Year: 1875

earnest in suppressing the slave
trade? The English officers say he 10
not; the American officers say that he
is. The latter say that Colonel Cor
don has cut it off from the mouth Of
the Sabat, and that the occupation Of
Darfour stops it in that direction
The English say that if the intention
were to kill it, Gordon would have
been permitted to run his line SO as
to cut off the slave caravans that
come from Dsrfour, and stunning
Berber and kartoom, reach Suakim
on the Red sea. Captain Barnaby,
. London Times correspondent, en-
countered one Of these caravans in
January near Berber. But the slaves
do not come down the Nile valley As
they did formerly; and l believe that
the trade is greatly ourtailed. The
money-lenders At Kartoom, who have
been accustomed to lend to slave. buy
ers at two to three hundred per ceat
for three months, certainly 6nd their
occupation gone. And Kartoom Is
just now = dull place. Some slaves,
Of course, still filter down tho Nile,
ard some reach Cairo by way of the
Red sea. | saw . lively little black
fellow to-day who was bought from
his mother for two handsful Of corn,
at the Sabat. He had been further
south, but on his return, when he
passed by his homo, he said he did
not wish to go to his mother. She
had no clothes for him, and he says
now that he should not like to 70
back.


The people do not take any more
kindly to the taxes than to the con-
scription. At Assowan l saw sew
eral men in irons in prison whose Of
Tense was that their brothers had been
conscripted and run away; these
were to be held till the dessrtsrs re-
turned. ! saw at the same Jail over
forty men confined for not paying the
taxes. The taxes are enormous, and
down in Soudan l hear they are more
onerous than in Egypt. The collsc
tors make raids upon the villagers and
sometimes parents sell their children
for money to pay the tax. Land is
taxed in Egypt at from one pound and
half to three pounds per acre. In
the Delta, say the friends Of the
khedive, this is not excessive, since
the canals and improvements have in
creased the productive power of the
land, and an acre, giving them three
crops year, brings to the owner or
lessee FIVE or six pounds. But the
best land in Egypt is in the hands Of
the government, and from third to
half of the whole of it, good and
bad. The government is indeed rap
idly acquiring all the land; the same
process 10 going on that Joseph
shrewedly managed for Pharioh when
he squeezed the land out of the pos
session of the owners in return for
the grain doled out to them in the
years Of famine. Egypt seems to be
all the time undergoing this opera
tion. Up the river every palm tree
is taxed, the tax having been doubled
within a few years, and the same is
true of every sakiyah, or wheel for
raising water. l saw many fields that
were said to be uncultivated by rea-
son Of the heavy tax.


The Khedive is tho great merchant,
trader, manufacturer, and farmer OF
the country. He is certainly doing
= great deal for the material devel-
opsment of the country. 1t is said on
the one hand that the people are so
inert and stupid that they will not
aid him-will not take to new meth
DDS or improvements and, on the
other, that all private enterprise is
impossible; for it is bad policy for
any one to be- known to make money
or to have money. Some pretext
would be found of squeezing it out
of him.


The Khedive has sixteen sugar fac
tories, some Of them very large, and
with all the improved machinery. I
have seen those that could not have
cost to fit up less than one million
dollars. He owns the rich lands about
them; he impresses laborers, men and
boys, for them, who are paid, was
told, from seven to ten cents a day,
with an allowance Of bread. And yet
these sugar mills, with perhaps one
exception do not pay; and one reason
for this is the imp ossibility of finding
natives intelligent enough to carry
them on. Foreigners are employed
at immense wages, and there is loss
and waste in every department.


1t should be said also in regard to
the taxes that there must be great
loss in the collection. 1t cannot be
otherwise in the system Of plunder
and "baksheesh" UNIVERSAL in this
country. The Khedive requires a
certain amount Of the Governor of a
certain province. The Governor ap-
portions it about to the districts, and,
of course, adds enough to save him
self. The under-Governors apportion
their shares to the Sheiks of the vii
lagos, and add enough to renumerate
themselves, and the Sheiks take care
to make their own profit, SO that the
tax gets to be excessive by the time
it reaches the fellaheen.


Where does the money 60? dc
not see how any one is to 6nd out
But there is the army,there is large
civic service, there are the courts
on magnificent scale--and there are
the railroads; the Viceroy is just be-
ginning a narrowgauge road from
Wady Halfor to Kartoom, say about
eight hundred miles. And there i.
the interest on the public debt, Sc
called, and on the private debt. Ac
cording to the almanac de Gotha, the
debt of Egypt is over forty million
pounds, of which over twenty millior
pounds is floating. According to re
port here, the debt is sixty millior
pounds. Money has to be borrowed
to pay the interest. heard the 9th
er day that the Khedive was paying
seventeen per cent for money bu
that, like all else | hear, may not b,
true. Egypt is very rich country
and can be made vastly more produc
tive than it now is. The event vii
show whether the Khsdive is author
lied in drawing on the future by hi


improvements as he is doing.


IL