Social and diplomatic memories

SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC
MEMORIES, 1894-1901

(Second Series)

n

SOCIAL AND
DIPLOMATIC MEMORIES

(Second Series)

1894-1901

EGYPT AND ABYSSINIA

BY THE RIGHT HON.

SIR JAMES RENNELL RODD, G.C.B.

LONDON
EDWARD ARNOLD & CO.

1923

[All rights reserved]

D

Made and Printed in Great Britain by
Butler & Tanner Ltd., Frame and London

PREFACE

I had originally intended to conclude the record
of my Social and Diplomatic Memories in a second
volume. But when the story of my experiences in
Egypt over a period of many years came to be
written, it grew to a compass which would have
left little room for a still longer subsequent period.
I have therefore, in the present volume, dealt only
with the Egypt of the final decade of the last and
the first year of the present century, including
some incidents of a mission to Abyssinia in days
when that country was little known to British
penetration.

During my residence in Cairo two figures domin-
ated the Valley of the Nile, those of Lord Cromer
and Lord Kitchener, and of the former little has
been written since his death. His life's work was
mostly accomplished away from his own country,
and there were therefore relatively few who, in the
days of his greatest activity, had such opportunity
of knowing him intimately as I had during a close
and constant official association with him of eight
years. It seemed a pious duty, while memory was
still fresh, to pay my tribute of affectionate regard
to the Cromer that I knew. Much happened in
those eight years which now belongs to history,
and though I do not pretend to be a historian, the
personal recollections of one who played a modest
part in the episodes to which reference is made may
assist and amplify historical appreciations.

vi PREFACE

After I left Cairo, at the end of 1901, I did not
return there till the end of 1919, when I was invited
to join the Special Mission presided over by Lord
Milner. It would have been interesting to compare
the situation which we were called upon to in-
vestigate, under the terms of reference, with that
which prevailed when I ceased to be officially con-
nected with Egypt eighteen years earlier. But
the Egyptian question is still in a controversial
stage, and the obligations on a former official
impose a reticence which it is my duty to observe.

The years from 1894 to 1901 covered a period of
frequently acute conflict with France, for which
our occupation of Egypt was mainly responsible.
It would be disingenuous to pretend to ignore that
conflict in recalling memories of Egypt in the
nineties. To-day it may even serve an useful
purpose to review with all goodwill past misunder-
standings in regard to which, as we can now see
more clearly, the tradition of Bismarckian policy,
less adroitly handled, was not disinterested in
envenoming controversy. It is happily possible
now to look back without prejudice on the vicissi-
tudes which preceded the Anglo-French agreement
of 1904, after which the Egyptian question ceased
to have an embittering effect on our relations.

At the end of the last century the issue which
stood out above all others in the African problem
was whether a line of cleavage in the great con-
tinent should run from south to north, or from
west to east. A French line from west to east,
with Abyssinia as the only interruption in its
sequence, could not have been established without
the sundering of certain well-defined interests
which we regarded as paramount. A British line
from south to north was compatible with existing
titles. In the end the principle was accepted by

PREFACE vii

the two former rivals that their respective spheres
of interest to the east and to the west should not
encroach on one another, and the ehmination of
further controversy on this issue prepared the way
for an understanding which was later on to save
the Western world in its hour of crisis. Some of
the antecedents to this happy consummation may
be made more comprehensible by the experiences
of five-and-twenty years ago recorded in the present
volume.

In the very benevolent reviews of my former
volume attention has sometimes been drawn to
evident reticences and to a spirit of restraint which
characterises its pages. There has even been a
certain suggestion of disappointment that it should
not have contained more startling revelations.
May I therefore here repeat that I have never in
my diaries made notes from official documents
which have come under my cognizance, and that
although my memory is still vivid of many in-
teresting developments in European politics, I
have too great a regard for the obligations of a
public servant consciously to exceed the limits
which discretion prescribes ? Official expressions
of opinion have been recorded in official communi-
cations, which will no doubt be accessible when the
proper time comes. My aim has rather been to
reproduce the atmosphere in which certain in-
teresting situations developed, and to do justice
to the character of some of the principal actors as
I saw them from behind the scenes. If memoirs
succeed in conveying such an atmosphere, they
may assist our appreciations of history.

NOTE

In the first instalment of these Social and Diplomatic Memories,
in spite of the care which was bestowed upon correction and
revision, a certain number of slips or lapses of memory were
overlooked, which have, I hope, been corrected in later issues.
It is not necessary to draw attention to obvious misprints.
But I wish to take the opportunity offered by the publication
of a second instalment to rectify some of the more important
errors.

Counsel for the defendant in the famous lawsuit, Whistler v.
Ruskin, to which reference is made on page 16, was Sir John
Holker, and not Sir Richard Webster. On page 35 I have by
some inexplicable confusion of mind substituted the name of
Harriet Ward Beecher for that of Julia Ward Howe. Again,
on page 84 I have spoken of the present Lord Tennyson as the
second instead of the eldest son of his father. Lord Brougham
was the step-grandfather of Sir E. Malet. and not his uncle as he
is said to be on page 96. The villa of Countess Arco, where
Mr. Gladstone stayed in 1886, is wrongly placed on the Lake
of Schlierseeon page 106 ; it should beTegernsee. On page 123
it is stated that after November, 1887, Sir M. Mackenzie " never
left his patient till his death." This should have been qualified
by the addition of the words, " save for a brief interval." On
page 124 the year 1809 should be 1800. On page 344 La Pallice
should be read instead of La Salice. On page 348, and again in
the index, the name of M. van Eetvelde is misspelt.

The Empress Eugenie was present at the opening of the Suez
Canal in 1868. The Emperor Napoleon III did not go to Egypt
as is suggested on page 192.

vui

CONTENTS

Portrait of Earl Cromer . . . Frontispiece

(From a pencil drawing by the Duchess of Rutland)

PAGE

CHAPTER I

1894 1

Arrival in Cairo. The Frontier Incident. The Young Khedive.
Intrigue to prevent his visit to England. Cromer's views as to
the future of Egypt. An appreciation of Cromer. Lady
Cromer. Stories of Ismail Pasha. Personalities in Egypt in
1894. Nubar Pasha. Kitchener, etc.

CHAPTER II
1895-96 44

Venice. Malta. Stuart-Wortley and the reconstruction of the
Egyptian army. The Agency at Cairo. Daily routine under
Cromer. Social figures ; Egyptian, Cosmopolitan, and British.
Wilfrid Blunt. The escape of Slatin from Omdurman. Cruise
in Greek islands. Sir William Butler. Italian defeat in
Abyssinia. Proposals to create a diversion. Preparations
for the advance to Dongola.

CHAPTER III
1896-97 91

The advance towards the Soudan. Conflict with the Caisse
de la Dette. Roddy Owen arrives. Cholera in Egypt. Joseph
Chamberlain at Highbury. Death of R. Owen. The Arabic
press becomes aggressive. Death of Sultan of Zanzibar.'
Armenian massacres. Occupation of Dongola. The credit
accorded by the Caisse refunded. Decision to despatch a
Mission to Abyssinia. Situation in that country. Composition
of. Mission. Preparations and departure. Aden. Zeila.
Lieut. Harrington.

ix

x CONTENTS

CHAPTER IV page

1897 124

On the road to Shoa. The Somali desert. Italian prisoners at
Biya Kaboba. Gildessa to Harrar. Ras Makunnen. To
Church with the Ras. Difficulty of securing transport. News
of M. Lagarde and Prince Henry of Orleans. Beauty of the
Highlands. Episodes of a night march. The valley of the
Hawash. The approach to Addis Abbaba. M. Ilg. The
capital. Our official reception by the Emperor Menelik.
Prince Henry as a correspondent and the French Press. The
Coptic Bishop and the Lord Chief Justice. The Empress
Taitu. Lunch at the Gobi. Leontieff. Sources of information.

CHAPTER V
1897 162

Negotiations with Menelik. Abyssinian ambitions on the Nile.
The festival of St. Raguel. Ritual dance of the priests.
Linguistic difficulties. A treaty agreed upon. Final conver-
sation. Relations of confidence established. Preparations
for departure from Addis Abbaba. Incidents of the return
journey. Spectacular demonstration on our departure. Harrar
again. Negotiations with Makunnen. Harrington. Carl
Inger. Homewards. The last day of Queen Victoria's Jubilee.
Visit to Windsor. Lord Salisbury and the situation in the
Equatorial Provinces. Capture of Abou Hamed.

CHAPTER VI
1897-98 192

Disturbances in the Provinces. The Sirdar and Financial
difficulties. Sir Francis Grenfell. British troops go up the
Nile. George Steevens. The march to Berber. Prince
Henry of Prussia at Port Said. The battle of the Atbara.
Serious illness of Lady Cromer. A second British Brigade
formed. Frankie Rhodes and Hubert Howard. The advance
to Khartoum. The battle of Omdurman. The 21st Lancers.
Appendix. Lieut. R. de Montmorency's account of the battle.

CHAPTER VTI
1898 221

Kitchener finds Captain Marchand at Fashoda. Exchange
of views with Paris. K.'s interview with Marchand. Status
quo pending his report. Marchand comes to Cairo. Ante-
cedents of the issue. The contentions advanced by M. Delcasse,
and the British case. Decision of French Government to
recall Marchand. Kitchener's return to Cairo and reception
in England. Death of Lady Cromer. Departure of Marchand
expedition via Abyssinia. Lord Salisbury's treatment of the
issue. Lord Curzon at Port Said. Cromer goes to Khartoum.

CONTENTS xi

CHAPTER VIII page

1899-1900 . . .247

Kitchener as Governor-General of Soudan. Differences with
Cairo. Death of Nubar Pasha. Visit to England. The Derby
with Lord 0. Beresford. Oaptain Wellby. His travels in
equatorial Africa. His dogs. Wingate's expedition against
the Khalifa. The fight at Gedir and death of the Khalifa.
The Boer War. Our universal unpopularity. Greek sym-
pathies in Egypt. Soudan-Eritrean Frontier settlement in
Rome. Lord and Lady Ourrie. K. ordered to South Africa.
Wingate becomes Sirdar. Critical situation in Soudan. Osman
Digna captured. Alfred Paget. Visit to Khartoum. Two
nights in the desert. Wingate's achievement as Governor-
General. The Khedive's visit to England. Sir M. Hicks-
Beach and the Soudan Budget.

CHAPTER IX
1900-01 282

A Palace Intrigue. Visit to Greece. A Ride through the
Morea. Delphi. Lord Lansdowne at the Foreign Office.
Death of Queen Victoria. Leave of absence. Verona and
London. Death of the Empress Frederick. An appreciation.
My appointment as Secretary of Embassy at Rome. Wilfrid
Blunt and the 11th Hussars. An incident and a White Paper.
The return of Arabi Pasha from Ceylon. Visit to Abouteeg.
Mahmoud Pasha Suleiman. Departure from Cairo.

Index 313

SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC
MEMORIES, 1 894-1901

CHAPTER I
1894

Arrival in Cairo. The Frontier Incident. The Young Khedive.
Intrigue to prevent his visit to England. Cromer's views as
to the future of Egypt. An appreciation of Cromer. Lady
Cromer. Stories of Ismail Pasha. Personalities in Egypt in
1894. Nubar Pasha. Kitchener, etc

1

I began my eight years of official life in Egypt
on the Queen's birthday, arriving in Cairo as second
in command to Lord Cromer on the 24th of May,
1894. In accordance with diplomatic precedent
there was a dinner party that evening at the British
Agency, where I met all the leading British officials
who had attained to the coveted rating which
entitled them to be invited. Lady Cromer had
already left for England. But the Agent and
Consul-General was remaining for another month,
so that I had ample time to take stock of the situ-
ation under the tuition of that remarkable man,
whose work of regeneration in Egypt I had been
studying in despatches and reports since 1884.

The crisis arising out of what was known as the

1 B

2 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

Frontier Incident, in which the young Khedive had
for the first time shown his hand, had just taken
place. He had made a progress up the river, and
there had been an inspection of the Egyptian
troops at the frontier. The army, reconstituted
after the chaotic period of the Arabi rebellion, and
trained by British officers, first under Sir Evelyn
Wood and subsequently Sir Francis Grenfell, 1 were
now commanded by Kitchener Pasha, who suc-
ceeded the latter as Sirdar in 1890. Abbas Hilmi
had thought fit to make some very disparaging
observations on the appearance and discipline of
the troops in a manner which would have left no
doubt of deliberate intention, even if there had
been no reason to anticipate such an outburst.
His action was at once reported to Cromer, with
the result that an unpleasant interview was in-
evitable on his return. The Khedive assumed an
attitude of surprise. He had had no idea that
Kitchener Pasha had interpreted certain remarks
of his in such a serious spirit. The Sirdar had not
protested at the time or they would have been at
once explained. Unfortunately for His Highness
it had been disclosed to the British authorities
beforehand from a source which was always friendly,
and generally well informed, that this occasion
was to be turned to account for a trial of strength,
and half Egypt was interestedly aware that the
young ruler intended to publicly assert himself.
The attempt ended as it only could, by placing him
in a humiliating position. He was obliged to issue
1 Field-Marshal Lord Grenfell.

MEMORIES 1894-1901 3

a general order commending the army and its
British officers. Maher Pasha, the Under-Secretary
for War, to whose inspiration the incident was due,
was dismissed, and Kitchener became Sir Herbert.
The Egyptians were much perplexed as to the
attitude they should adopt, the more so as Abbas
Hilmi had not yet rendered himself unpopular
by the autocratic acts of later years. " What shall
I do ? " said the eminent Sheikh el Bekhry to his
friends. " If I go to see Lord Cromer the Khedive
will take it amiss. If I go to see the Khedive
Lord Cromer will not be pleased. I think I will
go to see neither, but wait for a time, and after-
wards I will go to see them both."

As I had to be presented to the Khedive, who
was now at Alexandria, I accompanied Cromer
to Ramleh, the residential suburb of that city, to
which the Ministers and many of the diplomatic
representatives transferred their activities or pas-
sivities in the summer. The weather was hotter
than I ever remember it to have been during any
of the subsequent years which I spent in lower
Egypt. It was reported to have reached 112 in
the shade at Cairo and 109 at Alexandria. We
endeavoured to distract ourselves by playing piquet
in the train. But the midday railway journey
and the dust were almost unendurable.

At our interview with the Khedive no further
reference was made to the recent incident, to which
it was believed he meant to revert on an approach-
ing visit to London. He was quite gracious, but
it was easy to perceive that he was ill at ease ^v:th

4 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

Cromer. The penetrating diagnosis of the man
of fifty whom he regarded as a tutor, externally
courteous but expressing himself with an incisive
directness unwelcome to the Eastern mind, was
inevitably destined from the first to arouse the
antagonism of a boy of eighteen, as Abbas Hi lm i
was at the time of his accession, prematurely placed
in a position which might readily turn the head of
a young man who had not had the advantage of
disciplined home-training and tradition. He had
been educated at the military school at Vienna,
where forms and conventions probably played a
much greater part than in corresponding British
establishments. Some years at a British public
school might have done much for him, but political
considerations had made it desirable rather to
select neutral ground. Although still boyish in
appearance, Abbas was already predisposed to
stoutness, and he complained of the heat. He was
not without considerable charm of manner when
he chose to display it. In all my relations with
him, extending over some eight years, his geniality
never failed him. A younger man with a less
austere manner than that of the British Agent,
had no doubt a better chance of enlisting his good-
will. I remember on an occasion when I had to
obtain his assent to a reform which was not very
acceptable to him, the Khedive observed that he
did not particularly appreciate the proposal, but
that I had put it to him so courteously that he
felt he must at once accept it. An unwelcome
obligation may be mitigated by the sense of

MEMORIES 1894^1901 5

merit acquired in making a virtue of a necessity.
I have sometimes wondered whether any better
result could have been secured by a more cordial
treatment of the young Khedive in this earlier
stage. On the whole, having regard to subsequent
history and his unscrupulous proceedings towards
his own countrymen, I think it is improbable that
his arbitrary character would have been modified
in any essential respects by gentler handling. But
certainly there was a redoubtable element in Cromer,
until you came to know him well and had estab-
lished familiar relations by daily intercourse or
common humanistic interests. The English genius
for nicknames had christened him " over-Baring."
I was hardly ever conscious of such a barrier my-
self, though I realized how strongly it was felt by
others. Even such men as Kitchener and Sir
Leslie Rundle admitted to me that they always
approached the door of his study with a sense of
shyness and misgiving. I remember one day when
a reprimand had had to be administered to a certain
person, Cromer came into the Chancery and said,
' Well, I have settled him." But seeing a depre-
cating look on my face he added, " Oh, I was very
kind to him," and he was much amused when the
words half -in voluntarily escaped me, " Then, God
help him ! " Many years later, when he was
staying with my old friend Pandeli Ralli, he asked
him as a great friend of Kitchener's if he knew
what the latter' s ambitions really were. Ralli
said he thought that what K. would really like
best would be some day to become his successor

6 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

in Egypt. " I do not think," said Cromer, " that
that would do at all. K. has not got enough of
the suaviter in modo which is so necessary in dealing
with Egyptians." The story shows how little he
was conscious of the feeling which he himself in-
spired. As a matter of fact, however, Cromer was
very gracious in his intercourse with prominent
natives of the country.

The Khedive had decided to go to Europe, visit-
ing Austria, France, and England, when the Sultan,
his suzerain, intervened. The history of the in-
trigue which led to the abandonment of his projected
voyage is interesting as a revelation of the manner
in which Egyptian issues were turned to account
by the successors of Bismarck. To us it was really
a matter of little moment whether he went to
England or not. Indeed, in certain respects it
was at that time rather to our advantage that the
occasion should be deferred. It was, however,
assumed by those who directed the policy of France,
whose hostility to Great Britain in Egypt was
actively and consistently displayed ever after the
abolition of the Anglo-French Control in 1883
until the agreement of 1904, that we attached
importance to the visit. Public opinion in that
country was greatly excited by the conclusion of
the Anglo-Congolese agreement, referred to in the
preceding volume as having been signed with the
King of the Belgians, and our supposed anxiety
to induce the Khedive to go to London would
have constituted a sufficient reason for opposing
it. At least so it appeared on the surface. On

MEMORIES 1894^1901 7

the other hand, it might also be assumed with
justice that statesmen in France were desirous not
further to embroil the situation by risking an anti-
British demonstration in Paris, which the presence
of the Khedive there might readily have provoked.
The latter, who was concerned about his own
health during the great heat, was genuinely anxious
to go to Switzerland, and had realized that it would
be difficult for him to be in Europe without paying
these formal official visits. The French, in any
case, with the Russians in support, set to work at
Constantinople, while in Egypt they alarmed the
young man by raising the bugbear of a quarrel
with his sovereign. The Germans, who had origi-
nally encouraged us to go to Egypt, with that
amiable way they had of turning round upon their
friends when upset by some ephemeral' incident —
in this case it was the Congo agreement — took
this opportunity to ally themselves with the French.
The German representative, Baron von Heyking,
whose personal antecedents indicated him as a
fire-eater, dealt with the situation, as he also did
with subsequent incidents, in a rather heavy-
handed manner.

The Egyptian Ministers at Ramleh used to
appear, during the hours which were not devoted
to official duties or siesta, on the long terrace of
the Casino, whose corrugated-iron roofing was
reminiscent of the sugar-factory for which it had
originally been destined in the days of Ismail's
unsuccessful and extravagant experiments. There
they were no less astonished than we were amused

8 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

to see the German Agent and Consul-General
ostentatiously proclaiming the new alhance to the
public by walking up and down arm-in-arm with
his French and Russian colleagues, whom he cor-
dially disliked. Cromer had left the Khedive
severely alone to take his own decision, merely
observing to Nubar Pasha, who was now Prime
Minister, that a change of plans at the eleventh
hour would in his opinion be a mistake. As a
result of the efforts of the new combination the
Khedive received what was tantamount to an order
from the Sultan to proceed to Constantinople and
to abandon his proposed visits. He could only
comply, hoping later on to be allowed to go to
Switzerland. His submission, of course, placed him
entirely in the Sultan's hands. The French claimed
a diplomatic triumph, to which they were welcome.
But the agents on the spot were rather disappointed
to find that the decision left Cromer quite un-
concerned.

In the following winter, when every one was
back again in Cairo, there was a recurrence of
Heyking incidents, which I could only attribute
to some general instruction given him to make the
weight of German influence more appreciable to
the Egyptians. On one occasion, when he was
paying a visit at Shepherd's Hotel, an Egyptian
police officer ordered his carriage, which was stand-
ing at the door waiting for him, to move on a little
way to a more convenient halting-place, as the
narrow roadway there was hardly wide enough
for the heavy afternoon traffic. The Kavass of

MEMORIES 1894-1901 9

the German agency was well known for his tru-
culent manner, and he was probably responsible
for a highly-coloured report of the policeman's
action. In any case, we were amazed that evening
to receive a letter, evidently written under con-
ditions of great excitement with a spluttering pen,
in letters half an inch long straggling over a large
folio sheet, in which a protest was entered against
this impertinence to the representative of Germany,
and penalties were demanded against the injudicious
Zaptieh. After this and other outbursts, Heyking
invited me one day to come and see him. The
instructions from Berlin had perhaps been revised.
He told me that he had from various indications
received an impression that Cromer did not like
him, and he asked me whether there was any reason
for this unaccountable prejudice. He had no sense
of humour. But personally he was really quite
a good fellow, and his distress was so genuine that
I endeavoured to bring about more cordial relations.
His wife, who was a very charming and cultivated
lady, became afterwards well known as the authoress
of Briefe die nicht erreichen. They did not, how-
ever, remain very long with us.

While at Ramleh we paid a visit to Ghazi Moukh-
tar Pasha, the Turkish High Commissioner, for
whom the Egyptian Government had to provide
a residence near the sea, in addition to his sump-
tuous quarters at Cairo. He was originally
appointed joint Commissioner with Sir Henry
Drummond- Wolff in 1885, and his continued
presence in Egypt had no real justification after

10 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

the refusal of the Sultan at the eleventh hour to
ratify the Drummond- Wolff Convention of 1887,
under which we undertook to evacuate Egypt
after three years. But apart from other reasons
for keeping him there, Abdul Hamid was said to
be persuaded that Moukhtar had the evil eye, and
he therefore insisted on the maintenance of an
honourable sinecure for this fine old soldier at a
respectable distance from the Bosphorus. Moukhtar
was a sympathetic and dignified example of the
old-fashioned immutable Turk, and his military
record commanded respect. Had he not been held
back by superior orders from Constantinople during
the Russo-Turkish War his brilliant campaign in
Asia Minor must have ended disastrously for the
Russians. I always enjoyed paying him a visit.
His French was fairly fluent. But in speaking
that language he fell into a Turkish habit of speech
and substituted chose for any word which he was
at a loss to find. On one occasion when I was
calling upon him he had wished apparently to say
that he had been thinking of my name at the
moment when I was announced, and this was how
he expressed the coincidence : " C'est tres curieux,
au moment de votre entree, votre chose etait passee
par ma chose/ 5

While searching for a house in which to begin
my married life in the autumn, I took over tem-
porarily the rooms of one of the Secretaries who
was leaving. Cromer had broken up his establish-
ment. His chef had departed, and most of the
efficient Indian retinue of which his household was

MEMORIES 1894-1901 11

composed had gone home. Like every one who
serves the State abroad, Cromer found that the
demands on his hospitality tended to outrun the
means of satisfying them which the salary of the
post offered, and he was glad to close down during
the summer months. This was advantageous to
health as well as to pocket, as the cuisine at the
Agency was famous and dangerously seductive.
He gave careful attention himself to every detail.
The purchase of the winter supply of hams in
London was a ceremony of importance, and I
delighted in the humour of a modest tragedy con-
nected with this annual episode which he related
on his return from leave.

In the old-fashioned establishment at which
he had dealt for many years he had a long-standing
acquaintance with a be-aproned and shirt-sleeved
attendant, who assisted him in the selection. But
that summer, when he paid his regular visit, he
was confronted by an unfamiliar face. Cromer
said he would prefer, if possible, to see his old
friend Mr. X., who knew from long experience
what he required. " I am afraid," said the sales-
man, " that it will not be possible for Mr. X. to
attend you. Mr. X. is in fact dead. And I am
sorry to say that he died before completing your
Lordship's last order for hams." The solemnity
with which this information was imparted suggested
how grave a matter it was felt to be that Mr. X.
should have had to face eternity with this important
duty unfulfilled.

I found Cromer at that time much depressed

12 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

about the future in Egypt. The more arduous
stages of reconstruction had been surmounted,
the race against bankruptcy had been won after
some six years of precarious struggle, and it was
already possible, as credits became available, to
take in hand successive improvements in the internal
administration. But there was no visible end in
view, no definite solution which he could anticipate,
and he could only carry on and gradually develop
the great resources of the country under the in-
determinate conditions which our policy, or rather
absence of policy, entailed. This, Cromer said,
had been possible with a friendly Khedive like
Tewfik, but might become continually more difficult
with a ruler whose hostility was undisguised.
Most of the active and articulate elements in Egypt
were, for various reasons, hostile, and the opposition
of France, supported by Russia, had become chronic
whenever her influence could be exerted to counter
a British initiative.

While I was at Berlin M. Herbette, the French
Ambassador, who had been directeur politique at
the Quay d'Orsay, was always reverting to the
Egyptian question, which constituted, as he said,
a permanent difficulty between France and Great
Britain. Also, as a great ally of M. de Freycinet,
he no doubt felt strongly that in France respon-
sibility was visited on the latter for having allowed
us to go to Egypt alone. He said to Malet in
February, 1887, when the Drummond- Wolff nego-
tiations regarding Egypt were in progress at Con-
stantinople, that France only sought from us the

MEMORIES 189^1901 13

moral satisfaction of a definite undertaking to go.
She would accept all our reform proposals, and
would even agree to a modification of the Capitula-
tions which would subject foreigners to the juris-
diction of the Mixed Courts for criminal offences,
if we would fix a definite date for our departure
from Egypt. More than that, she would undertake
never to go there herself, and would agree to our
returning in certain eventualities. And yet it was
precisely that last condition which furnished France
with a pretext for successfully pressing the Sultan
to withhold his final acceptance of the Drummond-
Wolff Convention, in support of which Bismarck
had, on the other hand, exerted all his influence.

Cromer, who was erroneously believed by many
people to have annexationist ambitions, used to
apply to himself a parody of the well-known words
of Wilkes, " You know I never was a Cromerite."
He had not been in the first instance in favour of
occupation, the consequences and involvements
of which he foresaw. Nor, so far as I am aware,
did he raise any objection to the appointment in
1885 of joint Commissioners from Great Britain
and Turkey, in virtue of whose report the two
Governments were to " consult as to the con-
clusion of a Convention regulating the withdrawal
of the British troops from Egypt in a convenient
period." But long before I joined his staff he had
realized that things had reached a point at which
we could not with credit rapidly terminate the
occupation.

It is the more interesting to me to recall these

14

SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

conversations of 1895, and Cromer's depression
over the apparent absence of any definite goal in
view, because some five-and-twenty years later I
was called upon, in conjunction with Lord Milner,
to study the critical situation to which it was
inevitably bound to lead at last, and was associated
with the latter in submitting to His Majesty's
Government the first practical proposal for an
equitable solution of the Egyptian problem. In
the concluding chapter of that admirable book in
which the results of his experience of Egyptian
administration are so lucidly and impartially re-
corded, Cromer poses the question, Quo vadis ?
In seeking for a reply he lays down only two alter-
native courses as possible, the autonomy of Egypt
or its incorporation in the British Empire, and it
is the former of these alternatives to which he
personally adheres. It is true that writing in 1907,
while still favouring the policy of ultimate evacu-
ation, he expressed the opinion that one or more
generations would still have to pass away before
this solution could be contemplated, though he
at the same time did not exclude that intellectual
and moral progress might proceed more rapidly
during the ensuing than during the past quarter
of a century.

We are still far short of the completion of that
quarter of a century. But progress towards in-
tellectual and political maturity vires acquirit
eundo y and certainly when every allowance is made
for the inevitable differences between the progress
of the East and the West, it has been far more

MEMORIES 1894-1901 15

rapid than I had myself anticipated when I left
Egypt in 1901. A number of other factors and
precedents have also since manifested themselves
which would justify the modification of judgments
expressed in 1907. I hope to return some day to
the conditions of 1919, and the reasons which led
the Special Mission, presided over by Lord Milner,
unanimously to adopt the conclusions submitted
in their recommendations to the Government.
But I venture now to record my belief, based upon
eight years of intimate association with Lord
Cromer, that he would, having regard to the ante-
cedents and the circumstances which we had to
consider in 1920, have endorsed those conclusions
and recommendations with all the weight of his
great authority.

In subsequent years I generally had to take my
leave in the spring and early summer, returning
to Cairo just in time to enable Cromer to be away
for July, August, and September, so that the oppor-
tunity did not often recur of spending a month
practically alone with him after his family had left
for England. I have, therefore, always looked back
with pleasure to those first weeks of close personal
intercourse in which I learned to know him well.
His life has yet to be written, and therefore, as an
estimate of this great man's character can only be
formed from other records and the consideration
of his public services, I feel it to be a duty to his
memory to correct certain misapprehensions which
are in danger of finding acceptance.

I have referred briefly in my previous volume

16 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

to one of the most brilliant studies in critical bio-
graphy which have been published in recent years. x
In the section devoted to General Gordon I was
surprised to read, side by side with certain judg-
ments of Cromer which are penetratingly sound,
others which appear to me to be wide of the mark.
To say that Cromer took no interest in the East,
which meant very little to him, save as something
to be looked after and a convenient field for the
talents of Sir Evelyn Baring, is altogether unfair.
It would be as just to say in estimating any other
career that whatever the hand had found to do was
a convenient field for the activity of its energies.
I readily admit that the Oriental mind did not
appeal to him, and that in so far as he understood
it he regarded it as an obstacle to be overcome
rather than as a factor to be studied with sym-
pathetic appreciation. His own mentality was too
convincedly logical and western. But just because
the opening words of this sentence may approximate
to a truth, the conclusion as a whole appears the
more unwarranted. It would almost seem as if a
desire to enforce artistic values by contrasting the
nebulous idealism of Gordon with the sterner
realism of Cromer was responsible for a somewhat
distorted presentment of the figure in the second
plane, described as looking forward to " a pleasant
retirement — a country place — some literary recrea-
tions." The shade of disparagement implied in
these words, and the suggestion that his ambition
was to " become an institution," seem to me to
1 Eminent Victorians. Lytton Strachey.

MEMORIES 1894-1901 17

betray a curious misconception of the Cromer that
I knew. I do not propose to discuss the vexed
question of the mission and the tragic end of General
Gordon. The facts are set forth with clean im-
partiality in Cromer's Modem Egypt, which reveals
the terrible dilemma confronting the one man who
kept his head as an intermediary between a per-
plexed and vacillating Government which had
rejected his advice, and an agent, capable of heroic
resolution, whose attitude and counsels however,
changed from day to day, and even from hour to
hour, under the influence of inspirations which,
though inconsistent, he believed to be divine. It
is claimed that Sir Evelyn Baring might have
resigned when Mr. Gladstone, in the early months
of 1884, decided against a relief expedition to
Khartoum. His doing so would in no way have
modified the issue. In any case the insinuation
that in proceeding to London in April, 1884, Baring
was, " with a characteristically convenient un-
obtrusiveness," vanishing from the scene, and there-
fore shirking the issue, is manifestly unjust. In
London, while attending the Financial Conference
on Egypt, to which he had been summoned, he
would have opportunities for direct discussion, far
more effective than representations made by des-
patch, with those Ministers with whom a decision
lay.

Let me therefore here anticipate the experience
of eight years of intimate association with him, and
place it on record that I could never detect in
Cromer any personal motive or any ambition but

18 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

that of giving the best of his judgment and energy
to the work he had undertaken. He rang as sound
as a bell. He was unaffected by popular approval
or criticism. He saw with clear perception the
values of things as they were, and he dealt with a
given situation as it arose fearlessly after mature
consideration with practical common sense and
great fertility of resource. He made mistakes, as
all men must, but no one was readier to acknowledge
them than he was himself. He was so essentially
a worker that after ill-health had compelled him
to retire from Egypt he continually sought new
occupation for his energies, and he died working
assiduously to the last. I cannot therefore but
resent the suggestion that he had looked forward
as the end of a great career to the amenities of the
Victorian Squirearchy.

There were no doubt certain idiosyncrasies in
Cromer which those who understood him and
admired him might venture sympathetically to
indicate. Circumstances developed the autocratic
character to which he was temperamentally pre-
disposed. The success which attended his efforts
to produce order from chaos, and the eventual
elimination of all interference from home, increased
his sense of absolute self-dependence, and made
an authority which became too exclusively per-
sonal tend to diminish the sense of responsibility
in those who worked under him. It was curious,
when he had adopted a suggestion made to him
which proved successful in its effects, in how short
a time he convinced himself that the measure was

MEMORIES 1894-1901 19

due to his own initiative. He had, as I have said,
always been handicapped by the absence of any
definite policy with regard to Egypt, and the
obligation to carry on with no avowed goal in view.
The objects to be attained during the earlier years
of a terminable occupation were purely material.
It could not well be otherwise. But it is the
exclusively material character of our achievement
throughout, to the exclusion of moral development,
which might offer ground for criticism. Cromer's
positive mind, though it had a humanistic side,
was disposed to pass by the things of the soul.
Under his regime, with a constantly renewed
pressure of obstacles difficult to surmount, ad-
ministrative conditions which were only designed
to be provisional gradually hardened into per-
manence, with no considered scheme of expansion
to meet the changes they were destined to effect.
There was, of course, provision for education, but
it had been framed only with a view to the formation
of a class of minor officials, and remained in a state
of arrested development, with the result that in
after years it produced a superabundance of
competitors for State employment, whose training
had indisposed them to return to the agricultural
pursuits of their fathers. Cromer's successors took
over the situation as they found it, subject to an ever
growing spirit of local opposition. It was easier to
develop that material prosperity which had become
the ideal of the administration by a continuous in-
crease of Western co-operation. Government depart-
ments therefore became, after Cromer's retirement,

20 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

more and more permeated with British officials.
Little serious attempt was made to carry out our
professed intention of equipping the Egyptians
progressively to manage their own affairs. These
were weaknesses in a system which was the result
of an indeterminate policy, and of a lack of proper
revision after Cromer had accomplished his monu-
mental work. He redeemed the country from
bankruptcy, and immensely developed its great
natural resources ; he established the reign of
justice ; he raised the fellah from persecuted
thraldom to a state of personal freedom and in-
dependence, and incidentally he assisted the
Egyptian to develop a national consciousness.
But the very circumstances which enabled him
to accomplish his great work were unfavourable
to the creation of progressive machinery suited to
the special conditions of an Oriental country. Mean-
while the authorities at home had grown so accus-
tomed to accept his ruling without question that
they had ceased to preoccupy themselves with the
internal situation of the country, the anomalies of
which became more apparent to those familiar
with Egypt under Cromer's successors, when the
personal influence which had taken the place of a
system was removed.

The brief appreciation of my chief, which I have
ventured to record as a preface to some personal
reminiscences of the many years during which I
worked under him in Cairo, would be incomplete
without a word of similar testimony to the memory
of the first Lady Cromer, to whose unobtrusive

MEMORIES 1894^1901 21

collaboration her illustrious husband owed so much.
I shall not trespass into precincts consecrated by
a personal relation which commanded the affec-
tionate regard of all their intimates. It is enough
to say that a union, long delayed by the difficulties
arising from her fidelity to the tradition of an old
Catholic family, became an ideal association. I
doubt whether it was ever realized how large a
share she bore in the work which he accomplished
in Egypt. Under her gracious and tactful guidance
a social order was established there which set and
maintained a high standard in the British com-
munity. The desire to merit and retain her esteem
was a constant and an active influence. Wherever
there was trouble or distress her watchful sympathy
was at once revealed, and she had the gift of ex-
pressing feeling in sincere and spontaneous terms
which went to the heart. A letter in her beautiful
writing was always a pleasure to receive in itself,
and her correspondence was immense. She had
the instinctive perception of the little things men
care about. The calm and equable atmosphere
which her presence diffused was perfectly adapted
to round off certain asperities of Cromer's sometimes
preoccupied manner. Having seen so many careers
of public men diminished, if not compromised, by
the inadequacy or vanity of their wives, I have
always looked back upon her beneficent life with
growing respect and admiration.

Cromer told me much in those days of his ex-
periences as Controller of the Debt under Ismail,
of whose extravagancies the memory was at that

22 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

time still vivid in Cairo. A lady was in fact still
living there in comfortable domesticity who was
reported to have emerged, " noble and nude and
antique," from a gigantic pie which formed the
centre-piece of the Khedivial supper-table. He
said that he could have saved Ismail if the latter
had been straight and would have given him his
confidence. But Ismail had deceived him, and he
then realized that the only possible solution was
his removal from Egypt.

The deposed Khedive was a curious compound
of many qualities. He had big ideas, and some of
them were sound enough in themselves. But he
had absolutely no sense of the necessity of sub-
ordinating ends to means. His ignorance was
profound, and he fell a ready victim to the foreign
adventurers who flattered his vanity and plausibly
enlisted his patronage for impossible schemes which
transferred the wealth of Egypt to their own pockets.
An assimilation of Western methods did not modify
the despotic instincts of an Eastern ruler who
allowed nothing to impede the gratification of his
whims and who, though not essentially cruel, was
callous to the sufferings of his people and indifferent
to the processes by which the last shilling might be
squeezed out of them to pay the interest on his
debts.

He had humour of a kind, which he exercised
with a certain contemptuous geniality at the ex-
pense of the individuals who robbed him right and
left. In those days the consuls, commercial con-
suls for the most part, used to add to their incomes

MEMORIES 1894-1901 23

by pressing him to give orders in Europe, on which
they obtained commissions. To one of these
gentlemen, who had been granted an audience
and who stood before him hat in hand, he ob-
served : " Put on your hat, please, my friend,
this palace is full of draughts ; you might catch
a cold here and then I should have to pay an
indemnity."

On another occasion a gentleman who wanted
financial assistance was received in the evening
in one of the vast rooms at Abdin. None of the
innumerable chandeliers were lit, and there were
only three candles burning on a small table. After
greeting his guest Ismail glanced at the three lights.
" Pardon me, my friend," he said, " I am very
hard up just now. One candle will be sufficient
for us." And he blew out the other two. It was
evidently unnecessary for him with this visitor to
follow the practice which he frequently adopted
of attracting his interlocutor towards a window
and there detaining him while peering intently
into his face. A friend of mine who had noticed
that he made a habit of engaging in conversations
near the window asked him whether this was
deliberate, and if he had any particular reason
for doing so. Ismail replied that he had found
from long experience that if he could bring a man's
face into a strong light, he could always discover
whether or not he was telling the truth.

He used to contemplate with satisfaction the
Kasr-el-Nil bridge which he had caused to be built
at enormous expense. More than once he was

24 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

heard to remark : " People say I was a fool to spend
so much money on this bridge. Well, I may pos-
sibly have been a fool to build it at all, but I most
certainly was a fool not to spend more and make
it twice as broad."

One amusing story of Cromer's about him has
a delightful Eastern savour. Ismail was suffering
from a severe toothache, and sent for a European
dentist, who after examining conditions decided
that the offending tooth must be extracted. " Yes,"
said Ismail, " no doubt, but that will hurt me."
" Not at all," replied the expert, " I shall give Your
Highness gas, and you will not feel anything."
He explained the mode of procedure, whereupon
Ismail, looking somewhat incredulous, told his
A.D.C. to bring up one of the sentries from the
Palace gate. " Now," said he to the odontologist,
" give him gas ! " The gas was administered.
" Pull out one of his teeth ! " The tooth was
extracted. " Give him some more gas," said
Ismail, " and pull out another." The victim ad-
mitted that he had felt nothing during the opera-
tion. But the Khedive, reflecting that a fellah
soldier might not be very sensitive, still hesitated,
and he sent for an unfortunate woman from the
harem, on whom the operation was repeated. Then
having satisfied himself that the extraction would
be practically painless, he submitted his august-
person to the practitioner, and was very well satis-
fied with the result. It is to be hoped that the
soldier was liberally rewarded for his part in the
experiment. The dentist in any case received a

MEMORIES 1894-1901 25

handsome sum in Treasury Bonds, which, the story
concludes, were not honoured.

It was, I think, Ismail who claimed that Egypt
had ceased to be in Africa and had become a part
of Europe. But he himself remained irredeemably
Oriental in methods and mentality. The story of
Ismail Bey Sadyk, the Mufettish, has already
found its way into print. He had been the Khedive's
confidant in all his business transactions, and in
the brief period during which he acted as Finance
Minister was reported to have accumulated £800,000.
His wealth and his opportunities had made him the
most powerful man in the country. But he knew
too much, and Goschen, who had been entrusted
with a mission to investigate the financial con-
ditions, had most inconsiderately demanded the
production of his books and papers. One after-
noon in the year 1877 he was honoured by an
invitation to drive with the Khedive. At the
Palace of Ghezireh, on the island linked to
Cairo by the bridge which Ismail regretted not to
have widened, the carriage stopped and they
descended. The Mufettish was offered coffee, but
thought it more prudent to decline it. Then there
was a tap on his shoulder and he was hastily con-
veyed on board a steamer which lay moored to the
Palace quay. The ropes were at once cast off, and
the vessel left for Upper Egypt. Goschen waited
in vain for the books which Ismail Sadyk was
reported most unfortunately to have taken with
him. He was known to be of a full habit, and an
ample supply of strong liquors was placed at his

26 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

disposal to console him in his enforced exile. The
climate of Upper "Egypt does not pardon indulgence
in alcohol. After a considerable interval a little
party bearing the Khedive's signet ring was sent
up to visit the steamer. They returned and re-
ported that the Mufettish had died of drink, and
an answer in those terms was given to a question
in the British House of Commons enquiring as to
the cause of his death.

Even a residence of some years in Europe, at
Naples, after his deposition, did not modify Ismail's
essentially Oriental mentality. In the late 'eighties
he came to London in order to press personally
certain claims which he had formulated against the
British Government. Most of these claims were
manifestly absurd, while for a limited number a
plausible case might be advanced. He had collected
several foreign legal opinions of questionable value
in support of them, and he was also anxious to obtain
favourable counsel's opinion in England with which
to impress the Foreign Office. A friend of mine
in London, whom he used sometimes to consult on
questions of business, strongly advised him to drop
all the claims which could not be seriously substan-
tiated, and which if maintained would only serve to
discredit the more plausible ones and entail their
collective rejection. But Ismail took the view
congenial to the eastern mind that the greater the
number of claims put forward the better would be
his prospect of obtaining satisfaction for some of
them. He assumed, rightly or wrongly, that Lord
Randolph Churchill intended to use all his influence

MEMORIES 1894-1901 27

against their favourable consideration, and made
enquiries in various quarters as to that Minister's
financial position, which he believed to be weak.
Then he paid a nocturnal visit to the friend in
question, who had already retired to bed. Having
aroused the butler he obtained admission, and
insisted that the business was so urgent that his
employer must at once get up and see him. Ismail
was accompanied by an Italian secretary. He
had in his hand a black bag, which, he said, contained
a thousand sovereigns. He invited my friend to
act as his intermediary and to convey this sum on
the following morning to Lord Randolph Churchill
in order to buy off his supposed opposition. He
became indignant when this proposal was received
with hilarity and was explained to be quite out of
the question. There was, he said, no reason for
laughter. He had been Khedive of Egypt for
twenty years, and in all that time he had never
known anyone refuse " Baksheesh." On being
pressed to give an instance of any acceptance of
such inducement by British officials in Egypt, he
could only allege that he had once given a pair of
Arab horses to the wife of such an official. But
when asked whether this present had led to his
securing the desired object he replied : " No. That
was just the worst of it." The story of this mid-
night interview was eventually brought to the
knowledge of Lord Randolph Churchill, who was
greatly amused.

No doubt many illegalities were still perpetrated
in Egypt for many years after the occupation. In

28 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

spite of the theoretic application of impartial
justice to all classes, members of the Khedivial
family still regarded themselves as outside and
above the law. Cromer had received a visit, some
time before I joined his staff, from the wife of a
British resident who devoted a well-intentioned
but very insistent activity to social questions.
She arrived on this occasion full of indignation to
inform him that she had knowledge of a white

slave in the Harem of Princess who was being

gravely ill-treated. Cromer only insisted on an
assurance that she was positive as to the correct-
ness of her facts, and having obtained it he went to
see the Khedive — it was still Tewfik — and demanded
his intervention. Tewfik enquired what would
satisfy him, and he replied that the woman must
be sent to his house the same afternoon. She arrived
late in the evening, accompanied by another woman,
in a carriage, with the inevitable male duenna on
the box. It so happened that the Cromers were
that evening giving a fancy-dress ball, and the
British Agent was expected, sorely against his own
inclinations, to appear as an historic character. To
those who knew him the grim humour of what was
really a tragic situation will appear. The woman
protested with tears that she could not understand
why she had been brought there, she had nothing
to complain of, and only begged to be allowed to
return. But the issue could not then be avoided.
The lady who had brought the charge was sent for
and provided with an interpreter. In taking her
to the room where the victim was waiting Cromer

MEMORIES 1894-1901 29

said : " Now, go in and do what I could not do.
Strip her and see if there are any marks of ill-
usage." By this time guests were beginning to
arrive in the costumes of all the ages. In due
course the lady reappeared and apologized most
humbly for all the trouble which she had given.
She was now convinced that she had been entirely
mistaken. ' ' What have you done with the woman ? ' '
Cromer asked. " I have sent her back to her
mistress, as she wished." " Did you strip her as I
told you to do ? " No, she had not thought it
necessary. " Then," said Cromer, " you made a
great mistake. You have forced me to take a very
extreme measure, and all to no purpose." Some
little time after this interview it seems that the
woman in question disappeared. At least such
was the information which reached the lady who
had brought the charge, and she admitted with
tears in her eyes that she felt responsible for her
death.

At the end of June Cromer left for England.
There were at the moment no menacing storm-
clouds on the horizon. But minor problems arose
daily for the solution of which precedent was seldom
available. Cromer had all the threads in his hands ;
his methods were largely personal, and there was
little to be gleaned from the consultation of records.
Unfortunately also for me Boyle, the Oriental
secretary who kept the pro-consul's conscience,
had decided to take leave this year, so that I was
deprived of his valuable experience. As my old
friend Harry Boyle is still happily alive I can only,

30 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

without offending his modesty, refer with a certain
reserve to his remarkable gifts, his unfailing humour
and inexhaustible good nature. He was a product
of the British dragomans school at Constantinople,
which trained a series of eminent officials for the
public service, and has since many years been
closed. The Turkish language with its exuberance
of courtesies was congenial to him, and his know-
ledge of Arabic was profound. An impeccable
memory and an extensive and peculiar range of
study in every branch of literature made him the
most entertaining and remunerative of companions.
He is one of the most delightful of correspondents.
His letters, which kept me posted in Egyptian
affairs after my departure from Cairo, and which I
have not as he begged consigned to " devouring
Hephrastus at the back of the kitchen grate,"
remain a delightful and refreshing record, but they
are not for publication. That he should have been
born in Central America, apparently during an
orchid-collecting pilgrimage of a botanical father,
and that while domiciled at Ambleside he should be
the owner of a vineyard in Sicily, and the tenant
of a porter's lodge attached to the house of a Cairene
notable, were accidents which did not seem in-
appropriate to his unusual and endearing indi-
viduality.

Sir Elwin Palmer, whose earlier career had been
in India, had succeeded Sir Edgar Vincent as
Financial Adviser. He remained some weeks longer
in Egypt and reported the current proceedings of
the Council of Ministers at which his office entitled

MEMORIES 1894-1901 31

him to assist. Jack Gorst (Sir Eldon Gorst), who
after many years service at the Agency had been
lent to the Egyptian Administration as Financial
Under-secretary, was before long to be transferred
to the Interior as Adviser, a newly created function.
My old Balliol friend Clinton Dawkins, who had
been for some years in charge of the interests of the
Peruvian Corporation, was then to take over his
post in the Finance Department, of which Lord
Milner had been the first British incumbent.

The Prime Minister with whom I had now to
deal was the famous veteran Nubar Pasha, who
had replaced Riaz Pasha in the preceding January.
He had filled the same office from the beginning of
1884 until June, 1888, when his opposition to the
appointment of civilian Advisers and to British
intervention in internal affairs had led to a rupture
with Cromer, during which Nubar learned the
lesson that there was nothing to gain by com-
plaining to H.M.'s Government of the policy of
their Agent. His views had, however, since then
undergone considerable modification. He had
always accepted the British military occupation
as necessary, and even desirable, and he now fully
acquiesced in the existing order. In reality Nubar
was himself by origin almost as foreign to Egypt as
the British Advisers.

The tall handsome grey-haired Armenian, who
claimed with pride that he had given effect to the
supremacy of the law in Egypt, possessed the magic
gift of charm. An exceptional command of language,
equally remarkable when French was his instrument

32 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

of expression, and a facility for formulating brilliant
generalisations with a plausibility which tempted
the listener to forgo examination of the premises,
often effectually disguised a tendency to intrigue,
developed by the associations and conditions of his
early life. If he had no exceptional administrative
capacity he was on quite a different plane intel-
lectually from that of the average Egyptian or
Turco-Egyptian of the dominant class at that
time. Externally he appeared to radiate bene-
volence, and as it was impossible not to like him
and feel his personality, so it was difficult for a
younger man not to be subjugated by his genial
manner and the unhesitating flow of his rounded
periods.

I could well understand how his ready gift of
speech had once availed to save his life at a critical
moment from the caprice of a despotic master. He
told me the tale himself. Nubar, who had made
himself useful to Mohamed Ali, was in his younger
days travelling in the suite of the famous Ibrahim
Pasha from Constantinople to Alexandria. He
had managed in some way to offend that fire-eating
soldier, who ordered the Armenian to be thrown
overboard. Nubar perceived that the sun was
already low in the sky and, knowing that it is con-
trary to Moslem law to carry out a death sentence
after sunset, he craved and obtained permission
to speak before meeting his end. After a few
preliminary words he introduced a story which he
unfolded with so much eloquence and skill that
Ibrahim became an absorbed listener. The interest

MEMORIES 1894-1901 33

of his hearer did not fail until the sun touched and
then sank below the horizon. Thus he obtained
grace until the following morning, by which time
Ibrahim had forgotten the cause of offence and
received him back into favour.

His son-in-law Tigrane Pasha, who was much
more of a cosmopolitan, had also a considerable
attraction of charm. But Cromer had found it
impossible to work with him, and he was no longer
Minister for Foreign Affairs. His place had been
taken by the first Copt who obtained high office,
Boutros Pasha Ghali, whose energy and intelli-
gence eventually brought him to the Premiership,
only to be assassinated by a Moslem fanatic. He
died sincerely regretted by many friends, some of
whom like myself when no longer in Egypt main-
tained cordial relations with him until his regretted
end.

Not long after Cromer's departure I had to deal
with a very troublesome affair. A Turco-Egyptian
occupying a high social position was charged by the
Slavery Suppression Department with the recent
introduction of a slave into the country. Such
cases were very rare, and the Department was in
fact soon afterwards abolished, there being no
adequate justification for its maintenance. When
they did occur they had to be dealt with under
existing rules by court martial, and therefore fell
into the province of the Sirdar. It would be of
little interest to recapitulate the inner history of
the issue which was eventually terminated by the
defendant being declared physically unfit to undergo

34 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

trial, after an examination carried out by two
British medical officers attached to the Egyptian
Army. This was probably the best manner in which
to solve what may not have been a very good case.
But the manner in which it was accomplished
afforded me my first opportunity of gauging the
curious secretive character of Kitchener, whom I
afterwards learnt to appreciate through many years
of intimate association which matured into a friend-
ship maintained until his tragic death.

I had first heard his name in 1886, when I was in
Berlin. He had been sent out to Zanzibar, in the
days of Sir John Kirk, as a special commissioner
to investigate the rights of Sultan Barghash on the
mainland, and the situation arising out of the
territorial claims advanced by Germany. Bismarck
was dissatisfied with the attitude of Colonel Kitchener,
complaining that he always sided with the French
Commissioner against the German. Herbert Bis-
marck went much farther and claimed to have made
the astounding discovery that he was the son of
one Kiichner, a native-born German renegade, who
had fought against his own country in 1870, while
Kitchener himself had also served in the French
army. 1 There was some justification for the latter
allegation, as he had for a brief while, before actually
receiving his commission in the Engineers, joined
the army of the Loire under General Chanzy. An

1 The Kitcheners were an old-established family in Suffolk
for some two centuries before Horatio Herbert was born. His
father, Colonel Kitchener, who served in the 13th Dragoons
and 9th Foot, had purchased an estate in Ireland in 1850.

MEMORIES 1894-1901 35

attack of pneumonia contracted in a ballooning
experience cut short his career as a French officer.
The official reprimand which he received from the
Duke of Cambridge on his return to England was
discounted by the old soldier's evident sympathy.
The memory of K.'s services in France's day of need
became a tradition which was revived with
enthusiasm in the grim autumn of 1914. I heard,
not without emotion, that after the disaster to the
Hampshire, the cure of Dinan, where the family
had been living during the Franco-Prussian War
when he started to join General Chanzy, performed
a solemn mass in the church for the repose of the
soul of the old friend of France.

Kitchener, when appointed Sirdar of the Egyptian
Army in 1890, had at last emerged after a career
which until then had hardly fulfilled his undoubted
ambition. The captain of Engineers, who had
acted as a military vice-consul in Asia Minor and
subsequently had directed the work of the Explora-
tion Fund in Palestine, had been among the first
British officers selected to shape anew the Egyptian
Army under Sir Evelyn Wood, and in that service
had quickly made his mark. It was while stationed
in Cyprus that he came over to Cairo, I believe
without leave, to offer his services, and he was able
to advance the plea that he knew a certain amount
of Arabic. It was to my future brother-in-law,
then Captain Stuart Wortley, who was A.D.C. to
Sir Evelyn Wood, that he made his application.
He was first attached to the Egyptian cavalry.

When I arrived in Egypt Kitchener was as yet

36 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

by no means firmly in the saddle or sure of himself.
Some spirit of misgiving or mistrust prevented him
from putting his cards on the table. While the
ends which he had in view were sound in them-
selves, he had a habit of approaching them by
tortuous ways and sometimes, as it seemed to me,
made an unnecessarily misleading movement in
order to gain a point which he might equally well
have reached by the direct road. He was extra-
ordinarily reserved, the very opposite of the bluff
honest soldier of whom the general public in later
years regarded him as the type. It was character-
istic of him that he early managed to emancipate the
estimates of the Ministry of War to a considerable
extent from financial control, and made the most
of an Egyptian provision for departmental vire-
ments, by which the sums credited under one head
could be transferred to another. I have little
doubt that from the moment he took charge of the
Egyptian Army he contemplated the eventual re-
conquest of the Soudan, and laid his plans with a
prescient grasp of the future. But as yet he kept
his own council. After success had crowned his
career, when he was in a strong position to state
his case and carry it, his methods changed to some
extent. But the old habit of secretiveness re-
mained. In these early days a perceptible absence
of frankness and an assumption that if the end
was acceptable the means of attaining it were his
own affair made him officially something of a prob-
lem. It would almost seem as though his mentality
had been affected by long communion with men

MEMORIES 1894-1901 37

whose minds worked on Oriental lines, and when
he put forward a demand we used involuntarily to
ask ourselves. "What is he really out f or ? "

Kitchener undoubtedly had vision, and there was
a certain inarticulate poetry in his nature. His
face not less than his manner suggested the contem-
plative spirit. Those curious very blue eyes of his
seemed to look beyond you to the desert horizons
where so much of his life had been spent. His
intuition rather than his reason saw beyond the
actual moment, and then he elaborated far-reaching
plans for execution when the time should be ripe.
Having once determined on a course he was un-
receptive to new ideas, and worked towards his
end with machine-like precision. Intellectually the
past attracted him. Exploration work in Palestine
had stirred his imagination. He told me more
than once that his own predilection would have
been to retire early from active life and devote the
remainder of his years to archseological investi-
gation. He was a very hard worker, and he
mercilessly exacted the maximum of effort from
his subordinates. He seldom bestowed praise, or
even approval. And yet men worked for him as
for no other. He appeared ill-at-ease in social life,
and rather shy in the society of women, though it
is an error to suppose that he was never susceptible
to their attraction. There was certainly one who
exercised a strong influence for good over his idealism.
He had in those days no intimate friends. Many
admired him. Very few really liked him. He
walked by himself.

