the affirmative, a question which had often been
addressed to me.

'Do you think I could march as far as Gaza?' inquired Ibrahim, with a
smile.

This was a question of mockery. It was like asking whether the Life
Guards could take Windsor. I therefore only returned the smile, and said
that I did not doubt the enemy would agree to settle affairs upon that
condition.

'Tahib! Well I think I can march as far as they speak Arabic!' This was
a favourite phrase of his Highness.

I answered that I hoped, if I had the honour of attending his Highness,
the army would march till we could see another ocean.

'It is all talk up there,' replied Ibrahim; 'but my life is a life of
deeds.'

'Words are very good things sometimes,' I replied; 'that is, if we keep
marching at the same time.'

'God is great!' exclaimed Ibrahim; and looking round to his officers,
'the Effendi speaks truth; and thus it was that Redchid beat the beys.'

Ibrahim alluded to the Albanian campaign of the preceding year, when the
energy of the grand vizier crushed the rebellious beys of the ancient
Epirus.

'What do you think of Redchid?' he inquired.

'I think he is worthy of being your Highness's rival.'

'He has always been victorious,' said Ibrahim; 'but I think his sabre is
made of gold. That will not do with me.'

'It's a pity,' I observed, 'that if your Highness find time to march
into Syria, you had not acted simultaneously with the Albanians, or with
the Pasha of Scutari.'

'May I kill my mother but it is true; but up there, they will watch, and
watch, and watch, till they fall asleep.'

The truth is, the Orientals have no idea of military diversions; and
even if they combine, each strives to be the latest in the field, in
order that he may take advantage of the other's success or discomfiture.
Mehemet Ali, at an immense expenditure, had excited two terrible revolts
in European Turkey, and then waited to invade Syria until the armies of
the Porte were unemployed. The result with some will justify his policy;
but in the conquest of Syria, the truth is, Ibrahim himself used a
golden sabre, and the year, before, the contingents of the pashas, whom
he was obliged to bribe, were all busied in Europe.

The night previous to this conversation the style of the military
oath of the Egyptian army had been altered; and the troops, instead of
swearing allegiance to the Sultan, had pledged themselves to Mehemet
Ali. The Grand Pasha was so nervous a