IBRAHIM PACHA'S SYRIAN CAMPAIGN. 285 



from it, and organised into independent states. Towards the North, 

 Russia has pushed on her battalions as far as Erzeroum ; but it will 

 be found more difficult to govern Armenia from St. Petersburg than 

 from Constantinople. In politics, the calculation of distances is an 

 important element. In the South of Asia, Egypt lays claim to Syria, 

 and that part of Caramania situated between Mount Taurus and the 

 sea , a territory in which she will find those resources she at present 

 stands so much in need of, such as timber for ship-building, &c., a 

 Christian population, among whom the seeds of European civilization 

 will be more easily emplanted. She will thus form an empire that 

 will one day become powerful, if not prematurely exhausted by that 

 system of monopoly so rigorously put in force by her present ruler. 



The history of the quarrels of the Pacha of Acre with Mehemet 

 Ali, justifies, in some degree, the pretensions of the latter. Abdallah 

 Pacha had rendered himself famous by his extortions, and in 1822 

 took it into his head to seize Damascus. The neighbouring Pacha 

 formed a league against him, and laid siege to his capital, when Me- 

 hemet Ali negotiated his pardon, for a sum of 60,000 purses, which 

 of course the people paid. Interest soon prevailed over gratitude ; 

 the Pacha of Acre felt there was more to be gained from Constanti- 

 nople than from Cairo that the authority of the Sultan in the Pacha- 

 lie would never be more than nominal, and that the Porte, satisfied 

 by some presents, would not be in a condition to prevent his ex- 

 actions ; he therefore sought, on every occasion, to get rid of the 

 influence of Mehemet Ali, and to excite the jealousy of the Porte 

 against him. An opportunity soon offered itself. Some Egyptian 

 fellahs had taken refuge under the guns of Abdallah Pacha ; Mehe- 

 met Ali demanded these men, but the Governor of Acre refused to 

 give them up, on the plea that they were subjects of the Grand 

 Signior, and referred the matter to the Porte, who, on this occasion, 

 was seized with a fit of humanity, and bewailed the oppression of the 

 peasantry of the Valley of the Vale " Inde Bellum" This was at 

 the close of 1831. 



The moment was favourable for the viceroy's great designs. Europe 

 was sufficiently agitated to leave him no apprehensions of an inter- 

 vention on the part of Russia. The Albanians and the Borneans were 

 in open revolt, and insurrections had broken out also in several 

 pachalics on the side of Upper Asia. The sultan was considered the 

 slave of the Russians, and his conduct excited the contempt and 

 hatred of the whole empire. In the meantime, since the revolution, 

 the exactions of the government had extended to every object of pro- 

 duction and industry, while the conscription decimated the most in- 

 dustrious portion of the population ; and if to this organized system of 

 spoliation we farther add the ravages of the plague and cholera, we 

 may form some idea of the wretched state of those provinces, and 

 shall be no longer surprised that the Egyptians were every where 

 hailed as deliverers. 



Ibraham Pacha, the step-son of Mehemet Ali, was placed at the 

 head of the Egyptian army. Of a short, thick-set figure, he possesses 

 that gigantic strength which Homer so loved in his heroes, and which 

 inspires such respect among barbarous nations. To strike off the 