38 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

Egypt made Kitchener, and he could never
dissociate himself from its spell. He realized a
long cherished dream when he returned there as
Agent and Consul-General in succession to Sir Eldon
Gorst in 1911. I like to think of him in those
afterdays as associated with certain beneficent
activities which were not conceived in a solely
material spirit. It was to his initiative that the
institution of dispensaries and maternity homes
throughout the country districts was due. The
details of the scheme were worked out at his request
by Lady Sybil Graham, whose husband, our present
Ambassador in Rome, was then Adviser to the
Interior. They have been of unspeakable benefit to
the fellaheen, who have greatly appreciated them.

The memory of K. is also associated with the
provision of safe refuges for the roosting and breed-
ing of the egret. These beautiful birds, which in
my time were to be seen in large numbers all over
the delta, had been almost exterminated by the
alien plumage hunter. The egret, which eats the
boll-worm, is the protector of the cotton crop, and
the fellah has now been taught to understand the
value of its beneficent presence. Thanks to
Kitchener's sanctuaries the birds have once more
become numerous and are again a characteristic
feature in the Egyptian landscape. It is a constant
pleasure when the sun is setting to see them flight-
ing low over the water, and rising in a cloud over
the city bridges on their silent passage down the
river from the fields to their familiar trees in the
Zoological Garden at Ghizeh. When I returned

MEMORIES 1894-1901 39

to Egypt in 1920 the homeward flight of the egrets
always brought back a kindly thought of K., and
a picture of the strong ruddy face with the light-
blue eyes watching their white companies winging
through the golden evening glow.

The genial and popular head of the Intelligence
Service, Colonel Wingate, presented a marked
contrast to Kitchener. He combined the practical
with the intellectual to a remarkable degree. Long
experience and a certain flair had taught him
unerringly to penetrate the subtleties of the Arab
mind, a gift which at first sight seemed inconsistent
with, though perhaps it was really not a little due
to his own directness of character and rigid recti-
tude. Wingate did not by any means always see
eye to eye with Kitchener, but they were both in-
dispensable for a time which was rapidly approach-
ing and necessary to one another as complement
and supplement. It will be more opportune to
speak later on of Wingate' s great services to the
Empire, services which I feel have not been fully
appreciated at the close of a career of which both he
and those who hold him in high regard have reason
to be proud.

The Egyptian military service, and its technical
branches in particular, had attracted the elite of
the British Army. Our officers, mostly quite young
men, were on excellent terms with their Egyptian
colleagues, and the seniors among them, such as
my old friends Sir Leslie Rundle, then Adjutant-
General of the Army, and Sir John Maxwell, were
eminently possessed of those genial and human

40 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

qualities which are so valuable for bridging over
the great gulf between the East and West. The
latter, in spite of his having occupied a position in
Egypt during the Great War which often demanded
the exercise of stern authority, has nevertheless
always retained the regard and affection of the
Egyptian people.

British inspectors under the Ministry of the
Interior had hardly then fully established their
position in the country districts, and our influence
still made itself chiefly felt there through the Irri-
gation Officers. Sir Colin Scott Moncrieff had left
a splendid tradition behind him, which was carried
on by Forster, Garstin, and Wilcocks. Moncrieff had
impressed it on his staff that they were there as the
friends of Egypt only to guide and advise. But so
much was their guidance and advice appreciated
that they were reverenced almost to the point of
worship by the fellaheen, who for the first time in
their experience were aware of an impersonal and
impartial influence, securing equality of treatment
for all irrespective of position.

The appointment of British Inspectors of the
Interior, though I saw no reason to criticize it at
the time, when I was quite new to the country,
marked a fresh departure and an extension of our
intervention and authority. No doubt the ad-
mirable work of a man like Carter-Wilson, who
lived among the people, riding from village to
village, and listening to their grievances, was of
very great benefit to the peasants, by whom in those
relatively early days the presence of the inspectors

MEMORIES 1894^1901 41

was greatly appreciated. But the system once
initiated involved further development and the
obligation to impose a more efficient provincial
administration which, however desirable in itself,
had not been one of the aims originally contemplated
by the occupation. As time went on it inevitably
tended to diminish the consideration of the pro-
vincial governors and the district officials, and
entailed the assumption of increasing responsibilities
by the occupying Power.

Less known perhaps in the country districts,
but no less highly esteemed in the capital, was the
judicial adviser, Sir John Scott, whose counsels,
invariably sound, were advanced with a tact and
discretion which secured for them immediate accep-
tance.

My first summer in charge in Egypt was not
without its problems, but none of them proved
insurmountable. I remained in Cairo, where life
was very endurable in spite of the heat. The
Fencing Club in the Esbakieh Gardens was a great
resource, and every evening after tea time I there
met Maxwell, then a colonel in the Egyptian Army,
though only a captain of the Black Watch, and we
played with the foils and the epee under the instruc-
tion of Maitre Salon, a severe disciplinarian of
craft and warm-hearted exponent of the noble art
of swordsmanship. Salon, who was the friend of
every one, successfully kept up the appearance of
being quite unaware that there were such things as
international animosities or political issues in the
turbulent world of Cairo. The Fencing Club was

42 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

indeed a happy point of contact with the French
colony, and in its genial atmosphere harmony always
prevailed.

In June of this year was published Gerry Portal's
unfinished book, with the journals which I had
edited and supplemented, under the title of The
British Mission to Uganda in 1893. 1 Cromer had
written an introduction, and I supplied a memoir.
The tragic story of the two Portals occupied a
great deal of public attention, and in the lengthy
reviews I was glad to see that due credit was given
not only to Gerry's capacity as a leader, but also
to the considerable literary gift which the examiners
who rejected him for matriculation at Oxford had
apparently failed to detect. It should remain a
standard work for the early history of the East
African Colony.

An enthusiastic letter from Nubar Pasha, in
which he gave high praise to the brief epilogue
which I had added, pleased me not a little, and also
interested me as an indication of character, for he
appeared to be deeply stirred by words intended to
do honour to a conception of life inevitably so
different from that with which circumstance had
made him familiar.

Cromer returned at the beginning of October,
whereupon being released from duty I raced home
to be married. It must have been during the brief
interval preceding that ceremony, or else just before
I had gone out to Egypt, that I first met Rudyard
Kipling, who had returned from England and had
1 Edward Arnold, 1894,

MEMORIES 1894-1901 43

taken the world by storm with his Soldiers Three,
his Plain Tales from the Hills, and his early volumes
of verse. Some years before we met I had heard
of his work from Mowbray Morris, who as editor
of Macmillari 's Magazine had been one of the first
to recognize it. It was at a little dinner in Bruton
Street given by Lord and Lady Granby (Duke and
Duchess of Rutland), at which there were present
besides myself, A. J. Balfour, George Curzon, and
Harry Cust, with one or two more. In such com-
pany the conversation did not flag, but the guest
of the evening was rather contemplative, as indeed
he might well be at the side of the gifted hostess,
whose beauty was unsurpassed by any contemporary
of my generation.

Our wedding took place, not as I could have
wished quietly in the country, but in St. Peter's,
Eaton Square, with a certain pomp and circum-
stance. My old Balliol friend the Rev. B. W.
Randolph, the only one of my intimates who had
entered the church, came up from Ely to marry us.
And so from the 27th of October a new life began.
A lack of reticence, even in regard to domestic
relations, in biographical records does not appeal
to me. It is enough to say here that from thence-
forth every activity and accomplishment of subse-
quent experience was stimulated by the double
energy of a perfect association, and that although
a silver wedding has long since followed that
memorable date, every succeeding year has only
added to the measure of my debt.

CHAPTER II
1895-96

Venice. Malta. Stuart -Wortley and the reconstruction of the
Egyptian Army. The Agency at Cairo. Daily routine under
Cromer. Social figures — Egyptian, Cosmopolitan, and British.
Wilfrid Blunt. The escape of Slatin from Omdurman. Cruise
in Greek islands. Sir William Butler. Italian defeat in
Abyssinia. Proposals to create a diversion. Preparations for
the advance to Dongola.

Our road to Egypt lay through Italy, and part
of a delightful honeymoon was spent in Venice,
where the upper floor of the hospitable Palazzo
Barbaro had been prepared for us by the kindest
of hosts, Mr. and Mrs. Daniel Curtis, at the instance
of their son Ralph, a very old friend of mine who
had been one of the frequenters of Whistler's studio
in the merry days of Tite Street. He had himself
considerable ability as a painter, and would have
achieved much more than he did if circumstances
had not made life too easy for him. Our host was
a very gallant old American gentleman, who had
suffered for his chivalry. He had knocked down
a policeman who had been insolent to his wife, and
endured the inevitable consequences. He then
shook off the dust of his native land and settled in
Venice, where the Palazzo Barbaro became famous

44

SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC MEMORIES 45

for its genial hospitality. Curtis had a pleasant
humour of his own. "You know Vanderbilt, of
course ? " said a visitor to him one day. " No,"
he said, " when I left America he was only vander-
building." Like Sam Ward he could quote Horace
appositely, as he showed in the case of two billiard
players engaged in a game of fifty who had main-
tained level scores and reached forty-nine all,
when one of them missed his cue and gave away
the winning point. " Tulit punctum qui miscuit,"
was the appropriate comment. Curtis had many
stories to tell about Robert Browning, whose son
became their neighbour at the Palazzo Rezzonico.
Commentators will some day no doubt expend much
ingenuity in endeavouring to explain the genesis
of " Childe Roland to the Dark Tower came."
But Daniel Curtis had not hesitated to ask the
author himself for a clue. Browning very frankly
said that when he wrote it he did not mean anything
in particular. It was just a lyric. He had once
made a resolution, to which however he did not
adhere, to write a lyric of some kind every day, and
"Childe Roland" was the first of that contemplated
series. Venice, which I had first seen as a child
when the white-coated Austrian military band
played in the piazza of St. Mark, was at this time
the centre of a small and pleasant Anglo-American
society, the members of which did not, as so many
foreign communities do, quarrel amongst them-
selves. Lady Layard, the Edens, the Bronsons,
and the Curtises were its mainstays, with Horatio
Browne and Madam Viel (Alethea Lawley) to repre-

46 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

sent letters and research, and the native Venetians,
whose susceptibilities they did not outrage, made
them welcome. The Lido had not then begun to
attract the all-day bridge player and the social
mannequin. The great Campanile of St. Mark's
had not yet subsided.

By Florence, Siena, Rome, and Naples, we made
our way down to Messina, and thence to Malta,
which I then saw for the first time. My brother
and sister-in-law were living at Casa Leone, a mile
or so outside Valetta. Major Stuart- Wortley 1 was
brigade major on the staff. He had been intimately
connected with the early history of the British
occupation of Egypt, having been the first active
British officer to enter the Egyptian service, after
1882, as military secretary to Colonel Valentine
Baker. When the activities of the latter were
limited under instructions from home to the control
of the gendarmerie, Sir Evelyn Wood came out as
the first British Sirdar, and Stuart- Wortley became
his A.D.C. Almost simultaneously the services
were enlisted of a subaltern of artillery whom little
more than ten years later I met as Adjutant-General
of the Egyptian Army, General Sir Leslie Rundle.

After a sufficient nucleus of promising young
officers had been enrolled the inevitable dinner was
given to celebrate the reconstruction of the Egyptian
Army. My old chief Lord Dufferin, who had come
from the Embassy at Constantinople as High
Commissioner to study and recommend constitu-
tional reforms, made the speech of the evening.
1 Lt.-Gen. the Hon. E. Stuart-Wortley.

MEMORIES 1894-1901 47

His greatest hit was quite unconscious. Describing
in his roundest periods the important field of activity
which lay before these officers he affirmed, sweeping
his right hand rhetorically towards a diminutive
but highly intellectual young sapper, that they
were not to be " the brutal and licentious soldiery
of a despotic Power, but," indicating with his left
a certain flamboyant major of gendarmerie, whose
subsequent career was brief and hectic, " the mild
and unassuming guardians of the public peace."

Early recruits, only a little junior to these, were,
besides Kitchener and Wingate, Sir John Maxwell
and the well-known Bimbash Stewart, who after
serving as a subaltern in the first Nile expedition
returned home to reappear immediately as a major
in the Egyptian Army. The late Sir William Butler,
who, after the withdrawal from Dongola, had been
sent as brigadier to command at Wady-Halfa,
seeing him there congratulated him on his high
military rank. " Yes, sir," said Bimbash, " we
have both of us come back here much bigger bugs
than we expected to. Haven't we?" Nature
had designed him to be a soldier of fortune in more
adventurous and less censorious days when his
high spirits and genial insolence would have kept
his sword's point busy. Many years later, when
he had become a messenger and had carried the
King's mail to Homburg, he there met a very charm-
ing American lady of whom he only knew that she
was residing in a foreign capital where, as he learned
soon afterwards, her husband was the Ambassador.
Some rather too enterprising questions regarding

48 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

social life in that capital led her to observe : "I
do not think, Major Stewart, that you quite realize

what my position is at ." "No," he replied,

" I do not, but if it's anything like my position in
London, it's rocky — damned rocky."

My acquaintance with Stuart-Wortley was long
anterior to the kinship established by marriage,
and he had paid several visits to Malet while I was
at the Berlin Embassy. He had played an im-
portant part in the first Nile expedition in com-
mand of Arab irregulars, and had accompanied the
steamers in the forlorn hope to reach Khartoum in
time to save Gordon. I have always regretted
that he has not availed himself of a facile pen to
compile a record of those stirring times in Egypt
and the Soudan. Lest he should never do so I
would rescue from oblivion here one story which
he told me.

It will be remembered by those who have studied
the sequence of events at Khartoum up to the death
of Gordon that Colonel Stewart, with Mr. Power, who
had been acting as Times correspondent, and M.
Herbin, the French Consul, left that tragic station
on the 10th of September, 1884, in the steamer
Abbas to return to Egypt, and that they were all
three treacherously murdered after landing at Abou
Hamed, between Berber and Merowi. Subse-
quently during the Nile campaign some leaves of
the Consul's diary were found in the house where
they were killed. Wortley, who was there, read
them and made notes of their contents. He believed
that the papers found were eventually sent to Lord

MEMORIES 1894-1901 49

Wolseley. On one of these pages of his diary
M. Herbin had recorded his regard and admiration
for Gordon. He confessed that he bitterly regretted
what he had done against him at Khartoum. But
he had been compelled to choose between his own
inclinations and his duty, which was to carry out his
instructions. What were those instructions ? They
were no doubt consistent with the general " policy
of pinpricks " then in favour, which aimed at
making difficulties for the representatives of Great
Britain. The action taken cannot, however, have
had much influence on subsequent events in the
Soudan, and the French agent, of whom Gordon
speaks with appreciation in his diaries, paid the
penalty with the others for having remained too
long at his post.

When we reached Cairo I found that there had
been a most welcome addition to our staff in Arthur
Stanley, 1 who had but recently recovered from a
long and painful illness, with a permanent stiffening
of the knee joints, induced by rheumatic fever.
His disability bore hardly on one with so active a
temperament. But he accepted it with exemplary
patience and courage, and never allowed it to depress
his splendid spirits or embitter the essential kindness
of his genial humour. The remaining members
of our staff at this time were Alfred Mitchell-Innes,
who has retired from the public service, Horace
Rumbold, actually Ambassador at Constantinople,
and Count de Salis, who had joined a few months
after myself, with his beautiful and charming wife.
1 The Hon. Sir Arthur Stanley, G.B.E.

50 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

A Franco-Belgian by birth, with sisters married in
Austria and Italy, she brought a gracious sense of
something delicate and exotic into our British
atmosphere, and as her bright life closed prematurely
I have always hoped she realized how much we all
loved her.

Nubar Pasha had been compelled by his health
to resign in the autumn, and he was succeeded by
Mustapha Pasha Fehmy, who with Boutros to sup-
port him as Minister for Foreign Aftairs remained
in office during the remainder of my eight years in
Egypt. He loyally co-operated with those who
had, as he realized, the best interests of his country
at heart. He was incapable of intrigue, courteous,
upright and honest, and it was a pleasure to work
with a great gentleman whom I also felt to be a
personal friend.

I do not propose to write a history of British
effort and accomplishment in Egypt. This has
been done with authority in Cromer's admirable
summar}^. I shall confine myself, a I have in a
preceding volume, to episodes and incidents of
personal experience, believing that these may also
serve a useful purpose in throwing light on ten-
dencies and controversies. Although life in Egypt
was never altogether without incident, the first two
years of my residence there were perhaps the least
eventful. There was never lack of work, as the
indeterminate character of the occupation and the
opposition which its continuance aroused in certain
countries rendered constant vigilance indispensable.
The only definite sanction for our intervention was

MEMORIES 1894-1901 51

derived from what may be called the Granville
doctrine, which had laid down that so long as the
occupation lasted the advice of Her Majesty's
Government, conveyed through their representative
in Egypt, would have to be followed. A finger had
therefore to be kept on the pulse of every Depart-
ment and contact continually maintained with the
administrative officials. I had in addition work
of my own to do, in preparing financial and economic
reports.

The social side of life was also rather exacting.
Egypt was already a favourite winter resort, to
which sooner or later most of our acquaintances
seemed to gravitate. Besides these winter visitors
the social circle included the Diplomatic body, the
Commissioners of the Debt, the judges of the Mixed
Tribunals and a few leading advocates, the limited
number of Egyptians who forgathered cordially
with the foreign elements, the British officials in the
administration and the officers of the army of occu-
pation.

The Cromers were extremely hospitable. While
the first Lady Cromer was the most charming of
hostesses, he endured rather than enjoyed his
obligations to the visitors for whom the great pro-
consul was one of the mirabilia of their winter
experience. While he was rigid about punctuality,
having generally more work on his hands than time
in which to get through it, and was not indifferent
to the sensibilities of his excellent chef, there is no
truth in the story that he used to stand watch
in hand at the door and look significantly at it

52 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

before shaking hands with guests who were not
up to time. We used to chaff him about the
recurrence in his conversation with visitors of the
question whether they were going up the Nile and
his evident anxiety that they should answer in the
affirmative. The other inevitable cliche question
was, " Have you been to see the Pyramids ? "
The unusual answer of one lady gave him particular
pleasure. " Yes, I have," she said, " and I never
saw anything so ridiculous in my life."

To young people he was particularly kind, and
he took a personal interest in the balls which he
provided for their entertainment. But at musical
parties he was quite out of his element. I remember
a terrible disaster which occurred somewhat later
at the Agency. The Austro-Hungarian Commissioner
of the Debt, Count Zaluski, was a remarkable
musician, and he especially prided himself on his
interpretation of Chopin. He could seldom be
induced to play to others, and when he did the
performance partook of an almost ritual character.
He had, however, consented to play Chopin to Lady
Cromer and a small party of friends. Cromer had
been duly and seriously warned that he must not
speak a word to anyone so long as the Count was
at the piano. What happened is best described
in his own language. " I had had my instruc-
tions," he said, " and of course I meant to behave
myself without reproach. Zaluski sat down to
the piano, which he carefully dusted with a silk
handkerchief. He had just run his fingers over
a few bars, when I saw my American colleague

MEMORIES 1894-1901 53

bearing down upon me, and I knew that all was
lost. ' Well,' he began, ' we've got into our
house, and Mrs. Harrison is far from satisfied with
the sink and sanitary arrangements.' I had not
said a word, but Zaluski stopped dead, swung round
on his music-stool and surveyed me with a look
which would have paralysed an army of Philistines."
The representative in question, my friend Colonel
Harrison, who belonged to the well-known Phila-
delphia family, only arrived in my second year in
Egypt, in succession to Mr. Penfield, who returned
to Europe as American Ambassador at Vienna
during the Great War. He used to amuse me with
his frank statement of his own position when, as
he occasionally did, he called me into counsel
regarding some point of procedure. "I do not,"
he said, "know much about diplomacy, but if
anyone wants my opinion on chemicals, I'll give
him a pretty good one." However, the obligations
of his post had to be faced, and one day he told me
that he would be very grateful if I would assist
him by answering a few questions which his clerk
would put to me. I naturally promised to do my
best, and a few days later a rather austere young
gentleman called and said that he wished on behalf
of Colonel Harrison to ask me certain questions.
We faced each other in arm-chairs, and I invited him
to begin. Surveying me severely through his pince-
nez he enquired: " Boutros Pacha Ghali" — he
pronounced it Galley — " d'you know him ? "
"Why, yes," said I, " very well. He is Minister for
Foreign Affairs." " Well, what sort of a man is he,

54 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

anyway ? " I described him as one of the most
gifted of contemporary Egyptians, well informed
and widely read, but added that it was difficult
to generalise. Would he therefore tell me which
were the particular points on which he desired
information. He then enquired whether Boutros
was a Mohammedan. I replied that he was not.
He was a Copt. " A Copt ! " said my interviewer,
"what's that ? " I tried hastily to summarize the
history and character of the Coptic Church, but
evidently only succeeded partially as the next
question was : "Is he in communion with the
Church of Rome ? " That point having been
negatively disposed of, he put the more compre-
hensive question: 'Would you say that he was
the kind of man who could stand on his own bot-
tom ? " The reply entailed an elaborate exposition
of the existing situation in Egypt, and an expression
of some doubt whether Boutros would long remain
Minister if the support of the occup} 7 ing Power
were withdrawn from him. We were, however,
evidently not getting on, and so I asked my visitor
what was the object he had in view, and suggested
that it might be more useful for me to give him
some notes on the general situation than merely
to reply to his questionnaire. " Well," he said, " I
do not mind telling you in confidence that the
Agent and Consul-General will have to make a
report on people and things in this country, and
he would wish his information to be correct. "'

In the end I found it more profitable to have a
direct talk on Egyptian affairs with Harrison him-

MEMORIES 1894-1901 55

self than to supply him vicariously with answers to
elementary questions. I was, however, sorry to
learn that my visitor had reported me to be rather
reserved. I had not meant to be. The United
States were fortunate in those days in having few
direct interests in Egypt, and Harrison's position
was somewhat of a sinecure. So far as it lay in
his power to give or withhold support I always found
him on the side of the angels, by which in the present
instance I mean the occupying power.

Digressions are inevitable when the storehouse
of memory is being ransacked, and I have wandered
away from the centre of life in Cairo in the 'nineties,
where we rapidly settled down into the happy
family at the Agency. There Cromer would be
early at his table, and a series of visits occupied no
small part of the morning. The Financial Adviser
was a constant attendant, reporting the progress
made in Ministerial Councils with the most recent
schemes of development. Heads of Departments
would be received to plead for the reforms which
they had most at heart in their several administra-
tions, only too often to be disappointed in days
when a very careful selection had to be made among
the most urgent claims on expenditure. The Ever-
lasting No of the last ten years was, however, now
not always opposed to the eager reformer. But
Cromer required to be profoundly convinced of the
necessity before he would consent to the addition
of one more British official to the comparatively
small number who were engaged in remodelling
the public service. Notables from the provinces,

56 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

religious sheikhs or members of the Legislative
Council would be introduced by Boyle, whose un-
rivalled gift of interpretation ensured the con-
version into the most ceremonious Arabic of the
more positive crudities of the Anglo-Saxon. To
him also fell the task of examining a vast number
of petitions and complaints. The greater the in-
fluence of the occupying Power the larger the influx
of representations and appeals, which thus served
as a barometer of the public estimate of the balance
of power. Business interviews and conversations
with journalists fell to some extent to my province.
I was the more concerned to spare Cromer as far
as possible in the latter duty after he wrote to me
that a certain young gentleman had, " with infinite
tact, asked me to give him materials out of which to
concoct my own obituary notice in The Times. I
told him that the question was not one which
interested me." So much had always to be done
in Cairo directly and by word of mouth that it was
often not possible until the afternoon to deal with
current correspondence and reports to the Foreign
Office.

However great the pressure of work might be
Cromer always found some time in the day, whether
early or late in the evening, for reading. History
and the great Greek and Latin authors were his
constant resource. He had taken up the classics
rather late in life, alleging that when he was a boy
he had not been considered worth educating. I
believe, however, he had inherited from his mother,
who must have been an exception to the majority

MEMORIES 1894-1901 57

of her Victorian contemporaries, a love for classical
literature. At one time hardly a day would pass
without his reading a book of Homer or some pages
from one of the great tragedians. At another he
would be absorbed in the historians, and occasionally
would propound to us a question as to the interpre-
tation of an obscure passage in Thucydides. These
humanistic tastes he shared with his brother, the
late Thomas Baring, with whom he had much in
common. There was even a physical resemblance
which more than once deceived me at a certain
distance. Philosophy did not seem to have the
same attraction for him. Nor could he be induced
to read modern poetry. He had stopped short at
Dryden. I tried in vain to make him read Browning.
It was evident that the suggestive and imaginative
made no appeal to him. He could admit the merits
of the stanza from Obermann Once More, beginning
" The east bowed low before the blast." But it did
not tempt him further to explore the beauties of
Matthew Arnold. I was the more flattered when
one day he expressed appreciation of some lines I
had written on the death of Tennyson. Nor could
I ever discern in him any real interest in art or
architecture. To admire a primitive was to him
so incomprehensible as almost to seem an affectation.
Though he was never intolerant regarding the
tastes and inclinations of others, his own mind
seemed only receptive of the positive and the
concrete.

So far as he was interested in home politics he
claimed to be a Liberal. He had in fact at one

58 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

time contemplated standing for Parliament in the
Liberal interest. It was, he told me, as I have
already mentioned in the preceding volume, Mr.
Gladstone who had rather dissuaded him from
doing so, maintaining that the work of the Liberal
party was finished with the last extension of the
franchise, and that it had no prospects in the im-
mediate future. He expressed the opinion that
it was this conviction, coupled with a reviving
ambition for power, which had made Gladstone in
later years take up the Irish question. Cromer had
it in common with the Liberals that free-trade was
to him almost a principle of dogma which it was
heretical to doubt. He had heard me one day
raise the question of the advantage of retaliation
as a weapon in certain circumstances, and observed
to my wife, more in pity than in anger, that he
knew there were certain mentalities which could
see things that way.

He was curiously diffident as a public speaker.
Towards the close of our time in Egypt, when my
wife was interested in starting a nursing home and
had induced him to address the British colony on
the subject, she was much struck with his apparent
nervousness as they drove together to the meeting,
and his anxiety afterwards to know whether she
thought he had acquitted himself well. I have
always understood that the occasional speeches
which he made in the House of Lords did not impress
that critical assembly. In private conversation he
expressed his thought with lucidity and conviction.
But he was a man of action rather than a speaker.

MEMORIES 1894-1901 59

This characteristic of Cromer reminds me of the
answer given by a Japanese gentleman to an acquain-
tance of mine who asked why a very eminent fellow-
countryman of his was so parsimonious of his words.

" I know," he said, " that Baron is regarded

as one of your biggest men, but he says very little."

The reply was ' ' Baron man of action. In Japan

men of action not speaking much, but acting."

Cromer drafted important telegrams and com-
posed a great part of the annual reports himself.
But when a despatch had to be written he had a
way, which was rather disconcerting at first, of
giving me a rapid summary of what was in his
mind, or of a conversation which he had just had,
and then asking me to prepare a draft in that sense.
There was no time to take notes, and very con-
centrated attention was necessary if no point was
to be missed. As far as possible he delegated
responsible work to others. In one of his letters
to me, regarding an issue with Kitchener, he wrote :
" One of the reasons why Egypt has been brought
round is that I have never done anything myself that
I could get done for me. It is almost impossible to
make the soldiers see this. They agree to decen-
tralisation in principle, and in practice centralise
everything."

After luncheon he would either play a few games
of tennis at Ghezireh or drive out some distance
into the country and then take a walk along the
canals with Boyle, or sometimes with myself. During
these walks many projects were elaborated. It
was a characteristic habit of his to anticipate his

60 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

own decisions by free discussion in conversation,
nor did he confine himself to talking them over with
his staff. In later years, especially after the death
of the first Lady Cromer, he would take my wife, to
whom he was much attached, for drives and open
all out that was on his mind. It was his way of think-
ing aloud.

In those days it was still the custom that the
carriages of the foreign representatives should be
preceded in the town itself by running syces, whose
function was to clear the way among the straggling
pedestrians and donkeys for the chariots of the
mighty. With white wands in their hands and
flying sleeves, shouting their warning cry, they were
picturesque figures in the Cairo of the last century,
and their long bare brown legs covered the ground
with extraordinary speed in front of the trotting
horses. The tall figure in the grey frock-coat and
white hat sitting in the carnage was familiar to
every one and the object of many friendly saluta-
tions. " El Lord," as he was called by every one
down to the very donkey boys, seemed then un-
consciously to dominate the city by the Nile.

Although Cromer came into the diplomatic service
late after filling many other posts and knew
little of its old traditions, he instinctively fell into
line with them and adopted a family relationship
with his staff. This had been the practice of Lord
Lyons which was carried on by his pupil Sir Edward
Malet. Both of them took great pains to form the
young men who served under them. Malet had a
way of pointing out to us our mistakes with a kindli-

MEMORIES 1894-1901 61

ness which made it a pleasure to be instructed, and
of guiding our judgments as though we were his
sons rather than his secretaries. It was from the
school of Lyons and Malet that some of the ablest
diplomatists among my contemporaries issued. I
am not sure that the same close association exists
to-day. Even in my own time it was tending to
disappear when former permanent under-secretaries
from the Foreign Office, who had no foreign experi-
ence, were sent abroad as ambassadors and dis-
played rather the attitude of the schoolmaster than
that of the head of the family towards the juniors.
The Agency was a sound school in which to study
administration and, if there was less obvious
occasion there for diplomacy in the accepted sense,
Egypt offered ample opportunity for learning the
management of men which diplomatists above all
require to practise. We had all of us unbounded
confidence in our chief. During the eight years
of my association with him we had to steer among
constant shoals, through which one did not always
see a ready issue. But Cromer always gave me the
comforting feeling of a rock against which to lean.
He was often preoccupied himself, though only
those who knew him intimately might detect the
symptoms. He would fill and half smoke and
empty an unnecessary number of pipes while we
surveyed the tangle and discussed the prospects of
unravelling it. But when eventually he would say
with something which was almost a smile, " I have
a plan. We will await developments," I felt that
all was well.

62 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

At the head of Egyptian society was the Khedive's
uncle Prince Hussein, who in 1914 became the
first Sultan of Egypt. He was the most, it might
almost be said the only, public -spirited member of
the Khedivial family. A practical agriculturist, he
administered his estates with great success, and he
kept in touch with the country people, who looked
up to him with the respect which is instinctively
felt in the East for a great gentleman. The love
and care which he lavished on the beautiful garden
of his palace at Ghizeh, where the Prince of Wales
had been lodged in 1889, naturally indicated him
for the position of first President of the Egyptian
Horticultural Society, which created a new interest
and did excellent work. His tastes, like those of
most Egyptians, were more in sympathy with
French than with English culture. But he was
eminently unpartisan and genuinely appreciated
the results accomplished under British guidance.
His younger brother and successor, Fuad, the
reigning King of Egypt, had been only a boy at
the time of Ismail's deposition and had been brought
up in Italy. He was consequently less in touch
with the feeling of the country than Prince Hussein,
who though he had travelled considerably remained
essentially Egyptian.

Then there was Princess Nazli, who had entirely
emancipated herself from the traditional seclusion
of harem life and received gentlemen as readily
as ladies. Her boudoir was full of portraits of the
senior British officers of 1882. Her unconvention-
ally seemed to arouse little protest. The stricter

MEMORIES 1894r-1901 63

old-fashioned Egyptians only shrugged their should-
ers and said with a smile, " Enfin, que voulez-
vous, c'est la Princesse NazM." She was a clever
woman, and though she had good looks was curiously
destitute of feminine vanity. Her budget of in-
formation was always interesting.

To the visitor from Europe the best known of
Egyptians was no doubt the hospitable Izzet Pasha,
who was connected by marriage with the Khedivial
family and disposed of a considerable fortune. So
liberal was his interpretation of his obligations to
society that when he left Cairo in the summer for
Europe, a witty Frenchman was heard to say that
Izzet had gone to Paris to return the hospitalities
which he had offered in Egypt during the winter.
He had the misfortune to be in Constantinople in
the summer of 1914, and being unable to return to
Egypt with the outbreak of war he fell under some
suspicion, for which I am convinced there was no
justification. No one who knew him would suspect
him of taking a hand in politics. But it was not
until a long time after the war had ended that he
was allowed to return.

My wife paid visits to a certain number of culti-
vated and agreeable Egyptian ladies, but such
salons, with the exception of that of Princess Nazli,
were of course closed to me. Polygamy was practi-
cally extinct among the Egyptians of the upper
and cosmopolitan class, and the influence of their
wives was, as in many other countries, considerable.
The long retention of the children in the narrow
circle of the harem has probably had much to do

64 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

with preserving conservative traditions in the East.
But signs of revolt are growing more apparent to-
day, and many Egyptian ladies who travel in
Europe, temporarily at any rate while they are
there, emerge from seclusion. Many of them have
received a home education from European gover-
nesses, which has given them a wider outlook than
the male members of the family, and not a few have
taken a prominent if not an always well-balanced
part in recent political manifestations. One of the
ministers, who though reputed to be wealthy was
also notoriously careful, once gave us his views on
polygamy. There were, he said, few modern for-
tunes capable of maintaining the several households
which the multiplication of wives entailed. Clearly
if you gave one of your wives a pearl necklace or a
new carriage, the other, or others, must also have
pearl necklaces or new carriages. You see for your-
self, he urged, that it would be quite impossible
to keep this up. " Et puis, Monsieur," he added,
" il y a le cote moral qu'il ne faut pas perdre de vue."
And this reminds me of a story current in Cairo
in the winter of 1888-89, when the then Bishop of
Salisbury paid a visit to the Nile. Travellers in
Egypt counted on eliciting from their dragoman
much information useful to the politician, the
writer, or the superior person. The dragoman,
after the manner of the Oriental, generally answers
their questions in the way which he is quick to
perceive will be most appreciated. Thus evacua-
tionists or occupationists respectively seldom failed
to find their estimates of the advantages or dis-

MEMORIES 1894-1901 65

advantages of British control confirmed during a
trip up the river. The bishop was little con-
cerned with political issues, but he was troubled
with a holy horror of polygamy. He had been
fortunate enough to secure a dragoman who appeared
entirely to share his views, and he gathered abund-
ant comforting evidence that there was a growing
feeling against it in Egypt. Taking leave of his
dragoman at the station he gave him a present of
five pounds and, benevolently smiling as the train
began to move, enquired what Mahmoud proposed to
do with the money. "Now I got him," said Mah-
moud, " I find another wife."

Cairo was still full of interesting types, survivors
of the old order. There was Delia Sala Pasha, an
Italian who had been aide-de-camp to the unfortunate
Emperor Maximilian in Mexico, and had secured a
similar position at the Khedivial Court, where his
wife acted as a kind of unofficial grande maitresse,
and Baron Malortie, of Hannoverian origin, a free-
lance of many adventures who occupied a small
post as Director of the Egyptian Press-bureau.
There was Ambroise Sinadino, Rothschild's agent,
the most Parisian of Greeks, with a name which
recalled that of a reigning house of old Byzantium.
No local intrigue or entanglement escaped his
omniscience, and he acted as a living ear of Dionysus
which faithfully reported the rumours of the market-
place. In company with Nubar Innes of the
Finance he composed and produced an annual
Revue, which travestied all the episodes of the past
year, political, social, or scandalous. There was

66 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

also a cultivated and agreeable society of Sephardim
origin, of which the Cattauis, the Suarez and the
Hollos were the mainstay. Our insular country-
men took little pains to enlarge their acquaintance
in a direction which involved knowledge of French,
but when they did so they were amply rewarded.
Among the foreign representatives in Egypt a
few were perennials, others came and went. For
some of the smaller countries it was a diplomatic
backwater; to one or two of the great Powers it
offered a fertile field for opportunities which might
" serve." It was a great pleasure to us to have
there that Stirling gentleman of Emilia who after-
wards so worthily represented Italy in London,
Senator Pansa and his handsome wife. Baron
Heyking, the German agent, was succeeded by an
old colleague of mine in Rome, who was also to be a
future colleague in Stockholm, Herr Felix von
Miiller. He again gave place to Count Paul
Metternich, who was also well known in London.
I always regarded him as a friendly element from
conviction. He was economic of words, but looked
very sapient, with a rather Scotch habit of reverting
to the last subject of conversation but two, after
taking his time to think the matter out. Monsieur
Cogordan, who followed the Marquis de Reverseau
as French representative, was generally and deser-
vedly popular. His brief was presumably in accor-
dance with the prevailing sentiment of the day in
France. But while he was a most loyal servant of
his own country one could feel instinctively that he
was working to the best of his ability for better

MEMORIES 1894-1901 67

relations, and that he would approach questions
at issue without prejudice. Thanks to his influence
so long as he remained in Cairo a perhaps inevitable
opposition was minimised, and a pleasant personal
relation was maintained. The Austro-Hungarian
Consul-General, Baron Heidier von Egeregg, whom
I had known in Berlin, had in Egypt become an
enthusiastic amateur of golf, and as British as any
of us. His chief preoccupation was the protection
of Catholic Copts, to whose affairs he devoted a
tireless energy which seemed almost dispropor-
tionate to the paucity of their numbers. His staff
was in consequence apt to complain of overwork.
But so far as we were concerned Heidier was a good
colleague and nothing upset his equanimity, not
even Maxwell's enquiry as to how many g's he had
in his Egeregg. Monsieur Koyander, the Russian,
was a dark horse. Cromer had a high opinion of
his ability as an exponent of Russian diplomatic
methods. They were not in those days always
actively employed in assisting us. But Koyander,
himself, when not otherwise instructed, was friendly.
The existence of capitulations gave the representa-
tives of the Powers which enjoyed them special
opportunities for intervening in Egyptian affairs,
and theoretically there was no distinction between
their official position and that of the British Agent
and Consul-General. But behind the latter was
the army of occupation, small but sufficient, and
the acceptance by the Egyptian authorities of the
" Granville doctrine." The normal situation in
international issues entitled us to count on the

68 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

reasonable support of Austria-Hungary and Italy
and to anticipate the opposition of France and
Russia, while Germany, ostensibly a supporter, was
apt to gravitate to one or the other group according
as her interests at the moment rather than the
merits of the case dictated. Perhaps no political
machinery in the world contained so many old
pieces, which for various reasons could not be
replaced, as the Egyptian, and it had therefore to
be constantly lubricated with the oil of compromise.

The oldest British inhabitant in the social world
was Sir Alexander Baird, who owned a good deal of
property in and around Cairo. He was, however,
absent during my first year, having been for some
time in a condition of health which precluded
travelling. There were annuals whom the winter
season brought back, such as the Locke-Kings, to
whose enterprise the Mena House at the Pyramids
owes its existence. The Charlie Beresfords were
constant visitors when he was on half -pay. St. Loe
Strachey and his wife were guests of the Cromers,
and the Spectator was a very faithful ally of the
great proconsul. Professor Sayce and the late
Marquis of Northampton, who had retired from the
diplomatic service on his succession, had their own
Dahabeeahs on the river, and sooner or later most
of our acquaintance felt the call of the Nile.

On an old Arab estate in the outskirts of Cairo,
Sheikh Obeyd, generally referred to by its owner as
" my house in the desert," might be found Wilfrid
Blunt, living in studied discomfort and affecting
the dress of the bedawin supplemented by riding

MEMORIES 1894-1901 69

boots. There he and Lady Anne kept their stud
of Arab horses with a retinue of bedawin to look
after them. And there visitors who went to see
him were no doubt duly impressed when the hours
for tea arrived by the large wooden bowl of camel's
milk which was brought in to their host, who always
courteous, asked permission to drink it, saying, " I
never take anything but this." Faddists in diet
are inconvenient to entertain, and Blunt, who was
hardly consistent, occasionally became a problem
to his friends. The late Lady Galloway told me
that once, when he was staying with her in Scotland,
she, knowing his idiosyncrasies, enquired whether
any particular form of food was at that time in-
dispensable to his happiness. The month was
November. Blunt thanked her and said he was
living chiefly on peaches.

He had begun life in the diplomatic service and
had been the colleague of Malet, with whom he
afterwards came into conflict in Egypt when he
took up the cause of Arabi. Exceptionally good-
looking and clever in his wrong-headedness, with
all the courage of his unusual opinions, he was un-
questionably a poet, and was bound to have attracted
attention even if he had not deliberately chosen to
be a frondeur. With all his versatility, however,
it was only his poetry that really counted.

A former diplomatic colleague to whom I had
mentioned the Eastern garments which Blunt used
to wear in " my house in the desert," told me that
he always had a taste for dressing up, and that when
in Spain he used often to appear in the costume of

70 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

a bull-fighter. But then he had studied the art
of the Toreador and he had killed his bull.

There was an undoubted attraction in his person-
ality, and a great charm in his unconventional
conversation. But while modest in regard to his
own real achievement as a poet, he was in other
respects so great an egoist that one was tempted
to doubt whether his championship of unpopular
causes sprang solely from conviction and was not
due in part to pose. I do not wish to be unjust,
but I could never quite reject the first diagnosis
which I formed, namely, that Blunt having won
his laurels as a poet by the Love Sonnets of Proteus
in 1880, and having married Byron's granddaughter,
felt called upon to emulate the champion of Greece
by identifying himself with a national issue and
therefore, faute de mieux, took up the cause of
Arabi. The Egyptians in any case showed little
regard for " the mad Englishman," as he came to
be known among them, and he was often the victim
of those who imposed with extravagant stories upon
a credulous temperament, eager to find confirmation
of his theories.

Having seen it affirmed in biographical notices
since his death that Blunt was chiefly instrumental
in saving Arabi from the capital penalty after his
rebellion, I feel it an obligation to record another
side of this story which I had directly from Sir
Edward Malet, and made a note of at the time. I
was travelling with him from Paris to London. At
Amiens, where trains used then to stop for some
time, we got out to stretch our legs, and on the

MEMORIES 1894-1901 71

platform he saw Wilfrid Blunt, whom at that time
I did not know. We went towards him. But he
slipped away, and Malet remarked that it was
evident that he was intentionally avoiding us. I
enquired why he should do so and Malet replied
that when you were conscious of having behaved
badly to anyone you were not generally anxious
to meet him. He then gave me the following details
concerning the Arabi trial. He had made all the
necessary arrangements with the Khedive Tewfik
for the deportation of Arabi, whose life was to be
spared. But it was particularly desirable not to
revive the whole scandal by a trial at which in-
evitable revelations would make indulgence much
more difficult. Blunt, however, intervened and
engaged Broadley, a brilliant advocate unable to
practise in England, who was supposed to have
acquired a considerable knowledge of Eastern law,
for the defence. On arriving in Egypt Broadley
came to see Malet, who frankly told him how
matters stood and explained the steps he had taken
to save Arabi. The settlement already concluded
might even be compromised if Blunt persisted in
troubling the waters. Broadley replied that he
had been retained as an advocate and could only
carry out the instructions given him. But he said
that as Malet had been so frank with him he felt
bound to show him the letter of instructions which
he had received from his principal. In this letter
there was a passage warning Broadley above all
to beware of Malet, who was " narrow-minded and
blood-thirsty," and would do all that he could to

72 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

bring about the condemnation of Arabi in order
to justify his policy. Malet was much concerned
that a former colleague with whom he had been on
terms of Christian names could have expressed an
opinion of him which he must have known to be
entirely unwarranted.

I make no comments on this story which is told
exactly as it was told to me. But it left a sense of
prejudice which I had some difficulty in overcoming
when I first met the Blunts in Greece. For Lady
Anne I always entertained the greatest regard,
though unfortunately just before I left Egypt my
interpretation of my official duties led to a difference
of opinion with Blunt in which she warmly supported
her husband. It was generally Lord Cromer with
whom he found himself in conflict in the various
episodes which brought him back to public notice
in Egypt, but the last one to which I shall refer in
its proper place occurred while I was in charge.
It formed the subject of a White Paper laid before
Parliament.

Most of my particular group of friends were
intimate with Blunt, who entertained them as his
annual guests at the " Crabbet Club " in his house
in Sussex, where many brilliant things were said and
read. He had the artist's temperament, and was
excellent company " out of school." But as a
controversialist he seemed to me to have no sense
of fair play, and his published diaries reveal an
entire absence of scruple in the betrayal of confi-
dences. The opinions there recorded are, however,
not likely to be taken very seriously. I shall not

MEMORIES 1894-1901 73

emulate his example by recording mere gossip
current in Cairo concerning Blunt, and shall confine
myself to episodes of public notoriety.

One of these arose from his ambition to visit
the oasis of Siwa, the site of the temple of Jupiter
Ammon, which lies in the western desert some six-
teen days camel-ride from Cairo. Though in
Egyptian territory it had never been controlled
by the administration, and was only occasionally
visited by coastguard patrols. As the population
were adherents of the fanatical sect of the Senoussia
visitors were notoriously discouraged from attempt-
ing to penetrate into this solitary oasis unless
accompanied by a strong escort of the desert coast-
guard. It would, however, have been alien to
Wilfrid Blunt' s mentality to request the assistance
and protection of the Egyptian Government or its
British advisers. He accordingly started for Siwa
with his own camels and bedawin, without disclosing
his intended expedition to the authorities. When
he eventually reached the outskirts of Siwa the
excited population came out and asked him who
he was. Blunt, though wearing bedawin clothes, was
conscious that his Arabic was not strong enough for
him to be taken for a native of the country, and
passed himself off as a Syrian merchant. Whereupon
the inhabitants of the oasis dragged him off his
camel and proceeded to beat him with their sticks.
He then endeavoured, it seems, to explain that he
was an Englishman, only to be reminded that the
clothes he wore belied him. His position was a
very unpleasant one, but eventually his bedawin

74 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

succeeded in persuading the unhospitable Siwaites
that in spite of his Eastern robes he really was
what he represented himself to be. On his return
to Cairo he came to Cromer to protest against the
treatment he had received and invited him to des-
patch a punitive expedition to obtain satisfaction.
He was of course told that he must have been
perfectly well aware that the administration accepted
no responsibility for the population of Siwa, who
were practically outside the law, and that if he chose
to go there without giving notice to anyone he had
brought his misfortunes on himself.

It was not until some twenty years later, after
the war had led to closer contact with certain
members of the Senoussi sect, that I heard an echo
of this story from the other side. The old Senoussi
sheikh, who in my Egyptian days was omnipotent
in the oases, received constant information from
agents in Cairo. One of these, a venerable merchant
in the bazaar, was an acquaintance of mine, and he
from time to time gave us information regarding
the progress of this powerful and exclusive fratern-
ity. It seems that the old man had learned from
Cairo of Blunt' s intention to go to Siwa and of the
date of his departure, from which it was easy to
calculate the time of his arrival. On the day on
which he was due at Siwa the sheikh, who was in
the neighbourhood, was engaged in the rosary of
prayer with a group of his disciples, when he sud-
denly became silent and assumed the aspect of one
in a trance. His followers watched him breath-
lessly. After a long pause he spoke as if a vision

MEMORIES 1894-1901 75

had been revealed to him. " I smell the flesh of
the accursed. He is approaching the sacred oasis ! "
These or some such words fell from his lips. " What
shall we do, master?" his followers enquired;
"shall we kill him?" "No," said the sheikh,
" do not kill him. Beat him a little, and let him
go." And thus it was, according to the story which
was told me, that the population went out to meet
the traveller, while the Senoussi sheikh greatly-
enhanced his reputation as a prophet inspired.

The officers of the old army of occupation, of whom
Nubar Pasha was an enthusiastic admirer, were an
important element in the social life of Cairo. The
Highland regiments, the Camerons and the Seaf orths,
were especial favourites. The black Soudanese bat-
talions of the Egyptian Army, who also marched
to the bagpipes, regarded themselves as their especial
comrades in arms. The 21st Lancers, the latest
cavalry regiment in the Army List which had still
to win its spurs, was at Abassiyeh through the greater
part of my residence in Egypt. A story was current
of one of the few bad characters in the regiment
being brought before the colonel, who glanced at
his familiar charge-sheet and said in despair, " I
really don't know what to do with this." " Put
it in your colours, Colonel," said the delinquent,
" there's plenty of room there." But the name of
Omdurman was soon to be the first to fill the vacant
space. The tablets of memory also recall the
curious phrase of a charming young American lady
at a tea-party, who having just seen the handsomest
captain of the Seaforths, remarked to a friend on

76 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

her arrival : " My dear, you have just missed his
most beautiful Highland officer, he had not got as
many samples on his coat as that one, but he was
good looking ! " Time and the battlefields have
sadly depleted the number of old friends who
enlivened the merry days of the 'nineties, and those
that I still meet are grizzled veterans with many
letters to their names. A recent encounter with
a gallant Irishman who played a great part in the
social and sporting life of Cairo, and a very dis-
tinguished one in the Nile and South African cam-
paigns, reminded me of a certain evening twenty
years ago when he was entertaining some friends
at the Ghezireh Palace Hotel, and was dissatisfied
with his dinner. He sent for the manager, the great
Luigi Steinschneider, and protested : " Mr. Luigi,
it's really too bad, I ordered this dinner a fortnight
ago, and it's stone cold ! " At a stormy meeting of
the Sporting Club, when Cromer was in the chair, a
member had enquired whether the controversial
proposal under discussion was likely to prove
remunerative. The same distinguished officer inter-
posed : " Lord Cromer ! Will you allow me to answer
that question ? The answer to that question is
that it is a question which cannot be answered."
The late Professor Mahaffy, who was asked by a lady
to give her a definition of an Irish bull, expressed his
inability to frame one, but explained that it certainly
differed from any other kind of bull in that it was
always pregnant.

Early in 1895, overcoming Cromer's dislike to the
absence of any of his staff, we accompanied my

MEMORIES 1894-1901 77

brother-in-law Murray Guthrie and his wife up the
Nile on a steamer which he had chartered. The
glamour of Greece was then still too strong with me
to be altogether displaced by the influence of Egyp-
tian art, which only made its appeal to me in subse-
quent years. As yet it seemed too remote, too
lacking in human interest, and I was heretical
enough to appreciate the Hellenistic development
which the real Egyptologist despises. The expedi-
tion was nevertheless full of interest and two experi-
ences stand out conspicuously in my Egyptian
memories, both of them connected with Assouan.
The first was a migration of crown cranes, flying
low and descending the river in great numbers.
The second was the arrival of Slatin Pasha after
his escape from Omdurman across the eastern
desert.

Early one morning our dragoman on the steamer
reported a rumour in the bazaar that Slatin had
come in at daybreak. I rushed off to the military
head-quarters and there indeed found the prisoner
of the Khalifa whose rescue the Intelligence Depart-
ment had for years been trying to accomplish.
Wingate had been able through private agents, only
known by a letter or a number, to establish com-
munication with the ex-governor of an Equatorial
province in the impenetrable Mahdist capital, and
at last his efforts, conducted with the profoundest
secrecy, had been crowned with success. After
twelve years of detention Slatin, eluding his pur-
suers in a series of hairbreadth escapes, was restored
to civilisation.

78 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

Lean and haggard from insufficient nourishment,
bent and shaggy-bearded, with his feet covered with
sores from his terrible tramp over the stony wilder-
ness after the camel which was to carry him had to
bear his sick owner instead, he seemed hardly as
yet to realise that his long trial was over. I spoke
to him in German, and at first his replies came
slowly. His own language had grown unfamiliar.
For twelve years and more he had spoken nothing
but Arabic. A steamer was going down the river
that afternoon, and in it Slatin, shaved and clad
once more in the garments of the West provided by
the officers of the garrison, started for Cairo. The
band of the black regiment stationed at Assouan
spent most of the day in learning the Austrian
National Anthem, and by the time he mounted the
gangway to go on board they managed to play
something sufficiently like it to bring tears to his
eyes.

I persuaded him to write an account of his noc-
turnal evasion and subsequent adventures for
Harry Cust, who was still editing the Pall Mall
Gazette. I translated it into English, and it was
eventually incorporated in the book in which he
and Wingate collaborated, Fire and Sword in the
Soudan. It was a remarkable production for a
man who had not had a pen in his hand for twelve
years. After a brief interval we saw Slatin, who
now joined the Egyptian intelligence service, be-
ginning life again as he had left it when a young
man. He became a conspicuous figure at every
dance. Time's revenges were to carry him back to

MEMORIES 1894-1901 79

Omdurman with Kitchener's victorious advance.
After the reconquest his invaluable services to the
Soudan Government continued until the outbreak
of the Great War made it impossible for an enemy
subject to remain on the establishment. The sever-
ance of that long connection was viewed with real
regret by all who appreciated his loyal and sterling
qualities, and his old friends were glad to know that
on his return to Austria he had devoted himself to
Red Cross work, in which I do not doubt that when
occasion offered he rendered every assistance to our
countrymen in difficulties.

Charlie Beresford and his wife were at Assouan,
and there I met him in the bazaar, and heard him
assuring the ladies, who were adorning themselves
with long strings of beads, that when they went a
little farther south to Wady Haifa, where they would
find it very hot, these would be regarded by local
custom as quite sufficient clothing. I was glad to
have seen Phylae before the great lake eventually
created by the Assouan barrage entirely altered its
character, making the beautiful temple flush with
the water. It was bitterly cold descending the Nile
in the teeth of a strong north wind.

My wife had encouraged a brilliant young lady
scholar from Newnham to come to Egypt and assist
her in her classical studies. Her zeal for the wider
extension of female education was a constant
occasion for amiable banter from Cromer and Boyle.
She had chaffingly suggested that the latter and
the popular Dean Butcher, whose devout and
scholarly instincts did not exclude a certain affection

80 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

for the drama, might support by their presence a
series of lectures on the Greek tragedians, which
this lady was to give for the enlargement of the
intellectual horizon of ladies in Cairo. The in-
corrigible Oriental secretary, who seldom definitely
declined, but rarely fulfilled an engagement, replied
that he trusted she would see his reverend colleague
and himself " partaking in moderation of such
gentle refreshment, and benignly smiling, like two
genial Gullivers at the well-meant efforts of literary
Lilliputians, or perhaps like two modern Longinuses,
encouraging by their countenance and approbation
the soarings of the young Zenobias." He would
draw the attention of his colleague to an apt parallel
in Cook's voyages, where it was described how the
attractive, amiable, but intellectually inferior
Otaheitans invented pretty games, imitating drills
and church parades. In the meanwhile he proposed
to purchase the requisite collegiate equipment,
namely a vinaigrette, crochet-bag, and a large box
of chocolate-creams. A similar spirit of levity
was afterwards displayed by our chief, who, when
my wife took the initiative in founding a ladies'
club, sent a pincushion and powder-box for the
new institution to testify to his encouragement
and support.

To break the length of a second summer in Egypt
I decided to take half my leave in May, and we
devised a very perfect holiday. My wife and I,
with Clinton Dawkins and Arthur Stanley, went
by a Russian steamer to Piraeus, where a small
cutter chartered from Corfu had come to meet us.

MEMORIES 1894-1901 81

We transferred ourselves and our stores from the
steamer to the Undine in Piraeus harbour, and after
a visit to Athens set sail for the island sea. The
May weather was ideal, and we cruised for about a
fortnight from island to island. It was Stanley's
first real taste of the joy of life after his long and
weary illness and it was delightful to see his enjoy-
ment of the open-air existence, and the realisation
that he could swim with only his arms in the buoy-
ant iEgean. A little land-locked harbour received
us the first night at Zea (Ceos), the birthplace of
Simonides. Then we explored Thermia (Cythnos),
Serpho, Melos, and the beautiful island of Andros,
where there are many springs, and the hill-side
waterways were rosy with oleander. We only came
across scanty traces of antiquity. The raids of the
feudal barons, the centuries of piracy under Crescent
or Cross have left these islands bare of all but the
loveliness of colour which their rocky masses assume,
pearl-grey at dawn, amethystine in the late after-
noon and rose-flushed in the sunset. Even in
Roman times many of them seem to have been
abandoned to solitude. As we learn from the
epigram of Antipater of Thessalonica :

The glory that was yours long years has gone the way of fate,
Siphnos and Pholegandros are not more desolate.

