THE BOMBARDMENT OF ZANZIBAR 



thoroughly liked and respected by Europeans and 

 Arabs alike. 



He, as the Sultan's First Minister, was the 

 great man in Zanzibar ; it was not till some years 

 later that the British Consul-General took the first 

 place. 



Seyyid Hamoud died in 1902, not long after his 

 friend ; and his son, quite a boy, was his successor, 

 by name Ali bin Hamoud. The First Minister, Mr. 

 Rogers, who followed Sir Lloyd Matthews, was 

 made regent. Things, however, did not work very 

 smoothly. Seyyid Ali was not in Zanzibar with 

 his father at his death, as he was then returning 

 from England, where he had been as representative 

 of his parent at our King's coronation. He had 

 before then spent five years in England, where he 

 was partly educated at Harrow, and went by the 

 nick-name of "Snowball," and as I heard one of 

 his school-fellows say, boy-like, was usually to be 

 found in the tuck-shop. He is less Arab than his 

 forebears, as his mother was an ordinary Swahili ; 

 his little children again, of which there are now 

 two, a boy and a girl, the other little girl having 

 died, are even further removed from the pure Arab, 

 as they are the children of two of his Swahili 

 women, inmates of his harem. He has only one 

 wife, the Sultana, and on account of her being 

 royal, a princess from Muscat, his number is re- 

 stricted to one, although other Mohammedans 



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