THE ORIGIN OF THE KHEDIVIAL DYNASTY.

His fits of barbaric cruelty, followed by moods of

lavish generosity, his contempt for danger, his sublime indifference for any law other than that of his own

will and pleasure, his unscrupulous disregard for the rights of others when they came into conflict with his own, his determination to inflict condign punishment on all offenders who attempted to wring money out

of his subjects — as by so doing they violated his royal monopoly of exaction — all these things appealed to the Oriental mind, and gained for his memory a senti-

ment of mixed respect and fear such as none of his successors ever succeeded in obtaining.

For some twenty-five years after his arrival in Egypt, Mahomet Ali remained to outward seeming a faithful servant of the Ottoman Empire. During this period he had not only, as I have already mentioned,

created a powerful army, but had developed the pros-

perity of his Pashalik, had crushed with unrelenting sternness every attempt to upset his authority, had secured alike the confidence of the Porte and that of

Egypt, and had enlisted the services of a number of

whom he employed Jn the military and urrv

pfiani

ciyil^ administration of his adopted country. He was

now practically the king of the Turkish province, and the first use he made of the power thus acquired was

to employ it for the purpose of throwing off his alle-

giance to his titular Sovereign. He virtually declared Avar against Turkey in 1831 by invading Syria and annexing it to Egypt. What his ultimate ambitions may have been it is impossible to say. According to

I