deal of European literature and history and is able to draw comparisons.  He said, ’Vous seule dans toute l’Egypte connaissez le peuple et comprenez ce qui se passe, tous les autres Europeens ne savent absolument rien que les dehors; il n’y a que vous qui ayez inspire la confiance qu’il faut pour connaitre la vente.’  Of course this is between ourselves, I tell you, but I don’t want to boast of the kind thoughts people have of me, simply because I am decently civil to them.

In Egypt we are eaten up with taxes; there is not a penny left to anyone.  The taxes for the whole year eight months in advance have been levied, as far as they can be beaten out of the miserable people.  I saw one of the poor dancing girls the other day, (there are three in Luxor) and she told me how cruel the new tax on them is.  It is left to the discretion of the official who farms it to make each woman pay according to her presumed gains, i.e. her good looks, and thus the poor women are exposed to all the caprices and extortions of the police.  This last new tax has excited more disgust than any.  ’We now know the name of our ruler,’ said a fellah who had just heard of it, ‘he is Mawas Pasha.’  I won’t translate—­but it is a terrible epithet when uttered in a tone which gives it the true meaning, though in a general way the commonest word of abuse to a donkey, or a boy, or any other cattle.  The wages of prostitution are unclean, and this tax renders all Government salaries unlawful according to strict law.  The capitation tax too, which was remitted for three years on the pasha’s accession to the people of Cairo, Alexandria, Damietta and Rascheed, is now called for.  Omar will have to pay about 8 pounds back tax, which he had fondly imagined himself excused from.  You may conceive the distress this must cause among artisans, etc., who have spent their money and forgotten it, and feel cheated out of the blessings they then bestowed on the Pasha—­as to that they will take out the change in curses.

There was a meeting here the other day of the Kadee, Sheykh el-Beled, and other notables to fix the amount of tax each man was to pay towards the increased police tax; and the old Shereef at the end spoke up, and said he had heard that one man had asked me to lend him money, and that he hoped such a thing would not happen again.  Everyone knew I had had heavy expenses this year, and most likely had not much money; that my heart was soft, and that as everyone was in distress it would be ’breaking my head,’ and in short that he should think it unmanly if anyone tried to trouble a lone woman with his troubles.  I did offer one man 2 pounds that he might not be forced to run away to the desert, but he refused it and said, ’I had better go at once and rob out there, and not turn rogue towards thee—­never could I repay it.’  The people are running away in all directions.