter fitly adjoins the military and civil hospital, so this Boulak school forms part of the great establishment which groups together the Government printing-office, the cannon-foundry, and the railway workshops ; and here again the instruction given, during a course of at first three, but now of five years, is 208 EGYPT AS IT 18. most complete. Besides mathematics, chemistry, draw- ing, topography, and English or French, the pupils are taught nearly every branch of practical mechanics, but especially engineering. Last year they numbered forty- four, aU residents, with a teaching staff of six natives and three Europeans. The passed students of this school have already largely replaced foreigners as engineers and mechanical directors on the various public works and in the Government and Daira factories, in which also the working hands are now almost entirely natives. Of the two metropolitan Preparatory Schools whose pupils, after an elementary course of four years, pass to one or other of these higher institutions, that in the same building with the Polytechnic, Surveying, and Law Schools last year registered an attendance of 192 pupils, of whom 157 were residents, with a staff of thirty-four native and four European masters. The instruction here given includes rudimentary mathematics, geography, history, drawing — an accomplishment, it may be remarked, which is taught with great success in all these schools — Arabic and European writing, and the Arabic, Turkish, English, French, or German languages. The other school of this class, also in Cairo — in the old Mamlouk palace that lodged Bonaparte's short-lived Institut d'Egypte — was one of the earliest scholastic creations of Ismail Pasha, having been founded in 1864, the year after his accession, and in respect of organisation and efficiency is surpassed by no other school of its kind in Egypt. Its course, which also extends over four years, is similar to, but a degree more elementary, than, that of the school last noticed, and for the Moslem lads of its lower forms in- cludes instruction in the Koran. Its muster-roll last year showed the large attendance of 539 pupils, only sixty- nine of whom were non-resident; of its staff of thirty- GIRLff SCHOOLS. 209 four masters but two are Europeans. The tMrd of this triad of preparatory schools is at Alexandria, and also dates from 1864. In organisation and course of instruc- tion it is a close counterpart of the second, with, however, only 298 pupils (twenty-three outsiders) and a teaching staff of twenty-one, of whom only the drawing-master ia a European. These nine special schools thus collectively educate 1,386 pupils, 1,218 of whom are residents — taught by a net staff of 136 masters, allowance being made for twenty- two doing double duty. For the year this is a diminu- tion of forty-nine in the number of pupils as compared with 1874. More interesting, however, than the whole of these male seminaries, as an evidence of progress and of the lead Egypt is taking in Eastern civilisation, are the two Girls' Schools, which, though not yet three years in existence, are now admirably educating nearly 450 Mos- lem, Coptic, and other girls as, since the Hegira, women in the East have never been educated before. It is to the Princess Tshesma Haft Khanum, the third wife of the E^hedive, that the initiative of this great reform is due. Three years ago the only public schools for girls in Egypt were that conducted with exemplary self-sacrifice by Miss Whately, and another by ladies of the American mission. But these, although attended by a few Moslem children, were but as a. drop in the ocean for the great mass of the Arab population. The deeply-rooted popular prejudice against female education had, however, baffled every at- tempt of the Government to supply this primary condi- tion of social reform, tOl, in the spring of 1873, the third wife * of the Khedive lent the prestige of her sex and her * It may be here remarked that although the Khedive himself, who was reared under the social customa of tte old regime, has three wives, his sons 210 EGYPT AS IT 18. position to the effort. Under her auspices, and at her prirate cost, an old palace in one of the most populous quarters of Cairo was purchased, in great part rebuilt and adapted to the necessities of school life, with accom- modation for 200 boarders and 100 outside pupils. Even thus sponsored, however, the scheme was so far in ad- vance of public opinion that, although it appealed to the poorest classes, offering free board, lodging, dothing and education to aU who chose to come, it was with difficulty the first batch of pupUs was obtaiaed. But, the speU of prejudice once broken, the school rapidly filled with both residents and outsiders, and since then the applications have been many hundreds iu excess of the accommoda- tion. The pupUs, ranging from seven to twelve years of age, are of aU ranks, races, and creeds known to Egypt — from Pashas' daughters to slave-girls ; Arabs, Copts, Nubians, Jews, and Levantine Christians of every cross of blood. The course of instruction, which wiU spread over five years, includes reading, writing, arithmetic, drawing, geography, Turkish, French, music, the Koran (for Moslem pupUs), plain and ornamental needlework, cookery, laundry, and general housework — all thorough- ly taught by a staff of fifteen masters and mistresses, two of the latter of whom and the directress are Europeans. Periodical lottery sales are held of aU needlework beyond the personal clothing of the pupils, and the proceeds given to a dowry-fund for the poorest girls. The great success of this first effort to rescue Egyptian womanhood from the ignorance and apathy of harem-life, and so to lay the true foundations of a reaUy national education, soon led to the opening of a second school bave only one oach, and the fashion thus influeutially set is now generally followed in the upper ranks of native Cairene society. In fact, among the new generation monogamy may now he said to be the rule. 80S00L FOR THE BLIND. gij with a less extensive course, mostly with a view to do- mestic service, in another part of the capital, where, under a staflf of nine teachers, of whom the directress and one mistress are Europeans, 147 pupUs (76 boarders and 71 outsiders) were last year maintained and in- structed at the charge of the Khedive's first wife. Both these iastitutions, adequately endowed by their foun- dresses, are now under the control of the Ministry of Public Instruction, and rank amongst the most flourish- ing and important of the schools of Egypt. A third is in course of erection, and will be at work before the close of the present year, and, in compKance with numerous peti- tions, arrangements are in progress to open others in the chief provincial towns. In fact, popular prejudice has been completely overcome, and if this movement in favour of female education be continued, as there is every— reason to hope it will, in another generation the most' es- sential of Eastern reforms — the social emancipation of women — will in Egypt be an accomplished fact. The first established School for the Blind is also little more than two years old, but it last year usefuUy in- structed eighty-eight non-resident pupils in arithmetic, Arabic grammar, and the Koran, for aU of which an ex- cellent series of raised-letter text-books has been prepared and is in successful use. Similar instruction is given in a second recently-opened school of this class, in addition to which the pupils — many of them adults — are also taught mat-making, knitting, wood-turning, chair-making, and other handicraft suited to their condition.* The Normal School, which is also a recent addition to the system, is an effort of great importance to raise the level of education in the Arab primary schools, by tratn- • A second school for the blind has since been opened, and is now in vigor one operation. 212 EOTPl AS IT 18. tag a class of masters of much higher qualification than the present illiterate ^^w and moadibls. With this view, instruction was last year given in mathematics, geography, history, vn-iting, elements of physics, and the Koran to thirty-five non-residents, chiefly recruited from am-ongst the most promising students of the Azhar, who, if quali- fied at the end of a two years' course, are appointed to country schools, with a fixed salary, and the prospect of further promotion. In connection with this institution, there are also classes for actual teachers of primary schools who desire to improve themselves, and so qualify for Government pay and employment. These persons re- ceive gratuitous instruction and a pound a month tOl they either succeed or faU, during the same term, in passing the necessary examination. Of the twenty-three municipal Civil Schools which com- plete the roU of the purely Goverimient institutions, perhaps the most important, though not the largest, is that founded three years ago by Prince Tewfik Pasha, the heir-apparent, on his estate at Kobbah near Cairo, where, in addition to a very complete course of secondary instruction, practical farming is taught to ninety pupils, fifty of whom are boarders and the remainder gratis out- siders. This institution, Kke the two girls' schools, is whoUy supported by its founder, and so costs the educa- tion budget nothing. Besides it, there are sixteen other schools of this class, in or near Cairo, which receive no boarders, but, as before remarked, provide free instruc- tion for those who cannot afford to pay for it, and levy only a trifling charge for those who can. These last year collectively registered 1,683 pupils. In Upper Egypt, three similar schools have been established in the tovras of Beni-souef, Minieh, and Assiout, which together edu- cated 631 pupUs ; but of these 502 were residents, fed TBE AZHAH 313 and clotlied at State cost. A fotirth ia in succeosful work at Benha, in Lower Egypt, 233, all residents ; and finally two in Alexandria (of whicli one was founded and en- dowed by Rattib Pasha) complete the tale with respec- tively 139 and 129 externes. Daring the past year this list of Government institutions has been increased by the establishment of three indus- trial schools, in which the least promising pupils of the primary schools are taught trades, instead of, as was for- merly the custom, being drafted into the army. In these the instruction is free, and half the proceeds of the work done — less a deduction of five per cent, for pocket-money — is applied towards forming a fund to prande the papUs with free kits of tools and other aid to a start in life at the end of their five years' course. Next in official order after these Government semi- naries come the mosque colleges and Arab primary schools, which are mostly supported by their own en- dowments {waJcfs\ and, with few exceptions, are inde- pendent of State control. At the head of this second category stands the great college of El-Azhar ("the splendid"), the oldest mosque in Cairo proper, and which has long been famous as the chief university of Islam. Last year this great centre of Moslem learning registered 11,095 students, attracted from all parts of the Bast, and representing in unequal proportions the four rites or sects into which Soonee orthodoxy is divided,* lectured by no fewer than 325 sheikhs or professors. Each "nation" has its separate riwacTc, or cloister, with * The Hanafeeites, the Shafeeites, the Malekites, and Hambalites, called after the four great doctors of Soonee theology. The first of these includes nearly all Turkey and the remoter East, the second most of Egypt and Syria, the third North-western Africa and Morocco, and the fourth (which sent only twenty-three pupils last year to the Azhar), the Wahaheef of Central Arabia, and a few fanatical sectaries of Bagdad and Nablous. 214: EGYPT AS IT 18. its library and. staff of teachers proportioned to tlie num- ber of its moogawareen. The present chief sheikh, or head of the mosqne, belongs to the Hanafee rite, and haa at all times been an important personage in the official hierarchy of Egypt. The present occupant of the post ia Sheikh-ul-Islam for all the dominion of the Khedive. As might be expected, the instruction here given is much less liberal and modern than the curriculum of the upper Government schools. It is in fact, as before remarked, limited to the mental gymnastics of Arabic grammar, logic, rhetoric, Koranic law and theology, and to such a smattering of pre-Copernican astronomy and mathe- matics as is requisite for an almanac-maker, or the time- keeper of a mosque, with a view to precision in the hours for prayer ; for it is still both " science" and doc- trine at the Azhar that the earth is flat, that the sun moves' round it, and that the sky consists of seven super- imposed canopies. At the Government schools reason and knowledge ridicule this old-world dogma, but here in the mosque faith clings to it still. Before the sec- ularisation of the mosque lands by Mehemet Ali, the A^har enjoyed large endowments, but these are now re- duced to the rents of some adjoining houses, which merely suffice to furnish rations of bread and beans to a majority of the students, who, however, further receive from the Government distributions of clothes and provisions dur- ing Ramadan and on the occasion of the other great reli- gious festivals. The instruction is of course free, as the professors are unpaid, and maintain themselves by private tuition, copying the Koran, and other clerical work. Up till 1872 these sheikhs were, in a manner, self -elected ; but in that year the Government interposed with an order that for the future they should be ad- mitted to teach only after passing an examination in ARAB PSIM-AST SCBDOLS. 215 tteir respective subjects, and should be classified in three grades, promotion from the lower to the higher of which should also depend on a similar test of qualification. The result has already been a marked improvement in the quality of the instruction given ; but even yet, for aU modem and practical purposes of education, this great coUege is centuries behind the secular State schools. The other principal medressehs are those attached to the mosque of Ahmadi at Tanta, and to that of Ibrahim Pasha at Alexandria, the former of which was last year attended by 3,827 students, with thirty-six professors, while the latter registered respectively 413 and sixty-five. The instruction given in these seminaries is similar to, though more limited than, that provided at the Azhar, and, like the latter, both are supported mainly by their own endowments. ^ Comparatively wide, however, as are the scope and influence of the institutions thus briefly noticed, the true measure of instruction among the great body of the fellaheen is supplied rather by the TcouttaMs^* or Arab primary schools, most of which date back from the early years of Moslem rule in Egypt, and rank, educa- tionally, below the Irish hedge-schools a quarter of a century ago. As every village possesses one or more of these elementary nurseries of learning, the total num- ber of them throughout the country probably exceeds 5,000, the whole of which were, up to three years ago, entirely free from Government control or inspection in any way. Last year, however, a sort of educational census was taken, which, though confessedly imperfect, registered an aggregate of 4,685 Jcouttdbis, attended by 111,803 pupils. Of these, Cairo returned 265, with 8,875 scholars, and Alexandria respectively 137 and 3,114 ; the * Properly makatibl) in tlie plural. 216 EQTPT AS IT T8. remaining 4,283 and 99,814 being scattered tlironghout tlie other fourteen provinces. About lialf these primary schools have, or originally had, small endowments ; but between these and the others which depend whoUy on the voluntary contributions of the pupils — averaging a piastre a week each for those who pay anything at all — there is little or no difference in either the method or quality of the instruction given. The chief aim and limit of the whole are to teach the reading and learning by heart of the Koran, supplemented or not by writing and the most elementary arithmetic, beyond which modest range the scholarship of the fiki (teachers, plural properly /bg'Ma^) seldom or never extends. Many of them, indeed, are not merely illiterate, but blind to boot, and depend on their great powers of memory and the adroitly used help of an arif, or monitor, for at aU decently acting their part. Their emoluments however are, as a rule, on a par with their qualification, averaging ' commonly not more than an Egyptian pound (205. Qd.) a month.* In the case of schools with endowments, this modest wage is supplemented during the month of Ramadan with gifts of a tarboosh, a piece of white cotton for a turban, and another of blue stuff for the usual long blouse, from the funds of the toaJcf ; to which the wealthier parents add gratuities of a few piastres as Boon as their children can read or have learned by heart one or more of the 114 chapters of the Koran. As the office of schoolmaster, too, of whatever grade, is looked upon as semi-clerical, the JiM further adds to his earnings by reciting the sacred book at funerals, mar- * The maximum salaries of the teachers in the secondary schools vmdej Government control are 750 piastres (about ^l. 14«.), and the minimum 300 jiastres (3? 1«.) a month.. ARAB PRIMA BY 80E00LS. 211 riages and circumcisions, where lie is always a welcome, and generally a remunerated guest. Within the past couple of years, most of these primary schools have been induced to submit themselves to the Ministry of Public Instruction, to the extent of accepting periodical inspec- tion, and in many instances a higher class of teachers furnished from the Normal School. But a few still con- servatively resist State interference, and remain at the low ebb they sunk to after the Turkish conquest. Still, rude and limited as is the instruction provided by even the worst of these Tcouttdbbs, they educate the great mass of the fellaheen up to a level which, low though it be, is much above that reached by the Mussulman peasantry in Turkey proper, amongst whom ability to spell out the Koran and scribble the simplest meMoub is a very rare accomplishment indeed. Any very consider- able improvement of these primary village schools must, however, of necessity be a work of years, as their very number and the cost of a higher class of teachers pre- clude rapid reform. But the policy of Riaz Pasha, the present Minister of Public Instruction, is to gradually bring the whole under State control, and by a better administration of their endowments, to increase the pay of the filci, and so attract higher qualification, without either unduly swelling the education budget, or sensibly adding to "local rates." Much may, no doubt, be done in this way ; but even Pharaoh can no longer make bricks without straw ; and progress in public instruction, like the extension of railways or canals, must be regulated, not by what there is room for, but by what the country can afford. At present, without reckoning the military and naval academies (which are charged to their respec- tive ministries), or the liberal donations made by the Khedive from his privy purse to the non-Moslem and 218 EGYPT A8 IT m foreign schools, and exclusive, of course, also of the wa/c/s by which most of the mosque colleges and primary village schools are whoUy or in part supported, its edu- cation budget costs the Egyptian Crovemment above 40,000^. a year,* to which the Khedive adds 12,500Z. a year, the rent of the Wady estate ; against less than 50,000Z. a year, similarly spent by the Porte on a popula- tion nearly seven times as large. True it is that much of this amount is absorbed by the board and clothing of pauper pupils, and so does not represent outlay on pure teaching ; but without such bribe of free living, few or none of those who benefit by it could be lured to educa- tion at aU. It remains to notice the native non-Moslem schools and those belonging to the foreign colonies, which form nearly as important an element in the educational resources of Egypt as either of the groups thus briefly sketched. Of the former, the Copts have in all twelve in Cairo, one in Old Cairo, one in Grhizeh, and two in Alexandria. Of these, the most important is the college attached to the Patriarchate, which last year registered 379 pupils — forty boarders and 339 extems — of whom 302 were Copts, six- teen Moslems, one a Jew, eight Armenians, five Greeks, four Greek Catholics, two Armenian Catholics, and one a Syrian, to whom thirteen masters taught Arabic, Coptic, English, French, geography, vmting, and singing. A theological school at the same time trained twelve non- resident candidates for the priesthood, teaching them divinity, Coptic, Arabic, and church chanting. A third seminary, the college of Hart-Saqqaiin, was attended by seventy-four non-residents, of whom seventy-one were Copts, two Moslems, and one an Armenian Catholic, who * In 1863, the last veai of SaJd Pasha's administration, the amount thm applied was only 3,750^ . GOPTIO SCHOOLS. 219 were instructed in Arabic, Coptic, English, French, writ- ing, and arithmetic. In the same quarter is also a girls' school, in which 45 pupils, all Copts, were taught Arabic and needlework ; and near the Esbekieh is another, where 80 girls received similar instruction. The remaining seven schools m the capital, as also those in Old Cairo, Ghizeh, and Alexandria, are primary schools attended only by Copts, and last year mustered altogether 244 pupils, who learned Arabic, Coptic, writing, and elementary arith- metic. The total cost of these Coptic schools was last year 201,518 piastres, towards which the Khedive contrib- uted 109,688 piastres, being the rent of 1,500 feddans of land given by his Highness as an endowment: of the remainder, 20,000 piastres was derived from house prop- erty belonging to the schools, and the balance from the Patriarchate, which controls the whole. The Catholic Copts have besides several primary and secondary schools, chiefly in Upper Egypt, at Assiout, Takhta, Akhmia, Ghirgeh, Kenneh, and Nagadeh, in which last year nearly 300 children received instruction. Besides several primary schools in Cairo and j^Jexan- dria, the Jews maiutaiu in both cities a large free school for children of their own community. In the metropoli- tan seminary 175 boys and the same number of girls were last year taught Hebrew, Arabic, French, Italian, writing, and arithmetic ; and in that in Alexandria similar instruc- tion was given to 127 boys and 145 girls, of whom seventy of each sex were native Egyptians, and the remainder Israelites of other nationalities. There is also another Jewish boys' school in Alexandria, in which a tithe of the fifty-five pupUs are free, and the rest charged a small weekly fee. But these institutions furnish no complete measure of the state of education amongst the Jews of Egypt, as both boys and girls of this community largely 220 EGYPT AS n 18 frequent tlie numerous foreign scliools in operation throughout the country, to such an extent, indeed, that an illiterate Egyptian Jew is now rarely met with. The rayah Greeks support two free schools for boys and girls at Cairo, in which respectively 140 of the former are taught Grreek, French, Arabic, arithmetic, mathemat- ics, geography, and history ; and 120 of the latter learn Greek, French, history, geography, arithmetic, needle- work, and music. In Alexandria, where this community is more numerous, it similarly educates, in two separate schools, 430 boys and 222 girls, of whom, as in Cairo, a considerable number belong to other rites. Indeed, the liberality with which nearly all schools in Egypt are thrown open to aU comers, without regard to race, creed, or nationality, is one of the most gratifying features in connection with public instmction in the country. The Armenians, though availing themselves readily of both the native and foreign schools, maintain only one free seminary for thirty boys of their own community, at Cairo, in which the course of instruction is limited to Arabic, Armenian, French, and arithmetic. The Syrian Maronites have prifnary schools in Cairo, and the Greek Catholics of the same "nation " another ia Alexandria ; but the whole contribute little or nothing to the educational progress of the country, and caU there- fore for only passing mention. Between these native so to speak denomiaational schools and the large contingent conducted by foreign missionary and other agency may be ranked the two fine "Free, Gratuitous, and Universal Schools," founded in Alexan- dria and Cairo respectively in 1868 and 1873. under the patronage and with the very liberal support of Mehemet Tewfik Pasha, the heir-apparent. As their programme states, these institutions are "exclusively scientific and VBBE SOnoOLtf. 221 professional, and teach no religious dogma whatever, so that men and children of aU creeds may come and learn what is needful for their aims in life. Their work belongs to humanity, and they cannot in any case become the in- struments of a system or creed, since they recognise only liberty of thought, and morality dissociated from every preconceived idea." So broad a basis, coupled with gra- tuitous instruction, speedily attracted a heterogeneous crowd of pupUs to both schools, the 486 who were regis- tered in Cairo last year including 262 Egyptians of every native race and creed, fifteen English, sixty-two French, seventy-three Italians, twenty-six Greeks, twenty-one Austrians, five Prussians, three Turks, three Russians, three Spaniards, and thirteen of undetermined nationality ; while the 256 on the books of the Alexandria school were equally diverse. The course of instruction in both insti- tutions is nearly identical, including Arabic, English, French, Italian, elementary mathematics, history, and writing. In connection with both are night-schools for adults, which are also largely attended by Arabs, Copts, Jews, Levantines, and Europeans of almost every nation- ality : the waifs-and-strays of Babeldom who have no time for school-work by day, but who take industriously to it six evenings a week under the attractions here of- fered. The Khedive is also a generous supporter of these schools, which depend on voluntary contributions for the balance of their expenditure. The most important foreign day-school in Egypt is ..ne Italian College at Alexandria, founded during the reign of Said Pasha, who aided it with a grant of 2,4007, to which the present Khedive subsequently added the gift of a large and valuable piece of ground, the sale of a pari of which covered the whole cost of erecting the coUege building. This institution ranks as a "national college," 222 EGYPT AS IT 13. and as such receives a subvention of 1,200?. a year from tlie Italian Government. The course of instruction in- cludes Italian, Arabic, English (if desired), French, math- ematics, book-keeping, natural philosophy, history, geog- raphy, writing, and drawing. A majority of its pupils are Jews, and about twenty of the remainder Moslems. Of the foreign missionary schools, which play so im- portant a part in public instruction ia Egypt, the oldest are those conducted by the Sisters of St. Vincent de Paul and the Lazarist Fathers, whom Mehemet AU encouraged to establish themselves in Cairo in 1844, by a grant of val- uable house-property as an endowment. The Brothers of the Christian Doctrine soon followed, and during the next ten years the success of these pioneers and the liber- ality of the Viceroys attracted further reinforcements of Franciscans, Sisters of the Good Shepherd, and other educational propagandists of Rome, who, it must be gratefully admitted, have contributed much to the spread of popular instruction in the country. Most of their schools are free, and, although the " national' religion " of the whole is Roman Catholic, proselytism is subordi- nated to sound secular teaching, and the result has been a deserved success both in Alexandria and Cairo, to which their labours have been chiefly confined. Independent- ly of private schools, these Catholic missionary seminaries last year registered 3,132 pupUs, as diverse in race, creed, and nationality as those in attendance at any of the schools already noticed. The schools of the American Board of Missions rank next in importance, and similarly owe their success in great measure to the liberal protection of the Khedive. The first of these was opened in Cairo in 1855, in a build- ing granted by Said Pasha, and within the next ten years others followed at Alexandria, Medinet-el-Fayoum, Assi- AMEBI0A2H AND BRITISH BOSOOLS. 223 out, Kous, and Mansourah. These liave since been sup- plemented by thirteen others in the chief towns and villages of Middle and Upper Egypt ; until last year no fewer than twenty-eight schools, with an aggregate of 1,244 pupils, were in active operation under agents of the Board. Their chief centres of work are at Cairo, Alex- andria, and Assiout. In the first of these they have a boys' "college," two girls', and one mixed school; in the second, one boys' and one girls' school ; and in the third, one boys' and one girls' school, a "college" for advanced male pupils, a theological seminary for native Protestant candidates for the ministry, and a training- school for female teachers. Nearly the whole of these are free, the cost of their maintenance being borne by the Board, aided by grants from the privy purse of the Khe- dive. Last year, the site of the old building occupied by the coUege at Cairo being required for one of the civil improvements, his Highness gave instead of it a valuable plot of ground in one of the best parts of the Esbekieh, with a donation of 1,0001. for the erection of a new and improved tenement, which will suitably lodge not merely the 150 or more pupUs, but the whole teaching staff of missionaries and their families. Although these Ameri- can schools throw open their doors to pupils of all races and faiths, their chief clientele are Copts, amongst whom Messrs. Ewing, Lansing, Harvey, Hogg, and the other principal agents of the Boston Board, have won deser vedly great influence. Comparable with the best of these American semina ries is the "British Mission School," founded in 1862, and since then personally conducted in Cairo by Miss Whately, the daughter of the late Archbishop of Dublin, who has devoted her life and fortune to the promotion of instruction amongst the fellaheen, with an energy and 224 EGYPT AS IT m liberality wMch have already made lier school one of the chief educational forces of Egypt. Last year it gratui- tously tanght Arabic, English, French, geography, his- tory, and writing (and to the girls needlework), to 150 male and 158 female pupils, chiefly peasants, but also in- cluding not a few of middle class and higher rank, whom the excellent repute of the school attracted to its classes. This institution is also much indebted to the generosity of the Khedive, who made a free grant of its site ; but it mainly depends on the private fortune of its foundress, and the contributions of English travellers visiting Cairo. A couple of Scottish mission schools in Alexandria com- plete the list of the more important of these foreign aux- iliaries of public instruction in Egypt. Last year these two institutions, which are also free to the poor, were respectively attended by ninety-five boys and ninety -two girls, of all races and creeds, who, besides needlework for the girls, are taught Arabic, English, French, Italian, writing, arithmetic, and history. Such, then, is the educational machinery now at work in the dominion of the Khedive. The official inspection of last year, which was confessedly incomplete as regard- ed the village schools, and omitted also many private ones conducted by foreigners in the large towns, returned a total of 4,817 schools of aU classes, with an aggregate ol 140,977 pupUs in regular attendance. This showed an increase of 1,072 schools and 27,722 pupUs on the figures of the preceding year, but the augmentation is no doubt to be explained as much by the greater completeness of this last return as by the actual growth in the number of schools during the twelvemonth. " On the other hand," says the official report, "the inspection of more than one province having been made, either while the harvest was being gathered in, or at the time of high OOMPARISON WITH EUROPE. 225 Nile, when nearly the whole population was out in the fields or on the river-banks, the recorded figures often imperfectly represent the average attendance of the year. Such as they are, however, the results now submitted prove a rapid increase, which shows how fructuous and persistent have been the efforts made by his Highness for the spread of public instruction in the country." Relatively to Europe, the educational level attained by Egypt is not, of course, a high one ; but it is stiU respectable. Thus, while Prussia and Switzerland regis- ter 15, France 13, England 13, Austria 9, Ireland 8, Greece 5, Portugal 2^, and Russia 2 per cent, of their populations as receiving primary instruction, Egypt shows 2i per cent, of her motley miUions as under regular school teaching of some kind, or, in fact, more than 4 per cent, of her whole male population, seeing how few of her 140,000 odd pupUs as yet belong to the other sex. Such figures form a potent factor in Egyptian progress, and in view of their steady growth from the first year of the present reign, are fuU of hope for the future, not merely of the country itself, but — from its relation as the natural watershed, so to speak, of civilisation to the whole continent — of Africa at large. Nor could the conduct of this great humanising work weU be in better hands than it is at present. Riaz Pasha, the Minister of Public In- struction, like most of the other members of the present cabinet, was educated in Europe, and is a man of wide and liberal culture ; while, as remarked in a previous chapter, his inspector-general. Dor Bey, is a specialist of altogether exceptional qualification and devotion to his work.* * Since this was written, Mr. Rogers, formerly H.M.'s Consul at Cairo, and lately the Agent of the Egyptian Government in London, haa (on the abo- lition of the Agency) been re-appoiated Administrative Director of Public In- Btraction, a post which he had held for some time, with much usefulness, before his appointment to London. CHAPTER XI. PUBLIC W0BK8. The Great Aggregate of these — Railways — Principal Lines of the System— Nearly all Constructed during the Present Keign — Their Average Cost — Low Working Cost — ^Former Abusive Management — The New Administra- tion — The Soudan Line — Canals — Their Two Classes — How they Control and Blstriljuto the Irrigation — Great Additions made to the System daring the Present Reign — The Barrage — Its Proposed Completion — Ha/rbowr Works— Ai Alexandria — At Suez — Lighthouses — Details of the Present Service — Its Efficiency — Telegraphs — Existing Lines — External Communl- cation — Bridges — Kaar-en-Nil — GMzeh — Others Built during Present Reign. The pubKc works of Egypt are so numerous and im- portant that a mere catalogue of those constructed dur- ing the present reign would go far to account for the recent great development of both its trade and its debt. The correlation, indeed, of these three chief factors in the situation has been so close that it is not easy to say which among them has been cause and which effect ; for while railways and canals rartk for the most part first in order of time, the rapidly reacting growth of trade has forced on the extension of both at a rate which, in its turn, would have been impossible but for the borrowed capital represented by the debt. That some — not to say much — of this last has been wastefully expended, is not to be denied ; but the aggregate of railways, irrigating canals, docks, harbours, lighthouses, and telegraphs — nearly the whole of which are already reproductive— still exceeds in value the entire net proceeds of the Egyptian foreign loans. The Suez Canal, usury to loan-mongers, 22fi RAILWAYS. 227 improvident administration, and blackmail to Constan- tinople, quite sufficiently explain the large surplus of the present public debt. A brief sketch of the more impor- tant of these substantial state assets will illustrate, per- haps better than anything that has yet been said, the ma- terial progress made by Egypt within the past score of years. At the head of the Hst, in respect both of cost and immediate revenue value, stand above 1,100 miles of EAILWATS. These are divided into two categories — the seaward, or those running north of Cairo, and the southern / but, ex- cept only the short line of 15 miles from the capital to the sanitarium of Helwan, the whole are now under the Euro- pean administration, of which General Marriott was last~^ year appointed chief, with Ismail Pasha (educated in England) as assistant director. Subjoined are the prin- cipal lines of the present working system. MUea Prom Alexandria to Cairo (double) 131 " Tel-el-Barrlid (on the Alexandria-Cairo line, 54 miles from the former) by the left bank of the Mle to Boulak-el-Dakrour, opposite Cairo ... ... 74 '* Boulouk-el-DakroTir to Assiout, the Upper Egypt line 328 " Benha (on the main line, 39 miles from Cairo) to Zag- azig, Ismailia, and Suez (double as far as Zagazig) 129J " Assouan to Philse ... ... ... ... ... 5 " Alexandria to Rosetta ... ... ... ... 43 Branches from Tanta (54 miles from Cairo on the mainline) — 1. To Dessouk, on the Damietta branch ... 4a 2. To Zifteh do. do. ... 34 , 3, To Damietta (double as far as Mohallet-Roh) 86 4 To Chibin-el-K6ur 19 ' ' Prom Cftliob (below Cairo) to the Barrage ... 7i 228 EGYPT AS IT 18. MUea From Zagazig to Mansonrah 47 " Benha to Mitbereh 8 " Wasta to the Fayoum 41 " Aboo-Kebir to Salieh 22 Inclii ling the duplications between Alexandria and Cairo, Benha and Zagazig, and Tanta and MoliaUet-Roli, tlie mileage tlins represented amounts to a total of 1,086 miles, to wMch have to be added the Hne of 15 miles to HelwS,n, and about 25 mUes in and around Cairo which are used only for Government purposes, raising the whole to about 1,136 mUes, exclusive of 90 miles of sidings at the various stations. The first line of the system dates from 1852, when Abbas Pasha commissioned Mr. Robert Stephenson to construct a single railway from Alexandria to the capital, in the interest of the then rapidly developing overland traffic* This line was subsequently doubled, and the floating ferry across the Rosetta branch of the NUe at Kafr-es-Zyat (65 miles from Alexandria), where Achmet Pasha, then heir to the throne, was accidentally drowned in 1856 by the train running into the river whUe the ferry was not in its place, was replaced by a splendid iron bridge of twelve spans, resting on hoUow piles, at a cost of 400,000?. Five years later the communication between the two seas was completed by the construction of the * Long previously, in 1834, Mehemet All had surveys and sections of the desert line from Cairo to Suez made by Mr. T. Galloway, and plant for it ■was even ordered from England ; but French influence was exerted to pre- vent the carrying out of the scheme, which was consequently for the time abandoned. Four years later, however, a short steam tramway — the pioneer railway of Egypt — was constructed for his Highness at Alexandria by Mr. K. H. Galloway, who, with his brothers, erected nearly all the pumping and other machinery set up for the Pasha during these early years of the Egyptiaji renaigsance. The same firm also supplied most of the furthai machinery erected during the two following reigns. inZEAGE COST. 229 direct desert line of 90 miles from Cairo to Suez. At the accession of tlie present Khedive these two lines and a branch of 24 miles from Benha to Zagazig formed the whole railway system of Egypt. The importance of largely increasing it was promptly felt by his Highness, and railway extension advanced at a rate which in a few years spread an iron network over most of the Delta, snppUed an alternative route (on the left bank of the river) between Cairo and Alexandria, and invaded Upper Egypt and the Fayoum. In 1870 the disadvantages of the old desert line between the capital and Suez — over which water had to' be carried daUy to feed the locomo- tives, and which developed nothing along its track — led to its abandonment, and the adoption of a new and longer route, by the extension of the Benha-Zagazig branch for 98 miles along the fresh-water canal to Ismailia, and thence nearly due south by the side of the same channel, and the maritime Canal to Suez. Of the 245 miles there- fore iu operation at the death of Said Pasha, only 165 form part of the existing network : in other words, in- cluding the duplications, the present reign is to be cred- ited with 971 of the whole 1,126 miles which now reticu- late the country.* As the earthworks on nearly the whole of these lines have been constructed by corvee labour, it is estimated that their capital cost, including a first supply of rolling stock, averaged about 11,000Z. a mile. But as this again was aU borrowed money obtained at certainly not less than 12 per cent, interest, the ultimate cost of the system came fully up to the average of European railways, and * Besides these State railways, there is a short line of five miles between Alexandria ai.d its Bubnrb of Ramleh, constructed first as a horse tramway, but subsequently worked by locomotives, and owned by a small private (chiefly English) company. 230 EQTPT A8 IT M their revenue returns must in fairness be also estimated accordingly. On the other hand, tho moderate rate of speed at which all the trains are driven — except the one daily express between Alexandria and Cairo, and the mail trains between Suez and Alexandria — and the cheap- ness of native labour, which is now employed in nearly all branches of the service, enable the working expenses to be kept much below the European average, the respec- tive proportions being about 46 to 63 per cent, of the receipts. The highly-waged English and French enguie- drivers and mechanics having been nearly aU replaced by well-trained Egyptians, fuel and the rolling stock are now almost the only costly working items ; but, as against these, the tarifiE for both passengers and (especially) goods carriage is much higher than in Europe. Some modification has recently been made in this last ; but the policy of any considerable reduction is questionable, as water-carriage, though cheaper and still considerable in some districts, nowhere effectively competes with railway transport. A re-adjustment of many of the existing traffic charges might be made with advantage to both the public and the department, as the incidence of not a few of them is anomalous and inequitable ; but, collectively regarded, neither trade nor industry is unduly weighted by the present average tariffs. Until the recent transfer of the administration to European hands, it was notorious ihat great frauds were systematically practised on the service, with the connivance of underpaid or dishonest officials; but it may be expected that these vrill now cease ; and, if so, the gaia to revenue from this source alone will teU appreciably on the year's receipts.