98 Egypt
strongly by the French and less strongly by the British.
And both eventually agreed in insisting on a maintenance
of the succession as provided in the firman ; while the
French secured a maintenance of the right of Egypt to
make treaties, and the British secured a restoration of
the restrictions on the size of the army and on the con-
traction of loans—which difference in the policies of
British and French is easily explained by their divergent
imperial objects. Thus the British were protecting inter-
nationally their communications by the Canal. The
French were preparing further extensions for their empire
in North Africa. And the future Egyptian historian will
no doubt draw a moral from the miscarriage of policies
that were little concerned with the interests of Egypt
itself. For the consequence of either policy was the con-
trary of its purpose. The French, as it turned out, had
facilitated the future British occupation, while the British
had heavily handicapped it.
The Sultan thus put in his place, there remained the
reorganisation of the Dual Control. The Egyptian Con-
stitutional Nationalists, under Sherif, strongly opposed a
reappointment of European Ministers or a reassignment
of executive powers to the Controllers. So it was even-
tually settled that the British and French Controllers
were to have advisory powers only and a consultative
voice in the Cabinet. But they were no longer to be
revocable by the Egyptian Government, and in that
respect, as Mr. Gladstone later pointed out (House of
Commons, July 27, 1882), the foreign financial control
had become political. The division of functions between
them, which had previously favoured the British, was left
undefined. They were generally charged with helping
Egypt to pay its debt, while payment Itself was in charge
of the Debt Commission, on which Germany now got