Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 7.djvu/785

761 RISE OF MEIIKMET ALT.] EGYPT 761 siderable body of Turks, and being in possession of Damietta, was enabled to offer an obstinate resistance. After much loss on both, sides, he was taken prisoner and brought to Cairo ; but he was treated with respect. The victorious soldiery sacked the town of Damietta, and were guilty of the barbarities usual with them on such occasions. A few clays later, AH Pasha El-Tarabulusee landed at Alexandria with an imperial firman constituting him pasha of Egypt, and threatened the Beys, who now were virtual masters of Upper Egypt, as well as of the capital and nearly the whole of Lower Egypt. Mehemet Ali and El- Bardeesee therefore descended to Rosetta, which had fallen into the hands of a brother of Ali Pasha, and having recovered the town and captured its commander, El- Bardeesee purposed to proceed against Alexandria ; but the troops required arrears of pay which it was not in his power to give, and the pasha had cut the dyke between the Lakes of Aboo-Kecr and Mareotis, thus rendering the approach to Alexandria more difficult. El-Bardeesee and Mehemet Ali therefore returned to Cairo. The troubles of Egypt were now increased by an insufficient inundation, and great scarcity prevailed, aggravated by the exorbitant taxation to which the beys were compelled to resort in order to raise money to pay the troops; while murder and rapine prevailed to a frightful extent in the capital, the riotous soldiery being under little or no control. In the meantime, Ali Pasha, who had been behaving in an out rageous manner towards the Franks in Alexandria, received a khatt-i-shereef from the sultan, which he sent by his secretary to Cairo. It announced that the beys should live peaceably in Egypt, with an annual pension each of fifteen purses and other privileges, but that the govern ment should be in the hands of the pasha. To this the beys assented, but with considerable misgivings : for they had intercepted letters from Ali to the Albanians, endeavour ing to alienate them from their side to his own. Deceptive answers were returned to these, and Ali was induced by them to advance towards Cairo at the head of 2500 men. The forces of the beys, with the Albanians, encamped near him at Shalakan, and he fell back on a place called Zufeyteh. They next seized his boats conveying soldiers, servants, and his ammunition and baggage ; and, following him, they demanded wherefore he brought with him so numerous a body of men, in opposition to usage and to their previous warning. Finding they would not allow his troops to advance, forbidden himself to retreat with them to Alexandria, and being surrounded by the enemy, he would have hazarded a battle, but his men refused to light. He therefore repaired to the camp of the beys, and his army was compelled to retire to Syria. In the hands of the beys, Ali Pasha again attempted treachery. A horseman was seen to leave his tent one night at full gallop ; he was the bearer of a letter to Osman Bey Hasan, the governor of Kine. This offered a fair pretext to the Memlooks to rid themselves of a man whose antecedents and present conduct proved him to be a perfidious tyrant. He was sent under a guard of forty-five men towards the Syrian frontier ; and about a week after, news was received that in a skirmish with some of his own soldiers he had fallen mortally wounded. The death of Ali Passha produced only temporary tran quillity; in a few days the return of Mohammad Bey El-Elfee (called the Great or Elder) from England was the signal for fresli disturbances, which, by splitting the Ghuzz into two parties, accelerated their final overthrow. An ancient jealousy existed between El-Elfee and the other most powerful bey. El-Bardeesee. The latter was now supreme among the Ghuzz, and this fact considerably heightened their old enmity. While the guns of the citadel. those at Masr El- Ateekah, and even those of the palace of El-Bardeesee, were thrice fired in honour of El-Elfee, pre parations were immediately commenced to oppose him. His partisans were collected opposite Cairo, and El-Elfee the Younger held El-Geezeh ; but treachery was among them ; Hoseyn Bey El-Elfee was assassinated by emissaries of El-Bardeesee, and Mehemet Ali, with his Albanians, gained possession of El-Geezeh, which was, as usual, given over to the troops to pillage. In the meanwhile El-Elfee the Great embarked at Eosetta, and not apprehending opposition, was on his way to Cairo, when a little south of the town of Manoof he encountered a party of Albanians, and with difficulty made his escape. He gained the eastern branch of the Nile, but the river had become dangerous, and he fled to the desert. There he had several hair breadth escapes, and at last secreted himself among a tribe of Arabs at llas-el-Wadee. A change in the fortune of El- Bardeesee, however, favoured his plans for the future. That chief, in order to satisfy the demands of the Albanians for their pay, gave orders to levy heavy contributions from the citizens of Cairo ; and this new oppression roused them to rebellion. The Albanians, alarmed for their safety, assured the populace that they would not allow the order to be executed ; and Mehemet Ali himself caused a pro clamation to be made to that effect. Thus the Albanians became the favourites of the people, and took advantage of their opportunity. Three days later they beset the house of the aged Ibrahim Bey, and that of El-Bardeesee, both of whom effected their escape with difficulty. The Memlooks in the citadel directed a fire of shot and shell on the houses of the Albanians which were situated in the Ezbekeeyeh ; but on hearing of the flight of their chiefs, they evacuated the place ; and Mehemet Ali, on gaining possession of it, once more proclaimed Mahomet Khusruf pasha of Egypt. For one day and a half he enjoyed the title ; the friends of the late Tahir Pasha then accomplished his second degradation, 1 and Cairo was again the scene of terrible enormities, the Albanians revelling in the houses of the Memlook chiefs, whose hareems met with no mercy at their hands. These events were the signal for the reappear ance of El-Elfee. The Albanians now invited Ahmad Pasha Khursheed to assume the reins of government, and he without delay pro ceeded from Alexandria to Cairo. The forces of the partisans of El-Bardeesee were ravaging the country a few miles south of the capital and intercepting the supplies of corn by the river ; a little later they passed to the north of Cairo and successively took Bilbeys and Kalyoob, plunder ing the villages, destroying the crops, and slaughtering the herds of the inhabitants. Cairo was itself in a state of tumult, suffering severely from a scarcity of grain, and the heavy exactions of the pasha to meet the demands of his turbulent troops, at that time augmented by a Turkish de tachment. The shops were closed, and the unfortunate people assembled in great crowds, crying Yd Lateef ! YA Lateef! &quot;0 Gracious [God] !&quot; El-Elfee and Osman Bey Hasan had professed allegiance to the pasha; but they soon after declared against him, and they were now approaching from the south ; and having repulsed Mehemet Ali, they took the two fortresses of Tura. These Mehemet Ali speedily retook by night with 4000 infantry and cavalry; but the enterprise was only partially successful. On the following day the other Memlooka north of the metropolis actually penetrated into the suburbs; but a few days later were defeated in a battle fought at Shubra, with heavy loss 3 Khusruf Pasha afterwards filled with credit several of the highest offices at Constantinople. He died on the 1st of February 1855. He was a bigot of the old school, strongly opposed to the influences of Western civilization, and consequently to the assistance of France and England in the Crimean wsr. VTT. - 06