EGYPT. 



275 



their rent. The kourbash, by which all taxes 

 were collected, recruits obtained, and order main- 

 tained, is now forbidden. 



The financial accounts for 1889 were in the 

 highest degree satisfactory. The revenue was 

 9,719,000 pounds, and the expenditure 9,523,000 

 pounds, leaving a surplus of 196,000 pounds 

 where one of 8,000 pounds had been anticipated. 

 The revenue was 29,000 pounds more and the 

 expenditure 159,000 pounds less than the esti- 

 mates. The land tax, notwithstanding consider- 

 able remissions on lands left unirrigated through 

 the lowness of the Nile, yielded 52,000 pounds 

 more than was expected. The tax was collected 

 much more thoroughly than had been contem- 

 plated in the calculations, the arrears being only 

 40,000 pounds, instead of 130,000 pounds, and in, 

 like manner the house tax exceeded the -estimate 

 by 48,000 pounds, giving indication of more pros- 

 perous conditions than the officials supposed. 

 The receipts from customs were only 585,000 

 pounds, against 622,000 pounds in 1888, showing 

 the effect of three successive bad years that was 

 not felt in a diminution of imports of foreign 

 luxuries till the third year. The duty on native 

 tobacco yielded 91,000 pounds, instead of the ex- 

 pected 12,000 pounds, the area devoted to it hav- 

 ing increased with such rapidity that the Gov- 

 ernment has now prohibited the cultivation of 

 this exhausting crop, and raised the import duty 

 on tobacco at the same time from 14 to 20 pias- 

 ters per kilogramme. The disbursements were 

 79,000 pounds less than in 1888, and 248,000 less 

 than in 1887, notwithstanding- 50,000 pounds of 

 extraordinary expenditure for the operations 

 against the dervishes on the Nile. The amount 

 appropriated for the partial abolition of the cor- 

 vee was 250,000 pounds, not including 123,000 

 pounds received for exemption. Taxation to the 

 extent of 121,000 pounds was remitted, the debt 

 was reduced by 509,000 pounds, and 425,000 

 pounds were added to the reserve fund. These 

 results in a year following a bad Nile gave Sir 

 Evelyn Baring ground for the conclusion that 

 after a long struggle, during which the solvency 

 of the country remained doubtful, financial equi- 

 librium was at last secured, and justified his 

 promise of further measures both in the way of 

 fiscal relief and of material development. The 

 indispensable condition, he reported in a letter 

 to Lord Salisbury, dated Feb. 20, is that the po- 

 litical situation shall undergo no radical change ; 

 in other words, a British army must continue to 

 occupy the country, and the influence of the 

 English Government, which depends on the 

 presence of the army of occupation, must con- 

 tinue to be paramount. He considered it of great 

 importance also that Egyptian questions should 

 be treated on their own merits without reference 

 to the unfortunate international rivalries that 

 have been, and still are, so detrimental to the true 

 interests of the Egyptian people. This official 

 plea for a permanent occupation excited the ap- 

 prehensions of the Porte and of the French Min- 

 ister of Foreign Affairs. The latter asked for an 

 explanation, and was satisfied with the disclaimer 

 of Lord Salisbury, who said that Sir Evelyn 

 Baring was not qualified to express the opinions 

 of the British Government. 



Conversion of the Privileged Debt The 

 fixed annuity payable on account of the prefer- 



ence debt provides for interest at 5 per cent, and 

 a sinking fund that will extinguish the debt in 

 1941. The revenues of the railroads and tele- 

 graphs and the port dues of Alexandria are 

 pledged for the payment of this annuity, and 

 should these prove insufficient the deficit becomes 

 a first charge on the revenues assigned to the 

 unified debt, viz., the customs revenue and the 

 taxes of four of the provinces. Sir Edgar Vin- 

 cent in 1889 effected an arrangement for the con- 

 version of the debt into a 4-per-cent. loan, effect- 

 ing a saving of 80,000 pounds per annum after 

 deducting the cost of the operation. This could 

 not be done without the consent of the powers. 

 England, Italy, Germany, and Austria gave an 

 unconditional assent. Russia required assur- 

 ances that the saving should be applied to the 

 reduction of taxation, and, when these were 

 given, also consented. France offered to give 

 her consent on the condition that a date should 

 be set for the evacuation of Egypt by the British 

 troops. Lord Salisbury declining to consider to- 

 gether two totally different questions, France 

 definitely refused to consent to the arrangement. 

 Some months later Riaz Pasha asked for a re- 

 consideration of the question, but M. Spuller, 

 French Minister of Foreign Affairs, replied that 

 since the circumstances were the same France 

 could not alter her decision. 



The English then studied a plan to turn this 

 refusal to the disadvantage of the French. The 

 abolition of the corvee, or forced labor, on the ca- 

 nals and embankments had been partially effect- 

 ed by Sir Colin Scott Moncrieff, Secretary of 

 State for Public Works, who has had most of the 

 work of cleaning the canals and conduits and re- 

 pairing the works done by contract labor, which 

 was paid to the extent of 112,000 pounds a year 

 by a tax raised from the persons who were able 

 and who desired to exempt themselves from 

 forced labor. A proposal was made to the Pub- 

 lic Debt Commissioners and approved by the 

 powers to substitute for this personal exemption 

 tax and for the Upper Egypt water tax produc- 

 ing 25,000 pounds a year, a general tax of 3 pias- 

 ters (1 piaster = 5 cents) per acre on the lands 

 benefited, which would, yield 150,000 pounds, in- 

 cluding 20,000 pounds to be paid on the Domains 

 and Daira Sanieh lands and falling on the Gov- 

 ernment. 



The French Government, being unwilling to 

 stand in the way of a direct benefit to the Egyp- 

 tian people or to incur the odium of being re- 

 sponsible for an unpopular tax, was easily in- 

 duced to reopen negotiations. It first demanded 

 that the application of the reserve fund, already 

 amounting to 1,250,000 pounds, to the improve- 

 ment of the irrigation system should be subject 

 to the direction of a technical commission, in 

 which French engineers should have a part ; also 

 that a reserve fund should be set aside for the 

 requirements of the army and the police. The 

 French have criticised the English for treating 

 the Nile as if it were the Ganges; that is, of 

 stimulating the production of the cotton lands 

 by watering them abundantly, but neglecting to 

 restore their fertility by bringing the water to the 

 land before it has deposited the rich alluvial mat- 

 ter held in suspension. The British minister 

 would agree neither to the co-operation of 

 Frenchmen in the Public Works Department nor 



