The land of the Bey

by T. Wemyss Reid

It is not merely on the side of the French that curious intrigues are just now in full progress under one’s very eyes. The Bey, as I have said, is practically a prisoner in his palace at Goletta, utterly dejected and heartbroken, and so completely devoid of spirit that he has just conferred—need I say at whose bidding?—his highest decoration upon the French general commanding the troops in occupation of Tunis—an occupation which every Arab resents as an insult to his nationality and his creed. It is not surprising in these circumstances that rumours should be current regarding a probable change in the nominal rulership. Ali Bey, the next brother of the Bey, who is known as the Bey of the Camp, eagerly puts himself forward as the supplanter of the reigning Bey. Unfortunately for his chances he is very deaf, and, moreover, he is more than suspected of complicity in many of the intrigues of M. Roustan. His own troops are at this moment in a state of almost open mutiny against him, and more than once he has been denounced when riding through his own camp, as a traitor who had sold his country. The third brother, Taib Bey, lives a retired life at the Marsa, in a large and beautiful country-house, not far from the residence of the English Consul. He seems to be a man of considerable shrewdness and intelligence. Last of all on the list of Pretenders is Mustapha, whose friends openly declare that he is about to return to this country as Governor-General—a French Governor-General of course. I should imagine, however, that his chances are dependent upon the fortunes of his friend M. Roustan.

Tunis, October 30th.—There is something very amusing in the manner in which the capture of Kairwan has fallen flat upon the European community here. How the intelligence may have been received in Paris I am not of course aware. Perhaps the coup de théâtre of General Farre and M. Roustan may have been successful, and the Parisians may have applauded the occupation of the sacred city as though it were an achievement equal to another Solferino or Magenta. But here even the dullest of persons sees too much of what is passing behind the scenes to be deceived. It was known early last week that Kairwan was to be occupied exactly in time to allow of the news reaching Paris on Friday evening. The day before, I received a note from an officer with General Etienne’s force, dated Tuesday, and telling me that they were in sight of Kairwan, never having fired a shot during the march. I was therefore quite prepared for the receipt of the news of the occupation. On Friday morning, about ten o’clock, the transport Sarthe steamed into Goletta, bringing the expected tidings; and two hours afterwards everybody in Tunis was—laughing at it. The prodigious achievement, which was to crush the insurrection and strike terror into the hearts of the Arabs in North Africa, had resolved itself into a simple promenade across forty miles of sandy desert, and the holy city had been yielded up without a blow being struck in its defence. It was quite evident that the Arabs were too clever to fall into the trap which had been so ostentatiously laid for them by the French. A battle at Kairwan would, according to French ideas, have justified the destruction of the city; whilst it would at the same time have crippled the power of the Arabs. But the Arabs are as far from subjection as they ever were.

We have a fresh instance of mismanagement in this capture of Kairwan. The plan of campaign was that the two columns of Susa and Zaghouan should meet in front of the city on Tuesday last. Somehow or other, however, they “missed their connexions,” as the Yankees would say. General Etienne performed his part; General Saussier, the superior officer, failed in his. Although he encountered but trifling resistance, his straggling and ill-arranged column could not arrive at Kairwan on Wednesday night. The funny thing is, that there is much indignation among the leading officers here against General Etienne! It is said that it was his first duty to await the arrival of his superior, and that he has shown “indecent haste” in fulfilling his instructions and reaching and occupying Kairwan. General Etienne, however, is the only man who has shown himself up to his work during this campaign. The work has not been very heavy, but such as it is he has done it well. On reaching the city, Colonel de Moulin was sent forward to communicate with the Governor, one of the Bey’s servants, and a man of much intelligence. A white flag had previously been hoisted on the tower of the great Mosque of Okba. The Governor explained to Colonel de Moulin that he was the loyal subject of the Bey, and was prepared to receive the French army as the allies of his Highness. He only begged that the mosques might be held inviolate, and that the army would be content with passing through the town, and would not attempt to take up quarters in it. Colonel de Moulin asked the Governor to come with him to the spot where General Etienne was awaiting the result of the interview. This the Governor did. After some conversation the French general intimated that he must take possession of the Kasbah, or citadel within the walls, but that in all other respects he would comply with the Governor’s wishes. The French column was thereupon formed up, and each battalion being headed by its trumpeters marched into the sacred city to the sound of shrill martial music. The streets were crowded with Arabs, arrayed in their burnouses of many colours, and all watched with interest the passage of the troops. Anger and indignation were depicted upon every countenance. Very little else was to be seen that was worthy of notice by the unwelcome guests for whom the city had opened its gates.