One character is common to the island villages
in contrast to those of the Greek mainland, and that
is the tidiness and cleanness of the houses. The
limewash on their white faces seems to be constantly
renewed, and the pots and coppers within shine as

82 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

brilliantly as in a Dutch interior. They breed a stout
race of seafolk, good fellows, friendly and hospitable,
the best element in modern Greece. Their spirit of
adventure and enterprise is inborn and hereditary.
A few young men, who have probably had their sea
training in the Greek navy, associate themselves
together. With their hard-earned savings they
buy wood and build a small craft. On this, with a
few loaves of bread and some black olives for com-
missariat, they take the sea and engage in the small
coasting trade from port to port. Thrifty and
ambitious they will in a few years time have secured
a larger vessel — and eventually a tramp steamer,
with vistas of still greater developments before
them. You will find the Greek islander as a pioneer
of petty commerce on the outskirts of civilisation
all over the world.

Our fortnight among the islands passed like a
dream, and the same Russian steamer took us back
to Alexandria. We had secured a villa at Ramleh
for the summer, and there after the Cromers left
for England the same party forgathered. Dawkins
was acting as financial adviser during the summer,
and thus the essential elements of the hierarchy
were together under the same roof. It was a
pleasant life enough, with bathing from the end of
the garden, and rides in the early morning or late
evening into the desert or along the coast to Aboukir
The first sight of that memorable bay gave me a
thrill of emotion. " The place was silent and
aware." We did not, however, like the late Sir
William Buller, seek to find a living memory there.

MEMORIES 1894-1901 83

That restlessly active-minded general, when in
command of the British garrison at Alexandria,
had heard that there was a man still living at
Aboukir who was said to be more than a hundred
years old. He rode out and found the venerable
sheikh, whom he proceeded to interrogate. Did
he remember when he was very young a number of
great ships lying in the bay in heavy weather, and
then other ships coming round the island and fighting
with them. Yes. He remembered the big ships
very well. Could he recall how it ended — did he
see a big ship driven ashore, turning over on its
side ? Oh, yes, certainly he did, and he indicated
the very spot where he saw a ship heel over, so that
everything came out of it. And what, asked the
general in a fever of excitement, what came out
of it ? " Melons," said the old man.

I went in the course of the summer to the festival
at Tantah, which in old days had a strange priapic
feature, now long since suppressed. It must have
been a survival from very early times, many cen-
turies before the birth of the Moslem saint to whom
the day was dedicated. Scenes of a lupercal charac-
ter used also to be enacted at night during the
annual festival of Tents on the anniversary of the
prophet's birthday, which I have described in my
former volume. That gaily illuminated night-fair
seemed already to have lost much of its brilliancy
since I saw it in 1889.

A picturesque ceremony which was very popular
during my first years in Cairo, the cutting of the
Khalig, has now disappeared, though the cele-

84 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

bration of the Nile flood, the Wafa-el-Nil, of which
it was an incident, is still maintained. The Khalig
was a canal which ran from the Nile opposite Roda
island through the centre of the city. Its mouth
was closed by a dam during the low Nile season.
As soon as the nilometer at Roda had registered
eighteen cubits the earliest available day was
chosen to cut the dam away with accompaniment
of gunfire and due ceremonial. Tradition relates
that in olden days a virgin wearing costly jewels
was on this occasion thrown into the Khalig as a
propitiatory offering to the river god, with largesse
which the crowd struggled to retrieve in the water
as the Nile stream flowed in. In more enlightened
times a doll was substituted for the human sacrifice.
There is now no dam to cut away, nor indeed any
Khalig or canal, for it has been filled in, and a tram-
line runs along its ancient course. But the festival
of the Nile flood is still observed as a public holiday,
with official attendance and music and fireworks
in the evening among tents and booths.

As stationnaire that summer we had the Cam-
brian, which had recently been commissioned by
Prince Louis of Battenberg, the late Marquis of Mil-
ford Haven, the handsomest of a very good-looking
family, who combined remarkable charm with first-
rate professional ability. He spent a good deal of
his time at the villa. The Cambrian was a very
happy ship. Mark Kerr, who was number one, used
to organize the Wednesday sailing races in Alexandria
harbour.

In September my wife returned to England. The

MEMORIES 1894-1901 85

Cromers came back in October just in time to enable
me to reach home before the 25th, when our eldest son
was born in a little house in Curzon Street which
had been lent us by a brother-in-law.

Early in the following year, 1896, the outlook in
Egypt became dramatic and exciting. It had for
some time been evident that the position of the
Italians in Abyssinia was growing more and more
difficult. Their defeat in January at Amba Allagi
and the investment of Makalleh rendered probable
a Dervish attack on Kassala entailing the cutting
of their communications, and it was suggested that
we might render assistance in diverting such a
danger by a demonstration towards Dongola.
Kitchener was absent up the river when this proposal
was first mooted. Bundle, who was acting for him,
and Wingate were therefore called into council.

Cromer's reply to London was that a coup-de-
main on Suarda, which might entail an eventual
advance as far as Dongola, could be considered, but
that a movement from Suakin on the Red Sea coast
would be better calculated to effect the desired
diversion in the menaced region. London on second
thoughts preferred the alternative of " waiting to
see " whether or not the Dervishes moved towards
Kassala. At the end of February or beginning of
March confirmation of such a movement was received.
Kitchener had now returned. After consultation
with him the discussion of a possible advance to-
wards Dongola was resumed, and the difficulties
of the financial situation were explained. In Egypt
our opinion remained unchanged. We held that the

86 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

object in view would be best accomplished by a
movement from Suakin to Kokreb and Kor Langheb,
which would make the intervening country secure
on fairly cheap terms and perhaps without fighting.
The decision taken at home was, however, that such
action on our part would not be justified. The
Dervish power was evidently on the wane, and any
movement at that moment would be inopportune.
We were, therefore, once more free to devote all
our energies to internal development.

Then followed Baratieri's ill-timed advance,
inspired, it was said, by information that he was
about to be superseded, against the united Abys-
sinian forces of Shoa and Tigre, massed on the
heights which commanded his approach. The result
was the disaster of Adua. Crispi, the veteran
Prime Minister, who was reported to have tele-
graphed to him, " Your inaction is worse than a
defeat," could not be acquitted of responsibility,
and resigned. An old friend, the Duke of Ser-
moneta, who was spending the winter in Egypt,
was suddenly recalled to Rome to take up the post
of Minister for Foreign Affairs in a new Government.

Suddenly, like a bolt from the blue, arrived an
instruction from London to advance on Dongola.
There was no preliminary discussion as to ways and
means. The contemplated movement was at once
communicated to the British Press with barely the
necessary interval of time for us to break the decision
to the Khedive, much less to secure the support
of the Egyptian Ministers. The news was announced
in The Times of March 13, disguised as a Reuter

MEMORIES 1894-1901 87

telegram from Cairo. Lord Wolseley, who had been
called into consultation when it was decided that
something must be done at the thirteenth hour to
relieve the Italian situation, had, we were told,
considered it desirable to publish the information
at once. I cannot of course claim to know what
actually occurred at the Cabinet meeting at which
this decision was taken, but we gathered that it
had been Lord Wolseley' s advice which prevailed
in favour of a demonstration to Akasheh, in the
direction of Dongola, instead of the movement
advocated by those on the spot. The Egyptian
army and an expenditure of £500,000 would suffice
for the object in view. Thereupon Chamberlain
was reported to have suggested, " Why not retake
Dongola ? " No further questions were asked, and
the instructions to Cairo were sent forthwith.

This decision, which inevitably involved the
initiation of the reconquest of the Soudan four or
five years before we were ready for it, taken in
London by Ministers, one of whom was said to have
admitted that he did not know where Kassala was,
imposed immense difficulties on those who had to
carry it into effect. No details had been examined
and no provision made for the necessary expenditure.
We had not, however, long to wait before learning
that Egypt was to pay for everything. Every
public undertaking would therefore have to be
postponed, and not least that of the contemplated
Nile reservoirs, in order to provide money for eventu-
alities. Cromer's policy had been first to construct
the Nile barrages, and to extend the river railway,

88 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

which only went as far as Luxor, up to the existing
frontier. The augmented revenue derived from
the development of the new land would then enable
the Egyptian army to be increased. Thus by
successive stages the moment would eventually
have been reached at which the reconquest of the
Soudan might be contemplated. The situation
with which we were confronted, after the capture
of Omdurman in 1898, which will be dealt with in
subsequent chapters, shows that it was in fact very
fortunate that the initiation of the reconquest of
the Soudan was not so postponed. But I do not
believe that those who took the decision had then
any intuition how urgent it really was in British and
Egyptian interests to lose no further time.

Money to finance the campaign would have to
be taken from the Reserve Fund. To induce the
International Caisse de la Dette to give the necessary
consent by a majority vote, the support of Germany
and Austria, as well as of Italy, would have to be
secured in order to out-vote France and Russia,
whose opposition was inevitable. The French Press
had at once proclaimed that the advance was merely
a pretext for prolonging the occupation. The
Khedive, naturally predisposed to mistrust us,
assumed that the action taken was exclusively for
the benefit of Italy, and indeed having regard to
the time and occasion the assumption was justified.
We should have helped Italy more materially by
moving some weeks earlier, especially on the fines
which Cromer had indicated. Now it was already
late. Indeed when all the most pressing obstacles

MEMORIES 1894-1901 89

had been surmounted we were instructed to suspend
activities on a report that Kassala was to be
evacuated. The rumour proved to be unfounded.
The Italians had by a gallant action cleared the
Dervishes out of their positions round that station,
and driven them back over the Atbara. So we
were instructed to go ahead again.

I never admired Cromer more than at this critical
moment. His advice had not been followed, and
the chief military authority at home had rushed the
Government into the alternative plan. He now
set to work to make the best of the difficult situation
which had been created, and with clearness and
dignity submitted all the eventualities. He,
Kitchener, Sir Elwin Palmer and myself met in
constant conclave. He gave his concentrated
attention to what each had to say, always listening
to criticisms and accepting them when they were
sound. There were two points on which we were
all firmly agreed. First, that we must either
retake and hold Dongola and its province, or not
move up the Nile at all. A mere demonstration,
to which opinion at home seemed to be reverting,
would only weaken our position. Secondly, that
there must be a backing of British troops behind
the Egyptian army. Kitchener would require
the battalions actually garrisoning Suakin. We
knew that the black regiments would fight, but it
was still uncertain how far the Egyptian soldier
would stand the severe ordeal of the Soudan. I
well remember Cromer's weighty words at the
meeting at which we adopted these conclusions:

90 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC MEMORIES

" A good deal will depend on what I say now, and
I am not going to send all these fine young men to
their deaths for nothing."

Not long afterwards he received a letter from the
Duke of Devonshire in which the latter wrote that
he had not realised that any step had been taken
by the Cabinet which could not have been modified
had Cromer thought fit to contest the instructions.
Such a view, however, was manifestly inconsistent
with the fact that the Ministerial decision in favour
of an advance to Dongola was communicated to the
Press almost simultaneously with its transmission
to Cairo. Could the Duke have been taken in
himself by the form in which Reuter made the
announcement ?

It afforded a curious instance of the confusion
of mind prevailing at home that the War Office
continued for some days to telegraph instructions
and address enquiries to General Knowles, who had
succeeded Sir Frederick Forest ier- Walker in com-
mand of British troops in Egypt, as if he and the
British garrison, and not the Egyptian army, were
to undertake the expedition.

CHAPTER III

The advance towards the Soudan. Conflict with the Caisse de la
Dette. Roddy Owen arrives. Cholera in Egypt. Joseph
Chamberlain at Highbury. Death of R. Owen. The Arabic
Press becomes aggressive. Death of Sultan of Zanzibar.
Armenian massacres. Occupation of Dongola. The credit
accorded by the Caisse refunded. Decision to despatch a
Mission to Abyssinia. Situation in that country. Composition
of Mission. Preparations and departure. Aden. Zeila. Lieut.
Harrington.

On the 22nd of March, 1896, I saw the Sirdar
off with Wingate and Slatin. It was just a year
since I had met the latter at Assouan after his
extraordinary escape. So began the operations
which were to conclude after two and a half years
with the reconquest of Khartoum.

Meanwhile a pretty battle had begun in Cairo
over the financial problem. The Caisse de la Dette
was invited to sanction a credit of £500,000 from
Reserves. The Austrian, German and Italian
Commissioners associated themselves with the
British in consenting. The French and Russian
Commissioners not only dissented but claimed that
a unanimous resolution was necessary for such
a provision. We contested this claim and a decision
was postponed for four days. The French threat-
ened to appeal to the Mixed Tribunals for an in-

91

92 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

junction. The majority of the Caisse rejoined that
they did not recognise the competency of the Mixed
Tribunals to deal with the matter. After a further
interval of delay the Caisse granted the half million
by four votes to two, the French and Russian Com-
missioners recording their protest. The latter also
procured the lodging of a caveat with the Mixed
Courts by a group of bondholders. This led to a
second important group appearing on the scene
with a demurrer. They urged that to allow a single
obstructive commissioner to paralyse the working
of the Caisse would offer a disastrous precedent, and
be prejudicial to their interests. This was the
common-sense view, but that was not a necessary
reason for its adoption by a jurisprudence governed
by a civil code.

It was not without significance that the excite-
ment of public opinion in France, when it was
realised that Germany would not support the refusal
of funds and that Great Britain had secured a
majority vote, led to the resignation of the Minister
for Foreign Affairs, M. Berthelot, who was believed
to favour a better understanding with us. He was
succeeded by M. Hanotaux, who lost no time in
communicating to the Porte through the French
Embassy at Constantinople a memorandum urging
an enquiry into the motive for the expedition, and
as to why the Sultan had not been consulted. The
Suzerain was advised to sanction no steps in Egypt
without the concurrence of France and Russia.
The document was no doubt intended to be confi-
dential, but such intentions were not always re-

MEMORIES 1894-1901 93

spected at Constantinople by those through whose
hands State papers passed. The Russians were
more astute. The Ambassador put nothing on
paper, but signified his approval of the terms of the
French communication. Meanwhile the money had
been paid over, the troops had gone forward, and
the first stage in the movement was carried out
with rapidity and perfect organisation. There was
no fighting north of Akasheh, but Colonel Burne-
Murdoch, patrolling with the Egyptian cavalry
higher up the river, came into contact with Der-
vishes and fought a successful action. K. wrote
to me : " The thing that has given me the greatest
satisfaction during all this business has been the
kindly support I have received from the Lord. I
never was so well done in my life, and I can tell you
when one has a good deal on one's shoulders the
confidence it gives one to feel thoroughly strong
support at one's back is a comfort."

The Agency was now engaged in another battle,
this time with the War Office, which insisted on
the purchase by the Egyptian Government of
steamers and barges, apparently with a view to an
autumn campaign, before we had even received
the definite and final pronouncement of policy for
which we were pressing. Hostile movements were
developing in the neighbourhood of Suakin, and
the friendly Arabs, who were always between the
devil and the deep sea, protested that they could
not hold out unassisted. The precarious tenure of
these unfortunate people, whom our original plan
would have protected, was probably not realised

94 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

at home. Eventually we carried our point. Two
Indian battalions were to be sent to Suakin, and
British troops from Cairo were to move up to Haifa.
The cost of Indian troops was considerable, and we
were anxious as to the incursion which their co-
operation would entail into the half-million. These
two and one Egyptian reserve battalion would
replace four Egyptian battalions which had con-
stituted the garrison on the Red Sea Coast. They
would be none too many, but if Ghurkas were selected
probably sufficient.

The possibility of a desert advance was no sooner
in the air than that stormy petrel Roddy Owen
turned up from India. He had occupied his time
pretty fully and to good purpose since we had
parted at Mombasa on New Year's Day in 1893.
When Portal returned from Uganda he had remained
there, and under Colonel Colville took part in the
Unyoro war against Kabarega. His name is linked
with the early history of East Africa on account of
his plucky dash to Wadelai to plant the British
flag there in anticipation of rival competitors. After
rejoining his regiment in India he employed his
first leave in accompanying the Chitral expedition
as correspondent for the Pioneer. He had paid a
visit to the Pamirs, and then after nine months
regimental duty, as soon as leave was once more
due, was casting about for a new field of adventure
when the news from Egypt brought him to the Nile.
He was a useful man in emergencies and I did my
best for him with K., who accepted his services. At
that time the Curtises from Venice were staying

MEMORIES 1894-1901 95

with us, and though it was rather late in the season
they had decided to visit Luxor and Assouan. He
went up the river with the old people and laid him-
self out to be agreeable and informative. When
they returned they could not find enough to say in
praise of his attention and intelligence.

That consummate horseman and knight-errant of
adventure was indeed the most adaptable of men.
Shrewd and quick to perceive an opportunity, he
also had the magic gift of charm, and was therefore
one of those whom fortune protects and to whom
many things are forgiven. And no doubt Roddy
needed forgiveness at times. When he was A.D.C.
to Sir Evelyn Wood the general, realising that the
demands on the time of a gentleman rider so much
in request entailed unduly frequent absences from
duty, observed to him, "I do not seem to have
seen very much of you lately, Captain Owen." " My
loss, General," was his disarming if somewhat
pert reply. When at length after five unsuccessful
attempts " Father O'Flynn " carried him to victory in
the Grand National in 1892, just before he started
for Uganda, he gave up steeplechase riding and
determined to take his profession of arms seriously.
If you want to get on, Roddy explained to me, you
must appear to be well informed on all matters
which are exciting general interest. When, there-
fore, he was invited to a dinner party where he was
likely to meet people of importance, he went to his
club in the afternoon and read up all the reviews.
People of course expected little from him but
opinions on horses. But, as he remarked, it is not

96 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

very difficult to lure the conversation into the
channel you desire. Having done so he then, full
of his afternoon's reading, became illuminating on
the subject of discussion, whether it might be
bimetallism or the aims of Russia in Central Asia.
The other guests were bound to go away with the
impression that Major Owen was a very well-
informed young man. During his brief stay in
Cairo he was persuaded in spite of his protests to
try a gallop, and the following day rode and won
a really good race. He had, he told me, always
had an ambition to play a part in the reconquest
of the Nile, and I saw him off without misgiving.
Alas, I was never to see him again.

In the beginning of May cholera made its appear-
ance in Alexandria. A case was detected in a house
inhabited by a family from Algiers or Morocco.
The sanitary authorities put a cordon round the
place. But it had to be removed in consequence
of the protest of the French consul, who claimed
the family as French-protected persons. Some
seven infection-carriers were thus left at large in
the city. The French Representative in Cairo,
M. Cogordan, whom we all respected and appreciated,
always did his best to act in a spirit of common
sense, and he eventually rectified the initial error
and sanctioned the isolation of the infected family.
Whether or not the mischief was due to this un-
fortunate exercise of capitulation privilege the
epidemic made considerable progress, and in due
course spread to Cairo, where by the end of May
statistics showed fifty to sixty deaths a day. The

MEMORIES 1894-1901 97

efforts of the energetic Rogers Pasha and his second
in command in the sanitary department, Pinching
Bey, were nevertheless successful in confining it
within reasonable limits in a country where the
habits of the people inevitably stimulate the dis-
semination of disease. Their perseverance at last
succeeded in inducing the village sheikhs and
omdehs to co-operate in enforcing sanitary measures.

Cromer felt obliged under existing conditions
to renounce his leave in the early summer, and
urged me to go home in May and so give him a
chance of getting away later. We managed with
some difficulty to secure a cabin on a P. & 0. bound
for Brindisi and Venice, in which the whole of the
Jewish colony in Alexandria were evacuating that
city until the cholera should have subsided. Eighty
children, who moreover brought measles with them,
made the ship a pandemonium. Happily before
we landed at Venice the cholera incubation period
had expired, and there was no quarantine. By
the time we reached Paris, after a few days at
Venice and an expedition to Bergamo, news had
arrived of Kitchener's successful battle at Firket,
which revealed what ten years of training and
discipline under British officers had done for the
Egyptian Army. It was the more satisfactory
that all had gone well, as in London there had been
a tendency to depreciate Kitchener and to question
his qualifications for conducting the campaign.

Under the genial auspices of Austen Chamberlain
we paid our first visit to Highbury, and learned to
know the illustrious Joseph in the intimacy of his

98 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

family. Among the guests was Gerald Balfour.
We had a long discussion in the smoking-room
about the management of savage or semi-savage
races. Chamberlain confessed to an instinctive
prejudice against the punishment of flogging. It
might be necessary, but he did not wish to hear of
its use, and he was convinced that public opinion
in England would never tolerate the official recog-
nition of a penalty which involved, as he contended,
loss of dignity to the man. Balfour and I were
rather in opposition. The question is how best in
primitive conditions to protect the greater number.
Not only may imprisonment, when possible, be
rather in the nature of a privilege to the culprit,
who is fed without having to make any effort himself,
but there may often be no prison available within
hundreds of miles. Fines can only be a deterrent
where property exists. A case was within my own
experience of a porter in a caravan convicted of
theft from other porters, remote from all the re-
sources of ordered life. Such a man cannot be
expelled from the community. He would perish
if left alone, and the load he carries is probably
indispensable. Either he must remain unpunished
or some deterrent must be enforced. The only
available resource is to administer a certain number
of lashes and by making an example to inspire the
whole body with respect for the law.

Bad news arrived from Egypt. The measures
taken to arrest the progress of cholera up the river
had failed to stop it at Assouan, and in July we
learned that Roddy Owen had died of it in the camp

MEMORIES 1894-1901 99

at Ambigol, where he had organized a body of Arab
Scouts. Nor was he the only victim among the
British officers. I had sent him up some flannel
belts only just before leaving Cairo. He had
had dysentery and was no doubt weakened by it,
but he had refused to give in, and had overtaxed his
strength in patrols covering great distances. The
boy who milked his cow became infected, and he
committed the grave imprudence of drinking his
milk unboiled. So died a good friend and a very
gallant soul, a later recruit to that great band of
gentlemen adventurers by whom the Empire had
been built up and sustained. Those of his contem-
poraries who still survive no doubt remember him
rather as the winner of the Grand National of 1892.
To me he will always be the Roddy Owen who planted
the flag at Wadelai.

Three of my old East African associates were
thus dead within four years of our parting at Mom-
basa, and Frankie Rhodes had been condemned to
death at Johannesburg, though I had no misgiving
that such a sentence would be carried out. Arthur,
another member of the Uganda expedition, was not
long to survive, and Lloyd Mathews died five years
later in 1901. The conquest of Africa exacted a
heavy toll.

After a few weeks at home I returned alone to
Egypt, leaving my wife behind to pursue her studies
in Greek, which, though she only began them after
our marriage, she soon carried far enough for us to
read the Odyssey together. She was also making
rapid progress in Arabic. Railway construction

100 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

entailed a pause in military operations, and Cromer
found that he could after all take a very necessary
holiday. The cholera epidemic was on the decline
and in Cairo it was almost extinct.

Soon after my return the Walct and another
Egyptian newspaper published some violent and
gross attacks on the Queen. Possibly the moment
of Cromer's departure was deliberately selected.
The local Press had for some time past been taking
advantage of the unrestrained freedom which our
policy had sanctioned to become more and more
aggressive. On this occasion, however, I obtained
authority to take measures. The two journals were
suspended and their editors were arrested. The
native courts did their duty and they were con-
demned to the maximum penalty, a fine and eighteen
months' imprisonment. Another editor who had
already once been condemned for libel and promptly
pardoned by the Khedive was tried on a further
libel charge and sentenced to six months' detention.
These prosecutions had a salutary effect, and they
were in my opinion absolutely necessary. The
Khedive was largely responsible for the deplorable
character of the Arabic Press. He allowed himself
to be approached by low-class journalists and his
associates made merry together over the scandals
to be published. Those who abused the British,
or the Egyptian Ministers who worked with them,
received rewards or patronage and believed them-
selves assured of protection whatever they printed.
The Sultan also bestowed money or decorations
on writers who attacked the occupying Power.

MEMORIES 1894-1901 101

Such public opinion as could be created in Egypt
was being formed by absolutely worthless news-
papers, which continually increased in number.
With the extension of education more and more
Egyptians became able to read, and those who
could do so collected groups of listeners who eagerly
assimilated mendacious reports of iniquities attri-
buted to us, with the approval and encouragement
of their rulers. Under such conditions the great
benefits which the occupation had secured for the
people, such as the abolition of the courbash and the
corvee, and the equitable supply of water, though
still appreciated by the older generation, were
ignored by the younger men, whose limited capacity
for judgment was vitiated by the daily dose of
calumny. The French newspapers published in
Cairo also co-operated, if in more measured terms,
with a constant strain of depreciation. The young
Nationalist group, led by Mustapha Kamel, which,
had it worked in a right spirit, might have received
encouragement and have become a useful element,
was from the first exploited by our rivals for their
own purposes, and stimulated by fervent encourage-
ment from M. Deloncle and other agitators. As
yet the Nationalist party had not become formid-
able, but in view of the ferment which came to a
head in 1919, it is well to remember that the ground
was being prepared by the local Press at least
twenty-five years earlier.

In August Hamed bin Thwain, the Sultan of
Zanzibar, whom I had proclaimed in March, 1893,
died with unexpected suddenness. The mortality

102 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

of the Muscat Sultans in that tropical island had
been phenomenal. He was the third to disappear
in the eight years which had elapsed since the death
of Barghash in 1888. Once more 1 Seyyid Khaled
seized the Palace, but on this occasion with a con-
siderable force behind him and in the absence of an
adequate naval force he defied the authority of the
Protecting Power. The knowledge that we were
about to abolish domestic slavery had evidently
rallied many of the Arabs to his side. Sir A. Hardinge
was on leave and Mr. Cave was in charge. Lord
Salisbury wisely gave him a completely free hand
to deal with the emergency. The St. George and
the Racoon arrived on the scene with as little delay
as possible, and an ultimatum was delivered to
Khaled. As he did not submit the Palace was
bombarded. Khaled escaped to the German Con-
sulate. There under the exterritorial system of the
Capitulations he could not be apprehended. The
Consulate was some distance from the sea-front
and there should have been only two alternatives
open to him, either to remain there indefinitely or
to be arrested on leaving. But another resource
was found to be available. A piece of land adjoining
the Consulate and extending to the sea had been
offered by the Sultanate to Germany for the purpose
of building a hospital, and though no steps had ever
been taken to give effect to the object for which
the concession had been granted a claim was ad-
vanced that the privilege of exterritoriality covered
this strip of land also. Across the corridor Khaled
1 See previous volume, p. 304.

MEMORIES 1894-1901 103

was enabled to reach a boat and escape in a German
ship to Dar-es-Salam. Time's revenges have pre-
sumably brought him once more under British
jurisdiction.

The following month information reached us of
the organized massacre of Armenians in Constanti-
nople, for which the grimmest annals of the Middle
Ages hardly afforded a parallel. A certain number
of fugitives escaped and some highly skilled crafts-
men, for whom we tried to obtain employment, took
refuge in Egypt. I found old Ghazi Moukhtar
profoundly distressed by the news. He suggested
that the Embassies might avail themselves of the
opportunity to land detachments and retain them
on shore until the Sultan, who would go to great
lengths to get rid of them, should agree to any
reforms on which the Powers might insist. But
there was no prospect of common action among
the Powers, and the Sultan was strongly entrenched
behind European jealousies. The gift of a pair of
horses sent not long afterwards by him to the
German Emperor might almost seem to have marked
Abdul Hamid's appreciation of the absence of any
criticism in Berlin, where Real-politiJc was the order
of the day. Public opinion at home was deeply
and justly aroused, and Mr. Gladstone once more
emerged from private life to denounce the outrage.
But circumstances not solely confined to politics
had at that time diminished British influence at
Constantinople, and it was evident that any isolated
action on our part would unite the Continent against
us. Lord Rosebery, who in 1896 resigned the

104 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

leadership of the Liberal party, made an impressive
speech at Edinburgh, and did valuable service in
pointing out how inopportune was an agitation
which might end in a European war.

Hitherto all had gone mechanically with the
Soudan campaign. The Upper Egypt railway had
been prolonged from Luxor to Assouan, our poverty
and not our will consenting to a change of gauge.
Transport difficulties beyond the old frontier had
been solved by pushing a railway line ahead with
extraordinary rapidity between the second and
third cataracts. A group of young engineer officers,
among whom the most experienced in railway work
was a Canadian, Bimbashi Girouard, had trained a
railway battalion of Egyptian conscripts to a high
pitch of efficiency. The line as it progressed supplied
the material for its own extension, which was carried
out at the rate of a kilometer a day.

At the beginning of September, just as the river
line had reached a point which would enable the
attack on Dongola to be attempted, one of those
storms which are comparatively rare in these lati-
tudes burst with devastating violence, and con-
verted the rocky khors or gullies leading to the Nile
into rushing torrents. Twelve miles of line were
carried away and the railhead was left in the air.
It was a heartbreaking and indeed an anxious
moment. K., surveying the scene of disaster and
the lost material, preserved, externally at any rate,
his imperturbable calm, only exacting still more
strenuous effort to make good the break. This
mishap entailed a fortnight's delay in the advance.

MEMORIES 1894-1901 105

However, on the 23rd of September, the sixtieth
anniversary of the Queen's accession, I had the
satisfaction of telegraphing home that Dongola
had been occupied. Cromer returned from leave
that night. During these operations Commander
Colville, 1 whose former experience of Nile warfare
had indicated him as the right man to command
the Nile flotilla, was severely wounded at Hafia and
obliged to return home, with the consolation of
promotion to post rank. It was then that I heard
for the first time and was impressed with the Sirdar's
high opinion of a young lieutenant named Beatty,
who took charge when Colville was disabled. The
Khartoum campaign brought him his third stripe,
and twenty years later he was commanding the
biggest fleet ever assembled by his country in the
greatest of all wars.

The programme originally proposed had now been
successfully fulfilled. To us in Egypt it was for
many reasons obvious that Dongola could only
remain very temporarily a half-way house to Khar-
toum. For the moment, however, there could be
no further movement, the desert railway along the
chord of the arc described by the Nile between Wady
Haifa and Abou Hamed had first to be constructed.
No doubt at the time the scheme of a railway line
across waterless sands to a point still in the enemy's
possession must have seemed to many an almost
fantastic proposition. But K. and his young engi-
neers had no doubt of their ability to surmount
every obstacle. The Egyptian army, on which all
1 Admiral Hon. Sir Stanley Colville, G.C.B.

106 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

the work had hitherto fallen, had done well, but the
troops did not as yet inspire full confidence in
fighting at close quarters. The black regiments
were admirable, but there were too few of them.
British troops would be needed for the next stage.
But for the moment there must be a pause in opera-
tions.

Just a month later I reached London only a week
before a second boy was born, on the 26th of October.
I had only intended to remain at home the few
necessary weeks. But my wife was long in recover-
ing, and my mother was also seriously ill, so that
we did not return to Cairo until late in December.

During this period of absence I was reminded of
old Berlin dissensions by a bombshell exploded in
the Hamburger Nachrichten, Bismarck's organ, which
could only be attributed to the old man's irrecon-
cilable rancour, and his desire to show how much
wiser the old policy had been than the new. The
announcement was made public that up to 1890,
when he resigned, a secret treaty had existed between
Russia and Germany for benevolent neutrality in
case either of the contracting Powers were attacked
by a third Power. The disclosure of this treaty of
counter-insurance must have given cause for re-
flection to the other members of the Triple Alliance.
An apparent aggressor may so well be in reality the
party attacked. Caprivi, who was an honest man,
was severely handled in the Hamburg paper for
having dropped the agreement. No doubt so long
as it remained in force it made a Franco-Russian
alliance practically impossible. The official Gazette

MEMORIES 1894-1901 107

at Berlin issued a reprimand for this betrayal of
State secrets, which was tantamount to an admission
that the facts were as announced.

We travelled back with Sir Alexander Baird and
his eldest son, who had just entered the diplomatic
service, but had been allowed before joining the
Foreign Office to accompany his father whose health
was still uncertain. As everything pointed to a
heavy increase of work at the Agency, the Secretary
of State agreed to his remaining on duty in Egypt.
It was one of those happy accidents by which
careers are sometimes determined, and he took
every advantage of it, eventually transferring his
activities to the Public Works Department. He
accompanied Sir William Garstin on his expeditions
to investigate and deal with the Nile Sudd, and was
in due course appointed to the Legation in Abyssinia.
He has many adventures to his record, but I doubt
whether, even when a wounded lion left its mark
upon him, he was ever in a more critical position
than on the afternoon when I saw him at the end
of a steeplechase at Ghezireh, digging his knees into
the neck of a pony without headstall or bridle,
which seemed eager to explore the horizon. But
he reappeared in due course smiling, and now some
twenty-five years afterwards he is himself con-
trolling another Office of Works much nearer West-
minster.

Much had happened during our absence. The
appeal court of the Mixed Tribunals had, though
only by the casting vote of the President, decided
against the legality of the credit granted by a

108 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

majority vote of the Commissioners of the Debt.
The money had therefore to be refunded. Cromer
was ready for the emergency, and on the day follow-
ing the judgment Her Majesty's Government de-
clared their readiness to advance the £500,000,
just anticipating a French syndicate which came
forward with an offer. All the efforts of the opposi-
tion had only resulted in placing a trump in our
hands had we decided to use it. But the Govern-
ment, which had acted with some precipitation in
ordering the advance to Dongola, was hesitating
where circumstances might have justified action.
A suggestion that we should find the money, and
that Kitchener should occupy the Soudan for Her
Majesty's Government until it were possible for
Egypt to undertake the administration, was regarded
as too drastic. It would greatly have strengthened
our position afterwards, and would have simplified
the problem which had to be faced of excluding
the application of Capitulations to the Soudan.
Cromer, on the other hand, demurred to the pro-
posal of an advance at 5 per cent., of which one and
a half would go to form a sinking fund. Eventually
the British Government agreed to find the £500,000,
together with £240,000 additional for railways and
gunboats, at 2f per cent, without any sinking fund.
They attached to this offer the reservation that
they would take no responsibility for any operations
beyond Berber. Such a reservation may have
served some useful parliamentary purpose at the
time, but it was manifestly quite illogical. Sup-
posing Berber to have been taken in a battle in

MEMORIES 1894-1901 109

which the Dervish power of resistance had been
broken, with Khartoum separated only by a few
days' march and the gunboats ready to go forward,
was the advance to cease and were the Dervishes
to be allowed to reconsolidate ? Such a proposition
was untenable. As Egypt had been forced before
she was ready into an undertaking the nature of
which did not admit of stopping half-way, the sup-
pression of Mahdism once initiated would have to
be completed. It was, however, useless to raise
the issue prematurely. We had every confidence
that when the psychological moment arrived the
reservation would have no practical consequences.

The Christmas dinner party at the Agency, an
important annual event, was that year a particu-
larly merry one. The Baring boys had arrived
for the holidays just in time. After dinner we had
designed dumb charades, and one of the subjects
for the audience to guess was the Caisse de la Dette.
For the concluding scene six of us sat at a table
looking very serious and Cromer was called upon
to impersonate himself. He had to bring in five
large Foreign Office despatch bags in succession,
each of which was labelled £100,000, and deposit
them in front of the six. It was, I think, Elwin
Palmer, in the role of the French Commissioner,
who made a gesture of protest and shook his head.
Whereupon Cromer went off and brought back a
smaller bag which was labelled " interest." I do
not know whether the incorrigible levity of the
British ever became known to our critics in Cairo.

As it was now obvious that the Soudan operations

110 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

would entail the administration of the basin of the
Upper Nile, it was desirable to make use of the
interval which must elapse before the advance
could be resumed and to secure, if possible, the
friendly neutrality of the Abyssinians, who after
their recent successes against the Italians had
become a power to reckon with in a vast area coter-
minous with the Soudan. It was accordingly decided
in the beginning of 1897 that a mission should be
despatched to Menelik, King of Shoa and King of
Kings of Ethiopia. I had the good fortune to be
selected as Special Envoy. To my great satisfaction
my friend Wingate was to accompany me. We
were to start as soon as possible after receiving the
consent of Menelik to receive a mission.

Up to this time Great Britain had never had any
political, or indeed any relations whatever, with the
great southern kingdom of Shoa. The mad or bad
king Theodore, against whom we had made war
in 1867-8, had reigned in Tigre and Amhara in the
north, and there many of the chieftains oppressed
by his rule had given our expeditionary force
countenance and support. With King John of
Tigre, who succeeded Theodore, we had twice been
in official contact. The first occasion was in 1884,
when Admiral Sir William Hewett was sent on a
mission to invite him to facilitate the evacuation
of the Eastern Soudan by the Egyptian garrisons.
Some years afterwards a foreign consular official
who had spent most of his life in Red Sea ports
told a story of this mission which will perhaps be
received with a grain of its own Gallic salt. He

MEMORIES 1894^1901 111

said that King John was much surprised when he
first saw the Admiral, who maintained the Nelson
tradition and was clean-shaved. Unaccustomed
to see men of such an age without hair on the face,
he assumed that the Queen had selected as her
representative one of those often influential officers
who are only found in Eastern households, and he
did not consider the choice flattering. The inter-
preter, however, enlightened him as to the practice
of naval tradition. The second occasion was in
1887, when Sir Gerald Portal was instructed to offer
our good offices for the conclusion of peace with the
Italians. Neither of these missions, both of which
had a single definite object in view, penetrated to
any great distance from the coast. To reach the
capital of Menelik in Shoa, starting from the nearest
point on the Somali coast, we should have to traverse
five hundred miles of country which few British
travellers had ever visited.

The situation in Abyssinia had entirely changed
since King John had been killed in battle with the
Dervishes at Gallabat in 1889, and the ascendancy
had passed from the north to the south. Menelik,
who bore the name of the legendary son of Solomon
by the Queen of Sheba, and claimed the grandilo-
quent title of " The Conquering Lion of the Tribe
of Judah," had played for a time a waiting game
in the issue between the northern princes and Italy.
He appeared indeed, when he signed the Treaty of
Ucciali with Count Antonelli to have accepted an
Italian Protectorate. But when Italian influence
had been established in the north, and he realized the

112 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

menace to his own independence, Menelik, who after
the death of King John found little difficulty in assert-
ing his predominance, maintained that the Italian
version of the Treaty did not correctly interpret
the meaning of the Amharic text and that the claim
to a Protectorate rested on a mistranslation. He
therefore repudiated it. There had been little
restriction on the supply of arms and ammunition
which reached him through Jibuti, and in their own
mountains the soldiers of Shoa were a formidable
factor. He then made common cause with the
northern chiefs, who recognized him as Emperor,
and his victory at Adua in 1896 firmly consolidated
his power over the whole of Abyssinia.

The ostensible objects which I was to endeavour
to secure were thus described in the answer to a
question in the House of Commons returned by
Curzon, who had now become Under-Secretary for
Foreign Affairs : " The Mission is sent to assure
King Menelik of our friendly intentions, to endeavour
to promote amicable political and commercial re-
lations, and to settle certain questions which have
arisen between the British Authorities in the Somali
Coast Protectorate and the Abyssinian Governor
of Harrar." There was, however, more behind
the surface than might appear from the official
reply.

In the first place the Abyssinians were to us then
an unknown quantity, and since the Italian defeat
their attitude towards Europeans was reported
to have become very aggressive. Rumours had
been current that a renewal of more friendly re-

MEMORIES 1894-1901 113

lations with the Soudan, interrupted since the battle
of Gallabat, was not impossible. Such rumours
were the more credible as we had reason to believe
that the Abyssinians suspected us of having supplied
Italy with funds for the invasion of their country.
French Missions were moreover active in Ethiopia.
A commercial treaty had recently been negotiated
with France, whose colony of Obok-Jibuti consti-
tuted one of the main channels for foreign access.
The Governor, M. Lagarde, was reported to have
been entrusted with a diplomatic mission to Menelik
to discuss bases for a political understanding. We
had also been informed that M. Bonvalot had been
commissioned to study the problem of entering
the Soudan " for commercial purposes." A French
expedition was known to be moving from the Upper
Ubanghi towards the Nile, and a journey to Abys-
sinia of Prince Henry of Orleans, though under-
taken on his own account, might well have been
conceived with the intention of joining hands from
the East, a surmise which subsequent revelations
proved to have been justified. His published corre-
spondence regarding our action in Egypt did not
warrant the presumption that his activities would
be to our advantage. Other French expeditions
were spoken of as imminent. A Russian free-
lance, Leontieff, had recently conducted a small
party of Abyssinians to Russia, where religious
affinities between the respective churches had been
emphasized. France and Russia had had a clear
field in Ethiopia, and existing relations did not make
it probable that their agents would have reported

114 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

favourably to Menelik regarding our intentions in
the Nile basin. There was danger that arms and
ammunition might be passed on to the enemy. The
questions concerning the frontiers of Somaliland and
Abyssinia which demanded settlement would become
of relatively minor importance if we could succeed
in establishing friendly relations. To ensure if
possible that there would be no co-operation with
Khalifa, and to obtain a more intimate knowledge
of internal conditions were the essential objects of
the mission. Letters were accordingly despatched
through Zeila inviting Menelik to receive us.

The wide area over which he ruled is sometimes
called Ethiopia, and more often Abyssinia, the
latter being the name under which it is known to
us by long tradition. The Abyssinians themselves,
however, use only Ethiopia, as the name Abyssinia,
derived from an Arabic word meaning " mixed,"
indicating the variety of races to be found there,
has for them a somewhat depreciatory signification.

A week after the public announcement of the
mission our second little boy, who had been born in
the previous October, manifested symptoms which
gave us anxiety. The Egyptian climate is often
perilous to very young children. Two days later
the little life fluttered out so quietly that the moment
of transition was hardly perceptible. This was the
first shadow that fell across our married life, made
all the darker by the anticipation of my having to
leave my wife, who returned some weeks later to
England with Lady Cromer.

We had not very much time before us for pre-

MEMORIES 1894-1901 115

paration. In addition to Wingate three officers
were designated from home to serve with the ex-
pedition : Captain Count Gleichen, 1 of the Intelli-
gence Section in the War Office, Captain Swayne,
R.E., who had intimate knowledge of Somaliland,
and Lieut. Lord Edward Cecil, of the Grenadier
Guards. I also obtained authority to take my
brother-in-law, Captain the Hon. Cecil Bingham, 2
of the 1st Life Guards, who was paying us a visit
at the time. His knowledge and experience of
horses were likely to prove very useful with the
mule transport which we should require on reaching
the Abyssinian mountains. The Egyptian Govern-
ment lent us the services of Pinching Bey, 3 the
second in command in the Sanitary Department.
He had distinguished himself in fighting the recent
cholera epidemic, and was also a personal friend
whom I had first met at a bump-supper in Oxford
days when Balliol rowed second to Pembroke at
the head of the river in the Torpid Races. Captain
Tristram Speedy, a veteran of Abyssinia, who had
actually accompanied the expeditionary force in
1867, was in Cairo, and we were fortunate in securing
in him an Englishman who had some knowledge
of the Amharic language. He was a great deal
older than the most senior of our party, but still
vigorous and quite unapprehensive of the antici-
pated rigours of the march. Finally there was
Yuzbashi (Captain) Shahin Effendi George, a Syrian

1 Major-General Lord Edward Gleichen.

2 Lieut.-General Hon. Sir Cecil Bingham.

3 Sir Horace Pinching, K.C.M.G.

116 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

officer of the Egyptian Intelligence Section, who
spoke perfect English, to act as Arabic secretary. It
was desirable to limit numbers owing to the difficulty
of transport, and we arranged to take only three
European attendants to look after mess and camp
equipment. They were my servant Butcher and
two Grenadier Guardsmen, Cross and Herbert. At
Cairo we also engaged a native cook, who amply
justified Wingate's recommendation in manipulating
the implements of his craft over the glow of desic-
cated cow-dung, or in coaxing a fire from damp sticks
in the lee of a battered umbrella.

It was an accident, but no doubt a fortunate one,
that the stature of the members of the mission was
quite exceptional. Wingate, Gleichen, and I were
only average specimens. But Speedy with his
6 feet 5 inches belonged to the race of giants, while
Cecil, Bingham, Swayne, and Pinching ranged
from 6 feet 4 inches to 6 feet 2 \ inches. To judge
from a number of press cuttings which I received
at the time it was the length of the mission in feet
and inches which chiefly attracted public attention.

Speedy had not been in Abyssinia for many years,
and although after we reached the country he
quickly recovered a certain facility of speech he was
not up to dealing with written documents. It
was therefore imperative to find an efficient inter-
preter. There were in those days hardly any
Englishmen available who had acquired proficiency
in the Amharic language, and we understood that
Arabic would be of little service to us beyond Harrar.
As soon as the organization of the mission was

MEMORIES 1894^-1901 117

announced a Shoan who was living in Cairo made
himself known and offered his services. His name
was Waldo Haimanaut, and he claimed to be a
student of Ethiopian literature, and to have acquired
his tolerable facility in a peculiar broken English
from missionaries. He had a strange elusive per-
sonality, and I hesitated long before engaging him for
a position of confidence without more knowledge of
his antecedents than was obtainable. But there
was an obvious advantage in employing a Shoan,
whose residence in Egypt moreover would enable
him to tell his countrymen something of the work
which the British had accomplished there. I was
also not unfavourably disposed by the simplicity
of the man. He represented that were he to come
with us he would have to abandon his " business,"
which would be a serious consideration. As to the
nature of that business, and what it was worth to
him, his answers were at first evasive. At length,
however, I elicited that it consisted in hunting for
concealed treasure, of which he seemed to believe
there were many deposits in Egypt. He did not
appear as yet to have found any, but he lived on
hope. There were no other competitors for the
post, and so in spite of some misgivings I engaged
him conditionally on Menelik's consent to receive
the mission. When provided with a modest outfit
he put in a tolerable appearance, and though un-
practical and frequently exasperating he proved
serviceable and indeed indispensable.

A reply from Menelik cordially welcoming our
visit was received in the middle of February, and

118 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

we engaged passages by the first available steamer
for Aden. There was no time to lose if we were to
reach the Shoan capital and return before the great
rains broke on the Abyssinian plateau, rendering
the tracks practically impassable for some three
months. Meanwhile instructions had to be dis-
cussed between Cairo and London, arrangements
made for transport from Aden to Zeila in Somaliland,
and camels to be collected at the latter place to
carry us and all our equipment up to the foot of the
mountains.

A visit to the capital of Ethiopia presents com-
paratively few difficulties now that a railway from
Jibuti has been completed. But five-and-twenty
years ago Shoa was an unknown land, and the
organization of a big caravan to cross the inhospit-
able deserts of Somaliland and scale the successive
escarpments by which the lofty tableland of south-
ern Ethiopia is reached demanded serious study and
provision for unforeseeable contingencies.

The Cairo bazaars were ransacked for trade goods
with which to purchase food and friendly assistance
in Somaliland. The question of presents for the
King of Kings and the Abyssinian chiefs who would
have to be propitiated was the subject of anxious
discussion. Swayne, who was in London, had a
brilliant inspiration, and obtained from Rowland
Ward some skins with the heads set up as in life.
There was a polar bear, a black bear, a tiger, and a
jaguar. A service of plate was ordered, including
salvers, bowls for rice, candlesticks, and a ewer
and basin for the ceremonial washing of hands.

MEMORIES 1894-1901 119

Rifles of various design and calibre were sent from
England. Jewelled crosses for ecclesiastical digni-
taries were not forgotten. For the Empress Taitu
an emerald and diamond parure was purchased.
Carpets, rugs, and silks were procurable in Egypt.
For Somaliland we bought stocks of cotton cloth,
handkerchiefs of brilliant design, pocketknives,
beads, and all the objects dear to the simple
African.

The provisioning of so large a party as ours was
destined to be demanded careful calculation. Flour,
tea, sugar, and salt, which last commodity is greatly
in demand in Abyssinia, together with less bulky
supplies, had to be packed in cases of a size and
weight to suit alternative kinds of transport, two
for a mule and four for a camel, the loads assigned
to which should not exceed 160 or 280 lb. respectively.
Messrs. Burroughs & Welcome were good enough
to offer us an invaluable medicine chest, which con-
tained everything indispensable for such an expe-
dition. Guns, ammunition, camp furniture, uni-
forms, stationery, rope for loading, and officers' tents
made a formidable collection of baggage. Other
tents were to be indented for at Aden, and there,
last but not least, we were to find money in the form
of Maria Theresa dollars, the only form of currency
then acceptable in Ethiopia.

As we were to traverse certain areas in the interior
of Somaliland where nomad tribes might be en-
countered whose disposition was uncertain, it was
decided that we should take an escort, to be furnished
by the Aden troop, recruited from Sikhs and Rajputs,

120 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

consisting of a Jemadar and twenty men. For
these special rations had to be supplied and, as we
found to our consternation on arriving at Zeila
whither they were despatched in advance, their
tradition entailed a very generous outfit of camp
supplies.

At Ismailia, where all our equipment had been
assembled for embarcation, we joined the P. & O.
steamship Borne, in which Captain Swayne had
travelled from Marseilles, and proceeded to Aden,
where two or three days' delay was inevitable while
dollars, tents, and the dhoolies which our medical
officer insisted on taking, were assembled and packed.
During our stay there we were entertained by the
Governor, General Cunningham, with that generous
hospitality which is a tradition of the outposts of
empire.

On the evening of the 19th of March we re-
embarked in the Indian Marine gunboat Minto,
accompanied by the Resident in Somaliland, Colonel
Hayes-Sadler, and on the following morning we
found ourselves lying off Zeila, a village of reed huts
with a few coral-built houses dating from the Egyp-
tian occupation. The sea was a clean transparent
green, the sky an intense blue. Between them west-
ward lay the glowing yellow desert with a faint
suggestion of mountain outlines some hundred
miles inland. Zeila is an open roadstead, and we
were obliged to anchor some two miles out from the
shore and land our cases in native boats at a long
pier running into shallow water. All was made
relatively easy for us by the organizing ability of

MEMORIES 1894-1901 121

the Assistant Resident, Lieutenant Harrington, 1 of
the Indian Political Service. He had collected some
190 camels and thirty mules for our journey across
Somaliland. There were also five baggage ponies
in addition to the ten horses of the Aden troopers,
who were to ride and march in turns. A full day
was devoted to sorting our stores and gear, which
covered an acre, to organizing the caravan, to writing
on Somali syces and equipping these and Somali
police in the khaki jackets and accoutrements
which we had brought from Egypt. Meanwhile
we established ourselves in Harrington's new Resi-
dency, built by the versatile sapper on a mudflat
of the very best materials, according to textbook
and rules laid down for construction under quite
different conditions. The lower floor intended for
offices, instead of being raised on arches, as all such
buildings in East Africa should be, was flush with
the ground, and the moisture was streaming down
the walls.

Harrington's authority over the Somalis, a people
by no means easy to handle, impressed us from the
first, and we all regretted that he was not to accom-
pany the expedition. He had had a somewhat
remarkable career. After an education at Stony-
hurst, where he had also taken the University
course, financial complications and a difference of
opinion with his guardian had led him to enlist in
the Dublin Fusiliers. He went to India and in a
very short time became a sergeant. Working hard
under the difficult conditions of life in the sergeant's
1 Colonel Sir John Lane Harrington, K.C.M.G.

122 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

mess, he had no sooner obtained a commission, as
with his antecedents and ability he was bound to
do, than he succeeded in passing the examination
for the Indian Political Service. After some years'
employment at Residences in native states he found
himself Assistant Political Officer at Zeila. But
for the arrival of the Special Mission he might well
have been left on that low-lying shore until his con-
stitution had been completely undermined by the
prevalent fever. As it was, before the year was
out he became the first permanent British Repre-
sentative in Abyssinia, where he ably dealt with
a difficult situation over a number of years.

Special duties had now to be assigned. Wingate,
besides keeping the official journals, was to act as
Treasurer with Shahin EfFendi to assist him. Swayne,
whose former experience in Somaliland indicated
him as chief Shikari, was Transport Officer and
hierophant of the theodolite. Gleichen, who had
discovered a second moderate interpreter at Aden,
was Intelligence and Surveying Officer charged with
the selection of camps and provision of water.
Pinching, in addition to looking after our health,
which fortunately gave him little trouble, undertook
the duties of Mess President with full powers over
the issue or withholding of our limited provision of
luxuries. Bingham had charge of the native com-
missariat and became our honorary " vet." Cecil
was entrusted with the very important duties of
rear-guard officer and the issue of blankets and of
rope for loading. I begged Speedy, who was older
and less robust, to keep himself for Abyssinia where

MEMORIES 1894-1901 123

he would become responsible for local supplies.
Meanwhile, as he claimed to be something of a
taxidermist, he was hailed as naturalist to the
expedition.

Ever since I had left Zanzibar a haunting nostalgia
for tropical Africa had possessed me, and though
I could not ignore the great difficulties which lay
before us and the heavy responsibilities of the
mission with which I had been entrusted, I was in
the highest of spirits at the prospect of starting
once more on the path of adventure into a world
unknown.

CHAPTER IV
1897

On the road to Shoa. The Somali desert. Italian prisoners at
Biya Kaboba. Gildessa to Harrar. Ras Makunnen. To
Church with the Ras. Difficulty of securing transport. News
of M. Lagarde and Prince Henry of Orleans. Beauty of the
Highlands. Episodes of a night march. The valley of the
Hawash. The approach to Addis Abbaba. M. Ilg. The
capital. Our official reception by the Emperor Menelik.
Prince Henry as a correspondent and the French Press. The
Coptic Bishop and the Lord Chief Justice. The Empress
Taitu. Lunch at the Gobi. Leontieff. Sources of information.

Twenty-four hours of very hard work sufficed to
establish some order in our little army. One of
the first obligations was sensibly to reduce the
equipment of the Aden escort which, as landed at
Zeila, would have required fifty camels for its
transport. Loading up began at daybreak on the
morning after our arrival. By 10.30 the last camels
were away and then, bidding farewell to Hayes-
Sadler and Harrington who accompanied us for a
short distance, we marched some eight miles over
sandy country with desert growth of dwarf mimosa
and the large-leafed Dead Sea apple to the wells
of Warabod, where crowds of spear-bearing Somalis
of the White Esa tribe were watering sheep and
goats from half a dozen shallow pits. Thence

124

SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC MEMORIES 125

after a brief halt we rode on five more miles to a
camping ground selected because it offered good
pasture for the camels. They were turned loose
to graze while their owners built themselves shel-
ters for the night with the fleeces used for pack-
saddles.

It is hardly an exaggeration to describe our
caravan as a little army. In addition to the Euro-
pean or Egyptian officers and their personal attend-
ants with two interpreters, there were 21 men of the
Aden troop with 9 camp followers : 12 police, five
of them Soudanese, and the rest Somali ; 8 servants,
Egyptian, Hindu, or Somali ; 15 syces for the mules
with their headman, these mostly of the Gadabursi
tribe ; 12 dhooly bearers ; 2 sweepers ; and 20
coolies of the Esa Somali tribe, making a total of
115 for whom food and water had to be provided.
In addition to these there were 80 camel drivers
who carried their own rations. The animals
included 15 horses or ponies, 30 riding mules, and 1
donkey. At the start there were also 5 oxen and
12 sheep for rations. The camels numbered 191,
including a trotting dromedary which Gleichen had
acquired. Twenty-five of these carried 50 water
casks, and twelve more were loaded with presents
and bullion. The mobilization and feeding of such
numbers demanded considerable organizing ability.
Arrangements were worked out on the march. The
seventeen tents were pitched in a formation which
once adopted was maintained throughout the journey.
When once we had settled down the camp was
roused by gunshot at 5 a.m., and by 6.30 we had

126 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

breakfasted, struck camp, loaded up, and started
again.

