174 Egypt
the young Khedive might have been educated on rather
more kindly lines, and might have been converted into a
useful instrument for the inevitable transition towards
Home Rule. Cromer at about this time did begin to cul-
tivate the moderate Home Rulers of the landed interests
and leaders with liberal views like Said Zagloul. But in this
he was rather seeking to build barriers against the Khedive
and the Nationalists than to build bridges towards
Egyptian self-government. Before leaving he does seem
to have realised that we had neglected the political educa-
tion of our ward and had made for ourselves very serious
difficulties in the next phase when concession and co-
operation would become inevitable. But for the time
Cromer's Cromwellian solutions no doubt simplified the
Egyptian situation and very well satisfied his British em-
ployers.
The situation was still further simplified with the final
elimination of the French interest and intervention in
Egypt. For the French, largely through Cromer's
Influence, were bought out with great advantage to the
Egyptians at the cost of their fellow Moslem in North
Africa. By the Anglo-French agreement of 1904 France
gave the British a free hand in Egypt, getting for itself
a free hand in Morocco. The agreement declared that
the French '' will not obstruct the action of Great Britain
In Egypt by asking that a limit of time be fixed for the
British occupation or in any other manner." The British,
by thus buying off their only serious rival for the pro-
tection of Cleopatra, did a service to Egypt that
Egyptians have not sufficiently appreciated. While, on
the other hand, the service to the British Empire rendered
by this rather cynical trafficking has been somewhat over-
estimated by English writers. For what we thereby won
in Egypt on the roundabouts of European Imperialism we