EGYPT. 



257 



Great Britain imported from Egypt in 1896 

 raw cotton of the value of 6,484,450 sterling, 

 cotton seed of the value of 1,801,079, beans of 

 the value of 227,716, and sugar of the value of 

 94,829; and exported to Egypt cotton goods of 

 the value of 1,722,955, coal of the value of 

 899,005, iron of the value of 409,172, and ma- 

 chinery of the value of 249,479. 



Navigation. The number of vessels entered 

 at the port of Alexandria in 1897 was 2,203, of 

 2,267,120 tons, of which 657, of 1,034,019 tons, 

 were British; 139, of 280,359 tons, French; 140, 

 of 242,252 tons, Austrian; 100, of 204,087 tons, 

 Italian; 83, of 179,049 tons, Russian; 777, of 126,- 

 456 tons, Turkish; 184, of 82,166 tons, Greek; 35, 

 of 61,369 tons, German; 19, of 33,365 tons, Swed- 

 ish and Norwegian; and 49, of 15,998 tons, of 

 other nationalities. The total number cleared 

 was 2,143, of 2,270,836 tons, of which 663, of 

 1,046,886 tons, were British; 139, of 278,333 tons, 

 French; 141, of 243,921 tons, Austrian; 119, of 

 206,927 tons, Italian; 86, of 185,572 tons, Rus- 

 sian; 714, of 111,704 tons, Turkish; 184, of 85,449 

 tons, Greek; 35, of 59,946 tons, German; 19, of 

 29,317 tons, Swedish and Norwegian; and 45, of 

 22,781 tons, of other nationalities. 



Railroads, Posts, and Telegraphs. The 

 total length of railroads in operation on Dec. 31, 

 1898, was 1,238 miles, of which 1,166 miles be- 

 longed to the Government. Of the total, which 

 does not include 390 miles on the Daira Sanieh 

 estates nor other agricultural railroads, nor the 

 military railroad recently constructed in the Sou- 

 dan, 825 miles were in the delta and 413 miles in 

 Upper Egypt. The Government had under con- 

 struction 226 miles, while private companies were 

 building 64 miles, and had concessions for 230 

 miles in the delta. During 1897 there were 10,- 

 742,546 passengers conveyed on the state rail- 

 roads, and 2,796,096 tons" of freight. The gross 

 receipts were E. 1,982,883, and the operating 

 expenses E. 859,523; net receipts, E. 1,123,360. 



The post office in 1897 carried 11,300,000 in- 

 ternal and 2,250,000 foreign letters and postal 

 cards, 7,000,000 internal and 980,000 foreign news- 

 papers, and 173,000 internal and 56,000 foreign 

 parcels. There were 509,500 post-office orders 

 and remittances, representing a total sum of 

 E. 16,922,000. 



The Government telegraph lines on Jan. 1, 1898, 

 had a. total length of 2,058 miles, with 8,770 miles 

 of wire. The number of messages sent during 

 1897 was 2,498,834. 



Suez Canal. The number of vessels that 

 passed through the canal in 1897 was 2,986, of 

 11,123,403 tons, of which 1,905, of 7,389,237 tons, 

 were British; 325, of 1,194,106 tons, were Ger- 

 man; 202, of 807,995 tons, were French; 206, of 

 532,272 tons, were Dutch; 78, of 265,231 tons, 

 were Austrian; 44, of 218,514 tons, were Rus- 

 sian; 48, of 199,695 tons, were Spanish; 71, of 

 198,161 tons, were Italian; 36, of 165,425 tons, 

 were Japanese; 48, of 117,794 tons, were Nor- 

 wegian; 7, of 7,770 tons, were Turkish; 3, of 

 6,627 tons, were American; 3, of 5,916 tons, were 

 Chinese; 3, of 5,344 tons, were Egyptian; 2, of 

 4,457 tons, were Siamese; 2, of 1,954 tons, were 

 Danish; 1, of 1,648 tons, was Swedish; and 1, of 



H tons, was Mexican. The number of passen- 

 gers was 191,224. The gross receipts were 2,- 

 913,222 sterling. The loan and share capital was 

 463,120,739 francs on Jan. 1, 1898, besides which 

 151,174,307 francs of earnings have been applied 

 to improvements. The net profits in 1897 were 

 39,315,531 francs. The amount distributed in 

 dividends was 40,913,803 francs. 