Between Warabod and the nearest point where
wells could be dug we had to traverse 40 miles of
absolutely waterless desert. This stretch we were
enabled to negotiate owing to the prevision of
Harrington who had sent forty-five barrels of water
ahead of us to a half-way station. The first stage
of this march in scorching heat was very trying, as
we were not yet in training. A touch of fever gave
me some misgiving lest my old enemy, malaria,
might once more incapacitate me. But it was only
due to sun and exhaustion, and as an old African I
fared better than some of the novices, who had
rolled up their shirt-sleeves and opened their collars,
with the result that the skin peeled in rolls off the
exposed chest and forearms, not to mention nose
and neck. During the second stage we met a large
contingent of Italian prisoners returning from Abys-
sinia to the coast in charge of two officers. The
Italian Red Cross had established relief stations
at Harrar and Biya Kaboba, and Harrington was
sending out a further supply of water for their use.
They had been marching for forty days, and were
in high spirits at nearing their journey's end after a
long detention. Beyond our third camp at Hensa,
where water was plentiful, and where we shot a
number of sandgrouse, the road began to rise slightly
through rocky country, but the subsequent days'
stages were generally monotonous till we reached
the hundred and first mile at Biya Kaboba.

The itinerary of our caravan has been so amply

MEMORIES 1894-1901 127

described by Lord Edward Gleichen in a book 1
enlivened with his own excellent sketches that I
do not propose to extract similar details from the
diary, which I endeavoured to keep as complete
as possible by the light of a single candle in my tent
before turning in for the night. After the first
three days we did not dread long marches, especially
as clouds now began to veil the cruel African sun.
Therefore finding the wells at an intended camping
ground dry we saved a day and pushed on 26 miles
to Biya Kaboba. This enabled us to devote twenty-
four hours to rest and re-organization, which was
the more necessary as the camel drivers were pro-
testing against the length of our marches. They
considered even 20 miles a day excessive, and the
camel not less than his driver has a very stubborn
opinion as to the amount of work which may be
demanded of him.

At Biya Kaboba — the Big Water — we found on
the summit of a round hill a sort of blockhouse
with a small and ragged garrison. It was an
Abyssinian outpost, a great deal farther east than
it should have been according to our interpretation
of the frontier. Here we also found the Italian
Red Cross station and stores of Captain Bracco,
who kindly sent us some flasks of Chianti, which
were most welcome in the wilderness as our
" cellar " had been reduced to very modest dimen-
sions. He spoke very warmly of Harrington's
assistance at Zeila in repatriating his countrymen.
There was in his camp an unfortunate soldier who

1 With the Mission to Menelik. Edward Arnold, 1898.

128 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

had been left behind by the last company that had
marched through. An abscess in the mouth behind
a tooth was evidently poisoning his whole system,
and his face was swollen and distorted beyond
recognition. Pinching was afraid that things had
gone too far and that it would not be possible to
save him. However, he operated with success, and
I was glad to hear afterwards that the man recovered
completely.

We learned from Captain Bracco that Prince
Henry of Orleans, marching from Jibuti, had pre-
ceded us by about a fortnight. Here another batch
of Italian prisoners came in. I had a good deal of
conversation with an officer of artillery. He told
me their sufferings after the battle of Adua had
been terrible. They had to walk some 600 miles.
He had no boots and nothing left him but a shirt
and a pair of trousers. As there was hardly any
food available but a handful of grain or beans from
time to time, he sold his shirt for a chicken. The
women treated them with brutality. The men,
especially the older ones, were kindlier, but they
had little to give them. The prisoners who were
with Menelik himself were well cared for. He also
spoke in the highest terms of Ras Makunnen, the
Governor of Harrar, who had saved the lives of
many Italians, and recently on their march down
had done all that was in his power to facilitate their
journey.

The same officer gave me some interesting details
of the battle itself. A pretended deserter had
informed Baratieri that he had only a small body

MEMORIES 1894-1901 129

of Abyssinians in front of him, the main body being
several days' march distant. Afterwards when in
Addis Abbaba he had learned that this informer had
been sent by Menelik to lead them astray. Baratieri,
hoping to demoralise the rest by inflicting a crushing
defeat on a smaller force, fell into the trap. The
Italian artillery did great execution and some
twelve thousand Abyssinians were put out of action.
A factor which affected the situation for the Italians
most unfortunately was that their native levies had
no uniform, and bore no distinguishing mark except
their red caps, which they threw off in the heat of the
fight. The artillery could not distinguish friends
from foes, and at a critical moment, mistaking the
Abyssinians for their own people, had ceased firing
and so allowed them to advance right up to the
guns.

Beyond Biya Kaboba the aspect of the country
improved. There was abundance of the little mouse
deer, or dikdik, the smallest of the species, and a
great number of ground squirrels ; there were hyenas,
jackals, a few hares, and a great variety of beautiful
birds. Antelope, bustard, guinea-fowl and francolin
were encountered more rarely. Though we could
only occasionally during a halt diverge from the
line of march in pursuit of game, we managed to
keep the mess supplied with more or less palatable
meat, and sheep were generally obtainable from the
Somali herdsmen.

In reply to a letter sent on to Harrar I received
a polite communication from Ras Makunnen, in-
forming me that mules were scarce, but that he

130 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

was doing his best to collect some. Our camel
men would not go beyond Gildessa, the Abyssinian
customs station at the foot of the higher hills, which
40 miles of steep ascent separated from Harrar.
Swayne consequently rode on ahead of the caravan
to make such arrangements as might be possible.
Our camps were visited by sections of the black and
the white Esa Somalies, who performed their
pantomimic war dances and were rewarded with
presents from our stock of trade goods. From
these tribesmen we encountered nothing but friendli-
ness.

On the tenth day after leaving Zeila we reached
Gildessa, where we were saluted by the Governor
and a heterogeneous guard of honour, who fired
three rounds of ball cartridge as a salute. Here we
first came across the typical round Abyssinian
house with walls of mud or rubble, surmounted by
a high-pitched conical roof of straw thatch. The
village itself, containing some 2,000 inhabitants,
had little attraction, but the country round,
rich in springs and running water, with an opulent
vegetation, offered a grateful change after the
monotonous Somali plain. The bird life sur-
passed anything I had ever seen in brilliancy and
beauty of plumage. Not less abundant were the
beetles and insects, in which Ned Cecil took a special
interest.

Swayne' s efforts had been crowned with unex-
pected success, and by the following morning the
Governor had produced 300 donkeys and 18 hill
camels. The donkeys were small and amorous,

MEMORIES 1894^1901 131

more disposed to occupy themselves with their
private affairs than with ours, so that loading pre-
sented a difficult problem. Some repacking was
necessary, and we left a deposit of stores in the
Governor's charge for the return journey across
Somaliland. The camels were owned by Gallas,
who form the principal part of the population. But
the owners of the donkeys, which do most of the
carrying between Gildessa and Harrar, are a race
apart with a language of their own. They call
themselves R'hotta. They are placid, amiable,
physically well developed and very good looking.

The loading of our new transport occupied two
and a half hours and entailed a deplorable consump-
tion of rope. Then we began to climb through a
gorge with a wide torrent bed, leading to a succes-
sion of undulating hills. The air grew lighter
as we mounted and our spirits rose in proportion.
About 50 yards from our path a great baboon with a
mane like a lion was walking along quite unconcerned.
Behind him followed a group of smaller ones, pre-
sumably his wives, and a number of little fellows
brought up the rear. They disappeared over the
hills in the direction of the river. But presently
we saw them recross the track again about a hundred
yards behind us. These migratory tribes or families
of monkeys do great damage to the plantations of
the Galla villagers. Soon afterwards we encountered
a hailstorm of locusts. As we climbed higher and
higher up the first step in the Abyssinian mountain
system we came to the region of the candelabra
euphorbia, which is familiar in all descriptions of

132 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

the country, and the fig sycamore. On either side
high cliffs of rock or steep green slopes shut in a pass
at the head of which our camp was pitched near a
village called Belawe, on a stretch of turf above
the millet fields. Here both thermometer and
aneroid agreed in marking 5,800 feet. The ground
had been gradually rising ever since we left the sea.
The following morning we recommenced the
ascent through groves of wild olive, wild jasmine
and heliotrope, with a wonderful view looking
backwards over successive ridges to the foothills,
and the Somali plain. Then a fantastic procession
met us, the escort sent by Has Makunnen, headed by
a venerable officer of the high rank of Kanyasmach, 1
wearing a purple silk shirt and crimson cloak with a
silver-mounted shield hanging from the saddle. He
was followed by four horn-blowers blowing on long
wooden trumpets or shawms, and various officers
in coloured cloaks with silk handkerchiefs round
their heads, or more rarely the mane of a lion, the
trophy of the slayer. Behind marched a body of
soldiers wearing the white tobe, which is the universal
dress of the Abyssinian. This large oblong sheet with
its crimson border at one end only, draped over the
shoulder, seems the exact counterpart, and is per-
haps a survival of the old Roman toga. After a ball-
cartridge salute and exchanges of compliments we
learned that Has Makunnen would ride out to meet
us on the following morning, and so we pressed on
to a camping ground some ten miles east of Harrar.
Here we found awaiting us an offering of bread and
1 Commander of the Right Wing.

MEMORIES 1894-1901 133

sheep and a supply of the national drink, known as
tej, a kind of hydromel made from fermented hops
and honey. Speedy, who during his former sojourn
in the country had acquired the taste, was in his
element surrounded by the earthenware vessels,
known as gombos, in which it is kept. I drank my
measure of tej, when deference to the laws of hos-
pitality required it, but never appreciated it greatly,
and not unfrequently found the obligation difficult
to fulfil. Tej varies very much in quality according
to locality and to the care with which it is prepared.
Makunnen, who was far ahead of most of his country-
men in refinement and sensibility, offered us a really
agreeable clarified kind, rather resembling, as
Gleichen aptly suggested, sweet Madeira in taste.
But often the beverage pressed upon us was a sea-
green viscous liquid in which dead wasps or bees
and other extras floated unpleasantly. Nor did it
become more appetising when your host strained
it through the shirt which he was wearing. We
rose early after a very chilly night, and put on cere-
monial uniform. A beautiful mule had been sent
me by the Has, which I was quite unable to mount
until I discovered that the Abyssinians, owing to
their custom of wearing their curved swords on
the right, always mount horses or mules from the
off side. I never rode an animal with more perfect
action. She carried me all the way to Addis Abbaba
and back again to the coast, some 800 miles, before
we reluctantly parted company.

Leaving the camp to break up and follow later
we rode off with the ten mounted sowars of the

134 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

Aden troop and an Abyssinian escort through a
pleasant land rich with the dark green of coffee
plantations. The berry is indigenous in Ethiopia
and derives its name from the region of Kafa. We
were told that a great part of the produce found
its way to Arabia, to be reshipped as Mocha coffee.
After about two hours' ride we met the Has and
dismounted to greet him. He then said he would
precede us to the city to prepare for our reception,
and cantered off while we followed more slowly
towards the minarets and crenelated walls of an
old Arab town, on which we looked down from the
next ridge. It stands on rising ground in an amphi-
theatre of hills.

All the population were in the narrow streets to
watch our arrival, and a guard of honour was drawn
up in front of Makunnen's house. Here he received
us and offered us quarters. But as our caravan
was much too large to be accommodated within
the walls we thought it better to camp at a reason-
able distance from the town. The Has, whose
household was in charge of an Armenian and his
wife, provided an excellent luncheon, in which he
himself, being a strict observer of Lent, was unable
to take part on a Friday. We settled down about
half a mile beyond the gates, and in the afternoon
paid a visit to the genial officers of the Italian
Red Cross, who once more were so good as to send
us a present of wine. A last and final consignment
of 200 prisoners under General Albertone was due
to arrive on the day we left Harrar. Our mess tent
was prepared for the reception of the Ras, who

MEMORIES 1894-1901 135

called early the next morning, and we drank the
health of our respective sovereigns in the champagne,
over which our mess-president, having in mind its
medicinal importance, kept a rigorous guard. We
then returned his visit, taking with us the Queen's
present.

Ras Makunnen, the nephew of Menelik, was
regarded as the heir presumptive to his uncle, who
had only two daughters. He had been governor
of Harrar for some ten years, ever since the Shoans
took it and deposed the independent Emir estab-
lished there after the Egyptian evacuation in 1882.
He impressed us immediately as a considerable
personality. Rather small in stature, with delicate
hands, his brown features were pleasing and his
expression alert and intelligent. His manner was
quiet, cordial, and dignified. During the week which
circumstances compelled us to spend in his town,
and the second week through which we remained
there on our return journey, I saw him continually,
and felt that terms of real friendship had been
established. Though I was never able in after
years, when the railway to Abyssinia had been
opened, to take advantage of his warm invitation
to return and stay with him on his country estate,
he kept me in kindly memory and, when sent to
England to represent Menelik at the coronation of
King Edward, he paid a long visit to my mother
in London, and gratified her by friendly references
to her son. His own son, the present Regent of
Abyssinia, appears to be following in the footsteps
of his enlightened father.

136 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

The burning question of transport had not been
solved. We had hoped to find 300 mules awaiting
us. But the only definite assurance we could obtain
was the promise of the loan of some fifty from
Makunnen himself. As hiring promised to be very
costly we decided to buy, and orders were issued
that all available animals were to be brought in.
A Sunday intervened, and as Abyssinia is strictly
Sabbatarian, no business could be done. So we
went to church with Makunnen. Though unable
to follow the ritual, much of which is conducted in
the square enclosed holy precinct in the centre of
the circular edifice, which corresponds to the screened
sacrarium in the Coptic or Orthodox churches, we
did all that could be expected of us and duly kissed
the cross presented by the chief officiating priest. I
was greatly interested in the paintings on the panels
of the altar enclosure, which corresponds in height to
the wall of the circular church, but does not extend
up into the conical roof. Religious art, uniform
throughout Abyssinia, is Byzantine in character.
The colouring is crude, and the conception of biblical
scenes is not perhaps more elementary than that
of other primitive Christian pictures. Certain
characteristics, however, deserve mention. The
archers who shoot at St. Sebastian crouch in an
almost kneeling position, as bowmen are repre-
sented when taking aim in classic sculpture. The
virtuous and holy show the full face to the ob-
server, and the wicked as a rule the profile. The
Virgin and saints are fair-skinned, and all faces
have a much lighter complexion than that which

MEMORIES 1894-1901 137

prevails at any rate among the population of
Shoa.

Missionaries are not encouraged in Ethiopia.
There was, however, a Roman Catholic mission at
Harrar, which did a certain amount of unsectarian
and educational work. Its head, Monseigneur
Thaurin, with whom we exchanged visits, a charm-
ing grey-bearded type of the regular, had lived
twenty years in the country, and he furnished us
with much information. Apart from the repre-
sentatives of authority and some soldiers, there
were few Abyssinians in Harrar. In the bazaar
we found Indians, and a fair number of Armenians
and Greeks. We procured specimens of the goods
most in demand, and collected notes for a com-
mercial report. Otherwise Monday was disap-
pointing as only fourteen mules were secured. On
Tuesday we did better. The average price should
have been about thirty dollars, but the owners
made our need their opportunity. Once he had
acquired the numerals Pinching proved an adept
in bargaining. Our judge of horseflesh, Bingham,
had to reduce his standards, and sixty in all were
accepted. We dined with Makunnen, who promised
better results for the morrow, but Wednesday only
produced fifty. Though we reduced equipment by
leaving a further depot of stores at Harrar, and
sifted out more unnecessary material from the
gear of the Aden troop, our transport was still
below strength, and we were very short of pack
saddles. The mules provided by the Ras, which
were of excellent quality, were now loaded and sent

138 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

on to the first camp on the road. With the assist-
ance of the officer selected to accompany us to
Addis Abbaba a fair complement of mule-drivers
was secured, and early on Thursday morning
Gleichen got away with thirty men and fifty of the
best mules, carrying our tents. It was a black-
letter day for the rest of us. The remaining animals
were all pretty wild, and some of them had probably
never carried loads before. Heels were flying in
every direction, loads were bucked off, runaways
were disappearing over the horizon, and every one
was shouting and cursing in Arabic, Amharic,
Somali, or English.

Then followed the tragedy of the dhoolies. They
had with great difficulty been carried up the steep
ascent by Gadabursi porters. Pinching had now
had them rigged with shafts for mules by Harrari
carpenters. At the last moment we had bought
twelve more animals and loaded them with the
remainder of our indispensable property. Three
mules, one of them a crock, and an old horse were
left for the dhoolies. We persuaded our reluctant
medical officer to leave one behind. Then the two
able-bodied mules were with difficulty coaxed into
the shafts of the other, which was filled with melons
and cucumbers, the parting gift of the Ras. The
leader looked back over his shoulder at the strange
machine to which he was attached, and the mule
behind backed away from it. The next thing I
saw was dhooly and mules whirling round and
round down the hill-side like a catherine-wheel,
detached from its axle with flying vegetables for

MEMORIES 1894.-1901 139

sparks. The wreck collapsed somewhere in the
valley, where the frightened animals were recovered.
Dhoolies were written off. But we had only seven
drivers left for some thirty refractory mules, several
of which with their loads were already making for
the open country.

The Ras had insisted on accompanying us over
a portion of the road. But the hours passed and he
did not come. We had been working hard for
eight hours in the sun, and had a march of some ten
miles before us. So Wingate and I rode off to the
town to find him. We met him at the gate and
explained our difficulties. He undertook to pro-
vide fourteen more drivers and promised to send
on everything after us. But when he reached the
camping-ground there was still such confusion pre-
vailing with bolting mules and falling loads that I
begged him to return and leave us to organise the
tail of our scattering caravan. Always courtesy
itself he sent out officers to round up the fugitives.
So we took our leave and at length after five o'clock
in the afternoon got away fairly worn out with the
fatigues of a vexatious day. After riding through
a very pleasant land for about two hours we found
our tents pitched on a grassy slope above Lake
Haramaya, the haunt of innumerable coot, duck
and wild goose.

At no great distance from our camp was that of
two French travellers with whom we forgathered,
the Prince de Lucinge and Comte Le Gonidec. They
had accompanied Prince Henry of Orleans as far
as Harrar, but being only intent on sport had parted

140 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

company with him some weeks earlier, when he
had hurried on alone to Addis Abbaba in pursuit
of other game. From them we ascertained that
M. Lagarde had left Harrar for the capital some
two months before. It was, therefore, doubtful
whether he would still be there when we arrived.
M. Bonvalot, with some mysterious mission to
fulfil, was also some weeks ahead of us.

In a day or two our capable staff succeeded in
reducing the transport to order with or without the
assistance of our Abyssinian officer and guide, Ito
Ambascie, who met every demand with a salaam
and the invariable answer " Ishi," which signifies
immediate and zealous compliance, not necessarily
translated into action. Long association with
Ambascie in the daily routine of camp life finally
induced a friendly feeling towards a well-inten-
tioned but not very efficient mentor. We were,
however, never quite able to forgive him for a habit,
which is common to most Abyssinians of his class,
of covering his crisp hair with rancid and evil-
smelling butter, which was prevented from running
down into the eyes by a rag tied round the forehead.
This malodorous hairdressing is accounted a lesser
affliction than the parasitic alternative against which
it serves as a prophylactic. Speedy now took over
from him the duty of distributing rations among
our heterogeneous followers, and carried it out
with a strict impartiality which had been com-
promised by the predilection of Ambascie for his
own people. So long as we remained in Makunnen's
province the headmen of the districts in which our

MEMORIES 1894-1901 141

camps were pitched brought us ample provision of
food. This was in accordance with the custom of
the country, where on the main lines of communica-
tion the inhabitants are exempt from taxation on
condition that rations are furnished to travellers.

A re-examination of my diaries and photographs
vividly brings back to me the charm and beauty
of the scenery through which by successive
steps we mounted to an altitude of 8,000 feet.
The country was well watered, grass-land and
forest alternating. The wild olive was abundant,
and over our heads through the best part of one
day's march towered the giant Abyssinian zigbah
tree, used according to a local tradition, which
reveals complete disregard for problems of trans-
port, to build Solomon's temple. Sugar-cane,
upwards of 10 feet in length and 9 inches in cir-
cumference, was brought into camp. Honeysuckle,
dogrose, syringa, iris, tiger-lily, and many varieties
of fern abounded. The day temperature was hot,
but not excessively so, and at night the mercury
often sank under 40, and was recorded as low as
34. For such details, however, I must refer once
more to Gleichen's excellent book.

Reports received from Abyssinians who had
recently left Addis Abbaba led us to anticipate
that we should meet M. Lagarde descending to-
wards the coast in the beautiful Burka valley. We
prepared a modest banquet in our camp for his
reception, and induced the mess-president to unpack
some bottles of champagne. His baggage caravan
arrived, but Lagarde himself, we were informed,

142 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

had made a forced march to a cross-road, and had
there turned aside under pretext of paying a visit
to the chief of the district. We concluded that he
did not wish to meet us. The inexorable Pinching
re-packed the champagne.

After spending another week in crossing the
delectable plateau through scenery of constantly
varying charm we began to descend into the pro-
vince or region of Chercher towards the central
tropical valley of the Hawash river, a region desti-
tute of all supplies which we counted on crossing
by rapid marches. By this time our transport was
in a somewhat critical condition. Horrible sores had
developed on the backs of the mules, which were now
quite tame and subdued, while a considerable
number had broken down and were unfit to carry
loads at all. Stores for the return journey were
again left with the headmen of villages. But
additional transport was almost unprocurable, and
the problem of loading up the indispensable cases
became daily more difficult.

The Governor of Kunni, Fitaurari 1 Asfau, a
pleasant young chieftain who at the age of twenty-
two had succeeded his father, killed at the battle
of Adua, promised us everything, but could only
furnish very little. He was, however, able to secure
for us twenty Galla camels, which, though of a very
different type from the strong weight-carriers of the
Somali plain, would help us across the Hawash
valley. A short march early on the 19th of April

1 Literally a rhinoceros horn, metaphorically the leader of
the advance-guard.

MEMORIES 1894^1901 143

took us to Laga Hardim across the frontier of
Makunnen's province, the passage from which into
Shoa was not accomplished without some difficulty
owing to an objection raised by the frontier authority
to the presence of Harrari soldiers. But Gleichen,
whose whisky flask was capacious and fortunately
full, tactfully pacified the excited officer. At Laga
Hardim we rested all day and loaded up again at
nightfall for a moonlight march of five-and-twenty
miles to the Hawash river. Bingham became very
popular, having succeeded in annexing a small
supply of onions, which after our long abstention
from fresh vegetables helped to make more palat-
able the slice of cold sheep saved from the night
before for luncheon on the road, which developed
in our breast pockets a magnificent iridescence,
and was known as " rainbow mutton."

Next to the purgatorial day of our departure
from Harrar the hardest of our experiences was
probably that night march to the Hawash. We got
away about 11 p.m., some two hours after the moon
had risen, and climbed a steep ascent. Near the
crest of the pass leading to the great valley, where
the path wound narrowly round the side of a sheer
cliff, one of the Galla camels stumbled and fell over
the edge into the darkness. It was laden with
silver plate, one of the most important presents
to be conveyed to Menelik. Our rope was far
behind with the rear-guard. The Aden troopers
who were escorting the bullion knotted their long
pugries together, and with this improvised rope
Swayne, who was in front, descended the cliff into

144 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

the wilderness of thorn and bush below. But he
could find nothing. When I reached the spot I
found a note which he had left saying that he had
ridden on to reorganise the transport, but would
shortly return. Cecil and Ambascie with two Abys-
sinian soldiers then essayed the descent perilous.
Two shots rang out through the night, and a bullet
whizzed unpleasantly near my head. Ambascie re-
appearing described how two lions were preparing
to negotiate the dead camel when he had fired to
scare them away. This I have no doubt was an
outrageous invention. But he had succeeded in
retrieving one or two parcels. Swayne returned in
due course and went down the cliff once more, while
the rest of the caravan pressed on through the
night. With patience and daylight to assist him
our energetic transport officer succeeded in recover-
ing everything, and happily the stout cases con-
taining the silver had resisted the shock of the fall.
Morning and a pleasant little stream running
under great mimosas on a level stretch tempted us
sorely to halt and camp after twenty miles of rough
riding and a difficult descent in the dark, for it
promised to be tropically hot in the wide valley
below. But we resisted. Here we encountered
some huge snakes the species of which our naturalist
was unable to identify. The Hawash, a sight of
which we anticipated in every depression, seemed
as elusive as a mirage, and no indication of a river-
bed appeared in the scorched brown grass region
which stretched eastward for miles to the foot of
the lofty volcanic range of Fantalle on the farther

MEMORIES 1894-1901 145

side. At last quite suddenly, after some five miles
of weary going over coarse dry tufted grass, we
found ourselves on the edge of a deep ravine, per-
haps here nearly half a mile in width, at the bottom
of which some hundreds of feet below us ran the
river. A few miles away where the ravine narrows
there is an iron bridge, constructed in 1894 by French
engineers with material brought with infinite diffi-
culty from Jibuti. But its single layer of plank
flooring is only strong enough for light traffic, and,
to spare strain as much as possible, it is only used
in the rainy season when the river is in flood. During
the rest of the year it is kept closed by a stout thorn
zareeba. We had to ford the stream, which was
some hundreds of yards wide and running strong
with water up to the girths of the mules. Happily
all crossed in safety, though it was not till after
midday that the last stragglers of the caravan and
Swayne with his rescue party came into the camp
which Gleichen had prepared for us on the farther
side of the ravine. It is strange that a river of such
dimensions as the Hawash never finds the sea, but
disappears in the desert lands to the north-east.

The thermometer registered 107 in the shade.
The coarse yellow grass and a few dwarf mimosas
offered poor forage for our exhausted animals. But
we were all tired out after our long night march,
and it was necessary to make a halt in this un-
inviting sun-bleached spot. So we decided on
another nocturnal march after one long night and a
short day in camp. We had anticipated some big-
game shooting in the plain, where zebra, elephant

146 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

and lion were reported to be abundant a day's
march to the right or left of the track. But many
caravans had recently been passing up and down,
and we could not afford time to deviate far from the
track. On our return journey we sighted ostriches
there, and only missed securing some by an unlucky
manoeuvre. Hyenas and jackals were always with
us, and there were game birds and dik-dik to vary
the monotony of tinned rations. A mail sent after
us from the coast and newspapers reached us as a
pleasant surprise. The messenger, who was going
on to Addis Abbaba, took a letter for Menelik, in
which I announced to him the approximate date
of our arrival. In the afternoon we filled our water
tins and bottles and started on another march of
28 miles.

The Gallas were burning the dry grass in the
plain with a view to future cultivation, and as night
fell the travelling blaze diffused an eerie light. The
wind, which luckily shifted at an opportune moment,
had brought the conflagration unpleasantly near
our line of march. In two or three hours we reached
the western edge of the plain and began to ascend
the lower slopes of Fantalle, which were difficult to
negotiate until the waning moon appeared. At
daybreak camp was pitched near a pleasant river
with wooded banks, but though the burning Hawash
valley was behind us the thermometer still marked
110 in our tents.

During the next three or four days we mounted
step by step towards the high plateau of Shoa
through cultivated areas with many villages, and

MEMORIES 1894r-1901 147

then across a region of rolling prairie where no fuel
but desiccated cow-dung was obtainable, and at
last we found ourselves within a few hours' march
of Addis Abbaba.

Uncertain whether my former letter had ever
reached its destination I sent a second one to Menelik
to announce our arrival. The result was a visit
from M. Ilg, the Emperor's Swiss adviser and
counsellor of State, who rode out to meet us in a
frock coat. My two letters had arrived simul-
taneously on the morning of that day, and we had
travelled nearly as fast as the postal messenger.
Menelik regretted that the next day he had to attend
a great religious festival and could not therefore
receive us with due form, but if we cared to pro-
ceed at once we should find quarters in the com-
pound of the now extinct Compagnie Franco-
Africaine, recently occupied by Lagarde, and the
ceremonial reception could take place on the follow-
ing morning. We welcomed this suggestion and
the prospect of settling down to unpack and refit,
as we had now been on the road for more than five
weeks.

No one appeared to meet us on the morrow as we
approached what looked from a certain distance
like a vast camp with numbers of straw- or grass-
roofed huts standing in hedged compounds. But
our Abyssinians knew the quarters assigned to us,
where we found tents still in process of erection,
from which it became clear that we had arrived
earlier than had been anticipated. Before long,
however, M. Ilg arrived with the Gerasmach Joseph,

148 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

the chief interpreter, an intelligent and agreeable
Shoan who had been to Europe and could speak
French. If our reception had seemed inadequate
the amplest amends were offered, and soon after-
wards a procession arrived from the royal enclosure
bringing food of all kinds and abundance of fresh
vegetables.

Our baggage mules, which were in a deplorable
condition from long marches, short commons, and
back-sores, were distributed among the surround-
ing villages, where forage was abundant, and we
only retained our riding mules and the horses
within the compound. The latter contained a big
circular hut some 35 feet in diameter which was to
serve for our mess. A smaller two-roomed house was
occupied by Wingate and myself, while the rest of
the party remained in their tents.

Addi3 Abbaba lies 8,000 feet above sea-level in
an undulating plain, covered with coarse grass and
intersected by small gullies and ravines, under the
Entotto mountains, which rise some 1,500 feet
above the town to the north. Other more distant
ranges to the south, south-east and west form a
ring around the prairie plateau, which reminded
me not a little of the Roman Campagna with its
rolling expanse of grass bounded by the Alban, the
Sabine and the Ciminian hills. The Shoan capital
has been successively moved from Ankober to
Entotto and from Entotto to its present site, as
the neighbouring forests were cut down and the
timber supplies exhausted. The ever-increasing
distance which separates the present settlement from

MEMORIES 1894-1901 U9

the forests under Mt. Managasha will no doubt
eventually entail another move. In the centre
of an agglomeration of compounds distributed
over a very wide area, on a slight elevation domin-
ating the plain, is the royal enclosure known as the
G6bi, and round it are grouped the establishments
of the chief officers of the country. The capital
gives the impression of an ancient semi-civilisation
islanded in the midst of savage Africa.

Our official reception took place on the following
day. Very early in the morning there arrived in
camp a magnificently accoutred mule of stately
proportions for me to ride. An escort of several
thousand soldiers in clean white tobes, accompanied
by musicians and marshalled by officers in brilliantly
coloured silk shirts, followed in charge of the Lord
Chief Justice, whose official title literally rendered
into English is the " Breath of the King." The
Breath was a delightful old gentleman of whom I
subsequently saw a good deal. Over a purple silk
shirt and white trousers he wore a black cloak, and
his head was overshadowed by an enormous black
felt hat. We were all in full dress, and evidently
the effect produced on the spectators by Cecil as a
Grenadier, and Bingham with the cuirass and
helmet of the 1st Life Guards, was profound. We
took with us the Jemadar and eight sowars of the
Aden troop in their effective Indian uniform. The
scene was brilliant under a cloudless sky. A mile
or two separated our quarters from the palace, which
was surrounded by a high stockade. As we ap-
proached we could hear the weird rhythmic roll of

150 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

the Emperor's famous drums, and entering the gate
we saw the negro drummers in striped red-and-white
shirts with high-crowned red caps sitting on the
ground beside their big kettledrums. The audience-
hall was surrounded by troops. Some ten thousand
had been summoned to the capital for the occasion.

We were introduced into a big oblong reception-
chamber, constructed like all Abyssinian houses of
rubble with a remarkable thatched roof of very
wide span. At the far end the Emperor was sitting
under a canopy in Turkish fashion, on a divan raised
upon a dais. He wore a purple silk cloak, on which
were conspicuous the stars of the Legion of Honour
and of the order of St. Catherine of Russia.

Menelik, whose swarthy pit-marked face was
full of character and quiet power, smiled very
cordially as he held out his hand, studying my
features with steady eyes while the mission took
their seats on a row of chairs disposed in front of
the divan. Through Gerasmach Joseph, who spoke
in French, he bade us welcome, and then the guns
without thundered a salute, in acknowledgment of
which we rose to our feet. Menelik then begged us
once more to be seated, and I addressed him in
English, which was rendered into Amharic, sentence
by sentence, by Waldo Haimanaut. I told him that
the Queen had taken the occasion of the sixtieth
anniversary of her auspicious reign to despatch a
special mission to His Majesty, bringing a message
of friendship, a solemn assurance of peaceful in-
tentions, and the expression of a desire to maintain
cordial relations between our respective countries.

MEMORIES 1894-1901 151

Then, after delivering the Queen's letter with another
from the Khedive and a third from the Coptic
Patriarch in Egypt, I presented all the members of
the mission. Menelik enquired after the health
of the Queen and asked intelligent questions re-
garding affairs in Europe.

During these proceedings I had been able to take
in certain details of the picturesque scene. There
were some fifteen Europeans present standing to
the right of the divan. These included Prince
Henry of Orleans, with Vicomte de Poncins and
M. Mourichon, M. Bonvalot, Colonel Leontieff with
some Cossack non-commissioned officers, and of
course M. Ilg. On the left were massed the
Princes, Rases, and principal officers at the time
in Addis Abbaba, gorgeously costumed. Seated
on the ground at the Emperor's feet as honourable
prisoners were Ras Mangasha, son of King Theodore
against whom we had fought in 1867, and Ras
Selassie, who had been implicated in a rebellion
when Governor of the province of Amhara. The
minor officers of the empire and the capital formed
a background of brilliant colour behind us. Menelik
announced that he would fix a date for a private
interview shortly and meanwhile invited us to attend
the ceremony of consecration of a new church dedi-
cated to St. George at which he would be present
on the following morning.

Prince Henry in his letters to the New York
Herald, which I read later in England, described the
audience as short, correct, and cold. Others of
his countrymen, however, received a different im-

152 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

pression. In an interview with M. Jean Hess,
published in the Figaro some months afterwards,
M. Bonvalot said that the British Mission to
Abyssinia had revealed to him the real superiority
of method which had enabled Great Britain to
become a great colonial nation, with other compli-
mentary expressions which it is unnecessary to
repeat. The reports sent to the French Press
regarding our proceedings and depreciatory messages
from the Havas Agency formed interesting reading
on our return. From these also we learned for the
first time of a violent dispute which arose between
M. Bonvalot and Prince Henry, who embraced a
quarrel of his travelling companion M. de Poncins.
Of all the comments in the French Press the most
to the point was outlined in a series of drawings
entitled "Chez Menelick" by Caran d'Ache, re-
flecting the perplexity created in the mind of the
Negus by the succession of rival French missions.
In the first the Monarch was shown seated on his
throne with a square box by his side, receiving a
young man, evidently Prince Henry, who brought
offerings which included Tout Paris and the Alman-
ack de Goiha and pointed at a flag with the words,
" Sire, voild le drapeau de la France ! " The second
picture showed a group of black-bearded officials
in pith-helmets bearing the Code Penal and other
volumes, who also presented the Tricolor with the
announcement, " Sire, Voild le drapeau de la
Republique, le seule qui porte le timbre de V Adminis-
tration." Menelik with a puzzled face says, " Com-
ment faire — qui me tirera d'embarras ? " And in the

MEMORIES 1894-1901 153

third picture the lid of the square case by the throne
springs open and up comes John Bull as a Jack-in-
the-box with the British flag, exclaiming, " Moa,
Sire/"

We did not suppose that our arrival was particu-
larly welcome to Prince Henry, but with Wingate
and Gleichen I paid a visit to his modest camp in
the afternoon, which he in due course returned. He
was good enough to describe us in the Herald as
" very correct, well-brought-up, and amiable."

The Coptic Bishop, Abouna Mathios, was delighted
to see visitors who could give him news of his native
land of Egypt. In his house we found another
Bishop, Abouna Petros, who had presided over the
Abyssinian Church in the reign of King John.
Pinching became very intimate with the benevolent
Abouna, who gave us much valuable information.
We also called upon Madame Ilg, who had had the
pluck to venture on the long journey from Switzer-
land shortly before our arrival, and was now com-
fortably established in the house which Menelik
had had built for his counsellor. The Lord Chief
Justice also received me more than once, and was
always embarrassingly hospitable. It is not easy
between meals to swallow blocks of highly-peppered
meat extracted from the cooking-pot with her
fingers by a black handmaiden.

Among the many minor services rendered to an
unappreciative country, one for which due credit
is not always given, lies in the obligation to swallow
unpalatable food and drink in compliance with the
laws of hospitality. But the " Breath " at any rate

154 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

always produced a powerful, but not unpleasant,
alcohol which served to mitigate any inopportune
physical protest.

On the day following the dedication of the church
we returned to the Gebi to present our offerings, in
many of which the monarch took evident delight.
None pleased him better than the mounted skins,
which he placed by his side on the dais, summoning
a number of his suite, who gazed almost with con-
sternation at the monarch sitting between the open
jaws of a tiger and a polar bear. He was delighted
to receive a reproduction of one of the illuminated
Ethiopic manuscripts from Magdala now in the
British Museum, which the generosity of Lady
Meux had enabled Sir Wallis Budge to publish.
Other countries, said the Negus, had treated him
like a child and sent him musical boxes, but we had
brought offerings of real value and service.

We were then conducted to the apartments of
the Empress Taitu to present the Queen's gifts. We
found her in a room strewn with brilliantly coloured
carpets sitting like Menelik on a dais under a canopy.
She was partly veiled, but not sufficiently so to
prevent our seeing a quick and keen eye and a
skin very much fairer than that of her husband.
She was a daughter of the Ras of Gondar, where
the people are said to have lighter complexions
than in any other region of Abyssinia. The ex-
tremities were small and delicate. A black silk
cloak over garments of white disguised the amplitude
of her figure. She was said to be devoted to her
garden, and the presence of a number of pet dogs

MEMORIES 1894-1901 155

suggested an amiable character. This remarkable
lady had been famed for great beauty in her youth,
and she exercised a strong influence over her hus-
band. At that time she was reported to be about
forty years old. When she went abroad she was
always closely veiled, and custom prescribed that
the public should disappear on the approach of her
mule. Our reception was regarded as an exceptional
compliment. She took the greatest interest in any
details with which we could supply her regarding
the life and activities of our sovereign, whose kind
thought for herself in the Jubilee year Taitu ac-
knowledged with gratitude.

The life of Taitu had been full of varied experi-
ences. After her third marriage had been dissolved
she retired for a time into a convent. But she was
evidently not intended for claustral seclusion, and
she emerged to contract yet a fourth marriage before
she became Menelik's Queen. Divorce or the
annulment of marriage evidently presented no
serious obstacles in Abyssinia, where, moreover,
the relations between the sexes are, as we were
informed by those who knew the country well,
extremely lax. A considerable number of the
population in fact remain up to a certain age under
a sort of minor excommunication in consequence
of the irregularity of their intercourse. When the
fever in the blood declines, and they elect to settle
down permanently with the companion of their
household they are once more received into com-
munion.

Before proceeding to narrate the history of my

156 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

negotiations and conversations with the Negus during
a long series of meetings I will conclude the present
chapter with a few recollections of Abyssinia in
1897.

On the first Thursday after our arrival we were
invited to lunch at the Gebi. Thursdays were
generally devoted to the entertainment of the chief
officers and officials at a midday banquet. For us a
table was prepared in European fashion and, beyond
the fact that our meal was supplemented by some
excellent Burgundy and a tej of superlative quality,
it calls for no special comment. Interest centres
rather on the Ethiopian viands. Menelik was
served upon his divan. The principal Rases and
highest officers of State had their meal at the same
time. The Emperor sent us portions to taste of the
highly peppered pilaus which were prepared for
himself. These with quantities of meat seasoned
with red pepper seemed to be the universal food.
The bread is a damp grey-coloured round chupatty,
nearly half an inch thick and about the size of a
large plate, in lieu of which it is also used. A pile of
such bread is set before each guest, together with a
flagon or gombo of tej covered with a square of silk.
The pilau was well cooked, but so hot with red pepper
that our sensitive palates were on fire after a few
mouthfuls. We were surprised on the conclusion
of our repast at being invited by Menelik to smoke.
His predecessor, the fanatical King John, had for-
bidden his people tobacco in any form, and a
breach of his ukase was punished by cutting off
the lips.

MEMORIES 1894r-1901 157

Curtains which had screened off the greater por-
tion of the audience hall were now drawn back, and
the senior officers were admitted, seated in rows
and served. When these had feasted and retired
other groups were successively admitted. Some
two thousand in all, we were informed, would enjoy
this hospitality. But we did not remain till the
end of the banquet. So long as I was there I did
not see that any raw meat, which is a favourite food
with the people, was offered.

In conversation after lunch Menelik enquired
whether our medicine chest contained any remedies
recently discovered by science. Pinching explained
that he had a new antidote for snake-bites, but that
we had happily had no occasion to use it. The
Negus said that in his country a man who was bitten
by a snake would come to him to be touched, or if
unable to travel would obtain the touch by proxy
through a friend. The man thus touched frequently
recovered. How could this be accounted for ?
Pinching endeavoured to make clear to him the
influence of suggestion and the curative effect of
faith. Menelik listened with great interest and said
he supposed that must be the real explanation.

The members of the mission rapidly made acquaint-
ance with the few Europeans and the more numerous
Asiatics in Addis Abbaba. The Russian Leontieff,
on whom I called with Wingate, was a handsome
tall fair-bearded adventurer of plausible address.
He was described as Count Leontieff, having
apparently received that title, hitherto unknown
in Ethiopia, from Menelik, who had also, we were

158 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

amused to hear, exalted M. Lagarde to the rank of
Duke of Entotto ! Discussing with Leontieff the
experiences of a fellow countryman of his in big-
game shooting, I learned from him that the Abys-
sinians were on the Sobat River, which runs into
the Nile south of Fashoda. Leontieff denied the
truth of the current rumour that he had taken part
in, and been wounded at, the battle of Adua, at
which, however, he said that M. Clochette had been
present. He himself had only joined the Emperor
shortly after the battle. He confirmed what we
had learned from Italian prisoners that their position
had for a time been desperate because their captors
had no food to give them. The Abyssinians had
eaten all the neighbouring country bare, and they
could not have held out in their actual position
for another week if Baratieri had only refrained
from attacking them. This was confirmed by in-
formation from other sources.

The prisoners with whom I had talked on the
road were indeed very uncomplaining. They ad-
mitted that once the terrible hunger march was over
and they had been billeted among the villages the
Abyssinians gave them what they had for them-
selves, little enough though it was. Menelik, who
was anxious to be regarded as a civilised ruler, had
after Adua issued a proclamation to the effect that
if disputes arose between the Italian prisoners and
his people, the case would not be tried but the
Abyssinians would always be regarded as in the
wrong. There had been unpleasant whispers of
mutilation in Europe. From such evidence as I

MEMORIES 1894-1901 159

could obtain some authentic cases of mutilation of
the living had no doubt occurred, but they were
traceable to the half -savage allies or subjects of
Ethiopia.

It was from Asiatic merchants or craftsmen, and
especially from a friendly Afghan who came from
Peshawar, that we learned most. He had been
seriously ill and was profoundly grateful for the
relief and attention which he received from Pinching.
A few French merchants who had found their way
up were also cordial to fellow-Europeans. They
were all much depressed by the unfavourable pro-
spect of business and their views were in pronounced
contrast with the exuberant articles on the re-
sources of the country which had appeared in the
Paris Press, inspired no doubt by the pro-
moters of the project for a railway from Jibuti
to Shoa. By comparing and co-ordinating various
statements we were able to arrive at certain con-
clusions.

The most important fact established was that
M. Clochette, who was to lead a relief expedition
to the Nile with supplies and to join hands with
Captain Marchand coming from the west, had left
Addis Abbaba some weeks before we arrived, and
was organizing his caravan under Mt. Managasha,
two or three hours' march distant. He had with
him two French sous-officiers who had been brought
up by Lagarde and some 200 Abyssinians. It was
stated that he was taking 200,000 rounds of ammu-
nition. With Bonvalot, who had been present at
our reception, we never made touch. He had

160 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

left immediately afterwards for Clochette's camp.

We also ascertained that the Khalifa had sent a
mission to Menelik. The eight members of which
it was composed had been lodged in the compound
of the Coptic Abouna and were really treated like
prisoners. No one but the Negus himself had any
communication with them. There had been a
rumour, of which no definite confirmation could
be obtained, that they had offered him Metemmeh
in return for his goodwill and support. The Bishop
informed us that Menelik had had little to say to
the Dervish envoys and had advised them not many
days after their arrival to return to their own
country.

The Abyssinians were well armed. The Em-
peror had adhered to the Brussels Act, which
allowed him as sovereign to import arms for his own
use. He had thus established a sort of monopoly
which, as a disenchanted French merchant com-
plained to us, destroyed the business of the petty
trader. The facility with which the Abyssinians
had been armed under a liberal interpretation of
the Brussels Act had made them a formidable
factor in Africa. But they were dependent on
imported ammunition which, stored, together with
the royal treasure, in caves in the mountains of
Ankober, suffered from the damp. An attempt to
establish a local cartridge factory had failed. The
Gallas who were employed there always broke the
moulds.

The merchants told us that since Adua the
prestige of Europeans had greatly diminished.

MEMORIES 1894-1901 161

Before that time it had been a tradition with the
Abyssinians to accord an European the honours
due to one of their own generals. But now their
heads were much swollen and they believed them-
selves to be the elect of nations.

CHAPTER V
1897

Negotiations with Menelik. Abyssinian ambitions on the Nile.
The festival of St. Raguel. Ritual dance of the priests.
Linguistic difficulties. A treaty agreed upon. Final con-
versation. Relations of confidence established. Preparations
for departure from Addis Abbaba. Incidents of the return
journey. Spectacular demonstration on our departure. Harrar
again. Negotiations with Makunnen. Harrington. Carllnger.
Homewards. The last day of Queen Victoria's Jubilee. Visit
to Windsor. Lord Salisbury and the situation in the Equatorial
Provinces. Capture of Abou Hamed.

The remarkable man who had directed the des-
tinies of Ethiopia at a critical moment was now
known to be a considerable factor in African affairs,
but he was probably regarded in Europe as little
more than an exceptionally enlightened savage,
while the real personality of one so remote, if it
occurred to anyone to consider it, had certainly not
engaged general attention. During the many inter-
views which I had with him I formed a high opinion
both of his intelligence and of his character, with
the human side of which, after making due allow-
ance for all the differences of circumstance and
surrounding, I was very favourably impressed. His
manner was dignified and at the same time cordially
unreserved. He made no pretence of understanding

162

SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC MEMORIES 163

things which were outside his own experience and
wasted no time on phrases. His energy was aston-
ishing. By rising before dawn and beginning his
day with prayers in chapel at 6 a.m. he made time
to attend personally to every detail of administration
in a country constituted of many heterogeneous
elements. Accessible to all his subjects from the
highest to the lowest he had succeeded in winning
universal regard and affection. As little or nothing
has been written regarding Menelik in intimacy I
propose to record somewhat fully the purport of
our conversations, which reveal him in a sympathetic
light. To most of our meetings, which continued
with intervals for over a fortnight, Wingate accom-
panied me, and Swayne was present during the
discussion of the Somali frontier.

At the first private interview, which took place
in a small pavilion in the Gebi, we dealt only in
generalities, but the ground was prepared for future
exchanges of views and a pleasant relation was
established. Waldo Haimanaut interpreted on my
behalf. M. Ilg came in after a while and remained,
but he took no part in the conversation. Menelik
at once broke the ice by saying : "I was glad when I
saw your face at our first meeting, because there
was no anger in it." I replied that there was no
reason for anger, nor had we anything to conceal
from him. We only desired to regulate our eastern
frontier, to safeguard our commercial interests and,
on behalf of Egypt, to come to some territorial under-
standing.

When I reminded him that by Admiral Hewett's

164 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

treaty with King John, Ethiopia was bound to refer
to the British Government and to no one else all
disputes with Egypt, the Negus surprised me by
saying that he thought that treaty had been upset
by our " bringing in " the Italians between our-
selves and him, and I enquired what he had in his
mind. He replied that we had brought Italy to
Massawah. Such a suggestion had no doubt been
sedulously fostered in Abyssinia by influences inimical
to Great Britain. I explained that the occupation
of Massawah had been the act of an independent
European nation for which we could be in no way
held responsible. Egypt was not at that time in
a position to contest the reversion, nor were we
entitled to raise opposition. The treaty which
had been concluded with ourselves was not vitiated
by the action of Italy. Ethiopia was still in pos-
session of the Boghos territory which she had
occupied under its provisions, and we must adhere
to our claim to settle any disputes or issues arising
between his country and Egypt. We had accepted
the text of the treaty of Ucciali, negotiated by him
with the representative of Italy, in the form in
which it had been notified to my Government, and
it had only recently become known to us that the
Italian version was regarded in Ethiopia as not
correctly interpreting the Amharic. Believing the
text with which we had been furnished to be correct
we had caused a communication regarding our
frontier in Somaliland to be conveyed to him through
the Italian Government, which we understood to
be, by the terms of that treaty, the proper channel.

MEMORIES 1894^-1901 165

Thereafter we had considered the frontier question
to be definitively settled. Menelik rather discon-
certed me by saying that no such communication
had ever reached him.

In regard to commerce I explained that for the
present all we required was a guarantee of treat-
ment equal to that of the most favoured nation.
He assured me this would present no difficulty.
As however the event proved, perhaps when other
influences had been brought to bear on him, it was
by no means an easy matter to arrange. For the
rest, he genially observed we would settle every-
thing we could settle, and postpone what we could
not. He would duly study the boundary questions.
On my asking him whether there were any further
explanations which I could offer regarding matters
which might have been misunderstood in the past,
he said he saw no use in discussing the past and
only cared now about the future. Then looking at
me with a very cordial smile he repeated his former
words, expressing satisfaction that there was no
anger in my face, and added that he had no doubt
we should quickly agree. So after giving him an
assurance of our peaceful intentions on the west,
I took my leave feeling that we had made a fair
beginning.

A day or two passed before I saw him again, and
then, equipped with the information which we had
meanwhile obtained, I asked him how he interpreted
his obligations under the Brussels Act. Menelik
assumed that I was referring to the slave trade, and
said he had taken every measure in his power to put

166 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

it down, adding, " My people have hard heads, leave
me to deal with them. I know what to do." The
punishments which he inflicted were indeed drastic,
if our information was correct ; for slave raiding
or trading amputation of the foot, for mutilation
death. I told him that my question for the moment
was rather inspired by anxiety to know whether he
realised that his signature involved a solemn obliga-
tion to prevent the passage of arms and ammunition
to regions where the slave-trade prevailed, such as
the Soudan. He replied that he thoroughly under-
stood this. Some time before he had discovered
that merchants were conveying arms across his
dominions, and he had given the frontier Governors
the strictest orders to stop their passage. The
Dervishes were moreover just as much his enemies
as they were ours. I suggested that vigilance was
equally necessary in the south-west of Ethiopia and
casually observed that I had heard of large consign-
ments of ammunition going westwards with M.
Clochette. For the moment it seemed more oppor-
tune merely to drop a hint that his movements were
known to me. Menelik said the expedition in
question was only a sporting one and that supervision
would be maintained over the arms and ammunition.
Like Has Makunnen the Emperor expressed his
failure to understand our refusal to allow the passage
of arms through Zeila. I therefore explained to
him the Anglo-French agreement of February, 1888,
adding that if the French Government did not
consider that its terms precluded them from accord-
ing the facilities authorised by the Brussels Act,

MEMORIES 1894^1901 167

there was no reason why we should not adopt the
same attitude, on receiving his personal assurance
that such arms or ammunition were for the State
service or for himself. He said that that was all
he could ask for. Meanwhile I pointed out that
he was really under considerable obligations to us
for having closed the door at Zeila, as none of the
tribes with whom he was at war had been able to
obtain supplies. He replied, " You have acted as
honourable men."

We then approached the question of our claims
in Somaliland, of which he professed to have been
kept in ignorance. M. Ilg would call in the after-
noon with maps showing the frontier which had
been adopted with the coterminous French colony.
I was able to offer him free entry at Zeila for all
goods destined for his own personal use, and he asked
me to draft a clause setting forth what we wished
to secure in the way of most favoured nation treat-
ment. As regards the frontier with Egypt, and in
fact the boundaries of Ethiopia generally, it now
appeared that a circular letter had been addressed
to the powers which I had never seen, putting for-
ward the most extensive claims to a dominion not
only covering nearly half of our Somali Protectorate,
but also extending westward to the Nile. It claimed
to reconstitute the ancient limits of Ethiopia. It
was clear that on both sides we had been acting in
the dark, and we agreed that the only sound course
would be to begin afresh on the basis of the existing
situation, and by reasonable mutual concessions to
come to some understanding.

168 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

From M. Ilg I learned that the various border
governors were engaged in rapidly extending Abys-
sinian occupation in many directions. Menelik
himself had made it clear that his ambition embraced
a portion of the Nile. It became evident to me
that the more prudent course would be to postpone
all question of delimitation on the western side
until after we had reached Khartoum and our
reoccupation of the old Egyptian provinces on the
river had become an accomplished fact. I gathered
from Ilg that though the Emperor assembled coun-
cils of Rases to consider grave issues he acted as
his own Minister and allowed no one to interfere in
public matters. As regards the treaty with Italy
Menelik had agreed to a facultative discretion to
use that country as an intermediary in foreign
affairs. In the Italian text the clause had been
interpreted as a binding obligation to do so, and he
had first become aware of the discrepancy through
a letter from the British Government requesting
him, since he had undertaken to place his foreign
relations in the hands of Italy, to communicate
with us through that Government. He was very
indignant, though he would in practice have been
quite ready to avail himself of the good offices of
the Italian Government if they would have with-
drawn an interpretation which he maintained he
had never accepted, and which, being tantamount
to a Protectorate, placed him in a humiliating
position. The refusal to do so had made war inevit-
able.

It would fill too many pages to recount all the

MEMORIES 1894^1901 169

vicissitudes of our long discussions. He expressed
himself as disappointed when I said that we could
not go into the question of the boundaries of ancient
Ethiopia, nor could we withdraw our protection
from certain Somali tribes in well-defined areas who
had grown accustomed to our rule. He said that
he did not understand maps and felt unable to deal
with the matter without the advice of Ras Makunnen,
for whom he proposed to send. To this I could
not agree, as it would entail our remaining on into
the period of the great rains, and I was responsible
for the health of the mission. In the end it was
arranged that I should settle these matters directly
with Ras Makunnen on the way home. He would
accept whatever his nephew agreed to, and notes
could be subsequently exchanged confirming the
settlement. I urged him not to be too grasping in
his instructions to Harrar. He admitted that what
I had told him threw a new light on a subject
of which he knew but little. It became clear that
apparent aggressions on the frontier which had a
short time previously threatened to lead to a very
disagreeable incident had been made rather through
ignorance than deliberately. Menelik, with whom I
was now on the friendliest terms, struck me as quite
straightforward and anxious for a solution.

Our daily discussions were interrupted by a high
ecclesiastical festival in honour of the archangel
St. Raguel, which took place at a church on a ridge
of the Entotto mountains near the ancient but
now abandoned capital. It necessitated an early
start at six in the morning and a climb to an alti-

170 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

tude of 10,000 feet. The Negus had already arrived
before we reached the octagonal church, at which
the Bishop Mathios conducted the ceremonies.
The real interest began when we adjourned to a
wooden balcony outside, where the Negus took up
his position under a big red umbrella of State. The
Bishop stood beside him. We were the only other
guests invited to join him on the balcony. In a
hollow square formed by the deacons and acolytes
on the area in front of the church we witnessed the
ritual dance of the priests, which commemorates
the dance of David before the Ark of the Covenant.
The assistants chanted in the meanwhile to the
accompaniment of three big silver drums and the
clang of the tambourine discs on the bars of the
systrum. This instrument, like the tobe or toga,
would appear to be another survival in Abyssinia
of ancient tradition inherited from Egypt. It
precisely resembles the systrum with which we are
familiar in statues or on reliefs of Apollo and the
Muses. When the dance ended Menelik, request-
ing us to follow, marched three times round the
wooden gallery acclaimed by the spectators. Then
the soldiers who lined all the surrounding ridges,
numbering, we were told, 15,000, fired a feu de joie,
which, starting with those nearest the church, ran
along the mountain-crest for the best part of a mile
in either direction. Ball cartridge was used, and a
hail of bullets distributed itself over the neighbour-
ing ranges.