* * As an illustration of only one of the many abuses hitherto in costly operation. It maybe mentioned that since the appointment of Qeneial Mar riott to the management of the service an English firm of high standing re» TEE SOUDAN LINE. 231 But great as lias been tMs extension of railways in Egypt proper within the past twenty years, it pales be- fore a grandiose scheme conceived by the Khedive, soon after his accession, for the peaceful conquest and develop- ment of the vast but hitherto profitless provinces on the Upper NUe, by means of the same agency, employed on a stOl larger scale. The steam communication between Alexandria and Su8z had shortened the overland Indian voyage by several days, but his Highness projected a yet farther reduction of it by continuing the iron road from Cairo up through the Soudan to Shendy, the con- verging points for the camel routes from Khartoum and the White NUe, and thence vid Kassala to Massowah, which would save fully three days' time, and nearly the whole Eed Sea voyage. In 1865 a preliminary study was made of the country between Assouan and Khartoum ; but, although the report on this was favourable to the proposed scheme, nothing further was done till 1871, when a fresh and detailed survey was executed under the direction of Mr. Fowler, his Highness' s chief consulting engineer. In the result, the dimensions of the project were reduced to Wady-Half a, at the bottom of the Second Cataract — ^below which the Nile is navigable by steamers down to the First Cataract, and thence again to Cairo — being selected as its northern, and Metemmeh, opposite Shendy, as its southern terminus, the distance between these two points as surveyed being only 550 miles, and that from Shendy to Massowah about 500 more. The work was accordingly begun at Wady-Halfa, on the right bank of the river, in 1873; but financial considerations cently ofEered to supply similar or even better coal than that hitherto used at 60,000i. a year less than the previous contract price. This particular offer was not accepted, but the supply has since been contracted for by tender at rates much below those formerly paid, and with adequate guarantees that the qiianfities paid for shall be delivered. 232 EGTTT AS IT IS. have delayed its progress and compelled a modification of the line, which, as now finally projected, will run for 160 miles, partly through a wild and rocky desert, in which engineering difficulties unknown in Egypt proper have to be overcome, till it regains the Nile at Koh6, where an iron bridge, consisting of one central span of 80 metres, two of 30 m., and 26 other openings of 18 m. each, will carry it across to the left bank, which it will then skirt for 50 mUes further on to Hannek. Here the river will be again utilised up past Ordeh, the capital of Lower Nubia, to Aboo-Goosi, at which much of the caravan traffic from Kordofan and Darfour converges. At this point the iron road will be resumed, and run for a further distance of about 200 miles across the great plain or desert of Bahiuda — not to Shendy, as originally proposed, but to Khartoum, the proper capital of the Soudan, where it will for the present terminate, the proposed extension to Massowah having perforce been abandoned. The original intention of constructing the line within three years has also been necessarily modified, and its progress will now depend on the development of the local revenue, by which the cost of the work is to be defrayed ; for the Soudan itself is to bear the whole of this, without any part of it being thrown upon Egypt proper. Mr. Fowler's original estimate for the whole line from Wady-Halfa to Shendy was 4,000,000^. — or about 7,250Z. a mile for a narrow-guage road of 3 ft. 6 in., with light rails weighing 50 lbs. a yard, and the requisite roUing stock — of which 2,500,000?. was appor- tioned to the European part of the work and materials, and the remainder to native labour, and such wood and stone as the country traversed could supply. The elimi- nation of the section between Hannek and Aboo-Goosl will of course reduce this estimate, but not pro tanto, as the selection of this latter, instead of Ambakol, as the CANALS. 233 point at which the line will strike out from the river to cross the desert of Bahiuda, and of Khartoum instead of Shendy as its southern terminus, will add nearly 40 miles to its length in this direction. About 50 nules of the earthworks, and 40 of the permanent way, are already made south of Wady-Halfa, and by the time the Upper Egypt line has been completed from its present terminus at Assiout to Assouan — where a short steam tramway already turns the First Cataract to PhUse — Hannek will probably have been reached, and steam communication thus established by raU and river between Alexandria and the heart of the Soudan. Beyond Khartoum the country has also been surveyed by Mr. Fowler's staff, for a still remoter line to Darf our ; but this is as yet in futuro, and need not therefore at present engage remark. CANALS. Egyptian agriculture being whoUy dependent on artifi- cial irrigation, the system of canals by which the yearly overflow of the Nile is caught, stored, and distributed, has at aU tunes ranked foremost among the iudustrial public works of the country. From the Pharaohs to the Khedive its maintenance in thorough repair has always been the special and anxious care of the Government, since on this, next after the inundation itself, hangs the success or failure of the year's crops, on which in turn depends more than half the year's revenue. Here agaia, the energy of the present nUer has been conspicuous '.n improving and extending the network as Mehemet AU left it* — ^for few or no additions were made to it by either Abbas or Said — with the result that the whole now *Mr. Fowler estimates that the extension of the irrigation canals alone during the present reign has involved the excavation of 65 per cent, more materiel thaji the whole of the Suez Canal. 234 EGYPT AS IT IS. lineally measures more tlian 8,400 miles, with a water sur- face of nearly 100,000 square acres. The system com- prises two classes of channels, the larger of which (called s'efl, or summer, canals) are used for both navigation and irrigation, while the smaller ones (called nil% or high Nile, canals) serve the latter purpose only. Until the introduc- tion of railways nearly the whole transport of the middle and lower provinces was done by water, and even now the greater cheapness of the old method still secures for it a considerable share iu the carriage of native produce to the coast and the chief inland markets. But with two or three exceptions the primary object of the whole 870 odd canals which now reticulate the country is to receive and distribute the precious fluid on which everything depends. Distinguishing the two classes, we find in all 113 naviga- ble canals, 62 of which run through Upper and Middle Egypt, and 51 through the lower provinces. Of the for- mer, the Bahr-Yousuf generally, but inaccurately, gives its name to the long chain of channels that winds down for about 350 miles on the western side of the Nile, nearly midway between the river and the Libyan hills, from Far- shoot to a few miles above Cairo. The first action of this great watercourse is, however, more properly called the Moie-t-Soohag, from the provincial capital of Girgeh, whence it takes its name, and past which it runs in a channel nearly forty mUes long by more than 300 feet wide, watering the country as far down as the southern districts of Assiout. It is the only canal in Upper Egypt whose annual opening about the middle of August, to admit the swollen Nile, is the occasion of an officio-reli- gious ceremony similar to that which takes place at the cutting of the Khaleeg at Cairo in the same month. The Bahr-Tousui proper (Joseph's river) taps the NUe above MeUawee, and runs for more than_150 miles, with a width THE BAEB-TOUSUF AND IBBAHIMIEn. 235 similar to that of tlie SoohagMeli, tlirougli the provinces of Assiout, Minieh, and Benisouef, and then, tnming westwards through the opening in the Libyan range be- hind the latter town, enters the valley of the Fayonm, which it abundantly waters through a great network of branches, one of which empties into the Birket-el-Kom, and another, re-issuing from the valley, joins the Nile again above Rigga. Popxdar tradition ascribes the con- struction of this great channel to the patriarch whose name it bears, but some geographers regard it as an old branch of the NUe, which, after watering the Fayoum, ran on into the Bahr-bela-ma already mentioned, and so into the Mediterranean westwards of Alexandria. It is only navigable throughout its whole course during the inun- dation, being nearly dry in several parts during the rest of the year. The Ibrahimieh, which is a work of the present Khedive, and the next greatest channel on the western side of the river, begins near the town of Assiout, and with a width of about 200 feet for one-third of its course and of fifty for the remainder, runs nearly parallel with the Bahr-Tousuf, for more than ninety mUes, further watering, with many branches, Assiout, Minieh, and the wide extent of fertile land which the sweep of the river to the Arabian hills, below Behnesa, leaves on its Libyan side. In connection with these canals in Upper Egypt is a chain of vast reservoirs, chiefly the work of Mehemet Ali, which, filled from the river during the inundation, subsequently distribute their contents into smaller basins at a lower level, and so furnish water to the neighbouring land, as needed throughout the greater part of the year. Of the fifty or more navigable canals below Cairo, the most important are — (1) the Ismailieh, a work of the pres- ent reign, which, starting from the river near Boulak, runs in a fine broad navigable channel for nearly fifty-five 236 EGYPT A8 IT lA miles to the fresh-water canal from Zagazig to Suez, and 60 gives water communication between Cairo and Suez. The connection of this great work with the maritime Canal (by the widening and deepening of the fresh-water channel, respectively to 180 and llj feet between Zagazig and Ismaiilieh) has been completed, and through naviga- tion for vessels up to 400 tons burthen, paying only half the large Canal dues established between Cairo and the two seas. The new water-way will be worked under con- tract with the Suez Canal Company for the carriage of produce from Middle and Upper Egypt to IsmaiQieh, for shipment to Europe, in competition with Alexandria. Coals may be thus landed at Boulak direct from Cardiff or the Tyne, and return freights of cotton, sugar, Wheat, or seeds be taken back in the same bottoms. (2) The Bahr-Moez, supposed to be the old Tanitic branch,* which begins at Mit-E,adi, near Benha, on the right bank of the Damietta branch, and widening through the prov- ince of Charkieh, divides near Tell-Basta (Bubastis) into two channels, which empty themselves into Lake Meniialeh. (3) The Chibia-el-koum, a fine canal nearly ninety miles long, which zigzags across the Delta from Quamyeyn, on the Damietta to Farastaq on the Rosetta branch, throwing out, at the village from which it takes its name, a branch called the Melig, which joins the Taba- nieh canal below Sibel-Mtus, and with the latter empties itself into Lake Bourlos — a course which is almost iden- tical with that of the old Sebenitic branch of the river. (4) The Menoufieh, which crosses the Delta a short way below its apex. And (5) the Mahmoudieh, which con- nects Alexandria with the NUe at Atfeh, on the Rosetta branch, about twenty-seven miles above the latter town. This last important channel, which is another of the great * Tiiiilored to its iresent-Uao bv the first. Fatlmite Caliph, cire. A.D. 970. SMALLER €EANNEL8. 237 works of Mehemet AJi, follows in a part of its course th.e bed of the ancient Canopic branch, and the old canal of Fooah, which the neglect of the Mamelukes allowed to finally dry up about a century ago. The present channel was begun ia 1819, and during the ten months of its con- struction by the labour of 250,000 men, it cost 300,000?., and 20,000 lives, which perished by accident, hunger, and disease. Its length from the NUe to Alexandria is about fifty miles, with an average width of one hundred feet, and it is navigable for large river craft throughout the year. Altogether, these greater canals and their naviga- ble branches make up a system of some 1,900 miles between Farshoot and the Mediterranean. As, however, many sections of this are dry during low NUe, the water-way it would otherwise afford for the transport of local produce is broken and iuefflcient. But much has been done within the past dozen years to remedy this, by deepeniag the defective channels, and below Cairo especially the inter-communication is now fairly complete. These main arteries, however, form little more than one- fourth of the whole canal system of the country. In Upper and Middle Egypt, from Assouan to Cairo, there are 348 minor channels which serve only for irrigation. Of these the province of Esneh reckons 9, that of Kenneh 14, Girzheh 19, Assiout 63, Miuieh 71, Benisouef 52, the Fayoum ta aU 111, and Grhizeh 9. In the Lower prov inces there are 408, of which Galioubieh has 27, Menou- fieh 24, Garbieh 75, Charkieh 181, Dahkalieh 28, and Behera 73. Of this total of 756 canals — measuring in aU 6,600 mUes — a few in the Delta start direct from the Nile, but the great majority are subordinate ducts — capillaries, so to speak — of the larger channels, by which the vital fluid is circulated to the arable extremities of the coun- try. Of the whole 840 canals, 113 have been constructed 238 EGYPT AS IT 18. during the present reign, mostly below Cairo, besides 426 bridges — 160 in Upper, and 276 in Lower Egypt. The means by which the yearly inundation is caught and distributed through this great network, over almost tie whole cultivable surface of the country, are at once simple and efficient. In Upper Egypt a system of reser- voirs, already mentioned, receives and stores most of the supply needed from Assouan to Assiout, below which a less complete chain of similar basins serves in part a like purpose down as far as Ghizeh, the province opposite Cairo. Thence to the Mediterranean, the whole work of storage and distribution is done by canals. Of these, both in Upper and Lower Egypt, the large primary ones tap the Nile at a higher elevation than that of the dis- tricts they are intended to inundate, and are themselves again tapped by the secondary channels, which irrigate still lower and remoter levels, and from which, in their turn, branch off yet smaller courses that are again cut, almost at will by the villagers, tiU the precious fluid is finally distributed as the exigencies of the various crops require. The headworks of the large canals, which issue direct from the river, consist generally of substantial stone or brick-built viaducts, with openings of from ten to fifteen feet wide, which are closable by vertical planks or sheet piling. At intervals down the canal similar dykes are placed to produce successive heads of water, as far down as the annual in-take wiU feed an overflow into the adjoining fields, or materially reduce the height to which the water has to be raised by manual or other labour. The secondary canals branch from the larger ones through wires similar to those described, and, like them again, are dammed at intervals to feed the smaller channels, by means of stone or brick conduits through their banks. Like the Nile itself, where necessary, the DISTRIBUTION OF TEE mUNBATION 239 whole of these canals are embanked, and the maintenance of their earthworks is a rigorous duty of the adjoining villagers. The depth of water in the navigable canals averages about three feet at low Nile ; but, as the beds of the smaller channels are considerably above the ebb level o± the river, these latter are, of course, dry during the greater part of the year. Soon after the annual rise begins — about July — the head dams of the larger canala are opened, and the rising volume of water is admitted into the first sections till their banks are overflowed, and the adjoining land flooded ; the dykes lower down are then in turn similarly opened, as also those which feed the secondary channels, tUl the inundation is complete. As in "low" years the supply is insuflB.cient for the whole area to be irrigated, so in over-high Niles there is more water than is required, and the excess is more or less destructive of all the crops near the river. Another class of canals accordingly serves to catch this surplus water, and discharge it into the river lower down. But the ex- isting provision for this method of drainage is still inad- equate, and three times during the past ten years great damage has been done by overflows that could not be thus diverted in time. The great annual inundation, which is controlled and distributed in the manner now described, is further supplemented by numerous wells, by many thousands of sakJcias and shadoofs, and a yearly increas- ing multitude of steam and other pumps, the operation and uses of which will be more conveniently described in our chapter on agriculture. Extensive as is this great system of canalisation, it is etUl not only insufficient to water aU the land that might be reclaimed to cultivation in Lower Egypt, but it provides imperfectly for even the existing area during the eight months of ebb. To irrigate this adequately would re- 340 EGYPT A3 IT TS. quire a constant supply all the year round in the main canals at tlie same height, and in the same quantity as when the river has risen from twelve to fifteen feet ; and to obtain this desideratum the engineers of the French expedition first projected, and Mehemet AH, nearly ficfty years later constructed, the great work known as the Barrage of the 'NUe, immediately below the apex of the Delta. After experiment of the principle on one of the larger canals, the plans prepared by M. Mougel, a French engineer in the service of the Yiceroy, were adopted, and in 1847 the structure, on a much grander and costlier scale than had been suggested to Napoleon, was begun. The scheme consisted of a vast double bridge or viaduct, the western section of which was to span, and by a system of sluices dam back, the Rosetta branch, and the eastern the Damietta. It was estimated that the great work and its necessary complement of new canals would provide for the efficient irrigation of nearly 4,000,000 acres of ground, and by dispensing with more than 25,000 sakTcias and shadoofs would set free for other labour the many thousands of men and oxen employed in working these antiquated machines — a result which, if accomplished, would have been commercially well worth its cost. Dur- ing the next couple of years the work was vigorously pushed on, with a vast expenditure of money and labour, but soon after the accession of Abbas Pasha it was sus- pended, and has not since been resumed. The section over the Rosetta branch is, however, nearly complete, and is a structure of fine architectural effect. The river — at this point 506 yards wide — is spanned by a bridge of sixty-one arches of sixteen-feet span, with a sluice-gate in each opening, and the whole capped by a line of cren- ellated turrets corresponding in design with loftier towera over the entrance gateways and in the centre of the THE BARRAGE. 241 work. A similar but longer structure bridges the Dami- etta branch, which is 592 yards wide, but the sluice ar- rangement is here incomplete; and, except during high NUe, the only water that passes through this section is conveyed by a canal from the other side, and rushes through two or three arches only, the rest remaining dry. It was originally intended to back up the river by this structure about fifteen feet, but owing to the defective foundations it has not been deemed prudent to submit the work to a greater strain than that due to a head of from three to five feet of water, a level which is sufficient for the lands of Lower Egypt without the costly supple- ment of steam or other pumping.* The urgent want, therefore, of more efficient irrigation than this incomplete work affords, has recalled attention to the necessity of complementing it by other means of supply; and, in considering these, the choice has lain between a system of high-level canals, and the completion and extension of the present Barrage. The view of the Government was at first favourable to the former plan, according to which the Nile would have been tapped either at Queremate, on its right bank about fifty miles above Cairo, or on the left bank at Echment three mUes higher up, and, by means of a flatter faU than that of the river, a head of water would have been provided sufficient to supply a regulated irrigation to nearly 3,000,000 fed- dans of land below the capital aU the year round, thus rendering the greater part of Lower Egypt practically in- dependent of a good or bad NUe. The great cost, how- ever, of either of these schemes led to their abandonment, and it was then decided to utilise Mougel Bey's great * At present, navigation is carried on through loots at the Delta end of each section, where a toll of 60 paras (about l^d.) per a/rdeb is levied on passing craft. 242 EGYPT AS IT m work. In 1875, therefore, Mr, Fowler was instructed to exhaustively examine the condition of tMs structure, and to submit estimates and plans for its completion. This was done early in the following year, and, as the result showed that for an outlay of about 1,000,000?. the work could be made to realise its original purpose, and so sup- ply nearly all the additional irrigation required, it has been decided that this shall be done. Mr. Fowler's scheme is to complete the sluices of the existing Barrage, and to construct a new set on deep and very massive foundations immediately below the down-stream edge of the present work, which, wMle limiting the pressure on the old foundation to less than five feet, will raise the whole hydraulic head to the required level originally designed. The entire structure will be further strengthened by a broad mass of rubble, incorporated with two lines of beton blocks, traversing the river-bed Immediately below the new sluices, and so forming a solid abutment to the whole. When these additions to this gi-eat work have been carried out, vast tracts of new land may be at once brought under cultivation, and with the aid of a few ad- ditional canals to distribute the precious fluid over the extended area, the complete irrigation of Lower Egypt will have been provided for, with an immense economy of labour and money, as compared with the costly and inefficient system now in use. The result will be an en- dnrtng monument for both the sovereign and the en- gineer to whose joint energy and skill its achievement will be due. HAKBOTJR WORKS. Alexandria. — The modem harbour of Alexandria in which the trade of the port is now carried on lies, as already described, within the upper curve of a bay formed HARBOUR WORKS. 243 by tlie two projecting headlands of Eas-el-Teen, on the NE., and Cape Adjemi and Marabout Island on the SW., and measuring six miles ia length by an average of two ia width. It is landlocked on every side except one, the SW. ; the wind from this direction is, however, the pre- vailing one during eight or nine months of the year, and from time immemorial the "sea" thus occasioned has seriously impeded the loading and discharge of vessels in the roadstead by stone lighters, as the custom has hith- erto been. The importance of remedying this great draw- back on the convenience of his chief port had been felt by the Khedive from soon after his accession, but it was not till the threatened rivalry of the Suez Canal had empha- sised the necessity that he finally decided on carrying out a work of such magnitude and cost. Accordingly, in 1870, a contract was entered into with Messrs. Greenfield and Co., an eminent English firm, for the construction of a great breakwater, an inner harbour mole, and a line of quays, which should, together, afford the requisite shelter and ittcreased accommodation needed by the growing trade of the port. After some months spent in the neces- sary preparations the work was begun ia the spring of 1871, when the Khedive ia person laid the foundation stone. Siace then the original plan has been considerably modified, but it will be sufficient to mention its ultimate lines as now in great part carried out. Commencing at a point fifty metres SW. of the Eas-el-Teen lighthouse, the outer breakwater extends first in this latter direction for nearly 1,000 metres, and then, curving to SSW., runs ia a straight liae 2,350 metres further, or, ia aU, above two mUes across the mouth of the harbour, enclosing an area of more than 1,400 acres of stiU water, deep enough for vessels of the largest class. The principal entrance to the port is now, therefore, round the south-western end of the 244 EGYPT AS IT 18. breakwater, wMcli is 1,500 metres from the shore, while the narrow passage off Eas-el-Teen affords ingress and egress only to small craft and shore boats. As in the case of the great moles at Port Said, this outer sea-wall has been constructed, up to the water-level, of huge blocks of concrete, manufactured at the neighbouring Mex quarries, of sand and TheU lime, and deposited pell- mell on the sea side, with an inner front of rubble. The upper portion of the work, which is of solid masonry, rises ten feet above the lowest, or seven above the high- est sea-level,* and is of a uniform surface width of twenty feet. In all, about 25,000 concrete blocks, weigh- ing twenty tons each, and 130,000 tons of large and small rubble stones, have been sunk in the foundations of this great work. Shorewards the scheme comprises a broad mole, stretching out 900 metres from the mouth of the Mahmoudieh Canal and the harbour termiaus of the Cairo railway, towards Ras-el-Teen ; and a line of quays, 1,240 metres long, extending from the same point along the Marina to close upon the Admiralty Dock. Like the inner mole, these quays are based on a deep rubble foun- dation, with a superstructure of solid masonry, and when completed will have abutting iron jetties, alongside which ships may load and discharge in all weathers. A branch railway will connect the mole and quays with the Alexan- dria and Cairo line, and thus with the whole railway sys- tem of the interior; so that when the liae now ia ad- vanced progress to Khartoum is completed, the abundant produce of the Soudan — which is at present all but wholly shut out from the Western markets— will be * Tie masinmiii rise of tide here is twelve inches, but the level of high Mediterranean, when the water is forced up the Levant by westerly gales, is three feet above the level of low Mediterranean, caused by galea from the eastward. SUEZ HARBOUR. 245 carried to the Mediterranean almost in fewer days than it has hitherto taken months by the slow transport of river and caravan. The necessary complement of this undertaking — the total cost of which will exceed 2,000,O00Z. sterUng — will be the removal of the ledge of rock in the mouth of the harbour known as the Three Fathoms Shoal. Dangerous even in daylight, this obstruction practically closes the port between sunset and sunrise ; and as the increased power of modern cannon has deprived it of all strategi- cal vaiue as a protection against hostile shipping, its re- moval has now become, so to speak, a corollary of Messrs. Greenfield's great work. Already the harbour dues of Ad. a ton on vessels with cargo, and 2d. on those in ballast,* levied since the completion of the breakwater, yield about 130,000Z. a year, and it is estimated that little more than a twelvemonth's receipts of these would cover the cost of blasting and clearing away this now sole impediment to safe and easy entrance to the port at any hour or in any weather. Suez. — The works at this port, though less extensive and costly than those at Alexandria, are still only second to these latter in magnitude and importance. The idea of them was originally limited to a dry dock, the want of which was soon felt by the Peninsular and Oriental Company after beginning, in 1842, the mail and pas- senger service between England and India, via, Egypt. There was at that time no accommodation for repairing vessels south of the Isthmus nearer than Bombay, and the Company therefore strongly urged the Egyptian Government to erect either a gridiron or a floating dock at Suez ?o supply the want. The application was how- • Coasting steamers pay only half rates, and sailing coasters only 3^— THE NATIVE TRWUNALS. 285 Bat, although, the judicial and other personnel is thus complete, and the jurisdiction exercised includes aU civil disputes between the Government and natives on the one hand and foreigners on the other, as also those between foreigners of different nationalities, and aU suits and reg- istrations of sale and mortgage whatsoever of real prop- erty, the reform is yet at best only a half measure. For disputes between themselves or with the authorities, the natives are still left to the old meJcTcemehs, where the poor man has an indiiierent chance against the rich, and both even less against the Grovernment. It is but fair to admit, however, that since the chief Cadi has been appointed directly by the Khedive, and paid a fixed salary of 4,000 Napoleons a year, instead of being commissioned from Stamboul for a year's plundering by fees, the justice ad- ministered by these tribunals has much improved. The new code of the international courts has been as far as possible iatroduced, and under the firm and liberal con- trol of the present Minister — Cherif Pasha, who holds the double portfolio of Justice and Foreign Affairs — the worst scandals of the old system have been ia great part weeded out. But, as against administrative abuse, these native courts stiU. afford little or no protection.* It was, however, necessary to await the result of the new mixed measure before attempting any very radical changes in the native system ; but it is understood that if the inter, national experiment proves a success, a clear sweep vdU be made of the old Koranic law and procedure, and Gov- ernment, natives, and foreigners be all alike brought * The confidence with which these international tribunals are already re- garded by the natives, as compared with their own mekkeinehi, is shown by the now common device of plaintiffs who have claims either against other wealthy natives or the Government, fictitiously ceding their rights of action to foreigners, and thus bringing them within the jurisdiction of the new to^irts. EGYPT A8 IT rs. within tlie scope of tte reform wMcli is now so satisfao- torily Dn its trial. The logical and necessary consequence will be the complete abolition of the Capitulations in Egypt, be their fate in Turkey what it may. It is, there- fore, of good augury for the national progress that the new tribunals have already won the full confidence of both natives and foreigners, and that the Government also loyally bows to their authority. The independence of the Court of Appeal in unanimously affirming its jurisdiction over both the Government and the private estates of the Khedive himself in the matter of foreign claims against either,* has especially strengthened popu- lar faith in the reality of the reform, and shown how safely its agents may be entrusted with larger powers. There can be little doubt that the confidence thus felt will continue to be justified, and that in 1881 this new regime, modified as experience may have suggested, will perma- nently and exclusively replace the old. Egypt will then present a unique example of a Mussulman State governed by a system of laws in harmony with modern civilisation, under the asgis of which aU classes of its population will, for the first time, enjoy equal justice and protection from administrative abuse. History will contain no grander monument of the reign of Ismail I. * TMs assertion of jirrisdiction arose in connection witli tlie decree of May, 1876, unifying the wliole of the Government and Daira debts, the validity of which was disputed by certain foreign holders of bills of exchange drawn by the Dal'ra and accepted by the Minister of Finance. The Tribunal of First Instance having held that the decree in question barred such claims, the CJourt of Appeal reversed the decision, and decided that no administrative act to which the Powers were not parties could affect the right of their subjects In respect of claims against either the Government or the personal estate of the Khedive. His Highness demurred to this interpretation of the section of the organic law on which the Court relied, but consented to be bound by the opinion of the foreign Governments ; and this being against his own view, he has sinoe loyally acknowledged the jurisdiction thus affirmed CHAPTER XIV. MAITITFACTTJEING AND OTHER IHDUSTEIES. Skilled Industries not Improved Proportionately to Agriculture and Com- merce — Misdirected EfEorts of Mehemet Ali to Promote Them — 0£5cial List of Trades, Incomplete — Esnafs, or Trade Guilds — Weavers — Metal Work- ers — Workers in Wood — Masons and Bricklayers — Tanners and Curriers — Potters — Paper-maMng — The Boulak Mill— Bakers and Millers — Embroid- erers — Goldsmiths — Turners — The Old Mushrdbeeyahs — Modem Skilled Labour chiefly done by Europeans — Artificial Egg-hatching — Cotton-factory Workers — Poverty of Mmeral Eesources — Salt-pits — Natron Lakes — Petro- leum — Fisheries — NUe Boatmen — General Inferiority of Native Skilled Work — No Chance of Competing with Europe — True Policy of Govern- - ment to Encourage Agriculture. The great development in Egyptian agriculture and trade within the past twenty or thirty years has not been attended by corresponding improvement in the skilled industries of the country. With a few exceptions these are still as backward as they were a hundred years ago. In the three centuries of mixed Turkish and Mamlouk misrule which followed Ottoman conquest, Arab art of every kind lost its cunning, and when Bonaparte's savants entered Cairo they found its handicrafts, as its» learning, at the lowest ebb of decadence. Twenty years later Mehemet Ali began a series of efforts to revive the old mechanical skill for which Egyptian workmen had once been famous, but the special aim and the methods of his reforms in this direction were alike unsound, and costly failure was the result. Fascinated by the flattering theory then cheiished by more than one European Gov- 287 888 EGYPT AS n m eminent, of niaking his country independent of all others for its manufactures, he imported foreign artisans and machinery on a large scale, and established factories to produce everything required for home consumption which the old handicrafts of the country did not already supply. But he worked the whole on a vicious system of close Government monopolies which underpaid, and consequently discouraged rather than developed native skill. As the products, too, of his new workshops cost more than they could have been bought for in the Euro- pean markets, industrial failure was not compensated by commercial success, and even before the death of the old reformer most of his factories were closed. During the reign of Abbas Pasha, in this, as in all else, the country rather retrograded than advanced ; and although monopo- lies were abolished by Said Pasha, native industry re- ceived from him little or no other stimulus or relief. Not much more can be claimed for the earlier years of the present reign, when the energies of the Khedive were chiefly applied to the extension of public works, the skilled labour on which was mostly done by foreigners ; but the later Hausmannisation of Cairo and Alexandria, and the impetus given to technical ,?.ducation in the Gov- ernment schools, have materially improved the class of work done by the constructive trades within the past six or eight years. The Government and Daira factories and private enterprise (mostly foreign) have also contributed their quota to the same result ; but barring this compara- iively small aggregate of improvement, little or no indus- trial progress has been made since before the French oc- cupation. This lack of advance in the mechanical arts is no doubt in part explained by the fact that agriculture alisorbs so preponderant a share of the native labour, the proportion of cultivators to artisans being, roundly, about THE INDUSTRIAL CLASSES. 289 1,000,000* to 60,000. But the main cause lias been the low level of material civilisation among nine-tenths of the population, and till lately, the absence of Government encouragement except during the spurt of misdirected manufacturing effort made by Mehemet Ali. The latest official return on this subject gives the subjoined statis- tics t of the industrial classes ; but the list is incomplete, omittiag as it does bakers, millers, bookbinders, printers, carnage-builders, cotton-pressers, mechanical engineers, sugar-refiners, and several other crafts of modern date which, although chiefly worked by foreigners, also afford employment to many natives ; and in the instance of papermakers, it is obviously inaccurate, as the Daira mill at Boulak, which has a monopoly of this industry, em- ploys a large number of Arab and Copt hands. The great majority of the forty or more trades prac- tised in Egypt form separate esnafs or guilds, member- ship of which is obligatory on all who work at the re- * M. de Regny's Statistigiie de VEg-ypte reckons the whole, including gar- deners, at only 410,000 ; but his estimate omits the provinces of Ghizeh, Feni-souef, and the Fayoum, and takes no count of the many thousand hands e nployed on more than 100,000 mkhias, shadoufs, taboots, and steam-pumps. 1 Armourers 371 Painters . 686 Blacksmiths . 3,605 Papermakers 1 Brjckmakers . . 434 Pipemakers 357 Caulkers . 910 Plasterers 580 Carpenters and Sawyers 6,473 Plumbers 35 Charcoal-burners 330 Potters . 834 Clockmakers . 77 Ropemakers 19 Coppersmiths . 1,396 Saddlers . 770 Dyers 6,109 Shoemakers 3,375 Embroiderers . 1,871 Sievemakers 598 Engravers 831 Stone-cutters 1,404 Glaziers . 86 Tailors . 3,630 Goldsmiths and Jewellers 3,630 Tanners . 971 Lime-burners . 3,483 Tinmen . 515 Marble-cutters . 385 Tinsmiths 436 Masons . . . 4,113 Upholsterers 583 Matmakers . 1.463 Weavers . . 10,001 290 EOTPT AS IT m spective crafts. This system of esnqfs, which also obtains in Turkey, is said to have originated dnriag the Baghdad Caliphate ; but a similar organisation prevailed among the ancient Egyptians, and it is probable therefore that these trade corporations of Alexandria and Cairo — to which and a few other large towns the industrial popula- tion of the country is chiefly confined — are in the main native relics of the old time. At any rate, the system has been in immemorial use, and is probably maintained for the facilities it affords in the collection of personal taxes, as well as for the guarantee it is made to offer for the due execution of works ordered by the Govern- ment. Each esnaf is presided over by a sheikh, who is in practice chosen by the higher members of the craft, but is formally appointed by the Government, to which he pays a nomination fee of about 201. He is, in fact, the ruler of the guild, admitting members, fixing the scale of wages, directing the manner in which contracts shall be carried out, and selecting the workmen by whom they shaU be executed. He also collects the taxes payable by the guild, and is responsible to the Government for all matters connected with it. The members of the craft receive on admission certificates stating their proficiency and the rate of wages it entitles them to demand. They are, as a rule, restricted to the particular trade of the guild ; or if, as is rarely the case, allowed to foUow two crafts, or even separate branches of the same one, they are charged an increased tax, unless they can arrange matters privately with the sheikh. They may contract to do piece-work, but if employed by the day they can only ask for the wages fixed in their certificate. Besides these guild regulations, however, there is little or no legislation specially affecting the industrial classes. The costliness and magnitude, of the Khedive's sugar- WBA VERS. 291 factories would entitle tliem to rank among the public works of Egypt ; while, as they are at the same time in- dustrial adventures of his Highness, they might with equal fitness be described here. They faU still more ap- propriately, however, within the scope of the chapter on the Daira, to which they belong, and will therefore be noticed in that connection. Of the private trade of the country, numerically the most important is that of the weavers. Of these about 1,600 are employed in the three Daira factories of Foueh (belonging to the Queen-mother), Boulak, and Shoubrah, near Cairo. The first of these manufactures nearly 50,000 tarhoushes (the Egyptian fez) a year, of which the supply required for the army and navy is sold to the Ministry of "War, and the remainder to the public. They also turn out annually about 315,000Z. worth of woollen cloth, the greater part of which is simi larly bought for the troops. The wages ia these establish- ments average about 8d. a day. This industry, however, is mainly carried on in private workshops, of which, ac- cording to the latest available statistics, there are in Cairo — sixty weaving mixed cotton and flax, twenty woollen cloth, and eleven manufacturing carpets, besides 107 others spinning and preparing woollen and cotton yarn for the loom ; and in Alexandria thirty-eight weav- ing cotton cloth and thirty-one making carpets. In Damietta 166 shops weave silk, besides sixty-two others which are employed in dyeing it. One of the chief indus- tries of Beni-souef, also, is carpet-malking, and the weav- ing of coarse linen stuffs for the fellaheen. The rest of the hands engaged in textile work are employed in vari- ous other parts of the country in shops of from one to a dozen or more looms. The wages in this trade vary in different districts, bu 9d a day is about an average of the whole. 292 EGYPT AS IT IB. In metal work the Government takes tke lead vdth three large establishments at Cairo — a cannon foundry, a rifle factory (with machiaery for prodncing the latest Remington arms), the large engiaeering shops at Boulak, and a cartridge factory, which annually consumes a great quantity of raw copper. At Alexandria there are also an arms factory and extensive engineering workshops for the navy and the Khedivieh Steam Company, besides a small similar establishment at Suez. The official return is in- complete as to the distribution of private native industry among these trades, but Cairo may be mentioned as em- ploying 85 iron foundries, 80 whitesmiths' shops, 73 cop- per ditto, and 240 workers in gold and silver — chiefly Copts, Jews, and Armenians — besides a large number of armourers and blacksmiths. Alexandria, according to the same authority, reckons 6 iron foundries, 43 smiths' forges, 100 tinmen' s shops, and 93 workers in the precious metals. The large provincial towns absorb the rest. The wages of these various trades range, for native workmen, from averages of Is. Qd. to 25. a day, as much of the work is done by piece, and the amount earned therefore de- pends on the skill and activity of the mechanic. Workers in wood, from water- wheelwrights to house car- penters, now earn about a similar average wage. Of these also the great majority are employed in Cairo and Alex- andria, but within the past eight or ten years the exten- sion of building in the chief provincial towns has at- tracted thither large numbers of this class of mechanics, and correspondingly improved their rate of pay, which previously ranged below that of metal-workers. In what may be called the two capitals, however, the best work is all done by foreigners, at wages double, or even treble those paid to native hands. The same may also be said of bricklayersj masons, and other workers in stone, whose MASOJffS, TANNERS, AND CURRIERS. 