582 



The Review of Reviews. 



December 1, 1905. 



evidently meant to ripen into a fighting alliance, for 

 we are told that an entente with such a group of 

 Powers would give us a European army of formid- 

 able dimensions. With this army of 750.000 trained 

 soldiers, " Germany's misfortune is our oppor- 

 tunity '' : — 



Pan-Islamism would be effectually cbecked. aud our posi- 

 tion in Constantinople rendered more satisfactory; Ger- 

 many would be rendered harmless, and could build ber Asia 

 Minor railways without let or hindrance; three States would 

 be enabled to develop peacefully and normally; Europe would 

 be rid of an unsolved problem, and an international situa- 

 tion would be steadied by the appearance of a British- 

 Balkan entente. 



This is all very pitiful ! When the sky falls we 

 shall catch many larks. I sincerely hope no one will 

 imagine from the name of the writer that he in any 

 wav expresses mv sentiments or those of anv English 

 statesman. 



PAN-ISLAMISM. 



Bv Profe.ssor Vambery. 

 There is not a more fer\ent friend of Islam in all 

 Christendom th.an my friend Professor Arminius 

 Vambery of Buda Pesth. But his righteous soul is 

 ablaze with indignation at the recent developments 

 of what is called Pan-Islamism. He does not be- 

 lieve that anv real Pan-Islamist movement is pos- 

 sible. Writing in the Nineteenth Century, he says : — 



Pan-Islamism— viz., a united action of all Mohammedans in 

 the world— is under the present circumstances impossible, 

 but a local outburst of political efforts, under the disguise of 

 religious fanaticism, deserves the much more our full atten- 

 tion. 



It is because I am a well-wisher of the Mohammedans and 

 anxiously desirous to see their lot ameliorated that I must 

 declare myself against all adventurous and ill-devised plans 

 of forcible revolution, such as the confidence in Pan-Islam- 

 ism, which must long remain an empty vision, and. by rous- 

 ing the suspicion of the mighty European Powers, will cur- 

 tail the liberties the Moslems enjoy at present and will 

 uselessly retard the work of their progress. 



He is distressed by the follv of certain hare- 

 brained German writers who imagine that the Kaiser 

 can use Islam as dvnamite to blow up English and 

 French interests in Africa and .-Vsia. He savs : — 



If German politicians imagine that by constantly petting 

 the absolutist and ruinous rule of Sultan Abdul Hamid, and 

 by striving to represent the Emperor William the Second 

 as the protector of Islam, they will attain their end, they 

 are sadly mistaken. It is a great pity that the German Em- 

 peror is not duly informed of the disaffection and hatred 

 he has created amongst the enlightened Turks by the sup- 

 port he gives to Sultan Abdul Hamid. for the general 

 opinion prevails in Turkey that it is the Kaiser who insti- 

 gates the Sultan to continue his absolutist rule, and who 

 dissuades him from according liberties to his people. 



Professor Vambery is niuch exercised in his mind 

 concerning the licence of the papers in Egypt and 

 elsewhere in attacking England. He says : — 



Any open attack directed against England, or any fiery 

 appeal in the interest of unity and encouragement to shake 

 off the hated yoke of the Christian conqueror is quoted and 

 carefully translated in the newspapers of the different 

 countries. 



Therefore, he concludes : — 



Exceptional measures are not only permitted— nay, they 

 have become an imperious necessity, and temporar.v restric- 

 tion of the Press, for example, is certainly less injurious to 

 the welfare of England and Egypt than the political hallu- 

 cinations of a certain class of journalists, who, by envenom- 

 ing public opinion, do great harm to the moral and material 

 interests of their country. 



Mr, Harold Spender's Version. 

 Mr. Harold Spender in the Contemporary Review 

 writes on England, Egypt and Turkey. He explains 

 the action of Turkey in Egypt thus : " She looked 

 across the Mediterranean and saw it shining be- 

 neath the sun, a glittering prize, grown in twenty 

 years from a rubbish-heap to a gold mine. Without 

 any warning she stretched out an ugly claw and 

 scrabbled at the tempting treasure," Great Britain 

 suddenly discovered that she could not relv on the 

 loyalty and gratitude of the verv people she had en- 

 riched. Mr. Spender bears witness : — 



Whether ordered by the Sultan or the result of an instinc- 

 tive religious wave, a new and definite crusade began to af- 

 fect Egypt in the summer of 1905. Preachers appeared mys- 

 teriovisly in Cairo and sprea* rapidly through the country, 

 giving a new and stricter interpretation to texts from the 

 Koran, and preaching in strong terms the wickedness of 

 obeying the iniidel. 



The disaffection so fanned burst into a flame at 

 the Tabah incident, Mr, Spender gives interesting 

 quotations from the Egyptian Press showing how the 

 anti-British spirit was propagated. Mr. Spender 

 goes on : — 



The great point is to realise that a great and formidable 

 movement like Pan-Islamism has its roots far too deep down 

 in the human heart and mind to be extirpated by a display 

 of what is commonly known as " strong measures." 



The remedies suggested by the writer are bars to 

 hinder Mouktar Pasha using his position as a 

 Turkish resident in Cairo as he has done. Press 

 censorship is abhorrent to the English spirit. But — 

 if it could be proved that Turkish agitators or Turkish-paid 

 Egyptians are attacking England through a free Egyptian 

 Press, theu the limit of tolerance would be reached. Even in 

 England the Press cannot be used for the sowing of treason. 

 Better a few deported Turks than a sprinkling of European 

 massacres and more gallows-crops of executed Fellaheen. 



But for the final thwarting of Turkey, Mr. Spen- 

 der suggests the opening up of public ser\ice to the 

 cultured and intelligent Egyptian :■ — 



There is in Egypt now a large class of wealthy youths who 

 look for worthy employment in their own country. The pro- 

 blem of the future is to win these meu to our side by pro- 

 viding them with the two things they desire— better educa- 

 tion and greater responsibility. It is reall.v another form of 

 the wider problem — to extend the bounds of self-government 

 and to fulfil our mission by training Eg.vpt to rule itself. 



The Suinhnj Strciiil. besides giving; u sketch of not- 

 nble open-air services, of famous hymns and their 

 authors, treats its readers to an account of municipal 

 development in Battersea, under the title of "Cloud- 

 Lifting in South Ix)ndon." There i,= nl.<o a little 

 science supplied in a sketch by J. J. W ard of the 

 jelly-fish. 



