ROME SUEZ PANAMA. 149 



that they will never be able to do any good there. 

 Since the beginning of history all the conquerors of 

 Egypt have been obliged to abandon it : Persians, 

 Assyrians, Greeks, and all. The reason is a very 

 simple one. None of the Europeans or foreigners can 

 reproduce their species there, and a country in which 

 this is the case is one which cannot be permanently 

 inhabited or governed. I hope the English will in 

 the end see this. They have already lost a great 

 many men, and they have had to abandon the Soudan. 

 What is wanted is a better organisation. I regret, as 

 I have more than once openly asserted, that the 

 ex-Khedive was dethroned in favour of his son, who 

 is a very worthy young man, but who has neither the 

 power nor the authority of his predecessor, who had 

 covered the country with telegraphs and railways, and 

 who is, to my mind, the only ruler who can with 

 advantage be sent back there. I do not go in for 

 diplomacy, I give my opinions before all the world, 

 and I declare that the only way to save Egypt is to 

 restore, not the exclusive influence of France, but the 

 influence which she has legitimately acquired by 

 civilising the Egyptian people for the last fifty or 

 even eighty years. France has no desire to lord it 

 over other nations, but she desires to maintain the 

 influence to which she is entitled. 



It has been seen how we went to work at Suez, and 

 it will be the same with Panama, and I hope with the 

 same satisfactory results. We spent over twenty 



