In the Land of Mosques & Minarets. Mansfield Milburg Francisco

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СКАЧАТЬ before, the prince who was to reign henceforth received the proclamation of his powers at the Bardo, when he was invested with the Beylicale honours by the authorities of France and Tunisia.

      The funeral of the dead Bey was more pompous than any other of his predecessors. He died at his palace at La Marsa and lay in state for a time in his own particular “Holy City,” Kassar-Saïd, on the route to Bizerte, where were present all his immediate family. Prince Mohammed-en-Nacer, the Bey to be, was so overcome with a crisis of nerves that he fell swooning at the ceremony, with difficulty pulling himself together sufficiently to proceed.

      The progress of the cortége towards Tunis, the capital, was through the lined-up ranks of fifty thousand Mussulmans lying prostrate on the ground. Entrance to the city was by the Sidi-Abdallah Gate, and thence to the Kasba. The Mussulman population crowded the roof-tops and towers of the entire city. The military guard of the Zouaves, the Chasseurs d’Afrique, and the Beylicale cavalry formed a contrasting lively note to the solemnity of the religious proceedings, though nothing could drown the fervent wails and shouts of “La illah allah, Mohammed Rassone Allah! Sidi Ali-Bey!” the Arabic substitute for “The King is dead! Long live the King!”

      Before the Grande Mosquée the Unans-Muftis and the Bach-Muftis recited their special prayers, and all the dignitaries of the new court came to kiss the hand of the reigning prince, who, at the Gate of Dar-el-Bey, was saluted by the Résident Général of France.

      The Tomb of the Beys, the Tourbet et Bey, is the sepulchre of all the princes of the house, each being buried in a separate marble sarcophagus, but practically in a common grave.

      A fanatical expression which was not countenanced, but which frequently came to pass nevertheless, was the crawling beneath the litter on which reposed the remains of the defunct Bey by numerous Mussulman devotees. The necromancy of it all is to the effect that he who should pass beneath the body of a dead Mussulman ruler would attain pardon for any faults ever afterwards committed. Seemingly it occurred to the authorities that it was putting a premium on crime, and so it was suppressed, and rightly enough.

      The political status of the native of Tunisia to-day is similar to that of his brother of Algeria. It is incontestable that the Tunisian’s status under Beylicale rule was not wholly comfortable, for the indigènes were ruled in a manner little short of tyrannical; but the Arab lived always in expectation of bettering his position, in spite of being either a serf or a ground-down menial. To-day he has only the state of the ordinary French citizen to look forward to, and has no hope of becoming a tyrant himself. This is his chief grievance as seen by an outsider, though indeed when you discuss the matter with him he has a long line of complaints to enumerate.

      Things have greatly improved in Tunisia since the French came into control. Formerly the native, or the outlander, had no appeal from the Beylicale rule short of being hanged if he didn’t like his original sentence. To-day, with a mixed tribunal of Tunisian and French officials, he has a far easier time of it even though he be a delinquent. He gets his deserts, but no vituperative punishments.

      One thing the Tunisian Arab may not do under French rule. He may not leave the Régence, even though he objects to living there. The French forbid this. They keep the indigènes at home for their country’s good, instead of sending them away. It keeps a good balance of things anyway, and the law of the Koran as interpreted by the powers of Tunis is as good for the control of a subject people as that of the Code Napoleon.

      The Tunisians, the common people of Tunis, are protégés of France, and France is doing her best to protect them and lead them to prosperity, assisted of course by the good-will and influence of the ruling Bey, whom she keeps in luxury and quasi-power.

      Formerly when the native ruler did not care to be bothered with any particular class of subjects, whether they were Turks or Jews, he banished them, but the French officials consider this a superfluous prodigality, and keep all ranks at home and as contented as possible in their work of developing their country.

      The one thing that the French will not have is a wholesale immigration of the Arab population of either Algeria or Tunisia. To benefit by a change of air, the indigène of whatever rank must have a special permission from the government before he will be allowed to embark on board ship, or he will have to become a stowaway. Very many get this special permission, for one reason or another, but to many it is refused, and for good and sufficient reasons. To the merchant who would develop a commerce in the wheat of the plateau-lands, the barley of the Sahel, or the dates of the oasis, permission is granted readily enough; and to the young student who would study law or medicine at Aix, Montpellier or Paris; but not to the able-bodied cultivator of the fields. He is wanted at home to grow up with the country.

      Tunis la ville and Tunisia le pays are more mediæval and more Oriental than Algiers or Algeria. In Tunis, as in every Arab town, as in Constantinople or Cairo, you may yet walk the streets feeling all the oppression of that silence which “follows you still,” and of a patient, lack-lustre stare, still regarding you as “an unaccountable, uncomfortable work of God, that may have been sent for some good purpose – to be revealed hereafter.”

      The morality and the methods of the traders of the bazars and souks remain as Kinglake and Burton described them in their day, something not yet understood by the ordinary Occidental.

      This sort of thing is at its best at Tunis. Wine, olives, dates and phosphates are each contributing to the prosperity of Tunis to a remarkable degree, and the development of each industry is increasing as nowhere else, not even in Algeria. In 1900 the vineyards of Tunisia increased over two thousand hectares, and in all numbered nearly twelve thousand hectares, of which one-quarter at least were native owned.

      The wine crop in 1900 was 225,000 hectolitres, an increase of nearly thirty per cent, over the season before, and it is still increasing. The olive brings an enormous profit to its exploiters, and the Tunisian olive and Tunisian olive oil rank high in the markets of the world. Originally ancient Lybia was one of the first countries known to produce olive oil on a commercial scale. All varieties of olive are grown on Tunisian soil. The illustration herewith marks the species.

      The art of making olive oil goes back to the god Mercury. In the time of Moses and of Job the culture of the olive was greatly in repute. The exotics of the East and of Greece took the olive-leaf for a symbol, but the fighting, quarrelsome Romans would have none of it; the bay leaf and the palm of victory were all-sufficient for them.

      They soon came to know its value, however, when they overran North Africa, and they exploited the olive-groves as they did the plateau wheat belt. Cæsar even nourished his armies on such other local products as figs and dates and found them strength-giving and sinew-making. North Africa has ever been a garde-manger of nations.

      What Tunisia needs is capital, and everybody knows it. The date-palm and the olive give the greatest return of all the agricultural exploitations of the country, and after them the vine, and finally the orange-tree, the lemon-tree, the fig and the almond. Each and every one of these fruits requires a different condition of soil and climate. Fortunately all are here, and that is why Tunisia is going some day to be a gold mine for all who invest their capital in the exploitation of its soil.

      The date requires a warmth and dryness of atmosphere which is found nowhere so suitable as in the Djerid and the Nefzaoua in the south. Here the soil is of just the right sandy composition, and rain is comparatively unknown. For this reason the date here flourishes better than the olive, which accommodates itself readily to the Sahel and the mountains of the north. Of the vast production of dates in this region, by far the greater part is consumed at home, the exportation of a million francs’ worth per annum being but a small proportion of the whole.

      Almost every newly exploited tourist ground has an individual brand of pottery which collectors rave over, though it may be the ordinary variety of cooking utensils which СКАЧАТЬ