It was hardly credible that the patronage of Germany was acceptable to the French public or entirely satisfactory to the French Government, as the danger, not to say the humiliation, of falling altogether into the hands of Bismarck, could not quite be lost sight of. The French Government no doubt had two objects in view; the first, to make use of the support of Germany and the Powers, in order to guard French pecuniary interests, and to improve as far as possible the political position of France in Egypt; the second, to avoid severing themselves so entirely from England as to be left wholly at the mercy of Germany. Unfortunately for England the second object appeared to be the one to which the lesser importance was attached.
In short, the probabilities were, that unless we succeeded in coming to some arrangement with France, we should find arrayed against us all the European Powers, except Italy, the position in which we were placed at the moment, in consequence of the expedition to Khartoum, having been taken into account in calculating the means at our disposal to withstand such a coalition. It should be mentioned that the friendship of Italy had been purchased by an arrangement under which she was to take possession of Massowah and the adjacent coast.
The French counter-proposals respecting Egyptian Finance were communicated in the middle of January.
Lord Lyons to Lord Granville.
Paris, Jan. 20, 1885.
I earnestly hope that a settlement of the Egyptian Financial Question may be the result of the Cabinet to-day. That question seems to me to have a disastrous effect on our foreign relations everywhere.
Bismarck and Ferry are jouant au plus fin with each other at our expense. Each seems to think that he can use the other to help in thwarting us, without risk to himself. But Bismarck has the best of the game. He occupies the French thoughts, and to some extent their forces, at a distance from Europe: he keeps up irritation between them and us, and some of the acquisitions he encourages them to make (Tonquin for instance) will in all probability be a permanent cause of weakness to them. At the same time he neutralizes opposition from us to his childish colonial schemes, which I cannot help suspecting are founded as much on what, for want of a better word, I must call spite against us, as on any real expectation of advantage to Germany. Ferry hopes, by means of Bismarck and the Powers who follow Bismarck's lead, to carry his immediate points in regard to Egypt and other parts of the world, and so increase his reputation at home for the moment; and he trusts to his skill to enable him to stop before he has so entirely alienated us as to be quite at Bismarck's mercy. It is the natural disposition of almost all Europe to side against us, as matters stand, on the Egyptian Financial Question, which makes this pretty game possible.
Lord Lyons to Lord Granville.
Paris, Feb. 3, 1885.