The Sun.
London, England, 1860-12-31 00:00:00

THE SUEZ CANAL.

A letter from Alexandria, dated Dec. lith,
says :—Since Said Pasha's return from Suez intel-
ligence has been received of certain disturbances
having lately arisen with the Bedouins of the
neighbouring deserts. It was at first stated that
they had interfered with the workpeople engaged
in laying the foundations of the Red Sea light-
houses ; but, according to later and more reliable
reports, the affray has solely been between a small
number of Bedouins, recruited as labourers by M.
delLesseps for his canal works, and a small de-
tachment of Egyptian irregular troops. The
Egyptian Government, it appears, objects to the
introduction of Bedouin Arabs into the Isthmus,
and in the endeavour to prevent the enrolment, by
the opposition of its influence among the Bedouins,
a quarrel has taken place in which one or two men
have lost their lives. It is difficult to understand
what the precise objections of the Egyptian Go-
vernment to the enrolment of the Bedouins may
be; but even to those least favourable to the prose-
cution of M. de Lesseps' scheme, it will be matter
of regret that, if good and solid grounds exist for
the prohibition, they should not be set forth in an
open and unassailable manner.
M. de Lesseps went to Suez for the declared
purpose of engaging labourers for the canal works,
and of imparting a fresh impulse to the languid
progress of the " Universal" company's operations.
As might easily be foreseen, his efforts in that
direction met with but very slender success.
Whether with or without the approval of the Go-
vernment, he has little chance of collecting more
than a trifling number of Bedouins, and still less of
being able to keep them at work for any length of
time. Even their love of money will never be
sufficient to overcome their innate dislike for regu-
lar labour of any kind, and they will moreover en-
counter the same causes for discontent as those that
have acted in the case of the Egyptian fellahs. In-
deed, the mere fact of failure with the latter is
sufficient to show the utter hopelessness of the
attempt to replace them with Bedouins. The
fellahs are thoroughly inured to a life of hardship
and to privations of every kind, and are, moreover,
industrious and laborious to the highest degree, in
spite of which, the attempts to secure their services
have proved altogether ineffectual, as was, indeed,
ssl
clearly foretold by all posse •ng the slightest
knowledge of their temper and character.

The small number allured by the prospect of high
pay soon grew dissatisfied, and endeavour by every
means in their power to obtain their discharge.
Attempts have been made to maintan discipline
by flogging, a thing which will lead
to serious
consequences if attempted with Bedouins.
In the
case of fellahs, the immediate result has been that
the men desert in bodies, sacrificing the arrears of
pay that are held back in the end
them to their work. Not only, eavo
everur, ,
tos bind
how i this
the cage with the native labourers, but even the
European artisans have been throwing up their
appointments in large numbers. One, a French-
man, when lately asked Why he had Abandoned his

place, answered that at first he got men but no
pickaxes, then lie was supplied with, pickaxes but
no mcn, and 'at last, when he had both labourers
and tools, they found themselves without stores or
provision of any kind, upon which he and his men
appear to have left the place in a body.
The only work that can, though by stretch of
language, be characterized as in the least degree
effective is performed by the dredging machines, a
small um:aber of which are at work in Lake Menzaleh,
and one at an inner station, whither it has been
conveyed with heavy expense of labour and
time. Theqe machines, it had been announced
would excavate 1,800 cubic metres per day, instead
of which the maximum of their work proves to be
only 200 cubic metres each. At Port Said, the
tramway constructed for the purpose of conveying
materials to the jetty, and which last, spring was
destroyed by the sea, has not been reTimired. Some
of the inland stations have been ditogether aban-
doned. At one the few men that remains are em-
ployed in collecting natives, for what useful pur-
pose in connection with the caned it is hard to under-
stand. At another the men have been engaged in
cutting a section of the g7,•and canal on its full
scale, the object of which seems equally, if not more
mysterious, since even the rigole de service, or
elementary cutting, cannot be said to have been
any where fairly commenced.
M. de Lesseps lately applied to the Viceroy for
assistance in obtaining workpeople--in other words,
to be supplied with forced labour, a request which,
fortunately for his subjects, and for the interests
of the country in general, Said Pasha has refused,
under the influence, it is said, of the French Go-
vernment. The latter for the present appear in.
clined to leave:111. de Lesseps to his own resources
If this policy of " non=intervention" be persisted
in, the affairs of the CanalSompany will probably
soon come to an issue, and, for the sake of the
shareholders, it may be added, the sooner the better