310 Prince Mohammed All [ I 9 I ° 



dered, the University students, boys of twelve and thirteen, cheering 

 the murderer. This was intolerable. I asked him whether he did 

 not wish to see the British occupation ended, and he said: ' Of course 

 we all wish to be independent and a great nation, but we are not ready 

 for it yet. We have not the men to govern.' I asked him why he 

 did not himself take ofhee. ' What would be the use,' he said, ' without 

 the power? If you took an agent to manage your estate and forbade 

 him to climb over a fence how could he succeed ? ' His idea seems 

 to be the old one of despotic rule, and doubtless this is the Khedivial 

 intention if he can get his way. I asked whether he liked Gorst. 

 ' We like him,' he said, ' and you must not believe what the English 

 newspapers in Egypt write against him. They are angry because in 

 Cromer's time the English officials did just as they pleased, but now 

 they have to take a second place.' Mohammed Ali doubtless repre- 

 sents the feeling of the Court party. Gorst has been putting back the 

 Egyptian Government clock to where it stood in Tewfik's time, who 

 was allowed to arrest and deport as he pleased so long as he supported 

 the Occupation. As the Prince was driving away in his motor, he 

 said, putting his head out of the window : ' We like Gorst anyhow 

 better than Cromer.' 



" 25//! May. — The seven kings assembled for King Edward's funeral 

 have broken up camp and gone their ways, I fear in peace. I would 

 rather they had quarrelled, for a peace to which Kaiser Wilhelm is 

 chief party bodes little good to Asiatics. 



" 2nd June. — That swine, Roosevelt, has made another speech, this 

 time at the Mansion House, about Egypt, worse than before. I have 

 written a short answer to it for the ' Westminster Gazette,' but I doubt 

 if they will publish it. All the Tory papers are in delight at the 

 speech, and the ' Daily Telegraph ' demands the recall of Gorst and the 

 dragooning of Egypt after the severest Cromerian manner. ' The 

 Times ' is curiously moderate, though Egyptian Unified has fallen to 99. 



" 5th June (Sunday). — Lady Gregory and Yeats came down to 

 dine and sleep, Yeats in good form, telling a number of excellent stories 

 at dinner. He said that the three persons he had known who had 

 most impressed him with their power were William Morris, Henley, 

 and Madame Blavatsky. He had gone on one occasion with Oscar 

 Wilde to call on Henley. Oscar did not before know Henley, and 

 put out all his most brilliant talk to captivate him and succeeded in 

 doing so, while Henley said nothing. Both professed themselves after- 

 wards much pleased with the other's wit. 



" Lady Gregory is bringing out her new three-act play, ' The Image,' 

 at the Court Theatre. They have also Synge's ' Deirdre ' on their 

 list, but they say it is not successful. Yeats tells me he makes only 

 about £30 a year by the sale of his poetry. He is an extremely 



