BEFORE THE STORM.
In July 1879, the Bey took a bold step in direct opposition to M.
Roustan’s views. In spite of the various difficulties he had to
encounter, he established a Council of State, and announced that from
henceforth he should submit all matters of importance for its
consideration. As nearly all the members of the council have taken a
more or less prominent part in the events which preceded the Kasr-es-
Said Treaty, I think it best to mention their names. Muhamed es Sadek’s
last Cabinet was composed as follows, viz.: President—Sy Mustapha Ben
Ismael. Ordinary members—Sy Muhamed Khaznadar, ex-Prime Minister;
General Sy Hussein, Minister of the Interior; General Sy Selim, Minister
of War; General Sy Ahmed Zerouck, Minister of Marine; Sy El Aziz, the
Bey’s Secretary; General Sy Muhamed Baccouch, Director of the Foreign
Office; Sy Mustapha Raduan, Secretary of the Financial Commission;
Sheikh Bokhris, Under-Secretary to the Bey; General Sy Mourabet,
Governor of Kairwán; General Sy Arbi Zerouck, President of the Municipal
Council; and Sheikh Muhamed Beïram, Administrator of the Oukf or
Charitable Trusts. The necessity of discussing all proposals made in the
council afforded the Bey an excellent excuse when either M. Roustan or
Signor Maccio urged him to take some imprudent step; but in August the
Prime Minister was induced to obtain a concession for a state _Monte de
Pieté_, which put into the hands of a French subject the virtual
monopoly of pawnbroking operations in the Regency. The Italian Consul-
General protested, and the scheme, although since confirmed, has never
yet been carried into effect.
In September Mr. Thomas Fellowes Reade arrived in Tunis, after thirty
years’ distinguished service in the consular department, to succeed Sir
Richard Wood as the British political agent. Born in the Abdellia Palace
at the Tunisian watering-place of the Marsa fifty years before, Mr.
Reade’s appointment was naturally popular with all classes of the Arabs,
and especially so with the Bey. His dream in life had always been to
return to Tunis, and there gain the same power and good name as his
father possessed before him; inheriting the political creed and strong
sympathies of Sir Thomas Reade, he hoped to maintain and increase the
English influence already fostered by Sir Richard Wood. Mr. Reade,
however, only came to see the end alike of Tunisian independence and
British prestige, but while keenly sharing the sorrow of the Tunisians
themselves, he has faithfully obeyed the orders of his superiors.
A few days later a Greek Consul came to Tunis for the first time, and
proposed to the Bey an exchange of orders. Muhamed es Sadek only wished
he could so easily satisfy M. Roustan and Signor Maccio. A Tunisian
general was at once sent in the company of M. Valensi, the Bey’s second
interpreter, with a case of Nichans to Athens. After the ceremony of
investiture, M. Valensi addressed the king in a speech beginning with
the following sentence:—“I am charged by my august Sovereign, the Bey of
Tunis, to inform your Majesty that since the arrival of the Greek
Consul, _almost all the assassins and brigands in his dominions have
entirely disappeared._” . . . The king, however, took the reflection on
his country thus accidentally conveyed in excellent part, and the
Tunisian mission is not yet forgotten in Greece.
Early in 1880 M. Géry arrived at Tunis to obtain a concession for a port
at the Goletta, but the Bey declined for the present entertaining the
proposal. Not to be outdone by M. Roustan, Signor Maccio asked for
permission to lay a telegraphic cable from Cape Bon to Sicily, but he
was now encroaching on one of the most valuable and serviceable of the
pretended French monopolies, and the Bey dared not grant his request.
Muhamed es Sadek was doubly wrong; in the first place, the French
monopoly is a myth, and secondly, it proved to be the exclusive
possession of the telegraph, which more than anything else facilitated
the aggression of April 1881.
The three telegraph concessions made by the Tunisian Government to
France are now before me. The first is dated the 24th of October 1859;
the second, the 19th of April 1861; the third merely provides for a
telegraph station at Bizerta, and contains the same provisions as the
preceding ones. The first concession consists of only ten articles. In
the first article the French are allowed to construct a line from Tunis
to the Algerian frontier, and it is provided that, on its completion,
the Tunisian Government may obtain possession of it, by reimbursing the
French Government for its outlay. Of so temporary a nature was this
first grant considered, that it is expressly stipulated, in the fourth
and fifth articles of the convention, that, as soon as the Tunisian
Government obtained the line, the buildings employed for the service
should revert to it, and the French officials should resume their
functions as French telegraphic _employés_. From the first word to the
last not even the faintest shadow of a monopoly is created by the
concession of 1859. We now come to the second convention of 1861. It
contains only eleven articles, and admits of only one interpretation.
