Mr. Perdicaris and Mr. Varley, the American and the Englishman
captured at Tangier by the brigand chief Raisuli, were, we are glad to record, released on June 24th, and have returned to the city. They have not, they say, been ill-treated, but their health has suffered, and they will proceed at once to Europe to recuperate. Raisuli, who has received £14,000 and sovereign rights over five hundred square miles, fears the future vengeance of the Sultan, and threatens that if the promises made to him are not kept he will make a raid on the Europeans in Tangier, demand a European guarantee for all the pledges given him, and if it is refused, put his prisoners at once to death. It seems certain that his success so far will greatly increase the uncertainty of European life in Morocco, and discussion as to the beef means of protecting the colony in Tangier is incessant. The usual demand is that the French should occupy the port, but the French fear complications ; and from some cause or other the reasonable project of supplying the Sultan with a Mussulman gendarmerie trained in Algiers appears to hang fire. The people themselves are inclined to depose their weak Sultan, and trust to the energy of a stronger ruler for the restoration of order; but that project, which is seriously entertained, is hampered by the difficulty of finding the right man among the descendants of Mohammed, and by the jealousies of the armed clans.
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