AN ORIENTAL MONSTER.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 3015, 25 November 1882, Page 2

AN ORIENTAL MONSTER.

The special correspondent of the “London Telegraph ” states that when the British troops entered Cairo, they found many of the European residents had undergone grievous tortures at the hands of His Excellency Sulieman Zogheib Efifendi, a personage in authority. This was very odd. The smiling, amiable official who loved the English so was Major Zogheib—could he be guilty of such hideous cruelty ? This must be looked into, but meanwhile he must not escape ; so dignity, uniform, amiability, and all notwithstanding, he was promptly put in irons and deposited in a separate cell under the care of two sturdy Coldstreams. The following morning the matter was carefully sifted by Sir O. Wilson, and a pretty story came to light. I was fortunate enough to be present at the investigation. It was shown with crystal certainty that this big, burly, jolly, fat-fisted fellow is a Legree, who enjoys cruelty for its own sake as well as for perquisites accruing. It was proved that in one prison alone —a foul, small, square yard, open to the sky—two hundred and fifty sufferers were confined, more or leas maimed—some of whom had succeeded in evading the koorbash and hot iron by dint of specie payment. Major Zogheib had spared a few for bribes—had amassed, by diligent squeezing from the indigent, no less than a hundred pounds, but had visited the penniless with peculiar rigor, according to his private code. What had he to say to this? He smiled, looked up to Heaven, clasped his hot fat hands as well as fetters would permit, vowed that he never took a penny, that Arabs always turn on their superiors in moments of defeat, that he was an angel whose unsmirchedness would be made clear some day. Unfortunately for him, it, turned out that ho had already confessed to ihe grinding out of thirty pounds from a petty farmer with promises of restitution if the latter would connive at escape. All the wounds inflicted on the prisoners were of ancient date inflicted at headquarters before they were committed to bis fatherly care P He would rather

I die a thousand deaths than hurt a fly would the bind officer be good enough | to remove his irons ? He would never j regret, the courtesy so long as ho lived, A humbug, a.ruffian of this worst! kind, evidently an Oriental tribute to 1 the genius of Mr Wilkie Collins—for [ there fdood Count Fusco in the flesh, a ■ trifle brown, perhaps, and clad in Ottoman uniform, but Foseo none the less. Birr, tall, fat, unctuous, plausible, with sruilling, angelic face and heart of adamant—just the man to have cultivated lame white mice while planning unheard of crimes. And what a horrible catalogue of crimes came out, as Sir Charles Wilson painfully waded through the rnire of blood and suffering. Gaetano Ernfolli was a Maltese coachman, who must, of course, be a British spy. At sunrise and sunset he received daily sixty blows from a wire on his upturned feet, merely as an encouragement for the divulging of information which the victim did not possess. Another Maltese, who lost his way near Alexandria and fell into the enemy’s lines, had literally, pieces of flesh cut out of him with knotted cords. How was it done, I asked. “Two men sat on ray shoulders and two on my feet, and a sergeant of police stood one ■ on either side with knotted lashes, slashing alternately with regular rhythm.” Ali Mansool—Arab from Suez—had made good bis flight from that town at the time of the occupation '-by Admiral Hewett, but, rembering his wife returned, and so was caught. “Ah ! returning to the English, eh ?” He was a double-dyed traitor, and so was handed over to special punishment. On the back and feet this man actually received 1200 bastinado blows at one sitting, Only an Arab, whose tenacity of life is proverbial (as has been proved on recent battlefields), could have borne such suffering and lived. Another had received 550 blows, all on the back. He was arrested at Tanta and flogged, though there was naught against him, in hopes of a hint or two being gathered from his groans. Some men bore signs of thumb-screws, others a net-work of hot branding on their breasts. This precious fat major always made a point of attending every punishment ; exhorting the sufferers to pay up, and escape further torment; and when (hey made no reply he took the yellow shoe from his attendant, and belabored the victims across the face. We have been ridiculously and culpably lenient to many evildoers in this affair ; with fierce satisfaction I here record that the villainous Foscohas been removed from his solitary cell. Despite his cries he has been handcuffed and flung into the common ward among less magnificent offenders to await the result of a<court martial.