CLEOPATRA’S NEEDLE

Evening Star, Issue 20316, 26 October 1929, Page 5

CLEOPATRA’S NEEDLE

THE REMOVAL FROM EGYPT

STORY OF. STORMY PASSAGE. Somewhere in London there must bo some bright people who imagine that after all the. trouble thai was taken to get it here, England ought to return. Cleopatra’s Needle to Egypt. Early one morning recently on the Thames embankment, hundreds of people who for years have passed tho Needle without a second thought,' clustered around the historic relic. Prominently displayed on its base was a glaring notice in blact and red on which was crudely scrawled: — “Egypt! Righteousness exists! Notice: This monument came . from Egypt and was brought hero some years back. It is the property of the Egyptians, Long live the nation!” “Good heavens!” exclaimed a prominent Egyptian scholar in London when a newspaper writer approached him with tho news.

“ Surely, the most fiery Egyptian National would not deny us the Needle. In the first place, Egypt gave it to us. In the second - phu e, rve didn’t want it. In the third place, it was a miracle that' we ever managed to get it here. “ Mohammed Ali very kindly offered it to both George IV. and William IV,, and both said ‘No. thank you.’ The thought of bringing from Egypt a monument of carved granite weighing 140 tons was, in those days, more than a joke. “About 1801 Sir Ralph Abercrombie took a fancy to it, and suggested that it should be conveyed to England in commemoration of bis victory near Alexandria, where it had stood for a couple of thousand years. He and his friends subscribed 'some ' thousands ol ■ pounds toward the job, but it was not until 1877 that its transport was begun. “ Before it was launched the monument crashed into a tomb Tugs took it to sea, and it struck a rock and sank. It was raised and repaired and towed away again, but was cut adrift in a storm in' the Bav of Biscay. For two months it tossed about the ocean until it was discovered by a British ship and ; taken to Spain. It in England in September, 1878. “ And if we don’t deserve to keep it after that, who -does?” the speaker concluded.