[p.121]breaking into houses, invading and robbing harims.  You openly told the Pasha that they were eating abominations; upon which he directed one of his guards to smell your breath,-the charge of drunkenness being tangible.  The fellow, a comrade of your capturers, advanced his nose to your lips; as might be expected, cried “Kikh,” contorted his countenance, and answered, by the beard of “Effendina[FN#9]” that he perceived a pestilent odour of distilled waters.  This announcement probably elicited a grim grin from the “Pasha of the Night,” who loves Curaçoa, and who is not indifferent to the charms of Cognac.  Then by his favour, for you improved the occasion, you were allowed to spend the hours of darkness on a wooden bench, in the adjacent long gallery, together with certain little parasites, for which polite language has no name.[FN#10] In the morning the janissary of your Consulate was sent for:  he came, and claimed you; you were led off criminally; again you gave your name and address, and if your offence was merely sending on your lantern, you were dismissed with advice to be more careful in future.  And assuredly your first step was towards the Hammam.

But if, on the other hand, you had declared yourself a European, you would either have been dismissed at once, or sent to your Consul, who is here judge, jury, and jailor.  Egyptian authority has of late years lost half its prestige.  When Mr. Lane first settled at Cairo, all Europeans accused of aggression against Moslems were, he tells us, surrendered to the Turkish magistrates.  Now, the native powers have no jurisdiction over strangers,

[p.122]nor can the police enter their houses.  If the West would raise the character of its Eastern co-religionists, it will be forced to push the system a point further, and to allow all bona-fide Christian subjects to register their names at the different Consulates whose protection they might prefer.  This is what Russia has so “unwarrantably and outrageously” attempted.  We confine ourselves to a lesser injustice, which deprives Eastern states of their right as independent Powers to arrest, and to judge foreigners, who for interest or convenience settle in their dominions.  But we still shudder at the right of arrogating any such claim over the born lieges of Oriental Powers.  What, however, would be the result were Great Britain to authorise her sons resident at Paris, or Florence, to refuse attendance at a French or an Italian court of justice, and to demand that the police should never force the doors of an English subject?  I commend this consideration to all those who “stickle for abstract rights” when the interest and progress of others are concerned, and who become somewhat latitudinarian and concrete in cases where their own welfare and aggrandisement are at stake.