No. 56.] No. 468. Mr. Beardsley to Mr. Fish. AGENCY AND CONSULATE-GENERAL OF THE Cairo, January 7, 1873. (Received February 12.) SIR: I have the honor to report the arrival at Alexandria on the 22d ultimo of the United States ship Congress, Captain Rhind commanding. Captain Rhind and most of his officers came to Cairo, and on the 28th ultimo I had the pleasure of presenting them to His Highness the Khedive, who appeared highly gratified with the interview and expressed the hope that more of our men-of-war would visit these waters in the future. The presence of our ships in the Levant always has a most beneficial effect upon American interests, more, perhaps, than the Navy Department is aware of. Alexandria is a safe and commodious port, the winter climate is unsurpassed for salubrity, and the expense of remaining here is perhaps no greater than at Nice or Spezia, while the moral effect of the display of our flag is infinitely greater here than there. I think our varied and growing interests in Egypt will warrant me in suggesting to the Department the propriety of keeping at least one of the vessels of our European squadron in these waters during the winter months. The Congress sailed for Naples on the 2d instant. No. 469. R. BEARDSLEY. Mr. Beardsley to Mr. Fish. No. 59.] AGENCY AND CONSULATE GENERAL OF THE UNITED STATES IN EGYPT, Cairo, January 25, 1873. (Received February 18.) SIR: By invitation of His Majesty the Khedive I attended this morning a distribution of prizes to the students of the national schools at Cairo. About one hundred and fifty prizes were distributed. I send you by this mail two pamphlets, one containing a list of the pupils who received prizes, with the number of their class, rating, &c., and the other a statistical report on the actual condition of the schools, native and foreign, in Egypt. By the latter document it will be observed: (1) that the national schools are systematically graded from preparatory and normal up to the higher grades of literature and languages, medicine and surgery, and polytechnics; (2) that fifty-one students are being educated in Europe at government expense; (3) that at Cairo, Alexandria, and the chief towns and villages there are 2,067 schools, with 2,381 teachers, and 77,292 pupils; (4) that each pupil pays from one to four piasters a month, according to his means, the piaster being equal to five cents of our money; and (5) that these schools are all under the control of the department of public instruction. There are also in the public schools 5,010 scholars who are being educated partly at the ex pense of the government and partly at the expense of religious estates, making a total of 82,302 students in the national schools. Under the head of European schools are classed all independent schools. These are mostly under missionary auspices, and the number of scholars here given at Cairo and Alexandria is 5,978, which, added to 82,302, the number of scholars in the national schools, makes a total of 88,280 scholars. Besides these schools, however, there are many missionary schools in Upper Egypt, and the regimental schools in the army, of which no mention is made in the report in question. It is safe to say that the number of scholars in all the schools in Egypt will not fall much short of 100,000. A noticeable feature of this report is the mention of the establishment of a school for girls, which is an innovation of Oriental thought and custom almost too great to be realized. I have visited some of the schools of this city and will visit the balance of them the coming week, when I will be better prepared to report as to their efficiency. So far as I have seen they appear to be well conducted, and their influence for good upon the future of Egypt is beyond all calculation. I am, &c., No. 470. Mr. Beardsley to Mr. Fish. [Extract.] R. BEARDSLEY. No. 65.] AGENCY AND CONSULATE-GENERAL OF THE Cairo, February 15, 1873. (Received March 24.) SIR: I have the honor to report that the marriage of Prince Hassan, third son of the Khedive, with the princess the daughter of Mohammed Ali Pacha, was consummated on Monday, the 10th instant, and was followed by the same fêtes, ceremonies, and entertainments as were given in honor of the former marriages, as indicated in my preceding dispatches. During the past month nightly entertainments have been given to thousands of persons; semi-weekly representations by expensive artists have been given in the hippodrome; presents have been distributed to rich and poor; gold has been strewn in the streets in front of each bridal procession and thrown from the windows of the banking-houses to the struggling crowds below; invited guests have been entertained in a princely manner, and bridal