It is not to be supposed that a nation in this stage of civilisation could be so fervently devout as the Egyptians are, without the bad leaven of bigotry.  The same tongue which is employed in blessing Allah, is, it is conceived, doing its work equally well in cursing Allah’s enemies.  Wherefore the Kafir is denounced by every sex, age, class, and condition, by the man of the world,[FN#34] as by the boy at school; and out of, as well as in, the Mosque.  If you ask your friend who is the person with a black turband, he replies,

“A Christian.  Allah make his Countenance cold!”

If you inquire of your servant, who are the people singing in the next house, it is ten to one that his answer will be,

“Jews.  May their lot be Jahannam!”

It appears unintelligible, still it is not less true, that Egyptians who have lived as servants under European roofs for years, retain the liveliest loathing for the manners

[p.111]and customs of their masters.  Few Franks, save those who have mixed with the Egyptians in Oriental disguise, are aware of their repugnance to, and contempt for, Europeans-so well is the feeling veiled under the garb of innate politeness, and so great is their reserve when conversing with those of strange religions.  I had a good opportunity of ascertaining the truth when the first rumour of a Russian war arose.  Almost every able-bodied man spoke of hastening to the Jihad,-a crusade, or holy war,-and the only thing that looked like apprehension was the too eager depreciation of their foes.  All seemed delighted with the idea of French co-operation, for, somehow or other, the Frenchman is everywhere popular.  When speaking of England, they were not equally easy:  heads were rolled, pious sentences were ejaculated, and finally out came the old Eastern cry, “Of a truth they are Shaytans, those English.[FN#35]” The Austrians are despised, because the East knows nothing of them since the days when Osmanli hosts threatened the gates of Vienna.  The Greeks are hated as clever scoundrels, ever ready to do Al-Islam a mischief.  The Maltese, the greatest of cowards off their own ground, are regarded with a profound contempt:  these are the proteges which bring the British nation into disrepute at Cairo.  And Italians are known chiefly as “istruttori” and “distruttori"[FN#36]-doctors, druggists, and pedagogues.

Yet Egyptian human nature is, like human nature everywhere, contradictory.  Hating and despising Europeans, they still long for European rule.  This people admire

[p.112]an iron-handed and lion-hearted despotism; they hate a timid and a grinding tyranny.[FN#37] Of all foreigners, they would prefer the French yoke,-a circumstance which I attribute to the diplomatic skill and national dignity of our neighbours across the Channel.[FN#38] But whatever European nation secures Egypt will win a treasure.  Moated on the north and south by seas, with a glacis of impassable deserts to the eastward and westward, capable of supporting an army of 180,000 men, of paying a