The foregoing brings the narrative down to the time of Abdel Kader's pressing demand for reinforcements. At this period the relief expedition had been all but annihilated. Obeid was held by 3,500 men and Bara by 2,000. Both garrisons were short of food and in a depressed condition. Many of the officers and men had deserted to the enemy. The Mahdi, with the bulk of his forces, had encamped round Bara, and Amr-el-Makashef was at the same time operating on the Nile. The latest reports from Darfur were six months old, and the Governor reported that the province was disaffected, and that he could not maintain order without the aid of additional troops. CHAPTER XXVII. ARRANGEMENTS FOR THE FUTURE. The attitude of the European Powers towards the English occupation of Egypt was, at the opening of the year 1883, one of acquiescence tempered by expediency. On the 3rd of January, 1883, Lord Granville issued a Circular Note to the Powers on the Egyptian question. In it he recalled the fact that events had compelled Her Majesty's Government to undertake the task of repressing the Egyptian rebellion, a task which England would have willingly shared with other Powers. His Lordship added that, although for the present a British force remained in Egypt for the preservation of public tranquillity, the British Government wished to withdraw its troops as soon as a system capable of protecting the authority of the Khedive should be organized. In the meantime, they considered it a duty to give the Khedive advice, with the object of securing that the order of things to be established should be of a satisfactory character and possess the elements of stability and progress. Lord Granville further declared that the danger which threatened the Suez Canal during Arabi's revolt, its occupation by British troops in the name of the Khedive, its employment as a base of operations against the rebels, as well as the attitude of the Canal Company at a critical moment in the campaign, constituted strong reasons for seeking an international settlement of this question in order to avoid similar dangers in the future. Her Majesty's Government thought that free navigation on the Canal, and its protection against damage and obstruction resulting from military operations, were questions of general interest. His Lordship, in consequence, proposed to the Powers to come to a common understanding to insure the freedom of passage through the Canal for every description of vessel, under all circumstances, with this reserve in the event of war, that the ships of war belonging to one of the belligerent nations which might be in the Canal while hostilities were proceeding could disembark neither troops nor warlike munitions.