Old Friends at Cambridge and Elsewhere

by John Willis Clark

The suppression of Arabi’s revolt in Egypt created the greatest enthusiasm in this country. The British Public dearly loves a war, and every event in which our troops were concerned was eagerly read and proudly commented on by enthusiastic sympathizers. But there were probably not many who so much as read the scanty paragraphs which noted, first, the anxiety respecting the fate of some Englishmen who had gone into the Desert on a certain day in August 1882; and, subsequently, the certainty of their murder. Palmer’s wonderful achievement has been told for the first time by Mr Besant with a fulness of detail, a vividness of descriptive power, and, we may add, a bitterness of grief, that only those who read it carefully more than once can appreciate as such a piece of work deserves to be appreciated. We shall try to set before our readers the principal circumstances of those eventful days, treading in his steps, and often using his very words.

Early in the month of June 1882, when it became evident that the Egyptian revolt must be put down by force, two great causes of anxiety arose: (1) the safety of the Suez Canal; (2) the amount of support which Arabi was likely to receive, and the allies on whom he could depend. These two questions were of course closely connected with each other; and it is now known that as regards the second of them, Arabi hoped to obtain the support of the Arabs of the Desert on both sides of the Canal, and by their aid to seize, and, if possible, to destroy, the Canal itself. These Arabs, it is important to recollect, rise or remain quiet at the command of their sheikhs. The sheikhs, therefore, had to be won over. This he hoped to accomplish by the assistance of the governors of the frontier castles of El Arish on the Mediterranean, Kulat Nakhl, Suez, Akabah, and Tor on the west coast of the Sinaitic Peninsula, all of whom, at the beginning of the rebellion, were his frantic partisans. He had therefore an easy means of access to the Bedouin sheikhs. The number of men whom they could put into the field was estimated by Palmer himself at about 50,000; but this was not all. It was feared that if a single tribe joined Arabi, it would be followed by all the others, and that the Bedouin of the Syrian and Sinaitic deserts might presently be joined by their kinsfolk of Arabia and the Great Desert, a countless multitude.

It was on the evening of Saturday, June 24, that Captain Gill, whose unhappy fate it was to perish with Palmer on the expedition which they planned together, was sent to him from the Admiralty, to ask him for information respecting ‘the character, the power, the possible movement, of the Sinai Arabs.’ The interview was short, but long enough for Palmer to sketch the position of affairs, and to convince Gill that a man whom the Government could thoroughly trust must be sent out to arrange matters personally with the sheikhs. When Gill had left, Palmer said to his wife, ‘They must have a man to go to the Desert for them; and they will ask me, because there is nobody else who can go.’ On Monday Captain Gill came again, and the whole question was carefully talked over.

‘It was agreed that no time ought to be lost in detaching the tribes from Arabi, in preventing any injury to the Canal, and in quieting fanaticism, which might assume such proportions as to set the whole East aflame. It now became perfectly evident to Gill that Palmer was the only man who knew the sheikhs, and could be asked to go, and could do the work; it was also perfectly evident to Palmer that he would be urged to undertake this difficult and delicate mission; he had, in fact, already laid himself open by speaking of the ease with which these people may be managed by one who can talk with them. When Gill left him on that Monday morning he was already more than half-persuaded to accept the mission.’

It is evident that after this interview Captain Gill returned to the Admiralty, and gave a glowing account to his superiors of the man whom he had discovered, and the information he had obtained; for in the course of the same afternoon Palmer received an invitation to breakfast with Lord Northbrook on the following morning, Tuesday, June 27, which he accepted. The interest which he had already excited is proved by the fact

‘that all the notes and reports which Gill had made during the interviews on the subject were already set up in type and laid on the table. The whole conversation at breakfast was concerning the tribes, and how they might be prevented from giving trouble. Palmer stated again his belief that the sheikhs might, if some one could be got to go, be persuaded to sit down and do nothing, if not to take an active part against the rebels.’

At this point it is material to notice that the Government did not send for Palmer and ask him to undertake a certain mission to the East; neither did Palmer communicate with the Government and volunteer, in the ordinary sense of that word; but that in the course of three successive interviews it became evident to the Government that the mission must be undertaken by somebody; and to Palmer, that if he did not go himself the chance would be lost. No one equally fit for such a mission was available at that moment; no one knew the sheikhs personally as he did, and could travel among them as an old friend, for it must always be remembered that the country he was about to visit was the same which he had traversed with Drake in 1869-70. He did not exactly wish to go; he was too fondly devoted to his wife and children to find any pleasure in courting dangers of which he was fully sensible; but he seems to have felt that his duty to his country demanded the sacrifice; and perhaps the thought may have crossed his mind that, if he ran the risk and came out of it safe and successful, his fortune would be made; and therefore, when Lord Northbrook inquired, ‘Do you know anyone who would go?’ he replied, ‘I will go myself.’

This decision was not arrived at until Thursday, June 29. On the following evening he left London, and on Tuesday, July 4, he was on board the Tanjore, between Brindisi and Alexandria, writing to his wife:

‘I am sure this trip will do me an immense deal of good, for I wanted a change of air and complete rest from writing, and now I have got both. Of course, the position is not without its anxieties, but I have no fear.... It is such a chance!’

Such a chance! It was worth while running the risk, for, though there was danger in it, there was fame and fortune beyond the danger: there would be no more debt and difficulty; no more days and nights of uncongenial toil. No wonder as he sat under the awning, ‘like a tent,’ as he said, and did nothing, that these thoughts came into his mind, and found their way on to his paper—it was a chance indeed!