TOPICS OF THE DAY.
MOROCCO. THE death of Muley Hassan, Sultan of Morocco, is important to Europe for two reasons. One is that the jealousies between England, France, and Spain as to the reversion of the Empire, may be suddenly accentuated until they result in war ; and the other is that the Moors, being excited and released from control, may attack the Christians, and so compel Europe at any risk to terminate the independence of Morocco. The first danger is not, we believe, very acute. The Spaniards, even if they have to wait for their indemnity, will hardly invade Morocco against the will of both France and England ; and Lord Kimberley and M. Hanotaux have, it is reported, agreed that they will act together in support of the Shereefian dynasty,—that is, they will postpone the -whole question of the reversion of the Empire, leaving it for the time to go on as a Mussulman State in a condition of anarchy, tempered by executions and sanguinary insur- rections of rebel tribes. Bad as the Government of Morocco is, that is doubtless for the moment a states- manlike decision. Europe is not prepared for the only sensible ultimate arrangement, which is to give Egypt to Britain and Morocco to France, Tangier and its immediate neighbourhood being neutralised as a free city, with a garrison furnished by some small Power ; and pending that agreement the best alternative, if it be only possible, is to support the native dynasty, which has no more moral right to continue than the dynasty of any other African State, but which can, for the time, preserve some sort of corrupt and oppressive order, and at all events can prevent its subjects from gratifying their instinctive hatred of Europeans. Civilisation has endured Morocco for many years, and can continue to en- dure it for a few more. It is quite possible however, that even England and France, acting together, may be unable to avert the catastrophe. In the confusion certain to follow a vacancy of the throne, the Kabyles may attack Melilla, and the Moors slaughter out the Europeans of angier, and in that event the cataclysm, so long dreaded, 11 have arrived. Europe will not endure that kind of insult any more, and the Powers most concerned would be co pelled by opinion either to fight for the great prize, or to rrive at some compromise which would terminate Moorish independence but leave England and France contented, and therefore agreed as to the situation. We -cannot but think that even in the event of the worst— and by the worst we mean an uprising against the Christians—the latter is the alternative which the two Governments would accept. Great Britain wants nothing in Morocco except security that Tangier shall not become a French fortress, and so block the Mediterranean ; while France wants the Empire itself, which would round off and complete her magnificent dependency on the southern coast of the Mediterranean. That dependency is of little real value to her, because she cannot colonise and will not liberate native industry ; but she is proud of it ; she is ready to fight for it ; and in a way of her own she governs it fairly well, certainly much better than any Moorish Pretender will ever do. Morocco, therefore, should pass in bulk to France, and Egypt to Great Britain. No doubt the French in their present temper will 'be most difficult to manage ; but there is always at the bottom of the French heart a liking for a good bargain, they know perfectly well that they cannot get Egypt with- out an exhausting war, which might be a most dangerous temptation to the Triple Alliance ; and they understand clearly how much easier Morocco would be to defend than the Nile Valley which Great Britain can attack—or can defend—from two sides at once. We believe, therefore, that if the emergency ever arises, the dispute which will follow it, will end in a transaction that, however dubious it may seem to conventional 'statesmanship, will be immensely for the benefit of mankind. The notion promulgated by the Pall Mall Gazette in a most unjustifiable article, that Lord Rosebery has assig,ned Morocco to France as the price of her acceptance of the recent Congo arrangements, is to us simply incredible. Lord Rosebery is a better bargainer than that, and Lord Kimberley less of a mere opportunist ; and we do not doubt that the consideration offered to M. Hanotaux is aid in maintaining for the present the status quo in Tangier. That the claim to the vacant throne of Morocco will produce a civil war is, of course, more than probable. The boy whom Muley Hassan selected as his successor is said to be supported by the Vizier and "the Army," a body of ten thousand men commanded by a Scotch officer, and that is in his favour ; but the Vizier is the best hated man in Morocco, the tribes have been fighting the Army for the last twenty years, and there is a claimant with a better title than Abdul Aziz. The deceased Sultan had, we suppose, some right of bequest, for he is acknowledged as Khalif within his own dominion ; but by Mussulman law, which even the Khalif cannot set aside, the proper heir is the eldest male of the reigning House, that is Muley Ismail, now, it is said, rising in rebellion. The report is probably true, for if he does not rise he will be put to death as too dangerous, owing to his right of birth, to the tranquillity of the State ; and prudence and ambition for once point in the same direction. Even if he does not rise, however, but flies to some secure retreat, the discontented will, and the tribes who have only submitted to force, and every discontented chief who can gather a following. The Scotch Kaid, or Commander-in-Chief, who is said to have accepted Abdul Azis, may in the end put them all down ; but they are sure to try their fortune, and Morocco for a year or two will be plunged into all the miseries of civil war. That sounds dreadful in English ears, but we do not know that it matters much. Very low organisations bear cutting very easily, and the difference between Morocco in civil war and Morocco in its usual order is almost imperceptible. Muley Hassan was an unusually successful Sultan, but there never was a year in which he was not sending or leading an expedition against some tribe and taking off as many heads as he could reach.
The oppression committed by rebels is not worse than the oppression of the Sultan's officers, and there is as little chance of justice from the one as from the other.
The rebels, if they enter a village, will plunder it, and the Sultan's soldiery, if they enter a village, will requisition all it contains, and the difference between the two processes is mainly one of form. Gradually one of the claimants will exhaust his rival, and then there will be again a Morocco- such as we have always known it,—that is, the very worst of all existing semi-civilised States. Europe can- not alter, or even affect, that state of affairs until she is ready to terminate the Shereefian dynasty in favour of some civilised. Power, and until that period arrives, her only business in Morocco is to keep her subjects fairly safe. She cannot do even that unless England and France can agree, for this new device of keeping ships at a distance, held in leash as it were, ready to spring, must have been suggested by some European accustomed to read newspapers, and transact business by telephone. A Moor inclined for a massacre will no more believe in a ship he cannot see, than a London rough in- clined for an assault will believe in a policeman whom he knows to be a mile away. If the Powers could restrain their jealousies enough to send two men-of-war apiece to Tangier, to lie there in harbour with their big guns visible to all men, Tangier would be as safe as Liverpool ; but as it is, it is not safe. We suppose, as a matter of fact, the Powers adopt this absurd device, because they are afraid their ships might fire at each other instead of at Moorish insurgents; and if that is true, it exactly indicates why and to what extent the quiet of Morocco is matter of European importance. There is nothing to be done while such tempers prevail in London, Paris, and Madrid, but to postpone the solution of the Morocco question ; and this it is supposed, or hoped, M. Hanotaux and Lord Kimberley have agreed to do.
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