Article I. runs as follows:—“Le Gouvernement Tunisien rachète les lignes
du télégraphe électrique créés en Tunisie par les soins du Gouvernement
Français depuis la Goulette, Tunis et Bardo jusqu’à la frontière
Algérienne moyennant une somme de 91,997 francs et centimes, montant des
dépenses faites pour leur installation. . . . Le Gouvernement Tunisien
_laisse toutefois provisoirement_ au Gouvernement Français, le soin
d’exploiter les dites lignes _jusqu’au moment où il jugera convenable
d’en charger lui-même_.” The following articles grant permission to
erect stations in other parts of the Regency of Tunis on precisely
similar conditions. Article IX. provides that “le Gouvernement Français
aura le droit de faire attacher en un point quelconque de la Régence un
ou plusieurs cables sous-marin, reliant les lignes de la Régence à un
point quelconque d’Europe ou d’Afrique. _Le Gouvernement Tunisien
conserve toutefois le droit d’accorder la même autorisation à tout autre
Gouvernement_.” If the Government of Tunis had ever contemplated the
creation of a monopoly in favour of France it would not have reserved
the right to acquire itself the lines at any moment. The grant is merely
permissive in its terms, and creates no exclusive privilege whatever,
nor can any such privilege be inferred from the most strained
construction of the contract.
Signor Maccio had every right to resent the decision of the Bey, but he
was unwise in losing his temper and indulging in a bitter quarrel with
the Prime Minister, the effect of which was only to improve the position
of his opponent.
The French had lost the harbour and the Italians the telegraph, and both
now turned towards some new field of contest. Nothing could suit this
purpose better than the little English railway between Tunis and the
sea. If the French secured it they would possess an outlet for their
extensive lines of the interior, and complete the circle of
communication between the sea-coasts of Tunis and Algeria; if it were
purchased by the Italians, the system of French railways in the country
would be like Muhammad’s coffin suspended between earth and heaven, and
Italy would hold in her hands the approach to the Tunisian capital. Both
parties were anxious to buy, and the English proprietors equally willing
to sell—_at a price_. The Commendatore Rubattino sent over Mr.
Santillana to England to commence negotiations. A preliminary agreement
was signed, and Mr. Hodges, the Secretary of the Tunisian Railways
Company (Limited), went to Rome to arrange the details. Meanwhile M.
Géry got wind of the march stolen on them by their competitors, invited
by telegraph another agent of the vendors to come over to Paris, and
then and there concluded a purchase of the railway for £105,000. A
telegram suddenly called Mr. Hodges back from Italy, and the Italian
party felt they had been in turn outwitted. Just as Mr. Hodges was
leaving Rome a paper was thrust into his hand. It was a formal
authorisation from the Minister of the Interior to deliver to Signor
Rubattino “copies of all telegrams sent or received by the Englishman
Hodges since his arrival at Rome.” It was stipulated in the contract
entered into with M. Géry that the transaction must receive the
approbation of the Chancery Division of the High Court of Justice. The
battle-field between France and Italy over the spoils of the Bey of
Tunis was consequently transferred for a time from the shores of Africa
to the sober precincts of Lincoln’s Inn. Both Signor Rubattino and M.
Géry soon plunged into the thick of the fray, and Italy found an
unexpected ally in the person of Sir Richard Malins. Mr. Santillana came
to England to do battle for the Italians, and he left no stone unturned
to requite the cruel treatment he had received from M. Roustan at the
time of the De Sancy _ultimatum_ a year before. The caustic sarcasms of
the judge attracted as much attention to the case at home as the
murdering of French, Italian, and Tunisian names by the English lawyers
excited amusement abroad. At last Vice-Chancellor Malins annulled the
contract with M. Géry, and it was ordered that the line be resold by
public auction for the manifest, and, as it turned out, substantial
benefit of the shareholders who had originally purchased it for £40,000.
This sale was fixed for the 6th July. The French and Italian Cabinets
exchanged messages on the subject, and at the suggestion of Italy it was
agreed to leave M. Géry and Signor Rubattino to fight the battle out
amongst themselves. As the fatal day approached, M. Roustan felt there
was something wrong, and took the bold step of forbidding the Bey in
writing to transfer the line to the Italians, “whatever may be the
result of the auction in London.” The excitement caused by this
manifesto had hardly subsided, when a telegram reached Tunis stating
that the English railway had been purchased by Signor Rubattino for
£165,000. It afterwards transpired that when M. Géry presented himself
before the person charged by the Court to effect the sale, he found
there as his competitor Baron Heath, the Italian Consul-General. He had
no time to communicate with the French Government, and when he reached
the limit fixed by the Company he represented, he was forced to yield to
his rival, who had at his back a very satisfactory guarantee from the
Government of Signor Cairoli. The French were sure never to forget or
forgive an advantage snatched by such means as this, yet the friends of
Signor Maccio were weak enough to celebrate this triumph of Punic faith
as a great national victory. From the 7th July 1880 diplomatic war to
the knife was declared between M. Ferry and Signor Cairoli and M.
