FIRST STAGE OF INTERVENTION. 157 of Ismail's character, such action as that which the Mufettish was supposed to have contemplated would be regarded as tantamount to a treasonable conspiracy. Ismail Sadyk was a man so universally detested for his greed and cruelty, that, according to Oriental opinion, he deserved any fate which may have befallen him. His palace was pillaged by the orders of the Government, his property appropriated, and his family left for the time almost destitute.

Whether he had really conspired or not, where, how, and when he had died, remained unknown. He had for years been the favourite of the Effendina ; he had lost his lord and master's favour; and if he disappeared suddenly, his disappearance appeared as natural to the Egyptians of the day as the hanging of the baker and the restoration of the butler to Pharaoh s favour, as recorded in Holy Writ, seemed to their forefathers in the days of Joseph.

Various stories were current in Cairo at the time which increased the excitement caused by the mystery of the Mufettish's death. In the course of the evening which followed his arrest, two messengers were despatched from the palace with orders to communicate with the Vice-regal yacht. The first messenger was an officer, who was instructed to bring back the official seal of the Khedive which Sadyk Pasha had been entrusted with as Minister of Finance. The officer returned without the seal, but with his hand cruelly torn and lacerated. On his return empty-handed, a second officer was sent on a mission, whose object was