gifts and trousseaux have been presented rivaling in magnificence and value the most exaggerated descriptions of Oriental tales. It is sufficient to mention dresses covered and heavy with diamonds and Oriental pearls, tiaras resplendent with hundreds of diamonds of the first water, girdles dazzling with precious stones, and slippers of gold ornamented with rubies and emeralds, to indicate the nature and value of the bridal presents. It is said by persons supposed to be competent of judging that the value of the presents given by Prince Toussoum Pacha to his bride was £100,000 sterling, and that her trousseau cost a far greater sum. In an Oriental land like this, where extravagance in display and expenditure is looked upon as a mark and prerogative of royalty, it is perhaps wise and politic that the marriage of the hereditary prince should be celebrated with unusual ceremony and princely expenditure. * To each of the princes already married has been given a palace, suite, and all the paraphernalia of princely life; and each of the younger princes will expect as much when his marriage-day shall arrive. * The princes are all of them most estimable young men, of whom nothing but good can be said. They are intelligent, courteous, and gentlemannered, and they appear to be animated by a fraternal feeling for each other which, under the circumstances, is as refreshing as it is unexpected, and speaks volumes for their education. They are, moreover, industrious, and take an interest in the welfare of their country. The hereditary prince, Mohammed Tewif Pacha, is president of the private council of His Highness the Khedive and presides at its meetings, and Prince Hussein Pacha is minister of public works. Prince Hassan Pacha has but lately returned from Oxford College, England, where he has spent the last four years. He will return to England and enter the military school at Woolwich. There is a report current that Prince Hassan intends visiting the United States this year, but I am satisfied that such is not the case. The Khedive wishes him to make the tour of the world, but not until he shall have completed his studies at Woolwich. I am, &c., R. BEARDSLEY. No. 67. No. 471. Mr. Beardsley to Mr. Fish. AGENCY AND CONSULATE-GENERAL OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA AT ALEXANDRIA, EGYPT, Cairo, February 24, 1873. (Received March 25.) SIR: I have the honor to forward by this mail, direct to the Depart ment, Mr. Fowler's report on the proposed railway to the Soudan and on the ship-incline over the first cataract. The railway will commence at Wady Halfa, near the bottom of the second cataract, and continue up the right bank of the Nile 257 kilometers to Kohé, where it will cross to the left or west bank on an iron bridge. From Kohé it will follow the river as nearly as possible to Ambukol, a distance of 349 kilometers. At the latter place the Nile, making a great curve, runs northward and eastward about 240 kilometers to Aboo Hammed, where it again sweeps around to the south, and, passing Berber, receives the waters of the Atbara, and finally reaches Khartoum at the confluence of the Blue Nile and the White Nile. Within this great curve of the river lies the Bahinda Desert, uninhabited except by wandering Bedawee tribes. The railway will leave the river at Ambukol and cross this desert in almost a straight line to Shendy on the Nile, which will be the southern terminus of the Soudan Railway. Shendy, 283 kilometers from Ambukol, is about 160 kilometers northeast of Khartoum and about the same distance southwest of Berber. The entire length of the line from Wady Halfa to Shendy will be 889 kilometers; the estimated cost is £4,000,000 sterling; and the time required to complete the entire work, it is hoped, will not be more than three years from the date of its commencement. The narrow gauge of 3 feet 6 inches will be used, with rails weighing 50 pounds per yard and iron sleepers. The works at the first cataract are to consist of a ship-railway upon which steamers and loaded boats may be transported up and down the cataract. The vessels will be floated upon a carriage, or cradle, constructed to run upon the railway, and will be hauled over land by pow erful hydraulic engines of about 400 horse-power, placed near the center of the railway. The water to work these engines will be pumped up at a high pressure by a pair of large stream-wheels carried upon pontoons and driven by the rapids at the lower end of the cataract. The total cost of these works complete will be £200,000 sterling, and it is thought that they may be completed within one year and a half from the date of their commencement. These two works, the Soudan Railway and the ship-incline, must be considered