Fountains In The Sand Rambles Among The Oases Of Tunisia

n residents at Gafsa. I noticed it very clearly yesterday evening in the little French café-a soul-withering resort, furnished with a few cast-iron tables and uncomfortable chairs that repose

ention of leaving

of Thersites, who is understood to have established, from the days of Abdelkader and "for certain reasons," his headquarters at Gafsa, where he sips absinthes past all c

they interest me. Have

are regular organized bands of assassins, the police being doubtless in their pay. Be sure to hold your revolver in readiness-better carry it in your jacket pocket, like this.

ays "read

home, at midnight on the previ

s. They gave him-what do you think?-two years' imprisonment! Why not the Legion d'Honneur while we are about it? Then there was the Italian-a respectable Italian, for a wonder-who went out for a walk and was never heard of again. The country was scoured for two months, but not so much

rywhere, that is, save in those districts which are still under military rule. There you should see the natives stand up and salute you! I am anti-military myself; but I maintain that this salute should be kept up, as demonstrating the gulf that exists between ourselves and them. But the moment y

mer, apparently. "These are the criticisms to which we are expos

Gafsa for the last thirty years, and what

k. If you can't make it pay, leave it alone. You have every facility for buying land, for importing thi

the very Arabs out of the country in course of time, by sheer number of progeny and animal vitality. Oh, yes; it's clear the Sicilians can lower their standard to any extent. But they can never raise it. They are the cancer of Tunisia. Wherever they go, they bring their filth, their mafia, roguery and corruption. Every Sicilian is a potential Arab, the difference between t

e country has been compared to a wine-bottle that bears some high-flown label indicative of fine stuff within-the French adminis

for the average Frenchman. The traveller will not find it easy to acquire the ne

of whom were Government servants. This great predominance of a foreign stock scared some good folks, and a "C

hile? No, thinks the Government; and with reason. French rule in Northern Africa is a politico-moral experiment on a large scale, with what might be called an idealistic background, su

termediaries between the Arab and the white man they are invaluable, their plasticity allowing them to ascend or descend in either direction, while their broad and active tolerance, fruit of bitter experience in the past, has honeycombed the land with freemasonry and

hed, they sit fast like limpets, to the dismay of competing French office-seekers. Eject them? You might as well propose to uproot Atlas or Ararat. Not only can they never be displaced, but from year to year, by every art, good or evil, they con

if they dared, and sell his skin for boot-leather. They can play at being plus arabes que les arabes, and then, if the game goes against them, they invoke their rights of French citizenship in the grand manner. The Frenc

ish subjects. But such being the case, you never know! It is dishearteni

to have gone, to the gallows; that the Maltese are not merely cantankerous and bigoted (Catholic) Arabs, but also sober, industrious, and economical. I have lived with all these races in their own countries and-

tance, can produce children, but is often unkind to them (Read the papers!); the Frenchman is kind to children, but often cannot produce them. It

hat the more objectionable idiosyncrasies of the Maltese, Corsicans and Sicilians become diluted on African soil. Can it be the mere change f

ho own the land. And that's what we call settling a country. The Americans knew better when they cleared out the redskins! And how do the English manage in India? Why, they shoo

ver heard of that method

di

is or London just now; we can say what we think. Or better still" (glowing with enthusiasm)

y friend," said the voi

iness was merely an adm

-complexioned man of about forty-five, rather carefully dressed, blue-eyed, w

is life, or a public servant, starving on four francs a day. Behold!" he went on, extracting a newspaper out of his pocket, "behold the latest portrait of yourself and your col

! But it may be lying somewhere about the house. I only return

long article dealing with the phosphate industry of Metlaoui, near Gafsa, with views of the works

DUFR

civil de

e other

this meeting, on the

d mentioned that I possessed

o-morrow for the Djerid? Yo

nge to delay my departure for a little while he would accompany me as far as Metlaoui, which lies on the Tozeur route, an

tion and discontent that seemed

s contact with an inferior race upsets their nervous equilibrium. The lack of comfort and the need of abrupt action makes them discard gentleness a

f the Mektoub or resignation doctrine:

ance as only fit for slaves. He does not hunt for his own sins; he hunts for yours, and hits you on the head when he finds them. There was something in the notion, he thought, for surely remorse was rather a provincial sensation; it implies that a man has really done something wrong, or that he thinks he has; in either case, what was there to boast of? He had little time

ct-as a nation. It is his highest racial virtue to lead the Cosmic Life-to take all he can get, and ask for more. That is why every one, in his heart of hearts, envies and admires him. His chief de

I asked, "to our so-cal

pparently hypocritical fashion out of consideration for what he conceives to be the opinions of the majority. Profoundly self-respecting, he is equally careful not to impinge upon the feelings of others, however wrong-headed he may think them. In such

ifying. And what o

late our aristocracies every ten years, will never attain that mellow stage. One may dislike it; one dislikes the by-products of many excellent institutions. Your Government, for example, does extraordinarily little to foster art or literature or re

add

its true proportions at a point where other lands cease to be visible. Austria, for instance, can only be examined on the spot. Once you have crossed the insignificant Mediterranean, this immense and

ial State interference" in its management; the board of directors takes all it can get, and asks for more. It is a paying concern, a