250 Egypt
in principle. The order was given for the boycotting of
the Mission, and a barrage of anti-British propaganda
was laid down against it. This agitation was in no way
discouraged by the internment of the President and
prominent members of the Committee of Independence
and by the suspension of Nationalist newspapers.
Members of the suspended Legislative Assembly and
Provincial Councils met and protested. So did the
Ulema, the Notables, the Omdehs, the Bar, the Colleges,
and the schools. The agitation could not, indeed, be kept
within the limits of the boycott. Public demonstrations
raged, the schools rebelled, the mobs again began to
riot. The villages, where the repression had been
severest, could be kept quiet. But the town mobs that
had been let off easy began to break loose. There was
looting, followed by loss of life when the troops cleared
the streets. The most serious riots were just outside the
Abdin Palace and in the Muski (November 16), where
over a hundred rioters were killed and wounded. Foreign
shops were sacked, foreign heads broken, and the mob
showed itself more irresponsible and less purposeful than
in the earlier disorders. For these outbreaks were mainly
formidable as showing that the use of mob violence was
getting out of control. But they achieved their immediate
object. Mohamed Said took advantage of the rejection
of his representations against the despatch of the pro-
posed Mission to resign (November 15). The only sub-
stitute who could be found was a Copt, Yussef Wahab,
who had represented that community in almost every
Cabinet since the murder of Boutros in 1910. An attempt
was also made to form a party of Independent Liberals
to carry on co-operation, but the infant proved still-born.
Yussef and his Ministers lived anxious lives, and narrowly
escaped assassination more than once. His "Govern-