Mr. Hale to Mr. Seward
Sir: On the 16th instant I called on his excellency, Cherif Pacha, minister for foreign affairs, having come from Alexandria for the purpose on the prece ding evening.
The minister courteously made excuses for his delay in answering my note of 20th October, in which I had communicated to him the observations contained in your instruction to me, No. 13, of the 21st September. He told me that he was ready to give me an answer that would be in all respects satisfactory to my government.
I said that I was glad to hear this, and that if he could conveniently send me his answer that day or the next, I could communicate its substance by telegraph to Queenstown, in season to reach you, to be laid before the President before the opening of Congress. He said that he would do so.
We then dropped into a less formal conversation, when I was surprised to learn that the Egyptian government had not abandoned or even scarcely suspended the proposed expedition of negroes to Mexico. The minister expected that you would be entirely satisfied to have the expedition go on, if you were assured that the number of the force now in Mexico would not be increased, and [Page 333] that the soldiers were not slaves; and such was the substance of the formal answer he was about to send me.
As regards the first part of this answer, nothing else was ever proposed, and I told the minister that you could not have understood that anything else was proposed. His Highness had very clearly explained to me that the nine hundred negroes were to be embarked to relieve the contingent sent out in January, 1863.; that I reported the proposition exactly in those words, although it was observed that nine hundred was the number given to me, while four hundred and fifty was the number stated to Mr. Thayer in 1863, and reported by him. No remarks had been made even upon this discrepancy. I spoke of the expedition in my despatch as a relief; you began your instruction by rehearsing the words of my despatch in the usual manner, and that your observations must be taken as based upon the distinct understanding that it was proposed to send out the negroes to relieve the contingent already in service,
The minister seemed to take it for granted that the compulsory service of the negroes not only formed the whole objection to the affair in the eyes of the people of the United States, but that if that objection were removed by assurances on his part they would be entirely satisfied to see the expedition go forward.
I told the minister that I knew nothing of personal knowledge of the circumstances of the embarcation of 1863, but I knew how it was described by Mr. Thayer, and what was the general opinion not only in the United States but in Alexandria, where the story of those days in January, 1863, when no black boas (door-keeper) could be persuaded to open a door at night for fear of being crimped, and when many black servants ran away to hide for a week in the desert, while the embarcation for Mexico was going on, was still familiar in many households; and I had supposed that there was no doubt of the furtive and secret character of the proceeding.
With regard to this last remark, the minister said, no doubt, the embarcation in 1863 was sudden and secret, but this was for a political reason, namely, that it was necessary to keep the thing from the knowledge of the Porte until it was all over; as the whole proceeding at that time was against the Sultan’s will, it was arranged to have it finished before his remonstrance could arrive.
To conclude the conversation, however, I told the minister that his Highness had said to me expressly that he should not send the negroes except for the engagement of his predecessor to the Emperor of the French; that appreciating the position of his Highness, you had addressed your observations to the governments at Paris and Constantinople as well as to his own, and that I knew that the French government had been good enough, while assigning a special reason and reserving its general abstract right, to give up the affair on its part, after receiving your observations, and that I should be sorry if the Egyptian government, after receiving the same observations, found no reason to change the course that had formerly been proposed. I added that the announcement made by Mr. Drouyn de Lhuys to Mr. Bigelow to this effect was made independently of the matter of compulsory service, which had not been discussed between them until after this previous point had been disposed of, and then only as a matter of abstract interest; that Mr. Drouyn de Lhuys had expressly told Mr. Bigelow that the inquiries he proposed to set on foot here with regard to the nature of the service in the Egyptian army were to satisfy himself, and not as a matter of official concern to his government.
Cherif Pacha said this put an entirely new face on the affair, and could scarcely credit the accuracy of my information. To satisfy him I sent to my hotel for the copy which Mr. Bigelow had kindly transmitted to me of his despatch to you, No. 186, reporting his interview with the French minister. I read to Cherif Pacha the principal parts of this despatch, and afterwards, at his request, furnished him with a translation into French.
