The interest charge has been reduced from £4,263,000 to £3,704,000, a decrease of £559,000. The Imports in 1905 were worth. LE.21,564,000, and the Exports £E. 20,360,000. The specie imported amounted to £E.4,782,000, and that exported to E.3,870,000. Some 702,800 kilos. of cigarettes were exported. Customs revenue amounted to E.3,322,148. The Currency Notes in circulation were worth LE.913,000. On December 31st, 1905, the Savings Banks Deposits amounted to E.236,420; the Children's Savings Banks had 2,645 depositors. The share capital and reserves of the purely Egyptian deposit banks rose from £2,939,000 in 1901 to £6,300,000 in 1905; and their assets during the same period from 10,585,000 to £26,424,000. The share capital and reserves of the mortgage banks rose from £7,263,000 in 1901 to £29,749,000 in 1905, and their total assets during the same period from £7,744,000 to £32,655,000. The Domains Administration sold - 2,979 acres for £120,765, i.e., at the rate of £40 10s. per acre. The Daira Debt has now been entirely liquidated. In 1905 a penny postal rate between Egypt and Great Britain was established. The increase in the number of letters

A. D.

1905.

passing through the Egyptian Post Office is illustrated by the following figures:

Land Tax produced in 1905 £E.4,902,608, Land Sales Registration £E.943,oco, and the Date Tax E. 122,000. The net earnings of the railways were £E.1,327,000, and the capital expenditure E.647,000. The following figures illustrate the growth of passenger traffic :

Passengers between Egypt and Europe: in 1902, 60,000; in 1903, 74,000; in 1904, 90,400; in 1905, 99,922. The revenue from the telegraphs was E. 101,000 (profit, E.26,500); about 667,000 European and 1,248,000 Arabic telegrams passed over the wires. The Alexandria Telephone produced £E.3,728. The cost of the Prisons Department was E.107,080. Education cost £E.235,000. Manumission papers were granted in 1905 to 63 male and go female slaves in Cairo, and everyone must rejoice that a systematic trade in slaves is dead in Egypt. Would that the British authorities in Cairo had rule in other parts of Africa!* On April 1st, at According to Bishop Tucker, who writes from Uganda (Times, April 12th, 1906), "Slavery under the British flag may be found in a pure, unadulterated and unquestioned form in British East Africa. In Mombasa, Lamu, Malindi, and all the territory within the ten-mile limit, slavery is still a legalized institution."

*

A.D. 3.50 p.m., one of the Pyramids at Giza was struck 1905. by lightning, just below the apex, and several of the stones fell to the ground with a crash. fell in torrents, and the low-lying parts of Cairo were flooded.

Rain

1906. On February 20th H.H. the Khedive visited the Oasis of Siwa, with a suite consisting of Dr. Butler, Mr. Fals, Dr Kautsky, an Egyptian Secretary, and an engineer. In the same month a steamer service was inaugurated on Lake Menzâla, and the journey from Karputy (Port Said) to Mataria occupies about four hours. The steamers are of the stern-wheel type and have double promenade decks. Tug-boats and cargo barges have also been constructed. Good progress has been made with the Rôda Bridge which is being built by Messrs. Arrol & Co. It has been decided to build another bridge over the Nile, between the Kasr an-Nil and Embâba Bridges. The new bridge is to be named the "Abbâs Bridge," and is to have a drawbridge for the passage of vessels, and a footbridge at a higher elevation for pedestrian traffic when the drawbridge is raised, like the Tower Bridge in London.

In April, Maryâm, an Abyssinian outlaw at Noggara, raided several villages near Kadaref, killed 101 villagers, and carried off 41 men and 133 women, and numbers of cattle. In May, the natives who lived in the Nûbâ Mountains in the Southern Sûdân, incited by the Arab slave-raiders, attacked the Government Fort at Tâlôdi and killed a number of soldiers. The Sûdân Government despatched Major O'Connell with a force to punish the rebels, and this officer, in spite of the rains and flooded state of the country, reached

A. D.

1906.

Tâlôdî quickly, and, in the fight which followed, killed 300 of the natives, whose wish was to reopen the slave trade. The little garrison had held out bravely, but were in sore straits when relief arrived. Order was soon restored, and the natives in the neighbourhood of Gebel Kadir, where the Mahdî first preached his Mission, supported Major O'Connell. In June, five officers of Mounted Infantry went to shoot pigeons at Denshawâi, near Tanța, but were surrounded by natives, and so evilly treated that Major Pine Coffin was knocked down, and Captain Bull died of the injuries he received. The attack was premeditated, and was due to the fanatical feeling which exists in that part of the Delta. A large number of arrests were made, and the leaders of the attack were tried by a special court; four were sentenced to be hanged, five to be whipped, and others were sentenced to terms of imprisonment; two to penal servitude for life, one to penal servitude for 15 years, six to penal servitude for 7 years, three to receive 50 lashes and imprisonment for one year, and five to receive 50 lashes (Egypt, No. 4, 1906).

THE EGYPTIAN FLAG.

or

The Crescent and Star Flag is of considerable historical interest, and its marks, the Crescent and the Star, were used as symbols of divinity and sovereignty by nations in the East from time immemorial. Among the ancient Egyptians the crescent actually occurs in the name of Aah-mes, ie., "Child of the Moon," the first king of the XVIIIth dynasty, about B.C. 1700, and the five-rayed star ★ was a well-known symbol for neter "god." The crescent appears on Babylonian Boundary Stones, and on large Assyrian historical stele, and it is quite certain that supernatural powers were attributed to it. His Excellency

Yakub Artin Pâshâ, the highest authority on the study of Oriental Blazon,* has pointed out that on the coins of Phraata, one of the kings of the Arsacida, who reigned. about B.C. 37, the lunar crescent and star occur as the symbols of the conjunction of Venus and the Moon. Påshâ further points out that, in astrology, the star signifies "goodness, happiness, good-luck," &c., and the crescent,

66

new life." The use of these symbols extended from Western Asia to Greece and other countries in Europe, and before A.D. 697 we find that the Muḥammadan generals who warred in Persia adopted the crescent as a mark of the new life and new religion (as opposed to that of the Cross of Christ), which they were preaching. The moneys which they struck were decorated with the crescent and the six-rayed or eight-rayed star. Later, they adopted the star and the crescent in conjunction. At the close of the XIIIth century Ala Ad-Din Kêkôbâd II bestowed upon ‘Uthmân or Osmân, the founder of the great Ottoman Family, the

See his Contribution à l'Étude du Blason en Orient, London, 1902.