AND LOWER EGYPT. J2 5 



and the public treasury. This farming did not re- 

 semble the forced adjudication of the senna, which 

 the government of Cairo had pretended to impose 

 upon the European merchants who resided there. 

 They were obliged to buy a large quantity of this 

 drug, which is gathered in Upper Egypt. This was, 

 with respect to them, a species of avan'ie (intole- 

 rant impost *) ; for the culture of senna was so con- 

 siderable, that they could not find sale for it. The 

 Venetian merchants took the third of the annual 

 produce, and the French the other two thirds ; 

 the price of which, to these last, amounted to more 

 than 25,000 francs ( iooo guineas). The loss was 

 still augmented by the agreement which they had 

 made with the druggists of Marseilles, not to sell 

 the senna to any but them ; and these, on their side, 

 were authorized not to take a larger quantity than 

 they had occasion for. The result of this agree- 

 ment was, that the greatest part of the senna re- 

 mained on the hands of the French merchants. 

 They had Still, in their house at Rossetta, maga- 

 zines which had continued full for several years. 



Whilst our merchants, bound by their contract 

 with the Massilian druggists, were losing consider- 



* Avanie : it is thus that they name in the commerce of the 

 Levant, those violent and vexatious means which the Turks 

 employ 10 extract money from Europeans. These intolerances 

 succeeded each other in Egypt in a dreadful manner. 



y 3 ably 