In sending to Cherif Pacha this translation, I wrote a note to express what was [Page 334] already understood between us, namely, that this was not precisely an official communication; that I was waiting his answer to my official note of the 20th October, and that meanwhile I was willing to add to his information upon the subject. I begged his particular attention to the fact that the note of the 20th October conveyed your observations upon understanding that the proposed expedition of negroes to Mexico, was to replace the contingent now in service them. I said that whatever reason might be assigned, the thing needed to tranquillize public opinion in the United States would be to hear that his Highness had been good enough to declare that he did not intend to renew the expedition of Egyptian soldiers to Mexico; that a replacement would be considered as a renewal; that if he liked to make a reserve of his rights in the manner pursued by the French minister, in saying that the proposed expedition was not abandoned, but that in effect it would not take place on account of domestic reasons, I should be satisfied with this, but that of course a definitive abandonment would give us great pleasure; that I believed France would make no objection to it; among our people in America it would be regarded as a new proof of the friendship of his Highness, and everywhere in the world it would be regarded as a proof of his noble wisdom in the interests of humanity, since, without giving to the service of the Egyptian negroes in Mexico the name of “slavery,” it must be admitted would not be an agreeable thing for the soldiers, as his Highness himself had told me with all possible frankness when expressing his anxiety to replace the men now in that service by others.
The substance of the preceding paragraph, and nearly in the equivalent words in French, was written and sent to the minister, you will understand, with the view of influencing his answer to the note of the 20th October. He kept my messenger waiting a short time, however, and sent back by him his formal answer to that note, a translation of which answer is hereto appended and marked A.
As this formal answer to your observations will of course attract your particular attention, I make no remark upon it.
At the same time the messenger brought back a less formal note from the minister, in which he acknowledged the receipt of my last note, saying that for the present he could only refer me to our conversation of the morning, repeating that it gave the subject, a new phase, of which the Egyptian government re served for itself the examination, and that meanwhile he hastened to send me his official answer to your observations.
I believe that I have faithfully represented these communications, but for your greater assurance I transmit herewith, marked B, C, D, and E, copies of the originals of everything that has passed in writing, beginning with my note of the 20th October, in which I endeavored to give exactly the sense of your observations, continuing with the minister’s official answer, (of which the translation is the piece marked A,) and concluding with our less formal correspondence of the 16th instant, already described.
The telegraph wire between Alexandria and Malta had just broken; but the steam packet to the latter port leaves to-morrow, takes forward to Mr. Bigelow, in Paris, a telegraphic message to the effect that the Egyptian government say the insurrection is suppressed, and that the expedition of negroes may go forward. I have also written to him fully.
A French transport has arrived in the harbor of Alexandria with troops for Cochin-China, who have been disembarked and have taken the railway for Suez.
With regard to the question of the compulsory service of the soldiers in the Egyptian army, and especially that of the blacks from the upper country, I hardly know what I may say with propriety in an official communication. I have reason to believe that Mr. Outrey, the agent and consul general here of France, was annoyed at being called upon by Mr. Drouyn de Lhuys to make a report upon this subject. Even to an entirely disinterested observer it might be difficult, in a country where the civil government is absolute, to distinguish [Page 335] between compulsory service in the army and military service everywhere; to distinguish between a levy in the Soudan and the conscription in France. It would remain to weigh the evidence in such cases as are reported to have occurred in filling the number of the contingent at Alexandria in January, 1863. If the object desired is merely to satisfy the private judgment of a candid observer, something might be learned from the various books of modern travel in Egypt. The difficulties which embarrass the subject when approached as a matter of discussion among governments are illustrated by the fact—reported in my last despatch but one—of the frequent release of negroes from slavery in Egypt by the interposition of the good offices of the British consulates. The Egyptian government may point to these instances as so many proofs in support of the assertion proudly made in the minister’s answer to your observations, “Slavery no longer exists in Egypt;” for whenever the consulates bring forward an instance of the contrary, the man is immediately freed. Others would perhaps regard these instances as disproving the proposition insisted on, or at least as illustrating that it is not of universal application.
I shall endeavor to collect the most authentic and also the most available testimony within my reach, without loss of time, but should be glad of your instructions as to the manner and degree in which it may be advisable to push inquiries.
I have the honor to be, sir, very respectfully, your obedient servant,
Hon. William H. Seward, Secretary of State.