together and pay him a visit next autumn. Arabi is right in saying that neither Hassan Moussa nor Nadim were concerned in the riot. Nadim went down to Alexandria to deliver a lecture and Hassan on money business.]
[The Mufti also added the following remarks on March 20th, 1903.
There was an attempt to introduce freemasonry into Egypt in the later years of Ismaïl Pasha. The lodges were all connected with lodges in Europe. Sheykh Jemal-ed-Din joined one, but he soon found out that there was nothing of any value in it and withdrew. Ismaïl encouraged it for his purposes when he began to be in difficulties, but freemasonry never was a power in Egypt.
Mohammed Obeyd was certainly killed at Tel-el-Kebir. There were rumours for a long time of his having been seen in Syria, and we used to send from Beyrout when we were living there in exile to try and find him for his wife's sake, who was at Beyrout, but they always turned out to be false reports.
Mahmud Sami was one of the original Constitutionalists, dating from the time of Ismaïl. He was a friend of Sherif and belonged to the same school of ideas. It is most probable that he gave warning to Arabi of his intended arrest, as he was one of the Council of Ministers and must have known. After the affair of Kasr-el-Nil he was altogether with Arabi and the Colonels. That was why Riaz got rid of him from the Ministry and appointed Daoud Pasha in his place.
Riaz, at the beginning, underrated the importance of Arabi's action. Afterwards he was afraid of it. He began by despising it as he did all fellah influence in politics.