A good deal of small gambling goes on in the French camps, or rather just outside them; but this seems to be the army’s only considerable vice. Drunkenness and disorder seem to be exceedingly rare. I cannot imagine a more abstemious body of men. Of course conditions in the campaign in which the French are now engaged are all favourable to discipline; there is the stimulus of an active enemy, and yet the men are never overworked, except on occasional long marches, when they are inspired and encouraged to test their endurance.
The marching power of the French infantryman is extraordinary. Carrying two days’ rations and a portion of a ‘dog tent’ (which fits to a companion’s portion), he will ‘slog’ nearly fifty miles in a day and a night. I remember one tremendous march. The army left camp one morning at three o’clock, cavalry, artillery, a hospital staff, Tirailleurs and Légionnaires, about 3,000 men, and marched out fifteen miles to a m’halla, or Moorish camp, beyond Mediuna. For more than two hours they fought the Arabs, finally destroying the camp; and then returned, reaching Casablanca shortly before five o’clock in the afternoon. I did not accompany the army on this occasion, but went out to meet it coming back, curious to see how the men would appear. The Algerians showed distress the least, hardly a dozen of them taking the assistance of their comrades, and many, though covered with dust, so little affected by fatigue that they could jest with me about my fresh appearance. When their officers, about a mile out, gave orders to halt, then to form in fours to march into camp in order, they were equal to the part. But the Foreign Legion obeyed only the first command, that to halt, and it was a significant look they returned for the command of the youthful officer who passed down the line on a strong horse.
A still longer march was made by a larger force of this same army in January, after General d’Amade had taken command. Pushing into the interior from Casablanca to Settat, they covered forty-eight miles in twenty-five hours, marching almost entirely through rough country without roads, or at best by roads that were little more than camel tracks. Proceeding at three miles an hour, the infantry must have done sixteen hours’ actual walking. Moreover, on arriving at Settat the army immediately engaged the m’halla of Mulai Rachid. Good marching is a prized tradition with the French, and in this one thing, if in nothing else, the army of France excels.
It has been stated by men who have some knowledge of Moslems, that the French in Morocco are liable to start that long-threatened avalanche, the general rising of Pan-Islam. The first Mohammedans to join the Moors in the Holy War, it is said, will be the Algerians. But my own knowledge of Moslem countries leads me to argue otherwise. Since the French have been in Morocco, now more than six months, there have been less than a hundred desertions from the ranks of the Algerians; while a significant fact on the other side is the enlistment in the French ranks, in the manner of Goumiers, of Shawia tribesmen who have been defeated by them.
It has been from the Foreign Legion that desertions are frequent. Taking their leave overnight, the deserters, generally three or four together, make their way straight into the Arab country, usually to the north, with a view to reaching Rabat. In almost every case the deserters are Germans, and the Moors permit them to pass, for they understand that German Nasrani and French Nasrani hate each other as cordially as do Arab Moslems and Berber Moslems. Nevertheless, even though the deserters are Germans, it is asking too much of the Moor to spare them their packs as well as their lives. I have seen one man come into Rabat dressed only in a shirt, another, followed by many Arab boys, wearing a loin-cloth and a helmet.
The French consul at Rabat makes no effort to apprehend these men; but they are usually taken into custody by the German consul and sent back to their own country in German ships, to serve unexpired terms in the army they deserted in the first place.
CHAPTER VIII
TANGIER
To see Morocco from another side—for we had looked upon the country so far only from behind French guns—we started up the coast on a little ‘Scorpion’ steamer, billed to stop at Rabat. But this unfriendly city is not to be approached every day in the year, even by so small a craft as ours, with its captain from Gibraltar knowing all the Moorish ports. A heavy sea, threatening to roll on against the shores for many days, decided the skipper to postpone his stop and to push on north to Tangier; and we, though sleeping on the open deck, agreed to the change of destination, for we had seen all too little of ‘the Eye of Morocco.’
Tangier is a city outside, so to speak, of this mediæval country. It seems like a show place left for the tourist, always persistent though satisfied with a glimpse. Men from within the country come out to this fair to trade, and others, while following still their ancient dress and customs, are content to reside here; yet it is no longer, they will tell you, truly Morocco. There is no mella where the Jews must keep themselves; Spaniards and outcasts from other Mediterranean countries have come to stay here permanently and may quarter where they please, and there is a great hotel by the water, with little houses in front where Christians, men and women, go to take off their strange headgear and some of their clothes, then to rush into the waves. Truly Tangier is defiled. Franciscan monks clang noisy bells, drowning the voice of the muezzin on the Grand Mosque; the hated telegraph runs into the city from under the sea; an infidel—a Frenchman, of them all—sits the day long in the custom-house and takes one-half the money; and no true Moslem may say anything to all of this.
