The very slight success which Mehemet Ali had obtained when commanding the irregular forces during the expedition against the Wahabis decided him to put a long-cherished idea into execution, namely, to organise an army on European lines. Henceforth this became the sole occupation of the enterprising pasha and the exclusive goal of his perseverance. The Nizam-Jedyd was proclaimed in the month of July, 1815, and all the troops were ordered to model themselves after the pattern of the French army. This large undertaking, which in 1807 had cost Selim III. his life, proved almost as fatal to Mehemet Ali. A terrible insurrection broke out amongst the alien soldiers, who principally composed the army; the infuriated troops rose against the tyrant and the unbeliever, the palace was pillaged, and the pasha had scarcely time to seek the shelter of his citadel. His only means of saving his life and recovering his authority was solemnly to promise to abandon his plan. Mehemet Ali therefore deferred his military schemes and awaited the opportunity to test its success upon the natives, who would be far more easily managed than the excitable strangers, brought up as they were on the old traditions of the Okaz and the Mamluks. The war which still raged in Arabia gave him the means of ridding himself of the most indomitable men, whom he despatched to Hedjaz under the command of Ibrahim Pasha, his eldest son. Now came success to console Mehemet Ali for the failure of his reformatory plans. After a long series of disasters, Ibrahim succeeded, in the year 1818, in taking Abd Allah Ibn-Sonud, the chief of the Wahabis, prisoner. He sent him to the Great Pasha, a name often applied to Mehemet Ali in Egypt, at Cairo, bearing a portion of the jewels taken from the temple at Mecca. The unfortunate man was then taken to Constantinople, where his punishment bore testimony to the victory rather than the clemency of his conquerors. In reward for his services, the sultan sent Ibrahim a mantle of honour and named him Pasha of Egypt, which title conferred on him the highest rank among the viziers and pashas, and even placed him above his own father in the hierarchy of the dignitaries of the Turkish Empire. At the same time Mehemet Ali was raised to the dignity of khan, an attribute of the Ottomans, and the greatest distinction obtainable for a pasha, inasmuch as it was formerly exclusively reserved for the sovereigns of the Crimea. [Illustration: 157.jpg THE COTTON PLANT] After destroying Daryeh, the capital of Nedj, Mehemet Ali conceived the idea of extending his possessions in the interior of Africa, and of subduing the country of the negroes, where he hoped to find much treasure. He accordingly sent his son, Ishmail Pasha, with five thousand men, upon this expedition, which ended most disastrously with the murder of Ishmail and his guard by Melek Nemr, and the destruction of the remainder of his forces.