10 SEPTEMBER 1881, Page 3

The reports from Egypt are strange. It is stated that

the European officials are alarmed at the mutinous condition of the Army, and that the French and British Governments have agreed, should it be necessary, that the country should be occupied by Turkish troops. This policy, which would virtually reduce Egypt to a Turkish pashalic, and hand over its people to the rapacity of Turkish Generals, seems to be impossible ; but it is believed at Cairo, and has had the effect of calming the native troops. We wonder if there is any truth in the military indiscipline, or whether the whole affair is an intrigue. Men of no mean authority on Egypt believe that the Khedive directs the gmeates, and that their object is the abolition of European control, which is becomiug too irksome to be borne. If that is true, and the Western Governments know it, the application to Constantinople would be a hint, not to the Egyptian soldiery, but to the Khedive, which he would understand. There is something infinitely degrading in this movement of diplomacy and armies in the interest of bondholders, who lent money at 10 per cent., because of the risk, and now find their plunder guaranteed by France and England.