The streets are narrow, tortuous, and ill-paved; the houses of the prevailing Moorish type; and the great mosques are not particularly conspicuous so far as their exteriors are concerned. Within they contain many noble columns and antiquities, and curios of enormous interest and value. But no one was allowed to violate these shrines, within which no Christian foot has yet penetrated. There was general disappointment on the part of all when, the march through having been finished, the troops were brought out of the city, at the opposite gate to that by which they had entered. The detachment occupying the Kasbah was a small one, General Etienne feeling justified, in the absence of all resistance, in making this concession to the wishes of the Governor. He had previously given the latter to understand that he would hold him personally responsible for the maintenance of order within the walls. The situation chosen for the camp is good. It is within easy distance of the city, and has been entrenched—not because there is any fear of attack from the people of Kairwan themselves, but because of the possibility of a sudden raid from the neighbouring hills, into which the insurgent Arabs have fled for refuge.

Such is the story of the occupation of Kairwan by General Etienne; and it will be seen at once how tame a story it is. But though there has been nothing brilliant in this mean achievement, and though the struggle with the Arabs has been hardly advanced a single step by the occupation of this city, it has a degree of importance. The excitement and resentment among the Arab population of the Regency has been greatly intensified by an outrage upon a shrine which they have long regarded as sacred. Here in Tunis, the Arabs openly declare that the insult thus put upon their faith must be avenged in blood; and outside the city walls the populace is seething with rage. The hope which apparently prevails is that the Sultan may come to their assistance even now, and that with the aid of his troops they may avenge themselves upon the invader. It is to put an end to this hope that the Bey has been induced, or compelled, to issue a proclamation to his people. This proclamation, which appears on all the walls in the Arab quarter, states that the Sultan has sent his troops to Tripoli merely to preserve order, and that they are now about to be withdrawn. Still, the very fact that it should have been thought necessary to issue such a notice, shows how strongly the French are impressed with a sense of the danger which threatens them on that side. Nor is their anxiety groundless. Advices from Tripoli show that the excitement among the Mussulman population there is intense, and is being fomented by the action of fanatical preachers, who are passing from place to place, stirring up popular hatred against the infidel. Many hundreds of Tripolitans, including a large number of Turkish soldiers, have crossed the frontier, and are joining the Tunisian Arabs in these mountain fastnesses, in which they are preparing for the guerilla operations they evidently contemplate. It is, therefore, in that direction that the Tunisian question will probably next appear in a serious form.

Malta, Nov. 5th.—The rains were beginning to set in over Tunis when I left the Regency, and with the commencement of the rainy season the best authorities were agreed in believing that the fighting would cease. The Arabs have spent several months, during which no work could be done upon the land, in assailing their hated enemy, and they have inflicted upon him not only severe losses, but the necessity of taking the most costly and extensive measures for maintaining his hold upon the country. Now that the time is come when the natives must either attend to their fields or allow the next harvest to be entirely lost, those who know them best feel convinced of the course they will take. They will leave the mountains and come down to the plains, not to fight, but to work. A few months hence, when the harvest has been secured, there will probably be another insurrectionary movement, which will break out sporadically in all manner of unexpected places, and cause fresh trouble and expense to the French. For the present, however, there will be something like peace, save where General Saussier pursues his favourite occupation of having some unfortunate Bedouin hanged, simply to encourage the others. The moment seems, therefore, a favourable one for attempting some review of the situation as a whole.

Whatever may be thought about the morality of the transactions which have placed the French in command of Tunis—and I have spoken already with quite sufficient plainness on that point—the English public must make up their minds to one thing—that is, that France will not quit her hold of the prize she has now got within her grasp. I have spoken to many Frenchmen of influence and position who have visited Tunis during the past month for the purpose of learning the truth about the Tunisian question. There is not one of them who does not admit that the series of transactions which have ended by placing the tricolor on the Kasbah of the capital and the walls of Kairwan reflect dishonour upon the national name; there is not one who is not prepared to insist upon the exposure and punishment of M. Roustan and his entourage. But I have not met a single Frenchman who has expressed his willingness to retire from the country now that he sees France in actual possession of it. “What! give up Tunis now, after all the lives and the money we have spent in getting hold of it! Give it up after the tremendous price in honour we have paid to secure it! Never!” This is the French view of the matter; and even the Englishman who has been educated by recent transactions in Afghanistan and South Africa, must admit that there is some force in the prevailing French sentiment upon the subject. But whether that sentiment be just or not, let us at least not shut our eyes to the plain fact which stares us in the face—the fact that, whether M. Roustan is retained or dismissed, whether his conduct is denounced or applauded, nobody believes that France will retire from Tunis. There she is, and there she will stay, if for no other reason than because she has now such extensive financial interests in the country, that the clique of capitalists and jobbers who secretly control her foreign policy cannot afford to let those interests be sacrificed. But what must be the probable consequences of her retaining the prize she has succeeded in seizing by an act of international brigandage?

