The Marlborough Express PUBLISHED EVERY EVENING MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 19, 1910. "QUEER-CARDIE."

Marlborough Express, Volume XLIV, Issue 216, 19 September 1910, Page 4

The Marlborough Express PUBLISHED EVERY EVENING MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 19, 1910. "QUEER-CARDIE."

Mr Keir Hardies penchant for mischief-making is apparently an :n----curable malady. His unwarrantable encouragement of Indian seditionmongers will long be remembered as an example of the crass and almost criminal folly in which a British legislator can indulge when he forgets his duty to his race and to his country. Now Mr Hardie is again to the front, and is apparently bent upon _ gaining further unsavory notoriety as a champion of the mischievous young Egyptians whose object it is to upset the Government under which their country has of late years so greatly prospered, and to bring about the British evacutioxi of the Land of the Pharaohs. His speech at Geneva the other day was a monstrous impertinence. To ■, declare that the British occupation of Egypt "was maintained only in the _ interests of the landowners and capitalists" is nothing more or less than a foul and malignant falsehood, a disgrace to any man who might utter it, and doubly shameful coming as it did from the tongue of a

member of the British Parliament. Those who have read Lord Cromer's account of the splendid work done by British administrators in Egypt, and of the equally splendid results of that work need no declaration from us that Mr Hardies statement is flagrantly untrue. It is true that the landowners have benefited by the British occupation, but it is not true to say that they and the capitalists alone reaped such advantage. The Egyptian fellah or peasant now enjoys a liberty, a freedom from crushing burdens pf taxation such as never existed .during the old regime under which he was treated as a mere beast of burden by the arrogant and tyrannous pashas. The number of peasant landowners* and of prosperous, small jfarmers has increased enormously, .and were a vote taken for or against a continuance of the British protectorate and occupation the. fellaheen would be found very largely in favor of such continuance. The opposition to i British rule in Egypt comes from very j much the, same class as it does in | India, namely, from a lot of noisy young students in the cities, ■ who are ; the tools of cunning and unscrupulous agitator&r-mostly lawyers—who keep very largely in the background. ' The pashas, tvhdse tyrannous power was broken by the British rule, are also active in'the mischievous propaganda. They long for the, to them,. good old days of Ismail and Tewfik, when they waxed fat upon the money ground out of the hapless fellaheen and made Cairo notorious for its luxury and vice. No doubt the day will come when Great Britain will have to evacuate Egypt. Indeed, Lord Cromer himself hints in the final, chapter of his-book that such is his own impression. But Great Britain will choose her own time for evacutidn of a country in which her commercial, financial, and political interests are so many and so important; and it will certainly not be at the dictation of the so-called "Young Egypt" party that she will surrender the position which she now holds. There are certain antiBritish elements not only in Egypt but in Asia Minor, where the Germans are so desperately endeavoring to establish an influence which may render it not, only desirable but .actually imperative that Alexandria, Port Said, and Suez should remain under the same'control as at present exists. British interests.' also in the Soudan are such as also to constitute an" important factor in the case. Mr Keir Hardie is as disingenuous in his comparison of Egypt with Turkey as he is insulting in - his ' criticism of British administrai^on in the former country. The "Young Turks" won liberty for ' themselves and their country' by 'overthrowing a regime which had becoirte notorious through the whole civilised world for "inefficiency, corruption, and tyranny. Their agitation,' at first peaceful and constitutional, 'assumed a violently revolutionary form' only when all other methods!1 of obtaining, redress had been tried and had failed. How different is: the present position in Egypt from that which existed in Constantinople i The Government which these precious "Young Egyptians" would fain upset is a Government which has worked wonders for the country in the way of establishing order, and in abolishing.corruption and tyranny. Under its beneficent rule the resources of the country have < been developed to a degree hitherto unheard-of, trade and commerce have advanced by leaps and bounds, the courts have been cleansed of i corruption, and the poorest man-inr the land can call his soul and .his^home his own without fearing the . tyrannical interference, of an arrogant and greedy pasha. To compare-a rule under which these things have been achieved with the hateful tyranny which reigned at Stamboul previously to .the late revolution is,more than stupid—it is positively dishonest. We suppose that there is no way by which Mr Keir Hardie can be made to understand that his conduct in deliberately belittling and misrepresenting British rule in Egypt is a disgrace to him as a Briton and as a Member of Parliament.'", His hide is so thick, his conception of decent conduct in a public man, so elementary that the direct condemnation which may appear in the. British press .would probably not disturb his equanimity in the slightest. But the, House of Commons should, and, we trust, will, take some steps to vindicate its honor as a legislative assembly by deliberately expelling this sedition-monger from its midst.