Dictator Ousted

A small roly-poly porpoise sporting pompously in a pool would not be happier than was Egypt's plump, glistening little King Fuad in London last week. For four years His Majesty and his ministers on the Nile have been dictated to, nay openly bullied, by the British High Commissioner to Egypt, sleek, superior Baron George Ambrose Lloyd of Dolobran. Last week, in humiliating circumstances, the High Commissioner was forced to resign by his own Government, which at first withheld public explanation. In the House of Commons a teapot typhoon of invective rose.

"Are we to understand that a resignation has been extorted from Lord Lloyd?" boomed aggressive Winston Churchill, M. P., lately Conservative Chancellor of the Exchequer, now among the political "outs." For weeks it has been evident that "Winnie" Churchill hopes to crowd out placid Stanley Baldwin -as leader of the British Conservative party, is trying to do so by a display of his battling prowess in debate. Sweeping the momentarily silent Government Bench with an outraged glance, Mr. Churchill fairly growled his question a second time: "Has a resignation been extorted from Lord Lloyd?"

Answered at last His Majesty's new Foreign Secretary, Laborite Arthur Henderson, with a sly twinkle: "The telegram that I sent to Lord Lloyd was of such a character that I thought most people would have accepted it as an invitation to terminate the position."

As the crossfire of debate began, Mr. Henderson blandly maintained: 1) that Baron Lloyd had always been out of harmony with the Labor party's ideas of what constitutes fair treatment of Egypt; 2) that the High Commissioner had long insisted on a more domineering policy than was approved by even Sir Austen Chamberlain, lately Conservative Foreign Secretary. Upon receipt of the Henderson telegram, Baron Lloyd had hastened to London. Mr. Henderson said last week that after a "friendly talk" they had agreed that the resignation should be tendered and accepted. "All went well," concluded the Foreign Secretary with a wink which the House did not miss, "all went well until his Lordship had an interview with the former Chancellor of the Exchequer."

Reddening angrily Mr. Churchill barked, "You are not going to incriminate me!" then insinuatingly, "How did the Foreign Secretary know Lord Lloyd had met Mr. Churchill? Did I hear him say he had taken steps to find out?"

Henderson: I never made any such statement!

Churchill: Let him tell us how he knew --the Right Honorable gentleman has got himself into a difficulty.

Henderson: I am not in any difficulty.

Churchill: I demand to know on what the Foreign Secretary based his statement that Mr. Churchill had had an "interview" with Lord Lloyd?

Henderson (sweetly, provoking roars of laughter on all sides of the House): Lord Lloyd told me he had seen Mr. Churchill.

Aside from showing up brilliant "Winnie" Churchill as the demagog he often is, Mr. Henderson performed an international public service last week when he dismissed Baron Lloyd. It was he who last summer forced Egypt to accept the Cabinet of Mamud Pasha, who commanded only 28 seats in the Egyptian Chamber, whereas the "Opposition" led by Mustafa Nahas Pasha is a solid phalanx of 170 Deputies (TIME, July 30, 1928). A far less outrageous deed would be--if the U. S. were still a British dominion--for the British Ambassador at Washington to compel the installation of Alfred Emanuel Smith in place of Herbert Clark Hoover in the White House.

No one doubts that Baron Lloyd is sincere in thinking that Britain can only protect her rights in Egypt and on the Suez Canal with an iron hand. Toward Egypt he retains the war mentality of his old chief, Lord Kitchener, who in 1914 sent Lord Lloyd to Cairo to organize a military espionage service. Last week the British Labor Cabinet announced through Foreign Secretary Henderson that it proposes to regularize Anglo-Egyptian relations on a peaceful basis by treating with an Egyptian Government actually representative of the nation. It will take time for Egyptians, suddenly relieved of bullying, to evolve such a Government. Finally it may prove possible to draft a treaty making the position of the "Independent Kingdom of Egypt" less anomalous and ridiculous. At present, by treaty of 1922 Great Britain, enjoys four remarkable "rights": 1) Retention of the Sudan; 2) Maintenance of a British Army of Occupation to protect the Suez Canal; 3) British protection of Egypt against foreign aggression; 4) British protection of foreign interests and citizens in Egypt.

Naturally not even the British Labor Party will dare to unshackle "independent" Egypt completely from the Empire, but it should prove possible to replace relative injustice by relative justice.