"In 1863 the magnificently extravagant Ismail Pasha came to the throne
of Mehemet Ali. He burned with ambition to make himself the greatest
ruler in the world, and the canal was a darling of his heart. He was
the ready and willing victim of the loan sharks of Europe, and he would
sign anything in the way of an obligation if there was a little yellow
gold in sight.
"Meanwhile the canal was progressing slowly. Ismail ordered the
Egyptian peasants to do the work under the ancient _corvée_ system.
Every three months 25,000 drafted fellaheen went to the big ditch to
dig. Every three months a miserable remnant of the preceding 25,000
left the dead bodies of their comrades beneath the dump heaps.
"The Suez Canal was dug for the most part by those poor creatures who
scooped up the sand and dirt with their bare hands and carried it up
the steep banks to the dumps in palm-leaf baskets of their own making.
Task masters with cruel whips of hippopotamus hide punished the sick
and the fainting, as well as the lazy. There were no sanitary
precautions, and the men died by the thousands.
"This horrible condition of affairs aroused the indignation of John
Bull, who protested to the sultan. The sultan ordered the employment
of fellaheen labor to be stopped. Then De Lesseps and the canal ring
descended upon Ismail and held him responsible for damages. The case
was left to the arbitration of Napoleon III., who decided for the canal
ring, and Ismail was forced to pay a fine of nearly $10,000,000 because
his titular sovereign lord had ordered that Ismail's subjects should
not be murdered in the canal ditch. Each month a new obligation was
fastened upon suffering Egypt. Finally, when the canal was completed,
Ismail gave a great fête to celebrate its opening. Few festivals have
been so magnificent, none so extravagant. The celebration cost
$21,000,000. Verdi wrote the opera _Aida_ to order that Ismail might
give a box party one evening, and an opera house was built especially
for that purpose."