The wave of conquest has five times at least swept over Tunis, but, with the exception of the Arabs, none of the conquering races have left any visible imprint on the present population of the country. The levelling influences of Islamism has well-nigh obliterated all differences of origin, and the natives of Tunis are very often described generically as Arabs. Of Arabs pur sang, strange to say, there are none, and the name can only with any show of correctness be applied to the nomadic tribes of the interior, which have all mixed more or less with the indigenous Berbers. The term Bedouin is also frequently indiscriminately used when speaking of the tribesmen of Northern Africa. This, too, is an error. The term Bedouin in its strict sense is applicable exclusively to the dwellers on the borders of the Great Desert.
The following classification of the inhabitants of Tunis may be conveniently adopted, viz.:—(1) Moors, (2) Arabs, (3) Berbers or Kabyles, (4) Turks, (5) Koulouglis, (6) Jews. The remaining race distinctions, always excepting the large European colony, have no practical importance.
The term Moors demands some explanation. It formerly served to denote generally an inhabitant of Mauritania. This use of the word has now entirely passed away. It then served to describe the Saracens, who left Africa to conquer Spain and parts of France and Italy, and who at last returned to the countries from which they came. The Spanish Moors form in Tunis an exclusive and aristocratic clan. The word Moor is also applied to the townspeople of the cities of North Africa, who are essentially members of a more or less mixed race.
The picture of the Tunisian Moors has been drawn over and over again. They constitute the most admirable type of the Moslem population. They are generally well made, of almost fair complexion, and possess regular and often noble features. Although they are no longer warlike themselves, they are deeply attached to the religious and political teachings of their creed, and have a considerable influence over their uneducated although more hardy compatriots of the interior. Nearly all the Spanish Moors in Tunis have adopted some kind of trade, and they invariably show a marked preference for those callings which allow a minimum of exertion and a maximum of indolence. They retail silks, perfumes, incense, jewellery, drugs, and bric-? -brac, and it is difficult to say whether foreigners are more impressed by their dignified languor or their suave politeness. A scent-seller in Souk-el-Attarín (Bazaar of Essences) at Tunis is a lineal descendant of the Abencerrages, while his next-door neighbour (a living portrait of our own Henry VIII. in his prime) represents the lordly race of the Almoravides. They possess pedigrees of wonderful length and correctness, and retain as heirlooms the rust-eaten keys of their long lost Andalusian homes. They look on trade as no disgrace, and spend their time in filling and sealing hermetically small phials of the otto of roses and jessamine, in gossiping with their neighbours, and in reading and discussing the orthodox Jowaib, the official organ of the Panislamite enthusiasts at Stamboul. They look on the Bey of Tunis rightly or wrongly as a traitor to the Sultan, anathematise the French invaders under their breath, and await with patience the time when a European complication will allow Abdul Hamíd to have his own again in the Tunisian Pachalik. The Moors have a quick sense of humour, and are able at an emergency to indulge in a keenly pointed repartee. The report of the procès Roustan-Rochefort translated into classical Arabic has afforded them unceasing amusement since the beginning of the year, but their excessive mirth over the adventures of the French Minister and his friends the Musallis led them into indiscretion. Their proceedings reached the ears of General Japy, who summoned one of the most venerable members of the ancient confraternity of Moorish scent-sellers to appear before him. “You are always talking against the French,” said the general, “and you must be punished.” The luckless Moslem in vain protested the contrary. The general informed him that he was sentenced to lose his tongue. The instruments essential to the operation were then produced upon a tray. Then and then only did the Moor forget his dignity. Forgetting his ancestors of Granada and Cordova, he embraced with feverish eagerness the feet of his judge. I need hardly say he was pardoned, and that General Japy was only indulging his sense of humour, and at the same time giving the offender a wholesome lesson in prudence. The incident, however, will become a tradition of the Souk-el-Attarín, and will not be forgotten when the good time does arrive.
The present Bey of Tunis has turned one of his picturesque old city palaces into a public school for the Moorish youth. It was at the Sadikya college I first perceived by experience the Moorish capability of witty repartee. It was just after our defeat by the Zulus, and General Sir A. Cunynghame, G.C.B., was going over the institution. He was requested to examine the boys of the first class. The first question he asked was an unfortunate one:—Could the students point out the provinces lost by Turkey during the late war? If a thunderbolt had fallen in the midst of the room, the sensation of horror produced could not have been greater. The head-boy, with wonderful sang froid, pointed out the states in question one after another, but he added, “Perhaps mon genéral will condescend to show us the province in which the English have been so often beaten ces jours çi.” General Cunynghame took the boy’s shrewd sarcasm in good part, and carried away with him a high idea of the intelligence of the rising generation of Tunisian Moors.
