Khan 365concern at the time that that “some overstrung student, ignorant peasant
or bemused h.ashāsh [would] emulate the Indian assassin [Dhingra] at the
expense of some Egyptian official, conceivably himself.”^19 Thus, the British
editors of the Egyptian Gazette were perhaps closer to the truth than they
realized when they called the nationalists “Students of Dhingra.”^20
Organizing sedition in Europe
It was easy for impressionable young men to be caught up in national-
ist activities while in Europe, where societies of expatriate students were
springing up in every major city. Wardani had become involved through
an Egyptian student club, one of many that were directly affiliated with
the Watani Party. In fact, even before the Society of Brotherly Solidarity
was discovered and broken up in Cairo, the by-laws defining a quorum
had had to be reinterpreted to require that only half of the members
be currently present in Egypt, because so many of them were abroad.^21
Muhammad Farad’s memoirs are full of references to the various student
groups with which he worked all over Europe from the time he became
president of the Party in 1908. These students became even more impor-
tant after 1912, when all of Farid’s activities had to be carried out from
abroad due to his self-imposed exile from Egypt.
t is also in Europe that concrete alliances were being built between I
Egyptian nationalists and their counterparts from other colonies. Among
the most obvious of these is Muhammad Farid’s friendship with Madame
Bhikaji Cama, an Indian also based in Paris whom he mentions warmly
in his memoirs.^22 Both Farid and British Criminal Intelligence noted
that Cama’s home was a gathering place for activists from India, Egypt,
Ireland, and Africa as well as members of the early Socialist movement.^23
In addition to Farid, Cama’s many regular visitors included the French
socialist Jean Longuet,^24 the Indian activist Shyamaji Krishnavarma,^25 and
the MP of the Socialist Party in Britain, James Keir Hardie.^26 The lead-
ers of colonial and European radicals would meet students who gathered
in Cama’s home and elsewhere to discuss politics and policies, and the
education the young men received in these informal seminars was no less
crucial to their futures than their formal coursework. It was perhaps due