Then this vast body of men, with the agility of
goats, climbed down the steep slopes, dropping from

MEMORIES 189^1901 171

rock to rock, and formed up again in the plain
below. We also descended as rapidly as possible
by the footpath and, dismounting, drew up in a line
to salute the Emperor when he rode past, preceded
by his scarlet-clad kettle-drummers on mules. He
appeared much gratified and, turning aside, begged
me to mount and ride between him and his son-in-
law, Ras Mikhail, the king or governor of the Wollo
Gallas, who had arrived during the ceremony. The
procession formed once more and we proceeded
across the plain to the Gebi. It was evident that
Menelik had sought on this ceremonious occasion to
do special honour to the British Mission.

By this time I had drafted a form of treaty with
Ethiopia. It was brought back to me with certain
modifications which I could not accept. I there-
fore returned to the Gebi and after some discussion
concluded that our divergencies of view were not
insuperable. Menelik argued that having signed
the Brussels Act there was no need for him to engage
himself by Treaty to refrain from supplying arms
to the Dervishes. Eventually, however, he gave
way on this point. He added that, though it might
not be opportune at the moment for him to attack
them, he could never be at peace with a people
who had killed a King, who had defiled churches
and carried off precious relics. He even hinted at
possible common action against them in the future.
In view, however, of his evident ambitions in the
Nile area I did not encourage him to make any
definite offer.

He appeared to apprehend that a most-favoured-

172 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

nation clause would preclude him from granting
concessions in return for services rendered. It
might suit him, he said, to remit a portion of the
taxes due from a merchant who had carried out his
orders with great rapidity. Was he to be denied
such liberty of action ? I succeeded, however, at
last in overcoming his mistrust, explaining that
orders given on his own personal account would
not be affected. We were only considering the
general imports of the country. He had evidently
no conceptions of economic development or any
desire to promote it, nor did he seem anxious to
open up the country to European penetration.
The predatory habits of his people were opposed to
progress, for which the necessary elements of stability
did not exist. The forecast which I then formed,
that even with a railway from the coast Abyssinia
would long remain inhospitable to enterprise, has
been fully justified by experience.

Infinite patience was required to make him
understand the forms of official verbiage. The
Amharic language expresses itself in short, positive,
staccato sentences, and he could not understand the
use of the future or the conditional tense in treaty
provisions. Ever since the disagreement over the
text of the Treaty of Ucciali he had remained
suspicious of the pitfalls which translation into
a European language presented. As the syntax of
a conditional sentence could not be understood by
him we had to eliminate all " shalls " and " wills "
and substitute the present tense. I told him that
though he compelled me to be ungrammatical I

MEMORIES 1894-1901 173

would, to please him, submit. Finally the question
arose of the language in which our treaty should
be drawn up. No Abyssinian, he said, understood
English well enough to control the text. Would I
agree to sign a French and an Amharic version ? I
said if he required an Amharic text I must insist
on an English one which we should regard as bind-
ing. A threatened impasse was overcome by my
suggesting an exchange of notes containing a French
translation which would be accepted by both parties
as a reference in case of any divergence of view as
to the interpretation of the English or Amharic.
Nothing therefore then remained but to prepare the
final texts and to make a translation into French.

All our discussions were pleasant and conducted
in a spirit of cordiality. But the bald narrative
can convey little idea of the patience demanded to
bring to a conclusion a negotiation which would
have been a simple matter to settle with any one
familiar with conventional forms and Western
methods. Fortunately we had early established a
friendly relation of mutual confidence, and I ended
by feeling a great respect for the strong man of
Ethiopia, who made a genuine effort to understand
the position and overcome his mistrust of his own
inexperience.

When I had received his assurance that all might
now be regarded as settled on the lines laid down, I
informed him that I had been charged to convey to
him the Grand Cross of the Order of St. Michael
and St. George. A feeling of delicacy had not
allowed me to refer to this until after our discussions

174 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

had been concluded. He was greatly pleased by
this attention, the more so when his anxiety to know
whether it was the highest class of the Order had
been satisfied.

I then told Menelik that now that our formal
business had been concluded I was anxious to have
some private conversation with him alone through
my own interpreter. On his assenting we discussed
at length, and with perfect frankness, certain African
problems which were of interest to his country and
came to an understanding on some questions which
were also at that time of particular importance to
ourselves. Although the matters dealt with at
this concluding interview belong to past history and
can no longer affect present or future issues, I do
not feel at liberty to disclose their nature here, and
I only refer to it because the discussion revealed
that Menelik was a man of quick and keen intelli-
gence capable of appreciating political situations
with a clearness of apprehension which I had hardly
anticipated. The future showed that my confidence
in this remarkable African potentate was not ill-
founded, and I had the satisfaction of realising that
more had been accomplished by the mission than
might appear from any concrete results recorded in
a treaty.

A day had to be devoted to copying and collating
texts. Meanwhile our mule transport, restored by
a long rest and tolerable grazing, was collected from
the neighbouring villages. Presents were distri-
buted to all who had been of service to us and fare-
well visits were paid. Then on the 14th of May the

MEMORIES 1894-1901 175

whole staff went in state to the Gebi for the ceremony
of signing and sealing the treaty, and conferring the
Grand Cross on the Negus. Ten horses with silver-
studded saddles and bridles had been sent as his
gift to the members of the mission, and I was also
presented with the complete costume of a Has,
including a shield and sword with silver-gilt mount-
ings; but I was not created Duke of Ankober.
Presents for the Queen were also conveyed to the
camp, and the Empress Taitu sent a very curious
necklace of gold filigree work, such as is worn by all
the Abyssinian Empresses. Tradition claims that it
is a copy of the ornament worn by the Queen of
Sheba when she paid her historic visit to Solomon
and incidentally became the mother of the first
Menelik. We rode to the royal residence on our
new mounts and carried out our last duties with im-
pressive ceremony. The Negus took leave of each
member of the mission individually and invited
me to remain for a short private conversation, which
was of the most cordial character. I then took my
leave of this strong, autocratic African potentate, for
whom, after a fortnight of daily intercourse, I had
learned to feel a sincere regard. The relief which
the conclusion of our business afforded was accom-
panied by a sense of genuine regret that the moment
had come to say good-bye.

After farewell visits to the Coptic Bishop, who
sighed to think we were returning to the fleshpots
of Egypt, and to my friend the Lord Chief Justice,
the heartiest and most hospitable of Abyssinians, we
began to demobilise in anticipation of a start on

176 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

the following day. The camp was to break up
early and get away in charge of George EfTendi,
while the British officers were to lunch with the
Ilgs and follow in the afternoon. Our departure
was made the occasion for a remarkable demons-
tration which should leave no doubt in the capital
that the mission had proved a success.

Madame Ilg, the plucky wife of the Swiss Coun-
sellor of State, one of the very few European ladies
who had then visited Addis Abbaba, entertained us
at the last civilised meal which we were to enjoy
for many a day. We had not yet drunk our coffee
when we were told that the Emperor's guards had
arrived to escort us. Bidding adieu to our hostess,
we were accompanied by Ilg to the Gebi, in front
of which a vast assembly of Abyssinian soldiers
was collected. We saw Menelik and Taitu seated
on a balcony. Dismounting and drawing up in a
line, we bowed three times, and remounted to ride
away. Then we heard the royal drums beating
within. The drummers on their mules issued from
the enclosure and took up a position in front of us.
The soldiers — our military authorities estimated
them at 20,000 men — divided into two bodies, one
of which preceded us while the second formed a
rearguard. The commander of the army, Ras
Mangasha Tekkem, rode by me. M. Ilg and Ger-
asmach Joseph followed. The drums alternately
whispered softly or rolled like thunder, while the
notes of flute and shawm broke shrilly through. As
a pageant the scene under the bright African sun
was unsurpassed. Thus for three miles we rode,

MEMORIES 1894-1901 177

accompanied by this extraordinary procession flash-
ing with the glint of arms and vivid with the bril-
liant dresses of the officers among the white- toga' d
rank and file. Such an exceptional honour had,
we learned from M. Ilg, never been accorded to
any other mission. Then we took our leave and
trotted on to the first camp on our homeward trek
of 500 miles.

This demonstration had been wholly unanticipated
and we had every reason to be satisfied. Prince
Henry of Orleans in his letter to the New York
Herald tried to explain it away. He wrote : " The
English are going. Much good may it do them.
We shall be able to breathe. — The Negus wished to
repair the slip made on their arrival. They did
not meet the people sent to receive them. Now
they are going away amid an escort of 20,000 men
who have appeared at the signal, their guns on their
shoulders and their banners before them. And
every one gives a little Ouf ! " He himself, after
enjoying his " little Ouf," returned a fortnight
later to the coast and did not, for reasons which
we could only conjecture, accompany the Clochette
expedition, which started three days after we had
left Addis Abbaba on its forlorn hope to reach the
Nile. Soon after our departure I observed in our
camp a lady of stately proportions who displayed
conspicuous blue gums when she smiled. On
enquiry I ascertained that she was the wife of
Ambascie, who appeared to stand in considerable
awe of her voluble tongue ; but I could never discover
from where she came or at what moment she had

178 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

joined us. With the exception of Queen Taitu she
was the only Abyssinian lady whose acquaintance
I had the privilege of making.

While the difficulties of the return journey to
Harrar were lightened by a greatly diminished
number of loads, they were aggravated by the con-
stant shortness of local supplies and the resulting
discontent among our camp-followers. On the
second day we met Major Nerazzini, who had been
entrusted by the Italian Government with the
conclusion of final negotiations for peace. The
weather was distinctly cooler, and it was not long
before we had ominous reminders of the approach
of the rainy season and were obliged to trench round
our tents at night to prevent our effects being
carried away by the runnels. A terrific thunder-
storm encountered us one evening in the mountains
and the lightning appeared to be striking the ground
all round us. The rain brought out the flowers.
Lilies and jasmine and wild rose perfumed the
upland valleys. A fair amount of game birds,
bustard and guinea-fowl, were obtained, with an
occasional antelope; but the ostriches in the plain
of the Hawash were scared by the cries of our
caravan-drivers at a psychological moment. The
river was already swollen too high to be forded and
we were compelled to cross by the bridge.

Lack of food at moments threatened to produce
mutiny in our caravan. One morning, in a dispute
which arose over the proprietorship of water, a Galla,
a splendid statuesque specimen of nude humanity,
was threatening our Abyssinian officer with his

MEMORIES 1894-1901 179

leaf-bladed spear. Ambascie had only a little
cane in his hand, with which he kept striking at the
Galla. I was for the moment alone with him and
also unarmed. But luckily two of the Aden Sowars
were within hail, and they turned back, covering
the Galla with their rifles. He retired muttering
curses, but he had all my sympathies. Four or
five days' march from Harrar a Galla mule-driver
in a moment of exasperation thrust his knife into
the back of one of our heads of section, Ahmed, a
handsome native of the R'hotta tribe, who live
between Gildessa and Harrar. He was one of our
best men. The assailant was at once secured and
bound. The wound was deep and dangerous, the
blade had penetrated to the kidney, and Pinching
told me he had little hope of saving the man. Ahmed
was however stitched up, and after a night spent
under the flap of a tent he was carried on an im-
provised stretcher to the nearest village, where we
left him with strict injunctions to the head-man to
give him nothing but milk. We remained a week
in Harrar and, incredible as it may seem, Ahmed
arrived in camp apparently recovered before we
left. The wound had healed at the first intention.
He refused to prosecute the man who had stabbed
him, saying that he was now well and the matter
was therefore happily ended.

As our portable stores were consumed and loads
diminished progressively, our transport officers con-
ceived the brilliant idea of initiating sales by auction
of our surplus animals in some of the larger centres.
Once the idea was explained to him, the Abyssinian

180 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

delighted in a gamble and the villagers bid against
each other with the greatest keenness. Our Mess
President was magnificent at these sales, spurring
on the reluctant native to go one better in a strange
mixture of Arabic diluted with such Amharic as
he had picked up. His surgical skill had been a
great asset to the mission in gaining credit with the
local people. Some of the patients he had treated
on the upward journey were waiting for us on the
road to express their acknowledgments. Among
them was a warrior who had been wounded at
Adua from whose leg he had successfully ex-
tracted some splinters of bone. He was indeed
full of resource. There are no prohibitionists in
Abyssinia, and our diminutive stock of whisky
was evidently not going to hold out against the
inevitable demands of hospitality unless the Mess
President could devise a substitute. He was equal
to the occasion. His medical equipment included
a dozen bottles of spirit of wine. From these, with
a little sugar and a due proportion of essence of
peppermint, he manufactured a very creditable
Creme de Menthe which was greatly appreciated by
visitors.

This incidental tribute to the best of travelling
companions reminds me how little has been said
in these pages of the other members of our happy
family, and how inevitably egotistic must appear
my record of an expedition to which each one of
its members contributed all his energy and good-
will. I am only too conscious that I have not done
justice to Wingate's invaluable advice, to his im-

MEMORIES 1894H901 181

perturb able calm, and his understanding of African
character. In three or four months of camp life
together men grow to know each other very
intimately, and as the majority of us were to
continue in close intercourse during the next few
years in Egypt it is pleasant to record that we
returned even closer friends than when we started.

And so, often wet through and sometimes hungry,
but cheerful at the prospect, now not remote, of
returning to home and civilisation, we made a
final three-hour march on the 31st of May from
Lake Haramayah to Harrar, whither Harrington
had come to meet us. Cecil and Gleichen, who
were in advance, encountered him outside the town,
to their pleased surprise. Ras Makunnen, warned
of our approach, also rode out to meet us and
conducted the whole party to luncheon at his house.
The completion of a journey in sixteen days for
which mule caravans reckoned a month, four days
less than we had taken to cover the same ground
on our outward journey, was something of an
achievement, and I believe at that time a record.
It was a great advantage to me to have Harrington
at hand for the opening of negotiations with Ras
Makunnen, with whom he had already established
cordial relations. He could not however wait
for their conclusion, having to precede us to Zeila
to make preparations for our transit over the water-
less country and our eventual transport to Aden.

These negotiations were by no means easy. The
Abyssinians had encroached considerably across
the frontier which we claimed for the Somali

182 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

Protectorate east of Gildessa, and Abyssinian huts
constructed in the disputed area had been burned
by our people, so that the tension between Zeila
and Harrar had at one time caused some anxiety.
The sandy areas involved were in themselves worth-
less, and we were not disposed to use force in order
to compel evacuation of a few square miles of
inhospitable country and prolong unneighbourly
conditions which would prejudice the trade route.
Experience of the nature of the ground in dispute
had now given me a better appreciation of real
values. The tribes frequenting these regions were
nomadic, and the essential for them was to secure
free access to grazing grounds and water on either
side of the border. The settlement eventually
concluded made due provision for this, and though
it involved a recognition of Abyssinian jurisdiction
over a certain area claimed by our Protectorate
in which Ethiopian outposts had for some time been
established, it laid down a well-defined frontier.
Makunnen had contemplated a line much further
east and complained that we were hard bargainers.
I, on the other hand, interpreting the spirit of my
instructions to be in the first place the conciliation
of Ethiopia during the last phase of the Khartoum
campaign, made certain concessions which were
criticised by travellers who had penetrated into
Somaliland on big-game expeditions and therefore
laid claim to special knowledge. It would, however,
have been impossible to dislodge the Abyssinians
from posts which they had occupied without having
recourse to arms, and a failure to reach a settlement

MEMORIES 1894-1901 183

would have prejudiced our certainty of securing
friendly neutrality on the western side. The
arrangement was only accepted ad referendum, but
it was fully approved by the authorities at home.

Donkey and hill-camel transport had been secured
for the next stage of our journey to Gildessa. The
remainder of our baggage mules were sold by auction
not unsuccessfully, and the first section of the cara-
van started on the morning of the 4th of June.
Makunnen had had a big tent erected at the first
camp, and in the afternoon he rode to that point
and spent the night there with us. On the follow-
ing morning we bade him good-bye with sincere re-
gret. He was a perfect Abyssinian gentleman. His
quick intelligence readily assimilated new impres-
sions and ideas, and I imagine he owed a good deal
to association with the cultivated and kindly Mon-
seigneur Thaurin. Had he lived to follow his uncle
as King of Kings, in accordance with Menelik's
intention, the civil war in Abyssinia and the anarchy
which ensued with the succession of Lij Jasu would
have been avoided.

Not long before we reached Gildessa we
encountered a party of three white men with a
few mules who endeavoured to pass, like Kinglake's
Englishman in the desert, within a few yards of
us without that exchange of courtesies usual when
Europeans meet in the wilds of Africa. Gleichen
accordingly turned and rode after them, greeting
them as fellow-travellers in French. The leader,
a fair-bearded young man in Oriental dress, replied
civilly but seemed reluctant to give his name.

184 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

It proved to be Carl Inger. The name was inter-
estingly familiar to all of us who came from Egypt.
Wingate had his dossier by heart. In the course of
the previous year this young man had been arrested,
half-starved, in the neighbourhood of Suakin, in
Dervish dress and in possession of drill-books in
Arabic. Being an Austrian subject he was eventu-
ally sent back to his own country after he had
given an undertaking to abandon any further
attempt to join the Dervishes. Later he had been
heard of in Constantinople posing as an emissary
of the Khalifa. On arriving at the coast we dis-
covered that he had made an attempt to enter
Abyssinia through Zeila, in the hopes of reaching
the Nile from the coast, but Harrington had turned
him back. At Jibuti, however, he did not encounter
the same difficulty.

I despatched a letter to Has Makunnen setting
forth his antecedents and begging him not to allow
this irrepressible individual to proceed any further.
His ambition to join the Dervishes was thus once
more thwarted, and though if he survives he
probably owes his life to this intervention, he no
doubt cursed the bad luck which led the ubiquitous
Englishman once more to cross his path on a lonely
trail in Africa.

From Gildessa, where a plentiful supply of camels
awaited us, Swayne pushed ahead with an advance
party. It was terribly hot in the plain, which the
rains we had encountered on the high table-lands
had not yet reached. As there was a moon we
elected to march only in the evenings, loading

MEMORIES 1894-1901 185

up in the afternoon, and reaching camp about
midnight. Our tents by day were suffocating,
when the thermometer placed under the bed
registered 118, and the gun-barrel burned the hand.
The only one of our party whose spirits were not
damped in this torrid week was the latest- joined
member, a young dog-faced monkey who had been
annexed on the way down. He must have been
born in captivity or caught very young, as he was
absolutely at home with humans. He at once
attached himself to me and would ride behind me
on the mule, jumping off from time to time for a
run and then climbing up again by the stirrup
leather. Once more we negotiated the waterless
country in two stages, and then at last the happy
moment came when one long evening and night
would bring the welcome sight of the sea. After
some eight hours' march in the sultry moonlight
through the desolate waste we found at Warabod
a store of iced beer awaiting us. The political
agent, Colonel Hayes-Sadler, had crossed from Aden
to receive us, bringing with him a block of ice,
and he had the kind forethought to send out this
grateful supply. Our tepid water-bottles had long
been drained. The camp monkey was as thirsty
as we were, and, having nothing else to offer, I gave
him a mug of beer which he greedily consumed.
The result was disastrous. I had never before,
nor have I ever since, seen anything so ribald as
an intoxicated monkey. We were all dead-beat
and slept on the sand till morning broke. These
few hours' rest also restored Jacko to his normal

186 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

respectability. Hayes-Sadler, Harrington, and
Swayne rode out to meet us. The Minto was
waiting to convey us to Aden. A day sufficed
to wind up accounts, dispose of surplus stores,
and take leave of our Somali attendants, who had
proved right good fellows and had thoroughly
earned the rewards which awaited them. I handed
over my animals to Harrington and parted from the
mule which Has Makunnen had given me as from
a very old friend whom I should never see again.
General Cunningham once more most hospitably
cared for us, and the Coromandel carried us home-
ward through the Red Sea, where we met the north
wind, which made life more endurable. Those
who were to return to Egypt disembarked at Suez,
while Bingham, Cecil, Swayne, and I went on to
Port Said, Brindisi, and home.

On the day of our arrival in London took place
the last function of the second Jubilee, a great
garden party at Buckingham Palace. An invitation
awaited me, and, exchanging travel-stained raiment
for the garments of civilisation, I duly proceeded
thither with my wife. The sudden transition from
the Abyssinian highlands and the Somali deserts
to the well-dressed crowd of London was almost
overwhelming in its impression of contrast. I
found myself a centre of interest. The Empress
Frederick was there, and it was a great pleasure
to see her again after a number of years. I little
anticipated then that it was to be our last meeting.
The Prince of Wales had followed our movements
with the keenest interest, and Chamberlain engaged

MEMORIES 1894-1901 187

me in a long conversation. All the energies of the
Empire seemed to be concentrated in the precincts
of the Palace round the venerable Queen. But
for me the best thing of all was to be home again
with those who really mattered. On the following
day I was summoned to Windsor to dine and spend
the night. The Crown Prince and Princess of
Italy, but lately married, were staying there, and I
was then presented for the first time to the reigning
sovereign, of whom I was to see so much in later
years. I remained at Windsor most of the following
day, awaiting the opportunity to tell the Queen
about our adventures in Shoa and to present the
various gifts with which Menelik had entrusted
me. The Queen seemed to have aged considerably
since I had last seen her. But her interest in
everything was as fresh and keen as ever.

A long interview with Lord Salisbury revealed
that he was not much preoccupied about Abyssinian
encroachments in Somaliland. He was never much
concerned with the fate of " light lands in Africa."
The French advance towards the Nile was in his
eyes a more serious matter, so far as I could diagnose
his thoughts. For he listened with great attention
to my report, sitting huddled up at his table with
a rug on his knees. The policy which both Wingate
and I urged in our respective spheres was that
our forces in Uganda, where Colonel Macdonald 1
was now in chief command, should stick to the
Nile and move down the river as quickly as possible.
There seemed to us to be still a fair chance that
1 Major-General Sir James Macdonald, K,C.I.E.

188 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

Macdonald would have reached Fashoda before
Marchand. It is possible that had this been
attempted the Uganda Soudanese might not have
mutinied as they did at the end of 1897. But for
the moment the only comment I could elicit from
the reserve of the Foreign Secretary, when I
explained the imminent danger of Marchand' s
arrival on the Nile before we had reached Khartoum,
was " Well, let us hope he won't get there ! "

Failing a course which internal conditions in
Uganda may at the time have rendered impracticable,
Wingate and I did our best to urge an acceleration
of the advance to Khartoum. The problem of
transport would no doubt have rendered this very
difficult, and even if the necessary number of
camels could have been collected the cost of the
campaign must have been immensely increased.
It would have involved a direct British contribution,
but it would have been worth very much to us
to have had no Fashoda question. Though neither
of our alternatives was adopted we could con-
scientiously feel that we had given due warning
of the critical situation which was likely to arise
on the Upper Nile.

Another question the consideration of which we
urged in JLondon after our experiences in Somali-
land and Abyssinia was the construction of a light
railway from the Somali coast to the interior.
The project for a line from Jibuti to Harrar was
still inchoate, and the bulk of the trade was being
carried over the old route to Zeila. It was true
that its total amount remained inconsiderable and

MEMORIES 1894-1901 189

that Abyssinia was stubbornly recalcitrant to
European penetration, but a seaport which became
the terminus of a railway would secure a monopoly
in the future, and Somaliland, so long as it remained
without communications, was an unprofitable posses-
sion which might moreover become an onerous
one. As much may indeed be said of any African
colony which has only a coastal administration
and an indeterminate hinterland. I was not very
sanguine that the idea of asking Parliament to
provide even the modest credit which would have
sufficed to carry a light railway to the Haud, with
a branch to Gildessa, would commend itself to a
Chancellor of the Exchequer. But had such a
scheme been entertained there is little doubt that
the fanatical Mad Mullah would never have become
so formidable, and we might have been spared the
many valuable lives lost and the millions spent in
thankless punitive expeditions against that elusive
enemy who gave us so much trouble over a period
of twenty years.

A few days after my interview I received a very
kind letter from Lord Salisbury announcing that
a Companionship of the Bath had been conferred
upon me. I was also offered the post of Secretary
of Legation at Pekin, which would have given me
promotion over the heads of five or six of my seniors.
But the letter making the offer also suggested that
I should probably not care to accept the post. As
Cromer wished me to remain with him I did not
feel I could well leave Cairo at a moment which
was for him full of grave domestic anxiety, and

190 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

I was personally keen to continue serving there
at least until the Nile campaign had been success-
fully concluded. Had I gone to China I should
have been at Pekin during the siege of the Legations,
which would have added one more very interesting
experience to my record.

After a short interval spent in writing up my
reports in Abyssinia we left for Baireuth, where
we witnessed the performances of Parsifal and the
Ring and attended the court of Frau Cosima Wagner.
It struck me as strange that so great an artist as
Wagner should have had so little sense of the
picturesque and graceful in the costumes which
piety to his memory as their designer still retained
in use. Thence, by Vienna and Venice, we returned
to Egypt. At the former place the news reached
us of the capture of Abou Hamed at the cost of
the lives of two very valuable officers, Sidney and
Fitzclarence. This meant that the 230 miles of
desert railway along the cord of the arc described
by the Nile between Wady Haifa and Abou Hamed
had been completed. There have been few more
remarkable feats than the construction of this
line across the waterless sands to a point actually
in the hands of the enemy. Water to supply the
engines could only be obtained by artesian boring,
and after two unsuccessful attempts it was found.
Nothing was impossible to K. and his young
engineers. No sooner had the line reached Abou
Hamed than work had to be begun on a new stretch
of 150 miles along the river to carry it up to the
Atbara. Berber had been evacuated, and it then

MEMORIES 1894-1901 191

seemed improbable that the Dervishes would make
any resistance north of the Atbara.

A year or two later when I went to Abou Hamed
a legend had already attached itself to the two
white crosses which mark the desert graves of
Sidney and Fitzclarence, and the burial mounds
of the Soudanese troopers who fell beside them in
the action. No native of those regions would
approach the spot after sundown, when it was
reported that the black soldiers rose from their
graves and stood on guard round the graves of their
English Beys.

CHAPTER VI
1897-98

Disturbances in the provinces. The Sirdar and financial difficulties.
Sir Francis Grenfell. British troops go up the Nile. George
Steevens. The march to Berber. Prince Henry of Prussia at
Port Said. The Battle of the Atbara. Serious illness of Lady
Cromer. A second British Brigade formed. Frankie Rhodes
and Hubert Howard. The advance to Khartoum. The Battle
of Omdurman. The 21st Lancers. Appendix: Lieut. R. de
Montmorency's account of the battle.

Cromer had already left when we returned to
Egypt in the summer. The spirit in the country
was not altogether reassuring. The anniversary
of the Sultan's accession, the 31st of August, was
marked by some disturbances in the provinces and
aggressions against the Christian element. The
Arabic press, to whose unhealthy influence I have
already referred, was once more becoming extremely
violent, and practically advocating rebellion. I
was, however, not allowed to intervene at that time.
The effect of these incitements was manifested
by an episode which took place at the village of
Galioub, near Cairo, where a detachment of mounted
infantry was stoned by the inhabitants. I there-
upon acted without waiting to consult anybody.
The village was surrounded by British troops, and

192

SOGIAL AND DIPLOMATIC MEMORIES 193

no one was allowed to pass in or out, to or from
the fields or the wells, until the delinquents were
handed over. Two and twenty of these were sur-
rendered. A special tribunal, sanctioned under
a decree of 1895 to try offences against the army
of occupation, was at once assembled. The five
ringleaders in the attack were sentenced to six
and eight months' hard labour in the Soudan.
Companies of infantry were established in temporary
camps at Tantah and Damanhour, and for the
moment, at any rate, there were no more incidents
between the Christian and the Mohammedan
communities.

After Cromer's return, having some leave due
to me, we went to Italy and made a pilgrimage
through Umbrian and Tuscan towns to study the
great art of Piero della Francesca, whose fresco of
the resurrection at Borgo S. Sepolcro appeared to
me, as it had to Vasari, to be one of the most solemn
and impressive pictures I had ever seen. Our
expedition was cut short by the serious illness of
my wife, and we had to remain in a modest hotel
at Arezzo, where I passed through a brief period
of great anxiety. We met with every kindness
and attention there until she was well enough for
us to move to Rome.

When we settled down again in Cairo I found
that a rather strained situation had arisen. Italy
had determined to evacuate Kassala, and we were
taking over that somewhat isolated outpost. This
involved a considerable extension of frontier, and
as we had not men enough to hold so long a sali-

o

194 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

ent, the situation was not reassuring. Kitchener's
military estimates had been criticised, and he had
consequently announced his resignation, a step
which, even if it was not meant to be taken too
seriously, I rather resented in view of the constant
support he had received from Cromer. The borrow-
ing power of the Egyptian Government was limited
to one million. The British Government had already
advanced £800,000, leaving only £200,000 more to
be borrowed. As this was manifestly insufficient
to complete the reconquest of the Soudan, it was
clear that we must anticipate financial complica-
tions in the coming year. K. had already estab-
lished a great reputation as an organiser of success.
But his position was not yet absolute and assured.
He was still to stand in need of Cromer's good
offices, and fortunately he had to deal with a man
who was eminently judicial and impersonal.

The occasion arose in the latter stage of the
campaign, when a considerable number of British
troops were to be employed, and the War Office
desired to entrust the command to a more senior
British General. A military mission sent to discuss
certain points with Cromer found him obdurate in
insisting that the man who had prepared the re-
conquest was the man to carry it through. But,
it was contended, the importance of the British
force which would take part in the ultimate opera-
tions connoted a general of a certain seniority who
could not be placed under the orders of a junior.
That difficulty could, Cromer pointed out, easily
be overcome by giving Kitchener the higher rank

MEMORIES 1894-1901 195

entailed. I remember with a certain malicious
pleasure his answer to one of these officers who
ventured to say that he thought Cromer did not
perhaps quite appreciate the military point of view.
His characteristic comment was : " As regards that,
I may remind you that I am myself a major of
artillery, and I presume that even the military
point of view must, like other things, be governed
by the laws of common sense."

It was a great satisfaction to us all in Egypt that
at this rather critical moment Sir Francis Grenfell
was appointed to command the army of occupation.
Not only was he a great personal friend of the Agent
and Consul-General, but he had been Sirdar of the
Egyptian army from 1885 to 1892. His knowledge
of local conditions, his great tact, and the esteem
in which he was universally held would smooth the
way for the last stages of the Soudan campaign.
Not less satisfactory to myself was the appoint-
ment of Harrington, which I had strongly urged,
to take charge of our interests as representative
in Abyssinia, where later he became the first per-
manent British Minister. We had a critical year
before us, and it was encouraging to feel that the
men who would have to deal with difficult situations
were all in close and intimate relations with one
another.

The year 1898 opened with eager excitement in
Cairo, for British troops were now ordered to the
front. There was reason to believe that a large
Dervish force collecting north of the Atbara might
attack Berber, and, as I have already pointed out,

196 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

the Egyptian army alone was not strong enough
to hold the long line. Four British battalions were
to go up the river at once. The situation at the
moment gave some preoccupation. Three gunboats,
which had already patrolled as far as Metemmeh,
half-way to Khartoum, were still south of Berber.
The Nile was abnormally low, and the banks were
proportionally high. The question of attempting
to bring them back north of the Fifth Cataract
was discussed, but it was decided to leave them on
the upper reach. If the Dervishes were to advance
and to be defeated it would be impossible to follow
up a success so long as river transport was tempor-
arily suspended; and then, as Bimbashi Watson
pertinently observed, a watched Nile never rises.
It was doubtful whether a sufficient supply of camels
could be found to replace water transport, and the
cost would have been very great.

As matters stood, there was no alternative to
sending British troops at once, though they would
have to remain in camp throughout a long period
of very hot weather. Under these circumstances
the question of financial liability was left to be
determined later, and the troops were despatched
to the front. Major-General Gatacre came out
from England to take command of the British
Brigade, consisting of the 1st Lincolnshire and the
1st Warwickshire battalions, with the 1st Cameron
Highlanders. The 1st Seaforths were to follow.
The general, whose name the genial Mr. Atkins at
once converted into Back-acher, worked his men
desperately hard in the dry heat of the Soudan.

MEMORIES 1894-1901 197

But he was nevertheless extremely popular, as
every one of them was aware that he did far more
himself than he ever demanded of them. The
three brigades of the Egyptian army were com-
manded by Colonel Hector Macdonald, Lt. -Colonel
Lewis, and Lt. -Colonel Maxwell. Lt. -Colonel Long
commanded the Egyptian artillery. In all from
12,000 to 13,000 men were distributed between
Berber and the Atbara. Commander Colin Keppel
had now taken the place of Colville in charge of the
Nile flotilla, with Lieutenants Hood and Beatty to
support him.

The march of the British Brigade from the rail-
head to Berber, when rumours of a Dervish move
made it necessary to accelerate their arrival at the
latter place, was a remarkable performance. They
covered 118 miles of desert under the Soudan sun
in five days, one of which was devoted to a halt. If
the men were wonderful, their boots were deplorable.
Made of stitched leather without toe-caps, they may
have been the good boots they were stated to be
in an official answer to a question asked in the
House of Commons, but they were evidently good
for another climate and for very different ground.
The experience of those who knew the country
might have been consulted by those responsible
for equipment. The Egyptian army authorities
had long ago rejected any but riveted boots with
toe-caps, which alone resisted the stones and cut-
ting sands of the desert. As it was, the men of the
2nd Brigade were almost barefooted when they
reached Berber, while officers' chargers and trans-

198 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

port animals were bringing on stragglers who could
no longer march.

In the first week of the new year I had been sent
to Port Said to greet Prince Henry of Prussia on
his way to Kiao Chao in command of the Deutsch-
land. The German representative in Cairo, Herr
Felix von Miiller, went at the same time. We dined
on board with the Prince, who was very cordial and
discussed old times in Berlin. He spoke to me
rather apologetically about a speech of his delivered
on the eve of his departure, which had been a good
deal criticised, especially for the words addressed
to his brother, whose menaces to China had been
unpleasantly reminiscent of Attila, in which he
accepted " the gospel of Your Sacred Majesty."
He had, he said, been very hard worked up to the
day fixed for sailing, and final preparations, together
with the leave-taking from his family, had imposed
a considerable strain upon him. At the very last
minute the Emperor had announced his intention
of coming on board to dine. " You know," Prince
Henry observed, " how my brother warms you up
when he speaks." The Emperor had there charged
his younger brother to carry overseas the " mailed
fist " which became thereafter historically notor-
ious. Prince Henry responded with what he
described as a rousing quarter-deck speech, not in
the least, he maintained, realising that it was a
public occasion, and that reporters were present
who would telegraph his words all over the world.
It was only when he touched at Portsmouth on his
outward journey that he became aware of the

MEMORIES 1894-1901 199

publicity which had been given to the speeches, and
he was, he said, not at all surprised that " people
were annoyed in England."

A letter from Menelik addressed to the Queen
was received early in February ratifying the treaty
which I had signed with him. Sir Charles Dilke,
who had assumed the part of the universal dissenter,
attacked it in Parliament, and Curzon stoutly
defended it. It was approved by a very large
majority. The actual treaty, securing us equality
of economic privileges in Abyssinia and a guarantee
that Menelik would do all in his power to prevent
arms passing to the Mahdists, whom he declared
to be the enemies of his country, embodied only a
part of the results achieved by the mission. The real
value of our work lay in having established cordial
relations with a country where for various reasons
our prestige had declined ; in having removed
certain misapprehensions which it had been the
interest of others to foster; and in having assisted
Menelik to understand that it might be disadvan-
tageous for his kingdom to constitute the only break
in a trans-African road from east to west which
another country might eventually become ambitious
to establish. The German Nazional Zeitung, which
could hardly be regarded as an indulgent critic,
described the treaty as the one real success ob-
tained after manifold reverses suffered by British
policy in recent years.

February, 1898, marked a new stage of progress
in the development of Egypt. A contract was
signed for the construction of the Nile barrages and

200 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

reservoirs at Assiout and Assouan. Cromer was
temporarily away, and it was on this occasion that
I first made the acquaintance of the late Sir Ernest
Cassel, who had had the courage and foresight to
finance a scheme of which older financial houses
had fought shy. He greatly impressed me by his
largeness of view and business capacity. The
necessary final arrangements were all made in three
days. The contract was signed on the 20th, and
the following morning Cassel left for England.

With the despatch of British troops the war
correspondents also appeared on the scene. There
were all the old campaigners like Bennet Burleigh,
whom every one knew by reputation, the lineal
descendants of the famous Billy Russell, who first
established the position of the war correspondent
in the Crimea. But among the younger generation
was one very able writer, the late George Steevens,
a Balliol man who belonged to the brilliant group
of journalists recruited by my friend Harry Cust
when he was editor of the Pall Mall Gazette, and a
protege of the immortal W. E. Henley. His book
With Kitchener to Khartoum gives a humorous and
at the same time a vivid and picturesque account
of the Nile expedition. George Steevens was the
best of company, whose cynic humour was in genial
contrast with his kindly and gallant heart. His
premature death at Ladysmith during the siege
was a great grief to all his friends. Flebilis occidit !
I also then made the acquaintance of Winston
Churchill, who was attached to the 21st Lancers, and
recorded his experiences in " The Desert War."

MEMORIES 1894^1901 201

The mobile force of Dervishes which had advanced
to the Atbara was commanded by the Emir Mah-
moud, reputed to be the best fighting man the
Khalifa's rule had produced. Their actual position
remained for some time uncertain until General
Archibald Hunter, the fighting arm of the Egyptian
army, succeeded in locating their entrenched and
zareeba'd camp beside the then almost dry bed
of the river, some 18 miles from the fort at its
junction with the Nile. As this force showed no
disposition to move, the decision was taken to
attack. After a long night march the shelling of
their position began at 6 a.m. on Good Friday, and
at 7.45 the zareeba was rushed, the enemy being
driven back utterly routed over the dry bed of the
Atbara. Mahmoud became our prisoner. In the
Mahdist camp over 2,000 dead were counted, but
this could only represent a portion of the losses in
trenches and rifle-pits. The fugitives had many
miles of desert to cross before they could reach the
Nile, and there the patrolling gunboats were await-
ing them. Mahmoud' s ten guns were captured,
and his force, which had consisted of 16,000 men, was
practically annihilated. Our losses were not heavier
than might have been anticipated ; but the pro-
portion of casualties was heavy among the senior
officers. The Colonels of the Lincolns and the
Seaforths were both wounded, and Major Napier
and Captain Baillie did not recover from their
wounds. We were greatly distressed in Cairo to
learn the death of Findlay of the Seaforths, who had
just been married. His exceptional stature made

202 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

him a conspicuous mark. The eldest of the three
Findlay brothers had rowed in the Balliol Eight
in my time, and the second was before long to
succeed me in Cairo. They were all three giants.
In all eighty-one were killed and forty-nine wounded.

The Black troops had proved themselves as fine
infantry as any in the world. But the devotion
of the 10th Soudanese to their commander had
produced something like mutiny. A knot of them
grouped themselves round Nason Bey, and positively
declined to allow him to lead the way over the
zareeba. They only said, "At Abou Hamed we
lost our Bey (Sidney) and our second-in-command
(Fitzclarence). That shall not happen again, and
we are here to cover you from the bullets."

Soon after the battle of the Atbara I took my
leave, somewhat sooner than usual. Cromer was
anxious to be free to leave at an early date, as there
was now no longer any doubt that Lady Cromer
was seriously ill. The death of Gladstone, which
took place at that time, was the occasion of a
remarkable manifestation of sympathy. There
followed the death, quite sudden as it seemed, of
the well-beloved Burne-Jones. He had been
working in the afternoon, and died in the night.
He was only sixty-five. At the end of July of
this year (1898) Bismarck followed Gladstone. Thus
the two biggest figures in the political world during
the latter half of the nineteenth century, who,
though their lives were practically coeval had
never met, passed away almost simultaneously.
Events have since shaken the judgment which

MEMORIES 1894-1901 203

most men had formed at the time as to which of
the two had achieved the more enduring work.
I returned alone to Egypt. We had acquired a
London residence in Stratford Place, and I left
my wife behind there to instal herself.

While in London I had been sounded as to whether
I should care to go to Persia. Under ordinary
circumstances I should have welcomed the oppor-
tunity, as I was now embarking on my fifth summer
in Cairo. But it was impossible for me to leave
Cromer at such a moment, as he wished me to
remain, and his wishes were more important than
my own inclinations. The doctors had given the
gravest of verdicts on Lady Cromer's health. The
most critical year in the history of the new Egypt
had begun. There seemed, moreover, to be every
possibility that I might receive the promotion
which my seniority indicated as due with leaving
Cairo, so I decided to stand by the ship. I was
in fact soon afterwards promoted to be Secretary
of Legation. To become a junior Secretary of
Legation in one's fortieth year did not impress me
as a brilliant consummation, even though I had had
exceptionally interesting work, and opportunities
which did not fall to the lot of all. Curzon, whose
studies of the East clearly indicated him for the
post, was now appointed Viceroy of India, and
Clinton Dawkins was leaving Egypt for the same
destination, to take up the post of Finance Minister.
I began to feel I was falling behind my contempor-
aries. Some of the duties which I had to perform
in the spring and summer of 1898, moreover,

204 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

appeared to me unusually futile. As there were
British troops on the Nile, and Egypt was, theoreti-
cally at any rate, financing the expedition, it was
found necessary that I should sign vast piles of
vouchers submitted by the Staff in Cairo for ulti-
mate transmission to the War Office. Reflecting
on the hours which I had to devote to signing what
are known as " Nil Returns," documents recording
that great-coats had not been issued to various
military units, and similar epoch-making announce-
ments, I could only conclude that our machinery
was cumbersome and antiquated. Had there been
no other urgent work to do, the signing of these
vouchers might have served to kill time ; but to a
busy man burdened with many responsibilities the
filling up of negative formulae was only irritating.
Like the saint whose adamantine faith was almost
shaken by his inability to discover any use in the
order of creation for flies, I could only blindly trust
that my signing of these vouchers, which apparently
was an indispensable condition of the participation
of British troops, contributed in some degree to
uphold the British Empire. I notice from my
diaries that already at that time I was very critical
about atavisms in my own service, and claimed
that we ought to have " chanceliers " and pro-
fessional typewriters, and to reduce the diplomatic
staff to the number necessary for more important
duties. Many years were however still to pass
before this reform was introduced.

The last phase of the Soudan campaign, the
advance to Omdurman, had been timed to take

MEMORIES 1894^1901 205

place between the first and second weeks in Sep-
tember. I now learned that a crisis was feared in
Lady Cromer's illness, and that my chief's return
would be inevitably delayed. So I should have
to shoulder the burden and deal with the critical
situation which would arise if, as I confidently
expected, Captain Marchand were found established
on the Nile.

Cairo had assumed a very military aspect. The
hotels, generally empty in midsummer, were full
of officers. A second British Brigade had been
formed and placed under the command of my old
friend Brigadier-General Lyttelton. The 1st Grena-
dier Guards from Gibraltar, the 2nd Rifle Brigade
from Malta, the 1st Northumberland Fusiliers, and the
2nd Lancashire Fusiliers with a Maxim detachment
from the 1st Royal Irish Fusiliers stationed at Alex-
andria, were the composing elements, while as cavalry
the 21st Lancers, the popular regiment from Cairo
and the most recent unit added to the British army,
were to have their first experience of active service.
Some of the military authorities inclined to the
view that another British battalion should be
despatched, and Cromer in England had provision-
ally agreed. From the Egyptian end I opposed
this as unnecessary, and Cromer, when he learned
my reasons, expressed his satisfaction that I had
done so.

A fourth Egyptian brigade had been formed
under Collinson Bey. A portion of his command,
half of the 5th Regiment with a company of camel
corps, marched across the desert from Suakin to

206 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

Berber, covering some 288 miles in fifteen days.
The wells on which they had counted at the end of
one 30-mile stretch were found to be dry. They had
to march on 30 more miles before reaching water,
and they did it. Eddy Wortley, whose experience
in the first Nile campaign indicated him as the
right man for such work, was to lead a force of
Arab irregulars consisting largely of remnants of
the Jaalin tribe. This unfortunate riverain people
had made advances to us when they were ordered
by the Khalifa to attack Abou Hamed, and as we
were unable to support them their villages were
destroyed and the inhabitants were massacred
by the Emir Mahmoud. The Egyptian troops
moved up the river to Shablouka in steamers and
barges, leaving the fort at the mouth of the Atbara
for the British, who were despatched up the river
with mechanical regularity during the first half of
August. K. had a story of a young guardsman
who on arriving at the Atbara complained of the
length and discomfort of the journey from Cairo.
" Seven days," he said, " it has taken us to get
here ! " " Yes ? " replied Bimbashi Watson, always
smiling, " it took us two years."

Among the many old friends who turned up to
witness the final effort was Frankie Rhodes, once
more a free man, after discharging his commuted
penalty at Johannesburg, which had been far less
a blow to him than the inevitable loss of his com-
mission. His earliest experience of fighting had
been upon the Nile, and as he could no longer serve
as a British officer he came to witness the taking

MEMORIES 1894-1901 207

of Omdurman as a correspondent of The Times.
The same old smile played over his wizened face.
There was the same twinkle in the blue eye, which
was reported to have winked, perhaps unconsciously,
when he received his death sentence, an allegation
which he always denied, and his unflagging spirits
had not been depressed by his grim experience.
Hubert Howard also came out as correspondent of
The Times and the New York Herald. He was
another of Britain's young knight-err ants, who left
college to spend his early years in search of adven-
tures of which this was to be the last.

I shall not attempt to recapitulate the story of
the march to Omdurman, which I could only follow
at the end of the telegraph wire in Cairo a thousand
miles away. The concentration of the Anglo-
Egyptian force south of Shabluka was complete on
the 28th of August, and then we realised that a few
days more must bring contact. It will readily be
understood how intensified became the feeling of
suspense for those of us who had spent two anxious
years in preparing for the final event. The know-
ledge that heavy rains were interrupting com-
munications by the line which was laid along the
ground did not lighten our preoccupation. My
calculations for the psychological moment indicated
the 2nd of September, and all that day we awaited
news in tense excitement. Only on the morning
of the 3rd messages began to arrive. On the 1st
the opposing forces had been within 3 miles of
one another, and the gunboats, accompanied by
howitzers in barges, were despatched to demolish

208 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

the forts on the right bank of the Nile and on Tuti
Island. It was not, however, till late on the night
of the 3rd that I received in Cairo the news of the
capture of Omdurman after the battle which had
commenced as anticipated on the morning of the
2nd. The message had been drafted by Kitchener
late that evening by the light of one flickering
candle.

The first brief reports described how the attack
of the Baggara at about 6 a.m., repulsed with a
terrible concentration of fire on the advancing
masses, was renewed after 10 a.m. with great deter-
mination, and the battle had ended with the anni-
hilation of the Dervish army and the occupation
of Omdurman in the afternoon. Eddy Wortley
with his irregulars had cleared the right bank of the
Nile up to Khartoum, and the Jaalin, thirsting for
vengeance, had shown a bold front to the Baggaras.
Upwards of 60,000 of the enemy were reported
killed, 16,000 wounded, and 4,000 taken prisoners.
The Khalifa, who had been commanding in person,
had fled in the afternoon. The cavalry pursued
as soon as his flight became known. They covered
some thirty miles. But they had been fifteen
hours in the saddle and could go no further.

Our losses were relatively small. Lieutenant
Robert Grenfell of the 21st Lancers and Captain
Caldecott of the Warwickshires were killed. Frankie
Rhodes had been shot through the right shoulder
early in the day. The lung was touched. But
his undefeated spirit carried him through, and his
recovery was accelerated by the joyful news that

MEMORIES 1894^1901 209

his commission had been restored to him. Hubert
Howard was struck down by a stray shot or a
fragment of shell after the entry into Omdur-
man, a few yards away from the Mahdi's tomb. I
have seldom felt the performance of painful duty
more acutely than when I had to break the news
to Lord Carlisle, and I bitterly thought of the
gentle, kindly artist who as George Howard was
associated with my memories of Burne Jones and
with happy days in Willie Richmond's studio at
Hammersmith, receiving the sad telegram on the
Sunday morning. Hubert Howard, the son of a
father who was all temperament and a mother
whose zeal for reforming the world was carried
to bigotry, was born to be a soldier, but circum-
stance had thwarted that ambition. He sought
and found adventure elsewhere, in Cuba and in the
Matabele war, and he died, profoundly regretted
by very devoted friends, a soldier's death as he
would have wished in the hour of triumph.

An echo of Byron's lines after Waterloo came
back into our hearts with a pathos of appropriate-
ness :

11 They reached no nobler breast than thine, young gallant
Howard ! "

In filthy Omdurman were found the remaining
European prisoners of the Khalifa, Charles Neufeld,
the German trader, and Sister Teresa, the nun
who had been compelled to marry a Greek.

I have referred to a certain inarticulate sense
of imagination in Kitchener. It revealed itself

210 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

in the strangely impressive ceremony which he
organised on the day following the battle in the
ruins of Khartoum. A detachment from every
regiment which had been engaged and nearly every
officer in the force assembled at the site of the old
Palace, and in the deserted garden a memorial
service was held at which he made it a special
point that the Anglican, the Roman Catholic, the
Presbyterian, and the Methodist chaplains should
all take part. The British and Egyptian flags
were hoisted on the spot where Gordon fell, and a
thunder of saluting guns proclaimed that the humil-
iation of fourteen years earlier was avenged. Mr.
Gladstone had died a few months too soon to wit-
ness time's revenges.

In Cairo patriots were depressed rather than
exhilarated by the news of the overwhelming result
of British organisation and perseverance. Among
the first messages of congratulation received was
one from the ex-Emperor William. At Hanover,
where he was attending manoeuvres after the Sunday
morning service on the 4th, he harangued his troops
under the Waterloo monument, telling them of
the capture of Omdurman, and calling for three
cheers for the Queen.

Some days passed before letters from K., from
Wingate, from Maxwell and from Slatin followed
the telegrams, and gave further interesting details.
It was generally agreed that in the actual fighting
the hero of the day had been Hector Macdonald, a
veteran of the Afghan war which had brought him
promotion from the ranks, with bitter memories

MEMORIES 1894-1901 211

of Majuba Hill where he was taken prisoner, and
an Egyptian record which included Gemaizeh and
Toski. His brigade had borne the brunt of the
second Dervish attack. The 21st Lancers, thirsting
to give their new regiment a historic name, had
made a very gallant charge, after having been lured
by a deceptive movement of the enemy into a
ravine where a large body of Dervishes was con-
cealed, through which they hacked their bloody
way with heavy losses in men, and especially in
horses. My two particular friends in the regiment,
Kenna and de Montmorency, two of the finest
horsemen in the British army, had especially dis-
tinguished themselves, and both of them were
awarded the Victoria Cross for their services. These
two gallant officers now only live in the memory
of their friends. They would have felt very bitterly
the disappearance of the regiment, which they had
done so much to make efficient. Kenna had refused
promotion elsewhere, and had stuck to the 21st
until he was nearly the oldest subaltern in the army.
But he died a general. De Montmorency, glorious
to look upon, with every gift of charm and accom-
plishment, fell leading Cape irregulars in South
Africa. When his effects were sold by auction in
camp, according to the rough uses of war, every
button of his tunic fetched a high price, so eager
were his troopers to acquire some small personal
token to remind them of the leader they loved.
My wife had asked Montmorency when he left Cairo
to write down for her his impressions of his first
battle, while the picture was yet vivid in his mind.

212 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

He did so, and sent her a document which has the
quick interest of actuality. I have quoted it as
an appendix to this chapter.

That so numerous and fanatical a host was
crushingly defeated with such small losses on our
side — they were smaller than at the Atbara — was
mainly due to the forward movement in echelon
after the first Dervish attack was broken. The
majority of the enemy were cut off from Omdurman,
and therefore unable to rally behind their wall.
Kitchener risked his rear, which the gunboats could
look after, and exposed his flank, upon which, though
it was attacked with desperation, he could rely.
The all-important thing was that the Dervishes
should not be able to interpose the screen of their
twenty-foot wall.

Cromer, who was in Scotland, wrote to me ex-
pressing his great satisfaction. Lady Cromer had
then rallied after a critical stage in her illness. He
was for the moment chiefly concerned to bring her
back to London, and till that was accomplished
could make no plans. As I look back after all
these years and reflect on the great difficulties
which had had to be surmounted, internal, financial,
and diplomatic, only a portion of which have been
here set forth, I realise that he had good grounds
for satisfaction. With the railway extension as
an asset on the credit side this had probably been
by far the most economically conducted war in
which we had ever been engaged. Success was
mainly due to the fact that the fullest reliance had
been placed on those on the spot. It had there-

MEMORIES 1894-1901 213

fore been possible to secure the maximum value
of the best capacities available for the work in hand.
One of the many lessons in statecraft taught by
the late Lord Salisbury was that of refraining from
injudicious interference with those on whom he
had once bestowed his confidence. Cromer's views
had prevailed when he insisted that the Sirdar
should retain the supreme direction of the campaign,
and it was Kitchener's driving power and military-
administrative capacity which ensured the recon-
quest of the Soudan.

APPENDIX TO CHAPTER VI

Lieut. Reymond de Montmorency's Account op the
Battle of Omdurman

It is 4 a.m. on the 2nd September — the anniversary of
the fall of Sedan — and the whole Anglo-Egyptian army is
standing to arms waiting for the dawn when, as deserters
from the enemy have reported, the Khalifa will make his
last and greatest effort to vindicate the divinity of his
mission, to save his own life and stem the advance of
civilisation.

As day broke the British cavalry reconnoitred the Dervish
army that lay 3| miles S.W. from the zareeba beyond Jebel
Surgham ridges. We had been in touch with the Dervish
army all the preceding day and had located the exact
position of the whole force. So, twenty minutes after
leaving the zareeba, our advanced patrols were in touch
and reported that the whole of the Khalifa's army, divided
into five brigades, each about 10,000 strong, had begun to
advance. Our patrols immediately opened fire. But they

214 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

were soon driven in on the advanced squadron, which in
turn was driven in on the regiment as we retired slowly
at a walk towards the Nile, E. of the zareeba, so as to clear
the field of fire for our own army. Hardly had our advanced
patrols retired over the ridge when a single white flag
became visible on it, and the next minute the whole length
of Jebel Surgham was seething with a mass of waving
banners and spears, and the hoarse Dervish war-cry, " Allah' I
Allah, Khalifa Rasoul Allah," rolled ominously over the
desert.

At this moment the 32nd Field Battery, R.A., opened
fire from the left of the zareeba. Their first shot, range
3,400 yards, was too high, but their next, range 2,700
yards, burst just in front of the advancing mass and down
went six Dervishes. From this moment the fire was most
accurate and deadly, shrapnel after shrapnel bursting
right over the dense masses of the enemy and making great
gaps. Shortly afterwards the Gyppy batteries and then
the Maxims opened fire, and part of the infantry began
firing long-range volleys. I doubt if the latter did much
execution as they fired standing with fixed bayonets at a
range of over 2,000 yards. Waste of ammunition some
thought it, but those who should know best thought other-
wise evidently.

The enemy continued to advance at a walk, sauntering
along indifferently. But they soon found the terrific
fire from the zareeba too much for them and gradually
drifted away westward at about 1,700 yards from the
zareeba. During this part of the fight we watered our
horses in the Nile. The gunboats S.E. of the zareeba
also opened fire. But the shooting seemed to be very
inaccurate, falling some 1,000 yards from the enemy.

That was all we saw of this phase of the fight, as at
7.30 a.m. we received orders to move south along the river
bank and report if the enemy had any large reserves behind
Jebel Surgham hill and ridges. When we reached the rising
ground 3,000 yards south of the zareeba we were fired at

MEMORIES 1894-1901 215

from the top of Jebel Surgham and also by small bodies
of wounded and unwounded enemy returning from the
battlefield. About 2,400 yards from the zareeba the dead
were lying in heaps of six or seven with a lot of wounded
horses and donkeys here and there. We dismounted under
a hill 500 yards east of Jebel Surgham and opened fire on
the enemy, while two officers patrols under Lieuts. Pirie
and Grenfell were sent to report on the enemy to the S.W.
of Jebel Surgham. Both these patrols were fired at heavily
at a range of under 200 yards, but had no casualties. They
reported that several bodies of the enemy were moving S.
and S.W. of the ridge, most of them apparently broken,
and that there was one body about 1,000 strong 1 mile
S. of the Nile.

