lex to be set forth
here. So also are those of the disputes between our officials and those
of France. Suffice it to say that by shutting up the funds of the
"Caisse de la Dette," the French administrators of that great reserve
fund hoped to make Britain's position untenable and hasten her
evacuation. In point of fact, these and countless other pin-pricks
delayed Egypt's recovery and furnished a good reason why Britain should
not withdraw[376].

[Footnote 376: The reader should consult for full details Sir A. Milner,
_England in Egypt_ (1892); Sir D.M. Wallace, _The Egyptian Question_
(1883), especially chaps, xi.-xiii.; and A. Silva White, _The Expansion
of Egypt_ (1899), the best account of the Anglo-Egyptian administration,
with valuable Appendices on the "Caisse," etc.

A far more favourable light is thrown on the conduct of Arabi and his
partisans by Mr. A.M. Broadley in his work _How We Defended
Arabi_ (1884).]

But above and beyond these administrative details, there was one
all-compelling cause, the war-cloud that now threatened the land of the
Pharaohs from that home of savagery and fanaticism, the Sudan.

NOTE TO THE SECOND EDITION

For new light on the nationalist movement in Egypt and the part which
Arabi played in it, the reader should consult _How we defended Arabi_,
by A.M. Broadley (London, 1884). The same writer in his _Tunis, Past and
Present_ (2 vols. 1882) has thrown much light on the Tunis Question and
on the Pan-Islamic movement in North Africa.

CHAPTER XVI

GORDON AND THE SUDAN

What were my ideas in coming out? They were these: _Agreed
abandonment of Sudan, but extricate the garrisons_; and these
were the instructions of the Government (Gordon's _Journal_,
October 8, 1885).

It is one of the peculiarities of the Moslem faith that any time of
revival is apt to be accompanied by warlike fervour somewhat like that
which enabled its early votaries to sweep over half of the known world
in a single generation. This militant creed becomes dangerous when it
personifies itself in a holy man who can make good his claim to be
received as a successor of the Prophet. Such a man had recently appeared
in the Sudan. It is doubtful whether Mohammed Ahmed was a genuine
believer in his own extravagant claims, or whether he adopted them in
order to wreak revenge on Rauf Pasha, the Egyptian Governor of the
Sudan, for an insult inflicted by one of his underlings. In May 1881,