293 methods of labour are still for tlie most part as rude as when hardly anything better than a mud-hut was to be seen outside Cairo and Alexandria. Throughout the in- terior, sun-dried tQes are the structural material still most in vogue ; and even where imperfectly-burned bricks* are used, the mortar, and the workmanship in laying it, are generally so bad as to give the wall built with them little advantage, except in appearance, over the homelier mud one on which neither fire nor lime has been spent. Under European guidance the Egyptian mason or bricklayer can work fairly well ; but left to himself, he troubles little with rule or plummet, and if his waU keep at all within the perpendicular, accident, quite as much as his eye, is to be credited with the result. Building-stone in Cairo is obtained from the Mokattem quarries, behind the Citadel, and in Alexandria from those of Mex, five miles west of~ the city. These together now also supply the limited wants of the iuterior — where, barring in the capital, a stone structure is a rarity — which, until a few years ago, were chiefly dug out of the nearest temple or other ancient monument. But this vandalism has been stopped, and Mex and the Mokattem now furnish nearly aU the stone used throughout the country, except what is im- ported ready cut from Trieste. Tanners and curriers, although unable to compete with the more scientific processes of Europe, stlU turn out ex- cellent leather of cow, buffalo, sheep, and goat skins — the last of whici afl U-pholpterers' "morocco," finds a ready market abroad. The Government works a large tannery at Alexandria, which annually prepares between 30,000 and 40,000 skins, chiefly for army use ; and private indus- * The beat native bricks are those made in the Government yard at Oalioub, where some sixty workmen produce nearly 4,700,000 red bricks ■ year the ordinary market price of which is about 18s. a thousand. 294 E9TPT AS IT IS. try maintains some thirty others there and in Cairo, witli an outcome of above 200,000 skins a year. The wages in this trade range from lOd. to 15., and those of curriers and saddlers from about Is. 4d. to 1*. 8d. a day. Of the once famous ceramic art of Egypt only pottery and the commonest glass work now survive. The first of these, however, forms perhaps historically the most in- teresting, though far from the most flourishing of the contemporary industries of the country ; barring only that the processes and results of the craft as now worked are ruder than those of 3,000 years ago, both are almost identical vsdth its pictured presentments in the tombs of Upper Egypt. In fact, what may there be seen in colours that have survived a hundred generations may now any day be witnessed in real life and tangible substance at Memphis, at Mellawee, at Manfalout, at Assiout, and especially at BaUas and Kenneh, whence jars, jugs, tUes, and porous water-bottles, absolutely identical in form and method of manufacture with those in use before the Exodus are still annually floated down the WUe by thousands. The total produce of the trade averages nearly 500,000 pieces a year of aU descriptions. Glass- blowing has dwindled to eight or ten small shops ia Cairo, which manufacture annually some 10,000 objects of the commonest ware, and about 20,000 chimneys for the petroleum lamps now in general use. The wages of these two kindred crafts range from Is. to Is. 6d. a day. Although paper-making figures in the ofiicial list of trades with only a single representative, the fine Daira factory at Boulak, which, as above remarked, monopolises this industry in Egypt, employs nearly 220 hands, the whole of whom, barring a few English foremen and engineers, are natives. The machiuery of this establish- ment—which was erected in 1870— is English, and like "NATIONAL" PRINTING OFFICE. 295 that of many of tlie sugar-factories, lias the sole defect of being on far too large and costly a scale for the local wants of the trade. It annually manufactures some eighieea tons of coarse packing paper — chiefly for use at the sugar-factories — and about 70,000 reams of printing and writing papers of various qualities, for the coarser of which the species of grass called Ml/a * and sugar-cane fibre stalks supply cheap and abundant raw material. As most of the writing paper made is specially adapted for Oriental caligraphy, the surplus beyond what is used in the Government offices and sold to private consumers is exported to the Hedjaz, and a few bales are also sent yearly to India. In immediate connection with this factory is the "national" printing office, which, with a large annexed lithographic shop, also belongs to the Daiira Sanieh. Besides the forms required by the various Ministries, the railway administration, the Dairas, and other branches of the public service, this establishment prints all the school books issued by the Ministry of Public Instruction, in Arabic, Turkish, and the European languages ; and although the whole of the hands em- ployed — nearly 100 in aU — are natives, the work would do credit to most London or Paris printing offices. Besides this large Daiira establishment, private industry carries on five other printing and as many lithographic shops in Cairo and four in Alexandria, in which however many of the workmen are foreigners. The pay of the 200 or more natives engaged in these trades varies from Is. Qd. * Some three years ago the director of this estahlishment assured the writer that, with the available abundant supply of this grass, he could compete advantageously with the cheap "straw" papers of Europe, and was then esecuting a contract for a Glasgow newspaper of large circulation. As paper, however, has not since figured noticeably among the exports from Alexandria, it is to be feared tha* the experiment did not prove a complete Buccess. 298 EGYPT AS IT IS. to 2s. a day for compositors, wMle that of lithographers is about ten per cent. less. Bakers and millers, although also omitted from the official return, form a large industrial class. The former alone number in all above 2,300, specially engaged in the trade, irrespective of the private bread-making by the fellahs, who, like the Bedoween, do most of their own milling and baking. Of this total, above 1,000 are regis- tered in Cairo, 490 in Alexandria, and the remainder in the other provincial towns. The universal love of pastry, chiefly in the form of the cake called fateereh, further employs above 1,200 makers of this greasy luxury, of whom some 800 find work and customers in the capital, 200 in Alexandria, and the rest elsewhere. To provide flour for all these, 27 steam mills and 575 driven by horse-power are worked in Cairo, respectively 31 and 127, besides 37 windmills, at Alexandria, and a few of all three classes at Tanta, Zagazig, and Mansourah. For the supply of the army and navy the Government works a large steam miU at Cairo, and two great bakeries there and at Alexandria, which furnish all the bread and bis- cuit required by both services, as also for the extensive gratuitous distributions of both which are made to pass- ing pUgrims, schools, and other charities. The wages in these two trades are lower than those of most other crafts, averaging for the common hands not more than 9d. a day. In nearly tie whole of these handicrafts the work done by the natives is, as a rule, inferior. The masons, shoemakers, and tinsmiths turn out perhaps the best ; but even their work, as compared with that of foreigners, is clumsy and rough in finish. Occasional specimens of good embroidery may be met with, but, although pleasing to Ihe European eye from its being applied to objects AROHITEOTURE AND BNQIirEEBmQ. 297 with which embroidery is not generally associated ia Europe, and from the pattern being Eastern, these also are much inferior in delicacy and precision to the best Exiropean work. So, too, with goldsmiths' work, which, though in some of its results very quaintly pretty, is a3 rude in finish as its narrow range of patterns is antique — for the originals of nearly every one of these last may be seen in the Boulak Museum, or among the wall pictures of Thebes. The re-construction of so much of Cairo and Alexandria in a European style of architecture, and the imitation, more or less rude, of a similar fashion in the new buUdings in most of the other large towns has largely led, within the past dozen or fifteen years, to disuse of the old-fashioned musTirabeeyah, or projecting lattice window, and to a consequent very marked decline in the production of the beautiful turnery- work of which these were composed. So pretty indeed is this, that travelling collectors now pay more for old specimens of it than a whole window cost fifty years ago. The same remark also applies to the curious and intricate panel- work employed in interior decorations, which is similarly being superseded by tawdry French and German mould- ings. In Cairo and Alexandria a large opening is conse- quently offered to the better skill of Europeans — es- pecially in mechanical engineering, railway plate-laying, carpentry, smiths' work, and the best class of stone- masonry and bricklaying. The engineering required ia chiefly done by Englishmen, at wages ranging from Ql. to 25Z. a month, or by Frenchmen or Germans at from twenty to thirty per cent. less. But in this craft natives have, within the past few years, qualified to an extent which has sensibly reduced the number of Europeans employed, with the result that both on the railways and in fixed factories, a large proportion of the engine-drivers 298 EGYP7 AS IT la are now Egyptians, receiving from 8?. to lOl. a month. In the other trades Maltese take the lead in respect aiiKe of skill and wages, receiving as ordinary workmen, 5s., or as foremen, from 6s. to 8s. a day ; Frenchmen, Italians, and Greeks ranking next, at from 3s. to 5s. per diem. Passing from regular handicrafts to industries in which the labour cannot in the same sense be caUed skiUed, the oldest and most peculiar is that of artificial egg-hatching, which provides almost the whole poultry of the country. This curious process was already ancient when Herodotus made his note of it at Memphis, and as it was carried on then, so is it still in nearly every detail. The building in which it is performed, called mahTnal-ferdkh, is con- structed of burnt or sun-dried bricks, and consists of two parallel rows of small chambers and ovens — the latter uppermost — each about eleven feet square by about five feet high, and divided by a narrow vaulted passage, through which the rearer enters to watch the progress of the operation. This last takes place only during two or three months of the year, in spring, and as soon as the mahmal is opened the eggs are brought in by the neigh- bouring peasants, and after being carefuUy examined — with the result of about one-fifth being rejected as not fecundated^are placed on mats or straw sprinkled with bran, on the floor of the lower chamber. The ovens above are warmed with fires of gileTi, the flat cakes of mixed dung and chopj)ed straw described elsewhere. These mahmals vary in si^e from twelve to twenty-four cham- bers, and in the larger ones receive about 150,000 eggs during the annual term of their being open. The hatch- ing takes generally twenty-one days, during which the temperature is maintained at from 100° to 103° Fahr., fixed, it need hardly be said, by the practised sense of the rearer, without the aid of a thermometer. In the SCABOITT OF MINERALS. 299 result, about two-thirds of the eggs produce chickens, of which the owner of the mahmal retains one-half, as his fee in kind, and gives the remainder to the peasants. There are in all some 600 of these establishments through- out the country, hatching above 12,000,000 chickens a year. Although not reckoned in the official list of trades given in a previous foot-note, the workers in the cotton factories form a large industrial element, ranking in re- spect of wages about midway between common labourers and artisans. Most of these establishments date from the beginning of the American war, which gave so sudden a spurt to the Egyptian cotton trade. There are in aU eight steam pressing mills — six in Alexandria, with nine presses, and two in the interior — and about 150 ginning facto- ries, for the whole of which last, however, there is not now constant work. These establishments * employ a large number of men, women, and children, at wages varying, for the common hands, from 5d. to 2s. a day. As Egypt possesses few or no mineral resources, prop- erly so-caUed, it has in consequence no industries that can be classed strictly under this head. The old emerald mines of Jebel-Zabara and Wady-Sak£yt, between the Nile at Edfou and the Red Sea, the lead mines of Jebel- er-Eesas in the same region, the gold mines in the Bish- ari country, and the turquoise mines of Magharah in the peninsula of Sinai, have aU been long ago abandoned, although there is reason to believe that with improved modern skill and appliances some of these might be profitably re-opened, f The granite and limestone quar- * The largest of these cotton factories is that of Messrs. Whitworth Broth- ers, at Mansouiah, which comprises 80 cotton-gins, several presses, garbles for cleaning seed, ou-mills, flax-scutching machines, and an estensive com milL. f See note V. p. 11 300 EGYPT AS IT 18: ries of Assouan and the Mokattem are still of course worked, as are also those of Oriental alabaster and por- phyry at Wady-Omargoob and Jebel-ed-Dokhan in the eastern desert — the former of which supplied the ma- terial for the Citadel mosque at Cairo, while from the latter were taken, during the time of Trajan and Adrian, most of the splendid porphyry columns that still adorn Rome. Of coal, tin, silver, and the more modem metals, no traces have been discovered, and only the faintest of iron, copper, and lead, in, respectively, some rocks near Philse, and Mounts Baram and Zabara. Apart, therefore, from the quarries mentioned, the mineral products of the country are narrowed to the natron found in the province of Behera and at one or two other places on the Upper NUe, and to the nitre and other salts collected in the various salines of Lower. Egypt, or worked in the rock from along the western coast of the Red Sea. The first of these is chiefly gathered in the Wady-Natroon, about thirty -five miles west of Teraneh, on the Rosetta branch of the NUe.. The vaUey takes it name, as mentioned in a previous chapter, from a series of rock-walled basins whose waters contain crystallisations of natron or sub- carbonate, and of muriate of soda, or common salt. These basins or lakes — called melldhot — of which there are in all eight, besides two smaller ponds that dry up during the summer, are fed by infiltration from the NUe, whose waters take three months to percolate through the inter- jacent desert of rock and sand, the salts of which they carry with them, and deposit in these reservoirs. Thus, the annual rise in the water in the lakes begins only about the end of December, and continues to the middle of March, when the fall commences, after which, during the summer months, the subcarbonate and muriate are collected. AH the lakes contain the latter, but only some NATRON AND COMMON SALT. 301 of them both salts, which in that case crystallise sepa- rately, the natron underneath in a layer of some 30 inches thick, and the common salt above in one of about 18 inches. The natron is of two kinds — the TcTiartayeh- and the sultanieh, which latter (the better of the two quali- ties) is further distinguished as black and white. This (the sultanieh) is taken from the bed of the lakes as the water retires, and the Tchartayeh from the neighbouring low grounds which have not been submerged, but to the surface of which the salt rises. This valuable product is prepared for market by being washed, dissolved in water, and then again crystallised by the action of artificial or solar heat. The muriate is more commonly exported in the rough as collected. The official returns of this in- dustry do not distinguish between the two salts, but state the total quantity of both gathered in one season at 90,169 pes6s, of which 71,297 were collected directly on account of the Government, and the remainder, in the neighbourhood of Barnoughi in the same province, by a contractor who farms the enterprise from the Treasury. The cost price of the former, delivered in Alexandria, averaged about 10 pias. 8 paras per pes§, and that of the latter, being nearer the port, 6 pias. 10 par. The popu- lation of the Wady-Natroon is about 300, of whom some 200 are employed in this industry, and the re- mainder belong to the four Coptic monasteries,* which form the chief attraction of visitors to this desolate region. Natron is also found on the brink of some ponds in the valley ot El-Kab, above Esneh, and on the shore of the * Egypt, which once swarmed with monasteries and nunneries, has now properly none of the latter, and only seven of the former — these four in the Wady-Natroon, those of St. Anthony and St. Paul in the eastern desert, and one at Jehel-Koskam, in Upper Egypt. There are, it is true, several other religious establishments, but the priests are seculars and the inmates o( both sexes gOg MOTPT AS IT !& Birket-el-Korn, in the Fayoum, but in neither place in sufficient bulk to be of much commercial value. As it is, about 30,000 peses of natron are annually exported from Alexandria, chiefly to Austria and Italy. Large quan- tities of raw nitre are also extracted, chiefly on Govern- ment account, from the mounds that mark the sites of ancient cities in Middle and Upper Egypt. It is thus procured more or less abundantly from Ghizeh, Bedres- hayn, Sakkara, Enaneh, Mensheeyah, Denderah, Kamak, Koum-Ombos, and from various places in the Fayoum. The debris of the old waUs is thrown into shallow ponds, when the nitre dissolves, and is then drained off into still shallower basins, the water in which rapidly evaporates under the strong solar heat, leaving a layer of crystallised nitre at the bottom. The total quantity thus produced averages about 650,000 kilos a year, which, when refined at the Government saltpetre works at Old Cairo, yield about S60,000 kilos of pure nitrate of potash. In addition to this large collection of natron and nitre, above 72,000 ardebs of sea-salt are annually produced from twelve pits at Damietta (the largest of the whole), Ro- setta, Farkshour, BaUachi (on Lake Menzaleh), Brollos, Alexandria, Havara, Port Said, Ismaiilia, and Suez. The last official return reports nearly 700 persons and above 1,300 animals as finding employment at these twelve pits, at wages averaging for the former about 9d. a day. There are also two other large pits at Rawiah and Darrah, near Souakim, which further produce some 30,000,000 quintaia i, year. Of this quantity about 1,000,000 quin- tals are '-xported to Djeddah, Aden, and Bombay, and as much more is carried inland by caravans to Taka, northern Abyssinia, and other parts of the interior. The remain- ing surplus of the whole produce finds a market chiefly in the Levant and at Constantinople. Rock- salt exists in almost inexhaustible abundance along the coast of the FlBEERIEa. 303 Red Sea below Suez, cropping up to tlie surface in seams of great tMckness and purity ; but as yet these have been merely tapped at wide intervals, and contribute little or nothing to the salt produce of the country. This in- dustry, which is a Grovernment monopoly, yields to the Treasury a net annual revenue of about 250,0002. Petroleum of good quality has also been "struck" about a hundred mUes south of Suez, but only a few sam- ple barrels — drawn off last year by an American mining engineer in the service of the Government — have yet been raised. Machinery, however, for opening and working several wells has been procured, and will be in situ in a few months, when it is expected that not only the who]e of the lubricating oil required for the railways, the Khe- divieh steamers, and the Government and Daiira factories wlU be thus provided at a low cost, but a considerable excess be available for export. The sea and fresh-water fisheries, which are also farmed out, form an important industry, the former em- ploying above 3,700 persons and 800 boats, and the latter in all over 6,000 hands. Of these last, nearly 4,000 find work on Lake Menzaleh, with some 400 boats, and the remainder on the other lakes, the Nile, and the large navigable canals. As the total quantity of the fish caught greatly exceeds the home consumption, the ex- cess, salted and dried, forms a considerable article of export to Syria, Turkey, and Greece. The proceeds of this monopoly being lumped together in the Budget with those of boat-farming, bridge-toUs, and charges on waste lands, its separate value to the Treasury cannot be stated ; but the farming of Lake Menzaleh alone is said to yield 60,000Z. a year. The Nile boatmen and those employed on the larger navigable canals form another numerous class of in aU above 36,000, working some fifty river passenger steaw- 304 E&YPT A3 IT m era and tugs, and above 9,000 sailing boats of various kinds, from tlie yacht-like cangias or dahaheeyahs to the ponderous cargo-carrying maasTies or cock-boat sandals. They are nearly all fine muscular men, inured to severe labour in rowing, poling, or towing, and are withal per- haps the merriest of the Egyptian working classes. They mostly belong to the river-side villages, and in spite of the still not uncommon device of sacrificing an eye — where ophthalmia has not already done it — to avoid con- scription, they mainly furnish the crews of the small navy and of the Khedivieh Company's steamers. In both they are now fairly well treated, and the service ia much less dreaded and avoided than it was a few years If the level of native skilled labour in Egypt is thus generally low, it is at least quite up to the wants of the great mass of the population. A vast advance must be made in both the social and material civilisation of the country before a much higher class of work, or more of it, will be required for home consumption ; while as re- gards manufactures for export, the chance of Egypt com- peting successfully with Europe is still less now than it was fifty years ago. Sugar-making is perhaps the sole exception, and the foundations of that industry have been laid at a cost which no mere private enterprise could afford. From an aesthetic point of view the loss of the art which built Karnak, or of the later and more delicate skill that reared the old Cairene mosques, may be lamented; but the economist and the politician will not greatly regret either, nor the general backwardness in humbler crafts, if agriculture — the oldest and still most important of Egyptian industries — be improved and encouraged as it is the common interest of both the peo- ple and the Government that it should CHAPTER XV. SLAVERY. Popular Misconception on this Subject — Difierence between Eastern and Western Slavery — Property in tbe Person almost the only Common Fea- tTire — Status of Slave better in Egypt than in Turkey — Universality of the Institution — Different Classes of Slaves — Circassians now Rare — Abyssin- ians and Soudanis — Egyptian Slaves protected by Religion and Public Sentiment — Additional Safeguards decreed by the Khedive — Their Abuse by the Consuls — Consequent Limitation cf Consular Interference — Exist- ing Facilities of Emancipation — The Slave Trade legally Abolished, but still surreptitiously carried on — How it is fed — ^P.ices — The Institution now merely a Mild Domestio Servitude — Acknowledged Cruelties of Slave- huating — The Khedive honestly bent on its Auulltion — Colonel Gordon's Commission. On few topics connected \dth the East is Western opinion more at fault than on ohe subj-^fc of th'3 chapter. Thanks mainly to the well-meant but totally misleading exaggerations of professional phUanl'Liopists, the popular notion of Turkish and Egyptian servitude has been formed from illustrations of the cruel and brutalisiag bondage established in our own colonies till within little more than forty years ago, which survived for thirty years later in the Southern United States, cini which stUl exists in Cuba and Brazil.* But barring the owner's right of property in the slave, the two systems have hardly a fea- ture in common ; and even this the patriarchal manners and, on not a few points, the humaner legislation of the East have beset by limitations which distinguish it wide- ly from the absolute title of the Cuban or American Le- * The recent discussions in Parliament, and the appeals of the Anti- Slavery and Aborigines Protection Societies to Lord Derby, amply exem- plify the prevailing misconception on this subject. 20 305 306 EGYPT AS IT IS. gree. Many, too, regard slavery in the East as a purely Mohammedan institution, forgetting that it is older than Abraham, and ignorant that till within quite recent years it has been practised by Moslem and Christian alike. Under the less liberal laws and social customs of Turkey the right is no longer accorded to rayahs ; but in Egypt the law makes no difference between Arab and Copt, and slaves are therefore still commonly owned by both. But in both Turkey and Egypt the condition of the slaves differs toto caslo from that of the old Roman servus and the modem West Indian and American negro. In the latter cases he was and is a mere chattel, subjected to every degrading hardship, and liable to be cruelly abused at will. In the Levant he is simply an unwaged in-door servant, whom both law and religion protect from ill- treatment, and who, as a rule, is not only as kindly used as ordinary domestics in Europe, but enjoys over them not a few advantages. Slavery is of course bad and in- defensible under any conditions, but it is right that the vast difference between its Eastern and Western types should be understood. In the absence of any official statistics on the point, no even approximate estimate of the number of the slave population in Egypt can be given. It must, however, be large, as nearly aU the in-door work in every family above the poorest is done by servants of this class. From the house of the pettiest d ;p >.■ or even better class me- chanic, up to the palace oi i.lie Khedive, slave labour for this kind of work is the rule. And here one of the many important distinctions between Eastern and Western ser- vitude is at once met with. In Egypt and Turkey do- mestic work only is done by slaves, * the cases being rare * To this rule there are now in Egypt a few exceptions, in the case of village sheikhs, who, after the increase of wealth consequent on the develop RELATIVE STATUS HT B&7PT AND TTTRKEr. 30f in wMch they are employed even in stables or liglit gar- dening ; while in the West their chief value has always been as field hands. So inwrought, indeed, is the insti- tution into the domestic and social life of the country, that the possession of one or more slaves is as essential to "respectability" amongst one's neighbours as is that of a servant lye menial work ia a European family ; and this social consideration has, probably, more to do vdth the maintenance of the institution than any question as to the relative cost of slave and free labour. The Koranic law on the subject being, of course, the same in Turkey as in Egypt, the condition of slaves in the two coun tries is in the main identical, but practically it is in i„any respects better in the latter. In Turkey slaves are, as a rule, kindly treated, and in instances not a few have risen to high office ; but they are none the less made to feel that, so long as they remain slaves, their status is much below that of free men. In Egypt, on the contrary, the fact that for centuries a race of slaves — the Mamlouks — ruled the country, has long ago relieved bondage from the stigma of social degradation that attaches to it in the West, and has raised the relation between master and slave to one under which the latter, indeed, owes per- sonal service to the former, but without, either in him- self or others, any sense of ignominy involved in paying it. He is, in a word, rather the dependant than the slave of his owner, who treats him — far more than free servants — as a member of the family, and in cases innumerable gives him his liberty after a few years, an ?. starts him on his way to any fortune, save th highest in the country — for between black and white, freedmen and free men, ment of cotton culture during tlie American war, in c f ;W instances bought slaves to help in field labour ; but the work done by these is as Bght as that of the free' fellah, and In respect of food and lodging they share the common fortune of their owner End his family 308 EGYPT AS IT 18. neither the law nor society makes any practical distinc- tion. Slaves in Egypt may be broadly divided into white and hlaek, although the shades of colour between these two extremes are very numerous. To the one class belong the fair-skinned Circassian and the dusky but often beautiful Abyssinian ; and to the other the darker but still straight- haired Gralla and the negro from Nubia, Kordofan, or Darfour. The extinction of the Mamlouks, and the in- discriminate admission of Arabs and Copts alike to the public service, have practically put an end to the impor- tation of white male slaves, who are now rarely or never met with as adults. Some few boys are occasionally pur- chased as playfellows for the sons of the wealthier Beys or Pashas, but in almost every instance as soon as they reach full age they are liberated, married off — frequently to their masters' daughters — and in some way established in life. In fact, the relation of this very limited class to their owners just faUj chort ci cidoption, which was for- merly very t;ommon, but i~ less so now. The relatively great mortality amoiij fb cli ".dren of white mothers who have themselves not been bo- in the country, contributes to maintain the demand t^ ^ Circassian girls, the vast ma- jority of whom, however, find not merely purchasers but husbands among the sons ^i the wealthier classes. It is now, indeed, rare that a full-grown white girl is kept in mere concubinage, as both her cost and her personal at- tractions give her a value that speedily — very often at once — raises her to tlie higher domestic rank. But the importation of these Caucasian luxuries has greatly faUen off since the cessation of the regular trafiic between Con- stantinople and the coast of Abasia reduced the sup-nly, and correspondingly raised the price of the smuggled ar- ticle. Most of the few who now reach Egypt singly or in CIBCASSIAirS V. ABYSSimAITS. 309 (BOTiples, where thirty years ago they camd in scores, belong to the Circassian colonies in Ronmelia or Asia Minor, and the difficnlties of even their import, under the eyes of Jealous foreign Consuls, are such that the trade has virtually ceased. At any rate, it is only in the very wealthiest harems that these exotic beauties are now to be found. They are mostly bought at from ten to twelve years of age, and, after being weU nurtured for three or four years, and taught the usual Eastern accomplish- ments, are, as a rule, either married by the master of the house or given as wives to his sons. In strict law mar- riage does not confer freedom, but the girl is nearly al- ways first liberated, and the offspring are, in any case, bom free. One especial reason why these white girls are thus almost always married is that they wear muclt longer than either native Egyptian ladies or Abyssinians, retaining their fine physique to thirty-five or even f ortj years of age, whUe the latter are generally withered and passees before five-and-twenty. This is an important consideration in view of the now prevailing fashion among the upper classes of having only one wife ; but the much higher cost of these white beauties places them be- yond the reach of all but the wealthiest, and except for these . the harem market is now chiefly supplied with Abyssinians, who, at a. fifth, or even eighth or tenth of the price, are in aU but colour and wear physically equal to the best of their white rivals. Some of these copper- ekinned houris are indeed very models of southern beauty — combining with a profusion of long wavy hair, lustrous eyes, regular and delicately cut features, perfectly curved busts, and admirably moulded limbs generally, a grace and even dignity of carriage that no artificial training could heighten. Many of the wives of the middle, and nearly all the concubines of the upper classes are taken 310 EGYPT AS IT IS.- from this source of supply, as free Arab girls never enter tarems in this latter capacity. There are also many Abyssinian male slaves, whose employment and treatment are similar to those of their white feUows, and who, once liberated, may, like the latter, rise to any attainable rank ia the public service. The other class of wholly black slaves is much more numerous, and is generally employed in lower kinds of domestic work. than those just noticed.* They comprise specimens of every black race known to northern and central Africa, from the mixed Arabs and Abyssinians of Nubia, Berber, and Sennaar, to the pure negro of Darf our, and the yet other cross— neither negro nor Abyssinian — which forms the Galla tribes. These it is whose kidnap- ping and other means of obtainment in the remote inte- rior, form the chief ground of complaint against slavery in Egypt. But once in the country, and absorbed into its service, their condition, it may be affirmed, becomes not merely an immense improvement on their past, but in aU respects one of the lightest forms of servitude to which the name of slavery can be given. From every material point of view they are infinitely better off than the free- bom feUahs, on whom, indeed, they look down with proud contempt as an inferior class — since, as before re- marked, both law and religion combine to protect them, as neither protects the peasant. A bad master can, of course, ill-treat his slave as weU as his free servant to the verge of cruelty, without coming within the clutches of the Cadi ; but such cases are rare, as the social sentiment on the subject is essentially humane, and quite as op- erative as public opinion among ourselves. This is, of course, occasionally disregarded ; and where that hap- * But in families where botii slaves and free servants are kept, the meanest work of all is done by the latter.- CONSULAR INTEBFEBENOE. 311 pens tlie law now supplies a ready and eflective means of redress. Already tlie sheriat, or old religious law, entitled an ill-used slave to insist on being sold to another master ; but soon after his accession the Khedive ex- tended this provision by ordering his full emancipation in every case of proved abuse. This humane decree was, however, evaded ia practice by the masters meeting every complaiat with a countercharge of theft or other crimiaal offence, which availed with the too conservative and not always incorruptible Cadi to secure a sentence of impris- onment, or other severe punishment, unless the slave con- sented to return to his owner. To remedy this failure of justice the Khedive then ordered that the foreign Consuls should have jurisdiction in such cases, and that on their demand the native authorities should issue the necessary certificates of manumission. This very liberal provision worked fairly well for a time, till the abolitionist zeal of some of our own agents abused it in the other direction, by liberating every slave who presented himself at the con- sulate with even the flimsiest grievance. Many hundreds were thus set free before the abuse culminated at Mansou- rah, where, in 1873, our consular agent (ia rank not even a Vice-Consul) emancipated no fewer than 1,700 in a single month, and would soon have liberated the whole slave population of the province if the Cairo authorities, de- ferring to a general outcry among the heads of families, had not interfered. In the result, the Khedive indemni- fied the owners of the slaves thus incontinently released, and narrowed the liberating powers of the Consuls for the future to cases in which, after fall inquiry, in concert with the native authorities, positive mal-treatment should be proved. The subjoined extract from a despatch ad- dressed at the time by Nubar Pasha, himself a Christian, and then Egyptian Minister of Foreign Affairs, to her 312 EGYPT AS IT m Majesty's Agent and Consul-General embodies the views then, and there is reason to believe still, held by Ma Highness as to the extent to which this philanthropic in- terference between master and slave can, as yet, be fairly earned : It was impossible for his Highness to issue orders, as seems to have been understood, that it was only necessary for a slave to pre- sent himself before the local authorities in order that these latter should be obliged to give him his papers of liberation. Such an order would have been simply arbitrary on his Highness's part, and would have led to a result exactly contrary to that which he pro- poses, by stimulating the public sentiment against measures calcu- lated to arbitrarily injure private rights which have been legally acquired. This sentiment is all the more founded, since in the East, and especially in Egypt, religion and usage combine to cor- rect, as far as possible, whatever is hard or cruel in the condition of the slave. The European Governments who have abolished slavery in their colonies, have, in the interests of justice, taken into full account the rights acquired by the owners, and it was only by the payment of large indemnities that they put an end to an institution which even their religion condemned. In the orders he had issued, therefore, his Highness could not ignore his duty to protect institutions which are in Egypt consecrated by both relig- ion and custom. For this reason the orders he has always given were intended not to authorise the Government functionaries to set free all slaves asMng for liberty, but only those who may have suffered cruel treatment from their masters — whether they com- plained of this in person or through some other channel. In such cases the local authorities are obliged to inquire into the truth of the complaint, and once the ill-treatment is proved freedom is given. Foreign interference is now, therefore, exercised within these limits, which equitably meet all the fair wants of the sitnation ; since — besides the other ready means of obtaining his liberty which are afforded by volunteering into the army — ^with this right of appeal to her Majesty's SLAVS-LAW, MOSAIC. 313 Consul at Alexandria, Cairo, Port Said, or Suez, every reaUy ill-treated slave iu Egypt holds — — ia his own hand The power to cancel his captivity. Nor is it merely absence of cruelty and general human- ity of treatment whicli both, law and usage thus enforce. It happens so often as to have almost become the rule that, after a few years' faithful service, the slave is volun- tarily liberated, and, if a man, established in some sort of business ; or, if a woman, married to an honest freeman, with whom a suitable dowry secures her ready acceptance and good treatment as a wife. Even where this is not done, slaves bought young (as most of them are) are sel- dom or never sold again, and in nine cases out of ten they are set free at their owner's death. A concubine, too, who bears a child to her master, not only cannot after- wards be sold, but is generally liberated, and often mar- ried by him after the birth, while the chUd is bom free, * and the mother acquires the absolute right of freedom at his death. The wide distinction which aU this constitutes between Eastern and Western slavery results directly from the legislation on which the former is based. This is simply the old Mosaic law which Mohammed found in the Jewish Scripture, and adapted, with few or no material changes, to the new family life of Islam. At first, with Moslems as with Jews, slavery was maintained by the legitimate spoils of war, and in both cases it was only when these ceased that the institution was fed by the purchase of imported captives, found, the buyers were not curious to inquire how or where. In all times Africa has been the chief * Except wtere the mother is the property of one of the master's wives, who has not consented to the concubinage. The child is then a slave, nnles* before its birth the mother has been sold or presented to the father. 314 EGYPT AS IT 18. field of supply, and there is no reason to suppose that the cruelties practised in obtaining the victims and bringing them to market — which form the chief, if not almost the only argument agaiast the mild form of slavery at pres- ent existing in the Levant — are greater now than they were two, three, or four thousand years ago, when the traffic had the sanction first of patriarchal practice, and then of direct Levitical law. Looked at from the stand- point of our higher modem civilisation, it is now of course none the better for this ; but as the scene of the institu- tion is still the "unchanging East," much of whose social life has been stereotyped for a hundred generations, these historical factors in the problem should not be forgotten. StUl, although the conditions of servitude in Egypt are thus comparatively easy, the death-rate among the black slaves especially is, and always has been, higher than in any other class of the population. In the old days of plague they were its first and most numerous victims, and they still suffer from pulmonary diseases to an extent un- known among natives and resident Europeans. Few black slaves, indeed, reach middle age, ten or a dozen years gen- erally sufficing to sweep away a generation, at the end of which the whole have to be replaced. Black slave chil- dren, too, as well as white, bom in the country, mostly die early, and consequently contribute little or nothing to maintain the class. In this double fact lies the vitality of the trade that recruits the service, in spite of its legal abolition some years ago. The most the Government has been able — or has perhaps desired — to do has been to abate the cruelties of the traffic within Egyptian territory, to prohibit — i.e., minimise — the import of slaves by the NUe, and to close the public slave-markets in Cairo, Alex- andria, Tanta, and other towns of the interior where, till within a few years ago, the trade was openly carried on. HOW TEE TRADE IS FED. 815 To effect tlie first of these resulta the old gazzuas, or slave hunts, which even in Abbas Pasha's time were regularly organised by Gfovernment officers in Upper Nubia and the Soudan, have been put an end to, and kidnapping is now believed t6''be practised nowhere withia the limits of es tabUshed Egyptian authority, except in the southern dis- tricts of Sennaar and Kordofan, where the Khedive's fir- man is powerless to completely stamp out a traffic which has formed a staple industry in all these regions since his- tory began. The chief sources of supply are now, there- fore, the great oasis of Darfour, the Shjlook country, and the districts south of it watered by the Bahr-el-Gazel, the Sobat, and the Upper White Nile, over most of which the authority of the Cairo Grovemment is as yet only nominal, and powerless, consequently, to prevent the razzias which feed this cruelest of human traffics. After a long desert journey the caravans from Darfour strike the Nile either at Shendy or Dongola, according as they are intended for Souakim and the Hedjaz, or for Egypt proper. Those from the south-east embark at various points above Khar- toum, and after voyaging down as far as Halfe or Shendy, cross the so-called desert of Bahiuda to Old Dongola, where they again take to the river. In the case of the whole the sufferings and consequent mortality of the vic- tims before they reach the Nile are very great, and form, indeed the main argument against an institution which, however mild in its subsequent working, is condemned in advance by these antecedent horrors. But once within the jurisdiction of what may be called the Nile police, the condition of the captives becomes fairly tolerable. Even in these remote provinces the trade is nominally illegal, but the law is a dead letter, and the authorities directly control and profit by the traffic. Care is accordingly taken that the slaves are not unduly packed in the large nog- 316 EGYPT AS IT IS. gurs, or cargo-boats, wMcli transport tliem down the river, and that they have a sufficiency of food and water. Below the First Cataract, however, the law becomes operative, and thence down to Cairo the importation is strictly contraband ; bnt by this time the numbers have been greatly thinned by sales en route, and the small "parcels" that remain are easUy enough smuggled into Boulak, or landed a few miles higher up. Yery few, it may be here remarked, reach Cairo by way of the Red Sea, as nearly all who are sent to the east coast are shipped across to a ready market in the Hedjaz. Once in the capital the dealers {djellabs) distribute their stock among their agents in various quarters of the city, and there, although the police are supposed to be on the watch to prevent it, buying and selling go on under the thinnest veil of concealment. An intending purchaser goes to one of the private but perfectly well-known entre- p6ts in which the dealers and their slaves are lodged, and after examining the latter, selects what suits him, haggles for a time about the price, and finally closes the bargain then and there, or subsequently through a broker, who receives a small commission for the Job. The djellabs ob- ject to show their ware to Europeans, unless they be in- troduced by a native who is not merely a dragoman ; but with that voucher and the thin disguise of a fez and a Stamboulee coat, a sight of whatever is on hand may be easily enough had. Franks are, of course, now forbidden by their own laws to buy or hold slaves, but the prohibi- tion is not always regarded by residents in the native quarters of the city, where, indeed, a single man cannot hire a house nor obtain lodgings unless he have a female slave. Prices range from 101. or 12?. for a black boy or girl of as many years old, to 101. or lOOl. for an Abyssin- ian girl of from twelve to seventeen or eighteen, and AVERAGE PBIGE8. 