as integral parts of the same great enterprise, for either one of them would be of but little practical value without the other, the object being to afford an outlet by the Nile for the productions of the Soudan. At present only the lightest and most precious products of the Soudan can be brought down with any profit, owing to the great amount of land-carriage necessitated by the unnavigable condition of the river between the second and sixth cataracts, and to the frequent changes from water to land transportation. The chief commercial centers of the Soudan for the collection of the products of a great part of Central Africa are Khartoum, Kordofan, and Darfur. Boats carrying about 40 tons of merchandise leave Khartoum and come down the river as far as Abou Hammed, where their cargoes are transferred to camels and cross the Nubian Desert to Korosko, below the Second Cataract, where they are again transferred to boats and carried down to the First Cataract; there they are a second time unloaded and carried around the cataract to Assouan, where they are finally reloaded into boats and proceed down the river to Cairo or Alexandria; thus having broken bulk four times, and having been carried overland, on camels, 390 kilometers. From the Kordofan and Darfur districts the goods are brought by camels across the desert and embarked on the river at Dabbe and Handak, whence they are conveyed by boat and camel to lower Egypt, experiencing about the same number of changes as goods coming from Khartoum. It is evident that Shendy will supersede Khartoum as a depot for the products of the Upper Nile when the Soudan Railway is completed. Merchandise then leaving Shendy, Dabbe, or Handak, by rail, will be transferred into boats at Wady Halfa, whence it will proceed unbroken to Alexandria, the loaded boats passing over the ship-incline at the First Cataract. In my dispatch No. 46, of December 12, 1872, I had the honor to refer to the comprehensive views which His Highness the Khedive entertains in regard to the future development of the railway system of Egypt. The Soudan Railway is but one link in that system, which, when perfected, His Highness intends shall embrace an uninterrupted railway from Alexandria to Massowah on the Red Sea. Its benefits will then be more than local, for it will shorten the route to India and the East several days, and it may become the artery up which will flow the new blood which is to civilize Central Africa. This work cannot but be of great national benefit in developing and utilizing a vast and fertile country which is now comparatively worthless. The Soudan and the country within reach of the navigable waters of the Nile is capable of great development, and is rich in many things which Egypt needs. Its soil is said to be well adapted to the growth of cotton, grain, and sugar; timber is comparatively plenty, labor is abundant and cheap, and it is hoped that coal may be found within reasonable distance of the Nile. Nothing will contribute more powerfully to demoralize and destroy the slave-trade in the Soudan than this railway, and in that point of view alone it is a desirable and praiseworthy enterprise. Mr. Fowler is now in Egypt for the purpose of commencing the work at an early day, and it is confidently expected that it will be completed by the spring or summer of 1876. I am, &c., R. BEARDSLEY. No. 68.] No. 472. Mr. Beardsley to Mr. Fish. AGENCY AND CONSULATE-GENERAL OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA AT ALEXANDRIA, EGYPT, Cairo, February 25, 1873. (Received March 25.) SIR: I have the honor to report at this late day that the United States sloop of war Hartford arrived at Port Saïd on the 8th ultimo,_and sailed from Suez for China on the 18th ultimo. I presume Mr. Page has already reported the arrival and departure of the Hartford, as well as the particulars of her passage through the canal. As Mr. Page does not send his dispatches through this office, I deem it prudent, even at this date, to report the Hartford's movements, that there may be no doubt of the information having been communicated to the Department. I am, &c., R. BEARDSLEY. No. 79.J No. 473. Mr. Beardsley to Mr. Fish. AGENCY AND CONSULATE-GENERAL OF THE UNITED STATES AT ALEXANDRIA, Cairo, April 3, 1873. (Rec'd May 6.) SIR: I have the honor to report the arrival at Alexandria, on the morning of the 17th ultimo, of the United States frigate Wabash, bearing the flag of Rear-Admiral James Alden and commanded by Captain William G. Temple. In the afternoon of the same day the Wachusett, Captain Fillebrown commanding, arrived. On the 18th and 19th, the admiral and his staff paid and received the usual visits of courtesy at Alexandria, and on the 21st they came to |