At 8.45 we received orders from the Sirdar to annoy the
enemy's right flank and if possible head them off from
Omdurman. We immediately moved S.W. towards the
retiring enemy's right flank and our combat patrols reported
enemy in front of us — about 600 they thought, but they
could not get close enough to report exact numbers. We
continued to push on at a walk for another ten minutes,
when our combat patrols were driven rapidly back on us
and we came under a heavy fire from a body of the enemy
600 yards from our front. Our CO. immediately moved
us to the left in column of troops, so as to take the enemy
in flank, when we suddenly again came under the fire of a
large body of the enemy hidden in a khor 300 yards on our
left flank. Men and horses began to go down under the
hail of bullets and there was only one way out of a disaster,
and that was to charge home, which we accordingly did.
A quarter of an hour afterwards the Dervishes, some 2,000
strong, were in full retreat and we were masters of the
khor, they having lost 52 killed in the charge and 20 by our
carbine fire. No doubt they had a great number of wounded.
Our loss was 1 officer and 20 men killed, 4 officers and 45
men wounded, and 118 horses killed and wounded; a
heavy price to pay for victory. But, though this may have

216 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

had no immediate effect on the result of the battle, it had
a more far-reaching result, because it proved that the
British cavalry of to-day is imbued with the same spirit
as the British cavalry of the past, and that the formidable
Dervish is absolutely no match for the British trooper in
a hand-to-hand fight.

I will now endeavour to record what I actually saw myself
during this part of the fight. Before we wheeled into line
to charge I could see over my right shoulder, about 300
yards away, a dense mass of Dervish footmen pouring a
hail of bullets into us. Luckily, as usual, most of them
were too high. But it was not comfortable to be riding
along slowly in column of troops with the enemy blazing
into our right flank, and I found myself calling out : " Why
the blazes don't we charge before they shoot us down ! "
But directly we were wheeled into line and charged a wild
feeling of satisfaction came over me with the wish to put
my sword into an enemy, and as our pace quickened into a
fast gallop a cheer of excitement burst from us, for at last,
for the first time in the history of the regiment, we were
charging " in earnest " and the prayer of generation upon
generation of 21st Lancers was granted. Nothing could
have stopped us but absolute complete annihilation.

The Dervishes answered us with fierce hoarse yells of
" Allah'l Allah ! " which drowned our cheers, and some of
them actually bounded forward to meet us as if victory
was already theirs. They had yet to learn what British
cavalry was. As we closed on them I noticed that my
squadron leader and second in command were riding with
heads down as if against a hailstorm, and found myself
doing the same. It was very much like a hailstorm, as
the bullets made a continuous " whiz," " whiz," " whiz,"
with an occasional clink as one hit a sword or a lance-
point.

Just before we struck them I saw straight in front of me
a khor with rocks on either side filled with a dense mass
of Dervishes packed round three flags, yelling defiance,

MEMORIES 1894-1901 217

waving their spears and swords and firing their Remingtons.
Amid the smoke and waving arms I could see their upturned
faces grinning hate. My charger attempted to incline to
his left, but I managed to keep him straight and the next
moment he jumped the rocks and I was in the khor and
among them. They were as thick as bees and hundreds
must have been knocked over by our horses. My charger
— a polo pony — behaved magnificently, literally tramping
straight through them. He only received a slight spear
wound and I got through scot-free, except for a blow from
some blunt weapon across my left arm, but the left flap
and pocket of my coat were cut through, which let out all
my food (biscuits) for the day. Also my sword-scabbard,
frog and one rein were cut. The two Dervishes that gave
me most trouble as I passed through the khor were : one
a fine clean-shaven, light-skinned, well-bred looking swords-
man who cut at me with a huge sword, right hand on hilt
and left hand on right wrist. I can remember him well,
the hissing yell of " Allah " and the ferocious look of hate
with which he struck. I parried the blow, but the strength
of his cut knocked me half off my horse and as I recovered
my seat a coal-black fiend put his rifle straight at my chest.
Before he had time to fire I threw myself on to the other
side of my horse's neck, and he missed me. At this moment
my horse and Private Miller's cannoned at the bottom of
the khor and we passed out of it side by side, each of us
having thus only one side to defend.

Directly we got through the khor and had gone about
100 yards we halted and faced about, and we then saw that
the enemy had begun to retire westward, keeping up a
heavy fire on us all the time. We could see the emirs
rushing forward and trying to induce them to attack us
while we were rallying. But their followers were not for
it. They had already had enough of British cavalry.

At this moment I noticed that Private Byrne of my
troop was as pale as death and reeling in his saddle from
loss of blood. So I told him he might fall out. But he

218 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

answered, " No, no, sir. I'm all right. Fall in, No. 2 Troop !
Where are the devils ? " I was beginning to get annoyed
with my troop for not rallying more quickly. I could only
find six men. But I soon learned the reason, for one of them
called out, " This is all that remains of No. 2 Troop ! "
So I told them to rally with the rest of the squadron while
I went to see if I could find any of my men still alive in the
khor. I particularly missed Serjeant Carter, my troop
serjeant, a magnificent soldier and very skilful man-at-arms.
I knew he would have been with me unless something had
happened to him. Making for the khor I met Major
Wyndham on foot running in magnificent style with his
revolver in his right hand up in the air. One Dervish
horseman 40 yards behind was galloping after him with a
spear. Directly I rode at this horseman he turned and
attempted to make off and so I had to shoot him in the back.
Near to and in the khor I passed the bodies of several of
our men, terribly mutilated ; also many bodies of the
enemy, with some wounded as well as unwounded Dervishes
who had stayed behind to loot or mutilate, probably both.
The sight of our mutilated dead made me " see red " and
go for every Dervish I met like a fury. It had the same
effect afterwards on our men. I could not find Carter's
body, but suddenly I came upon the body of an officer
lying face downwards. At first I thought it was Smyth.
At that moment I saw Kenna and Corporal Swarbrick
riding about near me, so I called them both to the body,
and dismounting found it to be Grenfell's, terribly mutilated.
As the regiment was now 400 yards away and the enemy,
who had begun to advance again firing heavily, were only
200 yards off we determined to bring Grenfell's body away
before it could be further mutilated. After a great effort,
for a dead man is a terrible weight to lift, I managed to
get him on to my horse, which took fright at the unusual
burden and plunging forward broke away from us and
galloped off. Kenna and Corporal Swarbrick immediately
went in pursuit of my horse and, though the enemy was

MEMORIES 1894-1901 219

firing furiously at us and every moment getting closer,
they caught him and most gallantly brought him back to
me. I made one more effort to get the body on to the horse,
but found it impossible to lift quickly, and as we were only
three and in a few more moments several hundred Dervishes
would be round us there was nothing to do but to retire.
So I mounted and we rode off together amid a hail of bullets.
There is no doubt that the Dervishes are the worst shots
in the world, and not one of them in a hundred could hit
a haystack at 50 yards.

As we retired Taylor, who had first rallied his troop, opened
fire on the advancing Dervishes. He was soon reinforced
by several other dismounted troops. This fire checked the
enemy and drove them back again. They retreated west-
ward in confusion. The regiment mounted and advanced
slowly after them. So we recovered all our dead and also
three of their standards. They left some 72 dead. As
they retired they crossed the front of the 2nd British brigade,
which we could not see, just coming over the ridges west of
Jebel Surgham, and almost at the same moment the 32nd
Field Battery, R. A., opened fire at about 2,000 yards range
on the confused mass of the enemy. We could see the
shrapnel bursting among them, much to our satisfaction,
for we didn't bear any feeling of kindness to that black
mass that had just mutilated so many of our gallant
comrades.

They now retired westward into the great mass of broken
enemy who were slowly and sullenly strolling from the battle-
field towards Omdurman. In fact as we advanced we
found directly across our front a huge stream of defeated
Dervishes, several miles long and nearly a mile broad,
rolling towards the south-west of Omdurman. The nearest
occasionally stopped and sniped at us, and our advanced
patrols replied. Hundreds gave themselves up, were
disarmed and made to march behind us under escort.
Several had to be killed as they fired point-blank at our
officers and men while they were being disarmed. We

220 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC MEMORIES

continued watching the retreating enemy and making
prisoners from 10 till 4 p.m., all which time horses and men
were without food or water. At 4 we received orders to
water in Khor Shamba. The water there was thick and
muddy and strongly flavoured with dead camel, dead
donkey, and dead Dervish. But we drank quarts of it all
the same and found it most refreshing. At 6 p.m. the
21st Lancers, the Egyptian cavalry and horse artillery set
out in pursuit of the Khalifa. But we were too late. He
had left Omdurman at 4.30, and we never got within 10
miles of him. His escape was due to one thing only, to
there being no one in supreme command of the mounted
troops. Instead of one leader they had three, Martin,
Broadwood, and Young, all acting independently. At
11 a.m. the mounted troops could easily have gone round
to the south-west of Omdurman and cut off the Khalifa's
line of retreat. But from 10 a.m. till 6 p.m. the mounted
troops did nothing of any use. They were simply wasted.
At 11 p.m., after a fruitless pursuit, we bivouacked without
food or water in the desert and in a short time we were
all sound asleep. I lay down, helmet and all on, and tied
my horse to my wrist, and though he walked about during
the night, pulling me after him, I slept like a top. Our
sleep was sound for we knew that in our first battle the
regiment had behaved in a manner worthy of the traditions
of the British cavalry.

CHAPTER VII
1898

Kitchener finds Captain Marchand at Fashoda. Exchange of
views with Paris. K.'s interview with Marchand. Status quo
pending his report. Marchand comes to Cairo. Antecedents
of the issue. The contentions advanced by M. Delcasse, and
the British case. Decision of French Government to recall
Marchand. Kitchener's return to Cairo and reception in
England. Death of Lady Cromer. Departure of Marchand
expedition via Abyssinia. Lord Salisbury's treatment of the
issue. Lord Curzon at Port Said. Cromer goes to Khartoum.

After issuing the first most necessary instructions
for the re-establishment of order Kitchener pro-
ceeded up the Nile with a section of gunboats in
accordance with instructions from London, which
I had transmitted to him at the beginning of August,
in anticipation of the fall of Khartoum. Flotillas
were to ascend the White and the Blue Niles. The
White Nile expedition was to be commanded by
the Sirdar in person, and he was to proceed as far
as Fashoda. Should either French or Abyssinians be
encountered nothing was to be said or done which
would in any way imply a recognition on behalf
of Her Majesty's Government of a title to possession
by France or Abyssinia of any portion of the
Nile Valley.

221

222 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

A few days later M. Delcasse, who in the begin-
ning of September had succeeded M. Hanotaux as
Minister for Foreign Affairs at Paris, while con-
gratulating Great Britain on the success of our
arms, admitted to our Ambassador, Sir Edmund
Monson, that if Kitchener's gunboats continued
to advance up the Nile it was probable they would
fall in before long with Captain Marchand. He
described the position of the latter as merely that
of "an emissary of civilisation," who had no
authority to assume the decision of questions of
right, which must be discussed between the two
Governments. He expressed the hope that no
attempt would be made to settle these questions
of right on the spot. The record of this conversa-
tion did not, however, reach me until after the
Sirdar had actually started up the river. I for-
warded it at once, but on the same day a violent
storm south of Metemmeh again interrupted all
telegraphic connections, and it became impossible
for the message to catch him up before his arrival
at Fashoda. Almost simultaneously I received
a preliminary report from Kitchener announcing
that he had ascertained that the French flag was
flying there, and that Marchand had taken possession
of the old Egyptian station with eight European
officers and a force of Senegalese troops.

Lord Salisbury's reply to Sir Edmund Monson's
communication was to the effect that if M. Delcasse
should revert to the subject he was to point out
that all the territories which had been subject to
the Khalifa had passed by right of conquest to the

MEMORIES 1894-1901 223

British and Egyptian Governments, and that Her
Majesty's Government did not consider that this
right was open to discussion.

The expedition to Fashoda occupied a certain
time, and I could not receive K.'s despatches,
which were being brought down by Lord Edward
Cecil, until near the end of the month. The flotilla
had for the first time seen something of the Nile
Sudd, which K. admitted in his letters was more
formidable than he had anticipated and presented
a serious problem. The last week of September
was spent in a continual interchange of telegrams
with the Foreign Office. Meanwhile Sir Edmund
Monson had on the 22nd of September, with perfect
courtesy and without any suggestion of menacing
language, made it clear to M. Delcasse that Her
Majesty's Government would not acquiesce in
Marchand's remaining at Fashoda, and that on that
point no compromise was possible.

On the 25th I was able definitely to confirm that
Captain Marchand had with him 120 Senegalese
soldiers and a staff of eight officers. Kitchener
had announced his approach by letter, and in reply-
ing Marchand stated that he had been ordered by
his Government to occupy the Bahr-el-Ghazal up
to the confluence of the Bahr-el-Jebel, and also the
Shilluk country on the left bank of the Nile as far
as Fashoda. He had, he continued, concluded a
treaty with the Shilluk chiefs placing their lands
under the protection of France. Such instructions
were not easy to reconcile with the contention
repeatedly affirmed in Paris that there was no

224 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

Marchand mission, for the latter evidently regarded
himself as something more than a mere " emissary
of civilisation."

On the Sirdar's arrival Marchand at once came
on board his steamer. K. treated him with the
utmost courtesy and congratulated him on his
remarkable achievement. But he pointed out that
the presence of his party in the Nile Valley was an
infringement of the rights of Egypt, and he pro-
tested against the hoisting of the French flag in
the Khedive's dominions. Captain Marchand in-
sisted that he had received precise orders from his
Government to hoist the flag and to occupy
the official buildings, and maintained that he
could not withdraw without orders from his own
Government. There was a delicate moment when
the Sirdar enquired whether in view of the very
superior force by which he was accompanied resis-
tance would be made to the substitution of the
Egyptian flag at Fashoda. Marchand replied that
they would not of course be able to hold out against
such a very superior force, but that they could only
do their duty to the flag of France. K. said that
he had spoken like a Frenchman, and that the flag
should remain where it was until the matter had
been determined between the two Governments.
The Egyptian flag was then hoisted some five
hundred yards south of the French flag. The whole
region to the north was an impenetrable marsh.
The Fashoda area formed a sort of peninsula sur-
rounded either by swamp or river, and on the neck
of dry land connecting it with terra firma to the

MEMORIES 1894^1901 225

south a Soudanese battalion under Colonel Jackson
established a camp. These preliminaries having
been accomplished K. returned north to receive
the plaudits and rewards which an appreciative
country was preparing for him. As he took his
leave of Jackson and his officers, rather cynically
expressing the hope that they would enjoy them-
selves, a terrific tropical downpour descended on the
improvised camp in its unattractive surroundings.

Captain Marchand's party had been unsuccess-
fully attacked by the Dervishes on the 25th of
August. He had anticipated a renewed and more
serious attack, and had, therefore, sent messengers
southwards for reinforcements. The advance on
Khartoum, however, made it necessary for the
Khalifa to concentrate all his forces at Omdurman
and the Dervishes did not return. Marchand
appeared to have a fair amount of grain and beans,
but he was short of ammunition. Many months
must have elapsed before his supplies could have
been replenished, and Kitchener was of opinion that
had the Soudan expedition and the defeat of the
Khalifa been delayed nothing could have saved
him and his party from annihilation. That opinion
may be contested, but K. never hesitated to affirm
that they owed their safety to our timely arrival.

As regards the treaty concluded with the Shilluk
tribes which Marchand announced that he had
despatched to his Government, all who have had
experience of savage Africa know how readily a
local headman can be induced to place a seal or
mark on a document of the contents of which he

Q

226 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

has often only the most shadowy comprehension.
In any case the chief of the Shilluk tribe entirely
denied having made any treaty with the French,
and his people displayed undisguised satisfaction
at returning to their old allegiance.

The first encounter on the spot had taken place
in accordance with all good traditions of chivalry.
Would the French Government now agree to recall
Marchand and his party ? The attitude of M.
Delcasse in regard to the Nile Valley was summed
up in the words used in one of his own despatches
published in a French Yellow Book : " Nous demander
de Vevacuer prealablement sans discussion, ce serait
au fond nous adresser un ultimatum." Formally
no such procedure was employed, but in reality it
was a moral ultimatum to which the French Govern-
ment eventually yielded. Meanwhile they expressed
a desire to receive Marchand' s reports before further
negotiations took place, and we were directed to
forward a telegram instructing him to send one
of his officers to Cairo with a copy of his report. It
would be, Delcasse maintained, to ask the impossible
if we pressed for the recall of their agent before they
had had this report, but he was ready to discuss
the whole question in the most conciliatory spirit.
This request was agreed to. Lord Salisbury did
not ask to see the message which we were to trans-
mit, but our Ambassador in Paris was instructed
to point out that the transmission did not imply
any modification of the view already expressed by
Her Majesty's Government that, whether in times
of Egyptian or Dervish dominion, the region in

MEMORIES 1894-1901 227

which Captain Marchand was found had never
been without an owner ; and that the British Govern-
ment considered that his expedition into that region
with an escort of 100 Senegalese troops had no
political effect, nor could any political significance
be attached to it. Meanwhile Colonel Jackson
remained encamped at a convenient distance.

Eventually Captain Marchand himself came down
to Cairo, where he was in direct telegraphic com-
munication with his Government. I did not see
him. The situation was obviously a very delicate
one, and we felt that the greatest discretion must
be observed in our relations with the French Agency
during the somewhat protracted period occupied
by communications with Paris and subsequent
negotiations. Officers who came into contact with
him up the river expressed the opinion that he did
all that was in his power to facilitate matters and in
personal relations was courtesy itself. Every one
was, I think, genuinely sorry to feel that after his
remarkable achievement in bringing his expedition
to the Nile he should have found himself in such
a trying position. Criticism of the policy of his
Government was not incompatible with a sincere
feeling of regard for the officer who had so ably
carried out the duty entrusted to him. The ambition,
moreover, of France during the epoch of African
rivalries to obtain an outlet on the Nile with all its
eventual possibilities was easy to understand. Had
I been a Frenchman I should have fully shared that
ambition, and have been as ready to devote my
energies to realising it as circumstances had made

228 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

me zealous in contesting what I cannot admit to
have been a good claim in right.

Having been myself both in Egypt and in Abys-
sinia directly concerned with the antecedents of
the critical situation which had arisen, I feel
entitled to place on record a brief historical
summary of an issue which caused grave
anxiety at the time and left after its settlement
an inevitable sense of soreness in France. Even
there, however, expressions of opinion had not been
wanting at the time that the policy of continu-
ally irritating Great Britain was a mistaken one,
and in spite of Fashoda M. Delcasse, who had him-
self been largely responsible for the enterprise,
became not long afterwards one of the warmest
advocates of a better understanding, in giving
successful effect to which he incurred the undying
resentment of Germany.

Events of this nature are apt to be judged by
public opinion with regard only for the considerations
which obtrude themselves at the moment of crisis,
and without adequate appreciation of the conditions
anterior to that crisis. At home all parties were
united in resenting the entry of the Marchand
expedition into the rebellious Nile provinces at the
very time when Egypt and Great Britain were
engaged in the process of reconquering the Soudan.
But the sequence of events which had preceded
this action gave it an almost provocative character.
It has since more than once been suggested to me
in other countries that our attitude was intransigent.
It could not have been other than firm in view of

MEMORIES 1894H901 229

our repeated public and official announcements that
we did not regard the question of the Upper Nile
as open to discussion.

The record of the controversy summarised in
the following pages is based upon published docu-
ments. Personal experiences in Africa covering
the three or four years anterior to this historic
episode justify my attempting to deal with the
merits of an issue which it is difficult to appreciate
in all its bearings without intimate knowledge of
African affairs in the 'nineties.

The case for the rights of Great Britain and
Egypt in the Nile Valley was a strong one, and
it was in no way shaken by the French Govern-
ment's vindication of policy. The promulgation
of the Anglo-German agreement of July, 1890, had
constituted a public notification of what we regarded
as our sphere of influence in East Africa. M.
Delcasse" maintained that France had never recog-
nised the Anglo-German convention. But the
French Government had at the time of its publica-
tion and communication to the Powers protested
that certain French interests would be violated
by the establishment of a Protectorate over Zanzibar
which Germany had agreed to recognise. The
validity of the French protest was admitted, and
this issue was eventually determined by our recog-
nition of a French Protectorate over Madagascar
and the hinterland of Algeria. If France preserved
silence as regards the remaining dispositions of
the convention and confined her protest to this
single point, the assumption on our part that she

230 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

accepted the other provisions was surely justified.

Nevertheless, within a few months of the promul-
gation of the Anglo-German agreement in 1890,
M. de Brazza, the Commissioner-General of the
French Congo, despatched a mission under M.
Liotard to secure the Upper Ubanghi against
movements from the Congo State, with instructions
to establish " une region frangmse ay ant une porte
ouverte sur le Nil." We, of course, could then only
conjecture the precise nature of his instructions,
but any doubt as to how far the suspicions which
we entertained at the time were justified was
subsequently dissipated by a speech made in 1898
by M. Liotard himself, and published on the 7th of
October by the Temps, in which he made this
admission.

The British sphere was once again defined in the
Anglo-Italian agreement of March, 1891. Then
followed our treaty with the Congo Free State of
May, 1894, to which reference has been made in
my previous volume. By this instrument Great
Britain agreed to a lease to the Congo State of
certain territories in the Anglo-Egyptian sphere,
the extent of which was plainly indicated in the
map annexed. Belgian officers were at that time
advancing on the Upper Ubanghi, and in actual
occupation of certain posts in the Bahr-el-
Ghazal region. M. Hanotaux, who was then
Minister for Foreign Affairs at Paris, brought
pressure to bear on King Leopold to renounce the
lease, and a military expedition was organised by
M. Delcasse, as Minister of the Colonies, under

MEMORIES 1894-1901 231

Colonel Monteil, to expel the Belgians if necessary.
King Leopold gave way, and the Belgian officers
were withdrawn from the Upper Ubanghi, which
was detached from the French Congo and consti-
tuted a separate administration. The Monteil
expedition, nevertheless, remained on an active
footing, and a second expedition followed under
M. Liotard with instructions which were not made
public. The real object of these missions was
revealed some four years afterwards in an open
letter addressed to Delcasse by Prince Henry of
Orleans, and published in the Temps on the 21st
of November, 1898. He wrote : " In 1894 Colonel
Monteil, placed at the head of an expedition which
would advance from the Congo to the White Nile,
has asked the Government to give me (Prince
Henry) a mission to rejoin him through Abyssinia.
The occupation of Fashoda by French forces from
the eastern and western sides of Africa was to be
our objective." That the intention existed as
early as 1894 of giving the French Congo an issue
on the Nile was moreover admitted by M. Delcasse
in a despatch to the French Ambassador in London,
which was published in the Yellow Book of 1898.

After the treaty concluded between France and
the Congo State had rendered negative the pro-
visions of the Anglo-Congolese agreement, Her
Majesty's Government endeavoured to come to
terms with the French Government directly, and
the British Ambassador at Paris arranged with
M. Hanotaux for a discussion which contemplated
the adjustment of a number of African issues be-

232 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

tween the two Governments, and should also
include the question of the Nile. The French
Government agreed to the preliminary condition
put forward on our side that, pending this discussion,
Colonel Monteil should be recalled. They did not,
however, seem to have considered that the with-
drawal of Monteil connoted also a suspension of
the activities of M. Liotard, who was actually on
his way to the Bahr-el-Ghazal to anticipate any
negotiations by a fait accompli. So serious did the
situation thus created appear to Lord Rosebery's
Government that Sir Edward Grey, then Under-
Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs declared in
Parliament in March, 1895, that any invasion of
the Nile Valley would be regarded by Great Britain
as an unfriendly act. When Lord Salisbury re-
placed Lord Rosebery as Prime Minister in the
following year this warning was repeated by Mr.
Curzon as Under-Secretary in the place of Sir
Edward Grey. Once more in December, 1897, a
note addressed by Sir Edmund Monson in Paris
to M. Hanotaux allowed no doubt to exist that
Lord Salisbury adhered to the position adopted
by his predecessor in office. Our attitude had thus
been defined with unmistakable clearness.

M. Delcasse, in defending French policy in 1898,
had gone so far as to contend in a communication 1
to Sir Edmund Monson that there had been no
Marchand mission. Captain Marchand, in carrying
out his duty of relieving time-expired troops and
occupying regions recognised as in the French
1 Affaires du Haut Nil. Desp. No. 7 (1898).

MEMORIES 1894-1901 233

sphere by the Franco-Congolese Treaty, was, he
said, simply acting as the subordinate of M. Liotard,
and it had been himself who, as Minister of the
Colonies, had entrusted M. Liotard with his mission
in 1893, a date long anterior to Sir Edward Grey's
declaration. As a matter of fact M. Delcasse did
not become Minister of the Colonies until 1894, and
it was in that year, and not in 1893, that the Liotard
expedition was despatched. In 1893 Delcasse was
only Under-Secretary of State. The error of date
was no doubt a slip. But it was unfortunate that
such an error should seem to give greater force to
his insistence on " une date bien anterieure " to Sir
E. Grey's declaration. The question of what
Liotard' s instructions really were was evaded. No
doubt, however, on this point is left by subsequent
disclosures, including the admission of M. Liotard
himself, to which I have already referred, in a speech
published in the Temps of October 7, 1898, in which
he stated that the mission entrusted to him by M.
Delcasse in 1894 had the same object as that which
had been confided to him by M. de Brazza in 1890,
and contemplated an open door to the Nile. In
any case M. Liotard did not actually cross the old
Egyptian frontier until February, 1896, nearly a
year after Sir E. Grey's warning note, so that
there would have been ample time to revise his
instructions.

M. Delcasse's contention that there was no
Marchand mission could hardly be seriously accepted.
No doubt when in January, 1896, Marchand was
appointed to the Upper Ubanghi it was only as an

234 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

officer under M. Liotard's administrative control.
But he did not actually leave France until many
months later, and when he started in the following
June the Soudan campaign had already been initi-
ated in despite of every effort France could make
to prevent the Commissioners of the Debt in Egypt
from according the necessary funds. From the
French point of view a new situation had thus arisen,
which might compromise the project of connecting
the Congo Colony with the Nile. Captain Marchand
was then appointed commander of the military
forces in the Ubanghi area, and he took out with
him, in addition to a considerable staff, two river
gunboats and sufficient equipment and supplies
for a long period of African penetration. Moreover,
as soon as M. Hanotaux succeeded M. Berthelot
at the Quai d'Orsay in 1896, steps were taken to
organise expeditions through Abyssinia to join hands
from the east with Marchand advancing from the
west to the Nile.

When our decision to advance to Dongola was
adopted in 1896, the French Government had urged
upon the Porte that the Sultan should assert his
authority as Suzerain of Egypt, and that no steps
should be sanctioned without the concurrence of
France and Russia. x The sovereignty of the Sultan
and the rights of the Khedive had indeed for a
certain number of years constituted the stock
argument invoked by the French Government in
order to preserve the Equatorial provinces of the
Nile from trespass by others. M. Hanotaux in
1 See Chapter III, p. 92.

MEMORIES 1894-1901 235

1892 had made them a pretext for rejecting a
proposal from the Congo Free State for a division
of the Bahr-el-Ghazal. The rights of the Sultan
and of Egypt had been duly reserved in the Anglo-
Congolese Treaty of 1894. They were nevertheless
to serve as the chief argument for the invalidation
of that instrument in a memorandum submitted
in London by the French Ambassador in August
of that year. The Khedivial Government had, it
was maintained, never ceased to declare its desire
to re-establish authority there, and " it was useless
to pretend that the sovereignty of the Sultan and
of the Khedive was not infringed " even though a
perfunctory recognition of their rights was con-
tained in the agreement. This contention was
repeated by M. Hanotaux in a speech in the Senate
in 1895. And yet at the very moment when the
rights of Turkey and Egypt were being insistently
advocated by the French Foreign Office, M. Delcasse,
at the Ministry of the Colonies was organising an
expedition the object of which was " de donner a
notre colonie du Congo une issue sur le Nil" as he
himself admitted in a despatch addressed to Baron
de Courcel, the French Ambassador in London,
which appeared in the Yellow Book.

Nor did inconsistency end there. As soon as it
was known in France that Marchand had occupied
Fashoda the Sultan's sovereignty and the Khe-
dive's rights, which had served their purpose, were
conveniently dropped. Nay, those very rights of
Egypt were called in question when it suited the
French Government to contend that the Upper

236 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

Nile was no man's land, and therefore open to
French occupation. It is true that this contention
was only advanced after M. Delcasse, who had
certainly been consistent in his aims, had taken
the place of M. Hanotaux at the Foreign Office.
Though both spoke in the name of the French
Government, Delcasse did not hesitate to reverse
the arguments of his predecessor in office. M. de
Courcel, who was presumably acting on instructions,
reported that he had used the following language
to the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs : "I
enquired of Lord Salisbury whether he did not
consider that it was going rather far to vindicate
on behalf of Egypt alone the privilege of main-
taining in perpetuity her rights over territories
which had once belonged to her, disregarding all
the transformations resulting from conquests and
revolutions. I added that so far as the Bahr-el-
Ghazal region was concerned it had been under
Egyptian domination at most for three or four
years, and this was not much on which to base
the plea of inalienable legitimate possession which
it was sought to sustain against us." The rights
of Egypt and the Sultan which had been invoked
by France to warn off others, which had been held
sufficient to justify a practical ultimatum to the
Congo Free State, were not to be invoked against
France herself. We, however, had no option but
to defend a claim, any concession in regard to which
would have been disastrous to our future position
in Africa.

The controversy regarding Fashoda, with the

MEMORIES 1894^1901 237

successive phases, of which personal experience
made me familiar, is in some respects typical of the
old diplomacy and the expedients to which it
resorted. We in Cairo took a certain amount of
credit to ourselves for the accuracy of the informa-
tion which had throughout been supplied to our
Government and the deductions drawn from it.
This information had fully justified the despatch
of the mission to Abyssinia, the real importance of
which was probably not understood at the time.
The eventual confirmation of our deductions was
not a little due to the indiscretions of some of the
principal actors which have been quoted, and to
documents which were perhaps inadvertently in-
cluded in published official papers. Incidentally
these revelations showed how fortunate had been
the policy adopted for quite other reasons, of
initiating the advance into the Soudan in 1896.

Some weeks were yet to elapse before the settle-
ment, when the French Government decided not
to press their case and to recall Captain Marchand.
The decision when it came was a great relief, and
we could feel that if we had had a long and bitter
quarrel it was time to be friends once more. The
episode belonged to an epoch which is happily
passed. Between Great Britain and France there
are no more African rivalries, and the hatchet has
been buried with all goodwill, thanks not a little
to M. Delcasse himself, whose recent death was
regretted no less sincerely at home than it was in
his own country. The real facts of the case were
perhaps never fully understood in either of the

238 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

countries concerned by the mass of the public,
who only regarded the elements of controversy
obvious at the moment of crisis. It may, therefore,
serve a useful purpose to have reconstructed the
situation historically as those of us who were most
directly interested saw it, and a recapitulation of
the story from our point of view, I hope without
prejudice, may help at this distance of time to
reveal to our friends in France why we felt so
strongly on the subject. It is only in that spirit
that I have recalled it.

In any case with Captain Marchand himself
there had been no quarrel, and there was no one
in Egypt who was not sincerely pleased to hear of
his well-deserved promotion. The French officers
who serve their country in Africa are a corps of
the elite, whose achievements and personal qualities
have won for them the admiration of my country-
men. As I set down these words a letter was placed
in my hand from my son, actually travelling in the
French Niger territories. From Agades he wrote
that his party were staying in the Fort, the
guests of the French who were as usual charming,
and he added, " Whatever relations in Europe may
be, here they could not be improved."

The summer of 1898 had been a particularly
severe one in Egypt, and that year the great heat
lasted on well into the middle of October. A
succession of khamsin winds at the end of Sep-
tember made even the nights unendurable. The
strain and anxiety of responsibility during the last
weeks had been constant, and for a day or two

MEMORIES 1894-1901 239

I was put out of action with fever and an ulcerated
throat. At that moment the Cromers returned. An
apparent improvement in Lady Cromer's condition
had enabled them to undertake the journey back to
Egypt, as she ardently desired. It was perhaps
the last act of sacrifice of her singularly unselfish
and devoted life that she insisted on making the
effort without allowing her husband to perceive
her real anxiety not to keep him any longer away
from his work. There had been a bad moment
when the sea was rough, but otherwise the risk
of the journey was successfully surmounted.

During my momentary inaction I occupied myself
with the examination of some Byron relics which
Surgeon-General Muir was good enough to lend
me. His father Surgeon-Major-General Henry
Muir had been principal medical officer at Argostoli
when Byron came to Cephalonia in the Hercules,
and he lived some twenty years in the island. The
notes of his conversations with the poet, which I
then read for the first time, have now been published
in the Letters and Journals, 1 as also have the letters
contained in his collection, the gem of which was a
portrait of Byron in a cap and frogged military
coat by d'Orsay. Richness of experience does not
seem to have increased his esteem for the women
who had played such a large part in his life before
he took up the cause of Greece. He observed that
he was not surprised that they did not like Don
Juan: "They could not bear it because it took

1 The Works of Lord Byron. Letters and Journals. Vol. VI.
Appendix VI. John Murray (1904).

240 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

of! the veil and showed that all their damned senti-
ment was only an excuse to cover passions of a
grosser nature." Perhaps he only found what he
sought, but I wished he had not said it.

On the 6th of October Kitchener came down to
Cairo. His journey from Khartoum, which a month
earlier was still out of the reach of civilisation, had
only taken seventy-four hours.

He had received none of the messages of con-
gratulation or learned the announcement of his
peerage when he started up the river to Fashoda.
I gathered from him that he had had enough of the
Soudan, and did not particularly desire to go back
if anything else were to be offered him. About a
fortnight later he went to England, where he had a
wonderful reception. His scheme for the Gordon
College was taken up with enthusiasm. There
was a rugged directness in the manner in which he
demanded contributions from those that he believed
could afford them, and he did not hesitate to indicate
the amount which he considered appropriate to the
donor's financial position.

The excessive heat during this October of 1898
undoubtedly accelerated a fatal crisis in Lady
Cromer's illness. On the 12th she began to show
signs of collapse, and a day or two later was unable
to receive any nourishment. During the first few
days of this painful period Cromer held out manfully,
but the suspense told upon him and he could not
get any sleep. The strong man became gentle as a
child, and as it seemed to help him to talk to us, I
remained with Boyle at the Agency all day and

MEMORIES 1894-1901 241

late into the night. She lived on till the afternoon
of the 16th. Father Brindle, the much-beloved
Catholic chaplain, who had gone up with the army
to Khartoum and had earned the regard of men
of every creed, came in the afternoon and told me
he would like to say the prayers for the dying. I
found Cromer, who took him to the room, and he
had just concluded the last prayer when she passed
away. At this grave moment I am glad to think
that he had all the affection and sympathy which
we could give him and every assistance in the last
offices of piety. It was touching to realise how
much he appreciated the little we could do for him.
Her death was deeply felt by many, and not least
by Kitchener, who at this time revealed that human
side which he seldom allowed others to see. Cromer,
broken by his loss, was a very pathetic figure to me
in those days. But he carried on, working still
harder than before, and I liked to think that for
him the consolation of literature was not an empty
phrase.

It was not until the 14th of November that Major
Marchand left Cairo with definite instructions to
evacuate the position at Fashoda. About the same
time the news reached us that Major Martyr had
descended the Nile from the Lakes as far as Lado
and returned thence to Dufile. He had only
started in August. That he should have been able
to cover the distance in so short a time seemed to
indicate that our idea of anticipating Marchand by
pushing forward from the Uganda end had not
been altogether fantastic.

242 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

It had been decided that the French expedition
should return through Abyssinia. A letter from
Maxwell, who accompanied it up the Sobat as far
as the junction of the Jubba, described the departure
of the flotilla on the 11th of December. Their
equipment seemed very modest in view of all they
had accomplished when compared with the powerful
gunboats which were now patrolling the Nile. But
the smaller craft had been able to penetrate where
bigger steamers could not pass, and they were
perfectly adapted for work in the Bahr-el-Ghazal.
Fortunately there were no Abyssinians on the Nile,
and I could congratulate myself on the decision
taken at Addis Abbaba to postpone any discussion
of frontiers on this side until after we had re-
occupied the river basin.

Once in Abyssinian territory Marchand would
have no further serious difficulties, and he could
claim with pride that he had crossed Africa from
west to east by a route never before attempted. A
final small act of courtesy gave, I believe, real
gratification to that gallant officer. The 11th
Soudanese presented him with the flag of the Der-
vish Emir who had fought against him at Fashoda.
They had taken it at the battle of Omdurman.

Lord Salisbury gained great credit for his firm
attitude at this time, and the Foreign Department,
which had been subjected to much criticism for its
policy in China and elsewhere, recovered prestige.
He had inherited a number of unsettled and difficult
issues when he became Minister for Foreign Affairs
in 1895, not the least troublesome of which was the

MEMORIES 1894-1901 243

secular boundary dispute between British Guiana
and Venezuela. The claim advanced in Congress
by President Cleveland, that the United States
should become a party to the issue under a widened
interpretation of the Monroe doctrine, found ready
acceptance in Great Britain, and the boundary
question was regulated by arbitration in a manner
which we had no reason to regret. Looking back
over the years which preceded Fashoda I presume
that Lord Salisbury had long been preoccupied by
the probability of a serious crisis arising on the
Upper Nile. Since the summer of 1897 he could
have had little doubt that without immediate steps
to anticipate the French expedition it would reach
the debatable region first. He therefore no doubt
desired to keep his hands as free as possible. His
attitude towards Germany consequently became
more conciliatory, and it was difficult for him to
take a stronger line regarding the situation in China
in negotiations with Russia without knowing how
far her obligations to her French ally involved sup-
port in African questions. With all the information
at his command he had, it must be assumed, weighed
every consideration and then decided to let things
take their course. Any other action would have
entailed considerable expenditure, not easy to
justify to Parliament without explanations which
it would have been inopportune to give. No doubt
every credit must be ascribed to him for his firmness
when the issue did arise. But at the time some of
us who had been closely watching these develop-
ments remained unconvinced that we might not

244 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

have avoided an undesirable crisis either by a timely
movement from Uganda, very difficult but not
necessarily impossible, or by pressing on to Khartoum
immediately after the battle of the Atbara. At the
same time it must be admitted that we should in
any case have found sections of the Bahr-el-Ghazal
occupied, and, without the interposition of the
Fashoda episode, a settlement of the territorial
question in that province might have ended in
compromise.

Just before Christmas I went to Port Said to see
the Viceroy elect, now Lord Curzon, passing through
on his way to India. Another old Balliol friend,
Sir Walter Lawrence, was with him. We had an
afternoon together, and dined with the Royles at
the hospitable agency of the P. & 0. Company. As
he had just left the Foreign Office, where he had
made the position of parliamentary Under-Secretary
a more vital element in the department than it had
ever been before, we had much to discuss. The
long-standing Cretan question, which had occu-
pied much of my time and thought some ten years
earlier, was more or less resolved. The questions
arising out of the Spanish-American War had,
however, not yet received settlement. Finally
there was all that had been happening in Egypt.

At the end of the year Sir Francis Grenfell was
appointed Governor of Malta, and his command
in Egypt thus only just outlasted the Soudan War.
I presided over a farewell banquet in his honour,
at which a pleasant feature was the presence of
the American representative, Colonel Harrison, whose

MEMORIES 1894-1901 245

speech emphasising the needs of Anglo-Saxon friend-
ship was received with enthusiasm. He was
succeeded by Sir Reginald Talbot, who had been
military attache at Paris during my sojourn at the
Embassy. He and Lady Talbot became our neigh-
bours, and it was a great pleasure to be serving
together again at the same post. Some twenty
years earlier, while I was still an undergraduate at
Oxford, a girl's face which satisfied all the canons
of the rarest English beauty had distracted my
attention from a tedious sermon in a continental
church. It was destined not long after to become
familiar, and has remained so throughout the
friendship of a lifetime which has left that beauty
unimpaired. We had now two Sir Reginalds in
Cairo, and in a short time the other one, Wingate,
was to command the Egyptian Army as Sirdar.

Christmas was at hand. The family festival had
always been a great event at the Agency, and this
year it presented a difficult problem. The Baring
boys and their cousin, now Lady Granville, were
arriving and we felt that it would be melancholy
for them to celebrate it alone in a house of mourning.
My wife persuaded Cromer to come himself and
bring them to dinner at our house, where only the
staff would be present. But we dreaded the moment
of his arrival and the first words to be said on such
an occasion. Then my wife had a brilliant inspira-
tion. Our little boy Francis was now three and a
half years old and an extraordinarily winning child
of whom Cromer was very fond. Instead of being
put to bed at the normal hour he was left sitting in

246 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC MEMORIES

an arm-chair alone in the drawing-room till their
arrival, dressed in his pink pyjamas. The rest of
us were all in the plot to be rather late and allow
the child to receive him. When we all came in a
minute or two later we found Cromer quite content
with the boy sitting on his knee, pulling up his
small pyjamas and observing " much hair on leg."
The ice was broken, as it always is when " a little
child shall lead them."

Four days afterwards Cromer started for Khar-
toum, accompanied by Boyle and Arthur Stanley.
In the four months which had passed since the
battle of Omdurman the people had already learned
to appreciate the advantages of the ordered and
equitable administration which had replaced the
odious tyranny of the Mahdi and the Khalifa, and
he had a great reception. His address to the elders
and notables, specially designed to appeal to such
an audience, was translated sentence by sentence
into Arabic by Boyle as he spoke, a very remarkable
performance. And so ended this eventful year.

CHAPTER VIII
1899-1900

Kitchener as Governor- General of Soudan. Differences with Cairo.
Death of Nubar Pasha. Visit to England. The Derby with
Lord C. Beresford. Captain Wellby. His travels in Equatorial
Africa. His dogs. Wingate's expedition against the Khalifa.
The fight at Gedir and death of the Khalifa. The Boer War.
Our universal unpopularity. Greek sympathies in Egypt.
Soudan-Eritrean frontier settlement in Rome. Lord and
Lady Carrie. K. ordered to South Africa. Wingate becomes
Sirdar. Critical situation in Soudan. Osman Digna captured.
Alfred Paget. Visit to Khartoum. Two nights in the desert.
Wingate's achievement as Governor-General. The Khedive's
visit to England. Sir M. Hicks Beach and the Soudan Budget.

Kitchener had found himself a popular hero after
his successful conduct of the Khartoum campaign
and the subsequent negotiations. There was no
danger that that very level head would be turned.
The danger was rather that when once he felt his
ground secure the arbitrary side of his temperament
would assert itself. My sincere regard for the
memory of an old friend to whose vision and driving
power my country in its grimmest hour owed an
immeasurable debt would naturally predispose me
to refrain from criticising him. But the real
Kitchener was a much more interesting human study
than the Kitchener of popular imagination, and the
medal of the Nile had its reverse.

247

248 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

In the beginning of 1899 the Soudan problem, in
any case a difficult one, became still more difficult
to control owing to those idiosyncrasies of his
secretive character and the inveterate habit of not
placing his cards on the table with perfect frankness
to which I have alluded in a previous chapter. In
so far as his purely military budgets were concerned
he had been allowed to deal with the lump sum
assigned very much as he pleased, and though it
may be doubted whether he was really a good
financier his economies had been masterly. The
same latitude could hardly be accorded in regard
to the Soudan budget. But in his new position as
Governor-General he began to resent any interference,
and he used to complain quite unjustifiably of the
attitude of Gorst, who as Under-Secretary for Finance
had to exercise supervision over expenditure. The
Soudan was bound to impose a heavy burden on
Egypt. The £350,000 assigned to its administration
as an annual subvention was barely adequate, and
in Egypt itself financial stringency was to be
anticipated. Had it been possible, as originally
contemplated, to have postponed the reconquest of
the Soudan until after the construction of the Nile
reservoirs this anxiety would not have been felt.
But though the reservoirs might not be completed
within the estimated period, payment would begin
in four years' time. Experience showed us that
K.'s acceptance of a financial programme elaborated
in Cairo did not prevent instructions to the military
staff at the Egyptian War Office which were not
always consistent with it.

MEMORIES 1894-1901 249

At this time moreover discontent manifested
itself among the Egyptian officers serving in the
Soudan. As such a spirit was sedulously fostered
by the nationalist Press, and belie ved to be encouraged
by the Khedive, it was important to avoid giving
any pretext for it. Unfortunately there was some
justification for this discontent. K. had chosen a
moment when the pay of the British officers in the
Egyptian Army was being raised to cut off the
field allowance of the native officers, notwithstanding
that provision had been made for this expenditure
in the estimates, in order to increase balances
available for other purposes, and this without
reference to the Agency. The revocation of his
order could not fail to have an unfortunate effect,
but to have left it in force would have been more
unfortunate still. I was not in Cairo at the moment
when this difference of opinion arose. Cromer used
to write to me very fully during my absence on
leave. His letter on this occasion is characteristic
of the difference between the two men. He wrote :
" You know how secretive the Sirdar is. He does
not tell me anything, and I am not confident he
knows much about it himself. He terrorises all his
people and does not encourage them to speak the

truth. A Moslem army ; Christian officers ;

the blacks capricious and almost savage ; the
fellaheen loathing service in the Soudan ; the
Khedive, to say the least, f oolish ; the native and
French Press doing all they can to encourage dis-
content ; the older and more experienced English
officers getting promoted ; these facts are quite

250 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

enough for me. I do not think that Kitchener

at all appreciated the danger. Hence I insisted
on giving back the field allowances. Kitchener tells
me I was wrong, but I do not agree with him. It

instantly put a stop to all the agitation here.

Kitchener must remember he has to deal with
human beings and not with blocks of wood and
stone."

A certain reaction also began now to be perceptible
against the adulation which had been offered the
Sirdar after the close of the campaign. An expedi-
tion sent in pursuit of the Khalifa led to no result.
He had placed his brother in command over the
heads of Maxwell and Macdonald, a selection which
it was difficult to justify. The suppression in the
despatch indicating meritorious services of the
report of the officer commanding at Kassala, who in
the opinion of competent judges had done very well
with a quite inadequate force, had had for its con-
sequence the omission of that officer's name in the
list of those publicly thanked by Parliament after
the battle of Omdurman. Being in England at
the time and resenting what I felt was an injustice,
I obtained full authority from Cromer to place the
facts before a higher authority, and the officer in
question was immediately recommended for an
exceptional distinction. A number of the senior
British officers were now leaving Egypt, and the
Sirdar made it a grievance that they did not show
more devotion to him and sacrifice their own
careers by remaining.

Finally he was attacked in Parliament for the

MEMORIES 1894-1901 251

destruction of the Mahdi's tomb and the disin-
terment of the body. Here K. showed generosity
in taking on himself all the responsibility for the
manner in which the operation was carried out.
In view of the local conditions and the danger which
then still existed of a recrudescence of fanaticism
in the Soudan he was probably right in suppressing
everything which tended to perpetuate the cult of
a Mahdism repudiated by all sound Moslem opinion
and authority. But the circumstances of the case
appealed to a certain form of sentimentality at home,
and incidentally they offered a promising oppor-
tunity for an attack on the Government. I was
present in the House of Commons when Mr.
Morley (Viscount Morley) opened the debate with
a speech which did not seem to me one of his
happiest efforts. K. was in the Peers' gallery
with Lord Roberts, and his face was an interest-
ing study.

During this rather difficult stage Cromer dis-
plaj^ed great forbearance, and I did not think K.
showed sufficient appreciation of the debt he owed
him. There could only be one King in Brentford
and there was no doubt who that was to be. He
was no doubt overworked and depressed, probably
more than he would have admitted even to himself,
by criticism in Parliament. The defects, which I
trust I have not overstated, of his great qualities
in no way detract from the measure of the man in
normal conditions. It was not easy for him, having
once emerged and being constituted as he was, to
play a second part. It was therefore in many ways

252 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

fortunate that before the end of the year his
invaluable activity was required elsewhere.

In January, 1899, Nubar Pasha died in Paris,
where he had long been lying ill. The reconquest
of the Soudan had brightened his latter days, for
he was one of the few who had known Khartoum
before the Mahdist rebellion, when his brother
was governor of the Equatorial provinces. He died
as he had lived, proud of his contribution to the
progress of Egypt, the establishment of the Mixed
Tribunals and the inauguration of an impartial
judicial system. In announcing his death the
correspondent of The Times at Paris quoted some
words which Nubar had made use of not long before,
when discussing the failure of the European Powers
to solve the Turkish problem. The only way to
cure the chronic Oriental malady was to adopt a
policy of justice for which they had substituted
the policy of interest. " When," he said, " you
have given the Turks not only justice, but the sense
of justice, you will have saved both Europe and
Turkey."

The lease of our house had expired and we had
taken Sir William Garstin's house for the winter,
while he was absent on the Upper Nile inspecting
and reporting on the conditions of the Sudd. There
our eldest daughter was born on the 18th of March.
By a curious coincidence both her godfather, Lord
Cromer, and her godmother, Lady Grenfell, had the
same Christian name. It was therefore obvious
that she must be called Evelyn. At the end of
April we departed for our annual leave.

MEMORIES 1894^1901 253

On the Queen's birthday I received to my great
surprise a letter from Lord Salisbury announcing
that he had recommended me for the K.C.M.G.
for services especially in Egypt. As I realised that
this honour must have been conferred at the
suggestion of Lord Cromer, it was really gratifying
to me. In the same Gazette appeared the name of
Mr. Ernest Cassel, who received a similar distinction.

Another event of this leave season was my first
Derby, which I witnessed from Charlie Beresford's
coach. We drove over from his house at Ham,
where there was a very merry party, including that
splendid veteran of the sea, Sir Michael Culme-
Seymour. Every one on the course seemed to know
Charlie Beresford, who picked up a party of young
Australians paying their first visit to England and
brought them to lunch at the coach. He had the
happy knack of doing the right thing genially, and
was at home in every country, with a smiling
face which interpreted the universal language of
humanity. He was a great imperial asset.

During the summer which we spent at Ramleh
there arrived down the Nile from the heart of the
African continent Captain Wellby of the 18th
Hussars, who starting through Abyssinia had made
a very remarkable journey, eventually reaching the
river via Lake Rudolph. He brought the first
reliable information available regarding the Turk-
hanas, a curious race of giants who add to their
already exceptional stature by piling the hair caked
with clay in masses on the top of their heads.
Wellby, whose previous experiences as a traveller

254 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

had been in Asia, quiet, modest and resourceful,
had all the qualifications of a great explorer, not
the least of which was his sympathy with and
understanding of native races. His conspicuous
contribution to our knowledge of Africa at that time
is recorded in a very interesting book, 1 which was
only published after his sad death in South Africa,
where I was told that the Boer who had wounded
him cared for him afterwards until he died as though
he had been his own son. This did not surprise
me ; there was a singular charm in that unassuming
young soldier, who had made such good use of his
brief life.

Throughout his wanderings he had been accom-
panied by a fox-terrior of extraordinary intelligence.
So human in her instinct was the little " Lady "
that even Moslems in Africa to whom the dog is
by tradition unclean regarded her as an exception
to all rules. She was not really a dog, they said,
but an afrit or spirit, and they became as attached
to her as was her master. In Abyssinia there had
been a mesalliance with an Abyssinian greyhound,
and the result was a puppy who had reverted to the
type of the primitive yellow dog, but developed
remarkable character. As Wellby was uncertain
of his future movements, but hoped eventually to
return to Egypt, Lady was left with me and soon
settled down in her new surroundings after the first
day or two of perplexity. Baird meanwhile took
charge of the yellow dog with the long legs. Wellby,
after spending a day or two with us, left for home,
1 'Twixt Sirdar and Menelik. Fisher Unwin.

MEMORIES 1894-1901 255

whence he was ordered to South Africa, and to my
great regret I never saw him again. He left the
memory of a singularly winning personality.

In the early autumn Kitchener contemplated a
further attempt to deal with the Khalifa, whose
position had now been ascertained. He was being
shadowed by a friendly chief, who was however
not strong enough to attack him without support.
What remained of the Dervish army with the
Khalifa was quite demoralised, but there was always
the fear that discontented elements would rally
round him. Kitchener wrote to me from Khartoum
on the 11th September that a menace of trouble
in Senaar had been repressed by prompt action,
but that it had revealed that the Khalifa was still
a danger so long as he remained at large. Wingate
was entrusted with the command of a flying column
which was despatched to look for him, and the little
campaign was admirably conceived and carried out.
The 9th and 13th Soudanese, with one squadron
of cavalry, 250 camel corps, 1,000 irregulars, six
field guns, and six maxims, concentrated on the
west bank of the Nile, some 180 miles south of
Omdurman. After a night march they encountered
and broke up a foraging force under Ahmed Fedil,
capturing all the raided grain. They pressed on
through a second night to a short distance from the
Khalifa's camp, which had been definitely " located "
at a place called Gedid. Then, after a rest, they
started to march in the dark through thick bush
to the spot where the last act of the long-drawn-
out drama of Mahdism was to end. The Dervish

256 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

leaders displayed the old defiant spirit and disregard
of death, attempting a last forlorn rush to reach
their enemy. But nothing could live under the
fire concentrated on them in the half -fight of dawn,
and the Khalifa, with Ahmed Fedil, Wad Helu, and
the bodyguard of Emirs killed to a man, were all
found lying in a heap together. The remainder of
the force, with all the women and children, surren-
dered. The only leader of importance who for the
moment escaped was the ever-elusive Osman Digna.
The whole of the Soudan was now open.

Wingate sent me the photographs, taken on the
battlefield, of the bodies of the Khalifa and his
emirs lying where they fell, the arms outstretched,
the features calmly set, and their dark, bearded faces
and bald foreheads gleaming like bronze in the
African sun. Colonel Mahon stands by them with
his unfailing pipe between his lips. It was histori-
cally appropriate that Wingate, the quiet, indefatig-
able brain of the Egyptian army, should have given
the coup de grace to the tyrant of Omdurman.

The year 1899 was an eventful one. But I was
in no way concerned with the circumstances which
made it so. The extraordinary Dreyfus case ab-
sorbed the interest of Europe for a season. Then
came the South African War, which soldiers such as
old Hector Macdonald, in whose hearts the memory
burned, regarded as the penalty for our surrender
after Majuba Hill in 1884. It is interesting to
reflect how differently such episodes can be judged
by different mentalities. I remember an old Italian
statesman telling me how deeply Mr. Gladstone's

MEMORIES 1894-1901 257

decision on that occasion had impressed him with
the power and greatness of Britain. No other
European nation, he said, could have afforded to
be so magnanimous after defeat. That we had been
able thus to act was a convincing demonstration
to the world of our strength. His critics at home,
on the other hand/were rather disposed to attribute
Gladstone's magnanimity, of the ideal character of
which he no doubt ended by convincing himself,
to the fact that John Bright had threatened to leave
the Government if peace were not signed forthwith.
My diaries at the end of that year are clouded
with deep depression as disaster after disaster had
to be chronicled. Living in an international milieu
in Egypt, we were impressed by the extraordinary
unpopularity of our cause with almost every nation
in Europe. There were few outside the Empire
who were curious to consider the long evolution of
an issue of which Sir Bartle Frere had written
as long before as 1879 : " The trial of strength
will be forced upon you, and neither justice nor
humanity will be served by postponing the trial."
It was the universally accepted doctrine that
British Imperialism had determined to crush and
absorb a small and gallant people seeking to main-
tain their national existence and independence. In
some countries, and among these Italy, always
anxious to be friendly, the language of the press,
which was almost universally in favour of the
Boers, displayed a certain becoming restraint. But
this was rather the exception than the rule, and the
extremist free-lances of French journalism in the

258 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

year after Fashoda could find no language strong
enough to denounce the nation which M. de
Cassagnac in the Autorite described as " le peuple le
plus scelerat qui soit au monde." M. Edouard
Drumont in his Libre Parole referred to " les goddam
fanfarons du General White" while the deputy, M.
Lucien Millevoye of the Comite d'Egypte, in La
Patrie thus invited volunteers for the Transvaal:
" Uheure des represailles est venue. La chasse aux
Anglais est ouverte. Avis aux amateurs ! Le sport
ne tenter a-t-il personne ? "

In Egypt nationalist activities were stimulated by
our difficulties. There was an occasion when the
departing M. Deloncle, accompanied to his ship at
Alexandria by a committee of enthusiasts, with a
dramatic gesture flung the glass in which he had
drunk their healths upon the deck and announced
to his eager listeners that, as surely as it had been
shattered into fragments, so surely was the time
approaching when there would be no British left
in Egypt.

