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THE EGYPTIAN PROBLEM
developed into a demand for definite guarantees bei they would return to work. The principal conditi set forth in their ultimatum were :—
1. That the Cabinet should officially recog] the Egyptian Delegation as the legal mandatorj the nation.
2. That the Cabinet should declare its non-rec nition of the Protectorate.
3. That British sentries and guards should withdrawn and their places taken by Egyp-troops.
The new Prime Minister and his colleagues shcr even under this provocation the most exemplary bearance. They entered daily into interminable cussions with the Special Committee of Officials. Government could possibly accept such conditions at hands of its own servants, and Bushdi told them They raised issues which could not be settled off-hs and which it was not within the power of Egyp Ministers to settle. But he went on arguing with mutinous subordinates, held up to them the exan which Ministers themselves had set by agreeing to re1 to work, and entreated them to do likewise and to le larger political questions over for subsequent decis For three whole days the Cabinet sat almost continuot sometimes until midnight, and they interviewed official strikers jointly and separately. It was a naus ing spectacle, said an eye-witness, to watch these ir views between harassed Ministers and a crowd of I( voiced and hectoring Effendis, whose arrogance g from day to day. Some of the saner members of Special Committee themselves took fright. They that the movement was getting beyond their control and they offered to support Eushdi Pasha if he is* another appeal, addressed, however, not merely to officials, but to other strikers too, calling upon t. to return to work. This appeal was issued on April ]ich he warmly urged the people and the officials to return to their normal occupations. As far as the officials were concerned, this did not have the desired effect. On the contrary, their demand for " pledges " had by that time *