Difficulty was at first experienced in getting Cherif Pasha to undertake the formation of a Ministry. His idea was that it was inconsistent with a due regard for his own reputation for him to pose before the world as the accomplice of the mutinous soldiery, and at one time, after an interview with Arabi, Cherif positively declined. Meanwhile, meetings of the officers were held in which the most violent appeared to have the upper hand, and the belief that they had nothing to fear from Turkish intervention emboldened them to reject an ultimatum of Cherif, which was that, on condition of his undertaking the government, and guaranteeing the safety of the leaders, they should withdraw their regiments to certain posts assigned to them. Public opinion, more particularly amongst the Europeans, became much alarmed, and the Khedive declared himself ready to yield everything in order to save public security. On the 13th September, however, things took an unexpected turn for the better. Arabi, at the suggestion of Mahmoud Sami, who hoped to render Cherif impossible, and to get himself nominated in his place, summoned to Cairo the members of the Chamber of Notables. Cherif had acquired a good deal of popularity among the class to which the Notables belonged, and at their first meeting he found arguments to induce them to adopt a tone hostile to Arabi and his friends, whom they told to attend to the army, and mind their own business. The Notables went even further, and signed an address to Cherif entreating him to form a Ministry, and giving their personal guarantee that if he consented, the army should yield absolute submission to his orders. Arabi, it will be remembered, had all along professed to act on behalf of the Egyptian people, and the attitude of the Notables was a severe check to him, or rather to Mahmoud Sami, who was pulling the wires. This last individual, seeing that the Notables were playing into the hand of Cherif, at once declared himself the partisan of the latter and of the Chamber, and as a consequence Sami was reappointed Minister of War in the Cabinet which Cherif was eventually persuaded to form.