presence with me of my learned Arabic professor, Sabunji, whom I had had the happy inspiration to bring with me from London to help out my poor resources of that language.
It was thus from Hajrasi that I first learned the details of what had been going on at Cairo during the summer and the true position of the soldiers in regard to the National Party, facts which I soon after had confirmed to me from a number of other sources including my original friends, Mohammed Khalil and Mohammed Abdu. Sabunji, moreover, who had a real genius for this kind of work, was presently busy all the city over seeking out news for me, so that in a very few days we knew between us pretty nearly everything that was going on. Nor were we long before we had made acquaintance with some of the fellah officers who had taken part with Arabi in the demonstration, especially with Eïd Diab and Ali Fehmi, with whom I was pleasantly impressed. The matters being principally discussed at the moment were, first, the character of the Khedive—was he to be trusted, or was he not, to fulfil the promises he had given? He had promised a Constitution, but was this to be a real transfer of power to Ministers responsible to a Representative Chamber, or only the summoning of a Chamber of Notables with common consultative powers? Tewfik was mistrusted on this point, and it was generally believed that he was being advised to shuffle in this way out of his engagement by Malet who, as already said, had just come from Constantinople and had declared that the Sultan would never agree to real Constitutional government.