317 from 500Z. to 800Z. or even 1,0001. for a high-class Circas- sian. Adult women slaves who have already been in ser- vice are cheaper, unless their skill in cookery, needle- work, or some other useful art, balance the vice of temper or Gfc^isr defect, but for which they are rarely re-sold. The price of males above the age of childhood varies from 201. or 30Z. to 90Z. or 1001., Abyssinian youths and men ranging considerably above negroes. The neutral class of eunuchs has a still higher value, but these are now found in only the very wealthiest Moslem families, the rigorous prohibition which the law enforces against their produc- tion within Egyptian territory having greatly reduced the supply, and correspondingly heightened their price. Till within a few years ago boy slaves were bought on their way down the Upper NUe, and mutilated at Assiout and some other stations — Coptic priests being amongst the most expert operators — but this practice has now been sup- pressed, and the whole of the small yearly importation comes ready-made from Kordofan and Darfour. Most of the few who reach Cairo are bought up for Constantinople, where no Turkish "gentleman's" establishment is "com- plete" without one or more of these neutral police. It may be added that the whole of the slaves imported into Egypt readUy adopt the established faith, and soon be- come the most bigoted and fanatical section of the Moslem population. Such, briefly noted, are the chief conditions of slavery in Egypt.* How widely they differ from those of the institution whose horrors fired our English abolitionists in the beginning of the present century, and twenty years * " It must be borne in mind that it is a mild and harmless traffic as com- pared Tvith slave-trading in other parts of Africa ; and that domestic slavery in Egypt presents few of the horrible features which have been witnessed ia other parts of the world." — Report of Mr. Beardsley, U.S. Consul-Qeneral at Cairo (1873). 318 EGYPT AS IT m. ago tlirilled both Europe and America in the pages of "Uncle Tom's Cabin," need not be repeated. The one is, in short, simply domestic servitude under practically efficient guarantees against ill-treatment, while the other was the cruelest form of tyranny that man ever exercised over his fellow. But the two systems have this in com- mon — that the same initial cruelties are and were neces- sary to feed both. This is not so, of course, as regards the white slaves, who are freely sold by their parents, and are themselves consenting parties to the bargaia. In their case only the ethical sentiment of Christian as opposed to Mohammedan civilisation is offended ; and an apologist of the institution might plausibly enough con tend that this incident of it is vastly less immoral than the promiscuous "social evil" which, whUe sternly repro- bated by Moslem law and public feeling, flourishes under poKce license and almost with social sanction in Europe. It is different, however, with the more numerous class of black slaves, the victims of organised kidnappings and petty tribal wars as cruel as any ever waged on the West Coast ; and the sufferings of these it is, during their cap- ture, and till they reach the NUe, which condemn even the mild domestic servitude that must be supplied at this price as absolutely as the brutal exaggeration of it which fifty years ago cursed our own colonies and the United States. If the class were self -recruiting the case would be very different ; but dependent as it is on barbarities to which every African traveller from Bruce to Schwein- fiirth has borne witness, civilisation pronounces against it the same fiat l f extinction that abolished slavery in the West. Egypt, it is true, is only i:a part answerable for these atrocities in the remote interior, the spoils of which find markets equally at Zanzibar, in the Hedjaz, in Trip- . oU, Tunis, Morocco, and Constantinople ; but her share GORDON PASHA'S COMMISSION. 319 in the responsibility is still heavy enough to famish unfriendly critics with a plausible argument against Egyptian civilisation, and the credit of the Cairo Govern- raent is therefore directly staked on the complete sup- pression of this traffic. That the Khedive is fully sensi- ble of this is shown by the efforts he has already made to reduce it to the narrowest limits ; and, having done this, his determination to put an end to it altogether may be inferred from the enlarged powers he has conferred on Colonel Gordon to crush it everywhere between the Second Cataract and the Equator. No ruler of Egypt could do more than to entrust such a commission to such a man.* But even with Gordon Pasha in the Soudan, and the Khedive ia Cairo, the suppression of the trade and of the institution it keeps alive must needs be slow. Custom and religion have too long consecrated both, for any human power to at once stamp out either. With the gradual suppression, however, of slave-hunting and sell- ing in Darfour and along the Upper NUe, black slave- holding in Egypt proper must perforce die out ; and with the withering of that main trunk of the institution the rest will speedily disappear. In the meantime, while this social revolution is being effected, Egyptian legisla- tion and public sentiment may be fairly credited with having minimised the evils which are inseparable from slavery even in its mildest form. * In a recently published letter on the subject of his new commission, Col. Gordon says :— " I am astounded at the powers he (the Khedive) has placed in my hands. With the Govemor-Geueralship of the Soudan, it will be my fault if slavery does not cease, and if these vast countries are not open to the world. So there is an end of slavery if God wills, for the whole secret of the matter is in the government of the Soudan, and if the man who holds that government is against it, it must cease." CHAPTER XVL FAUNA AND FLOEA. The Camel— The Ass— The Horse— The Ox— The BnfEalo — Sheep and Qoat&— The Pig, " Unclean " to Christian, Moslem, and Jew — Dogs and Cats — Indigenous Wild Animals — Crocodiles and Hippopotami — Abundant Orni- thology — Tame Fowl — Wild Fowl — Ophidians — Fish — Native Trees less numerous than Animals — Palms — Sycamores — Acacias — Tamarisks — Pop- lars — Cypresses — Mulberries — Olives — Exotics very numerous — Their Varieties. The importance of a few of their respective types war- rants a brief chapter on the animals and trees now most commonly met with in Egypt.* Amongst the former, the camel ranks first as, next to the date-palm, the most characteristic feature ia the whole natural panorama. From the sea to the cataract, this most eastern of animals meets the eye everywhere ; stalking with long noiseless stride, cargo-laden, through the narrow streets of Alexandria near the harbour ; or inland, yoked singly with buflEalo or even donkey to the plough ; or yet again higher up, wending their way in solemn file along the high river-bank between Cairo and one or other of the stations at which the great southern caravan routes strike the Nile. The common Egyptian camel is the two-humped Bactrian variety, called by the -Ai'abs djemmel, and is much taUer and stronger than the '* The reader who cares for exhaustive information on this subject may he referred to the chapters contributed by MM. Coquebert, Savigny, and GeofEroy Saint-Hilaire to vols, xix., xxiii., and xxiv. of the Description de VEgypte, and to Captain Shelley's beautiful Handbook to the Birds of Egypt (1873). 320 GENERAL CHARLES GEORGE GORDON Egj/pt. OAMBLS Aim ASSES. 321 more graceful 7iad/fim, or one-humped dromedary, which is only used to carry single riders on rapid journeys across the desert. The chief breeders of the animal are the Ababdeh Bedoween, who share with the Bisharis the great Eastern wilderness south of Kenneh, and provide cattle for most of the caravans on both sides of the river. These dJemmeZ camels usually carry a load of six hun- dredweight, and, though fed for three-quarters of the year on nothkig better than chopped straw and an occa sional handful of beans, they are good for eighteen or twenty years' hard work. It is noteworthy that, al- though the camel was known in Egypt in the time of Abraham, no trace of the animal is found in any of the antique paintings or sculptures. This does not, however, prove that it was even rare in the country, since fowls and pigeons, which abounded from the earliest ages, are equally absent from the monumental records of farmyard stock. The ass is the next most prominent feature in Egyptian animal life. In the field, the constant fellow-worker with the camel, the buffalo, and the ox, he is, out of it, the universal mount of both rich and poor. Between, how- ever, the lordly white or cream-coloured Mecca donkey — as large and powerful as a mule — and his puny, ill-fed, over- worked relative at the other end of the asinine scale, the difference is as great as between the portly Bey or Eflendi who ambles past on the one, and the half-naked feUah bestriding the bare back of the other. Their mar- ket value, too, is proportionate — the one costing as much as 1001. or even 1501., while the other may be bought for nearly as many piastres. The low-caste animals are, of course, far the most numerous ; but even of them some fine specimens, ridden by less wealthy owners or plying for hire, may be seen in Alexandria and Cairo, where — 322 EGYPT AS IT IB. especially since last year's destructive epidemic amongst horses, wMch both, mules and asses escaped — these last now carry three-fourths of the street passenger traffic. The best of these low-caste donkeys are bred in Upper Egypt. The modem Egyptian horse., which is seldom seen out of what may be called the two capitals, is a poor speci- men of his race, and suffers from his double competition with the ass and the camel. Within the past few years, however, the Khedive has made successful efforts to im- prove the breed by crossing it with English blood, and up till the epidemic of last autumn he maintained a fine stud near Cairo, which had already in this way supplied a large number of excellent cavalry mounts. But the mys- terious malady swept away nearly the whole, and in little more than three months destroyed, it was estimated, 600,OOOZ. worth of horses between the mid-Delta and Upper Egypt. His Highness' s own stables, as well as his son's, were almost completely emptied ; and for a time Prince Mehemet Tewfik, the heir apparent, might be seen jogging in every morning to his Ministry of the Interior astride an ambling Tiemdr. Barley and clover being in- dispensable to the Egyptian horse, the dearness of his keep precludes his employment for agricultural work ; and except, therefore, for the better class animals which are fit for saddle or carriage use, the price ranges little higher than for a good (common) donkey or mule. This latter itself is in great local request, and shares with the high-class Hedjaz donkey the honour of mounting the wealthier old-fashioned grandees. The once divine ox has sadly degenerated since a single specimen of his kind sufficed to fiU one of the huge sarcophagi that excite the wonder of the visitor to the Apis mauscleum. Hard work and bad food, however, BUFFALOES, SHEEP, AND GOATS. 323 sufficiently account for tMs decadence ; and now, never pampered nor rose-wreathed, except when a French butcher in Cairo stall-feeds- and bedecks a single victim for the sacrifice of mardi-gras, he toUs three-fourths of the year at the plough or the water-wheel, and ends an unhonoured life by turning into such beef as is seldom met with out of Egypt. It is but fair to add that most of the present stock is not indigenous, but descends from the large importation from Turkey and Bessarabia which followed the desolating murraia of 1863-4. The huffalo of the Delta and NUe Yalley, though hardier and heavier than its bovine relative, has few features in common with its huge wild namesake of the American prairies. It is almost hairless, of a dark slate colour, and with its low-humped back, reflexed horns, and savage-looking face, is the ugliest, yet in reality one of the gentlest, of Egyptian animals. Its milk, besides being largely used fresh, also supplies most of the sour cream {ydourt) that forms a common article of fellah diet, and in the absence of wheel-carriages, its chief work, like the ox, is at the plough or the sakJcia. As sheep and goats herd together, and differ but little in size, colour, and coat, they may be here conjointly men- tioned. Both are very prolific, the gross total of a year's lambs and kids exceeding 800,000 — the sheep especially lambing twice in the twelvemonth, with usually two at a birth. Of these latter the breeds differ, according as the rams were from Barbary, the Sennaar, or the Hedjaz. The first of these three varieties is the most numerous, and is of the mouflon type, with a heavy fat tail, a long bushy chin-tuft, and a thick but coarse oUy fleece of wool. Their horns are large, with a triangular base, and rounded angles terminating in a sharp point. The goat abounds most in the Delta, where the commonest breed 324 EGYPT AS IT 18. is of Syrian origin. The type of the animal in Upper Egypt is smaller, with an abundant fleece of long sUky hair, resembling that of the Angora goat. In both sec- tions these animals supply the greater part of the milk and butter used in the country ; the former is good, but of the latter, as made by fellah dairy- women, the less said the better. As the food of both animals is the same — the weeds and dry acrid plants on the edge of the desert — the flesh of both has the same rather sour flavour, but is still superior to that of the Syrian sheep, which is largely imported and sells at a lower price. 1\epig in Egypt is as " unclean " to all delicate-stom- ached Christians as to the Moslem or the Jew. It divides with the dog and the kite the scavengering of the towns, and what even the Tcelb refuses as too filthy to be eaten, the TcJianzir ravenously devours. In this respect 3,500 years — when, ia the 18th dynasty, the animal first ap- pears in the sculptures — ^have but little improved either its habits or its local repute as an article of food. "As well," says a recent writer, "might you dine on a rat taken from a sewer, or a vulture caught in the ribbed cavity of a camel it was busy in eviscerating. It were aU one to sup with the ghools." No chemistry of nature can, in fact, transmute the filth on which the Egyptian pig generally feeds into fit nutriment for man ; and even the least nice of foreign tourists, therefore, will do well to avoid pork at a Cairene table d'hote. It is chiefly killed and offered for sale by Greek butchers, whose co- religionists do not so generally share the prejudice which the Copts feel quite as strongly as either Arabs or Jews to the flesh of this animal. The dog completes the list of the larger domesticated animals of Egypt, where, as throughout the East, he is also regarded as unclean, though in a much less degree D0Q8 AND OATB. 335 than the swine. In Alexandria and Cairo, as in Stam- bonl, these animals segregate themselves iato sets belong- ing to each " quarter," and woe betide the cnr of one toum who adventures into another. A similar geographi- cal antipathy divides the town dog from his country fel- low, who, nearly as savage as the wolf or the jackal, hovers in packs on the borders of the desert, and lives mainly by nightly forays on stray cattle, or anythiag that can be picked up round the villages. The two septs strictly re- spect each other's boundaries, or, if an individual does not, he pays the penalty of his skin, or even his life, for the trespass. As a rule, European doga do not thrive ia Egypt ; but where they do become accHmatised a buU- terrier, or even a pointer, scatters these native pariahs from his path almost as easily as Gulliver might have cleared his way in Ldlliput. There is, however, a race of large rough-haired dogs near Thebes, who are celebrated for their fierceness and courage. The domestic cat, anciently sacred to Pasht, is still treated with especial kindness ia Egypt, but the hospitals founded by Moslem piety for its care when sick or des- titute have fared even worse than most other charitable foundations, and the garden or court-yard of the Cadi's house is now, as it was forty years ago, when Mr. Lane described this kindly trait of Egyptian character, their only legitimate refuge. The indigenotis wild animals of a country which offers so little cover and feediag-ground as Egypt may be counted almost on the fingers of one hand. The crocodile is now seldom seen below Girzheh, more than 300 miles above Cairo, and the hippopotami still move rarely below the Fourth Cataract ; while on land, the hyena, the jackal, the fox, and (on the borders of the desert) the gazelle, are the chief mammals worth mentioning. Of 326 EGYPT AS IT IS. smaller types only tlie hare, tlie iclmeumon, tlie rat, and two or three different varieties of the lizard — the bigger specimens of which are often palmed off on travellers as young crocodiles — are the only examples that need be noted. If the native mammalia of Egypt, however, are not numerous, its ornithology is abundantly rich. A recent writer catalogues more than a hundred species which fell under his personal observation during a Nile voyage,* and in the works previously referred to in a foot-note, nearly two hundred more will be found scientifically de- scribed. Such a wealth of feathered life cannot be even sampled ia so cursory a notice as the present. It may, however, be said that the chief profusion is to be met with in Lower Egypt ; although in the Said, the district between Beni-hassan and Esneh, and the great plain of Edfoa, also teem with bird-life in swarming variety. Of tame fowl, the hen, the duck, the pigeon, the goose, and especially the turkey, abound everywhere ; but of the whole of these it may be remarked, as indeed also of almost all the mammaUa common to Egypt and Eu- rope, that they are smaller ia the former country than with us. Thus an ordinary Egyptian hen is not much larger than a French or English pullet, and her eggs little more than half the size of those of our own barn-door cacklers. The once sacred ibis still abounds, and ia the marshes of the Delta pelicans and flamingoes are nearly as plentiful as plovers on the Nile shallows, and wherever creeks have been left inland by the subsiding inundation. Snipe, sand-grouse, and especially quails, are also abun- dant — these last on their annual flight north in winter and early spring, when they are netted and shipped aUve by • Smith's AltrcKtims of the Nile, u., 197— 29a BNAKBS, FISH AND INBEOTS. 327 tliotisaiids to Europe — while of aquatic birds the sports man will find a very embarras des ricTiesses. Few or none of the larger ophidia are met with in Egypt, but the asp, the common and homed snakes, and the small spotted viper — aU more or less venomous — are in plenty. They abound on the borders of the desert, but seldom approach the towns or villages, into which, how ever, the hardly less venomous scorpion and a species of black tarantula penetrate freely, hiding in fissures of the walls or under the floor-matting. The performances of ser pent-charmers, though less common than formerly, are still not obsolete ; but the fangs of the snakes played vsdth are in every case extracted. This is done generally by pin- ning the reptile to the earth when caught wifh. a forked stick, and teasing it with a piece of strong woollen cloth, at which it bites, and which is then jerked sharply back, breaking the teeth and destroying the poison-ducts. Fish abound in the NUe, the Birket-el-Korn, Lake Men- zaleh — with the salted produce of which a considerable export trade is carried on with Greece and the Levant — and one or two of the larger canals, but, as compared with those of the sea, they are generally insipid, and, in the case of the numerous unsealed varieties, unwholesome. A few however, such as the hultee, the sJiall, the Mshr, the Mnee, and the Tcarmoot, are more delicate. Alexan- dria and the neighbouring coast consequently supply the greater part of the fish sold there and in Cairo. Lastly, though not least in practical interest to foreign residents or travellers in the country, during three-fourths of the year, flies, mosquitoes, fleas, and other insects of prey — though these last less profusely in the better class houses — swarm everywhere, from the mud-huts of the feUahs to the salons of Abdeen. Whether Moses intro- duced these special plagiies or not, they have survived aU 828 EGYPT AS IT IS. the " dynasties," and are as irritantly active now as wheu Pharaoh Menephtah hardened his heart and would not let the Israelites go. Use, however, seems to have ren- dered the natives indifferent to all three, but to foreigners they are a very sensible drawback on the pleasure of resi- dence ia or travel through the country, from Alexandria up to Nubia, where, strangely, fleas are as rare as snakes in Ireland, and hardly trouble you at aU out of your own dahabeeyah. The native plant-life of Egypt is much less rich in variety than its animals. The purely iudlgenous trees, indeed J hardly exceed half a score. Among these the date-palm holds the first place for number, usefulness, and beauty. Like the camel, it is seen everywhere — singly, in clumps, or in great groves large enough to be called forests.* There are no fewer than twenty-four varieties of this tree, which are, however, grouped into three categories distinguished by the size, shape, and especially the colour of their fruit ; and by the Arabs it is also further distinguished as being of two genders, the male called daTcar and the female entayeTi, the generic name of the tree itself being nakTileh. It needs no cul- ture, but the best fruit is obtained by those that are watered at the base and pruned once a year of the lowest of the five or six rings of long feathery leaves that spread out, fan-like, from its top. In Upper Egypt, where the best dates are grown, the rich clusters of fruit — in shape not unlike huge bunches of grapes — begin to ripen to- wards the end of June, a month earlier than in the Delta. They are gathered while stiU not quite mature, and • Chiefly in eastern Lower Egypt ; one also grows over buried MempMs, and another at Birket-el-Haggi, below Heliopolis, where took place the battle between the Turkish Grand Vizier and General EHeber, which ended in the great French victory known by the latter name. DATE-PALMS AND SYOAMORES. 329 allowed, to fully ripen afterwards off the tree. TTie average yield per tree is about four cantars a year. Besides forming, while fresh, a chief article of peasant diet, especially in the Said, the dates are also dried and kneaded into a sort of bread, for consumption during the other months of the year. Nor is it the fruit alone of the tree that is valuable : its leaves' are worked iuto mats and baskets ; the fibrous sheaths which attach them to the tree into brooms, and various sorts of cordage ; its branches, stripped of the leaves, into roof-coverings, bed-frames, fowl-crates, and chairs ; the trunk itself, which is only cut down when it ceases to produce, serves for house-building and many other purposes ; and, finally, the very date-stones are used to feed the camels and for fuel. The doum-palm, which grows only in Upper Egypt, differs materially from the other tree, in that its bark is smooth, and that a few feet above the ground its trunk divides into two main branches, which again bifurcate ; and this is repeated tOl the whole becomes, in fact, a cluster of trees on one stock. Its fruit also, of which there are two growths a year, is enclosed in a red- dish husk, and is much larger but less delicate than that of nakTileh. The sycamore (Arab, gimmis) is in girth the largest of Egyptian trees, specimens of it from twenty -five to thirty feet in circumference being sufficiently common. Its trunk, on the other hand, is short, and its branchea spread out almost horizontally, forming with their thick evergreen foliage an impervious shade from even a Cairene sun. The beautiful avenue on the Shoubra road is composed of these trees and acacias, which, arching and interlapping overhead, form a splendid natural gaUery nearly four miles long, that even in midsummer affords the cool gloom of a cathedral cloister. Sycamore-wood 330 EOTPT AS IT 18. is rot-proof, and in old times was therefore much used for mummy-cases. It is now chiefly employed in the con- struction of gun-carriages and water-wheels. A coarse kind of fig grows upon the trunk of the tree, but does not ripen unless cut. As the sycamore is the largest, so is the broad-podded acacia (Arab. lebbeTc) the prettiest native tree of Egypt. It is also an evergreen, and, as it grows rapidly if well watered, it has been largely planted round the new villas and along the boulevards which within recent years have so modernised Alexandria and Cairo. What the syca- more, too, has done for the Shoubra road, this tree is fast effecting for the long causeway from the Nile bridge to the Pyramids, which is already nearly as completely shaded for more than half its length by a double row of fine thriving lebteks. The Acacia nilotica, o°i thorny smaU-leaved acacia (Arab, sanf), a congener of the last, is found almost every- where, but attains its finest development ia Lower Egypt. It gives but little shade, but its wood is in great request for boat-buUding, and its fruit, called carat — which does not however grow abundantly below Thebes — is valuable for tanning. In the desert between Cairo and Suez it also exudes a fragrant gum, which is much esteemed by the Arabs. There is another species of the acacia, called ia Arabic fetneh, which flowers from December to March. It attains the height of about twenty feet, but is seldom met with out of gardens. The tamarisk (Arab. tarfeTi) is a hardier tree than any of the preceding, requiring but little moisture, and pro- ducing a thick foliage, nearly equal in shade-value to that o± the lebheJc. It is commonly grown round water- wheels, and its wood is mostly converted into charcoal, its fruit being utilised for dyeing and tanning. FBUIT AND OTHER TREES. 831 WHte and black poplars are also grown in Lower Egypt, but as they afford no shade, and tbelr wood is of little valne, they are not mncli propagated. Cypresses (Arab, sarou) are more nnmeronH, and not being in Egypt, as in Europe, symbols of sadness, they are mnch grown as garden ornaments, sing\*' or in avenues. Black and white mulberry-trees (Arab, toud) abound in eastern Lower Egypt, where the leaves of the lattd are gathered for silkworms, and the fruit of the formel fo( sale as a favourite article of fellah diet in the season. And finally. The olwe-tree (Arab, zeytoum), which chiefly flourishes ia the Fayoum. Mehemet Ali gave a great impulsion to the culture of this tree, but except in the province named, it is not now very largely grown. Its fruit here is coarse, and though good for oil is not much eaten. These are the native trees most commonly seen in Egypt. Of alien, but now perfectly naturalised species, the number is legion, especially since Mehemet Ali culti- vated the splendid gardens of Shoubra, and Ibrahim Pasha similarly converted the island of Rhoda into a nursery of the finest native and foreign trees and plants. The efforts thus made to extend and improve the flora of the country have been continued by the Khedive, with the result that the gardens of his Highness' s palaces, and those of many private proprietors, both at Alexandria and Cairo, are now rich in nearly every variety of tropical and sub- tropical shrubs, which in this bright winterless climate thrive as luxuriantly as in their native soil. Of fruit-trees may be mentioned — ^the banana, which flour- ishes best in Lower Egypt, flowering in October and No- vember, and producing the long luscious fruit so dear to vegetable gourmets ; the fig-tree,, in three varieties, whose 332 EGYPT A8 IT 18. fruit, if not equal to its Smyrna congener, is still good ; the Indian fig, a species of cactus, valued also for its fruit, and which forms pretty and effective hedges ; the pistachio, abundant and very productive ; the orange and lemon, also very plentiful, and the former, especially in the Delta, producing excellent fruit ; two varieties of the pomegranate, the fruit of one of which is deliciously sweet, and that of the other slightly bitter ; the guava, as productive here as iu its natural tropics ; the vine, not a great success, and chiefly cultivated for its raisins, of which one variety equals the best Turkish sultanas ; the walnut, excellent for the qua'lity of its wood, but not pro- ducing much or good fruit, a remark that applies also to the cherry-tree ; and finally, the almond, the pear, the peach, and the apple, which, if not equal to the best varieties of their European namesakes, contribute their fairly good quotas to the abundant fruit-crops of the country. CHAPTER XYH. CLIMATE. QsneiaUy, Dry and Hot — Considerable Difference between Coast and Inteno? — No Real Winter in Egypt — The Khamsin — Mean Snmmer Temperature at Cairo — Scarcity of Eain — Climate of the Isthmus — ^Mean Annual Rates of Temperature — Regularity of the Wind — Egyptian and European Death- rates — The Nile Valley anciently Famous as a Sanitarium — Testimony of Rev. A. C. Smith — Corroborated by Drs. Daliymple, Patterson, Walker, Zagiel, and Pruner — Endemic Diseases — Improving Sanitary Administra- tion — Consensus of Medical Opinion in Favour of Egypt as a Health-resort. The acknowledged value of Egypt as a health-resort suggests some notice of its climatic peculiarities, which, although less markedly, have stUl in common with many other features of the country undergone some sensible changes within recent years. Subject to considerable local qualifications, the climate of Egypt may be generally described as hot and dry. The description applies least perfectly to the lower Delta, the situation of which, along the sea, greatly tempers the elsewhere general heat, and at the same time gives to its atmosphere a degree of moisture which is unknown in the Middle and Upper provinces.* Thus in Alexandria, where there is an abundant rainfall between October and February, the thermometer seldom ranges above the aver- age of Southern Europe, and even in the dog-days keeps fairly down to "temperate." In Cairo and throughout Middle Egypt, the rain diminishes to slight showers on eight or ten days a year, and the mean temperature of the twelvemonth is nearly 3° higher than along the coast; while in Upper Egypt rain is an almost unknown phe- * According to Dr. Pruner, the moisture of Alexandria is one Ti/wnd/red and <-two tlmea that of Cairo. 333 334 EGYPT A8 IT 18. nomenon, and the heat, which during the summer months is intense, never cools below a point that excludes winter from the list of Egyptian seasons altogether. In Alexan- dria, and more rarely in Cairo, European residents some- times light a fire during December and January ; but in neither city is there, in our Western sense, properly any winter at aU. Spring, summer, and autumn are, in fact, the only seasons known to the whole land of Egypt. The first of these begins in February, when the fruit- trees blossom and the atmosphere gradually acquires a delightful warmth. It is, however, during this otherwise charming season that occurs the hot Tdiamsin* wind whose distinctive effects have gained for it a bad renown among atmospheric phenomena. This wind, or rather series of vdnds, which the Arabs also call simoom, blows intermittently from the end of March till the middle or third week of May. It comes from the far south, or more exactly SSE., and after traversing the burning sands of Africa at a time when the sun' s rays f aU almost perpen- dicularly, it reaches Egypt laden with all the noxious va- pours of the desert. On its approach, the sky, normally so blue and cloudless, becomes black and heavy, the sun darkens into a dim violet-coloured disc, and what is at first but a light warm breeze rapidly increases into a blast hot and dry as from an oven, which shrivels up every green thing, warps and cracks wood, renders breathing difficult, and is generally hurtful to both vegetable and animal life. Happily this pernicious sirocco lasts only from twenty-four * So calJ.ed from the fifty or more days during whicli it blows at frequent Intervals. The name simoom (poison) is more especially given to its hottest blasts, which seldom last more than a quarter of an hour or twenty minutes. A very vivid description of this latter will be found in the first chapter of Mr. Palgrave'a Central and Eastern Arabia. In Egypt, however, these hot winds have within recent years been much less frequent, and their action Ipss severe than formerly.^ THE "KnAMSm." 335 to forty-eight hours at a time, during wMch all out-door work is suspended and the inhabitants confine themselves to their houses, and vainly endeavour to shut out the fine unpalpable dust that fills the air, and, according to the Arab saying, is so penetrating that it will enter even an egg through the pores of its sheU. These are the winds which in the unsheltered desert have so often proved fatal to whole caravans, and more than once to entire armies. They are not however peculiar to Egypt, but blowing from different points occur also in other parts of Africa, in the Syrian desert, the Arabian peninsula, Babylonia, Persia, and southern India. It is at the sair.e time remarkable that this southerly breeze, so perni- ciously hot in spring, is during the winter months the sharpest and coldest that blows — the reason being that in December and January the solar rays faU more ob- liquely on the desert, and the wave of air which then descends on Egypt is chilled by its passage over the snowy highlands of Abyssinia. Hardly has tho last hot breath of the TcJiamsin swept away northwards towards Constantinople — which it reaches tempered by the Mediterranean, but stiU most unhealthily warm — than tho Egyptian spring at once ripens into summer. In Upper Egypt the heat then be- comes trying even to the natives, and almost unbear- able by Europeans. Lady Duff Grordon, however, testi- fies that even as far south as Thebes, by taking proper precautions and excluding light and air during the hot- test hours of the day, as is the universal rule in all tropi- cal latitudes, she suffered no inconvenience from the heat. At Cairo, the mean summer temperature is about 92° Fahr., but it sometimes, though rarely, ranges ten and even twelve degrees higher. But this latter extremity of heat is seldom experienced except in the more confined 336 EGYPT AS IT IS. districts of the Said, wMcli suffer also from the absence of the heavy dews that nocturnally irrigate the parched surface of the Delta and Middle Egypt. The northerly summer breezes waft in the evaporations of the Mediter- ranean, and these, suspended in the atmosphere during the day, are deposited at night in an abundant dew that moistens and cools the air, and in the morning again evaporates in light flaky clouds. The summer may be said to last till the last week of September," when even in the Upper Valley the heat ceases to be inconvenient, and the long genial autumn, which extends throughout our European winter, begins. For the first five or six weeks of it, light easterly winds prevail, which render the continuing warmth damp and muggy, and make this the most unhealthy period of the Egyptian year. But thence on till February the climate is everywhere delightfully mild, and in Upper Egypt balmy beyond anything known elsewhere in northern latitudes. In the Delta, as has been mentioned, it rains frequently and heavily during these months, but the mean general temperature of the season is only 12° or 15° below our English summer heat, and the air is every- where dry and invigorating except in immediate prox- imity to the sea. It might have been expected that the great number of trees planted by Mehemet AH, and the constantly extending area of the canals, would have largely increased the rainfall inland, but a comparison of the meteorological observations taken during the French Expedition with those more recently made shows that there has been no sensible augmentation. Thus, between 1798 and 1800 inclusive, the number of days on which rain feU averaged fifteen ; whUe between 1835 and 1839 the average was twelve, during which time the actual fall was reduced from 0.69 inches in 1835, and 0.38 inches is 1836, to TBBRMOMETBIO AVERAGES. 337 0.60 inclies, 0.44 inclies, and 0.12 inclies in 1839. In 1871 the number of rainy days in Cairo was niae, dnruig which it actually rained only 9 hours 8 minntes. At Alexan- dria the mean for the three years 1847-8-9 was 7.50 in. against 8.92 in. for 1867, 13.18 in. for 1868, 6.22 in. for 1869, 2.86 in. for 1870, 6.61 for 1871, and 11.14 in. for 1872. In the Isthmus of Suez, however, the cUmate has been sensibly modified by the opening of the Canal and the extension of cultivation along it, the summer being now cooler and the winter warmer than even ten years ago.* This improvement in the temperature of the Isthmus is attributed to the infiltration of water into the less ele- vated parts of the desert, but it is also no doubt largely owing to the vegetation which has sprung up along the banks of the Canal, and over the broad belt of reclaimed land which is now irrigated by the fresh-water canaL The nearly constant regularity of the temperature is Bhown by a comparison of recorded observations extend- ing, at intervals, over more than a century. Thus, an analysis of Niebuhr's observations from November, 1761, to August, 1762, gives the following mean rates for those ten months : 1761— November Deg. P. 67 78 December 58 16 1762 — January February March 56 21 58 66 61 April May June 69 61 77 6 79 77 July August 85 82 88 42 • During the first years of the work on the Canal, before the water waa admitted, the mercuij twice fell below zero, a degree of cold which has nni occurred since. 338 MGYPT AS IT IS. A similar analysis of tlie record kept at Cairo by the scientific staff of the French Expedition (as given by Clot Bey in centigrade degrees) shows the following for 1799 :— Deg. a January 13 3 February ... 14 March 17 5 April 23 2 May 24 3 June 28 6 July 30 2 August 29 September ... 38 3 October 23 7 November ... 18 8 December ... 16 2 Hfearly forty years later the observations of M. Des- trouches, a medical officer in the service of the Viceroy, gave the following annual means for the five years 1835-9, also in centigrade degrees : — Deg. C. Deg. C. 1835 . . . ... 22 4 1838 , . . ... 22 4 1836 . . . ... 22 1839 . . . ... 22 1 1837 . . . ... 23 or a mean for the whole five years of about 22° 4' C, equal to 70° Fahrenheit, which, it will be seen, corre- sponds closely with the result of the register kept at H.M. Consulate, Cairo, during 1870-71-72, when the following monthly averages for the three years were recorded : — January February March April Deg. P. . 54 . 54 . 63 . 68 . 80 THEBMO METRIC AVERAGES. 339 Deg. P June -.0 »•• ••• ...84 July • ■ ■ ) • • • • • ...85 August .. 86 September . . . .. 82 October ••• ••• ••• .. 73 November . . . December . . . ••• Q** ••* ••• ••• ••• .. 66 .. 59 or a mean temperature throughout the period of about 71° Fahr. A similar register kept at the Alexandria Con- sulate during 1873 gives an average of 69^^° for the year. While these figures may be taken to represent the aver- age daily heat throughout Middle Egypt — ^itself nearly a mean of the whole country — the night temperature is from 8° to 12° lower, the fall rapidly following sunset and continuing tUl sunrise. HygrometricaUy, the four months of December, January, February, and March, over which Nile tours generally extend, compare with our English summer months of June, July, and August as about 56 to 81 ; and, generally, the humidity of the atmosphere varies with the winds, being greatest when the wind is W. to NE., less when it is FW. to E., and least of aU when S. to SW. It need hardly be said that frost and snow are almost unknown. Hailstorms, descending from the Syrian hUls and sweeping across Palestine, sometimes reach the Egyptian frontier, and Consul Stanley reports having seen thin ice on the pools near Suez, but these are rare incidents which happen only once or twice in a century. Like nearly all physical phenomena in Egypt, the course of the wind, so variable in our climate, is there almost strictly periodical. In point both of force and dura- tion, the northerly breezes predominate, blowing nearly nine months out of the twelve.* They continue with * And thence anciently called " Etesian.' 340 EGYPT AS IT 18. little intermission from May till September, when about tbe autunmal equinox tbey veer round to th.e east, where they remaia for nearly six weeks with only slight devia tions. The current then sets north-east, with occasiona' changes to north-west, followed at intervals during De- cember and January by light southerly gales which, as has been said, are the coldest of the year. Thence on to the spring equinox, the eastern current once more pre- vails, till, as regularly as the rise and fall of the Nile, the baleful TcTiamsin again blows from the south. A comparison of the Egyptian death-rate with those of the chief European States affords a ready test of the sig- nificance of these climatic phenomena. The latest official returns report an average annual rate of 2.64 per cent, for the whole country, against 2.57 for England, 2.80 for France, 3.96 for Prussia, 3.34 for Belgium, and 4.08 for Spain. Cairo, however, with a population of 349,883, shows the high rate of 4.66 per cent., and Alexandria, with 212,034, a rate of 4.09, being a difference in favour of the whole country of 2.02 against Cairo, and 1.45 against Alexandria. This heavy adverse balance against the capital may, at first sight, seem strange, in view of the admitted healthiness of its climate, and the immense recent improvement in its sanitary condition. But it is quite sufficiently accounted for by the proportion of deaths occurring among natives who, for religious or other motives, flock from all parts of the country to Cairo to die, and by the deaths of resident Nubians and Sou- danis, amongst whom the comparative cold of Middle Egypt develops pulmonary disease during the winter months. The exceptional moisture of Alexandria and its still very defective drainage equally explains the fatal excess of that city's death returns over the mean rate of the whole country. But Egypt, as a whole, compares BEY. A. 0. SMITE'S LEPOBT. 