In subsequent years I have met not a few emin-
ent personalities who claimed that they had been
among the rare exceptions to those who denounced
the action of Great Britain, and that they had
realised that no other course was possible if we
were not to lose our hold on South Africa, a cardinal
point in the British Empire. This was undoubtedly
true as regards the late King Oscar of Sweden,
a very shrewd judge of international affairs, who
more than once reminded me of his friendly attitude,
which was, he said, governed by sincere conviction.

MEMORIES 1894-1901 259

There were degrees in the asperity of criticism to
which we were subjected. But, so far as my per-
sonal experience went, the only concrete evidence
of national sympathy for us came from the Greeks.
In Egypt it was most pronounced. As regiment
after regiment left for the Cape, to be replaced in
some cases by their militia battalions, the Greeks
hung out their flags and marched with the men
through the streets, loading them with gifts of
cigarettes. When in Cairo we organised a bazaar
for the wounded, at which we only expected support
from our own people, a delegation of the Greek
colony arrived, headed by Ambroise Sinadino, who
placed on a table a sack containing 500 sovereigns.
This sum, he said, they proposed to pay in without
reducing our stock by buying anything. The few
Greeks in Khartoum, mess-caterers or merchants,
sent a contribution of fifty pounds. From the
earliest days of the national movement Greece had
received constant evidence of sympathy from Great
Britain, which never failed through the many
vicissitudes of a century of struggle for emancipa-
tion. But though politicians may occasionally find
it opportune to enlarge on traditional friendships, it
is the exception for international relations to be
governed by sentiment or gratitude. I am the more
glad to place on record here the cordial and spon-
taneous initiative of the Greek community in
Egypt.

In November I was sent to Rome to delimit the
frontier between Eritrea and the Soudan with the
Minister for Foreign Affairs, by whose department

260 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

the Italian colonies were then administered. We
had had a recent case of plague in Egypt, after an
interval of thirty-five days' immunity. Quaran-
tine would therefore be inevitable. I found myself
the only first-class passenger in the Umberto I,
which carried no heavy cargo to steady her in the
very bad weather which we encountered, but was
transporting many thousands of quail imprisoned in
wooden cages. I have sailed at close quarters with
unwashed humans, with deck cargoes of apples and
of onions, I have lived in close proximity to a copra
store and camped in Africa when the porters had put
down the native rations of sun-dried shark to wind-
ward, but no offence to the nostril which I had
experienced ever equalled the penetrating odour of a
deck-load of quail. On reaching Naples after a
very rough night we were ordered to the quarantine
harbour at Nisida for three days. There, as we
swung at anchor, the wind over the cages blew aft
and there was no escape. Everything smelt and
tasted of quail. Food became repugnant, and it
was a very long time before I could bring myself
once more to eat one of those delicate little birds.
The purgatory, however, ended at last, and I had
earned my Paradise on the beautiful road to Rome
through a glorious autumnal afternoon.

Lord Currie had invited me to stay at the
Embassy. Both he and Lady Currie were old
friends, and I had always been an admirer of Violet
Fane. She was excellent company, though I cannot
honestly say that nature had designed her to play
the part of an Ambassadress. She would hardly

MEMORIES 1894-1901 261

have claimed any predisposition for the role herself.
Her French was fearless, but very insecure, as was
revealed by her uncertainty whether the birds in
the garden were merles or merlans. She was
essentially bohemian, and had remained free to
continue so till fairly late in life. It requires,
experto crede, a certain discipline in early years
to merge the bohemian in the diplomatist. She
admitted to me that her " Sophy " was a faithful
portrait of herself in youth. Her stories of those
early years were very entertaining. The nurse's
tale, accepted literally by an imaginative nature, had
terrorised her childhood. There was a cupboard
near the staircase in the country house where she
was brought up, which she always passed on tiptoe,
holding her breath. It had been pointed out to her
as Jerry-go-nimble's cupboard. In it lived a terrible
being who was all legs and who was summoned by
exasperated nurses to carry off naughty children.
He may be well known in nursery lore, but I had
never before come across the fascinating name of
Jerry-go-nimble.

Her passion at that time and ever after were her
Pekingese dogs, for one of which, a disagreeable
wall-eyed white and tan monster known as Buzzy,
she had an especial weakness. So exceptional in
colouring and points was he claimed to be that no
suitable mate had ever been found for him, and
perhaps the care that was taken to guard against
a mesalliance had affected his temper. Not very
long before, however Violet Fane explained to me,
when crossing the Piazza of St. Mark at Venice her

262 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

vigilant eye suddenly lighted on the ideal bride.
A matchmaking instinct gave her the courage to
approach the owner. The gem in question belonged
to a Russian Princess, and the psychological moment
was at hand. A match was arranged, her own
intended departure was postponed, and " two days
later," she said, with the air of a successful negotiator,
11 1 sent Buzzy off with a sprig of orange blossom
in his collar."

Lord Currie had aged a great deal since I had
seen him last. He had I think been bitterly dis-
appointed by his experiences at Constantinople and
the lack of support he had received from home.
Such disillusion is apt to be the fate of under-
secretaries who have had it all their own way at the
Foreign Office, when they are sent themselves late
in life to Embassies, where they become the acutest
critics of that much-abused institution. On the
day after my arrival I went with him to the Forum,
where the famous Black Stone had lately been
discovered by Boni, who was there to explain his
theory of its origin. My old friend Baddeley also
met us there and reconstructed for us the Basilica
iEmiliana, which was being unearthed after the
generous enthusiasm of Sir Lionel Phillips had
enabled the houses which occupied the site to be
demolished.

My business in Rome was with that fine old
patriot and statesman, Marchese Visconti-Venosta,
who was typical of a class no longer to be found in
Italian political life. He made my task an easy
one, and a week sufficed to conclude our negotiations

MEMORIES 1894^1901 263

for a frontier which would only require delimitation
on the spot after verification of tribal limits.

On the 6th of December I was back in Cairo.
Ten days later a telegram was received for retrans-
mission to Khartoum, offering Kitchener the post
of second in command to Lord Roberts, who was
leaving for South Africa to take over the grim
inheritance of the first two disastrous months.
The Empire had turned in the hour of need to that
splendid veteran who served his country so magnifi-
cently till the end, and started on his last campaign
with the telegram in his hand which announced the
death of his only son. K. accepted the offer in
terms which well became him and left Khartoum
on the 18th of December. A cruiser was waiting
to convey him to Gibraltar, where he met Roberts
on the 26th. The telegrams which he sent off
from Cairo impressed me greatly. They showed how
strong a grasp he had of the military situation.
Maxwell followed him before long to South Africa,
and Gallwey, 1 whose organisation of the medical
service of the Egyptian army had won high praise
from our experts during the Khartoum campaign.

Most of my own connections and friends had gone
or were on their way to South Africa, and I received
at this time a number of interesting letters, most
of them extremely critical of the leadership in the
earlier weeks. But as my chief aim in these volumes
has been to record my own personal observations
and experiences, I shall not refer to their contents.
Everything combined to make the opening weeks of
1 Major-General Sir Thomas Gallwey.

264 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

the new century a period of gloom and depression.
At home there was a devastating epidemic of
influenza. India was suffering from the worst
famine experienced for years, and a Russian move-
ment on Afghanistan was threatened. The seizure
of German ships suspected of carrying contraband
for the Transvaal appeared to have been based on
misleading, perhaps purposely misleading, informa-
tion, and in Egypt, and more particularly in the
Soudan, we had grounds for serious preoccupation.
We felt deeply the humiliation of our initial failures
at Ladysmith and Spion Kop. The only consolation
was the manner in which the nation met a critical
situation. Public criticism was honourably re-
strained, there was a constant flow of volunteers
for the front, while the dominions revealed their
solidarity with the cause of the mother-country by
offering contingents. To carry on a war extending
over a vast area of country seven thousand miles
from home, and to land, as we eventually did,
200,000 men in South Africa, was no mean achieve-
ment. I was much interested, in February, 1900,
to read a speech of the Prime Minister's in which
he excused the Government's lack of information
on the plea that so little provision was made for
secret service and protested against the undue
influence exercised by the Treasury. With this
criticism many who have served abroad, and have
witnessed the fatal consequences of a refusal to
include in estimates a very modest timely expendi-
ture which would have saved us many thousands
later on, would be disposed to agree. In one of

MEMORIES 1894-1901 265

his many letters to me Cromer wrote : " British
Governments have many excellent qualities, but
foresight, notably when the Treasury is concerned,
is not one of them." The malicious insinuated
that Lord Salisbury's attack on the Treasury had
been made under the impression that Welby, whom
he disliked, and who had resigned several years
before, was still permanent Under-Secretary, and
that he was much disconcerted when Sir Francis
Mowat, whom he appreciated, offered his resignation.
Wingate was appointed Sirdar and Governor-
General of the Soudan in succession to Kitchener.
My wife and I had intended to accompany him to
Khartoum, when news arrived which necessitated
his premature departure. It had been rumoured
in the market-place that attempts were being made
through the Egyptian officers to undermine the
loyalty of the black troops, but we were nevertheless
greatly surprised when two of those battalions
showed signs of insubordination. The black troops
had indeed their grievances, though they had been
too greatly in awe of the old Sirdar to give expression
to them until after his departure. They had no
pension rights, and a number of them had been
discharged after ten years' service with a very small
gratuity. A report had been assiduously dis-
seminated among them that they were about to
be sent to South Africa, where we had suffered a
disastrous defeat. The despatch of some machine
guns lent by the Egyptian Government gave some
colour to the belief. It was also whispered that
there had been a rising in Cairo against the British.

266 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

The efforts of the nationalists and the native press
had begun to tell on the younger officers. The
Khedive, who could not be acquitted of having
surreptitiously encouraged this spirit, now began
to be alarmed at its manifestations and showed
himself anxious to co-operate. He liked Wingate,
while he had always detested Kitchener. He con-
sequently furnished the former with letters which,
when their contents became known, altogether
disconcerted the officers who had thought they were
carrying out his wishes.

Wingate dealt with the situation with great
discretion. A mixed court of enquiry containing
a majority of Egyptian members was appointed,
and a limited number of officers were cashiered.
Matters then settled down rapidly. It is only of
interest to refer to these experiences because it is
probably not realised by those " who live at home
at ease " how constantly in those days we in Egypt
were faced with difficulties of which little echo
ever reached the general public. In this instance
we had been very near a serious crisis.

Our inveterate enemy of the eighties in the
neighbourhood of Suakin, the Hadendowa Osman
Digna, had at last been caught at Tokar. I saw
him on his way to Rosetta, where he was to be
confined, a grey-bearded old man of sixty, old then
for the Soudan, though he is still alive to-day, who
could show the scars of five wounds received in the
desultory fighting round Suakin, where he was so
often officially reported killed. He had, he said,
ceased to believe in the Mahdi when he saw him

MEMORIES 1894-1901 267

leaving the true path, and the Khalifa had never
taken him into confidence. All his former associates
were now dead or dispersed. During Wingate's
action at Gedid he had escaped with his jibbeh
turned inside out, and after long wanderings he had
followed the line of the Atbara, working his way
towards the coast with the intention of crossing to
the Hedjaz and making the pilgrimage. I could
not help feeling a certain sympathy for the solitary
old man, who had been in deadly earnest in his
elementary fanaticism. It was difficult for me to
realise then, looking at this wiry Arab veteran,
that he could have given us so much trouble in past
times or that his exploits could have loomed so
large as they once did in the daily press, when there
were fewer serious problems to discuss. K. had
reason to know him well, for it was at Suakin that
he received a wound in the jaw which was the
occasion for a famous laconic telegram from the
medical officer, who reported that Colonel Kitchener
had passed a good night and a bullet. So had my
old friend Alfred Paget, who for years patrolled
that inhospitable Red Sea coast in his venerable
sloop Dolphin, reputed to be the worst-groomed
ship in the Navy, though it was commanded by
one of the most gallant gentlemen that ever sailed
under the white ensign.

The Odyssey of the Dolphin and her crew, both
ashore and afloat, had it ever been written, would
have afforded entertaining reading, and even the
log would be full of interest. I asked Alfred Paget
one day what had induced him to borrow the balloon

268 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

of the once famous " Professor " Baldwin and
descend from mid-air with his parachute, the value
and capacity of which I believe that aeronaut was
the first to demonstrate in public. " Well, old
sportsman," said Alfred after a moment's reflection,
" I thought it was the sort of thing which I should
be afraid to do, and therefore I felt that I had better
do it." What did however give him some real
trepidation was the fear that his mother might
hear of the exploit. It was characteristic of the
ancient mariner of Suakin that, having no other
prospect of returning to active service during the
Great War, he dropped his admiral's rank and took
command of a mine-sweeper in the North Sea.
And of such is the empire of Britain !

The envelopment at Paardeburg and the news
of the relief of Ladysmith not many days after-
wards had their immediate effect in Egypt. For
some time past, when all was going amiss, the usual
daily petitions had almost ceased to be addressed to
the Agency. Petitioners had begun to lose faith in
British omnipotence. The day after Cronje's sur-
render was announced we received nine, and the
following morning twelve. It would be difficult
to find a more apt illustration of the importance
of prestige in the East.

At the beginning of March I started alone for
Khartoum, travelling with Sir William Garstin, who
was off again to his last hobby the Sudd, of which
six blocks had already been cleared from the course
of the White Nile. The little terrier Lady, antici-
pating a possible new separation, had sat all day

MEMORIES 1894-1901 269

on the cabin-trunk in my room, whining from time
to time and watching my every movement. I had
not the heart to leave her behind. The journey to
the Soudan had now a regular time-table ; twenty-
four hours' train from Cairo to Assouan, fifty hours
up-stream by boat through Nubia to Wady Haifa,
and then thirty-six hours by the desert railway to
Khartoum. Nubia has a special charm of its own.
A very golden sand overflows the edge of the rocks
bounding the narrow strip of green on the Nile
banks which marks the only cultivable ground.
In the light of early morning I saw the great rock
shrine of Abou Simbel, with its huge Colossi, relieving
from the river-cliff, staring across the desert to the
sunrise with the stony eyes of eternity. Of all
the marvels of Egypt, Abou Simbel has left with
me the most haunting and enduring impression.
It would be difficult to analyse what process of
assimilation, what association of which we are
hardly conscious, makes certain places and certain
objects rather than others take possession of the
imagination and abide with us, makes particular
lines of poetry or chords of music cleave to our
lives. It is not by any means the most beautiful
places or the greatest works of art which have this
subtle power. There is a ruined castle a mile or
so up a lateral valley from the Moselle which has
always epitomised in my imagination the whole
world of romance. A thought of the winding
ascent in the massive round tower, up which the
lord of Ehrenburg once rode, never fails to evoke
for me all the quick, fierce life of the Middle Age.

270 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

A portrait of the mother of Conradin at San Martino
above Naples, by some thirteenth-century sculptor,
means more to me than many masterpieces in
marble. The scent of violets in the early year
always suggests to me the colour and magic of
Papal Rome in the sixties, as I saw it when a boy.
So the rock-hewn giants of the pink cliff at Abou
Simbel remain with me as the most enduring
expression of the soul of ancient Egypt.

The night before our arrival the first act of a
tragedy took place. I was in bed when the train
stopped to water at Hamadeb wells, a desert
post marked only by a couple of tents. Some one
opened the door of the carriage, and Lady, who had
never left me for a moment, appears to have
jumped out. The train went on before I had dis-
covered her absence. The communication cord had
not been properly connected, and every effort to
stop the train was fruitless. We reached Khartoum
at 5 a.m. Telegrams were sent all along the line,
and the reply came from Hamadeb that the dog
was there and would be sent on by the next oppor-
tunity. But the trains only ran every other day.

My first impressions of the new Khartoum were,
I must admit, looking back on them now, unjustly
critical. The scale on which the Palace and the
Government buildings round it had been conceived,
and the scheme for the Gordon College, struck me as
savouring rather of what the Greeks call megalo-
prepeia. I knew how short money was, and must
be for some years to come. We had been educated
by narrow circumstances in Egypt to contract our

MEMORIES 1894-1901 271

ambitions and only consider the sternly practical.
Looking on what seemed to me then a debauch of
bricks and mortar, I reflected that the troops were
still under canvas, as they had now been living for
four years. The buildings, so far as they had then
been constructed, had been paid for with the local
tax of the Ussher or tithe, which had not hitherto
gone into accounts. Thereafter it would have to
appear in the budget. But K. had imagination,
and I now realise that he was quite right to lay out
Khartoum in the grand manner and to emphasise
a contrast with the vast, mud-built, squalid metro-
polis of Omdurman. The new Khartoum was to
have a moral significance, and results have justified
the larger conception.

The recent military troubles kept Wingate tied
to the spot and rendered impossible an expedition
which we had contemplated making together through
Gedaref to Gallabat and then on to Kassala to meet
the Governor of Eritrea. Meanwhile my little dog
had not arrived. The station guards reported that
she would not allow herself to be caught, so I deter-
mined to return at once to Hamadeb. Sowerby
of the Engineers gave me a truck in which to sleep,
and I laid in a small store of food. I spent two
nights and days in the desert, alone save for the
two Egyptian guards at the solitary wells. They
told me that Lady came back from time to time
to the station, but had always run away again into
the bush when they tried to catch her. I scoured
all the villages in the direction of the river, saw the
Omdehs, and offered rewards for information. But

272 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

only in one case did I hear that a white dog had been
seen drinking at the well. I was quite miserable
brooding over the fate of this sensitive little creature
who could not bear to be left behind. I could
hardly eat or sleep as I shivered in my truck through
the cold desert nights. People affect to be enthu-
siastic about the desert and write about it in terms
of lyric exaltation. I have never felt that charm,
and have only been impressed with its cruelty,
whether in Somaliland or the Soudan. Burning
hot by day, and, here at any rate, bitterly cold at
night, it has fleeting moments of beauty at sunrise
and sunset. Its mirages cajole, its barrenness
repels, and in the end it kills. Now the desert had
taken my little dog. She had crossed Abyssinia
and marched round Lake Rudolf in safety, only to
fall a victim, exhausted and despairing, to some
jackal or hyena in this abominable waste of sand.
Never, I resolved, would I give my heart to a dog
again. The inevitable sorrows of the world are
enough without seeking unnecessary ones. On the
third day I renounced the hopeless search, and
Midwinter, also of the Egyptian Engineers, picked
me up on his return from bridge-building along the
line and took me on to the camp at Shendy. Leaving
Haifa, I was the only passenger on the steamer,
feeling its difficult way through the shallows of one
of the lowest Niles on record.

I had hoped to renew my too brief visit to Khar-
toum, but was unable to do so before leaving Egypt.
Nor was I able to realize that ambition when once
more there with the special mission in 1920, though

MEMORIES 1894H901 273

two of our members went to the Soudan. I much
regretted not to have been able then personally to
witness the results of Wingate's civilising adminis-
tration. Of all the constructive imperial work
accomplished in recent years there had been little
to compare with the redemption of the Soudan
under his beneficent guidance. A population of
over eight millions had there been reduced to less
than two under the grim terror of Mahdism, and
thousands of once populous villages had disappeared.
To-day those far-off regions of Central Africa enjoy
a prosperity of which they never dreamed before,
and the security that the labour of a quick-witted
population will not be exploited by an unwelcome
alien domination, but remain their own to enjoy.
For nearly twenty years Wingate devoted his
energies, his experience, and his heart to the
reclamation of the Soudan. It was a matter of
regret to many of his friends that he should have
been called away from work for which he was so
eminently qualified, to Cairo, and confronted with
a perplexing reversion for which he was in no way
responsible. After a brief interval conditions in
Egypt rendered military intervention inevitable,
and thus his connection with the field of his life's
work was severed. The Soudan is so remote from
observation, and had been so long happy under his
governorship in having little history to record, that
I sometimes wonder if his splendid work there has
been adequately appreciated by his countrymen.

While returning home through Rome I was to
have dealt with some further points which had

274 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

arisen regarding the Soudan-Eritrean frontier. But
the Italian Government had not yet received the
necessary reports and the discussion had to be
postponed, as I had been entrusted with the prelim-
inary arrangements for the Khedive's long-deferred
visit to England. While at Rome I learned that
Lord Currie had asked for my appointment to the
secretaryship of Embassy there, which was about
to fall vacant. But I was hierarchically still rather
junior for such a post and hardly expected that his
suggestion would be adopted.

On the night of the 18th of May we were listening
to the haunting voice of Duse at the Lyceum, when
after the second act Comyns Carr walked through
the curtain and informed the house that a telegram
had just been posted at the Mansion House
announcing the relief of Mafeking. Only Duse
could have held the house after that. But she did
for one more act. That night no one slept, London
went mad, and a carnival of rather Philistine
rejoicing gave a new word to the language. Very
few had known till then that Colonel Mahon had
been leading a very mobile force of 3,000 men to the
outpost which Baden-Powell had been holding for
so many months, and still fewer knew that Frankie
Rhodes, who, unable to take any active part in
military operations, had devoted himself to hospital
work at Ladysmith, also rode in with the column.
Mahon had passed through Cairo some months before
on his way from the equatorial provinces. There
was a military steeplechase that day at Ghezireh,
and he was reluctantly persuaded during his one

MEMORIES 1894-1901 275

afternoon to ride a famous white horse which had
more than once been a winner. A youngster crossed
him at a jump ; the white horse fell with him and
bruised him badly. But he was taken to the station
in a condition in which others would have gone to
hospital and caught his ship for South Africa. The
next news I heard of him was that of his long ride
to Mafeking.

Some nights afterwards Duse was giving some
recitations at a house in South Audley Street where
we were guests. I heard one lady inquire of
another : " Do you see so very much in her, after
all?" "No," replied the other. "I don't; but
then, you know, I'm so bad at French."

The preparations for the Khedive's visit took me
to Windsor, and repeatedly to Marlborough House,
as the Prince of Wales took personal charge of the
programme. I was to coach the Prime Minister
on any Egyptian issues which might be raised, and
for that purpose went to lunch with him in Arlington
Street. An unfortunate incident had arisen after
the Khedive had left Egypt. The barracks of the
British infantry stationed at Alexandria were some
miles out of town, near the sea. A short distance
beyond lay the Khedivial estate of Montazah with
its country house and farms. Two English officers
who were returning from the city to their quarters
by boat were landed by mistake within the precincts
of the Khedivial property instead of opposite the
Mustapha barracks. Neither of these officers knew
a word of Arabic. They were therefore unable to
explain their presence. The Khedive's Bedawin

276 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

gaffirs (watchmen), finding two strangers wandering
about on the estate, fell upon them and mishandled
them very severely. The matter was duly investi-
gated and the gaffirs were arrested. The Khedive,
we were informed, was greatly incensed at the de-
tention of his servants and demanded their release.
But as they could not be allowed to take the law
into their own hands with impunity, they were sent
for trial. It was assumed that the Khedive would
take the matter up in London. I therefore gave
Lord Salisbury a precise account of the facts and
expressed the hope that no encouragement would
be given to any pretension that the Khedivial
domain was outside the law. " But," said his
Lordship, "if I understand you rightly, these
officers were trespassing." Technically I had to
admit that they were, but in perfect innocence,
having been landed there by a boatman who had
been directed in Alexandria to take them back to
their quarters. " If they were trespassing on some
one else's property," he insisted, " I think they
deserved all that they got." Lord Cranborne, who
was also present, took my side, and there was a lively
discussion between father and son. I had no doubt,
however, that if the matter were ever to be raised
the Prime Minister's fellow-feeling for the landlord
would not prejudice his ultimate treatment of the
question.

Wingate and I, who were to take charge of the
Khedive during his visit, proceeded in the Osborne
to Flushing, where he was due to arrive in a steamer
from Antwerp. We found him suffering from a

MEMORIES 1894-1901 277

severely inflamed throat which had begun to trouble
him some days before. We were to spend the
night at Flushing and cross the next day. That
morning his throat was much worse, and the naval
surgeon on board feared diphtheria. He remained
in bed and was unable to take the salute on reaching
Port Victoria. It was a moment for rapid decision,
and after consulting the equerry attached to His
Highness we telegraphed to London to put off all
arrangements for the reception and sent a special
train to London to fetch Sir Felix Semon. His
diagnosis was by no means reassuring, but only a
bacteriological examination could conclusively decide
the nature of the malady. Fortunately it proved
only to be a very severe case of septic throat need-
ing a few days' care, and I was relieved from the
anticipation of being charged by the inventors of
calumny in the native press in Egypt with having
poisoned our guest. But we had to remain from
the 21st of June to the 27th at Port Victoria, tied
up to a quay with a desolate outlook behind it,
consuming our hearts in intolerable boredom, after
exhausting our subjects of conversation with the
staff on the first day. Beyond a visit to London
one afternoon with Prince Mohamed Ali, the Khe-
dive's younger brother, my only occupation was the
reconstruction of the programme, which had to be
somewhat curtailed.

At last, on the 27th, we went up to Buckingham
Palace. The kindness and consideration of the
Queen in act and message could not be exceeded, and
it evidently affected the young Khedive, who had

278 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

seldom met with so much friendly and almost
maternal sympathy. The visit to Windsor, with its
dignity and ceremonial, profoundly impressed the
staff, who told me that they could not sleep from
emotion after the conversation which that wonderful
little lady in her wheeled chair had made a point
of having with each one of them.

A younger generation, less affected by tradition and
iconoclastically impatient with the ideals of the nine-
teenth century, can hardly conceive the atmosphere
which at the end of eighteen hundred surrounded
the venerable Queen who for fifty years had pre-
sided over the destinies of a great Empire, which
during her reign first grew conscious of itself. To
those of us who had devoted our service in various
capacities to no mean ideal, the little lady on whom
was concentrated the loyalties of men round all the
seven seas, whose health we had drunk nightly
beyond the line, meant a great fact which appealed
to an unquestioned sentiment, all the warmer
because the dignity of her position had never ex-
tinguished a very human side. My wife, who was
also invited to Windsor to dine and sleep, sitting
by the wheeled chair had expressed her fear that the
duties of the evening must be very tiring to the
Queen, who only smiled that very winning smile
and said, " My dear, it's what I'm here for." It
was the last time that either of us saw her.

The abbreviated programme of the visit included
a lunch with the Duke of Cambridge, a dinner at
Buckingham Palace to all old Egyptian officers and
officials of distinction, a dinner at Marlborough

MEMORIES 1894-1901 279

House with a State concert afterwards, and finally
a luncheon at the Guildhall, where the Khedive
made two little speeches in English. There seemed
for the moment every probability that a turning-
point in his life had been reached. He assured us
and many others that if at times he had shown
opposition it had been in the sincere conviction
that the view he sustained was right. Cromer had,
he admitted, always been very just, but was some-
times severe. As for himself, could he have his
choice he would have preferred the simple life of a
country gentleman to being the ruler of a country.
In all this he was at the moment quite sincere.
I had then great hopes that the visit would do
much for future relations. Wingate, Carington, and
I accompanied the party back to Calais.

My wife returned with me to Egypt, where we had
taken a house at Ramleh for the summer. After
a long period of anxious suspense a message from
China in June justified some faint hope that our
friends in the Legations who were being besieged by
the Boxers at Peking might still be alive, in spite
of the very full and circumstantial account of their
massacre which had been published in the Daily
Mail. This had been so generally accepted as
authentic that a memorial service had been actually
celebrated in Cairo, and I had congratulated myself,
finding the world still interesting, on not having
gone to China. At last in mid- August we learned
that the international relief expedition had entered
Peking and effected their release from a very trying
position. I have never been able to obtain from

280 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

any of my friends who were there a really illuminat-
ing account of the siege.

I missed Cromer in Egypt by a few days. It
had been his intention on arriving in England to
press strongly for some assistance in defraying the
administration of the Soudan, which, though placed
under the British and Egyptian flags conjointly,
was financed solely by the Treasury at Cairo. A
long time would have to elapse before that vast
country, depopulated and ruined by the exactions
of the Khalifa, could hope to provide a revenue
which would render it even modestly self-supporting,
while the subsidy still fell short of obvious require-
ments. But Egypt could do no more, could hardly
even justifiably continue to do what she had done
hitherto. Cromer accordingly went, with Gorst to
support him, and laid the situation before the
Chancellor of the Exchequer. The Soudan was a
British as much as an Egyptian interest. Some
help was indispensable if the work which had been
accomplished was not to be arrested. Sir Michael
Hicks-Beach listened to his exposition in silence,
looking down his beard. The only answer Cromer
obtained was comprised in four words : "I have no
money. ' ' Further details regarding the position were
supplied by Gorst. They received the same answer :
" I have no money." Then Cromer got angry and
let himself go. "It is always the same thing with
you at home," he said; "you never look forward.
You did not ask my advice. I knew we were not
ready to take over the Soudan. But you suddenly
ordered us to go there without consulting me, and

MEMORIES 1894-1901 281

now we are there you repudiate responsibility and
leave us to get out of our difficulties as best we can."
The Chancellor only repeated, " I am sorry, but I
have no money." " If you have no money to give,"
Cromer rejoined, " have you any advice to offer as
to what under the circumstances we can do for the
best ? " The amazing answer of a statesman who
enjoyed a certain reputation at home was : "If
you cannot afford to remain there, you had better
give it up and come away."

CHAPTER IX
1900-1

A Palace intrigue. Visit to Greece. A ride through the Morea.
Delphi. Lord. Lansdowne at the Foreign Office. Death of
Queen Victoria. Leave of absence. Verona and London.
Death of the Empress Frederick. An appreciation. My
appointment as Secretary of Embassy at Rome. Wilfrid
Blunt and the 11th Hussars. An incident and a White Paper.
The return of Arabi Pasha from Ceylon. Visit to Abouteeg.
Mahmoud Pasha Suleiman. Departure from Cairo.

After the Khedive's return I became most un-
willingly involved in what may be described as a
typical palace intrigue which affords a curious
example of the overtime problems occasionally
thrust upon the British Agency.

A brother-in-law of the Sultan Abdul Hamid,
Mahmoud Damad Pasha, was a fugitive from the
wrath he had provoked by associating with the
Young Turks. During the summer he had seen a
good deal of the Khedive, who evidently gave
him every encouragement to come to Egypt. He
duly arrived in the middle of September, and a
series of indignant telegrams from Constantinople
followed one another, protesting against his presence
there.

The Khedive had invited my wife and myself

282

SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC MEMORIES 283

to spend the afternoon at his maritime seat near
Alexandria, to see the farms and model breeding
establishments, which he took great pleasure in
showing. As a country gentleman and student
of agricultural economy he always seemed at his
best. This visit afforded me an opportunity of
opening up the subject of Mahmoud Damad.

He admitted that he had seen a good deal of the
Sultan's brother-in-law in Switzerland, and claimed
to have suggested to him that before coming to
Egypt he should consult the British authorities.
Mahmoud Damad said that Lord Currie, the Ambas-
sador in Rome, was a personal friend of his, and he
would go there with that object. He did actually
pass through Rome, and the Khedive therefore
presumed that I should have been fully informed.
Unfortunately I happened to know what His
Highness did not, namely, that the Ambassador
was absent from his post. Mahmoud had, he said,
little money left, and realised that his position was
hopeless. He wanted to find a way out of his
present straits and return to Constantinople.

He then gave me the following account of his
own connection with the case. The Sultan had
requested him, the Khedive, to persuade the fugitive
to return to Turkey. Mahmoud was disposed to
do so if he could secure a guarantee for his own
safety, and he would readily have accompanied
the Khedive to the Bosphorus. The latter accord-
ingly wrote from Europe to the Sultan in this sense.
After a considerable interval the only reply he
received was to the effect that his letter had been

284 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

mislaid. It would receive an answer when and
if it came to light again. The Khedive rejoined
that other monarchs with whom he was in the
habit of corresponding treated his letters with more
consideration. He repeated the proposal, and
asked for a reply, which this time arrived without
delay. He was on no account to bring Mahmoud
to Constantinople. The Sultan did not intend to
allow him to return. He was an exile and would
never be pardoned. The same mail, however,
brought Mahmoud himself a letter from the Grand
Vizir, informing him that a pardon and a high
position were awaiting him if he would come back.
This letter was shown to the Khedive, who wrote
once more pointing out the inconsistency of the
two communications. The Sultan replied that the
Grand Vizir was an imbecile, and had no business
to write as he had done. The Khedive was more-
over instructed to return at once to Egypt, where
ill-conditioned persons were reported to be contem-
plating demonstrations of hostility to his Imperial
Majesty which must be prevented. He replied
that his health did not permit him to return to
Egypt in midsummer, and continued his travels,
going as far as Odessa and waiting to see whether
or not he would himself be invited to Constanti-
nople. Meanwhile he ordered his yacht to go to
Salonika, and announced his intention of embarking
there. So far from being invited cordially to visit
his suzerain he received a peremptory message
forbidding him to go to Salonika and ordering him
to embark at Constantinople.

MEMORIES 1894-1901 285

Now this involved story of contradictions might
have puzzled me had I not learned from other
sources that in the matter of Mahmoud Damad
the Khedive was not influenced solely by altruistic
benevolence, but was playing a hand of his own.
He was anxious to induce the Sultan to bestow on
him a residence at Constantinople which he desired
and had conceived that Mahmoud Damad could be
made a lever to force the hand of the Suzerain.

Meanwhile the exile had arrived in Egypt, as he
claimed, on the Khedive's invitation. All his move-
ments had been carefully watched, and on the day
he left Brindisi a somewhat incoherent telegram
was despatched from the palace directing the
Khedive (a) to stop him from coming, (b) to prevent
him from disembarking, (c) to send him back to
Constantinople, where a full pardon awaited him.
The Khedive replied that he could neither prevent
his landing nor send him back without a judgment
of the Courts. He had taken the advice of his
ministers, and they considered it desirable that
Mahmoud Damad should return to Europe. Such
recalcitrance inevitably provoked a long and indig-
nant message. Ministers had nothing to do with
such a matter. It was a question of royal prero-
gative. The Khedive must act in accordance with
his instructions. It was impossible that Great
Britain, which, although in military occupation of
Egypt, had undertaken to maintain the integrity
of the Empire, should interfere. His Imperial
Majesty was much put out by the Khedive's tele-
gram, and had sent a copy of it to his mother.

286 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

I was a little puzzled to know how to get the
Khedive out of the mess in which he had thus
involved himself. We might have endeavoured to
obtain guarantees for Mahmoud and his property
at Constantinople, but the Sultan's undertakings
did not inspire confidence, and there was a natural
reluctance to intervene there. We were, however,
ready to support the Khedive in refusing to surrender
him, while inviting him to return to Europe as soon
as possible if he could not make arrangements
himself for his return to Turkey. I spent a not very
pleasant quarter of an hour with the unfortunate
exile, explaining the situation to him and offering
him our assistance to get away.

I had presumed that the Khedive would be much
relieved to have our co-operation in removing the
cause of his embarrassment before a crisis occurred
in his relations with the Sultan. But in the East
you will usually find that the conclusion arrived
at is exactly the opposite of that which you assume
the premises would justify. The Khedive was by
no means pleased. He argued thus: If Mahmoud
Demad goes away now the Sultan will either believe
that I have servilely obeyed his orders, or that the
British Government has overridden my wishes
and ordered him to go. In either case the advantage
will be with the Sultan and I shall be humiliated.
On the other hand, when he finds that menaces are
of no avail, he will try other means, and a com-
promise may well ensue which will enable me to
secure the coveted site. The Khedive, therefore,
feeling quite safe with Great Britain behind him,

MEMORIES 1894-1901 287

decided to keep Mahmoud in Egypt, even though
he might prove an expensive guest, until the Sultan
had changed his tone. Meanwhile we made no
objection to his remaining while negotiations were
proceeding, and beyond the receipt of a very stiff
telegram announcing that H.I.M. attendra Us evene-
ments, nothing happened. The matter had fortu-
ately remained exclusively between the Sultan and
the Khedive.

Abdul Hamid's ingenious methods of circum-
venting inopportune interference were illustrated
by an episode which occurred at that time when
the powers, whose attention was entirely concen-
trated on China, had suffered a notorious Pasha
who had been identified with massacres to be
appointed to an important vilayet without protest.
The Consular body, however, marked their sense
of the outrage by refraining from calling on or in
any way acknowledging the new Governor. In
due course the anniversary of the Sultan's accession
recurred, and the Governor issued a circular to
announce that he would hold a reception. The
Consuls all regretted in identical terms that they
would be unable to attend. The Governor, who
informed Constantinople by telegraph, then received
instructions to be diplomatically indisposed, and to
appoint the military commandant to receive in his
place. The latter accordingly announced that in
consequence of the Governor's illness he would
preside over the reception at the Palace. The
tenacious Consuls, however, replied that they would
be happy to attend a reception at his private house,

288 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

but that they were unable to enter the residence
of the Vali. This decision was also communicated
to Constantinople, whereupon the Governor was
deposed and replaced by the Military Commandant.
The reception was then held at the Konak, and the
Consuls duly attended it. But on the following
morning the Commandant was in turn deposed,
and the old Governor was reinstated.

Another ground of conflict with Constantinople
arose that summer owing to the death of the vener-
able Greek Patriarch of Alexandria. He had filled
that high position for so many years that there
were few alive who could testify to the procedure
followed at his elevation, which had been long
anterior to the British occupation. The Sultan
asserted his prerogative of appointment, while the
Greek colony claimed the right of electing their
Patriarch, subject to eventual confirmation by the
Sovereign. After searching for such precedents
as could be found we supported the title of the
Greeks, which in Cromer's absence it fell to my lot
to defend.

As my attendance in the early summer on the
Khedive had not been reckoned as leave I had still
some weeks to dispose of on Cromer's return. We
decided to spend them in Greece, where I was anxious
to visit some of the Frankish castles to supplement
the historical information which I had been collect-
ing for my book on the Princes of Achaia. In mid-
October we found our way by Brindisi to Patras.
Thence we explored Elis, where the Villehardouins
established their capital. After visiting the site

MEMORIES 1894-1901 289

of Andravida we rode on to Clarenza, now once
more called by its ancient name Kyllene, never
doubting the legend that Philippa of Hainault
regarded the title of Duke of Clarence, which she
conveyed to her son Lionel, as an inheritance from
that Florent of Hainault who became Prince of
Achaia by his marriage with Isabella Villehardouin.

A few miles south on its high promontory, watch-
ing the Zante channel and the water highway
northward to Cephalonia, rises the great castle of
Clairmont or Chloumoutzi, which Geoffrey Ville-
hardouin II, braving the interdict of Rome, built
with the revenues of the Church to be the key
of the Western Morea. This thirteenth-century
fortress, known later as Castel Tornese, must have
been practically impregnable in the Middle Ages.
It had remained intact until about a century ago,
when it was mined and blown up by Ibrahim Pasha.

Half-way there in a wooded fold of the hills we
spent some time in a little monastery, with pointed
arches in the upper windows which suggested a
building of the Frankish period. It is called
Vlachernae, and the similarity of name to that of
the imperial palace at Constantinople, together
with the presence of the floreate cross of the Frankish
emperors upon a marble slab on the outer wall,
seemed to justify a presumption that the monastery
had been appropriated to guard the grave of the
Emperor Robert, who died in 1228 while on a visit
to the little court of Geoffrey II. Within the
church are some remains of a canopied tomb. The
devastating passage of Ibrahim's troops had left

290 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

the little monastery a wreck, and conventual records
in Greece have all been destroyed or dispersed.

By Pyrgos we went on to Olympia, which my wife
had never seen. The beauty of the Hermes of
Praxiteles, one of the comparatively rare Greek
masterpieces which we can with certainty ascribe
as an original to the master's own hand, had a
profound effect upon her, and this may not have
been without its unconscious influence in making
her devote herself for some years to sculpture, which
she would have carried much farther had not
public duties when I became head of a Mission left
too little time for art.

The Demarchs (mayors) in the Peloponnesian
towns, with that freemasonry which prevails among
the Greeks where patriotic ambitions are concerned,
had somehow become aware that I had been of
service to their interests in the question of the
Patriarchate of Alexandria, and we received every-
where the most friendly assistance and delicate
attention. At Olympia we secured horses and
baggage mules and rode to Andritsena and the
temple at Bassse, which I have described in my
previous volume, and so on across the lovely Arcadian
highlands to Carytena, where the southern branch
of the Alpheius, known as the Rouphias, pierces the
mountains on its rock-bound passage from the
plateau of Megalopolis to the sea. The castle
perched on a lofty crag at the entrance to the defile
was designed to hold in awe the Slavonians of the
highlands. It was the head-quarters of the Frankish
barony of Escorta bestowed on Hugues de Bruyeres,

MEMORIES 1894^1901 291

whose son Geoffrey married the daughter of the
first Duke of Athens and became the most romantic
figure in the stirring annals of medieval Greece.
Thence we descended into the plain of Megalopolis,
where the British school at Athens had recently-
been conducting excavations, and so by Mycenae
and Tyrins made our way to Nauplia. As the bay
opened out in front of us we saw a number of big
ships lying at anchor. It was the British fleet from
Malta, and hastily changing our garments, travel-
stained after a ride of many days, we rowed out in
the evening to the flagship and found Charlie
Beresford, who was much surprised to see such
unexpected visitors.

When I left my post at Athens in 1890 Delphi had
not yet been excavated. In the meantime its
wonders had been disclosed by the French school.
We therefore made our way through the Corinth
canal and across the gulf to Itea, whence a tolerable
mountain road led up to one of the most impressive
sites on earth. Fifteen hundred years had passed
since the last oracle proclaimed to the imperial
apostate that the fair hall had fallen, that the
prophetic laurel was withered, and the speaking
fountain dry. Vicisti Galilcee ! Yet still a magic
haunts the chasm in the mountains which repre-
sented for the ancient world a link with spiritual
forces dimly apprehended, and interpreted for them
the mystery of life. No other place to which my
wanderings have taken me has seemed so well to
justify its mystic renown as Delphi, and nowhere
have I been more conscious of the influence of the

292 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

soul of nature, which is everywhere subtly present
in Greece. Up the valley behind Itea lay Salona
with its castle, the barony of the Stromonours in
the thirteenth century, round which legends gather
of a more material character. Parnassus and
Helicon dominate a scene which for beauty of outline
and colour has few equals in the world. Opposite,
the great rock of Acrocorinth evokes legendary,
ancient, medieval, and more modern associations.
It is an exquisite world of beauty and solitude
where the ages call to the aftertime.

In Athens, where I saw the Crown Princess, I
was distressed to hear a very sad account of the
Empress Frederick, with whom I had spent many
memorable days in Greece. The terrible disease
which had killed the Emperor had attacked her
also, and was making disastrous progress. In
mid-November we were back in Cairo in a very
attractive little house which we had bought, con-
veniently near to the Agency, and covered on three
sides with a bougainvillea which entirely concealed
the structure and almost blinded with its intensity
of colour in spring and summer.

The end of 1900 brought many changes. The
staff at the Agency had been entirely renewed.
Norman, Hohler, and Akers-Douglas had joined us.
Only Boyle and myself seemed permanent. The
British Commissioner of the Debt, Sir Alonzo Money,
a veteran of the Indian Mutiny, had died, and Cecil
Spring Rice was to replace him in a post which hardly
offered sufficient opportunities to so active a mind.
Gleichen, who had been wounded in South Africa,

MEMORIES 1894-1901 293

joined the Intelligence Department of the Egyptian
Army. Colonel Le Gallais was also to have come
back from the Transvaal to be Adjutant-General.
But just after winning one of the few real successes
we had had to our credit for some time and taking
seven guns, that brilliant officer was killed. It was
to me one of the saddest losses in that long-drawn-
out struggle, which had been responsible for the
death of poor George Steevens at Ladysmith from
enteric fever. The same fatal disease of the battle
area also carried off Prince Christian Victor, one
of the best and kindliest of men, who volunteered
for every hard service and always claimed less
than his due.

The war and the criticisms, now made with less
reserve on its conduct and responsibilities, rendered
a remodelling of the Government inevitable. Lord
Salisbury, who was anxious to contract his obliga-
tions, gave up the Foreign Office. Suggestions were
repeatedly made in the Press that Lord Cromer
should succeed him and be recalled to join the
Cabinet, where his sound sense, business instincts
and synthetic breadth of view would have been
invaluable. But he did not belong to the close
borough of politics, and except in rare moments
of national emergency only the regular players are
regarded as qualified to take part in the game. The
opportunity recurred some years later when Sir
Henry Campbell - Bannerman was forming his
Government and Cromer was invited to take
charge of the Foreign Office. But by that time his
failing health made it impossible for him to contem-

294 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

plate acceptance. Lord Lansdowne, who had been
most unjustly taken to task for the fossilisation
of the War Office induced by a long process of time,
was transferred to the Foreign Office, where he was
soon to reveal himself as one of our most successful
and courageous foreign ministers. Two of my
contemporaries, Brodrick and Selborne, took charge
of the War Office and the Admiralty, and George
Wyndham became Irish Secretary.

The tide had turned in South Africa. But the
end was not quite yet, and the venerable Queen,
who had never lost heart in the days of greatest
gloom, was not to live to see it. Her sixty-three
years' reign closed in January, 1901, after only a
few days of illness. There were few still alive who
remembered any other sovereign, and it was difficult
to accustom oneself to the solution of continuity
which her death implied. Her influence, real enough
and admirably adapted to the period in which she
lived, however much modern scepticism and flip-
pancy may seek to belittle it, had reconstituted and
given the throne a grace which it had entirely
lost with the four Georges. Those sixty-three
years had been astonishingly fertile in result to
human progress and national development. Facil-
ities for communication had changed the face of
the world and the British Empire had found itself.
For its members the great outcome of the Victorian
age was the realisation quod cuncti gens una sumus.

The funeral in England had been fixed for the
2nd of February. In Cairo on that day three
memorial services were held, at ten, eleven, and

MEMORIES 1894-1901 295

twelve: the first an official one, the second for the
British community, and the third an impressive
military ceremony in the barrack square at Kasr-
el-Nil, in which the chaplains of all denominations
took part, with muffled drums and pipes and volleys
from the guns. The garrison was drawn up in a
hollow square, and in the centre Reggie Talbot
sat his horse, immovable as an equestrian statue.
The Khedive, who sent his brother to England to
represent him, showed real feeling, which even
impressed Cromer. Indeed since the visit to Eng-
land all had gone more smoothly. The German
Emperor, who had in December earned goodwill
at home by refusing to receive Kriiger, over whom
Paris had been unnecessarily demonstrative, became
quite popular in England by his demeanour at the
funeral, and for the moment the clouds on the
North Sea coast appeared to be clearing.

We left Egypt in April for Venice, where I wanted
to look up a manuscript of Sanudo in St. Mark's
Library for my study of medieval Greece. That
famous institution is admirably served. There were
no formalities and no waiting, though the document
I wished to consult is one which can seldom be
demanded. At Verona, where we decided to remain
a day or two as our eldest boy had what appeared
to be a feverish cold, we ended by remaining three
weeks and passed through a period of intense anxiety
as his illness proved to be influenzal pneumonia.
He was admirably cared for by the chief surgeon
of the civil hospital. In a long experience in
different parts of the country I have learned to have

296 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

great respect for the Italian medical school. Half
my leave was lost, but we started for home with a
deep sense of gratitude that the boy was well again.
During these weeks in which I learned to know
Verona well I was able when convalescence began
to make some investigations at the municipal archives
into the antecedents of the long extinct family of the
Delle Carceri, who took part in the Fourth Crusade,
and became the feudal Lords of Euboea in the
thirteenth century.

Just before our departure the Bishop of Verona,
who had been to Rome to receive the Cardinal's
hat, returned to his see. A special number of the
local paper was issued containing messages of wel-
come from all the communes under his jurisdiction.
Among these was one in a language I had never
seen before. It is a dialect of German, and it was
said to be spoken in one commune of Verona only,
but in seventeen of Vicenza.

Locally it is described as Cimbric, a name for
which there can be no justification. It would
rather appear to be due to some overflow into the
plain of Germanic peoples from Tyrol. Verona in
this dialect is Beam. The greeting to the Bishop
began : Funfenek 'Gam Hirt hebe di Beam (May
Verona have thee for shepherd fifty years) ; and it
ended : Ta der Guter-Heare luse ditza Gapeta un dise
Luste. Ta*z sai (May the good Lord listen to this
prayer and this wish. So be it).

Visits to Belton and Highcliffe in all the beauty
of an English June made the prospect of yet another
summer, my eighth in succession in Egypt, a more

MEMORIES 1894-1901 297

than ever unwelcome prospect. London at that
season was also alluring to the exile. At a dinner
at Lord Rothschild's I had from Milner and Neville
Lyttleton interesting first-hand information from
South Africa. Then there was a dinner of old East
Africans with Sir Clement Hill, who was responsible
for Protectorates at the Foreign Office, where I for-
gathered with Sir H. Johnston, now back for good
from Nyassaland, Kirk, Lugard, Vandeleur, who
was killed not many weeks later in the Transvaal,
and others. I also spent a lively evening at the
House of Commons with a group of juniors who
were known as the Hooligans by a natural association
of ideas between our two great national institutions,
Parliament and the Music Hall. They used to dine
together every Thursday. The party that evening
included Lord Percy, Lord Hugh Cecil, Winston
Churchill, Ian Malcolm, and Arthur Stanley, who
had retired from the diplomatic service and secured
the suffrages of an indulgent constituency.

A young Egyptian friend of mine, Mohamed
Mahmoud, who had just taken a good degree at
Balliol, where he was very popular with his fellow-
undergraduates, was anxious before taking up
official work in Egypt to see something of the work-
ing of a public department in London. Lord Lans-
downe was so good as to disregard all the precedents
of red tape and meet my request by getting him
attached for a time to the most exclusive of bureau-
cracies, the Treasury.

Before returning to my post I was summoned to
Marlborough House, and had a long conversation

298 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

with the King, who gave me messages for my
brother-in-law Eddie Wortley, recently appointed
Military Attache at Paris. He was to devote all
his goodwill to maintaining the most cordial re-
lations with the French Army. The King gave me
a deplorable account of the health of the Empress
Frederick, which distressed him greatly. There
was a very strong affection between brother and
sister. She was still able, he said, to maintain a
lifelong habit and wrote to him every week in
pencil. But he anticipated that the end could not
be far off, and indeed I had not been back a month
in Egypt when the news reached me there of her
death on the 6th of August.

The tragedy of her life was great. She had
brilliant intellectual gifts. But fate had willed
that she should labour in a soil which was inevitably
unreceptive of the seed she had to sow. Her
qualities of mind and character met with little
appreciation in the Germany of those days which
looked for other virtues in women. With a nature
which spent itself in generous sympathy she often
appeared for such an able princess to be lacking in
tact. She had been brought up in a home where
it was the custom to be perfectly frank and open
and to speak freely without a shadow of suspicion.
But in the very difficult situation in which her lot
was cast frankness was not always opportune. There
such a natural predisposition had its grave perils.
The obligation of reticence, learned by hard experi-
ence, in acute conflict with a spontaneous impulse
to express her own strong feelings, led to contradic-

MEMORIES 1894-1901 299

tions and inconsistencies which exposed her to
criticism. She believed, and there was good justi-
fication for her conviction, that under the Bis-
marckian regime a close espionage had been exercised
on all her words and acts, which made it imperative
for her to be perpetually on her guard even among
those who professed to be her friends. But the
reserve she would have exercised broke down when
her feelings were aroused and a combative instinct
of frankness asserted itself. She was intolerant of
meanness and vanity. With a high ideal of duty
and an earnest desire to right social and traditional
injustices she failed to realise how hardly in human
evolution one small step is won, and how many
things, desirable in the abstract, it is not given us
to achieve.

A passionate love for the land of her birth which
she could not conceal was accounted to her for
unrighteousness. She welcomed the society of
artists, historians, and poets in their palace at
Berlin. But the efforts which she and the Crown
Prince made to break down the iron laws of
caste were wholly misunderstood, and while
malicious tongues during his brief reign referred
to him as the Judenhaiser, every blow aimed at
her husband was really designed for her, the English-
woman, who would not understand German modes
of thought and aspired to teach the Fatherland a
lesson. She was convinced, and here again there
were good grounds for the belief, that a deliberate
attempt was made to prevent the Emperor Frederick
from reigning, and she felt that she stood alone in

300 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

fighting his battle and hers. Her position then was
strangely pathetic and, having assisted at the last
phases of its tragic development, I record with
regret that, except for one or two individuals who
found themselves socially almost isolated, none
of those on whose loyalty she was entitled to count
displayed a sense of chivalry or ventured to break
a lance in her behalf.

It was a woman's verdict which suggested to me,
" Elle inspirait plus de sympathie et de pitie que de
tendresse" and it contained a sort of half-truth.
For while the wreck of all her hopes, aspirations
and opportunities commanded sympathy and pity,
her character was too strongly delineated. Her
pride was rebellious, and there could be mutiny
behind the pathos in her eyes. But she had also
the power of inspiring sincere affection among the
relatively few who knew her well. She was by
nature shy, intensely human, and never conde-
scending. Few women have exerted greater charm
without really good looks. To myself, whom un-
anticipated circumstances had enabled to be per-
haps a little helpful to her in a tragic hour, she
was always more than gracious, almost motherly,
and I preserve a face with a wistful and tender
expression of kindliness and sorrow in constant
and affectionate memory.

Within a week three other deaths were announced.
It was a curious coincidence that the veteran Sicilian
statesman Crispi, and Baratieri, the unfortunate
general of Adua, should have died almost simul-
taneously, while Prince Henry of Orleans, my old

MEMORIES 1894-1901 301

antagonist in Abyssinia, followed them prematurely
in a final adventure to the unknown.

I was now definitely offered the post of Secretary
of Embassy, or Counsellor as it is now called, at
Rome, and accepted it with great satisfaction.
But my departure from Egypt was still to be delayed
for a certain time, as Cromer, who told my wife that
the only bright moments in his desperately solitary
life had been the evenings he spent with us, was no
longer to be a hermit in the desert, and he had called
to give her the first news of his approaching marriage
in October.

I was not destined to leave Cairo without a
personal conflict with Wilfrid Blunt, with whom I
had always up to that time maintained friendly
relations. The episode which led to this conflict
engaged considerable public attention and formed
the subject of questions in the House of Commons.
A White Paper of 47 pages containing all the relative
documents was eventually issued and laid before
Parliament. 1 It certainly offered more entertaining
reading than the majority of official publications,
and it also illustrated the quality which I have
already criticised of wrong-headedness in Blunt' s
clever and often attractive personality and a certain
tendency to hit below the belt. In his concluding
letter to Lord Lansdowne he described the issue in
question as of infinitesimal importance compared
with the publicity given to it and the scandal
which it had occasioned. But he overlooked the
fact that this disproportionate publicity was chiefly
1 Egypt No. 3 (1901).

302 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

due to his having himself addressed the public in the
Press, and that before he was in possession of all the
facts. Reading over the documents again after
more than twenty years I am struck by the sobriety
and moderation of my own comments on his attitude.

Briefly stated the facts were as follows. The
officers of the 11th Hussars, who were quartered
at Abassiyeh, had brought out from England six
couples of hounds. On the morning of the 21st of
July seven officers with one private, who acted as a
whip, started from the barracks at 4 a.m., with the
possible prospect of drawing a fox or a jackal during
their ride along the edge of the desert. Incidentally
I may mention that it was a Sunday morning. But
the horses had in any case to be taken out, and it
appeared that all those concerned were duly in their
places at church parade at ten. Needless to say,
the most was made of " foxhunting on Sunday "
by those who sought to prejudice the case.