The number of vessels that passed through the 

 VOL. xxxix. 17 A 



canal in 1898 was 3,503, of 9,238,000 tons, of 

 which 2,295 vessels were British, 356 German, 221 

 French, 193 Dutch, 85 Austrian, 74 Italian, 54 

 Turkish, 49 Spanish, 48 Russian, 47 Norwegian, 

 46 Japanese, 10 Egyptian, 8 Danish, 4 American, 

 4 Chinese, 3 Portuguese, 2 Greek, 1 Roumanian, 

 and 1 Argentinian. The receipts amounted to 

 87,906,000 francs. The number of passengers who 

 went through the canal was 219,000. The capital 

 expenditure on improvements was 5,022,000 francs. 

 The Mixed Tribunals. The charter of the 

 mixed tribunals expired on Feb. 1, 1899, and after 

 their decision regarding the diversion of the re- 

 serve fund of the Caisse de la Dette to meet the 

 expenses of the Soudan campaign the English 

 resolved upon the reorganization of these tri- 

 bunals. The charter is given for a term of five 

 years. The Egyptian Government addressed a 

 circular note to the European powers, calling 

 attention to the expiration of the charter. An 

 international commission met at Cairo in April, 

 1898, to consider and report on the Government 

 proposals. In December, 1898, an extension of 

 one year was proposed in order to give time to 

 consider points of divergence, also the question 

 of the jurisdiction to be given to the tribunals in 

 cases of fraudulent bankruptcy. The powers 

 were slow in replying to the last circular, only 

 six of the fourteen powers interested having sent 

 replies prior to January, 1899. As the charter 

 would expire with that month, the Egyptian Gov- 

 ernment made concessions on sundry points. The 

 Government had asked that the competence of 

 the tribunals should be determined entirely by 

 the nationality of the actual parties to suits, not 

 by the mixed character of the interests involved. 

 The subcommission partly approved the Egyptian 

 demand, but refused to interfere with the juris- 

 diction of the tribunals over societtis anonymes 

 and over the administrations of the Daira Sanieh, 

 the railways, and the Alexandria municipality. 

 The Egyptian Government agreed that societes 

 anonymes should remain entirely under the juris- 

 diction of the tribunals, but demanded that the 

 Daira Sanieh, the railways, and the municipality 

 of Alexandria should not remain subject to them 

 in questions concerning natives. The Govern- 

 ment agreed to renew the charter for five years 

 if this last demand were accepted. The most 

 important changes in the commercial code are 

 the power to grant permission to a debtor of 

 good faith to manage his own business, without 

 subjecting him to the inconvenience of being de- 

 clared bankrupt; the institution of a delegation 

 of creditors, who are permitted to appoint from 

 one to three delegates to watch over the receiver 

 and examine books and documents; and the re- 

 strictions placed upon receivers in the realization 

 of assets, they having hitherto had absolute 

 power, and frequently laid themselves open to 

 charges of grave abuse. Under the new order 

 they are obliged to submit their operations to 

 the judge in bankruptcy for approval. The mixed 

 tribunals will hereafter have power to inflict from 

 one to five years' imprisonment on fraudulent 

 bankrupts and their accomplices. In revising the 

 penal code unremunerated labor for the Govern- 

 ment has been substituted for simple imprison- 

 ment in default of payment of fines, and the Eng- 

 lish ticket-of-leave system was introduced for 

 well-conducted convicts. The project of revising 

 the Mekhemeh Sherieh, which is the highest re- 

 ligious court, met with strenuous opposition from 

 the native Legislative Council. In hope of re- 

 forming the maladministration of justice in the 

 religious courts, two judges from the native ap- 

 peal court were appointed to sit on the bench 



