The War 221
1917). An Indian was given a seat in the House of
Lords, and no opportunity was lost of engaging the
interest of Indian notables in the war. The only similar
attention to Egyptians seems to have been a visit of
notables to the Canal defences in 1915, and an invita-
tion of leading legislators to lunch with G.H.Q. in 1916.
The sole explanation of our very different treatment of
India and of our discrimination against the Egyptians is
that we were afraid of India and felt no alarm about
Egypt.
For Egypt had proportionately as strong a claim as
India on our gratitude and generosity. Contrary to our
express undertaking, we had used Egyptians for making
war on their co-religionists and neighbours just as it
suited our convenience without any consideration for
their prejudices or any concession to their pride. Yet
Indian regiments in Egypt had been so affected by Pan-
Islamic propaganda as to become unreliable. Whereas
the Egyptian army of thirty thousand men maintained
loyally through the war its arduous and unattractive task
of policing the Sudan against the effects of that propa-
ganda. It was Egyptian artillerymen who drove their
Turkish co-religionists from the Canal on the only
occasion when our position in Egypt was imperilled,
while Egyptian officers were used for all manner of use-
ful services. Anti-British agitation never had the least
effect on the reliability even of Labour Corps and camel
drivers. Though this immunity may, it is true, have been
partly due to nationalist policy in confining anti-British
agitation to schools where it could not easily be dealt
with by such methods as military authorities understand.
Yet this, if so, did not decrease our debt.
The change of character in the campaign from a de-
fence of Egypt against Turks and Senussi into a British