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Bonaparte resolved to leave the administration of justice to the cadis. In execution of his scheme of succeeding to the rights of the Mamluks, he seized their property, and caused the taxes previously imposed to continue to be levied for the benefit of the French army. For this purpose it was requisite that he should have the Kopts at his disposal.
The Turks amounted to nearly eighteen thousand infantry. They had no cavalry, for they had not brought more than three hundred horses, but they expected the arrival of Murad Bey, who was to leave Upper Egypt, skirt the desert, cross the oases, and throw himself into Abukir with two or three thousand Mamluks.
But the Othmanli Turks, greatly heartened by the conquest of Constantinople in 1453, had been steadily encroaching in Asia, and, after defeating the shah of Persia, their advance upon Syria and Egypt was only a matter of time. The victory was made easier by jealousies and treachery among the Mamluks.
Shujai had the Mamluks of the late sultan on his side; while Ketboga, who was a Mongol by birth, had with him all the Mongols and Kurds who had settled in the kingdom during Beybars' reign. A Mongol warned Ketboga against Shujai, who had made all necessary preparations to throw his rival into prison, and he immediately was attacked by Ketboga and defeated after several attempts.
On May 1st, the day fixed upon for the festivity, Mehemet Ali received his guests in great splendour and with a cordiality calculated to dispel any suspicions the Mamluks might have entertained. At the conclusion of the banquet, as they were returning home, they were fired upon in the narrow pass, where retreat and resistance were perfectly impossible.
Bonaparte, who had been making a rapid march to join Kléber, suddenly made his appearance on the field of battle. A tremendous fire, discharged instantaneously from the three points of this triangle, assailed the Mamluks who were in the midst, drove them in confusion upon one another, and made them flee in disorder in all directions.
Before obeying these injunctions, the viceroy deemed it wise, previous to engaging in a campaign so perilous, to ensure Egypt against the dangers with which, in the absence of the forces, she would be menaced. But Egypt had no more powerful enemies than the Mamluks, who, since 1808, had kept the country in a constant state of agitation.
He then incited a revolt against the Oulemas, besieged Kourshyd Pasha in the citadel, made himself master of Cairo in the space of a few days, and finished his work by expelling the Mamluks. The Albanians and Oulemas, completely carried away by his valour and manouvres, proclaimed him pasha immediately.
He ruled again after some time in the name of a young descendant of Kamil, so as to be able to fight against the Ayyubids in Syria, who, with En-Nasir at their head, had taken possession of Damascus, with an appearance of right. Aibek again assumed the title of sultan after the victory, but was soon after to be murdered by the Mamluks, who were unwilling to be subject to any control.
Towards the middle of the eighteenth century the authority of the Turkish pashas had become merely nominal, while that of the beys had increased to such an extent that the government of Egypt became a military oligarchy. The weakness of the Turks left the way open for the rise of any adventurer of ability and ambition who might aspire to lead the Mamluks to overthrow the sovereignty of the Porte.
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