341 favourably witli aU the States above mentioned, except Great Britain, and as the sanitary science of the country is as yet in its infancy, the climate may claim the chief credit of the fact. Hence both the ancient and modem celebrity of the NUe YaHey as a favourite health resort. Decaying Thebes became fashionable in this way nearly two thou- sand years ago, when Celsus sent his rich Roman patients to recruit, in its bahny and yet bracing air, the energies shattered by Augustan luxury and dissipation ; and mod- em medical opinion has wholly endorsed the estimate of the KUe climate then formed by the author of the De Medicind. Of the mass of lay testimony supplied by books of travel, one quotation from a recent scholarly and suggestive work will suffice: — "I unhesitatingly as- sert," says the Rev. A. C. Smith, summing up the result of his personal experience during a four months' tour in Upper Egypt and I^Tubia, "that the dry warmth, the lightness of air, the total absence of fog or damp, and the magnificence of the weather, far exceeded my most san- guine expectations. We arrived in Egypt early in De- cember ; we left it at the beginning of April, and during the whole of that long period we never saw a drop of rain, or felt any moisture in the atmosphere ; we scarcely ever saw a cloud, but the brightest of skies, the most brilliant of suns, the balmiest of nights, attended us throughout. I do not mean to imply that it never rains in Upper Egypt, though Herodotus says almost as much, and proves the general rule by a single excep- tion, which he caUs a strange prodigy, when in the reign of Psammenitus, a few small drops of rain feU at Egyp- tian Thebes, 'a thing which had never happened be- fore, and had never happened again to his time, as the Thebans themselves testify.' But this is evidently a 342 EOTFT AS IT IS. mistake, as the inhabitants of modem days acknowledge, and as the watercourses in the neighbouring hUls prove, and the gutters or gurgoyles in some of the temple roofa clearly intimate ; although a shower of rain is by no means a frequent occurrence, and, as I have said, we ex- perienced nothing of the kind during our whole tour. Then in Upper Egypt and ISTubia we felt such heat as to many may seem insupportable, and it is to some per- sons distasteful, but to me was most delightful, even though I took active exercise on shore with my gun in the hottest part of every day To myself in- dividually the climate of Egypt has been under Provi- dence of the greatest value ; indeed, of such advantage has it proved, that I am reaping the benefit of it now, and so thoroughly set up was I by that wiater's roasting that I have been able to remain in England since during the winter months as I had not previously done for years ; and I feel bound to record that blessing, as an induce- ment to others to make trial of the same remedy, which has operated so beneficially for me." * English and Continental medical specialists bear abun- dant similar testimony. Reporting the result of a per- sonal investigation made ia 1860, Dr. Dalrymple says of the climate above Cairo : "Day succeeds day in a nearly constant round of bright cheer- ing sun, soft breezes, and blue sHes ; the heat rarely (though some- times at noonday) too great to be quite comfortable ; the early mornings just cool enough to make the use of a shawl or overcoat wise for those who are not in active exercise. . . . The diay passes in quiet enjoyment in the serenest atmosphere ; health is drunk in as you glide along, evening comes on rapidly, and again the shawl or overcoat becomes an absolute necessity, not because of absolute cold, but on account of the relative reduction of temperature that then takes place, . . . Here the same conditions may be reckoned year after year. There may be winters in which the cold or heat * The Nile and iti Banks. voL ii,. -pp. 174, 5, 7. DR. PATTERSON'S REPORT. 343 will be more or less, but the anxious hope of the invalid is never frustrated. The atmospheric phenomena are very constant, and in %ypt yon hear little or nothing of that extenuation of the climate which in Italy, Spain, or the South of France so often meets the remonstrant disappointed health-seeker, ' Oh 1 such a season aa this was never known.' .... The notes taken by me show that the favourable climate of the Said is continued, and in some re- speetfe improved, in ISTubia. The air is much dryer even than in Upper Egypt, and the rapidity with which the reservoir of the wet bulb thermf^meter exhausted was very remarkable. It is more bracing trom its closer contiguity to the desert, and there is far less dew at night. ... It is scarcely possible to imagine anything more invigorating and life-giving than the air of the desert ; there is a dryness and elasticity about it like nothing else ; and the sense of renovation when breathing it round the Mokattem hills [near Cairo], or further on in the actual wilderness, is to the languid invalid like a new lease of life." * A relatively still better authority, Dr. Patterson — for several years in the Egyptian medical service, and now surgeon-superintendent of the British Seamen's Hospital, Constantinople — writes seven years later : "Extending over so many degrees of latitude, and possessing varied physical peculiarities, Egypt necessarily presents many grades of climate. All observation, however, proves that the whole of Midtde and Upper Egypt has only one uniform charac- teristic, viz., great dryness and purity of atmosphere, and almost total freedom from rain. The seasonal changes are performed with such remarkable regularity, that, year after year, the same conditions of climate may be safely calcalated upon. Eain is sel- dom seen above Cairo, and even there is rare. The invalid has * Meteorological and Medical Observations on the Climate of Egypt, pp. 13, x3, 15, 17. This is undoubtedly one of tlie best recent essays on Egyptian climatology, but it no longer accurately describes either the sanitary or gene- ral administration of the country. The sixteen years since 1860 have vastly advanced and improved both ; and, with them, the hotel accommodation of which Dr. Dalrymple then so justly complained. In this respect Abbatt's and the Hotel d'Europe, at Alexandria, and Shepheard's, the New Hotel, and the Hotel de Nil, at Cairo, now leave little — except lower prices — ^to be de. sired. S44 EGYPT AS IT T8. not there to consider how many fine days he may be able to enjoy, as, from the paroxysmal character of the deviations from the gene- ral conditions aboye described, and from their being little fre- quent, they are not, in a practical sense, to be noted. The free- dom from an excess of humidity is a grand feature of the Nile climate, except at the time the river recedes ; and, doubtless, to this its health invigorating properties are chiefly due. This dryness renders it very easily acted on _by the sun's rays, the application and withdrawal of which produce the very marked differences of temperature so characteristic of the various periods of the day. During the hottest period of summer the morning air is deliciously cool, the same varying range of temperature existing. Thus it is not uncommon during the summer months to have a difference of 20° Fah., more between morning and midday, and 8° higher still between ten and three o'clock p.m. — the hottest period of the day. The changes produced at night by the rapid radiation of the heat from the earth's surface, under a cloudless sky, are well marked in Egypt. The mean yearly temperature of Cairo is generally stated at 73° Pah. My own observations indicate about 3° lower. The thermometer in Cairo seldom falls lower than 40° Fah., but it is often lower on the Nile. January is the coldest month of the year, or, perhaps what is more correct, the latter half of Decem- ber and the first half of January, as toward the latter half of Jan- uary there is a gentle and steady increase of the thermometer dur- ing the warmer parts of the day. The average of the month of April approaches nearest to the mean temperature of the year. The humidity is, of course, regulated by the rise and fall of the Nile ; and thus explains the discrepancies of authors — some stat- ing November, others December, to be the most humid month. It is at the time of inundation, and when the receding Nile leaves large tracts of country uncovered, heat fogs are common ; the mornings then are harsh and cold, and the evening damps prevail to a considerable degree. This condition is also observed m the desert, in the neighbourhood of the cultivated lands, but not to such an extent as near the river. The sun, even there, at about ten o'clock a.m., acquires sufficient power to disperse the fog, and then follows the beautiful serene day so much enjoyed by the in- valid. The summer heats are greatly tempered by the pleasant northerly breezes, the Etesian winds, which range from N. to NE. These winds blow with great regularity after the period of tho BB PATTMRSOira BEPOBT. 345 hkamsin, or hot winds, till November. ... It is many yoara since a ■well-marked Tchamsin wind has passed over Egypt, and old residente agree in saying that it is much less frequent than for- merly, and certainly much less severe. . , . After the period of the khamsin there is a gradual increase of the ordinary temperature,, till the thermometer reaches its average summer height of 95° Fah., with a considerable variation at night and morning. This heat, as already observed, is greatly tempered by the northerly winds, which bring, in the latter part of the season, light a ad re- freshing dews from the Mediterranean. The atmosphere is, how- ever, very dry until about the end of November, when the damps from the lands uncovered by the receding Nile begin to appear. Cairo and its neighbourhood has then a temperature about 70°, and the morning and night variations are not so great, being regu- lated by the humidity. A register kept on the Nile during a trip to Thebes in November, gives the average daily temperature of the observations, taken at the hottest periods of the day, as high as 78° Fah., while in Cairo a similar series shows 3° higher. Such is the general condition of the climate of Middle and Upper Egypt for the greater portion of the year. . , . The climate of Alexan- dria demands a brief consideration. Surrounded by water, it dif- fers in every respect from the other parts of Egypt already de- scribed. From November to March, the rain falls in torrents for several days at a time. Many fine days, however, intervene. The mean temperature of the year is below that of Cairo and the Nile, and is much less variable. The moisture also of its atmosphere is vastly greater. Alexandria formerly possessed a great reputation for salubrity, and was much recommended by the ancient physi- cians for diseases of the chest. It is probable that the ancient city was not exposed to such deleterious influences as at the present day, and that its climate was modified by a different condition of cultivation and drainage, as it by no means corresponds to its ancient reputation in this respect. Many cases of chest diseases certainly derive benefit from its climate, but they are of a special character. The general character of the climate of Alexandria may be described as being harsher than that of other parts of Egypt, and as unfitted for debilitated constitutions coming from Europe. Invalids returning from the Nile may, however, enjoy with great advantage a few weeks' stay at Alexandria, i. e., from about the begii ning of April to late in May. The temperature ia 346 EGYPT AS IT IS. not then higli, nor the humidity excessiTO. The days are bright and sunny, and the variations of the thermometer not great. The other parts of the Delta correspond in their meteorological phe- nomena to Alexandria, the temperature being a degree or two higher."* A yet later observer, Dr. Dunbar Walker, writing in 1873, bears similar but still more emphatic testimony : "I have (he says) after visiting most of Europe, parts of Asia and Africa, come to the concJnsion, with many others, that Egypt holds out the greatest advanUiges. Nice has got its advocates ; Mentone is considered by otb^-r? to be unrivalled in producing a salutary effect on phthisical u.rA other patients. San Eemo has been upheld, and seems to be drawing away numbers from her sis- ter towns in the Kiviera. Other authorities point to Italy as possessing a climate unequalled by any other part of the world. Spain has been shown., especially the southern coast, to outstrip other winter sanitaria. Sicily, Algiers, Malta, and Tangiers have all their advocates, but weighing all things, Egypt has advantages that far outshine any other winter resort, and will give results never afforded by any other place frequented by invalids, nay, even by any other spot on the habitable globe during the winter months. If Egypt is selected, I can say, that to sufferers from phthisis no climate offers so many attractions as those experienced in Cairo. That the disease is not met with in the town cannot be recorded, but that it is comparatively rare amongst native Cairenes can be asserted. Those amongst whom it is found are generally natives of Nubia or the interior of Africa, whose susceptibility to contract the disease is considerable from the reduced temperature from what they have been accustomed to, and the position they hold aa slaves. ... As regards the advantages and drawbacks of a Nile trip for the invalid, we notice, with reference to the increase of temperature, that in the portion of the Nile between Cairo and Siotit, the mean is 3° higher than in Cairo. On the river still higher up, from Siodt to Assouan, it rises another degree, and in Fubia still another degree, so that at the Second Cataract we have a mean of 4° higher than in the Delta [Middle Egypt ?]. The air * Egypt and the NUe : considered as a Winter Resort for PvZmona/ry and ■>ther rnvnlid.1. pp. 12-13, 19-30, 31-85. KNDEMia BISBASBS 347 18 dryer, purer, and more bracing the farther we proceed up the river, and it has been considered that if there is any air or climate in the world that offers advantages for the cure and non-develop- ment of phthisis, Nnbia possesses it." * These tkree writers concur in recommending the cli- mate of Egypt as of the highest remedial value, not only in all varieties of pulmonary disease, but also in rheumatic, renal, and brain disorders, and their opinion is strongly supported by Dr. Prince Zagiel, an eminent Eussian physician, in his monograph Bu Climat de VEgypte, as also by Dr. Pruner, in his TopograpTiie Medicale du Caire, and by other Continental specialists. On the other hand, if the Egyptian climate is thus powerfully preventive and curative of many of our most serious European maladies. Clot Bey enumerates no inconsiderable list of endemic disorders from which our colder latitudes are mostly or wholly free. Amongst these, plague formerly enjoyed the bad pre-eminence; but of this terrible scourge, which used to break out ^■pi- demically at nearly regular intervals of six, eight, or ten years, there has happily been no visitation for more than fifty years — partly, perhaps, because of the stricter quar- antine enforced against Barbary and the Hedjaz, where it is also endemic, and in both of which it has appeared more than once during that period. From the Pharaohs to the Viceroys, however, the plague has been one of the strictly native maladies of Egypt ; its inducing cause and its treatment have alike baffled medical skill, and it may be doubted if mere hygienic reforms will ever perma- nently eradicate it. Of the commonly prevalent dis- orders, opMTialmia is the most general and constant, with the result that the population of Egypt offers probably a larger proportion of whoUy or haK blind than that of any * Egypt an a Healtli Resort, pp. u9, 70, 90. 848 EGYPT AS IT 18. other country in the world. The great strength of the solar rays during the summer months — when the disease is worse — the clouds of fine dust brought down by the hot winds, and the neglect of cleanliness have all been variously assigned as the cause of this distemper ; but the first two at least of these surmises are negatived by the facts that in Upper Egypt and Nubia, where the heat is much greater, the affection is very rare ; and that in the desert where the Tchamsin dust equally abounds, it is alto- gether unknown. Fortunately, this native scourge seldom attacks Europeans, and when it does a few applications of sulphate of zinc will suffice to check and cure it. The vegetable diet of the fellaheen renders dysentery— toUovf- ing diarrhoga — another common, and at certain seasons destructive malady, but from this again ordinary dietetic care effectually preserves foreigners. Several varieties of sTcin disease, including leprosy — which appears, however, to be dying out in Egypt, though still very prevalent in its worst type in Crete — are also common amongst the na- tives ; but these, too, rarely or never affect Europeans, and need not be feared by either foreign residents or tourists. The great extension of hospital accommodation in Cairo and Alexandria within recent years has sensibly miti- gated the effect of these endemic disorders, and as the sanitary administration further improves, a corresponding reduction of the national death-rate may be reasonably expected. Even as it is, Egypt, we have seen, compares favourably with the healthiest countries of Europe, and as a resort for foreign invalids offers climatic attractions which a consensus of medical opinion declares to be unique. CHAPTER XVm. THE 80IJDAN. ItB QeograpMcal Area — Dongola — Berbera — Taka — Shendy and Halfe— Sen- naar— Khartoum — Kordofan— Darfoui — Tlie Shillook Country — Darfertit and Donga — Sir S. Baker's Expedition — Colonel Gordon — Successful Re- sults of his First Expedition— His new Commission as Governor-General— Expressed Determination to Extinguish the Slave Trade — The Opposing Difficulties — Antiquity and Wide-spread Sources of the Traffic— Trade of the Soudan — Its Export Routes — Development that may be Expected with Improved Communications — Results already Achieved — The Khedive's Claim on European Confidence. In "Western geography Mgritia, or tlie Country of tlie Blacks, comprises the great expanse of eastern Africa between Nubia and the Equator, and westwards any- where beyond Lake Tchad to the Niger. But the Egyp- tian Soudan, though covering nearly the whole of this area southward, is bounded westwards by Darfour, ex- tending on the east to the Red Sea, and thence down past Souakim and Massowah, overlapping Abyssinia, to Ber- bera and Harrar. Of the great group of provinces thus collectively named, Dongola, the first, is one of the finest ; for while its southern districts are within the zone of the annual rains, it is abundantly watered northwards by the over- flow of the Nile over an area of nearly fifteen mUes, known as the Wady-Jaijar, or great Dongolese plain. Some miles above Old Dongola, the former capital of the province, the river sweeps round to the north-east, and makes what is called the Great Bend, enclosing north- ward the fine peninsula savannah mis-named in our maps 349 R50 EGYPT AS IT IS. the desert of BaMuda, peopled by the Hussaneeya, Esoo- Arab, Fadneah, and Omeah Bedoween, who rear large flocks of sheep, goats, and camels, and after the rains cultivate considerable tracts of land. In the course of this great curve of nearly 400 miles, the Fourth and Fifth Cataracts are passed, and in lat. 17° 37' 'N., in the country of the Berbers, which is also a province of great industrial capabilities, the Nile receives the Taccaz6, or Atbara, its largest and last affluent hence to the Mediterranean. From this point northwards, for more than 1,400 miles, not even a rivulet swells the volume of the great stream -"an unexampled instance," says Humboldt, "in the hydrographic history of the world." During this long course it is exposed to the evaporation of a burning sun, drawn off into a thousand canals, absorbed by porous banks and thirsty sands, dnink of by every living thing, and yet, strange to say, it pours into the sea a larger volume than it displays between the Cataracts a thousand miles away. South-east of Berber lies the fine province of Taka, one of the most fertUe portions of Egyptian territory any- where east of the NUe. It is cultivated throughout, and from Kassala, its chief tovsru, carries on through Souakim a considerable trade with Djeddah and the Hedjaz. The Atbara gives its name to the extensive tract in- cluded withia the eastern basin of that river and the fork formed by its junction with the 'Nile. This includes the provinces of Shendy and Halfe (the ancient Meroe), both of which consist of weU-watered table-lands, broken by low ranges of hills, and still rich, now as of yore, in the elements of great material prosperity. Shendy, the chief town of the double province, derives importance from its situation on the caravan route from Sennaar and the gold countries, and also on that from Darfour and Kordofan BENNAAR AND EOBDOFAN'. 351 to Sonakim, through which the Red Sea trade of the southern provinces is still mainly carried on. At Khar- toum—sixty nules above the Sixth and last Cataract, if we except the recently discovered falls of Duffli above Gondokoro— the Blue and Wliite Niles (Bahr-el-Azeck and Bahr-el-Abiat) join, the former flowing down north- west from its sources in the Abyssinian hUls, and the latter — now recognised as the true Nile — nearly due north from the remote basin of the equatorial lakes.* Here begins the northern frontier of Sennaar, which may be roughly described as bounded east and south-east by the Taccaze and Abyssinia, westwards by the White NUe — which separates it from Kordofan — and south by the mountains of Fazoglou. It is for the most part a great undulr ; plain, increasing in elevation southwards, and, especi. near the rivers, abounding in forest. In the neighbourhood of Khartoum the soil is mostly sandy, mixed with Nile mud ; but farther south it becomes a deep bed of argillaceous marl, which, though dismally sterile-looking during the dry season, blooms with abun- dant crops after the autumnal rains. Its inhabitants, of a mixed Arab and Abyssinian race, are much superior to the negro ; and, altogether, Sennaar forms potentially perhaps the finest of the Upper Nile provinces of Egypt. Due west, beyond the White Nile, lies Kordofan, much smaller in area, but differing little in its chief physical fea- tures from Sennaar. In addition to the tropical rains, it is abundantly watered by wells ; so that even in the dry season — from September to April — ^it presents in a much less degree the parched and barren aspect exhibited by the latter province during the same months. Its culti- vable area is roughly computed at about 12,000 square * At their junction the Blue Nile is considerably the broader of the two^ being 7G8 yards -n-iile, wUHp tlip Wliitp, nr tmo. >Tilp Is only 483. 352 EGYPT AS IT 18. miles, and its population at 500,000, as against respective- ly 60,000 and 1,500,000 for Sennaar; but such reckoning can at best be only approximate, as no complete survey or census of these regions has been made since their an- nexation to Egypt. West again of Kordofan, separated from it by the nar- row strip of desert peopled by the Bagara and Hamran Arabs, lies Darfour, which was only annexed in 1875, after the brief campaign provoked by the forays of its Ameer across the Egyptian border. This latest addition to the dominion of the Khedive is in reality a large oasis, wholly enclosed in the Sahara, and lying roughly between lat. 10° and 16° N., and long. 26° and 29° E. It has been visited by very few European travellers, and neither its exact extent, population, nor chief physical features are at all accurately known. Its capital is a town called El- Paschir, in about lat. 14° 10' N"., in a plateau about 2,200 feet above the level of the sea. Towards the south the country is hilly, the principal elevation being a mountain ridge called Marrah, which traverses the province longi- tudinally, and is the source of numerous springs. South- wards it is level, sandy, and except during the annual rains — which begin early in May, and last from two to three months — nearly destitute of water. It produces, how- ever, abundant crops of wheat, millet, rice, maize, sesame, and tobacco. Cotton also is grown, but only in small quantities, as, either from the want of water or the un- suitableness of the soil, it does not flourish, the plant rarely reaching more than a foot and a half in height. There is, however, thriving vegetation everywhere, and after the first rains the country is said to be "one sheet of green." The fauna are similar to those common in the same latitudes east of the Nile. Copper and iron are said to abound in the hUls ; but the principal wealth of DABFOUB AND TEE BSILLOOK OOWITTBT. 353 the iiihabitaiits consists in cattle, wMch, in tlie absence of coin, form tlie chief barter-currency of the country. Besides the traffic carried on with the inland countries of Africa, it maintains a considerable trade with Egypt and the Hedjaz, exporting ivory, ostrich feathers, hides, drugs, copper, and especially slaves ; against imports of silk, cotton cloths, glass wares, trinkets, sword blades, firearms, and a variety of other goods. The bad distiac- tion of Darfour hitherto has been as the chief entrepot and point de depart of the Central African slave trade, whence most of this nefarious traffic down the NUe val- ley and to Arabia, through Souakim and Massowah, has been fed. The total area of Darfour is roughly estimated at about 450,000 square miles, with a population variously reckoned at from 3,000,000 to 5,000,000. A complete sur- vey and census of the country are now being made by order of the Khedive, but none of the results thus far are as yet available for publication. Wedged in between southern Kordofan and Sennaar, the ShJllook country, which was only finally subjected to Egyptian authority in 1870, extends, in a strip of coun- try some 300 miles long by hardly a dozen broad, to the junction east and west of the Sobat and Bahr-el-Grhazal rivers with the White Nile, about 700 mUes above Khar- toum. Its inhabitants, nominally Mussulmans but in reality Pagans, are perhaps physically the finest, as they are the fiercest, of the Upper Nile tribes. "No known part of Africa," says Dr. Schweinfurth, "scarcely even the narrow valley of the Nile in Egypt, has a density of population so great ; but a similar condition of circum- stances, so favourable to the support of a teeming popu- lation, is perhaps without parallel in the world. Every- thing which contributes to the exuberance of life here finds a concentrated field — agriculture, pasturaffP. fishinar, 36'4 EGYPT AS IT 18. and tie chase. Agricultiire is rendered easy by the re- currence of the rainy season, by irrigation effected by the rising of the river, assisted by numerous canals, and by an atmosphere ordinarily so clouded as to moderate the radiance of the sun, and to retaia throughout the year perpetual moisture."* Fashoda, the chief Government station, is already the centre of a considerable trade, in which raw cotton — now largely grown, and for the cul- tivation of which the soU and climate are admirably adapted — forms a principal staple. A census taken since the annexation of the province returns 3,000 villages, vsdth a population exceeding 1,000,000. West and south of this, along the Bahr-el-Ghazal, lie the Darfertit and Donga countries, ia the former of which the authority of the Khedive is as yet little more than nominal, and even in the latter it is effective only along the river vaUey to Grondokoro. To this point, however, the Cairo Government claimed to have pushed its sov- ereignty before 1869, when the Khedive commissioned Sir Samuel Baker to extend his annexations to the Equator, and suppress slave hunting and the slave trade in this great cradle of the traffic. A strong expedition was ac- cordingly dispatched to the region, and during what may be called a campaign of nearly four years. Sir Samuel carried the Egyptian flag to the Albert Nyanza, and scotched, if he did not kill, the nefarious commerce at several points. It was probably not his fault that the Khedive thought the result less satisfactory than the cost of it had led him to hope ; but be this as it may, early in 1874 his Highness induced Colonel Gordon, of Chinese fame, to take up the incomplete adventure on a less grandiose scale ; and in the next couple of years, what Baker had begun was, if not perfected, at least extended * The Seari of Africa, L, p. 85. BAKER AND GORDON. 355 and consolidated without farther costing a piastre to the Cairo Treasury— a judicious management of the Govern- ment ivory monopoly, which Baker had established, pro- duciug enough to defray the whole expense of the expe- dition, with a surplus of some 6,000Z. to spare. The sum of what was thus economically achieved may be briefly stated : Feeling that the first necessity was to strengthen his communications with Egypt, Gordon began by con- necting Khartoum and Gondokoro— Baker's Ismaiilia— by a chain, or rather network of new fortified stations, vary- ing from fifty to a hundred miles apart. The first 500 of the 1,400 miles which separate the two poiats presented little difficulty. The river was clear, the tribes friendly, and the authority of the Khedive was represented by petty officers who maintained at least a semblance of law and order. But at the point where the great river ceases to be a single channel, where the Sobat — 680 miles above Khartoum — pours into it from the east, and the Bahr-el- Ghazal (forty miles higher up), with its numerous tribu- taries from the west, the difficulties of communication begin. Here, accordingly, Gordon planted the first of hia posts, naming it Sobat, after the river on which it stands. From this point other stations branch out east and west into the heart of the slave-trading districts, one of the most important of these being at Nazar, two days' sail up the Sobat. Some 250 miles up the main stream, bul six days' march from it westwards, is another called Ratichambe, in the centre of a chief feeding ground for the traffic ; ninety miles further is Bor, and south-west of that again, far inland, Makraka, on the borders of the Niam-Niam country, which formed the limit of Schwein- farth's travels. Back again on the main stream, ninety miles above Bor, is thfe great station of Lardo, in favour of which Gordon has abaTidoned Gondokoro. ten miles 356 EGYPT AS IT IS. Mglier up ; and twelve miles still furtlier soutli, Eagaff, beyond wMcli the river becomes mmavigable, throngh a long series of rapids extending to DuflU. — Baker's Ibrah- mieli — a short distance soutli of wMcli lie Ms two final stations of Fatiko and Fowera, almost within hail of the Albert Nyanza. Above Grondokoro the river had at seve- ral points been blocked up with great swampy masses of reeds and grass, which stretched from bank to bank, and completely dammed the upper current. These Gordon cut through, and so cleared a continuous water-way to Eagaff, between which and Khartoum a line of steamers now pUes. Here a smaU 10-horse power boat was taken to pieces, and carried round to Duffli, where it was again put together, and the voyage thence to the lake com- pleted — a practicable line of communication being thus opened between Cairo and the Equator, over a distance of 2,800 mUes. The Albert is connected with the larger Lake Victoria by the Somerset river, but, though this is short, it is filled up with alternate swamps and rapids, which present insurmountable obstacles to navigation. A road overland must therefore be opened through the ter- ritory of King M'tesa, of Uganda, or by an alternative route through the country of the Usoga, a rival tribe. Much of the territory thus added to the dominion of the Khedive possesses splendid agricultural resources, but these cannot be developed or utilised till some better OQtlet has been found than the long and difficult route by the NUe. Such an outlet is, however, offered by either the Omoo-Maro or Ozy rivers, in the so-called territory of Zanzibar, the latter of which is navigable from the Indian Ocean up to within 250 miles of Lake Victoria. It is obviously in the interests of civilisation that the Khedive should be allowed a right of way by one or other of these rivers. OORBOWS ENLARGED COMMISBION. 357 In the meantime Colonel Grordon, during tMs first ex- pedition, completely subjected to a rude but regular form of government nearly the whole country between Gondokoro and the smaller lake, did much to suppress slave-hunting within the same area, enforced recognition of Egyptian authority, and opened up a channel for trade with Khartoum and the Lower Nile. Justly gratified with these results, the Khedive, in Feb- ruary last, renewed and enlarged Gordon's commission, conferring on him the rank of Pasha, with absolute mili- tary and civil jurisdiction over the vast expanse of ter- ritory extending southwards from Wady-Halfa to the Equator, and east and west from Darfour to the whole littoral of the Red Sea below Souakim. The main object of these extended powers was, no doubt, to give full scope to the great administrative abOity of the new gov- ernor-general, whose previous authority only began at Gondokoro, wMle the Soudan proper — which was ruled or mis-ruled by native officials — ^lay north of that point. But, almost co-ordinately with this, in the new Pasha's firman were unlimited powers to suppress glave-huatiag and abolish the slave trade throughout the whole extent of his government : so absolute, indeed, were these that, in a letter * published immediately after his appointment. Gordon Pasha himself declared that if the traffic be no'>; now stamped out, the fault will be his alone. The state- ment, however, rhetorically exaggerated the extent of his or any human power to accomplish this result, for slavery has flourished in these regions since the Flood, and is almost a natural law, Ineradicable by anything but the gradual operation of influences to which even physi- cal phenoBiena in time yield. If it were confined to a single province, the strong hand of authority might * Quoted in a foot-notejto.p..319. 358 EGYPT AS IT 13. pertaps crush it ; but, ingrained as it is iafco every fibre of what may be called social life throughout all Centra] and Eastern Africa, no power on earth can extinguish it except by the slow agency of civilisation. That Gordon Pasha will do much towards minimisiug its attendant evils within the area of his effective authority is not to be doubted, but the bare statement of its widespread sources and of the many channels through which the traffic north and eastwards is fed, will show how idle is the hope that he can suppress it altogether. Thus, large supplies are furnished by the Galla country — outside the Egyptian frontier — which find their way to the coast at Zeyla, and through Abyssinia to Gallabat and Massowah, or to the smaller unguarded towns along the coast, whence they are shipped to Djeddah and Yemen. According to the reports of the collectors of Customs at GaUabat (the fron- tier Abyssinian town), King John levies blackmail on nearly 20,000 a year passed over his border at that point. The country east of the Sobat river similarly furnishes a large contingent, which goes via Fazoglou and Sennaar to the great mart at Musselemia, above Khartoum, from which they are either smuggled down past that town by boat, or sent in caravans across the desert to Ambukol, and thence to Nubia and the lower valley. Sennaar itself also exports a smaller number, mainly through the same out- lets. "Christian" Abyssinia, with the full knowledge and concurrence of Melek Johannes, contributes several thousand a year, mostly for the Djeddah market, but a few also for the Lower NUe. Until Baker's expedition, the upper districts of the White Nile and the region of the lakes drove a lively trade, but Sir Samuel largely closed that source, and about 1,000 of both sexes now annually find their way north. He was, however, less successful in the upper districts, along the Behr-el-Gha- ASEA OF BLAVE 8UPPL7. 359 zal, wMch still export large nmnbers, mostly across the Homr desert into Kordofan, as do also tlie neighbouring Nooba mountains, whose produce commands a high price in the northern markets. But much larger is the supply from Kordofan itself, which rivals Darfour as the main source of supply in all these regions. This latter prov- ince not only exports largely from its own population, but is the great entrepot for the 15,000 or 20,000 slaves a year furnished by the Kredy tribes of the Darfertit country, and the remoter Mam-Niams, who aU find their way into the various currents of the trade east or north. A glance at the map will show how wide is the geo- graphical area which thus feeds the trade — much of it far outside even the nominal limits of Egyptian sovereignty, and which can therefore be in no way controlled by Gor- don Pasha ; while as regards the remainder, his author- ity over three-fourths of it is only effective in the towns and at the scattered military posts. In these he may scotch the trafiic, if fairly helped by the native officials on whom the execution of his orders must depend. The river may, and no doubt will, be closed against the pas- sage of slave noggurs, and Massowah and Souakim against exports ; but it will still be impossible to close the desert routes, or to blockade the whole Red Sea coast from Zeyla to Cosseir. The wildest abolitionist would hardly suggest that the Khedive should maintain a squadron along this great extent of littoral ; and, in de- fault of that, the human contraband will still be "run" from a score of points on the coast, notwithstanding the occasional capture of a dTiow by a chance British or Egyptian cruiser. At this early stage of its development, the trade of these remote provinces is, of course, relatively inconsiderable, but the producing capacity of nearly the whole is de- 860 EGYPT AS IT IS. scribed by botli Baker and Scbweinfurtli as great.* Be- sides the SMUook country, northern Sennaar, Shendy and Taka are especially adapted by soU, climate, and regular rains from June to the middle of September, for cotton cultivation on the largest scale. Kordofan and the Base country yield large quantities of gum-arabic, which can be sold at Kassala at twenty pias. (about 4s. 2d.) per cantar of 98 lbs. Ostrich feathers, ivory, aromatic woods, coffee, skins, ebony, senna, potash, and bees' -wax — ^this last mostly from Abyssinia — are also collected by travel- Hng native traders, and resold to resident merchants in Khartoum and Kassala, at prices that leave a large mar- gin of profit on export. With the gradual establishment of more regular government, the opening of easier and more rapid means of communication, and the even partial suppression of slave-huntiag, a wide and speedy growth in the producing industries may be expected — with cor- responding gain to the populations, to the Egyptian Treasury, and to civilisation. The wise policy which has been pursued by the Government for some years past, of supplying cotton and other seeds gratuitously, and offer- ing every inducement to raise experimental crops, has prepared the way for this ; and only access to profitable markets is now needed to stimulate the production of gi-ain, sugar, and cotton, on a scale fully commensurate with that of Egypt itself. The great centres of collection for the existing trade are Khartoum, Kordofan, and Darfour. Goods are chiefly brought to the first of these by land, and ar.^ there placed in river-boats, or noggurs, rudely -built craft * The total value, nevertheless, of the annual produce of the Soudan that reaches Cairo alone averages 1,500,000Z. ; besides which, considerable quan- tities of other goods are exported through SouaJdm and Massowah to the Hedjaz. TRADE OBNTRES. 361 of about 40 tons burthen., wMcli take cargo down as far as Aboo Hammed, at the north-eastern curve of the Great Bend, where it is transferred to camels, and carried across the Nubian desert to Korosko. There it is again re- Bhipped, and conveyed by water to the First Cataract, which is easUy passed at high Nile, or, when the river is low, the goods are landed at Shellal, a village below Philse, thence conveyed on camels to Assouan, and agaia re-laden .into boats and floated down either to the railway at As- eiout, or, without breaking bulk, to Cairo. By this route, five changes, involving nearly 250 miles of land carriage, are necessary between Khartoum and the capital. From the Kordofan and Darfour districts goods are brought by camels across the desert, and embarked on the Nile at Dabbe and Handek, whence they are conveyed by boat to Hafir, at the head of the Third Cataract, and thence again by camels to Wady-Halfa, and so down, like the Khartoum freights, to Cairo ; or at high Nile they may be taken by river as far as Amka, at the head of the Second Cataract, but this last portion of the voyage is tedious and full of risk. These routes also involve five changes, and respectively about 590 and 400 miles of land carriage between Kordofan and Cairo. The central Dar- four districts are nearly 200 miles still further away from the river. It need hardly be said that the difficulties of transport thus offered very heavily handicap trade, and show how valuable will be the facilities afforded by the railways now in progress, which — when the various links are completed — will furnish through communication between Khartoum and Alexandria with only a single break of gauge. But even already, "the foundations of a great future have been laid : a remote portion of the African race hitherto excluded from the world's history has been 362 EGYPT A8 IT 18. brought into direct communication with, the superior and more civilised races ; legitimate trade has been opened ; therefore, accepting commerce as the great agent of civilisation, the vrork is actually in progress."