e interference of a Mahometan in such a case as this would only have
been held as another persecution of the Christians; and the miracle of
the holy fire has continued to be exhibited every year with great
applause, and luckily without the unfortunate results which accompanied
it on this occasion.

Ibrahim Pasha, though by no means the equal of Mehemet Ali in talents or
attainments, was an enlightened man for a Turk. Though bold in battle,
he was kind to those who were about him; and the cruelties practised by
his troops in the Greek and Syrian wars are to be ascribed more to the
system of Eastern warfare than to the savage disposition of their
commander.

He was born at Cavalla, in Roumelia, in the year 1789, and died at
Alexandria on the 10th of November, 1848. He was the son, according to
some, of Mehemet Ali, but, according to others, of the wife of the great
Viceroy of Egypt by a former husband. At the age of seventeen he joined
his father's army, and in 1816 he commanded the expedition against the
Wahabees--a sect who maintained that nothing but the Koran was to be
held in any estimation by Mahometans, to the exclusion of all notes,
explanations, and commentaries, which have in many cases usurped the
authority of the text. They called themselves reformers, and, like King
Henry VIII., took possession of the golden water-spouts and other
ornaments of the Kaaba, burned the books and destroyed the colleges of
the Arabian theologians, and carried off everything they could lay hold
of, on religious principles. An eye-witness told me that some of the
followers of Abd el Wahab had found a good-sized looking-glass in a
house at Sanaa, which they were carrying away with great difficulty
through the desert, the porters being guarded by a multitude of
half-naked warriors, who had neglected all other plunder in the
supposition that they had got hold of the diamond of Jemshid, a
pre-Adamite monarch famous in the annals of Arabian history. Some more
of these wild people found several bags of doubloons at Mocha, which
they conceived to be dollars that had been spoiled somehow, and had
turned yellow, for they had never seen any before. A "smart" captain of
an American vessel at Jedda, who was consulted on the occasion, kindly
gave them one real white dollar for four yellow ones--an arrangement
which perfectly satisfied both parties. After three years' campaign,
Ibrahim Pasha retook the holy cities of Mecca and Medina; and in
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