Lord Salisbury to Lord Lyons.
May 21, 1879.
On Monday Rivers Wilson sent me word that he had a message to deliver to me from Waddington. Accordingly I asked him to come and see me yesterday to deliver it. It was to the effect that Waddington was willing and anxious to move the Porte to dethrone the Khedive, if England would join in this step. I represented that there were three difficulties. The Sultan might not assent: if he did, the Khedive might not yield. If the latter did yield, the successor might be either feeble or bad, and we should be called upon to support him in one case, and replace him in the other. To the first objection Wilson replied that Waddington had no apprehensions as to the Sultan's consent; to the second he (Wilson) and every person who knew Egypt well, did not doubt that the moment a Firman was issued, the Khedive would fall; as to the third, he could only say that Prince Tewfik was a compendium of the cardinal virtues.
If Waddington did not communicate his proposal to you, I am obliged to consider what possible motive he could have had for taking this circuitous route, unless he meant to disavow the offer later on. If he says nothing to you about it, it may be worth while to sound him.
If there were no France in the way, I should be disposed to give no reply to the Khedive's note we received by the last mail, or at least only to say that since the dismissal of the English Minister, the Khedive's finance had become so hopelessly tangled, partly owing to his extravagance, partly to the conflict with other Powers into which the decree of April 22nd has brought him, that we must reserve our judgment with respect to all questions of financial control till the position of affairs had become more intelligible. I think that on some such plea as that we might stand by and look on for a few months till the Khedive has knocked himself to pieces, which he inevitably will do. The fiscal condition is now so hopeless that I am rather grateful to the Khedive for refusing to put it into the hands of an English Minister. I doubt whether any European can now undertake it without discredit, until the country has gone into liquidation. The disproportion between the debt and the revenue—joined to the difficulties which have now been raised by the action of the courts and the attitude of the other Powers, makes effective or even humane government hopeless till there has been a bankruptcy. But then that would not suit a purely Bourse policy like that of France. We must take notice of this difference of the French view, and we may have to modify our policy accordingly; for we cannot allow France to go on alone, and we will not part company with her if we can possibly help it. But in this state of our relative views and wishes, it is already for us to wait, and for her to propose. If left alone, our disposition would be to find an excuse for waiting, and if we move it will be because France is urging us. We should therefore naturally wait till France made a proposal to us, and should be inclined to cross-examine her as to what will be her next move after that, in the various contingencies which may result from the course they propose. I think, however, you might open communications by mentioning, quite unofficially, how much pain the articles in the République Française and the Débuts have given us. To ordinary papers we should of course have paid no attention; but one of them is, or was till very recently, edited by a gentleman in the French Foreign Office; the other is in part the property of a Minister. We are utterly unable to understand on what foundation the reproaches rest that we have shown reserves and hesitations in the pursuit of the joint Egyptian policy. On the contrary, if we had occupied towards France the position which Servia occupies towards Russia, our compliance could hardly have been more exact. But this outbreak of causeless wrath justifies us in asking what France wants, and what she complains of.
You will of course say as much of this, or as much more as you may think wise. But it may be as well to show that we are not insensible to this attempt to work Parliament against us by revelations or communications on matters which the French Government themselves have charged us to treat as confidential.
The attacks on England in the French press were not inspired, as Lord Salisbury supposed, by the French Foreign Office, but by Gambetta, who desired a strong policy in Egypt and seized the opportunity to fall upon Waddington. The latter, however, by this time had made up his mind as to what should be done.
Lord Lyons to Lord Salisbury.
Paris, May 22, 1879.
As you will have seen by my telegram, what Waddington said to me yesterday was, that there appeared to him to be only two alternatives with regard to the Egyptian question—to depose the Khedive or to establish a Control. He talked a good deal more about the Control than the deposition; but when I asked him if this meant that the Control was the alternative he preferred, he declined to express any preference for the one or the other. If we are to wait until he has devised measures (and this is what he told me he was about) for establishing an efficacious control we need not fear being called upon to act in a hurry. I quite agree with you that we cannot let France go on alone in Egypt; for if we do, she may go lengths which will produce something a great deal more dangerous than a mere coolness between us. French power and French feeling are very different from what they were some years ago, when the French would have let us do almost anything we chose in Egypt, if we would have taken care of the interests of the French bondholders.
Nothing can be plainer than Lord Salisbury's desire to act in concert with France, and to have regard to French interests in Egypt, but the constant attacks made upon British policy and the persistent hostility of French agents, not only in Egypt, but elsewhere, rendered the task anything but easy. Gambetta's hostility was partly due to the fact that he was an enthusiastic Phil-Hellene, and considered that not enough was being done for Greece in the way of procuring for her accessions of territory at the expense of Turkey. It is as well to point out that, whereas the Turks had been compelled to cede territory to States with which they had been at war, they were at this time being pressed to cede territory to Greece because that Power had remained at peace.