* If this were true five years ago, it is stUl more so now ; and in the sole- fact that absolute power to direct this peaceful campaign against barbarism is in the hands of one of the best men and ablest administrators whom even England could furnish for the task, we have the surest, pledge that the work will be well and honestly done. In selecting such a man, and entrusting him with such powers, the Khedive, in his turn, has given the best pos- sible proof of his own claim on the confidence of Europe, and of his honest purpose not merely to do all that humanly can be done to rescue these vast regions from the curse of slavery, but to reclaim the whole to peaceful^ industry, settled government, and civilisation. Such, reader, are the chief economical conditions of New Egypt. How far this rapid survey of them justifies the friendly and hopeful estimate of the country and its Government with which these pages opened, must be left to your judgment. To this — in no spirit of partisanship, but of confessed sympathy with the revival of the most interesting country in the world — I submit the facts and figures now put together. On the seeming eve of what promises to be an.other "new departure" in Egyptian history, their publication has at least the apology of being more or less opportune. * Ismallia, ii., p. 512. CHAPTER XIX. OUTLINB OP THE HISTORY OF EGYPT FROM 1878 TO THE PRESENT DAY. In Chapter IV. (page 83) attention was drawn to the "national aspiration" of "Egypt for the Egyptians." This sentiment was taken up in 1881 as the watchword of that part of the national party which sided with the military in- surrection headed by Arabi, colonel of one of the Egyptian regiments. The cause of this outbreak was attributable to the financial recklessness of the previous Khedive, Ismail Pasha. The pay of the soldiers was diminished, and, more- over, was not regularly distributed in the time of Ismail, and while it was regularly given in Tewfik's reign, it was still so small that it hardly sufficed. Beggary was the result among the soldiers. In addition to this, the strength of the army had, for economy, been decreased. This had put numbers of men out of employment and contributed much to the pop- ular discontent. To add to the dissatisfaction, Turke and Circassians had been promoted in the army over native Egyptians. Quarrels bet-sf een these and the native officers were frequent. The Minister of War was a Circassian and showed favoritism to his countrymen. A protest by several native colonels was answered by their imprisonment. One of these officers, Ali Bey Fehmy, was forcibly released by his regiment, who marched in a body to the prison and took 363 364 EGYPT AS IT IS. him out, before the eyes of the Khedive who happened to be in the vicinity. The Khedive demanded submission, but a counter demand on the part of the soldiers to displace the Minister of "War was so vigorous that Tewfik was obliged to comply and appointed Mahmoud Pasha. Certain reforms were now made in the army, the pay was raised thirty per cent, and a commission appointed to inquire into the sources of abuse in the army. The European element on the com- mission was distasteful to the national party, and openly sedi- tious language was used by its head, Arabi Pasha. He especially hated the ministry of Riaz Pasha, then in power. An unfortunate accident to a soldier in the streets of Alex- andria had a bad effect upon the army, and this was hardly removed by the appointment of a new Minister of "War. Just at this time a visit of the Khedive to Cairo, where the na- - tional party feeling was strongest, happened to coincide in point of time with the promulgation of a previously deter- mined order to remove the regiment of Arabi Pasha from Cairo to Alexandria. This was taken by Arabi as a move on the part of the government to break up the party. On September 10, 1881, Arabi took the Khedive, his min- isters and their European advisers completely by surprise, by announcing that the army would march to the Palace of Abdin and demand the retirement of the Riaz ministry, and other reforms in the army recommended by the military commission already referred to. .At four in the afternoon the palace was surrounded by 4,000 troops, a squadron of cavalry, besides eighteen loaded cannon which were trained on the palace windows. Arabi, acting as spokesman of the army, again made his demands, and after a considerable parley between him and the Khedive, a compromise was made which resulted in the deposition of Riaz Pasha and the formation of a new ministry. After which the Khedive FROM 1878 TO THE PRESENT DAY. 365 received the apologies of the colonels and pardoned them. Sherif Pasha was appointed Prime Minister, and Mahmoud Pasha, acceptable to the army, was made Minister of War. About this time came a Turkish war vessel with a commis- sion appointed by the Sublime Porte, At the same time came two ironclads, an English and a French. Affairs gradually quieted down after this, the military reforms were carried out, and a reorganization of native courts upon Eu- ropean principles was begun. Arabi Pasha was appointed Assistant Secretary of War, From this time Arabi rose in power and the Khedive's influence gradually became less and less. A plot of certain discontented Circassian officers to murder Arabi led to the full power being virtually assumed by the latter. The French and English determined to put down the rebellion which was imminent, and a British fleet appeared and an- chored in the harbor of Alexandria. This made the Eu- ropeans still more hated by the people, and many of the former left Alexandria. Business was stopped and attention was directed to Arabi and his army. Earthworks were thrown up opposite the war vessels and cannon were placed in position. The British consul was attacked on the streets of Alexandria and seriously injured. About one hundred and fifty Europeans had up to this time lost their lives at the hands of the street mobs. The Khedive and the ministry moved from Cairo to Alexandria, and the British admiral, Sir Beauchamp Seymour, determined to use his best efforts to put down the rebellion and reinstate Tewfik in his fuD rights as Khedive of Egypt, which he was rapidly losing. Admiral Seymour demanded that the earthworks should be abandoned, and threatened that if Arabi did not surrender to him as protector of the Khedive's interests the British fleet would bombard Alexandria. This was what happened event- 366 EGYPT AS IT IS. ually on the 11th of July, 1883. The British admiral had thirteen warships under him, some of them being the best in the navy. He stormed the city for two days, after which flags of truce were shown by the Egyptian army. It was found that Arabi and his forces had departed. As they went they unlocked the prisons and the city was filled with plun- derers. For this sacking of the city by irresponsible natives, the English admiral was much censured, on the ground that he should not have bombarded a city that he had not land force enough to invest when it fell. British troops were not long in arriving, however, and immediately after dislodging Arabi from one point of vantage they pursued him to Tel-el- Kebir, where, on September 13th, under Sir Garnet "Wolseley, the Egyptian military was broken and Arabi fled. He sub- sequently returned to Cairo, where he was captured by the police and given over to the British general. The military revolt was now at an end. A British army of 10,000 was left in Egypt to preserve order. Lord Dufferin was sent to make preliminary arrangements for an Egyptian autonomy, if that were possible. Arabi Pasha was tried and sentenced to death, but his sentence was immediately commuted by the Khedive to banishment for Hfe to the island of Ceylon. The following year, 1883, saw elaborate plans for the reconstruction of the Egyptian administration by English advisers under the supervision of Lord Dufferin. These were carried out as well as could be under the unfortunate circumstances of a severe outbreak of cholera which lasted through the summer months. But of most interest to the civilized world were the incidents in the Soudan. A fanatical Mussulman, named Mohammed Ahmed, had appeared in that district and had given out that he was the Mahdi, the Messiah of the Moslems. Previous to this time he had been a carpenter's^ apprentice and a begging dervish, FROM 1878 TO THE PRESENT DAY. 367 and was made a priest in 1870. He then Kved as a hermit for twelve years in a pit on an island in the White Mle, passing his time in ascetic practices. He announced himself as the Mahdi in 1881, and soon after thousands flocked to Ms banner. His programme was to destroy or convert all in- fidels. An expedition was immediately sent against Tn'm by the Khedive and was routed. Next, an Enghsh officer, Col- onel Hicks, marched against him at the head of 7,000 men, but was led by a treacherous guide into a ravine where the Mahdists were waiting for him and where he could not use his cannon. His entire force was annihilated. This victory brought arms and provisions to the Mahdi and greatly in- creased his prestige. He was said to be able to turn the bullets of the enemy into water. This victory of the Mahdi was heard of in Cairo with great anxiety, and another expedition was sent against him, this time under Baker Pasha, a British general, who had organized an Egyptian force of frontier guards and mounted police. This army fled at the approach of the Mahdists and was almost entirely butchered, together with most of its British officers. In 1884 General "Chinese" Gordon was sent as governor-general of the Soudan to take complete charge of all matters there, to do what he could in putting down the Mahdist uprising and the slave trade. He arrived in Khartoum on February 18th, and was welcomed by all in the city with great enthusiasm. He immediately recognized the Mahdi as ruler of Kordofan, a district to the southwest of Khartomn. The latter, however, had been making prog- ress, having locked up the remnant of Baker Pasha's army in Suakim for a while; but they broke loose and retired to Berber, which also fell before the irresistible oncoming of the Mahdi. This made Gordon's position much more perilous, and he telegraphed for re-enforcements from Cairo, asking 368 EGYPT AS IT IS. that Zebehr Pasha be sent with them. The latter was, how- ever, not acceptable to the British government and was not permitted to go. It is probable that had this mistake not been made by the government the sad events yet to be told would never have taken place. The appeal of Gordon for three thousand Turkish troops was unheeded. As early as April, 1884, Khartoum had become so closely surrounded by the Mahdi's influence that hardly any word was received after that from General Gordon. A British force was sent under General Stewart for the relief of Khartoum. He met resistance at Abu Klea, where a fierce battle was fought, and after a hard struggle up the Nile a small party of them in two small steamers succeeded in getting as far as Khartoum, where they found the Mahdi's flag flying, and were received with a volley of Arab bullets. They realized then that they had come too late, and that Gordon must have perished ; so they turned about and re- turned to the rest of the army of relief. It became known later that the Mahdists, hearing of the successful advance of this army of relief and of their victo- ries at Abu Klea and at other points above, and fearing that if the siege of Khartoum was not ended by its faU it would be ended by General Stewart's army, made a final vigorous attempt against the city, which succeeded only through the treachery of some of Gordon's gate sentries. The Arab dervishes quickly had possession of the city, and some of them, contrary to the orders of the Mahdi, immediately put Gordon to death. It has been said that the Mahdi's desire was, in accordance with an old Mohammedan legend, to meet Gordon, convert him to Islam, and together with him rule the world. In the slaughter that followed the fall of Khartoum 4,000 persons were said to have been killed. The catastrophe oc- FROM 1878 TO THE PRESENT DAY. 369 curred on January 26, 1885, after a siege of three nundred and seventeen days. It was decided to cease further efforts against Khartoum for the present, and to abandon all the outposts in the coun- try south of Akasheh, which was on the FUe, a short dis- tance above Wady Haifa, and to reserve only a means of communication with the Eed Sea and with the seaports under British protection. The cause of the Mahdists seemed to have suffered some- what in the death of the Mahdi, who succumbed to smallpox in Jtily, 1885. It was, however, feared that his nephew and successor, Abdullah, might be eventually aiming at an inva- sion of Egypt, and considerable anxiety was felt concerning the continual attacks made upon the British outposts at Akasheh and other places. In 1887 Abdullah, who had assumed the title of Khalifa, seemed to be more peacefully inclined, and paying attention rather to commerce than to warfare, although unimportant skirmishes between the Egyptians and hostile Arabs were not unusual. The British forces in Egypt were stiU further reduced, though as yet no agreement had been made with the Khedive, the Porte, or the interested European powers, concerning their permanent or even temporary evacnation. An advance in satisfactory relations between the powers and Egypt was this year made in the neutralization of the Suez Canal, it being agreed that the canal should be open to all nations at all times upon the payment of the necessary toll, and upon the condition that no warlike acts should be per- mitted by vessels while actually in its waters. The next few years in the Soudan were marked by imim- portant fights. In 1889 General Grenfell's division at TosM cut to pieces a troop of dervishes amounting to 1,500 men. In 1890 the number of fugitives from^the Khalifa's power 370 EGYPT AS IT IS. increased ; but in the following year there was only one dis- turbance on the Soudan frontier, and that was quickly put down. The events of the four following years were of little im- portance, save the steady financial and administrative prog- ress made under the superintendence of the British advisers. In 1892 we read of the appointment of Colonel H. H. Kitch- ener as Sirdar of the Egyptian army, and, in the succeeding years, of his success in perfecting the organization of that army. In 1896 interest in the Soudan was again awakened by the announcement that the British and Egyptian govern- ments had decided to send a joint expedition southward in the direction of Dongola, with the ultimate object of destroy- ing the power of the dervishes if it became so great as further to threaten Egypt. The disasters to the Italian army in Abyssinia are thought to have led to this determination on the part of the Khedive. The expedition started on March 31, 1896 ; the force under the Sirdar, who commanded it in person, consisted of native Egyptian and negro troops, offi- cered by British, and with several British battalions. In May the expedition had reached Wady Haifa. It encoun- tered many unavoidable dangers other than those of war — heat, fever, cyclone and cholera, and, in addition, was ham- pered by lack of funds. On June 7, Ferkeh, near Akasheh, was stormed and taken. The Sirdar's army took possession of Dongola on September 23, and thus after six months, dur- ing which time two pitched battles were fought, the expedi- tionary force had advanced several hundred miles, driving the followers of the Khalifa before them. The year 1897 saw trade resumed in that part of the Sou- dan arormd Dongola, helped by the Sirdar's new railway. One decisive battle was fought at Abu Hamed, where the FROM 1878 TO THE PRESENT DAY. 37 i town soon fell into the possession of the Anglo-Egyptian army. Kassala, taken by the Italians some years before, was amicably handed over to Egypt and occupied by Egyp- tian troops. The last months of the year were devoted to collectiag provisions and making preparations for a further advance. The methods of the Sirdar's procedure in this expedition were such as to inspire in the civilized world great confi- dence in his eventual reconquest from the Khalifa of the whole of the Soudan, and to inspire in the latter and his followera the inevitable notion that his oncoming was irre- sistible. For he marched only a few miles a day, and the country which was behind him h© left fully protected, so that there should be no chance of his being cut off. He built also, at the rate of two or three miles a day, a railroad, so that if retreat were necessary it woidd be safe and easy, and added a telegraph hne, by which he was in immediate communication with Cairo. He drove the dervishes before him from point to point, taking iu succession Abu Hamed, Berber and Metemmeh, and finally came upon the complete force of the Khalifa at Omdurman. This city had been built, on the Nile opposite Khartpmn, by the Mahdists after the destruction of that city. The Khalifa, Abdullah, was thought, for a time, to have lost some of the wtmderful power over the dervishes which the Mahdi had. He built, however, in Omdurman, a tomb to the Mahdi, and, retiring within this edifice at certain times, gave out that he was receiving inspiration directly from the soul of the departed Mahdi. This is thought to have greatly increased the reverence with which the Khalifa was regarded by his dervishes, and to have contributed to the resolution with which they faced the annihilation which they suffered. 372 EGYPT AS IT IS. The decisive battle of Omdurman w^s fought on Septem- ber 2, 1898. It was, in some respects, the bloodiest battle of the century, and is peculiarly interestiag from the fact that, there, the most modern implements of war were used by the Anglo-Egyptian forces, with terribly machine-like and uni- form result. The battle began with the onset of the Mah- dist cavalry and lancers. These were shot down by the lines of British and Egyptian soldiers with the latest pattern of bullets, fired from rifles and machine guns. Then followed the infantry of the Khalifa. The battle, taking place in the open, and the thousands of fanatical dervishes advancing without any protection, resulted in the killing on one field of nearly eleven thousaud of them. It is estimated that few, if any, of their companies succeeded in getting within eight hundred yards of the Sirdar's troops. Hundreds after hun- dreds, advancing, were literally mowed down by the sheet of bullets which continually poured forth from the Sirdar's rifles. It seemed, nevertheless, that the dervishes must have thought them no more than raindrops, and to have been oblivious to the fact that they, themselves, were dropping; for their utter fearlessness of death is reported to have been something more than courage. They had been told that death was sweeter than cool well water to thirsty lips, and nothing but death stopped their advance. The carnage went on for several hours. The British and Egyptian soldiers fired until their rifles became red hot, and then returned to the rear for cool ones, and continued the business of butchery. The loss on their side was about fifty killed and two or three hundred wounded. The nature of the Mahdist is such that it was found nec- essaiy after the battle to send an Egyptian regiment over the field to put to death the wounded and those who shammed death. It would have been impossible for the Sirdar to care FROM 1878 TO THE PRESENT DAl 37 ti for any but his own wounded, as his hospital facilities in such an expedition were necessarily hmited. The Khalifa fled with some of his family and officers, and General Kitchener entered Khartoum and raised the British and Egyptian flags the following day. He proceeded from Khartoum a distance of four hundred miles southward to Fashoda, where he arrived about Sept. 15, 1898. He there found Major Marchand, who had pene- trated to that town from the Congo valley, whence he had led an expedition under French auspices. He had raised the French flag, and for a time it was thought that diplomatic relations between France and England might be broken. The comparatively scanty news of the details of this cam- paign in the Soudan gave to it a dramatic and spectacular interest, partly from the fact that telegraphic conmaunica- tion between the Sirdar's army and the outside world was occasionally and opportunely severed, and from the fact that newspaper correspondents were excluded from participation in it after the battle of Omdurman. Up to this point we have confined ourselves to the mili- tary history of Egypt, the two leading events of which, after the revolt of Arabi Pasha's regiment, were the fall of Khar- toum in 1884 and the campaign carried into the Khalifa's country, which began in 1896. A short resume of the in- ternal history, both financial and commercial, will now be attempted. The efforts of Lord Dufferin, sent to Egypt in 1883 as British commissioner, were directed to what has been called "a scheme of administrative and social reform, including the germs of a national representative system." A feature of the national representative system was a Legislative Coun- cil, which was destined later to make the British advisers of the Khedive a great deal of trouble. _ 374 EGYPT AS IT IS. In 1885 the finances, despite the efforts of the European councilors, were in so bad a shape that a loan of nearly $45,000,000 was necessitated. This was subscribed for more than twenty times over in England, France and Germany. The jealousy of France at the important position of Great Britain iu Egyptian affairs had always been great, and was not lessened when, ta 1885, the British and Turkish govern- ments signed an agreement by which the evacuation of Egypt by British troops was indefinitely postponed, and a Turkish commissioner, Mukhtar Pasha, was sent from Constantinople to act in conjmiction with the Enghsh commissioner, thus giving countenance to the latter's infiuence in the court of the Khedive. The British representative expressed himself as satisfied with the internal progress of Egypt, but sohcited from Mukh- tar Pasha some information as to the attitude to be taken by the Egyptian and Turkish governments with regard to the Soudan. In reply, it was proposed by the Turkish com- missioner that the strength of the Egyptian army be raised from 8,000 to 16,800 men, and that 6,700 gendarmes and police should be enrolled. For this he suggested that the pay of the soldiers should be reduced, and that the two hun- dred thousand pounds of Egyptian money, annually given to the British government for the support of their army in Egypt, should be withdrawn from that use and contributed to the maintenance of the enlarged Egyptian army. This should itself then form part of the army upon which the Sultan might be at liberty to draw in case of need, should be drilled and armed according to Turkish customs, and should be employed in attempts to recover at least a por- tion of the Soudan. It is obvious that this scheme could Liever be sanctioned by the British government, who objected on the ground that the project to regain the Soudan was at FROM 1878 TO THE PRESENT DAY. 375 present ill advised, and that such being the case, the sug- gested increase of the army was wholly unnecessary. The British commissioner asked that the proposed scheme should be returned to the government at Constantinople and changed so as to be more suitable to the British government. These negotiations, however, proceeded so slowly that nothing was accomplished, and the British army was allowed to remain ■ as it had been. In 1887, however, a move in the direction of evacuation was made by the British. In January a small part of the army of occupation was sent back to India, and another por- tion returned to England. In the same year English influence suffered somewhat of a setback by the unsuccessful mission of an envoy sent to Constantinople to urge upon the Sultan certain further re- forms for Egy^t. These reforms were : "That the autonomy of Egypt should be acknowledged, while the sovereignty of the Sultan remained unimpaired; that the privilege hitherto enjoyed by foreigners in Egypt, of being judged by their own consuls, should be withdrawn; that Egyptian territory should be neutralized under the guarantee of the Great Pow- ers, and that the guaranteeing powers should retain the right of transporting troops through Egyptian territory, either by land or by the canal; that England should exercise the right of appointing the majority of the officers in the Egyptian army, and should further retain the right of reoccupying the country in case necessity arose; and that the Enghsh army should evacuate the country when all the European Powers nad given their consent to the terms of the convention." * These conditions were not acceptable to the Sublime Porte, nor to France, and pressure was brought to bear against * Annual Register, 1887. 876 EGYPT A3 IT IS. them by the other powers, so that the negotiations fell through. The year 1888 was marked by a change of ministry. Nubar Pasha, the Prime Minister, became objectionable to the British commissioner, and was replaced by Eiaz Pasha and a new set of ministers. In 1890 a long-standing dis- agreement between France and Great Britain concerning the conversion of certain Egyptian bonds was patched up by a compromise, which converted not only the privileged debt, but the whole Egyptian debt, which was increased by a further loan of $6,500,000. The effect of this was to ex- empt the fellah or peasant population from the corvSe tax, thus freeing them from forced labor for the state. A further attempt was made in that year to improve the system of ad- miuistering justice in the courts, into which corruption had made its way. No little difficulty was experienced in graft- ing European ideas of justice upon Mohanmaedan customs. Up to this time torture had freely been used upon witnesses for collecting evidence, and this practice was now abolished. In the following year active measures were set on foot for the suppression of brigandage, and General Kitchener was intrusted with the formation of an efficient paid pohce force. Other notable reforms, such as a railway from Port Said to Ismailia, and through the desert to Kosseir, and the drain- age of the city of Cairo, were this year instituted. In January, 1893, the Khedive Tewfik, who had generally been favorable to British interests and influence in Egypt, succumbed to an attack of influenza, and his son Abbas, a boy of seventeen, ascended the viceregal throne. He had been educated in Europe and was a student at Vienna at the time of his father's death. He soon showed considerable dissatisfaction with British influence, and appointed, in 1893, a strongly anti-British Prime Mioister, thus gaining the FROM 1S?S TO THE PRESENT DAY. 377 plaudits of the native population, who still regarded with suspicion the many English officials in the Khedive's employ. The Legislative Council, instituted in 1883 on the recom- mendation of Lord Dufferin, now turned upon the English methods, made attacks upon much that they had accom- plished during the year, and declared that Egypt had been ruined by English control. Public agitation against the British, exaggerated by certain strictures of the young Khe- dive upon the condition of the army, which, however, he finally took back, was further accented by native and French journalists, and was hushed only by the appointment of a new ministry, and the expulsion from the country of the editor of the Journal Egyptien. In spite of all the opposition to British influence, which virtually amoimts to British rule, in Egypt, which in some years seemed to be ecHpsed by the intrigues of other nations and of the native ministers, the condition of Egypt has steadily improved. The administration of justice was in 1897 on a more solid foundation than ever before, and was shared by European and native officials alike. In the same year, too, a slightly better feeling toward the British began to be manifested, and was voiced by an Arabian journal, the editor of which was, significantly enough, the son of one of the followers of Arabi Pasha in the military revolt of 1883. He replied in an editorial to certain attacks made upon Brit- ish rule, pointing out that imder it the taxes on land had been reduced from $35 to about $7 an acre, that the poorest laborer was now free from tyranny, even of the greatest official, and that no one was above the law, concluding with the statement that "such are the benefits of British occupation." Further illustration of the good accomplished by Great Britain in Egypt is witnessed in the pubh'cation of a pamphlet 378 EGYPT AS IT 13. writtea by Ahmed Mokbel, a young Egyptian native (quoted in the "North American Review" for July, 1898). Part of the brochure is devoted to the reasons for approving British regime, supposed to be given by one peasant in conversation with another: "1. The British abolished for me the accursed torture of the Oourbache [a leathern whip with which great torture was inflicted upon the fellah], enabling me to live longer for my children than my father was able to live for me and my brothers. "2. The British have protected me from tyrants. "3. Thanks to them I pay no taxes that I ought not to pay. "4. I am no more harnessed to the plow, as I formerly was, to gratify the caprice or pleasure of the cruel Turks. "5. Thanks to the British, I no longer behold, lying on the ground bathed in blood, the body of my beloved wife, the ianocent companion of my misfortunes and suffering — a homicide which was formerly committed with impimity and relish throughout Egypt. The only rehef for me then was to let my heart weep, for I dared not weep publicly. "6. Thanks to the British I enjoy my frugal eveniag meal, surrounded by my children, and I am clad in winter better than in summer. "Thanks to the British my young cotton plants do not perish for want of water as formerly, when water was given abundantly only to rich proprietors at a high price, while we poor devils of fellaheen, having nothing to offer, saw our plants dying of drought. "In one word, I prefer the British to all others, and, that being the case, would it be reasonable for me to complain of them?" APPENDIX A. The Vioeeeqal Family. Ismail I., Khediye, bom December 31, 1830, son of Prince Ibrahim Pasha — eldest son of Mehemet Ali Pasha — succeeded his uncle. Said Pasha, on January 18, 1863 : the succession made hereditary in the direct line, by firman of May 21, 1866 : the title of " Khediye " (sovereign) conferred by firman of June 8, 1867 ; and complete autonomy conceded, with the right of unlimited aug- mentation of the army and nayy, and of concluding foreign loans and commercial treaties, further ratified by firman of September 29, 1872. Ohildren. — 1. The Princess Tawfideh, born in 1850, married in 1868 to Mansour Pasha, son of the late Achmet Pasha, and nephew of Mehemet Ali. 2. Prince Mehemet Tewfih Pasha (President of the Council) heir-apparent, bom in 1852, married in January, 1873, to Emineh Khanum, daughter of the late Il-Hawi Pasha, by whom he has a son, Abbas Bey, bom July 14, 1874. 3. Prince Hussein-Kiamil Pasha (Minister of Finance), bom in 1852, married in January, 1873, to Ain-el-Haat, daughter of the late Achmet Pasha, by whom he has a son, Kemal-ed-dyn Bey, bom in December, 1874. 4. Prince Hassan Pasha (Minister of War), bom in 1853, mar- ried in January, 1873, to Khadijah Khanum, daughter of the late Mehemet Ali Pasha (who died in 1861), by whom he has a son, Aziz Bey, born in 1873, and a daughter, Azizah Khanum, bom in 1875. 5. Princess Fatma Khanum, born in 1852, married in 1873 to the late Tossoum Pasha (son of Said Pasha), who died last ; 6. Prince IlraJiim Helmy Pasha, bom in 1860. 7. Prince Mahmoud Bey, bom in 1863. 8. Pnnce Fuad Bey, bom in 1867. 9. Princess Djemileh, bom in 1869. 10. Princess Emineh, bom in 1874. 11. Prince Djemal-ed-dyn Bey, born in 1875. S79 APPENDIX B. Egyptian Oueeesot, Weights, and Measubes. In Egypt, as in Turkey, the monetary unit is the piastre (Arab. kirsh) of 40 paras (Arab, faddah), which is coined in gold pieces of 100, 50, 35, 20, 10, and 5 pias. each ; and in silyer of 20, 10, 5, 2 J, and 1 pias. each ; and in copper of 1 pias., 30, 10, and 5 paras. The 100 pias. gold piece, or as it is locally called the Egyptian "guinea," weighs 44, as against 41 "kerats," the weight of the English soTcreign. The current value of the gold and silver coins is of course fixed, but that of the copper money fluctuates, and is greatly depreciated below its nominal standard. Thus, while an English sovereign is worth only 97 J pias. in Egyptian gold or sil- ver " tariff " piastres, its average value for some months past has been about 450 pias. in copper. The "tariff" piastre is therefore equivalent to nearly 2Jd. English. There are three rates of exchange — (1) The Government rate of 97J to the pound sterling ; (2) the commercial rate of 195 pias. to the pound sterling, which reckons the silver piastre as two, and ex- cludes copper ; and (3) the copper rate, which fluctuates as stated, and is generally used only in the smallest retail transactions. As, however, this native currency is insuflBcient for the large commerce of the country, the coins of nearly all the European nations pass as legal tender, both with the Government and between merchants, at the following tariff rate : — Gold. Oeeneh Ingleezi, Englisli Sovereign Oeeneh Starribooli, Turkisli lira Oeeneh Moskobi, Russian gTiinea Binto, Prencli Napoleon Bendooqe, Venetian sequin ... Mdjar, Austrian sequin ... . Ddbloon, doubloon ... ... . Silver. Bobieh, rupee ... ... ... . Bhileen, ahUlmg ... . mdl Stambooli, Turkisli dollar 380 Piaa Par 97 30 87 80 79 18 77 6 46 17 45 26 813 80 9 5 4 36 16 85 GUBBEITCT, WEIQHTS, AND MEASURES. 381 Siii.yTm.— Continued. i'ias. Par. Bidl Sfdnkoo, 5 franc piece ... ... ... 19 10 Ahoo Mddfaa, Spanish doUax ... ... ... 20 38 ^6oe teira, Austrian dollar. . . ... ... ...'30 — Bidl Moskohi, Russian dollar ... ... ... 14 37 A "purse" (Arab. Icees) consists of 500 tariff piastres, and is worth therefore about £5 2b. 6d. A khasneh (treasury) is worth 1,000 purses. As regards Weights and Measures, a Khedivial decree of August 1, 1875, ordered the adoption of the metrical system from and after January 1, 1876 ; at first, in all official and administrative transactions, and gradually afterwards in general substitution for the old standards. But the reform has as yet made little headway, and the following may, therefore, be given as the Weights still in general use : 13 dirhem make 1 wegieh (or ounce). 18 wegieh " ... 1 rottl (or pound). 3f rottl " .1 wuhkah (or oke). 36 vmkkah " 1 cantor. The English equivalents of these in avoirdupois weight are : — 1 oz. a drackms make 1 dirhem. 15 ozs. 13 dwts ii drs 1 rottl. 3J lbs. make 1 vmkkah. 99 lbs. " 1 canton: An Alexandria steam-pressed bale of cotton averages about 620 lbs. The Measures used differ according to the articles concerned. Thus in cloth measure at Alexandria 1 der&a, or pic, equals 33| English inches ; but in inland trade at Cairo and elsewhere the following are the equivalents in measuring linen and other textile goods made in the country : — 1 der&a beledi equals 53? inches. Aad in measuring European cloths 1 derda sta/mbooli equals ... - 86i inches. While for Bast Indian goods 1 derda hindazeh equals 25 inchM 382 APPENDIX 0. In land or superficial measure 800 hassabah make 1 kerat. 24 kerai " 1 feddan.* In dry measure 13 kileh, or 24 rodbaa, make 1 weibeh. 6 weibeh ... ... ... ... 1 a/rdeb. The ardeb, however, diSers according to the class of produce it is used for. Thus in measuring grain it is equivalent to 133-6374 kilograms (or, roundly, about 5 English bushels), while in measur- ing lentils and peas it represents 151-45573 kilog., and for Eosetta rice 185-6085 Mlog. APPENDIX 0. Egyptian' Oalendaes. No FEWEB than five calendars are partially followed in Egypt : — (1) the Mohammedan ; (3) the Coptic ; (3) the Julian, or Greek ; (4) the Jewish ; and (5) the Gregorian. According to the first of these — which dates from the Hegira, a.d. 633 — the year consists of twelve lunar months of alternately twenty-nine and thirty days, or in all of 354 days. In order, however, to harmonise civil with solar time, during every cycle of thirty years one day is intercalated eleven times — namely, at the end of each last month of the ^d, 5th, 7th, 10th, 13th, 16th, 18th, 21st, 34th, 36th, and 39th year of the cycle. Thus the year of the Hegira 1394 began on January 16, 1877. In Egypt, however, this era is now used almost exclu- sively for religious purposes, and by Moslems in their private social relations with each other. The Coptic calendar dates from the era of Diocletian, or " the Martyrs," A.D. 384, and its year consists of twelve months of thirty days each, with five days added at the end of every ordinary year, and six days at the end of every Leap-year. The Coptift year 1593 began on September 11, 1876, and will end on the 10th ,327, are comprised in one sum, with no particulars of the payments to MS. CAVE'S REPORT. 391 any paxtionlar class, nor even of the number of officials or servants employed ; the same may be said of a single entry of £137,000 for repairs of engines and carriages. It is therefore easily to be understood that the receipts of the rail- ways are generally supposed to be one-fifth lower than they ought to be under efficient management. " It may be mentioned here that all construction of new railways, except that of the Soudan, is suspended, and that this, which is called Nubar's line, is confined to the portion of the NUe between Wady-Halfa and Hannek, about 200 miles ; to cost, folly equipped, with machinery already on the spot, 7,000Z. per mile. The remainder of Fowler's original line, 850 miles from Hannek to Shendy, across a very difficult country, has been given up. The cataracts on this upper part of the Nile can be navigated during nine months in the year j but those on the line which is in course of construction are almost always Impassable. " The Soudan is, we are informed, a rich, populous country, growing much com. After paying the expenses of Darfour and the expedition to the great lakes, it contributes to the Treasury, according to the public accounts, a net revenue of 150,000^. " The occupation of Darfour and the expedition to the equatorial lakes are not, commercially speaking, successfuL The Khedive has engaged to some extent in these enterprises for the sake of the suppression of the Slave Trade, and the Abyssinian war was almost forced upon him. It is probable that he will retire as soon as possible from Abyssinia and the Equator. Extension of ter- ritory and of trade may have attractions for the Khedive, but he is not dazzled by the barren glory of war. " According to the documents handed to us by the Khedive, and to informa- tion furnished verbally by his Highness, and tested by such means aa were in our power, the present position of the Egyptian finances is as follows : — " The revenue of Egypt has increased from £55,000 a year in 1804, £3,300,000 in 1830, and £4,987,405 in 1864, the second year of the Khedive's administration, to £7,877,912 in 1871, the year previous to the changes caused by the law of Moukabala. Under this law all landowners could redeem one- half of the land tax to which they were liable by the payment of six years' tax, either in advance in one sum or in instalments. Those who paid down this contribution in one sum received an immediate reduction of their tax ; those who elected to make the payment in instalments receive a discount of 8j per cent, on their advance, and the reduction only takes place on the completion of their contribution. " The extreme term for the entire redemption of each contributor's tax was at first fixed for six years ; but as the law was either not properly understood, or the small owners were unable to make so heavy a payment annually, as their land tax, plus its amount minus 8^ per cent., the term was extended from six to twelve years, two years after the first promulgation of the law, so that it now has ten more years to run, during which the contributing landowner has to pay laud tax plus one half the tax (t\), and minus 8^ per cent, of the game. ' The annexed Table shows the operation of the system since its institution. 393 APPENDIX a. and the amount of income to be derived from it dining the next ten years, to the end of 1885. " It is most advantageous to the landowner who can afiord the present sac- rifice as in addition to the advantage of securing In perpetuity the redemption of half his tax by a payment of five and a half times its present amount, to which it is reduced hy the discount allowed (-inQ. i X 13 = i) he secures an indefeasible title to his land, the tenure of which is at present of an un- certain character. " To the State the arrangement is a ruinous one from a fiscal point of view, as the Khedive has bound himself in the most solemn manner not to re-im- pose the redeemed moiety of the tax in any shape whatever, and he has thus sacrificed for all time fifty per cent, of revenue from this source in order to realise eleven times the annual amount remitted during a period of twelve years. The original Intention of the law was to realise at once, or in a few years, sufficient capital to pay off the floating debt, but by extending its operation the sum raised annually has only sufficed to pay the interest on it. " The revenue now produces annually £10,689,070, but of this amount the Moukabala, £1,531,118, is terminable, and will drop out of the account in ten years — i.e., in 1886— whilst at the same time the land tax will fall from £1,305,131 to £2,634,834 "The normal expenditure amounts to £9,080,681, of which £5,086,675 ^ devoted to paying interest and sinking funds of the various State loans, of which an account will presently be given. " The private loans of the KJiedive are not chargeable to the State, except in two instances, namely, the Mustapha Pasha Loan of 1867, and the Anglo-Egyp- tian Da'ira loan of 1865. These loans, and a portion of the Daiira floating debt, amounting to 3, 000, 000^. , have been taken over by the State for value received. " The revenue has certain elements of elasticity in it ; but these are not likely to be very active in operation. " The principal of these is the Laud Tax, which, after its reduction under the operation of the Moutabala Law, will probably grow with the increasing area of cultivation, an increase likely to receive an impulse from the reduction of the tax. At present 4,805,107 feddans pay tax as under cultivation, which, compared with the 4,051,976 feddans cultivated in Said Pasha's time, show an increase of 18^ per cent, during the present Government. 353,850 feddans have also been brought under cultivation, and will shortly be assessed for taxation. As this will be effected gradually, no immediate increase of rev- enae will take place, but an addition of 180,000?. a year from this source may be expected in the coTirse of the next five years. " A further area of 367,650 feddans will become liable to taxation after it has been surveyed, from which an additional 140,000?. a year may be expected. " These two additions to the cultivated area amount to 630,000 feddans, or 15 per cent, of the land under cultivation at the Khedive's accession, making therefore in all an addition of 33 ^ per cent, dujing his rule of thirteen years. " There are stiU 1,098,000 feddans of cultivable ground, which have been registered but not yet cultivated. MB. CAVE'S REPORT. 