[2] Boghos Bey had promised to interest himself in the future of his young relative, and at his suggestion he was sent first to Vevey, and then to Toulouse, to be educated by the Jesuits, from whom he acquired an excellent command of the French language.

[3] Abbas Pasha, who succeeded Ibrahim in 1848, maintained Nubar in the same capacity, and sent him in 1850 to London as his representative to resist the pretensions of the Ottoman sultan, who was seeking to evade the conditions of the treaty under which Egypt was secured to the family of Muhammad Ali.

After a second time falling a victim to Said's caprice and being dismissed, he was again sent to Vienna, and returned as principal secretary to Said, a position he held till Said's death in January 1863.

He was already on friendly terms with him; he even claimed to have saved his life — at all events, it was a coincidence that the two had together refused to travel by the train an accident to which caused the death (on 14 May 1858) of the prince Ahmed, who would otherwise have succeeded Said.

The gratified Ismail created Nubar a pasha, and the sultan himself, persuaded to visit Cairo, confirmed the title so rarely accorded to a Christian.

In what he used to call an expensive moment of enthusiasm, he left these differences to the arbitration of the emperor Napoleon III and cost Egypt four million pounds sterling.

Nubar's bold design, for which alone he deserves the credit, was to induce these seventeen powers to consent to abandon their jurisdiction in civil actions, to substitute mixed International Courts and a uniform code binding on all.

Nubar made no attempt to get rid of the criminal jurisdiction exercised by the consular representatives of the foreign powers — such a proposal would have had, at that time, no chance of success.

It must be admitted, however, that the characters of Nubar and Lord Cromer were not formed to run in harness, and it was with no surprise that the public learnt in June 1888 that he had been relieved of office, though his dismissal was the direct act of the khedive Tawfiq, who did not on this occasion seek the advice of the British agent.