days of 1881, and awakened
great hopes, not only in Egypt, but among all who saw hope in the
feeling of nationality and in a genuine wish for reform among a Moslem
people. What would have happened had the Notables been free to work out
the future of Egypt, it is impossible to say. The fate of the Young
Turkish party and of Midhat's constitution of December 1877 formed by no
means a hopeful augury. In the abstract there is much to be said for the
two chief demands of the Notables--that the Khedive's Ministers should
be responsible to the people's representatives, and that the Dual
Control of Great Britain and France should be limited to the control of
the revenues set apart for the purposes of the Egyptian public debt. The
petitioners, however, ignored the fact that democracy could scarcely be
expected to work successfully in a land where not one man in a hundred
had the least notion what it meant, and, further, that the Western
Powers would not give up their coign of vantage at the bidding of
Notables who really represented little more than the dominant military
party. Besides, the acts of this party stamped it as oriental even while
it masqueraded in the garb of western democracy. Having grasped the
reins of government, the fellahin colonels proceeded to relegate their
Turkish and Circassian rivals to service at Khartum--an ingenious form
of banishment. Against this and other despotic acts the representatives
of Great Britain and France energetically protested, and, seeing that
the Khedive was helpless, they brought up ships of war to make a
demonstration against the _de facto_ governors of Egypt.

It should be noted that these steps were taken by the Gladstone and
Gambetta Cabinets, which were not likely to intervene against a
genuinely democratic movement merely in the interests of British and
French bondholders. On January 7, 1882, the two Cabinets sent a Joint
Note to the Khedive assuring him of their support and of their desire to
remove all grievances, external and internal alike, that threatened the
existing order[362].

[Footnote 362: For Gambetta's despatches see de Freycinet, _op. cit._
pp. 209 _et seq_.]

While, however, the Western Powers sided with the Khedive, the other
European States, including Turkey, began to show signs of impatience and
annoyance at any intervention on their part. Russia saw the chance of
revenge on England for the events of 1878, and Bismarck sought to gain
the favour of the Sult