393 " The net revenues of the railways have increased from 750,000?. a year in 1878 to 990,800?. in 1875 ; but this rate of increase cannot be entirely relied upon, as more of the gross receipts will necessarily be required for mainten- ance and renewal as the permanent way becomes worn, and deficient crops would cause diminis hed traffic. StUl, even after maMng these allowances, an honest and intelligent administration of the railways would probably pro • dace a larger revenue. Miles. " The extent of railwayi in 1873 was 1 HO Were added in 1874-5 lOo 1,210 " These lines have been constructed at an average cost of about 11,000?. per mile. Other lines have been projected, but the only important one actually in the course of formation is that in the Soudan. This is not the origiuaj Soudan line, but, as explained above, a section of it only, required to pass the worst cataracts. " The Customs duties may also be expected to improve. There has been a steady and gradual increase of the exports of cotton, which have risen from 1,253,593 quintals in 1867 to 2,615,120 quintals in 1874 " In the thirteen years of Ismail Pasha's rule, the quantity of cotton ex- ported has been 3 '6 times that of the exportation of the preceding thirteen years, or an increase of 257 per cent. The fall in price has caused disappoint- ment, and may check production, it being now doubted whether com does - not pay better. At the same time improved machinery enables cotton to be more effectually separated from the seed, from which oil and cake are now largely made. " In the general returns of exports and imports there is also a marked im- provement. " The total value of imports from 1863 to 1875 amounts to 61,939,736/., agaiast, from 1850 to 1862, 29,641,155?., showing an advance of 100 per cent, in thirteen years. "Exports have quadrupled during the same period, having increased in value from 36,889,543?. to 145,939,736?. " During the thirteen years the growth of the population of Egypt has been considerable, the births having exceeded the deaths by 636,809. " Education has been carefully attended to, the number of schools estab- lished on a European model having increased from 185 iu 1862 to 4,817* ia 1875. In the latter year there were 4,817 schools, with 6,048 masters and 140,977 pupils, being an augmentation on the previous year of 1,073 schools, 1,615 masters, and 27,723 pupils. The quality of the education given neces- sarily varies, but it has on the whole decidedly improved, and is iu soma cases of a very superior character. " These statistics show that the country has made great progress in every way under its present ruler ; but, notwithstanding that progress, its present financial position is, for the reasons that have been already stated, very criti- * Ibis is an error. The total nmnber of schools in the coonti; in 1875 was 4,817 ; bnt of these 4,685 were Arab primary schools, by no means " on a Bnropeon modeL" 394 APPEIWIX G. cal. StJU the expenditure, though heavy, would not of itself have produced the present crisis, which may be attributed almost entirely to the ruinous con- ditions of loans raised for pressing requirements, due in some cases to causes over which the Elhedive had little control. " The loans have been raised as follows : — " In 1863 Said Pasha contracted the first loan. The nominal amount was 8,393, 800?., repayable in thirty years ; the interest 7 per cent., and the sinking fund 1 per cent. We have no particulars of the amount really received on this loan. " In 1864 the first of the present Viceroy's loans was contracted. The nom- inal amount was 5,704,300?., of which, however, only 4,864,063?. was received. The interest and sinking fund on the nominal amount were respectively 7 and 3 '87 per cent., but on the amount received they were 8 '3 and 4 "5, or, together, 13'7 per cent., instead of 10'87 per cent, on the nominal value. This loan was redeemable in fifteen years, and will, therefore, be paid off in 1879. " The loan of 1868 was not made redeemable till 1898 ; its nominal amount was for 11,890,000?., of which only 7,193,334?. was received. The apparent interest and sinking fund of 7 and 1 per cent, became therefore 11 '56 and 1 -eS per cent., or together, 13i per cent. " In 1873 a further loan was contracted for a nominal amount of 33,000,000?., at 7 per cent, interest andl per cent, sinking fund, but as only 30,063,658?. was even nominally received, these figures became 11 and 1 '63 per cent., and the charge 13-63 per cent.; but of this 30,063,658?., at least 9,000,000?. were paid into the Treasury in bonds of the floating debt taken at 93 per cent. The Treasury may therefore be held to have received 30,740,077?., and the annual charge amounts to only 13 '3 per cent, on this sum. " A loan was raised for the construction of railways in 1866. Its nominal amount was 3,000,000?., at 7 per cent. The amount received by the State was 3,640,000?., which raised the interest to 8 per cent. The full amount of 3,000,000?. was repaid by sis annual instalments of 500,000?. each, from the 1st of January, 1869, to the 1st of January, 1874, a rate equivalent to a sinking- fund of 18'9 per cent. ; so that during six years this loan entailed on the State an average charge equal to 26 '9 per cent, of the amount realised. "In addition to these regular State loans there are two Dal'ra loans, which have been transferred to the State against value received. These are : — "The Anglo-Egyptian Loan of 1865 for 3,000,000?., at 9 per cent, interest, and sinking fund of 3.37 per cent., in all 13*37 per cent. ; and the Mustapha Pasha Loan of 1867 for 3,080,000?., which was raised at 9 per cent., with a sinking-fund of 3 '4 per cent., in all 13'4 per cent. Both of these loans vrill have been repaid by the end of 1881 " The personal loan of the Khedive, raised on his private estates in 1870, was obtained on slightly more onerous terms than the State loans, excepting that for railways. To obtain 5,000,000?., his Highness engaged to pay back 7,143,860?., in twenty years, with 7 per cent, interest on this nominal amoxmt. Bo that he really pays on the amount received 10 per cent, interest and 8"86 per cent, sinking-fund, or a yearly charge of 13*36 per cent. " The following Table shows these loans at a glance : — MB. OATH'S REPORT. 395 I "g-d o -as 1^1 °"S © _j O -** 'o • §1 aw •ag 5 o tin . 3i lOOS 05 00 00 u •a =« : ODO CO C> OO ■*o CD-** 00 CO TOl J3 3 o 9 S "rH CO 03 03 .s -30 --a-VM a -^ c « ® ^ ^1' i^lfl" =«s 00 00 030 00 £-0 00 o o 00 000 ^ 3« 00 00 -*«o CD CO 00 00 00 CO 0:1 a> 00 OS 00 03 cot' 00 00 O CO © '^ ®.S 00 396 APPENDIX G. " From tMs table it is seen that none of the Egyptian loaoas cost less thtm 12 per cent, per annum, while some cost more than 13i per cent, per annum, and the railways loan even 269 per cent, per annnm, including sinking funds. " A Return furnished by the Minister of Finance sets the amount paid for interest and sinking funds of the public loans to the end of 1875 at 29,670,994?.* "According to the same Betum, the revenue received from 1864 to 1875 inclusive amounted to 94,281,401?. During the same period the expenses of administration, including tribute to Constantinople, were 56,461,3632. ; and the Government expended on the Suez Canal, on different works specified in the subjoined list, and on certain compensations and transactions, 56,654,7322. " The debtor and creditor account of the State, from 1864 to 1875, stands thus : — " Heobifib. £ "ByEeventte 94,281,401 Loaas 81,ri3,987t Sale of Suez Canal Shares 8,976,583 FloaUngDebt 18,243,076 148,215,047 " EXPBNBITUBB. £ • Admlnlatraaon 48,888,491 Tribute to the Porte 7,592,872 Works of ntUity, &c 30,240,058 Kxtraordinary expenses — some of questionable ntillty, and othere under pressure of interested parties 10,539,545 Interests and Sinking Funds 34,898,962 Suez Canal 16,075,119 148,215,047 " Two striking features stand out in this balance-sheet, namely, that the sum raised by revenue, 94,281,4012., is little less than that spent on Adminis- tration, Tribute to the Porte, Works of unquestionable utility, and certain expenses of questionable utOityor policy, in all amounting to 97,240,9662., and that for the present large amount of indebtedness there is absolutely nothing to show but the Suez Canal, the whole proceeds of the Loans and Floating Debt having been absorbed in payment of interest and sinking funds, with the exception of the sum debited to that great work. It is to be further observed in connection with this subject that the necessity of paying large amounts to the Suez Canal Company obliged the Egyptian Government to resort to its earlier loans in 1864 and 1868. " * According to the Loan Contracts the service of the loans should only have cost 27,933,716^. to the end of 1875. This sum may have been swollen by extra charges. " t The greater part of the Loan of 1864 having been applied to the payment of the debts of the Khedive's predecessor, Is not included in this rctam, which therefore diners from the amount given in the table. MS. OA VETS REPORT. 397 " TL e operation of the law of tie Moukabala as above described is itself, per- haps, the most striking instance of the reckless manner in which the means of the future have been sacrificed to meet the pressing needs of the present Before the law was enacted, the land-tax yielded as nearly as we can judge, 4,793,459?. a year. The operation of the Moukabala was to give to the Gov- ernment six times this amount, or about 28,760,754?. Of this a part was to be returned in discount at %\ per cent., and 2,396,729?. will have been so returned by the end of 1885, leaving to the Government a total of 26,363,888?., the receipt of which will have been spread over fourteen years, in exchange for which the Government has surrendered in perpetuity revenue to the amount of nearly 2,500,000?. a year. " The immediate pressure arises from the Khedive's inabUity to take up the bonds of his unfunded floating debt, now falling due at short intervals, and estimated by his. Highness at 18,243,076?. at least, after deducting the 4,000,000?. which have been extinguished by the purchase-money of the Canal shares. " This unfortunate position is due in great measure to the onerous con- ditions of the Loan of 1873, which was contracted for the express purpose of clearing off the floating debt, amounting at that time to 28,000,000?. By these conditions the nominal amoxmt of 32,000,000?. was reduced to an appar- ent effective of 20,740,077?., of which 9,000,000?. were paid in the bonds of the floating debt. These bonds, purchased by the contractors at a heavy dis- count, and sometimes at a price as low as 65 per cent., were paid into the Treasury at 93 per cent., an operation which materially enhanced tt* profits accruing to the negotiators of the loan. " An examination of the contracts of the several loans shows that every available portion of the revenue has been pledged, sometimes more than once. " The loan of 1873 swallows up every resource. It is guaranteed, first by all the general revenues of Egypt, and then especially by — "1. All the railway revenues of Lower Egypt, with a trifling exception. (This security is estimated at 750,000?., but not limited to that amount.) " 3. The receipts from the personal and indirect taxes assessed at 1,000,000?. "3. The receipts from the salt tax, 300,000?. " 4. 1,000,000?. a year from the Moukabala, or commuted land-tax (of short duration). " And lastly all the revenues already given in pledge to all other loans as they by degrees become liberated by the paying off of those loans. " These last-named securities include — " The revenue of Province of Rodat-el-Bahrein (the Delta). " The Egyptian Customs duties. " The bridge and look dues. "All the farmed duties, such as the duties on salt and fresh fish. " Sheep tax. " Oil tax. " Duties on ferry-boats and barges. " As, therefore, every security of real value is pledged, and as, without the 398 APPENDIX a. means of meetiBg the floating debt, a very serious crisis in the financial affairs of Egypt must take place, which would be fatal to the interests of the bond- holders under her various loans, it would seem that the most feasible mode of averting the danger would be to buy up, for the purpose of consolidation, the loans of 1860 and 1873, and the bonds of the floating debt. By this means the revenues now pledged would be liberated, and would be available as secu- rities for a new loan, to be issued at a moderate rate of interest. " There is, however, an essential condition on which the success of some scheme of this character depends, namely, that the Khedive should place a person who would command general confidence, such, for instance, as the financial agent sent out by her Majesty's Government to take employment under his Highness, at the head of a Control Department which should re- ceive direct from the tai-coUector certain branches of revenue to be defined, but comprising the land-tax and Moukabala, and should have a general supervision of the incidence and levying of the taxes. " If the tax-collectors throughout the country were placed under the orders of this Department, it would have power to check frauds on the Exchequer on the one hand, and the extortion practised on the Fellaheen on the other. Inspectors should be sent round to tate specimen districts, so as to ascer- tain what every peasant, every sakkia, every date-tree, every feddan has paid during the year, and to trace the amount through the various hands through which it passes before it reaches the Treasury. In this manner it might be proved whether the burdens on the people are aggravated by the misconduct of their head men, and how far the system prevails of collecting taxes at the wrong time of year — of levying perhaps one year's taxes at the end of the year, and again immediately after, at the beginning of the next, under which, it is to be feared, that three years' taxes are sometimes paid in two years.* The system of practically forced loans, which the peasant can- not distinguish from taxes, might also be inquired into ; as also whether any special duties, such as those on date-trees, sakMas and shadoofs (methods of irrigation) lead to oppression and extortion. " His Highness should undertake to consider the recommendations made to him by his Control Department, and to remedy any well-substantiated cases of maladministration that might be brought before him. By these means an important element of future wealth and prosperity would be introduced into the country ; as the fellaheen, thus protected from oppression and able to em- ploy the means now wrung from them by the tax-collectors, in excess of what comes into the State Treasury, would add materially to the present resources of the country. " His Highness should further engage to make no fresh loans without the consent of the Control Department. "The details of this plan can be worked out when the principle has been settled. " With guarantees of this kind it might be possible to make the required arrangements, and the present debts having been replaced by one amount at *' * These complications are likely to increase in coneeqaence of the eabetitDtion of the Gregorian for the Coptic style at the commencement of the present year. MU. CAVE'S REPORT. 399 moderate interest, there is no reason why the country shonld not q^iickly recover. " The liabilities of the Egyptian Government are : Loans. Paid Off. To be Paid. Esplres. 1882 £775,800 £2,517,000 1892 1864 573,200 2,132,000 1879 1868 67,480 10,723,620 1898 1878 686,343 31,813,657 1903 Monstapha, 1867 922,500 1,157,500 1881 Daira Loan of 1865, bached by Treasnry . . . 1,542,688 1,457,313 1881 FloatlngDebt 18,334,960 AbyBsinlan War expenses 1,000,000 " The debts of the Khedive's Dalra, which it is desirable to bring into the general arrangement, are as under : — " The Loan of 1870— Unpaid Capital £6,032,630 FloatlngDebt 8,000,000 " The present Revenue of Egypt consists of :— "LandTax £4,805,131 Moukabala 1,531,118 Other sources of Eevenue .. 4,852,831 £10,689,070 " These figures will probably be maintained tiU the end of 1885, and this revenue will go on increasing unless any unforeseen calamity befalls the country. " In 1886 the Moukabala wiU cease, and the Land Tax will be diminished by the redemption of the tax, on a large portion of the land. On the other hand, fresh lands which are already brought under cultivation will then have begun to pay tax, and it may be confidently expected that other lands now waste will in the next ten years have been brought under cultivation and become tax-paying. It is also reasonable to suppose that other sources of rev- enue will have become more productive. "The Revenue of 1886 and following years may, therefore, be assumed to be at least equal to the following amounts : — "liandTax £3,134,824 Other sonices of Eevenne (10 per cent, more than In 1876) 5,338,103 Total £8,472,927. In ronnd numbers 8,473,000 •* The amount of unpaid capital on the loans is as f oUows : — SnmU Loans (nearly paid off). Unpaid Capital. Annuity. Expires in. 1864 Dalra Loan of 1865 (Anglo-Egyptian) 1867 (Monstapha) £2,133,000 1,457,312 i,i6r,soo £620,312 368,350 258,024 1879 1881 1881 Anmial amount £1,246,686 400 APPENDIX 0. The Larger Loans. TJnpaid Capital. ATiTinlty. Expires In. 1868 1868 1873 Dalra(1870) rioating Debt of the State Ditto of the Daira £8,517,000 :0,722,B50 31,Cl:,:59 G,o::,620 18,043,076 E,000,000 £263,978 958,803 2,506,670 663,000 189S 1898 1903 1890 Total Say £71,828,875 72,000,000 " It might simplify any scheEie for the consolidation of the debt if the loans which expire within the next six years, and whose annnities cm ba paid out of the revenue derived from tho Moukabala, were oxelnded from it. "In this case, in considering the amount of 73,000,000?. given aboTo to be dealt with by consolidation and the resources to meet the annual charges upon it, the following points are to be noted : — "As concerns the funded debt, the interest on the nominal amount of the loans with which alone we have now to deal is not excessive, but the sinking- funds add to it a yearly charge which is too heavy for the revenue. Were the term of repayment deferred, this charge would be lightened ; it is, therefore suggested that an offer might be made to the bondholders of these loans of a new stock at 7 par cent., repayable by the year 1936, instead of the bonds they now hold redeemable from 1893 to 1903. The inducement to these bondholders to accept the deferred payment would be the security given for the punctual payment of the debt charges, by the special Control Department, to be insti- tuted by tho Khedive as above described. A condition of the arrangement would be the transfer of the resources of the country from the service of special loans to the service of the whole debt. " It may be expected that If the gravity of the situation is explained to tho bondholders they will consent to an arrangement for securing to them a fair return on their money, and saving them from the heavy loss inseparable from a financial collapse. * "As regards the floating debt, it may be supposed that the holders of Treasury Bonds, which have been frequently renewed, and now represent a value far in excess of the amount paid to the Khedive, would willingly take bonds for the present nominal amount of these bonds with an assured interest and repayment. " It remains to examine whether the resources of the country are equal to the payment of the necessary annuity for covering this payment of interest and sinking-fund. • " It mast be observed that, by clause 19 in the contract of the Loan of 1873, the Khedlvo engages to malie no fresh loans before 1878, except to the extent of 10,000,000?. sterling for public worlcs. It is alleged, however, that tills engagement would not be broken by a loan for the purpose of funding existing debts. MR. OAVSrs UEPORT. 401 " As above shown, the Mnoimt of Funded and Unfunded Debt to be paid off, In- dependently of the three Bmall Loans, is £72,000,000 If to this be added, for the expense of the Abyssinian War 1,000,000 And for the cost of this operation 3,000,000 We liave a total amount of £75,000,000 " For tli« interest and sinMng-f und of whicli provision would have to be made. . Tie annuity to repay tUs sum in fifty years witli interest at 7 per cent, per anniun would be 5,484,425^., but as the Daira Loan and Floating Debt have been taken into the operation, a proportion of this charge will fall on the private estate of the Khedive, and not on the State ; this proportion would be 673,608?.,* leaving 4,761,817?. to be furnished by the State. " The permanent charges of the Budget are : — "Trtbnte to Constantinople £685,808 Interest on Snez Oanal Shares tiril896 198,839 Administration (indndlng CivllLlst of His Highness and family) 3,067,560 8,951,697 Say •••• •••• •••« •••• .... 4,000,000 The Revenue of 187610 1885 should be 10.689,000 Less the Moukabala (which we propose to deal with separately) .... .... 1,631,000 9,168,000 Deduct the permanent charge .• .... 4,000,000 6,168,000 The charge for Interest and SinHng-Fund 4,761,817 Leaves a working surplus of 896,183 But In 1886 and subseqaent years we have shown that the Beveime will be only (except the growth that may be expected in the future) .... 8,473,000 Deduct permanent charge 4,000,000 4,473,000 Service of Debt 4,761,817 Leaving a deficit of • .... «••• •••• 288,817 "This deficit might be dealt with by reserving the produce of the Mouka- bala receipts. These receipts will be 1,531,818?. a year untU the end of 1885. * " The Loan alone, without the interest of floating debt, now costs the Khedive 668,00«. • year, so that this sum can be well borne, as shown by his Highness's DaIra account 402 APPENDIX a. " The ctargea on them will be : — • ••> £ 1,246,686 Sniplns. iB 1876, AnnnlHeB of the Loans of 1864, 1865, 1867 £ 284,433 1877 ditto ditto 1,246,686 284,438 1878 ditto ditto 1,246,686 284,432 1879 ditto ditto 1,246,686 284,432 1880 ATinnitiea of the Loans of 1865, 1867 ■ •>• * •• 626,374 904,744 1881 ditto ditto 626,874 904,744 1882 • *•• **•• ...• •*■■ •••• • •• • ••• 1,631,118 1883 •... .... ■>•■ .■■• ■•■■ .■• ■ ••'• *•.. 1,531,118 1884 **■■ .... >••• .... .... • ••• .... .... 1,531,118 1885 .... .... •• 1,631,118 1886 £9,(m,688 " This Reserre Fund would probably be increased be accruing interest up to 1885, or if circmnstances should admit of a large portion of it being em- ployed in the redemption of bonds, it is clear that the diminution of charge would convert the deficit caused by the reduction of the land tax in 1886 into a surplus. The Moukabala should be absolutely vested in the Control De- partment, and be applied by it, so that security should thus be provided against possible fluctuations of revenue. " It would appear from these calculations that the resources of Egypt are sofflcient, if properly managed, to meet her liabilities, but that as all her available assets are pledged for the charges of existing loans, some fresh com- bination is necessary in order to fund at a moderate rate the present onerous floating debt. " The annual charge upon the people of Egypt is heavy, and has increased ; but the power of meeting it, that is, the wealth of the country as indicated by its exports, has increased in a far greater degree. And it must be remem- bered that this annual charge includes not only a siniing-fund for the re- demption of debt, but a very large proportion of what we should call local taxation. It also includes the cost of much that is done In this country by private enterprise, such as railways, canals, harbours, docks, etc., besides actual rent of lands belonging to the State, and repayment of advances dur- ing periods of scarcity and murrain. " We gather from all the information that we have been able to obtain Egypt is weU able to bear the charge of the whole of her present indebted- ness at a reasonable rate of interest ; but she cannot go on renewing floating ddbts at 25 per cent, and raising fresh loans at 13 or 13 per cent, interest to meet these additions to her debt, which do not bring in a single piastre to hei Exchec[aer. " Stkphbn Catb." MR OAVES RMFORT. 403 Appendix No. 1. Cm/nvATBa) Lands in the Provinces of Upper and Lower Egypt tn th« Coptic Tear 1591, corresponding to A.D. 1874-76. Lands subject to tax and borne npon the Beglster (Cadastre) — Kharadgis • ... ... ... ... Oachooryt ..• ... Lands not subject to tax and not borne npon the Eegister, viz.: — Ouchoary conceded in virtae of Takslds (Title of Concession) delivered by the Ronznameh, which have still to be made the object of an ulterior veriflcatton, according to which the tax wlllbeflxed Lands distinct from the Eegister, and others for which no Taksid has yet been given, i.e., Feddans. Taxable like the lands Ouchonry at the respective dates, conformably with the decision of the Chamber of Nota- bles 70,000 Subject to an ulterior verification and survey 197,650 Deduct — Lands cultivated under the preceding Govern- ment, that is to say up to the year 1B78 (Sep- tember, 1862)— ^ Kharadgis — — Deduct the lands of Eosetta, registered under the Government of Eosetta, and therefore deducted, because these lands were not registered under the Eegister of the Provinces as regards the year 1591 (1875) Ouchonry ... ... ... ... ... ... Difference rendered cultivable under the present QoT- emment I'eddans. 8,613,941 1,291,168 267,650 8,505,179 soa feddans. 4,806,107 630,000 Feddans. 6,425,iar 8,504,373 547,603 4,051,976 l,»8,iai • Lands paying tax aseessed on valae of prodace. t Lands paying a fixed tithe. 404 APPENDIX a. Appeitdix No. 3. UnouiiTiYATEi) Lands known according to the preceding Register madt during the Beign of Mehemet AH. Feddans. Feddana. Provinces of Lower Egypt— Mndjrieh Garbi^h • Ba^ra " Charkia ... • " Dakahlia Galionbia 550,000 180,000 100,612 49,955 11,074 861,641 206,858 Provinces of Upper Egypt— Mndirieh El atlzi-et-Attfeh " BlPayomn ' AsBiont 25,000 160,000 81,358 Total Feddans 1,097,999 Besides these lands, there exists in the Provinces of Gharhieh, Charkifih, Behera, and Dakahlieh about 1,500,000 uncultivated feddans not registered, without counting the area of lakes which may become dry. Appendix No. 8. Details of the Number of MUes of Railways and Telegraphs established under the Government of His Highness the Khedive. MUes. Total KUes. Coat per MUe in Ponnds Sterling. Total Cost In Ponnds Sterling. Eallwaya and Telegraphs established np to the end of September, 1873, i. e. — Hailwaya Telegraphs as far as the Soadan 1,110 9,298 10,408 246 £ e. 11,112 90 IS 10,270 60 Total ... £ 12,834,320 844,258 18,178,578 1,027,000 8,700 Hallways and Telegraphs established In 1874 and 1875, i. c— Eallways Telegraphs 100 14S ... Total MUes 10,658 14,214,278 MB. a A VE-S REPORT. 405 U CD r GOCOOOQOOOGOGOaOCOQOQOCOGO ■HiHT-HiH-i-nH-HTHl-li-t'HTH-H . 1> t- '^tt O t- C» T-( Oi 00 lO -^ o o m bDOP 0500tHO(EiO=0-^05CDO(M ft ^■^ C* tH (M O Ci CD Oi tH G5 lO -^ GO ~ CO th'ot C^Tca CO'T-ToiT'^rio't^ '^T'^ H- ^CDOSlOCSCSOOCQOT-tC^tMCCias ^ mOOJOCZJCOlOOiOiO OtH CO CO <^C0U5 1O'^"^''c«-**-<**"--*"»o'c01o'lo" t>TH-rH-^i>'^COC5T-(»0«G010 bflf <:oo':oost-cooc5CQOO-^03 _2 C3 O CD 1j3 -Tti Ci 00 1- O QOCOtHt-J_ '? 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CDCDCDCOCDCOCO<:Oi>i>i>i>t> OOOOOOQOOOOOCOCOOOOOOOGOOO t'COQOaOCOODCOCOCOCOQOOSOS -a O-g O CD t-CO t-OCDCOCOW^OS-^lOO iH i> Cft lO"^ <^_r^ lO-^ CD iH ' tH CO O CO T-T tH CD 0(5" GO Ci" lO OODCDiOOSlOCOOTHOSfH OW W C^CQIM OSrH-^ lO CO lOTHCjiCO^lOCDt-opCpCDTHM OiOTHc!(CO'4OOOiO-i-t ""dHlOiOlClOlOiOlOiOiOiOCDCD OOQOOOOOCOOOOOODCOOOCOCOCO lOCOt-QOOiOrHCQ'^lOCDt^OO CDCDCDCDCDir-t-£-i>I>i^-I>t- lOCDi>0i(MOCQi>Oi>00C0I> Cit— "^GOCOCOipT-l£.---rHi>-dHa5 "^coc?cD'yit'>:#i00o:i'^Oi£> oi" o '^^ -^ in ^^ O io'iH CD CO th' ccT OIOG500'<#00tH00OQ0C01OCJ COCOiHCDlOCOiOCOlOlOtOCDC- ^ APPElfDIX H. The FiifANoiAL Deceees. Although the scheme for the unification of the Egyptian debt, based on the decrees of May 3 and 7 of last year, fell through, those decrees themselyes technically survived, and though many of their provisions Tvere abrogated by the later edict of November 18, giving effect to the substituted Goschen-Joubert project, some others are stUl in force, and all three of the decrees must therefore be read together. The first — of May 2 — prescribes the new organisation of the Ministry of Finance, ■which, it will be seen, has been since im- portantly modified : — " Deoebb. " We, the Khedive of Egypt, having consulted our Privy Council, have decreed, and do hereby decree as follows : — "CliATJSB L "Establishment of a Supreme Council of the Treasury, and its Functions. "Abticle I. — A Supreme ConncU. of the Treasury is established, which will be divided into three Sections. The first of these wUl be denominated • Section for the General Inspection of the Revenue and the State Treasuries;' the second, ' Section for the Control of the Eevenue and Expenditure ; ' the third, ' Section for Auditing the Accounts.' " The three Sections will work separately or conjointly, according to the arrangements provided for by the present Decree. " AuTiCLE II. — The first Section will be charged with the inspection of the Central Treasury and the supervision of its accounts. This inspection and this supervision shall be extended to any other Treasuries which may bo established for any special service. The Section, or its delegated ofiicials, shall have the right at all times to take cognizance of the state of its funds, and to audit its accounts. " The reports of the inspectors charged by the Minister of Finance with the inspection of the other Treasuries and of the Inland Revenue Depart- ments shall be communicated by him to the Supreme Council. This Section will superintend the due receipt of all revenues and their strict application to their proper purpose. Every abuse or irregularity shall be reported to the Supreme Council, and proceedings shall be taken against the responsible 407 408 APPENDIX H. agents before tlie second Section in accordance with the articles following The inspector delegated by the Section can only take provisional resolutions A resolution of the Section is requisite to make them definitive. " Abticlb in. — The second Section, either alone or conjointly, according to the provisions hereinafter contained, shall make a prelinfiinary examination of aU engagements which involve any expenditure chargeable to the State Budget, as also all orders or draughts or opening of credits in favour of offi- cials authorised to issue bonds of payment to the amount of the sum placed at their disposal. "B. The second Section shall audit these bonds of payments, and pro- nounce on the responsibility of the officials who may have incurred expenses or made payments without being authorised. " C. If an engagement, or order, or draught fail to be met, or be not issued in the regular form, or if the same be incurred or issued by an incompetent authority, the Section shall bring the fact under the notice of the Minister of Finance, and, in case the Administration should persist, its act can only become legally valid by a decision of the Privy CounoU. " D. Every engagement involving expenditure, every order or draught for payment or opening of credit, the amount of which, in conjunction with the sums of the like nature already incurred or disbursed, exceeds the Budget estimate, or creates a fresh expense for which no sum has been provided in the Budget, shall be suspended by a resolution explaining the reasons for such course. The Privy Council shall deliberate on the case, and if it con- siders the expenditure necessary, and if his Highness the Khedive approve it, a special decree shall be issued authorising the expenditure, indicaiting at the same time the ways and means for the same. In pursuance of such decree, the modifications or fresh entries necessary for providing for its exe- cution shall be made in both the assets and liabilities of the Budget account. This Section shall watch over the prompt payment of all revenues into the Treasuries. " Article IV. — At the request of the Minister of Finance, or on the reports of Ihe inspectors transmitted to it through the medium of the Minister of Finance, the Section shall pronounce judgment, with power of execution, against any revenue oflScer who may receive sums without paying them into the Treasury indicated beforehand by the Ministry of Finance ; also against any official or cashier who may not have made his payments regularly, or who may have made improper or irregular payments. Every payment shall be considered irregular and improper which is not made in conformity with the formalities prescribed by law, and such payment is nuU and void, and the person making it shall be held answerable for the same. Among the formalities, the most essential are those which the regulations prescribe for determining the legal authority for the payments by the various Treasuries, or order them to remit funds. In this case the Treasurer is responsible fo* payments made in pursuance of any other order or draught having a different form. For discharging the responsibility of the payer it is sufficient that the form of the voucher be in order, and that the prescribed formalities be com. plied with, irrespective of _the merits of the payment. In the case provided THE FINANOIAL DEOREES. 409 for in the prc^oeding article, sub literd D, if tiers be a diBagreement between the members of the second Section on the definition of the expenditure, or on the sufficiency of the fnnds for the payment of the same, the question shall be regulated by the first and the second Sections conjointly ; these two Sec- tions shall also conjointly decide on the draughts and orders of payment which may be presented to the Treasuries without having been registered at the Council of the Treasury. " Aeticlh V. — The third Section shall audit and settle the accounts of all accountants whose duty it is, by the regulations, to furnish the said account^ for audit. The examination of the accounts shall be effected by the officials of the Audit Department, whose duties will be laid down in Clause HL The estimate of the general account shall be fixed, and the general accounts of the Treasury shaU be audited, by a union of the third with the first Section. Any accountant believing himself prejudiced by these audits shall have the right of subjecting them to a revision by the first and second Sections con- jointly. " Abticlb VL — The Supreme CounoU of the Treasury is entitled to demand from the Ministers and the chiefs of the difEerent administrations of the State all information and all documents having reference to the exercise of its functions. It is also its duty to lay information with the Privy Council and the Ministers, giving notice at the same time to the Minister of Finance, of all infringements of the laws and regulations referring to the financial adminis- tration of the State, and which may come under its notice during the execu- tion of the functions confided to it. It has also the task entrusted to it of presenting to the Privy Council, through the medium of the Minister of JPinance, at the end of every financial year, a report on the general position of the Treasury, on the general progress of the account, and on the useful reforms which it would be possible to introduce into the public accounts and into the financial administration of income and expenditure. " Clause H. " Formation of the State Budget. " Abticlb I. — Three months before the conclusion of every financial year the Minister of Finance will fix the Budget for the next year. The receipts and expenditure vrill be kept distinct, according to their nature, and specified aa f ar as possible. The draught of the Budget wiU be submitted to the Supreme Council of the Treasury, to receive its advice and the ideas which It may be able to suggest in order to render its wording better and more exact. "Article II. — At the end of every financial year a Treasury account shall be drawn up, showing all payments actually made and all income actually received. "Aeticle in. — To the Budget Estimates already fixed for the ensuing year shall be added, under the designation of ' Eesidues of Assets,' all difEer- ences between the estimated revenue and income actually received, as also the other unrealised credits ; and, under the designation of ' Residue of 410 APPMIWIX H. Liabilities,' the differences between the estimated expenditure and the pay. ments actually made. After three months of the new year's administration these differences are to bo reduced to their real value by fixing the estimated receipts and those in arrear, and the expenditure to be incurred, in a more just measure than had been done in the original estimates. The definitive Budget of the year is to be composed of these various elements. " Abticle IV. — One copy of the Budget and the statements of the Eesi- dues of Assets and Liabilities, as also of their successive rectification, is to be handed to the Minister of Finance, and a second copy shall be deposited with the Supreme CouucU of the Treasury. "Clause m. " Composition am,d Orga/nisation of the three Sections of the Swpreme CouncU of the Treasury. " Aeticlb I. — ^The Supreme Council of the Treasury will be composed of ten councillors, of whom five will be natives and five foreigners, and of a president, who will be appointed by his Highness the Khedive. There will be a Secretaryship of the Council. " ABTicrLB IL — The first Section will be composed of three foreign members. It wHL be presided over in rotation by one of its members in the order of theJT age. The President will remain In office for six months. " Akticub IIL — The second Section will be composed of five members — namely, four councillors, two natives and two foreigners, and of the Presi- dent of the Council, who will also be President of the Section. This Sec- tion will choose a vice-president from its midst. One of the members of the Section is to be delegated by the same to fulfil the functions of the publio ministry. The President of the Supreme Council will delegate one of the referendaries, of whom mention is made in Article VI. following, to exercise the functions of substitute of the Public Ministry. In dependence from this Section an office will be established for keeping the accounts in connection with the Budget, and for registering all documents submitted to its examina^ tion by virtue of the present decree. " Aeticle IV. — The third Section will be composed of three native mem- bers. A staff of six referendaries of accounts will be attached to this Section Two of these referendaries, comprising the one who has examined the accounts in question, will take part and be entitled to vote in the Section called upon to audit them. Two of these referendaries are to be foreigners. " Abticle V. — The appointment of the members of the council and of the Secretary-General wUl be made by virtue of a decree of his Highness the Khe- dive. Their appointments and other conditions are to be fixed by their re- spective contracts of service. " Aeticlb VI. — No member of the Supreme Council can be ordered to re- sign, or to tender his resignation, or be deprived of his functions, unless by decree of his Highness the Khedive, based upon the advice of his Privy Council. " Abticle Vli. — The Supreme CouncU will make its own regulations fof THE FINANCIAL DECREES. 411 Its internal administration, for the organisation of its Secretaryship-General and various offices, and for the distribution of its work. " Done at Cairo, the 2nd day of May, 1876. " ISMAJfL." "DECREE. " We, the Khedive of Egypt, in view of our decree dated May 3, 1876, rel- ative to the establishment of a Supreme Council of the Treasury, M. le Com- mandeur Scialoja, Senator of the Kingdom of Italy, having consented to accept, provisionally and without fixed salary, the task of organising the Supreme Council of the Treasury, and of presiding over it, I entrust this mis- sion to him by virtue of the present decree. " Done at Cairo, the 14th day of May, 1876. " ISMAlL." The document of May 1 decrees the unification of the debt, which, as before stated, could not be carried through. It provided, that-;- " Whereas the loans contracted in 1863, 1864, 1868, 1873, 1865, 1867, and 1870 by the Government and the Daira Sauieh originally amounted to the sum of £65,497,660 sterluig, and are now reduced to £54,793,150 sterling by the redemption of bonds effected up to this day ; " Whereas to these debts, contracted by means of loans with sinking funds, there is to be added the floating debt contracted both by the Government and the Daira in order to cover the deficit resulting from the partial non-execution of the contract relative to the loan of 1833, — not including the provision con- tained in Clause 19 of the said contract for the completion of the public works already in course of construction, — and also to meet the expenditure occa- sioned by circumstances beyond human control and by public calamities ; " Whereas this debt has to a great extent been contracted by means of credit operations which, having been forced upon the Government in critical periods or under other exceptional and urgent circumstances, have been con- cluded on conditions onerous for the State Treasury; " Whereas, in order to make it possible for the Treasury and the Daira Sanieh to satisfy these different debts, and to better secure for the future the interests of the creditors by a measure in conformity with the public exigen- cies, it has been found opportune and useful to unify all these debts by estab- lishing one general debt, bearing interest at the rate of 7 per cent. , and re- deemable within sixty -five years ; " Whereas, in view of the conditions of issue of the different loans with sinking funds attached, the bonds belonging to these loans, to be unified at pal of their nor^inal value, receive a benefit which it is only just to extend to the holders of bonds of the floating State debt and of the Daira Sanieh in a pro- portion which shall establish as fax as possible an equality between all credit- ors, and it is also equitable to accord to the holders of the 1864, 1865, and 1867 loans, the last payments of which are shortly falling due, a compensa- tion for the relatively greater prolongation of the sinking fond operations ; 413 APPENBTX B " Whereas, the yearly snm necessary for the service of the general unified debt, amounting to £91,000,000 sterling, -will be £6,448,600 sterling, but, in order to determine the real charge which will actually be chargeable in the ordinary State Budget, it is necessary to deduct from that sum £684,411 ster- ling, being the contribution of the Daira Sanieh in proportion to the amount ot its debt unified with the State Debt, and thus the annual charge on the State remains at £5,759,189 sterling ; " Whereas, the unification and the consolidation of the State debts into one general debt, make it inopportune to continue the payment of the Moukabala, by which the Government had intended to arrive at the extinction of the floating debt by anticipating the Land Tax in six yearly amounts ; "Whereas, in consequence of this anticipation, one of the most important revenues of the State would after some years be considerably reduced, while in the interest both of the Govemment and of the State creditors it is neces- sary that the revenue of the Treasury be secured, so as to satisfy the interest and the redemption of the Public Debt and also the Budget expenditure ; " Whereas, for these reasons our Privy Council has proposed to us, and we have approved, to arrest the operation of the Moukabala by according to those who have made anticipatory payments all rights and privileges over the property which they would only have definitively acquired after the full pay- ment of the Moukabala, and to take equitable measures either for the restitu- tion of these anticipatory payments or for a proportionate reduction of taxes, the result of which will be to obviate a considerable reduction in one of the principal sources of the State revenue ; " Whereas, further for the security of the creditors, it has become necessary to establish a special Treasury charged with receiving the amount of revenue devoted to the service of the Debt ; " We, the Khedive of Egypt, after consulting our Privy CouncU, have de- creed, and do hereby decree, as follows : — " Aeticle I. — Ail the Debts of the State and those of the Daira Sanieh, resulting from loans contracted in the years 1863, 1864, 1868, 1873, 1865, 1867, and 1870, the floating debt of the State, and the floating debt of the Daira Sanieh, including the Treasury Bonds and all other bonds or obligations, are unified into a general debt, the bonds of which shall beax interest at the rate of 7 per cent, on the nominal capital, and shall be redeemable in sixty-five years by half-yearly drawings. The unification is effected at par of the nom- inal amount of the bonds of the old 1863, 1868, 1870, and 1873 Loans. The bonds of the general debt shall be delivered at the rate of 95 per cent, of their nominal capital to the holders of Seven per Cent. Bonds of the 1864 and 1805 .joans, and of the Nine per Cent. Loan of 1867. For this latter loan the differ- ence of the percentage of interest shall be capitalised at the rate of 70 per cent, of the nominal capital, and at the rate of 80 per cent. , to the holders of the bonds of the floating debts of the State and the Daira Sanieh, in the form of Treasury Bonds, or other bonds and obligations which constitute them. By virtue of this operation the general unified debt will amount to £91,000,000 sterling nominal, to bear interest from the 1st of July, 1876. Article 11. — The loan debt and floating debt of the Daira Sanieh bein^ THE FINANCIAL DECREES. 