Page:On the Desert - Recent Events in Egypt.djvu/36

 

ENGLAND IN EGYPT.

"What business have the English in Egypt?" is a question often asked since the recent events. Without assuming to speak for those who are well able to speak for themselves, there are some plain principles of justice which must occur to all candid minds, and which may furnish at least a partial answer. Englishmen as individuals have just the same rights in Egypt which Americans have — no more and no less. We claim the right of going to Egypt, as we would go to France or Italy, and as long as we go quietly about our business, of having the protection of its laws. Certainly it is not unreasonable to insist that the Egyptian Government shall see to it that American citizens are protected in life and property, that they are not robbed or assassinated. If, in spite of all assurances of protection, they are robbed or murdered, the very least their Government can do is to make a demand, respectful but determined, that the robbers or murderers shall be punished. The most violent denouncers of English intervention can hardly deny that in this respect Englishmen have the same rights as Americans. But there was a time not many months ago when neither an Englishman nor an American could show himself anywhere in Egypt without danger of being both robbed and murdered; when the streets of Cairo and of Alexandria were as unsafe as if one were among the cannibals of New Guinea or the head-hunters of Borneo.