So far as other powers are concerned, there can be no doubt that Italy is the heaviest sufferer for the moment. The interests of Italy in Tunis far surpass those of any other country. Italian has hitherto been the European language used there in all commercial transactions; Italian capital has been most largely invested in the native industries; and the vast majority of the Christian population have hitherto claimed the protection of the Italian Consul-General. The Italians themselves will not deny that they have for a long time entertained a desire to do that which France has now done. They were the keen and eager rivals of Frenchmen in all the various enterprises designed for the development of Tunis. But either they were less bold or were more scrupulous than their competitors. At all events they had no M. Roustan to take the lead on their behalf, and thus, when the moment for action arrived, they were left hopelessly behind. It is impossible to exaggerate the rage and bitterness which now fill them against the French. If the two nations were actually at this moment at war with each other, the feeling could not be more hostile. Nor need we be surprised at this. The loss of the Italians in actual money in consequence of this transfer of Tunis to France is a very heavy one. The French, it must be understood, are not doing things by halves. They are already boasting that they will soon drive the last Italian capitalist out of Tunis, that the Goletta Railway (the purchase of which by an Italian company was the incident which fired the train of subsequent events) will soon be in their hands, and that before long they will be financially and commercially supreme.

All this the Italians see for themselves, and they are overwhelmed with chagrin at the spectacle. But they feel also that their prestige, and even their military position, has received a most serious blow. With the French at Bizerta and Goletta they maintain that they are unexpectedly outflanked. Various schemes have been put forward in Italy in order to secure some compensation for the injury thus inflicted upon the country. I find that in the important coast towns the favourite idea of the Italian residents is that Tripoli should be seized, in order to counterbalance the French acquisition of Tunis. But at Tripoli itself that idea finds no favour, even among the Italians; and the reason for this it is not difficult to discover. Neither from a financial, a military, nor a political point of view is Italy strong enough to secure Tripoli. Those who are on the spot are well aware of this, and they are most anxious to counteract the Chauvinist ideas of their fellow-countrymen at a distance. Let me add, that France herself would be worsted in any attack upon Tripoli. She may have the money and the men, but she lacks the power necessary to enable her to defy, not merely the Tripolitan Arabs, but the forces of united Europe. For the Italians to thrust themselves into the wasp’s nest from which the insurrectionary movement in Tunis originated, would be an act of supreme folly. To say nothing of the course which England would be bound to take in such a case—to say nothing of any resistance which might be offered by the regular Turkish army—the Arabs of Tripoli are themselves formidable enough to make any attack upon them by a State like Italy, a most dangerous if not a hopeless undertaking. They are far more fanatical than their co-religionists in Tunis; they are rich and brave; and at this moment they are eager to throw themselves across the border in order to revive the insurrectionary movement in the Regency. The attempt of any Christian power to interfere with them on their own territory would be the signal for the outbreak of a “Holy War,” compared with which that which has been waged in Tunis would be utterly insignificant.

Let me state, in proof of what I say as to the spirit which animates these Tripolitan Arabs, that I have ascertained during my trip down the coast that a subscription is actually being raised in Tripoli among the wealthier Moors for the equipment of a local militia, which may be ready to take its part in that war of race and religion for which every Tripolitan longs so earnestly. Italy must therefore give up the idea of Tripoli as an utterly hopeless one. It is difficult to see in what other direction she can obtain the compensation she covets. Nothing, for example, can counterbalance the French occupation of Bizerta, that noble harbour which may justly be styled the pride of North Africa—a harbour which, if improved, at a comparatively small expenditure, may be made equal to the requirements of the greatest naval power in the world. It has been suggested that Italy, which now holds Pantellaria, might convert that island into a naval and military position of value. No doubt, looked at simply upon the map Pantellaria seems to be in an admirable strategical position. It appears to guard the Malta channel and to cover the Tunisian coast. But I have been to Pantellaria, and I find it destitute of anything in the shape of a harbour. It can never vie either with Goletta or Bizerta as a naval station; and to make it even a position of moderate strength would demand that which Italy cannot afford—the expenditure of an almost unlimited amount of money.