413 unified with that of the State under the same restrictions and guarantees, the Daira Sanieh is hound to pay annually into the Treasury of the Public Debt the sum of £684,411 sterling, representing its proportion of the total yearly amount necessary for the interest and. sinking fund of the Debt. " Abticlb in. — The revenue specially devoted to the service of the General Debt are : — Moudirieh de Qarbieh, £1,301,533 sterling ; Moudirieh de Men- Duieh, £714,107; Moudirieh de Behera, £434,318; Moudirieh de Siout, £733,179 ; octroi dues of Cairo, £345,389 ; octroi dues of Alexandria, £137,837 ; import duties of Alexandria, Suez, Damietta, Eosetta, Port Said, and El Aiish, £659,677 ; railways, £990,806 ; tobacco dues, £364,015 ; salt revenues,£300,000 the rent of Materieh, £60,000 ; sluice revenues and navigation dues on the Nile up to Wadyhalfa, £80,000 ; bridge of Kasr-el-NU, £15,000— total, £5,790,845 sterling. Contribution of the Daira, which is to be paid imme- diately upon the money coming in, £684,411 ; general total of revenue devoted to the service of the Unified General Debt, £6,475,356. " Aeticlh IV. — The bonds of the General Unified Debt shall be issued in Bums of £30, £100, £500, and £1,000 sterling, with coupons payable half- yearly. The drawing of bonds for the half-yearly redemption will be effected by the Managing Commissioner of the Treasury of the Public Debt. These bonds shall be delivered in exchange for the bonds of the old loans and the bonds of the floating debt on the conditions prescribed in Article I. of the ■present decree. " Akticle V. — A group composed of banking houses and financial estab- lishments has undertaken by contract the operation of the unification of the Debt. Special Government Commissioners shall be appeinted by us to watch over the regular execution of these operations. " AsTiciiE VI. — For the service of the Unified Debt a special Treasury is created, the statutes of which are laid down in our preceding decree, which is to be considered as complementary of the present decree. " Abticle Vll. — Our Minister of Finance is charged with the execution of the present decree. " Done at Cairo, the 7th day of May, 1876. " Ismail." "DECREE. "We, the Khedive of Egypt, desiring to take definitive and opportune measures for obtaining the unification of the different debts of the State and those of the Daira Sanieh, and also desiring the reduction of the excessive charges resulting from these debts, and wishing to bear solemn testimony to our firm intention to secure every guarantee to all persons interested, have re- solved to establish a special Treasury charged with the regular service of the Public Debt, and to appoint to its management foreign Commissioners, who at our request will be indicated by the respective Governments as fit officials to fiU the post to which they wUl be appointed by us in the quality of Egyp- tian officials and under the following conditions. Having consulted our Privy CouncU, we have decreed, and do hereby decree as follows : — " Abticlb L — A Treasury of the Public Debt is established, charged with 414 APPENDIX S. receiving the fund necessary for the interest and the redemption of the Debt, and with applying them to this object exclusively. " Abticlb II. — The officials of the local treasuries or special administra- tions, after collecting, receiving or accumulating the revenues specially de- voted to the payment of the Debt are or shall be in future charged to pay them into the Central Treasury or to keep them at the disposal of the intendants of puUlic expenditure {prdonnateura des depenses de I'Etat). The intendants of public expenditure are, by virtue of the present decree, bound to pay these revenues on account of the States Treasury into the special Treasury of tha Public Debt, which will be considered in this respect as a special treasury. These officials, treasuries, and administrations can only procure a valid dis- charge by means of the vouchers which will be delivered to them by the said Treasury of the Public Debt. Any other order or voucher will not be valid. These same officials, treasuries, or administrations will every month send to the Minister of Finance a statement of the receipts or collections made by themselves directly or paid in by the receivers of the revenues specially de- voted to the Debt and payments made into the special Treasury of the Publio Debt. The Minister of Finance will communicate these statements to the Administration of the Treasury of the Public Debt. " The Treasury of the Public Debt shall receive from the Daira Sanieh the entire sum necessary for the interest and redemption of the amount of its unified debt, and it shall likewise receive the funds for the yearly payment due to the EngKsh Government, and representing the interest on the Su^z Canal Shares. " Articlb in. — If the payments of the revenues devoted to the debt be insufficient to meet the half-yearly charges, the Special Public Debt Depart- ment will refund to the Treasury, through the intermediary of the Minister of Finance, the sum required to complete the half-yearly payments ; the Treasury wiU have to deliver this sum a fortnight before the payments are due. If the funds in hand constitute a surplus over the amount necessary for the payment of the interest and the sinking fund, the Special Treasury of the Public Debt will pay this surplus at the end of each year to the general Treasury of the Exchequer. The Treasury of the Public Debt will submit its accounts, which will be examined and reported upon according to law. " Aeticlb rV. — The suits which the Treasury and its Directors, on ita behalf, acting in the name and in the interests of the creditors, mostly of foreign nationality, may consider they have to bring against the financial ad- ministration represented by the Minister of Finance in so far as regards the guardianship of the guarantees of the Debt, which we have confided to the said Treasury, wiU be brought in the terms of their jurisdiction before the new tribunals which, in conformity with the agreement entered into with the Powers, have been instituted in Egypt. " Article V. — The Commissioners selected as stated above will have the direction of the special Treasury of the Public Debt. They ■srtll be appointed by us for five years, and will sit iii Cairo. Their functions may be continued aft-er the five years have expired, and in case of the death or resignation of one C-i them the vacancy will be filled by us in the manner of the original appoint- TEE FINANOIAL BEGREBS. 415 ment. They nacj intrust one of themselves with the functions of President, and the latter xrill notify his nomination to the Minister of Finance. " Abticlh VI. — The cost of exchange, insurance, and conveyance of specie abroad, as well as the conunission for the payment of the coupons, will he borne by the Government. The Directors of the Treasury will come to a previous arrangement with the Ministers of Finance with regard to all these operations, but the Minister will decide whether the despatch of these sums is to be effected in specie or by letters of exchange. " Aeticlb Vn. — The Treasury will not be allowed to employ any funds, disposable or not, in operations of credit, commerce, industry, &e. " AnTiciiE VIII. — The Government will not be able, without an agree- ment of the Commissioners directing the Treasury of the Public Debt with the majority, to effect in any of the taxes specially devoted to the Debt any changes which might result in a diminution of the revenue from these taxes. At the same time, the Government may farm out one or several of these taxes, provided that the contract entered into insure a revenue at least equal to that already existing, and may also conclude treaties of commerce intro- ducing modifications in the custom duties. " Aeticlb IX. — The Government undertaies not to issue any Treasury Bonds or any other new bonds, and not to contract any other loan of any nature whatsoever. This same engagement is entered into in the name of the Daira Sanieh. Nevertheless, in case the Government from urgent national reasons should find itself placed under the necessity of having recourse to credit, it may do so within the limits of strict necessity, and without doing anything to affect the employment of the revenues set apart for the Treasury of the Public Debt, or to cause their diversion from their destination. These totally exceptional loans can only be contracted after an agreement on the subject with the Commissioners directing the Treasury. "Article X. — In order that the arrangements stated in the preceding article shall not place obstacles in the way of the Administration, the Gov- ernment may open a running account with a bank to facilitate its payments by means of anticipations to be regulated in accordance with the year's re- ceipts. The debit or credit balance will be settled at the end of each year. This current account must never be overdrawn during the year by more than 500,000,000f. " Done at Cairo, the 2d of May, 1876. " iBMAlL." Importantly modif jing what precedes, the decree of JSTovembei 18 substitutes the new scheme of Messrs. Goschen and Joubert for that of the previous French group, and adds administrative guarantees which give the new project its chief value : — "DECREE. "We, the Khedive of Egypt, considering that the Decree of the 7th of May, 1876, relating to the umfication of the debts of the State and of the Daira requires certain modifications in its application ; 416 APPENDIX E. " Considering the Decree of the 2(i of May, 1876, establishing the Treasury of the Public Debt, and desiring to strengthen still further the functions of the Commissioners who administer the said Treasury ; "Considering that the suppression of the law of the Moukabala raises unanimous objections on the part of those whom it aflects, and that the Cham- ber of Delegates has given expression to the desire that the law should be maintained ; "In oui firm desire to assure the regular course of the public services, while at the same time protecting the interests of the creditors by more efficacious guarantees ; " And having heard our Privy Council, we have decreed and decree " PtBST Division. " Finances. " Article I. — The Debts of the Daira, as set forth in the Tables A and B inserted in the present Decree, are separated from the Debts of the State, and are not included in the unification of the General Public Debt. These debts will form the subject of a special arrangement. "Abticle n. — The law of the Mookabala is re-established, and is con- sidered as never having ceased to be in force. Nevertheless, the annual re- ductions produced by the effect of the law of the Moukabala will not come into force until the commencement of the year 1886, and an annual interest of five per cent, will be credited to the contributaries up to the end of the year 1885 on the sums which should be deducted. "The whole sum produced by the Moukabala will be applied to the re- demption of the Loans of 1864, 1865, and 1867, and of the unified debt. "In the employment of the available (disponibles) funds yielded by the Moukabala, certain reservations axe made which are dealt with in Article 6 relating to ' amortisation.' "Abticlb III. — A special administration of the railways and of the port of Alexandria is established, which will be placed under the direction of a Commission, as will be set forth hereafter. " The revenues of the railways and of the port of Alexandria will be di- rectly applied to the payment of the interest and the sinking fund of a series of Preference Bonds having a special mortgage on the railways and the port of Alexandria, amounting to seventeen millions sterling, and bearing interest at 5 per cent., redeemable in sixty-five years. Interest to run from the 15th of October, 1876. " These Bonds wiU be offered by preference to the holders of the Loans of 1863, 1868, and 1873, in exchange for Bonds of these Loans bearing 7 per cent., which Bonds will be cancelled. " The annuity necessary for the service (Interest and Sinking Fund) of the Preference 5 per cent. Bonds, amounting to £885,744, and payable in two half-yearly payments of £442,873 each, will form the first charge on the Rev- enues of the Eailways and of the port of Alexandria, and will remain, in every eventuality, the first liability of the Commission of the Public Debt. THE FINANCIAL DECREES. 417 • Abticlb rV.— The Loans of 1864, 1865, and 1867 are deducted from the onifled Debt. " They will continue to beax the interest appertaining to them until their C(»uplete redemption, " They will he redeemed within the terms of their respective contracts. They will be redeemed, however, at the rate of 80 instead of at 100 percent., and the first half-yearly payment on account of this redemption will be post- poned by six months : that is to say, it will take place for the Loan of 1864, on the 1st of April, 1877 ; for the loan of 1865, on the 7th of July, 1877 ; and for the Loan of 1867, on the 23nd of May, 1877. " Abticlb V. — The Bonus of 25 per Cent., granted by the Decree of the 7th of May last to the holders of the Floating Debt, is reduced to 10 per cent. "By the efEect of these measures, the financial position will be a* follows : — A. The Bonns Inclnded In the Table of Unification annexed to the Decree of 7th May amounting to Is reduced — lot. By the entire Bonns on £8,906,151, the amount of the Floating Debt of the Daira £726,63; 2ndly. By the Bonns on the Loans of 1864, 1865, and 1867 806,796 Srdiy. By the reduction of the Bonus granted to the Floating Debts of the Malieh and of the Daira on the Malieh, viz., £5,170,993, 8/5thB of which representing the IB per cent, to be deducted, is 8,102,597 £6,201,31! B. The Unified Debt of will be reduced as follows by these several deductions :— 1st. The Consolidated Debt of the Daira £5,909,280 2ndly. The Floating Debt of the Daira 2,906,151 Srdiy. The Loans of 1864, 1865, and 1867 4,892,616 4thly. The Hallways and the Port of Alexandria 17,000,000 Sthly. Snndry Bonuses (as above) ... 4,136,930 4,135,930 £2,068,397 £91,000,000 84,343,977 There accrues to the Government on account of the Port of Alex- ■ndria, which is given as a guarantee, two millions In Bonds of the SeueralDebt Balance at the disposal of the Government ... Total of the Uulfled Debt £56,656,023 2,000,000 843,9rr £59,000,000 " To this debt of fifty-nine millions an annuity of £4,177,720 sterling is as- signed representing its redemption in sixty-five years, and interest at the rate of 7 per cent, upon the capital. Interest to run from 15th July, 1876. " This annuity is payable in two half-yearly payments of £2,088,860 each " The revenues which are at present assigned to the Treasury of the Pub- lic Debt by out Decree of the 7th May, 1876, remain pledged aa before, sub- ject to the modifications which will result from the present Decree, which 418 APPENDIX S. will be arranged by tbe Controllers-General to be mentioned hereafter, and by the Commissioners of the Public Debt. " The £3,000,000 in Bonds of the General Debt accruing to the Govern. ment for the Port of Alexandria are not to be disposed of until after the entire payment of the amount of £704,000 due on the 1st of January, 1877, to tha Contractors of the Port. ' Second DmsioN. "Amortisation. "Abticle VI. — The operation of redeeming the Bonds will be carried out by the Commissioners of the Treasury of the Public Debt. In order to increase the amount avaOable for redemption, a deduction will be made of one-seventh of the interest of 7 per cent., which is assigned to the service of this debt, viz. ; — 1 per cent, on the capital remaining to be redeemed at the beginning of each year. " The fund yielded by this deduction will be added to the sums available from the Moukabala, and will be also employed in redeeming Bonds by means of public purchases, subject to the reservation mentioned hereafter, in case of public purchases not being made. " This deduction, however, will only be made to the end of the year 1885 at the latest, and if before that date the unified debt is reduced to forty mil- lions sterling, payment of interest at 7 per cent. wiU be resumed from that moment. "The funds yielded by the Moukabala will be paid in their entirety to the Commissioners of the Public Debt, to whom the service of redemption is confided (' service d'amortissement '). The Commissioners of the Treasury of the Public Debt will take out of the funds paid to them the sum necessary for the redemption of the 1864, 1865, and 1867 loans, and they will devote the available balance to the redemption of the general ujiified debt. " In the event that after the service of the Public Debt shall have been provided for, the revenues should be insufficient to meet the estimated budget expenses of the Government, such as they are fixed in the table annexed to the present decree, the Finance Committee, composed of the Minister of Finance and the two Controllers-General, will give notice thereof to the Commissioners of the Public Debt. The latter will then keep back out of the available funds yielded by the Moukabala and intended for the redemp- tion of the unified debt, the sum necessary to make up the difierence. ' ' In o-der to be in a position to meet this liability, the Commissioners of the Pub Jc Debt will keep in hand (conservera dans ses caisses) out of the available sums yielded by the Moukabala and assigned for the redemption of the Public Debt, a sum of £600,000 per annum. This sum can only be sent to Europe after a notification of the Finance Committtee mentioned above. " If, on the other hand, there is an excess of Revenue after the charge for the Public Debt and the Budget expenses above mentioned have been met, this excess is to be added to the Redemption Fund. THE FINANCIAL BECREEa. 419 •' Tlw amortisation, both by the dedaction of 1 per cent, and by the snms remainiag available from the Mookabala and the Budget surpluses, is to be conducted by means of public purchases so long as it wUl be possible to effect these purchases below the price of 75. " In the event that during the period of the Moukabala purchases cannot be made at a rate below 75, the amortisation is to take place by drawings at the rate of 75. As soon as the increments of revenues shall produce a Budget surplus of 150,0002. per annum, the amortisation will take place at the rate of 80. " ThTBD DiVIBION. — ADMINISTBATIOir. " Controllers-Oeneral. " Abtictlb Vn. — Two Controllers-General will be appointed, the one a Controller-General of Eeceipts, the other a Controller-General of Audit (comptaMUte) and of the Public Debt. "Aeticle VIIL— The functions of the Controller-General of Eeceipts are the following : — " Ist. The collection of all the Eevenues of the State, and their payment into the receiving offices to which they belong {dans les causes respectwes). Sndly. He will have under his direction all the collectors, except the officials charged with the collection of Judicial Fees and others attached to the tribu- nals of the Judicial Eeform (IWninaux de la Beforme). " 3rdly. He will propose their nomination to us through the channel of the Minister of Finance. " He will have the right to suspend them from their functions, and he can also dismiss them after a reg^ar inquiry, with the concurrence of the Finance Committee, composed of the Minister of Finance and the two Controllers- General. " The Collectors of Taxes in the Provinces (Moudiriehs) will be chosen from amongst Egyptian subjects, who are not disqualified by any such legal incapacity as may be provided against by law. " 4thly. It will be his duty to see that the Agents of Collection do not col- lect more than the authorised taxes. Collection cannot be enforced on the Tax Papers of the direct taxes, until after they have been countersigned by him. "5thly. It will be his duty to see that the produce in kind belongiag to the revenues is realised to the best advantage of the Treasury. The Finance Committee will look to the best means of realising its value. " Abticle IX. — The Controller-General of Audit and the PubUo Debt will iave to fulfil at the same time the functions of ' Councillor to the Ministry of Finance.' " These functions will be the following : — " Istly. It will be his duty to see to the execution of all the Eegulatlona afEecting the Debts of the State, without trenching on the functions which belong to the Commissioners of the Public Debt. " 2ndly. He will control the general account keeping of the Treasury and of aU the Government Receiving Offices (Oaissei de FEtat), 420 APPENDIX A " Srdly. The Ministers or heads of administration will have the regulation ol all the expenses. The cheques or orders for payment {des mandats ou assig- nations) which they may issue must be countersigned by the Controller- General, in order to be honoured. " 4thly. The Controller-General wiU not have to judge of the expediency of the expenditure of the Government. He can only refuse his counter- signature to orders to pay (mandats) which would exceed the amount of the credits still open, or which would prevent sufficient funds remaining in hand to meet the balance of expenditure still to be incurred under the estimated Budget of tho current year. " Aeticlb X. — The Controllers-General will take part in the preparation of the Budget. They are not to encroach upon the functions of the Ministers, who will remain sole judges of the necessity of assigning credits to services of such and such a nature. Accordingly the Budget will be prepared by the Minister of Finance, who will centralise all the demands for credits made by the heads of departments. " The Budget having been thus prepared, will be submitted to the Council of Ministers, to which the two Controllers-General will be summoned. " When the Budget has been examined and revised, if necessary, it will be submitted by the Council to our approbation. "The Minister of Finance and the Controllers-General will see to the strict execution of the Budget. " Aeticlb XI. — The Finance Committee will have to give their approval in the first instance {prealablement), to all contracts entailing pecuniary engagements which would exceed -^fh of the credits open for the year, or which would be applicable to several years. " Aeticlb XII. — It will be the duty of the Finance Committee to draw up the general regulations in the matter of public accounts (en mature de eomp- tabilite piibUque), under our sanction. " Aeticlb XIII. — Of the two Controilers-Qeneral one will be an English- man, and the other a Frenchman. "Article XTV. — The nomination and the choice of the ControUers-Qen- eral vrill belong to us ; but in order to satisfy ourselves with regard to the guarantees offered by the persons whom we may choose, we shall address ourselves unofficially (officieusement) to the English and French Govern- ments, and we shall only engage persons who are furnished with the author- ity, or with the acquiescence of their Governments. If one or the other of these Governments, at the time when the nominations have to be made, should not give its authority or its acquiescence, our choice vrill be made amongst the higher officials of the two countries, either in active service or retired. "Aeticlb XV. — The two Controllers-General will be named for five years. In case of their resignation or their death, the proceedings taken to replace them will be the same as those taken for their nomination. "Aeticlb XVI. — The two Controllers-General vrill have the same rank, and will receive the same remuneration. " Abticlb a V 11, —They will be accountable only to os. TEE FINANCIAL DECREES. 431 " Oommisrion of the Pvblie Debt. " Aeticlb XV 111.— The Commisaioa «f the Public Debt is permanent until the entire debt is redeemed. "Aeticlb XIX. — The Commissioners wiU have the right to send the funds which they will have encashed, direct to the Bank of England, and to the Bank of Prance. They will have the necessary powers to make this transmission of funds ; but it will be their duty to come to an understanding beforehand with the Minister of Finance and the ControILer-General. " Aeticlb XX. — An English Commissioner will be added to the Commis- sion of the Public Debt. The nomination and the choice of this Commis- sioner will belong to us ; but in order to satisfy ourselves with regard to the guarantees offered bf the person whom we shall choose, we shall address our- ' selves unofficially to the English Government, and we shall only engage a person furnished with the authority and acquiescence of his Government. If the English Government, at the time when this nomination is to be made, should not give its authority or its acquiescence, we should make choice of a higher official iu the English service, either on the active or on the retired list. " Article XXI. — The merchandise or produce given for payment of taxes in the provinces specially set apart for the service of the debt, will be placed at the exclusive disposal of the Commissioners of the Debt, who will have the power to sell it ; coming, however, to an understanding {en se concertant toutefois) with the Minister of Finance and the Controllers-General as to the best means of realising it. " Article XXn. — The members of the Commission of the Public Debt will not be able to accept any other functions in Egypt. " Railways and Port of Alexandria. " Article XXTTT. — The railways which are now actually being worked, and the Port of Alexandria, will be placed under a Special Administration, which will be accountable only to us. This Administration wiU be composed of five Administrators, of whom two will be English, one French, and two natives. One of the two English Administrators will have the functions of President. "Article XXIV. — The annexation of the Administration of the Port of Alexandria to the Special Administration of the RaOways, and the appli- cation of their revenues to the service of the Preference Debt, are not in any case to prejudice the contracts already existing with the Contractors, nor to modify the relations of the Government to the latter with regard to the work which is still to be executed. " Article XXV. — The nomination and the choice of the Administrators will belong to ns ; but in order to satisfy ourselves with regard to the guaran- tees offered by the foreign Administrators whom we may choose, we shall ad- dress ourselves unofficially to the Governments of England and France and we shall only engage persons furnished with the authority or the acquies- cence of their Governments. In the event that one or the other of these Gov- 422 APPENDIX n. enunents should not give its authority or its acquiescence, OTir choice wiU be made amongst the higher officials, either civU or military, of the two coun- tries, or of their great Eailway Companies, either in active service or on the retired list. " Article XXVI. — The foreign Administrators will be named for five years. In case of their resignation or their death, the same proceedings will take place for replacing them as have been fixed for their nomination. " Akticle XXVII. — The Administration, formed as described above, will continue to act until all the privileged Bonds specially created have either been redeemed or paid ofi. The Port of Alexandria being comprised in this guarantee for the sum of £2,000,000, can be freed from this guarantee and detached from the Joint Administration as soon as £3,000,000 of these Pref- erence Bonds shall have been redeemed or repaid. " The Railways being comprised in this guarantee for £15,000,000 sterling in Preference stock, can be freed by the redemption or the repayment of £15,000,000 of this Stock. "Article XXVIII. — The Administrators will propose for our choice and nomination the superior employes of the Railways and the Port. " They will name the other employes direct. " They will have the right to suspend all the employes from their func- tions ; they may also dismiss them after a reg^ar inquiry. " They alone will have the right to make any modifications in the tartEEs and in the regulations in force, under our sanction. " They will be exclusively charged with the duty of making contracts for the purchase of rolling stock or of fixtures, and for the materiel necessary for the working of the Railways and the service of the Port. " They will decide on the necessity of repairs in the materiel or the per- manent way, as well as for the maintenance of the Port, all under our approval. " Article XXIX. — Provision will be made from the general resources of the Budget for extraordinary expenses which will have been decided on by the Administrators and approved by us. " Article XXX. — AU the receipts of the Railways and of the Port of Alexandria according as they come in, with the exception of what is neces- sary for the ordinary outlay for maintenance and for working expenses, and with the exception of the rights of the Contractors of the Port provided for in the contracts, will be paid into the Treasury of the Public Debt, to which they are assigned. " Article XXXI. — The Commission of the Public Debt will open a special account for the service of the Preference 5 per Cent. Bonds. The Commis- sion will be bound to send any funds which are paid into it by the Adminis- tration of the Railways and the Port, to the Banks of England and E>ance, and likewise to a special account opened for the service of the Preference Stock issued on the Railways and on the Port. " Article XXXII. — In the event that the payments made by the Ad- mmistration of the Railways and of the Port should be insufficient for the Bervioe of this Debt, the Commission of the Public Debt wUl have to provide THE FINANCIAL DEGREES. 423 for the service by taking as a first charge the necessary amount from the general resources which are assigned to it. " Abticlb XXXTTT, — All the provisions of our Decrees of the 3nd and 7th May, 1876, which are not contrary to these presents remain in force. " Given at Cairo the 18th November, 1876. •'{Bigned) ISMAJCL. " On behalf of the Khedive, " The Minuter of Mnanee," "(Signed) HUSSEIN-KIAMIL." 2' ABLE of the Expenditure of th^ Egyptian Qovernment mentioned in Article VI. of the above Decree. Tear 1877 ' 1878 " 1879 " 1880 " 1881 £4,259,350 £4,403,961 £4,500,000 £4,500,000 £4,600,000 Tear 1882 " 1883 " 1884 " 1885 £4,500,000 £4,500,000 £4,500,000 £4,600,000 INDEX. Ababdeh Bedoween, 27, SSL Abbas Pasha, 79, 228. Abdeen, Palace of, 89. Aboona, 31. Abou-sar-el-KibIs, 13. Abyssinians, 33. " Women, 809. Acacia Tree, 830. Accounts, System of, 105. Agricoltiire, 171. Councils of, 118. Alabaster, 300. Alexandria, 37. " Decadence of, 6. Harbour of, 41, 242. " Italian College at, 221. " Napoleon's Opinion of, 38. " Sanitary Eeforms in, 43. " to Cairo, 45. " Trade of, 44 American Mission School, 223. Ammon, Oasis of, 13. Apis Mausoleum, 333. Arabs, Primary School of, 313. " Settled, 23. " Tow-ir, 5. Architecture, European, 397. Argo, 17. Armenians, 83. Army, Regular, 96. Assembly of Delegates, 114. Assiout, 72. Ass, The, 331. Atbar? 3'50. Audit, Controller-General of, 14L Autumn, 336. Azizieh Misri Company, 100. B. Backsheesh, 104 Bahiuda, Desert of, 350. Bahr-bela-ma, 13. B»hr-eI-Ohazal, 355. Bakers and Millers, 294 Baker, Sir Samuel, 854 Balieh, 184. Banana Tree, 331. Barley, 163, 191. Bathen, 9. Beans, Growth of, 191, Belid-es-Soudan, 17. Beni-Ali, 37. " Hassan, Tombs of , 9. " Souef, 9, 74 Berenice, Euins of, 18. Benha, 71. Beys, Military Aristocracy of, 76. Brket-el-Kom, 8. Biaharis, 37, 831. Blfick Mail levied by King John, 358 " to Constantinople, 129. Black Slaves, 310. Bones, Shipment of, 164 Bor, 355. Bourlos Lake, 7. Boulak Museum, 60, 397. Bran, 164. Bridge, Kasr-en-NU, 258. Bridges, 353. British Friendship, 84 " Mission Schools, 328 Bubastis, Euins of, 73. Buffalo, The, 338. Byssos of Herodotus, 188. C. Caillard, Mr., 108. Cairo, 47. " atadel of, 58. " Gates of, 49. " Hotels of, 55. " Mosques of, 53. " Opera House in, 56. " Population of, 54 " Roads of, 55. •■ Trade of, 61. Caliph, 38. Camel, The, 830. 425 436 INDEX. Canal, Bahr-Moez, 336. " Chibin-el-Koum, 236. " for Irrigation, 237. « Ibrahimieh, 235. " IsmaiQieh, 235. " Mahmoudieh, 236. « Menoufleh, 236. " Navigable, 235. " Nili, 234. " Produce, Augmentation of, 188. " Sefl, 234. Capitulations, The, 105, 874. Caraites, 35. Caravan Merchandise, 166. " Routes, 10. Carrieres des Hyenes, 66. Cataract, First, 16. " Second, 17. Third, 17. Cat, The Domestic, 335. Cattle Murrain, 130. Cave, Rt. Hon. S., 184. Ceramic Art, 294 Cereals, 161. Cherif Pasha, 285. Circassian Girls, 308. Civil Code, 280. " Jurisdiction, 280. « School, 212. Climate, Dr. Dalrymple's Report on, 342. " Dr. Dunbar Walker's Re- port on, 346. " Dr. Patterson's Report on, 343. « Rev. A. C. Smith's Opin- ion of, 341. Qot Bey, 347. Clover, Growth of, 193. Coft,8. College, Italian, at Alexandria, 231. " of El-Azhar, 213. Commerce, 157. Commission for Administering Railways, 143. " International, 279. " of Public Debt, 155. Constantinople, Black Mail to, 129. Consular Authority, 376. Controller-General of Audit, 141. Coptic Convents, 11. Copts, 29. Cossier, 8, 13. Cotton, Growth of, 188. " Produce of, 137. Councils of Agriculture, 118. Court of Appeal, 283. Courts, Opening of New, 283. Credit, Rehabilitation of, 44. Crocodile, The, 325. Crops, Rotation of, 186. Cultivable Area, 18. Cultivation, Rude Method of, 183. Customs, 131. " Returns, 159. " Sub-department of, 103. Cypress Tree, 831. D. . Dahabeeyah, 60. Daira, 146. " Khassa, 151. " Sanieh, 147, Damanhour, 46, 73. Damietta, 5, 68. " Population of, 68. Date Palm, 328. Darfertit Country, 354. Darfour, 353. Death-rate in Egypt, 340. Debt, Consolidation of, 136. " Daira, 147. " Floating, 132. " Public Commission of, 141. Desert Line, Disadvantage of, 239. " The, 46. Dhoura, 190. Director of Wakfs, 103. Dog, The, 334. Donga Country, 354. Dongola, 849. Dor Bey, 103. Dromedary, The, 321. Dysentery, 348. E. Earth- works, Maintenance of, 339. Eastern Telegraph Company, 353. Education Budget, 218. Egg Hatching, Artificial, 398. Egypt, Administration of, 85. " and the Porte, 75. " Climate of, 888. " Death-rate in, 340. " Debt of, 139. " Finance of, 118. " Foreigners Domiciled in, 35 " for the Egyptians, 83. " Finance, Organic Law of, 138 " Garden of, 8. *' Greater 18. " Growth' of Trade in, 158. " Home of Science and Philos ophy, 201. INDEX iaa Egypt, Personal Nature of Govern- " ment of, 117. " Population of, 20. " Proper, 3. " Proper Towns of, 70. " Sultan of, 76. Egyptian Credit, Rehabilitation of, 143. " Navy, 100. Officials, Character of, 115. " Ryot, 114. El-Arish, 65. El-Bahari, 4. El-Kizkah, 173. El-Said, 4 El-Vostani, 4. Embroidery, 296. Engineering', 297. Esbekieh, 47. Esnafs, 289. Esneh, 74. Etko Lake, 7. Eunuchs, 317. European Architecture, 297. Expenditure, 127. Exports, 159. F. Fan4r, 33. Fashoda, 354. Fateereh, 296. Fayoum, 7. Fellaheen, Condition of, 25. Fezzan, The, 8. Fig Tree, 331. Fiki, 216. Financial Mal-administration, 93. Firman of 1872, 80. Fish, 337. Fisheries, 303. Flamingoes, 336. Flax, 163, 195. Flour, 164. Foreign Missionary School, 233. Fortified Stations, 355. Forced Labor, Abolition of, 131. Foreign Affairs, Ministry of, 94. Free and Universal School, 330. G. Gallabat, 358. Gallini, 184. Garden Plants, 192. Gazzuas, 315. Gazelle, The, 335. Geological Regions, 14. Ghawazee, 74, Ghizereh, Palace of, 61. Gileh, 398. Ginning Factories, 185. Girgheh, 74. Glass-blowing, 394. Goats and Sheep, 323. Goldsmith's Work, 297. Gondokoro, 18. Gordon, Colonel, 819. Goschen, Mr., 136. Government Schools, 304. Granite Quarries, 299. Gregorian Calendar, 282. Guarantees, 140. Guava, 332. Guilds, 389. Gum Arabic, 167. H. Halaybis, 37. Halfe, 350. Harar, 14. Harbor of Ibrahim, 347. " " Suez, 345. " Works, 343. Hasheesh, 195. Heliopolis, 46. Hemp, 195. Henadi, 37. Henna, 165, 196. Hides, 164 Hippopotamus, The, 335. Horns, 164. Horses, Epidemic among, 33 Horse, The, 333. Husseua Pasha Fehmy, 108. Hyena, The, 325. Ibis, The, 336. Ibrahim Pasha, 77. Port, 347. Ichneumon, The, 336. Imports, 167. Indigo, 196. Industries, SkUled, 288. Insects of Prey, 337. Interior, Ministry of, 95. Irrigation, Canals for, 237. " System of, 177. " Want of Efficient, 341. Islam, Peru to, 83. Ismallia, 65, 364 Baths of. 66. 428 INDEX. Ismail Pasha Sadyk, 8S, 98> Isthmas, Shortest line AcroBSi 64 Ivory, 166. " Government Monopoly of, 855. Jackal, The, 335. Jebel Attakah, 69. •• Mokattem, 7 Jews, 84. " School, 219. Joubert, Mr., 137. Judges, Foreign, 283. Judicial Eef orms, 274. Jurisdiction, Crinunal, 38(X Justice, Ministry of, 95. Eafr-es-Zyat, 46. " Feny at, 23a Kasr-en-Nil, Palace of, 5L Kasr-en-Hoosa, Palace of, SL Eassim Pasha, 100. Kenneh, 8, 73. KTi flTngiTi , 334. Kharadjieh, 172. Khartoum, 351. Khedive, The, 80, 85. avil List of, 127, Club, 56. DaUy Work of, 89. " Winter Palace of, 6L Khedivieh Steam Navigation Ckv, 60, 100. Khoshrew Pasha, 76. Kouttabbs, 215. Kutaieh, Treaty of, 77. Lagoons, 6 Land, Earnings from, 190k Lapenna, Dr., 283. Lardo, 355. Lemon Tree, 333. Lesseps, M. de, 63. Letters, Delivery of, 109. Lighthouses, 348. Limestone Quarries, 399. Loan, European, 130. " Khedive's, 153. " Mustapha Pasha's, 15& " of 1868, 131. " Second, 131. Loan, 7 per cent., 183. " Viceroy's, 152. Loilng, General, 99. M. McKillop Pasha, 250. Mahmal Ferakh, 298. Mahmoudieh Canal, 4/L Maize, 162. Mako, 184. Makraka, 855. Malan, Mr. Noel, 103. Mamlouks, 807. MSmours, 112. Manfalout, 7. Mansourah, 78, 811. Manure, 186. Mareotis, Lake, 6, 45. Marriott, General, 227. Massowah, 18. Trade of, 70. Mecca, Gifts to, 138. Mechanical Skill, Efforts to RevlfV 287. Medical School, 206. Medinet, 8, 74. Medressehs, 215. Mehaz, 27. Mehemet Ali, 76. " Act of Confiscation by 173. " Tewfik Pasha, 93. Mekkemehs, 386. MeUahot, 300. Menzaleh, Lake, 7, 68. Metal Work, 292. Mex Quarries, 293. Midwifery, School of, 207. Military Seminaries, 303. " Service, Mixed, 98. " Train, Want of, 99. Mineral Eesouroes, 399. Mines and Quarries, 10. Minieh, 9, 74 Ministry of Commerce, lOL " Foreign Affairs, 94 ■ " Interior, 95. " Justice, 95. " Marine, 100. " Public Instruction, 10& " War, 96. Miscellaneous Receipts, 12S. Miscoweh, 184 Moeris, Lake, 8. Mohafzas, 87. Moie-t-Sooh&g, 284 Mokattem EiUs, 46. INDEX 429 Mokattem Quarries, 293. Money, Extra Payment, 104. " Order System, 111. Monophysites, 31. Mosque Colleges, 213. " Land, 172. Mother-of-Pearl, 166. Mougel Bey, Work of, 241. Moukabala Law, 174. Mourabain, 178. Mud Deposit of Nile, 15. Mudirs, 113. Mulberry Tree, 381. Mule, 823. Mushrabeeyah, 297. Muzzi, Signer, 108. N. Natron, 164. Nazar, 355, Nazirs, 113. Nigritia, 349. Nile, Barrage of, 240. " Boatmen, 303. " Blue and White, 35t «' Mud Deposit of, 15. " Overflows of, 239. " Voyage, 60, " Yearly Flood of, 179. Nitre, 300. Nitria, 13. Noggurs, 860. Non-Moslem Native Schools, 818. Ndreg, 189. Normal School, 211. Nubar Pasha, Dispatch of, 311. " " Memorandum of , 378. Nubia, 17. O. Oases, 13. OflBcers, Education of, 99. Oilcake, 160. Olive Tree, 331. Oraer Pasha, 94. Omoo-Maro Eiver, 356. Ophidia, 337. Ophthalmia, 347. Opium, 165, 197. Orange Tree, 333. Ordee, 17. Ornithology, 326. Orthodox Community, 88. Ostrich Feathers, 167. Ottoman Party, 83. Oushurdjee, 175. Oushurieh, 172. Overland Route, 67. Ox, Divine, 333, Ozy Eiver, 356. Panel Work, 297. Paper-making, 394. Pastry, Love of, 396. Pelicans, 326. Pelusium, Buins of, 5. Petroleum, 303. PhilEe, 10. Pig, The, 824. Pistachio, 832. Plague, 347. Plant Life, 328. Plough, Eastern, 183. Polytechnic, The, 305. Pomegranate, The, 333. Poplar Tree, 331. Porphyry, 300. Porte, Jealousy of, 381. " Tribute to, 137. Port Said, 63. " Water Supply of, 65. Post OfSce, Sub-department of, 103. Prince Hussein Pasha, 94. " Tewflk Pasha, 312. Printing Office, 295. Privy Council, 93. Proportion of Cultivators to Arti- sans, 288. Provincial Administration, 111. Public Instruction, 200. " " Ministry of, 103. " Works, 138, 236. " " and Agricultural De- partment, 108. Pumps, 182. Pyramids, Drive to 58. " of Gizeh, 46, 69. Quails, 336. Quarries and Mines, 10 Quattdb, 27. ft. Rabbinists, 35. Ragaff, 356. Raghib Pasha, 103. 430 nwEX. Bags, 165. Eaflways, 327. " Commission for Administer- ing, 143. Profits on, 134 Scheme of Khedive, 331. " Working Expenses of, 330. Rainfall, 336. Kamadan, Gifts during, 316. Eamleh, 44. Ras-el-Teen Point, 41. Eatib Pasha, 100. Ratichambe, 355. Bayah Greeks, School of, 830. Recruiting by Conscription, 98. Remote Provinces, Trade of, 359. Rent Charges, 174. Revenue, Heads of, 119. Eiaz Pasha, 102. Policy of, 317. Rice, 162, 191. River Banks, Care of, 180. Eose Crop, 197. Eoses, Plantations of, 8. Eosetta, 5, 62. Rum DistilLeries, 147. S. Safflower, 196. Saffron, 165. Said Pasha, 79. BakMa, 177. Bait, 164. Baraffs, 175. Schools, American Mission, 333. " British Mission, 223. CivU, 312. " Foreign Missionary, 233. for Jews, 219. " Free and Universal, 230 " Government, 204. " Medical, 202. " Native Non-Moslem, 218. Normal, 211. " of Midwifery, 307. " of Rayah Greeks, 330. " jprimary Arab, 213. " Scottish Mission, 334 Scorpions, 327. Scrivenour, Mr., 104. Sea Salt, 303. Season, High Nile, 198. " Summer, 198. Winter, 198. Senna, 166. Bennaar, 351. Serrabria, 27 Sesame, 196. Shadoof, 177. Sheep and Goats, 828. Sheikhs-el-Beled, 113. Sheikh-ul-Islam, 314 Sheriat, 311. Sherif P^sha, 95. Shibeen, 74. Shillook Country, 358. Shitawee, 168. Shoobra, Palace of, 51. Shendy, 850. Simoom, 834. Sinai, 69. Skin Disease, 348. Slave Hunting, 319. " Markets, 314 " Trade, 357. Slavery, 805. Atrocities of, 318. Slaves, Female, Price of, 818. " Liberation of, 311. " White, 308. Smuggling, 105. Sobat, 355. Somerset River, 356. Boohag, 74. Souakim, 14, 69. Soudan, The, 349. Sphinx, The, 59. Spring, 334 Stone, General, 99. Stone, Workers in, 393 Suez, 66. " Isthmus of. Survey by Bona. parte, 257. " Port of, 245. " Prefecture of, 68. " Canal, Age of, 256. " " Award of Napoleon, 361. " " Commenced, 259. " " Compagnie Universelle, 259. " " Concession for Work,259. • • " Consent of Porte for, 259. " " Corvee Labour, 260. " " Financial Difficulties of, 361. " " Financial Position of,370. " " Khedive's Shares Pur- chased, 370. " Length of, 262. " " Nature of Soil, 263. " " Opened, 266. " " Return of Shipping, 267. " " Sale of Shares, 134 " " Sidings, 266. « ' Transit Charge, 368. " " VaJue to Commerce, 266. INDEX. 431 Suez, Waghom's Quay at, 69. Succossion to the Throne, 80. Sugar-cane, Cultivation of, 198> Sugar Factories, 147. Sufckoot, 17. Summer, 335. Sycamore, 339. T. Taboot, 131. Tabulated Statements, 158. Taccaze, 350. Taka, Province of, 350. Tamarisk, 330. Tamiathis, 63. Tanners, 298. Tanta, 46, 70. " Slave Market of, 71. Tarantula, 337. TarbouBhes, 291. Taxation, Heavy, 26. Taxes, Indirect, 120. " Land, 119. Tax on Date Trees, 120. Telegraphs, 250. " Eastern CJompany, 353. Temperature, Regularity of, 837. Territory, Limits of, 3. Thebes, 397. Threshing-floor, 189. Tidjaret Courts, 383. T ^ Sun-dried, 298. ah Lake, 65. Toombak, 196. Tor-Arabs, 37. Toums, 49. Trade, Foreign, Details of, 159. Inland, 158. " Licenses, 130. Transport, Difficulties of, 861. Treaty of 1840, 78. ■•'reaaury. Difficulties of, 184. Tribunals, New, Confidence in, 888. Mixed, 380. " of First Instance, 388. Tripoli, 8. Trona, 13. Turkish Element, 28. Valley of the Wanderings, 7. Viaducts, 238. Viceroy, Monopolies held by, 188, " Sovereignty of, 81. Victoria Lake, 356. Village Annuities, 123. Bonds, 124 W. Wady Kenoos, 17. •• Natroon, 13. " Nouba, 17. Waghom, Lieutenant, 358. Wakfs, 172. Director of, 103. Walnut Tree, 333. War, Ministry of, 96. Water Supply, 179. Wax, 165. Weavers, 391. Whately, Miss, 323. Wind, Periodical Course of, 889l Wood, Workers In, 393. Wool, 165. Taourt, Zagazig, 71.