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Updated: June 12, 2025
Meanwhile the British government, under the influence of Lord Palmerston, then foreign secretary, endeavoured for various political reasons to place obstacles in the way of the enterprise, and so far succeeded in this unworthy attempt as to prevent the sultan from giving his assent to the concessions made by the viceroy of Egypt. Nothing, however, could daunt the intrepid promoter, M. de Lesseps.
He explored the north-east coast of Asia, examined the island of Saghalien, and passed through the strait between it and Japan, often called by his name. In Kamtschatka La Pérouse landed Monsieur Lesseps, who had accompanied the expedition as Russian interpreter, and sent home by him his journals and surveys.
Mehemet Ali, whose energies for improving the welfare of his Egyptian people were almost boundless, never yielded to the blandishment of engineers scheming to pierce the isthmus; he may have known of the prognostication of Necho's oracle. Greater than any royal actor in the Suez enterprise, however, was Ferdinand de Lesseps, the Frenchman whom history persists in calling an engineer.
The French, in undertaking to reconstruct the Suez canal, have had much to encounter from the unfriendly commercial policy of the English and their influence over the internal affairs of Egypt, but the unwearied energy and great talent of Monsr. de Lesseps and the patriotism of the French nation have at last succeeded in bringing their great work to a successful close.
"He will never receive the honor he deserves on our side of the Atlantic, I fear," added Captain Ringgold. "After rich and powerful potentates had rejected the scheme, Lesseps still cherished it. Over sixty years ago, when he was an employe in the office of the French consul at Tunis, he was sent to Alexandria on business. Here he was subjected to a residence of some time in quarantine.
The Soudan and the Equatorial Province were so frightfully mismanaged and cruelly governed that, Gordon says, "when Said Pasha, the Viceroy before Ismail, went up to the Soudan with Count F. Lesseps, he was so discouraged and horrified at the misery of the people that at Berber the Count saw him throw his guns into the river, declaring that he would be no party to such oppression.
Two men were promenading up and down the wharves, among the crowd of natives and strangers who were sojourning at this once straggling village now, thanks to the enterprise of M. Lesseps, a fast-growing town.
Who made our proverbs and ballads? Cold baths v. hot or Turkish. Home Rule. Should the Royal Academy be abolished? and who should be the next R.A.? Should there be an Academy of Literature? or a Channel Tunnel? Was De Lesseps to blame? Should we not patronise English watering-places? Should there be pianos in board schools? or theology? Authors and publishers; artists and authors.
Then they recalled him, and, in order not to be bound by anything that he might have said, they set about the rumour that he was mad. Indignant at such treatment, Lesseps left the diplomatic service, and turned his attention to engineering. This was the origin of the Suez Canal.
Lesseps watched him sleeping, fascinated by the beauty of his magnificent head as it lay in repose. He still looked very young, though there was hardly a state in Europe where he was not proscribed. When Lesseps had gazed his full, he called 'Mazzini, Mazzini! The Triumvir awoke, sat up and asked if he had come to assassinate him? Lesseps told him his name, and a long conversation followed.
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