About 5 a.m. they were riding along the wall
enclosing Blunt's property which, like most walls
on Arab estates, was dilapidated, and had a large gap
in it some 12 feet long as well as other holes. The
hounds jumped over the wall, having struck a line
of scent where a fox must have passed, breaking
away at sunrise for the desert from the cultivated
grounds to which they come in at night. Two
officers with the private walked along the wall to
the door, which they found closed, and then entered
through the wide gap a little farther on to call the
hounds off. The other officers remained outside
some 70 yards away, and did not attempt to enter

MEMORIES 1894-1901 303

the enclosure until the noise of a conflict attracted
them. The riders who had gone in to withdraw
the hounds had been immediately assaulted by
Blunt's Bedawi stud-groom and some of his gaffirs
or watchmen. They and their horses were struck
with heavy sticks. Fifteen or more of Blunt's men
assembled, menacing the officers and pelting them
with clods of earth, while the stud-groom as ring-
leader used the most abusive language. Major
Rycroft, who was, during the absence on leave of
Colonel Osbert Lumley, in command of the regiment,
directed the officers to fall back, and, in spite of a
further onslaught on one of them who tried to
round up a lagging hound, exerted his authority to
prevent retaliation and demanded the names of
the aggressors. The only answer given was that
they were all named " Blunt.''

The chief offenders were, however, eventually
identified by a lawyer who lived in an adjoining
house. Practically no damage had been done by
the involuntary trespass, and any further unfor-
tunate consequences were avoided by the wise
restraint exercised by Major Rycroft. The general
officer commanding in Egypt, who was at that
moment Sir Ronald Lane, referred the case to the
Ministry of the Interior, which instructed the Parquet
to investigate the matter. The result was that the
chief offenders were tried and, being found guilty
of assault, condemned to sentences which I regarded
as somewhat too severe. They were very properly
reduced on appeal.

Blunt, on receiving a first and apparently quite

304 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

inaccurate account of what had taken place, not
only wrote to Lord Lansdowne complaining of the
officers who had " drawn my covers," and giving
credit to his servants who had only carried out his
general instructions, but he sent a long letter to the
Standard, placing the whole affair in an unwarrant-
able light. The hour of five on a Sunday morning
was, he suggested, a favourable one for a little
trespass. The night guard would then have gone
off duty. The officers, approaching his wall, "put
the hounds in," the master and two whips followed,
and, according to his advices, hunted and killed a
fox within the enclosure. The death of the fox
was supplemented by the killing of a " she- jackal "
reported in a letter, to which the specification of the
sex gave a circumstantial air of veracity. It was
afterwards ascertained to have been written by a
tenant who had not been present himself on the
occasion, but was in his own village a long way off.
Blunt went on to insinuate that Major Ry croft,
instead of claiming credit for forbearance, would
have acted a more manly part by showing a better
and a little longer fight, instead of which he and
the officers " capitulated and then appealed to the
law." After alleging that the native courts could
not be expected to deal fairly with a case between a
native and an English officer, he permitted himself
to suggest that there was a touch of comedy in
officers complaining of his servants and offering an
apology for their trespass after they had been beaten
on their backs and had taken a lawyer's revenge
in Court.

MEMORIES 1894-1901 305

A thorough investigation of all the circumstances,
and the preparation of considered replies to Blunt' s
charges and insinuations, added to my work in the
torrid summer. The affair was trivial enough in
itself. But in his correspondence with Lord Lans-
downe Blunt, who had already claimed that the
story told by his men had greater probability than
the report of the officers concerned, brought charges
of subserviency to the British authorities against
the native courts and judges which it was easy to
prove were wholly unsubstantiated, while he main-
tained that I ought never to have allowed the case
to be brought into Court.

It came out, both from evidence during the trial
and from various letters to the press recording
similar experiences, that this was not an isolated
case of aggression by Blunt' s Bedawin guards, who
appeared to consider themselves outside the law.
Their employer defended their attitude on the
ground of the inadequacy of provision against
trespass. He complained that there was no pro-
tection for any one living in the country districts
of Egypt " except such force or intimidation or
persuasion as he could exercise against European
marauders." The answer, so far as his property
was concerned, was that a coastguard post has its
quarters at a spot only five minutes distant from
his stables, and that there was a police station a
mile away at the end of the suburban line from
Cairo. Cromer, who was in England, only took part
in the controversy to make some observations
regarding the alleged inadequacy of the law of

x

i

306 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

trespass. He suggested that in order to protect
his grounds Blunt should repair and possibly raise
his garden wall.

In a final letter to Lord Lansdowne Blunt put
himself more hopelessly than ever in the wrong by
accusing General Lane and Mr. Machell, the Adviser
to the Interior, of having tried, " with the approval
of Sir Rennell Rodd, to repair the foolish position
in which these young officers had placed themselves
and their compromised dignity by endeavouring to
get a conviction of a vindictive character against the
Arabs." The only result of this somewhat offensive
insinuation was a despatch from Lord Lansdowne
to myself, published at the end of the White Paper,
in which while signifying his entire approval of my
proceedings and reports he agreed that " Mr.
Blunt' s observations do not require further notice
or reply."

In the autumn of 1901 Arabi Pasha was allowed
to return to Egypt from his long exile in Ceylon.
It had been anticipated that he would sink into
obscurity, but there was evidence that many of the
fellaheen had continued to regard him as the cham-
pion of their class against Pashadom. The country-
people and the middle class gathered in numbers
at his receptions and thousands assembled to kiss
his hand the first time he went to the Mosque.
Arabi himself never ceased to descant on the benefits
of British rule. The dream of his life had been
realised under the occupation, and now he could die
happy. He deplored the manner in which the
British were misunderstood and calumniated, for

MEMORIES 1894-1901 307

already in 1901 he perceived the spirit which was
gaining strength. The Palace was far from pleased
with the exile's popularity, and emissaries endeav-
oured to restrain the zeal of his visitors. The
interest in Arabi, however, only lasted for a short
time, as things do in Egypt which offer new
excitement, and soon it died away.

About this time I paid a visit of a few days to
Mahmoud Pasha Suleiman, the father of my young
friend from Balliol, at his estate of Abouteeg above
Assiout. The country was at its autumnal best.
The basins had just been opened. With the con-
struction of the reservoirs perennial irrigation has
replaced the old flooding process, and one of the
most beautiful aspects of Egypt, when great lakes
of the fertilising Nile water lay between the dykes,
with islands of palm groves tasselled with golden
dates, will now be seen no more. It was a most
enjoyable visit. Young Mohamed Mahmoud, who
had made real use of his educational opportunities,
impressed me with his judgments and his aspirations.
He advanced rapidly in the Egyptian public service.
But unfortunately, after having been quite a person-
ality at Oxford, he encountered on returning to
Egypt the problem which has never been sur-
mounted there, presented by the broad line drawn
between British and Egyptian, and though he
had philosophy enough to understand the difficulty
of the position it was inevitable that he should
resent the distinction. Mahmoud Suleiman, though
raised to the rank of Pasha, did not belong to the
imported Turkish or foreign Mussulman aristoc-

x*

308 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

racy. He enjoyed a sort of patriarchal position
as the father of his people, among whom he was
endeavouring to encourage arts and crafts. He
had the conservative instincts of the landlord, but
not to the same extent as Riaz, the old ex-Prime
Minister, an ardent agriculturist but a confirmed
disbeliever in modern innovations and scientific
analysis. " What nonsense it is," Riaz would say,
" that people should pretend that the cotton worm
comes from a moth. Worms don't come from
moths. Every one who knows anything is aware
that the cotton worm is the result of the salt dew
produced by the Suez Canal." It was to that
international highway that Riaz attributed all the
misfortunes of Egypt. From a certain narrow
point of view there was something to be said for the
theory.

After the arrival of the Cromers at the end of
October I went to Alexandria to take leave of the
Khedive. There had just been one of those un-
fortunate incidents which it seemed impossible to
avoid in Egypt. When it was definitely closed the
Khedive, no doubt over-persuaded by some of his
pernicious counsellors, complained that a certain
British official, who happened to be the most cour-
teous of men, had not treated him with sufficient
regard. He had worked himself up into an un-
justifiable state of excitement and had demanded
satisfaction in a manner which could not under the
circumstances be accorded. Cromer, who had had
to intervene to damp his ardour, was convinced that
he had done so with the kindliest consideration.

MEMORIES 1894-1901 309

Such, however, was not the view taken by the
Khedive, who was greatly disturbed. Their rela-
tions had inevitably remained those of pupil and
schoolmaster, and I realised once more that the
divergence was irremediable. My farewell inter-
view became a very painful one. The Khedive
broke down altogether in telling me his story. He
said that I was the only British official with whom
he had never had any disagreeable incident, and
that he deeply regretted my departure.

The last week of my residence in Egypt was
marked by a succession of farewell dinners which
made me feel how many friends I was leaving
behind. My own work of late had largely been to
oil the wheels of a difficult machine which was apt
to heat, to which new parts were continually being
adjusted, and which ran somehow as long as an
experienced engineer kept his hand on the levers.
But I could not help feeling that elements of per-
manence and continuity were wanting, and that
there was a growing danger in the indeterminate
character of a regime which we were neither disposed
to regularise or to terminate in any measurable
time.

On the eve of my departure on the 11th of
November a banquet was given in my honour,
which eighty-five of the principal personages in
Cairo attended. Cromer made a parting speech
which was very gratifying to myself especially
because of his cordial testimony to the part my
wife had played in the world of Cairo. She had,
since the death of the first Lady Cromer, presided

310 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC

over the social life of the colony, and had made no
enemies in any section. I replied as best I might.
On my other side sat Carton de Wiart, the eminent
advocate, who told me that Lady Anne Blunt had
that day spent two hours in his office, endeavouring
to discover some means of reopening the fox-
hunting incident and bringing an action before the
Mixed Tribunals against the officers and presumably,
if possible, myself. He had had to send her away
disappointed.

On the way home I was to stop in Rome, where
Harrington would join Gleichen and myself. We
were to endeavour to conclude an arrangement with
the Italians for a frontier between the Soudan,
Eritrea, and Abyssinia. Telegraph and Postal Con-
ventions had also to be drafted. Signor Ferdinando
Martini, the Governor of Eritrea, and one of the
greatest living masters of his own beautiful language,
met us there. We found him conciliatory. He
took a broader view of questions than the permanent
officials who had no local knowledge. So after ten
days' hard work in Rome we concluded our business
satisfactorily. This was the beginning of a long
friendship with Ferdinando Martini, the value of
which I learned to appreciate during the first year of
the Great War, when he as Minister of the Colonies
was a tower of strength in the period of hesitancy
which preceded May, 1915.

I had a few weeks' leave to my credit to spend at
home in the house we had acquired in Stratford
Place, and there, in the first hour of the last day of
1901, a second daughter was born.

MEMORIES 1894.-1901 311

So ended my eight years in Egypt, some of which
had been eventful, while none of them were lacking
in interest. I had lived in close and intimate re-
lations with a very remarkable man, to whom both
my wife and I had given all our affection and regard.
Cromer was never a demonstrative man, but the
letter which he wrote me when he learned that I
was to be transferred to Rome meant much to me.
He added, "Your own dear wife will not be easy to
replace. I shall miss also that blessed Francis
whose presence was a ray of sunshine in my solitary
and joyless life." If I quote such words here it is
because they reveal a very human and endearing
side of his character, which has been little known
and understood. It was hard to leave him. But
eight summers in succession on the Nile are many
for a northerner. There was now nothing more
for me to do in Egypt, and it was right that I should
return to my normal work of diplomacy. After
my departure from Cairo I continued to correspond
with him, but I saw him comparatively seldom until
after his retirement, as the periods of our leave in
England did not often coincide. His health finally
broke down, and he was relieved in 1907, having
devoted five-and-twenty years of his life to the
regeneration of Egypt.

After the titanic struggle which has recently con-
vulsed the western world, events which loomed
large in the thought of an older generation have
fallen into a remoter plane, and Cromer's name is
less often now on the lips of his countrymen. A
new phase of evolution has manifested itself in a

312 SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC MEMORIES

country so long recalcitrant to change, and others
will build for good or ill on the foundations which
he laid in the land of Nile. Yet I believe that some
day, when the history of his great work is honestly
taught and justly weighed in Egypt, its people
will realise the debt of gratitude they owe to the
brain and hand which guided them from misrule
and chaos to redemption and hope, and that in
process of time his figure will stand out in no less
strong relief to their moral perception than the
granite effigies of ancient Egypt on the cliffs of
Nubia do to the material eye. It has been my
special aim in this volume to recall certain intimate
memories of a great man whose character and person-
ality become ever more impressive to me as the
years of our association recede into the past.

They that dig foundations deep

Fit for realms to rise upon,
Little honour do they reap

Of their generation,
Any more than mountains gain
Stature till we reach the plain. 1

1 Rudyard Kipling, The Proconsuls.

INDEX

Abbas Hilmi, Khedive, 2-4, 6, 88, 100,

266; visit to England, 275-9,

283-7, 295, 308
Abdul Hamid, Sultan, 10, 92, 103,

282-7
Abou Hamed, 48, 105, 190
Abou Simbel, 269
Aboukir, 82
Abyssinia, Italian defeat in, 86 ; British

Mission to, 110-23, Chs. IV and V,

237, 242, 310
Acrocorinth, 242
Addis Abbaba, 147-9 ; departure from,

176
Aden, 120

Aden Horse, 121, 149
Adua, battle of, 86, 112, 128, 142, 158
Akasheh, 87, 93
Ambascie, Ito, 140, 144, 178
Ambigol, 99
Amharic language, 172
Andros, 81
Anglo-Congolese Treaty (1894), 230,

235
Anglo -German Convention (Africa,

1890), 229
Anglo-Italian Agreement (1891), 230
Ankober, 148, 160
Arab press, 100, 192, 249
Arabi Pasha, 69 ; trial, 71, 306
Armenian massacres, 103
Arms in Abyssinia, 160, 166
Assouan, 77, 79
Atbara, R., 89, 190 ; battle of the, 201,

206
Athens, 292

Bahr-el-Ghazal, province, 230, 232, 235

Baird, Sir Alexander, 68

— Sir John, 107, 254

Baker, Colonel Valentine, 46

Balfour, Gerald, 98

Banquets in Abyssinia, 156

Baratieri, General, 86, 128, 158, 300

Battenberg, Prince Louis of, 84

Beatty, Lieut., 105, 197

Beecher, Harriet Ward, viii

Berber, 108, 190, 197

Beresford, Lord Charles, 68, 79, 263, 291

Berthelot, M., 92, 234

Bingham, Captain, Hon. C. 115, 122,143

Bismarck, Prince, 34, 106, 149, 202

— Ot. Herbert, 34
Biya Kaboba, 127

Blunt, Wilfrid, 68-75, 301-6

— Lady Anne, 72, 310
Bonvalot, M., 113, 140, 151-2, 159
Boutros Ghali Pasha, 33, 50, 53
Boyle, Harry, 29, 56, 79, 246
Brazza, M. de, 230, 233

" Breath of the King," 149, 153
British troops in Soudan campaign, 195,

197, 204-6
Broadley, 71
Brougham, Lord, viii
Browning, Robert, 45
Brussels Act, 144, 156
Budge, Sir W., 154
Burleigh, Bennet, 200
Burne-Murdoch, Colonel, 92
Butcher, Dean, 79
Butler, General Sir W., 47, 82
Byron relics, 239

Caisse de la Dette, 88, 91, 109

Cambrian, H.M.S., 84

Cameron Highlanders, 75

Carter -Wilson, 40

Carytena, 290

Cassel, Sir Ernest, 200, 253

Cecil, Lord Edward, 115, 122, 149

Chamberlain, Rt. Hon. J., 87, 97

Chercher, province, 142

China, siege of Legations, 190, 279

Christian Victor, Prince, 293

Churches in Abyssinia, 136

Churchill, Lord Randolph, 27

— Winston, 200, 297
Clairmont, 289
Clarence, Duchy of, 289
Clochette, M., 158, 159, 166
Cogordan, M., 66, 96
Colville, Commander, 105
Congo, French, 231

— State, 230, 236
Courcel, Baron de, 235-6
Orispi, Sr., 86, 300

Cromer, Earl of, 1-30, 50-2, 55-61, 85-
90, 97, 194-202, 205, 212, 240, 245,
280, 293, 301, 307-9, 311

— Ethel, Lady, 20, 202, 205, 239-41
Currie, Lord, 260-2, 274, 283

313

314

INDEX

Curtis, Daniel, 44, 94

— Ralph, 44

Curzon, Marquess, 112, 203, 244

Cust, H., 78, 200

Dance of priests in Abyssinia, 170

Dawkins, Sir Clinton, 31, 80, 82, 203

Delcasse, M., 222, 228-37

Deloncle, M., 101, 258

Delphi, 291

Dervishes, menace to Italy, 85 ; war
with Abyssinia (1889), 111 ; Mis-
sion to Menelik, 160, 171.

Devonshire, Duke of, 90

Dhoolies, 120, 138

Dongola, 85-7, 89 ; occupation of, 105

Drummers, Abyssinian, 150, 176

Drummond-Wolff, Sir H., 9, 12

Convention, 10, 13

Dufferin, Earl of, 46

Dufile, 241

Duse, Signora, 274

Edward VDI, 298

Eetvelde, M. van, viii

Entotto, 148, 169

Eritrea, 259

Esa Somalis, 130

Ethiopia (see Abyssinia), 114 ; ancient

limits of, 167
Eugenie, Empress, viii

Fantalle, Mt., 144, 146

Fashoda, 188, 221-5 ; issue between

French and British Governments,

229-38, 241
Findlay, Captain, 201
Firket," battle at, 97
Fitaurari, 142
Forster, 40

Frederick, Empress, 186, 292, 298-300
Frere, Sir Bartle, 257
Freycinet, M. de, 12

Galioub, 192

Gallas, 131, 146, 160, 178

Gallwey, General Sir T., 263

Garstin, Sir W., 40, 107, 252, 268

Gatacre, General, 196

Gebi, 149 ; lunch at the, 156, 175

Gedid, battle of, 225, 267

Gildessa, 130, 183-4

Girouard, Bimbashi, 104

Gladstone, W. E., 17, 58, 103, 202, 257

Gleichen, Major Count, 115, 122, 127,

143, 183, 292, 310
Gordon, General, 16, 48

Gorst, Sir Eldon, 31, 248, 280
Granby, Marchioness of, 43
Greece, visits to, 80-2, 288-92
Greeks in Egypt, 259, 288
Grenfell, Sir Francis, 195, 244

— Lieut. Robert, 208, 218
Grey, Sir Edward, 232

Hamadeb, 270

Hanotaux, M., 92, 222, 230-1, 234-6

Haramaya, Lake, 139

Harrar, 112, 134-8, 181

Harrington, Lieut., 121-2, 181, 186,

195, 310
Harrison, Colonel, 53-5, 244
Hawash, R., 142, 145, 178
Hayes Sadler, Colonel, 120, 185
Heidler von Egeregg, Baron, 67
Henry, Prince, of Orleans, 113, 128,

139, 151-3, 177, 231, 300

of Prussia, 198

Herbette, M., 12

Herbin, M., 48

Heyking, Baron v., 7-9

Hewett, Admiral Sir W., 110, 163

Hicks-Beach, Sir M., 280

Hill, Sir Clement, 297

Holker, Sir J., viii

Hooligans, 297

Howard, Hubert, 207, 209

Howe, Julia Ward, viii

Hunter, General Sir A., 201

Hussars, 11th, 302

Ibrahim Pasha, 32

Hg, M., 147, 151, 163, 168, 176

— Madame, 153, 176
Indian troops for Suakin, 94
Inger, Carl, 184

Ismail Bey Sadyk, 25

Ismail Pasha, Khedive, 21-7

Italian prisoners in Abyssinia, 126, 128,

134, 158
Italian Red Cross, 127, 134

Jaalin tribe, 206, 208

Jackson, Colonel, 225

Jebel Surgham, 214-5

Jibuti, 112, 113, 118 ; railway project,

159 188
John, King of Tigre, 110, 156, 164
Johnston, Sir H., 297
Joseph, Gerasmach, 147, 150
Jubilee, second, 186

Kafa, 134

INDEX

315

Kanvasmach, 132

Kassala, 85, 89, 193, 250

Kenna, Lieut., 211, 218-9

Keppel, Oommander Colin, 197

Kerr, Lieut. Mark, 84

Khaled, Seyyid, 102

Khalifa, 208, 213, 220, 250, 270

Khalig, cutting the, 83

Khartoum, 48, 109, 168, 188, 210, 270

Kipling, Rudyard, 42, 312

Kirk, Sir J., 34

Kitchener Pasha, Sir H. Sirdar, 2, 6,

34-9, 59, 85, 89, 93, 97 ; at Don-

gola, 104 ; at Omdurman, 208-10 ;

at Fashoda, 221-5, 240, 247-52,

255, 263, 267, 271
Knowles, General, 90
Kokreb, 86
Koyander, M., 67
Kunni, 142

" Lady," 254, 268, 270

Laga Hardim, 143

Lagarde, M., 113, 140, 141, 158, 159

Lancers, 21st, 75, 205, 211, appendix

on p. 213
Lansdowne, Marquess of, 294, 304-6
Le Gallais, Oolonel, 293
L«5ontieff, 113, 151, 157
Lewis, Oolonel, 197
Liotard, M., 230, 232-4
Long, Colonel, 197
Lucinge, Prince de, 139
Lyttelton, General Hon. Neville, 205

Macdonald, Colonel Hector, 197, 210,

256
— General, Sir James, 187
Mad Mullah, 189
Mafeking, 274
Mahaffy, Professor, 76
Mahdi's tomb, 251
Mahmoud Damad Pasha, 282
Mahmoud, Emir, 201, 206
Mahmoud, Mohamed, 297
Mahmoud Suleiman Pasha, 307
Mahon, Colonel, 256, 274
Makunnen, Ras, 128, 132-9, 169, 181-3
Malet, Sir E., 12, 60, 69-71
Malortie, Baron, 65
Managasha, Mt., 149, 159
Mangasha, Ras, 151
Marchand, Captain, 159, 188, 205,

222-38, 241-2
Maria Theresa dollars, 119
Martini, Ferdinando, 310

Martyr, Major, 241

Massawah, 164

Mathios, Bishop, 153, 160, 170, 175

Maxwell, General Sir John, 39, 41, 47,

197, 242, 263
Menelik II, Emperor of Abyssinia, 110,

111, 147, 150, 154, 156-8, 162-76,

168, 199
Metternich, Count Paul, 66
Mikhail, Ras, 171
Milner, Viscount, 14, 15
Mitchell-Innes, Alfred, 49
Mixed tribunals, 108
Mohamed Ali, Khedive, 32
Moncrieff, Sir Colin Scott, 40
Money, Sir Alonzo, 292
Monson, Sir Edmund, 222, 232
Montazah, 275, 307
Monteil, Colonel, 231-2
Montmorency, Lieut. R. de, 211, 213-

20
Morley, Viscount, 251
Mouktar Pasha, 9, 10, 103
Muir, Surgeon-General, 239
Muller, F. von, 66
Mustapha Fehmy Pasha, 50
Mustapha Kamel, 101

Napoleon III, viii

Nason Bey, 202

Nauplia, 291

Nerazzini, Major, 178

Neufeld, Charles, 209

Nile, Abyssinian ambitions on, 168,

171 ; French door to, 230-5
Nile reservoirs, 87, 199, 248
Nubar Pasha, 8, 31-3, 42, 50, 252
Nubia, 269

Olympia, 290

Omdurman, 77 ; battle of, 207-12 ;

Appendix to Ch. VI
Orleans, see Henry Prince of
Oscar, King of Sweden, 258
Osman Digna, 256, 266
Owen, Roddy, 94-6, 98

Paget, Captain Alfred, 267

Palmer, Sir Elwin, 30, 89, 109

Pansa, Senatore, 66

Patriarchate of Alexandria, 288

Phylae, 79

Pinching Bey (Sir Horace), 97, 115, 122,

128, 137, 153, 157, 180
Piraeus, 80
Poncins, Vicomte de, 151

316

INDEX

Portal, Sir Gerald, 42, 111

Prince of Wales (King Edward), 275

Queen of Sheba, 111, 175

Queen Victoria, 277-8 ; death, 294

Raguel, St., 169

Ralli, P., 5

Ramleh, 3, 7, 82

Religious art in Abyssinia, 136

Reverseau, Marquis de, 66

Rhodes, Colonel Frank, 206, 208, 274

R'hotta tribe, 131, 179

Riaz Pasha, 31, 308

Roberts, Field-Marshal Earl, 263

Rogers, Sir John, 97

Rosebery, Earl of, 103, 232

Rumbold, Sir Horace, 49

Rundle, General, Sir Leslie, 5, 39, 46, 85

Russians in Abyssinia, 113

Rycroft, Major, 303

Salis, Count de, 49

Salisbury, Marquess of, 187, 189, 213,

226, 232, 242, 253, 264, 276, 293
Salon, Maitre, 41
Sayce, Professor, 68
Scott, Sir John, 41
Seaforth Highlanders, 75
Semon, Sir F., 277
Senoussi sect. 73-5
Sermoneta, Duke of, 86
Shablouka, 206
Shahin, George, 115
Shoa, Kingdom of, 110, 143
Sinadino, Ambroise, 65, 259
Siwa, 73

Slatin Pasha, 77-9, 91
Sobat R., 242
Somali Protectorate, 112, 114, 118, 167,

181, 189
Soudan, Reconquest policy, 87, 248,

265 ; Wingate's administration,

273
South African War, 256-9, 263, 268,

293
Speedy, Captain, 115, 122, 133, 140
Spring Rice, Sir Cecil, 292
Steevens, George, 200, 293
Stewart, Major, 47
Strachey, Lytton, 16
— J. St. Loe, 68
Stuart -Wortley, Major Hon. E., 35, 46,

48, 206, 208, 298

Suakin, 85, 93, 266

Swayne, Colonel, 115, 118, 122, 130,

143, 163, 184
Systrum, 170

Taitu, Empress of Abyssinia, 119, 154,

175
Talbot, General Hon. Sir R., 245, 295
Tantah, 83
Tej, 133, 156

Tewfik Pasha, Khedive, 12, 28, 71
Thaurin, Monseigneur, 137, 183
Theodore, King of Tigre, 110
Thermia, 81
Tigrane Pasha, 33
Tobe, or toga, 132
Touching for snakebites, 157
Treaty with Ethiopia, 171, 175
Turkhana tribe, 253

Ubanghi, Upper, 113, 230
Ucciali, Treaty of, 111, 164, 168
Uganda, 188

Venice in 1894, 45, 295
Verona, 295

Villehardouins in Greece, 288
Violet Fane, 260-2
Visconti-Venosta, Marchese, 262
Vlachernae, 289

Wady Haifa, 79, 94, 105

Wafa-el-Nil, 84

Waldo Haimanaut, 117, 150, 163

Warabod, 126

War Office, 90, 93

Webster, Sir R., viii

Wellby, Captain, 253

Wilcocks, Sir W., 40

William II, German Emperor, 198, 210,

295
Windsor, visits to, 187, 278
Wingate, General Sir R., 39, 77, 85, 110,

139, 163, 180, 184, 187, 245, 255,

265, 273, 276
Wolseley, General Lord, 49, 87
Wood, General Sir Evelyn, 2, 35, 46

Zaluski, Count, 52
Zanzibar, 34, 101, 102, 229
Zea, 81
Zeila, 118, 120, 166

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AUTUMN

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THE ASSAULT ON MOUNT EVEREST, 1922.

By Brig.-General the Hon. C. G. BRUCE

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in a light and readable style, and gives us plenty of amusing inci-
dents and anecdotes, and several lively sketches of the outstanding
personalities among Japanese administrators.

6 Edward Arnold & Co.'s Autumn Announcements.

ANIMAL LIFE IN DESERTS.

A STUDY OF THE FAUNA IN RELATION

TO THE ENVIRONMENT.

By Dr. P. A. BUXTON.

Formerly Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge ; Medical Ento-
mologist, Government of Palestine.

With numerous illustrations. Demy 8vo. 10s. 6d. net.

This volume is the result of several years' study of the conditions
of desert life in Algeria, North- West Persia, Southern Palestine and
Mesopotamia, and the author has endeavoured to summarize his own
observations and to elucidate their meaning by comparison with
what has been observed in other deserts.

The desert is an environment unspoilt by the hand of man, so
that one can more clearly observe the interaction of plant and animal
life upon each other, but, on the other hand, we are ignorant of
certain details of the climatology of deserts and of the life-history
of the great majority of the smaller animals. The extent to which
nearly all forms of animal and plant life are modified to enable them
to exist in these more or less hostile conditions is naturally greater
than it is in more favoured parts of the globe and renders their
accurate observation more difficult. It is partly in order to sum-
marize our present knowledge and to draw attention to the graver
deficiencies in it that the book has been written. It is hoped that
this study of the desert creatures and their environment which
leads one to a very fascinating meeting -place of several sciences, will
prove interesting to many who delight in natural history, but who
have never had an opportunity to make themselves acquainted with
the more formal aspects of zoology.

A HANDBOOK OF THE CONIFERS
AND GINKGOACEjE.

By W. DALLIMORE,

Assistant at the Royal Gardens, Kew,

and A. B. JACKSON, A.L.S.

With 32 full-page plates and over 100 illustrations in the text.
One Volume about 600 pages. Medium 8vo. 42s. net.

This book contains descriptions in easily understood terms of
all the cone-bearing trees with information upon their economic
uses and cultivation.

The need for such a book has long been felt, for although groups
of conifers have been described elsewhere, the family has not been

Edward Arnold & Co.'s Autumn Announcements. 7

exhaustively dealt with in a single volume for many years. More-
over the number of new species introduced during the present
century makes necessary a review of the whole group.

Although the book is primarily a general work upon Conifers,
special attention has been given to those that are hardy in the
British Isles or are of outstanding economic importance. A feature
of the work is the series of keys to genera and species which are
designed to assist beginners in the work of identification.

The families Taxacece, Pinacece and Ginkgoacece are separately
treated, the genera and species being alphabetically arranged.
Following a short generic description each species is dealt with,
giving the scientific name with authority and the most important
common name. Then come scientific and common synonyms,
followed by a botanical description, the geographical distribution,
date of introduction, economic uses and cultivation, with one or
more references to the plant in other works. About 115 natural
size line-drawings by Miss G. Lister add considerable value to the
descriptions, whilst 32 full-page photographs illustrate woodland
scenery and specimen trees. The descriptions have been drawn
up from living plants or herbarium specimens in the Royal Botanic
Gardens, Kew.

FOUNDERS OF OCEANOGRAPHY AND
THEIR WORK.

AN INTRODUCTION TO THE SCIENCE OF THE SEA.
By Sir WILLIAM HERDMAN, F.R.S.

With about 60 Illustrations. One Volume. Demy 8vo.
21s. net.

Sir William Herdman is one of the most famous of living oceano-
graphers ; he has lived through the period that has seen the
development of the Natural History of the Sea into the Science
of Oceanography, and has known intimately most of the men
who did the pioneer work.

His book may be roughly divided into two sections. The first
few chapters are biographical sketches of the pioneers of oceano-
graphy, in which are recorded the author's personal impressions
of these men and their work : Edward Forbes, the Manx Naturalist,
the pioneer of shallow- water dredging ; Wyville Thomson and
John Murray and the work of the Challenger expedition ; Louis
and Alexander Agassiz, the founders of American Oceanography ;
and finally the late Prince of Monaco, whose practical interest in
deep-sea exploration has done so much to advance knowledge.

The second section deals with subjects rather than men, and
here the author has chosen those matters in which he himself is
particularly interested. He starts with an account of the various

8 Edward Arnold & Co.'s Autumn Announcements.

oceans, the influence on marine life of their salinity, depth and
temperature. This is followed by a fascinating study of the various
deep-sea deposits and a chapter on Coral Islands with a survey
of the various theories that have been advanced to explain their
formation. He then discusses the various causes of luminescence
in the sea. Finally there are chapters on plankton or floating
life of the sea, on oyster and mussel cultivation and on the sea-
fisheries.

Oceanography has many practical applications in connection
with our sea-fisheries and the cultivation of our barren shores,
and is a subject which should appeal specially to a maritime people
like the British, who owe everything to the sea. The volume is
beautifully illustrated and is full of interest for the general reader
as well as for the student.

BRITISH HYMENOPTERA.

By A. S. BUCKHURST, L. N. STANILAND, and G. B.

WATSON. With an introduction by Professor H. Maxwell

Lefroy.
One Volume, Crown Quarto. With many illustrations. 9s. net.

An introduction to the study of the habits and life-histories of
British Saw-Flies, Wood-Wasps, Gall-Flies, Ichneumon-Flies, Ruby-
Wasps, Digger-Wasps, Mud-Wasps, Wasps, Bees, and Ants. Suffi-
cient information is given for their identification and technical
terms are carefully explained. The authors aim at interesting all
those interested in the study of insects, and who require a volume
more accurate than the wholly-popular romantic works and yet
less technical than a systematic treatise.

DRAWINGS BY GUERCINO.

Edited by ARCHIBALD G. B. RUSSELL, B.A., F.S.A.,
Lancaster Herald.

Authob of "The Engbavtngs of Wtt.t.tam Blake," etc.
One Volume. Quarto. Finely printed. 25s. net.
The Edition is limited to 500 numbered copies for sale.

The book will be illustrated by twenty-four reproductions of
Guercino's drawings which have been carefully selected with a view
to representing the various aspects of the Artist's genius by the
finest possible examples. The Royal collection at Windsor, the
British Museum and several important private collections have
been drawn upon for this purpose.

The Editor, Mr. Archibald G. B. Russell, Lancaster Herald, well

Edward Arnold db Co.'s Autumn Announcements. 9

known as an authority upon the drawings of the Old Masters, will
contribute a study of the Artist's life and work, together with notes
upon the illustrations.

Guercino's drawings which enjoyed an immense reputation in
the eighteenth century, a large number of them being engraved
in facsimile by Bartolozzi and other eminent engravers of the period,
have since that date passed through a time of comparative neglect
among collectors, due in part to the temporary eclipse in the public
esteem suffered by the whole Bolognese School and in part to the
absence of fine examples upon the market. The recent dispersal
of a notable group of drawings from the collection of the late Lord
North wick and of the matchless series (probably with that at Wind-
sor the finest that has ever been brought together) lately in the
possession of the Earl of Gainsborough, from whose cabinet they
can be traced back to a nephew of the Artist, has however done
much to contribute to the present revival of interest in his work.
The finest of these drawings which have lately been the subject of
a very interesting exhibition at the Burlington Fine Arts Club, are
to be included among the illustrations of the forthcoming volume.

The book accordingly will have a special value, not only for
collectors of Old Master Drawings, but for all lovers of Fine Art.
It should also make a particular appeal to artists in view of Guer-
cino's brilliant use of the various mediums employed in his sketches.
Their influence has already been far-reaching, and it is certain that
the beauty of his pen and wash drawings left a deep impress upon
the work of Tiepolo, who is known to have formed a collection of
them and to have held them in the highest regard.

PAINTING IN THE FAR EAST.

By LAURENCE BINYON,

Deputy Keeper, in chakoe of Oriental Prints and Drawings, British

Museum.

Third Edition. With Frontispiece in colour and forty-one full-
page plates. Medium Svo. 30s. net.

The last edition of this book was published in the year before
the War broke out discolouring all our minds and interdicting
for so long the pursuits of peaceful study. In spite of the world's
material convulsions, however, interest in Oriental art everywhere
gained ground ; and during these years notable works in one aspect
or another of the subject have been published, and valuable addi-
tions have been made to European and American collections,
though these perhaps have been less important in the domain of
painting than of sculpture.

In preparing this new edition, therefore, a good deal of revision

10 Edward Arnold & Co.'s Autumn Announcements.

has been necessary, and a certain amount of fresh matter has been
incorporated. It is especially in the chapters on early Chinese
painting and in that on " Ukiyo-ye and the Colour-Print " that
new material and new information have had to be taken into
account.

The number of illustrations has been slightly increased. Two
or three plates which appeared in the second edition have been
replaced by other subjects ; and there has been added as frontis-
piece a coloured reproduction from a beautiful small Sung painting
in the famous collection of Air. George Eumorfopoulos, to whom
the author is greatly indebted for permission to use it.

THE ANALYSIS OF THE HUNTING FIELD.

By R. S. SURTEES.

With reproductions of the original Plates by H. Alken.

A new Edition. Crown tto. 21s. net.

" The Analysis of the Hunting Field " is a series of lively sketches
of the various personages found there. Originally written for
Bell's Life to commemorate the exceptionally good season of 1845-
46, it is not usually grouped with the novels of Surtees,
although, apart from the fact that there is no connected tale run-
ning through the chapters, it presents all the characteristic features
of the novels and will delight the general reader no less than the
hunting man. A recent subscription edition of Surtees' works
does not include either " Jorrocks' Jaunts and Jollities " or " The
Analysis of the Hunting Field," and it is anticipated that possessors
of this set will be glad to make their collections more complete
by adding this new edition of the latter work. Robert Smith
Surtees is one of the puzzles of literature. Considered by some
as being the greatest fiction humorist of his day, he is at the same
time comparatively little known to the general reader. But it
is safe to say that whoever makes the acquaintance of this capti-
vating storyteller of English country life, with his hilarious and
joyous tales of fox-hunting, horse-dealing, racing, dinners, dances
and flirtations, will not rest content until he has read everything
Surtees produced with so much bounce and gusto. And no better
volume need be selected to start with than " The Analysis of the
Hunting Field." It contains coloured plates after Henry Alken
— most popular of sporting artists — and while it would be invidious

Edward Arnold & Go's Autumn Announcements. 11

to compare the merits of his work with that of Leech, who suc-
ceeded him as illustrator of Surtees' books, it is noteworthy that
first editions containing Aiken plates fetch much higher prices
in the sale room than those illustrated by the later artist.

SEAMANSHIP FOR YACHTSMEN.

By F. B. COOKE.

Author of " The Corinthian Yachtsman's Hand-book," " Single-handed

Cruising," etc.

One Volume. Demy Svo. Illustrated, 12s. 6d. net.

The success which has attended the publication of Mr. Cooke's
previous books ensures a cordial welcome for this, his latest work
on Yachting. He writes mainly for the owners of small yachts,
and gives eminently practical advice, from knowledge gained in
the hard school of experience, as to all the different occasions where
seamanship comes into play. Chapters are devoted to Getting
under Way,'Seamanship under Way, Heavy Weather, Bringing up,
Moorings, Stowing away, Running Aground, Accidents, Strange
Harbours, Rule of the Road, Racing Tactics, and other kindred
topics. The whole book teems with useful information, and illus-
trations are freely used whenever they are required to elucidate
the text.

RELIGIO MILITIS.

By AUSTIN HOPKINSON, M.P.

One Volume. Probable 'price, 7s. 6d. net.

This book is an attempt by one, who has taken an active part
in the politics, wars and industry of the country, to explain what
the generation to which he belongs really believes. He endeavours
to show that the pessimism of the twentieth century is no more
to be justified than the thoughtless optimism of the nineteenth,
and that the effect of the war has been to imbue a large number
of our young men with an intense, but unspoken, religious faith,
which may well give rise to a great improvement of political and
of industrial conditions in the near future. Like Mithraism, the
soldiers' religion of the early part of the Christian era, this faith
is dualistic. It accepts the reality of a never-ending struggle
between moral beings and a non-moral cosmic process, and tends

12 Edward Arnold & Co.'s Autumn Announcements.

to associate Evil with the crowd, while it holds Good to be the
attribute of the individual. Thus it becomes the basis of the
Aristocratic Principle — that the well-being of the many can be
secured only by self-sacrifice of the few. The extreme subjectivism
of this outlook is, the author believes, strongly supported by
the work of the physical relativitists, and he endeavours to show
that it in no way runs counter to the teaching of the synoptic
Gospels. But his determination ruthlessly to tear away all those
accretions with which institutional religion has somewhat obscured
primitive Christianity, may possibly raise a protest from orthodox
churchmen.

The book is no mere splitting of metaphysical hairs, but a sincere
attempt to justify the extreme idealism which the author has
advocated and which he has put into actual practice in dealing
with industrial and political problems. Indeed, he expressly
disclaims any skill or training in metaphysics, and describes in
the simplest and clearest language possible what, for better or
for worse, is the faith of his generation.

GERMAN STRATEGY IN THE GREAT

WAR.

By Beevet Lieut.-Colonel PHILIP NEAME, V.C., D.S.O.,

Royal Engineers.

One Volume. Demy 8vo. With numerous Maps. 10s. 6d. net.

The author has based this book on lectures he gave recently
to officers at the Staff College, Camberley. Although intended
primarily for military students, it is a work of absorbing interest
for the general reader. In fourteen short chapters, Colonel Neame
discusses the strategical operations of each phase of the war, out-
lining the plans of the General Staff, describing the actual move-
ments that took place and indicating the causes of success or
failure. His estimate of the characters of the different commanders
and their influence on the course of events is most illuminating,
and the book is full of suggestive inquiries as to how far the issues
would have been affected had different dispositions been made.
There is a valuable series of seventeen carefully prepared maps,
specially drawn to illustrate the critical phases of the campaigns,
and it is confidently anticipated that the work will form an invalu-
able hand-book for all students of strategy in the Great War for
many years to come.

Edward Arnold & Co.'s Autumn Announcements. 13

OVER THE BALKANS AND SOUTH RUSSIA.
BEING THE HISTORY OF NO. 47 SQUAD-
RON, ROYAL AIR FORCE.

By H. A. JONES, M.C.

With an Introduction by Air Vice-Marshal Sir W. G. H.

SALMOND, K.C.M.G., C.B., D.S.O.

One Volume. Demy 8vo. With Maps and Illustrations.
10s. 6d. net.

Squadron No. 47 has a record of a high standard of efficiency.
The Squadron tackled whole-heartedly any job that came its way.
And those jobs were diverse. It was formed at Beverley in May,
1916, and left for Macedonia in September of that year. For the
next three years, in the Balkans and South Russia, it had little
rest. Its work, under the extraordinary conditions which marked
the progress of the Macedonian Campaign, is here told in detail,
with many intimate little pen pictures of people who played their
part and passed on.

The story of the Battle of Doiran, as it is here written, will, it
is hoped, do something towards ensuring justice for a singularly
fine feat of British arms.

After the convention with Bulgaria was signed, No. 47 was
ordered against the Turks in the direction of Constantinople. But
Turkey also went out of the war. Then came Denikin's campaign
against the Bolsheviks. Once more 47 was on the move. The
story of that ill-fated campaign is told briefly but clearly. Briga-
dier-General A. C. Maund, C.B.E., D.S.O. , who commanded the
Air Force in South Russia, writes of this part of the history, " It
is one of the most accurate descriptions I have ever read."

By the courtesy of the Air Minis try, the book is based on official
records, and consequently forms a contribution to the authenticated
literature on the war.

THE REVOLUTIONARY IDEA IN FRANCE,

1789-1871.

By GODFREY ELTON,

Fellow of Queen's College, Oxford.

One Volume. Demy Svo. 10s. 6d. net.

This book develops a theory of the essential character of the
French Revolution and of the revolutionary outbreaks of 1830,

14 Edward Arnold & Co.'s Autumn Announcements.

1848 and 1871, which we believe has not been hitherto presented
as a distinct thesis and made the subject of separate treatment.
Mr. Elton points out that all historians of the Revolution have
handled it as though the Revolution and the general history of
France were interchangeable terms, and have thus in his opinion
obscured its real character. He maintains on the other hand that
it is possible to disengage the true essence of the Revolution from
the general history of the time, and by so doing to make clear who
were the actual authors of the Revolution, their motives and aims,
and the permanent results which they in fact achieved. He applies
his method with unshrinking thoroughness, e.g., passing by the
conflict with the Church as irrelevant in tracing out the story of
the Revolution, though of vast importance as a part of general
history. His conclusions have a logic and a lucidity which give
the book an absorbing interest. One of its most striking features
is the distinction on which Mr. Elton insists between the revolu-
tionary ideas of 1789, and the new economic or socialist revolution
attempted in 1848 and again in 1871. This portion of the story
brings us into touch with the most vital and urgent problems of
modern politics.

TRENTAREMI AND OTHER MOODS.

By the Right Hon. Sir J. RENNELL RODD, G.C.B.

Authob of " The Violet Chown," " Ballads of the Fleet," etc.

One Volume. Crown Svo. 4s. 6d. net.

A new volume of Poems by Sir Rennell Rodd will be welcome
to the many readers who admire his previous work in this sphere.
Trentaremi is the name of a little rock-sheltered bay in the Gulf of
Naples where the Author has a house, and its romantic surround-
ings have doubtless lent inspiration to his Muse.

IMPROMPTUS.

By MARGARET, RANEE OF SARAWAK.

One Volume. Croum 8vo. 6s. net.

It is to the late W. H. Hudson that we owe the publication of
these graceful and charming sketches from the pen of Margaret,
Ranee of Sarawak. Only a few days before he died, he asked if
she had done anything towards putting them into book form,
and repeated the apt lines, which are quoted in the Foreword : —

What are thoughts ?

But birds that fly.

What are words ?

But traps to catch them by.

Edtvard Arnold & Co.' 8 Autumn Announcements. 15

In the pages of this small book are collected thoughts on a wide
variety of subjects, the connecting thread being an intense sympathy
with nature in all its forms. The author sees life as a highway
on which one encounters one's fellow-wayfarers, and cries them
greeting : and by wayfarers are meant not only men and women,
but the creatures who also claim our kinship. Who that reads
this book will forget Isopel and her horse ; the dog Jack, the parrot
who pleaded so persistently to be taken from the confines of a
London shop to the freer life instinct told him this friend would
give him ; or the lonely swan (perhaps the most charming of all
the sketches). In all life this kinship throbs. When the Ranee
weaves a romance around the carven figure of a woman long since
dead ; when she watches the sap rising in the trees at spring-
time, the same faith is hers — that life and love never pass away
for ever.

AN ATTRACTIVE NEW NOVEL.

THE GATES ARE OPEN.

By J. CRANSTON NEVILL.

Author of "Ring Up the Curtain," etc.

Crown 8vo. 7s. 6d. net.

In this, his third novel, Mr. Nevill has given us a piece of work
of great psychological interest. He writes with ease : he develops
his subject skilfully : his characters are not mere abstractions,
but real human beings who claim our sympathy. It is a book that
will make a wide appeal, and especially to music-lovers, for Air.
Nevill writes of music with that sympathetic insight that belongs
only to the true musician.

Noel Lane possesses more than his share of the good things of
life — youth, good looks, and a musical ability which just falls short
of genius. His agent, Carl Blumenthal, and his friend, Lady
Hermione Radleigh, are conscious of this lack, but to the former
Noel's talent represents no more than a business asset of consider-
able value, to be exploited by publicity methods, justifiable or not
justifiable. Lady Hermione sees it as a gift which needs only the
flame of some great emotional experience to transmute it into genius.

Light-heartedly, Noel pursues the way of success, accepting all
the happiness that comes to him so easily — his marriage, his child.
But the heights are not yet reached. Only through travail can the
real self be born. Not until tragedy has touched him — as Lady
Hermione foresaw — can he find fulfilment. What exactly that
tragedy is, it would be unfair to divulge ; suffice it to say that
Air. Nevill works up to his climax in a masterly manner, and that
his story holds our attention to the end.

16 Edward Arnold & Co.'s Autumn Announcements.

A FIRST NOVEL BY A NEW WRITER.

SOFT GOODS.

By OSWALD H. DAVIS.
Croum 8vo. 7s. 6d. net.

Mr. Davis, in this, his first novel, has achieved a remarkable
piece of work, original in outlook, sincere and exact in presentation.
He shows us life from a new view-point — from behind the counter
— and shows it with almost uncanny vividness.

Brian Leagold is the son of a provincial draper. Endowed with
an appreciation of the beauty in life and with some literary ability,
his ambition is to make a name for himself in the world of letters.
But the prosaic needs of existence force him to earn money by more
assured methods, and, as a means to an end, he enters his own
shop. Here humiliation awaits him. Dismayed to find himself
inferior to his own shop-assistants, he struggles for mastery over
the multifarious intricacies of the trade — the nice distinction
between one material and another, the hieroglyphic markings on
a hosiery packet. And gradually he finds his self-imposed task
is absorbing all his energies. An excursion into the literary world
only disillusions him : journalism, he finds, is but another form
of trade, " like cutting and selling bacon, only without the profits."
He discovers the fascination of watching from behind his counter
the ebb and flow of real life, and frankly he admits that trade
has claimed him.

Mr. Davis' story rivets the attention. The reader himself seems
to move in Brian's world ; to watch with him the life of the pro-
vincial city ; to see through his eyes the " commonness " of the
women-kind with whom he is forced to mix : to feel with him their
allurement, while candidly admitting their vulgarity.

Mr. Davis set out to present the persistent everyday realities of
life warring against the creations of the imagination, and brilliantly
has he achieved his task. Unusual, vivid, well- written, interesting
— such is his story.

EDWIN BALMER'S LATEST NOVEL.

KEEBAN.

By EDWIN BALMER.

Author op " The Breath op Scandal," etc.

One Volume. Croum Svo. 7s. 6d. net.

All who enjoyed that fine novel " The Breath of Scandal " will
turn expectantly to Mr. Balmer's new book " Keeban." And they

Edward Arnold <Se Co.'s Autumn Announcements. 17

will not be disappointed. It is a thrilling tale of mystery, written
with all the author's customary vigour.

Who is Keeban ? That is what Steve Fanneal wanted to know :
what Jerry Fanneal, as the person most concerned, set forth to
find out. Was it a case of dual personality or merely one of mistaken
identity ? And it all happened because a small child in a Chicago
park strayed from its mother ; strayed from the " underworld " of
that city to a " marble mansion " on Astor Street.

It would be unfair to unfold here the solution of the mystery.
Suffice it to say that there is not a dull moment in Mr. Balmer's
book. It has all the excitement and surprises of a cinema film, and
may be best described as being " full of punches." To all who like
a good story, well told, we recommend " Keeban " and can assure
the reader that the book, once begun, will not be dropped until it
is finished.

ANOTHER INTERESTING FIRST NOVEL.

GABRIEL QUELFORD.

By ARTHUR HOUGHAM.
One Volume. Crown 8vo. 7s. 6d. net.

Mr. Hougham is a new writer whose work the discerning critic
will watch with interest, for he gives promise of great things. This,
his first book, has a simplicity, a freshness and a reality that lift
it well above the average novel. His diction is clear and decisive :
time after time he hits on an exact Tightness of expression, or on
some fresh poetic simile that lingers in the memory : his characters
are beings of flesh and blood — Gabriel, Gabriel's mother, Raven the
agent, Cecily — to meet them in the pages of Mr. Hougham's book
is to meet them in real life.

Gabriel Quelford, when we first encounter him, is a farm lad,
illiterate and uncouth. Stirred by longings for something he
cannot even put a name to, he rebels at life's tyranny which has
bound him to " the same thing, the same thing and the same thing
again " : had he known the word " monotony " he would have
used it. One day he sees a stranger striding over the hill : a
" gentleman," who seems to possess all that he himself lacks —
freedom, knowledge, outward seemliness. Ambition wakes in
Gabriel : his formless desires take shape : one day he will be as
that stranger. How bit by bit he attains his ideal, only to find
disillusionment : how at the last comes love, love for a woman of
the class he has alternately envied and despised, and with love,
content, Mr. Hougham shows with masterly skill.

18 Edward Arnold & Co.'s Autumn Announcements.

A CHARMING CORNISH PASTORAL.

JACYNTH.

By F. T. WAWN.

Author of "The Mastebdielo," "The Joyful Years," etc.

One Volume. Crown Svo. 7s. 6d. net.

Readers of " The Masterdillo " will delight in welcoming another
book from the pen of Mr. F. T. Wawn. His writing has a flavour
all its own, and in " Jacynth " he proves himself to have lost none
of that whimsicality and freshness that distinguished his earlier-
novels.

Jacynth Humphreys is a notable creation : a character of rare
charm and vitality : a heroine for whom the clean, open country
makes a fit setting. The daughter of a Harley Street doctor, we
find her, in the late years of the war, working as a land-girl in a little
Cornish village. As a sharer of their toils, she is brought into close
touch with the countryfolk, all of whom seem to have stepped
straight from their village into the pages of Mr. Wawn's book.

She attracts the notice of one Jasper Jones, a 1915 pensioner,
with an unromantic name, a lame foot, a taste for the classics, and
a love for all creatures great and small. The growth of love between
these two, so far apart socially, so close in sympathies, is described
with rare delicacy — the shy approach, the gradual yielding, the
fulfilment.

Mr. Wawn's characters always have just that touch of " differ-
ence " which constitutes that intangible thing, charm. He writes
of them with reality, but reality tempered with a fragrant senti-
ment : for this reason M Jacynth " comes as a welcome relief from
those numberless novels that insist only on life's ugly side.

A FIRST NOVEL OF GREAT PROMISE.

THE SILKEN SCARF.

By L. C. HOBART. Crown Svo. 7s, 6d. net.

"Writers of readable fiction have enlisted a promising recruit
in Miss L. C. Hobart. There are indications in the book of a real
talent for description, and clear evidences of a skilful use of dia-
logue." — Liverpool Post.

" Miss L. C. Hobart has a good many qualities that should make
for popular success. Above all, she can tell a story : an old-
fashioned gift, but one that is very necessary. Her story moves.
She stresses the emotional note, as she stresses the descriptive
note here and there, but she does contrive to convey the emotion
and the scene to her readers." — Birmingham Post.

Edward Arnold & Co.'s Autumn Announcements. 19

THE BREATH OF SCANDAL.

By EDWIN BALMER. Crown 8vo. 7s. 6d. net.

" This novel is a fine piece of work, very carefully written and
most interesting to read. The scene of the scandal is a suburb
of Chicago, and the protagonist is a prominent business man cursed
with a wife who cares for nothing but a steady climb up the social
ladder. And so there is another lady in the background. Un-
fortunate, but not difficult to understand. But there is also a
daughter. When her eyes are opened — well, that is Mr. Balmer's
story, and very well he tells it." — The Bystander.

RECENTLY PUBLISHED VOLUMES.

THE LIFE OF JAMESON.

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tions ' between the protagonists of the drama, combine to make
it unique among modern biographies." — The Times.

ALFRED YARROW: HIS LIFE AND WORK.

By ELEANOR C. BARNES (LADY YARROW). With
many coloured and other illustrations. 10s. 6d. net.

" We get a picture of a man who carved out his way by steady
application, fair dealing, and innate engineering skill, to the estab-
lishment of a great undertaking that has become famous all over
the world."— The Times.

" The book is a great and inspiring story. It is a triumph of
good writing and excellent compilation." — Glasgow Herald.

" One of those books that act upon one like a mental tonic.
There is something wonderfully bracing about this vigorous,
great-hearted personality." — Truth.

THE STRANGER AND OTHER POEMS.

By BRYCE McMASTER. Crown Svo. 5s. net.

" Mr. McMaster gives us charming lyrics expressing a delightful
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" His sense of the felicitous word, his real delight in natural
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Aubrey de Vere at his best." — Freeman's Journal.

20 Edward Arnold & Co.'s Autumn Announcements.

RECENTLY PUBLISHED.

BEASTS, MEN AND GODS.

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Impression. 12s. 6d. net.

" It would be difficult to imagine anything more thrilling than
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" It is the most wonderful book of warlike adventure which has
appeared for many a long year." — Morning Post.

" The most extraordinary book of travel and adventure that
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LETTERS ON PRACTICAL BANKING.

By JOHN BRUNTON, Author of " Bankers and Borrowers."

7s. 6d. net.

" It is, in fact, a modern successor to Rae's ' Country Banker,'
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THE MORAL SELF: AN INTRODUCTION

TO ETHICS ( M0DERN EDUCATOR'S

LIBRARY.)

By A. K. WHITE and A. MACBEATH, Lecturers in Moral

Philosophy in the University of Glasgow. Crown Svo.

6s. net.

SOME CONTRIBUTIONS TO CHILD
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London : Edwaed Arnold & Co., 41 & 43 Maddox Street, W.l.

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R5A3
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Rennell, James Rennell Rodd,
Baron

Social and diplomatic
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