The inhabitants of the interior of Tunis are, with very rare exceptions, the descendants of the conquering Arab race, which quickly mixed with the Berbers of the country. The Tunisian Arab is naturally dark complexioned, and is generallybronzed by exposure to the sun. He is muscular and robust, and presents a striking contrast to his Moorish co-religionists. The Arab is always brave, and generally active and energetic. M. Roustan knew nothing of the Arabs, or he would not have observed jocularly to M. Saint-Hilaire that “four French soldiers and a corporal could take Tunis.” African Arabs are as a rule given to hospitality, and never refuse a meal to a stranger. Twelve months ago travellers could pass unmolested from douár to douár (encampment to encampment) over the whole face of the country from Khamír-land to the Tripolitan frontier. The Arab Sheikh looks upon diffa, or the feeding of wayfarers, as a crowning virtue. Any European could always count on obtaining food and lodging, but an Englishman invariably commanded a welcome. The very name of England was a talisman to the hearts of these simple-hearted herdsmen. They loved to ask about our Queen and our soldiers, to inspect our breechloaders and revolvers, and to talk of their brethren under British rule in the Blad-el-Hind. All this is past and gone now. We advised the Bey to acquiesce in the punishment of the Khamírs by the French, and assured both him and his subjects that if he “co-operated” with the invaders the expedition would go no further. He acted on our advice, but the French never found the Khamírs, and in six months overran the whole country from Tabarka to Jerba. From the day the French troops appeared before the Kasr-es-Said palace, Englishmen were reckoned with ordinary Roumis and Giaours. The Arabs are good horsemen, and make the best of their wretched flint-lock guns. If they had possessed better arms, the siege of Sfax and the march to Kairwán would have been a very different matter.
The inhabitants of the Tunisian Regency outside the walls of its towns are divided and subdivided into a large number of tribes and fractions of tribes. A list of these clans would only tire the reader, and the names of the most powerful of them will necessarily occur over and over again in the course of the narrative of the war. Each large tribe is ruled by its Caid, who has one or more subordinate Khalifas. The Khalifas in their turn are superior to the Sheikhs, who sometimes only control a small cluster of tents. All these officials are invested and appointed by the Bey, and they all pay an annual tribute in proportion to the extent of their different governments. The manipulation of these nominations has from time immemorial been a source of great abuses, but of late it has become almost intolerable. “A reform of the list of Caids” sounds pleasantly enough to the European ear. The dwellers in Tunisian tents know too well what it means and what it costs.
The Arabs are capable of real patriotic feeling, quite apart from religious enthusiasm. A year ago the very existence of a community of Arab sentiment was treated as a myth. Europe is almost convinced now that there is some kind of understanding rife amongst them from Tangiers to Cairo. They appear to have combined to make a last stand against extinction or extermination. It was to a very great extent the sending of letters written in blood by the surviving Sheikhs of the Chiaïa tribe to all the great clans in the Regency, immediately after the regrettable occurrences of the 30th March 1881, which provoked the general rising that very soon afterwards took place.
In considering the question of the capability of the Arab tribes to participate in a general and concentrated movement, an important element in the discussion is almost invariably omitted. I allude to the growing power of theKhouan, or semi-political semi-religious confraternities, which seem destined to cover the whole of North Africa with a web of Moslem freemasonry. At the head of the associations are the Senoussia, the avowed opponents of the French “mission of civilisation,” of whom I shall speak at length in a future chapter. This powerful brotherhood has sprung into existence during the last thirty years, but it now threatens to overshadow if not absorb the older but less militant corporations. Thirty-five years ago a remarkable report was addressed to the Duc d’Aumale upon this subject by M. De Neveu, chef du Service Géodésique de l’Algérie. Even then the author wrote that “it is absolutely necessary to ascertain the political object of those confraternities, which have undoubtedly produced a remarkable power of combination amongst individuals, have furnished the means for an almost incredible rapidity of communication, and seem destined to play an important part in the affairs of West and Central Algeria.”