Roustan and Signor Maccio. The object of the contest was predominance in
Tunis.
M. Roustan’s primary endeavour was to efface the consequences of the
recent defeat. The French railway for the residue of a term of ninety-
nine years could not go to Goletta, but what was to prevent its being
carried a couple of miles eastwards, to Rades, a village, which, like
the town of Goletta, is built on the shores of the Mediterranean? A
concession was demanded for a French line from Tunis to Rades. As a
proof of being in earnest, the Bey was only allowed twenty-four hours to
reply. The proposal was so contrary to the spirit of the original
concession to the English company, that the Bey summoned up courage to
reject it, and M. Roustan was obliged to withdraw his objection to the
transfer to Signor Rubattino, because it was found out that after all
the Bey’s consent was not a _sine quâ non_. The pressure now brought to
bear on the Bey by M. Roustan and his satellites was almost unbearable.
Before the end of August they obtained concessions for a harbour in the
Tunis lake (which was to cost an enormous sum, and presented no other
advantages than a probability of causing epidemic fever during its
construction, and a tolerable certainty of killing Goletta and the
Rubattino railway when completed), as well as for railways to Bizerta
and Susa. It is generally believed that M. Roustan also received a
formal promise that all concessions for public works in the Regency
should henceforth be first offered to French capitalists.[35] Affairs
remained in this unsatisfactory state till December, when we heard
rumours of troops being massed on the frontiers. M. Roustan reassured
the Bey with an official denial, but his words were apparently belied by
the appearance of a French squadron at Goletta.
At this very moment M. Léon Renaud, Deputy to the French parliament,
arrived in Tunis. It was at once rumoured that he was intrusted with a
special mission to the Bey, that he was an emissary of M. Gambetta, and
that he was come to bring matters to a crisis with the Italians. These
reports emanated chiefly from the Musallis and M. Roustan’s personal
friends, and when M. Renaud took up his abode at the French Residency,
the uninitiated made up their minds that Tunis was on the eve of great
events. M. Roustan at once presented M. Renaud to the Prime Minister,
and it soon became everybody’s secret that the cut-and-dried draft of a
concession had been presented to the Bey for signature. The Bey became
very much perturbed, and at once communicated with the representatives
of Italy and England. There was certainly some ground for this alarm, as
the projected Credit Foncier of M. Renaud combined in itself the
_imperium in imperio_ of the Italian Agricultural Company, and the
ambiguity of the De Sancy cessions. In a word, M. Renaud asked for an
exclusive permission to issue bank-notes to the value of all sums
advanced by him as loans in the country, and required the Government to
give a guarantee “in order that the bank should lose nothing by the
loans it contracted.” I have the draft _in extenso_ before me, but
everything is summed up in these words. M. Géry had already got a
promise of all the railways, and M. Renaud wanted a promise of every
financial operation present and to come. The Bey himself suggested the
means of escape. From the dusty archives of the Bardo were hunted up the
protests which M. De Botmiliau had induced all the _corps consulaire_ to
make against the far less innocuous English bank seven years before. On
the 23d May 1873, the French Chargé d’Affaires had declared that a
permission granted to Messrs. Ranking of London to issue bank-notes was
illegal, “comme exposant le pays à des sinistres consequences trop
faciles à prévoir,” and on the 23d of December 1880, the same
functionary asked the same Government not only to allow M. Renaud to
issue bank-notes to a practically unlimited amount, but to guarantee him
against all ultimate loss! When M. Renaud went next day to receive an
answer, the Bey put the protests into his hands and said he would act
according to the advice contained in them, and refused to sign the draft
M. Renaud had been good enough to prepare for him. The Bey asked his
secretary to return the original scheme to M. Renaud. “Keep it,
Highness,” answered the Deputy of Corbeil (I quote the _Gaulois_), “I
will leave you my project. Think over it, and although you refuse it
now, you will some day, after useless struggle, accept it. You will have
once more to acknowledge the preponderating influence of France, but you
will have lost all claims to her gratitude!” The parting interview with
Mustapha was even more stormy, but, to be just to M. Renaud, it is not
historically true that he threatened the minister with hanging as soon
as the French troops got into Tunis, if he did not induce the Bey to
sign the Credit Foncier Concession. M. Renaud’s attempt to centralise
Tunisian finance ignominiously failed, and he went away in a rage.[36]