et public
opinion mature. I therefore contented myself with indicating the defects
of the present system and the general direction which reform should
take, leaving it to those younger than myself to carry on the work when
advancing years obliged me to retire. I may add that the manner in which
my proposals were received and discussed by the European public in Egypt
afforded good reason for supposing that the obstacles to be overcome
before any serious reforms could be effected, though formidable, were by
no means insuperable. After my departure in 1907, events occurred which
rendered it impossible that the subject should at once come under the
consideration of the Government, but in 1911 Lord Kitchener was able to
report that the legislative powers of the Court of Appeal sitting at
Alexandria had been somewhat increased. Sir Malcolm M'Ilwraith, the
Judicial Adviser of the Egyptian Government, in commenting on this
change, says:

The new scheme, while assuredly a progressive step, and in notable
advance of the previous state of affairs ... can hardly be
regarded, in its ensemble, as more than a temporary makeshift, and
a more or less satisfactory palliative of the legislative impotence
under which the Government has suffered for so long.

It is most earnestly to be hoped that the question will now be taken up
seriously with a view to more drastic reform than any which has as yet
been effected.

There is one, and only one, method by which the evils of the existing
system can be made to disappear. The British Government should request
the other Powers of Europe to vest in them the legislative power which
each now exercises separately. Simultaneously with this request, a
legislative Chamber should be created in Egypt for enacting laws to
which Europeans will be amenable.

There is, of course, one essential preliminary to the execution of this
programme. It is that the Powers of Europe, as also the European
residents in Egypt, should have thorough confidence in the intentions of
the British Government, by which I mean confidence in the duration of
the occupation, and also confidence in the manner in which the affairs
of the country will be administered.

As regards the first point, there is certainly no cause for doubt. Under
the Anglo-French Agreement of 1904 the French Government specifically
declared that "they will not obstruct the action of government in Egypt
by asking that a limit of ti